Moto Gaheris

Legend of the Five Rings card from Soul of the Empire, Celestial Edition 15th Anniversary

Card Type

Personality

Force

5

Chi

6

Honor Requirement

-

Gold Cost

15

Personal Honor

2

Clan

Unicorn

Keywords

Cavalry, Double Chi, Loyal, Unique, Clan Champion, Experienced, Moto Clan, The Khan, Unicorn Clan

Card Text

While Gaheris is at the current battlefield, other players may not play Strategies during the Combat Segment unless their effects will unconditionally move or destroy him.

Legality

Hidden Emperor (Jade)

Deck

Dynasty

Printings

Rulings

• An action card must immediately and unconditionally remove Gaheris's unit from the battle to be be legal. An action card that might remove Gaheris (e.g., Stand or Run), destroys Gaheris (e.g., To Do What We Must), or ends the battle (e.g., Entrapping Terrain), is not legal. [ZF, 2 August 2000] Rules Archive, August 18, 2007, p. 115
• Q: Can I play an Action card that destroys Gaheris? He'll leave the battle .... A: No. It must remove him as a stated effect of the card. The Imperial Herald, Issue 17, p. 40

Rules Q&A

• Q: Jeff Alexander answered the following question:
  Moto Gaheris Question
  Unicorn Clan Champion*Moto Clan Khan*Cavalry*Double Chi*Experienced*Unique Gaheris will only join a Unicorn player. Opposing players cannot play Action cards during the Battle Action Segment of a battle containing Gaheris unless the Action removes Gaheris from battle.
  If an opponent has no personaliteis in the battle, could the opponent or ally of the opponent in theory play actions to bring personalities into the battle to opposed Gaheris, like say Tireless Assualt?
  Yes.
  Can somebody explain this answer?
  A: Some cards that talk about "opposing players" mean anyone who has units opposing yours right now. Others always mean the leader of the other army. Remember, L5R is also a multiplayer game, so the two are far from equivalent. Unfortunately, since one-on-one play is so dominant, for many years the cards did not strongly stress wording that clearly differentiated the two. So, when the current definitions were made a base set or two ago, they were based on those pre- templated wordings so there'd be the least amount of confusion overall across all tournament formats. (The rulebook isn't the Current Storyline Format rulebook. It's the L5R rulebook.)
  Sometimes, no one at all fits the definition of "AN opposing player". This is the case with Gaheris against an empty army. His trait only applies to players who control units opposing him -- which is why it doesn't stop someone who doesn't have anyone there yet from moving one in. Jeff Alexander, "rules for 4 March 2004", 5 Mar 2004
• Q: I'm sorry, but I'm confused by a ruling/clarification you made in the subject above. The confusion stems from the following:
  Re: [L5R-CCG] Opposing Player Questions
  [begin excerpt] Bloodied Ground refers to "THE opposing player". There will always be one regardless of presence -- either the Attacker or the Defender.
  Moto Gaheris Question
  Unicorn Clan Champion*Moto Clan Khan*Cavalry*Double Chi*Experienced*Unique Gaheris will only join a Unicorn player. Opposing players cannot play Action cards during the Battle Action Segment of a battle containing Gaheris unless the Action removes Gaheris from battle.
  If an opponent has no personaliteis in the battle, could the opponent or ally of the opponent in theory play actions to bring personalities into the battle to opposed Gaheris, like say Tireless Assualt?
  Yes. [end excerpt]
  Gaheris would seem to prevent one from playing cards if all of the following conditions apply: 1) The action is a card. 2) The opposing player wants to play the card during the Battle Action Segment. 3) The card does not remove Gaheris from the battle.
  A: "AN" opposing player. Someone with no units there yet is not "an" opposing player. Jeff Alexander, "rules for 2-3 March 2004", 4 Mar 2004
• Q: Moto Gaheris Question
  Unicorn Clan Champion*Moto Clan Khan*Cavalry*Double Chi*Experienced*Unique Gaheris will only join a Unicorn player. Opposing players cannot play Action cards during the Battle Action Segment of a battle containing Gaheris unless the Action removes Gaheris from battle.
  If an opponent has no personaliteis in the battle, could the opponent or ally of the opponent in theory play actions to bring personalities into the battle to opposed Gaheris, like say Tireless Assualt?
  A: Yes. Jeff Alexander, "rules for 1 March 2004", 2 Mar 2004
• Q: I have a few questions on how Moto Gaheris and Storms of War interact with action card that are played as focuses when in a duel. when Gaheris is in the current battle can the other player play the above mentioned reactions during a duel against another one of my personalities?
  A: No. Reactions are actions (Gold Edition rulebook, pg. 47). Zen Faulkes, "Rules for 25 August 2003", 25 Aug 2003
• Q: If you'll re-read the rulebook, you'll see that reacting to one of your Personalities leaving battle or leaving play from a battle also satisfies Relevance. It's legal right now without changing anything.
  How about this, though... If Moto Gaheris is in a battle (on your opponent's side), you can't play action cards that would kill him because that would not directly remove him from the battle. He's still there, he's just dead.
  A: STOP. Bad reasoning. He does leave the battle following his death. He leaves PLAY following his death. But his removal from the battle is not a direct result of the action. Only his death is. That's the directness rule in a nutshell. Jeff Alexander, "replies to 24 September 2001", 25 Sep 2001
• Q: Setting: A really big final battle, Unicorn vs Scorpion at the last Scorpion province.
  The Players: Moto Gaheris experienced with attached scout and ancestral sword and a whole host of attacking Unicorns, Bayushi Kachiko exp 3 and many others defending.
  Bayushi Kachiko exp3 Ho/Co/PH: -/10/2 Scorpion Clan Seductress. Experienced 3. Unique. Kachiko will only join a Scorpion player. Reaction: Discard a card from your hand when a Battle action is played during a battle Kachiko is in. Cancel the action.
  Moto Gaheris exp Ho/Co/PH: -/15/2 Unicorn Clan Champion. Moto Clan Khan. Cavalry. Double Chi. Exp. Unique. Gaheris will only join an Unicorn player. Opposing players cannot play Action cards during the Battle Action Segment of a battle containing Gaheris unless the action removes Gaheris from battle.
  Scout Ho/Co/PH: 0/1/- Cavalry. An Attacker with a Scout in his army may play a terrain card before the Defender performs his first battle action.
  Situation:
  The scout causes Deadly Terrain to be played. If this is a battle action, then Kachiko can cancel it and the Scorpions are saved (sending Gaheris home and exterminating the remaining Unicorn army). If it is not a Battle Action, and/or Kachiko cannot cancel it, the Scorpions are unable to simultaneously destroy the terrain and remove Gaheris from the battle and die horribly beneath the hooves of the rampaging Unicorn host. YOU make the call... who will reign triumphant and who will die ignominiously.
  A: The terrain is still a Battle action. Scout changes when it's played but not what sort of action it is. Thus, Kachiko can be used to discard a Fate card to cancel it. (Using Kachiko's ability is not considered to be "playing an Action card," irrespective of the type of card discarded.) Jeff Alexander, "replies to 10-14 July 2001", 19 Jul 2001
• Q: What matters is card text. Since there exists an Agasha Personality with an alignment other than "Dragon Clan" (Agasha Genai Exp.), "Agasha" is a legal choice.
  Gee, you got the easy ones. The original poster didn't even consider the stranger situations with Oath of Fealty or Ronin Dojo. ;} Let's see... in my Unicorn deck I can use Ronin Dojo to give Moto Gaheris the Ninja trait, so he is now a member of another clan. This means when "Agasha Join..." comes up, I can name Moto and get Tsume in for just 2 gold! Woohoo!
  (Seems legal, no matter how twisted and wrong it is in concept. ;)
  A: You must have missed where I said that it's only the global card set that matters. In-game changes don't. Jeff Alexander, "Rulings for late February 2001", 10 Mar 2001
• Q: This question was probably answered a long time ago, but I have to ask...(I'm building a deck...)
  Does Hiruma Sensei trump Moto Gaheris ability, or the other way around?
  A: Hiruma Sensei trumps Gaheris. Vaughn Derderian, "Rules for February 6th", 6 Feb 2001