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Sunday, August 29, 2010

Zhāng Jiǎo 张角

Posted by Ricky Chua On 12:01 PM 43 comments
Translated description:
"General of Heaven 天公将军 (tiān gōng jiāng jūn)"

Wikipedia link: Zhang Jiao Wiki

Who is he:
The leader and inciter of the yellow turban rebellion, Zhang Jiao became a hero to the those suffering under the corrupt and decaying Han Dynasty 汉朝. Due to a terrible famine that hit China at around 180 AD, the people suffered terribly and yet were further tormented by corrupt and greedy officials. It was then that Zhang Jiao met a strange old man in a cave which gave him 3 books, said to contain the ways of a mysterious art. After mastering the books, Zhang Jiao could control the wind, rain, and lightning and became a sorcerer. Despite having these powers, Zhang Jiao won the hearts of the people by providing aid and supplies to those in need. It was thus that tens of thousands rallied behind Zhang Jiao in his bid to overthrow the Han Dynasty. He never succeeded however, and was defeated by those who were loyal to dynasty, namely Liu Bei 刘备 and Cao Cao 曹操.

Character ability 1: "Lightning Strike 雷击 (léi jī)"
Whenever you use a DODGE 闪 card, you can target any player to make a judgement. If the judgement card is of the "spades" suit, the target player suffers 2 units of lightning attribute damage.

Character ability 2: "Dark Sorcery 鬼道 (gǔi dào)"
You can exchange the judgement card of any player before it takes effect with any of his "spades" or "clubs" suit cards (on-hand or equipped).

(Note that the cards are exchanged, meaning Zhang Jiao can retrieve the original judgement card back into his hand.)

Character ability 3: [Ruler ability] "Amber Sky 黄天 (huáng tiān)"
All Heroes 群雄 characters can give you one DODGE or LIGHTNING 闪电 card during their individual turns.

Ability's relation to story:
In the story, there wasn't much mention of Zhang Jiao himself. From what is written, it is known that can he control the weather (like Storm from X-Men). Therefore "Lightning Strike" is a direct link. There is no mention of any form of deception or intervention such as "Dark Sorcery", however.

"Amber Sky" actually has a link to the story. Part of the slogan of the Yellow Turban Rebels goes something like this:

"The Dynasty is dead, arise the Amber Sky 苍天已死, 黄天当立"

where Amber Sky is a celebratory designation that Zhang Jiao gave himself, akin to calling himself the Amber Emperor.

Additional info based on story:
1. Most famous achievement - Inciting the Yellow Turban Rebellion and opening the epic Three Kingdoms story. Zhang Jiao appears in Chapter 1 of the story and his valiant efforts in galvanizing the people led to the rebellion. This rebellion is critically important as it marked the beginning of the end of the Han Dynasty, though the rebellion itself fizzled away quickly.

2. Cause of death - Unknown! It was only written in a passing statement that Zhang Jiao had died, and no reference was made as to who killed him and how. The story then put the focus on Zhang Jiao's brother Zhang Bao 张包 and his battle with Liu Bei 刘备.

FAQ and Disambiguation

1. How do we arrange the judgement card exchange ability between Zhang Jiao and Si Ma Yi when they are in play?

Ans: The sequence  in which judgement tinkering works is as follow (according to SGS online game)

-Imagine the players turns go anticlockwise from player A to B to C etc..Up to H. Now imagine player B is Si Ma Yi and player H is Zhang Jiao.

-Say player A draws a judgement card ,the 1st tinkerer allowed to change the card is player B(Si Ma Yi) ie. following direction of gameplay. After that player H (Zhang Jiao) can change the judgement card that Si Ma Yi  laid down.

-Once the ''cycle'' goes back to player A, the tinkering ends. Which means both tinkerers only have ONE CHANCE to change the judgement card , and who changes first is determined by their sequence  in the gameplay.


2. Whose ability comes first when Zhang Jiao use Dodge against Pang De's attack?

Ans: Zhang Jiao performs lightning strike BEFORE Pang De gets to discard Zhang Jiao's cards . The reason for this is as follows (based on the chinese instruction on the cards):

Zhang Jiao's lightning strike  takes place before the conclusion of the DODGE 闪结算前 whereas Pang De's ability states when an Attack has been DODGED(杀被闪抵消时). Thus it appears that Zhang Jiao's lightning strike take precedence.


3.Will Zhang Jiao's ability come into play twice if he uses a dodge card?

Ans: Yes, he can use Lightning Strike TWICE if he uses 2 dodge cards.


4. If Zhang Jiao has the Eight Trigrams armor equipped , does that count as a dodge?

Ans: Yes it does. If Ba Gua Zhen judgement is Red, it is equivalent to having used a dodge, and Zhang Jiao can use Lightning Strike with it.


5. I know that Zhang Jiao can use his ability to exchange judgement cards, but say he is a victim of Acedia and Rations depleted, since its equipped to him, can he use his ability to use those cardsto exchange the judgement cards?

Ans: Yes he can. For Ration's Depleted 兵粮寸断, the user of judgement needs to open a Clubs to dodge the effects so ''Zhang Jiao 张角'' an use his ability to ''cheat'' the effect. However , for ''Acedia 乐不思蜀 '' the user requires a Hearts to escape the penalties and ''Dark Sorcery  鬼道'' ONLY allows you to change the judgement card into black(Spades or clubs) which makes Zhang Jiao 张角 100% to fail judgement if he changes it.


6. If Zhang Jiao is in a state of Rations Depleted ( which means the tool card is equipped to him) and if somebody attacks him, zhang jiao dodges, forces judgement. NOW since Rations Depleted is a dark suit card , and is equipped to him , can he use THAT card to exchange the judgement?

Ans: Time-Delay Tool cards such as ''Acedia 乐不思蜀'' and Lightning 闪电 belongs to no one regardless of its user and position. Reason being Time-Delay  Tool cards are still tool cards just that they stay in play until they take effect (eg. Guan Yu can't possibly use his Red Duel 决斗 card in the middle of a duel as an ''ATTACK '' in the middle of duel if he runs out of ATTACK )

However , i may be wrong , so feel free to dispute my claim

43 comments:

  1. If Zhang Jiao and Si Ma Yi are in play, how to arrange the judgment card exchange ability between them?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Great question!

    The sequence in which judgement tinkering works is as follow (according to SGS online game):

    1. imagine the players' turns go anticlockwise from player A to B to C etc... up to H. Now imagine player B is Sima Yi and player H is Zhang Jiao.

    2. Say player A draws a judgement card, the 1st tinkerer allowed to change the card is player B (Sima Yi). ie following direction of gameplay. After that, player H (Zhang Jiao) can change the judgement card that Sima Yi laid down.

    3. Once the "cycle" goes back to player A, the tinkering ends. Which means both tinkerers only have ONE CHANCE to change the judgement card, and who changes first is determined by their sequence in the gameplay.

    Hope that answered your question!

    ReplyDelete
  3. when zhang jiao meets pang de, whose ability comes in precedence? For example, pang de uses Sha on zhang jiao, zhang jiao uses a Shan. Does Zhang jiao gets to chose the character to perform a lightning strike or does Pang de gets to discard zhang jiao's card first?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Zhang Jiao performs lightning strike BEFORE Pang De gets to discard Zhang Jiao's cards. The reason for this is as follows (based on the chinese instructions on the cards):

    Zhang Jiao's lightning strike takes place before the conclusion of the DODGE (闪结算前) whereas Pang De's ability states when ATTACK has been DODGED (杀被闪抵消时). Thus it appears that Zhang Jiao's lightning strike takes precedence.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Xiǎo Qiáo's ability makes it so that any spade becomes a heart when it is part of her action. So when Zhang Jiao does the lightning on her and she flips a judgment and Zhang jiao replaces it with a spade, will his lightning hit or not?

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hi Danny, very very tough question to answer. There seems to be a consensus amongst the community based on the translated instructions of Zhang Jiao' "Lightning Strike".

    It states: "...可令任意一名角色判定..." (Zhang Jiao can command any player to undergo judgement)

    which is interpreted to mean the judgement card is flipped by the target, and not Zhang Jiao himself. In this scenario, if Xiao Qiao flips the judgement card, she will NEVER be hit by lightning strike.

    Then the question goes to "what if Zhang Jiao replaces the judgement card? Is that card still considered Xiao Qiao's card or Zhang Jiao's?"

    The general consensus amongst the forums is although Zhang Jiao may have changed the judgement card, but ultimately the judgement action belongs to her. Thus even if Zhang Jiao changes the judgement card to spades, Xiao Qiao will still see the card as hearts, thus will NEVER get struck!

    Like i mentioned, this is very arguably and has stirred a lot of debate. My recommendation is to lay your house rules clearly if such a scenario happens so that everyone is agreeable.

    Hope that helped!

    ReplyDelete
  7. I quote one of your answer posted on 26th Oct above:
    "Ricky Chua said...
    Great question!

    The sequence in which judgement tinkering works is as follow (according to SGS online game):

    1. imagine the players' turns go anticlockwise from player A to B to C etc... up to H. Now imagine player B is Sima Yi and player H is Zhang Jiao.

    2. Say player A draws a judgement card, the 1st tinkerer allowed to change the card is player B (Sima Yi). ie following direction of gameplay. After that, player H (Zhang Jiao) can change the judgement card that Sima Yi laid down.

    3. Once the "cycle" goes back to player A, the tinkering ends. Which means both tinkerers only have ONE CHANCE to change the judgement card, and who changes first is determined by their sequence in the gameplay.

    Hope that answered your question!
    October 26, 2010 10:52 PM"

    What if this player A is now Zhang Jiao & player B is Sima Yi? Who is the 1st tinkerer?

    ReplyDelete
  8. The first player allowed to tinker is Player A himself, then the order goes to Players B, C, D and so on.

    Which means to say if Player A is Zhang Jiao, he can change his own judgement card, but Player B Sima Yi can change the judgement again. Zhang Jiao will have no more opportunity to change the judgement since he was the first.

    In this case, Zhang Jiao has the disadvantage for being the first tinkerer.

    ReplyDelete
  9. What if Lu Bu attacks Zhang Jiao? Since if Zhang Jiao uses a dodge card, his 2nd ability comes in play. Will his ability come into play twice, if he used two dodges to evade Lu Bu's attack?

    ReplyDelete
  10. Everytime Zhang Jiao uses a dodge card, he can use Lightning strike. Since he needs to use 2 Dodges to evade Lu Bu's attack, he can use Lightning Strike TWICE if he uses 2 dodge cards!

    This becomes even more interesting. If Zhang Jiao only has 1 dodge card, he can still use it and evoke Lightning Strike for that 1 dodge card. But since he does not have another dodge, he will need to suffer damage for Lu Bu's attack. This is a worthwhile trade!

    In effect, if Zhang Jiao is the Ruler, it would be incredibly useful to have Lu Bu as the Loyalist.

    ReplyDelete
  11. If Zhang Jiao has the ba gua zhen equiped, does that count as a dodge?

    ReplyDelete
  12. Yes it does. If the Ba Gua Zhen judgement is Red, it is equivalent to having used a dodge, and Zhang Jiao can use Lightning Strike with it.

    ReplyDelete
  13. I know that Zhangjiao can use his abilty to exchange judgment cards, but say he's been "Le Bu Si Shu" and "Bing Liang Cun Duan", since it's equipped to him, can he use his ability to use those cards to exchange the judgment cards?

    I'm just confused, because when Sima Yi is attacked, he is able to use retaliation and take away a card from the attacking player from anywhere on his field. (Including le bu si shu and bing liang cun duan)

    ReplyDelete
  14. @Anonymous
    Qn: "I know that Zhangjiao can use his abilty to exchange judgment cards, but say he's been "Le Bu Si Shu" and "Bing Liang Cun Duan", since it's equipped to him, can he use his ability to use those cards to exchange the judgment cards? "
    Ans: Yes he can. for "Rations Depleted 兵粮寸断", the user of judgment needs to open a Clubs into to dodge the effects so "Zhāng Jiǎo 张角" can use his ability to "cheat" the effect. However, for "Acedia 乐不思蜀", the user requires a Hearts to escape the penalties and "Dark Sorcery 鬼道" ONLY allows you to change the judgment card into black (Spades or Clubs) which makes "Zhāng Jiǎo 张角" 100% to fail judgment if he changes it

    ReplyDelete
  15. I think you misunderstood the question, I know that he can exchange any judgment card as long as he has a spade or club. But my question is IF Zhang Jiao is in a state of "Bing liang cun duan" (which means the tool card is equipped to him) and if somebody attacks him, zhang jiao dodges, forces judgment. NOW, since bing lian cun duan is a dark suit card, and is equipped to him, can he use THAT card (Bing liang cun duan) to exchange the judgment? (therefore he is no longer in a state of bing liang cun duan)

    ReplyDelete
  16. No he cannot use a time-delay card USED ON HIM as a card.

    The logic is time-delay tool cards used on the victim do not belong to the victim. In fact it belongs to nobody.

    The ambiguity arised due to the Sima Yi ability, and the "ownership" of pending time-delay cards is under question.

    I would prefer to look at it as Sima Yi's is a 1-time anomaly. Generally, pending time-delays do not belong to anyone, thus Zhang Jiao cannot use them.

    ReplyDelete
  17. @Anonymous
    opps, my bad.

    Qn: "IF Zhang Jiao is in a state of "Bing liang cun duan" (which means the tool card is equipped to him) and if somebody attacks him, zhang jiao dodges, forces judgment. NOW, since bing lian cun duan is a dark suit card, and is equipped to him, can he use THAT card (Bing liang cun duan) to exchange the judgment? (therefore he is no longer in a state of bing liang cun duan)"

    Ans: I have never encountered this problem before (at least the ppl i played with never attempt to use such a combo) but my guess is, all Time-Delay Tool Cards such as "Acedia 乐不思蜀" and "Lightning 闪电" belongs to no one regardless of its user and position. reason being Time-Delay Tool Cards are still tool cards, just that they stay in play until they take effect (eg. Guan Yu cant possibly use his Red "Duel 决斗" card in the middle of a duel as a "ATTACK 杀" in the middle of duel if he runs out of "ATTACK 杀")
    However, i may be wrong, so feel free to dispute my claim

    ReplyDelete
  18. The rules do state that time delay cards belong to no one.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Online rules show that if Zhang Jiao changes Xiao Qiao's judgement card from Lightning, it will still be a heart.... this "balances" out so that Xiao Qiao can never be hit by lightning damage when it is her turn, and thus allowing her to transfer 3 damage to anyone.. (overpowered..)

    Unless of course she is shackled to someone and they get hit by lightning....

    ReplyDelete
  20. So it is confirmed then. Xiao Qiao is freaking lightning proof!

    ReplyDelete
  21. If Sima Yi attacks zhang jiao and he dodges, and strikes sima yi with his lightning ability..

    a)If Sima yi receives 2 damage, does he take a card from Zhang Jiao?

    b)If sima yi dies, does zhang jiao draw 3 cards if he's a rebel?

    I ask this question because i've always thought that lightning is a judgment move, and the target player flips the judgment for his own life, thus if he dies or gets struck, it's natural cause, therefore zhangjiao receives no rewards or retalitory cause.

    ReplyDelete
  22. In this case, Zhang Jiao's "Lightning strike" ability is not the same as "Lightning" tool card. The source of the damage is attributed to Zhang Jiao, thus the answers to both (a) and (b) are YES.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Great blog! However, there is one small correction I would like to make.

    "Say player A draws a judgement card ,the 1st tinkerer allowed to change the card is player B(Si Ma Yi) ie. following direction of gameplay. After that player H (Zhang Jiao) can change the judgement card that Si Ma Yi laid down."

    The order of the judgement tinkerers is actually based on whose turn it is when the judgement is flipped, not the person who flips the judgement. In cases of time-delay tool cards, there is no difference. However, when Zhang Jiao uses "Lightening Strike," he may target someone other than the person who attacked him (i.e. the person who is playing their turn is not flipping the judgement card). In this case, there is a difference between the final outcomes of the two rules.

    Going back to your example for illustration purposes, let's say player B is Sima, H is Zhang Jiao, C is attacking Zhang Jiao, and A is Zhang Jiao's target (the one flipping the judgement). According to how you have the rule written here, Sima changes the judgement first and Zhang Jiao changes has the final say. From playing online, I have found that in this situation Zhang Jiao changes the judgement first and Sima has the final say (because Zhang Jiao is the first judgement tinkerer that is encountered when going counterclockwise from the person who is playing their turn and Sima is encountered next).

    ReplyDelete
  24. Can Zhang Jiao target himself with lightning strike?

    ReplyDelete
  25. ^ Yes, Zhang Jiao can target himself with his ability. I have done it online. If you are chained to Gou Jia and you want to strike him without letting him take the judgement card, you should target yourself.

    ReplyDelete
  26. I posted the question concerning the differences between play, use and discarding cards for TaiShiCi and now I have another question about a similar idea. Lets say Zhang Jiao has the "SERPENT HALBERD" equipped and plays/uses two dodge cards to carry out an ATTACK. I'm not sure if it is considered used or played. If this happens can he perform use his first ability twice ? Thanks

    ReplyDelete
  27. ^this is a very interesting question indeed.
    First of all we look at Serpent Halberd's description.
    The description says that, whenever you need to use/play an Attack, you can use any two on-hand cards to substitute the Attack card that you want to use/play.
    Main thing to carefully look at is: "you can use any two on-hand cards to SUBSTITUTE the Attack Card you want to use/play"
    Substitute any two cards is what matters here, you are neither playing/using the two on-hand cards, you can just 'using' them as substitutes to play/use the Attack card.
    Again, hope this make sense to you.

    ReplyDelete
  28. ^From the Serpent Halberd's weapon ability description, you can combine two on-hand-cards to substitute as playing/using an ATTACK card. Hence disregard the two on-hand-cards original functions and suits ._.

    ReplyDelete
  29. To make my point more clear consider this scenario:

    You have Serpent Halberd equipped and you want to Attack someone but you don't have any Attack Cards you first(you don't really have to...but for the sake of this topic) you declare you want to utilize your weapon, which is the Serpent Halberd.

    Activate Serpent Helberd->Pick two cards to substitute for Attack-> Attack-> Exit the activation of Serpent Helberd.

    During the activation, any card that you pick losses it's original usage and will only be treated as two on-hand cards that you are picking for substitutes as Attack.

    ReplyDelete
  30. With Serpent Halberd, both cards together are considered an ATTACK card.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Yes this makes sense. And from what i gather this means the two cards substituted for the SERPENT HALBERD effects are not play nor used, nor discarded. So previous i mentioned that I distinguish the utilization of cards in three ways; you can play it, use it, or discard it. From this it seems there might be a fourth way to utilize a card; play it, use it, discard it, or substitute it. Does this seem accurate ? And to directly clarify the question for anyone else reading this blog, Zhang Jiao cannot activate his ability for substituting any DODGE cards while using the effects of the SERPENT HALBERD.

    ReplyDelete
  32. Precisely, you convert both cards as an ATTACK, and use (ATTACK someone) or play (defend yourself from DUEL and BARBARIANS) it. The two cards lose their original function. So if Zhang Jiao convert DODGE to ATTACK with SERPENT HALBERD, he cannot activate LIGHTNING STRIKE.

    P.S. (wrt Anonymous 17 Nov) SERPENT HALBERD does regard the suit of the orignal cards, more precisely the colour.
    Two red cards --> Red ATTACK
    Two black cards --> Black ATTACK
    One red and one black card --> Colourless ATTACK

    ReplyDelete
  33. Okay just to clear things up a bit more about the order of judgement tinkering.

    Lets say there are only two players in the game, Player A (Zhang Jiao) and Player B (Sima Yi).

    1. If Player B (Sima) attacks Player A (ZJ), and ZJ dodges and decides to activate Lightning Strike on Sima. The judgement card that is flipped will be Sima's. In the situation who will be the first one that changes the judgement? This clarifies if the judgement tinkering starts with the person who's judgement it is (Sima in this case) or starts to the person on the right (anti-clockwise direction) of the judgement being flipped (ZJ).

    2. If Player B (Sima) attacks Player A (ZJ), and ZJ has Eight Trigrams equipped and flips a judgement. In this case is the first person to change the judgement, ZJ who's judgement card is being flipped, or is the first person Sima who is the person to the right of the player's (ZJ) turn.
    This will answer also who changes first when Lightning, Acedia, and/or Rations Depleted is placed on one of these two players. The answer to the first situation should also explain this one.

    Basically I'm asking if the first judgement change starts:

    A. On the person who judgement occurs on
    B. To the right of the person judgement occurs on
    C. The person whose turn it is (ie. the attacker or person who has a time delay placed on them)
    D. To the right of the person whose turn it is.

    Sorry for the long winded comment, hopefully this will be able to end all the arguments that occur when we play. Thanks!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The correct answer is C (the person whose turn it is). The judgement tinkering starts at the person whose turn it is, then the character siting right to him/her...Also, everyone has only one chance consider whether to switch the judgement or not. If that character forfeits switching the judgement, he does not have a second chance. So the character changes the judgement last is apparently in advantage.

      Situation 1: Because it is Sima Yi's turn, so Sima Yi uses "Demonic Talent" first, then Zhang Jiao uses "Demonic Craft" (I prefer this translation).

      Situation 2: Same as Situation 1.

      Delete
  34. If Zhang Jiao used Blaze, and was able to use a matching suit Dodge card to deal damage to a player, Do he get to use his Lightning Strike?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No. You need to use a DODGE (against an ATTACK) or play a DODGE (against RAINING ARROWS) to trigger "Thunder Strike". When you are using BLAZE, you discard the DODGE but not using nor playing it, so you cannot activate "Thunder Strike".

      Delete
  35. what happens if Lu Bu attacks Zhang Jiao, Zhang Jiao puts out one dodge and the lightning hits Lu Bu. Does the damage to Zhang Jiao still take effect?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Let me be more specific. Lu Bu is at 1 health. He attacks Zhang Jiao, who puts out one dodge and lightning subsequently hits Lu Bu who dies. Does Zhang Jiao still need to put out another dodge? Or does Lu Bu's attack disappear?

      Delete
    2. I believe Lu Bu's attack still 'remains', similar to Dian Wei's ability, but I am not sure. Zhang Jiao still needs to use one more DODGE unless someone fullfils the victory condition (i.e. Lu Bu is the ruler or the last Rebel/Defector). If Zhang Jiao suffers the damage from this attack, it would be considered as damage without source of damage.

      Delete
  36. Would it be possible for Zhang Jiao to ATTACK himself, then DODGE his own attack to lightning somebody? I checked the rules posted for ATTACK, didn't see anything about the option of attacking yourself.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Good question, but no, you can only attack other people.

      Delete
  37. If he uses a Dodge to exchange judgement card, can he use Lightning Strike?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. First of all, there are no black Dodge cards, so it is not even possible to exchange judgement with a Dodge.
      Second, "USE" explicitly means utilizing the function of the card: in the case of Dodge, it is only "used" when you avoid an Attack with it.

      Delete

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