A topic from AEG's L5R CCG Rules forum, copied for Oracle of the Void from a copy of the forum saved in October 2015, so pages it didn't save are missing. Players' names are left out; the rules officials are named. Rulings are as they stood on these dates; later rulings, the rulebooks and the Rules Archive may differ.
A player, 21 August 2012
Hi,
In the EE Comprehensive rules, I can no longer find a reference under "Challenges and Duels" that restricts the challenger to being unbowed. It seems (my guess) that this was relegated to specific card text, as per the Oracle text for the classical Iaijutsu Challenge:
"Limited: Choose your performing unbowed Personality and target another player's Personality: Your Personality challenges him. He may refuse; if he did, dishonor him and his controller loses 7 Honor. The winner's controller gains 5 Honor. Destroy the duel's loser."
My question then is: can a bowed personality who ignores the cost of bowing to perform Kiho strategies (e.g. Shinsei, Togashi Satsu experienced 1 through 3, etc.) perform a Facing Your Devils, given the Oracle text on that Kiho is:
"Battle/Open: Bow your performing Monk or Shugenja and target a Personality: Your Personality challenges the target. The Personality's controller may discard cards with a total Focus Value greater than the challenger's Chi; if he did, his Personality may refuse. Destroy the duel's loser."
With no specific reference to the challenging personality being unbowed?
Brook Cunningham (rules official), 23 August 2012
Hi,
In the EE Comprehensive rules, I can no longer find a reference under "Challenges and Duels" that restricts the challenger to being unbowed. It seems (my guess) that this was relegated to specific card text, as per the Oracle text for the classical Iaijutsu Challenge:
"Limited: Choose your performing unbowed Personality and target another player's Personality: Your Personality challenges him. He may refuse; if he did, dishonor him and his controller loses 7 Honor. The winner's controller gains 5 Honor. Destroy the duel's loser."
My question then is: can a bowed personality who ignores the cost of bowing to perform Kiho strategies (e.g. Shinsei, Togashi Satsu experienced 1 through 3, etc.) perform a Facing Your Devils, given the Oracle text on that Kiho is:
"Battle/Open: Bow your performing Monk or Shugenja and target a Personality: Your Personality challenges the target. The Personality's controller may discard cards with a total Focus Value greater than the challenger's Chi; if he did, his Personality may refuse. Destroy the duel's loser."
With no specific reference to the challenging personality being unbowed?
The lack of "unbowed" in Facing Your Devils was an oversight on my part, sorry. It was from the era of implied targeting, where you implicitly targeted your performer, and while not from an era with implicit need for a challenger to be unbowed, it WAS from an era when your own bowed cards were never legal targets. Fixing!