I was playing some games against my brother and a friend this past weekend. I am an honor bound Wall defender (from my time playing A Game of Thrones), so I’ve naturally taken up the cause as part of the Crab Clan here.

Over the course of the weekend, I played 7 games, of which I won all 7.

5 were against Dragon and 2 were against Phoenix.

During these 7 games, I noticed something very interesting and it is something that my brother (who was playing Dragon) also pointed out to me.

The benefit of being honorable and having high glory is typically not as good as the weakness of being dishonorable and having high glory is.

There are exceptions of course. Way of the Crane makes for easy honoring and therefore offsets the danger associated with high glory, but for clans that aren't focused on honoring or dishonoring but still have high glory, such as Dragon, whose clan champion Yokuni has 3 glory, this can be very crippling in many cases.

Some context:

I play Crab as a hand pressure/dishonor deck that can destroy provinces. It sounds scattered, but it actually works amazingly well.

Because of this, I’ve chosen to splash, for the time being, Phoenix in order to play Display of Power, Pacifism and Magnificent Kimonos. (We’ll see what Scorpion has to offer the deck in a few weeks > : ).)

In the 7 games I played, I realized that attaching Kimonos to my opponent’s high glory characters (prior to them losing a conflict), as well as using Court Games and Ring of Fire (or Display of Powering their Ring of Fire to reverse their honoring into a dishonoring) was extremely crippling to their plan of attacking and defending.

Even before this weekend, I played a game against @I Fight Dragons (Travis of Winter Court Podcast fame) and was able to Display of Power a Ring of Fire to make his Serene Warrior a 0/0 (or, technically, a -1/-2) instead of a 7/6. That made the character he was intending to defend with in my follow up attack virtually useless. I was able to replicate these types of plays over the weekend as well.

Court Games out of my low glory deck is also a conflict killer to characters that have high glory. It essentially means that, if you have a high glory character, you can’t really defend or attack with that character alone. One Court Games can just end that character’s chances of winning a conflict. I’ve had people concede (perhaps prematurely) out of frustration from me Court Games-ing their Clan Champ who is defending alone in a key conflict (making Tsukune a 0/0 and Hotaru a 0/3.) Meanwhile, if you Court Games my Clan Champ, he’s…still a 7/2 .

Of course, they can always play their own Court Games to offset it but the point still stands that it is very risky to go into a conflict alone with a high glory character compared to a low glory character.

In addition, one of the best neutral cards in the game in my opinion, Spies at Court, requires that you dishonor a character. Low Glory characters can do this with very little consequence outside of the honor lost when they leave. My 1/ 2 Shrewd Yasuki is now a 0/1. Totally worth removing 2 cards at random from your opponent’s hand. But high glory characters can really suffer from this, especially if they have fate on them, meaning they’ll have to live with those bad stats for another round.

What has your guys’ experiences been with high vs low glory characters? I personally am very happy that my characters are all low glory. It really takes a lot of the fear out of dishonored characters out of the equation for me.

Of course, we haven’t yet seen how Scorpion manipulates dishonored characters. Maybe glory will matter a whole lot more once we see those cards haha.

I am glad your Crab deck is working so well. I feel Crab is one of the strongest decks right, but one of the toughest to learn a proper strategy. Once you do though, Craaaaaaab!

I think Crab has the greatest opportunity to punish your opponent's mistakes. Way of the Crab is just...crazy good. You basically can never leave a valuable character unprotected if the crab player has a <3 cost character going into the next round and is first player.

Based on my very limited number of games, I would argue the opposite.

Having someone honored with high (or even moderate) glory is a significant stat boost that helps you to threaten provinces. This, in turn, forces your opponent to react in a certain way that they might not have otherwise.

Having someone dishonored with high (or moderate) glory is, obviously, a problem. But the majority of effects that can honor someone can also dishonor someone. I find myself selecting the "honor" option in both my Crane and Phoenix deck FAR more often than the dishonor option.

The exception, which you eluded to, is Yokuni. In his case, I think his 3 glory is a huge liability. Dishonoring him is always a priority. Especially since he exists in a clan that generally doesn't have the means or inclination to care much about honoring / dishonoring effects.

29 minutes ago, Yogo Gohei said:

Based on my very limited number of games, I would argue the opposite.

Having someone honored with high (or even moderate) glory is a significant stat boost that helps you to threaten provinces. This, in turn, forces your opponent to react in a certain way that they might not have otherwise.

Having someone dishonored with high (or moderate) glory is, obviously, a problem. But the majority of effects that can honor someone can also dishonor someone. I find myself selecting the "honor" option in both my Crane and Phoenix deck FAR more often than the dishonor option.

The exception, which you eluded to, is Yokuni. In his case, I think his 3 glory is a huge liability. Dishonoring him is always a priority. Especially since he exists in a clan that generally doesn't have the means or inclination to care much about honoring / dishonoring effects.

So, I guess the question becomes what clans have high glory but are generally disinterested in honoring characters. Yokuni is the true outlier in his clan, but Lion has a considerable amount of characters that can just as easily be bitten by the dishonor bug, such as Toturi, Eiji and the Historian. Does Lion prioritize Fire over any other ring to prevent such things? I guess that's up to playstyle. they have characters that honor themselves, but they don't have a Way of the Crane like effect to counter any dishonor, outside of Court Games.

I am curious to see how Unicorn deals with dishonor as well, since they seem to be moderate to high glory but we haven't seen anything that would make them value honor more than any other clan yet.

I agree that the high honor clans value the honor choice over the dishonor choice. But that also makes the Ring of Fire even more impactful for your opponent if they are to prioritize it. And, if you are going to prioritize it, due to its heavy impact on your characters, you are then leaving yourself open to hand attrition like Ring of Earth or character removal via Ring of Void.

I don't know. Like I said, it's definitely a hot take meant to spur discussion.

All I know is I'm super thankful that my characters have 0 or 1 glory (a few 2 glory exceptions).

What is your opinion on Court Games? Is it a 3x requirement in every single clan at this point? Because, if you don't run it at 3x, your opponent may be running it at 3x, which then makes it that much more difficult to deal with your characters being dishonored.

We even saw @BayushiCroy post his deck list that did not have Court Games at all. That would leave his characters rather open to being dishonored easily and potentially ruining his political attacks/defense.

I plan on running that card at 3x for quite a while and I know many people who feel the same way. Any deck that isn't running 3 of them suddenly has a weakness built into their deck that is only amplified if their characters are high glory.

2 hours ago, Joe From Cincinnati said:

I was playing some games against my brother and a friend this past weekend. I am an honor bound Wall defender (from my time playing A Game of Thrones), so I’ve naturally taken up the cause as part of the Crab Clan here.

...

I think you have made an interesting crab deck, and want to see how it works.

But about Glory in my plays I feel the opposite.

Honor or dishonor a character have the eactly same effect, but is easier honor than dishonor a personality.

One example is court games, you choose a char to honor, but your opponent chooses a char to dishonor, makes sense cause when they leave play loose 1 honor is more powerful than gain 1 honor, of course dishonoring a champion alone in the conflict is huge but if there are 2 units the card can be useless.

As we got more cards revealed court games will give place to more interesting cards in the decks with low glory characters.

Phoenix deck is entirely focused in honoring, so they will have more cards to honor their guys than other decks to dishonor them, they also have the way of phoenix that let them "reserve" the fire ring.

If you play right, Serene warrior honored is a 7/6 char costing 3 fate.

Knowing only what we know now, 3 Court Games is a mandatory inclusion for Phoenix, as they do not have access to Way of the Albino Crane.

Once we see scorpion, we'll have a much better idea of exactly how many honor effects will be needed, as well as how many scorpion might bring to the table as a potential splash. My guess is, it'll be a hard 6 requirement in Phoenix decks.

I think high glory can really hose certain characters. In general I prefer low glory because I prefer to go after water and void rings. If you play crab there's no needs to give a **** about the fire ring. Most other decks do.

Kimono on opposing guys is pretty funny. I personally believe Shrewd Yasuki is the lifeblood of dishonor crab. Gotta keep the cards coming!

Court Games is starting to look more and more likely to be in all of my decks. Even the low glory clans can make use of the dishonour effects, especially Crab, since they can play the dishonour game pretty well already. If it does become prevalent, we may end up seeing some Crane Splashes for Steward of Law and Voice of Honor.

1 hour ago, Joe From Cincinnati said:

I agree that the high honor clans value the honor choice over the dishonor choice. But that also makes the Ring of Fire even more impactful for your opponent if they are to prioritize it. And, if you are going to prioritize it, due to its heavy impact on your characters, you are then leaving yourself open to hand attrition like Ring of Earth or character removal via Ring of Void.

I guess the counter to this is that Ring of Fire on a high glory character is worth several cards itself, and can easily be worth it. Even honoring a 2 glory character is worth a Fine Katana and an Ornate Fan, and the honour when leaving play is about half a card itself. You are forced to play for the ring, but often it seems worth it. Incidentally, this makes going first a big deal; I often will not play Yokuni unless I'm going first and can guarantee winning the Fire ring.

3 hours ago, Joe From Cincinnati said:

In the 7 games I played, I realized that attaching Kimonos to my opponent’s high glory characters (prior to them losing a conflict), as well as using Court Games and Ring of Fire (or Display of Powering their Ring of Fire to reverse their honoring into a dishonoring) was extremely crippling to their plan of attacking and defending.

Ring of Fire and Magnificent Kimono are both high-variance plays, the stars have to align for them to be truly impactful. The kimono only works if they commit a high-glory guy into a conflict they can potentially lose, which might not happen the entire game, and has the potential to completely backfire if they're holding on to a potentially conflict winning card. Display of Power requires you to spend two fate and an honour and often essentially sacrifice a province, which may be fine early, but could cost you the game late. I'm hesitant to say for sure "Glory is bad", as the fact that you seem to have pulled off the high variance plays in a few games could honestly be down to luck. Glory is a double-edged sword, no doubt, and you have to be prepared for it.

Incidentally, did you run into Radiant Orator out of Phoenix? That card owns Crab hard.

Agreed on just about all points. A character's being high glory only matters if you can consistently get them honored right away, and not a delayed effect like the Fire Ring which is prone to losing the conflict or surprise Display of Power. Right now, I think Phoenix's main weakness is a lack of consistent honoring so I currently don't think Serene Warrior is a great card, personally. That Display of Power you used turn 1 against me set me back basically an entire turn in terms of stats. I won that game by the skin of my teeth, but that wasn't because of high glory characters; it was completely off the back of Tsukune and Kuroi Mori. Hopefully we see more conflict honoring for Phoenix, but that seems unlikely out of the core set.

1 hour ago, L5RBr said:

Honor or dishonor a character have the eactly same effect, but is easier honor than dishonor a personality.

One example is court games, you choose a char to honor, but your opponent chooses a char to dishonor, makes sense cause when they leave play loose 1 honor is more powerful than gain 1 honor, of course dishonoring a champion alone in the conflict is huge but if there are 2 units the card can be useless.

Personally, I feel like FFG did a real good job at redesigning the Honorable/Dishonorable status. It now has a mechanical function in game rather than just setup for other card effects.

Court Games though is poorly designed IMO. Sure its going to be a staple in most decks that can utilize them but the option to choose should have been more consistent. If I get to choose who I can honor with it, it should have given the option to dishonor someone to the caster as well. I don't see any mechanical reasons to let the opponent have a say in who to dishonor since he didn't have a say on the honoring as well. You said it yourself, Honor and Dishonor has the same effect.

Lastly, losing 1 honor is mechanically the same as gaining 1 honor. The only reason why you feel losing 1 honor is much stronger is because of the psychological effect of loss aversion. The reason why people prefer lower Glory is to lessen variance of their decks, after all consistency is key in card games.

In my (limited) experience of solitaire games, what makes Court Games powerful is that you get to choose when to play it. You can wait until your opponent has nothing but Doji Hotaru on the table before you play it, having an enormous impact.

3 minutes ago, Shosuro Teri said:

Lastly, losing 1 honor is mechanically the same as gaining 1 honor. The only reason why you feel losing 1 honor is much stronger is because of the psychological effect of loss aversion.

While that is a factor, certainly, there is an actual reason that losing an honor is probably stronger than gaining an honor. There are very few cards that give more honor gains than honor losses, and I believe all packed into 2 clans. Yes, ring of air can too, but relying on rings is always complicated. The clan with the highest starting honor so far, and likely at all out of the gate, has 12 starting honor. That means they need to gain 13 to win, or lose 12 to lose. Everyone one else has that difference increased. Some clans, like Crane and Lion, have tools to help, and they are ones who have a lower gap. Also, decks have to be built to take full advantage of honor gains. Sure, any deck can certainly win by honor if they bid low enough and their opponent bids aggressively enough, but at that point you are playing for the honor. Any deck is in danger of being dishonored if a dishonor focused deck sits down across from them, so they'll have to factor that in more into their thinking.

To get more on topic, I feel that higher glory is generally better. Sure, your opponent can wait for an opportune time, but you don't have to wait to get whoever you want honored. Your opponent has more work to do than you do. very few characters can take out provinces neutral. high glory makes many threats solo when honored, or makes them weaker, but then they weren't strong enough to solo anyways so you'd have had to send backup anyways. And usually high glory dishonored people just turn into chump blockers for me, people to send into defenses knowing I'm going to lose, but so I don't lose the honor for not defending.

23 minutes ago, Shosuro Teri said:

Lastly, losing 1 honor is mechanically the same as gaining 1 honor. The only reason why you feel losing 1 honor is much stronger is because of the psychological effect of loss aversion. The reason why people prefer lower Glory is to lessen variance of their decks, after all consistency is key in card games.

Is more powerful because the climb to 25 honor is bigger than getting 0 honor.

Also there are some good cards like Banzai or assassination that makes you loose honor to use, while cards that make you gains honor like honored blade costs you fate and you need win a conflict, for example.

I do think, generally, dishonor will be easier to do than honor. In order to not lose honor you have to:

1. Minimize not defending an attack.

2. Minimize Air Rings getting through

3. Minimize letting your characters leave dishonored.

4. Minimize your card draw from the bid.

5. Minimize your use of negative honor effects like Banzai, Spies at Court and Banzai

6. Avoid triggers like Crab's Levy, Watch Commander and Intimidating Hida.

In order to gain honor you have to:

1. Win Ring of Air

2. Win Ring of Fire

3. Bid low and hope your opponent bids high.

4. Use cards like Honored blade, Court Games and Kakita Asami.

If only you gained an honor for winning a conflict unopposed...:\

1 hour ago, Casanunda said:

I'm hesitant to say for sure "Glory is bad", as the fact that you seem to have pulled off the high variance plays in a few games could honestly be down to luck. Glory is a double-edged sword, no doubt, and you have to be prepared for it.

Exactly. It's a high-risk, high-reward sort of thing. Clans with low Glory will play more consistently, but may struggle to break through tough defenses. Clans with higher Glory will be able to hit high numbers easier, but are more susceptible to large swings if the opponent dishonors a character.

I know it's not quite the same, but I am reminded of a riddle:

Without my you would crawl

With me you stand tall

Too much of me and you will fall

Answer (highlight to read): Pride

39 minutes ago, Shosuro Teri said:

Court Games though is poorly designed IMO. Sure its going to be a staple in most decks that can utilize them but the option to choose should have been more consistent. If I get to choose who I can honor with it, it should have given the option to dishonor someone to the caster as well. I don't see any mechanical reasons to let the opponent have a say in who to dishonor since he didn't have a say on the honoring as well. You said it yourself, Honor and Dishonor has the same effect.

It adds a skill element to the game if you have a way to play "around" your opponents cards. If you think Court Games is incoming, send in an extra guy. If you think Noble Sacrifice is oncoming, don't choose dishonor when Crane For Shame's you. If you think Admit Defeat is incoming, don't defend with one character. Personally, I like playing around my opponents cards, it makes me feel like I could have done something to stop them even IF they go off.

In short, I don't agree that it is poorly designed.

Ah, but you were playing Crab in all of those games. Crab dishonor personalities, so Glory is a weakness against them. But what about Clans who do not dishonor others so easily? Then Glory loses its downside, and if you honor your personalities gains an upside. A single high-Glory personality can threaten a province alone. I love Glory as a mechanic because it is a double-edged sword. I think it will price to be one of the biggest meta choices in FFG's L5R.

Like almost everything in the game, it's a give and take.

A lion event can send home some of your strongest characters with only a single character present. A dragon event can bow some of your strongest characters even after all the provinces have been spoiled. The phoenix shugenja will almost always be able to remove a fate from any one of your units. Court games becomes essentially a dead card against characters with low glory.

So while I don't think higher glory is bad necessarily, I do think it makes for less consistent performances. Consequently, this is also one of the reasons why I believe Crane to be the strongest clan thus far - they have additional ways to honor their characters (Way of the Crane and Savvy Politcian) and take advantage of/mitigate the respective benefits and drawbacks of decent glory stats.

2 hours ago, Shosuro Teri said:

Personally, I feel like FFG did a real good job at redesigning the Honorable/Dishonorable status. It now has a mechanical function in game rather than just setup for other card effects.

Court Games though is poorly designed IMO. Sure its going to be a staple in most decks that can utilize them but the option to choose should have been more consistent. If I get to choose who I can honor with it, it should have given the option to dishonor someone to the caster as well. I don't see any mechanical reasons to let the opponent have a say in who to dishonor since he didn't have a say on the honoring as well. You said it yourself, Honor and Dishonor has the same effect.

Lastly, losing 1 honor is mechanically the same as gaining 1 honor. The only reason why you feel losing 1 honor is much stronger is because of the psychological effect of loss aversion. The reason why people prefer lower Glory is to lessen variance of their decks, after all consistency is key in card games.

There are two kill actions so far that are dependent on having a dishonored character - I can Swim and Noble Sacrifice. Perhaps part of the reason Court Games doesn't allow for a choice in dishonoring is to prevent these effects from killing clan champs and high cost units too reliably. Merely speculating, of course.

5 hours ago, Casanunda said:

It adds a skill element to the game if you have a way to play "around" your opponents cards.

There is significantly more cards that the opponent cannot play around than those that he can in the current pool.

Design usually gives a way to work around a certain card if it has some seriously powerful effect to balance it out. If being honorable and dishonorable is mechanically the same, why not give the caster the option for the former but not for the latter?

Easier to win by dishonor than honor? No, thats exactly the opposite of what people's sample games are. People are winning more consistently with honor than dishonor.

Is this some remnant of Dishonor hate from the CCG model? Don't answer this. I'll make a separate thread for it.

43 minutes ago, Shosuro Teri said:

Easier to win by dishonor than honor? No, thats exactly the opposite of what people's sample games are. People are winning more consistently with honor than dishonor.

From what I've seen, this has been mostly due to inexperience. Bidding 5 on turn 1 and 2 was all the rage for a solid month of testing in this game. Players like Croy took advantage of that.

I think people are moderating their draws more now. I haven't seen or heard about an honor win in quite a while.

I honor consistently with my lion deck. I bid 1. I out 2 court games in. I prioritize air with my lion deck since air is 2 honor and fire is at best 1. Losing 1 honor is more than gaining 1 because at itself is lose 1 or gain 2.

Replying quickly to many posts I see. I am happy to have sparked discussion @Joe From Cincinnati

20 hours ago, JJ48 said:

Without my you would crawl

With me you stand tall

Too much of me and you will fall

Funny, I was thinking "alcohol"

19 minutes ago, twinstarbmc said:

Funny, I was thinking "alcohol"

I like the rhyming answer better.