In this article we look at the Phoenix cards in the Elemental Cycle. Phoenix has had a bit of a rollercoaster with the Clan pack, some poor tournament results after that, and recently some success. One of those successful players is Travis McDaniel who was second place at Origins and Gencon. Travis was one of the first Phoenix Hatamoto at Gencon 2017 and achieved the title another 3 times in the Toshi Ranbo season.
Check out our review of the Phoenix pack below. You can also check out our YouTube channel, where we talk our way through the pack (link at the end).
Top players prepping for a tournament will put together a range of the decks they expect to face and play their chosen deck against this ‘gauntlet’. The first difficulty with this is picking out the right decks, hopefully, I’ve done a decent job below but any suggestions are welcome. Different environments have different playstyles and sometimes a deck that will do well in one area will underperform in another. At the most basic, does your environment typically bid high or low during the draw phase? Just that simple norm can shift which decks come out on top. This might mean you need to shift your playstyle to get the best out of each deck. The hard part then is getting the games in. Practice, practice, practice.
The first Imperial tournament is going to be at PAX south on January 12th followed by Cork on 27th January. So far, we have only the faintest idea of where the clans stand relative to each other as the Imperial cycle added 120 cards to the small starting card pool. At the end of January, we will have a pretty good idea, but that’s no good for us now. This Christmas, Imperial Advisor is giving you the gift of rampant and wild speculation. We’ve had limited testing and nothing to back it all up with. I’ve included win rates based on the results from the Lotus Pavilion tournament website. As tournaments, you’d hope that it would be a little more accurate, but that could still have a lot of noise. With that aside, we present, the Imperial cycle tier list.
With the Imperial cycle finally out, let’s have a look at the Phoenix to see which of the new cards might earn a place in their decks. …
Although not a faction, the Neutral cards are the most important in any pack. They are playable by everyone and have the greatest potential impact on the meta. For the Imperial cycle a few stand out.
Isawa Atsuko by Le VuongThe Phoenix clan pose somewhat of a mystery to Rokugan. As devoted pacifists, they are an easy target for clans who would seek glory in war, but if roused, their powerful Shugenja and mastery of the elements can devastate even the strongest army. They are a clan of great power and wisdom, but sometimes arrogance and hubris.
Fantasy Flight Games have recently released spoilers of the Phoenix clan cards from the upcoming core set so we have another review of the clan cards. This time veteran Phoenix player Justin Walsh has helped out and given some of his insight for this article.