Oracle of the Void #rules

If you target a Yojimbo who's not a legal target for the original action, Final Sacrifice does nothing.

The player of the original action is free to choose any legal target.

If your opponent takes a Ranged Attack action, and you Interrupt it with Final Sacrifice and target your Yojimbo Personality who's at the current battlefield and has no Followers, the Yojimbo is a legal target for the Ranged Attack action, so they will be the target.

OTOH, if the Yojimbo has a Follower attached, they aren't a legal target for the Ranged Attack, so Final Sacrifice does nothing.

Well, that was the right way to do it before and after Ivory, so don't feel bad about that. Blind redirection was an unfortunate side effect of some templating-changes-growing pains introduced in that Edition which, as Kempy said, were soon fixed with 20 Festivals, which added a "choose targets" step to taking an action, which takes place before interrupts, after which the action actually starts resolving and targeting technically "happens".

The change from the default "an action can be taken any number of times per turn as long as you can pay the cost again" (often, bowing the card, so unbowing it first would be required) lasted until Lotus Edition; from then on, all Lotus-legal cards and upwards were Once Per Turn by default. So, that's a way to tell by the printed versions, but the Oracle wordings of all cards should reflect the latter default, with "Repeatable" or "Any number of times per turn" added to all pre-Lotus-legal abilites with that default.

Melee Attacks are functionally the same as Ranged Attacks, except that you can't combine Melee Attacks with Ranged Attacks and vice versa.

They have to come from separate cards.

And they have to be in the same unit, IIRC.

Both correct. I recall, specifically regarding coming from separate cards, someone once asked a question about combining two attacks that were separate abilities on the same card, and that's a no-go.

And you can't combine a Melee Attack (or Ranged or Fear) from a Strategy with one from a card in a unit.

Sabotage?

Several. Burn it Down is one, from the same set as Sabotage, Honor Bound.

Castle of the Wasp Mantis Clan stronghold from Diamond/Lotus eras is half-entirely based around that concept, too.

Well, I said "several", but a closer look reveals maybe only maybe 10-20. Still, that Stronghold isn't a bad start if you want to make a whole deck around it.

Yeah, that Stronghold. How do you post the image right in the chat, forgive my discord illiteracy?

Cool, thanks! Here's a Personality for that deck:

If you don't mind mixing Editions, that is.

Enlightened did have a Rulebook meaning. It's in the Legacy rules.

A Personality with the Enlightened keyword has +1F for each Ring in play. In addition, all players have the following ability, "Elemental Battle/Open: Bow your target performing Enlightened Personality to straighten a target Ring."

NP. It was a very narrow period of time that it existed as a keyword/Rule.

bows

There were two "Siege" sets produced where a single deck would take on any number (optimally 3) other decks working cooperatively against it. The little samurai helmet icon = number of other players. And the deck had a lot of cards with the "Warrior" keyword for that other trait.

And of course, the Stronghold itself MADE "Warrior"-keyword Personalities.

Yes.

The Naga were coming back in Onyx Edition. You can probably find a spoiler for that set somewhere around the internet.

If you like Naga, and can find a Siege: Heart of Darkness set, it's pretty fun to go X-coop players v. 1 uber-player. The second and last Siege set recreated the united Clans fighting Fu Leng on the 2nd Day of Thunder. It was Siege: Clan War, and it came with a Shadowlands deck versus Monks, Toturi's Army, and Yoritomo's Alliance. 🙂

You had to take successive "Territory" cards from the uber-player before a special Clock deck ran out on you. Give or take; I forget the specifics, sadly.

Yep. And I mean, out of the box it was 3 decks, but by design, it could be more. That's why the little samurai helmet icon = number of opposing players.

Enjoy! I'm sure @kempy_nezumi knows where to find a full copy of the Siege rules, but I don't offhand, sorry.

The Unique rule itself also changed, though the exact Edition in which it did escapes me, but it used to allow only one in play anywhere, and then it was changed to only one in play per player. So, Singular and Unique only differ in terms of deck construction by the most current Rules.

Just did a little research, and I believe the change to the Unique Rule happened as of Celestial Edition.

Wow; prophetic of Shiwan, there. Were you able to wreck faces with an untouchable unit, or were people packing anti-Ninja/Journal meta, like Doji Shizue Exp?

Of course, neither the Instigator nor either Assassin action can target the guy with the Journal. Duplicate is a nice choice to counter it, apart from 1. it's an Event, so unreliable, 2. the fact the Journal might come back any time, and 3. boosting the heck out of the other guy's economy, especially having to hit a Naga Warlord out of Heart of the Shinomen; suddenly up to 6 Personalities in the deck are free (4 non-Uniques and the 2 Exp versions).

Attachments are * Items * Followers * Spells * Ancestors

Nothing happens.

It's a multi-player only card, where a player other than you can choose to lose five Honor to smack a different player with a ten-Honor loss.

I suppose it could be slightly clearer in the Oracle if I wrote "If" instead of "After", but mechanically it's the same and more specific to triggered effect timing.

Also, it needed to specify a timing on when each player got to opt to take the 5 Honor loss.

With the classic wording, it was just like "up for grabs" with no clear timing.

Or, I suppose I could also write "After a player chooses to take a loss" rather than simply "After a player does," but the previous sentence was a choice between "does" or "does not" choose to lose 5 Honor, so I thought the trigger was clear enough based upon that. If no one does, there's no trigger.

he was one of the early errata, always intended to be unique

@kempy_nezumi Did you check the list of errata from Clan War era Rulebooks, like Emerald through Void/Coup; I think it's in there. Or do you only have access to the one in your Dropbox, which is just the Imperial one? I'm not sure it'd be in the Jade one you have in the dropbox either, because they might not have expected to reprint him AND screw up reprinting him at that time.

I'm surprised and embarrassed the Oracle Notes section doesn't mention it, but on the other hand, I'm not THAT surprised and I'm frequently embarrassed. ;P

@kempy_nezumi I will concede that if you've scoured rulings post-CWS, then there's no easily-findable record that the leaving off of "Unique" was a mistake, since they DID manage to fix the title (might have been in an Imperial Herald?). But the more I think about it, I'm SURE the Clan War rulebooks' errata section mentioned both that the Shadowlands version is supposed to be named Kamu AND is Unique.

And, let's be real, it was probably a mistake. looks at you, Yoritomo basic promo

Well, true, but as you said, that was waaaaaay later, well after the CWS reprints. I can assure you he IS Unique and was not intended to have his errata reversed; the highest likelihood (and I imagine must have been contemporarily communicated somehow) is they changed the title but forgot to change the keyword/trait line in the CWS reprint. The design decisions you mentioned immediately above were a completely different team and environment.

Sorry I edited that about a billion times. 😛

Yep. As I've been saying. 😛

I'm putting in an issue report now. Took forever to get github to recognize my humanity.

If I am, I'm one that can add to 14 on 4 dice TWENTY times!! 😛

@kempy_nezumi Incidentally, I've intentionally reversed the ruling in Bullet Point #5 on that list above by not including any text in the Oracle version that supports it. I can understand why DW ruled it that way in 97, but JA should not have upheld it in 2003, because the wording on Unexpected Allies changed in Gold Edition so that the player is explicitly who brings Kamu into play, not just the Event itself. I'm not sure if the 3-turn lifespan needs more clarity in Oracle text, per bullet #6, or if that ruling isn't consistent anymore either with the current CR on "counting things" or the definition of "turns from now" but I'm not looking into that right now. Maybe later. 😛

Works for me.

@kempy_nezumi Point of fact, contemporarily to Gold Edition under the Rule of Relevance, Ghedai COULD use that ability from home. I made a universal decision when writing Oracle text to have the current Rule of Location which replaced the Rule of Relevance govern older cards, even if it changed their contemporary function. I'm thinking of maybe going back on that call, but one of the main reasons besides consistency and being able to read a card and understand how it works without consulting the Oracle for EVERYTHING (see how Beowulf got the "right" answer before even asking?), it would also involve going back and writing "Remote" on a LOT of abilities. Sooooo... I dunno. Just full disclosure here.

Rule of Location was introduced in Samurai; Lotus still used Relevance. 😉

Like I said, I'm leaning toward putting in the extra work, but Location was so much clearer and better a Rule than Relevance ever was, and there have to be lines where the Rules change the cards versus when the cards have to be changed via Oracle'd to work how they used to. Like, I can't write a trait on every pre-Ivory Conqueror, forbidding him from straightening if any other Conqueror is doing it too, or on every Duelist of a certain age, giving him the first option to focus if his Chi is lower or equal, rather than just winning ties.

I mean, I COULD... but, like, nah bro. 😛

Fun Fact tangental to the above: The first "Duelist"-keyworded card in L5R was Bayushi Yokuan in Scorpion Clan Coup. The keyword meant absolutely nothing until Lotus Edition.

When Duelist was first made a Rules-bearing keyword in Lotus Edition, it allowed a Duelist entering a duel against someone of higher or equal Chi to Focus first, even if they initiated the challenge. I forget when it changed to "wins ties against non-Duelists".

It started as "focus first" then changed to "wins ties". Was never both. Also, Reju was never reprinted after it became "wins ties". Also-also, Reju is slightly better because he wins ALL ties, but Duelists only win ties against non-Duelists.

I feel like I've mentioned this before, but FYI, the Ivory Edition MRP of Kharmic Strike makes both LOSE, not tie, so it no longer combos with Reju in an environ where you're using MRPs versus contemporaneous wordings.

I argued against it, but the Lead Designer was very keen on the change for no reason that I can rightly recall.

Probably to prevent Duelists abusing it, though, yeah, although they could've timed it to resolve after or cancel out the Duelist advantage. Something to preserve it for Open format and Reju, but no.

I guess it makes it much clearer how it interacts with Duelists, in any event.

Good old Reju.

Sure! I look forward to going over where and how I drew the initial "lines" when I first did all the Oracle text, and the situations I actually chose to apply the Legacy/Oracle-exclusive "Remote" keyword, even though I didn't for such cards as Ghedai or Naga Shugenja. Also, thinking on it further, the situations described may be soluable by putting some more optional, arc-simulation Rules into the Legacy document whenever you host it, rather than having to rewrite each individual card.

"Some people think"? ;P I can confirm that, while it might not have been the sole motivator behind things like Interrupts and Gold Pooling (making the game more player-friendy may well have been another), the fact that such changes would make a digitial version easier to program was definitely a consideration when deciding to implement them. I wonder, how many people noticed/remember that design was also getting rid of Limited actions as of Onyx; every Action-phase ability was going to be Open. If you're someone who didn't notice or don't believe me, go to the Oracle and narrow the search to "Onyx Edition" legality (which will pull everything from 20F, Thunderous Acclaim, and Evil Portents), then type "Limited" in the Text search; see what you get. 😉

Well, except that you effectively still had Limited actions.

Yeah. It wasn't a shift away from the Action phase wholesale, it was just a shift away from distinguishing YOUR turn actions from everyone else's. So, all action-phase abilities were for every player on every turn, full stop.

Haha. Also that. 😛

There's only 4 instances of "If it is your turn" in the Onyx PDF, however - and one is on an Interrupt, and one says "If it is your turn or you control a Courtier..."

I mean, growing pains, right? Were there any more "If it is your turn" Opens I wonder, in 20F, TA, or EP? Easy to check; gotta love the Oracle.

Turns out, just one. Togashi Yokuni from S:CW. Not as easy as I thought though, because the Oracle pulled every instance of all five of those words in ANY order. I thought you could put quotes around them to narrow it to the specific order, but no. Maybe brackets? Or maybe I imagined that function.

No idea about the Deathseeker stuff; Rules never looked at RoJ, but maybe someone who PT'd would know, or Gilador might just because "Lion". ;P Also, for the Phoenix box, I don't know if Kharmic MAY have changed to pure "Open:" in Onyx or "Open: If it is your turn," (per our discussion above of Limited going away). In the latter case, and by current RAW, I'd say that despite the Stronghold being templated as simply "Open" it doesn't inherently override restrictions on WHEN you can use the Kharmic ability, only cost and targeting, but all that said, we never got as far in Onyx discussions/notes to clarify its intent, so again PT may be the better source if you want to know how it's "supposed" to work, rather than how it works as written.

We never got to do Rules stuff on RoJ, so I don't know what the intent was on the Deathseeker Sensei.

As written, it would seem that you could Proclaim any number of them in one turn, but I don't know what Bryan wanted.

Either way, it wouldn't have gone to print with that text.

They're 2/3 -/4/0 Ninja, right?

So, yes, unaligned in Lotus, Ninja aligned in Open/Legacy

When facedown, Ninjutsu Personalities look just like this:

When I ran a Ninjutsu deck, I had several of these which I put on top of my facedown Ninja to help me and my opponents. It especially helped to determine which cards I had and had not looked at in my Provinces.

Actions can be performed by Personalities and Followers.

An action from an ability on a Personality is performed by the Personality

An action from an ability on a Follower is performed by the Follower

An action from an ability on an Item or Spell is performed by the Personality

I forget which of those applies to Ancestors.

An action from an ability on a Strategy (or Ring, or other card not in unit, or in the rulebook) is performed by a Personality or Follower if it says it is (in Emperor).

Before Emperor, there was no explicit performing, so things were a little woolly.

We finally persuaded Reese that performing should be explicit in Emperor - and then he decided to do away with the concept entirely in Ivory.

No

Well, it depends on the edition.

The rules for performing pre-Emperor were somewhat woolly.

IIRC, pre-Emperor, if an ability on card not in a unit targets your Personality or Follower in the constraints block (ie, the bit between the bold-face colon and the second colon, if there is one), then it's performed by that Personality or Follower.

That only applies to sets beginning with Dawn of the Empire, which is when the constraints block was introduced.

All the rewordings of Strategies in the Oracle should be explicit about their performer. Some say "choose" when they should say "target", but the "performing" aspect should be correct.

Nope.

0PH isn't inherently = dishonorable

Dishonorable is a separate state, signified by turning the Personality upside-down, that includes with it the fact that the Personality has a max PH of 0 while dishonorable.

So, long and short, all dishonorable Personalities are 0PH, but not all 0PH Personalities are dishonorable.

@saaam I think they may have fixed that either within Storm Heart's lifetime or shortly after? Like, wasn't the issue that Focusing at the time was a temporary bonus to the stat, so a dishonorable Personality in a duel could never even Focus his way up, because his max 0PH would always tank him? At some point they changed duels so that Focuses + Stat = Compare Resolution Scores, rather than just Stat + Focus bonuses = Compare Stats. I could look up exactly when that changed, but... don't wanna. 😛

Well, I know they fixed it at some point. Couldn't recall if it was in Storm Heart's legality life or not.