A CL related question.

Why is stealth and Bleed (S&B) broken under CL? I've been pondering over it for a while now and I'm not sure why it can be so much more broken under CL than NL (this is not an attack, I am looking for a clear answer here). People have been arguing against S&B saying how badly broken it is under CL, and I agree it is pretty deadly. But I just can't see how NL makes this any better. The way I understand it NL is better because it allows you more defence against S&B. That sounded ok at first, but when you start to think about it I'm not so sure. The possible defences, as I see them (I may miss a few here, so please remind me) are: Bounce Intercept Rush Reduce Blood Gain Race Hand Jam Now, as far as I can see there is very little difference between CL decks and BL decks when it comes to these different defences: Bounce: 8 or 16 cards in an 80 or 90 card deck seems a reasonable amount of bounce (maybe I'm wrong; how much bounce does an 80-90 card bounce deck typically have?) Intercept: With the amount of intercept in the game I can't see how Auspex intercept is any worse under Cl than under NL, with so much available the limits on cards becomes a bit pointless as they will be measured more as a percentage of the deck size. Rush: Now this is a point that I'm the least sure about. Since the Sabbat there has been a new rush action, effectively giving another 4 rush cards, and optimisation of rush strategies through Haven uncovereds, and various clan specific strategies (Bloodhunts, Contracts, Political Struggles, Mononomancy). Reduce: Well, okay, so with only 4 telepathic counters reducing the bleeds seems less practical under CL than not, but do many people base a bleed defense strategy soley around bleed reduction? I would have thought that it would be in more as a supplimentary to bounce or intercept (well, that's what its does in CL anyway). Blood Gain: Now, this seems to be a dubious tactic, and I'd like to know exactly how it works. Most CL decks I have played with are very good at gaining blood back anyway. I would have thought that has blood gain as a main tactic would be very dull to play both with and against. Race: Now I have seen two descriptions of this and I can only guess which one it is. The first description, and the least likely, is that Malks will not bleed other malks etc; this seems a little naive so I suspect its not the proper description. The second description is that you can oust someone as quick as you are likely to be ousted, although the description is very unclear. This tactic seems very obvious, but no deck I've seen is as fast as a Stealth and bleed deck, and so you'll probably loose the race. Hand Jam: This seems a fairly suicidal tactic; it leaves your offense completely wasted as you normally will only have out on or two vampires. (Please let me know how you can do this effectively). Anything else that I've missed? awaiting enlightenment.... Ben,

GEN...@leeds.ac.uk (B.D. Redmond) writes: >Why is stealth and Bleed (S&B) broken under CL? >The way I understand it NL is better because it allows you more defence >against S&B. That sounded ok at first, but when you start to think about it >I'm not so sure. >The possible defences, as I see them (I may miss a few here, so please >remind me) are: >Bounce: 8 or 16 cards in an 80 or 90 card deck seems a reasonable amount of >bounce (maybe I'm wrong; how much bounce does an 80-90 card bounce deck >typically have?) Unless you have *both* auspex and dominate, you max out at 8 (thanks to the new Sabbat deflection). Without Sabbat (when most of the arguments for/against NL/CL that your draw from were made), you max out at 8 only if you have both skills. >Intercept: With the amount of intercept in the game I can't see how Auspex >intercept is any worse under Cl than under NL, with so much available the >limits on cards becomes a bit pointless as they will be measured more as a >percentage of the deck size. True. Auspex Intercept is immune from CL as much as S&B is. >Rush: Now this is a point that I'm the least sure about. Since the Sabbat >there has been a new rush action, effectively giving another 4 rush cards, >and optimisation of rush strategies through Haven uncovereds, and various >clan specific strategies (Bloodhunts, Contracts, Political Struggles, >Mononomancy). Before the Sabbat, you had 8 cards, giving you approximately a dozen potential forced combats in your entire library. This is enough to oust one (maybe two) methuselah - if you can burn though your library that fast. The alternative methods require Princes, votes, or specific clans. A typical deck will only be able to use at most one of these methods (unless it waters down the combat enough to make politics possible - but then it has difficulty winning combat once it gets into combat). >Reduce: Well, okay, so with only 4 telepathic counters reducing the bleeds >seems less practical under CL than not, but do many people base a bleed >defense strategy soley around bleed reduction? I would have thought that it >would be in more as a supplimentary to bounce or intercept (well, that's >what its does in CL anyway). Regardless of how "popular" the defense is, it is not possible under CL. >Blood Gain: Now, this seems to be a dubious tactic, and I'd like to know >exactly how it works. Most CL decks I have played with are very good at >gaining blood back anyway. I would have thought that has blood gain as a >main tactic would be very dull to play both with and against. Princes, 5th Tradition, Minion Tap (augment 5th Tradition with Voter Cap if you plan a political deck). "Dull" is not a consideration when the opponent is a S&B :-) >Race: Now I have seen two descriptions of this and I can only guess which >one it is. The first description, and the least likely, is that Malks will >not bleed other malks etc; this seems a little naive so I suspect its not >the proper description. The second description is that you can oust someone >as quick as you are likely to be ousted, although the description is very >unclear. This tactic seems very obvious, but no deck I've seen is as fast as >a Stealth and bleed deck, and so you'll probably loose the race. Another S&B deck is as fast. Some political (Conserv. Agit) decks are as fast - and have blood gain potential to boot. >Hand Jam: This seems a fairly suicidal tactic; it leaves your offense >completely wasted as you normally will only have out on or two vampires. >(Please let me know how you can do this effectively). This tactic is usually used to supplement a blood gain defense. -- L. Scott Johnson (sjoh...@math.sc.edu) | * <-- Tribble http://www.math.sc.edu/cgi-bin/sjohnson/home | o <-- Jean-Luc Tribble Graphics Specialist and V:tES Rulemonger. |

B.D. Redmond wrote: "I've been pondering over it for a while now and I'm not sure why it can be so much more broken under CL than NL (this is not an attack, I am looking for a clear answer here). People have been arguing against S&B saying how badly broken it is under CL, and I agree it is pretty deadly. But I just can't see how NL makes this any better." The important point to realize here is not that S+B is "Broken" under CL, but that S+B is completely unhindered under CL while most other decks are. As a result, S+B decks work perfectly well unders CL rules while most other decks just can't get going, so it seems that S+B is "Broken". With the standard CL of 4, a Malkavian S+B deck can have (from just the basic set): 4 Bonding 4 Conditioning 4 Threats 4 Govern The Unaligned 4 Computer Hacking 4 Lost in Crowds 4 Cloak the Gathering 4 Faceless Night 4 Spying Mission 4 Mask K Faces 4 Psychic Veil ect. These cards will make a really quick very effective S+B deck that is completely unhindered by the fact that there is a 4CL imposed upon the environment. Add in the expansion cards, and you can eaisly make a 90 card deck with no more than 4 of any card and never run into any lack of needed cards. On the other hand, most non S+B decks suffer from a lack of the redundancy that Obfuscate and Dominate have. Obfuscate and Dominate have a great deal of redundancy in variation cards because they are almost all Action Modifier cards, and because you can only use one of each particular Action Mod per action, there is a reason to have such redundancy. Most of the other disciplines do not have this much redundancy, as there is no need for it under the actual rules (NL). Without this redundancy, a Rush deck can only have 4 Bum Rush and 4 Haven Uncovered to get into combat, and a Rush deck that is crippled like this cannot compete with a S+B deck that is not hamstrung in the same manner. Without this redundancy, a deck cannot rely on Deflection as a defense, as there are only 4. Without this redundancy, a vote deck will only have 4 KRC and 4 CA, amking it far less reliable at killing its prey than a S+B deck. You get the point. Under 4CL, S+B works just as good as it will under NL. Sadly, under 4CL, all other decks do not work as well as they would under NL, so S+B seems overly powerful (because it is in that enviornment). I left out all of the new Sabbat cards out of these comments, because Sabbat did quite a bit to loosen up the 4CL with all of its redundant cards (like Ambush and Redirection), to the point that there is really no reason (IMO) to continue to use 4CL, as it is now a 8CL for the most part, and thus almost just like NL. Sadly, it still does nothing to fix the biggest problems of Jyhad-Repeat Actions and Vote Pushing. Peter D Bakija PD...@aol.com "You haven't seen 'Yojimbo'?" -Mulder

B.D Redmond wrote: "Hand Jam: This seems a fairly suicidal tactic; it leaves your offense completely wasted as you normally will only have out on or two vampires. (Please let me know how you can do this effectively)." The concept of "Hand Jam" as a defense is something of a misunderstanding of the concept. If you know you have no hope of blocking your S+B predator when they come to bleed you, never try to block. Thus, all of their stealth cards will clog up their hand and slow down their bleeds. Hand Jamming a S+B deck is not a active defense tactic, it is just sort of common sense that has an effect on the game. If, for instance, you are playing a good Rush deck, you probably won't have much, if any, intercept in your deck. If this is the case, why try to block a bleed by a Malkavian? They will just get to play a stealth card that would otherwise be sitting in their hand doing nothing and taking up space. By giving them an opportunity to play it, they get to replace it with what may very well be a Conditioning. Unless you have a reasonbly good chance of blocking (like you are playing an Intercept deck...), don't every try to block a S+B deck. It slows them down after the first couple of bleeds, as all of their stealth does them no good at all. This is the same school of thought that will have you realize that you don't really need Wakes in every deck. If you are always tapped out and have no intercept in your deck, why have Wakes? By the same idea, if you can't block a stealthy action, why try to block? Hand Jamming a S+B deck is not a sure thing, but you lose nothing by not blocking actions you probably couldn't intercept anyway, and very possibly gain somthing by doing so (jaming you predators hand). [ quoted text not captured ]