One Piece TCG Blue Deck Guide: Tempo and Draw 2026

Updated October 19, 2026: rebuilt from results data. We pulled every Limitless Play Standard event from August 20 to October 17 (102 events), their decklists and round pairings. The old version ranked leaders by a tracker's labels and listed generic slot counts (12 counter sources, 12 to 16 draw cards, 6 to 10 bounce effects) that no posted list follows. It also showed a Green card (Arlong, OP16-023) in a Blue guide. All three are gone.

What Blue actually does

Read the cards in the current Blue deck and three jobs keep coming up.

Draw, paid for with your hand. Xebec's leader effect lets you trash a card when he attacks, reveal the top card of your deck, and draw two if it's a Rocks Pirates card. Kyo (OP17-045) draws one on play. Charlotte Linlin (OP17-049) makes your opponent choose between you drawing two and them trashing two.

Removal that isn't a K.O. Gloriosa (OP17-046) is a blocker that sends a Character with a cost of 5 or less to the bottom of its owner's deck. The Rocks Pirates event (OP17-056) can rest five DON!! to return a Character with a cost of 6 or less to its owner's hand. Both get around K.O. protection, and the bottom-of-deck one doesn't come back.

Stopping attacks. Miss Buckingham Stussy (OP17-054) keeps an opposing Character with a base cost of 6 or less from attacking until the end of your opponent's next End Phase.

Image credit: One Piece Card Game official card list (Bandai). Kyo, Gloriosa and the Rocks Pirates event, all OP-17.

The old idea of Blue as a slow bounce-and-wait colour doesn't describe the deck that wins. Xebec attacks every turn, trashes cards for value, and uses bounce to clear the one blocker in his way.

The Blue leaders people are actually playing

Counts are players with a recorded leader at Limitless Play Standard events. Records are match wins, losses and ties from the standings.

Before the ban, only Mihawk (289 players) drew a bigger crowd than Xebec. In the first eight post-ban events Xebec led the field, ahead of Luffy & Ace. Hancock is the only other Blue leader with real numbers, and she's been under even. If you liked Blue/Yellow Nami or Green/Blue Luffy from earlier formats, the results say they're now niche picks.

Our Blue/Yellow Hancock guide covers the second option if Xebec isn't for you.

What a Xebec list looks like

We counted 273 posted Xebec decklists from the same events. Nine cards turn up in every one of them, almost always as four-ofs:

• Characters: Kyo, Miss Buckingham Stussy, Gloriosa, Charlotte Linlin, Edward.Newgate (OP17-040), Shiki (OP17-048) and the 10-cost Rocks.D.Xebec (OP17-118)
• Events: There's No Authority in the World That Lasts Forever!!! (OP17-055) and Rocks Pirates (OP17-056)

That's 36 cards decided before you start. Captain John (95% of lists), Buckin (88%), Streusen (82%), Don Marlon (72%) and Kaido (66%) fill most of the rest. The median list runs 42 Characters and 8 Events, and stages almost never show up.

Elliott posted his post-Mihawk deck profile the day after Bandai announced the ban:

Our full Xebec deck guide goes card by card.

Matchups: where Blue wins and where it doesn't

We matched every Xebec player to their opponents in the round pairings and tallied the results by opposing leader, leaving out mirrors.

Chart: ShonenTCG. Source: Limitless Play Standard events (round pairings), August 20 to October 17, 2026, pulled October 19.

The problem is Black Luffy (OP17-079): 35 wins and 74 losses. Players had already worked that out when the ban was announced. Under the Reddit thread on the post-ban Rocks meta, ChilliWithFries wrote: "Black luffy is like one of the only ones that have a positive matchup lol." The numbers back that up.

Kaido is the matchup people argue about. MentalBoom9 said in the same thread: "Kaido's bodies are just too big." Over 96 games it came out dead even. Mihawk was Xebec's worst matchup by far, and he's gone. Against the rest of the popular field (Sabo, Luffy & Ace, Robin, Enel, Red Ace) Xebec wins more than half.

GODEEPER: How the field moved once Mihawk left. OP-18 meta predictions after the Mihawk ban →

SHOP: Building the Xebec list? Check the current price of the Rocks.D.Xebec leader (OP17-039) on TCGplayer before you fill out the 36-card core. Shop TCGplayer →

Playing Blue well

• Your hand is a resource, not a reserve. Xebec, Newgate (OP17-040), Shiki and Linlin all ask you to trash a card. Pick which cards are fuel before the game gets tight, or you'll trash a counter you needed.
• Save bounce for the blocker or the threat that matters. Gloriosa's cost-5 limit and the event's cost-6 limit mean neither touches the biggest bodies, so don't spend them on something you could just attack past.
• Stussy buys a turn. A Character that can't attack is often better than one that went back to hand and gets replayed next turn.
• Against Black Luffy, you're the underdog. Plan for it in your side choices rather than hoping the main deck carries it.

When to play another colour

If you want something faster and simpler, the Red colour guide is the place to start. Black has the deck that beats Xebec most often: see the Black Luffy deck guide. For the colours in between, there are guides to Purple, Green and Black.

Our take

Blue is in its best spot in a while, and almost all of that is one leader. Xebec is a real deck: the most-played leader since the ban, a winning record against most of the popular field, and a list that's settled enough to copy without guessing. Build the 36-card core first, then fill the flex slots with whatever your local Black Luffy players hate most. If you want Blue but not Xebec, try Hancock and expect a tougher climb. We wouldn't take the other Blue leaders to an event right now.

How we checked this: on October 19, 2026 we pulled the 102 Limitless Play Standard events from August 20 to October 17 (Extra-format cups left out), tallied leaders and records from the standings, card counts from the 273 Xebec decklists, and matchups from the round pairings, then read each card's text on Bandai's official card list and the Limitless card pages.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does Blue do in One Piece TCG? Blue draws cards, sends opposing Characters back to the hand or the bottom of the deck, and stops Characters from attacking. In the current Rocks.D.Xebec deck it also trashes cards from its own hand to pay for power boosts and draws.

What is the best Blue leader in One Piece TCG right now? Rocks.D.Xebec (OP17-039). He was the second most-played leader in online Standard events from August 20 to October 11, behind the now-banned Mihawk, and the most played in the first post-ban week. Blue/Yellow Boa Hancock is a distant second.

What beats Rocks.D.Xebec? Black Monkey.D.Luffy (OP17-079). Xebec won only about a third of its matches against that leader in online Standard events from August 20 to October 17. Charlotte Pudding also held a winning record over it, on a smaller sample.

Is Blue good for beginners in One Piece TCG? Xebec is a fair first Blue deck because the list is settled: nine cards appear as four-ofs in nearly every posted version. The hard part is knowing when to trash cards from your hand, which takes games to learn.

Related Reading

• OP-17 Rocks.D.Xebec reveal: what the leader does and how it was first received.
• One Piece TCG banlist and restrictions explained: the Mihawk ban and what it changed.
• Blue/Yellow colour guide: the Hancock and Nami side of Blue.

References

• Limitless Play One Piece tournaments: standings, decklists and pairings for the 102 events
• OP17-039 Rocks.D.Xebec card record: leader text and colour
• One Piece Card Game official card list: Kyo, Gloriosa, Stussy, Linlin and the OP-17 events
• Bandai restriction notice, October 2026: Mihawk ban effective October 12