Anatomy of a Deck: Crane Military

Deck building can be a strange thing. Often it just resolves around a combo or perhaps something you have seen a better player do and wish to replicate. Sometimes it is designed around fear of an archetype.

I wanted, for better or worse, to list my own experimentation with a deck type I 'like' playing. Definitely not the best deck out there and quite possibly even weak by Crane standards.

Genesis.

With the launch of Children of the Empire most Crane players launched into a furious endeavour to test out the new duelling cards. Crane players started fielding enormous Tower characters and formerly uncommon splashes sprung into being to support these towers (Crab splash I am looking at you).  I decided in the end I did not like it though. Until the new Crane Stronghold and (in all likelihood) two useful duelists arrive it has too many cards required to make it work and thus is heavily dependant upon luck. Any deck which needs support cards to shore up its base line competency will be weak by nature.

What Then

Slightly disappointed but unsurprised I looked back at some of my older decks and hoped to 'upgrade' with some Children cards. I focused in on two. One is a keeper Unicorn splash deck that uses the wonderful Talisman to make the province line up more formidable. The other was older still and was a Lion splash military. It was the second I went for only due to the large amount of attachment hate out there.

Restricted

I often find when thinking about new decks that the best starting point is to think about which restricted card you want to field, why you want it and how it helps against the global meta. Ignore those which just do not match. i.e Policy Debate is a wonderful card for the Crane Tower dueller as it is a duel and one which opponents will hate. For a military deck less useful

For me the primary contenders were

Guest of Honor - People hate guest. She can outright win certain matchups (Crane, Scorpion) and help against the current dominant deck type (whatever Aneil is playing so let's say Phoenix). Weaknesses are that she is expensive, does not help against tower decks and Dragon and Crane towers will be seen a lot in the next few months.

Feast of Famine - A surprise fire option for Crane this can still generate huge swings. Better perhaps out of Unicorn splash with talisman to protect or deliver as required.

Charge - A wonderful card. Subverts covert, can get huge value from a single fate point.

I decided on charge. Now I focus on dynasty.

Dynasty

Once the restricted is decided upon you then need Dynasty to support that decision. When I 'pack' charge I often increase the more expensive characters I select just as it so enabling.

5 costers

Akodo Toturi - Just there as a military beat stick and his prime purpose is to be charged out

Doji Hotaru - Also there as charge target. Or late game. Combos well with formal invitation to charge her out and then FI her to your political conflict to gain that extra ring

4 costers

Kakita Toshimoko - This deck is  not built to make him a defensive force but he again combos well with charge and even if he is two or three points below the opposition his duel at the end will gain you some honor and force the opposition to perhaps waste some cards to take out him and the province.

3 costers - the strength of any line up

Doji Challenger - Perhaps Crane's best three coster. Her value is increasing now that Toshimoko and later on Uji are appearing as she is less likely to be auto clouded.

Doji Representative - Not all Crane's like her but I do. You can charge her in (ideally if a military defence at Shameful Display) and then honor and run her out again. She allows poke and go against some nasty provinces (FOF, UA)

Kakita Kaezrin -  Another charge candidate with good military and when timed well his ability reads (for example) as charge me in, watch my opponent waste lost of cards to beat me, then run a duel to lose and run home. Last ditch defence is also good though naturally you want to fire his duel when intending to send hundreds of weenies home in your opponents last conflict and not their first.

2 costers -

Brash Samurai - Yup another charge target for an emergency province defence.

Savvy Politician - Crane wants honoured peeps and she makes that better. If running with seeker then I might have removed her (seeker crane has less honouring opportunities)

Daidoji Nerishima - Anti-Kisada tech and his ability allows blank provinces to be flipped to hopefully find a better charge target and/or a good holding. The deck packs plenty of 2's so the chances of a low cost/holding sweep is just as high so this helps make the deck more efficient.

Cautious Scout - All time best scout ever.

1 coster

Callow Diplomat  That honoring thing? I still like doing it. Plus he makes a cheap province poker which is very important in some matchups.

Holdings

With these you are either looking at long term threat (Imperial Palace), or fast advantage. Anything that requires setup is more 'meh' As an example in duelling Crane I ran Kakita Dojo and Proving Grounds. It almost forces you to 'force' duels as you don’t want to lose the advantage from the cards. In some cases that runs contrary to what you should do (but what a blast when it works…).

For this deck I went back to the staples

Favourable Grounds - You can so tell that I am old-game Harrier player as I do love movement tricks.  This protects against covert and makes opponents potentially overload defensively plus makes challenger even more irritating.

Imperial Storehouse - Need card will give.

Imperial Palace - What's not to like, If you are lucky and it arrives on Magistrate Station and you can defend the first attack then good things will come your way.

Count

It is good to fight to get the base deck size down to 40 and I did consider breaching that limit  as Charge also essentially means you thin down your dynasty deck. I kept at the minimum though. One concept I like to use with decks is what I term Dynasty Cost Per Card (DCPC) and Dynasty Cost Per Character (DCPCH). The first is tot total cost divided by cards in deck and the second is the total cost divided by characters in the dynasty deck.

This deck has a DCPD of 2.4, which means it is quite expensive. Allowing two charges fire and they take out two five costers over a long game (reasonable) then the DCPD drops to 1.9 which is much better.

DCPCH is 2.909 which drops to around 2.3 with the charge restriction.

Conflict Deck

Next up I look at the conflict deck. 

Events

3*Charge - though this has utility throughout it is often better early against an unopposed attack.

3* way of the crane and 3* voice of honour are defaults. This deck aggressively honours.

2* noble sacrifice - There should be a chance to use and this is one of the few Tadaka defences.

1 * fallen in battle - This is a 'surprise' military deck so yes it can beat with five strength in military. My fastest victory ever was won with a similar deck to this. My opponent purchased a Lion Akodo Toturi with two fate on him first turn. I just had a challenger and a brash. I defended with the brash and lost. I then Noble sacrificed the Toturi and attacked and broke a province. Turn two the Lion player brought a second Toturi (with one fate).  I waited for the Toturi to attack and bow and let him take a province then attacked with the challenger pulled in the bowed Toturi and fallen in battled him. It was practically over past that point. Again though another Takada defence

2* Admit Defeat - I like one or two of this card though it can be a wasted card in some games. There is a lot of anti-bow about so my position with this may weaken after some plays and perhaps look at something else to reinforce the decks honouring capabilities.

3 *  court games - Honouring is good. Dishonouring Tadaka so Noble Sacrifice him is better.

3 * Hand to hand - Decks need some attachment hate and this provides some even if it is just removing all the clouds that will be come flying your way.

3 * Legion of one - I love this card. It's even better with a surprise one cost attacker (conflict usually) Since there are several cards who like attacking alone this makes things even more amusing.

1* Stand Your Ground - due to all the honouring there will be chances to save some stud from disappearing.  Also combos with (charge) surprise… as in I can charge a ig body in, honor then keep them around. Only one though as I don’t like wasting slots on support.

1*Ready for battle unfortunately the more Tadaka is out there the more one of's get more useful. There is less direct bow in the environment now with Mirumotos Fury restricted so this is more for the odd water ring counter.

1*Rout Another Tadaka single of. The deck is full of Bushi and also full of large force pumps. As with Kaezrin it is better to use on their second conflict and not their first (if at all possible)

2* Defend Your Honor - In a non-duelling deck this might be a surprise inclusion but it counters some nasty Unicorn tricks and functions as an extra cancel for unpleasantness.

3* Banzai - no need for an explanation

1* Assassination - there are several cheap 2 costers that I want to see the end of so a single copy of this is helpful. I find it more useful early on than later in game though. It is also good to have one to keep your opponents honest if they ever get to read your list prior to a game.

2* Soul Beyond Reproach - one reason for Keeper and not seeker is this card. Ok it costs one but as a hard counter to dishonour and an emergency way to fire savyy on it is strong. It is also very useful against the Scorpion menace - lessened recently though that is.

Conflict Characters

I have a rough (and breakable rule) that states that your conflict character total should match your holdings. Conflict characters allow earlier passes in dynasty and emergency defence. With this deck they can also drop in with an extra fate and become much stronger very quickly.

3 * Young Harrier - Not enough courtiers in the deck to make for shame reliable so the harrier gets the place. He also has one glory for emergency favour defence

1*Doji Fumiki - Unique so you want two max. She is great when you expect dishonoured characters

1* Political Rival - Very expensive but very good when affordable.

2*Goblin Sneak - Combos nicely with legion of one.

Attachments

None. I love formal invitation but unless you are carrying full suite of Fine Katana and Ornate fan it is a risk to carry due to the attachment hate present in the environment which is not lessening. This way against a lot of opponents some of the nasty attachment hate out there is just wasted cards. I do lose the permanent bonus that these give though.

Province Line up

Fire - Magistrate station. The one Crane always wants to defend. Our only unbow and go ability which is why it's usually  target number one for the opposition.

Void - Shameful Display - combos with charge and noble sac and makes Crane happy

Air - Art of Peace - Uncertain about this as it can be farmable for certain clans. Mass NS enablers are not bad though..I may be tempted to switch this to Manicured as Keeper Decks have less fate generation than seeker and that is a weakness.

Earth - Upholding Authority - One of the few I don’t want to defend. My alternate for this slot is Vassal fields but the ability to see your opponents hand and just remove the biggest threat is too good to ignore.

Water - Midnight Revels - With six five costers this may not earn its keep but as long as that is kept in mind it might make a contribution. Water is still a weak line up and this makes seeker more attractive just so we can ignore it..

Opposition

Crab - These are always hard. The never go away and 'I buy one costers and make your expensive dudes go pop' and finally 'watch commander' makes them a varied and still strong clan. Against these guys honour fast for Voice and save it for Wotc and Assassinates. The Mountain does not fall is actually the nastiest in their line up.

Crane - Two primary varieties out there. Similar to this though probably with dragon/unicorn splash and the duel towers. As always winning the honouring war is often key to grinding out victory.

Dragon - Still towers. Not incredibly popular and  their primary strength is tower and tower is going to be under threat from our new Shugenja. The fact Aneil has flipped allegiance to Phoenix means even less popular. Until Tower becomes dodgy Hitomi will attract some stalwarts.

Phoenix - The nemesis of all. We are finally seeing the strength Phoenix was given a year ago with their clan pack starting to show. Tadaka is an unholy monster who might as well say 'win now' against most decks.  Save FIB and NS just for him.

Lion - has also improved. You would not think this from having listened to its player base who seem to be playing a different game to the rest of us. That game appears to be 'whine that our clan sucks worse than Unicorn did and hopefully FFG will release some unbalanced cards so we can dominate'. As opposed to making trying to work with what they have got. They have got decks that can work and are not even slightly in the hole Unicorn was in plus Tyler has stated that he expects Lion to be dominant by the end of the year.

Scorpion - Also starting to moan that they are not the dominant NPE that they once were but they still can do the same unbalanced crap  they used to its just that Phoenix hard counters them. For me keep SBR to attempt to counter their dishonour shtick.

Unicorn - FFG have indeed swung too far in the other direction and Unicorn is about to enter a period of dominance. Against these guys always poke provinces with a cheap dude first in case it’s the exploding province. Defensively counter punch as opposed to straight up defend as they are so strong as to prevent most defence from working.

Future Proofing - The deck has partially been built with the intention of slotting Daidji Uji in (instead of either Toturi or Hotaru, depending on how useful Formal Invitation is or is not) and Ashahina Takanori. He will work as a wonderful blocker against the cheaper towers making them for more difficult to use.

What Next

I am going to track the deck in useable competitions along with changes made. In march I have two EC's bookmarking the month. End of may seems the Birmingham Grand Kotei and there will be at least one more discord league.