Shadowfist Deck: Punchy Hand by Willow Palecek

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Home > Decks > Decks: Punchy Hand (GenCon 2009 Invitational tournament winner)
[posted 18 Feb 2010]

Posted with permission. Thanks Willow!

Willow Palecek used this deck to win the first exclusive invitational tournament at GenCon 2009 (multiplayer, constructed) for winners of other major tournaments. The format doesn't have an official name yet, but in my opinion it can't be anything other than Fists of Legend.

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Punchy Hand
by Willow Palecek (51 cards)

Foundations (10)
Golden Candle Society x5
Buddhist Monk x5

Hitters (11)
Sword Saint x4
Iron Monkey x2
Cheng Hu Bai
The Silent Cowboy
Zhu Maichen
Lui Yu Min
Derek Han

Feng Shui (10)
City Square x2
Fox Pass
LaGrange Four
Mah-Jongg Parlor
Sacred Heart Hospital
Temple of the Angry Spirits x2
Whirpool of Blood x2

Events (15)
Confucian Stability
Rigorous Discipline x5
Secrets of Shaolin
The Willow Bends x3
Violet Meditation x3
Wind on the Mountain x2

Etc (5)
Chinese Connection
Hot Zone
Shield of Pure Soul
Spear of Destiny
Violet Senshi Chamber

This is the deck that allowed me to go undefeated in the 2009 Gencon Invitational Tournament. It didn't do quite so well in the World Championship Final Brawl, due to a few larger game sizes and some horrid draws.

The deck is an absolute beast in 3-player. You want to get out a Sword Saint early, and burn sites before anyone else can, and use that to field more characters. Always keep pushing. Play from first place, and play hard.

The other hitters are a grab-bag of useful characters. If you lose a site, hopefully Shield of Pure Soul can set you up with a character that's useful for any given situation.

I got a lot of mileage out of Willow Bends to keep my Sword Saints punching through and my Temple of the Angry Spirits healed, but the Rigorous Disciplines are so flexible. The non-Sword Saint hitters all have juicy abilities, and I've got a lot of mileage off of copying what my opponents play. Also, you can copy a Buddhist Monk onto itself, allowing a potential 2 for 6 or 2 for 8 late game cheap hitter. A sneaky move I'm fond of is copying the Sword Saint's text onto an opponent's character to get a power gain when my own guys die, or to prevent a state from showing up.

Special thanks to Jim "The Beast" Sensenbrenner for suggesting the Spear of Destiny. In addition to its usefulness in permanently canceling opponent's cards, it fits right in on the Sword Saint.

-Willow

[writeup by Willow Palecek]

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