Dragonball Z Collectible Card Game

Black Style, Weaknesses and Strengths

The Black style, AKA foot and hand style, has some of the strongest attacks out there, mixing powerhouses and the ability to gain some awesome anger that is only second to red, puts it in a class of its own.


The Energy Attacks

Black Energy attacks are major, some doing up to 8 life and 5 stages. Now you think well I can get an Orange energy attack doing twice as much, but few see that this is just the base damage, with the TS mastery on board Black doesn't need to have non-combats to make their attacks huge and dangerous.

Black Anger is something that people rarely see. With energy and physical attacks giving you anger here and there and sometimes giving you 2 it makes no since not to go for this style. Adding to this beast is its blocks that allow you to raise your anger 1 or 2 giving you a great advantage in power levels and letting you step one inch closer to the MPPV.

The Physical Attacks

Black Physical attacks are in the same area as the Black energy attacks. Having the ability to do some major "+" damage. Black also allows you to have physical attacks when you are zero still doing 6 stages of damage all by itself.

Black "Searchers" are also one very unique thing that black has to bring to the table. Allowing you to hunt through your opponent's deck and eliminate their best cards. This allows you to take advantage of your opponent while you move in for the kill leaving your opponent just a hollow shell of what their deck use to be.

OK now you are thinking what can be the cons of this color? It has huge attacks with no non-combats to slow you down. Anger to power up and searchers to eliminate their decks, but Black has some major draw backs that you just can't have in a tournament deck, you may add these cards into your deck to slow your opponent down, but it just doesn't have the built in anti everything you need.

Black's Anger Management

Black and anti-anger. Anger is always major in decks and black lacks the ability to stop it, focusing more on your anger than your opponent is a good thing but not when you are facing a red anger deck that has the ability to over come you in a few short turns. Black just doesn't have what you need to keep your opponent from blowing you away.

Ok anger isn't hard to get away, time for me to add Goku's Heart Disease and some Awful Abrasions, hey I am a bad guy I just add Cell's Threatening Position and I am all set. Wrong, Black has its Major troubles with Non-Combats, leaving you wide open for orange or even that occasional pesky dragon ball deck that rolls your way. Black has only two drills that can get rid of your opponent's non-combats forcing you into playing a certain type of deck. First we have Black Mischievous Drill you pay 5 life and there is one less non-combat, yes it works against non-combats but is it worth it? If you are playing a db deck they will have tons of non-combats, are you willing to pay 20 life just to get rid of only 4 non-combats?? Then you have the Black Erasing Drill, ok for a successful energy attack you get rid of a non-combat. That's good and all but now you are forced into playing with an energy beat down deck and even then you need for the attack to be successful.

The Cons

With all this in mind you now say ok I am a bad guy so I will through in 19's energy bursts to nuke their drills and I will throw in a lot of energy attacks he can't stop them all. But now you are forced into playing a Black Energy Beat down with not a lot of black attacks because you need that extra room for those other cards, which in turn brings down the effectiveness of the black style mastery.

In conclusion play what you want, black, orange, anything, but remember once you choose a tokui-waza you are forced into certain corners that you may not like, some may and that's great for them, just make sure you look at all things before you decide on what to play.
                                                           
Sincerely,
David C. / Shenrongod2
IQ's Crew

IQ's Note:
Black is a great beat down style because of the Trunks Saga Mastery and many player over look the Cell Saga Mastery because it doesn't make your attacks bigger but its power is not that bad. We have to remember that beat down doesn't always win the game >_^