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Image from Decipher
 

  Gutsman, Body Strength

Power Up!

1 C 2

Date Reviewed: 10.21.04

Constructed Average Rating: 4
Limited Average Rating: 4

Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being the worst.
3 ... average.
5 is the highest rating.

tcorbett 1 C 2 Gutsman, Body Strength NetNavi

Rating: 4/5 GutsMan has a high Strength, a low Defense, and a high Blast. Because of his high Strength and the Strength bonus he gets when you play a BattleChip, GutsMan decks tend to be very aggressive. With the high Blast, though, he doesn't Blast THAT often. With Red and Yellow as his colors, he can Blast more often than most NetNavis with a Blast greater than 2.

GutsMan has two Red Resources (GutsHammer and GutsThump), two Yellow Resources (Buckethead and Dex, Jokester), one Yellow Event (Feel the Thump), and a BattleChip that requires two Yellow (BigHammer1). Because of this, GutsMan decks tend to lend towards Yellow.

GutsMan has a few strategies that work for him. One is to make use of the powerful Red and Yellow BattleChips and go pure aggro. The more traditional one is to use Yellow's distruption to cripple your opponent and then crush him with BattleChips.

As for his specific cards, his two Red Resources help him deal more damage. GutsHammer adds his Blast (3 unless something changes it) to your Blast Destiny. GutsThump lowers your opponent's Defense to 0, which can be a very powerful effect against defensive decks.

His two Yellow Resources are rather different. Buckethead let's you Power Up twice. Dex, Jokester, lets you destroy one of your opponent's Resources whenever you play a GutsMan card. Dex makes GutsMan especially brutal since without Resources, it's very hard to do anything to stop GutsMan from taking you out.

His Event is very powerful. For the low cost of destroying two of your own Resources, Feel The Thump (or as I like to call it,
SuperGutsThump!) nukes your opponent's side of the field. Your opponent loses everything they have in play EXCEPT their NetNavi!

BigHammer1 is the biggest non-variable BattleChip in the game.
+5 Strength from the Chip and another +1 from GutsMan's ability
puts him at a whopping 9 Strength! And it doesn't have a Power requirement, so it's possible to do on the first turn!

The biggest drawback to GutsMan is his low Strength. He can dish out a lot of damage, but he can't take it.
 

Otaku

New Feature: If you think this review is too long to read, just skip straight to the scores and then read the summary for a concise overview!  Yes, the summary now lives up to its name.

 

MegaMan is still a relatively new game.  As such, some of my terminology may be confusing, as I plan on using the game specific terms to refer to cards.  For example, Energy refers to cards in your deck, but Power refers to cards in your Power Gauge.  Confused?  You can download the current rule book here, from Decipher’s MegaMan TCG site.  If something doesn’t make sense, make sure the game meaning is being applied to the word.

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Name   : GutsMan

Title     : Body Strength

Set       : Power-Up!

ID         : 1 C 2

Type    : NetNavi

Emblem: [Gu]

Strength: 3

Defense: 1

Blast    : 3

Effect   : Whenever you play a BattleChip, your GutsMan is strength + 1.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  

Guts, GUTS, GUTS!

 

GutsMan is a Navi I have both run and faced.  And yes, that’s a brilliant taunt right after you wipe out four of your opponent’s Resources and five of their Power with an opening Feel the Thump. ;)

 

Stats                : There are no other versions of GutsMan, either Ally or NetNavi.  So on the upside, you aren’t losing out using this GutsMan, but you can’t try to find any sweet discounts from cards geared for working with the non-existent other GutsMan.  GutsMan provides his own Emblem, naturally: its text abbreviation is [Gu], and it looks like a thick green cross/plus sign on a black circle.

 

As for GutsMan’s side stats, he has the top Strength score in the game (S3), and was the first Navi with that score.  There are now five other Navi’s with that score.  It’s a great score: only five NetNavi’s have the Defense of three needed to soak all that damage.  GutsMan has a tiny Defense of just one.  Only three other NetNavi’s have that.  Fortunately for GutsMan, a full seven NetNavis have a mere Strength of one.  This means he is more likely to do as much damage or more damage to his opponent than they do to him (from Strength/Defense conflicts alone).  Only three other NetNavi’s have his Blast score of three, which is no longer the high.  It’s enough to make you shift away from Blasting, but not enough to make Blasting exceptionally rare.  The bright side is GutsMan can get away with running more low Destiny cards since the odds are better he’ll hit a high Destiny card when he Blasts.  If you do the math, you realize that GutsMan’s Strength and Defense balance out.  So his high Blast must be meant to pay for his effect.

 

Card Effect       : It looks like a solid trade off.  GutsMan’s effect gives him a +1 bonus to his Strength for each BattleChip his controller plays.  In a deck geared around it, you can often get a BattleChip off to close to every other of your turns.  I feel this is a good trade off, since some of those turns you’ll be doing more than one chip.

 

Uses/Combos   : GutsMan’s colors are Red and Yellow.  Here’s the rundown on his Navi-specific cards. 

 

BigHammer1 is raw power for GutsMan.  It needs [Y][Y][Gu] to be played, but gives a very solid +5 to his Strength.  Since this is a BattleChip, it becomes +6.  It’s topped off with a solid Destiny Number of three.  Given what we know of GutsMan, I’d say run at least three, maybe four of these.

 

Buckethead is a Yellow Resource with a Destiny Number of three.  It only requires [Gu] to be played.  To actually use it is pricey: when you spend this, you must then spend two other resources.  You don’t get the other resources effects’.  You do get to power-up twice for it.  Seems like a waste, but it’s quite comboliscious with Viruses, who normally are used just to fill Resources slots and spent only to get rid of them.  Good for an early game lead, but remember you’re also effectively doing two damage to yourself.  This kind of gives GutsMan a sort of “macho man” feel: the classic tough guy hurting himself to show how tough he is.

 

Dex, Jokester and Feel The Thump also lends to the whole “tough guy” image.  Dex, Jokester is pricey Yellow Resource to get into play: 4 Power and [Gu] to play it.  It does have a solid Destiny 4.  Its effect is pretty sweet.  It turns every GutsMan card you play (not even spend) into Resource destruction: play it, and then you may choose to nuke a resource.  Feel The Thump may very well be the defining card for GutsMan though.  It is a Yellow Event that requires [Gu][Gu][Gu] to play, and then makes you spend two Resources for no effect.  However, it is well worth it: doing this destroys every Resource and card in your opponent’s Power Gauge.  You could be using three cards to destroy nine of the opponents: a three for one deal sounds sweet.  It also has a solid Destiny of three.

 

GutsMan does a lot of damage, and Navis like Roll don’t care: they’ll just pump up their Defense to soak it if they can’t negate it.  That’s where GutsThump comes in.  A Red Resource, it only requires [Gu] to be put into play, but to use it requires you spend a Resource for no effect.  Sensing a theme?  This Red Resource is the flip side of WideSword: instead of zeroing out the opponent’s Strength, this reduces their Defense to zero.

 

The final GutsMan specific card is GutsHammer.  This Red Resource requires three Power and [Gu] to play.  This card is meant to encourage Blasting with GutsMan: you get to add your Blast to your Blast Destiny.  Unfortunately, that means a mere +3 damage.  Not bad, but not great.  Then remember that the cards only Destiny 2, which discourages Blasting.

 

To run GutsMan, use some Viruses to feed his self destructive Resource tendencies, and just hammer away with BattleChips while setting up some spectacular combos.  AreaSteal is a good deal for GutsMan.  So are the Boomers and Vulcans.  Defensive BattleChips are nice, since in a pinch they are still good for a +1 to Strength.  Barrier and Rock Cube look good.

 

Ratings

 

Casual             : 4.5/5-GutsMan is one of the best beginner NetNavis.  Even without his more rare support, he lends himself to a raw, super aggressive Beatdown deck.  The only drawback here is remembering you’re doing more damage than most other Navis, and taking more than you’d expect.

 

Tournament     : 4/5-GutsMan is still quite nice here.  With his Rare and better cards, he can be one of the top aggressive players.  He doesn’t become as sick as some Navis do, but he also doesn’t have as steep a learning curve.

 

Limited            : 4.75/5-The only thing keeping this from getting a perfect score is you might manage to pull GutsMan and somehow fail to pull any compatible cards.  That being said, as long as you can get your resources and BattleChips to match up (even off colors like Green or Blue), GutsMan can come out swinging.

 

Summary

GutsMan is a simple Navi that hits hard and fast.  You won’t Blast a lot, but you’ll be able to fake it with plenty of BattleChips.  Great for beginners, and while it works best with its official Red/Yellow color scheme, you can get by with Blue or Green.

 

-Otaku

 

 

 

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