[Deck] Brujah/!Brujah

Here's a deck I've worked up. It borrowed liberally from the !Brujah starter deck, but I think this is better. I haven't played it yet (this weekend, hopefully), but I think it'll do well. I've been evolving a rush deck over the past few weeks of playing. Gave up on the Talbot's Chainsaw idea for lack of enough freak drives (for one...there are other issues as well). That deck was based on fortitude, potence, and a dash of obfuscate. I then went to for/pot, and now I'm trying an iteration with fortitude and celerity. Once I had settled on that, I ditched the computer hacks and went with the presence, thus making brujah/!brujah the obvious choice, but the bleed is really just butter. Good butter, but what I'm questing after is an effective rush deck since no one I play with has ever really made a competitive one. Without further a-doo..... CRYPT: 12 Dre (Brujah, 3, pot cel) Jacob Bragg (!Brujah, 3, pot cel) Evangeline (!Brujah, 4, pot cel pre) Victor Tolliver (!Brujah, 4, pot CEL) Rigby, Crusade Vanguard (!Brujah, 5, aus pot CEL PRE) Volker, Puppet Prince (Brujah, 5, pot CEL) Black Cat (Brujah, 5, pot CEL) Gaspare Giovanni (Giovanni, 6, cel nec POT, +1 hand damage) Anvil (Brujah, 6, tha dom pre POT CEL, primogen) Beast (!Nosforatu, 7, ani cel, OBF POT, built in rush, +1 hand damage) Amelia (!Brujah, 7, CEL PRE POT, bishop, built in rush) Richter (!Brujah, 7, for pre CEL POT, +1 hand damage) MASTER: 13 Direct Intervention Blood Doll Potence Amusement Park HG Haven Unconvered Fame Tribute to the Master Sudden Reversal Minion Tap Dreams of the Sphinx Rumor Mill London Evening Star KRCG MINION: 67 x7 Torn Signpost x6 Immortal Grapple x7 Pushing the Limit x2 Undead Strength Disarm x2 Decapitate x5 Taste of Vitae x3 Blur Acrobatics Lightning Reflexes x2 Pursuit x2 Flash Sideslip x2 Fast Hands (guns are popular these days) x5 Bum's Rush x3 Ambush x2 Delaying Tactics x2 Forced Awakening x3 Enchant Kindred Social Charm X2 Legal Manipulation x2 Leather Jacket x2 Sword of Judgement Laptop Computer Distraction Rampage David Cherryholmes P.E.T. Facility, Radiology Duke Clinic d...@petsparc.mc.duke.edu

[ quoted text not captured ] I assume you don't have any copies of Jimmy Dunn (4,POT,for,CEL). He really, really loves this sort of deck. It's worth looking for a couple. >MASTER: 13 >Direct Intervention >Blood Doll A few more wouldn't hurt. More reliable gain than either Tribute (you won't have that many minions in play) or Minion Tap (they aren't all that big) >Potence >Amusement Park HG The other minions are your HG via Taste. Why pay for it? >Haven Unconvered Needed for minions that require repeat rushes - like Obedience users. Another one or two wouldn't hurt. >Fame >Tribute to the Master >Sudden Reversal >Minion Tap >Dreams of the Sphinx >Rumor Mill >London Evening Star >KRCG Mostly you want annoying minions dead to save you the bother of intercepting them. Three of these seems over the top. > >MINION: 67 >x7 Torn Signpost >x6 Immortal Grapple >x7 Pushing the Limit >x2 Undead Strength >Disarm >x2 Decapitate >x5 Taste of Vitae >x3 Blur >Acrobatics >Lightning Reflexes Only does more damage than Blur when you use it for 3 additional strikes at the cost of FOUR!! blood. Even if you really needed that additional strike to finish off the target, it's unlikely that you could afford the blood. This card just sucks. Ditch it for another Blur. Or if you really want that third additional strike badly, use Quickness. >x2 Pursuit >x2 Flash >Sideslip >x2 Fast Hands (guns are popular these days) If that's so, you need a lot more maneuver. Assume that your rush will be blocked so you won't get the built-in maneuver. This deck doesn't need stolen weapons but it does need to deny their use. Make sure to get to close range and you can pocket the weapons when Dre diablerizes. (apart from the bloodhunt of course). >x5 Bum's Rush >x3 Ambush >x2 Delaying Tactics >x2 Forced Awakening >x3 Enchant Kindred >Social Charm >X2 Legal Manipulation >x2 Leather Jacket Nice when the Gangrel are about but the equip action can be costly. >x2 Sword of Judgement Cute but not really necessary. You can thump people quite hard enough without it. And you may not be able to afford the equip action - or pool. >Laptop Computer >Distraction >Rampage Tom

"David Cherryholmes" <d...@petsparc.mc.duke.edu> wrote > > CRYPT: 12 > Dre (Brujah, 3, pot cel) > Jacob Bragg (!Brujah, 3, pot cel) > Evangeline (!Brujah, 4, pot cel pre) > Victor Tolliver (!Brujah, 4, pot CEL) > Rigby, Crusade Vanguard (!Brujah, 5, aus pot CEL PRE) > Volker, Puppet Prince (Brujah, 5, pot CEL) > Black Cat (Brujah, 5, pot CEL) > Gaspare Giovanni (Giovanni, 6, cel nec POT, +1 hand damage) > Anvil (Brujah, 6, tha dom pre POT CEL, primogen) > Beast (!Nosforatu, 7, ani cel, OBF POT, built in rush, +1 hand damage) > Amelia (!Brujah, 7, CEL PRE POT, bishop, built in rush) > Richter (!Brujah, 7, for pre CEL POT, +1 hand damage) Your average crypt size is 5.16... way too high, especially for a rush deck. You need to lower this to at least 4 I would say. I think rush decks should probably go for slightly cheaper vampires as they will often need to rush both their predators and their prey. Therefore, it is cost efficient to have enough vampires yourself to be able to do this. I would take out Amelia in favour of Sela. Amelia has all three at superior but her ability ends up being a waste most of the time. If you are rushing a deck that has a bunch of weenies, you will NEVER be able to rush them all, nor will the victim care that much. Sela's +1 Bleed is always useful, especially once your prey has no vampires to block with. Black Cat is useless in this deck as you don't have enough equipment to use her special. Only your Laptop Computer qualifies as something she can equip without paying cost. The Swords of Judgement are !Brujah only. Also, your crypt seems to favour CEL rather than POT, which is fine, I suppose, except that your library seems weighted in the opposite direction. I would add a few weenie guys with inferior Potence: Lupo, Koko, Mitchell the Headhunter just to bring your average size down a bit. You might also want to concentrate on having a few copies of some of the better vamps like Beast or Sela. > MASTER: 13 > Direct Intervention > Blood Doll More dolls... you can slowly leech off them and then gain blood back with Taste of Vitae > Potence Maybe more of these depending on how much you want to concentrate on Pot vs Cel. So far, your crypt has a lot of CEL, so maybe another Potence card. > Amusement Park HG I would forego HG in this case and go for Taste of Vitae or standard hunts as a way to gain blood. You could try Hungry Coyote or Inbase Disco to make your hunts more effective. > Haven Unconvered More... maybe 3 of these > Fame > Tribute to the Master Maybe exchange the Tribute for a Blood Doll or another HU > Sudden Reversal This will end up jamming your hand more than anything else. Having a seven card hand is vital for rush decks. Wasting one space for a card in the hopes of someone playing a nasty Master... well, I've pretty much stopped using SR's in most decks, but especially not in rush decks. There are Masters that will piss you off, but most will be locations which are easily fixed by a deck like this. A Rampage or two might better solve that problem. Unless you expect to see 'Out of Control' in your game in which case maybe playing with a 6 card hand is a GOOD idea. > Minion Tap > Dreams of the Sphinx > Rumor Mill > London Evening Star > KRCG That's a LOT of intercept locations. Actually, that is ALL of the intercept locations. I would toss LES and KRCG and use only Rumor Mill. You can afford to spend a blood from your vamps with Tastes paying for it. However, the question needs to be asked if you really NEED to have intercept available. With enough rushes you can make sure your predator (or prey I guess) doesn't have a lot of options to use against you. I've learned this the hard way. If you have a choice between TRYING to block Zebulon, or forcing Zebulon into the ground where he belongs, the latter is always preferrable. > MINION: 67 Get as close to the legal card limit as possible. Rush decks cycle through cards like crazy and you do NOT want to run out of cards. > x7 Torn Signpost > x6 Immortal Grapple A few more I think. If you're worried about guns, this will hose them just as easily. > x7 Pushing the Limit > x2 Undead Strength > Disarm I would say more Disarms, but I know this is your only copy. I only have two... <sigh> Pulled Fangs can be a reasonable substitute though. > x2 Decapitate > x5 Taste of Vitae I think more since it sounds like you will be lower on blood than you like. If you prefer Pushing the Limit to Undead Strength, Taste can make the PtL a 'freebie' card. > x3 Blur MORE! Especially with all your CEL guys. > Acrobatics > Lightning Reflexes Eh. I'd take this out. > x2 Pursuit > x2 Flash MORE! Flash is essential. Even at inferior you have a damn versatile card. And if your environment is gun-heavy, you NEED the maneuvers to prevent theirs. I generally choose Flash over Pursuit. > Sideslip > x2 Fast Hands (guns are popular these days) Do you WANT the guns? Or do you want to remove the THREAT of the guns? If the latter, go with more Flash and Imortal Grapples and just make their guns useless while you pound them away. A dead 8 capacity vampire with a 44 Magnum is a bleed for 10. > x5 Bum's Rush > x3 Ambush Might want more Bum's Rush (or Ambush in a pinch). If you grab another Beast you might not need it. His built in rush can replace a few of these. > x2 Delaying Tactics > x2 Forced Awakening Good for the occasional surprise, just make sure you CAN block. > x3 Enchant Kindred > Social Charm > X2 Legal Manipulation I would go for all Legal Manipulations. If they block you, get into combat. If they don't gain 1 pool. If they deflect... prey they deflect to your predator. Enchant Kindred might help with Pool gain, but you might find that you rarely have a vampire in your inactive region to use it on. > x2 Leather Jacket > x2 Sword of Judgement Damn. I wish this card was as cool as it sounds. I tried SO hard to get it to work, but it always ends up being discarded or sitting in my hands waiting for someone who doesn't have a Combat Ends card. You end up hosing your own Immortal Grapple with this thing. > Laptop Computer > Distraction > Rampage Ok. The Laptop might be better replaced with a Tasha Morgan or a JS Simmons. They cost nothing and are effectively the same card. Might be hosed or stolen, but same can be said for Laptops. Bleed helpers can somewhat help you to either whittle down your prey after his minions are toast, or give them something scary to block if you run out of Rush cards. Another one that James Hamblin recommended in an old !Brujah newsletter is Invererary Scotland... you can spend your idle actions building up the bleed. This is always easier in theory than in practice however. Hope this helps, WES

On Fri, 2 Mar 2001 15:26:42 -0500, "Andrew 'Wes' Weston" <gh...@mnsi.net> wrote: > >"David Cherryholmes" <d...@petsparc.mc.duke.edu> wrote >> >> CRYPT: 12 >> Dre (Brujah, 3, pot cel) >> Jacob Bragg (!Brujah, 3, pot cel) >> Evangeline (!Brujah, 4, pot cel pre) >> Victor Tolliver (!Brujah, 4, pot CEL) >> Rigby, Crusade Vanguard (!Brujah, 5, aus pot CEL PRE) >> Volker, Puppet Prince (Brujah, 5, pot CEL) >> Black Cat (Brujah, 5, pot CEL) >> Gaspare Giovanni (Giovanni, 6, cel nec POT, +1 hand damage) >> Anvil (Brujah, 6, tha dom pre POT CEL, primogen) >> Beast (!Nosforatu, 7, ani cel, OBF POT, built in rush, +1 hand damage) >> Amelia (!Brujah, 7, CEL PRE POT, bishop, built in rush) >> Richter (!Brujah, 7, for pre CEL POT, +1 hand damage) > >Your average crypt size is 5.16... way too high, especially for a rush deck. >You need to lower this to at least 4 I would say. I think rush decks should >probably go for slightly cheaper vampires as they will often need to rush >both their predators and their prey. Therefore, it is cost efficient to have >enough vampires yourself to be able to do this. > Problem with the little guys is not putting away the target at the first try. That's a waste of a rush card. That's about the average size that I've used effectively. >I would take out Amelia in favour of Sela. Amelia has all three at superior >but her ability ends up being a waste most of the time. If you are rushing a >deck that has a bunch of weenies, you will NEVER be able to rush them all, >nor will the victim care that much. Sela's +1 Bleed is always useful, >especially once your prey has no vampires to block with. > No, no. You need Amelia. Weenies must always be killed until their nasty owners stop playing the boring things. Even non-weenie decks use the odd low cap, especially as bleed bouncers. <various comments I agree with snipped> > >> MINION: 67 > >Get as close to the legal card limit as possible. Rush decks cycle through >cards like crazy and you do NOT want to run out of cards. > That's the conventional wisdom but I'm not so sure anymore. I always stick to 90 but I've never come close to running out of cards with my rush deck which is a lot more combat focussed than this one (at least since removing Infernal Pursuit). Sure you use cards like mad in combat but after a bit one of two things happen - either you get ousted because you couldn't draw rush cards fast enough to stop a fast bleeder or every minion near you is in torpor (the preferred situation) and you can spend leisurely turns on small bleeds and hunting with your depleted minions. Even at the end of a three hour final at Watford the other week, I had at least twenty cards left. Tom

"Tom Kassel" <thomas...@ntlworld.com> wrote > >I would take out Amelia in favour of Sela. Amelia has all three at superior > >but her ability ends up being a waste most of the time. If you are rushing a > >deck that has a bunch of weenies, you will NEVER be able to rush them all, > >nor will the victim care that much. Sela's +1 Bleed is always useful, > >especially once your prey has no vampires to block with. > > > No, no. You need Amelia. Weenies must always be killed until their > nasty owners stop playing the boring things. Even non-weenie decks > use the odd low cap, especially as bleed bouncers. Spending 7 pool to bring Amelia out in order to attack minions that cost 3 pool or less? I don't find that cost-efficient. A dedicated weenie deck isn't going to care if you knock a few of them down. While you chase down your predator's weenie prince, five other weenies will bleed you for 10 pool. Don't get me wrong, she's fine without her ability... but her ability just isn't <that> useful to me. I WAS using her in my bruise-bleed deck because she had all three disciplines at max but found that I never needed her ability. The one time I rushed a weenie, it was blocked by a larger minion (who then went bye-bye) so that was acceptable. But in that case, the reacting Methuselah made an error in judgement I think. I think if you want dedicated rushing, go for Beast instead. He can rush anyone at the table and gets an extra point of damage too. His disciplines jive somewhat with the Brujah with POT and cel. For a rush deck, he's worth every penny. > >Get as close to the legal card limit as possible. Rush decks cycle through > >cards like crazy and you do NOT want to run out of cards. > > > That's the conventional wisdom but I'm not so sure anymore. I always > stick to 90 but I've never come close to running out of cards with my > rush deck which is a lot more combat focussed than this one (at least > since removing Infernal Pursuit). Sure you use cards like mad in > combat but after a bit one of two things happen - either you get > ousted because you couldn't draw rush cards fast enough to stop a fast > bleeder or every minion near you is in torpor (the preferred > situation) and you can spend leisurely turns on small bleeds and > hunting with your depleted minions. Even at the end of a three hour > final at Watford the other week, I had at least twenty cards left. I've never run out either, but if I did, my rush deck would be screwed. Since I am focusing on smaller vampires than you, this may be why. I need for each minion to earn his pool, and this requires each of them to be able to rush, whack and taste, whatever. I suppose adding a few permanents that can assist you if you do run out might be a good idea, Depravity being my first choice since it doesn't interfere with Immortal Grapple. > I assume you don't have any copies of Jimmy Dunn (4,POT,for,CEL). He > really, really loves this sort of deck. It's worth looking for a > couple. I didn't even notice he was missing! Jimmy Dunn wasn't included in the Sabbat War set unfortunately so he's a bit harder to find these days. Cheers, WES

Tom Kassel wrote: > > >x2 Sword of Judgement > Cute but not really necessary. You can thump people quite hard enough > without it. And you may not be able to afford the equip action - or > pool. Also, you can't use it under the Grapple (not even the additional strike), so it's mostly useless. James -- James Hamblin ham...@math.wisc.edu "You seem to think you know it all Let me tell you something, you can't win." -- Pat McGee Band

Tom Kassel wrote: > > >Your average crypt size is 5.16... way too high, especially for a rush > >deck. You need to lower this to at least 4 I would say. I think rush decks > >should probably go for slightly cheaper vampires as they will often need to > >rush both their predators and their prey. Therefore, it is cost efficient > >to have enough vampires yourself to be able to do this. > > Problem with the little guys is not putting away the target at the > first try. That's a waste of a rush card. That's about the average > size that I've used effectively. I think you may need to rethink your deck to make the little guys more effective. One (costly) way to do this would be to get your hands on a bunch of Disarms. Since acquiring my nine, I've made my combat deck Potence-only and full of weenies. Hasina Kesi rocks! Otherwise, the key I think is to have a mix. Richter or Beast can destroy at will, and then Lupo cleans up the mess. You're right that Lupo probably won't be able to take down Arika in a typical pot/cel deck, but he's essential against a quick predator. If your predator is a heavy stealth-bleed deck with minimal combat defense, all of your vampires, even the little ones, should be effective. And they _need_ to be, otherwise you'll be ousted quickly. > No, no. You need Amelia. Weenies must always be killed until their > nasty owners stop playing the boring things. Even non-weenie decks > use the odd low cap, especially as bleed bouncers. Dude. She costs seven! For that you can make Dr. Dre _and_ Jimmy Dunn. The built-in rush action is just too conditional to be worth the price. Just put in more rush actions vs. weenies. > That's the conventional wisdom but I'm not so sure anymore. I always > stick to 90 but I've never come close to running out of cards with my > rush deck which is a lot more combat focussed than this one (at least > since removing Infernal Pursuit). Sure you use cards like mad in > combat but after a bit one of two things happen - either you get > ousted because you couldn't draw rush cards fast enough to stop a fast > bleeder or every minion near you is in torpor (the preferred > situation) and you can spend leisurely turns on small bleeds and > hunting with your depleted minions. Even at the end of a three hour > final at Watford the other week, I had at least twenty cards left. But if you want to win the table, you'll need to oust at least two preys. If you've laid waste to your predator and prey, you still have to have enough cards to kill your next prey, and probably your next predator. And, as we discussed in that crazy math thread a while back, you don't get that much of an advantage by scaling your deck down. Also, if you're running low on cards, people will be less likely to make deals with you (since they think you'll run out and you won't be able to kill anymore). [ quoted text not captured ]

"James Hamblin" <ham...@math.wisc.edu> wrote in message news:3AA117F4...@math.wisc.edu... > Tom wrote: >> hunting with your depleted minions. Even at the end of a three hour >> final at Watford the other week, I had at least twenty cards left. > predator. And, as we discussed in that crazy math thread a while back, > you don't get that much of an advantage by scaling your deck down. Agreed. Also, I run through my entire deck, or at least odwn to the last 10 card at least one of every two times I play a rush deck. I don't think I'll ever scale a rush deck below 90 cards. Dude, 9 Disarms? Xian

And now for even more helpful advice... >>Dre (Brujah, 3, pot cel) Jacob Bragg (!Brujah, 3, pot cel) Evangeline (!Brujah, 4, pot cel pre) Victor Tolliver (!Brujah, 4, pot CEL) Rigby, Crusade Vanguard (!Brujah, 5, aus pot CEL PRE) Volker, Puppet Prince (Brujah, 5, pot CEL) Black Cat (Brujah, 5, pot CEL) Gaspare Giovanni (Giovanni, 6, cel nec POT, +1 hand damage) Anvil (Brujah, 6, tha dom pre POT CEL, primogen) Beast (!Nosforatu, 7, ani cel, OBF POT, built in rush, +1 hand damage) Amelia (!Brujah, 7, CEL PRE POT, bishop, built in rush) Richter (!Brujah, 7, for pre CEL POT, +1 hand damage)>> As a few folks have already mentioned, the huge average capacity of this deck will get you killed. The 7 point vampires are really powerful and all, but they are slow to get out, and generally not necessary. With this crypt, it is not at all unlikely that you will start a game with all vampires costing 5 or higher, which means you don't get started quickly enough, and you don't get enough vampires out to do what you need to do. The decks that you need to be afraid of, and really need to be able to deal with are quick kill decks--weenie bleed, efficient S+B, or weenie vote. You don't have enough pool gain to be able to soak up much, if any damage, so you need to be out on the table and killing as quickly as possible. Don't underestimate the power of little vampires with only Pot (Hesina, KoKo, Lupo, etc)--they are quick to start, can slow down a speedy predator quickly (even 3 points of damage to a weenie vamp is good), and with a skill card, become very efficient for little investement. Keep in mind that in a blind play situation (like a tournament), it is unlikely that you will run into a lot of combat defense--maybe the occasional manuver, probably a lot of S:CE, but not much else. As a result, having only Pot isn't that big of an issue. >>MASTER: 13 Direct Intervention Blood Doll Potence Amusement Park HG Haven Unconvered Fame Tribute to the Master Sudden Reversal Minion Tap Dreams of the Sphinx Rumor Mill London Evening Star KRCG>> In this kind of deck, there really isn't that much room for Master diversification. You need Haven Uncovereds, some pool management (like Blood Dolls), hand management (card cycling), and skill cards. Not much else. 13 is a good number, but the DI, HG, SR, and intercept locations should mostly be swapped out for more vital cards. >>MINION: 67 x7 Torn Signpost x6 Immortal Grapple x7 Pushing the Limit x2 Undead Strength Disarm x2 Decapitate x5 Taste of Vitae x3 Blur Acrobatics Lightning Reflexes x2 Pursuit x2 Flash Sideslip x2 Fast Hands (guns are popular these days) x5 Bum's Rush x3 Ambush>> All pretty solid. The Lightning Reflexes isn't really worth using, as it is too expensive--you rarely, if ever, need more than the 2 extra strikes provided by Blur. You should have more Rush actions--industry standard is 12 Bum's Rush/4 Haven, even with Beast. Bum's Rush/Ambush are mostly interchangeable, but if you are going to mix them up, I'd say, like 66% Bum's/33% Ambush. >>x2 Delaying Tactics x2 Forced Awakening x3 Enchant Kindred Social Charm X2 Legal Manipulation x2 Leather Jacket x2 Sword of Judgement Laptop Computer Distraction Rampage>> Also not bad, but the Delaying Tactics require you to be untapped, or holding a Forced (and be willing to spend the blood). The Sword of Judgement doesn't work with IG, so not really worth using. The Leather Jackets are probably not necessary--if you are afraid of the Gangrel, use dodges or Side Slip. If you are afraid of other Pot decks, make yours more focused. Any other combat you should be able to beat. And you can't really afford to waste actions equipping with a deck like this. The bleed cards are a possibility, but for my money, I vastly prefer a *very* focused approach--you don't really need to bleed for more than 1 per action if every vampire near you is in torpor, and this is more likely to occur if your deck is solid combat. Peter D Bakija PD...@aol.com http://www.geocities.com/bakija6 "Why so many swords?" "I must kill many." -Kikuchiyo

James Hamblin wrote: > Tom Kassel wrote: > > >x2 Sword of Judgement > > Cute but not really necessary. You can thump people quite hard enough > > without it. And you may not be able to afford the equip action - or > > pool. > > Also, you can't use it under the Grapple (not even the additional > strike), so it's mostly useless. The Brujah antitribu bearing the Sword of Judgment gets an optional additional strike each round. This is not affected by Immortal Grapple, which only restricts strikes (and the press step and next-round range, at superior). -- LSJ (vte...@white-wolf.com) V:TES Net.Rep for White Wolf, Inc. Links to revised rulebook, rulings, errata, and tournament rules: http://www.white-wolf.com/vtes/

"James Hamblin" <ham...@math.wisc.edu> > > >x2 Sword of Judgement > > Cute but not really necessary. You can thump people quite hard enough > > without it. And you may not be able to afford the equip action - or > > pool. > > Also, you can't use it under the Grapple (not even the additional > strike), so it's mostly useless. > > James Not that I am advocating using the Sword (not any more anyway) but I thought the ruling was that you COULD use that additional strike without actually using the Sword to strike. I think it was mentioned that the additional strike was given to the minion independently of the inherent strike from the weapon itself. Didn't LSJ say this recently? Cheers, WES

LSJ <vte...@white-wolf.com> wrote: : James Hamblin wrote: :> :> Also, you can't use it under the Grapple (not even the additional :> strike), so it's mostly useless. : The Brujah antitribu bearing the Sword of Judgment gets an optional additional : strike each round. This is not affected by Immortal Grapple, which only : restricts strikes (and the press step and next-round range, at superior). Oops. I thought I remembered a ruling saying that the Sword's additional strike had to be with the sword. James -- James Hamblin ham...@math.wisc.edu "What drives you on can drive you mad. A million lies to sell yourself is all you ever had." -- Garbage

On Sat, 03 Mar 2001 10:12:36 -0600, James Hamblin <ham...@math.wisc.edu> wrote: > >Tom Kassel wrote: >> >> >Your average crypt size is 5.16... way too high, especially for a rush >> >deck. You need to lower this to at least 4 I would say. I think rush decks >> >should probably go for slightly cheaper vampires as they will often need to >> >rush both their predators and their prey. Therefore, it is cost efficient >> >to have enough vampires yourself to be able to do this. >> >> Problem with the little guys is not putting away the target at the >> first try. That's a waste of a rush card. That's about the average >> size that I've used effectively. > >I think you may need to rethink your deck to make the little guys more >effective. One (costly) way to do this would be to get your hands on a >bunch of Disarms. Since acquiring my nine, I've made my combat deck >Potence-only and full of weenies. Hasina Kesi rocks! > Feel free to read this as sour grapes from someone who only owns a single copy of Disarm, but, cool as it is, at a certain level it's just a cheaper 1 ag poke than Claws of the Dead. Taking all their blood away really hurts vampires, where torpor is sometimes only an inconvenience. Disarm/Decapitate does the business really sweetly, but a 2-cap like Lupo can't afford the blood after taking a point of damage. Pot/POT only would scare me (to play - not play against). All of my decks with a combat dimension (that is, most of my decks) use plenty of maneuvers to get to the range they like. >Otherwise, the key I think is to have a mix. Richter or Beast can >destroy at will, and then Lupo cleans up the mess. You're right that >Lupo probably won't be able to take down Arika in a typical pot/cel >deck, but he's essential against a quick predator. If your predator is >a heavy stealth-bleed deck with minimal combat defense, all of your >vampires, even the little ones, should be effective. And they _need_ to >be, otherwise you'll be ousted quickly. > A mix is fine. I just don't like to go down to single discipline vampires, drawing the line at Dre. >> No, no. You need Amelia. Weenies must always be killed until their >> nasty owners stop playing the boring things. Even non-weenie decks >> use the odd low cap, especially as bleed bouncers. > >Dude. She costs seven! For that you can make Dr. Dre _and_ Jimmy >Dunn. The built-in rush action is just too conditional to be worth the >price. Just put in more rush actions vs. weenies. > She's also a Bishop which doesn't hurt. I'm not putting four copies in a crypt, but I consider her good value. The built-in rush doesn't figure every game, but her two relevant superiors do. >> That's the conventional wisdom but I'm not so sure anymore. I always >> stick to 90 but I've never come close to running out of cards with my >> rush deck which is a lot more combat focussed than this one (at least >> since removing Infernal Pursuit). Sure you use cards like mad in >> combat but after a bit one of two things happen - either you get >> ousted because you couldn't draw rush cards fast enough to stop a fast >> bleeder or every minion near you is in torpor (the preferred >> situation) and you can spend leisurely turns on small bleeds and >> hunting with your depleted minions. Even at the end of a three hour >> final at Watford the other week, I had at least twenty cards left. > >But if you want to win the table, you'll need to oust at least two >preys. If you've laid waste to your predator and prey, you still have >to have enough cards to kill your next prey, and probably your next >predator. And, as we discussed in that crazy math thread a while back, >you don't get that much of an advantage by scaling your deck down. >Also, if you're running low on cards, people will be less likely to make >deals with you (since they think you'll run out and you won't be able to >kill anymore). > I'm not about to go below 90 with a rush deck. I'm just no longer surprised that I've always got plenty of cards left. Tom

"Xian" <xi...@waste.org> wrote in message news:LK9o6.859$BG4.2...@news.uswest.net... [ quoted text not captured ] Yes, that Hamblin bastard has 9 freaking Disarms. <sigh> The only thing I can do is keep playing my Tremere deck over and over and over again. Either that or my bleed-you-for-19 deck, and pray to god that James is my prey, and I can oust him quickly. Or I can just pack 10 Fake Outs in every deck I make and then it'll be OK, I think... oh, wait, I am still dead. :( > > Xian > Kevin J. Mergen, Prince of Madison, WI (remove NOSPAM for direct reply) "Know your enemy, and know yourself; in one-thousand battles you shall never be in peril." -- Sun Tzu, "The Art of War" "Contentment... Complacency... Catastrophe!" -- Joseph Chevalier

Tom wrote: >>Pot/POT only would scare me (to play - not play against). All of my decks with a combat dimension (that is, most of my decks) use plenty of maneuvers to get to the range they like.>> This is a pretty serious meta game decision (playing Pot only)--as is always the case with any combat deck, it is easily foiled in a regular play group, but in blind play (i.e. a tournament setting), Rush decks do really well, as A) few folks expect them, B) few folks know how to deal with them, and C) few folks think they are worth worrying about. As this is the case, running into enough manuvers to seriously hinder an all Pot deck in a tournament setting is not that likely. My Pot/Obf Rush deck has 8 Behind You's to combat the occasional manuver, and even then, in a tournament setting, I rarely use them--maybe two or three per game. Unless someone *knows* they are going to run in to heavy, close range combat, putting a lot of manuvers in to a non combat deck is only going to gum up your hand. >>A mix is fine. I just don't like to go down to single discipline vampires, drawing the line at Dre.>> While understandable, you really are hamstringing yourself unecessarily--Hesina, Lupo, and KoKo (and pals) are a strong addition to a Pot based Rush deck. Yeah, they don't have the necessary manuver discipline, but they are quick to get out, perfectly effective against many targets (against other weenie vampires, a 3 point hit is all you need, and if you get a Pot skill on them, they become very damaging), and are cheap enough to be disposable for vital Diablere or something. >>She's also a Bishop which doesn't hurt. I'm not putting four copies in a crypt, but I consider her good value. The built-in rush doesn't figure every game, but her two relevant superiors do.>> Amelia is certainly a good vampire, but again, as a 7, she is expensive, and Beast is simply a better deal (+1 hand damage, can attack anyone). Thus, you need to draw the line somewhere--if you are keeping your crypt size down (which is key for this kind of deck), you should really only have one 7 pointer in the crypt,and Beast will win the cut every time. If you are going to put in two 7's, I'd much rather put in two Beasts rather than one of each--the duplication isn't really an issue, as it is unlikely that you'll be able to afford two 7's in play in any case. [ quoted text not captured ]

On 03 Mar 2001 22:12:26 GMT, pd...@aol.comANTISPAM (Peter D Bakija) wrote: >Amelia is certainly a good vampire, but again, as a 7, she is expensive, and >Beast is simply a better deal (+1 hand damage, can attack anyone). Thus, you >need to draw the line somewhere--if you are keeping your crypt size down (which >is key for this kind of deck), you should really only have one 7 pointer in the >crypt,and Beast will win the cut every time. If you are going to put in two >7's, I'd much rather put in two Beasts rather than one of each--the duplication >isn't really an issue, as it is unlikely that you'll be able to afford two 7's >in play in any case. It would be an interesting idea to stick 4 Amelia, 4 Beast, and Hasina/Lupo/Koko/Jimmy in a deck, though. Having both Amelia AND Beast influenced gives you, probably, 2 cardless Rushes per turn, and the others will give you miscellaneous actions should you require them. The 'expensive' concept deserves revisiting here, I think. Rush decks typically use small vampires. Why? Because they may need to kill many vampires quickly, and as a sideline, the multiple actions provide redundancy for those pesky Obedience- and Fortitude-chuckers. What sort of deck would produce many vampires that you'd need to kill? ...Weenie decks, which make Amelia's rush action golden. Hmm. So does a deck which has ONLY Amelia and Beast controlled have a problem? Well, it'll get Beast first and can probably handle its predator fairly well. It'll get Amelia next, and since you ARE including Rush actions as backup, you'll have certainly drawn into one by then, which she can use if necessary. If not, you can be discarding them until you get one of your Backup Weenies out, and while killing only two vamps per turn can indeed be "slow", the combination of POT/CEL is most lethal of all, meaning you can include fewer cards like Disarm and more Plain Ol' Damage cards like Pushing the Limit; being able to play TS/IG/Blur/PtL for 12 points on occasion can be a lovely thing, and much more effective than simply ripping Arika's arm off. Beast may only have inferior CEL, but he still hits for 11 with the same 4 cards, so isn't exactly hurting. (And being 7-caps, they're likely to have the 3 blood necessary to pull this off.) Not incidentally, you also give your prey a little bit of a free ride early on by playing in this fashion. But is it necessarily bad to let your prey weaken your grand-prey and then vaporize all his vampires, making him unable to successfully oust? Biggest problems I can see are the predictable crypt-screw, although I'd expect you're almost guaranteed to see at least one Beast and one Amelia, and highly unlikely to see all 4 of either; and the misfortune of sitting 1st or 5th with a weenie Computer Hacking deck behind you. But that's pretty unlikely right now; without Misdirection, the weenie bleed decks have pretty much wandered elsewhere. They're still quite effective, I'm sure, but definitely weakened behind many decks now. -- Derek "Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge." - C. Darwin, 1871

pd...@aol.comANTISPAM (Peter D Bakija) writes: Re: weenie pot > other weenie vampires, a 3 point hit is all you need, and if you get a Pot > skill on them, they become very damaging), and are cheap enough to be > disposable for vital Diablere or something. And if you get out, say, Koko and Jimmy Dunn, rather than Amelia, your bleed ratio can be upped considerably. When you don't have a rush card (or don't want to use a rush card), just send Koko for a bleed. It gets you a bleed, potentially, or a combat - and you still have Jimmy to do the rush that Amelia could have done. Since rush decks have very little in the way of extra bleed, usually (Legbiter has done a few nice things with Computer Hacking before), every little helps. -- James Coupe | PGP Key 0x5D623D5D "Definitely a woman" - www.thespark.com/ Standard disclaimers apply to this post. Full written details available upon request. Your statutory rights are not affected.

Derek Ray wrote: > > On 03 Mar 2001 22:12:26 GMT, pd...@aol.comANTISPAM (Peter D Bakija) > wrote: > > >Amelia is certainly a good vampire, but again, as a 7, she is expensive, and > >Beast is simply a better deal (+1 hand damage, can attack anyone). Thus, you > >need to draw the line somewhere--if you are keeping your crypt size down (which > >is key for this kind of deck), you should really only have one 7 pointer in the > >crypt,and Beast will win the cut every time. If you are going to put in two > >7's, I'd much rather put in two Beasts rather than one of each--the duplication > >isn't really an issue, as it is unlikely that you'll be able to afford two 7's > >in play in any case. > > It would be an interesting idea to stick 4 Amelia, 4 Beast, and > Hasina/Lupo/Koko/Jimmy in a deck, though. Having both Amelia AND > Beast influenced gives you, probably, 2 cardless Rushes per turn, and > the others will give you miscellaneous actions should you require > them. Interesting. But bad. You'd spend a lot of time getting out your two vampires, and then you can only make two attacks per turn. Often that is not enough, especially if your predator is a quick deck. I agree that expensive are better at combat in a lot of ways, but you simply need more minions than two or three. > The 'expensive' concept deserves revisiting here, I think. Rush decks > typically use small vampires. Why? Because they may need to kill > many vampires quickly, and as a sideline, the multiple actions provide > redundancy for those pesky Obedience- and Fortitude-chuckers. What > sort of deck would produce many vampires that you'd need to kill? > ...Weenie decks, which make Amelia's rush action golden. Hmm. But Amelia can only use her rush action once a turn. So yes, she can go kill one weenie. But Jimmy Dunn and Dr. Dre can go kill two weenies. Sure, they need to play a card to go do it. But the difference between killing one weenie or two weenies can be a bleed for 6-7 that you do or don't take. > So does a deck which has ONLY Amelia and Beast controlled have a > problem? Well, it'll get Beast first and can probably handle its > predator fairly well. No, it will get Beast out. It will kill one of it's predator's vampires each turn. Which may not be fast enough. Case in point: your predator is playing weenie dominate bleed. First turn: they get out a weenie, you put 3-4 blood on Beast. Second turn: Dominate master on the weenie, bleed you for 7 (GtU, CotB, Cond.), get out another weenie. You get out Beast. Third turn: both weenies bleed you for 5 (GtU, CotB, Bonding), get out another weenie. Now you're at 6 pool, and there's no way you're going to keep from being ousted next turn. How about this scenario: your predator is playing the same deck, you're playing a combat deck with a smaller crypt size. First turn: they get out a weenie, you get out Dr. Dre. Second turn: they bleed you for 5 (GtU, CotB, Bonding), get out another weenie. You fuck up a weenie with Dre, get out Jimmy Dunn. Third turn: they bleed you for 5 (same), get out another weenie. You fuck up both of their weenies, and if all goes well, they'll never bleed you again. You have 13 pool and a neutralized predator. > It'll get Amelia next, Too late. You're dead by then. > and since you ARE including Rush actions as backup, you'll have certainly drawn > into one by then, which she can use if necessary. ...but are you including fewer rush actions, since you're relying on getting built-in Rush people? > If not, you can be > discarding them until you get one of your Backup Weenies out, and > while killing only two vamps per turn can indeed be "slow", the > combination of POT/CEL is most lethal of all, meaning you can include > fewer cards like Disarm and more Plain Ol' Damage cards like Pushing > the Limit; being able to play TS/IG/Blur/PtL for 12 points on occasion > can be a lovely thing, and much more effective than simply ripping > Arika's arm off. Many points to make here. * Only being able to kill two a turn can indeed be too slow. I hope you don't think the above examples are extreme cases; there is a deck in our playgroup which does bleed that quickly. * POT/CEL isn't appreciable more lethal than, say pot/CEL or POT/cel, which you can get for cheaper. You shouldn't design your combat deck so that you're required to have both superiors in order to be effective. You also hardly ever need to do 12 damage in a single round; if you are pummeling an IC member, you can always press. * Don't underestimate diablerie. After Lupo rips Arika's arms off, Hasina can go have a tasty IC snack. With only Beast and Amelia, you'll never be able to afford diablerie. > Beast may only have inferior CEL, but he still hits > for 11 with the same 4 cards, so isn't exactly hurting. (And being > 7-caps, they're likely to have the 3 blood necessary to pull this > off.) Well, Dre can TS/IG/FoD/Blur for 6 damage with only pot/cel. Add a Taste and he's back up to fighting strength. Granted, it's not 11-12 damage, but that's hardly a requirement for a successful combat. > Not incidentally, you also give your prey a little bit of a free ride > early on by playing in this fashion. But is it necessarily bad to let > your prey weaken your grand-prey and then vaporize all his vampires, > making him unable to successfully oust? What if they're playing with significant pool gain? Vaporizing their vampires isn't going to be good enough when they still have 30 pool and you're bleeding for 2 a turn. > Biggest problems I can see are the predictable crypt-screw, although > I'd expect you're almost guaranteed to see at least one Beast and one > Amelia, and highly unlikely to see all 4 of either; Odds of getting Amelia and Beast: 71.9% Odds of getting 4 Amelia or 4 Beast: 0.4% Odds of getting at least 3 Amelia or Beast: 13.33% > and the misfortune > of sitting 1st or 5th with a weenie Computer Hacking deck behind you. > But that's pretty unlikely right now; without Misdirection, the weenie > bleed decks have pretty much wandered elsewhere. They're still quite > effective, I'm sure, but definitely weakened behind many decks now. I'm not sure weenie decks are as dead as you think they are. James -- James Hamblin ham...@math.wisc.edu "You seem to think you know it all [ quoted text not captured ]

On Sun, 04 Mar 2001 11:03:27 -0600, James Hamblin <ham...@math.wisc.edu> wrote: > >> and the misfortune >> of sitting 1st or 5th with a weenie Computer Hacking deck behind you. >> But that's pretty unlikely right now; without Misdirection, the weenie >> bleed decks have pretty much wandered elsewhere. They're still quite >> effective, I'm sure, but definitely weakened behind many decks now. > >I'm not sure weenie decks are as dead as you think they are. > This seems to be the real issue. In my limited experience of three tournaments, I've seen just one weenie bleed deck (it reached the final but was first or second out) and I never sat at the same table with it. You can't perfectly prepare against everything so there's no point worrying unduly about absent threats until they make an appearance. I think Derek's 4xBeast/4xAmelia is over the top, but I'd happily stick with the 2xBeast/2xAmelia version I last used (except that I'm currently experimenting with 8 cap Brujah princes in any case). Tom

"James Hamblin" <ham...@math.wisc.edu> > > Interesting. But bad. You'd spend a lot of time getting out your two > vampires, and then you can only make two attacks per turn. Often that > is not enough, especially if your predator is a quick deck. I agree > that expensive are better at combat in a lot of ways, but you simply > need more minions than two or three. Also, I am not sure how reliably we can predict any kind of deck showing up in any given game, so planning for weenie votes/bleeds isn't really helpful either. I'm starting to think that for a rush deck, it is better just to focus on the job at hand and just HOPE that you don't have that kind of predator, or a Gangrel prey for that matter. ANY kind of stratification seems to adversely affect a rush deck from what I have seen. Contrarily, rushing seems to help against almost all strategies, both offensively or defensively, so using that as your focus seems the way to go. > * Don't underestimate diablerie. After Lupo rips Arika's arms off, > Hasina can go have a tasty IC snack. With only Beast and Amelia, you'll > never be able to afford diablerie. But you can afford Decapitate, without fear of reprisal... a worthy consideration I think. Also, if you use a lot of wakes, you might be able to counter the cost of the large vampires somewhat, though at risk of losing that precious focus I suppose. Beast and Amelia both rush and kill two, then wake and kill two more. That might pay off, though I suspect it would have too many moving parts. > Well, Dre can TS/IG/FoD/Blur for 6 damage with only pot/cel. Add a > Taste and he's back up to fighting strength. Granted, it's not 11-12 > damage, but that's hardly a requirement for a successful combat. I also see it as too many eggs in one basket. One vampire rushing is somewhat easy to hose. Two is harder. Three is near impossible. Any deck that tries to commit to defending against multiple rushes is going to lose its own focus. I think that is one of the true strengths of the rush deck; that in order to defend against it you would need to DEVOTE the deck to defending against it, and that just wouldn't make sense. It always seems to come down to table composition. If I am a typical rush deck, I would love to have a Malk S&B deck as my prey but would hate to have them as my predator. I would love to have a combat deck as my predator (well... moreso than a Malk, and assuming a deal can be struck to share the game) but would hate to have one as my prey. Cheers, WES 'Why so many Bum's Rushes?' 'I must kill many' -Weenie Wes

"Andrew 'Wes' Weston" <gh...@mnsi.net> wrote in message news:97ugh...@enews3.newsguy.com... > either. I'm starting to think that for a rush deck, it is better just to > focus on the job at hand and just HOPE that you don't have that kind of > predator, or a Gangrel prey for that matter. ANY kind of stratification Pretty much. [big minions] > But you can afford Decapitate, without fear of reprisal... a worthy > consideration I think. Also, if you use a lot of wakes, you might be able to > counter the cost of the large vampires somewhat, though at risk of losing > that precious focus I suppose. Beast and Amelia both rush and kill two, then Yeah, that's a problem. Especially if you have a stealthy predator...those Wakes will just eat up space: "Democritus calls Parity shift." "Beast WwEF to block." "Does Beast have any intercept?" "Umm...damn. No." It only gets worse when you're talking about a *dedicated* stealth deck. And even worse than losing focus, it hand jams you. Bad. > wake and kill two more. That might pay off, though I suspect it would have > too many moving parts. How often do you encounter a 0-stealth deck? Usually they have some trick to keep you from blocking (stealth, unblockability, Kiss of Ra)...unless it's a bruise and bleed deck, in which case, you may or may not be helping them by blocking. > It always seems to come down to table composition. If I am a typical rush > deck, I would love to have a Malk S&B deck as my prey but would hate to have > them as my predator. I would love to have a combat deck as my predator Nah, it's not so bad having a Malk S&B as your predator. You maybe bring out one fewer vampires, vaporize them when you feel like it, and laugh as they get jammed on stealth. It's funny. > (well... moreso than a Malk, and assuming a deal can be struck to share the > game) but would hate to have one as my prey. I hate having a combat deck next to me, no matter what. I'm going to try to work deals with people, but it's a curious situation currently. I'm trying to get people to work more deal-making in, but it's a struggle. Xian

Wes wrote: >>Also, I am not sure how reliably we can predict any kind of deck showing up in any given game, so planning for weenie votes/bleeds isn't really helpful either.>> Well, it isn't really a matter of predicting what decks you will sit next to, it is a matter of knowing what fairly common deck strategies are a particular weakness for your strategy. Rush decks in general don't really need to worry about slow bleed decks, slow vote decks, or standard S+B decks. They *do* need to worry about weenie bleed/vote decks and Gangrel decks (and Gangrel decks tend to not do so well in a competetive situation, where weenie decks do)--thus, it is prudent to make a deck that is prepared to deal with the big weaknesses without compromising the deck as a whole. This is the logic that leads to including manuvers in a close range combat deck, or combat defense in a non combat deck. >>I'm starting to think that for a rush deck, it is better just to focus on the job at hand and just HOPE that you don't have that kind of predator, or a Gangrel prey for that matter.>> In the case of a weenie bleed predator, the Rush deck that can deal with one of those can generally deal with pretty much anything else as well--it is always a good idea to anticipate common strategies and plan appropriately. [ quoted text not captured ]

On Sun, 04 Mar 2001 11:03:27 -0600, James Hamblin <ham...@math.wisc.edu> wrote: >Derek Ray wrote: >> >> It would be an interesting idea to stick 4 Amelia, 4 Beast, and >> Hasina/Lupo/Koko/Jimmy in a deck, though. Having both Amelia AND >> Beast influenced gives you, probably, 2 cardless Rushes per turn, and >> the others will give you miscellaneous actions should you require >> them. > >Interesting. But bad. You'd spend a lot of time getting out your two >vampires, and then you can only make two attacks per turn. Often that >is not enough, especially if your predator is a quick deck. I agree >that expensive are better at combat in a lot of ways, but you simply >need more minions than two or three. Well, that depends. You're worried directly about weenie hordes being the big threat to this type of deck. The math below shows some interesting numbers itself; but do notice that 4 of your vamps are excellent weenie choices that you might end up grabbing first if you were VERY worried. >> The 'expensive' concept deserves revisiting here, I think. Rush decks >> typically use small vampires. Why? Because they may need to kill >> many vampires quickly, and as a sideline, the multiple actions provide >> redundancy for those pesky Obedience- and Fortitude-chuckers. What >> sort of deck would produce many vampires that you'd need to kill? >> ...Weenie decks, which make Amelia's rush action golden. Hmm. > >But Amelia can only use her rush action once a turn. So yes, she can go >kill one weenie. But Jimmy Dunn and Dr. Dre can go kill two weenies. >Sure, they need to play a card to go do it. But the difference between >killing one weenie or two weenies can be a bleed for 6-7 that you do or >don't take. well, the bleed for 6-7 deserves revisiting, too. Only Delilah with a skill card can pull that one out under Presence; and while Dominate weenies can do it much more easily, Dominate weenies are mighty rare these days due to Misdirection... and more expensive to get than a bunch of 1-caps who Computer Hack the hell out of you, or the Presence weenies who all mob you with Social/Legal/occasional Aire. I could see having trouble killing the 1-caps, but they only bleed for 2 each. I could see having a little trouble killing the Presence weenies, but stacking Aire of Elations takes some work and won't come out early; you can afford to be hit with a bleed of 3 or two. Only the DOM bleed deck usually hits the ground running with Govern/Condition until it pukes, and again, that's just plain rare these days because without Misdirection to help its speed, *it* is taking a huge risk. >> So does a deck which has ONLY Amelia and Beast controlled have a >> problem? Well, it'll get Beast first and can probably handle its >> predator fairly well. > >No, it will get Beast out. It will kill one of it's predator's vampires >each turn. Which may not be fast enough. ONLY if it's true hardcore weenie. Beast has a very high "slaughter probability" once he's out, so your predator has to be playing with a bunch of 2-caps to not lose his guys almost as fast as he gets them. Which has become quite fragile anymore - a lot more decks pack Wake, a lot more decks pack light intercept, and Misdirection is vastly weakened. >Case in point: your predator is playing weenie dominate bleed. First Not seen around here anymore, interestingly enough. Variants on the Crypt Machine are kept around as "tester" decks in case someone needs to see how they do against hideous bleed, but the ridiculous itty-bitty-weenie Dominate/Presence versions are no longer about. >turn: they get out a weenie, you put 3-4 blood on Beast. Second turn: >Dominate master on the weenie, bleed you for 7 (GtU, CotB, Cond.), get >out another weenie. You get out Beast. Third turn: both weenies bleed >you for 5 (GtU, CotB, Bonding), get out another weenie. Now you're at 6 >pool, and there's no way you're going to keep from being ousted next >turn. You're describing a fairly lucky scenario for the bleed deck, by the way, including one likely impossibility -- the first weenie probably used all his blood on Govern/Conditioning the first turn =). And I know when I chucked around my Dominate bleed decks, I had a hell of a time getting the skill cards without hand jamming on them later; and I sure didn't use Bonding, I used Seductions instead. Safer, especially now in the higher-intercept environment we see these days. >How about this scenario: your predator is playing the same deck, you're >playing a combat deck with a smaller crypt size. First turn: they get >out a weenie, you get out Dr. Dre. Second turn: they bleed you for 5 >(GtU, CotB, Bonding), get out another weenie. You fuck up a weenie with >Dre, get out Jimmy Dunn. Third turn: they bleed you for 5 (same), get >out another weenie. You fuck up both of their weenies, and if all goes >well, they'll never bleed you again. You have 13 pool and a neutralized >predator. Yes, this will be effective... and you are highly dependent on your Rush actions. Having dorked around a good bit with the industry standard and variants thereof, i've found that you tend to run out of Rush actions every so often despite the 12/4 included; not so tidy. Sure, you can spend lots of time bleeding for 1 after that, but you also rapidly become a cross-table dumping ground (Deflection, KRC) due to the threat you pose to everyone. And you can't threaten when you're short Rush. Interestingly, I did quite well recently with an 80-card pot/CEL variant (there's a long thread a few months back between Peter Bakija and I as to what it might should be constructed with), and I trimmed it by initially sliding its Rush actions down to 10/3. It gained 3 VP by ruining its predator/prey, leaving its prey with no vampires and 4 pool, and then killing backwards around to its grandprey. It did run out of cards; however, at the time it ran completely out of cards there was only one enemy vampire left on the table, while I controlled 3 (and one of mine was Bianca). I was able to save Rush actions by threatening my predator and bleeding for 1 forward lots, even while sitting with a Rush action in hand for the time I might really need it. Sometimes I got Deflected for 1, which turned out to be no big deal and actually weakened my grandprey somewhat. Handy. >> It'll get Amelia next, > >Too late. You're dead by then. > >> and since you ARE including Rush actions as backup, you'll have certainly drawn >> into one by then, which she can use if necessary. > >...but are you including fewer rush actions, since you're relying on >getting built-in Rush people? Sure. But you aren't using ANY of them at first, and you should be able to gain at least ONE in your hand over the course of several combats. You can either shrink your deck size, or include more head-chopping toys, or whatever. Computer Hackings are probably a waste, though; if you could stick Social Charms in or something, that'd be nice, but only Amelia can use them, so it'd be pointless. The generally-larger vampire size means you can also include fewer Tastes, since you no longer may need to play one every combat just to save your guys; or worse, play one every combat just to move through your hand and avoid jam. >> If not, you can be >> discarding them until you get one of your Backup Weenies out, and >> while killing only two vamps per turn can indeed be "slow", the >> combination of POT/CEL is most lethal of all, meaning you can include >> fewer cards like Disarm and more Plain Ol' Damage cards like Pushing >> the Limit; being able to play TS/IG/Blur/PtL for 12 points on occasion >> can be a lovely thing, and much more effective than simply ripping >> Arika's arm off. > >Many points to make here. > >* Only being able to kill two a turn can indeed be too slow. I hope you >don't think the above examples are extreme cases; there is a deck in our >playgroup which does bleed that quickly. "a" deck. We have decks which bleed that quickly as well; and we have Mike Perlman in our group, so we certainly have the weenie factor. But such decks have grown more and more fragile recently (it's hard to sneak weenie bleed past Tzimisce intercept-and-kill), and are falling out of favor from what I can see. The recent Charlotte and Columbia tournaments didn't show me ANY weenie decks, and instead a move towards larger vampires and other pool-gain methods. It's moving towards the point where I'm much more willing to risk being in front of a weenie deck once now than I was, say, six months ago; especially considering the prevalence of Cool Big Vamps running around these days. >* POT/CEL isn't appreciable more lethal than, say pot/CEL or POT/cel, >which you can get for cheaper. You shouldn't design your combat deck so >that you're required to have both superiors in order to be effective. >You also hardly ever need to do 12 damage in a single round; if you are >pummeling an IC member, you can always press. Oh, goodness, no. Beast does have only POT/cel, after all, and Hasina/Lupo/Koko won't ever have much other than POT or pot/cel, depending on which skill card shows up. It's assumed that you'll apply Beast and Amelia to those vampires who might need a full-on beating, and the weenies to the others. This is why I mentioned Pushing the Limit; it's a suitable POT strike that a 2-cap with pot can use just as effectively as a 7-cap with POT/CEL. (signpost and PtL is worth having to possibly hunt next turn, IMO) Worth noting: Hasina, Lupo, Koko, Mitchell, Dr. Dre, and Jacob cannot press from Potence without a skill card -- and the Weenie Four can't even use Flash as a backup. >* Don't underestimate diablerie. After Lupo rips Arika's arms off, >Hasina can go have a tasty IC snack. With only Beast and Amelia, you'll >never be able to afford diablerie. With Beast and Amelia, you'll not have to worry about it as everyone will be hitting torpor empty. Dead heat here, I'm thinking. (and you STILL will have one of the weenies as backup.) idle note: i find that it's lots less worth it to go munching with intent to burn yourself as well; losing a vampire really sucks UNLESS it's Hasina and you're desperate. This leads me away from using Disarm in such large quantities. >> Beast may only have inferior CEL, but he still hits >> for 11 with the same 4 cards, so isn't exactly hurting. (And being >> 7-caps, they're likely to have the 3 blood necessary to pull this >> off.) > >Well, Dre can TS/IG/FoD/Blur for 6 damage with only pot/cel. Add a >Taste and he's back up to fighting strength. Granted, it's not 11-12 >damage, but that's hardly a requirement for a successful combat. It is when you need to beat the hell out of Gilbert Duane, Gratiano, Meshenka, Sheldon, etc. All of whom are DAMNED common to see. And while Dre can chuck around a Flash as necessary to press, the littler guys are going to have a long road to hoe, or will need to have piles of Disarm (which has the above disadvantages). Especially Sheldon. Lots of him these days, what with all the Temptation decks. >> Not incidentally, you also give your prey a little bit of a free ride >> early on by playing in this fashion. But is it necessarily bad to let >> your prey weaken your grand-prey and then vaporize all his vampires, >> making him unable to successfully oust? > >What if they're playing with significant pool gain? Vaporizing their >vampires isn't going to be good enough when they still have 30 pool and >you're bleeding for 2 a turn. Hard-core Minion Tap/5th is going to suck no matter what. Such huge-vamp decks normally pack Obedience, Secure Haven, Skin of Steel, and the like to protect themselves from Rushes; they know perfectly well what their REAL weakness is. >> Biggest problems I can see are the predictable crypt-screw, although >> I'd expect you're almost guaranteed to see at least one Beast and one >> Amelia, and highly unlikely to see all 4 of either; > >Odds of getting Amelia and Beast: 71.9% This is actually lower than I care for, given that not getting both is likely to result in 3 Amelia and a weenie, or 3 Beast and a weenie. Perhaps it's worth going 3/3, and then using vamps like Jimmy, Dre, Jacob, Victor Tolliver, and Lupo/Koko to backfill. >Odds of getting 4 Amelia or 4 Beast: 0.4% Diddly/Squat, about what I expected. Also the odds of getting NEITHER, something that would be a very unpleasant surprise mitigated only by the fact that your entire crypt would cost 9 pool total. >Odds of getting at least 3 Amelia or Beast: 13.33% Fairly small, interestingly. Meaning that you have a reasonably good chance of having Amelia, Beast, and a weenie in your crypt; 3 vampires total, since going "fishing" is just going to be total luck of the draw as to whether you'll get a 4th. But your two thugs will be out, and a third backup thug. >> and the misfortune >> of sitting 1st or 5th with a weenie Computer Hacking deck behind you. >> But that's pretty unlikely right now; without Misdirection, the weenie >> bleed decks have pretty much wandered elsewhere. They're still quite >> effective, I'm sure, but definitely weakened behind many decks now. > >I'm not sure weenie decks are as dead as you think they are. I haven't been seeing them lately. (shrug) I also haven't HEARD much about them lately, at least not in the hard-core "i nuke you for lots" form. Justin Lacey did play a hideous-Embrace Lasombra deck in Columbia, but that sort of deck requires its own minions to be alive to make weenies, as opposed to just transferring them out. All of this is not to say that the stock little-bugger Rush deck is bad at all; it's just to say that other options are ALSO opening up for it, and they no longer have the same problems that they previously did... while they have some advantages that also previously weren't available. [ quoted text not captured ]

Sorry it took so long for me to reply to all the great feedback I got. I finally played the deck for the first time last night. The final version looks very little like the deck I first posted. I incorperated most of the advice I recieved from Tom and Wes, although the crypt stayed *mostly* the same. I did drop one of the 7 capacities (Richter, I believe) and replaced him with, uh, a 2 capacity Pander with [pot obt]. I'll post the whole deck when I get home (at work now), but it's probably ho-hum by now. Suffice to say that one other player weasled out with a victory point with a surprise bleed for 4, and I took the rest. The ass-beating was so bad, and droopy-face so prevelant, that I (almost) felt bad for hammering them with it. Thanks for the tips., everybody! Oh, a couple of quick ones: (I'd start a new thread, but is another "'Couple a Questions LSJ" any more meaningfull)? 1) Can anyone point me in the right direction for info on the tournement coming up in Atlanta? 2) "hand damage" is the innate strike of the minion (i.e. Thadius Zo's 2R is technically "hand damage", right?) [ quoted text not captured ]

"David Cherryholmes" <d...@petunia.mc.duke.edu> wrote in message news:Pine.GSO.4.21.01030...@petunia.mc.duke.edu... > Sorry it took so long for me to reply to all the great feedback I got. > I finally played the deck for the first time last night. The final > version looks very little like the deck I first posted. I incorperated > most of the advice I recieved from Tom and Wes, although the crypt stayed > *mostly* the same. I did drop one of the 7 capacities (Richter, I > believe) and replaced him with, uh, a 2 capacity Pander with [pot obt]. > I'll post the whole deck when I get home (at work now), but it's probably > ho-hum by now. Suffice to say that one other player weasled out with a > victory point with a surprise bleed for 4, and I took the rest. The > ass-beating was so bad, and droopy-face so prevelant, that I (almost) felt > bad for hammering them with it. Thanks for the tips., everybody! Glad it worked for you. Out of curiosity, which vampires did you end up influencing out? I'm interested to see if you noticed what we were discussing about the problems with large capacity rushers. Also, you may want to switch Mitchell the Headhunter with either Lupo or Koko. While it may seem like an advantage that Mitchell also has inferior OBT, you aren't using that discipline. Also, his flaw could end up working against you at the worst possible time. Cheers, WES

> Out of curiosity, which vampires did you end up influencing out? I'm > interested to see if you noticed what we were discussing about the problems > with large capacity rushers. Off the draw (and I went second, had the 1st minion out): Mitchell, Dre, Black Cat, and a 4 cap !Brujah whose name I can't recall (female, pot cel pre). I later brought out the 4 cap !Brujah with pot CEL. So, mostly little guys. They did fine; Mitchell got skill carded up to 4 cap, but was rocking from the get-go. Still, I think I wouldn't want to weenie-ize the crypt any further. But having four minions out and quickly rushing was HUGE. I may just drop one of the other big guys for a 3 capacity. > Also, you may want to switch Mitchell the Headhunter with either Lupo or > Koko. While it may seem like an advantage that Mitchell also has inferior > OBT, you aren't using that discipline. Also, his flaw could end up working > against you at the worst possible time. Correct, his disad sucks. However, I chose him from among the list of 2 caps with pot because he seemed least likely to be contested (Koko's too popular with lots of Nos decks floating around at the moment. Lupo, on the other hand.....). > Cheers, > WES David Cherryholmes

David Cherryholmes <d...@petunia.mc.duke.edu> wrote in message news:Pine.GSO.4.21.01030...@petunia.mc.duke.edu... > 2) "hand damage" is the innate strike of the minion (i.e. Thadius Zo's > 2R is technically "hand damage", right?) Wrong. No strike that is ranged is a Hand Strike. Thadius Zho does zero hand damage if he is Immortally Grappled. >1) Can anyone point me in the right direction for info on the tournement >coming up in Atlanta? Check the email links on the VTES Atlanta website, they will get you talking to the people in the know. http://people.atl.mediaone.net/intj/jpa/ Carpe Noctem. Lasombra http://lasombra.tripod.com http://legbiter.tripod.com http://vekn_clans.tripod.com

"David Cherryholmes" <d...@petunia.mc.duke.edu> > Off the draw (and I went second, had the 1st minion out): Mitchell, Dre, > Black Cat, and a 4 cap !Brujah whose name I can't recall (female, pot cel > pre). I later brought out the 4 cap !Brujah with pot CEL. So, mostly > little guys. They did fine; Mitchell got skill carded up to 4 cap, but > was rocking from the get-go. Still, I think I wouldn't want to weenie-ize > the crypt any further. But having four minions out and quickly rushing > was HUGE. I may just drop one of the other big guys for a 3 > capacity. Yeah, I figured as much. 18 total capacity for 5 vampires. Sounds like the small crypt directly contributed to the success you had. Bigger minions would have slowed it down considerably. Note that Beast doesn't really slow down a rush deck TOO much because his inherent ability means you always have some ability to rush even without a card. Sela doesn't have the rush, but bleed for 2 is nothing to sneeze at so she ends up being able to get into combat too (or directly attack your prey's pool which is often better). Why don't you post the crypt that you ended up playing with? Also, since I am the !Brujah newsletter writer, I'd love to be able to post your deck and any commentary... as long as you are kosher with it. > Correct, his disad sucks. However, I chose him from among the list of 2 > caps with pot because he seemed least likely to be contested (Koko's too > popular with lots of Nos decks floating around at the moment. Lupo, on > the other hand.....). I wouldn't worry about contesting too much in this case. Contesting is NEVER good mind you, but at least your strategy doesn't hinge on getting either Lupo or Koko out. Beast is much more likely to be contested. But in a case where this happens, contesting is going to be less of a problem than whether the other guy is your predator or prey. With two rush decks, you'll have to agree to split the table between you. Cheers, WES

Wes, I'll definitely post the deck when I get the chance. At the moment I'm in the happy, happy land of (shudder) debugging assembly code for an assignment due tomorrow. When it goes up, I'd love to have it presented with the news letter. [ quoted text not captured ]

Screw homework! Well, here it is. A few notes: 1. In case you miss it below, Psyche is my poor-man's answer to a lack of immortal grapples 2. Rumor Mill: Having the one point of perm intercept makes the casual stealth guys think before they act. It buys me time and may get me into a combat... worth one master slot, I think. 3. Last one is a question: it *is* legal to rescue someone else's vampire from torpor, right? Last night I pulled this: Bum rush prey -- torpor his vampire Legal Manip for 3 Ambush Fame'd guy -- torpor, take 3 Rescue Fame'd guy (yeah, I paid the 2 blood) Ambush Fame'd guy -- torpor, take 3 Nice and legit, right? Crypt: (12 cards) [Min: 10, Max: 24, Avg: 4.33] 1 Anvil (dom CEL POT pre tha, Brujah, 6, Primogen) 1 Beast (ani cel OBF POT, Nosferatu Antitribu, 7) 1 Black Cat (CEL pot pre, Brujah, 5) 1 Dre (cel pot, Brujah, 3) 1 Evangeline (cel pot pre, Brujah Antitribu, 4) 1 Gaspare Giovanni (cel nec POT, Giovanni, 6) 1 Jacob Bragg (cel pot, Brujah Antitribu, 3) 1 Lupo (pot, Brujah, 2) 1 Mitchell (obt pot, Pander, 2) 1 Rigby (aus CEL pot PRE, Brujah Antitribu, 5) 1 Victor Tolliver (CEL pot, Brujah Antitribu, 4) 1 Volker (CEL pot, Brujah, 5, Prince) Library: (90 cards) Master (14 cards) 3 Blood Doll 2 Celerity 1 Fame 4 Haven Uncovered 1 Hungry Coyote, The 2 Potence 1 Rumor Mill, Tabloid Newspaper, The Minion (76 cards) 2 Acrobatics 4 Ambush 6 Blur 8 Bum's Rush 4 Flash 5 Immortal Grapple 6 Legal Manipulations 4 Psyche! **** for lack of IG's**** 4 Pursuit 8 Pushing the Limit 1 Quickness 2 Rampage 4 Sideslip 5 Taste of Vitae 7 Torn Signpost 6 Undead Strength [ quoted text not captured ]

I looked it up and answered my own question about it's legitimacy. It is. Also, I forgot to add that when my prey's turn came, he Sacrificial Lamb'd his own guy to get rid of the Fame, burning the vamp and preventing me from taking any damage from my own Fame. Shweeeet! [ quoted text not captured ]

David Cherryholmes wrote: > > Screw homework! > > Well, here it is. > A few notes: > 1. In case you miss it below, Psyche is my poor-man's answer to a lack of > immortal grapples Noted. (You really should try to score some more IG's though; they should be pretty plentiful, being uncommon and included in the !Brujah precon.) > 2. Rumor Mill: Having the one point of perm intercept makes the casual > stealth guys think before they act. It buys me time and may get me > into a combat... worth one master slot, I think. I've argued about this card until my face turns blue. Let me just say that it's not just a master slot; it's regularly leaving a minion untapped in the hopes of intercepting +1 stealth actions. That's a much greater cost. > Crypt: (12 cards) [Min: 10, Max: 24, Avg: 4.33] > 1 Anvil (dom CEL POT pre tha, Brujah, 6, Primogen) > 1 Beast (ani cel OBF POT, Nosferatu Antitribu, 7) > 1 Black Cat (CEL pot pre, Brujah, 5) > 1 Dre (cel pot, Brujah, 3) > 1 Evangeline (cel pot pre, Brujah Antitribu, 4) > 1 Gaspare Giovanni (cel nec POT, Giovanni, 6) > 1 Jacob Bragg (cel pot, Brujah Antitribu, 3) > 1 Lupo (pot, Brujah, 2) > 1 Mitchell (obt pot, Pander, 2) > 1 Rigby (aus CEL pot PRE, Brujah Antitribu, 5) > 1 Victor Tolliver (CEL pot, Brujah Antitribu, 4) > 1 Volker (CEL pot, Brujah, 5, Prince) Where's Jimmy Dunn? You might also consider Hector Sosa and/or Hugo. Sela is also excellent. > Library: (90 cards) > Master (14 cards) > 3 Blood Doll > 2 Celerity > 1 Fame > 4 Haven Uncovered > 1 Hungry Coyote, The > 2 Potence > 1 Rumor Mill, Tabloid Newspaper, The Looks OK. Only half your guys can use the Coyote; plus they have to take an action to hunt. Just use Taste of Vitae as your blood gain. Maybe a Dreams to help with the cycling. Another Fame could also help. > Minion (76 cards) Lemme do a little rearranging to make it clearer. Rush > 4 Ambush > 8 Bum's Rush I would go with all Bum's Rush. Being unable to rush because they decided to stay untapped isn't worth the replacement. You can't replace a card you can't play. Anti S:CE > 5 Immortal Grapple > 4 Psyche! I would use more of this type of card; more IG's if you can get them, otherwise more Psyche!s. + Damage > 8 Pushing the Limit > 7 Torn Signpost > 6 Undead Strength This is a lot. Since you have a lot of additional strike capability, I would consider more Signposts and some Fists of Death. Fewer strike cards. Celerity > 2 Acrobatics > 6 Blur > 4 Flash > 4 Pursuit > 1 Quickness > 4 Sideslip I think Quickness is pretty mediocre. Lose that, and a couple Sideslips. > 6 Legal Manipulations > 2 Rampage > 5 Taste of Vitae The Legal's just water your deck down. You can't really play them reliably, since only a third of your crypt has Presence. If you put in a second Fame, you can do plenty of damage with the rescue-and-kill trick. As it is, Legal Manip is a bad rush card that lets your prey use the bleed bounce cards which will otherwise be clogging up their hand. [ quoted text not captured ]

"David Cherryholmes" <d...@petunia.mc.duke.edu> wrote > I looked it up and answered my own question about it's legitimacy. It is. > Also, I forgot to add that when my prey's turn came, he Sacrificial > Lamb'd his own guy to get rid of the Fame, burning the vamp and preventing > me from taking any damage from my own Fame. Shweeeet! I'm not sure that it's the most viable way of reducing your prey's pool... but it's probably the most satisfying :) Cheers, WES

On Wed, 7 Mar 2001, James Hamblin wrote: > > 1. In case you miss it below, Psyche is my poor-man's answer to a lack of > > immortal grapples > > Noted. (You really should try to score some more IG's though; they > should be pretty plentiful, being uncommon and included in the !Brujah > precon.) I might get a few boosters this weekend. I really do like to keep my monetary layout small. One of the reasons I ditched Magic and have stuck with Jyhad. > > 2. Rumor Mill: Having the one point of perm intercept makes the casual > > stealth guys think before they act. It buys me time and may get me > > into a combat... worth one master slot, I think. > > I've argued about this card until my face turns blue. Let me just say > that it's not just a master slot; it's regularly leaving a minion > untapped in the hopes of intercepting +1 stealth actions. That's a much > greater cost. Hhmmm. You may sell me on this one. I'll just note that the one time I played this deck, there were times I had minions untapped anyway. Most commonly because they'd just been influenced out (there's a blocker a turn if they're small), sometimes because I petered out on rush. > Where's Jimmy Dunn? You might also consider Hector Sosa and/or Hugo. > Sela is also excellent. Don't have Jimmy, sadly. > > Looks OK. Only half your guys can use the Coyote; plus they have to > take an action to hunt. Just use Taste of Vitae as your blood gain. > Maybe a Dreams to help with the cycling. Another Fame could also help. I don't think I have enough ToV (5) in the deck to keep them afloat. They were all pretty low, mostly from paying two for PtL/Blur. > Rush > > 4 Ambush > > 8 Bum's Rush > I would go with all Bum's Rush. Being unable to rush because they > decided to stay untapped isn't worth the replacement. You can't replace > a card you can't play. I think cutting hand size down for a combat deck, as it enters combat, is a bad thing. Seemed to be plenty of tapped targets, but that's why it's weighted towards BR. Still, might be a motive to squeeze in Elder Library, to sort of support the cost of the Bum's Rush. > + Damage > > 8 Pushing the Limit > > 7 Torn Signpost > > 6 Undead Strength > > This is a lot. Since you have a lot of additional strike capability, I > would consider more Signposts and some Fists of Death. Fewer strike > cards. All the TS I own. > > 6 Legal Manipulations > > 2 Rampage > > 5 Taste of Vitae > > The Legal's just water your deck down. You can't really play them > reliably, since only a third of your crypt has Presence. If you put in > a second Fame, you can do plenty of damage with the rescue-and-kill > trick. As it is, Legal Manip is a bad rush card that lets your prey use > the bleed bounce cards which will otherwise be clogging up their hand. I think I might trim the LM down to 4. All I expect is to have one guy out with presence. The rest hammer down his minions into torpor, then I Legal Manip with the presence guy. Granted I've only played the deck once, but it was working very well that game. Might not be too effective with weeny prey, but oh well. Good advice, though. > James David

>===== Original Message From James Hamblin <ham...@math.wisc.edu> ===== >David Cherryholmes wrote: >> >> Screw homework! >> >> Well, here it is. >> A few notes: >> 1. In case you miss it below, Psyche is my poor-man's answer to a lack of >> immortal grapples > >Noted. (You really should try to score some more IG's though; they >should be pretty plentiful, being uncommon and included in the !Brujah >precon.) > >> 2. Rumor Mill: Having the one point of perm intercept makes the casual >> stealth guys think before they act. It buys me time and may get me >> into a combat... worth one master slot, I think. > >I've argued about this card until my face turns blue. Let me just say >that it's not just a master slot; it's regularly leaving a minion >untapped in the hopes of intercepting +1 stealth actions. That's a much >greater cost. > Might as well be even bluer. I think Rumor Mill is very strong in this deck. It becomes more valuable as the crypt becomes smaller (I can't remember where you stand on the crypt size argument). With several minions in play, it's quite possible to run out of rush opportunities from time to time. The choice is then a bleed for one or leaving someone untapped. The latter is often wasted with no intercept available but quite useful otherwise. The Mill won't do anything against real stealth, but is often enough against hunt/rescue/vote actions. Furthermore, even when you are tapped out, your predator doens't know with certainty that you have no wake available. And finally, you get to sell the intercept to someone else. It may be fun to slaughter the table on your own, but it's more effective if someone else helps. Tom ------------------------------------------------------------ Get your FREE web-based e-mail and newsgroup access at: http://MailAndNews.com Create a new mailbox, or access your existing IMAP4 or POP3 mailbox from anywhere with just a web browser. ------------------------------------------------------------

>===== Original Message From David Cherryholmes <d...@petunia.mc.duke.edu> ===== >On Wed, 7 Mar 2001, James Hamblin wrote: >> > 2. Rumor Mill: Having the one point of perm intercept makes the casual >> > stealth guys think before they act. It buys me time and may get me >> > into a combat... worth one master slot, I think. >> >> I've argued about this card until my face turns blue. Let me just say >> that it's not just a master slot; it's regularly leaving a minion >> untapped in the hopes of intercepting +1 stealth actions. That's a much >> greater cost. > >Hhmmm. You may sell me on this one. I'll just note that the one time I >played this deck, there were times I had minions untapped anyway. Most >commonly because they'd just been influenced out (there's a blocker a turn >if they're small), sometimes because I petered out on rush. > Nah, stick to your guns. The Mill is fine. :-) >> Where's Jimmy Dunn? You might also consider Hector Sosa and/or Hugo. >> Sela is also excellent. > >Don't have Jimmy, sadly. > >> >> Looks OK. Only half your guys can use the Coyote; plus they have to >> take an action to hunt. Just use Taste of Vitae as your blood gain. >> Maybe a Dreams to help with the cycling. Another Fame could also help. > >I don't think I have enough ToV (5) in the deck to keep them afloat. They >were all pretty low, mostly from paying two for PtL/Blur. > The Coven is an interesting blood source. It can be played at most stages of combat for nice flexibility. After initial strike resolution, for example, when you need some blood to Blur. It gives opponents blood too but when all goes well you get to Taste it back. By the time the game reaches the last two, you get the use of it every turn. Glad you're enjoying the fun. Tough luck for the others. :-) [ quoted text not captured ]

"David Cherryholmes" <d...@petunia.mc.duke.edu> wrote in message news:Pine.GSO.4.21.010308...@petunia.mc.duke.edu... > Hhmmm. You may sell me on this one. I'll just note that the one time I > played this deck, there were times I had minions untapped anyway. Most > commonly because they'd just been influenced out (there's a blocker a turn > if they're small), sometimes because I petered out on rush. If you peter out of rush, you can always (...sigh...) bleed for 1. It's painful, and people generally realize that you're out of rush, but every little bit counts. > I think cutting hand size down for a combat deck, as it enters combat, is > a bad thing. Seemed to be plenty of tapped targets, but that's why it's > weighted towards BR. Still, might be a motive to squeeze in Elder > Library, to sort of support the cost of the Bum's Rush. I know plenty of people that play with the Elder Library...I don't because I don't like paying the pool for it, but that's just me. I have been caught with Ambush when I needed Bum's Rush, and I don't think I'll ever go back. > I think I might trim the LM down to 4. All I expect is to have one guy > out with presence. The rest hammer down his minions into torpor, then I > Legal Manip with the presence guy. Granted I've only played the deck > once, but it was working very well that game. Might not be too effective > with weeny prey, but oh well. If you really want to keep bleed cards in, you might go with Enchant Kindred instead. That way, you can get vampires out for less/gain pool easily. I run with 2 GtU in my Lasombra rush deck, and they're pretty handy. I definitely wouldn't go above 4 bleed cards though...and it's better if they're multi-purpose. Xian

> If you peter out of rush, you can always (...sigh...) bleed for 1. It's > painful, and people generally realize that you're out of rush, but every > little bit counts. Played a couple of games with it again last night. Having the bleeds was very useful again. By torporing my prey's minions I would open up temporary windows to bleed. I don't block the attempt to rescue, so they come back out and his overall pool of minion blood goes down further, making the next torpor easier. After beating down that round of minions I often had only one left untapped, and it was good to make the one bleed substantial. In short, the cards enable mid-game bleed, and supplement the damage from Fame. > I know plenty of people that play with the Elder Library...I don't because I > don't like paying the pool for it, but that's just me. I have been caught > with Ambush when I needed Bum's Rush, and I don't think I'll ever go back. I backed off of actually putting EL in. But I may do it after all, for different reasons. Every game I've played with this deck (3, now) I've gotten hand-jammed on mastercards. I'm already low (14 in a 90 card deck), but I feel like I either must go WAY low, or institute measures to deal with it. I'm thinking of putting in a few Gehenna's ("MADNESS!") and perhaps the Elder Library or the Book of Nod to alter the numbers on the Mastercard to cards in-hand ratio. Elder seems better, since I think I need just a little bit to nudge the probabilities in the right direction, and I don't have to deal with defending since I don't plan on leaving minions untapped. > If you really want to keep bleed cards in, you might go with Enchant Kindred > instead. That way, you can get vampires out for less/gain pool easily. I run > with 2 GtU in my Lasombra rush deck, and they're pretty handy. I definitely > wouldn't go above 4 bleed cards though...and it's better if they're > multi-purpose. I think I can effectively ignore the superior version of each card. It's a +2 bleed that costs one. But I guess on the blue moon when I'm bleeding with a guy who has superior presence, I'd rather get it straight to the pool and decide for myself whether it goes towards getting another guy out. On the other hand, I can just as easily yank the same amount off that turn, so they *seem* equal. Legal Manip wins because it doesn't require a platform (an uncontrolled minion) to make it into my pool. But, yeah, 4 seems like the max. Both games last night went badly for me. I got no VP's in the first and one in the second. Both times it was a damage prevention-heavy fortitude deck that gave me problems, once as my prey and then as my predator. Lots of Skin of Steels with lots of FOR, lots of DOM bleed, and bounce. Ouch. > Xian David Cherryholmes

On Fri, 9 Mar 2001 11:46:41 -0500, David Cherryholmes >Both games last night went badly for me. I got no VP's in the first and >one in the second. Both times it was a damage prevention-heavy fortitude >deck that gave me problems, once as my prey and then as my predator. Lots >of Skin of Steels with lots of FOR, lots of DOM bleed, and bounce. Ouch. > > Yep, that's what kills POT rush, if they're serious about it. It's a natural counter within a play group once the rush deck appears. The theory goes that the danger of this is greatly reduced in the tournament environment. The likelihood of encountering rush in a tourney is lowish and the heavy prevention deck isn't fast enough to compete with other decks types, therefore no one plays it. Tom

On Fri, 9 Mar 2001, Tom Kassel wrote: > Yep, that's what kills POT rush, if they're serious about it. It's a > natural counter within a play group once the rush deck appears. The > theory goes that the danger of this is greatly reduced in the > tournament environment. The likelihood of encountering rush in a > tourney is lowish and the heavy prevention deck isn't fast enough to > compete with other decks types, therefore no one plays it. > > Tom Thanks, good info to know. I'm tinkering with a Gangrel potence deck right now. I doubt it will have the necessary speed to be competitive, but it should be fun to play around here. One camp of players are very tool-boxy, and like their games that way. I don't mind obliging; it's a fun change-up from the other, very competitve, group I play with. Later, David Cherryholmes