As we round out the year, we get to experience our final set of 2025 here in North America: Carrying On His Will, released on November 7th 2025. This set is very unique and seems extremely balanced whereas, in the past few years, almost all of the leaders presented at the end of the year proved to be VERY powerful. It's refreshing to see that not every leader in the last set of the year is overwhelming. Set 13 has 6 leaders, four of them being multicolored leaders and 2 of them being mono-colored leaders. As with almost all leader reviews, there is a lot to unpack with this. Lets dive into it my fellow seafarers!

Monkey .D. Luffy

Yes, as the Main Character of the One Piece franchise, we have yet another Monkey .D. Luffy leader. This particular Luffy upholds the standard for multicolored leader statistics with 5000 power and 4 life, and has the following ability: "[DON!!x1][On Your Opponent's Attack] If you have 5 or less active DON!! cards, you may rest any number of your DON!! cards. For every DON!! Card rested this way, this Leader or up to 1 of your 'Straw Hat Crew' type characters gains +200 power during this battle."

Green is well known for resting and unresting cards on the table for its benefit, but this Luffy really wants to put the walls up. Granted, you need to have a DON!! on your Luffy leader in order to utilize his ability, but you can rest 1 DON!! and give a character or leader +2000 instead of just adding +1000 power to your character on your opponent's attack, potentially preventing you from drawing a life card or losing your board state. Sure, this ability only benefits Straw Hat type characters, but there are a plenty of Straw Hat characters we can choose from. Let's take look at some of them from this very set!

Sanji and Nico Robin both are odd cost characters that curve out well as long as you are on the play with Monkey .D. Luffy as your leader. Sanji is a 5 cost 7000 power Character, whereas Nico Robin is a 7 cost 7000 power character with a +1000 counter. Sanji has two abilities, "[On Play] Set up to 2 of your DON!! cards as active." as well as "[End of your turn] If your Leader has the [FILM] or [Straw Hat Crew] type, set up to 1 of your DON!! cards as active." Sanji enables you to ensure you have DON!! up for a counter event or simply for your own Leaders ability when he hits the field (ideally turn three) as well as unresting something on the board. Tie in the cost with the power and abilities and this Sanji should be a target that your opponent will want to get rid of.

Moving on with our hypothetical turn, we can go ahead and drop Nico Robin who has the ability "[On Play] Up to 1 of your opponent's Characters with a cost of 8 or less cannot be rested until the end of your opponent's next End Phase". She's pseudo-removal, but this is a big body that ensures an opposing big body won't be swinging toward you.

Portgas .D. Ace.

Portgas .D. Ace is a multicolored leader with irregular stats at 6000 power and 3 life. Portgas .D. Ace has the two following abilities: "[On Your Opponent's Attack][Once Per Turn] You may Trash 1 card from your hand: Give up to 1 of your opponent's Leader or Character cards -2000 power during this battle." and "[DON!!x1][Once Per Turn] When you take damage or your Character with 6000 base power or more is K.O.'d, draw 1 card."

Ace brings some self-defense for him and his characters, like Luffy, but he is not limited by a subtype. And he has a way to draw cards on your opponent's turn! Three life can be scary, but Ace brings a lot of protection to the table as well as being a 6000 power leader. It is worth noting that Ace upholds the Whitebeard Pirates card type so he can synergize with previously printed Whitebeard Cards such as Izo from the most recent Whitebeard starter deck and Portgas .D. Ace character from Starter deck 15

Neither of those characters are from Carrying On His Will, but they are potential additions to your Portgas .D. Ace deck! So, let's go over some fiery characters to include in your Portgas .D. Ace deck from this current set. For this leader we'll want to look at Edward Newgate and Vista, both of which curve out well as long as you go second.

Starting off with the Captain of the Whitebeard Pirates, Edward Newgate is a 10-cost 12000 power character with Blocker and the following ability: "[On Play] Draw 2 cards and trash 1 card from your hand. Then, give your Leader and 1 Character up to 2 rested DON!! Cards each." Edward Newgate dodges abilities like the previously mentioned Nico Robin with such a huge cost while also providing a hard blocker to try and get around, on top of filling up your hand and buffing up your board. There isn't much that Edward Newgate isn't going to accomplish after he lands on the table.

Vista is a 6-cost 8000 power character with Double Attack and the following ability: "[Once Per Turn] If this character would be K.O.'d or would be removed from the field by your opponent's effect, you may trash 1 card with a type including 'Whitebeard Pirates' from your hand instead." This is yet another Character that dodges removal at a cost, but it's one of the many within OPTCG's current cardpool. Vista is a big body that will need to be blocked or at least countered for your opponent to avoid drawing 2 from life.

Jewelry Bonney

Jewelry Bonney is our only Yellow Leader in Set 13. She upholds the standard mono-color leader statistics of 5000 power and 5 life and has the following ability: "[Your Turn][Once Per Turn] This effect can be activated when you play a character with a trigger. Give up to 2 rested DON!! Cards to 1 of your Leader or Character cards." Jewelry Bonney has an ability that relies on you playing with cards with trigger, but outside of that there is no other limitation to this leader. Play Characters, buff your characters. While there aren't a whole lot of Bonney Pirates cards for Bonney to synergize with, there are a fair amount of cards that synergize with the "Egghead" subtype. Let's go over some support characters that belong within a Jewelry Bonney deck from this set.

S-Snake is a 4-cost 5000 power character with +1000 counter and the following ability: "[On Play]/[When Attacking] You may turn one card from the top of your life cards face-up: Give up to 1 of your opponent's characters -2000 power during this turn." While it's dependent on the amount of cards in your life pile, this ability can potentially trigger twice and allow you to more easily remove opposing characters from the board by means of combat. S-Snake also has a trigger of "You may trash 1 card from your hand: Play this card." It's definitely a base-level threat on the battlefield but has growing potential as the game goes on, as long as she stays on the board.

On the other side of the cost spectrum, Jewelry Bonney is a 9-cost 10000 power character with the following ability: "[On Play] If your Leader has the [Egghead] type, this Character gains [Rush] during this turn. Then, your opponent adds 1 card from the top of their Life to their hand." as well as a trigger that reads, "If you have 1 or less life cards, rest up to 1 of your opponent's characters with a cost of 7 or less." As long as Bonney's on play ability triggers, she will be swinging in for a minimum of two life, if not the game. Don't forget that with her leader ability, Bonney can turn this character into a 12000 power attack as soon as she drops instead of a 10000 power attack! The trigger is a bit limited, especially if your opponent has a board full of like 8+ cost characters, but 9 times out of 10 this trigger should hit something.

Sabo

Sabo is a Red and Black leader with irregular statistics for a multicolored leader at 5000 power and 5 life. Sabo has a static ability of "If you have 4 or more life cards, give this Leader -1000 power," in addition to his leader ability "[DON!!x1] If you have a character with a cost of 8 or more, your Leader and all of your Characters gain +1000 power."

Sabo certainly brings something new to the table when it comes to Red and Black leaders. Not only does he start off with an additional life compared to most multicolored leaders, but he also brings in a way to buff your leader and other characters without needing to worry about taking a life to get back to the standard 5000 leader power. Granted, you will need to have a character with cost 8 or more on the field, so you will want to protect your life as much as possible until then. But with Sabo there is plenty of opportunity to make it to the late game. There are plenty of revolutionary cards that were printed in previous sets, such as Sabo from 500 Years in the Future and Monkey .D. Dragon from Legacy of the Master.

But, I'd like to talk about the Set 13 printings for both of those characters!

We'll start off with one of our secret rares of the set, Sabo. There is a lot going on with this character, but he is a 6-cost, 7000 power with blocker and the ability "[Activate:Main][Once PEr Turn] Up to 1 of your characters gains +2 cost until the end of your opponent's next turn. Then, give up to 1 rested DON!! Card to your leader," This Sabo was definitely created with the Sabo leader in mind, enabling you to have an 8 cost character on turn three if you drop Sabo and buff his cost from 6 to 8 and then you can throw a DON!! onto Sabo leader to ensure that you can utilize the leader ability. On top of this ability which enables Sabo to fully utilize his strength, Sabo is a 7000 power blocker that can be hard to get around.

Monkey .D. Dragon is a 6-cost 7000 power leader with +1000 counter and the ability "[Once Per Turn] If your 'Revolutionary Army' type character would be removed from the field by your opponent's effect, you may give this character -2000 power during this turn instead." Monkey .D. Dragon works as protection for other Revolutionary characters while also operating as a beat stick on the field!

Gol .D. Roger

Gol .D. Roger is a Red and Purple leader with irregular stats of 7000 power and 5 life, and he has the following static leader ability: "If you have any DON!! cards on your field, 1 DON!! Card placed during your DON!! Phase is given to your leader. If you have 9 or less DON!! Cards on your field, give this leader -2000 power."

It's good to see that even if Bandai makes a 7000 power leader with the same amount of life as a mono-colored leader, they recognize that there might need to be a nerf to initial strength out the gate. Regardless, Roger is a leader that wants a lot of DON!! Interaction and forces a DON!! to be utilized if you are under a certain DON!! count.

Much like the other leaders we have discussed so far, we need to go over two characters that work well alongside Gol .D. Roger from this set!

Gol .D. Roger is a 10-cost 13000 power character with the static ability "Your Leader and all of your characters that do not have a type including 'Roger Pirates' have their effects negated" and the following ability "[On Play] DON!! -3: Your Leader gains +2000 power until the end of your opponent's next end phase. Then, give all of your opponent's characters -2000 power until the end of your opponent's next End Phase." While costly at 10 DON!! total, this character still has a whooping 13000 power to swing in with on your next turn while also buffing your leader and shrinking the opposing forces. Without any form of gaining more DON!! next turn, your leader will be reduced down to 5000 power instead of 7000 with the Gol .D. Roger character ability, but I am sure there are a few ways around that.

Silvers Rayleigh is a 8-cost purple character with 9000 power and Rush. He has the ability: "[On Play] If you have any DON!! cards given, rest up to 1 of your opponent's characters with a cost of 5 or less. Then, add up to 1 DON!! card from your DON!! deck and set it as active at the end of this turn." Rayleigh provides a way to get around Roger Leaders DON!! demands within his static ability while also either getting rid of a threat on your opponents board or knocking out a minimum of a 5-cost character.

Even though we've gone over the Pirate king he is not our final leader of the set. There is still one last, mono colored leader, we need to discuss...

Imu

Imu is a Mono-Black 5000 power leader with 4 life and the following static ability: "Under the rules of this game, you cannot include Events with a cost of 2 or more in your deck and at the start of the game, play up to 1 'Mary Geoise' type Stage card from your deck."

In addition to this static ability, Imu has the following leader ability "[Activate: Main][Once Per Turn] You may trash 1 of your 'Celestial Dragons' type characters or 1 card from your hand: Draw 1 card.

There is a lot to unpack with this leader. Imu somewhat balances himself out by starting off at 4 life and limiting the kind of events you can play within your 50-card deck. However, being able to start with a stage on the board right off the bat and also having a viable draw engine is nothing but gas. Within the current storyline of One Piece, there isn't much known about Imu, so you will notice a "?" where there would normally be an attribute in the top right hand corner as well as in the leader's sub-type.

Imu does not simply have one or two characters that work along well with him, but working alongside this leader are the Five Elder Stars that directly report to him. Each Elder Star performs their own unique ability that supports Imu's agenda and playstyle. I won't be going into each of these characters, as there is a lot to unpack with them, but please have a look for yourself.

With all of these ground-shaking leaders and characters coming to the table, which one speaks the most to you? 'Till the seas do us part next time, fellow seafarers!