replies to 7 September

Some Questions

Aquiring Favor: I originally took this card to be able to be used as a cost for those cards that require the Imperial favor to be discarded (i.e. part of the card's cost) e.g. Imperial Standard. But circulating around the traps it has come to my attention that some people think you can use it AS the Imperial favor i.e. discard it to use the Winds ability. So what is the real deal?

Playing Acquiring Favor will work with your Wind's ability. It's just like discarding the Favor for any cost.

And although I have asked this already, with no answer forthcoming I'll ask again: Battle of Quiet Winds plus Towers of the Asako: Does Towers of the Asako completely cancel this terrain, or only part of it (i.e. you can use Towers of the Asako to just cancel the part that prevents your unit from going home? Relevant card text: BoQW: Battle Terrain: The Attacker and the Defender may each send an opposing unit home bowed.

You use the Towers as soon as your opponent targets one of your Personalities. The action is then canceled, including all yet-to-be-resolved effects. You cannot choose to selectively allow some of them to still happen.

For Battle of Quiet Winds, the active player gets to decide who chooses a target first in cases where it matters (like this one).

Perfect Cut Numbering System

While sorting my perfect cut cards, I noticed a slight problem with the numbering scheme. Cards 84 and 85 are misnumbered. I can't remember off hand whether they were all 84 or all 85, but one number was missing.

Matsu Hyun should be 85. Akodo Setai is the real #84.

Ki-Rin Rules Question

Ki-Rin (gold edition) "While the Ki-Rin is unbowed and Honorable, Personalities with 0,4, or 5 = Personal Honor cannot be in armies attacking your Provinces."

My question: what happens if one of the attacker's Personalities has = Frenzy (or some other effect that would dishonor them or raise or lower = their PH to 0, 4, or 5) played on them? They are already present, so is = the action that would cause the conflict illegal? Is the Personality = sent home? Or do they stay in the current battle until resolution, = unable to move to a different battle, and are prevented from attacking = at a later time until the situation changes?

Treat the Ki-Rin as saying "cannot assign or move into".

GenCon uk commentary

Next, Exploding Crane doesn't refer to Crane exploding themselves with To Do What We Must.

Actually, yes, it does.

Errata needed for Fire and Air?

I guess this is kind of a question for the design team.... I was looking at the card Fire and Air from APC and noticed that the first action says to bow the shugenja and the second action does not, it just say "once per turn". At first I though this meant that the shugenja can use it to move into an adjacent battle and still be able to range attack (or fling a Kiho, or whatever...). But then I remember a longstading rule from the Rulebook. "A Shugenja must bow to use a Spell unless the Spell CLEARLY INDICATES OTHERWISE." (A Perfect Cut Rulebook, p.62.) That means you have to bow to use the second ablility on Fire and Air even though it doesn't say so because it doesn't specifically say not to. Is this right?

Yes.

Was that the intent?

No.

Or should there be an errata?

There are no errata to Fire and Air at this time. Play it by the rulebook for now: both abilities require bowing. There may or may not be an MRP later.

APC Question: By Will of the Wind [Jeff? Zen?]

Dearest Jeff or Zen,

Is By Will of the Wind an air action for Master of Five?

I'm going to cast Fist of Designer and say "no".

Is it a political/elemental action?

Actions have never picked up the "Elemental" trait automatically just by being air/earth/fire/void/water actions, so, no, but for a real reason.

Is it cancellable with Way of the Earth?

No. See answer #1.

Emperor's Under-Hand Reversal

Speaking of things-which-were-once-Political, Bayushi Kaukatsu (Soul of Bayushi Goshiu) lacks the Political trait on his Reaction, whereas Bayushi Goshiu's Reaction is Political.

Is this truly not meant to be a Political Reaction (as printed), or is this unintentional?

Unintentional. For now, play him as worded.

Regarding the Under-Hand, there's a ruling: For cards printed before Gold Edition: If the Imperial Favor can be discarded to pay for an action's cost, the action will always be Political, but the action's effects are not automatically Imperial Favor effects. [ZF, 1 August 2001]

Would this ruling (in combination with the above reversal of Vaughn's ruling that actions discarding the Imperial Favor as a cost are always political even if the discard is optional) imply that since the Under-Hand is a pre-Gold Edition card, using the Emperor's Under-Hand is not a Political Action if you're not discarding the Imperial Favor as part of the cost (in other words, you're just looking at the cards), but it IS Political if you are using the "enhanced" ability to discard a card? Or was this ruling also part of the reversal?

It is not Political irrespective of whether you force a discard.