News: Inigo Harem Tops Game Plaza and Nerima Tournaments

On June 28th card shop Game Plaza Genki 302 held a 16-person Swiss Draw tournament for Cipher; the tournament fell far short of capacity at only six participants, with first place going to Kisoda playing an Inigo Harem deck similar to the one played by Haro P a week earlier. The Inigo deck has been a popular choice in the formation of the early tournament scene, as it can quickly turn into a defensive wall outside the reach of standard attackers, and rack up a strong offensive with a swarm of different Pegasus Knights cards. Second place went to Matt, and third to Lihou.

One particular offensive combo has been noted in Japan for taking advantage of a Flying-affinity lineup in a way no other deck can. The CCS of "Gentle Flower of the Shepherds, Sumia" gives +10 Attack to every unit that's supported by card with the Flying affinity, and this combos with "Guardian of Rosanne, Cherche," whose Wyvern Screech skill gives all Flying units +10 Attack. With over 70% of the deck being made up of Flying units, this on average doubles the attack power of every attacker other than Inigo.

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Game Plaza followed up on the tournament with another 16-person Swiss Draw competition on July 5th, but again had attendance problems with only 5 persons attending. Kisoda placed second in this tournament and Matt in third, with first place going to Higashi playing a Sword of Light deck. This is one of the most streamlined versions of the Sword of Light build seen since its debut, focusing on promoting five core lines of units and supporting them with a lineup of 25 support cards that each either overlap with the promotion lines or can act as reliable low-cost attackers that don't interfere with the deck's overall strategy. "Angelic Advocate of Affection, Caeda" is the defensive axis of the deck, able to search the deck when her attakc hits for copies of Marth to use for evasion, and "Crimson Reaper, Navarre" is its offensive axis, destroying a second enemy unit every time he destroys one by battle.

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On July 3rd, the Nerima branch of Card Kingdom hosted a 16-person Swiss Draw tournament. This tournament marked the second top by Taketea, who had also won the previous week's tournament. Although he played an Inigo Harem deck like Kisoda above, as at the previous tournament, Taketea thanked his "working 3" the Pegasus Knight sisters Palla, Catria, and Est, who have quickly become his trademark in local play. The multicolor deck shares a number of characteristics with the monocolor Marth build he played in the previous week, using Minerva's Iote's Shield to protect his units with Flying, and setting up his field with the lower-cost Pegasus sisters prior to promoting.

Game Plaza Genki 302 shop tournament (6/28)
First place: Kisoda/キソダ
Cost 4: 4
x2 Angelic Advocate of Affection, Caeda
x2 Affectionate Saint, Lena
Cost 3: 20
x4 Man of Flower's Fragrance, Inigo
x4 Gentle Flower of the Shepherds, Sumia
x4 Guardian of Rosanne, Cherche
x2 Pegasus Knight Paragon, Cordelia
x2 Aura's Heiress, Linde
x4 Wings of Restoration, Caeda
Cost 1: 27
x4 Cultivator of Smiles, Inigo (Main Character)
x4 Wyvern Loving Knight, Cherche
x4 Young Prodigy, Cordelia
x4 Maiden of Flower Fortunes, Sumia
x2 Eldest Pegasus Rider, Palla
x3 Young Princess of Macedon, Maria
x2 Crown-Princess of Macedon, Minerva
x2 Middle Pegasus Rider, Catria
x2 Youngest Pegasus Rider, Est

Game Plaza Genki 302 shop tournament (7/5)
First place: Higashi/ヒガシ
Cost 5: 1
x1 Hero to His Country, Marth
Cost 4: 14
x4 Lodestar, Marth
x4 Angelic Advocate of Affection, Caeda
x4 Sage of Gales, Merric
x2 Crimson Reaper, Navarre
Cost 3: 5
x3 Steel Swordsman, Ogma
x2 Wielder of a Bloody Blade, Navarre
Cost 2: 4
x4 Princess of Altea, Elicei
Cost 1: 26
x2 Crown-prince of Altea, Marth (Main character)
x4 Mage of Winds, Merric
x4 Crimson Fencer, Navarre
x4 Talysian Mercenary, Ogma
x4 Liberation Army Archer, Gordin
x4 Crown-princess of Talys, Caeda
x4 Princess of the Divine Dragon Tribe, Tiki

Card Kingdom (Nerima) shop tournament
First place: Taketea/竹てぃー
Deck name: Triangle △ Formation/トライアングル△フォーメーション
Cost 3: 22
x3 Pegasus Knight Paragon, Cordelia
x2 Eldest Pegasus Sister, Palla
x2 Middle Pegasus Sister, Catria
x2 Youngest Pegasus Sister, Est
x3 Princess, Minerva
x2 Wellspring of Youth, Nowi
x4 Gentle Flower of the Shepherds, Sumia
x4 Man of Flower's Fragrance, Inigo
Cost 2: 2
x2 Princess of Altea, Elice
Cost 1: 26
x2 Cultivator of Smiles, Inigo (Main Character)
x3 Princess of Talys, Caeda
x1 Practitioner of Dark Arts, Tharja
x2 Intellectual Inquirer, Miriel
x3 Young Prodigy, Cordelia
x2 Eldest Pegasus Rider, Palla
x2 Middle Pegasus Rider, Catria
x2 Youngest Pegasus Rider, Est
x3 Crown-princess of Macedon, Minerva
x4 Maiden of Flower Fortunes, Sumia
x2 Young Princess of Macedon, Maria

News: War of Darkness Tops Card Kingdom Shop Tournament

June 26th, 2015. A representative of the Nerima branch of card shop Card Kingdom tweeted the results of their weekly Fire Emblem Cipher shop tournament, congratulating tournament champion Taketea (@taketea0hyuga) for winning the 16-man tournament. Card Kingdom is one of the most notoriously competitive shops in Japan, with each of its six branches hosting regular tournaments for each of their supported Trading Card Games. In the west the shop is primarily known as the inspiration for Cardfight!! Vanguard's fictional Card Capital; the owner of the franchise was a friend of Bushiroad CEO Takaaki Kidani prior to the company's rise to prominence in the TCG market. Taketea's decklist is transcribed at the bottom of the page.

Taketea's deck uses three primary cost 1s; Navarre, Gordin, and Tiki. Navarre is invaluable in the first turns of the game because his power rises from 40 to 60 if he and the main character are the only allies on the field, all but guaranteeing that his attack will go through and take an early orb from the opponent. Gordin's range 2 lets him attack the vanguard from the rearguard without fear of reprisal. The two become all the more dangerous when promoted to their cost 4 and 3 versions. Navarre becomes capable of destroying another non-main character unit every time he destroys a card by battle, while Gordin can move the opponent's Flying units every time a cost 2 or less ally is played. Gordin's attack power is below average both prior to and after promotion, but because his permanent skill gives him +30 while attacking a Flying unit, he can effectively check against decks that try to set up Triangle Attack combos.

Tiki forms the lead in the deck's support lineup. Because Tiki's support skill can accelerate bond control by putting a card from hand to the bond area every time she's support checked, Sword of Light decks have an incentive to run her for her support alone. Moreover, she becomes a base 60 with 4+ bonds in play, which puts her on par with "Crimson Fencer, Navarre" and "Talysian Mercenary, Ogma" as a big basic unit that can make an effective attacker.

Taketea's other support cost 1s are Caeda, Wrys, and the three cost 1 Pegasus Sisters. Caeda and the Pegasus Sisters all have the same support skill of moving a unit other than the attacking unit when checked, which lets a unit that has already attacked move to the rearguard to protect it from vanguard attacks. Caeda also promotes into a cost 4 that can search out cost 2 and lower tech cards like Elice and Ogma, and units with Flying as a whole play into the deck's cost 4 Minerva, who powers up based on the number of Flying units in play.

Wrys is valuable in most Sword of Light decks because his support preemptively prevents critical hits from being used, which can prevent a key unit from being taken out of play. Defensively he can also protect vulnerable allies with his action skill.

The Pegasus Knight sisters are one of the most subtly important aspects of the deck. The object of running so many units with Flying is to get out Princess Minerva, whose Iote's Shield ability forces all enemy archers to lose "Clear the Skies," the skill that gives them a permanent +30 bonus versus Flying units, mimicking its in-game effect of nullifying effective bonuses. Each of the Pegasus Sisters can action herself and reverse 2 bonds to search for one of the other Pegasus Sisters and play them, creating one of the cheapest swarming tactics to come out of Warblade of Heroes. Unlike other players that try to use the cost 3 versions of the Pegasus cards to initiate a Triangle Attack with 100 base power, Taketea instead runs just the cost 1 Pegasi with Minerva, to setup a field that will make Minerva continually have 80 base power.

This works like a slightly weaker but less costly and always-active Triangle Attack, that also doesn't give up any allies for the turn. Since each Pegasus can search for each other Pegasus, it's fully viable to at the late stage of a game play one Sister, search for another one, and then search for the third one with that one's skill, then play a Minerva from hand to nullify Clear the Skies and attack for 80. These are search skills, so there's also no need to run all three sisters in high quantities when drawing any one of them can be as good as drawing all of them, and they conveniently circumvent bond costs by playing one another straight from the deck--with only two bonds in play, one can play three Pegasus Sisters, two from hand and one from deck.

Finally, Taketea's main character line is Marth, but while many were theorizing around maximizing main character lines to increase opportunities to perform critical hits and evasion, Taketea instead shaved off the fourth copies of his cost 4 and 5 Marths to make room for ally units. "Lodestar, Marth" can come out as early as the third turn via promotion cost, and once per turn can move a rearguard enemy to the front when an ally is played, which synergizes with the Pegasus Sisters' ability to search one another, as well as with Caeda's search skill. "Hero to His Country, Marth" is the defensive end goal of the deck, as 70 base power is the highest unmodified original power allowed on any card. By reversing three bonds and discarding any Marth, he gives +30 to all allies until the end of the opponent's next turn, ensuring that even if the opponent survives the current turn, they won't be able to destroy anything during their own.

By saturating his deck with strong unpromoted units that synergize towards a few key plays with his higher costed ones, Taketea built a deck that could simultaneously play a game of overwhelming force with field swarming while also seizing control of the endgame. The deck notably uses less than 20 promoted units, which is shaping up to be typical of the Japanese metagame at this time. One feature of Cipher that's been observed repeatedly is an in-game bias against higher costed cards, as a direct result of lower costed ones being cheaper and more easily played.

First place: Taketea/竹てぃ (Pseudonym)
Deck name: The Deck I Thought Strongest/ぼくのかんがえたさいきょうのデッキ
Cost 5: 3
x3 Hero to His Country, Marth
Cost 4: 12
x3 Crimson Reaper, Navarre
x3 Angelic Advocate of Affection, Caeda
x3 Lodestar, Marth
x3 Princess Minerva
Cost 3: 2
x2 Archanean League Bowman, Gordin
Cost 2: 4
x2 Princess of Altea, Elice
x2 Strong-armed Gladiator, Ogma
Cost 1: 29
x4 Crown-Princess of the Divine Dragon Tribe, Tiki
x2 Pegasus-riding Little Sister Knight, Est
x2 Pegasus-riding Lady Knight, Catria
x2 Pegasus-riding Big Sister, Palla
x4 Crimson Fencer, Navarre
x2 Talysian Mercenary, Ogma
x4 Healing Priest, Wrys
x4 Liberation Army Archer, Gordin
x4 Crown-Princess of Talys, Caeda
x1 Crown-Prince of Altea, Marth (Main Character)