[Ruling] Master Tactician

By Goateh, in L5R LCG: Rules Discussion

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1) Is the 3 card limit on Master Tactician per character? For example, if you have 2 Master Tacticians in the conflict, can you look at and play up to 6 cards?

2) Similarly, if a Master Tactician leaves play and returns during the same turn (via Spiritcaller, Echoes, Specral Visitation, etc.), is this considered to be a new card with a new 3 card limit?

Master Tactician's limits are by card, as you're only using one Tactician to play any given card off the top. So you could play 6 cards with two Tacticians or reset the count by flickering it
[Tyler Parrott, May 4 2020]

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Master Tactician question time!

I understand that these stack (and let you play up to 6 cards), and that they reset when they leave play (which makes sense). My question revolves around how they "unstack" as they leave play. Let's consider the following example:

My opponent attacks, and I defend with Master Tactician 1. The top card of my deck is Forebearer's Echoes, and I play it to bring in a 2nd Master Tactician. One card down, 2 to go for Master Tactician 1 - my opponent chooses not the cancel the effect, and the 2nd Master Tactician enters play. I should now be able to play 5 more cards from the top of my deck.

The next top card is a Fine Katana, which I attach to Master Tactician 1. And here's where it gets a bit tricky. Is Master Tactician 1 at 2/3 played, with Master Tactician 2 at 0/3 played? Is Master Tactician 1 at 1/3 and Master Tactician 2 at 1/3? Or am I, as the player, now at 2/6 cards played from the top of my deck?

The next top card is Prepare for War, which I use to honor Master Tactician 1. That's the last action in the conflict, and Master Tactician 2 goes to the bottom of my deck. I'm now faced with a scenario where any of the following could be true:
(1) I can still play 2 cards from the top of my deck (Katana & Prepare for War were credited to Master Tactician 2)
(2) I can still play 1 card from the top of my deck (Katana was credited to Master Tactician 2, Prepare for War was credited to Master Tactician 1)
(3) I can no longer play any cards (all cards played are credited to the player, and my "pool" has gone from 3/6 to 3/3, and I can no longer play any more cards this round).

Since this ability is constant, and not an action similar to Pillow Book / Masterpiece Painter, it seems unlikely that I'm allowed to "spend" the card from a particular Master Tactician. It seems like one of the following has to be true:
(1) Cards are "spent" from the Tacticians in the order in which they enter play (either oldest first, or newest first, but one of the two)
(2) Cards are added to a collective pool for the player, and then that collective pool is used up as cards are played, with the "# of cards played" always being, at most, the size of the pool (so if I play 6 cards from the top, then lose a Tactician, I drop to 3/3 cards played rather than 6/3 cards played)

When multiple Master Tacticians are in play (along with a Battlefield), both of their constant abilities attempt to be applied, but only one can actually be applied at any given moment, as you can’t be using both abilities simultaneously (the limit of three cards refers to the individual paragraph that the character is using to play cards from the top of your deck).

Most of the time, this won’t be a problem as it doesn’t matter which Master Tactician you are using (they do the same thing and have the same duration), but as you’ve pointed out there will be times when it does. Per the RRG, under Priority of Simultaneous Resolution: “If two or more constant abilities…cannot be applied simultaneously, the first player determines the order in which they are applied.” This means that should it be required to identify which Tactician’s ability has been used, the first player assigns the ability to the source.

To your specific example, then:

Tactician #1 plays Forebearer’s Echoes (1/3)
One of the Tacticians plays Fine Katana, assigned by the first player (2/3 + 0/3 or 1/3 + 1/3)
One of the Tacticians plays Prepare for War, assigned by the first player (1/3 + 2/3 or 3/3 + 0/3)
The echoed Tactician leaves play.

Note that even in this example, this only matters if you have a way to get the original Master Tactician into a second conflict, as he cannot look at or play cards outside of a conflict.

[Tyler Parrott, May 11 2020]

Edited by Goateh
Adding second ruling