Question for someone at gencon who played in the tournaments.

Dragon seemed to dominate the day one event but didn't do nearly as well in the second tournement. Was this just luck or was something else driving this?

I really just want to say "single core" but it's also that the first tournament had a much higher concentration of newer players where Dragon's game (literally just being good at stats) can really shine without a lot of counter-play. Not downplaying any of the accomplishments of Dragon players, but I feel day 2 had a much harder swiss series once you got into 4+ wins, and several good players didn't make top cut.

Thanks a lot. Sounds sensible. What seemed strong in the second tournment? Lion seemed to do well considering how few of them took part.

Has anyone release participation statistics? What I mean is do we know how many players of each clan there were for each day? I had assumed that the high Dragon hatamoto count on day 1 might have had something to do with simply a lot of Dragon players.

35 minutes ago, I Fight Dragons said:

I really just want to say "single core" but it's also that the first tournament had a much higher concentration of newer players where Dragon's game (literally just being good at stats) can really shine without a lot of counter-play. Not downplaying any of the accomplishments of Dragon players, but I feel day 2 had a much harder swiss series once you got into 4+ wins, and several good players didn't make top cut.

That was my immediate thought after seeing the results Thursday night. Less synergy due to 1X Core, more efficient base stats ratios and a lot of variation in player base ability = Dragon would have an edge. This could be confirmation bias on my part though. I have made the argument that stats ratios among the different clans will affect play styles. Some clans will have to do more (bonuses, speed etc...) to make up the shortfall. On Thursday, it seemed like a lot of clans couldn't close the gap on Dragon.

Dragon are very strong - and I do find it kind of funny for people to say "well, it was a lot of new players" for a game that literally hasn't released officially yet ?

But I also think a lot of the players who wanted to try different clans were the ones who signed up for the day 2 event when they couldn't get into the Day 1 event. Finally, since I was in the Day 1 event I can say some of the Dragon players who made it into the Day 2 event had already decided they wanted to try a new clan the next day. Variety is the spice of life and all that.

The second tournament people seemed to adopt the "I bid 5 on turn 1 every game no matter what" strategy.

That made decks that were able to pressure honor or dishonor a bit more potent than on Thursday.

I think that may explain why a Scorpion and a Crane were in the final :).

35 minutes ago, Joe From Cincinnati said:

The second tournament people seemed to adopt the "I bid 5 on turn 1 every game no matter what" strategy.

That made decks that were able to pressure honor or dishonor a bit more potent than on Thursday.

I think that may explain why a Scorpion and a Crane were in the final :).

that is a good observation - I've been wondering what "bidding meta" may evolve. I've heard good things about a stronger up front bid but I've also seen my own hopes shrink after bidding heavy... Until I'm building optimally with full card pool and more experience I doubt I can judge it - so I'd love to hear what other players have experienced.

I saw a lot of turn 1 bid 5 and did get a couple dishonor wins. I know the Scorpion player in the finals won almost all games on dishonor, so that's an astute observation!

39 minutes ago, Reiga said:

I saw a lot of turn 1 bid 5 and did get a couple dishonor wins. I know the Scorpion player in the finals won almost all games on dishonor, so that's an astute observation!

The guy you played, Mat, is my meta mate and friend and we discussed this between nearly every round. It simply blew us away how careless people were being with their honor. In fact, he won every single game via dishonor, if I remember correctly.

It works fine if both people bid 5, then it's just a conflict card extravaganza.

But if you bid 5 on turn 1, and your opponent bids 1 you're already down 4 honor. If your starting honor was 10 (as with Crab, Unicorn, Dragon and Scorpion), you're at 6 before you play a single card. One Air conflict, you're at 5. One unopposed conflict (as 2 characters each is a typical turn 1 in 1 core environment, that means unopposed conflicts were 1 Rout/Outwit away) and you're at 4 after just a single turn (not including any self inflicted honor loss, like Banzai or Assassination)

Sure, those 4 extra cards may get you a province on turn 1, but you're now inches from losing. Mat had a guy down to 2 honor entering the second round in one of his matches, which is basically just game over.

Every person was running 2 assassinations and 2 banzais, 2 of the most potent conflict cards in the 1 core environment, so that's more honor loss right there.

****, I got 5 dishonor wins in two days and I wasn't even trying to do dishonor most of the games unless my opponent just begged for it (like by bidding 5 on turn 1 and 4 on turn 2).

8 hours ago, shosuko said:

that is a good observation - I've been wondering what "bidding meta" may evolve. I've heard good things about a stronger up front bid but I've also seen my own hopes shrink after bidding heavy... Until I'm building optimally with full card pool and more experience I doubt I can judge it - so I'd love to hear what other players have experienced.

I have found that it's best to just bid 2 to 3 and see what your opponent does. If they bid high, you may have a slight card disadvantage for a round, but you'll have more honor meaning you have more liberty to use Assassination and Banzai as well as go after other rings while your opponent has to soon go for Air and Fire to give themselves breathing room.

From there, you can evaluate whether or not you can get them to 0 honor or if you just want to use that extra honor as card advantage and bid a bit higher on turn 2.

If they bid low, you lose only 1 or maybe 2 honor, which isn't so bad and then you can decide if you have the honor available to bid in that mid range or if you want to bid low again to preserve your honor.

This past weekend I saw too many people lose to dishonor with 8+ cards in hand. Having more cards is great, but I've found it best to gradually slope into card draw (as well as utilizing Ring of Earth and draw effects, such as Fertile Fields and holdings) as to not risk a loss to dishonor. Nothing feels worse than seeing your honor diminish and knowing there's very little you can do about it other than be first player and get that Ring of Air conflict.

Loving some of the insights offered here.

I agree with Joe from Cinninnati about the wait and see approach vs Scorpion but against a lot of opponents you probably will want to draw 5?

I think it's the second bid that's more important. Is bidding 5 in turn one and 1 in turn 2 not better than going say 3 in both as you get the cards front loaded to build momentum.

11 hours ago, Bayushi Curtin said:

Question for someone at gencon who played in the tournaments.

Dragon seemed to dominate the day one event but didn't do nearly as well in the second tournement. Was this just luck or was something else driving this?

Please, can you share the source of the data?

I see nothing here or in ffg facebook or any other place I look.

Thanks.

I totally agree, though the irony of me starting the finals game with a 5 bid isn't lost on me. That was a calculated risk as I didn't have the counter play cards I needed to not get BLOWN OUT by I Can Swim. The plan was to bid low and claim air from that point forward.

Bidding should be dynamic. I saw so many people lose on the bid - both bidding 5, 4, then 3+ and, inversely bidding 1 on a (pen)ultimate turn when they needed cards desperately.

Seems sensible, honour does drop very fast if you go over board on bidding and in the first turn lots of cards wont help you enormously due to a relatively low amount of spare fate/peeps.

Once you get to low honor against Scorpion or Crane then they can often keep you there and from that point onwards it is very hard to climb out of the hole plus they almost have to chase the honour gaining rings through dired or peeps leaving as opposed to potentially more useful rings for the rounds they are actually in.

Sometimes when I have someone at 3-4 honour I will deliberately go for a 5 myself (knowing they are likely to one) because in later rounds the card advantage can help win if timed correctly.

1 hour ago, Koriume said:

Please, can you share the source of the data?

I see nothing here or in ffg facebook or any other place I look.

Thanks.

http://imperialadvisor.com/wp/

Check out the various GenCon day articles for data.

1 hour ago, Reiga said:

I totally agree, though the irony of me starting the finals game with a 5 bid isn't lost on me. That was a calculated risk as I didn't have the counter play cards I needed to not get BLOWN OUT by I Can Swim. The plan was to bid low and claim air from that point forward.

Bidding should be dynamic. I saw so many people lose on the bid - both bidding 5, 4, then 3+ and, inversely bidding 1 on a (pen)ultimate turn when they needed cards desperately.

@Reiga Any other one core tips?

I've been playing mainly 1 core as going to the London event (plenty of time after to play 40/40).

Sure, these aren't all mine but collective from the the Discord:

1) Take 2x Court Games, Spies at Court, and Cloud the Mind in every deck unless you have a REALLY good reason not to (though Dragon should heavily weigh dropping Spies imo)

2) Buy and add fate to you clan characters very aggressively as you'll only see them once. Especially your Champ.

3) Bids are huge, many people bid very aggressively take that into account to either enable higher bids or honor pressure

4) Even more than usual priority target provinces with opposing Clan characters because re: #2

5) Get lucky! LOL! This format is high variance and you may find yourself with a flop full of neutrals or with a turn 1 champ against their mediocre flop

Not that you asked me, but if anyone is interested, I have a few other tips:

1. With very few exceptions, I recommend discarding any neutral characters in your provinces at the end of each round. Your clan characters are exponentially better and, with how many neutrals you are forced to run, it is better to cycle through them as quickly as possible to get to your valuable cards.

2. I also think a key play to winning in 1 core is how you handle Assassination. In 1 core it is kind of the meta defining card. If you can compel your opponent to use it at low cost to you, it's a good play.

What I mean by that is: give your opponent a 2 cost or less target that is juicy enough to make them use an assassination but not so strong that it would actually cripple your board. 1 fate on a 1 or 2 cost character and maybe one conflict card (either an attachment or a banzai) is usually enough to pull that assassination from their hand.

On the flip side of that point, I would say only assassinate a character if they are about to break a province or are preventing you from breaking a province. Losing a conflict to a 1 or 2 cost character and giving your opponent a ring effect is not great but, unless the ring effect is taking your last honor or removing the last fate from a high impact character, it generally isn't worth the 3 honor and assassination just to stop a ring effect.

I had a game where my opponent was attacking with an Imperial against my 6 strength province (Borderlands Fortifications). I defended with the same imperial. He put on a Katana. I passed. He Banzai'd to make it 8 to my 2. I used my Stronghold to go to 3 (no longer breaking). He attached a second katana. I assassinated. It cost me 3 honor and a card to remove 3 cards from his hand and a character.

In an opposite example, I attacked similarly in another game and my opponent just outright assassinated my character when it was tied 2 to 2.

It's a pity that I didn't get that ring, but it didn't impact my game too much. And now my opponent had 3 less honor and I was out no cards from hand.

3. This may be a more debatable opinion, but I think buying a Wandering Ronin is nearly always worse than not buying a Wandering Ronin. Unless you have absolutely no hand and no board state or are entering the final turn, a Wandering Ronin is far too high of a fate investment to ever justify spending 3 fate (or more) on him. It's much better to enter the conflict phase with 4 or 5 fate rather than a 2/2 that can mortgage its future to go to 4/4 or 6/6 for 1 conflict, if for no other reason than to have plenty of fate for purchasing better characters next turn.

4. This is less specific to 1 core and it partially goes with @Reiga's second point, but I'll bring it up anyway:

Purchase your 3 cost and higher clan characters with at least 2 fate on them, if at all possible. Far too often, I saw opening turns of purchasing a 3 cost character with 1 fate, then a 1 and 2 cost character with no fate (or 2 1 cost characters with 1 additional fate on one of them.) This leaves your board extremely vulnerable to Ring of the Void wiping your board and you entering the second turn with no characters.

A 3 cost character with 2 fate and a 1 cost character is a far better starting turn than a 3 cost character with 1 fate and 2 1 cost characters. You may only be able to initiate one conflict that round, but you'll be able to have a strong board state entering turn 2.

That and people are far less likely to do a Void conflict if it doesn't result in a character leaving the board that turn, so having a character with 2 fate basically means your opponent will pass on ring of void, allowing you to use it for your first conflict if they chose to play a character with 1 fate.

You can see this occur in the game that I played on stream on Thursday (https://www.twitch.tv/videos/167708908?t=07h11m00s) relevant timestamp is 7 hours and 11 minutes. My opponent opened with 3(1), 1(0), 1(0) I opened with 4(2), 1(0). Since I didn't have a removable target via Void, my opponent chose Water as his first conflict. This allowed me to do Void to clear the 1 fate off his 3 cost character, making the board state 4(1) vs no characters entering turn 2 (plus, I got my keeper monk out, but that's not relevant to this tip).

Reiga and Joe,

Thanks for the above! Some lovely tips in there.

Where all Scorpion splashing into Crab? I've been trying both Crab and Dragon and find them both good.

I think it's important that when you have the 1st player token you should be evaluating the board to see where you are weak and what your opponent will likely try to do in their attack. Sometimes denying them a ring by throwing some sacrificial lambs at them and losing a battle is better than going after the ring that does something.

In Joe's example his opponent could have saved his 3 fate character by throwing one or both of his 1 cost characters into a void battle first. Going after Water to bow a 1 cost character is likely not going to net as much value as saving that 3 cost character for an additional round.

Second the part about putting 2 fate on high cost characters. My Scorpion opponent only put 1 fate on Shoju, when I had Tsukune on the board. He unfortunately swung with Shoju solo into Shameful Display to get Shoju dishonored, then I hit him with For Shame to force him to bow Shoju. I'd used Way of the Phoenix to block him from declaring Void, so I just played out my conflicts for other rings, then triggered Void with Tsukune at end of conflict. So not only did Shoju accomplish nothing in the turn he got, I took away his only fate to make my opponent discard him end of the round. There was no recovering from that, at least not in single core decks.

That was mainly me capitalizing on the situation, but I could have just as easily won a Void conflict with far less shenanigans and left my opponent in the same disadvantage.

56 minutes ago, Joe From Cincinnati said:

Not that you asked me, but if anyone is interested, I have a few other tips:

1. With very few exceptions, I recommend discarding any neutral characters in your provinces at the end of each round. Your clan characters are exponentially better and, with how many neutrals you are forced to run, it is better to cycle through them as quickly as possible to get to
.....

Snip!

Thank you for the insight, it is greatly appreciated!

Any advice for a Crab player headed to a launch tournament? How did your Crab fare? Any thoughts/predictions for Crab in a 3-core environment?

6 hours ago, Reiga said:

Bidding should be dynamic. I saw so many people lose on the bid - both bidding 5, 4, then 3+ and, inversely bidding 1 on a (pen)ultimate turn when they needed cards desperately.

Really glad to hear this, to be honest; when I saw the bidding mechanic, I was wondering how many "power" players were just going to outright bid 5 just because "more cards wins games". Seriously, we need to get past that; yes, it is generally true, but in this game, they come with a cost (in fate as well as honour), and you HAVE to consider that cost. I've actually been largely avoiding Assassination, just because the cost in cards is so high. If you do want to bid high and push yourself towards dishonour, then you are forced to take the Air ring just to recover, which means you aren't taking a ring which directly impacts the board state. I'm glad that the game doesn't always just boil down to 5 bids every round between competitive players.

48 minutes ago, Shu2jack said:

Thank you for the insight, it is greatly appreciated!

Any advice for a Crab player headed to a launch tournament? How did your Crab fare? Any thoughts/predictions for Crab in a 3-core environment?

Well, I got Hatamoto on Thursday, so it went pretty well.

On Friday I started 3-1, but then got paired against a meta mate who I didn't want to knock out of the top 32 (moral debate regarding match ups vs meta mates not withstanding) and then lost in a narrow game against Tobin, the Art of the Warcast guy, in the final round where I chose the wrong ring on the final turn when I was first player and paid dearly for it. Ended Friday 4-3.

So, overall I went 9-3 with a faux-concession and felt like I controlled nearly every game from the very beginning.

Specific advice for Crab is a little harder to do without going into specific characters and cards. We're very lucky that we can build a full 30 card dynasty deck without having to include any Wandering Ronin, who I believe is hands down the worst card in the entire game, so there's that.

The splash choice is definitely an interesting decision.

I went with Scorpion because it did give me attachment steal, character steal and character kill, which are all extremely valuable in 1 core (or just in general, really.) I was able to I Can Swim a Shinjo Asparagus because by doing such an overwhelming military fire conflict (Vengeful Berserker + Steadfast Witch Hunter + Seppun Guardsman) that he didn't bother trying to stop it. I dishonored his Asparagus and then killed her when she attacked, which was a game winning play...

One of the other Hatamotos did Crane for the +4 political attachment, Admit Defeat for an offensive bow and the dueling attachment due to Crab's unusually high military strength for another bow. That worked really well for him as well.

Dragon is also a solid splash just for all the fancy returning attachments and defensive bow action.

In terms of play style, the keeper monks are your best friends. Just keep using their reaction to bring them out and then discarding them for your sacrifice effects like Funeral Pyre, Witch Hunter and Stoic Gunso. You only get 1 Way of the Crab per game so when you draw it, you need to set it up perfectly. In that game I referenced above, I played a Stoic Gunso and put a fate on him so that I could Way of the Crab during the Fate Phase action window to remove his final character, a Wandering Ronin with 1 additional fate on him. Keep in mind the keeper monks and any other neutral characters cannot be used with Way of the Crab, as it must be a Crab character.

It is my personal playstyle to bid relatively low to keep dishonor pressure on my opponent. If you can get them under 5 honor you'll start to see them panic a little bit and start making plays that are optimal for you, whether you're actually trying to dishonor them or not. You have so much card draw available to you from the pyre, storehouses, Fertile Fields, Kaiu Envoy and Shrew Yasuki that you can afford to bid lower without sacrificing too much conflict potency :).

1 hour ago, Bayushi Curtin said:

Where all Scorpion splashing into Crab? I've been trying both Crab and Dragon and find them both good.

I splashed Dragon to good effect, although I only actually ran four Dragon cards.