Preview – Asako Maezawa
Thanks to FFG we have another preview today, and this one actually highlights a whole new theme and deck concept for the Phoenix clan!
For the Temptation’s cycle, there are two major themes, Maho and Dire. Maho are cards where you can only pay their fate cost by removing fate from characters you have in play. This is very thematic as Maho in the setting is blood magic and often involves human sacrifice to invoke evil spirits.
Dire fits in nicely with Maho, a Dire ability is one that a character can only use when they have no fate on them. This means you’ll typically only have that ability for the last turn the character is in play. With Maho of course, you can speed this up and activate a Dire ability by removing the remaining from the character.
Asako Maezawa is a different theme. In the setting, the Phoenix clan, and specifically the Asako family, have a group of Inquisitors. These are the people who hunt down those who use the evil magic of Maho and kill them. The assumption here is that any character with no fate on them, is an evil Maho-Tsukai, a Maho user. Of course, the Inquisitors aren’t always right in their suspicions and Asako Maezawa’s effect will typically have a target or two against a deck that isn’t using Dire or Maho cards.
His stats are nothing amazing but are fine. As a Courtier character he has value but doesn’t slot into the primary Phoenix deck style which focuses on Shugenja. His ability is a mirror of the bowing effect for the Water ring which is quite cool. The timing does mean it will trigger before the Ring for the conflict, so you won’t be able to win a Ring of Void and trigger it to give Maezawa a new target.
The effect dishonouring a Phoenix character seems to be a reference to the vote at Birmingham where players in the top cut decided Maezawa would focus his search for corruption in in Phoenix lands rather than Otosan Uchi. You can learn more about the character from the story Hidden Markings.
Assuming the Phoenix get a few more cards with this theme of punishing characters with no fate, then you can expect Phoenix to play a pretty scary fate denial deck that strips fate from the opposing characters and then punishes them for having no fate!
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