Introducing: Judge Tower

• Your starting hand size is 0.
• You have infinite CP.
• You cannot generate CP.
• It is assumed you used whatever type of CP a card asks for.
  (Playing Black Mage will cause you to draw 2 and discard 1)
• If there is an action you can take, you must take it: You can’t pass priority if you can play a character or activate an ability; You must make all legal attacks and blocks.
• Auto-abilities that trigger must be declared, even if nothing will happen when they resolve.
• Optional effects must be performed.
  (You have to use Yuna on all Characters that move from field to BZ.)
• If an effect says “up to,” you must do as much as possible.
  (for Rikku, you must choose all of your backups.)
• If an action ability can be used more than once in a turn, you can only use it once. As usual, zone changes will reset this.
  (Heretical Knight Garland must be activated exactly once per turn. If he is returned to hand and replayed, he will need to be activated again.)
• You cannot win or lose the game.
• If you commit a Game Rules Violation, you are issued an Instant Defeat.

That’s a fair amount, but don’t be intimidated. They can pretty much be summed up as: do everything possible with infinite CP.

Here’s the decklist that I built and have been using. I’ll include some guidelines below if you want to build your own Tower. Until then, let’s talk about how the Tower plays. You’ll wind up with lots of complicated stacks, where you put three or more abilities/summons on at once, only to have your opponent respond with their own. You can arrange your plays in any order, so long as you don’t pass priority with an action you could take. Often, turns will be something along the lines of “play a Character; play a Character with an ETF; in response, activate every ability; let opponent activate all their abilities; resolve; move to combat.”

There’s a fine line to walk between playing too quickly and too slowly. Sure, you want to make sure you’re not rushing, not forgetting anything, but let me tell you from experience: the game is no fun if you examine every single card you control every time you do anything. There’s nothing worse than watching your opponent take a three minute turn to do four things in a format designed for fast paced play. Accept that you’re going to forget stuff. Failure is the best way to learn! And after all, the penalty for screwing up is just: Next game!

Keeping your own board simple is usually the best road to victory. If removal can be used on your own stuff, do it! You’ll find yourself excited to draw cards like Sin and Ninja that let you keep your field under control. Since blocks are mandatory, try to sequence your attacks so that your opponent has no choice but to break your forwards.

We usually just play until we get bored or run out of time, and we usually don’t keep track of our records, but you can set a goal number and play until someone gets that many wins if you prefer.

Some common things that trip people up:

There’s lot of effects that can be applied to your own stuff, like Enuo, that are easy to forget about. Cards like Archer and Ranger can choose themselves.

You’re still restricted to 5 backups and by the Name Rule.

Famed Mimic Gogo is unceremoniously put straight into the BZ when his condition is met. Since it’s a field ability, it doesn’t trigger or use the stack, and goes directly without waiting for anything to resolve.

A lot of people ask that since they have infinite CP, do they also have infinite S fuel, for instance if they have Sephiroth out, do they Shadow Flare every turn? And the answer is no, it’s only CP that’s supplied.

You can activate cards like Black Mage even if you have nothing to play off of them.

Lann’s ability triggers itself, and can be used to completely wipe your own board.

Just because an effect is supposed to happen at a certain time doesn’t mean it has to. Since Mateus doesn’t choose, it can be cast outside of combat.

Starter Shuyin isn’t a forward. (Love you, Dan!)

Building your own tower can be a lot of fun, as you pore over cards you never get the chance to use. Ask yourself how the card is likely to play out in game, there are a few that look enticing but don’t really do anything. Discard will almost never matter, since both players’ hands will be empty 90% of the time. Here’s a list of things I try to keep in mind when adding cards from a new set:

• Don’t add any card that searches. Under any circumstance. You want games to be quick.
• Speaking of wanting quick games, cards that reveal X like Moogle Brothers bog the game down and should be used sparingly, if at all.
• Make sure each card does at least one interesting thing, even if it’s just conditional haste on Llyud.
• Anything that draws a card is good. Anything that draws multiple cards is terrifying in the best way.
• Things that care about a specific type of card (Tama, Siren) make you stay on your toes.
• Try to keep a decently high ratio of forwards to non-forwards. FF is more fun when you’re arguing over the board.
• You want cards to be a specific kind of annoying. Look for cards that make the players go “oh no this is going to be tough” and not “oh no this is going to be a chore.” (Chocobo Chick is a great example for this, there’s no interesting play there. It just reactivates itself every turn.)
• Make sure to add some cards that players are actually happy to see, like Kefka and Feral Chaos.
• Prioritize EX Burst, so that taking damage doesn’t feel like a waste of time. There’s a case to be made to just remove taking damage, since you can’t lose that way, but it’s just so fun every once in a while to win at like 13 damage.
• Make sure you have enough targets for things. Don’t run Rydia if you only have four or five Earth Summons. It’s more ok for cards like Tama, where you need to remember the ability, but avoid ETFs that are unlikely to hit. I’m willing to give a little leeway for EX Bursts, though.
• You don’t have to stick to the singleton format that I use. If you prefer to up the ratio of certain cards, do it!
• My Judge Tower is unsleeved, so I avoid cards with real value. And while I don’t think anyone around here would steal my Tower, I’d rather not even give people the temptation. Feel free to put in expensive cards if you like. Aerith and Cloud of Darkness seem like good additions.
• Judge Tower is a good way to get practical experience with new cards, as well! Make a tower with 2x of all the C and R from a new set, maybe a few H or L here and there, and go to town! Make sure to omit anything that searches, or anything else that seems unfun.