Card of the Week 9/29

[Logress]

Rifleman Knight

This week’s card is a bit of a contradiction, except for the part where it’s a low level Gowen card that can do cartloads of damage. It’s level one, it works best as a late game card, it’s not used very often, is Rarity 1, and it can do 100 points of damage with no exterior help. Let’s take another look at [card=250]Rifleman Knight.[/card]
Incidentally, Rifleman Knight is female, but Riflewoman Knight is a bit awkward and I actually didn’t notice it was a she until last week when someone on the forums pointed it out. I haven’t seen much use out of the card, maybe because you put her out in the early game and she’s practically useless. Salamander is also level one, except he has one of the best open skills in the game. He also does more damage out of the box, and while the Rifleman has more hit points, when the numbers are this low it doesn’t make much of a difference. The Rifleman’s RNG of 5 is awesome, but in the early game you never need more than RNG 3 to hit the back row. His Charge attack is nice, but how often do you have 2 SP to spare in the early game? Might as well use Magic Weapon, it’s cheaper, permanent, and doesn’t cripple your unit.
When you bring Rifleman Knight out a little later, everything changes. First of all, after Rank Up he’s doing 50 damage a shot on his own at a RNG of 5. That’s a magic number for taking out Lawtia tanks, and it’s coming from a throwaway unit. Second, once the field starts filling up, having a unit that can consistently take out support cards in the enemy’s third row can be a lifesaver. He can even take out Light Spearwoman and other high HP archers pretty easily. Charge is just a nice extra here, but it makes short work of just about anything, including a Blessed Coatl and most dragons. Spending 2 SP in the mid-late game is a lot better than wasting a Grimoire, and it can be just as effective. Notice that the negative aspect of Charge is self-inflicted damage; that means that you are one Dryad away from being able to use the power indefinitely with no ill effects. If you don’t want to waste one, you can just let the Rifleman kill himself the second time, or Standby in between shots.
Rifleman Knight’s Soul Skill is a fairly humble LP 2, +10 AT and +1 RNG to all units. However, in practice having every unit on your field able to attack the enemy’s support cards can be devastating. I’m not sure any Vordore File will be able to survive it, especially if you use it with fast units that are likely to go before those augmented Sylphs and Undines. It only works if you field a lot of units at once, however.

[EvilGenius]

I'm amazed that this and Animated Dead are level 1. But I love 'em both.

[Phades]

This would be a general all purpose killer if it were faster. The only problem is that it is rather difficult to get good agl boosts that are permenant on the table. I think the abscense of speed is why it is underused. The same could be said about the difference between the two gowen dragons. One is more commonly used than the other simple because it gets to strike before it can be killed in any instance excluding oni.

[DanTheTimid]

I'm amazed that this and Animated Dead are level 1. But I love 'em both.

I'm unclear as to why your amazed by that fact, but I will say I do like riflewoman knight (maybe just call her rifle knight? Or riflegirl knight? It has always just seemed wrong to me to call her rifleman). Her biggest flaw is just that she exists in a sphere thats loaded with over powered level 1s. Salamander is arguably the single most over powered level 1 in the game, and both dryad and exploding spores are not only solid when splashed in any deck, but absolutely amazing when correctly used in certain popular combos. Since Dryad and Spore are more effect based, and riflegirl is more of a power house with decent effects, Salamander being also a powerhouse and having a really good effect is what's really keeping riflegirl knight from seeing more play.

Conversely in a sphere like Refess, the players would be rejoicing in the streets over being given something like Riflegirl Knight to work with. Huge range, decent hp for a level 1 (can't be salamandered), decent (potentially huge with rank up) ATK, and an effect to make that damage even huger still! Her biggest issues are just that high rank up level (needs 6) and her speed, but as anyone whose faced Salamander will tell you, units that can attack from the back row are surprisingly hard to get at (even with high range units you still have a high probability of hitting their front or middle row units) all to often allowing them to still be around even when they are that slow.

Overall because she really needs her rank up to truly shine she's not very splashable, and for low level gowen rush decks that aren't running rank up abilities (gowen angel/panther soul)and wouldn't normally increase their gowen level beyond 5 anyway she isn't quite as cheap as she really seems. Like most rank up units she's versatile in that you can play her early game if you need to, but to justify a spot you really need to want to get your gowen level to level 6 or more anyway for other reasons, whether its a deck that runs alot of the high gowen level rank up skills or even a gowen high level dragon/emperor deck, if your going to be going up that high anyway the stats she gives you for a level 1 are truly fantastic, and her charge ability even makes her a decent counter for those ever popular high level decks (100 damage, 120 if Kurina is out, not much is gonna live through that).

Overal I give her a 3/5, really good, but currently outclassed in her sphere by too many ridiculously good cards of the same level. There are some card files I think she still deserves a spot in, but in the average gowen deck you usually just won't be able to find room.