2024 World Championship Format Breakdown!

The ultimate climax of the 2024 competitive season has come to a close, and it was an incredible spectacle to witness! We saw familiar faces from around the world, returning players, and a selection of characters that I'm real excited to talk about today! First and foremost, the greatest of congratulations to Kevin Broberg reclaiming his World Championship title back from 2022 after taking a year off. I implore all of you to go back and watch Kevin pilot his deck that I’ll be talking about, because he is a masterful player when it comes to decision-making and deck building. Without further ado, join me as we say congratulations and farewell to these competitors and their decks as we move forward into the 2025 competitive season.

1st Place: Kevin Broberg's Death Hange Zoe, Four Eyes

I've got to say, I cannot believe he's done it again, but in my honest opinion Kevin Broberg is probably the greatest UniVersus player of all time. Kevin started showing this deck off at NA Nationals and also in a deck profile he posted, and it is so amazing to see it become the Worlds-winning deck that it is today.

Some of the key gameplay loops of the deck are using strong damage reduction cards like Weapon Clash and The Greater Goal along with Hange Zoe’s Enhance to keep Attacks low on damage, while keeping their Stage healthy. The offensive attack pattern is using Duplicitous Recollection to Build in transformed copies of Beast Titan Attacks! which allow us to pick up more attacks like Readied Shot to then pick up copies of Genkai’s Guidance. There's lots of moving cards from different zones to have a very strong defense, and using a lot of the powerful 4-check Attacks to keep your opponent on the back foot.

For those of you who enjoy this deck and how it plays, the good news is that it only loses a couple of cards from rotation and will keep this deck very playable in the upcoming competitive season. I can’t wait to see what new things Kevin is going to bring to the world of UniVersus including his future Champ Card he will be able to create!

4th Place: Alex Gurney’s Earth Pony Tsunotori

Players from OCE came ready to play for the World Champion title, and Alex made it the furthest for his region piloting his Earth Pony Tsunotori deck. Alex had a great showing on-stream against Travis Tangeman, showcasing a lot of the specific tools that most Pony decks aren’t playing anymore to keep his Stage ready to pass more checks.

Alex used Foundations like A Mother’s Embrace and Weightless helped ready themselves or other cards to help compensate for the biggest flaw that can end attack turns for Pony decks: passing checks. Clearing copies of Spirit Slash also helped build more Foundations in the middle of attack turns to pass even more checks for Attacks. Due to strategies like this, Alex was able to pull off the only turn-2 kill turn we saw on stream all weekend!

Pony decks like Alex’s don’t lose a lot of Attacks due to rotation, but they do lose some key Foundations and Actions that we saw at Worlds. I am excited to see what new Pony decks look like, and also to see what players like Alex bring to the 2025 season and fight for a chance at the World Championship next year.

6th Place: Tim Keefe’s Life Ymir

Ymir is another character that most people were anticipating to make a strong showing at Worlds–this makes sense when you see players like Tim Keefe piloting it, finishing in 6th place overall. Tim’s list is the most unique one though, and that’s why I chose to focus on this specific deck.

Key cards across almost all Ymir decks are the Foundations that gain health, but there are more interesting choices in Tim’s list that allow him to have more interactions and counterplay against his opponents. Arrogant Fighter can help seal problem Foundations at "Response on Play" speed because of sacrificing it with Best Buddies. Mikasa’s Flying Knee Strike and Blow to the Head offer different 4-difficulty Attacks to pick up from Tetra-Terror Onslaught in case you need different options for different game states. My favorite card in the deck, Canister Creation Strike, helps build in higher-impact Foundations like Meeting Hange or Moment of Peace by removing our committed 2-difficulty Foundations.

Ymir loses quite a bit of high impact foundations with rotation that help her accelerate to nine Foundations by turn 2 or 3, so it will be interesting to see how Ymir players adapt to the new format. Plenty of strong players do enjoy the character though, so I’m sure they'll figure out how to keep her competitive.

7th Place: Keandre Groenewoud‘s Good Izuku Midoriya, On the Move

We saw quite a few Izuku Midoriya, On the Move decks played at the World Championship by strong OCE players, but Keandre made it furthest with basically only a two-card difference than Zane and Jame’s deck. However, Keandre had a tough match against Trenton Caudill’s King Ghidorah deck. Unfortunately, that deck had a lot of main-deck answers to combat the combo-oriented gameplan of the Midoriya deck.

The deck’s main strategy is transforming into the Izuku Midoriya, Quirks Unleashed side of the character to eventually establish a large stage to play the Form ability on the character enough times to make a Phantom Threat deal enough damage and gain Flash to kill most decks… unless they have Response speed answer that, and the Midoriya deck plays its own answer to those answers.

Any questions?

Seriously though, the core of the Midoriya deck doesn’t lose that functionality after rotation, but the deck is reliant on the format as a whole on whether or not it's a good call to bring to events and how prepared people are to fight against it. The biggest factor however, Evade and Copy, does rotate, which means the deck can play less answers to that specific card.

11th Place: Barlow Guess’s Chaos Jean Kirstein

This was the deck I was personally rooting for in the whole tournament, but that's only because I really enjoy the gameplay loop of Jean Kirstein. Barlow brought his own flavor and plenty of strong cards to fight against the format while still showcasing the strengths of the character and having such a powerful Enhance ability.

Jean mainly wants to generate momentum to have total control of an Attack’s speed and zone, and has a way to generate momentum while using Card Pool-clearing effects. One of the biggest showcase cards was I AM HERE! That allows you to randomly get an Attack or Foundation while clearing the remaining cards that Jean can selectively pick one of them to go to momentum. That also means if it is a card that goes to momentum face up like Vast Hybrid Chimera Kraken or Deception Dagger, you get a strong momentum ability as well.

It was very fun watching Barlow pilot the deck, and overall and it looked like a blast to play! Barlow has had a lot of top cuts, and I’m sure he will continue to show us top-tier gameplay in the 2025 season.

13th Place: Jorge Zhang‘s Void Rodan, Giant Monster of the Sky

Another Worlds-caliber player and former National Champion, Jorge Zhang went full circle from the 2024 season and brought a new take on Rodan. In typical Jorge fashion, the deck plays plenty of cards to have a lot of options, but was very well-tailored for the format.

Board control, card advantage, and lots of speed is the name of this Rodan deck. It even excelled at denying its rival's Momentum with cards like “Borrowed” Goods. This deck also had plenty of strong Assets like Tattered Costume and Psychic Spirit Glass that can be built or picked up from the discard pile with the help of Strategic Maneuver. The deck thrives at generating a lot of value from its attacks and foundations and then also plays incredible defense because of the amount of speed control Rodan offers.

Rodan is slated to still be a powerful defensive character even after rotation, and this deck doesn’t lose a whole lot. Jorge has always brought different characters and deck strategies at almost every event he attends, and I don’t think he will stray from that style even in 2025.

Out With 2024, In With 2025

The curtain has officially closed for 2024, and I had an absolute pleasure watching players at the past few events. I plan to continue keeping a close eye on the competitive scene and cheer for players across the globe as they kick off 2025 in Denver, CO and begin the road to the 2025 World Championship. Will Kevin Broberg win another year in a row? Will someone dethrone him and claim the spot themselves? Only time will tell and I can’t wait to see who pulls through.