[Dragon] Mountain Summit Temple Militaire par Greg Wong, 1/2 finaliste aux worlds

Mountain Summit Temple (40/40) (cf. TheDragonClan.com)

Dynastie (40)

1 City of the Rich Frog
1 A New Wall
1 Winter Storm

1 Castle Gate
1 Fortified Camp
3 Gold Mine
3 Harmonious Temple
1 Minting House
1 Seat of Power
1 Secluded Village
3 Secluded Waystation
1 Temple of the Seekers
1 The Mikado

1 Fusami
1 Kitsuki Iweko XP
1 Mirumoto Kei XP
1 Mirumoto Mareshi XP
1 Mirumoto Ryosaki XP
1 Togashi Ieshige XP
1 Togashi Satsu XP4
1 Muketsu XP
1 Utagawa XP
3 Mirumoto Atsushi
3 Togashi Chiko
3 Togashi Kazuki
3 Togashi Masujiro


Destinée (40)

1 Ring of Air
1 Ring of Earth
1 Ring of Fire
1 Ring of the Void
1 Ring of Water

1 Footman's Pike
1 Katana of Twilight
1 Koutetsu Mukei
1 Nyoko's Daisho
1 Scales of the Dragon

2 Fortified Cavalry
1 Seppun Miharu

3 Beloved of the Clan
1 Desperate Wager
2 Determination
2 Draw Your Blade
1 Duel of Champions
3 First and Final Strike
2 Hamstrung
2 Hired Killer
2 Shameful Injury
3 Surprising Resistance
3 Warrior Challenge
3 Weigh the Cost


[card draw] Card draw is fine if you see a ring or the Daisho (as you then immediately get access to Void). Without Void your hand will empty pretty quickly in any kind of prolonged military matchup.

[absence de Famous Bazaar] The deck is expensive, you really need the extra gold to make it run smoothly. You can run the Bazaars but not in the Waystation slot and you'd need to run extra holdings as well to get it to work properly (I'd rather have the extra peeps).

[Minting House] Minting House was great. The deck runs on things that cost 7 or 8 which requires gold in increments of 3 or 4 to pay for respectively. Turning all my 2s into 3s and 3s into 4s is huge, it basically means I can clear provinces for honour in addition to dropping the odd attachment or Hired Killer.

[The Mikado] The Mikado was ok. The glimpse into your opponent's hand is valuable and you'll generally get it to produce 3 without any real problems. It was another Secluded Village previously but I didn't figure that 2 Villages was the right call in a field that Dragon go first in 95% of the time.

[Togashi Chiko] Togashi Chiko is amazing. 5F is really good and he's a fabulous favour monkey or Ring player as he can always swing in to attack (or defend) if needed. The Harmonious temples are what enable him as they push up the number of 3-producers you have to buy him with 3rd turn.

[Beloved of the Clan (plutôt que Doomed)] Beloved of the Clan would generally win over Doomed in my decks due to focus value (3 vs 2). Beloved also serves as honour meta and I'm generally lacking good actions to use with Doomed anyways (outside of Atsushi or Kei Wink).

[Seppun Miharu] Seppun Miharu border on being borken. Military decks have been running Bayushi Tsimaru XP out of clan to stop movement for most of the arc so having his ability (even a slightly lesser version) available on a follower is huge.

[Weigh the Cost] Weigh tends to get focused more often than used but the battle action was still quite valuable. You're right that 7 of my 21 peeps can't use it (being non-samurai) but 4 of those 7 almost never see battle (3xMasujiro & Muketsu). The action is generally used to evacuate my key units in the event that a battle goes poorly (Kei & Fusami tend to be the ones leaving most often). Most games I have few enough units that Weigh is better than Ordered Retreat as if I'm leaving the battle the straighten effect of Ordered isn't really relevant.

[victoires à l'honneur] 20% seems about right for honour victories. The honour option is for those military games where you end up in a standoff with your opponent and both of you realize that attacking isn't really an option. In those situations, having Masujiro on the table puts all the pressure to "do something" on my opponent.

[absence de Sneak Attack] Sneak attack is nice but this deck is more about hitting back than hitting first. I defend as often as I attack so I don't want to draw cards I can't use on the defence (which is part of why Ruthless Advance has never made the deck).

[peu de Followers] The lack of followers bugs me sometimes but generally I find that I've got so many guys that qualify as "threats" that it doesn't really matter who my opponent takes out. On the occasions that I've got a blatant threat (Kei generally) I have the Fortified Cav to keep her a bit safer.

[absence de Retribution] I did test Retribution for a while & found I didn't consistantly have a single unit province taker handy or if I did, they were bowed when I wanted to use Retribution.

[absence de Wisdom Gained] Strangely enough, Reese spent about half an hour Sunday night getting everyone he could find to ask me about Wisdom Gained Tongue. Dynasty room is, indeed, tight but my main two reasons are as follows. 1. I hate giving my opponent a ring (especially given the number of T3/T4 Chags I saw in the tournament). 2. I tended to see the event when I didn't need it (usually prior to turn 4 when I've got no one in play an hence no way to play the ring).

[Duel of Champions] Duel of Champions is awesome in military. It basically acts as an Etsui for me saying "don't assign that guy". Ryosaki is a control card. She forces your opponent to consider who they attack with as she might attack back & drag them in bowed Cheesy. Contemplation has flickered in and out of the deck but I didn't want to run it in a Unicorn heavy environment as it has almost no effect on them. Hogai was in the deck in Germany but left in favour of Chiko (who's MUCH better).

[que changer après LA ?] Changes based on now knowing what the field was like would have probably led me to running a third Determination (again) to deal with the mass of negations running around as well as possibly swapping Hamstrung for The Slow Death. Dynasty-side I would have pulled Winter Storm for Wisdom Gained or something else. The changes are specific to the LA field mind you; in general I like how the deck is set up, I'd need to know where I was going to play to settle in on any major changes.

[absence de Solving the Riddle] Solving the Riddle requires Private Trader & I get a lot more mileage out of the two legacy holdings I've already got. I did have it in when I had a straight ring-honour build together as well as when I had an enlightenment build but it's dead weight in the military version. The Rings are generally too good to give up but I think you'd want to drop Fire first then Water if you were replacing with Solving.

[Hamstrung --> Slow Death] Hamstrung's fine for stopping the 2nd province that Chags tries to take but honestly it was pretty dead for me most of the tournament (an oddity in an environment that was 1/4 Unicorn). You've got other answers for early Chags (including having 3 guys in play & blocking 3 provs. You're going to lose 1. The key is not to lose 2 early. Slow Death's focus effect is more in favour of what my deck is trying for than Hamstrung (specifically, adding force for attacking). Also, the rise of Surprising Resistance makes the battle action more plausible (although Ordered Retreat wouldn't be bad in that slot either).
Early Chags is an issue. Hamstrung is going to be more effective at saving the 2nd province if your opponent's going for the undefended ones. The Slow Death will be better if he moves in to oppose you. The problem I generally see with unicorn is that if you're moving in to defend you're losing guys unless you've moved in with Doomed (sadly the only peep in this deck whose on-board action would regularly stop Chags is Kei so Doomed isn't really an option). It depends on your playstyle & your opponents. Personally, I'm going to try out the Slow Deaths & see if the early Chags thing is more/less/as much of a breaker as before.

[Tsimaru XP] Tsimaru was in a few of the versions (throughout Kotei season). He was removed after Words & Deeds became legal due to a combination of being too expensive and the rise of Contemplation of Destiny & Unwanted Mediation.

[match-up déshonneur] Against the average dishonour deck you should roll them (and it doesn't matter what style they play). The deck is a terrible thing for them to play against as it has large static force as well as the ability to gain honour. Against an experienced dishonour player the deck should go 80% or better (at least, that's what my testing showed). The bleed version is easier as you just need to choose not to bleed (and remove their Uyedas). Determination seppuku is your friend Tongue.

[absence de Togashi Hogai XP] I ran Hogai in Germany and found he wasn't quite good enough. I like him as random meta vs Flanking Action & True Strength (in addition to being a double Outer Walls Tongue) but I needed someone pro-active.

[Surprising Resistance] Surprising Resistance was intended as a bow action & a 'run-away' action. I don't like Stay Your Blade as I tend not to run unless I'm bowed. SR was great as it let me bow out my opponents guys while still preserving mine if things went badly.

[Shiba Aikune XP3] I had Aikune in the Gencon version of the deck and took him out for a few reasons. 9G out of clan for a non-monk was getting expensive. The honour requirement was an issue in the honour matches (which is where I really wanted Aikune) as I was usually trying to flood the board with peeps hence buying a number of them for cheap. His trait doesn't protect him from the Favour (something I didn't figure out until after Gencon, I can be slow that way Tongue).
Mareshi has wandered to the border of removal several times & always seems to make the cut as having that 1 extra Cav guy really is that good. His ability to straighten people is a nice bonus (I almost never bother using the "move" section Wink).
Atsushi is a card you have to run a few times to understand. He's cheap, but still threatening and can deter a lot of early game military grief by just sitting there saying "I might range 11 you, do you have an answer for that?".

[Shameful Injury] Shameful was used exactly as stated by Seigi, Three Stone meta first, presenceless force negation second. It's solid in a deck that has good non-action force (like Kazuki & Satsu's traits Cheesy). Three Stone is a serious problem for this deck as it usually fights with low numbers of high force peeps & minimal followers. The four focus on Shameful doesn't hurt either.