[IG3] Dragon Clan Preview - Shattered Stone Kata

[ramela]

I think this will be very nice for PoV decks, a reusable kill action goes a long way toward preventing your hand from drying up for the late game.

Also, having this Swift Counterattacked won't hurt as much. 

[Mirumoto Minoru]

guys please check my new topic Which Kata would you use? Dance of the Void or Shattered Stone Kata? under General Strategy for your opinions about which kata would be best for our current monk decks..

This will not only help us tackle this upcoming issue about the two katas that we have but it will also help us get others opinion on which kata should be used for a specific kind of deckset.. Thus helping us choose the right Kata for us..

Your replies would be greatly appreciated.. Tnx!

(advertising? hehehe!  )

[Black lotus]

Janky idea there, that knew kata made me feel we'll only miss some reusable additional battle action engine ... should we consider testing Moshi Sayoko in POV decks ?

She is Loyal, isn't she?

On the other hand, perhaps 2x Wotan should be more than enough, along with CHSH, SHK and HHS.

My bad, you're right, Moshi Sayoko is loyal, I guess I was being too much enthusiastic 

[Togashi Avatar]

Hmm the Fire Water Monks are gonna love this...

Firewater Monks?  Are those like Monks with Sake tokens?

/ Bloodhound Gang voice

'The opponent, the opponent is on fire. We have control all the water, let the mofo burn: BURN!!!'

/ end Bloodhound Gang Voice

Or you could see it as our own version of the Drunken Master technique: either way, opponents will be severely injured...

:-)

[Daramere]

You know, now that I think about it, a Monk with both Fire and Water could be pretty helpful.

[Togashi Avatar]

You know, now that I think about it, a Monk with both Fire and Water could be pretty helpful.

And if it's a female, then she'll be sizzling hot!!!

If needed let's boiler plate it...

[Togashi Deckard]

I'm personally hoping for more diversity in the elemental traits of our shuggies.

[Daramere]

Throwing random elemental traits on our shugenja just makes them worse (and isn't really in flavor for the setting for a Tamori to not have Earth and/or Fire).  Printing an air shugenja, for example, doesn't in any way let us use cards that rely on the Air keyword, while denying that Personality the possibility to use cards that look for the Fire or Earth keywords.  Until they start printing multi-elemental shugenja for non-Phoenix, I don't want to see random "Air" or "Void" keywords on any Tamori.

[Togashi Deckard]

Throwing random elemental traits on our shugenja just makes them worse (and isn't really in flavor for the setting for a Tamori to not have Earth and/or Fire).  Printing an air shugenja, for example, doesn't in any way let us use cards that rely on the Air keyword, while denying that Personality the possibility to use cards that look for the Fire or Earth keywords.  Until they start printing multi-elemental shugenja for non-Phoenix, I don't want to see random "Air" or "Void" keywords on any Tamori.

However, there are a number of cards that get better with more elemental keywords overall, and there are a number of spells that get better with both Water and Void traits. I liked being able to run a shugenja-themed deck back in the olden days, and we tended to have someone here or there that could be associated with each element. I don't find the Fire theme exciting, really. And really, a clan that is continually seeking enlightenment should be more diverse than that. Remember when our ise-zumi breathed ice? Or could fade into shadows? (There's some tattoo for that... Night sky? I don't know.) And our shugenja could look into the void and pull focus cards out of it? (Yoshi, void.) Or cycle cards? (Gennai, void.) Cancel spells? (Jodome, air. A lifesaver against Secrets on the Wind, The Wind's Truth, Touch of Death.) That all was way cooler than simple fire kung-fu. And since the DT is actually making a really good effort to have focused themes, shugenja with these elemental themes, updated to be relevant to the environment could obviously help us get out some rings while they were at it, search for/reuse spells/kihos or grab other stuff out of the deck (air/void), unbow our kensai and monks (air), move people back into battle (water)...  With all respect, I think you're not using your imagination here. It wouldn't be in keeping with our current fire theme, but it would be more true to what our clan has been historically, and more appropriate with our enlightenment theme as a whole, which (I think?) is supposed to be a higher priority focus than kung-fu.

The only card that matters that checks for Earth right now is Groves of Stone, (I think the earth-checking effect of Tetsubo of Earth giving -2 against ranged attacks isn't so fantastic given that it's only protecting one personality... and what do our shugenja need a weapon for anyway?) and I don't think that's getting run so much in Dragon. Touch of the Flames I think is much better as a spell (checking for your total elemental keywords) than as a focus card (which gets you a free card... But only has 3 focus value so you have better options there anyway), In Aikune's Name is good as a focus effect but unique, and Cleansing the Path isn't that big a deal for us. As for fire kihos, I think we have more than enough fire people for those anyway by now.

[Daramere]

I wouldn't object to that in theory.  But it would require a substantial change in design philosophy in how Dragon Shugena work (and how many of them there are), and to a lesser extent probably a change in how the Monks are designed.  Just throwing keywords on a handful of Shugenja wouldn't let us play those Phoenix-aimed cards that key off of the number of elemental keywords.