Ancient Battlefield

Legend of the Five Rings card from Dawn of the Empire

Card Type

Strategy

Gold Cost

2

Keywords

Terrain

Card Text

Before this battle's resolution: You may target one of your honorably dead Personalities that was destroyed since the end of your last turn by a card another player owned or from having 0 Chi, negate all non-permanent Chi penalties on him, and bring him into play in your current army, ignoring costs and restrictions.
Battle, : If there are no Terrains at the current battlefield: Put this card into play there.

Focus Value

2

Legality

Age of Enlightenment (Lotus), Rain of Blood (Diamond)

Deck

Fate

Printings

Rulings

• May not be played in a battle in which you have no units, because it does not move a unit into battle unconditionally; the unit moves in when a player makes a decision when Delayed Terrains resolve, which cannot be determined when it is played. [JA, 29 November 2004] Rules Archive, August 18, 2007, p. 5

Rules Q&A

• Q: But that doesn't settle the issue. The card that you are talking about is an Imperial edition card. All other MRPs have either "You may play this in a battle which you have no units" thus making the Presence issue moot or some statment making it only legal to play when you have one or more units in the battle.
  Greetings,
  The question at hand is, "Does Ancient Battlefield fulfil the Rule of Presence?" Yes. Precedent: Traversable Terrain (not the most recent printing, however). Under its original wording, it was used for years to slide in units in a battle where you had none.
  A: I agree. Traversable Terrain is not a precedent. The rules of Presence and Relevance were not the same in Imperial Edition, which is the only edition of the rules where Traversable lacks the explicit exception to the Rule of Presence.
  Regarding Ancient Battlefield:
  Page 80 says the action meets Presence only if the gaining of a unit in the battle is an unconditional result of the action.
  Examining the Glossary on page 98 reveals that the definition of "conditional" is incorrect and needs to change.
  The exact wording has yet to be determined, but it will either be similar to or replace the definition of "variable". The movement of the unit into the battle IS conditional -- it is not a preordained mandatory effect of the action, but instead relies on something not determinable at the time of playing (in this case, a future player decision made when Delayed Terrains resolve).
  In the interim, since the movement of the unit is conditional, the action of playing Ancient Battlefield does not meet the Rule of Presence. It is not legal if you have no units in the current battle. Martin Lund, "Rules for 29 November 2004", 2 Dec 2004
• Q: Let's say that my opponent reduces Tokaro's chi with Written in Blood and he dies. I now have no one on the boards. I declare a Raid battle, pay 2 gold, and play Ancient Battlefield. Does this work?
  In my support:
  In the case of Strategic Crossroad it was ruled that you couldn't because it would create an action that would create presence, but didn't in and of itself. In the case of Ancient Battlefield the terrain itself will create presence when it resolves.
  A: See Archive, Ancient Battlefield. Zen Faulkes, "Ancient Battlefield + Presence/Relevence", 31 Mar 2005
• Q: i'm a phoenix player and i defend one of my provinces with sesaru, 2 kanjiros and another three (Personalities) against 4 lions with tactician trait. in the middle of a battle the lion play rain of death and kill sezaru and a kokujin daisho atached to danjuro.
  danjuro can bow to redirect the target on sezaru or it be an illegal target because he has attachead the Kokujin's Daisho.?
  later i play ancient battlefield and i gain the battle, when the delay terrain resolves he target a courtier in his home an play misdirection changing the target that i choose (in this case i choose to bring back sezaru) for an otomo taneji dead in the same battle.
  he can do this target changin with misdirection or not
  A: The general answer to 99% of all redirection questions: Could those have been picked as legal targets in the first place (Diamond rules, pg. 74)?
  In the first case, assuming the second ability of Rain of Death was used, Danjuro could not have originally been picked, so he cannot redirect it to him.
  In the second case, you could have picked someone else, so redirecting the action is legal. Zen Faulkes, "Ancient Battlefield and Misdirection", 25 Mar 2005