Prague Kotei and Second Chance

I could not participate in the main event and I did not even expect that I would want to. On Saturday I went to celebrate my birthday with my family and after that a lot of work awaited me at KC Vltavska.

On Saturday evening, when I was already too tired to do anything, I went to see the Kotei's site. I've never been there (DDM Prague 6) so I at least wanted to see the place. I knew that there is a club 'Sestka' where you can play various games on Xbox, pc, board games etc. They also have 2 Fit Pro dance pads and you can either play EverStep or Stepmania with Stepmixes 1-5.^_^.

When I arrived to the main hall I noticed that there were many orange booster boxes on the table. I was like WTF? I came closer to examine the box and few seconds later I noticed the Embers of War logo. I wasn't aware of this set being released and I haven't seen that many cards from the set. I asked few people if they can show me some cards. I went through them and sometimes I was wondering if the card is a joke or not.

After asking me if I'm new to the game (and me answering no) I was given the cards. So I read each card one by one. Among the cards there was a deer token. Seems like new Kitsune personalities are in EoW.

During that time I was asked if I will play in Second Chance event...so a thought crossed my mine - I could actually. About 15 cards from my deck was in someone else's deck playing the main event so I had to get them from somewhere else or not play them at all.

Kotei's after party including me, French players and Kotei organizers was held at Stepan's place. It was actually a really nice and calm barbeque party^_^. He prepared some meat and sausages for us (and not only that). They were delicious. Smaller groups were chatting about who knows what and everyone enjoyed the time spent there. After ten the majority of the group left to a Salsa club. I left them and went to our game store to build my deck.

It took me some time to find the actual deck. After that I had to figure out what cards to play. My deck had to change because I borrowed cards from the deck to somebody playing the main event. I also spent roughly two hours looking for my Stronghold but I couldn't find it. I found one under a proxy card later by accident when I hit a box that fell on the ground. When I was collecting the cards I noticed that one of the proxies was on a Lion clan stronghold. I took the card out and it was Shamate Keep.

After this frantic search I decided to go to sleep so I could wake up 6 hours later and leave for the site.

When I arrived I ate goulash, drank some coffee and asked two people if they would play a game with me. I played against a really high position Dragon Clan player from Saturday who beat me utterly with his Magistrate (?) Dragon Honor. I should have waited to built an army and attack with more personalities. But I did not do that so I utterly lost. I was too slow and Rhetoric ruined my day. Anyway it was good to see new cards and to find out how to duel and such. The few new red cards I saw made me really nervous. If such strong cards were printed early in the arc what else I can expect at the tournament?

My second opponent played Mantis scout and I tried playing Honor once again. But it was rather tricky. He got quite a lot of personalities and too much force for me to handle. His Alter History resolved as well which did not help me much. In the final battle though I was able to bow or kill majority of his personalities and he did not destroy my last province (even with Yoritomo's Guidance). It was tough and Isas was annoying and killed so many of my personalities that I was wondering if there are any left^^.

Then it was time for the Second Chance tournament to begin. I was paired against a new Legend of the Five Rings player (a Magic player, yeah that's why he was ok when I was using Magic terminology).

Round 1 - Scorpion Dishonor
This poor player was quite bewildered and also played an illegal card. But after a while everything was ok and we could proceed to our game. It was a dishonor deck and I was surprised by new cards (obviously). The card that completely caught me offguard though was Bad Kharma that negated my kill action. After that I decided that my family honor should NOT get below -1. I was destroying provinces as I could and managed to destroy the last one having 4 Family honor.

Round 2 - KK Mantis Scout
A game against the nice guy who was willing to play a game against me earlier. He bought a holding and got even more holdings turn later so I tried attacking a province. One province was down and he still wasn't able to 'outswarm' my deck so I was destroying provinces as well. I was defending my provinces though and was gaining honor at that time mostly. I had 2 Iron Wills and Effortless Counterattack which also helped me gain some more advantage. I won by Honor Victory. Even though I could crush the last province as well.

Lunch Break
I wasn't really sure if I wanted to eat something so I went upstairs to the club Sestka and asked if I can play some Dance Dance Revolution. I was picking songs more or less randomly and was enjoying the movement. I was really nervous during the tournament and had to concentrate a lot as the cards were new to me and I did not know how my deck should behave against this or that deck (but probably I should/could have played 'military' in all the games I played). Stomping on the arrows helped me ease the stress quite a lot. My last two songs were Maxx Attacks and Max Forever. After that I was so tired that I actually went to grab something to eat and drink. Downstairs I waited for the Round start and was wondering against what I would be playing (there were quite many Scorpion decks around).

Round 3 - Phoenix Honor - Temple of Purity
This deck caught me by surprise. I knew that -4F and open bow tech might be quite annoying but 6 province strength also sounded easy enough to break. But this deck was gaining honor really fast (faster than me). I got to 29 Honor when my opponent was one turn from being over 40. I decided that gaining more honor could be rather dangerous for me as there were some courtiers on the table. Early in the morning the card named Rhetoric made me almost cry. In the end it showed that it was a good decision to stop earning honor. I had three attacks. In the first one, one lion with Greateful Reward followers attacked but was sent home. In the second one all my personalities managed to break one province. In the upcoming turn I had to destroy the remaining 3 provinces and I managed that! The game was really crazy.

Round 4 - Berserkers
As there were 3 people with 3:0 it was highly probable that I and Stepan Kadlec would meet. That happened. I got 'holdings' screwed'. After depleting my Border Keep and two more turns I finally flipped two holdings. I was at 32 Honor (lost 2 from Armor of Heavens) and had 2 personalities that were doomed to die. I managed to play Cast aside the weak on one of the berserkers but Stepan had Feign Death which ruined my whole plan. With that one personality dead I could have possibly win (with quite a bit of luck^^)

Round 5 - Shiro Chugo
Farnusch Scharwin was my next opponent. He played some (I just have no idea what decks would people play) Scorpion military from Shiro Chugo. I wasn't aware that Proclaim is an action which completely ruined my strategy as I was trying to win via honor victory and it was too late to switch to military.
I destroyed a province but there were already so many personalities, I couldn't do much with them. I was at 31 honor which would be fine if I wouldn't be losing 2 honor per turn. Add Kameyoi to it and you have the result of the match. I lost, but it was winnable if I would play straight military from the beginning. I deserve a face palm and Scharwin deserved a better place than being just above me. He knew what to do against my deck and played accordingly. He went straight for Hotako and I had no idea what to do with her. She's too annoying. I always had like 3 personalities not being able to assign to battle or perform action and the rest tried to defend 1-4 8 Force plus personalities.

In the end I managed to get in top 8. Stepan Kadlec lost in the finals against Kitsu honor but ended up second. We both got 24 packs of Embers of War^_^.

If I look back at the games and my deck I would certainly not play Great Sacrifice and would replace it with let's say Singh Remnants or some Shugenja cards (Unimpeachable Name, A Forefather's Vengeance, Visitation). Chrysanthemum Blossom was wonderful. Not only it was gaining me honor but the personality was soon able to take a province alone. Iron Will + Effortless Counterattack was good but many players did not want to take the additional action anyway so I usually had the second card in my hand for the rest of the game. It's good when playing in military mode, but for honor decks there are other cards that could be better. If I would have known the field better I could have possible gotten a better score even with the deck I played at the tournament.

Shamate Keep

Dynasty

Shamate Keep
1x Border Keep XP
1x Bamboo Harvesters XP


2x Traveling Peddler
2x Family Library
1x Chugo Seido
1x Akodo's Grave
3x Remote Village
3x Copper Mine
2x Indomitable Home

1x Akodo Kobi
3x Matsu Nishijo
3x Akodo Tezuka
3x Matsu Koyama
3x Matsu Gohei
1x Matsu Fumiyo XP
1x Akodo Dairuko
3x Akodo Kakihara
2x Kitsu Kagako
3x Akodo Dosei

1x Imperial Gift
1x Jurojin's Blessing
1x Blighted Region
1x Alter History

Fate
3x Greatful Reward
2x My Enemy's Mercy
2x Brawl
2x Great Sacrifice
1x Creating Order
2x Honor of the Lion
1x Ring of Fire
2x A Paragon's Strength
1x Chrysanthenum Blossom
1x A Game of Dice
3x Wall of Honor
3x Surety of Purpose
2x Effortless Counterattack
2x Broken Alliance
3x Guided By Honor
3x Iron Will
3x Cast Aside the Weak
3x Sundering Strike
1x Ring of Earth