Major Problem with V:TES Today

I am both an avid V:TES player and a game store owner. I promote Jyhad here in the store with a regular play night. Recently, some of our players have started to fade away, just attrition I guess. So that means we need new players right? So I began gearing up for a demo, when I realized, if I do hook a new player, there is one glaring thing in their way to enjoyment and competetiveness (perhaps the same thing) in this game. A lack of cards. I can still get Jyhad/V:TES for relatively cheap or through standard distribution channels. And Jyhad is a good set. But let's be honest, Ancient Hearts and the Sabbat have the cards that everyone wants multiples of, no matter what discipline or clan they are playing. And both those sets are gone, baby gone. Mark Korshavn never seems to get back in some of the more popular Sabbat cards (Entombment, Hungry Coyote to name two), or if he does they are gone immediately, and with the dearth of Sabbat unopened packs, he never will. So my demo scenario will look like this. New player(s) come and learn how to play in the demo environment - everyone playing pretty much the beginner decks that someone has been posting here or that one finds on the Madness Network site. We even give each player 500 common Jyhad cards and extra vamps (I got them, no worries). They come back the next week and we play open format, wherein many of us are trying to make tournament decks work. New player gets pummeled by a bunch of rare or even common Sabbat/Ancient Hearts cards. Thinks either "well, that was no fun, I quit" or "that was interesting, how can I compete". The first player might be lost to us, but the second is worth saving. However, the new player can no longer compete with those of us who have been in the game for a long time. _Can not compete_. Not unless they are a masochist, or somehow manage to make some killer trades with the older generation Methuselahs, or are content to play the same deck over and over (and most likely lose). At one time a great selling point of this game was that it was inexpensive. Some of it still is, just not the good stuff. So Wizards - as a store owner, I pledge that if you reprint the Sabbat, I will personally for the store buy 100 boxes on the initial order. And if you reprint Ancient Hearts, I will personally buy 50 boxes on initial order. And if you print a new set, I will buy 200 boxes on intial order (that's about $10,000 wholesale for those scoring at home). I like to put my money where my mouth is... Chris -- Chris Shorb, Monger of stuff Tammy Martin, Queen of the Eastern Marches, and damn good mom Alexander Shorb, little guy who could Shameless plug: <www.thethirdplanet.com>

In article <37FBA1A3...@ix.netcom.com>, Chris Shorb & Tammy Martin <ino...@ix.netcom.com> wrote: [Snip] >A lack of cards. > >I can still get Jyhad/V:TES for relatively cheap or through >standard distribution channels. And Jyhad is a good set. >But let's be honest, Ancient Hearts and the Sabbat have the >cards that everyone wants multiples of, no matter what >discipline or clan they are playing. And both those sets >are gone, baby gone. Mark Korshavn never seems to get back >in some of the more popular Sabbat cards (Entombment, Hungry >Coyote to name two), or if he does they are gone >immediately, and with the dearth of Sabbat unopened packs, >he never will. [Snip more stuff saying AH and Sabbat have the power cards] Huh. I haven't found that to be the case at all. Granted, some of the later vampires are more powerfull, but those aren't that hard to come by, and you don't really need multiples. I definitely haven't found that people with older cards can't compete, just that they can't play as wide of a variety of decks. Are you playing with the official errata? If not, then I can certainly see how you'd have problems. However, the solution is easy -- play with the errata. Admitedly, most of the rare stuff I want is in the later sets (since they cost more), but they're generally funky cards that aren't really that great. I have plenty of effective decks that don't use any of the later cards, or that could easily swap in an older version. I'm curious, which specific later edition cards are the newbies missing that they _need_ to compete? -- /\ Jasper Phillips /VVVVVVVVVVVVVV|~"~"~"~"~"~"----------........____ jaz j^^^^^^^^^^^^^\/"~"~"~"~-----------........._____ ~"~--. * http://www.engr.orst.edu/~philljas/ "~"~'--`

Yes, Sabbat is all but gone. Once in a while a box or two pop up but thats about it. But AH cards are still around. Just go to WOTC homepage and go to the Online store under VTES. You can buy as many packs as you want for retail (2.25 each). Retail is not the best but how many of us would GLADLY buy Sabbat boxes at retail? Hmmm... thought so. Just trying to help out. :) Todd Banister Prince of Atlanta Scribe of the Assamites Chris Shorb & Tammy Martin <ino...@ix.netcom.com> wrote in message news:37FBA1A3...@ix.netcom.com... > I am both an avid V:TES player and a game store owner. I > promote Jyhad here in the store with a regular play night. > Recently, some of our players have started to fade away, > just attrition I guess. So that means we need new players > right? So I began gearing up for a demo, when I realized, > if I do hook a new player, there is one glaring thing in > their way to enjoyment and competetiveness (perhaps the same > thing) in this game. > > A lack of cards. > > I can still get Jyhad/V:TES for relatively cheap or through > standard distribution channels. And Jyhad is a good set. > But let's be honest, Ancient Hearts and the Sabbat have the > cards that everyone wants multiples of, no matter what > discipline or clan they are playing. And both those sets > are gone, baby gone. Mark Korshavn never seems to get back > in some of the more popular Sabbat cards (Entombment, Hungry > Coyote to name two), or if he does they are gone > immediately, and with the dearth of Sabbat unopened packs, > he never will. > [ quoted text not captured ]

On 6 Oct 1999 20:44:30 GMT, phil...@eel.ENGR.ORST.EDU (Jasper Phillips) wrote: >[Snip more stuff saying AH and Sabbat have the power cards] > >Huh. I haven't found that to be the case at all. Granted, some >of the later vampires are more powerfull, but those aren't that >hard to come by, and you don't really need multiples. I definitely >haven't found that people with older cards can't compete, just >that they can't play as wide of a variety of decks. Without Apportation and the Sabbat vamps, the Tremere are significantly weaker than they already are. Good luck getting 12 Immortal Grapples by purchasing only Jyhad/V:TES boxes - the uncommon-ness of it in Sabbat was necessary. Tribute to the Master made "minion horde" decks even more fearsome. The Sabbat and AH vampires are in very short supply - and THOSE can differentiate between identical decks all on their own (Jimmy Dunn and Hugo being big examples - Jacob Bragg being an excellent fill-in for Dr. Dre that won't contest - Mitchell, Headhunter - and those are just the potence combat guys.) Pursuit was an excellent Celerity card. Side Strike is great too if your deck likes to dodge (Acrobatics is nice but *does* cost blood - having an alternative is great). Pushing the Limit is an excellent way to make Potence a "backup" discipline without burning too many card slots - think Nosferatu Bruise/Vote. Forgotten Labyrinth was awesome - the card Obfuscate *really* needed, and not abusable by the Malkavian Dominate guys. The Fortitude cards provide excellent variety in damage-prevent: you can choose what flavor to put in your deck as necessary, as opposed to "Hm, Skin of Rock or Skin of Steel?" How many *additional* Presence bleed cards did we get? Not to mention Awe. Hm. Political Stranglehold is a brutal card for a big-vampire vote deck late in the game. Guard Dogs is a card no Animalism-untap deck should be without. Precognition for Auspex is a GREAT include - Auspex got a LOT of cards in the Sabbat, actually, but a lot of them were also rare. Dominate got Foreshadowing Destruction in Ancient Hearts - OW! You know, I can't think of any Protean cards that really make my weasel tingle. Quick Meld is nice for a Form of Mist deck, though - those pesky IGer's have a long way to go to catch up to *two* maneuvers. >I'm curious, which specific later edition cards are the newbies >missing that they _need_ to compete? ...see above. There are an awful lot that when used in quantity really set a deck one notch above a similar Jyhad/V:TES/DS deck. It's not that a newbie can't make an effective deck, it's that without picking from a VERY small list of types, he can't make one as good as the decks he sees everyone else play - and will sit there going "damn, I wish I had some of those cards", getting more and more frustrated 'til he finally quits. (some people are instant-gratification types - they quit immediately.) Sure, he can play a Ventrue Law Firm deck and that will be effective. And just as surely, someone will lug out the Ventrue Antitribu vote-smacking deck the next week and pummel them with a stick. The Sabbat vamps/cards made a lot of new strategies viable - to me, making a difficult idea work in a deck is a lot of the fun of the game. If it wasn't, I'd just play Presence misdirect-bleed. I would love to see them reprint Sabbat - I would buy a couple more boxes immediately. AH as well, but because I do have a couple Sabbat boxes I don't feel the lack as much. I would be delighted to have Alacrity, Dreams of the Sphincter, Tomb of Ramses, and a few of the other wack masters - oh, and those last two cards are effectively GONE. I will never own one of either without a reprint: NOBODY is selling unless they are quitting the game, which is a Bad Thing in itself. -- Derek PEACE, n. In international affairs, a period of cheating between two periods of fighting. (replying by email? remove the nospam from my domain :)

>>Just go to WOTC homepage and go to the Online store under VTES. You can buy as many packs as you want for retail (2.25 each). << I tried this just recently, and they were out of stock. Yes, indeed! Can someone (LSJ??) get the message to WotC that these cards are needed?? Perhaps if this fabled upcoming mini-expansion sells well, cards might get reprinted. Madman -- Posted via Talkway - http://www.talkway.com Exchange ideas on practically anything (tm).

Madman2001 wrote: > > >>Just go to WOTC homepage and go to the Online store under VTES. You can buy as many packs as you want for retail (2.25 each). << > I tried this just recently, and they were out of stock. Yes, indeed! > > Can someone (LSJ??) get the message to WotC that these cards are > needed?? Of course. I pass these sort of comments on directly to Jennifer Clarke Wilkes who passes them on to the brand manager. I sent Chris's message to Jennifer yesterday. -- LSJ (vte...@wizards.com) V:TES Net.Rep for Wizards of the Coast. Links to revised rulebook, rulings, errata, and tournament rules: http://www.wizards.com/VTES/rules.asp

On Thu, 7 Oct 1999, Derek S. Ray wrote: > Without Apportation and the Sabbat vamps, the Tremere are > significantly weaker than they already are. Good luck getting 12 > Immortal Grapples by purchasing only Jyhad/V:TES boxes I have about 16 Jyhad IGs, actually. When boxes are cheap, you can afford to buy lots. I've spent less money on Jyhad boxes than I have on Sabbat, and I have more Jyahd IGs than Sabbat ones. > The Sabbat and AH vampires are in very short supply - and THOSE can > differentiate between identical decks all on their own (Jimmy Dunn and > Hugo being big examples - Jacob Bragg being an excellent fill-in for Dr. > Dre that won't contest - Mitchell, Headhunter - and those are just the > potence combat guys.) They are? You can buy them for $.25 or $.50 a pop from any of the online traders. > Pursuit was an excellent Celerity card. Side Strike is > great too if your deck likes to dodge (Acrobatics is nice but *does* > cost blood - having an alternative is great). Pushing the Limit is an > excellent way to make Potence a "backup" discipline without burning > too many card slots - think Nosferatu Bruise/Vote. Forgotten > Labyrinth was awesome - the card Obfuscate *really* needed, and not > abusable by the Malkavian Dominate guys. The Fortitude cards provide > excellent variety in damage-prevent: you can choose what flavor to put > in your deck as necessary, as opposed to "Hm, Skin of Rock or Skin of > Steel?" How many *additional* Presence bleed cards did we get? Not > to mention Awe. Hm. Political Stranglehold is a brutal card for a > big-vampire vote deck late in the game. Guard Dogs is a card no > Animalism-untap deck should be without. Precognition for Auspex is a > GREAT include - Auspex got a LOT of cards in the Sabbat, actually, but > a lot of them were also rare. Dominate got Foreshadowing Destruction > in Ancient Hearts - OW! Sure, AH and Sabbat have some good cards -- I don't think that most of these examples are inherently _better_ than their Jyhad equivalents, however. I will concede that Apportation is more useful in most instances than Movement of the Mind, but I think that of the other common combat cards you mention, none are really 'game-breaking' in that they make the Jyhad set pointless to play. Your argument seems to be that certain expansions make certain decks possible to play, and without them you can't play that deck. Well, yeah. It's almost a tautology: Without Ancient Hearts, which is the only expansion with Assamites, you can't play an Assamite deck. Without Jyhad, you couldn't play any Camarilla decks. Without Dark Sovereigns you couldn't play Giovanni or Ravnos (except some really weird decks which consist of four copies of each of the three Ravnos cards in AH, I suppose). So you're basically saying that WotC should keep all expansions in print forever? Sorry, me bucko, but that's not the way it works. Look at M:tG -- the Legends and Dark sets were massively popular, and massively underprinted... but rather than putting those sets back into print, they rolled some of the cards into the Chronicles set or later Unlimited editions. I think that you'd get better mileage asking WotC to publish a second Unlimited (V:tES) edition, incorporating some of the cards from later expansions (e.g. Apportation) than you will by asking them to go against the business model they've worked out for the only truly successful CCG of all time. My two pence. Fish.

I also mentioned something to this effect on my newsletter. Being an optimist, I hope that posting enough comments will eventually convince them that there is profit in reprinting...especially since there are now DCI santioned sealed/draft formats. LSJ wrote: > Madman2001 wrote: > > Can someone (LSJ??) get the message to WotC that these cards are > > needed?? > > Of course. I pass these sort of comments on directly to Jennifer > Clarke Wilkes who passes them on to the brand manager. I sent Chris's > message to Jennifer yesterday. -- Ethan Burrow - Prince of Austin et...@ddg.com http://whitestar.ddg.com/vtes/

On Thu, 7 Oct 1999 10:40:42 -0500, Fish Flowers <awfl...@midway.uchicago.edu> wrote: >On Thu, 7 Oct 1999, Derek S. Ray wrote: > >> Without Apportation and the Sabbat vamps, the Tremere are >> significantly weaker than they already are. Good luck getting 12 >> Immortal Grapples by purchasing only Jyhad/V:TES boxes > >I have about 16 Jyhad IGs, actually. When boxes are cheap, you can afford >to buy lots. I've spent less money on Jyhad boxes than I have on Sabbat, >and I have more Jyahd IGs than Sabbat ones. Then either you're lucky or I'm "un" - I bought lots when Jyhad boxes were $5 each, and only ended up with like 6 or so. Got 4 more out of two Sabbat boxes for 10 total - functional but just a hair short. It's literally almost the only "rare" Jyhad card I don't have enough of. Oh, wait - I had to borrow some Kindred Intelligences to make a deck recently. Only had 7. I don't see Kindred Intelligence as being in short supply though. ;) >> The Sabbat and AH vampires are in very short supply - and THOSE can >> differentiate between identical decks all on their own (Jimmy Dunn and >> Hugo being big examples - Jacob Bragg being an excellent fill-in for Dr. >> Dre that won't contest - Mitchell, Headhunter - and those are just the >> potence combat guys.) > >They are? You can buy them for $.25 or $.50 a pop from any of the online >traders. hm, i thought Korshavn was selling them for more than that, but I could be wrong - I don't usually read the "vampires" list of his bin. =) >> Pursuit was an excellent Celerity card. Side Strike is >> great too if your deck likes to dodge (Acrobatics is nice but *does* >> cost blood - having an alternative is great). Pushing the Limit is an >> excellent way to make Potence a "backup" discipline without burning >> too many card slots - think Nosferatu Bruise/Vote. Forgotten >> Labyrinth was awesome - the card Obfuscate *really* needed, and not >> abusable by the Malkavian Dominate guys. The Fortitude cards provide >> excellent variety in damage-prevent: you can choose what flavor to put >> in your deck as necessary, as opposed to "Hm, Skin of Rock or Skin of >> Steel?" How many *additional* Presence bleed cards did we get? Not >> to mention Awe. Hm. Political Stranglehold is a brutal card for a >> big-vampire vote deck late in the game. Guard Dogs is a card no >> Animalism-untap deck should be without. Precognition for Auspex is a >> GREAT include - Auspex got a LOT of cards in the Sabbat, actually, but >> a lot of them were also rare. Dominate got Foreshadowing Destruction >> in Ancient Hearts - OW! > >Sure, AH and Sabbat have some good cards -- I don't think that most of >these examples are inherently _better_ than their Jyhad equivalents, >however. I will concede that Apportation is more useful in most instances >than Movement of the Mind, but I think that of the other common combat >cards you mention, none are really 'game-breaking' in that they make the >Jyhad set pointless to play. Is Pursuit better than Flash? No, just different. But Flash is Jyhad CEL's only maneuver card - meaning you have to pack a bunch in to be sure of your maneuvers, risking having too many when you don't need them. With the option to include Flash *and* Pursuit, you can cut down on the Flash, since I know there are a number of times when I only need to hit the guy one more time, not two, and I don't have to spend a blood for a Blur and an unnecessary third strike. A deck that goes from only Flash/Blur to Flash/Pursuit/Blur increases its effectiveness significantly. This was more what I meant by listing all the cards above - not that they made their predecessors OBSOLETE, or that they broke the game, but that they start to be more than just "nice to have". >Your argument seems to be that certain expansions make certain decks >possible to play, and without them you can't play that deck. Well, yeah. No, it's that the expansions make existing deck designs significantly more EFFECTIVE, and make new deck designs POSSIBLE. The first part is the real problem. [snip obvious about assamite decks w/o AH and ravnos w/o DS] >So you're basically saying that WotC should keep all expansions in print >forever? Sorry, me bucko, but that's not the way it works. Look at M:tG -- >the Legends and Dark sets were massively popular, and massively >underprinted... but rather than putting those sets back into print, they >rolled some of the cards into the Chronicles set or later Unlimited >editions. No, I'm not actually saying that - don't put words into my mouth ;) No company can afford to do that. But since card rarity was not supposed to be an issue with Jyhad/V:TES, it does not "break the game" to reprint a set, unlike all those Magic players who would lose it if you reprinted their rare cards they spent hundreds of dollars on each. I think the most expensive card Korshavn sells is Protected Racehorses at $10 - a V:TES ultra-rare. Reprinting the Sabbat or AH when a sudden demand arises wouldn't hurt the game or WOTC that much - and would provide us a chance to get a number of new players playing the game, since we can point and say "Yeah, the Sabbat is expensive, but at least you can GET the cards"... as opposed to "Yeah, these are out-of-print" which REALLY turns people off. >I think that you'd get better mileage asking WotC to publish a second >Unlimited (V:tES) edition, incorporating some of the cards from later >expansions (e.g. Apportation) than you will by asking them to go against >the business model they've worked out for the only truly successful CCG of >all time. The model for Magic is "Make money, make more money, continue making money, and don't yank on that hook in the gamers' mouths TOO hard or they'll notice we're just making money." Game balance doesn't appear to have been an issue (I believe they followed your suggestion above and rolled Black Lotus or an equivalent power-rare into newer sets - players freaked because of the rarity problem. I only know what I've heard from friends unfortunately - i refused to play Magic long ago.) The other problem is that I don't believe WotC is ever going to publish another "new" set for Jyhad, after the current promised expansion is done (and if THAT even gets done). It's obvious that they don't see it at the top of their list, and the only way to convince them otherwise is to provide them a low-effort way to show that there ARE players out there now. About the only way to do that is to reprint an existing set. [ quoted text not captured ]

Derek wrote: >>Then either you're lucky or I'm "un" - I bought lots when Jyhad boxes were $5 each, and only ended up with like 6 or so. Got 4 more out of two Sabbat boxes for 10 total - functional but just a hair short. It's literally almost the only "rare" Jyhad card I don't have enough of. Oh, wait - I had to borrow some Kindred Intelligences to make a deck recently. Only had 7. I don't see Kindred Intelligence as being in short supply though. ;)>> You are only going to get 1 IG out of a box of Jyhad boosters, and that is if you are lucky. You simply can't get all the rares you need by buying boxes. You need to buy singles or trade. I prefer the trade, myself. You have 10 Immortal Grapples. Your friend has 2. What is he going to do with 2 Immortal Grapples? Trade them to you for a couple Freak Drives or soemthing. You can get such cards as singles by being dilligent and searching around. Heck--Korshavan has 3 Jyhad IGs for sale as we speak. >>hm, i thought Korshavn was selling them for more than that, but I could be wrong - I don't usually read the "vampires" list of his bin. =)>> Yup. A quarter. >>Is Pursuit better than Flash? No, just different. But Flash is Jyhad CEL's only maneuver card - meaning you have to pack a bunch in to be sure of your maneuvers, risking having too many when you don't need them. With the option to include Flash *and* Pursuit, you can cut down on the Flash, since I know there are a number of times when I only need to hit the guy one more time, not two, and I don't have to spend a blood for a Blur and an unnecessary third strike.>> But Pursuit does not affer you the option of pressing--thus it does different stuff. Is it better stuff? Not necessarily. Flash is an *incredibly* useful card--yes, Pursuit is strong, but you never *need* a pursuit--decks built around Flash are perfectly viable and do just fine. Will having 5 Flash and 5 Pursuit make a deck better than having 10 Flash? Maybe. Maybe not. Depends on what you are trying to do and what your vampires look like. Is there a lot of CEL and you are always going to want to use an additional strike? Do you have mostly vamps with cel, and pressing will usually do the trick? The Sabbat "variation" cards are handy, sure, but none of them are outright better than their Jyhad counterpart, and you can always do just fine without them. Peter D Bakija PD...@aol.com "Isn't it strange, G'Kar? When we first met, I had no power and all the choices I could ever want. Now I have all the power I could ever want, and no choice at all." -Londo

Folks: I've been thinking about the fact that AH & Sabbat are OOP and difficult to obtain to some extent. But, the fact is that V:TES IS a trading card game, and people shouldn't dive into V:TES and expect to be able to obtain any card they want (need?) immediately at a low price. Frankly, I find V:TES cards just about as easy to obtain as Magic cards. In fact, in terms of the difficulty and cost of putting together a deck, V:TES wins hands down! Let's look: Cost of cards: I must say that it is cheaper to put together a V:TES deck. First, you can buy boxes of Jyhad on eBay for $15 to $20 each. Second, I have only seen one V:TES single priced over $10 (Tomb, Korshavn) whereas the best Magic rares will often/usually cost that much. Obtaining cards: yes, it can be more difficult to obtain some V:TES singles, primarily due to the thin market. However, I would expect that one could obtain nearly any card given a bit of patience. Cards phasing out: the fact is that V:TES decks don't become obsolete. Competitive MtG decks must change 3 times a year, and once a year about half your deck suddenly is no longer tournament-legal (Type II, that is). It takes a huge investment to play Magic even at the local gameshop level. So, compared to the most successful trading card game around (ignoring <ugh> Pokemon), it is actually easier and cheaper to create and maintain a V:TES deck. Yes, the lack of boxes of Sabbat can adversely affect the Draft/Sealed environment, but still . . . My $0.02. [ quoted text not captured ]

on the sabbat boxes difficult to obtain saga..... yes, there are in short supply, and oh wouldn't it be wonderful to have loads of cards and wouldn't everybody then not have the challenge of trading for cards with thine enemy. its about building decent decks with the cards we have rather than with what we wish we had. I thought it was a game about how our brains think - not how much money we are willing to spend. if you want to win all the time and figure that having loads of cards would help. think again cos thats not the name of the game. It is about interacting with people. I often share cards with newbies until they can get there own, or swap long distance (ireland/australia/southampton) when the need arises but it is for the love of the game and of keeping/getting people into the game, not about winning everything. i think between myself and ian, we've spent about £150 ($200) in 2 years on cards and we still have cards that others want and more importantly, we still have loads of fun. yes. i agree it would be nice to have some new cards (o to make giovanni useable without too much grief) and it would be nice to get sabbat cards (hint hint WotC). If it was easy to get cards, it wouldn't be interesting. my shilling's worth. anam "don't start with me, you will NOT win"

Jasper Phillips wrote: > In article <37FBA1A3...@ix.netcom.com>, > Chris Shorb & Tammy Martin <ino...@ix.netcom.com> wrote: > [Snip] > >A lack of cards. > > > >I can still get Jyhad/V:TES for relatively cheap or through > >standard distribution channels. When I mean standard distribution channels, I mean to retail stores. I hate to say it, but Potomac and Edge-man and online card discounters, while great for the end users such as your(our)selves, carry no weight with WotC. When you have an established base of 2000-3000 shops selling at full retail, each buying 2-200 boxes of WotC's new Magic product, that is Wotc's true customer base. And we get that stuff through distributors. Also, I am not speaking specifically of Jyhad/V:TES. I mean specifically Sabbat and AH. This is an open invite to all who say "we don't need to have either more expansions, or shouldn't reprint any of the two better sets (AH & SAB)". Please make as many Jyhad/V:TES/DH *only* decks that you can and only play them for two months, and then tell us a) how many games you won b) how much fun you honestly had. And then post back to this NG. Don't reply to this and say "Oh I have an all Jyhad deck that kicks butt!" No doubt you do. But wouldn't you be really bored of that if you played that _every_ time you played V:TES? And your winning percentage would most certainly go down as people realized, oh he's playing that Drawing out the Beast deck again, for the third time tonight and the tenth time this month. What I am talking about is enticing people to learn this very complicated yet incredibly rewarding game. Learning a new game is tough, and there are lots of barriers. Among those barriers are finding other players, learning the rules, being interested in the game, and accessibility to the game. Jyhad is very deficient in the first and second (few players, extensive errata), but the third, holding player's interest can be very high. If the fourth is also high, accesibility, then we have a recipe for sucess. > And Jyhad is a good set. > >But let's be honest, Ancient Hearts and the Sabbat have the > >cards that everyone wants multiples of, no matter what > >discipline or clan they are playing. And both those sets > >are gone, baby gone. Mark Korshavn never seems to get back > >in some of the more popular Sabbat cards (Entombment, Hungry > >Coyote to name two), or if he does they are gone > >immediately, and with the dearth of Sabbat unopened packs, > >he never will. > > [Snip more stuff saying AH and Sabbat have the power cards] > > Huh. I haven't found that to be the case at all. Granted, some > of the later vampires are more powerfull, but those aren't that > hard to come by, and you don't really need multiples. I definitely > haven't found that people with older cards can't compete, just > that they can't play as wide of a variety of decks. > > Are you playing with the official errata? If not, then I can > certainly see how you'd have problems. However, the solution > is easy -- play with the errata. > > Admitedly, most of the rare stuff I want is in the later sets > (since they cost more), but they're generally funky cards that > aren't really that great. I have plenty of effective decks that > don't use any of the later cards, or that could easily swap in > an older version. > > I'm curious, which specific later edition cards are the newbies > missing that they _need_ to compete? > > Besides the cards that Derek Ray mentioned, there are cards like Direct Intervention, Recruitment, Tribute to the Master. None of which are necessarily better or worse than other cards. But when someone busts one out, the newbie will go neat! I want one. And then can't get one. And I want everyone to remember a few things. Not everyone playing Jyhad have net access, or are interested enough to go shop for teh stuff. In my playgroup, only 50% have net accesss, although all of them have bought cards on teh net. I don't think most participate in this forum however. And finally, if stores are not making money off of the game, then often they don't want to support the game, in the form of gaming space. So buying cards at the store, even if only a pack or two every time, is a good way to support the game, get your fix, and support your store. I'm rambling at this point, so I'll sign off. Thanks, Chris -- Chris Shorb, Monger of stuff Tammy Martin, Queen of the Eastern Marches, and damn good mom Alexander Shorb, little guy who could Shameless plug: <http://www.thethirdplanet.com/>

lor...@nospam.nineball.org (Derek S. Ray) writes: >The model for Magic is "Make money, make more money, continue making >money, and don't yank on that hook in the gamers' mouths TOO hard or >they'll notice we're just making money." Game balance doesn't appear >to have been an issue (I believe they followed your suggestion above >and rolled Black Lotus or an equivalent power-rare into newer sets - >players freaked because of the rarity problem. I only know what I've >heard from friends unfortunately - i refused to play Magic long ago.) Nope. They never did that. Certain people asked them to do it but they refused to reprint any card they deemed "unbalanced". Black Lotus is one such card. What *did* happen is that they were reprinting a number of very *popular* cards at one point (note the difference between "popular" and "overpowered" or, as you call them "power-rare" cards) and a lot of people whined about only that. This ultimately resulted in the creation of the "Reserved List", which spelled out just exactly when, where, and how many expansion cards might later be reprinted and guranteed that most rares never would be (including a means of identifying which rares those were after a while). Fred

This is a reply concidering the whole thread: Of course it sucks that there are cards in short supply (e.g. Sabbat/AH) but allthough some clans/disciplines are some what less playable, still the basic set is the one to use. I find that most of my decks are just spiced up by the later sets. A couple of cards which are "the most powerfull" are: *WWEF *Minion Tap *5th tradition *2nd tradition *GtU etc.etc.etc. It would be great to have acces to all cards on an equal basis, but wouldn't it take away some of the 'Collectible' part? This plus the fact that THE best thing about Jyhad/V:tes is the fact that the most powerfull cards are the common cards and the unc. cards. One thing I disliked about Sabbat was the fact that WotC deterred from that path and made Rares that are so powerfull/unbalancing without mayor drawbacks. But this all means that even if you don't have acces to the Rares, you still can trade for the commons/unc.'s. (or in my case give some of the cards away for free to the newbies,.... don't I feel good about myself <sigh>) I feel that one of the problems today caused by the short supply is that it pushes new players away from the game as they can't get the cards they see others using without spending a lot of money on singles. That's why I totally agree with the comment on sharing the cards with newbies, or even trading them for less than usual. I mean: the more players the merrier and come on: it's just a card game! It is about interaction and a bunch of people getting together. If you can get new players interested for this great game, share and help them. Once WotC/Hasbro sees that there are more and more new players getting into this game they might concider reprints and speed up the release of new series as the game will become a beter investment for them. And yes I would buy at least two boxes of Sabbat if it would be reprinted, but that's because I'm a V:tes Junkie. In reality I've probably spend $1000 on V:tes in the last 4-5 years but buying the cards did not enhance my fun, but simply sped up getting the cards I want, but then without the interaction of trading. (boxes in holland went for about ($125 per box) Okay enough of my rambling, LET THE JYHAD RAGE!! greetings, Tim Eijpe Prince of Utrecht The Netherlands Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Before you buy.