Kazuya! http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_new.asp?eidn=691

Discuss.

Nice to see more of the character stacking mechanic! Plus, he is also Infiltrating in character form!

HAHA! I KNEW he was gonna have speed + damage buffing! I called it last night on the King thread.

As an aside, I love the fact that he encourages character stacking (I'm a Yi Shan player, so character stacking holds a special place in my heart). And by the gods, his Inflitrating-style ability is so NASTY good, it's awesome, especially on a 6 HS guy.

One complaint, though: why is his difficulty 4 while Yi Shan's is 6? WTF man??? When do I get my cheap character stacking awesomesauce?????

LordAggro said:

I think Kazuya is pretty darn amazing, and Tekken cannot get here fast enough, imo!

One train of thought about why Yi Shan is 6-diff leads me to believe it is so because it works off ALL characters in play, not just how many characters YOU have in play, as is the case with Kazuya.

Still, Infiltrating on a stick is a nice bat to carry, indeed.

Yeah, I guess you're right. I would still like to see a 4-diff Yi Shan, though (for the lolz).

Well, I think Hata hit it on the head with this Kazuya (the effects are exactly the way I picture him); now he has to remember to make all other versions of the char 4 diff as well.

tempted to just copy/paste Target X's Nightmare deck for this guy.

...Time to put those anti destruction cards back in the sideboard.

dshaffer said:

You mean the ones that are totally useless in B4 because there's barely anyone who destroys a single card?

(Psst. this is when you tell me Journey of Repentence acts as a lightning rod and prevents all those by saying that R: affects cards that destroy multiple cards)

3 of the 5 Tekken characters have been 6-handers now? Will the other two be as well I wonder? I don't think anyone'd mind since all 3 so far have been extremely playable,

Cascade said:

Christie has to be a 7 hander!

...anyways...

...ugh...of all the things they could have done with him. And wtf? Why does he have this game's most evil symbols (C/D/E)?

Anyways, oh yeah, he'll definitely see play. It's kinda like how Infiltrating worked...'cept it doesn't require a 6 diff, can't be KFT'd, and can be done almost every turn due to tutoring/recursion. I'd say wait it out until the opponent builds, nuke their hard work, and then build and out pace them with Cursed Blood and Buddhist Devotion.

Beast in the sheets he is. Not a huge fan, but hey, his Enhance is pretty tasty.

I agree; Christie should be 7 HS. I'm kind of surprised Nina wasn't 7 HS, but her shenanigans make up for it.

Well, Marco, Kazuya may be the way he is because Heihachi dropped him off a cliff one too many times in an attempt to toughen him up, but he's still one of Tekken's resident bad-a$$es, along with the likes of Bryan Fury, among others. And to boot, the way I've seen him at maximum effectiveness is not as a straight-up, combo-mashing machine gun like Law, nor is he a pure misdirection guy like Lei. Kazuya's game is to keep the opponent under constant pressure via well-placed, unpredictable (and painful) moves, very similar to Street Fighter's Akuma or Soul Calibur's Nightmare. So that's the explanation I see for Kazuya's symbol spread.

Holy Start Over Batman!

Great set up! I loved doing that kind of ability from Cody :: but with this new way of destruction Tag Along is most likely the only way to stop that utter destruction. Though as a rhetorical statement people will probably run him off Anti-R's right?

MarcoPulleaux said:

That being said - things like Tag along and Red Lotus make him a very sad panda. Additionally he does help deal with grey wars.

Antigoth said:

Kazuya: "What wars? What are all those drab, dull looking cards in your staging area? How about I get rid of them for you?"

Grey... Green... the whole kit and kaboodle.

Seems kinda good

It intrigues me somewhat that these two most recent character spoilers have the ability to do things at the tail end of their turns -- King plays a free attack, now Kazuya nukes the world. For Kazuya especially, that's a HUGE boon (vs. having it be a First F or whatever) -- spam my hand, tapping whatever foundations I need to pass checks or draw more cards, then nuke and have huge board position already established.

LordAggro said:

Agreed on Nina, and I'd say Kazuya is a combination of Akuma and Nightmare, in that he isn't Mr. Glass Cannon Akuma is, and he isn't slow-add uber big damage Nightmare is.

Bah...I just think his symbol spread is stereotypical, like, "Oh he's this badass villain, let's give him UFS' 3 most 'wicked' symbols."

Aesthetic nitpicking aside, I guess his boring playstyle is made irrelevant by his, well, awesomeness. I honestly didn't even see the 4 diff without Hata mentioning it, and obviously, it'll help him out tremendously. Giving attacks +2 +2 is already good enough, but when you get to 3 and 4, don't plan on blocking too much.

And Waffle got it; spam the Hell out of things, passing all the way (and possibly drawing off Hulking Brute or Bigger They Are), then blow up. Cursed Blood adds to the love.

Kazuya is a good "just for fun" character. Tag Along & Red Lotus is to widely played for him to ever make an impact right now. And discarding a card for his E is too costly. Until block 4 or a second (I hope better) Kazuya is released he's just not that good.. UFS has been shitting on Villians lately!

Immortal-JyNxX said:

Because people are going to play Kazuya in Block 3.

Yes.

I'd play Kazuya off Death if you want to blow stuff up consistently. Death's response hate ( Inhuman Perception , The Lesser of Many Evils , I can go on but I think the point is made) says Red Lotus doesn't matter, Blinding Rage can only save 1 thing anyway, and Tag Along cries silently in the corner while a mushroom cloud consumes your staging area. To boot, you still have access to Ichi no Tachi , Midnight Launcher , and Knight Breaker (Combo awesomesauce ). If you want to run him in full beatstick mode to use and abuse his Enhance, I'd say Chaos is your best bet, simply because it has more card drawing available ( Dancing Battle Kabuki , The Bigger They Are... , et cetera), though Death has some shenanigans available to it in this area as well ( Selfless Giving and Hulking Brute are good examples). So, Immortal-JyNxX, enlighten me, how is Kazuya bad?

Immortal-JyNxX said:

End It All + Lesser of Many Evils = Kazuya ***** on the cards that **** on him, effectively giving him German citizenship. Next week, we see his UR character-only asset, the Shamwow...

And block 4 he's a terror, the ability to reset the board when it gets out of hand + close-to-free speed pumps means he's the best aggro character if the meta shifts to control again. [off Death -- Upper Claw + no characters stacked E + Unstoppable Warrior = 6H10 for a 4cc, a discard, and a destroy foundation; ditto Leg Slash but 4L10... or imagine landing a Menuett Dance with a couple guys stacked...]

Immortal-JyNxX said:

Misconception is misconception.

Yeah, the aforementioned cards are played religiously, but a Death Kazuya exhumes a painstaking LAWL. Midnight Launcher flips the bird to Tag Along, Ka Technique blanks Red Lotus, a well-played Shadow Blade wades around it, and Inhuman Perception covers both and more.

Also, his discard isn't that bad of a cost when you're giving THAT much of a boost. As I'd said, +2 +2 is already good enough, but only becomes greater at +3+3 and +4+4, His symbols aren't the best draw around, but they do have some (Bigger They Are for obligatory +1, POSSIBLY +2, and of course Hulking Brute, Monster Lariat).

LordAggro said:

Ok you all seem to be forgetting Kazuya isn't Ibuki! After the form you're incapable of going for a kill so who gives a ****? All ur doing is pressing the reset button BOTH PLAYERS with have to re-build their staging area so the benifit is 50/50. Inhuman Preception is useless cuz it will be removed for the cost, End It All leaves you with 2 less cards to start over with not a good idea. Lesser of Many Evils is the only really good option but again it leaves you with a 50/50 chance of coming out on top. Lets not even mention There's a big chance you will never draw 1 of 3 Kazuya's in your deck making him really useless.. Oh and good luck with a Tachi/Launcher/Breaker combo with no foundations 2 tap..

@Waffle: Didn't I say he'll be good Block 4?

@Marco: Like I mentioned before Inhuman is useless and most of your examples includes attacking first. So its an even better chance of you not building a better Staging Area after the reset. Also getting +3's or +4's is awesome! But with only 3 copies in an at least 59 card deck the chances of ever stacking more than one(if that even) is really slim.

Guy's don't get me wrong Kazuya is the ONLY Tekken character I like so I wish the best for him. But until Block 4 he won't make an Impact at all,,,

Immortal-JyNxX said:

List of reasons Infiltrating is still better:

You can have 4 infiltratings in a deck, you can only have 3 of his character card because one starts in play.
You cant attack with his character card.
You can use infiltrating the turn you draw it. You have play Kaz first, then use him.

So that's my piece. He does have ways around tag along in Preventing the Curse, a card that has been getting better and better every set. Resetting the board is really nice, but at the same time i don't see that he will be particularly strong against anything else that can just kill him before that. Siegfried has a this guys number in miniblock, and astrid and Zimei may just bee to fast for him.

Also Im going to go to the place i always go when looking at a new character card. Almost as a rule 6 Hand size is only good when 7 isn't available. He's only going to have 3 character cards in his deck and he needs to draw them, at least unless a promo version comes out, but there is no telling if that promo will be worth running and what difficulty it will have. Cody was amazing because the playable versions of him all had 3 diffs.