Just to archive some of my decks from the old boards before they go bye bye, Not so much for the list itself but for the memories alongside the actual playing the deck. These represent my road trips and are something I don't want to forget.

Hanzo: 1/9/2008

As of set 10, Hanzo receives his Ninja Battle Suit, upgrading to Hanzo+. For now though, the original Hanzo after many, many ninja missions can rotate happily, to live the life of a Hokage.

*Hanzo*
3x 3/2 Agohani Geri (Water)

4x 3/5 Rejection (Evil/Water)
4x 5/4 Tag Along (Air/Water)

4x 0/6 Broken Leg (Infinity)
4x 0/6 Owlface (Infinity)
4x 1/4 Addes Syndicate (Evil)
4x 3/3 Seal of Cessation (Infinity)
4x 4/4 Fan Blade (Evil/Water)

4x 1/3 Ninjitsu (Evil/Water)
4x 2/5 Shinobi Tradition (Evil/Water)
4x 2/5 Ibis Minuet (Air/Water)
4x 2/5 Higher Calibur (Air/Evil/Water)
4x 2/5 Blood Runs True (Evil)
4x 2/5 Red Lotus of Fun (Evil)
4x 2/5 Control the Present (Evil)
4x 3/4 TYPFG (Infinity)

Sideboard:
1x *Yoshitora* (Evil/Water)
3x 3/3 Ichi no Tachi (Evil)
4x 1/4 Dodge Step (Air/Misc)

First of all, why Hanzo? In essence he is a blank, Evil/Water 8hs, 20vit character... that's really all there is to it. In a format where 7hs Evil is dominant (Ibuki, Zi Mei, Olexa, Akuma, Cody...), Hanzo has pure, traditional card advantage over the meta. The higher you play in a tournament, the greater the chance of facing 7hs Evil. In these matchups where board position is all important, the greater handsize has the advantage, hence, Hanzo is king.

The kill is just Agohani/Ibis/Shinobi/Fan Blade. Depending on decks and position, sometimes the Fan Blade or Shinobi aren't needed (though these games are rare). The kill is backed up by Ninjitsu for anti-negation. Two Ninjitsu forms and your E's and R's become solid, so as to bypass Addes, Air Base, Po8, etc.

As for construction, yes there are a lot of four-of's and copies in playsets. Another player may want to trim some of the fat (slacking on Tag Along, Fan Blade, etc). Basically the four-of's are my playstyle. I like to mulligan aggressively and running this kind of numbers set up allows for this without a mulligan really affecting your deck in any way or really impacting the numbers of copies of your key cards. Everything in four-of's are cards I want to draw early game (or have in hand as early game response's). I want to see Fan Blade/Ibis/Shinobi before I see Agohani. I want to be able to Tag Along-Agohani in any given turn I am set up. Because of this, the deck plays four-of's.

Up until the kill, Rejections, Broken Legs (clearing from your pool with Ibis) and Fan Blade life gain (usually calling 2 for life gain off foundations) keep you alive and topped up. After you cycle, your deck is thinned but will still contain the 8 Rejection/Legs in a smaller deck, increasing the chances of drawing/playing through these as the game goes on. In three major tournaments there has been only one occasion where Hanzo had to Broken Leg without clearing it with Ibis. On all other occasions, Ibis has been in play and has been used to pitch the Broken Leg from your card pool. In an emergency, Ninjitsu can be used to tap your own Ibis (destroying itself in the process) if you need to clear a Broken Leg.

No Pieces of Eight... it was originally in side deck for worlds but was taken out for Dodge Step in UK Teams. In a deck with 2 checks, Po8 is a risky first turn card and as such is not a viable first turn defence vs Talim and other aggro (AS decks come to mind...). Control the Present eats Talim. It's also very useful vs Chain Throw, Zi Mei, Ukyo and a slew of other multiple E characters. It can be played with 100% certainty turn one and can really slow aggro down.

The reason Chesters Backing is not in the deck was the team split. Baz (Talbain) and Ross (Sakura) needed the Backing's more than Hanzo, so I used TYPFG instead. It would have been fun to hit the Calibur/Backing combo, but in all but one of the Team Nats games (excluding the game against a Viewtiful Donovan Order deck), Calibur/Backing wouldn't have really helped. In the Order matchup though, yes, Calibur/Backing would be absolutely broken and 100% needs to go.

TYPFG really earned a place in this deck following some initial response war games at Indy. Having TYPFG and Owlface as Form (non-response) based ways to push through Owlface vs Lotus/Oral Deed is very needed. Without TYPFG you are at a disadvantage where Owlface vs Lotus/Deed loses the numbers game 4:8 ratio. TYPFG also aids the kill turn, tapping Calibur, Addes, BRT et al.

*Yoshitora* has always been a solid alternative starter. Against E' based aggro (Ukyo, Zi Mei, Donovan, Olexa, Akuma, Night Terror, Mai...) he provides a little extra board and character control. The three extra vitality can also offer some extra padding if needed. Probably the main choice for running Hanzo main and Yoshitora side is Ibuki. With little to no character card based E', Yoshitora really doesn't help. Instead Hanzo has card advantage over her.

The decks record was 1st place (unbeaten) in Grinder 3 at GenCon Indy, Worlds Top 8 (losing only to Ukyo in siwss and top 8 ), UK Teams 1st Place (losing to Donovan in swiss). I'm happy with that. Even better, the Hanzo character card has now evolved to a thing of beauty. I now have two signed *Hanzo*'s and a special chibi-Hanzo that fits in the deck sleeve, drawn by Patriot Games resident artist. I'll try to get some pics of these online tonight.

Matt.H

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Lizardman: 9/10/2008

Edits:
Tabarzin moved to sidedeck, Nefarious Deeds side-decked.
Dormant for Millions of Years removed.
Title edited - Lizardman is no longer Dormant for Millions of Years!
Chesters Backing added.
Sideboard updated.
Chesters Backing moved to sideboard.

Character:
1x ::Lizardman::

Attacks: 15
4x 4/3 High Plasma Beam
4x 4/3 Circuit Scrapper
4x 4/3 Sakura’s Shinku Hadoken
3x 5/3 Tabarzin

Actions: 8
4x 3/5 Rejection
4x 3/5 Tag Along

Assets: 4
4x Owlface

Foundations: 32
4x 1/4 Battle Prowess
4x 1/5 Empire’s Ruin
4x 2/4 Shooting Capoeira
4x 2/4 Hybrid Style
3x 2/5 Tenacious
4x 3/4 Chinese Boxing
4x 3/4 Gorgeous Team
4x 3/5 Program Malfunction
1x 6/3 Giradot’s Leadership

Sideboard:
1x ::Sakura::
1x 2/5/3 Tabarzin
4x 4/6 Chesters Backing

I tried Lizard Chaos/Water, Maternal Instinct’s wasn’t great (possibly the 5hs), Water with Gorgeous Team definitely seemed better. You can Lizardman E’ the Gorgeous Team’ed card to pick up Rejection, recycle it with Hybrid Style, recycle Hybrid Style with Shooting Capoeira which also recycles Chinese Boxing, Gorgeous Team and Battle Prowess. Until close to the kill turn, you just drop 1-2 attacks every turn (using Tenacious to end turns with an attack in hand), using your own attacks to fuel your recursion into Chinese Boxing’s, Capoeira’s, Gorgeous Teams, Giradot’s, etc.

Possibly too many 4cc’s than is healthy, but all of them seem to help each other out.

Chesters Backing was making the deck way too top heavy (even with Lizardman's hand cycling). So they went to sideboard to make room for the Tabarzin's back in. Still have the Boxing's/Malfunctions/Owlface in there for lockdown so it's not all bad!

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