VEKN Caitiff Newsletter January 2001

VEKN CAITIFF NEWSLETTER Jan. 2001 Issue #1 INTRODUCTION CLAN? WHAT CLAN? CAITIFF HAIKU DECK DE-CONSTRUCTION CAITIFF FICTION VAMP OF THE HOUR COMING SOON TO A POST NEAR YOU INTRODUCTION I'd like to thank the Academy for nominating me. oh wait, wrong post. This is the first of what is almost an oxymoron. The Caitiff Clan Newsletter. I will try to uphold the quality of my fellow editors, and continue a great tradition of humour and discussion. I believe that a Caitiff newsletter has great possibilities and I hope to see all clans (and Caitiff) represented accordingly. CLAN? WHAT CLAN? What truly separates the Caitiff from their fellow kindred is their lack of a Clan, and yet they are considered to be Camarilla vampires as well (see recent post). They do not have Hunting Grounds available to them unless accompanied by another who has a Clan affiliation, and have very few cards to help them as well. The bonus to the Caitiff is their wide range of Disciplines. If you are making a deck based on a clan, but are one or two shy of where you truly want to be, you can always throw in a Caitiff with some common disciplines, but we will get in to that in Deck De-Construction. CAITIFF HAIKU Uriah is gone. My prey has the bugger now. Let the fun begin. DECK DE-CONSTRUCTION Not too many decks out there have just Caitiff, I wouldn't mind getting sent a couple so I can comment on them! In the mean time I will talk about everybody's favourite concept. weenie bleed!!! There are a couple of Caitiff that fit the Weenie Bleed format perfectly, Antoinette DuChamp, Igo the Hungry, and even Navar McLaren. Navar you say? Antoinette and Igo are a given with their "pre", but Navar? I have seen the damage caused by a Weenie Bleed deck spattered with Army of Rats and I tell you it wasn't pretty. I know that it isn't cumulative but one pool a turn can hurt if not countered by a Hunting Ground/Blood Doll or equivalent. CAITIFF FICTION Hasina leapt at Masika, taking him by surprise with a shredded street sign flying by his face. Being rushed was not uncommon to Masika, but this one was going to be different. Masika pulled out his deer rifle, and moved away, but Hasina's rush inherently brought her closer. Again, Masika tried to pull away, but Hasina faked him out and they stood face to face. "We are immortal. shall we not grapple as such?" Hasina mused. "Oh s**t" Masika blurted, knowing that his majesty could not save him now. Hasina called upon the strength of the Undead to assist her, as Masika just stood there and weakly struck back. After the smoke had cleared, Hasina stood triumphant with a bloody stump of a left arm still clutching the deer rifle. VAMP OF THE HOUR Hasina Kesi Can anyone say Immortal Grapple? There's only one thing better than a 1-cap Vamp with "pot", and that's a 2-cap vamp with "pot". She can't decapitate, but she can disarm after an Undead Strength/Torn Signpost, and that's a disgusting way to get rid of bloat. Sure, you risk burning a pool if she goes to torpor, but the trade-off is worth it. Plus, she can do this turn two for you if someone TORIII's a fatty out on you. COMING SOON TO A POST NEAR YOU -Tradition Upheld. D'OH! -Revelation of the Sire. WOOHOO! -Igo. is he truly hungry and what is he hungry for? -More haiku and fiction. Send your raves to oaf...@sprint.ca and your complaints to whoc...@notme.com. Remember, I'm looking for some good Caitiff only decks. let me know!! Email oaf...@sprint.ca with your ideas! oAFLORD aka Thomas Kuster Prince of Caledon "Of Man's first disobedience, and the fruit Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste Brought death into the world, and all our woe." John Milton Paradise Lost. Book i. Line 1.

[ quoted text not captured ] INTRODUCTION [ quoted text not captured ] CLAN? WHAT CLAN? [ quoted text not captured ] CAITIFF HAIKU [ quoted text not captured ] DECK DE-CONSTRUCTION [ quoted text not captured ] CAITIFF FICTION [ quoted text not captured ] VAMP OF THE HOUR Hasina Kesi [ quoted text not captured ] Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/

>COMING SOON TO A POST NEAR YOU > >-Tradition Upheld. D'OH! >-Revelation of the Sire. WOOHOO! >-Igo. is he truly hungry and what is he hungry for? >-More haiku and fiction. While I was a bit dismayed that HASINA got vamp of the hour (and it looks like Igo gets it next time), I would just like to put in a strong recommendation for the nomination of Smudge! It's time that Smudge was Ignored no longer because... well, he's Smudge! =) Halcyan 2

halc...@aol.com (Halcyan 2) wrote: > While I was a bit dismayed that HASINA got vamp of the hour (and it > looks like Igo gets it next time), I would just like to put in a > strong recommendation for the nomination of Smudge! It's time that > Smudge was Ignored no longer because... well, he's Smudge! =) Smudge is ignored for good reason. I felt teased because Mr. Kuster teased us with a Uriah Winter haiku and then didn't make him Vamp of the Hour or provide us with a deck that makes use of his unique and wonderful ability. Regards, Noal -- "I was probably pretty young, when I realised that I had come from what you might call a family, a clan, a race, maybe even a species, of pure sons of bitches." --Faulkner, "The Mansion" [ quoted text not captured ]

> Smudge is ignored for good reason. I felt teased because Mr. Kuster > teased us with a Uriah Winter haiku and then didn't make him Vamp of the > Hour or provide us with a deck that makes use of his unique and > wonderful ability. What, like the Camerilla Segregation sleaze deck? 1) Get Uriah out. 2) Use a Secret Horde / Hostile Takeover / ToGP to make sure you have less blood than your prey. 3) Get a few Judgement: Camerilla Segragations up 4) Equip him with Blood Tears of Kephran. 5) Do a Revelation of the Sire onto Uriah 6) Burn the Tears 7) Get him to Clan Impersonate to, ooh I dunno, a ravnos. Steps 4 - 6 are optional - you might be able to build him up in other ways, but if their was a Heidleburg Castle up, you could theoretically do all of this in one turn if you had enough vampires. Your prey should get whacked at the beginning of their untap phase, loosing lots of pool to the Cammie Segs, and it would be too late to burn Uriah to get rid of one (Uriah moves accross during the Untap phase, the Cammie Segs kick in during the untap phase, you can only burn them during your minion phase). You might not even need to hand over Uriah, but it keeps your options open. Rinse and repeat (probably requires about 4-6 Uriahs and 8 Judgements). This would work well with a Gangrel Royalty deck, coz Ingrid Rossler can buy in an uncontrolled vampire and influence it if it's Uriah in one turn, and because Uriah has Fortitude (a clan discipline). Otherwise, it's Ventrues and Info Highways. A trick deck, fragile as hell, but as always would be spectacular if it worked. If only... There's always the "Trojan horse of the Giovanni" deck too. DH [ quoted text not captured ]

>> or provide us with a deck that makes use of his unique and >> wonderful ability. > > What, like the Camerilla Segregation sleaze deck? That's one example. > 1) Get Uriah out. > 2) Use a Secret Horde / Hostile Takeover / ToGP to make sure you have > less blood than your prey. Take a look at Powerbase: Washington D.C. and Succubus Club. The Powerbase allows you to ditch up to 3 pool during your untap phase and Succubus Club lets you give as much pool as you like to whoever will take it. > 3) Get a few Judgement: Camerilla Segragations up > 4) Equip him with Blood Tears of Kephran. > 5) Do a Revelation of the Sire onto Uriah > 6) Burn the Tears > 7) Get him to Clan Impersonate to, ooh I dunno, a ravnos. Seems like a lot of Steps. You could just as easily add a Master Discipline card or Clan Impersonation/Freak Drive/Revelation of the Sire/Freak Drive/remove the Clan Impersonation. > There's always the "Trojan horse of the Giovanni" deck too. Yeah, that's a personal favorite of mine. *grin* I've got another Uriah Winter deck in the works, too. Crypt with Uriah Winter, Anson and Rebekka, Chantry Elder of Munich. Push Uriah to your prey, use Anson/Parthenon to put out 3 Betrayers for Uriah, and then use Rebekka to do Seeds of Corruption to keep Uriah from moving anywhere. If Uriah does move, contest him and use Anson's minor dom to play Thanks for the Donation. Since Anson and Rebekka both have AUS and PRE you can make a cohesive secondary strategy to keep it competitive. Regards, Noal -- "I was probably pretty young, when I realised that I had come from what you might call a family, a clan, a race, maybe even a species, of pure sons of bitches." --Faulkner, "The Mansion" [ quoted text not captured ]

> > > 1) Get Uriah out. > > 2) Use a Secret Horde / Hostile Takeover / ToGP to make sure you have > > less blood than your prey. > > Take a look at Powerbase: Washington D.C. and Succubus Club. The > Powerbase allows you to ditch up to 3 pool during your untap phase and > Succubus Club lets you give as much pool as you like to whoever will > take it. Secret Horde lets you take as much as you like off and get it back (great if your prey refuses to loose pool). Powerbase Washington would be there as a backup. Hostiles are the most fun, using Parity Shifts to equalise the balance. > > 3) Get a few Judgement: Camerilla Segragations up > > 4) Equip him with Blood Tears of Kephran. > > 5) Do a Revelation of the Sire onto Uriah > > 6) Burn the Tears > > 7) Get him to Clan Impersonate to, ooh I dunno, a ravnos. > > Seems like a lot of Steps. You could just as easily add a Master > Discipline card or Clan Impersonation/Freak Drive/Revelation of the > Sire/Freak Drive/remove the Clan Impersonation. And that's not a lot of steps!!! My way uses 3 cards, costs 1 blood (net), and leaves an empty Uriah on your Preys side. Yours uses 5 and costs 5 blood, so is more efficient. And I did say it was optional (you may get time to grow it organically early on). > I've got another Uriah Winter deck in the works, too. Crypt with Uriah > Winter, Anson and Rebekka, Chantry Elder of Munich. Push Uriah to your > prey, use Anson/Parthenon to put out 3 Betrayers for Uriah, and then use > Rebekka to do Seeds of Corruption to keep Uriah from moving anywhere. If > Uriah does move, contest him and use Anson's minor dom to play Thanks > for the Donation. Since Anson and Rebekka both have AUS and PRE you can > make a cohesive secondary strategy to keep it competitive. You really like Uriah, don't you. ;) DH [ quoted text not captured ]

hamd...@my-deja.com wrote: > You really like Uriah, don't you. Yeah, I do. The fact that he is the only minion that you can permanently force on another player makes Uriah a unique opportunity for exploitation. Regards, Noal -- "I was probably pretty young, when I realised that I had come from what you might call a family, a clan, a race, maybe even a species, of pure sons of bitches." --Faulkner, "The Mansion" [ quoted text not captured ]

"Noal McDonald" <dhar...@my-deja.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag news:93kja5$653$1...@nnrp1.deja.com... > <snip> > > I've got another Uriah Winter deck in the works, too. Crypt with Uriah > Winter, Anson and Rebekka, Chantry Elder of Munich. Push Uriah to your > prey, use Anson/Parthenon to put out 3 Betrayers for Uriah, and then use > Rebekka to do Seeds of Corruption to keep Uriah from moving anywhere. Well, I am not so sure that this would be legal... From the Rulings: Seeds of Corruption [AH] - Action (tha) (2) "Special ability" includes all non-sect, non-title text. (note that this only means that the affected vampire cannot do anything that he is allowed to do only by special ability - not that he can now overcome some special restriction. Assamites still cannot commit diablerie, for example) [LSJ 19970801] The pessimist in me (and my visitor Skaffen, who is fetching some new red wine for us both right now) tells me that, abuse in some Trojan/Greek Horse decks aside, Uriah's special ability is, in fact, a special restriction - so Seeds of Corruption would not work on it... LSJ??? *sound of Skaffen and me drinking lots of wine, meditating over that problem...* > If > Uriah does move, contest him and use Anson's minor dom to play Thanks > for the Donation. Since Anson and Rebekka both have AUS and PRE you can > make a cohesive secondary strategy to keep it competitive. > > Regards, > Noal > -- > "I was probably pretty young, when I realised that I had come from > what you might call a family, a clan, a race, maybe even a species, > of pure sons of bitches." > --Faulkner, "The Mansion" > > > Sent via Deja.com > http://www.deja.com/ -- Hardy Range hardy...@gmx.de

On Thu, 11 Jan 2001 21:42:25 +0100, "Hardy Range" <hardy...@gmx.de> wrote: >The pessimist in me (and my visitor Skaffen, who is fetching some new red >wine for us both right now) tells me that, abuse in some Trojan/Greek Horse >decks aside, Uriah's special ability is, in fact, a special restriction - so >Seeds of Corruption would not work on it... LSJ??? Well... it's intended to be a restriction. But when you get right down to it, Uriah's special is just a "special"; it is neither an ability nor disability, it just sort of IS, much like "If Alvaro abstains, he gains 2 blood". That isn't an ABILITY per se, since Alvaro doesn't have to actively use it; it just happens (and if he's in torpor). Since Seeds would disable Alvaro, I'd guess that Seeds should disable Uriah as well. "the Tao of Uriah Winter is not the true Tao." >*sound of Skaffen and me drinking lots of wine, meditating over that >problem...* What, you needed an EXCUSE to drink lots of wine? =) -- Derek Goon-of-the-Month club member "In a MAN's game, you tap things that block." -- F. Scott, 2001

>> I've got another Uriah Winter deck in the works, too. Crypt with >> Uriah Winter, Anson and Rebekka, Chantry Elder of Munich. Push >> Uriah to your prey, use Anson/Parthenon to put out 3 Betrayers >> for Uriah, and then use Rebekka to do Seeds of Corruption to keep >> Uriah from moving anywhere. > > Well, I am not so sure that this would be legal... Yep, it is quite legal. > From the Rulings: > > Seeds of Corruption [AH] - Action (tha) (2) > "Special ability" includes all non-sect, non-title text. (note that > this only means that the affected vampire cannot do anything that he > is allowed to do only by special ability - not that he can now > overcome some special restriction. Assamites still cannot commit > diablerie, for example) [LSJ 19970801] > > The pessimist in me (and my visitor Skaffen, who is fetching some > new red wine for us both right now) tells me that, abuse in some > Trojan/Greek Horse decks aside, Uriah's special ability is, in fact, > a special restriction - so Seeds of Corruption would not work on > it... LSJ??? The restriction refers to things a vampire cannot do. For example, Navar cannot block older vampires and Assamites cannot commit diablrie. It doesn't apply to Uriah's wanderlust. In fact, LSJ was asked specifially about Uriah Winter by James Coupe and he responded on 12/01/1999 and said that the "ability" is not defined in terms of whether it is an advantage or a disadvantage. Therefore, Seeds robs Uriah of his ability to defect. Here's the URL that spells it out: http://x69.deja.com/[ST_rn=ps]/getdoc.xp?AN=555517491 Regards, Noal McDonald Prince of Metro Detroit [ quoted text not captured ]

>The restriction refers to things a vampire cannot do. For example, Navar >cannot block older vampires and Assamites cannot commit diablrie. It >doesn't apply to Uriah's wanderlust. > >In fact, LSJ was asked specifially about Uriah Winter by James Coupe and >he responded on 12/01/1999 and said that the "ability" is not defined in >terms of whether it is an advantage or a disadvantage. Therefore, Seeds >robs Uriah of his ability to defect. I suppose the same holds true for Jimmy Dunn? But what happens with contesting and who burns? Halcyan 2

"Noal McDonald" <dhar...@my-deja.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag news:93lepf$1ic$1...@nnrp1.deja.com... [snip] > In fact, LSJ was asked specifially about Uriah Winter by James Coupe and > he responded on 12/01/1999 and said that the "ability" is not defined in > terms of whether it is an advantage or a disadvantage. Therefore, Seeds > robs Uriah of his ability to defect. > > Here's the URL that spells it out: > http://x69.deja.com/[ST_rn=ps]/getdoc.xp?AN=555517491 > On no - three bottles of good wine destroyed for a problem that already had been solved... ;-) -- Hardy Range hardy...@gmx.de

halc...@aol.com (Halcyan 2) wrote: > I suppose the same holds true for Jimmy Dunn? But what happens with > contesting and who burns? No contesting. The first burns, by card text on the new (unseeded) Jimmy. -- LSJ (vte...@white-wolf.com) VTES Net.Rep for White Wolf, Inc. Links to revised rulebook, rulings, errata, and tournament rules: http://www.white-wolf.com/vtes/ [ quoted text not captured ]

In message <93kga3$2v8$1...@nnrp1.deja.com>, Noal McDonald <dhar...@my-deja.com> writes >Smudge is ignored for good reason. I felt teased because Mr. Kuster >teased us with a Uriah Winter haiku and then didn't make him Vamp of the >Hour or provide us with a deck that makes use of his unique and >wonderful ability. How about a Hasina one, then? Hasina is really good; She beats the crap out of you. Only strength survives. (With apologies to anyone with literary sense.) -- James Coupe | PGP Key 0x5D623D5D "What's wrong with wanting more? If you can fly -- then soar! With all there is, why settle for just a piece of sky?"

"James Coupe" <ja...@zephyr.org.uk> wrote in message news:+sH7wz5+...@obeah.demon.co.uk... > How about a Hasina one, then? > > Hasina is really good; > She beats the crap out of you. > Only strength survives. Wasn't that 7-7-5? I thought haiku was 5-7-5...of course, I'm pronouncing Hasina as [Heh-see'-nah], and maybe I miscounted really. It's just one syllable, isn't it? Those are always the ones that get me...the short ones with a non-silent vowel at the end. "Hasina is good" might work better. :) Xian