Rules for 7 June 2004

Your Rules for Monday, June 7, 2004

To try and keep things more consolidated for Tournament Staffers, I'm going to try to include all rulings from this day - even those I already answered in-thread. I may not get it right the first time, but I'll give it my best.

Overwhelmed vs. Wedge

My opponent has a Hitomi Daisetsu and a Togashi Kansuke as the only units in his army. He plays Wedge on Kansuke. I play Overwhelmed. What can/must he do?? He can't send both of them home becuase he can't target his Kansuke. He can't destroy Kansuke because he can't target him.

A) He sends home Daisetsu but leaves Kansuke. B) He does nothing at all.

B seems like the correct answer to me, but I'm not sure.

It used to be that you would send Daisetsu home, since that's the only option that will do anything but fail completely.

However, the MRP in Diamond says, "He must choose to destroy a Personality if he cannot send two units home." I can't argue with explicit card text.

So you must choose the destroy option, which fails.

Unless Jeff says otherwise, you're right. It'll be answer B - do nothing.

Superior Strategist/Archer Squad

Okay, I know that playing a Formation is considered to be a battle action, but Sup Strat doesn't care about that, it says to search for an action card with a Battle or Open Action. And Archer squad does not have either an open nor a battle action upon it. (it just gives Battle Actions to other cards)

So the question is, can a person use Superior Strategist to grab and play Archer Squad? And if so, why?

You can't use Superior Strategist to grab and play Archer Squad.

Archer squad has no Actions on its card to meet Superior Strategist's requirement of "a card with a Battle or Open action." It only has a Trait that gives other cards an Action, just like Yogo Towers has no Action but a Trait that gives other cards an Action.

Ranged Attack reactions Tsuruchi Tech vs. Outer Walls

Player A takes a Ranged attack action from a personality that has exactly enough strength to kill an opposing personality. Let's say a Tsuruchi Hiro targets a 4 Force personality with his built in Ranged 4 attack.

My opponent reacts with Outer Walls to reduce the strength of the attack to 2.

Is it a legal play for me to now react to the original Ranged attack reaction with Tsuruchi technique to increase the strength of the attack to 5?

Sure. Tsuruchi Technique and Outer Walls both have the same timing trigger (immediately before the Ranged Attack effect resolves), so they'll get played during the same window of Reactions, passing around the table until each player passes in a row.

Bayushi Tai's Token

I was just wondering if the token Bayushi Tai creates can be destroyed to pay the cost for using Overwhelmed.

No. Jeff's already addressed this one. Here is the archived ruling:

"From: Jeff Alexander <jalexander@alderac.com> Subj: Re: [L5R-CCG] Tokens and Bowing Extension

Non-card tokens are neither bowed nor unbowed. A pure token Personality cannot be destroyed to pay for Overwhelmed."

Sezaru's Gift + Daigotsu Dojo

I have been hearing rumors of these two as an effective combo, but I don't really see it. If you choose to increase the numerals on Daigotsu Dojo with Sezaru's Gift, doesn't that reduce the penalty?

Sezaru's Gift says, "Kiho Limited: Bow one of your Shugenja or Monks and remove this card from the game to permanently increase or decrease one numeral on one Holding by 1. This may not be used to change a numeral to 0."

It can decrease or increase the numeral. Hence you can use it to magnify the chi penalty the Dojo creates. You could also counter-act this effect with additional copies of the Gift (use a Gift to reduce your opponent's boosted Dojo back to a more manageable level). The only thing you can't do with Sezaru's Gift is actually change the number to 0. (card text)

OK, that should be anything and everything that was addressed as a direct Rules Question on L5R-CCG for 7 June 2004. If I missed your question, please repost it with a clear subject line include the flag [RULES].