Queen of Hearts

by Andrew Davidson
November 6, 1996

1 Bite of the Jellyfish
5 Family Estate
1 Hostile Takeover
1 Monkey King
1 Operation Killdeer
1 Political Lock
1 Realpolitik
2 Soul of the Dragon
1 Soul of the Shark
5 Student of the Bear
1 Swiss Banker
5 Triumvirate Dealmaker
1 We Know Where You Live
3 Dump Warrior
1 Entropy Is Your Friend
2 Gorilla Warfare
2 In Your Face Again
2 Jamal Hopkins
1 Monkeywrenching
1 New Manifesto
5 Resistance Squad
1 Too Much Monkey Business
1 Avenging Thunder
1 Blanket of Darkness
1 Brain Fire
5 Claws of Darkness
3 Counterfeit Heart
1 Darkness Pagoda
4 Darkness Priestess
1 Fire and Darkness Pavilion
1 Fire Pagoda
1 Fire Sled
1 Fire Warriors
1 Ice Courtier
1 Ice Diadem
1 Ice Healer
1 Ice Pagoda
1 Ice Shards
1 Ice Tiger
1 Ice Warriors
1 King of the Fire Pagoda
1 King of the Thunder Pagoda
1 Mark of Fire
3 Molten Heart
1 Netherworld Return
1 Queen of the Darkness Pagoda
1 Queen of the Ice Pagoda
5 Shields of Darkness
1 Sibling Rivalry
1 Soul Diver
1 Spirit Pole
1 Thunder Knights
1 Thunder Pagoda
5 Alchemist's Lair (Magic)
3 Anomaly Spirit
2 Art of War
1 Discerning Fire
1 Dragon Mountain
1 Elevator to the Netherworld
1 Festival Circle
1 Field of Tentacles
1 Fortress of Shadow
1 Fox Pass
5 Illusory Bridge
1 Inner Sanctum
5 Killing Ground
1 Killing Rain
1 Lily Pond
1 Locksley Station
1 Monkey House
1 Mourning Tree
1 Netherworld Passageway
1 Peacock Summit
1 Perpetual Motion Machine
1 Pinball Hall
1 Ring of Gates
1 Rust Garden
1 Sacred Ground
1 Sampan Village
1 Scroll of Incantation
1 Shattering Fire
1 Soul Maze
1 Stone Garden
1 The Faceless
1 The Hungry
1 Wall of a Thousand Eyes
1 Whirlpool of Blood
1 Year of the Rat
= 140 cards

Stats:

BY TYPE
42 Characters
19 Edges
20 Events
20 Feng Shui Sites
20 Sites
5 Battleground Sites
14 States
BY FOUNDATION
10 Ascended
8 Jammers
11 Monarchs
BY PERCENTAGE
21% Base resource
14% Feng Shui
14% Site
21% Magic
6% Tech
BY SET
43 Limited
72 Netherworld
25 Flashpoint
BY RARITY
9 Very Common
66 Common
38 Uncommon
27 Rares
BY FACTION
26 Ascended
18 Jammers
46 Monarchs
50 Neutral

Notes:

This is my second attempt at a Triumvirate deck. I tried designing one before but gave up when I found I had over 250 cards - there are just so many tempting Ascended, Monarch and Jammer cards. This time I was much more severe in my choice of cards - no Shadowy Mentors, Butterfly Knights or other favourites from these factions. The cards chosen had to fit one of the following categories:
  1. 1. Foundation characters for the three factions. Family Estates provide additional Ascended resource.
  2. 2. Power generation - lots of sites and power-generating edges, states, events and characters. I have found power-shortages to be the main weakness of the Monarchs and they are the dominant faction in the Triumvirate.
  3. 3. Lots of edges which will benefit from the protection of the Counterfeit Heart.
  4. 4. Cards which exploit the front-row effect of the Molten Heart - Jamal Hopkins, Illusionary Bridge and Anomaly Spirit.
  5. 5. Theme cards - the Four Monarchs, their followers and other Triumvirate cards.
  6. 6. A sprinkling of good events from each of the factions.
The deck may have some weaknesses - it is light on FS sites and big hitters and so might suffer from a bad shuffle. It could probably use more card-churning effects - Supercomputer, for example. So far, though, it has worked surprisingly well. It was tested in a couple of two-player games and won both of these easily. It has now been proven in the fire of a multi-player tournament and emerged victorious - the winner of Flashpoint Finchley III. Its main virtue, though, is that it can be lots of fun - there are lots of ways to mess with the other players and keep them guessing. And I just love big sprawling site structures...

Last modified: January 16, 1998.
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