Dustin’s DBZ Theory Craftin – Gohan Goes BOOM!

Howdy all,

After doing a Saiyan set review last week it really got my creative juices flowing. Before I get into the deck lets talk about combo. In Magic the Gathering and TCG’s in general combo describes a specific type of deck. This type of deck is often looking to setup a certain board state (maybe draw certain cards or cast certain spells) that leads to an unfair and usually game winning turn. One of the most powerful combo deck in the history of Magic is storm. Storm cards copy themselves for each other spell played in a turn, combo-ing with cheap/ free spells for a huge one turn victory out of nowhere.

Not only do I think that there may be a powerful combo deck in DBZ, I think that a storm may be lurking in DBZ. This deck tries to setup a big turn were it plays as many cards as it can in one turn and hopefully kills your opponent in the process. I present this with a word of caution. This is theory crafting and I have no idea how good this deck is without some real testing. It might be terrible or it might be fantastic but more likely it falls some where in between.

The Little Engine that Could:

 

Ok lets get start. Any good combo deck has to have an engine. These are the cards that make the deck work. These cards often look terrible on the surface but when added into the right mix you got dynamite.:

Each card works to make your attacks hit just a little bit harder. By themselves the bonus is small and insignificant but when enough combine together each attack will hit for huge chunks of life. Your plan is to assemble 2 or more of these cards in a single turn and than follow up with a huge barrage of attacks to try to take advantage of the damage bonus. Gohan (lvl 1 or 2) the dragon ball and Saiyan Offensive Rush can stay on the table and not take up a card in you hand. This is important as you want to maximize the number of attacks you can play in the turn you decide to “go off”.

Putting the Pieces Together:

The next key part of a combo deck is card draw/ card manipulations. You want to be able to draw the engine cards early and draw the gas (the cards that combine with the engine) later. Although Saiyan has a limited number of card draw effects will wok with what we have now:

The point of these cards is to dig into what you need. Saiyan enraged is especially good allowing you to have additional cards in the turn you decide to go off. As I said you have limited options here but luckily there is one more card that can help fuel you engine:

U108 Battle Pausing

By most accounts battle pausing is a bad card. Although it looks like cards advantage is often is just a 2 for 2 plus pumping your opponent up to punch you in the face. In this deck it can do much more. On the turn you decide to go off this card can return a couple of key cards to greatly turn the tides in your favor. The main targets for this spell Saiyan Energy Toss, Saiyan Elbow Drop, and Saiyan Multi-Blast. If nothing else you can trade it those extra engine pieces when you don’t need them for any 2 random attacks.

The Gas:

Attack, attack, attack and attack. Your deck wants a ton of attacks. In fact you want so many attacks that when you decide to go off you hope you have 4 attacks in hand and even a couple more on top of your deck to draw into. This means that we are going to have to build this deck much differently than your standard 10ish setups, 15-20 blocks and 30 ish attacks. Due to the limited card pool this will lead to using a lot of filler attack cards to fill up the deck but there are a couple I would like to highlight.

Saiyan Elbow Drop

This is one of the best cards in the deck (and in Saiyan in general). With only Gohan and a single Saiyan Offensive Rush this card will deal 5 life cards and +3 at stages twice. That’s around 20% of there deck in a single attacks. Combined with a few more engine pieces this card can easily shred your opponent apart all by itself.

Saiyan Multi-Blast

Free attacks are extremely powerful especially when getting a huge boost in damage. The main danger here is that this card draws on hit. Overall its a high risk, high reward card that can be huge if unblocked. Play it late and hope to avoid blocks.

Saiyan Energy Focus,Saiyan Domination, Saiyan Surprise and Saiyan Pinpoint Blast

These are you leading attacks. Depending on the situation these cards can shut down the various on board/ event based blocks that you opponent is holding onto. You are trying to maximize your damage in one turn and these cards help with limiting you opponents options to stop you big turn. Enough talk already lets put it all together:

Gohan Goes BOOM!!

Personality

Gohan Resilient Child

Gohan Young Warrior

Gohan Determined

Gohan Armored

Non-Combat-13

Namek Dragon Ball 1 x 1

Saiyan Enraged x 3

Saiyan Offensive Rush x 3

Visiting The Past x 2

Saiyan Preparation x 2

Battle Pausing x 2

Blocks-4

Saiyan Focus x 2

Saiyan Lightning Dodge x2

Attacks-43

Gohan’s Masenko x 2

Saiyan Acute Rapid Slam x 3

Saiyan Cheap Shot x 3

Saiyan Direct Strike x 3

Saiyan Domination x 3

Saiyan Elbow Drop x 3

Saiyan Energy Focus x 3

Saiyan Energy Rupture x 2

Saiyan Energy Toss x 3

Saiyan Gut Kick x 3

Saiyan Left Kick x 3

Saiyan Multi-Blast x 3

Saiyan Pinpoint Blast x 3

Saiyan Surprise x 3

Saiyan Uppercut x 3

Notable missing cards:

Gohan’s Power Punch

This is not a styled cards and it raises your anger 2. Usually raising your anger is a bonus but this decks wants to stay at Gohan lvl 1/2 as long as possible, which is hard enough with all the Saiyan attacks.I have considered Empowered Flying Kick to keep your anger in check but Gohan’s power is so weak that the cards is pretty bad.

Saiyan Power Up

Although I mentioned this card earlier, I feel that it is strictly worse than Visiting The Past. I may be wrong as Gohan is fairly soft and may need the extra stages to begin his chain of energy combats (the mastery powers you up with each attacks).

Saiyan Clothesline

One of the best cards in Saiyan but as i mentioned before Gohan doesn’t have the power stages to take advantage of this card.

Confrontation and Time is a Warrior’s Tool

I didn’t include these because I don’t own them and i don’t think they are essential to the list. Time could definitely replace a block but confrontation is a give or take. You would likely have to cut an attack for confrontation making it only so-so for the deck. If you are striping a block, confrontation feels fantastic, but if you miss , you could be missing out of 8 life cards of damage or more.

Blocks

This deck runs 4 block as you want to maximize the number of attacks in the deck. It might be more correct to run one time is a warrior’s tool and no block at all but I included these for two reasons. There are some attacks you will badly wish to block, so hold onto these for emergencies. Last, the draining of there stages is very relevant with the power matters cards in Saiyan.

The general flow of the deck should go something like this:

-Assemble engine pieces (2 or more if possible w/ Gohan)

-Try to build up on board advantage (Saiyan enraged and Visiting the past)

-With a hand full of attacks pull the trigger, play you leading attacks and damage advantage effects and chain out into and elbow drop to try finish you opponent off all in one turn.

-Rinse and repeat

Please let me know how the deck works for you. It looks great in my mind and on paper but until a few testing games are played you never know.

Latest Comments

  1. grimlock64 February 9, 2015
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