In recent times, one deck has emerged as the dominant force in the ONE PIECE Card Game metagame: the Black Moria deck. The latest addition to this deck’s achievement list came last week when Elliot Charters, a former professional League of Legends and World of Warcraft player, used this deck to win the Sydney Regional on home turf.

This deck is built around card manipulation and KO effects. Players using this deck seek to control the pace of the game while utilizing both hand and trash as key resources. Additionally, one of this deck’s biggest strengths is its ability to get the jump on an opponent in the early stages by retrieving a 4-cost Thriller Bark Pirates Character card from the trash at a relatively low cost via the Leader effect of the Moria card from Wings of the Captain [OP-06]. By combining Perona with Hogback, both also Wings of the Captain [OP-06] cards, the resource gap can be further increased.

The main cards to seek when mulliganing are Perona and Victoria Cindry, both taken from the Wings of the Captain [OP-06] set, if going first. If the player goes second, the Brannew card from Pillars of Strength [OP-03] will be of most benefit.

Ordinarily, this deck would often face matchup difficulties against a Black/Yellow Luffy deck. To counter this, in the early game the player can make frequent use of blockers as well as the Perona card, then follow it up with the Moria card from Wings of the Captain [OP-06] to recycle cards and eventually set up a scenario in which the player can easily KO the opponent’s buffed Leader card.

In general, the resource gap developed early on will often bait the opponent into making sub-optimal plays and force them to attempt big moves later on. This would potentially leave the opponent vulnerable to blockers and counters that can be easily set up.

The total cost of all the cards in a Black Moria deck is at least 45,880 JPY (~US$295).

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