MHA Universus Kyoka Jiro Deck Tech

The metagame for MHA moves pretty fast. Characters and deck archetypes fall in and out of favor in the span of a couple of weeks. There are a few that have maintained presence in high level play, and Jiro is one of the most popular. Many decks use Good, mostly to use Cannon Blast, or All to take advantage of Weapon synergies. This one focuses on Air, relying on Jiro’s reaction abilities along with low to mid-difficulty Charge attacks. The full deck list is posted on UVS Ultra.

First, we should look at the character at the heart of the deck. Jiro has 3 abilities, all of which are useful. The once per turn Enhance lets you rearrange the top two cards of both player’s decks. Use it every turn you can, since it gives information about what to expect and lets you manipulate checks. The first reaction is the focus, triggering after you play a Charge to give the attack +1 damage for every card in your card pool. The second response is similar, triggering with Weapon attacks and boosting speed. Cards in the card pool for any reason count for this bonus, making abilities such as Mineta II’s ability to pull cards from the stage risky to use.

Most of the attacks have the Charge keyword, meaning they will get a damage bonus when played. Your ideal opening is Long-Lasting Explosion. A 5 speed mid attack hitting for 7 almost demands an answer, and the enhance sets up your next attack perfectly. Airstream Driver makes a good second attack. It gets +3 speed for the LLE enhance, and you can discard a card from your opponent’s card pool to give another +3 speed and +3 damage. Between these and the Jiro reaction, Airstream Driver turns into a 9 speed high that deals 10.

If LLE hits, any of the other attacks make a good follow up, especially if you have a Seizing The Advantage in hand. The ideal finishers are either Home Run Comet, which can get a high Powerful rating, or Improvised Blade, which combos off a Charge attack to get +1 damage per card in your pool. Getting a Meteor Shower in momentum early in the game can help extend your attack, which can make both finishers more potent.

One of the most important foundations is Scouting The Forest. After your Weapon or Charge deals damage, reveal the top 4 cards of your deck and add a Weapon or Charge attack to your hand. This can help keep your hand filled with attacks when you want to go for a one turn kill. Destined For Mainstream Success is a conditional draw card. However, Jiro has plenty of options to know the top card of the deck. Small And Limber, Feelin’ Cute, and Basic Training offer small buffs for speed or damage.

I recently used this deck at a local Provisional tournament. While I did not win the event, the deck performed well for the most part. Having multiple 2 check values in the deck did hurt performance, and the ratio of foundations to blocks gave me several turns where the game didn’t significantly advance. While having extra foundations isn’t necessarily bad, the deck works best if you can apply constant pressure. In retrospect, I would likely drop 2 foundations to add in 2 copies of Zero Gravity Lift. I would also drop to 3 Specialized Sound Waves to add another Airstream Driver.

Overall, this is a good gateway to competitive play. The strategy is fairly basic but effective: play all the attacks in your hand every turn. However, emptying your hand on non-lethal attacks will leave you wide open with few defensive options. Knowing when to poke and when to go all out is the key to using this most effectively.