Need help with this Gangrel deck

I made this deck inspired by the winning deck of the TWD - FIRST BLOOD tournament, customizing it. Can anyone suggest me some improvements? Or strategy to play it best? I love this deck, but unfortunately I consume pool counters too quickly in every game. And I get ousted from the game by running out of resources very quickly.I usually start by waking Ingrid to get more transfers. Then going to wake Xaviar, and in the end Stanislava when the prey is weakened to complete the job with the '+2 bleed'. The other players in the local store where I play advised me to wake only two vampire for game, Xaviar and Stanislava, to get more votes. And wake Ingrid only in case more transfers are needed. Would that be a good tactic? Crypt (12 cards; Capacity min=9 max=11 avg=10.) ================== 3x Ingrid Rossler Gangrel:2 4x Stanislava Gangrel:2 5x Xaviar (ADV) Gangrel:3 Library: 90 cards Master (17 cards) ================== 1x Ennoia's Theater 1x Giant's Blood 1x Information Highway 1x Mob Connections 1x Monastery of Shadows 1x Pentex(TM) Subversion 1x Backways 7x Villein 2x Dreams of the Sphinx 1x Ecoterrorists Action (5 cards) ================== 5x Deep Song Action Modifier (9 cards) ================== 5x Freak Drive 4x Earth Control Action Modifier/Combat (2 cards) ================== 2x Predator's Transformation Political Action (17 cards) ================== 6x Anathema 2x Ancilla Empowerment 3x Parity Shift 1x Political Stranglehold 5x Alastor Combat (24 cards) ================== 4x Flesh of Marble 4x Hidden Strength 5x Indomitability 3x Taste of Vitae 8x Carrion Crows Retainer (2 cards) ================== 2x Dog Pack Equipment (3 cards) ================== 3x Assault Rifle Reaction (11 cards) ================== 6x Second Tradition: Domain 5x Sense the Savage Way Thanks all for the replies.

Before we start discussing about it, have you tried the 25th Anniversary deck? The crypt uses the same vampires (plus others) and rely on Dominate to bring out vampires and oust players. If you have tried it, what are the reasons you discard dominate and play Alastor/Anathema with that crypt? What do you like best? Prince of Paris, France Ratings Coordinator, Rules Director

No, I haven't tried playing the 25th deck (I own it, having bought it to get the cards needed to make this deck). I was thinking of adding 7 Govern to speed up awakenings from the uncontrolled region. But I would have to remove several cards to make space. I like Anathema, as it earns me life if I reduce the vampire with that card to 0 blood. Alastor, as he makes me search for an equipment and assign it, paying half the cost. And it allows me to do a direct action "enter combat with" (if I understand correctly).

Yes you understand correctly but what is your goal with this deck ? Bringing out all 3 vampires and destroying your opponnent's vampires with the additional benefit of gaining a lot of pool ? Doing all that seems cool on paper but it is a somewhat fragile strategy for different reasons : the first is a lot of moving parts : - having a big vampire out (justicar and inner circle are not cheap) - passing an alastor political action (need to not be blocked and have enough votes) - passing an anathema political action (again !) - entering combat with said target - empty the target the second problem is no less problematic : - burning your opponent vampires doesn't give you VP (which is how you win) and the last problem is what I consider to be the last nail that broke the camel back : - not all your opponents will have big juicy vampires you will want/need to destroy : some will have only small vampires and other mainly allies and small vamires in big numbers or any number of allies will be problematic for an alastor deck ( the 2 ancillas are a good start).

> the first is a lot of moving parts : > - empty the target > Especially with only 2 Dog Packs, you will not manage to burn vampires playing Strike: Combat Ends reliably. Since you need the pool to survive, you may die quickly, especially with no crypt acceleration and if you plan to bring Ingrid out first (who cannot play Alastor). > > the second problem is no less problematic : > - burning your opponent vampires doesn't give you VP (which is how you win) > That's the main problem. The 25th anniversary works the opposite: bring Stanislava out first because she can play everything at superior (so if you have an aggressive predator, you can still play your cards at their best), and most importantly, she can Govern down to bring out other vampire for a discount. And she can deflect, meaning a higher chance of survival. I'd suggest you give it a try to compare how the two decks behave. Alastor / Anathema is not bad, but 1/ probably with a different crypt that can play Psyche! (only Stanislava would be able to do with this crypt) 2/ you still need a plan to oust your prey. Prince of Paris, France Ratings Coordinator, Rules Director

> what is your goal with this deck ? > The goal is initially to weaken the prey, with combat. With anathema to try to get pool, but using anathema is a secondary strategy. And then when he is without vampires, eliminate the prey with bleed actions. Should I remove some Anathema bringing it to 4-5? removing other cards to can add 6-7 governs to speed up the crypt or to bleed? > > I'd suggest you give it a try to compare how the two decks behave. > I'll try, thanks for the advice.

As described below, this deck have many moving parts on the way to success: - Big caps => Slow influencing especially without governs, zillahs, highway - Your combat significantly rely on weapon from Alastor, but it's also tricky. => You may you have tiny stealth module. Not required to be a wall, just telepathic misdirection is enough. => High chances not to draw it in the first few turns at all. => Vote lock is also real, with highcaps (enemies will influence all they want also) + no vote gain. - Anathema pool gain is OK, but have it flaws: it's weak vs low-caps and if you got blocked by other minion (not only vampire, imagine nocturn / legionnaire) you (1) got no pool (2) lost a turn for 10-cap vampire requiring multiturn setup. - The plan "weaken the predator by turn 6 in the perfect scenario" then bleed the prey with base bleeds of avg. < 2 is very questionable, because... there are 3 other players on the table and your prey were free to do anything (no pool / combat pressure from you).

> smeeag wrote: > As described below, this deck have many moving parts on the way to success: > - Big caps > => Slow influencing especially without governs, zillahs, highway > So much this! Even the "normal" Stanislava deck tends to get low on pool. But it packs an awesome stealcth/anti-combat module and can really inflict a horrendous amount of pool damage during a turn. Love your Anatheme idea though. Stani is your main gun, she should always be brought up first. The "Govern chain" used to bring the next one(s) more cheaply and quickly. I've been pondering a combat Stani deck with the intention of torporizing and right away graverobbing vampires. Have serious doubts about it and it'll most likely be nowehre near as good as the "regular" Stani decks... If you haven't actually given a couple of tries to playing the 25th Anniversary deck I STRONGLY suggest you do a couple of times and hopefully notice that the deck will mostly flow like a dream and work so much better than your deck. It is only, like, in the handful of top Tier 1 decks... Finnish Politics!