Ok, I want to build a new deck, something I haven't done since shortly after Drums came out. (a large factor in my poor showing at the Kumitae). Clearly, what may be our strongest decktype, Eiya duelling, is out. Honored Hostage jank is *far* too fragile, and when it's successful, it's the opposite of fun. So, what's left? Let's see if we can get some brainstorming going here. Currently, I have two deck ideas:

Ring military. Whether out of Dragon's Heart Dojo or High House, this would involve playing the rings and various pseudo rings, the various people that interact with them, and a fair amount of PK.

Duelling. Good, old-fashioned, duelling. Unfortunately, I haven't tested the current environment enough yet to see what duelling variant will work yet.

Does anyone have ideas for what decks will and won't work in the current environment?

I have no skill whatsoever, but I prefer DHD's Ring Military over High House.

Don't ask me about duelling, though. The last time I played a duelling deck, it never won. Currently I'm refusing to support anything duel. Vindictive frustration alert.

'Local environment' != 'current environment', and the latter essentially doesn't exist.

Are your planning to play the deck somewhere specific? Know that you'll be facing there?

One of the hallmarks of a champion is the ability to predict the meta and build to beat it. Like Faber did at the World Champs.

I think that the only deck in the current environment that dragon can compete with on the broadest levels is dueling.

However, there are a broad range of pseudo-viable options which I think can work in a local environment.

The HHOL enlightenment deck can work reasonably well, if not execllently. Similarly a ring-honor deck out of HHoL or DHD will work reasonably well (though less so). Further, a HHOL control deck may be viable... A ring-military deck is also feasible if you dont mind an auto loss v.s. control.

Call me a n00b, but I'd finally like to just ask and know this:

What in the blue hell does "control deck" actually mean? What is a "control deck" doing?

Most of the time it's just annoying you.

Thats one hell of a question.

In essence there are 4 types of deck in l5r and most other ccgs.
Aggro: Aggressive decks which endeavor to defeat you through the directed application force. This describes pretty much all military decks in the game.

Combo: Decks that play x+y+z to win. This describes all enlightenment decks and not alot else in l5r. There have been others, but design tends to quash them fairly quickly.

Control: This deck type is intended to win by not losing. The deck tries to prevent it's opponent from winning while it sets up it's own win condition. Think scorpion politics, mantis pirates, and most forms of dueling

Aggro-control: a combination of aggro and control which beats control but loses to aggro. Think the deeds-of-honor deck.

If you want more detail I cna provide it later. I have a decent grounding in theory and deckbuilding.

So, "control deck" means "Shosuro Maru". Yep, that's what I already assumed.



It happens, now and then.



Naw, that summary was already fine and helped to confirm my conjecture. However, if you enjoy offering theory and deckbuilding to people who could use a bit more help regarding strategy, you're invited to do so. I sure wouldn't mind learning a bit. There's still much to know, I assume.

In any case: Thanks for the help.

I can do

Do you have any specific questions?
I started a deckbuilding article a while ago, perhaps I should finish it XD

Hmm...what needs to be included in a deck to make losing with it a mere matter of bad drawing luck?

Seriously, I'm not too good at building decks. I've created a Dragon deck now that finally manages to win a great deal, even against people I've been busy losing against most of the time before. But I'm not sure that's because I've finally managed to create a tight deck or if I'm still just lucky and use some powerful cards.

Ok, here is what the thought process for deck building might look like...

Deck Title:
Clan:
Composition: (What style of deck will this be)
Objective: (What type of victory?)
Requirements: (It really is important to remind yourself sometimes... just how does this win?)
Utilities:
PK: Availability & Functionality
Force: Of the clan/deck's peep range
Defense: How are you on the defense?
Movement: Can you deal with movement tech?
Draw: Got cards?
Dueling: Do you duel? Do you want to?
Honor: Are you honorable? Do you need to be?
Rings: Can you ring it up? Should you?
Numerical Strength: How many peeps can you get on teh table at once?
Gold Scheme: got an economy?

Weaknesses: Do any of these bother you? If so how do you want to deal...
Limited Control:

Limited Dueling:

General Dueling:

Battle Dueling:

Superior Military:

Thats the basic thought process, in a sense. If you want to pick a deck to look at I can run through it. Though it may take a bit if I dont know the deck XD. Its really important that your deck be focused on winning by a specific method and on dealing with your bad matches.

I try apply two rules...

1] The best combo is a one-card combo, ie: include cards that you can use for immediate effect.
2] Effect [(Kill > Bowing > Send Home) x number of targets] vs. Cost [(None > Bowing > Gold > Kill) x number of targets]

Everything else is mostly flavour.

Good rules in some senses, though they dont incorporate the notion of the metagame alltogether well...

Still definitely 100% correct in terms of how to do pk.

Enlightened Madness has posted a deck over in the deck construction forum... you should all come look at it...

http://www.jadehand.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=100465[/url]