Hello friends, and welcome to the next “Leader” Guide though this one is in the guise of the Buu Guide we did a while back, where we’ll talk about the actual archetype moreso than the Leader though each Namekian Leader will get their shine.

Namekians

Playstyle:

Filling up the board in a go wide strategy, though unlike most in DBS that do so with making cheaper Battle Cards or approaching an endgame with a certain formation/boss card, Namekians instead build up incremental value over the course of the game. Many of their Battle Cards replace themselves in some capacity or draw cards.

Unique Mechanic:

Bond. While it’s not 100% unique to Namekians (as Slug’s Army and Ult U7 Goku use it), it is the mechanic that the entire archetype revolves around. It demands you keep a certain amount of Battle Cards on board at any time to activate your abilities, which usually involve drawing more cards or taking cards away from the opponent.

Strengths:

Can keep a solid hand size due to the sheer amount of cards that cantrip at the very least, or provide card advantage over time. It allows it a very consistent curve and flow over the course of the game. Also quite a few cards have Barrier making them annoying for the opponent to get rid of.

Weaknesses:

As with any Go Wide strategy, losing the board can be devastating. Especially for Namekians who cannot refill it all that well. While they do have Barrier, cards like Jiren, Fist of Justice would provide an outright nightmare. Also can struggle against Aggro Strategies, even with the advent of Sacrifice, because it shortens the clock before a board is set.

Now that we have a baseline for what Namekians are about, let’s go over each Leader, what they can provide to the archetype and a corresponding List for each of them.

Piccolo Jr./Piccolo Jr., Evil Reborn

Unique Cards:

None

Strengths:

+ Untap 2 Awaken is very useful for both Go Wide strategies, and just in general during a very Aggro heavy format.

+ Consistent, cheap removal on what is essentially a free body is absolutely great, especially in a deck that would like to take up its turns playing more bodies.

Weaknesses:

– Provides no payoff to actually using Namekians (honestly a better generic Green Leader than Namekian Leader)

Overview:

Piccolo Jr. is the Starter Deck Namekian Leader and it’s hard to go wrong with him. He’s all around solid and independently good. The hardest thing when it came to making a list, was trying to make a Namekian list specifically to take advantage of the strengths that Jr. provides. Ultimately I feel I’ve come up with a solid list, though do note that there only so many cards of difference between the three lists because of how many Namekians need to be run. Anyway, let’s get to it.

Deck List:

Piccolo Jr.

4 Kindhearted Namekian Dende

4 Newfound Power Gohan

3 Gift of Power Guru

4 Nail, the Namekian Ace

4 Piccolo Jr., Driven to Fight

4 Namekian Duo Pirina

4 Namekian Duo Saonel

4 Caway, the Ki Master

3 Combo Killer Anilaza

3 Kami’s Power Piccolo

2 Time’s Choice, Supreme Kai of Time

4 Full Power Energy

4 Sacrifice

3 Planet Namek

Deck Overview:

My goal here was to make pretty much every play as cheap as possible. I even briefly considered not putting any 4 drops in here, but looking at the Namekian suite at cost 3 (spoiler…it’s not very good)…I abandoned that idea. Make a bunch of cheap plays, augmented with a free kill anytime you need it Post-Awaken.

Discussion Points:

8 Negates?

Yeah, it’s that kind of format right now. Very Aggro heavy. Now contrary to a lot of opinion, I’m perfectly okay with that. Unless you’re a very small amount of Leaders in the game right now, you usually can at least tech some things to stem the tide of Aggro. Luckily Namekians carry a few that make them decently suited for the format. Full Power Energy is one of the best Aggro stoppers in the entire game right now. The sheer POSSIBILITY that you have it in hand will have opponents willingly forego potential attacks to guarantee Flute or Swap shenanigans, which goes in your favor. If they don’t, they risk a blowout. Sacrifice is also a great tool for dealing with Double Strike and Critical attacks when tapped out. For a deck that wants to tap out on average, it’s beautiful to have. But yeah, these 8 Negates will be showing up in every list, and for good reason right now. If your personal meta has less aggro, feel free to cut back on FPE.

Caway?

Basically to put more cheap threats on board. Luckly quite a few Bond cards for Namekians don’t need other Namekians, so Caway works just fine as the extra body on the back end. Plus the deck likes to poke, bodyguards are great at poking.

Tips:

Don’t be afraid to just let the KO rip every turn with your Awakened side, even if on cheap Battle Cards.

Simply put, at worst, against a cantrip the one Green Energy investment represents a 10K power swing. Feel free to use it and abuse it when you can.

Also don’t be afraid to combo away Battle Cards on board if need be.

A big mistake for a lot of first time players of Namekians is valuing bodies on board far more than necessary. This isn’t Universe 11, you don’t need 5 bodies on board to set up a Final Turn. Just having one is fine but if you need to combo it off, do so. Don’t get TOO greedy protecting a lowly Dende to try and set off Bond next turn. There’s enough independently good cards in this deck to make due.

Piccolo/Piccolo, Kami’s Successor

Unique Cards:

Special Beam Cannon

Strengths:

+ Same Untap 2 utility as Piccolo Jr. that’s extremely relevant this format.

+ Decent pay off for building Namekians around him.

+ Special Beam Cannon is a potentially very strong card.

Weaknesses:

– Extremely reliant on having relevant Battle Cards on board to get any value out of his Auto ability.

– Forced to be somewhat conservative with protecting even smaller Battle Cards if he wants to maintain Critical.

Overview:

U7 Piccolo adds a few different wrinkles to the package. He provides indirect support by pumping a Namekian on his swing, which makes cards like Piccolo Jr. threaten Awakened Leaders. He also has some payoff with his Critical continuous allowing him to pressure a Leader much more freely and get good use out of his ability. The goal here is to guarantee consistently boarding Namekians so your Bond stays completed.

Deck List:

U7 Piccolo

4 Kindhearted Namekian Dende

4 Newfound Power Gohan

4 Gift of Power Guru

4 Nail, the Namekian Ace

4 Piccolo Jr., Driven to Fight

4 Namekian Duo Pirina

4 Namekian Duo Saonel

2 Kami, the Watcher

3 Combo Killer Anilaza

4 Kami’s Power Piccolo

2 Time’s Choice, Supreme Kai of Time

4 Full Power Energy

4 Sacrifice

3 Special Beam Cannon

Deck Overview:

Really not a ton of differences from the previous variant, but now there’s less of a structure of “cheapness” as we don’t need to hold over Energy for Piccolo’s skill. The main thing was just putting in a few more Namekians and of course Special Beam Cannon.

Discussion Points:

Kami the Watcher?

Yeah I’m not a fan of the card myself, but I wasn’t really fond of the other Namekian choices and Kami can essentially be a 1 Drop. A 2-of works here as an augment when things are going.

No Planet Namek?

It was more useful in Piccolo Jr as the goal of the deck was to use nearly everything as cheap as humanly possible. Here, we can’t afford to take a turn off to set up Planet Namek. Also I feel guaranteed board quality is a lot more important here compared to Piccolo Jr who only cared about simply value all the way through.

Lord Slug/Lord Slug, Gigantified

Unique Cards:

Slug’s Army

Strengths:

+ Potent Self-Awaken and pressure on his front side (he’s essentially Vegeta, what’d you expect?)

+ Makes use of the excess card advantage in Namekians on his flip side with his discard ability. Also can make use of certain Reanimator synergies.

Weaknesses:

– His Self-Awaken can slightly conflict with Sacrifice (though obviously you can just choose not to use his Front Side ability, though it leaves you at a loss in card advantage).

– Without synergy, his Awakened ability can be a detriment if coming from behind in card advantage.

Overview:

Lord Slug rounds out the Namekian Leader Trio of the set. He’s probably the most generically solid of the three (it’s between him and Jr. but it’s hard to argue with Slug being useful against all decks). Self-Awaken, Critical Pressure, Hand Control. While it doesn’t seem like he really supports Namekians outside of being generically good at first glance, the reality is that he leaves open new opportunities that the deck wouldn’t otherwise have. Including one that I’m VERY excited to finally play with no guilt.

Deck List:

Lord Slug

4 Kindhearted Namekian Dende

4 Newfound Power Gohan

4 Nail, the Namekian Ace

4 Piccolo Jr., Driven to Fight

4 Namekian Duo Pirina

4 Namekian Duo Saonel

3 Ready to Strike Piccolo

3 Combo Killer Anilaza

4 Kami’s Power Piccolo

4 Reign of Terror King Piccolo

4 Full Power Energy

4 Sacrifice

4 To Save a Hopeful Future

Deck Overview:

That’s right, we’re gonna make a pseudo-Reanimator strategy here to line up with Slug’s Awakened ability. What we end up having is an EXTREMELY potent poke deck that is very energy efficient and able to reuse a bunch of synergies. Let’s just get down to it.

Discussion Points:

To Save a Hopeful Future/Reign of Terror King Piccolo

Now for those who haven’t been following No Negate for that long may not know but, To Save a Hopeful Future is one of my favorite cards in the entire game. I love Reanimator strategies to absolute death. Reusing cards, making a toolbox, cheating cards out, it touches all of my fun points. That’s why I’ve been notably sullen over the fact that To Save a Hopeful Future just wasn’t all that great in this game due to not getting enough value, not being all that consistent, being very restricted and of course, getting completely overshadowed by the Over Realm mechanic. But undaunted, every set I go back to the drawing board to try and find a new path to make it work and ladies and gentlemen, today I have found a path! …well okay, technically it was weeks ago, but today I’m writing about it! Lord Slug and Reign of Terror King Piccolo is the perfect combination to make To Save a Hopeful Future really shine. Lord Slug lets you strategically dump any card that you want. King Piccolo is probably one of the best targets for it there is. It’s a 5 Drop, so you get your cheat value that way. He pokes very well, he puts another card on board while untapping an Energy making it very safe. But best, he does it while sacrificing himself! That means he puts himself right back in the Discard for more reanimation abuse. The amount of value you get from the play is just fantastic, especially if the Piccolo you board is Kami’s Power, Piccolo.

Even when King Piccolo isn’t the best value, you can still get something like Anilaza or KP Piccolo back as well, again showing the power of being a potential toolbox for whatever big drop you actually want that turn. I love the card to death, and it makes me truly want to use this deck.

Ready to Strike Piccolo?

Mainly here just to up the Piccolo count for King Piccolo. Does provide decent value though as a Blocker and surprisingly draws Flute as a removal a lot. There are also those couple of matchups where the opponent is forced to out him or suffer a huge loss in card advantage, which Slug enjoys as well.

No Slug’s Army?

I’m not all that jazzed about Slug’s Army as a package. At the very least though, I don’t think it meshes all that well with Namekians which is what this article is about. It would need its own sort of build.

Tips:

Don’t be afraid to go slow with this variant.

This variant isn’t as strict on getting a wide board compared to the other two. If faced with a very aggressive matchup, TAKE IT EASY. Don’t try to tap out and be a hero just to manage some card draw. The longer the game goes, the more it’s in your favor no matter the matchup in most cases.

You only realistically need one King Piccolo in the drop.

It’s the upside to using King Piccolo in the first place, as he puts himself back in the Drop Area for use later. Thus don’t just dump every single one of them unless you’re feeling strained in your hand on combo power. If you need to charge one, that’s fine. Hell, play it from hand, you still aren’t tapping out. If you want, you can even change out the 4th King Piccolo for a 4th Anilaza instead, but I feel that you REALLY want to make sure you see him by the requisite turn.

Final Thoughts and Overview:

Ultimately I had a lot of fun with Namekians. They’re straightforward but leave enough wiggle room to put your own type of personality into the deck. My personal favorite variant, if you couldn’t tell, is Slug. However I’ll probably say that Piccolo Jr is probably better for the current format simply because he provides the most ways to NOT DIE. Still, I’m gonna run with Slug but the beauty of Namekians is I don’t think any Leader choice is outright wrong for them.

Next Time, we’re gonna travel to Genosha and help revive the (Machine) Mutant race.