I was looking at weird old decks based around a bunch of copies of a single card, and the classic Tremere/!Tremere Weenie Thaumaturgy Cryptic Mission deck caught my eye.
Wanting to put my own spin on things, I wanted to see if something similar with the Gangrel could be done. This would be the base of the deck. Does anyone have suggestions for a Master module? Or card ratios? Or combat module? Can anyone chime in and comment on the classic weenie Thaumaturgy deck and how that played and wins?
4x Anarch Convert -none- Caitiff:ANY
3x Frere Marc Gangrel antitribu:4
2x Jacob Fermor Gangrel:4
1x Shiloh Marie, Vengeance Gangrel:5
1x Celeste Lamontagne Gangrel antitribu:4
2x Crow Gangrel:5
Library: 37 cards
Master (2 cards)
2x Discipline: Thaumaturgy
Action (19 cards)
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4x Loki's Gift
5x Shattering
4x Tier of Souls
9x Cryptic Mission
Action Modifier (3 cards)
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3x CrimethInc.
Equipment (5 cards)
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1x Heart of Nizchetus
1x Palatial Estate
1x San Lorenzo de El Escorial, Spain
1x Dartmoor, England
1x Laptop Computer
Reaction (8 cards)
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8x Detect Authority?
Gangrel. Noddist. Camarilla. Once each turn, LivesByProxy may burn 1 blood to lose Protean until the end of the turn and gain your choice of superior Auspex , Obfuscate , or Potence for the current action.
> LivesByProxy wrote:
> Can anyone chime in and comment on the classic weenie Thaumaturgy deck and how that played and wins?
>
I find that the CM deck is quite weak. It can win on a mishap, but if it was "popular" in the 2000s, it's probably more due to a fantasy of playing 15 copies in the same deck and thinking it's going to be great.
Let's not be mistaken: the deck has won a few tournaments, but tournaments of no more than 15 people, and I guess it was in a relaxed atmosphere
Loki's Gift is clearly more interesting. Its attrition power is similar (i.e. low) but it can be played in a more opportunistic strategy by attritioning the right vampire at the right time. I play it for example in a weenie Gangrel vote, and the 2 votes boost allows to get some Praxis that consolidate the number of permanent votes.
Playing both imposes strong constraints on the crypt, for a result no better than playing exclusively CM or LG.
Prince of Paris, France
Ratings Coordinator, Rules Director
I played CM a bit, I must say Ankha's analysis is on point. A few things you may want to know about the CM archetype (from play experience): It needs at least 4 vampires, ideally 6+ minions out to be a threat (so weenies, all with ) It needs over 20 copies of CM to be able to take down multiple vampires (30 is not out of question). Society of Leopold helps bring down vampires. Being able to block hunts can also be strong. Vampiric Disease may be good addition depending on the meta (strong against multi-action decks) It bloats with a lot of Vessel/Blood Doll It uses Deflection for defence It bleeds to kill, some Computer Hacking, Govern and/or Conditioning, once your prey does not have the blood anymore to bounce. It is strong against allies Some allies or vampires with CM ability do help (Kyoko, Impundulu, Gregory Winter, Young Bloods) It works best with an even number of players (4 players, duel) because of the stable continuum. So it's stronger in small tournaments with more 4 players tables. If it makes it to the duel, it has a good chance to win.
Still, it is a slow build, the forward power is low, and it takes time to take down a single vampire. More often than not, it just grinds a bit then dies. It needs perfect seating to win. (If the prey is a wall, it dies. If the predators plays politics, it dies. Bloat decks like Girls are crazy hard to take down).
The archetype did win a 41-players tournament in 2002 (UK qualifier): codex-of-the-damned.org/en/deck-search.html?cards=Cryptic+Mission&threshold25=true&id=2k2ukqualifier
Note that 41 players means that had the maximum number of tables of 4 players (4).
> lip wrote:
> I played CM a bit...
>
I'm curious if that was recently. In the era of "every vampire gets Villeined for 5," blood denial seems pretty good.
> Kushiel wrote:
>
> > lip wrote:
> > I played CM a bit...
> >
> I'm curious if that was recently. In the era of "every vampire gets Villeined for 5," blood denial seems pretty good.
>
Yeah... but doing it 1 by 1 using a card and an action each single time ???
It has never been an efficient strategy...
If you want to do "blood denial", why not :
bum's rush
torn signpost
taste of vitae
You have 3 cards for 3 damages + leech
And only 1 action !
And it can send vampires to torpor (which CM does NOT)
My example is extreme because weenie is not a very strong strategy nowadays for a lot of very good reasons. But IMO, CM is a worst strategy for a lot of also very good reason... (primarily because of cards and actions economy)
EDITH :
If you want a better example, see shattering crescendo with 1 action and 3 cards (using a missing voice for the stealth) you have double the damage of 3 actions and 3 cards using CM. And again, it is DAMAGE and not burn blood which can send vampires to torpor remember
> Kushiel wrote:
>
> > lip wrote:
> > I played CM a bit...
> >
> I'm curious if that was recently. In the era of "every vampire gets Villeined for 5," blood denial seems pretty good.
>
Well, I regularly play online against strong player. Once they see what you’re playing they adapt fast and adjust the villein amounts. Also the table is often happy to let you die first and you don’t have a strong defense. Finally, in the days of the legion many decks are fitted to play against swarms of minions and that doesn’t help. If a deck can handle the legion, it can usually destroy your little Tremere troops ☺︎
I don't see the point in mixing Cryptic Mission with Loki's Gift. It makes your crypt awkward to play 2 cards that are essentially duplicates instead of having synergies. You lose compared to a normal weenie Tremere and you lose Hunt synergies compared to a dedicated Loki's Gift deck so it looks weaker than either option.