This battle was my first major defeat. My primary opponent, as he said, has 'finally learned how to play the game.' The armies were something like this:
Crane Army:
As for army composition, I did not check the card when my opponent
told me that Goblin Shamans were capable of leading a combat unit.
He was not aware of the rule that each shugenja must have a yojimbo, so
we took 8 goblins out of the Warmonger's unit, and under the assumption
that the Shaman could lead a combat unit, gave each shaman a 4-base unit
of Goblin Mob.
Terrain consisted of an open field, a large hill on one side, and a large forest on the other.
I set up my Crane forces in the center, side by side. My opponent set up his main goblin force opposite my Iron Warriors, and placed the Oni no Jimen opposite my archers. He placed the shamans and Tsuburu behind the hill.
Opening moves: I moved my units about a third of the way across the table, and waited for an attack. I was aligned with the hill, so that my archers flank was protected. He advanced slowly, so as to stay within range of his GOW equipped shugenja and stay out of range of my archers. With two GoW, he was able to cancel every ranged attack I declared in the game.
Tsuburu made an end run around the hill, while Jimen slowly advanced on the archers. I finally gave up and advanced the Iron Warriors to within 4 inches of the Goblin Warmonger and goaded him into engaging me. I tried to play wall of spears, but my opponent argued that I could not play it since my unit moved that turn instead of 'standing firm' and the card Wall of Spears targets a unit that has 'stood its ground.' We rolled a die to settle the argument and he won. I killed a bunch of goblins. They got my spears dirty, but otherwise did not harm the Iron Warriors.
Meanwhile, my Archers were about to find themselves in the middle of an Oni no Sandwich. There was some complicated maneuvering as I tried to decide which Oni I wanted the unit to face with its front flank; the other Oni would get a duel from Yosai. Yosai was killed by a Kharmic Strike in a duel against Jimen. Without a leader, the Archers failed the morale test from being flanked and having guys killed, and broke. Jimen played No Mercy and killed many archers. The archers routed.
Meanwhile, being greedy and deciding I needed more of a tactical advantage with my Iron Warriors than I already had, I played Fallback and Regroup and made a Break-Away, hoping to get another turn of Yari Effect. I successfully retreated, but my opponent did not follow. The Goblin Warmonger simply stood back and watched his Oni buddies kill my archers while the Iron Warriors did nothing. So I moved the iron warriors to flank the Oni, but too late. The Oni engaged the Iron Warriors front to front and Jimen played Test of Might on Kuwanen. Kuwanen was seriously wounded. I spent 2 void to heal a wound. He played my favorite card, Bad Kharma.
I threw in the towel. My general was permenantly spent. My archers were decimated. My Iron Warriors had one flank exposed to the Warmonger and the other to Tsuburu. And I'm sure my opponent had a nice Evil Portents or something saved for me.
Lessons Learned: