Gainig Grounds Season 1: Ojabun's war room

[Necrokamo]

This post is to comment on the new season of GG and how to implement our strategies accordingly.
The link to it (with errata and faqs):

GG 01

What Change for us?

Minako Rei
° Kharmic Debt Trigger timing changed from After resolving to After succeeding (default).
° Create Katashiro TN increased from 15 to 17.
° Create Katashiro now gains +2 Stat if a Shadow Marker was removed for the Action’s cost.

Yasunori
° Cost increased by 1.
° Chasing Advantage is for every three cards (rounded down) in the opposing players hand instead of every two.
° Onslaught Trigger replaced with Quick Reflexes.

Lust
° Lascivious Music is now a Bonus () Action.
° Lascivious Music no longer reveals extra cards based on Sin Tokens and the target must discard a random card from their hand (different than the card drawn).
° Seduction gained the Love Hurts Trigger.
° Df increased from 4 to 5.

Chiaki
° Split the Soul cost changed to: Discard a card and choose a
° friendly non-Master Retainer model within range.

Sensei Yu
° Brutal Sensei only gives Chi when a friendly model is damaged by an enemy effect.

Kitty Dumont
° Under the Table now restricted to: Enemy only.

 

UPGRADES
Reliquary (Manos, the Risen)
° Demise (Eternal) replaced with Lantern of Souls.
° Regeneration +2 changed to Regeneration +1.

Fermented River Style
° Drunken Kung Fu replaced with Unpredictable.
° Falling Rave Kick effect and cost changed to: “Discard a Chi Token. Place this model into base contact with the target. Target suffers 3 damage and gains Staggered.
° Falling Rave Kick ranged increased from 1" to 2" and gained a TN of 12.

Masked Agent
° Unsettling Presence replaced with Relentless.
° With Me changed to choosing a friendly model within 2".

 

What was explained? (FAQ)

1. Wandering River Style – When using the Four Winds Punch Action, Markers are removed and then Dropped again. Do these markers change Alignment (friendly/enemy)?
a) No. The Markers Dropped by this Action are the same as those removed and do not change Alignment when removed.

2. Gwyneth Maddox – Does the Luck Thief Ability apply before or after  and  modifiers cancel each other out?
a) Before. Modifiers to a duel (such as ofrm Focused, Concealment, etc.) are generated during Step A of performing duels (pg. 10).
Luck Thief immediately applies to any  modifier generated changing it to a  modifier. Then, the duel proceeds to Step B, at which point  and  modifiers would normally cancel each other out.

3. Lone Swordsman – If the Lone Swordsman takes the Last Breath Action twice in an Activation targeting the same model, are the effects cumulative?
a) No. However, if The Lone Swordsman targets two different models with the Last Breath Action in the same Activation, it would resolve the effects of both actions separately.

[LeperColony]

So...Yasunori on the shelf now, or still worth taking?  And if so, when?

[Necrokamo]

If before it was a "good" option for its cost compared to the other "Rider" characters, now I see it more limited.  Lacking 'Ruthless' and 'Ride with me' already did less, now without 'Onslaugth' can hardly be a heavy attack unit within the faction. The change to 'Chasing Advantage' means that now 5 cards are needed in the rival's hand to make many of their actions that require it worthwhile.  

For now I think I will limit his use (shelf).  Fortunately, they didn't kill Minako completely (her Katashiros is another thing).

[SerZaka]

I don't mind the changes to Minako, I use her only with Misaki anyway . And the trigger is actually good anyway. You want to win just the first duel, then it is done .

Poor boy Yasu , beaten hard . Now far less scary to face I suppose. He reduces damages only by 1 for half the turn and then he doesn't even that anymore . A movement 7 with Flight and still 6/7 on the defenses can still have a part in some lists . I didn't read the Strategy yet.

Lust : I don't know and honestly I don't care xD

 

Chiaki : don't mind either , I put the reliquaries only on the Gokudo anyway . 

 

Sensei Yu : he lost his touch xD no more self-loathing preparation . This mean 3-6 less Chi in the first turn . It doesn't influence the rest of the game . But 3-6 Chi is a lot , we will see .

 

Kitty : this was predictable , and righteous in my opinion

 

The reliquary of Manos was strong even on a Gokudo I can't imagine on a Master . I will miss the Midnight Stalker-like Gokudo with Demise and Hard to Kill tho.

 

Drunken Style : this was predictable too. We don't know what Unpredictable means as it doesn't exist in any other card (probably it treat all - as + only in the duels) . Have a 2" range attack is useful for tackle an enemy model who really wants to leave. But for only 3 damage maybe the High River will see some sunlight. 

Edit: about Masked Agent we don't know what relentless is , right?

Edit 2 : nevermind, I'm dumb . The Dropbox with the cards is hidden there. The Unpredictable and Relentless are there . 

[Morgan Vening]

Just for clarity...

Unpredictable: When taking Actions, this model treats all in their Action's duel as if it were and vice versa.
Basically, removing the ability of Drunken Kung Fu to affect Damage Flips, and other issues that might arise (The negative Wp aura some models have, on Terrifying Tests).

Relentless: Enemy models engaged with this model may not declare Resistance Triggers.
Basically dropping it from 6" to engagement range.

[Jesy Blue]

Of the changes I only used Lust and Masked Agent... not much changes for the upgrade, but my card manipulation with Lust just got quartered.  might be time to replace her in Qi and Gong with Mr Tannen permantly.

[Jinn]

25 minutes ago, Jesy Blue said:

my card manipulation with Lust just got quartered.

Can you explain this? That action seems significantly better for Qi and Gong now that it discards a random card.

[Jesy Blue]

As a regular action with the bonuses from Sin Tokens, I would discard 5 cards from the deck and give them a crap card, twice.  Each time I make them draw a card, they trigger either Flirtatious Wink or Consumed by Lust. 

Now, I can only do it once, I can only remove 2 cards, and hopefully give them crap (I might not get terrible stuff with 3 cards, but I KNOW something terrible is coming in 6 cards).

[Drowsheep]

Seems like TT didn’t get ruined by the nerf; and a lot of it is justifiable.

I really wanted Minako to lose versatile and take less of a hit; her summoning is a bit tougher now.  But it be like that sometimes.

I haven’t played Yasunori that much; but I will say that he got hit a bit too hard... XD

[Jinn]

I don't see how discarding from deck is very useful (maybe if it spikes really high and they're halfway through it? Just as likely to spike low...) when compared to discarding a random card from hand. Being more likely to reveal a weak card does not seem worth it to me when compared to a random discard; I'd need to reveal all three as ~9-10+ cards for the discard to become worse than the draw for me IMO.

The reason Lust's old action was weak is because the net change of your flips when you discard 6 cards from your deck is functionally nil on average. Being able to draw the weakest of those cards is a bonus when you factor in all the abilities like Flurry or Juggernaut (discounting Lust's Sin token mechanic as it works as well or better with her new action). The new version of Lust will be even better at utilising Sin tokens for damage given she can now walk + Lascivious Music + Destructive Performance. The only place she might be less effective is in a Crossroads 7 crew, but that's unlikely given how rarely she was hired in those and how much stronger she is now as a model, she is likely better in that crew as well.

[Necrokamo]

1 hour ago, Drowsheep said:

Seems like TT didn’t get ruined by the nerf; and a lot of it is justifiable.

I really wanted Minako to lose versatile and take less of a hit; her summoning is a bit tougher now.  But it be like that sometimes.

I haven’t played Yasunori that much; but I will say that he got hit a bit too hard... XD

Mostly the errata has corrected some claims. 

Kitty Dumont is not affected in his game by the change, it will continue to be a great schemer and support to move characters.  

Minako has just become an additional attacker for teams that need it, invoking now is difficult outside Last Blossom.  

Sheng Long and his team were simply tuned (the impact on the competitive must now be seen now that NV lost Inhuman Reflexes).  

Yasunori is unanimously the worst of all Riders, now being a very expensive schemer.

Chiaki and Lust have not used them yet to say something, but the consensus is that Lust is now more useful.

[Nikodemus]

Considering I was planning on in-theme Minako anyway, phew. Still summoning on 10s

Not very enthused with Sensei Yu nerf. Feels like a big nerf to Monk theme lists in general. Few times I did use High River Monks they didn't feel like they needed nerfing. Oh well, gotta play 'n see.

Mostly feeling positive about the changes though. Mostly

[Nikodemus]

6 minutes ago, Necrokamo said:

Yasunori is unanimously the worst of all Riders, now being a very expensive schemer.

At this point I'm starting to compare Dawn Serpent and Yasunori, and it's not looking good for the pony boy.

[Starrius]

Weirdly only model that infuse that changed was chiaki, the rest of the changes didnt really impact me.  But one of the interesting things from the FAQ was that challenge now stacks  this has a massive impact on my play style and I think it improved my Qi and Gong crew immensely

[DeleteAccount]

Of course Yasinori gets overcorrected when I finally decide to buy him XD

He got absolutely castrated, see very little incentive to use him after this. His only real selling point is his mobility now since his resilience has gone way down with the opponent just needing to go to 2 cards to leave him naked and although with his bonus action he can do easier setups for Quick Reflexes, I'm still not sure how useful that would actually be in practice since now he seems like a schemer bully, not something you jam into the middle which also means less chances to trigger Quick Reflexes.

As for the rest, fine, I'm mildly annoyed with the card discard required for Chiaki, but making it Retainer only makes all the sense in the world, Yan Lo will have to be more careful now though.

Minako frankly didn't address the issue with her, when I field her I tend to bring Ototo for the ride anyway, so there I get my shadow markers (if you want them for cheap, a Torakage can at least give you 1) and I'm still surprised she can summon both Katashiro in the same turn. More surprised still that Katashiro can still leap for free.

On other things that really raise my eyebrow is how Rebuild Corpus still just happens and Wandering River Style still hasn't gotten a TN. On the other side of the spectrum, Dawn Serpent still seems like crap to me and High River Monks are still hard sells just as an immediate couple of models I have gripes with.

I was expecting more sweeping errata in general I guess, but seems they prefer to take it slow and well, they are the game devs

[SerZaka]

1 hour ago, Razhem said:

how Rebuild Corpus still just happens

Don't get this. Should Yan Lo lose his summoning ability?:

 

3 hours ago, Nikodemus said:

At this point I'm starting to compare Dawn Serpent and Yasunori, and it's not looking good for the pony boy.

It is time for the little snake to shine for once xD

 

Anyway after I took a look on every subforum I must say that this is the only one with an original and thematic title xD good job OP 

[DeleteAccount]

12 minutes ago, SerZaka said:

Don't get this. Should Yan Lo lose his summoning ability?:

Nah, I just think it should have a cost now that chiaki can preset the ancestor replace bu getting the upgrade on a gokudo.

That action during beta got buffed to the high heavens since it was very hard to set up. Then Split the Soul happened like a week before ending the beta.

[SerZaka]

Ahh. Yep, I told that too during the beta : that Yan Lo had become a little brainless with that trigger on Chiaki  . It cost actually a card ... But you get 2 when you summon xD

[Cursed25]

I'm a little sad about Yan Lo nerf! 😞 I wish Chiaki could still give upgrade to any minions. Before the errata I experimented a lot with OOK models with Reliquaries and it was nice to build toward different startegies with his crew. Removing masters from the possible reliquaries carrier was a good move (I used many times Shenlong with Yan and it was really strong) but only giving reliquaries to Retainer kills a lot of OOK picks we could use with him to build interesting crew!

Also the nerf to Manos Reliquary is ruff! no more Demise eternal and a worse regen! ouch! this will make Gokudo or Izamu way less tankier!

For me this is a major power nerf for Ancestor! I will have to play them a bit with the new Errata but I won't use them as much as before!

 

Minako nerf was anticipated and she is almost as strong as before in a Last Blossom crew! So I'm happy with this!

 

I didn't like Yas before the nerf! Now he is just pure garbage ahah! very happy that I never bought it!

 

Shenlong is still a strong master! he can still delete 1 model per turn but it will take him more actions to do (no more  on dmg everywhere and he is way less mobile) and he will have less Chi to play with since Sensei Yu changes. I'm pretty sure we will still see Shenlong doing well! wandering style is still an excellent scheme/anti-scheme tool, he still have is irreducible dmg and now that Sensei is less useful we will see even more Shenlong crew with almost no Monks in it (low river and wandering monks being the only exceptions)

 

I never used Lust but as others have said she has now more synergies with Qi and Gong and she is a bit tankier

 

Masked agent could ruin the day of every Resistance trigger crew out there and this upgrade gave TT a very easy way to negate these crews. This is a big nerf but I see why they've done it.

[Wakefield]

Masked Agent was a little crazy before. It still functionally does the same thing but you need to commit with it. It was a tech piece that destroyed what it teched against. Now it at least has some counterplay. Leveticus is going to be a bit tougher to handle but it doesn't really change too much in the long run. 

Yasunori will still see some play in less mobile crews as an option compared to the Shadow Emissary for the small pushes and being able to free up models. He's a lot more of a tech piece now and I don't think they should have taken onslaught. He at least gets additional attacks still. Even if reflexes is worse than onslaught. 

Still all in all, it seems like we didn't get it as bad as Tara. 

[Psycho_alchemist]

As always, the nerfs seems to follow the general rule of "rounding down" instead of a general balance.

Pieces that did not see table time before will remain in on the shelf.

I was hoping for some more changes in both directions.

And yes, yasunori is terribly overpriced now. I will be using dawn serpent now as fast versatile schemer. 

[SerZaka]

7 minutes ago, Psycho_alchemist said:

As always, the nerfs seems to follow the general rule of "rounding down" instead of a general balance.

Pieces that did not see table time before will remain in on the shelf.

I was hoping for some more changes in both directions.

And yes, yasunori is terribly overpriced now. I will be using dawn serpent now as fast versatile schemer. 

There is a small contradiction in your post

"Pieces that did not see table time before will remain in on the shelf"

And 

"And yes, yasunori is terribly overpriced now. I will be using dawn serpent now as fast versatile schemer. "

So it actually worked xD the snake is on the board now 

[SerZaka]

I was joking Necrokamo...

[Mithrandir]

I'm sad and confused for Yasunori's nerfs. I'd like to know the train of thought behind these changes. Can anyone from the testing team explain them to us? 

[Psycho_alchemist]

3 hours ago, SerZaka said:

There is a small contradiction in your post

"Pieces that did not see table time before will remain in on the shelf"

And 

"And yes, yasunori is terribly overpriced now. I will be using dawn serpent now as fast versatile schemer. "

So it actually worked xD the snake is on the board now 

That's fair but... I always used the little dragon, only for a different role. Now I am promoting it to the former spot of Yasunori