L5R CCG Strategy

In addition to weekly articles about the design process, the design team wants to give the casual player (and the casual tournament player) a better insight into what it takes to be a great L5R player. This series of articles is meant not only as a method to help the community improve its play but to better understand competitive L5R as a whole. The design team feels that when players better understand how the environment has changed in a massive way players will enjoy the game on a higher level, as well as helping create a game with a solid competitive tournament scene.

Below is a decklist that took top4 this past weekend at the Toronto storyline tournament, that had heavy numbers of Crane and Unicorn players and an analysis. Hope you like the article.

Jared DS
PDT
T3ch news editor

How to Win with Lion in the Web of Lies Environment

By Danny Swartz

When Web of Lies came out, I was excited to see that my clan, the Lion, had received a new mechanic. Many of the Lion personalities in Web had abilities that forced other players' personalities to move into the battle, whether they liked it or not. This "provoke" mechanic added an entirely new flavor to building Lion decks, and it was in keeping with Lion's "Enough talk, you silly Crane/Scorpion/whatever, now face me in battle!" attitude that was traditional for the clan.

In terms of gameplay, however, the provoke mechanic (and Web of Lies as whole) took Lion in an entirely new direction. When I first built my provoke deck, I added cards that were traditionally good in Lion. Strength of Purity. Wedge. The new card called "The Fortunes Smile". After some testing, however, I realized that these cards weren't good in a Lion deck anymore. And soon after, I figured out why.

Here's why, kiddos: Lion, post-Web of Lies, is a control deck. Yep, that's right. This is why so many Lion players have had trouble building good Lion decks in Web. For the first time in our clan's illustrious history, our focus has shifted away from sending huge armies to war and over to tactical elimination of personalities. In short, Lion now kills people first, and takes provinces second.

So, in order to help out Lion players and the L5R community in general, I'm now going to go over what a good Lion deck should look like, piece by piece. While the deck I'm going to show you isn't exactly the same deck that I played in Toronto (I changed 4 or 5 meta slots around to match what I thought the environment was going to be like), it's close enough that it should enable you to do well in any tournament.

Stronghold: Kenson Gakka
Sensei: Gozoku Sensei
Wind: None

Kenson Gakka still remains the best stronghold for Lion. Shiranai Toshi is bad due to the fact that terrains are no longer nearly as powerful as they were in early Diamond. While Kyuden Ikoma is decent, it doesn't measure up to Gakka in terms of overall usefulness: while it may sound insignificant, the ability to Sup Strat and Rain with your non-tactician people is very important to the deck. Destroying a Mieko to destroy two opposing people with Rain is a much better tradeoff than destroying, say, a Rokku, or a Mirotai loaded down with followers.

Gozoku Sensei may seem like an odd choice to some people. "Why would you choose a sensei that makes it so Matsu Aoiko, Lion's best boxable, is no longer boxable?" you may ask. Well, first of all, Aoiko isn't that good anymore, believe it or not. She doesn't contribute at all to any of the deck's control aspects, and she has a blank text box, which is becoming increasingly unacceptable as more and more personalities with printed battle actions are created. With Gozoku, you'll still start at 5 honor, which is higher than most clans. This means that you'll have favor control in a majority of matchups. So what does Gozoku do for the deck? When you use Gozoku sensei's primary ability (the lockdown one) on your opponent's personalities, it not only bows them, it also prevents them from straightening until you use it again. This means that when you Provoke them, they try to straighten, but your Gozoku friends prevent that, and they move into the battle bowed and fairly helpless. Easy kill. Gozoku is the action phase half of this deck's personality control engine, and Provoke is the battle phase half. Together, they form the basis for a formidable Lion Control deck.

Events (2):
1x Commanding Favor
1x The Death of Ryoshun

Commanding Favor is an obvious choice for the deck, since it allows for a one-shot use of the Gozokuage without having to actually gain and discard the Imperial Favor. Death of Ryoshun is more of an all-purpose meta card that shuts down many cards you will see in a tournament. Just to name a few: Utaku Tarako, in Unicorn; Yoritomo Tokaro or Tsuruchi Etsui, in Mantis; Doji Saori, in Crane; Underhand of the Emperor, Tangen Sensei or Tejina's Blessings, in Scorpion; and any of the Elemental Dragons in Phoenix's City of Remembrance.

Holdings (15):
1x A Favor Returned
3x Copper Mine
3x Crystal Mine
1x Gifts and Favors
1x Shrine of Duty
3x Shrine to Benten
3x Shrine to Daikoku
Regions (3):
3x City of Gold

I have listed holdings and regions together for a reason: City of Gold is an important part of this gold scheme. Why City of Gold? Think about it. Crystal Mine + City buys Rokku for cheap, or Kuemon for full. Copper Mine + City buys Tadneori for cheap, or unlocks a person from the ever-popular Doji Saori. Benten + City buys Kuemon for cheap.

City also enables the deck run an abnormally high number of holdings that cost more than 2 gold (7, in my case). Normally, I would never run more than 5 such holdings in any deck, since if I were to run more, the chances of flipping two 3-or-more cost holdings on turn 2 (after getting Gifts on turn 1), and thus being unable to buy two holdings on turn two, would become too high. In this deck, the reasonably high chance of flipping a City of Gold by turn 2 mitigates the chance of flipping two 3-cost holdings on turn 2 after getting Gifts and Favors on turn 1, since you will be able to use the City with Gifts and Favors to buy a 3-cost holding.

Why all of the singular holdings? Won't I get gold screwed by flipping 2 Daikokus on turn 2? Surprisingly, no. While this gold scheme doesn't look very consistent on paper, it's consistent enough to give you a decent gold chain in 9 out of 10 games. And it has the raw economic power that Lion needs in order to purchase expensive 7, 8, and 9 cost people. Chances are, you won't need much gold besides the 3 holdings you get on turns 1 and 2 as long as two or three powerful holdings (Benten, Crystal, Daikoku, Copper) to pay for your more expensive personalities. I suggest that anyone who wants to play Lion give this gold scheme a try. It's many times more consistent and powerful than Farm Scheme or Geisha Scheme, which I have seen a lot of in other people's Lion decks posted online.

[Jared]
I cannot stress enough the importance of having 3x of all the singular holdings, and not only for this deck. Running more singular holdings then most of the players in the field gives you a massive edge in terms of what you can buy on turn 3 and onward.

Personalities (20):
3x Akodo Kuemon
3x Akodo Mirotai
3x Akodo Rokku
3x Akodo Tadenori
1x Ikoma Korin (Experienced)
3x Matsu Mieko
3x Otomo Taneji
1x Toturi Kurako (Experienced)

You'll notice that 13 out of 20 people are printed tacticians. That's because this deck lives and dies by its printed tacticians. Actions such as Rain of Death and Forward Sentries, which are some of the best cards in the fate deck, require printed tacticians to work. So it's generally good to have as many as possible. "Why no Tamago, Nimuro, or other random huge people?" you may ask. It's quite simple. Lion cannot afford to run such large people. This deck already has fairly expensive personalities to begin with, and none of Lion's huge people synergize at all with the provoke mechanic; adding huge people would accomplish very little. Now, I'll go over some of these people in detail.

Akodo Mirotai is your powerhouse personality. You should use his ability every turn, with no exceptions. Why? Well, since you're playing Kenson Gakka, he'll get his tactician trait back as soon as you assign him to a battle, so he can still Sup Strat and Rain of Death like a tactician. And since he doesn't lose the printed tactician trait, he still counts for forming Rain of Death and Forward Sentries.

Akodo Tadenori, honestly, is a weak point in the deck. He has the aforementioned disadvantage of a blank text box, as well as 0 force, which is bad since he'll end up tying a battle against a bowed personality if he's on his own. The only reason he's in the deck is because there are no better alternatives in terms of reasonably costed printed tacticians. Hopefully Lion will receive a better alternative to Tadenori in Enemy of my Enemy.

Matsu Mieko is a boxable personality 90% of the time. She's also a Gozoku for purposes of Misdirection. Her ability is fairly useless, but sometimes it's nice to know it's there, and I have managed to threaten with it a couple times during extended games.

Otomo Taneji is your all-around bowing for stuff man. During the action phase, he bows for the favor, and he bows for Gozoku's honor-manipulation ability. If you don't have anything to do with him during the action phase, send him into battle! You can bow him to pay for Slaughter the Scout, draw cards with him via Stay Your Blade, or Misdirect some nasty battle action to him ("No, you duel Taneji!").

FATE (40)
Actions (34):
3x Fall on Your Knees
3x Few Against Many
3x Forward Sentries
3x Misdirection
2x Peasant Vengeance
2x Plans Within Plans
3x Rage of Matsu
3x Rain of Death
3x Slaughter the Scout
3x Stay Your Blade
3x Superior Strategist
3x Tireless Assault
Followers (6):
3x Warrior Pilgrim
3x Zashiki Warashi

Ok, I'll do this part card by card.
Fall on Your Knees is an unfortunate necessity in this deck. I hate having to run it, but my deck depends on some key reactions (Few, Misdirection, Slaughter), and I need to run my own Falls in order to prevent them from being canceled by my opponent's Falls. Also, Feign Death can mess up this deck, so Fall is great for canceling that. Few Against Many is half of your battle pk protection package. People will try to kill your tacticians in battle; most decks, once provoked, won't just sit there and do nothing. Hence Few is necessary to protect them. And yes, between Mirotai and 6 fateside followers, you'll have enough followers to protect the important guys.

Forward Sentries is your big provoke card. If you can get a Sentries or two going, you generally win. Remember to target their most important unit first so that if they cancel it or something, you can hit the same unit again with the second use.

Misdirection is the other half of your battle pk protection package. It triggers off of both Taneji and Mieko, and you'll generally have at least one in play. Remember that you can send many actions right back at your opponent with it, such as Refugees and Utaku Tarako's ability. Peasant Vengeance is spot battle pk. Useful for picking off small units that you don't want to waste a Rain on.

Plans Within Plans is generally for getting the favor on your opponent's turn. If you have one in your hand on turn 3 (and you went first), you can grab the favor on their turn 3, then unbow on your turn 4, and basically lock a guy for free. You can even grab the favor again and lock two guys, if the situation dictates. If you can't get the favor with Plans, you can always use it with Mirotai for a free follower, or you can attach a follower from your hand in order to set up a Few Against Many.

Rage of Matsu is your Written in Blood. Remember how I said that this was a control deck? Rage is a one guy = one provoke card. Although it doesn't possess the sheer lethality of Written on its own, I make this comparison because it's great in the early game just like Written, when you have only a few guys on the table and can't form a Forward Sentries yet. I have only used the first action on Rage a few times in my many test games, although it's good to cycle it if you don't need it for some reason. The main use of Rage is for the tactical action. Remember that you can also use Rage of Matsu on the defense to basically Tireless one of your units into the battle for free. Also, one other thing: since Rage of Matsu always satisfies the Rule of Relevance on its own, you can perform it with tacticians not in the battle! One of the key plays in one of my games against Crane in Toronto this past weekend was using a Saori-locked tactician at home to Rage in my opponent's Saori and Slaughter her, thus ending her reign of terror.

Rain of Death is your BIG kill card. It's one of the most lethal cards in the environment right now, and generally, if you get it in play, it's all over for your opponent. Remember that you can use tacticians in other locations for Rain's first ability.

Slaughter the Scout is another spot pk card. It's great for getting rid of a unit that you just provoked before it can do anything. Just make sure that you have a Fall to protect it if you suspect that your opponent is packing Falls; a Falled Slaughter is a recipe for disaster. Slaughter is best used with Akodo Rokku's ability; since Rokku's provoke takes place before the battle action segment, your Slaughter is un-Fallable at that point. Stay Your Blade is card draw, plain and simple. Sup Strat is a "duh!" card in Gakka. It gets you whatever you need. And I'm sure you all know what Tireless does by now.

Warrior Pilgrim is a great follower that cycles itself when you play it. But I'm sure that you're all wondering about Zashiki Warashi. It kills things, plain and simple. A ranged 6 is strong. Plus it draws attention away from your tacticians: most people will freak out when they see it and try to kill it ASAP. If you put it on a Mieko or Taneji, this will help you keep your tacticians alive so you can drop that all-important Rain or Sentries.

[Jared]
Here are some other options to include as fateside slots.

I like to run Explored Terrain in my version of the deck. You usually play it before you begin provoking your opponents units or as your first action in a battle. It wastes one of the opponents kill actions and can combo off of rain of death, reducing the destruction cost of the formation.

I have found occasionally that 6 followers + Akodo Mirotai is just not enough consistency for Few Against Many and Peasant Vengeance. In addition you can often end up using up your followers in hand too early in the game since your opponent will often target and kill your units with followers first. Cavalry Reserves is a great additional follower to play in the deck. Its effectively 2 followers in one since you can use it to create actions twice in a battle.

One of the major issues this deck can have is with the smaller opposed battles. There just aren't that many one shot actions in the fate deck, you are usually looking to get into an all your personalities versus all their personalities type of battle. This is not always easy or possible. I have found that with Explored Territory in the deck you can run a 6 terrain and 3 Well Prepared package if you have major issues with this in testing.

Now, I'll discuss matchups. Based on showings at recent tournaments, the field you can expect to see at a reasonably sized tournament is going to be about 1/3 Crane (of various types) and 1/3 Unicorn (mostly Special K). The last third will be made up of small chunks of the other clans.

Versus most kinds of Crane, you'll generally want to buy gold for at least 2 and a half turns (on turn three, buy two holdings and a personality, or all holdings if it flips that way), especially if you go second. Then, on turn 4, start buying 3-4 people a turn and don't stop. The reason it's necessary to play this way is because many Crane decks, consciously or not, are geared toward handling a turn 4 attack. If try to set up an attack turn 4, you'll be playing right into their hand. Again, your primary goal is to kill people rather than take provinces; focus on removing important targets like Kakita and Saori. Slaughter these important people as they move in so they can't run away with Weigh the Cost. Once you clear the board, you can take provinces at your leisure.

[Jared]
What Danny eludes to here but doesn't completely flesh out is the best way to beat honor decks in L5R has always been production advantage and not speed. Honor decks have trouble dealing with large numbers of personalities not 2 personalities a turn. Sacrificing buying a personality on turn 3 to be able to buy 1 more each turn for the rest of the game gives you a massive advantage in the honor matchup.

Versus Unicorn, your strategy will be almost the opposite of Crane, since early Gozoku lock is key. Try to set up to buy a Taneji and a holding turn 2 if you can. A turn 2 Taneji means that you can get the favor turn 3, and lock down whatever guy they buy on their turn 2. Your entire goal here is to stop their blitz. If you can live long enough to attack and lay down a Sentries and/or Rain, you've got the game won. Special K does run Confusion at Court to stop Gozoku, but between regular favor uses, Plans Within Plans, and Commanding Favor, you should have more than enough uses to keep them locked down.

[Jared]
Watch out for Unicorn decks using meta slots to deal with Gozoku like Confusion at Court. The play of buying a turn 2 person is often too risky in this matchup. You should consider either of the following two plays depending on draw: if your gold draw is solid you can often buy two personalities (1 at full) and a boxable personality on turn 3. Unicorn decks will likely take one of your provinces or kill one of your personalities still leaving you with two personalities at the least on the board. You should be able to gain some semblance of control from here, or buy a boxable and a holding turn 2 if your draw doesn't look as stellar. Remember you want to draw out their confusion at courts early so stay ahead of them in honor and lock their board, using provoke as a personality kill mechanism.

Against other decks, you can generally let the situation dictate your plays. If it looks like there's not going to be much resistance, attack on turn 4 and try to kill stuff. If you can't, buy guys for full and wait until turn 5.

When it looks like you're honor running, a military deck will be pressured to attack you and then you'll be in good shape, since you can attack and provoke them at your leisure, or just defend and drop a Rain. Don't worry about losing a province or two. Your goal is to maintain personality advantage, not province advantage. Of course, you should try to take provinces when you can, since taking provinces is ultimately your victory condition.

That's pretty much all there is to say about Lion Control for the moment. I plan to take a deck similar to this one to many of the Koteis that I plan to attend, and I hope that many other Lion players will do the same. Together, we can prove to the L5R world that Lion is still a force to be reckoned with! RAWR!!!!!!!

[Jared] I left in the last part even though it made me cry.