Duelists

## Overview

*Press your opponents with stunning Swordplay and fancy footwork! Your low power minions work together to play cards quickly and repeatedly. Arm yourself with play-on-minion actions and activate your abilities with +1 power counters while you prepare to deliver a finishing blow.*

The Duelists faction features many small minions who interact with special actions called Swordplays. Swordplays are small advancing moves which let you push forward in power, while triggering other benefits besides. As you advance with power counters, your minions become stronger and trigger other benefits to chain together plays and press the advantage. You can bide your time with this faction while adding small presence on the board, until you're ready to unleash a devastating combo!

Image Album: https://imgur.com/a/3oxuIjV

## Details

#### General

* Name: Duelists
* Author: ludichrisness
* Complexity: 1.5/5
* Version: 1.0
* Last updated: January 19, 2023

## Cards

#### Breakdown

Duelists have 12 minions and 18 actions. They have a total minion power of only 27, or an average of 2.25 per minion. Among their actions, there are:

* No play-on-base actions
* 5 standard actions (three of which directly affect a minion, **in bold**): **Advancing Attack**, Reckless Riposte, Spirit Strike, **Terrain Tactics**, **To The Quick**
* 2 actions that directly increase a minion's power: Advancing Attack, To The Quick

#### Minions (12)

* **1x Senor Muchoslice (5)**: Ongoing: Once per turn per minion, after one of your minions gains a power counter, you may move it to another base.
* **2x Master of Arms (4)**: Talent: Play a minion here of power 2 or less.
* **3x Swordsman (2)**: Ongoing: After the first time you play a standard action each turn, or after you play a Swordplay, you may place a +1 power counter on one of your minions here.
* **4x Fencer (2)**: Play a Swordplay from your hand or discard pile.
* **2x Sword Spirit (0)**: Talent: This minion gains +1 power until the start of your next turn for each +1 power counter on it.

#### Actions (8)

* **1x Advancing Attack (Swordplay)**: Draw a card. Place a +1 power counter on one of your minions for each Swordplay you have played this turn.
* **1x Reckless Riposte (Swordplay)**: Choose an action on a minion. Destroy it OR transfer it to one of your minions.
* **1x Terrain Tactics (Swordplay)**: Move a minion of printed power 2 or less to another base. You may transfer a counter on it to another minion.
* **1x Spirit Strike (Swordplay)**: Play an action on a minion from your hand or discard pile.
* **1x Sabre**: Play on your minion. Ongoing: Once per turn, after this minion gains a power counter, you may give it +3 power until the start of your turn.
* **1x Main Gauche**: Play on your minion. Ongoing: Once per turn, after this minion gains a power counter, you may use a Talent on this minion.
* **1x Epee**: Play on your minion. Ongoing: After this minion gains one or more power counters, draw a card.
* **1x To The Quick**: Place a +1 power counter on each of your minions on one base. Special: Play before a base scores to place a +1 power counter on each of your minions instead.

#### Bases

* **(24) The Sealord's Palace (5 3 2)**: Before this base scores, each player with a minion here when this base starts scoring may play a standard action.

* **(22) Dueling Grounds (4 1 1)**: On your turn, if you have a minion here and the most power here, you may place a +1 power counter on one of your minions. On your turn, if you have a minion here and do not have the most power here of all players, you may play an extra action.

## Clarifications

* **Swordsman:** If the first standard action you play in a turn is a Swordplay, only place one +1 power counter.
* **Advancing Attack:** You count the Swordplay you are currently playing to determine the number of +1 power counters you place.
* **Epee, Main Gauche, Sabre:** If you trigger this and then transfer it to another minion in the same turn, the modifier can be triggered again on the second minion.
* **The Sealord's Palace:** Actions here are optional, so the current player has priority and can choose to play or pass; if someone else plays an action, anyone who has passed has another opportunity (in player order) to play an action. Because of the unusual wording, if the current player plays an action which removes another player from the base, the player whose minion was removed can still play a standard action because they had a minion there when the base started scoring.
* **Dueling Grounds:** Each ability can be used once on your turn, and if the conditions change, you could hypothetically use both abilities on the same turn.

## Strategy

### General

Duelists are a faction which is simple on the surface but which offers a lot of tactical depth. Your cards chain together naturally to unfold quickly once you have some key pieces, especially your four Swordplay actions which provide small abilities which can easily be repeated and which minorly advance you or provide situational benefits. As your game progresses, you'll build up a toolkit of Swordplay actions and weapons (Sabre, Main Gauche, Epee) in the discard pile which can be accessed repeatedly by your Fencers and the Swordplay action Spirit Strike. Of the templated cards, Epee and Advancing Attack are the most important to try to get out early and often to start drawing cards aggressively.

Man At Arms is an extremely potent elite (2x 4-power minion) which has a good number of options to play as the game progresses. He can stage a Sword Spirit for zero added power to the base, and then on a future turn play a Swordsman to be able to power up that Sword Spirit for a burst. Alternatively, MAA can be a source of Swordplays as well by playing a Fencer to access one of those key actions. By playing multiple Fencers in a turn, you can easily play two to three Swordplays in a single turn, which can amplify with Advancing Attack to press the advantage with a flurry of +1 power counters. Your Sword Spirits are your big guns, able to lay in wait slowly accruing power until you are ready to unleash an attack on a base.

Senor Muchoslice is your game changer, able to suddenly turn all of your minions mobile, and this can easily turn into a multi base attack as your minions can quickly reposition based on power distribution and rival presence. It's tempting to use SM as a big finisher, but he can deliver a lot of value if you keep him out turn over turn to be able to slip away from rivals or send your other minions in to overtake them and close a base. His most exciting play is with the Special card To The Quick, which becomes a combination of Jolt and Full Sail when played in Phase 3 with Senor Muchoslice on the field, allowing for some incredible double score opportunities.

### Partner Suggestions

#### Published

* **Disco Dancers:** Disco's many standard actions provide a lot of fuel for Swordsman, and being able to copy some of the Swordplays onto Divas can be very impactful. Rollers can activate and move en masse together with To The Quick and Senor Muchoslice. We Are Family is an ideal modifier to be able to reposition with Reckless Riposte.
* **Fairies:** The sword style modifiers that Duelists provide have an intriguing scenario where if they are transferring to different minions, they can trigger another time in the turn on the new minion. This is perfect for Tinx who can pull it to double tap, which can be significant power activation in the case of Sabre. Tinxes are easily played for free for this purpose by Man At Arms, and the fairy card draw helps you quickly get to your key Duelist cards.
* **Itty Critters**: With three total options to sling with Itty Critters, Duelists become a lot more consistent. You can sling Swordsman before playing your Swordplays to stretch them further, Fencers to essentially allow your Coach to play a Swordplay, or Sword Spirit if you have an opportunity to get a lot of power counters on it quickly, to add additional plus power.
* **Mulan**: This is an intensely synergistic pairing with many abilities on both sides being triggered by power counter placement. You'll blitz through your deck, add a lot of power, and also have a lot of other tricks to deal with rivals like antagonistic movement, destruction, or shuffling. This is easily the strongest Duelist pairing I've tried, as the two cover each others' weaknesses pretty perfectly.
* **Mythic Greeks**: With 10 standard actions, you'll be easily triggering your Spartans and Swordsmans regularly. If you get to a couple key cards like Heracles, Odysseus, Epee, and Advancing Attack, you'll be throwing extra power out like crazy with every play, quickly adding up to overtake rivals.

#### Custom

* **Blood Realm**: Blood Realm synergizes pretty perfectly with the power counter aspect of Duelists, being able to place power counters to activate their abilities, but also able to control power creep by removing power counters after triggering abilities. Blood Realm brings a lot of extra minion plays along with minion recursion and removal, a couple key tools which Duelists lack. There is a big potential to make a huge Sword Spirit in this combo for a giant burst of power.

## Author Notes

I really enjoy the Duelists, and think they're one of the most elegant custom factions I've made. They have a real feel of "death by a thousand cuts" as their cards chain together to trigger and reinforce each other, powering up en masse to be able to make some crazy swings. They feel a little bit to me like Musketeers but with more playable cards early on, able to stage their smaller minions and have those minions contribute to and enhance their eventual chain burst. It definitely feels like biding your time until you can press the advantage, while still keeping the pressure up on rivals in the meantime as you build a toolkit of Swordplay cards.

Most of the art for this faction was made with Midjourney v6. Images sourced elsewhere are credited on the card level.