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Thursday, July 29, 2010

Rattan Armour 藤甲 (téng jiǎ)

Posted by Ricky Chua On 1:11 PM 28 comments
Description:
Body armour that is impenetrable... at least in those days! Used by the Southern Barbarians 南蛮, this armour thwarted the arrows and blades of the troops of Zhu Ge Liang 诸葛亮. It's a nice addition to the cardgame, albeit a little too difficult to overcome!

What it does:
BARBARIANS 南蛮入侵, RAINING ARROWS 万箭齐发, and normal ATTACK 杀 has no effect on you. Fire attribute damage against you is increased by 1. RATTAN ARMOUR has no defense against any form of Lightning attribute damage.

How to use it:
Just equip it! Gah!! I've been blinded by the obvious!

Historical basis:
RATTAN ARMOUR first appeared on Romance of the Three Kingdoms when Meng Huo 孟获 rebelled against the kingdom of Shu Han 蜀汉 to the north. Meng Huo was not the one who introduced the armour, rather it was an ally of his, king Wu Tu Gu 兀突骨, who made good use of it. The armour was said to be so light that soldiers could grab on to them to float across rivers. It was also able to deflect arrows and blades, making the "Rattan Army" difficult to defeat. Zhu Ge Liang, however, simply decided to burn the buggers alive. Wu Tu Gu and his army perished in the flames. Thus there is a link behind +1 fire damage. Read more about Wu Tu Gu and the Rattan Army on Wikipedia!

28 comments:

  1. If 2 shackled players both have this armor equipped, thus players A and B. A receives fire attribute damage, thus takes 2 damage. This damage is transmitted to player B. Now, does it make sense for player B to receive 3 damage? 2 transmitted damage + fire attribute damage?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Also, when duel is used, is he susceptible to normal sha? and, does he take proper damage (2 for fire, 1 for lightning) during duels?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No, the damage comes from duel but not sha

      Delete
  3. Now, does it make sense for player B to receive 3 damage? 2 transmitted damage + fire attribute damage?

    >>ANS: Yes that is the "official stance", though many still argue about the fairness and logic behind this decision.


    when duel is used, is he susceptible to normal sha? and, does he take proper damage (2 for fire, 1 for lightning) during duels?

    >>ANS: when Duel is used, the Rattan Armor can be completely ignored. The reason is because Rattan armor ability only applies to "damage" received. Duel will always cause non-element damage.

    Arguable point: during Duel against someone with Rattan Armor, even normal Attack is effective though the Rattan Armor card clearly states normal Attack has no effect.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In Duel, the damage is not dealt by attack, but by the duel. The duel causes the character that is unable to 打出 an attack to receive one damage from the other “participant” of the duel; and therefore, since the attack is 打出 not 使用 the damage goes through the armour as a form that cannot be blocked by it, e.g. lighting attack.

      Delete
  4. When you have this equipped and you suffer Fire damage, is the +1 damage suffered considered Fire attribute as well?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. no; if that were the case, one would receive infinite damage from one fire attack. It is a final modifier applied to the damage just prior to the time of Xiao Qiao's skill activating, and after active weapon abilities are triggered (e.g. the bow shooting a mount).

      Delete
  5. Yes, as Iron Shackles is able to transfer the damage.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Say there's player A with no hand cards equipped shackled with player B with no hand cards and the helmet equipped.
    player C has wines and fire attacks player B. Obviously B takes only 1 damage, but what about player A?

    ReplyDelete
  7. @Anon
    Player A takes the same damage player B takes(1 damage, in this case)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Unless player A has the Rattan Armour equipped, in which case he takes 2 damage. But that's not what you're asking, is it?

    ReplyDelete
  9. If a player takes wine / jiu before attacking, it will still do 2 damage to the player with this armor.

    ReplyDelete
  10. ^
    A normal ATTACK won`t deal any damage at all.
    A lightning ATTACK will do 2 damage in this case, while fire ATTACK will do 3.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Can a player wearing rattan armor be damaged by 酒杀?

    ReplyDelete
  12. Liu Bei emperor wearing Rattan armour with no hand cards
    Xu Zhu strips, drinks wine, wear Ancient Scimitar, and fire attacks Liu Bei
    5 damage

    ReplyDelete
  13. You are so conservative... A popular example among SGS fans is:
    Zhou Tai as the Ruler, wearing a Rattan Armor, without on-hand cards, was shackled with Xiao Qiao (in another Rattan Armor).

    Da Qiao is also in play.

    Now Xu Chu (not Xu Zhu), equipped with a 方天画戟, stripped, drunken, plays his last on-hand card, a FIRE-ATTACK against Xiao Qiao, Da Qiao and Zhou Tai (in such a sequence because of seats). Now:
    1. Xiao Qiao's damage to be taken is 3 (if she doesn't deflect it, it would be 4 ), but she deflects the damage toZhou Tai; (note that Xiao Qiao hasn't taken any damage in fact, so the SHACKLE is not in effect yet at this point.)

    2. Zhou Tai takes the 4 fire dmg deflected from Xiao Qiao, and the SHACKLE is triggered, transmitting the 4 fire dmg to Xiao Qiao again;

    3. Xiao Qiao would take 5 fire dmg if she doesn't deflect it. But actually she does, and deflects the 4 fire dmg back to Zhou Tai;

    4. Zhou Tai takes 5 fire dmg because of his Ratten Armor (again!); (SHACKLED status was cancelled in step 2, so nothing further here, the resolving of the ATTACK on Xiao Qiao is finished.)
    (suppose Zhou Tai is so unlucky today that he hasn't drawn any MISSED cards during TIAN-XIANG天香)

    5. Da Qiao deflects the ATTACK card to Zhou Tai: another 4 fire dmg;

    6. Resolving of the FIRE-ATTACK card on Zhou Tai himself adds 4 fire dmg as well.

    So, finally, the poor Ruler undertakes 17 damages in total, all originated from a single ATTACK card...
    He need extreme luck to survive, with 13 Brinks-of-Death不屈 cards on his character card.

    (making yourself crystal clear on the example, will help you better understand the resolving sequence of Shackles, Ratten Armor, XIAO QIAO's TIAN-XIANG and etc.)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hey. Don't forget 神諸葛亮's 狂風. How much damage would it be then? :P

      Delete
  14. For whatever reason, players on web.sanguosha.com hate this armor. They avoid it like the plague. I routinely see people discarding it at the end of their turn even when they do not have armor equipped. I also routinely see Zhang Zhao and Zhang Hong use "Blunt Advice" to place this armor on an enemy, even if they or their teammates have no means of immediately causing fire damage to the target. In an extreme case, I saw ZZ&ZH equip this armor on an enemy Cai Wen Ji, damage her with a lightning attack, then Cai Wen Ji promptly used "Dirge" to discard the armor.

    Am I crazy for thinking that these players are out of their minds when it comes to this armor? I will acknowledge that there are some situations in which it is not good to equip it. For example, I would not use it if an enemy was using Younger Zhuge Liang, Demigod Zhou Yu or Cheng Pu. I also wouldn't use it if an enemy had the fire fan (obviously) and I am always hesitant to use it if I was shackled to many teammates, just on the off chance that someone on the team (or even me) would receive fire damage. I would also not use it if I was using a character with a damage-activated ability like Sima Yi, Cao Pi, or Cao Cao since it would decrease the number of instances in which I would receive damage and increase the number of units of damage I would take per instance, making these abilities weaker. However, it seems that many players on web.sanguosha.com seem to think that this armor should never be used under any circumstances. I strongly disagree with this point of view. I would even say that more often than not, it is heavily in one’s favor to equip this armor.

    I have counted the cards in the deck. Fire attacks and blazes account for 5% of the deck, while non-elemental attacks, barbarians, and raining arrows cumulatively account for 21.1% of the deck. That's right - the rattan armor provides over four (!) times as much protection to cards than it does weakness. Even if you are unfortunately hit with fire damage at some point, chances are that you were protected four other times. It is incredibly useful against Cao Cao, Zhu Rong, Xun You, and Yuan Shao since these characters will frequently play raining arrows and barbarians. Even without the presence of these characters, I love equipping this card when I am using a character like Zhang He, Gao Shun, Cai Wen Ji, or Tai Shi Ci since they need to store up hand cards in order to use their abilities.

    Please forgive my super-long post. I am just curious if anyone on here agrees with me or has some insight as to why everyone else hates this armor so much.

    ReplyDelete
  15. The armor does have its use, but the negatives far outweigh the positives.
    People only equip this as a last resort.

    Wearing this armor will save you from some AOEs, but the game isn't just about yourself. You are an asset to the team, as soon as you put this on, you become a liability and you can be damn sure all the chains will go for you, from then on you are just a damage transferer to your enemy's real target.

    You'll become the top target for Blaze and elemental sha, as soon you run out of cards to protect yourself you're gonna get hit hard and in the process you've also caused the downfall of teammate(s).

    ReplyDelete
  16. I agree with the opinion that the Rattan armour is really awesome!
    I am AppleCrisp, and I approve of this message.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Can drunken attack (with a normal attack) still damage the player with rattan armour on?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No. Any normal attack has no effect, regardless if whether you used Wine before or not.

      Delete
  18. if player A has this on, and player B attacks with a regular attack while B has the double gender swords, what would the outcome be?

    1) Player A takes no damage but decides to either discard or let player B draw
    2) or just nothing happens since the attack doesnt work?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Option 1 takes place. The same holds if the attack is black against the black shield.

      Delete
  19. Situation: Tai Shi Ci uses Justice of Heaven to disarm one character of their last card (wins the points duel) and then targets this character and another character who are both empty-handed, chained together and wearing rattan armor (not Elder Zhuge Liang). Tai Shi Ci has Ancient Scimitar and then attacks them both with a wined fire "sha". Accounting for the chains and equipment effects, what's the total damage that each character takes?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Say Tai Shi Ci is A, the person after him is B and then C.
      Even though both B and C are targeted, B will always take damage first as he is the next person in turn.
      B takes:
      * 1 dmg from sha
      * 1 dmg from fire since he is wearing rattan armor
      * 1 dmg from wine
      * 1 dmg from ancient scimitar
      A total of 4 fire damage.
      As soon as the 4 fire damage is taken, chains activate to transfer damage before calculating the sha to C.
      C takes:
      * 4 fire dmg from chains
      * 1 dmg from rattan armor
      A total of 5 fire damage.
      If somehow C is still alive, you then calculate the sha towards C which is similar to B above.
      C then takes:
      * 1 dmg from sha
      * 1 dmg from fire since he is wearing rattan armor
      * 1 dmg from wine
      * 1 dmg from ancient scimitar
      A total of 4 fire damage.

      So B takes a total of 4 dmg and C takes a total of 9 dmg.

      Delete

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