UNION ARENA: Every SAKAMOTO DAYS Deck, Ranked
Wondering what the strongest SAKAMOTO DAYS UNION ARENA decks are?
While this set doesn’t feel quite as hyped as the likes of Solo Leveling, it’s still known for being a strong set over in Japan, and feels highly collectible, too.
Luckily for SAKAMOTO DAYS fans, most of these decks are actually pretty strong. With plenty of free-play effects to help you keep up and and even exceed many of the strategies currently topping the English meta, as well as some absolute powerhouse plays, we could easily see one or two SAKAMOTO DAYS decks work their way into the very top tiers of all UNION ARENA decks.
#5 LABO
The only deck from SAKAMOTO DAYS that feels lackluster is LABO. While it does have some interesting mechanics – including a Raid Character who can damage your opponent’s life as an Activate:Main and a very interesting, Raid/Color Trigger combo, the rest of the deck feels half-baked. When testing this particular build, I found myself gravitating towards Osaragi as a filler (as I do with just about every Purple deck in the set).Without Osaragi the deck just didn’t really feel complete.
That being said, your most unique character in this deck is that four-cost Color Trigger character I was talking about.
The Invisibility Suit actually is quite powerful. It can’t be chosen by ANY ability, making it almost invulnerable. Meanwhile, it inherits the When Played and When Attacking abilities of the character you Raided over.
While there are multiple characters in this deck that this could apply to, your strongest fit is Seba.
One Seba grants you a powerful free-play effect, while the other grants powerful BP boosting. Still, unless you’re just really into LABO or love the Invisibility Suit mechanic, this is one deck that’s pretty safe to skip.
#4 Yellow Shin/Heisuke
The Yellow Shin deck brings a highly unique strategy into the game – one we haven’t seen in the English version prominently before. Essentially, this deck is all about flipping Life cards and cards on top of the deck face up to unlock additional benefits. These include things like reducing the AP cost of playing certain cards, switching attackers to active, and more.
Meanwhile on the Heisuke side of things, you’re looking to do a lot of damage at a low energy cost. While you’ll have to play your cards right to ensure you hit the three or more face-up cards on the field, Sniping with Impact at just five energy is pretty insane, making Heisuke essentially one-of-a-kind.
And while this deck absolutely has it where it counts in removal and freeze effects and the like, it’s also got a solid free-play option that benefits your high-end plays with low-end versatility. Take, for example, the two-cost Shin Color Trigger.
Shin’s When Played gives you two options to help adapt him to your situation. Of course, manage to already have a face-up card in play and you’ll be free-playing your three-cost Asakura, or more easily playing your big Shin character who comes in active for just one AP.
Overall, this deck delivers an intriguing strategy that feels just strong enough to avoid being a gimmick.
#3 Purple Osaragi
Taking a huge jump up in power level, Purple Osaragi is a very strong deck. What I like about this deck is its insane utility and finishing power. What I mean by this is the crazy draw/free-play you get. You have a built in AP-extend via five-cost Shishiba – a card that not only lets you recoup the cost of paying for an Extra Draw (a core mechanic of this deck), but one that also lets you get ahead of your opponent. While he doesn’t have any other effects, getting an extra one-or-two AP when he’s played makes a huge difference, especially when you factor in how much card advantage you have access to in this deck.
Of course, the real killer card remains Osaragi. She’s just so good that you almost want to fit her into each and every Purple deck if you can.
In this build with how much “extra draw” support you have built-in (with the four-cost Osaragi Color Trigger that lets you take an extra draw for free), the likelihood of hitting that holy grail 5000 BP Damage 2/Impact 1 combo is strong.
Learn how to build and play the Purple Osaragi Deck.
#2 Purple Hybrid
I don’t know about you but I’m loving the Sakamoto Purple Hybrid deck. While you can certainly build this deck more purely on the Taro/Nagumo combo, Osaragi just feels like she fits in so naturally here. Use Raid Sakamoto to activate Triggers, buff Osaragi to a Damage 2 Impact 1 character (when possible), and benefit from free plays off of your Nagumo for both Raid characters – what’s not to like?
Players looking for an edgier Sakamoto build can’t go wrong with this Purple Hybrid. Really the only thing it’s missing is removal. If it had that, it would be a potential S-tier threat. Of course, really ambitious players could tech in the same six-cost Takamura that The Order build runs. However, it doesn’t quite feel right in a deck with mostly lower-cost energy characters.
Alternate build: Purple Sakamoto/Nagumo
While the Purple Hybrid is gaining the most attention right now with some players even teching in the Shishiba for his AP re-stand, you can also play a pure Sakamo/Nagumo build: one that goes all-in on the Trigger-activation via card effects. While this build lacks some of the high end power of the hybrid, it does boast more consistency by building the entire strategy around Nagumo and Sakamoto.
#1 Yellow Sakamoto
More than ever, UNION ARENA is feeling like an arms race to see which deck can manage to get the most free-plays. Sakamoto Yellow excels as one of the best of these kinds of decks, up there with the likes of Yellow Evangelion (or maybe even better in this regard) free playing characters effortlessly alongside fielding incredibly strong ones.
The core backbone of your deck is undeniably four-cost Taro Sakamoto.
This guy’s Raid does the character justice, letting you rapid fire your way to victory via a 5000 BP, Impact character who effortlessly free-plays a strongish character from the top five cards of your deck.
Again, that doesn’t sound CRAZY at first glance, but it effortlessly combines several key, competitive mechanics into one card, making it one of the stronger free-play characters we’ve seen since arguably Purple Gaius.
There are plenty of other powerful cards in this deck – for example the four-cost Sakamoto that provides a defensive layer, or the multi-purpose three-cost Lu. But it’s thanks to this low-cost beast of a character that Yellow Sakamoto is this set’s strongest deck.
Alternate build: Yellow Hybrid
The other way to build Yellow Sakamoto that’s also strong is to include the four-cost Shin package AND the Mashimo. This deck has performed well in Japan (taking top finishes at Worlds) and more recently made up the highest play share in the Florida 26-27 Regional.
While running an unusually high number of Raid character, this deck adds layers upon layers of strategy to the otherwise straight-forward aggro play that the pure Yellow Sakamoto goes for. With four-cost Shin, you can disrupt your opponent’s hand while Mashimo unlocks powerful Snipe/Impact. The only thing that makes the pure Shin/Mashimo deck lackluster – a lack of free-plays – is handled by Taro Sakamoto.
SAKAMOTO DAYS is the free-play set. Just about every deck gives you the option to play something for free, showing just how fast the English meta is getting. Before long, gen 1 decks (like your Purple Code Geass, Blue Sukuna, Purple BLEACH) will really be a thing of a past, and free-play effects will be the new norm.
Call it power creep if you want. But it’s clear where the game is headed fast, and SAKAMOTO DAYS is a fantastic jumping-in point for new players just for that very reason.
Learn more about the decks in my podcast episode below.
