[DIGIMON] Reaper Deck Review

Hi everyone, this shall be the first post on Digimon here! As mentioned in the title, this post is about the hyped D-Reaper deck which received all its support in the release of EX-02. There are already quite a lot of YouTube videos on this type of deck, and it actually appears to be strong (if not imba).

Key cards

We will look at the key cards of this deck and understand why it can be so strong and scary.

First up is Mother D-Reaper (EX2-007, Digitama). Without this card, this deck cannot function at all. 

First skill (translated): [All Turns] This Digimon can't attack and isn't affected by your opponent's effects.

Basic but very strong effect as it cannot be affected by opponent's card effects. This makes it very difficult for opponent to remove this card on the field. It cannot attack at all, but other reapers can do the job easily.

Second skill (translated): [Main] [Once Per Turn] If you don't have another [Mother D-Reaper] in play, place 1 of your [ADR-02 Searcher]s from in play or your hand under this Digimon as its bottom digivolution card.

Another nice skill. The player will only have 1 Mother D-Reaper on the field anyway, unless he/she is trolling and hatch more than 1 of them... This skill means it can put 1 ADR-02 Searcher card under its digivolution source once per turn. We will look at that ADR-02 Searcher card later.

Third skill (translated): [Your Turn] [Once Per Turn] When you would play a card with [D-Reaper] in its traits from your hand, you may reduce its play cost by 1 for each of this Digimon's digivolution cards.

This effect means other D-Reaper cards will be much cheaper to play, although it is only once per turn. It is a strong effect once you see what the other D-Reapers can do... The magic numbers for digivolution cards are 6 and 7.

Second, we will look at ADR-02 Searcher (EX2-046, Digimon) which forms the core of this deck. This card will get stacked under Mother D-Reaper, and remember that we want to have at least 6 or 7 of them.

Card Effects (translated):

You can include up to 50 copies of cards with this card's card number in your deck.
When you don't have another [ADR-02 Searcher] in play, if you play this card from your hand, reduce its play cost by 2.
[Your Turn This Digimon can't attack players.
[Your Turn <Draw 1> (Draw 1 card from your deck).

Inherited Effects (translated):

[Your Turn] All of your Digimon with [D-Reaper] in their traits get +1000 DP.

Since we can include up to 50 copies of this (instead of the usual 4), most players will run about 15-20 of them in the deck. It costs 1 to play if you do not have another ADR-02 Searcher on the field, and then you draw 1. This effectively replace the digivolve draw bonus in other decks. 

Furthermore, the inherited effect gives all [D-Reaper] +1000 DP during your turn. This means your D-Reaper cards can potentially have insane DP during your turn!

 

Next, we will look at 2 cards which help to speed up the process of stacking ADR-02 Searcher under Mother D-Reaper. They are ADR-01 Jeri (EX2-049, Digimon) and ADR-04 Bubbles (EX2-048, Digimon).

On the left, ADR-01 Jeri allows you to suspend it to reveal top 5 cards of your deck, then put 1 ADR-02 Searcher from among them under Mother D-Reaper. This skill bypasses the "summoning sickness" and it can be used on the same turn it is played.

On the right, ADR-04 Bubbles has 2 effects which do the same thing. One activates when you check it in security, and the other one activates when you play it. It allows you to place 1 ADR-02 Searcher from your field or hand under Mother D-Reaper.

So, after stacking so many ADR-02 Searcher under Mother D-Reaper, we need a way to win the game. Here comes the finisher card, Reaper (EX2-055, Digimon).

Card Effects (translated): 

When you would play this Digimon, you may trash 7 or more digivolution cards from the bottom of 1 of your [Mother D-Reaper]'s to reduce this Digimon's play cost to 0.
<Rush> (This Digimon can attack the turn it comes into play)
[Your Turn]You may place 2 [ADR-02 Searcher]s from your trash under this Digimon in any order as its digivolution cards to unsuspend this Digimon.

When you finally have 7 or more ADR-02 Searcher under Mother D-Reaper, you can play this card for no cost (free!) by trashing 7 or more digivolution cards from Mother D-Reaper. The digivolution cards are synonymous with ADR-02 Searcher in this case as there should be no other cards under Mother D-Reaper.

It should be the endgame once you play this card. It has <Rush> so it can attack immediately after play, and its other skill allows it to unsuspend multiple times. Your opponent will be hoping for some good security checks once they see this card. There are some security checks which can stop this card (1 easy example is Gaia Force). But if luck is on your side, you can just attack with this card until you win.

Utility cards

We will now look at some utility D-Reaper cards which complete this deck.

 

 

On the left, we have ADR-03 Pendulum Feet (EX2-047, Digimon) which has an on play effect. It allows you to check top 3 of deck and take 1 ADR-02 Searcher and 1 card with D-Reaper in its traits. This also means you can take 2 ADR-02 Searcher if you are ever short of them.

On the right, we have the destroyer ADR-07 Palates Head (EX2-051, Digimon). You can suspend it to delete 1 of your opponent's Digimon with less than or equal to this Digimon's DP. If you still remember ADR-02 Searcher's [Inherited Skill], all D-Reaper +1000 DP during your turn for each ADR-02 Searcher under Mother D-Reaper. This card can easily snipe opposing 10k+ DP Digimon when you have 7 or more ADR-02 Searcher under Mother D-Reaper... And similar to ADR-01 Jeri, you can use this effect on the same turn it is played. Sounds balanced?

We will look at 2 more D-Reapers which have higher play costs and good effects.

 

ADR-09 Gatekeeper (EX2-054, Digimon), on the left, is the defender of this deck. Its first skill allows you to play it for free from security check (without battling though). Second skill allows you to Recover 1 Security when you have a Mother D-Reaper on field. Its third skill is definitely the most pesky one; all opposing Digimon gets [Security Check -1] when your Mother D-Reaper has 6 or more digivolution sources. Your opponent will need to get rid of this card before even attacking your security, or negate this effect by having [Security Check + x]... Otherwise you can just stall the game for as long as you like. 

ADR-08 Optimizer (EX2-053, Digimon), on the right, is considered a luxury for this deck. Its effect is not required for you to win the game, but it is still nice to have. Its only effect activates either on play or when attacking [Once per turn] if your Mother D-Reaper has 5 or more digivolution sources. It allows you to check top 3 card of deck, and play 1 cost 10 or less D-Reaper card from among them. Put the remaining cards back on top of deck. If you noticed, the play cost of this card is 10, so you can actually play this card again from the top 3 cards and then repeat the effect... Other good choices include ADR-01 Jeri and ADR-07 Palates Head. This card just ramps up your field as a bonus and maybe for flexing.

We have covered almost all of the D-Reaper cards now. Only ADR-05 and ADR-06 are missing here but their effects are pretty basic so I will skip them.

 

Decklists and Strategies

Let's look at a typical decklist for D-Reaper.

The above deck consists of D-Reaper cards only, and it is still a very decent deck. The key cards are at 4 copies each, with 20 ADR-02 Searcher. 

 

When playing a D-Reaper deck, it is actually advantageous to go first. If you go first, it means you get to hatch your Mother D-Reaper before your opponent attacks. This maximizes the potential security effects of ADR-04 Bubbles and ADR-09 Gatekeeper. Also, you can memory choke your opponent just by playing a ADR-02 Searcher, passing only 1 memory to your opponent. 

Every turn, you would want to play at least 1 ADR-02 Searcher to draw 1 and cycle through your deck. Then, Mother D-Reaper will activate its skill to suck 1 ADR-02 Searcher under itself. Finally, you will normally end the turn by playing 1 more D-Reaper card, which has its play cost reduced due to Mother D-Reaper's effect.

With the help of ADR-01 Jeri and ADR-04 Bubbles, you will probably reach 6-7 digivolution sources in less than 6 turns. So your aim is just to survive until then. Against a non-rush deck, this should be achievable as your opponent also needs time to setup their own field. However, a rush deck could cause problems as it could deplete your security before you even reach 4 digivolution sources? Thus, there are 3 blockers in the form of ADR-05 Creep Hands which would help to stall a bit. It might not be enough against rush decks, but at least there is an attempt to slow the game down. And if you managed to survive the initial rush and reach 6 digivolution sources, ADR-09 Gatekeeper will defend easily for the rest of the game.

 

There is also another way to slow the game down by using Yellow cards. Let's take a look at this sample decklist.

 

 

 

The D-Reaper core cards remain, but with less ADR-02 Searcher and some Yellow cards now.

There are 2 kinds of Yellow Options here. First is Tactical Retreat! (BT4-105), which triggers <Recovery+1> from security, effectively nullifying 1 damage. It also allows you to place 1 Digimon from field on top of your Security stack. You can use this option to place ADR-09 Gatekeeper or ADR-04 Bubbles on top of Security to make use of their Security effects. Second is Reinforcing Memory Boost! (BT6-100), which lets you check top 2 from deck, and put 1 on top of Security and 1 to hand. It also has the effect <Delay: Gain 3 Memory> which helps when you are short of memory.

 

To play Yellow option cards from hand, you need either a Yellow Tamer or Digimon already on the field. Obviously we have no space for more Digimon, so we introduce 2 different Yellow Tamers here. First is T.K. Takaishi & Kari Kamiya (BT6-089), which gains you 2 memory when you have less security cards than your opponent. Next is Kari Kamiya (BT8-090), which sets your memory to 3 and you can suspend it to gain 1 memory when a card is added to your security stack during your turn.

 

The <Recovery> effects of the Option cards can hopefully help to stall the game for you to reach 6 digivolution sources. The Tamers provide more memory for you to work with, so you can play more cards and try to reach 6 digivolution sources in fewer turns.

 

We know much more about D-Reaper decks now. It is time to see the weaknesses of Reapers.

Weaknesses

1. Rush decks - As mentioned earlier, rush decks can win the game before Mother D-Reaper reaches 6 or more digivoluton sources. The Yellow cards help but you might not always have them. Lv3/Lv4 rush is still more consistent than you drawing yellow cards and checking good securities.
   
2. Mother D-Reaper can be destroyed - This can only be exploited by some specific cards, but it is still considered a weakness. 1 notable mention is Judgement of the Blade (BT6-093), which allows [Royal Knight] to attack unsuspended Digimon.They still need to hit 15K DP however, but Jesmon and Gallantmon should have no problem hitting it. MetalGreymon (BT8-067) inherited effect also allows [Dragonkin] or [Machine] to attack unsuspended Digimon, so this is another method. Once Mother D-Reaper is destroyed, all the digivolution sources go to the trash and you have to start all over again. It basically means you lost the game.
3. Security checks - Reaper is not immune to security effects, so if it get disrupted by any Security effects halfway, it cannot continue to attack and you cannot win the game. Once you play Reaper, you have already trashed 7 digivoluton sources under Mother D-Reaper, and ADR-09 Gatekeeper cannot help to defend anymore. There is possibly a way around this, which is to stall until you have 14 digivolution sources. This give you 2 chances for Reaper to win the game. Just be prepared to play a long game...
4. Hexeblaumon (BT5-032) 😂 - Digimon with no digivolution cards can't attack or block when your opponent has a Hexeblaumon in play. Since all D-Reapers (except Mother) have no digivolution cards, they cannot attack at all. You can get around this with ADR-07 Palates Head's effect (need 8 digivolution sources to hit 11K DP though).
   

Conclusion

D-Reaper deck comprises of just CUR cards but it is still a strong deck. It has some weaknesses but it should perform quite well against most decks. It is also consistent with ADR-02 Searcher helping to draw cards for just 1 cost, and you are able to memory choke opponents if they do not have set to 3 memory Tamers. All D-Reapers card do not have Level, so it is immune to all effects that target Level as well. I guess this deck will be popular for quite some time while it is still strong. Hopefully this deck will not dominate the meta and we can still see more traditional decks (involving actual Digivolution) in play. 

Enjoy the game and Happy New Year everyone!