Strike Battle and BUPPA Explained for Dragon Ball Super Divers

Strike Battles are timed button clashes in each battle area. They decide ki loss, faint, and chip damage to Team HP. BUPPA (official system name in English news) turns the 3rd area into a BUPPA zone from round two starting in Set 7. Set 13 Awakened Resolve, scheduled for 19 November 2026 in Japan, adds the Buchinuki Chance Area in the 2nd area on round one only. This page covers those layers; card placement basics sit in how to play.

How does one Strike Battle play out?

Each area fires two Strike Battles per fighting round when both sides committed cards: one for the attack role and one for the defense role (official order follows initiative starting from the initiative player’s 1st area). Inside a single Strike Battle both sides mash or time prompts; the cabinet judges who wins that exchange.

Outcomes chain as follows:

1. Button timing decides the strike winner for that role.
2. Ki damage applies to the losing side’s active cards in that area.
3. Faint triggers when a card’s ki hits zero. Fainted cards cannot attack and their skills do not activate for the rest of that round’s logic.
4. Team HP damage applies to the opponent’s shared pool when your attack strike succeeds.

If you launch an attack against a rival area where every defender already fainted, the damage uses a 1.5x multiplier. That rule rewards setting up sweeps rather than only tapping single targets.

How do special moves tie into Strike Battles?

Normally a special move in an area needs two conditions on the official chart:

• Combined special move energy from cards in that area meets the move’s threshold.
• Your side wins the attack Strike Battle in that area.

Triple Type Bonus stacks extra damage if Impact, Boost, and Rush types sit together in the attacking area and you hit the bonus prompt during the strike. Limited type does not replace that trio requirement.

BUPPA areas (below) and sealed-special effects can override parts of that checklist. If an effect seals specials, even BUPPA cannot force a locked special move until the seal ends.

When does an area become BUPPA, and what changes?

From Set 7 “All-Out Attack” onward, global rules add the BUPPA stage:

Starting round two, the 3rd area becomes a BUPPA area for both players. While it is active:

• Winning an attack Strike Battle there lets you fire a special without counting special move energy.
• Damage from that special uses 1.1x.
• Triple Type Bonus is treated as automatically successful in that area.
• BUPPA Skills printed on cards can still matter even on older stages before the BUPPA zone lights up, per official text.

If a seal effect blocks specials, the BUPPA area cannot bypass that seal. Plan another area or wait out the lock.

What is Buchinuki, and how is it different from BUPPA?

Buchinuki System (official English name on Bandai news) arrives with Set 13 Awakened Resolve, Japan launch scheduled November 19, 2026. Card lists for that set were still unpublished on November 11, 2026; treat mechanic descriptions as preview facts from official news, not from leaked stats.

On round one only, the 2nd area becomes Buchinuki Chance Area. If you win the Strike Battle there as the attacker:

• Every attacking card in that area regains full ki.
• You gain one extra ki orb, raising the ki orb cap from four to five for that fight.

That is a one-round tempo spike in the middle lane, separate from the round-two BUPPA transformation in the 3rd area. After round one, area two returns to normal labeling per the preview rules.

Set 13 also advertises two action skills on news pages:

• Buchinuki Strike: a button-rush minigame breaking rock plates for large damage that ignores Guard.
• True Awakening (unofficial translation of official Japanese name): a fusion-focused awakening sequence shown with Vegito in marketing copy.

We will expand card-specific interactions after Bandai posts the Set 13 list on dbsdv.com. Until then, see the Set 13 hub for schedule-only facts.

Where do the multipliers and bypass effects stack?

Use this cheat sheet when theorycrafting; always confirm on the cabinet after patches.

How should beginners practice Strike Battles?

Trial Diver Passport players can still run story modes that include strikes, but they cannot enter Ranked where strike consistency matters most. Tourists should burn a few Strike Battle Rush runs (simplified mode) to learn button cadence before touching Build-heavy teams. Pair practice with the beginner guide passport table and the tier list only as a third-party Japanese blog opinion, not official balance.

For background on machine availability and English status, see what is Super Divers. For card letters and type synergy, return to how to play.

Sources and verification

Last verified: November 11, 2026. Built from Bandai’s official Super Divers pages (guide, BUPPA system, news 282 Set 13 preview, news) and English Dragon Ball news entry for Awakened Resolve. English names marked “unofficial translation” are ours, not Bandai’s. This is an independent fan reference, not affiliated with BANDAI NAMCO, Dimps or Toei Animation.