Ancient Warriors

Ancient Warriors
"Valiant Zhang De", "Virtuous Liu Xuan", and "Loyal Guan Yun" in the artwork of "Ancient Warriors Saga - Three Visits"
Japanese	戦（せん）華（か） 戦華 (base) せんか (ruby) Senka (romanized) Warring Flower (translated)
French	Guerriers Anciens
German	Alte Krieger
Italian	Antichi Guerrieri
Korean	전황 Warring Sovereign (Hanja) Jeonhwang (romanized)
Portuguese	Guerreiros Antigos
Spanish	Antiguos Guerreros
Sets Ignition Assault Eternity Code Rise of the Duelist Blazing Vortex Dimension Force OCG Rise of the Duelist +1 Bonus Pack
Lists	Members Support Anti-support

"Ancient Warriors", known as "Warring Flower" (戦（せん）華（か） Senka) in Japanese, is an archetype of Beast-Warrior monsters introduced in Ignition Assault.

Etymology

The theme's Japanese name is a portmanteau of 戦（せん）火（か） senka, "the fires of war"; and 中（ちゅう）華（か） Chūka, the Japanese reading of 中華/中华 (Pinyin: Zhōnghuá), the formal and poetic name for China that literally means "central flower", hence "the Flower at war".

A direct Sino-Korean conversion of 戦（せん）火（か） would not quite work, since it would be 전화 (Jeonhwa), which happens to be homophonous with 電話 ("telephone"), 戰火 ("war conflict") or 戰禍 ("damage by war"). Since the Korean writing system does not use Chinese characters with furigana to minimize ambiguity the same way the Japanese writing system does, the Korean version opts for 전황 (Jeonhwang), possibly from the Chinese morpheme 皇 (hwang) meaning "sovereign" or "emperor."

Design

The "Ancient Warriors" archetype is based on figures from the Three Kingdoms period of China, in particular their dramatized portrayals in the classic Chinese novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Each "Ancient Warriors" monster is a counterpart to a figure from the Three Kingdoms period.

Visually, "Ancient Warriors" monsters are human warriors wearing clothes or armor that based on certain beasts, which explains their Beast-Warrior typing. The artworks of all "Ancient Warriors" monsters depicts animal feathers or fur scattered in the air, which are distinct for every Attributes: white feathers for the WATER "Ancient Warriors", red and fiery feathers for the FIRE "Ancient Warriors", and the WIND "Ancient Warriors" might show certain beast fur instead.

Members

Each "Ancient Warriors" monster's name features their historical counterpart's surname and one character from their courtesy name. Additionally, the Japanese names of the three "emperor" monsters—"Sun Mou", "Liu Xuan", and "Cao De"—also use the unused character from their courtesy names as their title.

Ancient Warriors Monsters

Attribute	Historical faction	Ancient Warrior	Origin	Courtesy name	Beast reference
WATER	Eastern Wu	Graceful Zhou Gong	Zhou Yu	Gongjin	Swan
		Masterful Sun Mou	Sun Quan	Zhongmou	Turtle and snake
		Eccentric Lu Jing	Lu Su	Zijing	Sturgeon
WIND	Shu Han	Valiant Zhang De	Zhang Fei	Yide	White Tiger
		Loyal Guan Yun	Guan Yu	Yunchang
		Virtuous Liu Xuan	Liu Bei	Xuande	Dragon
		Ingenious Zhuge Kong	Zhuge Liang	Kongming
		Double Dragon Lords
FIRE	Cao Wei	Ambitious Cao De	Cao Cao	Mengde	Phoenix
		Fearsome Zhang Yuan	Zhang Liao	Wenyuan	Demon
		Deceptive Jia Wen	Jia Xu	Wenhe	Bird
DARK	Independent	Savage Don Ying	Dong Zhuo	Zhongying	Boar
		Rebellious Lu Feng	Lü Bu	Fengxian	Demon

Additionally, most "Ancient Warriors" monsters can be categorized by their historical basis and card effects into three monster design categories, with each of these categories having their own pattern of effects.

• "Leaders" are counterparts to the emperors and warlords of the Three Kingdoms period.
• "Warriors" are counterparts to the military generals of the Three Kingdoms period.
• "Tacticians" are counterparts to the strategists and statesmen of the Three Kingdoms period.

Ancient Warriors Monster Categories

Attribute	Leaders	Warriors	Tacticians
WATER	Masterful Sun Mou	-	Graceful Zhou Gong
			Eccentric Lu Jing
WIND	Virtuous Liu Xuan	Valiant Zhang De	Ingenious Zhuge Kong
		Loyal Guan Yun
FIRE	Ambitious Cao De	Fearsome Zhang Yuan	Deceptive Jia Wen
DARK	Savage Don Ying	Rebellious Lu Feng	-

Support

"Ancient Warriors" Spell/Trap Cards are based on iconic events from either the historical period or the Romance of the Three Kingdoms dramatization.

Card	Origin
Defense of Changban	Battle of Changban
Sun-Liu Alliance	Alliance between Sun Quan and Liu Bei against their common foe, Cao Cao
Borrowing of Arrows	The Borrowing of Arrows in the Battle of the Red Cliffs
Three Visits	Three visits to the thatched cottage
East-by-South Winds	Zhuge Liang summons an eastern wind
Chivalrous Path	Guan Yu spares Cao Cao at Huarong Trail
Deception and Betrayal	Lü Bu confronts Dong Zhuo, his adoptive father, with Cao Cao's forged imperial decree that summoned 18 princes to attack Dong Zhuo

Playing style

The "Ancient Warriors" have an overall playing style that focuses on swarming and beatdown. Many "Ancient Warriors" monsters have the ability to Special Summon themselves, remove the opponent's cards, gain additional advantageous effects if other "Ancient Warriors" monsters are present, and/or have effects that trigger only in response to actions taken by other "Ancient Warriors" monsters.

The "Ancient Warriors" monsters have a diverse range of effects, including card destruction, searching, effect negation, ATK change, protection, etc., and almost all "Ancient Warriors" monsters have multiple effects. "Ancient Warriors" monsters in each of its three main Attributes also each share an effect activation requirement for one of their effects:

Attribute	Effect requirement
WIND	If your opponent controls more monsters than you do
FIRE	If a card(s) your opponent controls is destroyed by battle or card effect
WATER	If your other "Ancient Warriors" monster's effect is activated (except during the Damage Step)

Ancient Warrior monsters also share some common effect patterns depending on their monster category (see #Members).

• "Leaders" generally feature searching effects and self-protection effects, the latter while they're alongside another "Ancient Warriors".
• "Warriors" are all Level 6+ monsters with summon-from-hand effects, and generally provide removal effects and apply protection to others. "Cao De" uniquely seems to be a Leader-Warrior hybrid, having both self-protection and summon-from-hand effects.
• "Tacticians" are all Level 4 monsters with high DEF and low ATK (excluding "Zhou Gong"), and provide supportive effects involving sending a friendly Continuous Spell/Trap to the GY.

In general, the deck is played as a Main Deck-based beatdown, utilizing its many summon-from-hand effects and searching effects to quickly swarm the board with board-controlling "Leader" and "Warrior" boss monsters. As such, their critical cards are their monster searchers, the in-archetypal ones being "Masterful Sun Mou", "Virtuous Liu Xuan", "Double Dragon Lords", and "Three Visits".

Their Spell/Trap cards, all of which are Continuous, favor the presence of "Ancient Warrior" monsters ("Three Visits", which searches an "Ancient Warriors" monster, and "Sun-Liu Alliance", which negates the activated effects of your opponent's monsters) or are battle-related, focusing on either battle protection ("Defense of Changbang" and "Chivalrous Path") or ATK manipulation ("Borrowing of Arrows" and "Sun-Liu Alliance") and card destruction ("East-by-South Winds"). The Spells all have effects that activate when they are sent from the Spell & Trap Zone to the GY (with the exception of "Sun-Liu Alliance") while the Traps have effects that they activate in the GY by banishing themselves.

A large number of "Ancient Warriors" monsters require sending a card from the hand or the field to the GY to activate their effect or Special Summon themselves; therefore, the archetypal Spell/Trap cards are prime targets for fulfilling this cost, since they have effects triggered upon being sent to the GY or GY effects.

Recommended cards

Main Deck Monster Cards Effect Monsters Alpha, the Master of Beasts Ancient Warriors - Ambitious Cao De Ancient Warriors - Savage Don Ying Ancient Warriors - Eccentric Lu Jing Ancient Warriors - Fearsome Zhang Yuan Ancient Warriors - Graceful Zhou Gong Ancient Warriors - Ingenious Zhuge Kong Ancient Warriors - Loyal Guan Yun Ancient Warriors - Masterful Sun Mou Ancient Warriors - Rebellious Lu Feng Ancient Warriors - Valiant Zhang De Ancient Warriors - Virtuous Liu Xuan Brotherhood of the Fire Fist - Buffalo Kaiju monsters Tuner monsters Three Trolling Trolls Spell Cards Normal Spells Onslaught of the Fire Kings Small World Continuous Spells Ancient Warriors Saga - Borrowing of Arrows Ancient Warriors Saga - Deception and Betrayal Ancient Warriors Saga - East-by-South Winds Ancient Warriors Saga - Sun-Liu Alliance Ancient Warriors Saga - Three Visits Fire Formation - Ingen Fire Formation - Tenki Fire Formation - Tensu Trap Cards Normal Traps Tri-Brigade Revolt Continuous Traps Ancient Warriors Saga - Chivalrous Path Ancient Warriors Saga - Defense of Changban Fire Formation - Tensen Call of the Haunted Extra Deck Fusion Monsters Brotherhood of the Fire Fist - Swan Xyz Monsters Brotherhood of the Fire Fist - Tiger King Diamond Dire Wolf Link Monsters Ancient Warriors Oath - Double Dragon Lords Barricadeborg Blocker Black Luster Soldier - Soldier of Chaos Brotherhood of the Fire Fist - Eagle Eria the Water Charmer, Gentle Fire Fighting Daruma Doll Tri-Brigade Rugal the Silver Sheller Tri-Brigade Shuraig the Ominous Omen Wynn the Wind Charmer, Verdant

Weaknesses

• The Deck is extremely reliant on its Normal Summon, specially that of "Liu Xuan" or "Sun Mou", which are the main starters of the deck
  • It also heavily relies on "Three Visits" as it's its main way of searching and generating field presence aside from "Liu Xuan" or "Sun Mou"
• While they all have Special Summoning conditions, the high presence of High-Level monsters can cause bricks, specially since their Summoning conditions rely on the field presence of other Ancient Warriors monsters, which aggravates the first problem, because if your Normal Summoned monster is destroyed, you won't likely be able to follow-up your strategy.
  • "Ingenious Zhuge Kong" can be a brick as well as he's better off Special Summoned via a search.
• While being a Go-2nd Deck, the "Underdog" mechanics of the WIND monsters makes them incompatible with commonly ran Go-2nd cards such as "Evenly Matched", "Lightning Storm" or "The Winged Dragon of Ra - Sphere Mode", as they wipe the opponent's field presence on which the former rely on.
  • Similarly, the Deck lacks strong "first turn" options, having at most "Rebellious Lu Feng" or "Double Dragon Lords" as its "first turn" plays.
• The Deck has a hard time dealing with monsters that can't be neither targeted nor destroyed (such as a "Mekk-Knight Crusadia Avramax" summoned with "I:P Masquerena"), as such, the use of "Kaijus" is strongly advised.