"The Monster Mash"
By Matthew D. Woolley

The Monster Mash is a dueling deck that combines jank, resilience and lightning counter attacks in one unpredictably successful package.

The Monster Mash (50 cards)

4 Cave Networks
4 Proving Grounds
Whirlpool of Blood
Fox Pass
Kinoshita House
2 Bandit Hideouts

5 Ogres
4 Little Grasshoppers
4 Rebel Consumers

3 Abysmal Deceivers
3 Redeemed Pirates
3 The Iron Monkey
3 Lui Yu Min

4 Shaolin Hoedowns
2 Mysterious Return
2 Tortured Memories
2 Secrets of Shaolin
2 Violet Meditation

At its core is the combination of Shaolin Hoedown and the Abysmal Deceiver. When played effectively, this combination allows you to attack with a Character and then sacrifice it for more than double its power value.

By Clint Oldridge and Andy Holt.

There were two UK National Championship tourneys this year, 3- and 4-player. The 3-player event was held in September and the 4-player in July.

Sam Roads (Cardiff Cartel) is the 3-player champ, Clint Oldridge (Cardiff Cartel) is the 4-player champ.

First, some highlights, or series of random memories, of the 3-Player championship tournament as reported by Andy Holt:

* The shop having taken the trouble to use some Chinese Lanterns for decoration.

* A total of 21 players including Happy - he recruited Clint, Ron, and myself as extra judges so that there was always one judge outside a game.

There are a lot of tournament formats that have been invented for Shadowfist, and they all have names that sound cool, but aren't always as helpful as they might be. Here are how the official ones go:

by Matt Woolley

Fear is the mind killer. Fear leads to Anger. Anger leads to Hate. Hate leads inevitably to Monkeys. But more important than this, fear leads to dreadful games of Shadowfist.

You can guarantee that many players will assess the board in terms of what they can lose, rather than what they have to gain. This kind of fearful mentality slows the game down and promotes the kind of waxy build up that generally makes for dull, uninspiring games. The players who pretend to have nothing useful in their hand, play with a one-column site structure, burn for power and leech power off the other players need to be shown the error of their ways! We need champions to dispense with this kind of play. We need heroes with a gun in their hand, a foot on the throat of the nearest Guiding Hand player, and maybe a slight facial tic. We need you!

Let’s get something straight right away – there is no rule in Shadowfist that says you have to attack left, and anyone adamantly insisting you should attack left is either an idiot or playing you for a sucker. There is a well-meant piece of play advice that says: “Everything else being equal, attack to the left.” This article deals with finding out if everything is equal, or “reading the board”, and how to make the most of your attack.

Ideally, you should know at all times who is closest to winning or furthest ahead. If you attack the leader, other players are more likely to assist you or at least will not interfere with your attack. There are several visible indicators that are used to identify who is currently winning: number of Feng Shui sites (FSS), power generated per turn (from sites, edges or characters), power in pool, and fighting on the board. Finally, the card pool of the faction that the opponents are playing has to be considered, specifically how easy it is for the specific faction to generate power from events and how easily the faction can turn power into fighting.

by Bruce Neiger

This article, presented in two parts, with an “intermission” and an afterword, describes the “Mostly Harmless” and Netherworld Return deck types. I have given the Tim Linden’s Netherworld Return deck, published on Stephan’s Shadowfist site, an “honorary” entry into this category as an “unrelated ancestor”. I hope he doesn’t mind.

The Mostly Harmless deck type has taken on several faces at this point, each inspired by the others. The core concept, however is to combine alternate power generation with large hitters and (almost always) with cheap recursion. All except the Netherworld Return deck also combine Red Bat with a large number of free or low cost events, quickly yielding very large Red Bats.

Brian's Guide to Drafting

Navigating the Netherworld by the Seat of your Pants

In these beleaguered time, where no starter decks are available for purchase anywhere, demo decks are a crucial way to get new people to play our beloved game. If you have always wanted to contribute to the recruiting effort from your collection while cleaning out your closet at the same time, here are a few guidelines for building a decent demo deck.

The Purpose of the Deck

… is obviously to introduce new players to the game. Ideally, the decks should be fun and easy to play, and showcase some of the strengths of Shadowfist. You want lots of characters, and lots of free stuff, so that the new player feels like he can influence the game at all times. You don’t want tricky decks. You don’t want decks that are poorly resourced. And you absolutely don’t want any cards that are hard to understand, or that (even worse) have been errated and don’t do what they claim they do.

Card Focus: Fox Pass

Fox Pass
Feng Shui Site
1 Power, 5 Body
Unique. Turn to change one attacker's target to any Character or front-row Site you control.

Fox Pass? Why Fox Pass? Why now?

Fox Pass is probably one of the most powerful, most versatile of the defensive Feng Shui sites, and veteran players are likely to know of several tricky methods to use it to good effect. New players however, frequently see Fox Pass, and only consider the most basic of its uses. Hopefully this article may be useful to less experienced players, and also point out some new combos to old hands alike.

By Brian Bankler

Fermat’s Last Stand
Event
[Pur] [Pur] 1
All Characters you control gain +1 Fighting until they leave play, then take one damage.

When I opened up my Shurikens & Six Guns cards, I stared at this. Then I banished it to the back of the box. With so many good cards, why bother? Later I recognized the amazing potential.

This gives one fighting per character. But you suffer one damage per character, so it’s a wash. If you can’t avoid the damage, it’s slow. Many characters ignore the damage, though.

• Any character with Toughness is safe, which includes Void, Twisted Horror (if you have an edge) and Morphic Spirit (if you have a second faction).