Yellow Re:ZERO Starter Deck Upgrade Guide
Want to start building and playing Re:ZERO but don’t know where to start? The natural starting point is with the new Re:ZERO starter deck featuring the Yellow Emilia deck.
After building and playing this deck myself, I’m surprised at how strong it can be. And while the basic upgrades for the starter deck are relatively easy to play, the fully upgraded version gets really complicated, and really fun when you manage to chain the right combos together.
For this upgrade guide, we’ll be looking at three things. First, we’ll be looking at what is included in the Re:ZERO starter deck directly out of the box. Next, we’ll go over how to do a basic upgrade guide using just two starter decks and combining them together in a cohesive way.
Finally, we’ll be looking at what this deck looks like in its fully upgraded version, and how much you’ll have to spend to actually get there.
Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- - Starter Deck
UE24ST: Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- Starter Deck
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Re:ZERO Starter Deck Contents – what’s inside?
The Re:ZERO starter deck is ideal for three different kinds of UNION ARENA players.
Entirely new players wanting to cut their teeth on the latest set.
Anyone wanting to build Yellow Emilia.
Players who don’t care at all about Yellow Emilia but want the starter deck exclusive cards
In fact, other than for the purposes of writing this guide, I also just really wanted to play Yellow Emilia. She’s a great character in the Re:ZERO anime and the deck is VERY fun. It’s likely the one I’ll be taking to the Re:ZERO Rare Battle, making the investment worth it. With the Starter deck, the total deck upgrade (we’ll get into that in a moment) was actually quite affordable.
Re:ZERO Starter Deck card list
So this is what the deck looks like directly out of the box. As far as UNION ARENA starter decks go, this is one of the better ones. You have some very solid bones here. The only thing that really stands out as weird to me is how many two energy generating cards you get.
While the fully upgraded Yellow Emilia deck will want roughly eight double energy generating characters, the starter deck runs 10 without having the five-cost Emilia at all.
Other than that, the deck also runs far too many triggerless cards to be viable.
For this reason you’ll really need to buy two starter decks to build something roughly playable.
Re:ZERO promotion pack card list
You don’t only buy the starter deck for the cards in the deck, though. Some of the most valuable and vital cards are found in the promotion pack.
Not only does each pack come with four cards you’ll need to build the other Re:ZERO decks, you’re guaranteed one parallel rare/alt art per pack.
Re:ZERO starter deck upgrade – basic method
Clearly, attempting to play a UNION ARENA battle anywhere other than on the kitchen table is out of the question with just a single Re:ZERO starter deck. How about when you buy two starter decks?
Turns out, what you get from buying two starter decks and mashing them strategically together is a huge step up. Dare I say, it’s remarkably solid for an entry-level deck.
Here’s the deck I built using the cards from both starter decks, as well as some of the reasoning behind why I built it this way.
All of a sudden, this deck now looks pretty good. Running the three-cost Ram with the eight copies of Rem gives you a solid draw/energy gen character. You have to run a slightly high triggerless count because two-cost Felt is just too good to pass up on, and you need the two-cost Emilia to bring your Raid ratio up to the solid 8/4 count. For newer players: you typically want twice as many Raid targets as Raid characters to ensure consistency.
To help the triggerless count out, I dropped two of the Dragon Insignia cards from this build. In the fully upgraded build you’ll ideally run four. However, there’s less reason to in the basic upgrade between the two starter decks as there’s not a huge payoff from having a ton of events in the sideline.
Yellow Emilia deck – full upgrade method
While the above basic upgrade method is an excellent start for those who are new to the game, eventually you will want to graduate to the complete Yellow Emilia deck. This deck is much stronger, complex, and pretty affordable once you already have the two starter decks.
In the fully upgraded version, you won’t need the Rem/Ram characters. Instead, you’ll be leaning into Emilia herself as this deck’s core engine and attacker. You can get the fully upgraded version for just a little more than $30 on TCGPlayer right now. We’ll go over each card you need that the starter deck doesn’t have below.
Five-cost Emilia is this deck’s strongest card
Emilia (027)
UE24BT: Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- • Super Rare
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UNION ARENA starter decks typically omit a deck’s best card, leaving it up to you to either buy online or find in booster packs. Five-cost Emilia is a very strong card. While the Raid you get in the starter deck is also quite good thanks to her Impact and draw/filter combo when attacking, five-cost Emilia is going to unlock much more advanced plays by letting you do things like:
Free-play the Dragon Insignia and restand an AP.
Free-play a Final card, letting you get two AP back instead of just one.
Free play a Puck character who technically counts as an event.
As if that weren’t enough, she also has a handy resting effect built in – one that turns into a freeze when you have eight event cards in your sideline.
Three-cost Puck is a powerful secondary attacker
Puck (002)
UE24BT: Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- • Rare
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While pairing five-cost Emilia with your Event cards unlock additional AP, letting you extend the number of actions you are allowed to take in a turn, arguably your strongest card to pair with her free-play effect is the three-cost Puck.
As long as you have the required number of Event cards in your sideline, Puck can switch to active and will gain 1000 BP during your turn. So while appearing rather benign at first, in reality, five-cost Emilia softens up your opponent’s defenses via her rest/freeze effect, then lets you free-play a 4000 BP character set to active.
It’s an insane amount of utility you get out of a single card.
Better Raid targets for Emilia
Emilia (023)
UE24BT: Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- • Uncommon
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Emilia (025)
UE24BT: Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- • Rare
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Lastly, you’ll want better Raid targets for Emilia than you currently have access to. First, zero cost draw-one-discard-one is fantastic for a Raid target. Meanwhile, one-cost Emilia lets you stack the next few cards in your deck the way you want them. This becomes particularly important when you factor in how much filtering the Yellow Emilia deck does between her one-cost, her four-cost Raid, and her Special.
Emilia (026)
UE24BT: Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- • Rare
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Lastly, the three-cost Emilia is a must, letting you draw a card while generating two energy. All of these cards are available for less than a dollar a piece, making the upgrade to the full Yellow Emilia build a no-brainer.
Yellow Emilia matchups into the current meta
When I initially wrote my guide to the Re:ZERO decks, I was a bit unfair towards Yellow Emilia. I cited its lack of high end power as a huge deficit to its strategy. However, after picking up the starter deck and trying the complete upgrade build more, I’ve come to realize I was wrong.
This deck is actually incredibly powerful. The combination of AP extension and free-play with solid Impact attacks, characters that readily switch to active on play, and five-cost Emilia’s powerful freezing effect is one of the stronger deck profiles coming out of Re:ZERO.
It works particularly well into the current meta against anti-removal decks like Yellow Sakamoto and Red Chainsaw Man, and should be a powerful counter into the Blue Subaru deck during the Rare Battle season.
If you’re looking for both an accessible deck to start, as well as one with potential, you absolutely can’t go wrong with the Re:ZERO starter deck.
