Contesting

As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Ian Forrestal, I go 4th, on my second turn I play him. My predator on his next turn influences Ian Forrestal into play with the caveat, "damn we're gonna contest" and "sorry man gotta do it" and "deck is based on Ian". I know we are both going to lose. I can't stop it. It is turn 3 and I know my game is FUBAR.

[ quoted text not captured ] http://deckserver.net/jol3/13th Lucky Bullet

[ quoted text not captured ] But, but, that isn't random! And someone chose to make you both lose! And the penalty is perfectly reasonable and you shouldn't have been playing a deck that uses such a popular minion in the first place! :-) (Note smiley) -Peter

On Aug 10, 8:37 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Ian > Forrestal, I go 4th, on my second turn I play him. Great proof. Not sure that anyone ever doubted it though. > My predator on his next turn influences Ian Forrestal into play with > the caveat, "damn we're gonna contest" and "sorry man gotta do it" > and "deck is based on Ian". > > I know we are both going to lose. I can't stop it. It is turn 3 and I > know my game is FUBAR. Consider that Ian could've bled you for more than those 8 pool + 1 each turn. You're in a great position, unless your deck is so dependent on Ian that you can't do anything without him.

>unless your deck is so >dependent on Ian that you can't do anything without him. Someone who builds a deck around one vampire deserves to get contested and lose. Why don't we address the benefits that deck has in every other game it plays that give it an advantage to win since it has no problems getting a marginal crypt, once that is done let's reduce the penalty for focusing on one vampire.

On Aug 10, 3:00 pm, Obtenebration <obtenebrat...@obtenebration.org> wrote: > >unless your deck is so > >dependent on Ian that you can't do anything without him. > > Someone who builds a deck around one vampire deserves to get contested > and lose. How is getting your 8-cap contested as soon as you put him into play "building a deck around one vampire"? I am not seeing that anywhere in my post, nor in the game that I was playing. Please explain.

On Aug 10, 10:24 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > I know we are both going to lose. I can't stop it. It is turn 3 and I > > > know my game is FUBAR. > > > Consider that Ian could've bled you for more than those 8 pool + 1 > > each turn. You're in a great position, unless your deck is so > > dependent on Ian that you can't do anything without him. > > Huh? It means that if your predator was allowed to have Ian Forestal, you'd lose more than 1 pool each turn (if your predator plays a decent deck, xe should be able to do an average of 2+ pool damage to you each turn). You're in the winning position of the two mentioned players (assuming your deck can handle not having your star vampire for a while, otherwise it's obvious who to blame for your loss).

On Aug 10, 3:35 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 10, 10:24 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > > > I know we are both going to lose. I can't stop it. It is turn 3 and I > > > > know my game is FUBAR. > > > > Consider that Ian could've bled you for more than those 8 pool + 1 > > > each turn. You're in a great position, unless your deck is so > > > dependent on Ian that you can't do anything without him. > > > Huh? > > It means that if your predator was allowed to have Ian Forestal, you'd > lose more than 1 pool each turn (if your predator plays a decent deck, > xe should be able to do an average of 2+ pool damage to you each > turn). And if I had Ian Forrestal, I would have been able to handle it. But since we were contesting, I wasn't. What is your point? > You're in the winning position of the two mentioned players (assuming > your deck can handle not having your star vampire for a while, > otherwise it's obvious who to blame for your loss). Oh, my predator died in about 4 turns which was exactly what I told him would happen. He died before me. I still didn't enjoy the game very much, which is why I play VTES, you know, to have fun...

On Aug 10, 10:39 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > On Aug 10, 3:35 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Aug 10, 10:24 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > > > > I know we are both going to lose. I can't stop it. It is turn 3 and I > > > > > know my game is FUBAR. > > > > > Consider that Ian could've bled you for more than those 8 pool + 1 > > > > each turn. You're in a great position, unless your deck is so > > > > dependent on Ian that you can't do anything without him. > > > > Huh? > > > It means that if your predator was allowed to have Ian Forestal, you'd > > lose more than 1 pool each turn (if your predator plays a decent deck, > > xe should be able to do an average of 2+ pool damage to you each > > turn). > > And if I had Ian Forrestal, I would have been able to handle it. But > since we were contesting, I wasn't. > > What is your point? That paying 1 pool is better than paying 2+. > > You're in the winning position of the two mentioned players (assuming > > your deck can handle not having your star vampire for a while, > > otherwise it's obvious who to blame for your loss). > > Oh, my predator died in about 4 turns which was exactly what I told > him would happen. He died before me. Then you got Ian back. Sounds like a manageable situation. > I still didn't enjoy the game > very much, which is why I play VTES, you know, to have fun... Don't play with asshats that contests out of stupidness.

On Aug 10, 3:43 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 10, 10:39 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > > > On Aug 10, 3:35 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > On Aug 10, 10:24 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > > > > > I know we are both going to lose. I can't stop it. It is turn 3 and I > > > > > > know my game is FUBAR. > > > > > > Consider that Ian could've bled you for more than those 8 pool + 1 > > > > > each turn. You're in a great position, unless your deck is so > > > > > dependent on Ian that you can't do anything without him. > > > > > Huh? > > > > It means that if your predator was allowed to have Ian Forestal, you'd > > > lose more than 1 pool each turn (if your predator plays a decent deck, > > > xe should be able to do an average of 2+ pool damage to you each > > > turn). > > > And if I had Ian Forrestal, I would have been able to handle it. But > > since we were contesting, I wasn't. > > > What is your point? > > That paying 1 pool is better than paying 2+. ....which is ironic, since I had just paid 8, you know. > > > You're in the winning position of the two mentioned players (assuming > > > your deck can handle not having your star vampire for a while, > > > otherwise it's obvious who to blame for your loss). > > > Oh, my predator died in about 4 turns which was exactly what I told > > him would happen. He died before me. > > Then you got Ian back. Sounds like a manageable situation. Oh yeah, you know it was. There were only 2 1st Traditions sitting on the table when I did. > > I still didn't enjoy the game > > very much, which is why I play VTES, you know, to have fun... > > Don't play with asshats that contests out of stupidness. So, it's a demonstrable problem and you still want to chalk it up to the "asshat" factor. I think it is a rules problem....really.

On Aug 10, 10:49 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > I still didn't enjoy the game > > > very much, which is why I play VTES, you know, to have fun... > > > Don't play with asshats that contests out of stupidness. > > So, it's a demonstrable problem and you still want to chalk it up to > the "asshat" factor. Yeah. If the contest did nothing else than making you both lose it's your predator's stupidness that got you there. I think the problem is mostly that your deck couldn't handle being without Ian. I'm not saying contesting didn't make your situation worse. It did, and I think contesting is supposed to work exactly that way. If you couldn't handle not having Ian for 4 turns, that's not at all a rules problem. Really. People contesting for no reason are the same people that stealthes through a bounced bleed and ousts crosstable because the "need to cycle cards". Or that burns their grand predator's Ian with Goratrix Adv. > I think it is a rules problem....really. I think it's an attitude problem....really.

On Aug 10, 4:00 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 10, 10:49 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > > > I still didn't enjoy the game > > > > very much, which is why I play VTES, you know, to have fun... > > > > Don't play with asshats that contests out of stupidness. > > > So, it's a demonstrable problem and you still want to chalk it up to > > the "asshat" factor. > > Yeah. If the contest did nothing else than making you both lose it's > your predator's stupidness that got you there. I think the problem is > mostly that your deck couldn't handle being without Ian. > I'm not saying contesting didn't make your situation worse. It did, > and I think contesting is supposed to work exactly that way. If you > couldn't handle not having Ian for 4 turns, that's not at all a rules > problem. Really. My deck couldn't deal with contesting AND someone laying down 1st Traditions on the other side of the table with 5 cap princes. One or the other, I might have been able to deal with, but with both of them it was just "GAME OVER". > People contesting for no reason are the same people that stealthes > through a bounced bleed and ousts crosstable because the "need to > cycle cards". Or that burns their grand predator's Ian with Goratrix > Adv. > > > I think it is a rules problem....really. > > I think it's an attitude problem....really. I think it is such a random event that almost never happens that players just don't have any experience with the difference between contesting library cards (i.e. the ivory bow) versus contesting vampires, especially 8 cap vampires. Everyone thinks its a brilliant play when you contest the ivory bow, because the cost is really insignifigant. Most players just don't have enough experience contesting vampires, so they think it is just like contesting the ivory bow. Which, of course, it is not. It is such an incredibly random event that it takes someone with many years of playing to have even experienced it enough to form an opinion on it.

On Aug 10, 5:00 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > Yeah. If the contest did nothing else than making you both lose it's > your predator's stupidness that got you there. I think the problem is > mostly that your deck couldn't handle being without Ian. I don't see Norm saying anywhere that *his* deck, being the one who brought out Ian first, couldn't function without Ian. What he said is that his predator, who decided *his* deck couldn't function without Ian, contested after Norm brought him out but before even doing anything with him. Yes, that's debatably an asshat move, but if predator hadn't done that, he's 7 pool down the tubes for a few turns and waiting a few more before he gets a real vampire up. (Similar to how Ben Kalb's deck, in that other ludicrously long thread, would have been just fine with a different vampire than Lutz, but was already 10 pool into getting Lutz ready to be out, so when Lutz then popped up cross table Ben was screwed whether or not he contested and thus screwed the other guy too.) Whether or not Norm needed Ian, specifically, once Ian was on the table and then got contested, what Norm needed was the 8 pool investment, plus the cost of contesting, plus the 2 turns, back. The rules provide no way of doing that. Let's assume Norm's predator picked the other option, and didn't contest - what he needed was some way to get back the investment before he just plain lost, then. Which doesn't exist, because contesting is too harsh. > I'm not saying contesting didn't make your situation worse. It did, > and I think contesting is supposed to work exactly that way. If you > couldn't handle not having Ian for 4 turns, that's not at all a rules > problem. Really. OK, how's this: whatever your first, fairly large, vampire is, you're 1 pool shy of bringing it out. And it pops up cross-table. Not a star for you, not a specific highly-popular vampire, just random chance. You're 8 pool into a 9-cap or something. How is that not a rules problem totally screwing your game over on pure randomness? > People contesting for no reason are the same people that stealthes > through a bounced bleed and ousts crosstable because the "need to > cycle cards". Or that burns their grand predator's Ian with Goratrix > Adv. And people that choose not to contest the vampire they've started putting pool onto just lose on their own, without taking someone with them, but that's still a big pile of no-fun, and unnecessarily harsh. - D.J.

On Aug 10, 11:28 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > People contesting for no reason are the same people that stealthes > > through a bounced bleed and ousts crosstable because the "need to > > cycle cards". Or that burns their grand predator's Ian with Goratrix > > Adv. > > > > I think it is a rules problem....really. > > > I think it's an attitude problem....really. > > I think it is such a random event that almost never happens that > players just don't have any experience with the difference between > contesting library cards (i.e. the ivory bow) versus contesting > vampires, especially 8 cap vampires. > > Everyone thinks its a brilliant play when you contest the ivory bow, > because the cost is really insignifigant. > > Most players just don't have enough experience contesting vampires, so > they think it is just like contesting the ivory bow. > > Which, of course, it is not. > > It is such an incredibly random event that it takes someone with many > years of playing to have even experienced it enough to form an opinion > on it. Sounds like you agree with this not being a rule problem. It could be somewhat fixed by changing the rules though, but in my eyes people should adapt to the rules and learn from mistakes instead (that goes out as much, or more, to your predator).

On Aug 10, 5:02 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 10, 11:28 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > > > > People contesting for no reason are the same people that stealthes > > > through a bounced bleed and ousts crosstable because the "need to > > > cycle cards". Or that burns their grand predator's Ian with Goratrix > > > Adv. > > > > > I think it is a rules problem....really. > > > > I think it's an attitude problem....really. > > > I think it is such a random event that almost never happens that > > players just don't have any experience with the difference between > > contesting library cards (i.e. the ivory bow) versus contesting > > vampires, especially 8 cap vampires. > > > Everyone thinks its a brilliant play when you contest the ivory bow, > > because the cost is really insignifigant. > > > Most players just don't have enough experience contesting vampires, so > > they think it is just like contesting the ivory bow. > > > Which, of course, it is not. > > > It is such an incredibly random event that it takes someone with many > > years of playing to have even experienced it enough to form an opinion > > on it. > > Sounds like you agree with this not being a rule problem. I think the rules are so harsh that it is an event to be avoided. I think we agree on that. > It could be somewhat fixed by changing the rules though, but in my > eyes people should adapt to the rules and learn from mistakes instead > (that goes out as much, or more, to your predator). I think that is is an event to be avoided, and it is an event that is so random and rare that even so-called "experienced players" have no real experience with it. Perhaps if it happened with increased frequency then people would understand how debilitating it is. How would you feel if the rule was changed to "All capacities are unique, if two vampires of the same capacity are brought into play then they contest"? I think that you would come to grips with it quite quickly if you experienced it more. Then you could strategically use contesting by playing skill cards on your vampires.

On Aug 10, 11:36 pm, "D.J." <dj...@comcast.net> wrote: > > Yeah. If the contest did nothing else than making you both lose it's > > your predator's stupidness that got you there. I think the problem is > > mostly that your deck couldn't handle being without Ian. > > I don't see Norm saying anywhere that *his* deck, being the one who > brought out Ian first, couldn't function without Ian. > > What he said is that his predator, who decided *his* deck couldn't > function without Ian, contested after Norm brought him out but before > even doing anything with him. Yes, that's debatably an asshat move, > but if predator hadn't done that, he's 7 pool down the tubes for a few > turns and waiting a few more before he gets a real vampire up. > (Similar to how Ben Kalb's deck, in that other ludicrously long > thread, would have been just fine with a different vampire than Lutz, > but was already 10 pool into getting Lutz ready to be out, so when > Lutz then popped up cross table Ben was screwed whether or not he > contested and thus screwed the other guy too.) > > Whether or not Norm needed Ian, specifically, once Ian was on the > table and then got contested, what Norm needed was the 8 pool > investment, plus the cost of contesting, plus the 2 turns, back. The > rules provide no way of doing that. Let's assume Norm's predator > picked the other option, and didn't contest - what he needed was some > way to get back the investment before he just plain lost, then. Which > doesn't exist, because contesting is too harsh. There is the transfer back rule, you know. I heard it was created for exactly those situations. Yes, it's tough. No, it's not impossible unless your deck was designed bad (as in "can't handle that specific situation"). > > I'm not saying contesting didn't make your situation worse. It did, > > and I think contesting is supposed to work exactly that way. If you > > couldn't handle not having Ian for 4 turns, that's not at all a rules > > problem. Really. > > OK, how's this: whatever your first, fairly large, vampire is, you're > 1 pool shy of bringing it out. And it pops up cross-table. Not a > star for you, not a specific highly-popular vampire, just random > chance. You're 8 pool into a 9-cap or something. A week back, in a casual game, my grand predator put up Anson. My predator played an Ansons deck as well. He changed vampire, got Volker and Nik out, rushed Anson and sent him to torpor and then ate Anson. Then he brought his own copy out and won the game. > How is that not a > rules problem totally screwing your game over on pure randomness? The game is about getting over randomness. When you build your deck you should consider the things you might encounter and design your deck to be able to handle as many as possible of those. Sometimes you will end up facing a deck that you can't handle. That's part of the game, and you have to try solving it from the crapplace you're in. You can build your deck so that it can handle a contest, and if you chose not to then you will most likely lose when the situation comes up. Just like you can build your deck so that it can handle an Animalism weenie, and if you chose not to then you will most likely lose when that one is your prey. Change your deck and playing style instead of the rules. > > People contesting for no reason are the same people that stealthes > > through a bounced bleed and ousts crosstable because the "need to > > cycle cards". Or that burns their grand predator's Ian with Goratrix > > Adv. > > And people that choose not to contest the vampire they've started > putting pool onto just lose on their own, without taking someone with > them, but that's still a big pile of no-fun, and unnecessarily harsh. And people who get their first vampire Brainwashed after 7 transfers can lose as well. Let's ban Brainwash. Cairo Airport Caitiff decks should be illegal as well. Or they could just get a different vampire out and do the best of the situation. And also consider that some tables are almost impossible to win (due to the random seating ending up giving you the "wrong" predator/prey/grand prey/grand predator. If you have the wrong deck in the wrong situation it'll suck. What situation is wrong depends on how what your deck was constructed to handle. But yeah, one could just blame the rules instead.

On Aug 11, 12:11 am, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > It is such an incredibly random event that it takes someone with many > > > years of playing to have even experienced it enough to form an opinion > > > on it. > > > Sounds like you agree with this not being a rule problem. > > I think the rules are so harsh that it is an event to be avoided. I > think we agree on that. We don't. I still think the contest rules are fine. > > It could be somewhat fixed by changing the rules though, but in my > > eyes people should adapt to the rules and learn from mistakes instead > > (that goes out as much, or more, to your predator). > > I think that is is an event to be avoided, and it is an event that is > so random and rare that even so-called "experienced players" have no > real experience with it. I think everyone in my playgroup have got some experiences with contesting. Good ones and bad ones. Even the ones who doesn't really play as frequently as most of us. And it's not too hard to think for 1-2 minutes and see some possible outcomes of a contest. Knowing if it'll be worth it though, that's as hard as knowing if your prey has that Deflection in her hand. > Perhaps if it happened with increased frequency then people would > understand how debilitating it is. How would you feel if the rule was > changed to "All capacities are unique, if two vampires of the same > capacity are brought into play then they contest"? I think that you > would come to grips with it quite quickly if you experienced it more. > Then you could strategically use contesting by playing skill cards on > your vampires. Well, yeah. If I ended up contesting every game I'd probably think that the rules were kinda crappy. But I don't, so that's irrelevant. Contesting happens from time to time, sometimes it saves my ass and sometimes it bites my ass. Just like Graverobbings, Renegade Garous or Parity Shifts. And I'm still not the one who wants to change stuff here so trying to bring forth new rules and pin them on me is silly.

On Aug 10, 5:24 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 12:11 am, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > > > It is such an incredibly random event that it takes someone with many > > > > years of playing to have even experienced it enough to form an opinion > > > > on it. > > > > Sounds like you agree with this not being a rule problem. > > > I think the rules are so harsh that it is an event to be avoided. I > > think we agree on that. > > We don't. I still think the contest rules are fine. So you don't want to avoid contesting vampires? > > > It could be somewhat fixed by changing the rules though, but in my > > > eyes people should adapt to the rules and learn from mistakes instead > > > (that goes out as much, or more, to your predator). > > > I think that is is an event to be avoided, and it is an event that is > > so random and rare that even so-called "experienced players" have no > > real experience with it. > > I think everyone in my playgroup have got some experiences with > contesting. Good ones and bad ones. Even the ones who doesn't really > play as frequently as most of us. And it's not too hard to think for > 1-2 minutes and see some possible outcomes of a contest. Knowing if > it'll be worth it though, that's as hard as knowing if your prey has > that Deflection in her hand. > > > Perhaps if it happened with increased frequency then people would > > understand how debilitating it is. How would you feel if the rule was > > changed to "All capacities are unique, if two vampires of the same > > capacity are brought into play then they contest"? I think that you > > would come to grips with it quite quickly if you experienced it more. > > Then you could strategically use contesting by playing skill cards on > > your vampires. > > Well, yeah. If I ended up contesting every game I'd probably think > that the rules were kinda crappy. But I don't, so that's irrelevant. > Contesting happens from time to time, sometimes it saves my ass and > sometimes it bites my ass. Just like Graverobbings, Renegade Garous or > Parity Shifts. Okay, we'll at least you can admit that if you had to deal with this rule all the time then it would be "kinda crappy" > And I'm still not the one who wants to change stuff here so trying to > bring forth new rules and pin them on me is silly. You need turn your paranoia dial back a little, because no one is trying ot pin anything on you.

On Aug 11, 12:40 am, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > On Aug 10, 5:24 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Aug 11, 12:11 am, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > > > > It is such an incredibly random event that it takes someone with many > > > > > years of playing to have even experienced it enough to form an opinion > > > > > on it. > > > > > Sounds like you agree with this not being a rule problem. > > > > I think the rules are so harsh that it is an event to be avoided. I > > > think we agree on that. > > > We don't. I still think the contest rules are fine. > > So you don't want to avoid contesting vampires? Well, yeah, in that sense. I thought you were talking about avoiding contesting in the rule-changing way. > > Well, yeah. If I ended up contesting every game I'd probably think > > that the rules were kinda crappy. But I don't, so that's irrelevant. > > Contesting happens from time to time, sometimes it saves my ass and > > sometimes it bites my ass. Just like Graverobbings, Renegade Garous or > > Parity Shifts. > > Okay, we'll at least you can admit that if you had to deal with this > rule all the time then it would be "kinda crappy" With your suggested rule, yes. I'd think a rule that made me lose the game if my starting hand consisted of 7 master cards would be kinda crappy as well. > > And I'm still not the one who wants to change stuff here so trying to > > bring forth new rules and pin them on me is silly. > > You need turn your paranoia dial back a little, because no one is > trying ot pin anything on you. Why did you use the example? Looked to me like it was some sort of attempt to turn my love for harsh contesting rules against me.

henrik wrote: > It could be somewhat fixed by changing the rules though, but in my > eyes people should adapt to the rules and learn from mistakes instead > (that goes out as much, or more, to your predator). Using unique minions in your crypt is not a mistake.

[$0.02] There are two issues working in this: - Decisions by players in game (taking the actions to Contest or not talking about what they need to bring out...) - Decisions by players out of game (Turbo-Baron Superstar, Anneke Sees All, etc) In Game Decisions: This is the same situation as having your cross-table stealth-up a flicked bleed for 5... thankyou very freakin much you jackass OR Player 1: You sonuva... I'm screwed! Player 2: I know, bleed for 6... Out of Game Decisions: I want to build an Anneke Sees All... do I bother about building the crypt to handle contest? Nah, nobody's going to do that... OR Hmm... Anneke... people LIKE Anneke. Time to build in a Plan B (sticks in handful of Eagle's Sights and maybe a Praxis Solomon) The contestation rules don't need to change. Playgroups need to realise how to use contesting Vampires as a tactical measure and how to AVOID it if it's not a deliberate tactical measure. That means different deckbuilding as well.

Juggernaut1981 wrote: > The contestation rules don't need to change. Playgroups need to > realise how to use contesting Vampires as a tactical measure and how > to AVOID it if it's not a deliberate tactical measure. That means > different deckbuilding as well. You can't avoid putting unique vampires in your crypt (not in any meaningful way).

[ quoted text not captured ] Not being able to handle contesting is, though. Or maybe not a mistake, but rather a calculated risk. Similar to not adding combat/ bleed/vote defense. How you handle a contest should probably be called an experience to learn from rather than a mistake as well. But that doesn't really change my point.

henrik wrote: > On Aug 11, 1:22 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> Using unique minions in your crypt is not a mistake. > > Not being able to handle contesting is, though. Or maybe not a > mistake, but rather a calculated risk. Similar to not adding combat/ > bleed/vote defense. No. Using unique vampires is not similar to omitting combat defense. At all. Then "handling contesting" is simply "making the best of an unreasonably bad turn of events that are beyond your control", where "the best" is "pretty bad" to "futile flailing"; we're not talking making lemonade here. > How you handle a contest should probably be called an experience to > learn from rather than a mistake as well. Sure. Like how you handle a temporary change of control into Return to Innocence or VP sniping with Dramatic Upheaval. Good learning experience. Suck it up. Stiff upper lip and all that. > But that doesn't really change my point. I reckon that's true.

[ quoted text not captured ] That is my core point. You cannot generally avoid unique vampires in your crypt (Tupdog & Hermanas excluded). So if your deck will topple into a cosmic pile of crap if you can't influence out Minion X... then maybe you need to work on your deck's Plan B. It is the same scenario for a deck as having a key vampire eaten/ torpored/Pentexed/Sense-Dep'd. How does your deck work when you HAVEN'T got Minion X?? Does it die? Does it faff around attempting to hunt-bloat until you can influence out Minion X? Does it do something else? This should be an extension of the thinking of "How does my Vote Deck oust a Wall-Prey? How do I keep myself safe from a rush-pred? How do I not die with this deck?" That's my position on contesting: build your decks so it doesn't hurt as much.

Juggernaut1981 wrote: > So if your deck will topple into a cosmic pile of crap if you can't > influence out Minion X... then maybe you need to work on your deck's > Plan B. Yeah. But not the point. The point is losing transfers and pool stuck idling on a still-uncontrolled vampire when someone else brings out that vampire. Now you've lost several turns (up to 3) of transfers, and all of that pool is out of your reach until you can afford to lose even more turns of transfers simply moving the pool back to where it was to begin with.

And if my Superstar gets rushed by Theo Bell while Rake is standing around and diablerised... I again am many turns behind, lost a pile of pool and now have many more turns before I'm on my feet again. In this position, I've not only lost the minion but the pool and transfers I have spent. That is in effect a far worse position than having to redraw pool for a minion I don't want to contest. In game, at least two people have to take actions and make decisions to make a contest happen. If the players around you keep on saying "its cause my deck won't work without XYZ" then maybe you should help them put a Plan B in the deck and learn to work around the situation.

Juggernaut1981 wrote: > And if my Superstar gets rushed by Theo Bell while Rake is standing > around and diablerised... I again am many turns behind, lost a pile of > pool and now have many more turns before I'm on my feet again. In > this position, I've not only lost the minion but the pool and > transfers I have spent. That is in effect a far worse position than > having to redraw pool for a minion I don't want to contest. Yeah, but that you can do something about (or are at least much more responsible for not being able to do anything about).

Juggernaut1981 wrote: > In game, at least two people have to take actions and make decisions > to make a contest happen. If the players around you keep on saying > "its cause my deck won't work without XYZ" then maybe you should help > them put a Plan B in the deck and learn to work around the situation. Yeah. And not the point. Even when you and your buddy agree not to contest, one of you is still randomly hosed (loss of transfers and impounding of pool).

> If you have the wrong deck in the wrong situation it'll suck. What > situation is wrong depends on how what your deck was constructed to > handle. > But yeah, one could just blame the rules instead. The contesting rule for crypt minions is indeed very harsh. The penalty for falling victim to this very random event is the (at least temporary) loss of a minion, the time invested in controlling that minion (that could have been used to control a different one), the investment of Pool for that minion, and continued loss of that minion and additional Pool for the duration of the contest. There is a high probability that the table will tilt drastically in favor of methuselahs NOT involved in the contest, for no other reason than that the contest exists. Saying that one should "build their library or crypt to deal with" a contest is not fair, IMO, because that means using your very limited resources to defend against something that is very unlikely. Do you play clan hosers in all your decks? You should, because you will probably see vampires that belong to clans in every game. Not having a clan hoser card for every clan in every deck is folly! My apologies for the sarcasm, but I think the fact that the punishment for contesting may not fit the crime has to be considered. What if the contestation rules for unique crypt minions (NOT unique library cards) were more along the lines of a Hostile Takeover? When a minion is contested, the involved methuselahs bid for control of that minion (starting with the methuselah who already controlled the minion). The winning bid is paid in Pool to the yielder, who then removes their in-play copy of the minion from the game, and burns any cards or counters that may have been on that minion. This accomplishes a few things: -It resolves the contest immediately -It provides some measure of compensation for the yielder -It adds an additional element of strategy to contesting a crypt minion -It does not "undo" time and resources invested without compensation It also uses a mechanic that is familiar to most players, and has been around a long time.

Wasn't there just another very long post on this very subject? I guess it's touched a nerve. Maybe instead of contesting, whenever you bring out a unique minion from your uncontrolled region, if there is already a copy of that minion, the other controller's copy gets sent back to the uncontrolled region like a Banishment. I'm sure this was suggested before, as were a multitude of ideas for dealing with the situation. Something like this really plays along to the theme of VTES - a tug of war between Methusalehs over the control of a vampire. In my play group in LA, I have seen the contestation issue come up four times in memory: 1. A complete newbie contested my Masika. I was playing a Masika star vampire deck. He didn't realize what would happen once his Masika came out. Nonetheless, he was in the same position as has been discussed - if he hadn't contested Masika, he still would have lost several turns and transfers. Of course, after he gave up the contestation, I got an Assault Rifle on Masika and my prey then used Serpentis to bring the other Masika out of the ash heap to contest him. I had to play kill through contestation as best I could. The game timed out, I think. I never in my life imagined that I would have to contest Masika. 2. A predator contested his prey's Gabrin. Both were ousted without gaining VPs. 3. My predator didn't bring out Anson because I already had him. It hurt his game a lot, but he could still function. I won the game. He couldn't or wouldn't contest because his predator was a stealth bleeder. 4. Someone else contested my Anson cross table just cause I think he was frustrated with the game and he didn't understand the contestation rules. Once he realized he couldn't get blood back from a contested vampire and I was going to pay the contest to the bitter end, he gave up. I got 1 VP that game. Hmm... Maybe this contestation thing isn't that rare after all. I would guess it happens in 5% of games. Doing something a little more dynamic than the current rules might be worth considering.

As predator I will always consider contesting cards with my prey. Not only am I depriving them of a resource but I am getting in a faux bleed for 1 in every turn. At the very least it may urge them to give up contestation immediately as they have recouped some use out of the card already (e.g. Minion Tapped previously) and allow both Methuselahs to continue playing without being hamstrung. It is interesting that these contestation discussions are centered around crypt fatties as the problem. Contest a weenie and the penalties are the same, however relinquishing control is not so problematic nor is contesting other unique minion or master cards. Contestation is a choice, not accounting for players bloody mindedness. Rules are fine as is.

On 10 août, 20:37, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Ian > Forrestal, I go 4th, on my second turn I play him. > > My predator on his next turn influences Ian Forrestal into play with > the caveat, "damn we're gonna contest" and "sorry man gotta do it" > and "deck is based on Ian". > > I know we are both going to lose. I can't stop it. It is turn 3 and I > know my game is FUBAR. Seems like your predator is playing badly. How is it different from a grand-prey putting a Parity Shift on you because someone threatened him with a rush if he didn't, or from an ally playing Scourge of the Enoichans at the start of the game while you play a Hermana Minor deck ? I even remember a silly predator rushing my 7-cap vampire on turn 2 with a 6-cap vampire, Amaranth my vampire and has his own one burned because of the blood hunt (because he didn"t realize his predator has some votes in hand). Does it need to be fixed?

Octagon wrote: > As predator I will always consider contesting cards with my prey. As your prey, I *love* it when you contest a vampire with me, since you still have a predator and I don't. Woot! :) Kevin M., Prince of Las Vegas "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 Please visit VTESville daily! http://vtesville.myminicity.com/

On Aug 11, 2:32 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> Using unique minions in your crypt is not a mistake. > > > Not being able to handle contesting is, though. Or maybe not a > > mistake, but rather a calculated risk. Similar to not adding combat/ > > bleed/vote defense. > > No. Using unique vampires is not similar to omitting combat defense. > At all. But building a deck that can't handle contesting is similar to building a deck that can't handle combat. > Then "handling contesting" is simply "making the best of an unreasonably bad > turn of events that are beyond your control", where "the best" is "pretty bad" > to "futile flailing"; we're not talking making lemonade here. I don't think the current rules are unreasonable. And the only thing that's beyond control is whether you'll sit at a table where contesting might happen. Just like it's beyond your control whether you'll sit at a table where there's a combat deck. And for the record, "the best" can very much mean "game win" when it comes to making the best of a contest situation. > > How you handle a contest should probably be called an experience to > > learn from rather than a mistake as well. > > Sure. Like how you handle a temporary change of control into Return to Innocence > or VP sniping with Dramatic Upheaval. Good learning experience. Suck it up. > Stiff upper lip and all that. Yes. Regarding Dramatic Upheaval I agree that the game is more fun without those cards, but that's more because they were being so commonly used (and in a way forced the rest of the players to play them too). I don't think the current contesting rules has that kind of problem. Return to Innocence was somewhat before my time as a serious player so I can't comment whether that change was good or bad, but combos that are too strong isn't what we're dealing with here either (just like we're not making lemonade).

Juggernaut1981 wrote: > On Aug 11, 3:09 pm, Octagon <aaron.con...@gmail.com> wrote: >> Contestation is a choice, not accounting for players bloody Yeah. And, again (as repeated way too many times already), not the point. Being in a situation where contestation is an issue for the vampire you've already spent time and resources on (but who yet remains uncontrolled) is the point. >> mindedness. Rules are fine as is. > +1 from me Neat.

henrik wrote: > I don't think the current rules are unreasonable. And neither do I. But that doesn't mean they can't be better. > And the only thing > that's beyond control is whether you'll sit at a table where > contesting might happen. Just like it's beyond your control whether > you'll sit at a table where there's a combat deck. Yeah. And, again, the latter is something you choose to address in your deck or not. There isn't any meaningful choice to be made to use unique crypt cards or not. > And for the record, "the best" can very much mean "game win" when it > comes to making the best of a contest situation. Yeah. The fates may align the planets that way. But in the common case (reasonable case), it's just a choice of bad and worse. > Regarding Dramatic Upheaval I agree that the game is more fun without > those cards, but that's more because they were being so commonly used > (and in a way forced the rest of the players to play them too). They were "unfun" when used to snipe regardless of how often that occured. If it happened in a game, it would be just as unfun for that game whether that was the only time the card was ever played in the history of the game or the card had been played six times in every game before.

On Aug 11, 12:45 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > henrik wrote: > > I don't think the current rules are unreasonable. > > And neither do I. > > But that doesn't mean they can't be better. Of course not. I could rephrase and say that I think the current rules are good though, and in no need of changing. > > And the only thing > > that's beyond control is whether you'll sit at a table where > > contesting might happen. Just like it's beyond your control whether > > you'll sit at a table where there's a combat deck. > > Yeah. > > And, again, the latter is something you choose to address in your deck or not. So is the sooner. You can build your deck so that the loss of those 2-3 turns and 4-10 pool does minimal damage to your game. Just like you can add combat defense so that those nasty combat cards/ weapons does minimal damage to your game. > There isn't any meaningful choice to be made to use unique crypt cards or not. I never said there was. Defending against contesting isn't about being 100% certain that you won't contest. Just like combat defence (in most cases) isn't about being 100% certain that won't get into combat. Both are about being able to handle a situation that might or might not come up during a game. Whether the situation does come up is out of your control (in both cases). > > And for the record, "the best" can very much mean "game win" when it > > comes to making the best of a contest situation. > > Yeah. The fates may align the planets that way. But in the common case > (reasonable case), it's just a choice of bad and worse. I've found deck building and table talk to work better than astrology when it comes to handling contests. My experience is that it's a choice of bad or better, in the common case. > > Regarding Dramatic Upheaval I agree that the game is more fun without > > those cards, but that's more because they were being so commonly used > > (and in a way forced the rest of the players to play them too). > > They were "unfun" when used to snipe regardless of how often that occured. I don't think they were really more "unfun" than bleed bounce, Parity Shifts, Domain Challenges or other stuff. As I said, the biggest problem I had was that they were so strong that loads of decks used them. They made the game less diverse, and thus more "unfun". During our tournaments there was at least 3 decks out of 10-12 that had those cards. > If it happened in a game, it would be just as unfun for that game whether that > was the only time the card was ever played in the history of the game or the > card had been played six times in every game before. I don't agree there. I get tired of games when they're the same every time. If all decks I faced would be Theo Bell rush decks, I'd think that was unfun. If I faced one Theo Bell rush deck in every 5 games, I don't think it's equally unfun. Sure, vp sniping is stronger than Theo Bell rush but I hope you can see my point.

> So is the sooner. > You can build your deck so that the loss of those 2-3 turns and 4-10 > pool does minimal damage to your game. > Just like you can add combat defense so that those nasty combat cards/ > weapons does minimal damage to your game. > > > There isn't any meaningful choice to be made to use unique crypt cards or not. > > I never said there was. Defending against contesting isn't about being > 100% certain that you won't contest. > Just like combat defence (in most cases) isn't about being 100% > certain that won't get into combat. > Both are about being able to handle a situation that might or might > not come up during a game. Whether the situation does come up is out > of your control (in both cases). As it is, a deck investing 2-3 turns on influencing out a minion, and having the 4-10 pool on it, the minion is of some importance to the deck. It still cripples the game you are wanting to play. Let's assume a hypothesis: You build a deck, and carefully select the minions you want to play, those that are rarely, if ever played, so you avoid contesting. You've taken the precautions to avoid contesting, correct? Let's even assume, that you play DOM/PRE-based crypt, so you can influence more minions out faster. You go third in transfers, and decide to get the biggest vampire in your crypt out, so you can Enchant/Govern to uncontrolled. Let's assume it's the 8cap, so you won't get it in 2 turns. Now, for some random hate coming from the planets being in the wrong alignment, someone else brings out the exact same vampire as you were influencing out. How could you prepare more against this? I'll remind you, you don't have a star vampire, the 8cap just happened to be the biggest/2nd biggest vampire in your crypt, and you decided that it's good enough for me to get my game rolling. And then you contest it, just out of sheer randomness. How could you have prepared against it?

On Aug 11, 1:32 pm, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > I never said there was. Defending against contesting isn't about being > > 100% certain that you won't contest. > > Just like combat defence (in most cases) isn't about being 100% > > certain that won't get into combat. > > Both are about being able to handle a situation that might or might > > not come up during a game. Whether the situation does come up is out > > of your control (in both cases). > > As it is, a deck investing 2-3 turns on influencing out a minion, and > having the 4-10 pool on it, the minion is of some importance to the > deck. It still cripples the game you are wanting to play. First, building your deck so that a 10 cap takes 3 turns to influence out isn't really great. Crypt acceleration and stuff should be used, and that will lessen the impact of a contest situation. Second, everything that every other player does will (at least possibly) in some way cripple the game you are wanting to play. > Let's assume a hypothesis: > > You build a deck, and carefully select the minions you want to play, > those that are rarely, if ever played, so you avoid contesting. You've > taken the precautions to avoid contesting, correct? One of the precautions, yeah. There are more ways that just considering the popularity of your minions. > Let's even assume, > that you play DOM/PRE-based crypt, so you can influence more minions > out faster. You go third in transfers, and decide to get the biggest > vampire in your crypt out, so you can Enchant/Govern to uncontrolled. > Let's assume it's the 8cap, so you won't get it in 2 turns. Now, for > some random hate coming from the planets being in the wrong alignment, > someone else brings out the exact same vampire as you were influencing > out. How could you prepare more against this? I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt construction). I could've played with Dreams of the Sphinx, Information Highway etc to get your minion out earlier. There are also a couple of different ways to handle the situations regardless of how I've prepared for it. > I'll remind you, you don't have a star vampire, the 8cap just happened > to be the biggest/2nd biggest vampire in your crypt, and you decided > that it's good enough for me to get my game rolling. And then you > contest it, just out of sheer randomness. How could you have prepared > against it? By making sure that your deck could handle a situation where your first vampire is removed from the game (via contest, combat, Brainwash etc). In the situation you describes, I made a judgement call. I'll go for my 8 cap even though it'll take me 3 turns. I knew that those 3 turns could be expensive, but I figured that if I'd get my 8 cap first I'd be in a better situation that if I started with a 3 cap. The random planetary hate you speak of could've just as easy gotten me bled for 12 during those 2 turns I spent influencing my 8 cap. Or I could've been Parity Shifted twice. The planets could've made my grand predator's Theo Bell rush, torporize and diablerize my 8 cap before my 4th turn.

On 11 elo, 15:02, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 1:32 pm, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > I never said there was. Defending against contesting isn't about being > > > 100% certain that you won't contest. > > > Just like combat defence (in most cases) isn't about being 100% > > > certain that won't get into combat. > > > Both are about being able to handle a situation that might or might > > > not come up during a game. Whether the situation does come up is out > > > of your control (in both cases). > > > As it is, a deck investing 2-3 turns on influencing out a minion, and > > having the 4-10 pool on it, the minion is of some importance to the > > deck. It still cripples the game you are wanting to play. > > First, building your deck so that a 10 cap takes 3 turns to influence > out isn't really great. Crypt acceleration and stuff should be used, > and that will lessen the impact of a contest situation. > Second, everything that every other player does will (at least > possibly) in some way cripple the game you are wanting to play. > And, you never draw your acceleration. Now it still takes 3 turns to get an 10cap out, more if you go first. > > Let's assume a hypothesis: > > > You build a deck, and carefully select the minions you want to play, > > those that are rarely, if ever played, so you avoid contesting. You've > > taken the precautions to avoid contesting, correct? > > One of the precautions, yeah. There are more ways that just > considering the popularity of your minions. Like what? This one is far the easiest and most secure way to avoid contestation. > > Let's even assume, > > that you play DOM/PRE-based crypt, so you can influence more minions > > out faster. You go third in transfers, and decide to get the biggest > > vampire in your crypt out, so you can Enchant/Govern to uncontrolled. > > Let's assume it's the 8cap, so you won't get it in 2 turns. Now, for > > some random hate coming from the planets being in the wrong alignment, > > someone else brings out the exact same vampire as you were influencing > > out. How could you prepare more against this? > > I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > construction). I could've played with Dreams of the Sphinx, > Information Highway etc to get your minion out earlier. > There are also a couple of different ways to handle the situations > regardless of how I've prepared for it. > Like I said, it's also likely that you never draw your acceleration, and it still takes 3 turns to get the 8cap out. And you are in a bad shape. > > I'll remind you, you don't have a star vampire, the 8cap just happened > > to be the biggest/2nd biggest vampire in your crypt, and you decided > > that it's good enough for me to get my game rolling. And then you > > contest it, just out of sheer randomness. How could you have prepared > > against it? > > By making sure that your deck could handle a situation where your > first vampire is removed from the game (via contest, combat, Brainwash > etc). > In the situation you describes, I made a judgement call. I'll go for > my 8 cap even though it'll take me 3 turns. I knew that those 3 turns > could be expensive, but I figured that if I'd get my 8 cap first I'd > be in a better situation that if I started with a 3 cap. > The random planetary hate you speak of could've just as easy gotten me > bled for 12 during those 2 turns I spent influencing my 8 cap. Or I > could've been Parity Shifted twice. > The planets could've made my grand predator's Theo Bell rush, > torporize and diablerize my 8 cap before my 4th turn. And how can you make sure of that? Include 4 DI's and 4 SR's in every deck you play, just in case you see Brainwash/SenseDep? The thing is, contesting has nothing to do with what the deck you play does, nor what the decks of other players do. It's just completely random hate from the universe. If you get bled for 12 in 2 turns, then your predator obviously has a deck that does what it's supposed to do. It has nothing to do with the randomness of contestation. Same goes for the Parity Shifts, the deck does what it's supposed to do. And the same goes for rushdecks. No deck in this game randomly removes/prevents you from gaining/using a minion without cards. If there's a card involved, then the deck obviously is supposed to do that at some degree, not dependant of how minor the amount of cards involved is.

henrik wrote: > I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > construction). So: don't play with more than three 5+ caps, else you might have no weenies in your opening draw. > I could've played with Dreams of the Sphinx, > Information Highway etc to get your minion out earlier. Heh. You know Dreams and Info Highway are unique (and each more popular than even the most popular vampire), right?

On 11 Aug, 00:15, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > > A week back, in a casual game, my grand predator put up Anson. My > predator played an Ansons deck as well. He changed vampire, got Volker > and Nik out, rushed Anson and sent him to torpor and then ate Anson. > Then he brought his own copy out and won the game. > Such lovely fun that was. Getting my Anson torporized and eaten. And getting myself humiliated. Good times... I think the main problem of this discussion is that many players don't understand deckbuilding. You build your deck, play it, and then get screwed. You then have 2 options when analysing why you lost. 1.) My deck isn't strong enough. I need to improve it and myself to be able to handle the game better. 2.) I got screwed over by some rule and bad luck. It's that rules fault I lost. You should never blame the rules when you loose a game. Sure, you should analyse them and comment if there's need for improvement. But first you have to be 100% sure the rules need improvement and that it's not a matter of you having to improve yourself. It's not a random thing that bad players get screwed by the rules and good players use them to their advantage. Regarding contesting vampires I would say it's about 50/50 when it's good for me to contest and when it's bad for me to contest. Current rules are in my opinion very good since they add strategic depth and presents you with problems that are very hard to solve, but still quite solvable. Regards Alex Swedish NC

On Aug 11, 8:02 am, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > First, building your deck so that a 10 cap takes 3 turns to influence > out isn't really great. And again, not really relevant. The game has 10 capacity vampires. Even though crypt acceleration exists, they should be playable on their own. At least in theory. > Crypt acceleration and stuff should be used, > and that will lessen the impact of a contest situation. Sure. But you don't always have crypt acceleration in your hand. No matter how well you build your deck (well, unless you got a deck made of 84 Zillah's Valley and 6 other cards...). > I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > construction). I could've played with Dreams of the Sphinx, > Information Highway etc to get your minion out earlier. And again, here you are saying "You need to make your decks less varied in the name of the rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". -Peter

_angst_ wrote: > I think the main problem of this discussion is that many players don't > understand deckbuilding. You build your deck, play it, and then get > screwed. You then have 2 options when analysing why you lost. > > 1.) My deck isn't strong enough. I need to improve it and myself to be > able to handle the game better. > 2.) I got screwed over by some rule and bad luck. It's that rules > fault I lost. > > You should never blame the rules when you loose a game. Sure, you > should analyse them and comment if there's need for improvement. But > first you have to be 100% sure the rules need improvement and that > it's not a matter of you having to improve yourself. Yeah. But that's not anywhere near this discussion. This discussion isn't about blame. Nor even about any particular game or player. > It's not a random thing that bad players get screwed by the rules and > good players use them to their advantage. How do you use the loss of two or three turns of transfers and the impounding of a quarter to a third of your pool to your advantage? You can (and should, and most players do) make the best of a bad situation, but you're not getting any advantage out of it -- you're still down those transfers and out the pool until you can sac some more transfers to put it back where it was to begin with. > Regarding contesting vampires I would say it's about 50/50 when it's > good for me to contest and when it's bad for me to contest. Current > rules are in my opinion very good since they add strategic depth and > presents you with problems that are very hard to solve, but still > quite solvable. So on the 50 in which it would be bad for you to contest and you've now lost those turns and have had your pool impounded, what advantage do you create? A rule that said each player rolls a d20 and starts with 10 pool plus whatever xe rolled would add strategic depth and present some players with problems that are hard to solve and still quite solvable.

On 11 Aug, 14:47, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > _angst_ wrote: > > I think the main problem of this discussion is that many players don't > > understand deckbuilding. You build your deck, play it, and then get > > screwed. You then have 2 options when analysing why you lost. > > > 1.) My deck isn't strong enough. I need to improve it and myself to be > > able to handle the game better. > > 2.) I got screwed over by some rule and bad luck. It's that rules > > fault I lost. > > > You should never blame the rules when you loose a game. Sure, you > > should analyse them and comment if there's need for improvement. But > > first you have to be 100% sure the rules need improvement and that > > it's not a matter of you having to improve yourself. > > Yeah. > > But that's not anywhere near this discussion. > > This discussion isn't about blame. Nor even about any particular game or player. > It seems to me that many people who call for changes in the rules do it due to blaming the rules for their old shortcomings. But you're right, the discussion in itself isn't about that. It's just something to be considered when someone wants to change something. > > It's not a random thing that bad players get screwed by the rules and > > good players use them to their advantage. > > How do you use the loss of two or three turns of transfers and the impounding of > a quarter to a third of your pool to your advantage? > > You can (and should, and most players do) make the best of a bad situation, but > you're not getting any advantage out of it -- you're still down those transfers > and out the pool until you can sac some more transfers to put it back where it > was to begin with. > Being weak can often be an advantage. It will move focus away from you and through diplomacy you can even make people help you more than they probably should since you're in such a weak spot. Also, if you'r contesting with your predator, those lost transfers and 1/pool a round can be a good deal if the contested vampire would be a big source for damage to you. > > Regarding contesting vampires I would say it's about 50/50 when it's > > good for me to contest and when it's bad for me to contest. Current > > rules are in my opinion very good since they add strategic depth and > > presents you with problems that are very hard to solve, but still > > quite solvable. > > So on the 50 in which it would be bad for you to contest and you've now lost > those turns and have had your pool impounded, what advantage do you create? > As I said. As long as your deck can handle to survive and do things wihout that vampire (for a while) being in the weak spot at the table can be a diplomatic advantage. Also cards like parity shift and con boon can be easier to pull through. > A rule that said each player rolls a d20 and starts with 10 pool plus whatever > xe rolled would add strategic depth and present some players with problems that > are hard to solve and still quite solvable. I don't see how this would be even close to the current rules regarding contest. Regards Alex

_angst_ wrote: > It seems to me that many people who call for changes in the rules do > it due to blaming the rules for their old shortcomings. But you're > right, the discussion in itself isn't about that. It's just something > to be considered when someone wants to change something. It's something to be considered when processing calls for change, perhaps. But it isn't useful when discussing a change. >> You can (and should, and most players do) make the best of a bad situation, but >> you're not getting any advantage out of it -- you're still down those transfers >> and out the pool until you can sac some more transfers to put it back where it >> was to begin with. > > Being weak can often be an advantage. It will move focus away from you > and through diplomacy you can even make people help you more than they > probably should since you're in such a weak spot. Um. Perhaps. But irrelevant. Social engineering bandages are no substitute for a proper rule. You could use social engineering to fix R2I or steal-blood-burns-a-vampire. > Also, if you'r contesting with your predator, those lost transfers and > 1/pool a round can be a good deal if the contested vampire would be a > big source for damage to you. Yeah. If. Might. There are cases where it can be to your advantage. Those aren't the cases under discussion. There are cases where it is simply a randomly-inflicted strict disadvantage, and the disadvantage is out of proportion to what it should be (and could be). [ quoted text not captured ] Well, it matches your position that being disadvantaged is an advantage. I would hope that it illustrates the flaw in that position, but YMMV.

On 11 elo, 16:38, _angst_ <a...@student.chalmers.se> wrote: > It seems to me that many people who call for changes in the rules do > it due to blaming the rules for their old shortcomings. But you're > right, the discussion in itself isn't about that. It's just something > to be considered when someone wants to change something. That goes both ways. I would seriously consider whether your position is based on the contesting rules being good enough or on your guesses about the motivation of those with an opposing view.

On Aug 11, 2:15 pm, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > As it is, a deck investing 2-3 turns on influencing out a minion, and > > > having the 4-10 pool on it, the minion is of some importance to the > > > deck. It still cripples the game you are wanting to play. > > > First, building your deck so that a 10 cap takes 3 turns to influence > > out isn't really great. Crypt acceleration and stuff should be used, > > and that will lessen the impact of a contest situation. > > Second, everything that every other player does will (at least > > possibly) in some way cripple the game you are wanting to play. > > And, you never draw your acceleration. Now it still takes 3 turns to > get an 10cap out, more if you go first. Just like you never draw combat defense and got sent to torpor before your first action with said 10 cap? Bad draws will always happen, and the only thing you can do is to settle for a ratio you think will work. Sometimes it won't work and all your Deflections will be in the last 15 cards of your library. That's how the shuffling and stuff works. > > > Let's assume a hypothesis: > > > > You build a deck, and carefully select the minions you want to play, > > > those that are rarely, if ever played, so you avoid contesting. You've > > > taken the precautions to avoid contesting, correct? > > > One of the precautions, yeah. There are more ways that just > > considering the popularity of your minions. > > Like what? This one is far the easiest and most secure way to avoid > contestation. The only way to avoid contestation is to play with non unique minions. There are a few ways to avoid getting an "instant game loss" due to early contesting though. The easiest one would probably be to, as I've mentioned before, make sure that your deck can handle it (assuming you have the fattest bad luck with card drawing as well). > > > Let's even assume, > > > that you play DOM/PRE-based crypt, so you can influence more minions > > > out faster. You go third in transfers, and decide to get the biggest > > > vampire in your crypt out, so you can Enchant/Govern to uncontrolled. > > > Let's assume it's the 8cap, so you won't get it in 2 turns. Now, for > > > some random hate coming from the planets being in the wrong alignment, > > > someone else brings out the exact same vampire as you were influencing > > > out. How could you prepare more against this? > > > I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > > construction). I could've played with Dreams of the Sphinx, > > Information Highway etc to get your minion out earlier. > > There are also a couple of different ways to handle the situations > > regardless of how I've prepared for it. > > Like I said, it's also likely that you never draw your acceleration, > and it still takes 3 turns to get the 8cap out. And you are in a bad > shape. Yes. I'm aware that there are no 100% guarantees that your deck will be able to handle everything, even if precautions are taken during deck building. If that's a big problem though, I think the library/ drawing system should be changed rather than the contesting rules. > > > I'll remind you, you don't have a star vampire, the 8cap just happened > > > to be the biggest/2nd biggest vampire in your crypt, and you decided > > > that it's good enough for me to get my game rolling. And then you > > > contest it, just out of sheer randomness. How could you have prepared > > > against it? > > > By making sure that your deck could handle a situation where your > > first vampire is removed from the game (via contest, combat, Brainwash > > etc). > > In the situation you describes, I made a judgement call. I'll go for > > my 8 cap even though it'll take me 3 turns. I knew that those 3 turns > > could be expensive, but I figured that if I'd get my 8 cap first I'd > > be in a better situation that if I started with a 3 cap. > > The random planetary hate you speak of could've just as easy gotten me > > bled for 12 during those 2 turns I spent influencing my 8 cap. Or I > > could've been Parity Shifted twice. > > The planets could've made my grand predator's Theo Bell rush, > > torporize and diablerize my 8 cap before my 4th turn. > > And how can you make sure of that? Include 4 DI's and 4 SR's in every > deck you play, just in case you see Brainwash/SenseDep? That's my point. You can't ever be sure that you won't lose to a certain thing. Luck will be involved in a game of V:tES. > The thing is, contesting has nothing to do with what the deck you play > does, nor what the decks of other players do. It's just completely > random hate from the universe. If you get bled for 12 in 2 turns, then > your predator obviously has a deck that does what it's supposed to do. > It has nothing to do with the randomness of contestation. Same goes > for the Parity Shifts, the deck does what it's supposed to do. And the > same goes for rushdecks. Yeah, contesting doesn't have much to do with the deck you play (other than certain minions having a higher risk of getting contested). How much you lose due to a contest is all about the deck you play though. > No deck in this game randomly removes/prevents you from gaining/using > a minion without cards. If there's a card involved, then the deck > obviously is supposed to do that at some degree, not dependant of how > minor the amount of cards involved is. I don't really see the difference between a card removing my minion or a rule in the rulebook doing it. The result is the same anyway, and I don't think it's too harsh in either situation.

On 11 Aug, 15:53, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > _angst_ wrote: > > It seems to me that many people who call for changes in the rules do > > it due to blaming the rules for their old shortcomings. But you're > > right, the discussion in itself isn't about that. It's just something > > to be considered when someone wants to change something. > > It's something to be considered when processing calls for change, perhaps. But > it isn't useful when discussing a change. > I thought we were discussing a call for a change and not a change. I don't see a reason to discuss a change since there is no reason to change anything. But that's just my opinion (and Henriks I guess, and about any person I've discussed this with IRL). > >> You can (and should, and most players do) make the best of a bad situation, but > >> you're not getting any advantage out of it -- you're still down those transfers > >> and out the pool until you can sac some more transfers to put it back where it > >> was to begin with. > > > Being weak can often be an advantage. It will move focus away from you > > and through diplomacy you can even make people help you more than they > > probably should since you're in such a weak spot. > > Um. Perhaps. But irrelevant. Social engineering bandages are no substitute for a > proper rule. > > You could use social engineering to fix R2I or steal-blood-burns-a-vampire. > The social part of this game is probably one of it's most important factors so I don't see why handling by social skill would be moot. Especially since I'm still claiming there is no need to change this rule since it mostly screws players because they're not good enough at this game. And being good at social engineering is a big part of being good at this game. It helps you handle alot of those situaions where you're at a very big disadvantage. > > Also, if you'r contesting with your predator, those lost transfers and > > 1/pool a round can be a good deal if the contested vampire would be a > > big source for damage to you. > > Yeah. If. Might. > > There are cases where it can be to your advantage. > Those aren't the cases under discussion. > > There are cases where it is simply a randomly-inflicted strict disadvantage, and > the disadvantage is out of proportion to what it should be (and could be). > IIRC you asked me to state a couple of situations where the loss of contesting would give you another advantage. Perhaps I got it wrong :( I don't see how it's randomly inflicted, ever. I don't think I've randomly contested anything ever. I've contested as part of a strategy several times though. The only random element I see is the seating element where I'm seated with someone who plays the same crypt as I do. And I don't see the difference between that and being seated with a weenie combat or weenie bleed predator. And even that is a random element that you have to be able to handle to be good at this game. You have to have a deck that allows you to play the odds and that allows you to play to your skills as a player. > >> A rule that said each player rolls a d20 and starts with 10 pool plus whatever > >> xe rolled would add strategic depth and present some players with problems that > >> are hard to solve and still quite solvable. > > > I don't see how this would be even close to the current rules > > regarding contest. > > Well, it matches your position that being disadvantaged is an advantage. I would > hope that it illustrates the flaw in that position, but YMMV. I sorry but I have no idea what YMMV means :( I told you it can sometimes be an advantage. Sometimes it's a disadvantage. And I don't think the current contest rules are random (more than current seating rules) so I don't see the connection to rolling a die. Regards Alex

On Aug 11, 2:26 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > henrik wrote: > > I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > > construction). > > So: don't play with more than three 5+ caps, else you might have no weenies in > your opening draw. That's a decent thumb rule if you're so afraid of a contest, yeah. Crypt acceleration can make up for higher caps as well. I'm not saying I always follow that rule though, but when I don't I'm well aware that an early contest might make me lose. It's a calculated risk. Just like I often play without vote defense in my decks and sometimes that bites my ass. > > I could've played with Dreams of the Sphinx, > > Information Highway etc to get your minion out earlier. > > Heh. You know Dreams and Info Highway are unique (and each more popular than > even the most popular vampire), right? I do. There are also Zillah's Valley, Coroner's Contact, The Eternals of Sirius and possibly more if one's afraid of contesting. That's why I added the "etc".

henrik wrote: > Yeah, contesting doesn't have much to do with the deck you play (other > than certain minions having a higher risk of getting contested). How > much you lose due to a contest is all about the deck you play though. OK. Try this: At the start of each game, roll a d100. A roll of 1 means you lose 8 pool (start with 22 pool instead of 30) and lose one of your uncontrolled minions (chosen at random, to be nice -- rather than choosing whichever one you would most like to bring out) and get no transfers on your first two turns. To balance this out, you get the ability to spend two transfers to gain 1 pool, but you can only do this 8 times in the game. Now, what does you deck have to do with how much you lose when you roll a 1?

On Aug 11, 2:46 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 8:02 am, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > First, building your deck so that a 10 cap takes 3 turns to influence > > out isn't really great. > > And again, not really relevant. The game has 10 capacity vampires. > Even though crypt acceleration exists, they should be playable on > their own. At least in theory. But they aren't. For a lot more reasons than contest rules. > > Crypt acceleration and stuff should be used, > > and that will lessen the impact of a contest situation. > > Sure. But you don't always have crypt acceleration in your hand. No > matter how well you build your deck (well, unless you got a deck made > of 84 Zillah's Valley and 6 other cards...). Sometimes you won't draw that 8 cap you wanted to influence out either. I don't see how that's relevant here though. Bad luck will sometimes give you the "wrong" cards and that'll make you lose. > > I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > > construction). I could've played with Dreams of the Sphinx, > > Information Highway etc to get your minion out earlier. > > And again, here you are saying "You need to make your decks less > varied in the name of the rule that is supposed to make decks more > varied". It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the [ quoted text not captured ]

henrik wrote: > On Aug 11, 2:26 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> henrik wrote: >>> I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt >>> construction). >> So: don't play with more than three 5+ caps, else you might have no weenies in >> your opening draw. > > That's a decent thumb rule if you're so afraid of a contest, yeah. But no one is "so afraid of a contest". > Crypt acceleration can make up for higher caps as well. > I'm not saying I always follow that rule though, but when I don't I'm > well aware that an early contest might make me lose. It's a calculated > risk. Just like I often play without vote defense in my decks and > sometimes that bites my ass. Sure. And it could still be a calculated risk even if the penalty being risked is appropriate rather than disproportionate.

[ quoted text not captured ] Nothing. But I'd sure as hell make decks that could survive even if I got a bad roll.

_angst_ wrote: > I don't see how it's randomly inflicted, ever. I don't think I've > randomly contested anything ever. Again, we're not talking about beginning the contest. We're talking about being at a table where the vampire you've spend 8 pool and 8 transfers on (and who is yet uncontrolled) is brought out into the ready region of another player. And that, as explained so many times already, is a random coincidence of fate.

[ quoted text not captured ] You seem to be arguing that contesting doesn't result in an automatic loss. Others seem to be arguing that contesting results in an unreasonable disadvantage. Every deck has a chance to survive contesting. Most decks are greatly disadvantaged if they contest a vampire.

[ quoted text not captured ] Please post the deck that isn't at a real disadvantage when rolling a 1 when the four other decks (created by equally-competent players) at the table roll numbers other than 1.

Considering table dynamics, I think unless you're up against a stubborn predator or poor cross table player, contesting is fine. As the prey, you should be able to table talk your predator, "We can contest X or I can choose not to influence him out if you give me X turns of relief." As predator, you can use the same table talk for your prey, "I won't go forward for X turns, if you choose not to contest." As someone on this newsgroup here said, contesting IS a choice. You cannot influence out both minions in the same turn if it's two different players. Even IF you're hosed cross table, you're not hopeless as you have cross table allies. No one wants to see their grandprey getting walked over if they can help it. Regarding illogical plays/asshat behaviors, well that comes down to VTES's problem. Yes you can lose games due to unforeseen plays that you don't agree with. But guess what? At a tournament, you just have to deal. Unless you ban all players that hasn't attained X level of skill, it will happen.

[ quoted text not captured ] Yes, but is it more random than getting seated with decks you can't handle? Anyways, if that's the thing we're discussing then I don't see why a change to the contest rule would be relevant. An addition of some kind of option in those cases is what we should discuss in that case. (I saw the no transfer back suggestion and I'm sorry to say it was horrible IMO). I this is a problem that is considered more random than seating in general (and I don't really think it is). Then why not just allow the player to remove said copy of the vamp from the game and get all the pool back? Regards Alex

_angst_ wrote: > On 11 Aug, 16:24, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> _angst_ wrote: >>> I don't see how it's randomly inflicted, ever. I don't think I've >>> randomly contested anything ever. >> Again, we're not talking about beginning the contest. >> >> We're talking about being at a table where the vampire you've spend 8 pool and 8 >> transfers on (and who is yet uncontrolled) is brought out into the ready region >> of another player. >> >> And that, as explained so many times already, is a random coincidence of fate. > > Yes, but is it more random than getting seated with decks you can't > handle? No, but moot. The game is about playing other decks. See also the d100 pre-game roll. > Anyways, if that's the thing we're discussing then I don't see why a > change to the contest rule would be relevant. An addition of some kind > of option in those cases is what we should discuss in that case. (I > saw the no transfer back suggestion and I'm sorry to say it was > horrible IMO). The transfer back rule was added to the game to handle the problem of contesting. If that rule fails to accomplish its goal (of putting the penalty for losing the lottery into proper proportion), then replacing that rule with one that does seems natural. And the current rule also has the effect of enabling additional forms of bloat through the uncontrolled region. So perhaps the replacement rule could be formulated to be more targeted to the problem it is designed to address. > I this is a problem that is considered more random than seating in > general (and I don't really think it is). Then why not just allow the > player to remove said copy of the vamp from the game and get all the > pool back? Um. Right. Why not, indeed.

On Aug 11, 4:21 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > henrik wrote: > > On Aug 11, 2:26 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> henrik wrote: > >>> I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > >>> construction). > >> So: don't play with more than three 5+ caps, else you might have no weenies in > >> your opening draw. > > > That's a decent thumb rule if you're so afraid of a contest, yeah. > > But no one is "so afraid of a contest". Let's make the contest rules more harsh then. > > Crypt acceleration can make up for higher caps as well. > > I'm not saying I always follow that rule though, but when I don't I'm > > well aware that an early contest might make me lose. It's a calculated > > risk. Just like I often play without vote defense in my decks and > > sometimes that bites my ass. > > Sure. And it could still be a calculated risk even if the penalty being risked > is appropriate rather than disproportionate. Sure. I think it's appropriate though.

henrik wrote: > On Aug 11, 4:21 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> henrik wrote: >>> On Aug 11, 2:26 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >>>> henrik wrote: >>>>> I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt >>>>> construction). >>>> So: don't play with more than three 5+ caps, else you might have no weenies in >>>> your opening draw. >>> That's a decent thumb rule if you're so afraid of a contest, yeah. >> But no one is "so afraid of a contest". > > Let's make the contest rules more harsh then. Illogical. >>> Crypt acceleration can make up for higher caps as well. >>> I'm not saying I always follow that rule though, but when I don't I'm >>> well aware that an early contest might make me lose. It's a calculated >>> risk. Just like I often play without vote defense in my decks and >>> sometimes that bites my ass. >> Sure. And it could still be a calculated risk even if the penalty being risked >> is appropriate rather than disproportionate. > > Sure. I think it's appropriate though. And yet it is much more severe than appropriate.

On Aug 11, 4:26 pm, suoli <suoliruse...@gmail.com> wrote: > You seem to be arguing that contesting doesn't result in an automatic > loss. Others seem to be arguing that contesting results in an > unreasonable disadvantage. I'm more argumenting that contesting doesn't result in a more unreasonable disadvantage than many other things you can be the victim of (Pentex Subversion, diableri, Sense Dep., etc). > Every deck has a chance to survive contesting. Most decks are greatly > disadvantaged if they contest a vampire. Most deck could be improved to reduce that advantage. Most people take their chances and when the contest situation comes up they say "the rules suck" instead of "I could've made a deck that could handle this, but I didn't".

[ quoted text not captured ] Crypt: Low cap princes/justicars library: Parity Shifts Then again, I never said that contesting doesn't give you a disadvantage. Or that there was a deck that wouldn't be at a real disadvantage through your mentioned rule. But randomness will hit you in V:tES. What you can do is to lessen the damage from the blows.

On Aug 11, 4:59 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > henrik wrote: > > On Aug 11, 4:21 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> henrik wrote: > >>> On Aug 11, 2:26 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>>> henrik wrote: > >>>>> I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > >>>>> construction). > >>>> So: don't play with more than three 5+ caps, else you might have no weenies in > >>>> your opening draw. > >>> That's a decent thumb rule if you're so afraid of a contest, yeah. > >> But no one is "so afraid of a contest". > > > Let's make the contest rules more harsh then. > > Illogical. Not if we assume that the rule exists to balance the more powerful vampires and make playing with them a less obvious choice. > >>> Crypt acceleration can make up for higher caps as well. > >>> I'm not saying I always follow that rule though, but when I don't I'm > >>> well aware that an early contest might make me lose. It's a calculated > >>> risk. Just like I often play without vote defense in my decks and > >>> sometimes that bites my ass. > >> Sure. And it could still be a calculated risk even if the penalty being risked > >> is appropriate rather than disproportionate. > > > Sure. I think it's appropriate though. > > And yet it is much more severe than appropriate. You think so, I don't.

On 11 Aug, 16:58, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > _angst_ wrote: > > On 11 Aug, 16:24, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> _angst_ wrote: > >>> I don't see how it's randomly inflicted, ever. I don't think I've > >>> randomly contested anything ever. > >> Again, we're not talking about beginning the contest. > > >> We're talking about being at a table where the vampire you've spend 8 pool and 8 > >> transfers on (and who is yet uncontrolled) is brought out into the ready region > >> of another player. > > >> And that, as explained so many times already, is a random coincidence of fate. > > > Yes, but is it more random than getting seated with decks you can't > > handle? > > No, but moot. > > The game is about playing other decks. > > See also the d100 pre-game roll. > Why is it moot? Explain. Imo a deck that includes a vampire that can contest with you is just another deck that's bad to be seated with. > > Anyways, if that's the thing we're discussing then I don't see why a > > change to the contest rule would be relevant. An addition of some kind > > of option in those cases is what we should discuss in that case. (I > > saw the no transfer back suggestion and I'm sorry to say it was > > horrible IMO). > > The transfer back rule was added to the game to handle the problem of contesting. > > If that rule fails to accomplish its goal (of putting the penalty for losing the > lottery into proper proportion), then replacing that rule with one that does > seems natural. > > And the current rule also has the effect of enabling additional forms of bloat > through the uncontrolled region. > > So perhaps the replacement rule could be formulated to be more targeted to the > problem it is designed to address. > That was then, a long time ago... Considering how long that rule has been in effect I would say that it would be pretty wrong to say that it's its only current purpose. ATM I would say that it is a rule that is a big part of the game and which most expansions have been playtested to fit. I would state that any change to that rule is currently uncalled for. Just as I don't think the contest rule should be changed. A small addition to any of these rules might be ok though. Something minor that can help with that small part of this discussion that actually satisfies the requirement of being a random-ish event. Even though I still fail to see why it's more random than getting any other bad seating at a table. > > I this is a problem that is considered more random than seating in > > general (and I don't really think it is). Then why not just allow the > > player to remove said copy of the vamp from the game and get all the > > pool back? > > Um. Right. > Why not, indeed. I don't get if you're being sarcastic or sincere here so I can't comment any further. Regards Alex

henrik wrote: > On Aug 11, 4:59 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> henrik wrote: >>> Let's make the contest rules more harsh then. >> Illogical. > > Not if we assume that the rule exists to balance the more powerful > vampires and make playing with them a less obvious choice. Sure. But we make no such assumptions. And that assumption is almost certainly wrong. And even if it were right, it would have been rendered obsolete by now with the current volume of crypt choices.

_angst_ wrote: > On 11 Aug, 16:58, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> _angst_ wrote: >>> On 11 Aug, 16:24, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >>>> _angst_ wrote: >>>>> I don't see how it's randomly inflicted, ever. I don't think I've >>>>> randomly contested anything ever. >>>> Again, we're not talking about beginning the contest. >>>> We're talking about being at a table where the vampire you've spend 8 pool and 8 >>>> transfers on (and who is yet uncontrolled) is brought out into the ready region >>>> of another player. >>>> And that, as explained so many times already, is a random coincidence of fate. >>> Yes, but is it more random than getting seated with decks you can't >>> handle? >> No, but moot. >> >> The game is about playing other decks. >> >> See also the d100 pre-game roll. >> > > Why is it moot? Explain. I did. > Imo a deck that includes a vampire that can contest with you is just > another deck that's bad to be seated with. The game is about playing your deck against other decks. >> The transfer back rule was added to the game to handle the problem of contesting. >> >> If that rule fails to accomplish its goal (of putting the penalty for losing the >> lottery into proper proportion), then replacing that rule with one that does >> seems natural. >> >> And the current rule also has the effect of enabling additional forms of bloat >> through the uncontrolled region. >> >> So perhaps the replacement rule could be formulated to be more targeted to the >> problem it is designed to address. >> > > That was then, a long time ago... Considering how long that rule has > been in effect I would say that it would be pretty wrong to say that > it's its only current purpose. Non-sequitur. A rule's aging does not change the purpose for which it was formulated. > ATM I would say that it is a rule that > is a big part of the game and which most expansions have been > playtested to fit. True. But no reason not to find a more suitable rule and playtest it to make sure it also fits. > I would state that any change to that rule is > currently uncalled for. Just as I don't think the contest rule should > be changed. A small addition to any of these rules might be ok though. A small addition is also uncalled for in equal or greater degree than a correction to the current rule. > Something minor that can help with that small part of this discussion > that actually satisfies the requirement of being a random-ish event. > Even though I still fail to see why it's more random than getting any > other bad seating at a table. It isn't, as I've already agreed. >>> I this is a problem that is considered more random than seating in >>> general (and I don't really think it is). Then why not just allow the >>> player to remove said copy of the vamp from the game and get all the >>> pool back? >> Um. Right. >> Why not, indeed. > > I don't get if you're being sarcastic or sincere here so I can't > comment any further. The rule you put forward as "why not" is exactly one of the suggestions that was made. So I have no "why not" for it, naturally. A: Why not X? B: Mmm. C: Nnnn. B: Oooo. C: Why not X? ... D: Rrr. C: Ssss. D: Why not X? C: Why not X, indeed.

On 11 elo, 18:01, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 4:26 pm, suoli <suoliruse...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > You seem to be arguing that contesting doesn't result in an automatic > > loss. Others seem to be arguing that contesting results in an > > unreasonable disadvantage. > > I'm more argumenting that contesting doesn't result in a more > unreasonable disadvantage than many other things you can be the victim > of (Pentex Subversion, diableri, Sense Dep., etc). Diablerie is a reasonable reward for torporing a vampire, succeeding in the d-action and surviving blood hunt/losing a minion. You are completely right about PS and SD, they are indeed unreasonable. > > Every deck has a chance to survive contesting. Most decks are greatly > > disadvantaged if they contest a vampire. > > Most deck could be improved to reduce that advantage. No, not to any useful degree without completely changing the deck. > Most people take > their chances and when the contest situation comes up they say "the > rules suck" instead of "I could've made a deck that could handle this, > but I didn't". Most people can make a deck that can handle contesting but would rather play something other than weenies once in a while.

On Aug 11, 5:13 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>> Let's make the contest rules more harsh then. > >> Illogical. > > > Not if we assume that the rule exists to balance the more powerful > > vampires and make playing with them a less obvious choice. > > Sure. > But we make no such assumptions. I do. > And that assumption is almost certainly wrong. Why not make all vampire non unique then? Perhaps with the exception of the same player not being able to control duplicates. > And even if it were right, it would have been rendered obsolete by now with the > current volume of crypt choices. Ok. I thought that reasons for rule creation never got rendered obsolete. Like the transfer back rule.

henrik wrote: > On Aug 11, 5:13 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>>>> Let's make the contest rules more harsh then. >>>> Illogical. >>> Not if we assume that the rule exists to balance the more powerful >>> vampires and make playing with them a less obvious choice. >> Sure. >> But we make no such assumptions. > > I do. > >> And that assumption is almost certainly wrong. > > Why not make all vampire non unique then? Perhaps with the exception > of the same player not being able to control duplicates. Most likely the obvious reason: so that a crypt would have a selection of vampires rather than 12 copies of the "perfect" vampire for that deck. >> And even if it were right, it would have been rendered obsolete by now with the >> current volume of crypt choices. > > Ok. I thought that reasons for rule creation never got rendered > obsolete. Like the transfer back rule. Ah, missing the point, I see. Contrast "exists to" and "was originally created to". And, as explicitly addressed point-by-point above, moot.

On 11 Aug, 17:21, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > _angst_ wrote: > > On 11 Aug, 16:58, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> _angst_ wrote: > >>> On 11 Aug, 16:24, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>>> _angst_ wrote: > >>>>> I don't see how it's randomly inflicted, ever. I don't think I've > >>>>> randomly contested anything ever. > >>>> Again, we're not talking about beginning the contest. > >>>> We're talking about being at a table where the vampire you've spend 8 pool and 8 > >>>> transfers on (and who is yet uncontrolled) is brought out into the ready region > >>>> of another player. > >>>> And that, as explained so many times already, is a random coincidence of fate. > >>> Yes, but is it more random than getting seated with decks you can't > >>> handle? > >> No, but moot. > > >> The game is about playing other decks. > > >> See also the d100 pre-game roll. > > > Why is it moot? Explain. > > I did. > Then either I missed it or I'm slow... > > Imo a deck that includes a vampire that can contest with you is just > > another deck that's bad to be seated with. > > The game is about playing your deck against other decks. > Agreed. So why do we distinguish the contest rule from any other seating related randomness that doesn't allow you to play your game? > >> The transfer back rule was added to the game to handle the problem of contesting. > > >> If that rule fails to accomplish its goal (of putting the penalty for losing the > >> lottery into proper proportion), then replacing that rule with one that does > >> seems natural. > > >> And the current rule also has the effect of enabling additional forms of bloat > >> through the uncontrolled region. > > >> So perhaps the replacement rule could be formulated to be more targeted to the > >> problem it is designed to address. > > > That was then, a long time ago... Considering how long that rule has > > been in effect I would say that it would be pretty wrong to say that > > it's its only current purpose. > > Non-sequitur. A rule's aging does not change the purpose for which it was > formulated. > Yes, perhaps, but I would say the purpose of the rule can still change. Perhaps it was to ease contesting back then. Now it might be just a good idea that adds a good element to the game. I don't think we have to connect that rule to contesting ATM even if it was originally introduced to ease the effects of it. > > ATM I would say that it is a rule that > > is a big part of the game and which most expansions have been > > playtested to fit. > > True. But no reason not to find a more suitable rule and playtest it to make > sure it also fits. > Well. No. Not as long as it's properly playtested with representative playtesters. Just introducing a change to an already functional rule without proper testing would however being throwing away the lock of that good ol' Pandoras box we opened in the last contest-discussion- thread. > > I would state that any change to that rule is > > currently uncalled for. Just as I don't think the contest rule should > > be changed. A small addition to any of these rules might be ok though. > > A small addition is also uncalled for in equal or greater degree than a > correction to the current rule. > Well, main point is that I could agree to something minor that would be about as cornercase as contesting vampires in the first place. A big change to the rules, be it a tweak or not, isn't a good call IMO. Like something as major as removing the transfer back rule. I would fight teetch and claws to prevent such a major change to the game ;o) > > Something minor that can help with that small part of this discussion > > that actually satisfies the requirement of being a random-ish event. > > Even though I still fail to see why it's more random than getting any > > other bad seating at a table. > > It isn't, as I've already agreed. > Then why do we adress this instance of randomness. Why don't we try to fix all random seating hosing? > >>> I this is a problem that is considered more random than seating in > >>> general (and I don't really think it is). Then why not just allow the > >>> player to remove said copy of the vamp from the game and get all the > >>> pool back? > >> Um. Right. > >> Why not, indeed. > > > I don't get if you're being sarcastic or sincere here so I can't > > comment any further. > > The rule you put forward as "why not" is exactly one of the suggestions that was > made. So I have no "why not" for it, naturally. > > A: Why not X? > B: Mmm. > C: Nnnn. > B: Oooo. > C: Why not X? > ... > D: Rrr. > C: Ssss. > D: Why not X? > C: Why not X, indeed. Well, atleast I got the already suggested part :o) It seems like a minor tweak affecting those cornercase situations where randomness kills your game (or atleast might kill your game). It would however need playtesting first (ofcourse). Regards Alex

_angst_ wrote: > On 11 Aug, 17:21, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> _angst_ wrote: >>> On 11 Aug, 16:58, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >>>> The game is about playing other decks. >>>> See also the d100 pre-game roll. >>> Why is it moot? Explain. >> I did. > > Then either I missed it or I'm slow... Explanation: the game is about playing your deck against other decks. >>> Imo a deck that includes a vampire that can contest with you is just >>> another deck that's bad to be seated with. >> The game is about playing your deck against other decks. > > Agreed. So why do we distinguish the contest rule from any other > seating related randomness that doesn't allow you to play your game? Because the uniqueness lottery isn't a matter of deck building ability nor of playing ability. > Then why do we adress this instance of randomness. Why don't we try to > fix all random seating hosing? That's a fool's errand. The game is about playing your deck against other players' decks. i.e., the game is a TCG. But putting the proper effect on losing the uniqueness lottery shouldn't be abandoned just because the game is a TCG.

[ quoted text not captured ] But what makes you say the current effect isn't proper? Regards Alex

On Aug 11, 5:28 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > > Why not make all vampire non unique then? Perhaps with the exception > > of the same player not being able to control duplicates. > > Most likely the obvious reason: so that a crypt would have a selection of > vampires rather than 12 copies of the "perfect" vampire for that deck. If you wouldn't be allowed to control more than one copy of the same minion a crypt like that would probably not be used more than it is today. > >> And even if it were right, it would have been rendered obsolete by now with the > >> current volume of crypt choices. > > > Ok. I thought that reasons for rule creation never got rendered > > obsolete. Like the transfer back rule. > > Ah, missing the point, I see. > > Contrast "exists to" and "was originally created to". I have no real clue about why the contesting rules was created originally. I do know that an effect they have today is providing incentive to play something else than the currently strongest deck/ crypt. Might be that it doesn't have that effect on all players, but some of us actually do think about contest risks when building decks and/or selecting decks for bigger tournaments. And those of us that takes contesting into consideration doesn't seem to think that the rules are too harsh. And I suppose that the transfer back rule was originally created to ease the disadvantage of contesting, but today it exists to provide pool gain via cards like Powerbase: Montreal, Scouting Mission etc.

On 11 elo, 17:10, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 2:15 pm, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > > As it is, a deck investing 2-3 turns on influencing out a minion, and > > > > having the 4-10 pool on it, the minion is of some importance to the > > > > deck. It still cripples the game you are wanting to play. > > > > First, building your deck so that a 10 cap takes 3 turns to influence > > > out isn't really great. Crypt acceleration and stuff should be used, > > > and that will lessen the impact of a contest situation. > > > Second, everything that every other player does will (at least > > > possibly) in some way cripple the game you are wanting to play. > > > And, you never draw your acceleration. Now it still takes 3 turns to > > get an 10cap out, more if you go first. > > Just like you never draw combat defense and got sent to torpor before > your first action with said 10 cap? > Bad draws will always happen, and the only thing you can do is to > settle for a ratio you think will work. Sometimes it won't work and > all your Deflections will be in the last 15 cards of your library. > That's how the shuffling and stuff works. Yes, it's true. But atleast you have the means, which can partially counter/will counter those decks, and there are several choices for that. But there's pretty much only 1 card that solves contesting, and it needs a vampire out. Which pretty much just could be the vampire you are currently contesting. > > > > Let's assume a hypothesis: > > > > > You build a deck, and carefully select the minions you want to play, > > > > those that are rarely, if ever played, so you avoid contesting. You've > > > > taken the precautions to avoid contesting, correct? > > > > One of the precautions, yeah. There are more ways that just > > > considering the popularity of your minions. > > > Like what? This one is far the easiest and most secure way to avoid > > contestation. > > The only way to avoid contestation is to play with non unique minions. > There are a few ways to avoid getting an "instant game loss" due to > early contesting though. The easiest one would probably be to, as I've > mentioned before, make sure that your deck can handle it (assuming you > have the fattest bad luck with card drawing as well). So everyone should be playing Tupdogs and Rock Cats? As that's pretty much the only deck that doesn't have the risk of contesting anything it has. With the possible exception of Charisma, if you play it on a Tupdog. If you have another way to make a deck, that has it's crypt containing non-unique minions, that actually could oust it's prey, feel free to tell me one. > > > > Let's even assume, > > > > that you play DOM/PRE-based crypt, so you can influence more minions > > > > out faster. You go third in transfers, and decide to get the biggest > > > > vampire in your crypt out, so you can Enchant/Govern to uncontrolled. > > > > Let's assume it's the 8cap, so you won't get it in 2 turns. Now, for > > > > some random hate coming from the planets being in the wrong alignment, > > > > someone else brings out the exact same vampire as you were influencing > > > > out. How could you prepare more against this? > > > > I could have a 4 cap ready to transfer up (prepaing through crypt > > > construction). I could've played with Dreams of the Sphinx, > > > Information Highway etc to get your minion out earlier. > > > There are also a couple of different ways to handle the situations > > > regardless of how I've prepared for it. > > > Like I said, it's also likely that you never draw your acceleration, > > and it still takes 3 turns to get the 8cap out. And you are in a bad > > shape. > > Yes. I'm aware that there are no 100% guarantees that your deck will > be able to handle everything, even if precautions are taken during > deck building. If that's a big problem though, I think the library/ > drawing system should be changed rather than the contesting rules. It's easier to change the rules concerning contesting, than rework library/drawing which works greatly. > > > > I'll remind you, you don't have a star vampire, the 8cap just happened > > > > to be the biggest/2nd biggest vampire in your crypt, and you decided > > > > that it's good enough for me to get my game rolling. And then you > > > > contest it, just out of sheer randomness. How could you have prepared > > > > against it? > > > > By making sure that your deck could handle a situation where your > > > first vampire is removed from the game (via contest, combat, Brainwash > > > etc). > > > In the situation you describes, I made a judgement call. I'll go for > > > my 8 cap even though it'll take me 3 turns. I knew that those 3 turns > > > could be expensive, but I figured that if I'd get my 8 cap first I'd > > > be in a better situation that if I started with a 3 cap. > > > The random planetary hate you speak of could've just as easy gotten me > > > bled for 12 during those 2 turns I spent influencing my 8 cap. Or I > > > could've been Parity Shifted twice. > > > The planets could've made my grand predator's Theo Bell rush, > > > torporize and diablerize my 8 cap before my 4th turn. > > > And how can you make sure of that? Include 4 DI's and 4 SR's in every > > deck you play, just in case you see Brainwash/SenseDep? > > That's my point. You can't ever be sure that you won't lose to a > certain thing. Luck will be involved in a game of V:tES. Of course luck is included in any game that has something determined by randomness. > > The thing is, contesting has nothing to do with what the deck you play > > does, nor what the decks of other players do. It's just completely > > random hate from the universe. If you get bled for 12 in 2 turns, then > > your predator obviously has a deck that does what it's supposed to do. > > It has nothing to do with the randomness of contestation. Same goes > > for the Parity Shifts, the deck does what it's supposed to do. And the > > same goes for rushdecks. > > Yeah, contesting doesn't have much to do with the deck you play (other > than certain minions having a higher risk of getting contested). How > much you lose due to a contest is all about the deck you play though. > > > No deck in this game randomly removes/prevents you from gaining/using > > a minion without cards. If there's a card involved, then the deck > > obviously is supposed to do that at some degree, not dependant of how > > minor the amount of cards involved is. > > I don't really see the difference between a card removing my minion or > a rule in the rulebook doing it. The result is the same anyway, and I > don't think it's too harsh in either situation. A card doing it says that the deck is supposed to do that. A rule in rulebook says: If you have bad luck, you are most likely losing this round.

> > Heh. You know Dreams and Info Highway are unique (and each more popular than > > even the most popular vampire), right? > > I do. There are also Zillah's Valley, Coroner's Contact, The Eternals > of Sirius and possibly more if one's afraid of contesting. That's why > I added the "etc". And those require a spesific clan, not including Zillah's. How are those going to help, let's say Ventrue for example?

_angst_ wrote: > But what makes you say the current effect isn't proper? Observation. That is what started this and the other threads about it.

henrik wrote: > On Aug 11, 5:28 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>> Why not make all vampire non unique then? Perhaps with the exception >>> of the same player not being able to control duplicates. >> Most likely the obvious reason: so that a crypt would have a selection of >> vampires rather than 12 copies of the "perfect" vampire for that deck. > > If you wouldn't be allowed to control more than one copy of the same > minion a crypt like that would probably not be used more than it is > today. Yeah. > And I suppose that the transfer back rule was originally created to > ease the disadvantage of contesting, but today it exists to provide > pool gain via cards like Powerbase: Montreal, Scouting Mission etc. No. Today it provides such bloat ability, as has been covered. But that's not what it exists to do[*]. [*] Citations to the contrary welcome.

On Aug 11, 6:09 am, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 12:45 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > > > henrik wrote: > > > I don't think the current rules are unreasonable. > > > And neither do I. > > > But that doesn't mean they can't be better. > > Of course not. > I could rephrase and say that I think the current rules are good > though, and in no need of changing. > > > > And the only thing > > > that's beyond control is whether you'll sit at a table where > > > contesting might happen. Just like it's beyond your control whether > > > you'll sit at a table where there's a combat deck. > > > Yeah. > > > And, again, the latter is something you choose to address in your deck or not. > > So is the sooner. > You can build your deck so that the loss of those 2-3 turns and 4-10 > pool does minimal damage to your game. > Just like you can add combat defense so that those nasty combat cards/ > weapons does minimal damage to your game. > Please give me 2-3 examples of how you can build your deck to deal with the loss of 2-3 turns of transfers and 6-10 pool (4-5 pool loss from contestation sucks, but its not a "I lose button" yet imo) in a single turn. Please note that I will not take build a diverse crypt as answer. I've built several Ventrue decks with only 1-2 Arika in them. Contesting Arika in such a deck is as debilitating as a deck with 4 or more Arika in the crypt. > > There isn't any meaningful choice to be made to use unique crypt cards or not. > > I never said there was. Defending against contesting isn't about being > 100% certain that you won't contest. > Just like combat defence (in most cases) isn't about being 100% > certain that won't get into combat. > Both are about being able to handle a situation that might or might > not come up during a game. Whether the situation does come up is out > of your control (in both cases). > I can see a brutal combat coming. I can look around at what vampires are in play and look at my hand and see if I can deal with the situation. I cannot stop another player from making transfers. > > > And for the record, "the best" can very much mean "game win" when it > > > comes to making the best of a contest situation. > > > Yeah. The fates may align the planets that way. But in the common case > > (reasonable case), it's just a choice of bad and worse. > > I've found deck building and table talk to work better than astrology > when it comes to handling contests. > My experience is that it's a choice of bad or better, in the common > case. > I can except table talking your way through a bad situation with a combat deck on the table. There is often little to no warning that someone is going to contest with you at the end of any influence phase. I have no opportunity to table talk them out of that terrible idea they are about to act upon. Later, ~Rehlow

On Aug 11, 12:09 am, Octagon <aaron.con...@gmail.com> wrote: > As predator I will always consider contesting cards with my prey. Not > only am I depriving them of a resource but I am getting in a faux > bleed for 1 in every turn. At the very least it may urge them to give > up contestation immediately as they have recouped some use out of the > card already (e.g. Minion Tapped previously) and allow both > Methuselahs to continue playing without being hamstrung. > > It is interesting that these contestation discussions are centered > around crypt fatties as the problem. Contest a weenie and the > penalties are the same, however relinquishing control is not so > problematic nor is contesting other unique minion or master cards. > This is an incorrect statement. Contesting a 4 cap is not the same as contesting a 10 cap. In the former you have lost 1 turn of transfers and at most 4 pool is in limbo. In the later you have most likely lost 3 turns of transfers and up to 10 pool is in limbo. > Contestation is a choice, not accounting for players bloody > mindedness. Rules are fine as is. Only 1 player makes a choice. The 1 pool a turn is nothing when contesting a fattie, it is the lost transfers and all that pool put in limbo as soon as the contest starts. Later, ~Rehlow

As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Arika, I go 3rd, and on my third turn I play her. My grandpredator influences out Beast, the Leatherface of Detroit, looks around, and says, "This will hurt me in the long run, so I might as well tac-nuke it - sorry mate, nothing personal". He then rushes and torporizes Arika (any one my predator's weenies diablerize her). I know I'm going to lose. I can't stop it. It's turn 3 and I know my game is fucked up beyond all recognition. -- Regards, Daneel

On Aug 10, 6:15 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > A week back, in a casual game, my grand predator put up Anson. My > predator played an Ansons deck as well. He changed vampire, got Volker > and Nik out... It's good to see that the current contestation rules are working, in that they force people to play with vampires other than the ones we've seen over and over again. Wait a minute... John Eno

[ quoted text not captured ] Zillah's Valley will help Ventrue. And, as mentioned earlier, Dreams of the Sphinx, Information Highway and Powerbase: Montreal will help as well (even if they also have a risk of being contested).

On Aug 11, 8:19 pm, Johann von Doom <invisibleking...@gmail.com> wrote: > > A week back, in a casual game, my grand predator put up Anson. My > > predator played an Ansons deck as well. He changed vampire, got Volker > > and Nik out... > > It's good to see that the current contestation rules are working, in > that they force people to play with vampires other than the ones we've > seen over and over again. Wait a minute... It doesn't force people to do anything. It gives people a reason not to play the more popular vampires that we've seen over and over again. Apparently though, it's more popular (at least on the newsgroup) to blame the rules for game losses instead of asking themselves what they could've done to not lose.

On Aug 11, 6:57 pm, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > Just like you never draw combat defense and got sent to torpor before > > your first action with said 10 cap? > > Bad draws will always happen, and the only thing you can do is to > > settle for a ratio you think will work. Sometimes it won't work and > > all your Deflections will be in the last 15 cards of your library. > > That's how the shuffling and stuff works. > > Yes, it's true. But atleast you have the means, which can partially > counter/will counter those decks, and there are several choices for > that. But there's pretty much only 1 card that solves contesting, and > it needs a vampire out. Which pretty much just could be the vampire > you are currently contesting. The card can be played by a 1 cap though. Unless you're playing pure Imbueds or 12 of the same vampires it's not impossible to get a vampire out and play the card. > > The only way to avoid contestation is to play with non unique minions. > > There are a few ways to avoid getting an "instant game loss" due to > > early contesting though. The easiest one would probably be to, as I've > > mentioned before, make sure that your deck can handle it (assuming you > > have the fattest bad luck with card drawing as well). > > So everyone should be playing Tupdogs and Rock Cats? As that's pretty > much the only deck that doesn't have the risk of contesting anything > it has. With the possible exception of Charisma, if you play it on a > Tupdog. If you have another way to make a deck, that has it's crypt > containing non-unique minions, that actually could oust it's prey, > feel free to tell me one. I've taken two game wins with an Aabbt Kindred deck, so that's certainly a possibility. But avioding contests isn't what I'm talking about, I'm sure I've said that already. I'm talking about lessening the negative effect contesting has on your game. Just like combat/vote/bleed defence is about lessening the negative effect combat/votes/bleeds have on your game. Deflection doesn't stop your predator from bleeding, Majesty doesn't stop your prey from rushing you. > > Yes. I'm aware that there are no 100% guarantees that your deck will > > be able to handle everything, even if precautions are taken during > > deck building. If that's a big problem though, I think the library/ > > drawing system should be changed rather than the contesting rules. > > It's easier to change the rules concerning contesting, than rework > library/drawing which works greatly. It's easier to shape up, than changing the rules concerning contesting which works greatly. > > I don't really see the difference between a card removing my minion or > > a rule in the rulebook doing it. The result is the same anyway, and I > > don't think it's too harsh in either situation. > > A card doing it says that the deck is supposed to do that. A rule in > rulebook says: If you have bad luck, you are most likely losing this > round. All rules in the rulebook says that, if you read it that way. Bad luck can cause you to lose games. People who doesn't want a game where luck is a factor shouldn't play V:tES, really.

On Aug 11, 10:19 am, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > But they aren't. For a lot more reasons than contest rules. And yet the contestation rules are a big part of it. You change the contestation rules so that contestation has a less severe penalty (but still a penalty), and a handy side effect is making big vampires more useful. Which seems to be a current blanket design goal. > It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the > rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". You answer is always "Use smaller vampires, don't rely on a single minion, and use crypt acceleration". All of which are certainly ways to preemptively attempt to avoid the problems of contestation. But they are also ways in which all decks end up looking the same. So once again, the rules for contestation, which people point to as "something that makes people make more interesting decks" is doing the exact opposite. -Peter

Lets just banned contesting. If a unique is in play know one else can put it in to play. Woot Not that that will help the other player requiring the same wheel minion. Maybe we should banned the unique trait from the game so everyone can play their game. In Norms' example one of them was going to be screwed no matter what. If Ian Forestal is in a deck that deck needs him. Right? Infernal familiar is hardly an option. First Tradition and a contest, why would you pay for a turn? Maybe for the untap, transfers or just to get below Parity Shift. VTES is not a easy game. There are alot of cards to know, Table dynamic is hard to perceive. No one will win every game they play. You may never get to act w/ your minions. You are not always going to have fun playing it. Altering the rules for contesting will not change this. It is not even guaranteed to reduce it. In the example giving there is very little that would compel me (in Norms position) to yield the contest no matter what the rule change was. A cross table contest would have been different, but less likely to occur. Perhaps Norm could have recovered from a cross table contest with different rules in place, perhaps not. Overcoming adversity is the joy in this game. There is no other. Those who like it, like it because it is hard. Matt Rock, Paper, Scissors

[ quoted text not captured ] I agree. Still, in the interest of reducing contestation harshness without depriving us of the transfer back rules (whose flexibility I see as too essential to give up), I'd suggest something along the lines of being able to transfer back blood from contested minions at 1 transfer per point. You'd still have to keep up the contest for a couple of turns in order to evacuate all the blood, but the end result would be a lessened penalty. It would also allow Democritus and Olugbenga to retain their usefulness. Drain

[ quoted text not captured ] Amen, brother. When I was young we used to play with cards made of razorblades and drops of blood for counters. The first one to get ousted/pass out from the blood loss got his liver carved out. Sure, it wasn't always fun but it's either that or you're a whiner who can't play.

suoli wrote: > Amen, brother. When I was young we used to play with cards made of > razorblades and drops of blood for counters. The first one to get > ousted/pass out from the blood loss got his liver carved out. Sure, it > wasn't always fun but it's either that or you're a whiner who can't > play. +1 Me Too.

On 11 elo, 23:33, Drain <dr...@hotmail.com> wrote: > I agree. Still, in the interest of reducing contestation harshness > without depriving us of the transfer back rules (whose flexibility I > see as too essential to give up), I'd suggest something along the > lines of being able to transfer back blood from contested minions at 1 > transfer per point. You'd still have to keep up the contest for a > couple of turns in order to evacuate all the blood, but the end result > would be a lessened penalty. It would also allow Democritus and > Olugbenga to retain their usefulness. > > Drain Someone suggested the option to reveal an uncontrolled vampire, burn it and move counters on it back to your pool when another copy of that vampire is played.

[ quoted text not captured ] That and draw new crypt card. In influence phase that cost 0 transfers.

On Aug 11, 9:43 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > > It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the > > rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". > > You answer is always "Use smaller vampires, don't rely on a single > minion, and use crypt acceleration". And yours is "change the rules". > All of which are certainly ways > to preemptively attempt to avoid the problems of contestation. But > they are also ways in which all decks end up looking the same. Not necessarily. There are different ways to do it (and one can still chose not to do it, but that might be a bad choice). However, I will confess that I don't want any and all decks to be able to win any given tournament. People should be allowed to play any deck they want, but changing the rules because some decks aren't competative is stupid. > So once > again, the rules for contestation, which people point to as "something > that makes people make more interesting decks" is doing the exact > opposite. Only if you consider bad decks interesting and good decks boring.

"Peter D Bakija" <pd...@lightlink.com> wrote in message news:1c6fd272-c875-4ebd...@p15g2000vbl.googlegroups.com... [ quoted text not captured ] It looks to me like people are talking past each other about the intent or utility of contestation (apart from simply encouraging diversity by forbidding the simultaneous use of, say, multiple Arika decks on the same table). Sure, contestation can be seen purely as a drawback in the metagame against star vampire decks. And it's absolutely true that other useful rules also have unintended and undesirable side effects at times, just like contestation. But there's clearly no metagame need to hose star vampire decks given that their vulnerability to so many other game effects (destroyed by combat, Pentex Subversion and other effects of that sort, "minion-cannot-block/block-fails" forms of stealth, and probably a number of other things I'm not thinking of right at this moment) really does a fine job of keeping them from being overrepresented in the metagame. Does anyone disagree with this? I mentioned in the other discussion about Heir to the Blood reprints that I agreed Carlton Van Wyck should get reprinted in part because the occasional contestation of Carlton is a useful check on his general utility. But are there people who actually believe that certain star vampires need the same check? That would strike me as extreme. If not, then the question simply boils down to: "Are the occasional hosed-up games that contestation can lead to when two star vampire decks collide common enough and bad enough to call for a change to the contestation rules?" The main drawbacks to changing the rules are the confusion caused by changing existing rules and possibly creating significantly more complex rules in a game already seen as too complex by many. In my book, the bad games caused by contestation are too rare to reach the threshold of tempting me to tinker with the rules. But I don't blame people for disagreeing because I know the games where this has an effect can be pretty rude. Fred

"LSJ" <vte...@white-wolf.com> schreef in bericht news:h5qffu$nba$1...@news.eternal-september.org... > Juggernaut1981 wrote: >> So if your deck will topple into a cosmic pile of crap if you can't >> influence out Minion X... then maybe you need to work on your deck's >> Plan B. > > Yeah. > > But not the point. > > The point is losing transfers and pool stuck idling on a > still-uncontrolled vampire when someone else brings out that vampire. > > Now you've lost several turns (up to 3) of transfers, and all of that pool > is out of your reach until you can afford to lose even more turns of > transfers simply moving the pool back to where it was to begin with. Then the "problem" is there is any, is not the actual contestation rules but the fact that it takes three transfers to move pool from one uncontrolled vampire to another. "During the influence phase, a player may move 1 blood from an uncontrolled vampire to a younger vampire of the same clan at the cost of 1 transfer".

"henrik" <www.h...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:3a02a5b4-8493-481c...@c1g2000yqi.googlegroups.com... > On Aug 11, 9:43 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > > > > It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the > > > rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". > > > > You answer is always "Use smaller vampires, don't rely on a single > > minion, and use crypt acceleration". > > And yours is "change the rules". Nit: I don't get the sense that Peter is proposing to change the rules in order to make star vampire decks more playable. He's just saying that if it has that effect, it wouldn't hurt anything. I get the sense Peter's main bone of contention is that if you create a star vampire deck for whatever reasons lead you to do that (and there are certainly good strategic reasons to do so) and collide with another such star vampire deck in any game, tournament or otherwise, the game can get really REALLY unfun. At least, it will be for some of the players: certainly any player who has to refrain from using a star vampire or two players who wind up contesting one. But it can also suck for his/their allies, grandpredators and/or grandprey who have to watch their predator get an easy victory point and six pool or their prey go unmolested for critical periods of time. In fact, I'm not terribly charmed by winning games because I got a lucky break from someone else getting crippled in this way. Fred

On Aug 11, 10:41 pm, suoli <suoliruse...@gmail.com> wrote: > Amen, brother. When I was young we used to play with cards made of > razorblades and drops of blood for counters. The first one to get > ousted/pass out from the blood loss got his liver carved out. Sure, it > wasn't always fun but it's either that or you're a whiner who can't > play. We played Magic with some house rules saying that noone every lost. It was great fun and everyone could win with any deck.

On Aug 11, 11:07 pm, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > "henrik" <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote in message > > news:3a02a5b4-8493-481c...@c1g2000yqi.googlegroups.com... > > > On Aug 11, 9:43 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > > > > > It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the > > > > rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". > > > > You answer is always "Use smaller vampires, don't rely on a single > > > minion, and use crypt acceleration". > > > And yours is "change the rules". > > Nit: I don't get the sense that Peter is proposing to change the rules in > order to make star vampire decks more playable. I don't think he is either. I think it's because changing the rules is the easy way out, instead of adjusting deck building and play style to be able to handle contesting better. > He's just saying that if > it has that effect, it wouldn't hurt anything. I get the sense Peter's > main bone of contention is that if you create a star vampire deck for > whatever reasons lead you to do that (and there are certainly good > strategic reasons to do so) and collide with another such star vampire > deck in any game, tournament or otherwise, the game can get really REALLY > unfun. At least, it will be for some of the players: certainly any player > who has to refrain from using a star vampire or two players who wind up > contesting one. But it can also suck for his/their allies, grandpredators > and/or grandprey who have to watch their predator get an easy victory point > and six pool or their prey go unmolested for critical periods of time. In > fact, I'm not terribly charmed by winning games because I got a lucky break > from someone else getting crippled in this way. I think contesting should be the biggest fear for star vampire decks. They should be built to be able to handle it or, if they're not built to handle it, they shouldn't expect to win as much. It's very possible to build star vampire decks that still can manage to play games without their star.

On Aug 11, 8:12 pm, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: > As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Arika, > I go 3rd, and on my third turn I play her. > > My grandpredator influences out Beast, the Leatherface of Detroit, looks > around, and says, "This will hurt me in the long run, so I might as well > tac-nuke it - sorry mate, nothing personal". > > He then rushes and torporizes Arika (any one my predator's weenies > diablerize her). I know I'm going to lose. I can't stop it. It's turn 3 > and I know my game is fucked up beyond all recognition. But, but, that isn't random! And someone chose to make you lose! And the penalty is perfectly reasonable and you shouldn't have been playing a deck that uses such an aggravating minion in the first place! :-) (Note smiley)

On Aug 11, 11:12 am, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: > As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Arika, Stop there. You've convinced me. ;) > My grandpredator influences out Beast, ...He then rushes and torporizes Arika (any one my predator's weenies > diablerize her). I know I'm going to lose. I can't stop it. It's turn 3 > and I know my game is fucked up beyond all recognition. > If this was meant to be a counterargument to the contesting rule screwin with the game, keep in mind that there are far more counters to rush than there are for contesting. And your argument, such as it is, holds very little water whatsoever. T

On 12 elo, 00:21, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > I don't think he is either. I think it's because changing the rules is > the easy way out, instead of adjusting deck building and play style to > be able to handle contesting better. Skill level has nothing to do with this discussion. I think you're bringing too much baggage from the Swiss Academy vs. XZealot-type debates. This is a completely non-partisan attempt to discuss the betterment of the game.

"henrik" <www.h...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:cc8fb59f-1584-4726...@q23g2000yqn.googlegroups.com... > On Aug 11, 11:07 pm, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > > "henrik" <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote in message > > > > news:3a02a5b4-8493-481c...@c1g2000yqi.googlegroups.com... > > > > > On Aug 11, 9:43 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > > > > > > > It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the > > > > > rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". > > > > > > You answer is always "Use smaller vampires, don't rely on a single > > > > minion, and use crypt acceleration". > > > > > And yours is "change the rules". > > > > Nit: I don't get the sense that Peter is proposing to change the rules in > > order to make star vampire decks more playable. > > I don't think he is either. I think it's because changing the rules is > the easy way out, instead of adjusting deck building and play style to > be able to handle contesting better. "Easy" is kind of a perjorative word here. I would say your answer to it misses his point and that's why the two of you are talking past each other. When solving general game problems, the answer is always to change the rules of the game, as opposed to expecting invididuals changing their style of play. The problem of unfun games caused by contesting star vampires is a systemic problem; in competitions, the role of individuals is merely to do the best they can at winning games. They are not responsible for making the game more fun if, for instance, their best strategy turns out to be one that creates less fun games. To give you a much more apparent example of what I mean, if VtES is _much_ easier to win by players using stealth-bleed decks than combat decks, the answer to print new cards and/or ban old cards in order to allow for a more balanced metagame, which is presumedly more fun. (Note that banning, changing, and printing cards are merely another means of changing the rules to a game - since card text are essentially game rules in a CCG.) Notice that the answer to making the game more balanced is contained in a change to the game, not an expectation that players should engage in sub-optimal strategies. If you're responding to what is seen as a problem in contestation creating unfun games by telling people to alter the strategies they would otherwise pursue, you're essentially doing the same thing: expecting player to engage in sub-optimal strategies to solve a game problem. Wrong. Fix the game itself and let players be free to choose the strategies they think best for their chances of winning without worrying about whether those strategies cause crippled games. (To avoid misunderstanding, again: my personal view is that contestation- crippled games aren't frequent enough to bother. But that's a different objection.) > I think contesting should be the biggest fear for star vampire decks. It is not and never has been. Destruction or otherwise rendering useless the star vampire is almost certainly the biggest downside to star vampire decks. Second, I suppose, would be the usual metagame risks that all decks are subject to, whether star vampires are used or not. Also in there somewhere is the chance of not drawing your star vampire, if the crypt is mixed. Contestation, in my observation, is really quite a rare problem. (And hence this is why I hold my opinion about the merits of changing these rules.) It just has massive effects on the game when it happens. And the negative effects Peter is complaining about go beyond simply one or two guys losing a game. > They should be built to be able to handle it or, if they're not built > to handle it, they shouldn't expect to win as much. It's very possible > to build star vampire decks that still can manage to play games without > their star. That's your personal view of strategy. Another reasonable view is that the possibility isn't worth covering and trying to cover it will weaken your star vampire deck too much. So accept defeat when it happens and win more often in the vast majority of cases when it doesn't happen. But such a view doesn't solve Peter's perceived problem of contestation causing unfun games. Again, the job of players is do their best to win. It's the job of the rules to create the greatest possibility that the games will be fun. Fred

On Aug 11, 7:38 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > Juggernaut1981 wrote: > > On Aug 11, 3:09 pm, Octagon <aaron.con...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> Contestation is a choice, not accounting for players bloody > > Yeah. And, again (as repeated way too many times already), not the point. > > Being in a situation where contestation is an issue for the vampire you've > already spent time and resources on (but who yet remains uncontrolled) is the point. I find myself in situations a lot in V:TES and try to make the best of them. For instance, that vampire I have already spent time and resources on I can leave uncontested and uncontrolled for the moment, gradually transferring back pool till I need only 4 more to bring it out, all the while watching the in play vampire in question gain equipment, retainers and blood dolls integral to that Methuselahs game plan. At an opportune moment I contest it and deprive them of their star vampire with all that stuff.

On Aug 11, 3:27 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > It doesn't force people to do anything. It gives people a reason not > to play the more popular vampires that we've seen over and over again. Apparently it doesn't give people that reason, despite your assertions here to the contrary. Your own play experience just showed us that. Really, I have no argument here. (At least not any that haven't been reiterated many times, and recently.) I just think it's hilarious that you've told us again and again about how you and your playgroup worry about vampire contestation in the deck design phase, and yet here you guys are playing with the same vampires as each other. It was this offhand comment of yours that made me finally realize why you the think that the contestation rules are so necessary. I should've picked up on it earlier, when you said that if not for contestation you'd see everyone in your group playing Dementation weenies all the time, but I missed it during that go-around. John Eno

On Aug 11, 6:26 pm, Johann von Doom <invisibleking...@gmail.com> wrote: > Apparently it doesn't give people that reason, despite your assertions > here to the contrary. Your own play experience just showed us that. I should add, because everyone sounds like a jerk on the internet (including me, I know) unless they tell you otherwise, that I don't really think that there's anything wrong with the folks in your group wanting to play the same vampires. It was just illuminating to me as to why you might think the way you do about the vampire contestation rules. John Eno

On Aug 12, 12:26 am, Johann von Doom <invisibleking...@gmail.com> wrote: [ quoted text not captured ] I said we consider it. Not that we never, ever contest. I'm well aware that contesting happens, even with the least played vampire it'll happen sometimes. Just like we worry about vote decks, combat and bleed decks but sometimes get ousted by those as well. And everyone in my playgroup wouldn't play Dementation weenies 24/7, but I'm fairly certain that I'd see it more often if contesting wasn't an issue.

On Aug 12, 12:29 am, Johann von Doom <invisibleking...@gmail.com> wrote: [ quoted text not captured ] Well, yeah, my playgroup has affected my thoughts about contesting. We're all powergames and half psychopaths, which has both ups and downs. If some vampires are better than others, they'll get played more. If a discipline is stronger than others, it'll be played more (dominate lol). And while we're at it, I don't really think there's anything wrong with people wanting to play with "kinder" rules. I just think they can make up house rules instead of rewriting the rulebook.

Altering the rules for contesting will not change the fact that you need to build a deck with alternatives. In fact, only decks that have alternatives will benefit. Superstar decks are still screwed. I doubt any change will as big an impact as the ban on PTO, Dramatic Upheaval, or Succubus Club. Thou removing the transfer back option may. I just want a contested card to remain "out of play" until the contest is yielded. Matt

On Aug 12, 2:45 am, Rehlow <newsgr...@rehlow.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 12:09 am, Octagon <aaron.con...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > As predator I will always consider contesting cards with my prey. Not > > only am I depriving them of a resource but I am getting in a faux > > bleed for 1 in every turn. At the very least it may urge them to give > > up contestation immediately as they have recouped some use out of the > > card already (e.g. Minion Tapped previously) and allow both > > Methuselahs to continue playing without being hamstrung. > > > It is interesting that these contestation discussions are centered > > around crypt fatties as the problem. Contest a weenie and the > > penalties are the same, however relinquishing control is not so > > problematic nor is contesting other unique minion or master cards. > > This is an incorrect statement. Contesting a 4 cap is not the same as > contesting a 10 cap. In the former you have lost 1 turn of transfers > and at most 4 pool is in limbo. In the later you have most likely lost > 3 turns of transfers and up to 10 pool is in limbo. Not incorrect. The 'penalty' for contesting is the same, 1 pool every untap phase if you wish to continue contesting. The opportunity cost, which is what you are referring to is substantially different according to the capacity of the vampire but this is what I was attempting to point out, that this is really only an issue for high capacity crypts. As such it needs to be taken into consideration both in deck construction and initial influencing. > > Contestation is a choice, not accounting for players bloody > > mindedness. Rules are fine as is. > > Only 1 player makes a choice. The 1 pool a turn is nothing when > contesting a fattie, it is the lost transfers and all that pool put in > limbo as soon as the contest starts. Once again, beg to differ. I make a choice playing a large cap, popular vampire. I make a choice putting all my proverbial eggs\pool into the one vampire. Sure, being the first Methuselah to bring out that potentially contested vamp removes the ultimate choice, however that in itself has advantages as it often means the other Methuselah feels it is in their best interest to go for another vampire entirely. Regards, Aaron Connor Prince of Adelaide

"henrik" <www.h...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:c8f7daaf-cab1-4e30...@k30g2000yqf.googlegroups.com... > And while we're at it, I don't really think there's anything wrong > with people wanting to play with "kinder" rules. I just think they can > make up house rules instead of rewriting the rulebook. No? I do. When you play by "house rules", you then need to build decks differently to whatever degree the house rules are different from the standard rules. You wind up with a different set of decks, or decks that are sub-optimal when shifting from one set of rules to the other. Overall, it's usually not a worthwhile proposition. But then, it's not really the point, is it? It's just another way of saying you disagree with changing the rules to cover a perceived problem with the game because you think individual players should use sub-optimal strategies to cover such problems instead. Fred

On Aug 11, 11:53 pm, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > "Easy" is kind of a perjorative word here. I would say your answer to it > misses his point and that's why the two of you are talking past each other. > When solving general game problems, the answer is always to change the rules > of the game, as opposed to expecting invididuals changing their style of > play. The problem of unfun games caused by contesting star vampires is a > systemic problem; in competitions, the role of individuals is merely to do > the best they can at winning games. They are not responsible for making the > game more fun if, for instance, their best strategy turns out to be one > that creates less fun games. It's just that I don't think there is a general game problem here. I think the rules and costs for contesting is great. If I agreed that there was a problem, I'd agree that a rule change would be the best way to fix it. > To give you a much more apparent example of what I mean, if VtES is _much_ > easier to win by players using stealth-bleed decks than combat decks, the > answer to print new cards and/or ban old cards in order to allow for a > more balanced metagame, which is presumedly more fun. (Note that banning, > changing, and printing cards are merely another means of changing the > rules to a game - since card text are essentially game rules in a CCG.) I'm not totally agreeing that new cards is the same as changing the rulebook. New cards enable new strategies and/or counters to old strategies. How to use those counters is up to the players. But anyway, I think enough counters exists for people to be able to create decks that doesn't suffer horrible deaths when faced with contests (even star vampire decks). So the way I see it, the problem is that some people can't be bothered to create decks that can handle a contest and instead they want to change the rules. > Notice that the answer to making the game more balanced is contained in > a change to the game, not an expectation that players should engage in > sub-optimal strategies. If you're responding to what is seen as a problem > in contestation creating unfun games by telling people to alter the > strategies they would otherwise pursue, you're essentially doing the same > thing: expecting player to engage in sub-optimal strategies to solve a > game problem. Wrong. Fix the game itself and let players be free to > choose the strategies they think best for their chances of winning without > worrying about whether those strategies cause crippled games. I don't see what's suboptimal. What I've suggested people to do is to create decks that can handle one of their minions disappearing very early. That's a good thing to be able to handle for any deck, regardless of what they'll be up against. It could be diableri, Pentex Subversion, Sense Dep, Temptation of Greater Power or contesting. Being prepared for a generic loss of a minion is something that I think every deck should aim for. > > They should be built to be able to handle it or, if they're not built > > to handle it, they shouldn't expect to win as much. It's very possible > > to build star vampire decks that still can manage to play games without > > their star. > > That's your personal view of strategy. Another reasonable view is that > the possibility isn't worth covering and trying to cover it will weaken > your star vampire deck too much. So accept defeat when it happens and > win more often in the vast majority of cases when it doesn't happen. > > But such a view doesn't solve Peter's perceived problem of contestation > causing unfun games. Again, the job of players is do their best to win. > It's the job of the rules to create the greatest possibility that the games > will be fun. In my opinion, those games are only unfun if the contesting players have bad decks (as in decks not being able to handle a contest) or if they give up right away when faced with a contest. I just think that it's attitudes that should change, not rules.

"wedge" <mat...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:828f2cb9-8f3a-4291...@j9g2000prh.googlegroups.com... > Altering the rules for contesting will not change the fact that you > need to build a deck with alternatives. Why? What if you took the viewpoint that, "I'm willing to go down in terrible flames if a certain set of conditions are met in exchange for a better chance of winning when they're not? On the whole, that might yield more victories more often, might it not? And if you got destroyed during the other games, at least you have plenty of time to run and get dinner while the remaining players stuggle to stablize the game - or just let it go as hopelessly screwed. I've considered packing a deck with Kiss of Ras in order to punish the super-intercept-y decks in the past, but fortitude is just too ubitiqous in the game, so the designers have that piece covered. I do often express this concept in my utter contempt for designing in any real answer to vote decks in almost anything I build. I used to toss in a Vox Domini but after seat-switching votes got the boot, so did the Voxes. It's just not worth building anything into my decks as an alternative for when voting predators turn up. But then, I'm not a terribly good player. Maybe it's just me. Fred

On Aug 11, 4:23 pm, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > "wedge" <matt...@gmail.com> wrote in messagenews:828f2cb9-8f3a-4291...@j9g2000prh.googlegroups.com... > > Altering the rules for contesting will not change the fact that you > > need to build a deck with alternatives. > > Why? What if you took the viewpoint that, "I'm willing to go down in > terrible flames if a certain set of conditions are met in exchange for > a better chance of winning when they're not? On the whole, that might > yield more victories more often, might it not? And if you got > destroyed during the other games, at least you have plenty of time > to run and get dinner while the remaining players stuggle to stablize > the game - or just let it go as hopelessly screwed. Of course, you can do that. In fact many players do, myself included. It has been said the 4-5 cap bleed or vote decks stand to gain the most by a change in contesting. I now think that to be true. Matt

On Aug 12, 1:12 am, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > But then, it's not really the point, is it? It's just another way > of saying you disagree with changing the rules to cover a perceived > problem with the game because you think individual players should > use sub-optimal strategies to cover such problems instead. I still don't think there is a problem. And if we're playing that game, changing the rules would be a slap in the face of the players who actually build decks that can handle a contest, players who actually consider the effect a contest might have on their tournament results, players who try to figure out what kind of decks will be played and not played at the tournament in order to pick the right deck for themselves. I don't think players should use sub-optimal strategies. I think that contesting is percieved as a problem because they do.

"henrik" <www.h...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:9f418253-dec4-4b19...@a13g2000yqc.googlegroups.com... > On Aug 11, 11:53 pm, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > > "Easy" is kind of a perjorative word here. I would say your answer to it > > misses his point and that's why the two of you are talking past each other. > > When solving general game problems, the answer is always to change the rules > > of the game, as opposed to expecting invididuals changing their style of > > play. The problem of unfun games caused by contesting star vampires is a > > systemic problem; in competitions, the role of individuals is merely to do > > the best they can at winning games. They are not responsible for making the > > game more fun if, for instance, their best strategy turns out to be one > > that creates less fun games. > > It's just that I don't think there is a general game problem here. I > think the rules and costs for contesting is great. If I agreed that > there was a problem, I'd agree that a rule change would be the best > way to fix it. Then you should argue about that, and not trade snipes about the best strategy for star vampire decks. You should be addressing whether Norm's orginal complaint was, "I'm not winning enough with a star vampire deck" - which would be a metagame balance problem - or, "this situation is not fun for anyone" - which would be a real rules problem. I've been reading it as the latter, but I could be reading stuff into what other people say. > > To give you a much more apparent example of what I mean, if VtES is _much_ > > easier to win by players using stealth-bleed decks than combat decks, the > > answer to print new cards and/or ban old cards in order to allow for a > > more balanced metagame, which is presumedly more fun. (Note that banning, > > changing, and printing cards are merely another means of changing the > > rules to a game - since card text are essentially game rules in a CCG.) > > I'm not totally agreeing that new cards is the same as changing the > rulebook. New cards enable new strategies and/or counters to old > strategies. How to use those counters is up to the players. Sure. None the less, card text are rules. Ergo, new cards are also new rules. I don't believe there's anything to debate here. By the same token, I can add a new rule to a board game in the form of a new option that players can use. If they choose not to use the new option in their strategy, that's their perogitive. It's still a rule. (And, for instance, opposing players will have had to take the possibility that the option _might_ have been used into account when choosing their opposing strategy. Same with new cards.) > But anyway, I think enough counters exists for people to be able to > create decks that doesn't suffer horrible deaths when faced with > contests (even star vampire decks). So the way I see it, the problem > is that some people can't be bothered to create decks that can handle > a contest and instead they want to change the rules. Right. And I responded to this point of view below so won't repeat myself. > > Notice that the answer to making the game more balanced is contained in > > a change to the game, not an expectation that players should engage in > > sub-optimal strategies. If you're responding to what is seen as a problem > > in contestation creating unfun games by telling people to alter the > > strategies they would otherwise pursue, you're essentially doing the same > > thing: expecting player to engage in sub-optimal strategies to solve a > > game problem. Wrong. Fix the game itself and let players be free to > > choose the strategies they think best for their chances of winning without > > worrying about whether those strategies cause crippled games. > > I don't see what's suboptimal. What I've suggested people to do is to > create decks that can handle one of their minions disappearing very > early. But here's the problem: you're responding to the wrong original complaint, I believe. This is an answer to losing. It isn't an answer to the game becoming unfun and unbalanced when this happens. If Norm were merely worried about the fact that he lost when this happens, then I'd agree with your response. I don't think that was his actual complaint as much as the fact that it's a really rude way of losing and screws up the games for the remaining players. (If that wasn't Norm's complaint, I think other guys, like Peter, have expressed that complaint.) Wrong complaint, wrong answer. > > > They should be built to be able to handle it or, if they're not built > > > to handle it, they shouldn't expect to win as much. It's very possible > > > to build star vampire decks that still can manage to play games without > > > their star. > > > > That's your personal view of strategy. Another reasonable view is that > > the possibility isn't worth covering and trying to cover it will weaken > > your star vampire deck too much. So accept defeat when it happens and > > win more often in the vast majority of cases when it doesn't happen. > > > > But such a view doesn't solve Peter's perceived problem of contestation > > causing unfun games. Again, the job of players is do their best to win. > > It's the job of the rules to create the greatest possibility that the games > > will be fun. > > In my opinion, those games are only unfun if the contesting players > have bad decks (as in decks not being able to handle a contest) or if > they give up right away when faced with a contest. That's certainly a valid opinion. If so, then I think we've exposed the real subjective difference between you and Peter, rather than the stuff you two were sniping over. > I just think that it's attitudes that should change, not rules. Well, OK. But subjective opinion about what rules would make for the most fun more of the time are somewhat irreconcilable. Best to just agree to disagree about that. Fred

>> My grandpredator influences out Beast, ...He then rushes and torporizes >> Arika (any one my predator's weenies >> diablerize her). I know I'm going to lose. I can't stop it. It's turn 3 >> and I know my game is fucked up beyond all recognition. >> > If this was meant to be a counterargument to the contesting rule > screwin with the game, keep in mind that there are far more counters > to rush than there are for contesting. And your argument, such as it > is, holds very little water whatsoever. What he is trying to say, I suppose, is that there are dozens of other ways that will get your game fucked beyond all recognition and are equally random (or choosing of another player or whatever, let's drop the semantics discussion) as contestment is, that are also 100% out of your control and will show up once every 1000 games you play. Shit happens. The underlying question that I'm reading in it, is why the dozen of other ways of getting your game fubar'd are acceptable and not in need of a change and contestation (apparently) is.

"LSJ" <vte...@white-wolf.com> schreef in bericht news:h5rvei$i7v$3...@news.eternal-september.org... > _angst_ wrote: >> I don't see how it's randomly inflicted, ever. I don't think I've >> randomly contested anything ever. > > Again, we're not talking about beginning the contest. > > We're talking about being at a table where the vampire you've spend 8 pool > and 8 transfers on (and who is yet uncontrolled) is brought out into the > ready region of another player. > > And that, as explained so many times already, is a random coincidence of > fate. If that is indeed the only real reason behind these endless discussions about changing contest rules, why don't we just play with open uncontrolled regions? Is there any *real* argument not to do so? I'm not too pursuaded by the strategical "keep my vampire hidden" argument as that's generally out of the window in turn 2. Besides, in any tournament with, say, less than 20 people (which is the large majority) this secrecy is a virtually non-existant in rounds beyond the first. Plus, it could be argued that being able to see which vampire(s) someone is influencing could allow for more strategic counter-play instead of just getting out the guy you planned to, encouraging more crypt diversity. It would also have the benefit of no longer having to worry if cards that target uncontrolled crypt cards (such as Govern and Grooming) are targeting something legal. Note that I'm not saying this is a problem anywhere I have played. On the contrary even, but it's surely a lot "cleaner" and less prone to mistakes. Mistakes that usually require significant judge interference to correct. Of course, we're not going to play with open uncontrolled regions anytime soon, leading me to believe there is more behind all this than *just* the oddball "I got contest-fucked out of the game randomly".

"Izaak" <nom...@usenet.plz> wrote in message news:4a820b27$0$29964$703f...@news.kpn.nl... > "LSJ" <vte...@white-wolf.com> schreef in bericht news:h5rvei$i7v$3...@news.eternal-september.org... >> We're talking about being at a table where the vampire you've spend 8 pool and 8 transfers on (and who is yet uncontrolled) is >> brought out into the ready region of another player. >> >> And that, as explained so many times already, is a random coincidence of fate. > > If that is indeed the only real reason behind these endless discussions about changing contest rules, why don't we just play with > open uncontrolled regions? Is there any *real* argument not to do so? There absolutely is, yes. Because the hidden nature of uncontrolled vampires is a distinct element in the game. It makes a difference whether you have to guess what your opponents have available to them or not. (And some cards, e.g. Brainwash and Betrayer, absolutely hinge on this rule - although granted, that's a nit.) > I'm not too pursuaded by the strategical "keep my vampire hidden" argument as that's generally out of the window in turn 2. > Besides, in any tournament with, say, less than 20 people (which is the large majority) this secrecy is a virtually non-existant > in rounds beyond the first. I'm a little confused by your thrust here but I'll take the obvious leap and guess that you think that once someone has revealed a vampire or two out of their uncontrolled area (or, alternatively, dumped some library cards that might leak the same information), there's no useful information to be hidden in an uncontrolled area. If so, I disagree. Exactly which vampire(s) are uncontrolled can be very significant at times. For instance, when someone can suddenly influence out a vampire that makes a surprise difference. Or when you have multiple vampires on the board and can easily replace one of them (by influing out) but not the others - and which vampire does your opponent rush and decapitate? (Ironically, one of the most key examples of the criticality of face-down vampires is wehn one suddenly transfers out a vampire who contests his prey's last vampire and uses the lack of interceptors to bleed the guy out.) I'm not saying this makes a constant difference. But it makes a difference enough of the time that I like it as a feature in the game, myself. > Plus, it could be argued that being able to see which vampire(s) someone is influencing could allow for more strategic > counter-play instead of just getting out the guy you planned to, encouraging more crypt diversity. > > It would also have the benefit of no longer having to worry if cards that target uncontrolled crypt cards (such as Govern and > Grooming) are targeting something legal. Note that I'm not saying this is a problem anywhere I have played. On the contrary even, > but it's surely a lot "cleaner" and less prone to mistakes. Mistakes that usually require significant judge interference to > correct. > > Of course, we're not going to play with open uncontrolled regions anytime soon, leading me to believe there is more behind all > this than *just* the oddball "I got contest-fucked out of the game randomly". 1) There's no reason to believe there's anything more "behind all this" than what people are citing as their complaints. 2) Face up uncontrolled minions would hardly be a costless solution as you suggest. At least, not IMHO. Fred

On Aug 12, 10:00 am, "Izaak" <nom...@usenet.plz> wrote: ... > The underlying question that I'm reading in it, is why the dozen of other > ways of getting your game fubar'd are acceptable and not in need of a change > and contestation (apparently) is. I do see the following things all sit in the category of "stuff that will bone my game horribly but I can't really do much about when they actually happen that I haven't already done before I sat down to play VTES" - Seating order - Library Jam - Crypt Screw/Jam Seating Order Seating order, more often than not, leads to a more-frequent less-fun VTES experience. Getting the deck archetype that you have least defence for as a predator sucks, but that was something I defended least against when I built the deck... long before I sat down to play. My issue, it was a risk I assessed as low and didn't protect heavily against it. Library Jam/Crypt Screw I shuffled, the cards got cut and unadulterated chance screwed me. My combat deck drew all of its masters/action mods and none of the rushes and combat cards... My vote deck drew no vote-push... My superstar deck drew all of the Support Cast and so on... Again... pure bald-faced chance of the same variety as seating. Did all of my planning to avoid this by the way I designed the library/ crypt. Contesting Wow, I landed on a table with another Eurotrash-Brujah deck and looks like we both want Donal OConnor... bugger, bollocks and damnation. Looks like I work on getting Constanza out first and we can have a debate about Theo during someone else's turn while we don't have to care so much about what is happening... UNLIKE the others this involves Chance + Choice. Chance = landing on another table where someone will want to utilise the same vampire. Choice = both of you choosing to influence that vampire out. DURING THE GAME I had the opportunity to avoid this situation, it didn't just rely on choices I made BEFORE I sat down and certainly required choices made by others AFTER I sat down. So, by combining the fact that it requires a number of player's choices, occurs during the game and occurs comparatively rarely, I squarely fall in the camp for: "The Contesting Rule Does Not Need To Be Changed"

On Aug 11, 4:53 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > And yours is "change the rules". 'Cause the rules in this instance are bad. > Not necessarily. There are different ways to do it (and one can still > chose not to do it, but that might be a bad choice). > However, I will confess that I don't want any and all decks to be able > to win any given tournament. People should be allowed to play any deck > they want, but changing the rules because some decks aren't > competative is stupid. And again, the issue is not "some decks aren't competitive." The issue is "the rules for contestation are disproportionately harsh". > Only if you consider bad decks interesting and good decks boring. 'Cause you are the only arbiter of what decks are good and bad? -Peter

>> If that is indeed the only real reason behind these endless discussions >> about changing contest rules, why don't we just play with open >> uncontrolled regions? Is there any *real* argument not to do so? > > There absolutely is, yes. Because the hidden nature of uncontrolled > vampires > is a distinct element in the game. It makes a difference whether you have > to > guess what your opponents have available to them or not. (And some cards, > e.g. > Brainwash and Betrayer, absolutely hinge on this rule - although granted, > that's a nit.) Similarly, uniqueness of vampires is a distinct element of the game which should, IMO, be retained at all costs. I'm not convinced Brainwash would be impacted, as not only do you hardly ever see it in the first place, it's also going to be placed on the first guy to get transferred on regardless. And Betrayer, well... ye, you know. It's wallpaper already. > (Ironically, one of the most key examples of the criticality of face-down > vampires is wehn one suddenly transfers out a vampire who contests his > prey's > last vampire and uses the lack of interceptors to bleed the guy out.) A situation that, on paper, should be (almost) as rare as the random event of your 1-blood-short minion getting brought out crosstable out of your control. How often do you *really* get the chance to contest someone's last blocker without him seeing it coming or at least him being able to get some clue. I mean, it's not as if you randomly throw a Carna in a Setite deck just in case your prey might play a Carna Superbowl wall. I mean, sure, I see that happening for Carltons, Ivory Bows, Hearts of Cheat and Aranthebeses all the time, but crypt cards? Serious? > I'm not saying this makes a constant difference. But it makes a > difference > enough of the time that I like it as a feature in the game, myself. Oh I don't neccesarily disagree. I don't think contestation rules need to be changed because the random event that's being discussed is simply too rare to go and fiddle with the rules. But if you're looking to fix said occurance, it should be made sure to fix only THAT specific occurance instead of messing about with new transfer and influence rules as suggested in the 700-post thread a week or what ago. > 2) Face up uncontrolled minions would hardly be a costless solution as you > suggest. At least, not IMHO. Maybe not. I think it might actually actually encourage people to build more varied crypts with different capacity ranges so that one is able to respond to his or her predators and prey's crypts instead of going into "no brain influence out Lutz"-mode for the first 3 turns and hoping nobody else had the same idea. Or you could say that the 4 initial cryptcards are face up at the start of the game and at the start of player 1's master phase phase all cards in the uncontrolled regions are shuffled and put back face down. Proceed as current afterwards. Plenty options. What I'd like to see, if a rule change is deemed to be required, is a clean and easy to understand one. Preferably in one sentence and it should fix exactly the situation we've been discussing all along without causing all kinds of collateral damage (such as the new transfer rules that were brought in that other thread would IMO cause).

[ quoted text not captured ] Bleh! I have to back up here because I misread your response. No, is not a valid response to Peter's complain, as I understand it. The dismissal of players having "bad decks" is yet another attempt to misdiagnose the complaint he's making and prescribe a fix to _losing_ - as opposed to making the entire game bad for all players present. In short: BZZZZZZZZZZZTTTTT!!!! Try again... Fred

"Izaak" <nom...@usenet.plz> wrote in message news:4a821eaf$0$5847$703f...@news.kpn.nl... >> (Ironically, one of the most key examples of the criticality of face-down >> vampires is wehn one suddenly transfers out a vampire who contests his >> prey's last vampire and uses the lack of interceptors to bleed the guy out.) > > A situation that, on paper, should be (almost) as rare as the random event > of your 1-blood-short minion getting brought out crosstable out of your > control. How often do you *really* get the chance to contest someone's last > blocker without him seeing it coming or at least him being able to get some > clue. Both seem less rare than you think. I've seen people do the contest-and- bleed-out thing and I recall being in position to at least consider it myself. (As far "him being able to get some clue", what clue could he get? There aren't many ways to look at uncontrolled vampires. As long as you remain poker-faced, he really shouldn't have a clue before you actually do it. He may suspect that it's a possibility given the vampires you've influenced out so far, but you can't play your game worrying about such a thing, so it almost never matters.) I've certainly been victimized on having important vampires either contested or brought out just before I could bring my copy out. I agree, it is pretty rare. And you'd _think_ it would be vanishingly rare given how many vampires there are in the game. But, for whatever reason, it stills seems to affect a small but significant number of games. >> I'm not saying this makes a constant difference. But it makes a >> difference enough of the time that I like it as a feature in the game, >> myself. > > Oh I don't neccesarily disagree. I don't think contestation rules need to be > changed because the random event that's being discussed is simply too rare > to go and fiddle with the rules. As noted elsewhere, I'll mention that's actually my position, too. I'd ultimately prefer to keep things the way they are and not try to fix this. I mostly just posted to disagree with your position that face-up uncontrolled vampires would be a reasonable fix. And, you know, to argue for the sake of arguing. :-) >> 2) Face up uncontrolled minions would hardly be a costless solution as you >> suggest. At least, not IMHO. > > Maybe not. I think it might actually actually encourage people to build more > varied crypts with different capacity ranges so that one is able to respond > to his or her predators and prey's crypts instead of going into "no brain > influence out Lutz"-mode for the first 3 turns and hoping nobody else had > the same idea. It might. But somehow, I don't really think it would make that much difference to most crypts most people would choose. > Or you could say that the 4 initial cryptcards are face up at the start of > the game and at the start of player 1's master phase phase all cards in the > uncontrolled regions are shuffled and put back face down. Proceed as current > afterwards. Plenty options. Well, that's definitely a better proposal. It still doesn't deal with the possibility that, say, two Enkidu decks sit at the same table. Usually people are not going to put any kind of reasonable alternative into their deck that allows them to do anything without Enkidu in an Enkidu deck. There just isn't a backup vampire that does what he does. So even if you know the problem's coming, there's almost no reasonable way to salvage the game. It probably improves the situation - and there's still a cost I don't like. Remember, this will let cats out of bags in 100% of the games in order to grant players a heads-up-problem's-coming on only a small number of them. So, still not worthwhile, IMHO. > What I'd like to see, if a rule change is deemed > to be required, is a clean and easy to understand one. Preferably in one > sentence and it should fix exactly the situation we've been discussing all > along without causing all kinds of collateral damage (such as the new > transfer rules that were brought in that other thread would IMO cause). Yep. Agreed. I'd also like it if the fix were something I actually thought preferable to the problem - which I haven't seen to date. Fred

On Aug 12, 3:08 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > henrik wrote: > > On Aug 11, 5:28 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > > >>> Why not make all vampire non unique then? Perhaps with the exception > >>> of the same player not being able to control duplicates. > >> Most likely the obvious reason: so that a crypt would have a selection of > >> vampires rather than 12 copies of the "perfect" vampire for that deck. > > > If you wouldn't be allowed to control more than one copy of the same > > minion a crypt like that would probably not be used more than it is > > today. > > Yeah. > > > And I suppose that the transfer back rule was originally created to > > ease the disadvantage of contesting, but today it exists to provide > > pool gain via cards like Powerbase: Montreal, Scouting Mission etc. > > No. Today it provides such bloat ability, as has been covered. But that's not > what it exists to do[*]. > > [*] Citations to the contrary welcome. I would be very confident in stating that the primary use of the transfer back rule today is to gain pool from ecoterroists, powerbase: montreal etc. This is from my playing experience across Australia and on JOL. simcof

LSJ wrote: > henrik wrote: >> And I suppose that the transfer back rule was originally created to >> ease the disadvantage of contesting, but today it exists to provide >> pool gain via cards like Powerbase: Montreal, Scouting Mission etc. > > No. Today it provides such bloat ability, as has been covered. > But that's not what it exists to do. Maybe not, but it looks like you could implement some kind of contestation-rule change without saddling it with a transfer-back rule change and see very little complaining. Why are you so intent on marrying the two changes? Or am I seeing things incorrectly? Kevin M., Prince of Las Vegas "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 Please visit VTESville daily! http://vtesville.myminicity.com/

On 11 elo, 22:22, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 6:59 pm, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > > Heh. You know Dreams and Info Highway are unique (and each more popular than > > > > even the most popular vampire), right? > > > > I do. There are also Zillah's Valley, Coroner's Contact, The Eternals > > > of Sirius and possibly more if one's afraid of contesting. That's why > > > I added the "etc". > > > And those require a spesific clan, not including Zillah's. How are > > those going to help, let's say Ventrue for example? > > Zillah's Valley will help Ventrue. And, as mentioned earlier, Dreams > of the Sphinx, Information Highway and Powerbase: Montreal will help > as well (even if they also have a risk of being contested). It seems that you only read what you want to read. I said Zillah's Valley NOT INCLUDED.

On 11 elo, 22:39, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 6:57 pm, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > Just like you never draw combat defense and got sent to torpor before > > > your first action with said 10 cap? > > > Bad draws will always happen, and the only thing you can do is to > > > settle for a ratio you think will work. Sometimes it won't work and > > > all your Deflections will be in the last 15 cards of your library. > > > That's how the shuffling and stuff works. > > > Yes, it's true. But atleast you have the means, which can partially > > counter/will counter those decks, and there are several choices for > > that. But there's pretty much only 1 card that solves contesting, and > > it needs a vampire out. Which pretty much just could be the vampire > > you are currently contesting. > > The card can be played by a 1 cap though. Unless you're playing pure > Imbueds or 12 of the same vampires it's not impossible to get a > vampire out and play the card. You still need to influence the vampire out, and pass the referendum. Which, what you know, takes transfers and turns. > > > > The only way to avoid contestation is to play with non unique minions. > > > There are a few ways to avoid getting an "instant game loss" due to > > > early contesting though. The easiest one would probably be to, as I've > > > mentioned before, make sure that your deck can handle it (assuming you > > > have the fattest bad luck with card drawing as well). > > > So everyone should be playing Tupdogs and Rock Cats? As that's pretty > > much the only deck that doesn't have the risk of contesting anything > > it has. With the possible exception of Charisma, if you play it on a > > Tupdog. If you have another way to make a deck, that has it's crypt > > containing non-unique minions, that actually could oust it's prey, > > feel free to tell me one. > > I've taken two game wins with an Aabbt Kindred deck, so that's > certainly a possibility. > But avioding contests isn't what I'm talking about, I'm sure I've said > that already. > I'm talking about lessening the negative effect contesting has on your > game. Just like combat/vote/bleed defence is about lessening the > negative effect combat/votes/bleeds have on your game. Deflection > doesn't stop your predator from bleeding, Majesty doesn't stop your > prey from rushing you. No you haven't said it. You have been defending the current rules and negative effect contesting has from what I've understood. > > > Yes. I'm aware that there are no 100% guarantees that your deck will > > > be able to handle everything, even if precautions are taken during > > > deck building. If that's a big problem though, I think the library/ > > > drawing system should be changed rather than the contesting rules. > > > It's easier to change the rules concerning contesting, than rework > > library/drawing which works greatly. > > It's easier to shape up, than changing the rules concerning contesting > which works greatly. And here you defend the current rules for contesting again. > > > I don't really see the difference between a card removing my minion or > > > a rule in the rulebook doing it. The result is the same anyway, and I > > > don't think it's too harsh in either situation. > > > A card doing it says that the deck is supposed to do that. A rule in > > rulebook says: If you have bad luck, you are most likely losing this > > round. > > All rules in the rulebook says that, if you read it that way. Bad luck > can cause you to lose games. People who doesn't want a game where luck > is a factor shouldn't play V:tES, really. People who don't want luck involved, shouldn't involve in any creative activity.

On 11 elo, 23:53, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 11, 9:43 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > > > > It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the > > > rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". > > > You answer is always "Use smaller vampires, don't rely on a single > > minion, and use crypt acceleration". > > And yours is "change the rules". Perhaps there is a problem in the rules, if people ask/beg/discuss for alternative options, and it gives several pages long threads? > > All of which are certainly ways > > to preemptively attempt to avoid the problems of contestation. But > > they are also ways in which all decks end up looking the same. > > Not necessarily. There are different ways to do it (and one can still > chose not to do it, but that might be a bad choice). > However, I will confess that I don't want any and all decks to be able > to win any given tournament. People should be allowed to play any deck > they want, but changing the rules because some decks aren't > competative is stupid. Now how this relate to contesting? It doesn't involve it, only bad deck construction, if you are trying to win with Trujahs or a similar clan. > > So once > > again, the rules for contestation, which people point to as "something > > that makes people make more interesting decks" is doing the exact > > opposite. > > Only if you consider bad decks interesting and good decks boring. Good decks usually are boring, if they are the same ones we've already seen dozens of times. Good decks that are new, and refreshing, are a different thing.

[ quoted text not captured ] I read that. I don't know why you want it excluded though. How do you block actions without using intercept or stealth lowering effects?

On Aug 12, 3:35 am, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > > And yours is "change the rules". > > 'Cause the rules in this instance are bad. No. > > Not necessarily. There are different ways to do it (and one can still > > chose not to do it, but that might be a bad choice). > > However, I will confess that I don't want any and all decks to be able > > to win any given tournament. People should be allowed to play any deck > > they want, but changing the rules because some decks aren't > > competative is stupid. > > And again, the issue is not "some decks aren't competitive." The issue > is "the rules for contestation are disproportionately harsh". That's just one view of it. I think the problem is to be found in deck building, not the rules harshness. > > Only if you consider bad decks interesting and good decks boring. > > 'Cause you are the only arbiter of what decks are good and bad? Nope. When I'm talking about "good" and "bad" decks here, I'm talking about how good/bad they are when it comes to handling contests. If they can't handle a contest, they're bad. Every deck that can handle a contest aren't a guaranteed winner though. But we can probably quit it here, since we're still just telling each other that we have different views of the game.

On Aug 12, 11:03 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the > > > > rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". > > > > You answer is always "Use smaller vampires, don't rely on a single > > > minion, and use crypt acceleration". > > > And yours is "change the rules". > > Perhaps there is a problem in the rules, if people ask/beg/discuss for > alternative options, and it gives several pages long threads? Perhaps. But the newsgroup are far from representative though. Even if I'm next to alone in stating that I think the current rules are fine, there are plenty of other people who thinks that as well. They just don't write about it here. (I'm also quite sure that there are more people than the ones in this thread that thinks the rules are too harsh. I'm not trying to say that it's a vocal minority.) > > > All of which are certainly ways > > > to preemptively attempt to avoid the problems of contestation. But > > > they are also ways in which all decks end up looking the same. > > > Not necessarily. There are different ways to do it (and one can still > > chose not to do it, but that might be a bad choice). > > However, I will confess that I don't want any and all decks to be able > > to win any given tournament. People should be allowed to play any deck > > they want, but changing the rules because some decks aren't > > competative is stupid. > > Now how this relate to contesting? It doesn't involve it, only bad > deck construction, if you are trying to win with Trujahs or a similar > clan. How does what relate to contesting? I was replying to a statement about the contesting rule making every deck look the same. > > > So once > > > again, the rules for contestation, which people point to as "something > > > that makes people make more interesting decks" is doing the exact > > > opposite. > > > Only if you consider bad decks interesting and good decks boring. > > Good decks usually are boring, if they are the same ones we've already > seen dozens of times. Good decks that are new, and refreshing, are a > different thing. Bad decks are always boring.

[ quoted text not captured ] Because you can use your library to defend against those. Against contesting, you need a library card, and a vampire out. Which means you influence out a new vampire, while paying the first one being contested.

On Aug 12, 1:45 am, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > You should be addressing whether Norm's > orginal complaint was, "I'm not winning enough with a star vampire deck" - > which would be a metagame balance problem - or, "this situation is not fun > for anyone" - which would be a real rules problem. I've been reading it > as the latter, but I could be reading stuff into what other people say. I replied to Norm's original post after reading it like the latter. Then other stuff came along and I just rolled with it. > But here's the problem: you're responding to the wrong original complaint, > I believe. This is an answer to losing. It isn't an answer to the game > becoming unfun and unbalanced when this happens. If Norm were merely > worried about the fact that he lost when this happens, then I'd agree with > your response. I don't think that was his actual complaint as much as the > fact that it's a really rude way of losing and screws up the games for > the remaining players. (If that wasn't Norm's complaint, I think other > guys, like Peter, have expressed that complaint.) Wrong complaint, wrong > answer. I think they're connected. The game doesn't become unfun when contesting if you've built a deck that can handle contesting. Just like a game can become unfun for an imbued deck when it gets Stanislava for predator. If you run into something that's totally impossible to handle (I know imbueds can handle Stanislava in some ways, just an example) then the game tend to become less fun. However, it doesn't get heavily unfun until the player throws in the towel and gives up. > >> In my opinion, those games are only unfun if the contesting players > >> have bad decks (as in decks not being able to handle a contest) or if > >> they give up right away when faced with a contest. > > > That's certainly a valid opinion. If so, then I think we've exposed the > > real subjective difference between you and Peter, rather than the stuff you > > two were sniping over. > > Bleh! I have to back up here because I misread your response. No, > is not a valid response to Peter's complain, as I understand it. The > dismissal of players having "bad decks" is yet another attempt to misdiagnose > the complaint he's making and prescribe a fix to _losing_ - as opposed to > making the entire game bad for all players present. > > In short: BZZZZZZZZZZZTTTTT!!!! Try again... I still don't think the entire game becomes bad for all players present unless the contester/s have decks that can't handle contesting and/or gives up too early. > > I just think that it's attitudes that should change, not rules. > > Well, OK. But subjective opinion about what rules would make for the most > fun more of the time are somewhat irreconcilable. Best to just agree to > disagree about that. I think both me and Peter knows that since the last thread.

[ quoted text not captured ] Because when talking things in a general level, mentioning cards that affect a certain clan, is not exactly a good idea. We are not talking about Setites or Samedi here. But on a general level of the game.

On Aug 12, 10:57 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > The only way to avoid contestation is to play with non unique minions. > > > > There are a few ways to avoid getting an "instant game loss" due to > > > > early contesting though. The easiest one would probably be to, as I've > > > > mentioned before, make sure that your deck can handle it (assuming you > > > > have the fattest bad luck with card drawing as well). > > > > So everyone should be playing Tupdogs and Rock Cats? As that's pretty > > > much the only deck that doesn't have the risk of contesting anything > > > it has. With the possible exception of Charisma, if you play it on a > > > Tupdog. If you have another way to make a deck, that has it's crypt > > > containing non-unique minions, that actually could oust it's prey, > > > feel free to tell me one. > > > I've taken two game wins with an Aabbt Kindred deck, so that's > > certainly a possibility. > > But avioding contests isn't what I'm talking about, I'm sure I've said > > that already. > > I'm talking about lessening the negative effect contesting has on your > > game. Just like combat/vote/bleed defence is about lessening the > > negative effect combat/votes/bleeds have on your game. Deflection > > doesn't stop your predator from bleeding, Majesty doesn't stop your > > prey from rushing you. > > No you haven't said it. You have been defending the current rules and > negative effect contesting has from what I've understood. I've said it in other places in this thread. And yeah, I've also been defending the current rules of contesting since I think they're good and appropriate. > > > It's easier to change the rules concerning contesting, than rework > > > library/drawing which works greatly. > > > It's easier to shape up, than changing the rules concerning contesting > > which works greatly. > > And here you defend the current rules for contesting again. Yep. > > > A card doing it says that the deck is supposed to do that. A rule in > > > rulebook says: If you have bad luck, you are most likely losing this > > > round. > > > All rules in the rulebook says that, if you read it that way. Bad luck > > can cause you to lose games. People who doesn't want a game where luck > > is a factor shouldn't play V:tES, really. > > People who don't want luck involved, shouldn't involve in any creative > activity. All creative activities aren't luck based though. But sure.

On 12 elo, 12:16, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 12, 11:03 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > It's still "You need to make your decks less crappy in the name of the > > > > > rule that is supposed to make decks more varied". > > > > > You answer is always "Use smaller vampires, don't rely on a single > > > > minion, and use crypt acceleration". > > > > And yours is "change the rules". > > > Perhaps there is a problem in the rules, if people ask/beg/discuss for > > alternative options, and it gives several pages long threads? > > Perhaps. But the newsgroup are far from representative though. Even if > I'm next to alone in stating that I think the current rules are fine, > there are plenty of other people who thinks that as well. They just > don't write about it here. > > (I'm also quite sure that there are more people than the ones in this > thread that thinks the rules are too harsh. I'm not trying to say that > it's a vocal minority.) Granted :) > > > > So once > > > > again, the rules for contestation, which people point to as "something > > > > that makes people make more interesting decks" is doing the exact > > > > opposite. > > > > Only if you consider bad decks interesting and good decks boring. > > > Good decks usually are boring, if they are the same ones we've already > > seen dozens of times. Good decks that are new, and refreshing, are a > > different thing. > > Bad decks are always boring. Or they can be interesting, if they have a new mechaninc, that can be refined to being better, and becoming a good deck.

[ quoted text not captured ] On the general level of the game, you can use Zillah's Valley, Dreams of the Sphinx, Information Highway or Powerbase: Montreal (possibly some others that I forgot).

[ quoted text not captured ] No they aren't. They create unfun situations, where you most likely will lose the game because you are contesting a vampire. > > > > A card doing it says that the deck is supposed to do that. A rule in > > > > rulebook says: If you have bad luck, you are most likely losing this > > > > round. > > > > All rules in the rulebook says that, if you read it that way. Bad luck > > > can cause you to lose games. People who doesn't want a game where luck > > > is a factor shouldn't play V:tES, really. > > > People who don't want luck involved, shouldn't involve in any creative > > activity. > > All creative activities aren't luck based though. But sure. All players in the football team get food poisoning.

> Because you can use your library to defend against those. Against > contesting, you need a library card, and a vampire out. Which means > you influence out a new vampire, while paying the first one being > contested. Without taking sides here, I can come up with plenty events that a well-constructed library in a perfectly reasonable deck has little to no chance of defending against. Putting 1 on Enkidu in turn 1, see Ohanna and Mustafa Rahmann in your back come out is one of those. I've been utterly buttfucked by people playing 2 brainwashes in the first two turns of the game too and there's nothing you can do about it. "Play Sudden or Wash". Well ye, but unless I play a deck with 83 Sudden Reversals I might not see one in my first 8 cards. Is this rare? Sure. That's why we generally suck it up and move on.

On Aug 12, 11:44 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > I've said it in other places in this thread. > > And yeah, I've also been defending the current rules of contesting > > since I think they're good and appropriate. > > No they aren't. They create unfun situations, where you most likely > will lose the game because you are contesting a vampire. If you're playing a deck that can't handle contesting. > > > > > A card doing it says that the deck is supposed to do that. A rule in > > > > > rulebook says: If you have bad luck, you are most likely losing this > > > > > round. > > > > > All rules in the rulebook says that, if you read it that way. Bad luck > > > > can cause you to lose games. People who doesn't want a game where luck > > > > is a factor shouldn't play V:tES, really. > > > > People who don't want luck involved, shouldn't involve in any creative > > > activity. > > > All creative activities aren't luck based though. But sure. > > All players in the football team get food poisoning. $50 says it was deliberate.

[ quoted text not captured ] I didn't say those situations don't exist. And playing with Enkidu, and having weenie-dom predator is in my eyes equally universal hate. We all run to situations where your deck is scissors to my paper. But what contesting is in a rock-paper-scissors game?

On 12 elo, 12:52, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 12, 11:44 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > I've said it in other places in this thread. > > > And yeah, I've also been defending the current rules of contesting > > > since I think they're good and appropriate. > > > No they aren't. They create unfun situations, where you most likely > > will lose the game because you are contesting a vampire. > > If you're playing a deck that can't handle contesting. Circular reasoning works because circular reasoning works because circular reasoning works because circular reasoning works. Care to actually show a deck that CAN handle contesting instead of repeating over and over gain the same phrase? Of note, we haven't been talking about weenies here. > > > > > > A card doing it says that the deck is supposed to do that. A rule in > > > > > > rulebook says: If you have bad luck, you are most likely losing this > > > > > > round. > > > > > > All rules in the rulebook says that, if you read it that way. Bad luck > > > > > can cause you to lose games. People who doesn't want a game where luck > > > > > is a factor shouldn't play V:tES, really. > > > > > People who don't want luck involved, shouldn't involve in any creative > > > > activity. > > > > All creative activities aren't luck based though. But sure. > > > All players in the football team get food poisoning. > > $50 says it was deliberate. 100$ says it was raw chicken

[ quoted text not captured ] Yeah. I noted that it has such an ability.

On Aug 12, 11:57 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > On 12 elo, 12:52, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Aug 12, 11:44 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > > I've said it in other places in this thread. > > > > And yeah, I've also been defending the current rules of contesting > > > > since I think they're good and appropriate. > > > > No they aren't. They create unfun situations, where you most likely > > > will lose the game because you are contesting a vampire. > > > If you're playing a deck that can't handle contesting. > > Circular reasoning works because circular reasoning works because > circular reasoning works because circular reasoning works. Care to > actually show a deck that CAN handle contesting instead of repeating > over and over gain the same phrase? Of note, we haven't been talking > about weenies here. I have shown decks like that in response to others. I've also several times mentioned how to one can create a deck so that it has a decent chance of winning even if the first vampire is contested/influenced out by another player. And whether you like to forbid me from suggesting to add a few small vampires to the crypt or not, that is one of the ways to be able to handle contests.

[ quoted text not captured ] I haven't seen a single deck yet. Only ideas, suggestions and whatnots. That hardly qualifies as a deck.

"Akantes" <aka...@hotmail.com> schreef in bericht news:61713ee3-f606-4718...@b15g2000yqd.googlegroups.com... [ quoted text not captured ] That would be a UFO in orbit targeting your rock, paper or scissor with a laserbeam and melting it. It is *that* rare.

On 12 elo, 13:56, "Izaak" <nom...@usenet.plz> wrote: > "Akantes" <akan...@hotmail.com> schreef in berichtnews:61713ee3-f606-4718...@b15g2000yqd.googlegroups.com... [ quoted text not captured ] It isn't.

[ quoted text not captured ] Oooooh, strong logic rebuttal...... 1267 unique vampires. Lets assume the people playing all chose their vampires out of this group. Leaving aside non unique minions for the moment. a tournament with 40 players. someone please do the actual stats as to 2 people sitting down at a table with the exact same vamp in their opening crypt draw.

>> That would be a UFO in orbit targeting your rock, paper or scissor with a >> laserbeam and melting it. >> >> It is *that* rare. > > It isn't. A vampires in play getting contested? Sure, that happens occasionally; mostly this is a strategical choice from the one initiating the contest. That doesn't need any sort of fix and I think most of the participants in this discussion would agree. Putting 8 pool on <Vampire X> in turn 1 and 2 and then see it come out cross table? It never happened to me once and I've been playing since '96 (and tournaments since 2002). I'd count that as rare occurances that don't need rule changes. YMMV.

[ quoted text not captured ] Assume distinct vampires in each individual uncontrolled region (otherwise the math gets complicated). Player A: V1, V2, V3, V4 (100% chance of getting 4 vampires). Player B: 1263/1267 * 1262/1266 * 1261/1265 * 1260/1264 = 98.74% miss (not getting any of the four vampires A has). Including all other players B,C,D,E (all missing the players that went before): Definition of the falling factorial (the first n terms of a factorial): ff(x,n) := x!/(x-n)! = x * (x-1) * (x-2) * ... * (x-n+1) ff(1263,16) / ff(1267,4)^4 = 88.07% miss Over all 8 tables: (ff(1263,16) / ff(1267,4)^4)^8 = 36.19% miss Meaning 63.81% chance of at least one table with at least two players sharing at least one vampire between them. ... in the first round. Over three rounds (assuming the 4 vampires drawn in the earlier rounds have no bearing on the ones drawn in later rounds): (ff(1263,16) / ff(1267,4)^4)^8^3 = 4.74% miss Meaning 95.26% chance of at least one uncontrolled-region collision in three rounds. (not including the final)

> Oooooh, strong logic rebuttal...... >1267 unique vampires. Lets assume the people playing all chose their > vampires out of this group. Leaving aside non unique minions for the > moment. > a tournament with 40 players. > someone please do the actual stats as to 2 people sitting down at a > table with the exact same vamp in their opening crypt draw. I can't do the numbers of what you asked on the fly, but let's give this a go: With 1267 vampires in the pool, we assume that all vampires are equally likely to see play which is simply not true. For simplicity�s sake let�s assume only 900 vampires actually see play - this is a purely arbitrary number that I felt is reasonable. Now, the odds of someone influencing to the same vampire as you in turn 1 is 1 in 900, or 0,11 %. Or rather, the odds of him NOT transferring to the same guy are 99,89%. Of course there are 3 more players, so that makes the chance that nobody else is influencing to the same vampire as you are 0,9989^4 = 0,9956 or approximately 99,6%. If we account for the fact that other players might influence to the same vampire that is different from yours and that it happening to them would make the game equally unfun for you, the odds of everything going to plan do drop a bit, and round to 99,5%. This isn't too surprising as the difference between 1 in 900, 1 in 899 and 1 in 898 is neglicable. So what we have is a 99,5% chance of not seeing this "random crosstable fuck of someone bringing out the guy someone else was transferring to", which means that it happens on average once in 200 tables. Of course a tournament with 40 players (3R+F) has a total of 25 tables played so the chance of this random crosstable "contest before you bring it out" is 1-(0,995^25) = 0,117. Which is roughly 12% chance. Of course, looking at the TWDA, most tournaments don't have anywhere near 40 players, but more like 15-25 players. Let's assume 25 (which is a high estimate) player tournaments, which have only 16 tables played. In that scenario the odds of it happening on any table during the day are only 7,7%. So, on average, if you play 5 tournaments a year, this would happen once every 3 years *in a tournament you're playing* not even neccesarily on a table you're playing. That chance is a mere 2,0% per tournament played, assuming you make the finals in all of them. Again, going with 5 tournaments a year it would occur once every 25 years on average. And that's with a pool of 900 crypt cards. In reality, of course, this is only a real problem with the bigger minions (say, 6+?) reducing the odds even more in favor of it not happening. Do we *really* need a rulechange for that?

[ quoted text not captured ] Now that seems to me to be something that has a high enough chance to happen as to be a completely unnecessary way to have your tournament game go boink for no bloody good reason. Yes, I have seen contestation used strategically, EC2008 finals being a prime example. But more often it tends to ruin a game for everyone, except maybe the predators of the contestees. Keep contestation as a concept, but lessen the penalty for the

[ quoted text not captured ] And still I'm told that I'm paranoid because I consider contesting when building decks. The math, while interesting and assumed correct, misses some things though. If Dawnfires vampire count from the TWDA is to be somewhat trusted, Lutz von Hohenzollern(example) is 10 times more commonly used that Roxanne, Rectrix of the 13th Floor and Arika is used more than twice as much as Alexandra. (Given that the data is only collected from winning decks, it probably has more of the strongest vampires in it than what's represented in a "normal" tournament though. I'm not saying it should be used as unquestioned truth about vampire representation.) Link to the data collection: http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/browse_frm/thread/3eea3299b1bf7b01#

[ quoted text not captured ] > Link to the data collection:http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/browse_f... Which means only that the chances of contestation increases. Which is a greater chance of this kind of skullfuckery screwing you over. Which means making it more play friendly could be good.

On Aug 12, 3:02 pm, Blooded Sand <sandm...@gmail.com> wrote: > > The math, while interesting and assumed correct, misses some things > > though. If Dawnfires vampire count from the TWDA is to be somewhat > > trusted, Lutz von Hohenzollern(example) is 10 times more commonly used > > that Roxanne, Rectrix of the 13th Floor and Arika is used more than > > twice as much as Alexandra. (Given that the data is only collected > > from winning decks, it probably has more of the strongest vampires in > > it than what's represented in a "normal" tournament though. I'm not > > saying it should be used as unquestioned truth about vampire > > representation.) > > > Link to the data collection:http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/browse_f... > > Which means only that the chances of contestation increases. Which is > a greater chance of this kind of skullfuckery screwing you over. Which > means making it more play friendly could be good. Or it means that chances of contesting certain vampires (the ones with high numbers in the xls-file) increases, while it decreases for the vampires with low numbers. But all in all, Id say it means people should perhaps consider contesting more when building decks instead of calling it totally random planetery hate. After all, it seems the risks of it happening seems to be huge. Almost as big as the risk of having a bleed deck as predator, something that most people assume can happen and plan for.

henrik wrote: > But all in all, Id say it means people should perhaps consider > contesting more when building decks instead of calling it totally > random planetery hate. Or rather that they should consider it, even though it is totally random planetary hate, and, while considering it, also consider whether the game could be improved by lessening the impact of this random thing when it occurs.

[ quoted text not captured ] Sure. I'm just saying that if it's given proper consideration when building decks, the impact often isn't that horrible (even if contesting almost always will be more horrible than not contesting). Then again, I've been saying that for a while now and mostly been called paranoid and irrational for it. Thanks for the math, by the way. It was interesting.

On 12 elo, 16:07, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Which means only that the chances of contestation increases. Which is > > a greater chance of this kind of skullfuckery screwing you over. Which > > means making it more play friendly could be good. > > Or it means that chances of contesting certain vampires (the ones with > high numbers in the xls-file) increases, while it decreases for the > vampires with low numbers. > But all in all, Id say it means people should perhaps consider > contesting more when building decks instead of calling it totally > random planetery hate. After all, it seems the risks of it happening > seems to be huge. Almost as big as the risk of having a bleed deck as > predator, something that most people assume can happen and plan for. How does a given deck realistically prepare for contesting? Should we only play low caps? Should we include a vote card that will be useless 88.07% of the time and hope that we draw and pass the vote when it's needed? It would be unreasonable of me to request a deck list but could you give examples of viable solutions? Remember that there are decks with 8+ caps that can't justify including Zillah's Valley or Information Highway and that playing smaller support vampires doesn't give back the time and pool already spent on a big cap. If the answer is "don't play big caps or superstars" I'd rather change the contesting rules then impose that restriction on deck creation.

On Aug 12, 12:13 am, "Kevin M." <youw...@imaspammer.org> wrote: > LSJ wrote: > > henrik wrote: > >> And I suppose that the transfer back rule was originally created to > >> ease the disadvantage of contesting, but today it exists to provide > >> pool gain via cards like Powerbase: Montreal, Scouting Mission etc. > > > No. Today it provides such bloat ability, as has been covered. > > But that's not what it exists to do. > > Maybe not, but it looks like you could implement some kind of > contestation-rule change without saddling it with a transfer-back > rule change and see very little complaining. Why are you so intent > on marrying the two changes? Or am I seeing things incorrectly? I agree that those two changes need to be addressed separately and not banded together as a single change.

[ quoted text not captured ] The rules are among of the various options designed to handle the problem of having your influenced-but-yet-uncontrolled vampire pop up across the table. The first fix (transfer back) seems to 1) not do enough and 2) not be targeted enough. So alternative fixes are considered to be both more effective at addressing the problem they're designed to address and more targeted in addressing that problem.

LSJ wrote: [ quoted text not captured ] So you are saying that you do not assign transfer-back as now a part of the game separate from contestation but rather you assign it to a part of contestation and hence subject to replacement if contestation itself would be replaced? I'd suggest that transfer-back has clearly outgrown its original function and therefore should be considered an issue separate from contestation and contestation's possible replacement. I admire your adherence to V:TES' original intent, but this is one of those few cases where I'd like to help you see that you're wrong. :) Kevin M., Prince of Las Vegas "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 Please visit VTESville daily! http://vtesville.myminicity.com/

On Aug 11, 7:11 pm, Octagon <aaron.con...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 12, 2:45 am, Rehlow <newsgr...@rehlow.com> wrote: > > On Aug 11, 12:09 am, Octagon <aaron.con...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > It is interesting that these contestation discussions are centered > > > around crypt fatties as the problem. Contest a weenie and the > > > penalties are the same, however relinquishing control is not so > > > problematic nor is contesting other unique minion or master cards. > > > This is an incorrect statement. Contesting a 4 cap is not the same as > > contesting a 10 cap. In the former you have lost 1 turn of transfers > > and at most 4 pool is in limbo. In the later you have most likely lost > > 3 turns of transfers and up to 10 pool is in limbo. > > Not incorrect. The 'penalty' for contesting is the same, 1 pool every > untap phase if you wish to continue contesting. Umm... only if you make the choice to actually bring the vampire into play (or someone does elsewhere on the table) does the 1 pool a turn come into play. The discussion, as presented by the people who started it, is about being put in a situation, randomly, where contestation becomes a factor, whether because it actually happens, or because his/your vampire pops into play just before you/he has a chance to get your copy out. Please try to follow along - the opportunity cost *is* the game- crippling penalty under discussion. It's essentially LSJ's "Hey, thanks for playing, but you rolled the 1. Please put 8 pool back in the blood bank, and take no transfers till your third turn. You may spend 2 transfers to take 1 pool from the blood bank, up to 8 times this game." > The opportunity cost, > which is what you are referring to is substantially different > according to the capacity of the vampire but this is what I was > attempting to point out, that this is really only an issue for high > capacity crypts. Well, that part is true - it's only a problem for crypts that contain, and would prefer to start with, high-capacity vampires. So are you intentionally saying "play weenies or shut up about it?" > As such it needs to be taken into consideration both > in deck construction and initial influencing. How so? Initial influencing? Should I be announcing, before there's any clues on the table, exactly what I'm playing so I can discuss with other players what they're bringing out? Because I'm sure as heck surprised when another deck with Random Vampire X shows up at a given table, but it does happen. > > Only 1 player makes a choice. The 1 pool a turn is nothing when > > contesting a fattie, it is the lost transfers and all that pool put in > > limbo as soon as the contest starts. > > Once again, beg to differ. I make a choice playing a large cap, > popular vampire. *BZZT* Strawman. Popular or not is not the issue. > I make a choice putting all my proverbial eggs\pool > into the one vampire. Sure, being the first Methuselah to bring out > that potentially contested vamp removes the ultimate choice, however > that in itself has advantages as it often means the other Methuselah > feels it is in their best interest to go for another vampire entirely. In which case, if they're 7+ pool into bringing out that vampire, it's them that's screwed instead of you (or, alternately, they have the option of taking you with them by actually contesting). So switch perspective on the discussion. How has random chance not killed *their* game? And remember, this isn't about star vampire decks, etc. This isn't about "key minions." This discussion isn't about anything at all other than the fact that right now, built in, the rules have a random "You're going to have your game severely crippled. You may choose to take someone else down with you, and destabilize the table even further." factor built into them. - D.J.

[ quoted text not captured ] Just some examples. Examples that can if it's the first thing that happens: http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9nycqualifier http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9blackplanet http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9icelandeq http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9royalrumble2 http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9qcfblr http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9nfeqparis http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9swedishecq http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9orebromarch http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9falangoth http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9orebrofeb http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9lvmq Examples that probably can't: http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9linkopingmay http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9tolgothsweden http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k9impflamess Regards Alex

On Aug 11, 9:11 pm, Juggernaut1981 <brasscompo...@gmail.com> wrote: > Contesting > Wow, I landed on a table with another Eurotrash-Brujah deck and looks > like we both want Donal OConnor... bugger, bollocks and damnation. May I ask how you knew it was a EuroBrujah deck that wanted to get Donal out before you'd already put 7 pool there, and then he popped out of that other deck? Because until there's a vampire in play, I can't see how you'd know that. > UNLIKE the others this involves Chance + Choice. Chance = landing on > another table where someone will want to utilise the same vampire. > Choice = both of you choosing to influence that vampire out. Except that, to a large extent, which vampire you're choosing to influence out is a blind choice, therefore essentially chance. - D.J.

On Aug 12, 5:11 am, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > No. And yet the lead designer of the game, even if in a hypothetical sense, seems to agree with my premise, which makes me think I might be on to something. And again, there were just as many people who thought that Return to Innocence was perfectly fine. And the reason it seemed so stupidly overpowered was 'cause people were just not preparing for it adequately. Same with Pulled Fangs burning folks. Heck, I *loved* when Pulled Fangs burned folks. I used it all the time to do just that. And it was, at least to me, hysterical. But it was also deeply broken and wildly overpowered, and I was on the front lines of arguing for that, too. > That's just one view of it. I think the problem is to be found in deck > building, not the rules harshness. Yes you do think that. But I think you are incorrect. In that while you certainly can attempt to mitigate the disproportionate negative effects that result from being in a position to contest a minion, that doesn't mean that the disproportionate negative effects couldn't use a changing so as to make the game more fun and less hampered by incredibly random, harsh hosing. -Peter

[ quoted text not captured ] Well put DJ. So this simplifies things rather immensely, as DJ's statement and clarification above is actually exactly what both this and the previous htread was about.

On Aug 12, 4:03 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > Yes you do think that. But I think you are incorrect. In that while > you certainly can attempt to mitigate the disproportionate negative > effects that result from being in a position to contest a minion, that > doesn't mean that the disproportionate negative effects couldn't use a > changing so as to make the game more fun and less hampered by > incredibly random, harsh hosing. > > -Peter Peter, just for ease of comprehension and firebreaking sidetrack arguments, would you be happy to have the last sentence reworded as "random, incredibly harsh hosing"?

[ quoted text not captured ] It is part of the game just like the overly-punitive contestation is and just like (D)-symbol-omnidirectability was part of the game. Every part of the game is part of the game. Until it is not. QED. > I'd suggest that transfer-back has clearly outgrown its original function > and therefore should be considered an issue separate from contestation > and contestation's possible replacement. > > I admire your adherence to V:TES' original intent, but this is one of > those few cases where I'd like to help you see that you're wrong. :) Wrong about what? I welcome any evidence to the contrary of my position (evidence that uncontrolled-region bloat is not part of the game, for instance, or that uncontrolled-region bloat is part of the design goal or even a necessary feature of the rule set).

"LSJ" <vte...@white-wolf.com> schreef in bericht news:h5ufkv$9sn$1...@news.eternal-september.org... [ quoted text not captured ] Let's please not forget that the numbers presented are the numbers *possible* contestation (ie, two players having an identical vampire in their opening crypts). It doesn't account for it actually becoming random planetary hate. Those odds are much, much smaller.

On Aug 11, 1:59 am, Vincent <v.rip...@gmail.com> wrote: > On 10 août, 20:37, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Ian > > Forrestal, I go 4th, on my second turn I play him. > > > My predator on his next turn influences Ian Forrestal into play with > > the caveat, "damn we're gonna contest" and "sorry man gotta do it" > > and "deck is based on Ian". > > > I know we are both going to lose. I can't stop it. It is turn 3 and I > > know my game is FUBAR. > > Seems like your predator is playing badly. How is it different from a > grand-prey putting a Parity Shift on you because someone threatened > him with a rush if he didn't, or from an ally playing Scourge of the > Enoichans at the start of the game while you play a Hermana Minor > deck ? It is different because none of those involve contesting. Your analogies are false. >I even remember a silly predator rushing my 7-cap vampire on > turn 2 with a 6-cap vampire, Amaranth my vampire and has his own one > burned because of the blood hunt (because he didn"t realize his > predator has some votes in hand). > Does it need to be fixed? This is a different subject for a different thread. If you think it needs to be fixed then you should say so in another thread.

On Aug 11, 1:12 pm, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: > As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Arika, > I go 3rd, and on my third turn I play her. > > My grandpredator influences out Beast, the Leatherface of Detroit, looks > around, and says, "This will hurt me in the long run, so I might as well > tac-nuke it - sorry mate, nothing personal". > > He then rushes and torporizes Arika (any one my predator's weenies > diablerize her). I know I'm going to lose. I can't stop it. It's turn 3 > and I know my game is fucked up beyond all recognition. You are correct. That player is playing irrationally.

[ quoted text not captured ] I would postulate that the evidence for uncontrolled-region bloat is that it is a common strategic function that is commonly acknowledged to be a benefit to the game. I think that was recognised by the designers as such even if I don't have evidence to prove that claim. This is in direct contrast to Contesting Crypt Cards which is disproportionate, random, and arbitrary. The designers recognised that it may have been such but that they didn't want to or didn't have the time to come up with a sutable alternative. Think that banding these two together as "designer intent" is muddying the water substantially.

XZealot wrote: > I would postulate that the evidence for uncontrolled-region bloat is > that it is a common strategic function that is commonly acknowledged > to be a benefit to the game. Interesting hypothesis. And 1-agg-burns-a-blood-or-a-vampire may have been commonly acknowledged to be a benefit to the game. Common acknowledgment is one thing. Reality is another. Even commonly acknowledged things may not match reality. Extra bloat may indeed not be a benefit.

On Aug 12, 10:07 am, Blooded Sand <sandm...@gmail.com> wrote: > Peter, just for ease of comprehension and firebreaking sidetrack > arguments, would you be happy to have the last sentence reworded as > "random, incredibly harsh hosing"? I suppose? Being in a situation where contestation is an issue is: A) Incredibly random. and B) Often incredibly harsh. But if you like it better your way, I won't argue. -Peter

[ quoted text not captured ] Extra bloat would be beneficial if it was only available to those clans/discs which have no other way to survive S+B. As most decks that have access to transfer down bloat are usually also packing either DOM or AUS as one of their disciplines, and thus have access o one of the most effective counters to SB (read Bounce) it seems to allow a number of strategies that would otherwise ber far from potimal to survvie, and possibly even win

[ quoted text not captured ] It certainly may NOT be but PLEASE do not lump in the transfer-back issue and its possible removal or replacement with the contestation- lottery issue and its possible removal or replacement. Please give each issue its due diligence on its own unless absolutely necessary. These issues *clearly* deserve separate consideration. [ quoted text not captured ]

Peter D Bakija wrote: > And again, there were just as many people who thought that > Return to Innocence was perfectly fine. You must have played with AMAZINGLY stupid players back then. At the time, I regularly played with about 30 players and NONE of us believed the card was 'perfectly fine'. [ quoted text not captured ]

On Aug 12, 12:20 pm, "Kevin M." <youw...@imaspammer.org> wrote: > You must have played with AMAZINGLY stupid players back then. > > At the time, I regularly played with about 30 players and NONE of us > believed the card was 'perfectly fine'. I'm not talking about people I played with. I'm talking about people on the interwebs. In the pre 7/7 discussions about cards that were too powerful, every single time that RTI was mentioned as too powerful and game breaking, someone would chime in with "Bah! Just use bleed bounce! You are just whining 'cause you are a bad player! Good players don't worry about RTI 'cause they plan for it!" Every single time. -Peter

On Aug 12, 10:44 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > XZealot wrote: > > I would postulate that the evidence for uncontrolled-region bloat is > > that it is a common strategic function that is commonly acknowledged > > to be a benefit to the game. > > > Common acknowledgment is one thing. > Reality is another. I am at a loss as to why you cannot address the two issues separately. Can you explain that?

Blooded Sand wrote: > On Aug 12, 5:44 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> XZealot wrote: >>> I would postulate that the evidence for uncontrolled-region bloat is >>> that it is a common strategic function that is commonly acknowledged >>> to be a benefit to the game. >> Interesting hypothesis. >> >> And 1-agg-burns-a-blood-or-a-vampire may have been commonly acknowledged to be a >> benefit to the game. >> >> Common acknowledgment is one thing. >> Reality is another. >> >> Even commonly acknowledged things may not match reality. >> >> Extra bloat may indeed not be a benefit. > > Extra bloat would be beneficial if it was only available to those > clans/discs which have no other way to survive S+B. Assuming the S+B didn't benefit more from the bloat, yeah. > As most decks that > have access to transfer down bloat are usually also packing either DOM > or AUS as one of their disciplines, and thus have access o one of the > most effective counters to SB (read Bounce) it seems to allow a number That, too. > of strategies that would otherwise ber far from potimal to survvie, > and possibly even win ? You seem to stack up arguments for one side and then say that it leads to the other.

Kevin M. wrote: > LSJ wrote: >> Extra bloat may indeed not be a benefit. > > It certainly may NOT be but PLEASE do not lump in the transfer-back > issue and its possible removal or replacement with the contestation- > lottery issue and its possible removal or replacement. > > Please give each issue its due diligence on its own unless absolutely > necessary. These issues *clearly* deserve separate consideration. The issue of fixing the rule does NOT *clearly* need to be split into two issues.

[ quoted text not captured ] As it is not true, I would find it hard to prove, indeed.

[ quoted text not captured ] Ah, that was a non-sequiture that you responded to that spawned this side thread. If the two are not actually bound together then I have nothing more to say on it.

[ quoted text not captured ] No, no. I am addressing the issue as a an issue and not splitting it. But that is not to say that the issue cannot be split into two or more issues.

On Aug 12, 8:17 am, "Izaak" <nom...@usenet.plz> wrote: > >> That would be a UFO in orbit targeting your rock, paper or scissor with a > >> laserbeam and melting it. > > >> It is *that* rare. > > > It isn't. > > A vampires in play getting contested? Sure, that happens occasionally; > mostly this is a strategical choice from the one initiating the contest. > That doesn't need any sort of fix and I think most of the participants in > this discussion would agree. > > Putting 8 pool on <Vampire X> in turn 1 and 2 and then see it come out cross > table? It never happened to me once and I've been playing since '96 (and > tournaments since 2002). I'd count that as rare occurances that don't need > rule changes. > > YMMV. I can see that contesting key vampires in your decks is a topic that some players have strong feelings about. I have been the victim of this before in a qualifier and I didn’t have a problem with it. As the game currently stands I believe there is a good balance of player skill, both in deck building and actual play during the game, along with luck of the draw which helps to keep the game fresh and exciting each time you play with a deck. Without this VTES would be no different from any other card games out there. 9/10 times they already know there going to win or louse because there playing a particular deck. Also I believe the concern of contesting to some extent helps to keep a verity of decks to see play. If everyone played the same deck this game would get old really quick. My recommendation to help people overcome contesting problems is to add cards to your deck that will help you get out your vampires faster and have other good uses later in the game such as Dreams of the Sphinx. If someone else decides to contest with you it’s likely a strategic decision and there is not much you can do about that. For me its part of the game I love to play, and sometimes that means taking the good with the bad. Aaron Miller Prince of West Lafayette

[ quoted text not captured ] Why is Contesting and Transferring Off of an Uncontrolled vampire a single issue?

[ quoted text not captured ] See the thread. Transferring off is a rule designed to address the unique-lottery-loss.

[ quoted text not captured ] Since it doesn't address the unique-lottery-loss as the introduciton of 11 cap vampires in Dark Sovereigns created the potential of non- participation in the game for as much as 8 turns (3 turns of transferring 10 pool onto an 11 cap, then 5 turns of transferring off), and really it didn't address it before that even, it seems illogical to bind the two together, and change two rules in the rulebook when only one has been demonstrably shown to be an issue.

[ quoted text not captured ] Since it was designed to address exactly that, it seems logical to say it was designed to address that. And if, as you say, it fell short, it seems logical to examine alternatives which may do a better job of addressing the issue.

[ quoted text not captured ] As contesting is rare and transferring off is an every-game occurrence, I would say that transferring off has superseded designer's intent to become something greater than originally planned. Removing it would do more harm than help.

XZealot wrote: > As contesting is rare and transferring off is an every-game > occurrence, I would say that transferring off has superseded > designer's intent to become something greater than originally > planned. Removing it would do more harm than help. Burning vampires with an Ivory Bow or with Pulled Fangs was a common occurrence, too. Adjusting that arguably did less harm than help. "Unintended consequences" does not necessarily equal "better", no matter how common.

[ quoted text not captured ] Oh, and lest I forget, thanks for taking the time to address the issue with critical thinking. Very much appreciated.

On Aug 12, 1:26 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > XZealot wrote: > > As contesting is rare and transferring off is an every-game > > occurrence, I would say that transferring off has superseded > > designer's intent to become something greater than originally > > planned. Removing it would do more harm than help. > > Burning vampires with an Ivory Bow or with Pulled Fangs was a common occurrence, > too. > > Adjusting that arguably did less harm than help. Agreed, it was a good change > "Unintended consequences" does not necessarily equal "better", no matter how common. In this specific case it can be demonstrated that it can be shown to be an improvement that has been strategically explored and removal of it can be demonstrated to limit strategic avenues that are available to all players which in turn can be shown to limit deck viability and discourage the use of a well-developed group of decks that were designed to take advantage of this rule. Removal of that rule limits creativity by removing deck viability while introducing nothing in its place to fill the void that will be left over from the removal of these decks, which is demonstrably bad for the game.

XZealot wrote: > On Aug 12, 1:26 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> XZealot wrote: >>> As contesting is rare and transferring off is an every-game >>> occurrence, I would say that transferring off has superseded >>> designer's intent to become something greater than originally >>> planned. Removing it would do more harm than help. >> Burning vampires with an Ivory Bow or with Pulled Fangs was a common occurrence, >> too. >> >> Adjusting that arguably did less harm than help. > > Agreed, it was a good change > >> "Unintended consequences" does not necessarily equal "better", no matter how common. > > In this specific case it can be demonstrated that it can be shown to > be an improvement that has been strategically explored and removal of > it can be demonstrated to limit strategic avenues that are available > to all players which in turn can be shown to limit deck viability and > discourage the use of a well-developed group of decks that were > designed to take advantage of this rule. I'm sure there were players who felt the same about the agg rules or 4CL. But in any case, I welcome such a demonstration of demonstrability. > Removal of that rule limits > creativity by removing deck viability while introducing nothing in its > place to fill the void that will be left over from the removal of > these decks, which is demonstrably bad for the game. Perhaps. Or it could be good for the game by increasing the strategic role of resource management around which the game was founded, the deviation from which is [ quoted text not captured ]

On Aug 12, 1:44 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > XZealot wrote: > > On Aug 12, 1:26 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> XZealot wrote: > >>> As contesting is rare and transferring off is an every-game > >>> occurrence, I would say that transferring off has superseded > >>> designer's intent to become something greater than originally > >>> planned. Removing it would do more harm than help. > >> Burning vampires with an Ivory Bow or with Pulled Fangs was a common occurrence, > >> too. > > >> Adjusting that arguably did less harm than help. > > > Agreed, it was a good change > > >> "Unintended consequences" does not necessarily equal "better", no matter how common. > > > In this specific case it can be demonstrated that it can be shown to > > be an improvement that has been strategically explored and removal of > > it can be demonstrated to limit strategic avenues that are available > > to all players which in turn can be shown to limit deck viability and > > discourage the use of a well-developed group of decks that were > > designed to take advantage of this rule. > > I'm sure there were players who felt the same about the agg rules or 4CL. > > But in any case, I welcome such a demonstration of demonstrability. Certainly, but I need to establish 1 assumption first. That assumption that if a deck has won a tournament then that deck is "viable". I am sure you can agree to that. The below is a deck that fits into the category of using "transfers off of uncontrolled vampires as a defensive mechanism" AP League Penrith, Australia July 17, 2009 2R + F 13 players Brendan Healy's Tournament Winning Deck Deck Name: The Art of Undue Influence Created By: Brendan Healy Description: Toreador Antitribu Undue Influence Deck Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 8, Max: 22, Avg: 4) ------------------------------------------ 1 Angela Decker pre 1 Pander 1 Creamy Jade aus cel vic PRE 5 Toreador Antitribu 1 Cristos Mantigo aus cel dom obf pre 5 Toreador Antitribu 1 Emerson Wilkershire III pre 2 Toreador 1 Frederick the Weak pre 2 Brujah Antitribu 1 Jost Werner ani AUS PRE 6 Toreador Antitribu 1 Lolita for pre 3 Toreador Antitribu 1 Mercy cel dom pre AUS 5 Toreador Antitribu 1 Remilliard pre AUS 4 Toreador Antitribu 1 Sabrina aus cel pre 4 Toreador Antitribu 1 Sheila Mezarin cel for AUS PRE 6 Toreador Antitribu 1 Victor Revell aus dem pre CEL 5 Toreador Antitribu Library: (60 cards) ------------------- Master (18 cards) 2 Anarch Revolt 1 Coven, The 2 Effective Management 3 Galaric`s Legacy 4 Palla Grande 1 Poacher's Hunting Ground 1 Powerbase: Los Angeles 2 Seattle Committee 2 Twilight Camp Action (20 cards) 20 Undue Influence Action Modifier (13 cards) 13 Power of One Reaction (2 cards) 2 Delaying Tactics Combat (6 cards) 6 Staredown Event (1 cards) 1 Narrow Minds This deck either ousts its prey to gain 6 pool from ousting or uses the blood generated from Undue Influence to bloat its pool to keep from being ousted. You will notice that the deck uses none of the 3 common defensive disciplines (Animalism, Auspex, and Dominate) to protect itself from being ousted. Yet, this deck won a tournament. If you remove the "transfer off uncontrolled vampire" rules then you remove this decks defensive option to prevent it from being ousted. This is a simple example of the types of decks that would become non- viable if the transfer back rules were removed. > > Removal of that rule limits > > > creativity by removing deck viability while introducing nothing in its > > place to fill the void that will be left over from the removal of > > these decks, which is demonstrably bad for the game. > > Perhaps. > > Or it could be good for the game by increasing the strategic role of resource > management around which the game was founded, the deviation from which is > demonstrably bad for the game. In no way does the presence of the "transfer back rule" decrease the strategic role of resource management. Nice unproven assertion. :P

>I welcome any evidence to the contrary of my position (evidence that >uncontrolled-region bloat is not part of the game, for instance, or that >uncontrolled-region bloat is part of the design goal or even a necessary feature >of the rule set). While it is difficult for me to prove what the original designers intended beyond the shadow of a doubt (especially since i didn`t start playing until much later or interact with any of them in any way), Consider the following: The transfer back rule appears in the original Jyhad rulebook. This means that the rule has been with us since the the first set, which also gave us quite a large Number of Cards that put blood on uncontrolled vampires (six total, by my count). I posit that designers/playtesters could hardly have missed the interaction between theses Cards and the transfer back rule. Thus it is likely that they approved of this interaction (or at least did not strongly disapprove of it), since it would have been trivial to restrict reverse transfers to copies of vampires already in play to limit/stop such bloat. (There was even another opportunity with the Vtes set, but to my Knowledge it was not taken, despite there being several alterations in the transition) Interstingly, the example in the rulebook explaining the transfer back rule doesn`t mention contesting but instead the player (Nora) deciding that putting pool on that Vampire was a mistake. (Just as an aside, such mistakes seem a pretty good reason to have a transfer back rule. It is after all no more fun to lose pool to a mistransfer than it is to lose it to a possible contest) There is also the original Wording of Brainwash, which only stops transfers to that minion, not off him. All these things lead me to believe that the Designers considered the Rule a seperate part of the ruleset even though it may have been originally created to avoid contests. (or to allow a player to correct his mistakes in influecing for that matter).

[ quoted text not captured ] Sure. I'm sure there were decks that used the agg burn rules as well. And they do less well without that rule. Or Zip Gun decks that used DBR. Naturally, any change affects decks that use the thing being changed. >> Or it could be good for the game by increasing the strategic role of resource >> management around which the game was founded, the deviation from which is >> demonstrably bad for the game. > > In no way does the presence of the "transfer back rule" decrease the > strategic role of resource management. > > Nice unproven assertion. :P Well, saves me the trouble of labeling it. Thanks. But not sure why you're running it up the flagpole, in that case.

On Wed, 12 Aug 2009 14:26:08 -0400, LSJ <vte...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >XZealot wrote: >> As contesting is rare and transferring off is an every-game >> occurrence, I would say that transferring off has superseded >> designer's intent to become something greater than originally >> planned. Removing it would do more harm than help. > >Burning vampires with an Ivory Bow or with Pulled Fangs was a common occurrence, >too. > But not part of the original jyhad rules, unless I`m reading my rulebook wrong. Same with omnidirectional bleed. Please clarify this, I`m honestly curious.

On 12 elo, 22:06, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: > > > Removal of that rule limits > > > > creativity by removing deck viability while introducing nothing in its > > > place to fill the void that will be left over from the removal of > > > these decks, which is demonstrably bad for the game. > > > Perhaps. > > > Or it could be good for the game by increasing the strategic role of resource > > management around which the game was founded, the deviation from which is > > demonstrably bad for the game. > > In no way does the presence of the "transfer back rule" decrease the > strategic role of resource management. > > Nice unproven assertion. :P Wait, are you talking about the assertion you made earlier, the one LSJ made or the one you made now? ;)

Pascal wrote: > I posit that designers/playtesters could hardly have missed the > interaction between theses Cards and the transfer back rule. > Thus it is likely that they approved of this interaction (or at least > did not strongly disapprove of it), since it would have been trivial > to restrict reverse transfers to copies of vampires already in play to > limit/stop such bloat. I posit that it is more likely that the rule was added later in the process than the cards that seem to have been written to facilitate bringing out vampires, and that the bloat bits were considered minor and were never (ab)used in playtest to even a fraction of the degree to which the players (ab)used them once the set was released. See also references to minion/vampire on retainers, et al. > Interstingly, the example in the rulebook explaining the transfer back > rule doesn`t mention contesting but instead the player (Nora) deciding > that putting pool on that Vampire was a mistake. Sure. Rather than go into the needless details of why it was a mistake (e.g., another copy of that vampire appearing in play), you just describe the rule. > There is also the original Wording of Brainwash, which only stops > transfers to that minion, not off him. ? You can make transfers to a vampire to move blood from your pool to the vampire (costing 1 such transfer) or to move blood from the vampire to your pool (costing 2 such transfers to that vampire). But even if the verbiage accomplished what you suggest, that would only be an argument for the "transfers off not fully considered" side.

[ quoted text not captured ] Right. Addressing the "but it's commonly seen" argument doesn't have to be done with one arm tied behind my back.

Banishment, Exile and Reality should be banned, if you remove the transfer back option.

On Aug 12, 12:41 pm, wedge <matt...@gmail.com> wrote: > Banishment, Exile and Reality should be banned, if you remove the > transfer back option. And Leandro

[ quoted text not captured ] Assuming no other way to get at the blood in those cases, perhaps. That issue has been illuminated. > And Leandro Wait. What?

On Aug 12, 3:06 pm, Pascal <Pasca...@nospam.com> wrote: > >I welcome any evidence to the contrary of my position (evidence that > >uncontrolled-region bloat is not part of the game, for instance, or that > >uncontrolled-region bloat is part of the design goal or even a necessary feature > >of the rule set). <snip> > Interstingly, the example in the rulebook explaining the transfer back > rule doesn`t mention contesting but instead the player (Nora) deciding > that putting pool on that Vampire was a mistake. > (Just as an aside, such mistakes seem a pretty good reason to have a > transfer back rule. It is after all no more fun to lose pool to a > mistransfer than it is to lose it to a possible contest) I was also going to reference that example. Since you already have, I'll run with it: Even if contestation never occured, players would occasionally find themselves in situations like Nora's, where they have begun to influence a vampire, but due to changing circumstances between turns, decide against it. The transfer back rule allows a player to adapt to these changes during the game at something of a cost - recouping the pool investment takes twice as long as making investment did, and doing so limits the player's ability to influence a different minion. This is true whether the change of circumstances is due to the potential for contestation, new information about your opponents' capabilities, or significant loss of pool during your predator's turn - and even if contestation is removed as a factor, the others remain. Also, we've also had 15 years of card with the rules as they are. Presumably that side effect of bloat through the uncontrolled region was taken into consideration during design and playtest. For example, Public Trust would be significantly less useful in the absence of a transfer-back rule, while Legal Manipulations would suffer not at all. -witness1

On Aug 12, 3:28 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > Pascal wrote: > > Interstingly, the example in the rulebook explaining the transfer back > > rule doesn`t mention contesting but instead the player (Nora) deciding > > that putting pool on that Vampire was a mistake. > > Sure. Rather than go into the needless details of why it was a mistake (e.g., > another copy of that vampire appearing in play), you just describe the rule. It IS mentioned in the rulebook why putting pool on that vampire was a mistake - because now Nora doesn't have enough to get out the more important minion she had also spent pool on. In the specific example given, contestation has nothing to do with it. -witness1

[ quoted text not captured ] Naturally, any rhetoric you can say allows you to avoid the discussion altogether. > >> Or it could be good for the game by increasing the strategic role of resource > >> management around which the game was founded, the deviation from which is > >> demonstrably bad for the game. > > > In no way does the presence of the "transfer back rule" decrease the > > strategic role of resource management. > > > Nice unproven assertion. :P > > Well, saves me the trouble of labeling it. Thanks. But not sure why you're > running it up the flagpole, in that case. Apparently you are running off into "I'm not going to address your point" land. Yawn

On Aug 12, 12:48 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: [ quoted text not captured ] Just want him banned for screwing up my resource management though out the years. :)

[ quoted text not captured ] By directly addressing it? OK. Enjoy your vacation.

On Wed, 12 Aug 2009 15:28:57 -0400, LSJ <vte...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >Pascal wrote: >> I posit that designers/playtesters could hardly have missed the >> interaction between theses Cards and the transfer back rule. >> Thus it is likely that they approved of this interaction (or at least >> did not strongly disapprove of it), since it would have been trivial >> to restrict reverse transfers to copies of vampires already in play to >> limit/stop such bloat. > >I posit that it is more likely that the rule was added later in the process than >the cards that seem to have been written to facilitate bringing out vampires, >and that the bloat bits were considered minor and were never (ab)used in >playtest to even a fraction of the degree to which the players (ab)used them >once the set was released. > It is certainly possible. However there seem to be no hard facts either way. >See also references to minion/vampire on retainers, et al. > Which ones are you refering to? >> Interstingly, the example in the rulebook explaining the transfer back >> rule doesn`t mention contesting but instead the player (Nora) deciding >> that putting pool on that Vampire was a mistake. > >Sure. Rather than go into the needless details of why it was a mistake (e.g., >another copy of that vampire appearing in play), you just describe the rule. Well yes. But a possible contest is certainly not the only reason Nora could have changed her mind. It is not even the only ingame reason. Allowing Players to change their mind even if no contest is forthcoming seems worthwile. >> There is also the original Wording of Brainwash, which only stops >> transfers to that minion, not off him. > >? >You can make transfers to a vampire to move blood from your pool to the vampire >(costing 1 such transfer) or to move blood from the vampire to your pool >(costing 2 such transfers to that vampire). > >But even if the verbiage accomplished what you suggest, that would only be an >argument for the "transfers off not fully considered" side. Brainwash (original jyhad version) Master Put on an uncontrolled vampire of your prey. No more transfers can be made to this vampire. Any minion may burn this card, which would be at +1 stealth. Considering the rulebook only describes transfers as a currency you can spend for two different effects and even uses a different term for the process of transfering back "taking back pool" instead of "moving pool from you blood pool to one of your uncontrolled vampires) I believe the Wording accomplished just that even if something else was intended. There is however no clear Hint that this was the case. Wording Issues aside, this whole thing is rather murky and speculating about the developers intent seems to ultimatly lead nowhere. Do you, as lead developer, have access to the original design documents or something else that sheds more light on this Issue. If not, then here is my Claim: The Transfer back rule was not added to combat contesting, but to allow a player who mistakenly puts his counters on the wrong Vampire to recoup his pool. It punishes such mistakes by slowing the player down, but doesn`t render the pool completly lost. Again, that seems like a fine reason for the rule. Now, among all those things there might be no single Argument so decisive that it completly rules out any possible change. However, I think that you should not consider the transfer back rule a package deal with the contest rule, since it has clearly taken on and indeed may always have had other functions both within the actual ruleset and the overall metagame. Anyways, I hope my Imput was at least somewhat useful.

[ quoted text not captured ] Not in my Copy. There it just says that she uses her remaing two transfer to bring out another minion.

[ quoted text not captured ] You're looking at the original I suppose? Here's what the current online rulebook says: "Nora comes to her influence phase. She has four transfers to spend, but only 2 pool. She sees that she has built up 8 blood counters on a vampire with a blood capacity of 10, and she thinks she can win the game if she gets it into play. However, she cannot use both counters in her pool to put it into play because that would put her out of the game. She had invested a couple of blood counters in a vampire with a blood capacity of 7 on a previous turn, so she spends two of her four transfers to take back 1 of those counters and put it in her pool. Now she has 3 pool and two transfers left to spend. She spends the two transfers by moving 2 of the 3 blood counters from her pool to the vampire with the blood capacity of 10 and moves that vampire to the ready region." -witness1

On Wed, 12 Aug 2009 22:25:44 +0200, Pascal <Pasc...@nospam.com> wrote: [ quoted text not captured ] My apologies, we are talking about two different examples: I was talking about the upper one on page 25, you about the next on farther down the page.

On Wed, 12 Aug 2009 13:33:52 -0700 (PDT), witness1 <jwnew...@bellsouth.net> wrote: >On Aug 12, 4:25�pm, Pascal <Pasca...@nospam.com> wrote: >> On Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:52:25 -0700 (PDT), witness1 >> >> >> >> >> >> <jwnewqu...@bellsouth.net> wrote: >> >On Aug 12, 3:28�pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> >> Pascal wrote: >> >> > Interstingly, the example in the rulebook explaining the transfer back >> >> > rule doesn`t mention contesting but instead the player (Nora) deciding >> >> > that putting pool on that Vampire was a mistake. � >> >> >> Sure. Rather than go into the needless details of why it was a mistake (e.g., >> >> another copy of that vampire appearing in play), you just describe the rule. >> >> >It IS mentioned in the rulebook why putting pool on that vampire was a >> >mistake - because now Nora doesn't have enough to get out the more >> >important minion she had also spent pool on. >> >> >In the specific example given, contestation has nothing to do with it. >> >> >-witness1 >> >> Not in my Copy. >> There it just says that she uses her remaing two transfer to bring out >> another minion. > >You're looking at the original I suppose? Indeed I was. Since there was a question about the original design of the game, i thought that this might be a good resource. However, as I noted we were simply talking about differrent examples: mine is under "moving blood and bringing vampires from the crypt", yours under "putting vampires into play". (at least in the original rulebook).

On Aug 12, 4:35 pm, Pascal <Pasca...@nospam.com> wrote: > On Wed, 12 Aug 2009 13:33:52 -0700 (PDT), witness1 > > > > > [ quoted text not captured ] Gotcha. The online rulebook only has the one example. It does seem to be desirable that players be allowed to transfer their pool between uncontrolled minions for reasons other than just contestation. -witness1

"henrik" <www.h...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:e7994409-a21d-417b...@o15g2000yqm.googlegroups.com... On Aug 12, 1:45 am, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > > You should be addressing whether Norm's > > orginal complaint was, "I'm not winning enough with a star vampire deck" - > > which would be a metagame balance problem - or, "this situation is not fun > > for anyone" - which would be a real rules problem. I've been reading it > > as the latter, but I could be reading stuff into what other people say. > > I replied to Norm's original post after reading it like the latter. > Then other stuff came along and I just rolled with it. OK. These threads are too massive to go back and study every punch and counterpunch. I'm just saying, the distinction is important and I see pretty strong evidence that you're missing it. Or that you're missing some important implications that come from it. > > But here's the problem: you're responding to the wrong original complaint, > > I believe. This is an answer to losing. It isn't an answer to the game > > becoming unfun and unbalanced when this happens. If Norm were merely > > worried about the fact that he lost when this happens, then I'd agree with > > your response. I don't think that was his actual complaint as much as the > > fact that it's a really rude way of losing and screws up the games for > > the remaining players. (If that wasn't Norm's complaint, I think other > > guys, like Peter, have expressed that complaint.) Wrong complaint, wrong > > answer. > > I think they're connected. The game doesn't become unfun when > contesting if you've built a deck that can handle contesting. This is exactly the reasoning that I believe is causing you to conflate the two. You may be correct about this but the fact is, players build decks to win games and they SHOULD build decks to win games. They are not tasked with the responsibility of building decks to make the games fun. The rules of the game are supposed insure that. Well, OK, no game rules can insure such a thing but it's better if they're comported to insure the best chance of having a fun game. Your words above indicate that you're placing the burden of fun-ness on the individual players, and stating that a player should compose his deck towards the goal increasing the fun-ness of the game - at the expense of what he might feel is his best chance to actually win the game. The trouble with this is that fun-ness is a group goal, not an individual goal. And even if I compose my deck torwards maximum fun-ness, another player (say my grand-prey) might not, preferring to go for optimizing for victory. And when his stab at victory goes awry because he's contesting Enkidu with his prey, then my prey waltzes in and grabs two easy victory point. No fun for me and here I did nothing bad. I weakened my deck by making sure I had alternatives to Stanislava in case anyone else brought her out but no one did, so now I've got a weaker deck and an unfun game. Oh, well... > Just like a game can become unfun for an imbued deck when it gets > Stanislava for predator. If you run into something that's totally > impossible to handle (I know imbueds can handle Stanislava in some > ways, just an example) then the game tend to become less fun. Sure. But that's a different issue and not one that anyone's trying to solve. It's not a valid argument to say, "The game is flawed in this way and we can't fix that so we shouldn't try to fix anything." Had LSJ taken such an attitude when Return To Innocence was a problem, it would still be part of the game. > However, it doesn't get heavily unfun until the player throws in the > towel and gives up. Well, actually that's not true. Games can easily become unfun whether a player in a terrible position gives up or not. But such a nit is beside the point and not worth bickering over. Fred

"Kevin M." <you...@imaspammer.org> wrote in message news:LZBgm.62384$0z7....@newsfe07.iad... > Peter D Bakija wrote: >> And again, there were just as many people who thought that >> Return to Innocence was perfectly fine. > > You must have played with AMAZINGLY stupid players back then. > > At the time, I regularly played with about 30 players and NONE of us > believed the card was 'perfectly fine'. Not to disagree with you here, Kevin. That's my opinion of anyone who would make such an argument as well. But there were players who posted such things in this newsgroup, IIRC from many years back. Fred

[ quoted text not captured ] The way I look at it, when building decks, is that I try to cover as many possible match ups as I can think of. I try to make my decks good vs bleed decks, vote decks, combat decks, wall decks, weenie decks, high cap decks and so on. When doing that I also tend to think about contesting, since there's a risk that I'll end up at a table where someone else plays the same minion/s as I am. I don't know why you think I do this because I want the other players at my table to have fun. I do it because the deck gets better. I do it to win. But of course, most decks won't be good against every other deck. They'll have a weakness of some kind. What that weakness is, is something you chose when building the deck. You can chose to make it great against bleed decks and vote decks while skipping combat defense. Just like you can make your deck great against combat decks and bleed decks while skipping vote defense. Those are choices you make. And whether you do them to win or to bring fun-ness to the table isn't something I really my concern. You're free to do it because the monster in your basement told you to (not saying you're crazy and talks with basement monsters, just an example). Now, if I think I'll have a big risk of contesting one or more of the vampires in my crypt, the first thing I'd do is to switch deck. The second thing I'd do (if I really, really wanted to play with that clan/ minion) is to make sure that I can survive an early contest. Crypt acceleration, low/mid cap vampires, bloat cards and stuff like that can help here. I don't see this as a sub-optimal thing to do with my deck. If I saw it that way, I wouldn't do it. And, as I've stated before, constructing your deck so that it can handle your first minion being removed from the game rather fast is a great thing when it comes to deck building. It doesn't make the deck weaker. It doesn't necessarily make the other players have more fun (it's quite likely to make you have more fun though, since a good deck is more fun to play). It's good, since on many tables something bad will happen early on. It could be a War Ghoul, Pentex Subversion, Mind Rape + diableri, contest or whatever. The list is huge, and being prepared for crap stuff like that will give you a good edge when they happen. > > Just like a game can become unfun for an imbued deck when it gets > > Stanislava for predator. If you run into something that's totally > > impossible to handle (I know imbueds can handle Stanislava in some > > ways, just an example) then the game tend to become less fun. > > Sure. But that's a different issue and not one that anyone's trying > to solve. It's not a valid argument to say, "The game is flawed in > this way and we can't fix that so we shouldn't try to fix anything." > Had LSJ taken such an attitude when Return To Innocence was a problem, > it would still be part of the game. That's not my point. I don't think the Stanislava vs Imbueds is a real flaw. It's just an example of how a game sometimes can be very bad, due to the randomness of seating. I think that's fine, in a game like this. Random seating will make my deck easier or harder to play. There are many, many tables I walk away from with 0 vps and say "there wasn't much I could do about that with my deck, considering what I was up against". But just because I couldn't do anything about those other decks doesn't mean the rules should be changed to make it easier on the deck I played. I do think that if the contest rule is so horrible, then Stanislava vs Imbueds is a huge problem. As well as Pentex Subversion, Sense Dep., Brainwash, War Ghouls, Renegade Garous etc. All those things can ruin your game after just 3-4 turns, unless you're prepared to handle them. Just like a contest can. If Return To Innocence had been a dominate card that had a cost of 1 and said "(d) bleed at +2 bleed", I would've agreed with your comparision.

"henrik" <www.h...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:d9f83e4e-ed94-4724...@h21g2000yqa.googlegroups.com... On Aug 12, 11:54 pm, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > > Your words above indicate that you're placing the burden of fun-ness on > > the individual players, and stating that a player should compose his deck > > towards the goal increasing the fun-ness of the game - at the expense of > > what he might feel is his best chance to actually win the game. The > > trouble with this is that fun-ness is a group goal, not an individual > > goal. And even if I compose my deck torwards maximum fun-ness, another > > player (say my grand-prey) might not, preferring to go for optimizing for > > victory. And when his stab at victory goes awry because he's contesting > > Enkidu with his prey, then my prey waltzes in and grabs two easy victory > > point. No fun for me and here I did nothing bad. I weakened my deck > > by making sure I had alternatives to Stanislava in case anyone else > > brought her out but no one did, so now I've got a weaker deck and an > > unfun game. Oh, well... > > The way I look at it, when building decks, is that I try to cover as > many possible match ups as I can think of. I try to make my decks good > vs bleed decks, vote decks, combat decks, wall decks, weenie decks, > high cap decks and so on. When doing that I also tend to think about > contesting, since there's a risk that I'll end up at a table where > someone else plays the same minion/s as I am. > > I don't know why you think I do this because I want the other players > at my table to have fun. I do it because the deck gets better. I do it > to win. But that's the way _you_ look at building decks. Why would you assume other players look at deckbuilding the same way? Everybody has their own ideas about how to maximize their chances of winning a game of VtES. And some, at least at times, will conclude that it's counterproductive in the long run to try to cover every possiblity (as you yourself noted further down in your post). In some cases, at least, it would certainly weaken a deck overall to attempt to cover the possibility that your star vampire is contested. Ergo, a player may quite reasonably conclude that his best choice is to build as if he will never be contested - and just write off the games when he is as lost causes. And so expose any game in which he plays this deck to disaster, it not mattering whether he choses to give up or "fight" (whatever that actually means) to his rather speedy demise. To insist that he must make some other choice in the name of fun-ness that he wouldn't choose in order to maximize his chances of victory is to demand that he make a sub-optimal (at least in his PoV) strategy choice to fix a game problem. ... (ellided lots and lot of discussion principally about optimizing one's deck for victory) Look, I've pointed out the same flaw in your thinking several times. If you insist on conflating the goals of victory vs. comporting your deck to make the game more fun for all, that's going to lead you to conclude that the fun-ness problems people are citing are caused by a failure of players to construct and/or play their decks correctly. But while the two goals certainly have a relationship, ultimately they're different things. So I believe that remains the source of your disagreement with Peter and others. Fred

On Aug 13, 1:04 am, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > But that's the way _you_ look at building decks. Why would you assume > other players look at deckbuilding the same way? I don't assume other players look at deckbuilding the same way I do. Rather the opposite, and I've been trying to tell people some ways of building decks so that they won't be screwed/have unfun games when a contest happens. > Everybody has their > own ideas about how to maximize their chances of winning a game of VtES. > And some, at least at times, will conclude that it's counterproductive > in the long run to try to cover every possiblity (as you yourself noted > further down in your post). Yeah. It's next to impossible to cover everything. But if one ignores a certain possibility, that doesn't make it a rules problem when said possibility happens. > In some cases, at least, it would certainly > weaken a deck overall to attempt to cover the possibility that your star > vampire is contested. Ergo, a player may quite reasonably conclude that > his best choice is to build as if he will never be contested - and just > write off the games when he is as lost causes. And so expose any game in > which he plays this deck to disaster, it not mattering whether he choses > to give up or "fight" (whatever that actually means) to his rather speedy > demise. > > To insist that he must make some other choice in the name of fun-ness that > he wouldn't choose in order to maximize his chances of victory is to demand > that he make a sub-optimal (at least in his PoV) strategy choice to fix a > game problem. But how is this different from combat defense/stealth/whatever? I don't get that part. Sure, combat decks are maybe more common that contesting. But in general. Playing combat defense can very well "weaken" a deck, unless it's facing combat. Taking a chance that one won't be facing combat and thus strenghten ones deck against everything else could be considered maximizing ones chances to win. However, it won't make combat broken/ overpowered or a game problem. Just like not adding enough stealth to a deck won't make blocking a game problem. Many (if not all) of the possibilities one choses to ignore when building decks can give you an unfun game, while they still increase your chances to win. That's how the game works. Removing one of the possibilities to consider when building decks won't change that. Some games you're just going to have to suck it up. It's your choice whether it's the games where someone else plays the same minion as you or if it's the games where someone else plays Stanislava. The way I see it here, the issue is that most people chose to ignore contesting. Not that contesting is too harsh. And since I think that's the case, I think changing the rules is unnecessary. > ... > (ellided lots and lot of discussion principally about optimizing one's deck > for victory) > > Look, I've pointed out the same flaw in your thinking several times. If > you insist on conflating the goals of victory vs. comporting your deck > to make the game more fun for all, that's going to lead you to conclude > that the fun-ness problems people are citing are caused by a failure of > players to construct and/or play their decks correctly. But while the > two goals certainly have a relationship, ultimately they're different > things. So I believe that remains the source of your disagreement with > Peter and others. I see your point. And I see what you've been pointing out. And it's possible that's why I don't agree with Peter and others, I suppose. I think that I might be disagreeing with all of it because I don't consider games unfun very often. It takes quite a lot for that to happen, much more than some bad luck with seating. We probably have very different ideas of what an unfun game is, which leads to disagreement. The example you wrote above, where some stuff happens and your prey ends up with 2 vps. Looking at that I don't see it as an unfun game. Not from the information given, at least. Unless I'm having a bad day, I'm able to enjoy games no matter how unfair/random/crappy stuff happens (as long as the players are nice, at least). Today, for example, I got stuck between an Auspex weenie with 7 Smiling Jack in around 60 cards (my prey), and a speedghoul deck (my predator). I played a semi serious diversion deck with mostly 3-4 caps. The most successful think I did in that game was to once get a War Ghoul down to 3 lives (the Vagabond was still untapped though). That didn't make the game unfun though. We laughed quite a lot, and I'd even go so far as to say that it was my most fun game of tonight. This is what I'm trying to point out when I'm saying that games doesn't get unfun until people's attitude make them unfun. Anyway, I'm not sure we'll be able to agree about anything. Thanks for the time and posts, and for forcing me to look up and understand a bunch of new words.

"henrik" <www.h...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:59d46e5c-4815-4c48...@r18g2000yqd.googlegroups.com... On Aug 13, 1:04 am, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > > But that's the way _you_ look at building decks. Why would you assume > > other players look at deckbuilding the same way? > > I don't assume other players look at deckbuilding the same way I do. > Rather the opposite, and I've been trying to tell people some ways of > building decks so that they won't be screwed/have unfun games when a > contest happens. ... > > Everybody has their > > own ideas about how to maximize their chances of winning a game of VtES. > > And some, at least at times, will conclude that it's counterproductive > > in the long run to try to cover every possiblity (as you yourself noted > > further down in your post). > > Yeah. It's next to impossible to cover everything. But if one ignores > a certain possibility, that doesn't make it a rules problem when said > possibility happens. Nor does it make it _not_ a rules problem when they do that. It doesn't say anything either way. It's just how they're building their deck in order to maximize their chances of winning. Which is a different thing from maximizing everybody's chances of having a fun game. > > To insist that he must make some other choice in the name of fun-ness that > > he wouldn't choose in order to maximize his chances of victory is to demand > > that he make a sub-optimal (at least in his PoV) strategy choice to fix a > > game problem. > > But how is this different from combat defense/stealth/whatever? I > don't get that part. I assume you mean, "How is getting screwed by investing a bunch of pool into a unique fatty that someone else influences out any different from getting screwed, by, say, a random metagame problem?" If so, there aren't that many differences. I'm guessing people like Peter and Norm might say the it happens more often and is a more extreme problem when it happens. But I don't want to speak for them. As I've said, I don't personally think this happens enough to be worth fixing myself. And on that point I suspect you and I agree. One major way they are probably different is that there are solutions that can be proposed to the problems caused by contesting. There really aren't any solutions to, say, people building combat decks that don't cover S:CE and then running into predators and prey who have S:CE. > Many (if not all) of the possibilities one choses to ignore when > building decks can give you an unfun game, while they still increase > your chances to win. That's how the game works. Removing one of the > possibilities to consider when building decks won't change that. Not in general, no. But it will fix the one particular problem. Apparently, some people think that it's worth fixing. And again, the fact that we can't fix all problems doesn't mean that it's never worth trying to fix any problems. > > Look, I've pointed out the same flaw in your thinking several times. If > > you insist on conflating the goals of victory vs. comporting your deck > > to make the game more fun for all, that's going to lead you to conclude > > that the fun-ness problems people are citing are caused by a failure of > > players to construct and/or play their decks correctly. But while the > > two goals certainly have a relationship, ultimately they're different > > things. So I believe that remains the source of your disagreement with > > Peter and others. > > I see your point. And I see what you've been pointing out. And it's > possible that's why I don't agree with Peter and others, I suppose. > I think that I might be disagreeing with all of it because I don't > consider games unfun very often. It takes quite a lot for that to > happen, much more than some bad luck with seating. We probably have > very different ideas of what an unfun game is, which leads to > disagreement. I don't know that you and I disagree that much. Some games are utterly bad when you seat the table - like when two guys have star vampire decks based on Soul Gem and use the same star vamnpire. But games that bad are very, very rare in my experience. I haven't heard any proposals so far that I think aren't worse than the disease. They all contain elements that strike me as too complex and/or subvert one or more features of the game (to a greater or lesser degree) that I like and would prefer to keep as they are. I posted just as a devil's advocate, to demonstrate why sometimes it makes sense to change a rule even though individual player behavior is perceived as causing the problem. ... > Anyway, I'm not sure we'll be able to agree about anything. Thanks for > the time and posts, and for forcing me to look up and understand a > bunch of new words. Sure. :-) Fred

LSJ wrote: > Kevin M. wrote: >> LSJ wrote: >>> Extra bloat may indeed not be a benefit. >> >> It certainly may NOT be but PLEASE do not lump in the transfer- >> back issue and its possible removal or replacement with the >> contestation- lottery issue and its possible removal or >> replacement. >> >> Please give each issue its due diligence on its own unless >> absolutely necessary. These issues *clearly* deserve separate >> consideration. > > The issue of fixing the rule does NOT *clearly* need to be split > into two issues. Then please tell us why you believe that the losing-the-contestation- lottery and the transfer-back issues *must* be resolved at the same time and *cannot* be separated, since it seems clear to some of us that they are two related but very separate issues, which now have two very different in-game purposes, no matter what their relationship in the deep past of VTES. Kevin M., Prince of Las Vegas "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 Please visit VTESville daily! http://vtesville.myminicity.com/

Peter D Bakija wrote: > On Aug 12, 12:20 pm, "Kevin M." <youw...@imaspammer.org> wrote: >> You must have played with AMAZINGLY stupid players back then. >> >> At the time, I regularly played with about 30 players and NONE of us >> believed the card was 'perfectly fine'. > > I'm not talking about people I played with. I'm talking about people > on the interwebs. In the pre 7/7 discussions about cards that were too > powerful, every single time that RTI was mentioned as too powerful and > game breaking, someone would chime in with "Bah! Just use bleed > bounce! You are just whining 'cause you are a bad player! Good players > don't worry about RTI 'cause they plan for it!" Every single time. Then I'd suggest that "just as many people" is an overstatement and perhaps you could've chosen better words for that particular subject. :) [ quoted text not captured ]

On Aug 13, 1:38 am, "Kevin M." <youw...@imaspammer.org> wrote: > Then please tell us why you believe that the losing-the-contestation- > lottery and the transfer-back issues *must* be resolved at the same > time and *cannot* be separated, [...] Did he say he believed that? > [...] since it seems clear to some of us > that they are two related but very separate issues, which now have > two very different in-game purposes, no matter what their relationship > in the deep past of VTES. Perhaps it could be further subdivided analytically into four issues. Or perhaps the issue need not be addressed or resolved at all.

John Whelan wrote: > On Aug 13, 1:38 am, "Kevin M." <youw...@imaspammer.org> wrote: >> Then please tell us why you believe that the losing-the-contestation- >> lottery and the transfer-back issues *must* be resolved at the same >> time and *cannot* be separated, [...] > > Did he say he believed that? Up until the LSJ/XZealot exchange later on, which I didn't read until after responding, everything LSJ had said led me and some others to believe that he was only willing to address both issues together. I'm glad to see -- I think -- that I was wrong. [ quoted text not captured ]

On Aug 13, 3:59 am, "Frederick Scott" <nos...@no.spam.dot.com> wrote: > > > To insist that he must make some other choice in the name of fun-ness that > > > he wouldn't choose in order to maximize his chances of victory is to demand > > > that he make a sub-optimal (at least in his PoV) strategy choice to fix a > > > game problem. > > > But how is this different from combat defense/stealth/whatever? I > > don't get that part. > > I assume you mean, "How is getting screwed by investing a bunch of pool > into a unique fatty that someone else influences out any different from > getting screwed, by, say, a random metagame problem?" If so, there > aren't that many differences. I'm guessing people like Peter and Norm > might say the it happens more often and is a more extreme problem when > it happens. But I don't want to speak for them. As I've said, I don't > personally think this happens enough to be worth fixing myself. And on > that point I suspect you and I agree. > > One major way they are probably different is that there are solutions > that can be proposed to the problems caused by contesting. There really > aren't any solutions to, say, people building combat decks that don't > cover S:CE and then running into predators and prey who have S:CE. Sure there are. Ban S:CE would fix that. And making every vampire able to burn a blood to end combat pre-range would fix the need to include combat defense. There are loads of ways to fix any of the "problems" that are similar to contesting. The best fix to all of the problems would be to just admit that one's own deckbuilding didn't cover for what happened, and move on to the next game. > > Many (if not all) of the possibilities one choses to ignore when > > building decks can give you an unfun game, while they still increase > > your chances to win. That's how the game works. Removing one of the > > possibilities to consider when building decks won't change that. > > Not in general, no. But it will fix the one particular problem. > Apparently, some people think that it's worth fixing. And again, > the fact that we can't fix all problems doesn't mean that it's never > worth trying to fix any problems. That's very true. And as I said, I'm not trying to tell people that there are loads of other similar problems with the game and that fixing this problem would be stupid unless fixing the others. I'm trying to tell them that there are no problems with the game (or with the random seating lottery, at least). And most of the times I've compared contesting to something else that can happen, I've been given the answer that the other thing can be countered via table talk and/or better deckbuilding. Which have led me to be more against changing the rules than I probably should be, since I don't really care except thinking it'd be stupid. > > I see your point. And I see what you've been pointing out. And it's > > possible that's why I don't agree with Peter and others, I suppose. > > I think that I might be disagreeing with all of it because I don't > > consider games unfun very often. It takes quite a lot for that to > > happen, much more than some bad luck with seating. We probably have > > very different ideas of what an unfun game is, which leads to > > disagreement. > > I don't know that you and I disagree that much. Some games are > utterly bad when you seat the table - like when two guys have star > vampire decks based on Soul Gem and use the same star vamnpire. But > games that bad are very, very rare in my experience. I haven't heard > any proposals so far that I think aren't worse than the disease. They > all contain elements that strike me as too complex and/or subvert one or > more features of the game (to a greater or lesser degree) that I like > and would prefer to keep as they are. I posted just as a devil's > advocate, to demonstrate why sometimes it makes sense to change a rule > even though individual player behavior is perceived as causing the > problem. Yeah, I can see how it sometimes is. Personally I think both the Imbueds and high caps are in need of a couple of changes, even if they're all playable at the moment. I'll quit here. I meant to do it yesterday, but this'll be the final one unless you write something horrible :p Have fun. (Meant sincere and not ironic.)

> Sure there are. Ban S:CE would fix that. > And making every vampire able to burn a blood to end combat pre-range > would fix the need to include combat defense. There are loads of ways > to fix any of the "problems" that are similar to contesting. > The best fix to all of the problems would be to just admit that one's > own deckbuilding didn't cover for what happened, and move on to the > next game. Preparing for bleed/votes/combat/whatever can reasonably solved with the cards in your deck. Contest can't be. That's the problem.

[ quoted text not captured ] It still can. You might not believe that a deck can be built that could handle contesting, but I promise you that it's true. Decks like that really exists. (And I know that contesting will, in many cases, be worse than not contesting. But I don't think I've seen anyone that wants to change that part.) That people mostly don't think it's worth preparing for it, since they consider contesting too rare is a different thing. We can compare it to Brinksmanship decks instead of combat/votes/bleed decks if that makes it easier to see. Or Imbued decks (assuming they're rare in your playgroup/meta).

On 13 elo, 12:48, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Aug 13, 11:28 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > Sure there are. Ban S:CE would fix that. > > > And making every vampire able to burn a blood to end combat pre-range > > > would fix the need to include combat defense. There are loads of ways > > > to fix any of the "problems" that are similar to contesting. > > > The best fix to all of the problems would be to just admit that one's > > > own deckbuilding didn't cover for what happened, and move on to the > > > next game. > > > Preparing for bleed/votes/combat/whatever can reasonably solved with > > the cards in your deck. Contest can't be. That's the problem. > > It still can. You might not believe that a deck can be built that > could handle contesting, but I promise you that it's true. Decks like > that really exists. (And I know that contesting will, in many cases, > be worse than not contesting. But I don't think I've seen anyone that > wants to change that part.) Yes, but when you do that, you also need to build the deck weaker most likely. It's easier if you play cam-voters, or a bleeder. Those propably can survive the contest, assuming, it's coming from your predator. But when you are playing indies, or sabbat-voters, things come a lot more complicated, as with sabbat-voters, you don't have the luxury of Parity Shift. Or the indies. It takes even less effort, if you are playing weenies. > That people mostly don't think it's worth preparing for it, since they > consider contesting too rare is a different thing. We can compare it > to Brinksmanship decks instead of combat/votes/bleed decks if that > makes it easier to see. Or Imbued decks (assuming they're rare in your > playgroup/meta). To see what, that you are hosed, or your game is going to be fucked if they are your predator?

On Aug 13, 11:57 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > On 13 elo, 12:48, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > On Aug 13, 11:28 am, Akantes <akan...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > > Sure there are. Ban S:CE would fix that. > > > > And making every vampire able to burn a blood to end combat pre-range > > > > would fix the need to include combat defense. There are loads of ways > > > > to fix any of the "problems" that are similar to contesting. > > > > The best fix to all of the problems would be to just admit that one's > > > > own deckbuilding didn't cover for what happened, and move on to the > > > > next game. > > > > Preparing for bleed/votes/combat/whatever can reasonably solved with > > > the cards in your deck. Contest can't be. That's the problem. > > > It still can. You might not believe that a deck can be built that > > could handle contesting, but I promise you that it's true. Decks like > > that really exists. (And I know that contesting will, in many cases, > > be worse than not contesting. But I don't think I've seen anyone that > > wants to change that part.) > > Yes, but when you do that, you also need to build the deck weaker most > likely. It's easier if you play cam-voters, or a bleeder. Those > propably can survive the contest, assuming, it's coming from your > predator. But when you are playing indies, or sabbat-voters, things > come a lot more complicated, as with sabbat-voters, you don't have the > luxury of Parity Shift. Or the indies. > > It takes even less effort, if you are playing weenies. Yeah. Adding defense against one thing will most likely weaken your deck against other things. That's how the game works. Adding stealth cards helps me against a wall deck but it makes me weaker against rush decks etc. That's how deck building usually works. You think about what you might face, then you add defense against the things you're most afraid of and you skip some of them thinking "I probably won't run into this or that anyway". And when actually playing, if you run in to one of those things you didn't prepare for you'll be screwed. Whether it's contesting, Bum's Rush or Parity Shift is your call. > > That people mostly don't think it's worth preparing for it, since they > > consider contesting too rare is a different thing. We can compare it > > to Brinksmanship decks instead of combat/votes/bleed decks if that > > makes it easier to see. Or Imbued decks (assuming they're rare in your > > playgroup/meta). > > To see what, that you are hosed, or your game is going to be fucked if > they are your predator That you'll be fucked if they're your predator *only if* you're not prepared to face such a deck. And that it was your own doing that got you there (not to that particular table, but to a position where you are fucked due to having X as a predator). There are ways to prepare against a Brinksmanship deck, or an imbued deck. Many people doesn't do that, since it's generally not worth it due to those decks being rather rare in most meta games. The same goes for contesting.

Kevin M. wrote: > LSJ wrote: >> Kevin M. wrote: >>> LSJ wrote: >>>> Extra bloat may indeed not be a benefit. >>> It certainly may NOT be but PLEASE do not lump in the transfer- >>> back issue and its possible removal or replacement with the >>> contestation- lottery issue and its possible removal or >>> replacement. >>> >>> Please give each issue its due diligence on its own unless >>> absolutely necessary. These issues *clearly* deserve separate >>> consideration. >> The issue of fixing the rule does NOT *clearly* need to be split >> into two issues. > > Then please tell us why you believe that the losing-the-contestation- > lottery and the transfer-back issues *must* be resolved at the same > time and *cannot* be separated, since it seems clear to some of us > that they are two related but very separate issues, which now have > two very different in-game purposes, no matter what their relationship > in the deep past of VTES. I don't. As stated, the issue *should* (not *must*) be handled as itself rather than being split up.

[ quoted text not captured ] Except that combat/vote/bleed is expected to see in a regular basis. And I'll repeat myself yet again, reasonably easy to prepare for. Contest doesn't fall into that category. Sure, bloat makes you survive, and lenghten the game. Maybe even let you win the contest. Contest isn't expected to see on a regular basis, but often enough, that the penalty, and unfun situations that follow it happening to your first minion are too harsh. The pay 1 pool isn't the issue here. > > > That people mostly don't think it's worth preparing for it, since they > > > consider contesting too rare is a different thing. We can compare it > > > to Brinksmanship decks instead of combat/votes/bleed decks if that > > > makes it easier to see. Or Imbued decks (assuming they're rare in your > > > playgroup/meta). > > > To see what, that you are hosed, or your game is going to be fucked if > > they are your predator > > That you'll be fucked if they're your predator *only if* you're not > prepared to face such a deck. And that it was your own doing that got > you there (not to that particular table, but to a position where you > are fucked due to having X as a predator). There are ways to prepare > against a Brinksmanship deck, or an imbued deck. Many people doesn't > do that, since it's generally not worth it due to those decks being > rather rare in most meta games. The same goes for contesting. Imbueds really aren't that bad. Only thing I hate about imbueds, is that on the setup-phase of the game, the turns take too long, no other complaints about it. Passing the Brinksmanship is... difficult enough, that if they can do that, let them. Contesting harms you, if they are on the crosstable. Having Imbued/ Brinksmanship doesn't harm you if they are crosstable. But I fail to see how this is related to contesting? Every paper has it's scissors.

[ quoted text not captured ] I think contest falls into that category. Sure, it's more rare than combat/vote/bleed decks but that's the only difference I see (in terms of defending against it). > Contest isn't expected to see on a regular basis, but often enough, > that the penalty, and unfun situations that follow it happening to > your first minion are too harsh. The pay 1 pool isn't the issue here. Again, I don't think so. I think the penalty is very suitable and appropriate. > > > To see what, that you are hosed, or your game is going to be fucked if > > > they are your predator > > > That you'll be fucked if they're your predator *only if* you're not > > prepared to face such a deck. And that it was your own doing that got > > you there (not to that particular table, but to a position where you > > are fucked due to having X as a predator). There are ways to prepare > > against a Brinksmanship deck, or an imbued deck. Many people doesn't > > do that, since it's generally not worth it due to those decks being > > rather rare in most meta games. The same goes for contesting. > > Imbueds really aren't that bad. Only thing I hate about imbueds, is > that on the setup-phase of the game, the turns take too long, no other > complaints about it. > Passing the Brinksmanship is... difficult enough, that if they can do > that, let them. They were just examples of things that are so rare that including defense against the often isn't worth the library slots. Let's just say First Tradition instead of Brinksmanship, if that makes it more understandable. > Contesting harms you, if they are on the crosstable. Having Imbued/ > Brinksmanship doesn't harm you if they are crosstable. But I fail to > see how this is related to contesting? Every paper has it's scissors. Consider that having a Brinksmanship deck as grand predator can very much harm you, since it'll probably give your predator a free ride for some time. The relation to contesting is that if you build a deck that can't handle it, contesting will be a problem. It'll be the scissors to you paper. If you instead had build a rock deck, then you'd be "fine" (I realize that contesting always will be worse than not contesting. But one can make it rather trivial if one wishes).

> Again, I don't think so. I think the penalty is very suitable and > appropriate. You consider wasting 12-14 pool and 3-4 turns of transfers a very suitable and appropriate penalty? This is before we take into account, that your predator actually tries to oust you, so most likely it'll cost you a minimum of 17-18 pool. > > > > To see what, that you are hosed, or your game is going to be fucked if > > > > they are your predator > > > > That you'll be fucked if they're your predator *only if* you're not > > > prepared to face such a deck. And that it was your own doing that got > > > you there (not to that particular table, but to a position where you > > > are fucked due to having X as a predator). There are ways to prepare > > > against a Brinksmanship deck, or an imbued deck. Many people doesn't > > > do that, since it's generally not worth it due to those decks being > > > rather rare in most meta games. The same goes for contesting. > > > Imbueds really aren't that bad. Only thing I hate about imbueds, is > > that on the setup-phase of the game, the turns take too long, no other > > complaints about it. > > Passing the Brinksmanship is... difficult enough, that if they can do > > that, let them. > > They were just examples of things that are so rare that including > defense against the often isn't worth the library slots. > Let's just say First Tradition instead of Brinksmanship, if that makes > it more understandable. Don't see much difference here. Both are equally annoying. > > Contesting harms you, if they are on the crosstable. Having Imbued/ > > Brinksmanship doesn't harm you if they are crosstable. But I fail to > > see how this is related to contesting? Every paper has it's scissors. > > Consider that having a Brinksmanship deck as grand predator can very > much harm you, since it'll probably give your predator a free ride for > some time. Only if they do pure D-actions. > The relation to contesting is that if you build a deck that can't > handle it, contesting will be a problem. It'll be the scissors to you > paper. If you instead had build a rock deck, then you'd be "fine" (I > realize that contesting always will be worse than not contesting. But > one can make it rather trivial if one wishes). If your rock is contesting it's first vampire, is it still rock? No, it's not.

On Aug 13, 1:51 am, "Kevin M." <youw...@imaspammer.org> wrote: > Then I'd suggest that "just as many people" is an overstatement and > perhaps you could've chosen better words for that particular subject. :) I dunno--if by "just as many people" I meant "equivalent to a couple of people involved in the discussion here about contestation", I'd be right on target :-) -Peter

[ quoted text not captured ] You define "losing-the-contestation-lottery" *plus* "transfer-back" as "the issue / itself", inseparable due to their single source, long ago. I define "losing-the-contestation-lottery" and "transfer back" as two currently separate game issues, and while I acknowledge that they came from a single source, long ago, I also understand that "transfer-back" has gained a place of its own distinct from "losing- the-contestation-lottery" and therefore should be handled (if at all) on its own and not in some sort of bundle. Some players have been vocal in agreeing with my point-of-view and have been vocal in suggesting such to you. It seems you don't agree. I'm really trying to understand this since it's so clear to me and yet I keep seeing you disagreeing. Is it that, for you, the origins of VTES and/or the designer's intent generally overrides any current game and deck-design mechanics -- as transfer-back clearly has become -- or is it that you don't agree with the hypothesis that the two issues have become separated over time? Kevin M., Prince of Las Vegas "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 Please visit VTESville daily! http://vtesville.myminicity.com/ Please buy my cards! http://shop.ebay.com/kjmergen/m.html

On Aug 13, 9:03 am, "Kevin M." <youw...@imaspammer.org> wrote: > I define "losing-the-contestation-lottery" and "transfer back" as > two currently separate game issues, and while I acknowledge that > they came from a single source, long ago, I also understand that > "transfer-back" has gained a place of its own distinct from "losing- > the-contestation-lottery" and therefore should be handled (if at all) > on its own and not in some sort of bundle. While I completely agree with you, that "contestation" can be fixed without touching "undo influence" (I'm still standing on the side of "if you yield contestation, you get all the blood on the contested minion put back into your pool" as the simplest, cleanest, most laser guided repair with the least collateral damage), I can see where LSJ is (at least I think I do) coming from here--if you fix contestation, the game rules are not at a zero sum relative to now. Something is just changed, and the thing that was introduced into the game to balance that out, still being there, leaves the game in an unbalanced state. So removing the "undo influence" is the cost for fixing "contestation". I don't know if this would be a positive change to the game (as contestation, while sucky, *is* random and fairly infrequent while transferring back is incredibly common and would affect most games all the time). But I can see why the connection is made and the two are lumped together. -Peter

I had contesting issues on my last game, on Dmitra Ilyanova. My prey played it before I could say a word and this was totally unexpected. Now how could I get the vote lock? By contesting. But this messed up the game for both he and I. But I didn't whine. Now, it's true that contesting most of the time ruins two players, especially on high capacity vampires. I'd like to make a suggestion to LSJ : let's not change contesting rules, but add a new influence rule. During your influence phase, spend 4 transfers to move all blood on a contested minion to one of your uncontrolled vampire or imbued. Remove the contested minion from the game. This allows several game mechanics about contesting : > contesting is still bad. If no one yields, pool keeps to be lost. (outcome : keeps game diversity) > contesting slows contested vampires but does not kill the yielding methuselah. (outcome : contesting is bad, but not deadly) > contesting can be a strategy (If A plays Stanislava, that she is downed to a few bloods, then B contests Stanislava. A will ponder "do I yield now or lose transfers to gain some pool?") A few cases to illustrate what this suggestion can lead to : -A plays stanislava, B stops influencing her, then plays another vampire. B is slowed, A plays with stanislava, her blood drops down, then B contests : the benefit of having played with a contested vampire will be balanced by the fact the vampire has less blood. -A and B play stanislava. A uses the new influence rule, but just has Nadima and another stanislava to influence on to. If he keeps buggering B he will contest stanislava again. If he's smart and if he wants to play, he will play Nadima and loose 3 blood in the process, plus the 1 pool burned to keep contesting. So, as I said, contesting is still bad with this rule.

XZealot schrieb: > On Aug 10, 4:00 pm, henrik <www.hen...@gmail.com> wrote: >> On Aug 10, 10:49 pm, XZealot <xzea...@cox.net> wrote: >> >>>>> I still didn't enjoy the game >>>>> very much, which is why I play VTES, you know, to have fun... >>>> Don't play with asshats that contests out of stupidness. >>> So, it's a demonstrable problem and you still want to chalk it up to >>> the "asshat" factor. >> Yeah. If the contest did nothing else than making you both lose it's >> your predator's stupidness that got you there. I think the problem is >> mostly that your deck couldn't handle being without Ian. >> I'm not saying contesting didn't make your situation worse. It did, >> and I think contesting is supposed to work exactly that way. If you >> couldn't handle not having Ian for 4 turns, that's not at all a rules >> problem. Really. > > My deck couldn't deal with contesting AND someone laying down 1st > Traditions on the other side of the table with 5 cap princes. > > One or the other, I might have been able to deal with, but with both > of them it was just "GAME OVER". Which happens. He could have also rushed your Ian Foresta, diablerized him and be killed afterwards because he didnt backrush quickly enough. The situation would have been much the same for you. Do we want to change the rules for that too?

[ quoted text not captured ] No, he could not have taken down Ian Forrestal. I was quite prepared to defend my Ian Forrestal.

LSJ schrieb: > henrik wrote: >> Yeah, contesting doesn't have much to do with the deck you play (other >> than certain minions having a higher risk of getting contested). How >> much you lose due to a contest is all about the deck you play though. > > OK. Try this: > > At the start of each game, roll a d100. A roll of 1 means you lose 8 > pool (start with 22 pool instead of 30) and lose one of your > uncontrolled minions (chosen at random, to be nice -- rather than > choosing whichever one you would most like to bring out) and get no > transfers on your first two turns. To balance this out, you get the > ability to spend two transfers to gain 1 pool, but you can only do this > 8 times in the game. > > Now, what does you deck have to do with how much you lose when you roll > a 1? I�d be fine with the rule since everyone has to roll just as everybody is prone to contestation. Over the course of many games it won�t change anything. And bad games happen. Often, in this case it ends quickly so thats even better.

[ quoted text not captured ] > Please buy my cards!http://shop.ebay.com/kjmergen/m.html- Skjul tekst i anførselstegn - > > - Vis tekst i anførselstegn - I am with Kevin on this, and is also very interested in why you seem adamant that "losing-the-contestation-lottery" and "transfer back" are tied together and cannot be solved individually. As I see it "transfer back" isnt an issue at all. "Losing-the- contestation-lottery" was the ISSUE. "Transfer back" was the suggested SOLUTION that now, after so long, seem to not be doing what it was supposed to do, but which has instead grown into a seperate aspect of the game. We still have the issue with contestation, but it is still not clear to me (and many others it seems) why you feel that you cannot address the old issue with a different approach, without also removing/ changing the old proposed solution. Unless it is because you feel the game game mechanic wise must remain at some status quo, and that leaving this untouched would greatly inbalance the game? I sincerely doubt that will be the case. I believe that the solution of having the option to move all counters from a contested vampire or imbued to your pool and then removing the vampire from the game (not burned) is a very simple yet effective solution.

On Tue, 11 Aug 2009 14:40:48 -0700 (PDT), talonz <talo...@yahoo.ca> wrote: > On Aug 11, 11:12ￜam, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: >> As proof that players don't play rationally, I am playing an Arika, > > Stop there. You've convinced me. ;) > > >> My grandpredator influences out Beast, ...He then rushes and torporizes >> Arika (any one my predator's weenies >> ￜ diablerize her). I know I'm going to lose. I can't stop it. It's turn >> 3 >> ￜ and I know my game is fucked up beyond all recognition. >> > > If this was meant to be a counterargument to the contesting rule > screwin with the game, keep in mind that there are far more counters > to rush than there are for contesting. And your argument, such as it > is, holds very little water whatsoever. If I now start bringing up the argument that the rush deck will likely cream you no matter what, you (or someone else) will chime in with the strawman, that "Yes but you can put 50 Skin of Steels in your deck if you want to, but you are COMPLETELY HELPLESS against contestation!!1!11". So let's put it like this. We are talking about the loss of a minion. The chances of which can be mitigated (or even eliminated) by taking less mainstream, less optimal choices during deck construction. In one case by upping the defense count in the library; in the other by choosing less powerful, less frequently played minions or by diversifying the crypt. Having one of your midcap goons contested is usually better (but seldom worse) than getting him nuked. I mean, you are anyway preparing for the possibility of the loss of minions in most decks; with contestation, you might just be getting the dude back. I don't think anyone will cry a river for contesting a Corine Marcon. But people will find it an aggravation to contest Arika. I suspect that the main problem might be that only a handful of fatties are being played regularly. -- Regards, Daneel

On 13 elo, 20:40, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: > If I now start bringing up the argument that the rush deck will likely > cream you no matter what, you (or someone else) will chime in with the > strawman, that "Yes but you can put 50 Skin of Steels in your deck if > you want to, but you are COMPLETELY HELPLESS against contestation!!1!11". I'll chime in with the argument that the rush deck didn't just happen to cream you. The deck's player had to construct a deck that was able to jump through the several hoops between Theo's fangs and Arika's neck. Removing a minion is his reward.

I am very interested in LSJ's thinking about the transfer back rule. I agree with him that that transferring back and 'unique-crypt-lottery- loss' are connected discussions, because you cannot talk about getting rid of 'transferring back' without also talking about changing the rule for cypt contestation. Transferring back is the most basic mitigation for 'unique-crypt-lottery-loss' that the game provides. From my experience crypt contestation or its threat happens at a more than negligible rate. I estimate I've played 50 games since getting back into the game in October 08, and I can think of six games in which vampires were contested or could have been contested. Nonetheless, I don't have a strong objection to the current vampire contestation rule. My only criticism is that it could be more dynamic. Losing the use of a vampire to contestation or losing pool and transfers to 'unique-crypt-lottery-loss' can greatly reduce a player's options, especially in the case of big vampires. This makes the game less fun. I am more interested in the transferring back rules, but if I had to change the vampire contestation rules to the game more fun, the options I would prefer would be: 1. Open uncontrolled regions and keeping traditional contestation. This gives players' full knowledge of the possibility of contestation. All players can begin adapting to the table environment starting with turn one. 2. Dynamic vampire contestation. Whenever a player influences a unique vampire (or imbued, etc.) from the uncontrolled region, if another copy of that vampire is in play, it is returned to its owner's uncontrolled region like a Banishment. This could still hose the contesting players, but it would allow for more interesting strategic play. It fits the flavor of the VTES gameworld well: two (or more?) Methusalehs invest resources to influence the same key vampire, whose allegiance changes according to which Methusaleh most recently exerted the necessary influence. Removing transferring back: in recent posts on Extrala.blogspot.com ( http://extrala.blogspot.com/2009/07/results-poll-would-you-like-to-see.html ), I have argued in favor of removing the transferring back rule. I think getting rid of 'transferring back' would be interesting because: 1. Transferring back has become a bloat tool, although it was originally intended to mitigate potential contestations. The roleplaying concept expressed by superior Govern the Unaligned and Enchant Kindred is not one of gaining general resources; the concept is using your controlled vampires' mind control powers to bring more vampires under your control. I think it's better for game mechanics to conform to the flavor of the cards. 2. Removing transferring back would balance the power of Presence and especially Dominate to other disciplines. Yes, that means weakening them. 3. Removing transferring back would speed up games because there would be fewer bloat options. 4. It doesn't make sense to be able to transfer resources rather easily away from a vampire you don't control, while it requires a card (Blood Doll, Minion Tap, etc.) to get resources away from a vampire you do control. I used the example of bribing an official in my post on extrala.blogspot. I guess LSJ is talking about this issue in other posts as well. http://extrala.blogspot.com/2009/08/poll-transfer-rules-change-proposal.html BTW: Why is this topic called "Ban Rush" now?

> We still have the issue with contestation, but it is still not clear > to me (and many others it seems) why you feel that you cannot address > the old issue with a different approach, without also removing/ > changing the old proposed solution. Unless it is because you feel the > game game mechanic wise must remain at some status quo, and that > leaving this untouched would greatly inbalance the game? I sincerely > doubt that will be the case. > > I believe that the solution of having the option to move all counters > from a contested vampire or imbued to your pool and then removing the > vampire from the game (not burned) is a very simple yet effective > solution. My concern was diffrent from what you think : it's not particularly that "the actual game mechanic is wise", but more "if we dramatically change the system, many errata and general game balance will have to be made". It's true that if you play a mono-deck (like, turbo cybele CotGB, or the polemic turbo Ian Forestal :p) and you are contested, it's still a serious issue. However, if you do not have a plan B, it's because you chose that weakness. Since you, as both player and deckbuilder haven't thought about a backplan, you've got to pay the price of that decision. And anyway, any deck will have a blindspot. This solution takes just a line or two in the rulebook, and does not affect general gameplay since vampire contesting is a cornercase. One more thing : library cards contesting is a more frequent issue and the harsh old way of dealing with it works fine, if you ask me, and I doubt many players find it unbalanced. I think it's better to have a general rule for contests and then an additional option to give a lifesaver to contesters. If we keep the solution I proposed (thanks for the compliment mate ;) ), the main concern I have is about "coming into controlled region effects" (like Tariq, Anarch Convert, and so on and so forth.) The fact is, a lot of rulings already exist, and just need to be checked out and updated, and I don't think many of them will need changes. I hope LSJ will find my proposition and will like it, if he still reads this troll of a topic.

LSJ, I understand the modification that you suggest but let me ask how it is intended to fix the lost lottery. Let's say I spend 3 turns transferring out a minion, then my predator contests said minion. Then I need to spend 5-6 turn of transfers to get my pool back. I don't see how that addresses the problem. What have I missed? As to Kevin's point, that the two issues should be separated, I have to say I agree with him that contestation and transfers should be separated, partially because they can happen through different means. I can use Possession to put a vampire into play and contest a vampire, it doesn't involve transfers, there are a few other cards which can accomplish this feat without transfers, so the issue of contesting a vampire is not solely based on transfers. I also want to thank you for your extensive time on not only this topic but the game as a whole. David Wilson Ann Arbor

Wilsoros wrote: > LSJ, > > I understand the modification that you suggest but let me ask how it > is intended to fix the lost lottery. > > Let's say I spend 3 turns transferring out a minion, then my predator > contests said minion. Then I need to spend 5-6 turn of transfers to > get my pool back. I don't see how that addresses the problem. > > What have I missed? When you yield, you move the blood on that vampire to your pool and/or distribute it among your uncontrolled vampires. On the other side, when you are not yet contesting, you can reveal the would-contest-another-player's-card crypt card to move the blood on it to your pool and/or distribute it among your uncontrolled vampires. > As to Kevin's point, that the two issues should be separated, I have > to say I agree with him that contestation and transfers should be > separated, partially because they can happen through different means. Yet this transfer (2 to undo tranfers) rule exists only because of the contestation issue it was designed to address. If the supposition that it doesn't adequately address the issue it is designed to address is true, then it is natural to investigate alternatives (rather than patches). > I can use Possession to put a vampire into play and contest a vampire, > it doesn't involve transfers, there are a few other cards which can > accomplish this feat without transfers, so the issue of contesting a > vampire is not solely based on transfers. OK. > I also want to thank you for your extensive time on not only this > topic but the game as a whole. And thank you.

> > I understand the modification that you suggest but let me ask how it > > is intended to fix the lost lottery. > > > Let's say I spend 3 turns transferring out a minion, then my predator > > contests said minion. Then I need to spend 5-6 turn of transfers to > > get my pool back. I don't see how that addresses the problem. > > > What have I missed? > > When you yield, you move the blood on that vampire to your pool and/or > distribute it among your uncontrolled vampires. > > On the other side, when you are not yet contesting, you can reveal the > would-contest-another-player's-card crypt card to move the blood on it to your > pool and/or distribute it among your uncontrolled vampires. LSJ, Sorry I wasn't clear on my point. You get to redistribute, I get that, but the time it takes is extraordinary. Let's say I go 4th and and bring out an 11 cap, I get contested right away. It takes me 6 turns to empty the vampire, or were you saying 2transfers to move 1 blood to your pool or another vampire? although it is now half rate to move off and would be better(faster) to spend more pool and come back to the contested vampire later. > > As to Kevin's point, that the two issues should be separated, I have > > to say I agree with him that contestation and transfers should be > > separated, partially because they can happen through different means. > > Yet this transfer (2 to undo tranfers) rule exists only because of the > contestation issue it was designed to address. > > If the supposition that it doesn't adequately address the issue it is designed > to address is true, then it is natural to investigate alternatives (rather than > patches). > > > I can use Possession to put a vampire into play and contest a vampire, > > it doesn't involve transfers, there are a few other cards which can > > accomplish this feat without transfers, so the issue of contesting a > > vampire is not solely based on transfers. > > OK. > > > I also want to thank you for your extensive time on not only this > > topic but the game as a whole. > > And thank you. I really missed Vtes, glad to be back, see you all in time.

On Thu, 13 Aug 2009 12:24:25 -0700 (PDT), suoli <suolir...@gmail.com> wrote: > On 13 elo, 20:40, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: >> If I now start bringing up the argument that the rush deck will likely >> ￜ cream you no matter what, you (or someone else) will chime in with the >> ￜ strawman, that "Yes but you can put 50 Skin of Steels in your deck if >> ￜ you want to, but you are COMPLETELY HELPLESS against >> contestation!!1!11". > > I'll chime in with the argument that the rush deck didn't just happen > to cream you. The deck's player had to construct a deck that was able > to jump through the several hoops between Theo's fangs and Arika's > neck. Removing a minion is his reward. Opportunity = building a combat deck and having the cards in hand. (compare: including the vampire and drawing him) Cost = the cards they play, damage they take, table hate they gather. (compare: spending the cost of the vampire and not getting him for sure) I see a comparability here. Sure, you can say, "yeah, but you don't have to play any red cards to contest!" or similar, but I think if you take a step back and look at the big picture (minion loss, with opportunity and cost) then things fall into place. It's not like PTO where you spend 1 blood and kill a vampire. It's like spending X pool and transfers and either wasting those (with potentially spending additional Y pool on it) or getting the vampire in time and removing another vampire from the table (with potentially spending additional Y pool on it). It doesn't make sense to ignore the cost of contestation. The cost is probably very heavy on the other player. They might end up doing more damage to themselves than to you. Let's not focus on irrational play please, because there are a significant number of irrational plays that will screw you cross-table - so much that you end up wishing you were only contesting a midcap. -- Regards, Daneel

On 14 elo, 19:55, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: > On Thu, 13 Aug 2009 12:24:25 -0700 (PDT), suoli <suoliruse...@gmail.com> > wrote: > > > On 13 elo, 20:40, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: > >> If I now start bringing up the argument that the rush deck will likely > >> cream you no matter what, you (or someone else) will chime in with the > >> strawman, that "Yes but you can put 50 Skin of Steels in your deck if [ quoted text not captured ] The issue here isn't intentional, tactical contesting. Burning a vampire through combat rewards one player for intentionally doing something at a certain cost and kicks one player in the teeth. Being unintentionally in a situation where contesting is an issue hurts one or more players at the cost of 0 to anyone who happens to benefit.

Wilsoros wrote: >>> I understand the modification that you suggest but let me ask how it >>> is intended to fix the lost lottery. >>> Let's say I spend 3 turns transferring out a minion, then my predator >>> contests said minion. Then I need to spend 5-6 turn of transfers to >>> get my pool back. I don't see how that addresses the problem. >>> What have I missed? >> When you yield, you move the blood on that vampire to your pool and/or >> distribute it among your uncontrolled vampires. >> >> On the other side, when you are not yet contesting, you can reveal the >> would-contest-another-player's-card crypt card to move the blood on it to your >> pool and/or distribute it among your uncontrolled vampires. > LSJ, > > Sorry I wasn't clear on my point. You get to redistribute, I get > that, but the time it takes is extraordinary. Let's say I go 4th and > and bring out an 11 cap, I get contested right away. It takes me 6 > turns to empty the vampire, or were you saying 2transfers to move 1 > blood to your pool or another vampire? although it is now half rate to > move off and would be better(faster) to spend more pool and come back > to the contested vampire later. I'm saying[*] that at the instant you yield, all of the blood is immediately distributed among your pool and/or your uncontrolled vampires. * Under the proposed rule

> Yet this transfer (2 to undo tranfers) rule exists only because of the > contestation issue it was designed to address. What evidence is there for this assertion -- which, by the way, I find so outrageous that I think you may be pulling our legs? (I haven't managed to read every word of every post in this thread, so if evidence was given I ask you to indulge me by repeating it.) Midgame, I often put pool on a strong vampire o that I am one turn from bringing it out, so that I can take quick advantage in case of a fortuitous turn of events. If my luck turns bad I pull it off. The threat of contesting is almost never the reason I change my mind about where I'm investing my pool. Really, like not even 1% of the non- bloat back-transfers I've made in my life were associated to contesting. I genuinely doubt that the back-transfer rule was designed even *primarily* to address contestation, let alone *exclusively*. The excerpts others have quoted from the rulebook do not indicate that back-transfers exist to address contesting; to the contrary, they illustrate other reasons to redistribute the counters on uncontrolled vampires.

Malone wrote: >> Yet this transfer (2 to undo tranfers) rule exists only because of the >> contestation issue it was designed to address. > > What evidence is there for this assertion -- which, by the way, I find > so outrageous that I think you may be pulling our legs? (I haven't > managed to read every word of every post in this thread, so if > evidence was given I ask you to indulge me by repeating it.) Garfield. Describing how the rule came to be.

On Fri, 14 Aug 2009 10:09:17 -0700 (PDT), suoli <suolir...@gmail.com> wrote: > On 14 elo, 19:55, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: >> On Thu, 13 Aug 2009 12:24:25 -0700 (PDT), suoli <suoliruse...@gmail.com> >> wrote: >> >> > On 13 elo, 20:40, Daneel <dan...@eposta.hu> wrote: >> >> If I now start bringing up the argument that the rush deck will >> likely >> >> ￜ cream you no matter what, you (or someone else) will chime in with >> the >> >> ￜ strawman, that "Yes but you can put 50 Skin of Steels in your deck >> if >> >> ￜ you want to, but you are COMPLETELY HELPLESS against >> >> contestation!!1!11". >> >> > I'll chime in with the argument that the rush deck didn't just happen >> > to cream you. The deck's player had to construct a deck that was able >> > to jump through the several hoops between Theo's fangs and Arika's >> > neck. Removing a minion is his reward. >> >> Opportunity = building a combat deck and having the cards in hand. >> (compare: including the vampire and drawing him) >> >> Cost = the cards they play, damage they take, table hate they gather. >> (compare: spending the cost of the vampire and not getting him for sure) >> >> I see a comparability here. Sure, you can say, "yeah, but you don't have >> ￜ to play any red cards to contest!" or similar, but I think if you take >> ￜ a step back and look at the big picture (minion loss, with opportunity >> ￜ and cost) then things fall into place. >> >> It's not like PTO where you spend 1 blood and kill a vampire. It's like >> ￜ spending X pool and transfers and either wasting those (with >> ￜ potentially spending additional Y pool on it) or getting the vampire >> ￜ in time and removing another vampire from the table (with potentially >> ￜ spending additional Y pool on it). >> >> It doesn't make sense to ignore the cost of contestation. The cost is >> ￜ probably very heavy on the other player. They might end up doing more >> ￜ damage to themselves than to you. Let's not focus on irrational play >> ￜ please, because there are a significant number of irrational plays >> ￜ that will screw you cross-table - so much that you end up wishing you >> ￜ were only contesting a midcap. >> >> -- >> Regards, >> >> Daneel > > The issue here isn't intentional, tactical contesting. Burning a > vampire through combat rewards one player for intentionally doing > something at a certain cost and kicks one player in the teeth. Being > unintentionally in a situation where contesting is an issue hurts one > or more players at the cost of 0 to anyone who happens to benefit. The rush deck is expending resources to tac-nuke a minion. There is a clear loss for the controller for the minion. There is a clear cost to the rush deck. There is a clear gain for everybody else at the table just because they happened to sit there. Don't forget that because of the seating, you are guaranteed to be in an unintentional situation (e.g. if you went light with your combat package to have more punch with your actions, the last thing you want is to sit at the same table with a rush deck; you could say that being there to begin with is quite unintentional). If players play cleverly, contestation becomes a tactical tool. I've seen more games being upset by trigger-happy combat decks rushing willy-nilly, wreaking havoc and then dying, then contestation. By a magnitude of something like a lot. Really. If anything, we should change the seating - let each player decide where to sit, with perfect information about each opponent's deck, to make sure nobody has to have the frustrating experience of going too heavy / too light on some aspect of the game (or repeating some key crypt card). :) -- Regards, Daneel

I would have to say that I have seen far more destructive table results come from "Wall-of-Agg Damage" and "Rush" than Contesting. I am still someone who views Contesting as a corner-case event, that while significant in its result, is a particular weakness for certain deck-types (especially Superstar decks).

[ quoted text not captured ] I'm not sure why we're debating designer intent from 15 years ago. Garfield's design intent is mostly irrelevant for determining what's best for the game at this point. I realize this game is not designed by the consensus of this community, but insofar as LSJ chooses to listen to some players, I would summarize the thread so far as follows: It seems to me that many people in this thread think that a change to the crypt contesting rules could improve the game. Some people think the rule need not change. I would enjoy playtesting such a change, and I'm wondering if LSJ would repost his most current thinking. I've missed a lot in two weeks, and I'd love to get some playtest games going. It also seems to me that, other than LSJ, no one in this thread thinks that the transfer back rule is a problem. From LSJ's posts, I infer that he thinks the transfer back rule is bad for the game, but I personally don't see any problems with it. When I try to think about LSJ's perspective, I got this far: Dominate and Presence are the strongest discplines, and have the most ways to bloat via transferring back. Removing the transfer-back rule would weaken cards like Govern the Unaligned and Enchant Kindred, which is a good thing for game balance. That said, I think there are other ways to make Dominate more balanced, and removing the transfer back rule isn't the way I'd go about it. I agree with other posters who have noted that in regular gameplay, I often use the transfer back rule to put some pool on a fatty; if I oust my prey, I'll add more and bring out the minion. If things go badly, I'll transfer back. It has nothing to do with contesting or bloating. I will often use the transfer back rule to bloat, and practically never related to contesting (since contesting rarely happens.) Ira

Ira Fay wrote: > On Aug 15, 5:32 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> Malone wrote: >>>> Yet this transfer (2 to undo tranfers) rule exists only because of the >>>> contestation issue it was designed to address. >>> What evidence is there for this assertion -- which, by the way, I find >>> so outrageous that I think you may be pulling our legs? (I haven't >>> managed to read every word of every post in this thread, so if >>> evidence was given I ask you to indulge me by repeating it.) >> Garfield. Describing how the rule came to be. > > I'm not sure why we're debating designer intent from 15 years ago. We're not. Stating is not debating. > Garfield's design intent is mostly irrelevant for determining what's > best for the game at this point. Sure. What his perceived intent is relevant for in this case is identifying an aspect of the rules (e.g., the aspect of the rules addressing the problem of losing the unique crypt card lottery: the undo influence rule) that could be improved. Evaluating alternatives to his original intent is clearly done without needing to conform to his original intent. > I realize this game is not designed by the consensus of this > community, but insofar as LSJ chooses to listen to some players, I > would summarize the thread so far as follows: > > It seems to me that many people in this thread think that a change to > the crypt contesting rules could improve the game. Some people think > the rule need not change. I would enjoy playtesting such a change, > and I'm wondering if LSJ would repost his most current thinking. I've > missed a lot in two weeks, and I'd love to get some playtest games > going. If extra bloat is good for game: Extend influence to controlled vampires (i.e., remove the "uncontrolled" restriction). And to contested vampires as well, I suppose, for added complexity reduction. If extra bloat is not good for the game: Replace the undo influence rule (i.e., two transfers to move a counter from uncontrolled to pool) with: Expose a crypt card that would contest a unique card controlled by another player to remove that card from the game and redistribute the blood counters on that card among your other uncontrolled minions and/or your pool. Coupled with a similar rule for contested cards: When yielding a crypt card, redistribute <as above>.

On Aug 18, 9:41 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > If extra bloat is good for game: > Extend influence to controlled vampires (i.e., remove the "uncontrolled" > restriction). And to contested vampires as well, I suppose, for added complexity > reduction. > > If extra bloat is not good for the game: > Replace the undo influence rule (i.e., two transfers to move a counter from > uncontrolled to pool) with: From the current state of the game, such bloat is not "extra". > Expose a crypt card that would contest a unique card controlled by another > player to remove that card from the game and redistribute the blood counters on > that card among your other uncontrolled minions and/or your pool. > > Coupled with a similar rule for contested cards: When yielding a crypt card, > redistribute <as above>. As noted earlier in the thread, this is likely to make cards such as Banishment and Reality somewhat stronger. I propose the following addition to help mitigate this power: A methuselah may forfeit his transfers for the turn in order to get two gransfers instead. Each gransfer may be spent to move one blood from an uncontrolled minion to that methuselah's pool. This rule would also have some side effects. For example, a methuselah who has invested pool in a minion on one turn, but decides on a later turn that another minion would be a better choice, to eventually reclaim the initial investment. I think that this is a beneficial effect in general because, unlike library cards - where the cost is paid all at once, and the card takes effect immediately - crypt cards are often purchased in installments, and remain completely unusable until the entire cost is paid. This can leave a methuselah in the awkward position of having a great deal of his resources invested in a card that he becomes unable to use. Certainly, one could take the position that a player who moved 4 pool onto an 8-capacity vampire and ended up with less than 5 pool on his next turn, unable to afford the remaining influence, deserves his fate. However, I would instead argue that whatever reduced this player from a percieved-comfortable pool total to less than 5 pool was probably a sufficiently bad fate without requiring that the player's 4 pool investment remain locked in limbo forever. It would also have the side effect of allowing cards such as Ecoterrorists and Art Museum to be used for poolgain instead of just bringing out additional minions. I think this effect is probably acceptable, given the current state of the game. It would allow certain kinds of decks to go lighter on defense than normal, relying on a steady drip of poolgain to counteract a portion of their predator's offense, but I don't think it badly throws off the game balance compared to the benefits. Maybe Govern the Unaligned would be a little too good, but that's a hit I'd be willing to take. -witness1

witness1 wrote: > On Aug 18, 9:41 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> If extra bloat is good for game: >> Extend influence to controlled vampires (i.e., remove the "uncontrolled" >> restriction). And to contested vampires as well, I suppose, for added complexity >> reduction. >> >> If extra bloat is not good for the game: >> Replace the undo influence rule (i.e., two transfers to move a counter from >> uncontrolled to pool) with: > > From the current state of the game, such bloat is not "extra". Tomahto. In any state of the game, extra is extra, no matter how accustomed to it one is. See also XL (American humor -- please ignore).

[ quoted text not captured ] I think a little dose of Occum's Razor is needed... If it works like pool gain, Ends up giving people pool or ends up saving people pool as if they'd gained it... IT'S POOL GAIN. (See more common Duck analogy). There are a big raft of ways to gain pool. "Contesting" is not about "gaining pool" its about not getting BONED by having someone else being sat at your table and wanting to use the same vampire you did and someone else beats you to it. This thread went a LONG way away from "you are currently in a contest" to "how do you make the rules nicer when an unwanted contesting-situation is about to occur and it wasn't because of someone's dirty shennanigans". It also seems to be entirely focussed on CRYPT cards (rather than Fame, The Rack and a raft of other cards people tend to contest "defensively"). There are a number of play issues the Jackass Factor(idiot/jackass play like Rushing upstream like a Salmon) and Popular Vampires (everyone likes Anson in Toreador decks, everybody loves Arika, it's hard to play an Una deck without Una in it, etc). I don't think it's really the "super mega issue" that the 3+ threads of 250+ posts each really implies... HOWEVER... if it comes down to it I don't mind the "burn the Crypt Card" option I've seen if it is going to result in a rules change. I don't mind a rule which says something like: "During your Influence Phase you may use 4 transfers reveal a unique card in your uncontrolled region that is currently Controlled and remove that minion from the game. Blood counters on that card can be moved to any other unique card in your uncontrolled region." I don't want to see it include a "auto-bloat" because that does allow for exploitation via GtU, EK, Art Museum, Ecoterrorists, etc.

LSJ <vte...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >If extra bloat is good for game: >Extend influence to controlled vampires (i.e., remove the >"uncontrolled" restriction). And to contested vampires as well, I >suppose, for added complexity reduction. > >If extra bloat is not good for the game: >Replace the undo influence rule (i.e., two transfers to move a counter >from uncontrolled to pool) with: > >Expose a crypt card that would contest a unique card controlled by >another player to remove that card from the game and redistribute the >blood counters on that card among your other uncontrolled minions >and/or your pool. Why not: If the current amount of bloat is good for the game, leave that alone and introduce rules that handle contesting only. ? That something provides a benefit now does not mean that providing it more liberally will be better, and many aspects of the game have balanced themselves around that (e.g. certain decks and strategies being viable, decks that have the ability to lunge to thwart a bloating strategy that kicks in next turn). And if something is okay now, there is no need to remove it. -- James Coupe PGP Key: 0x5D623D5D YOU ARE IN ERROR. EBD690ECD7A1FB457CA2 NO-ONE IS SCREAMING. 13D7E668C3695D623D5D THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION.

James Coupe wrote: > Why not: > > If the current amount of bloat is good for the game, leave that > alone and introduce rules that handle contesting only. > > ? Sure. That goes without saying.

[ quoted text not captured ] So, with: in case of contesting, reveal the contest and redistribute pool to crypt and/or pool, we could stop debating it? Done! Best idea so far, imho, and contesting library cards doesn't need fixing, as far as I'm concerned, and as far as I read in the many threads on the subject. I'd say I'd like to start playtesting it immediately, but I fear we'd have to wait a couple of years for a contesting to occur on our weekly game of V:tes. So please keep an eye out for the playtesting results...

Mark wrote: > On 19 aug, 12:24, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> James Coupe wrote: >>> Why not: >>> If the current amount of bloat is good for the game, leave that >>> alone and introduce rules that handle contesting only. >>> ? >> Sure. That goes without saying. > > So, with: in case of contesting, reveal the contest and redistribute > pool to crypt and/or pool, we could stop debating it? Sure. If you assume that the current amount of extra bloat is good and the current level of unique-lottery-loss mitigation is not. That leaves plenty of room for debate, though.

I have read through all the posts on this topic but I am not sure I have seen the following suggested: Instead of paying 2 transfers to move blood from an uncontrolled vampire to your pool, the cost is the same as from your pool to a vampire. This means that it will be much faster to take home blood to your pool and subsequently placing them on a new vampire again. I know this also benefits any cards that allow you to move blood from the blood bank (or other sources) to uncontrolled vampires (in terms of putting this blood back to pool) which might not be a be a good side effect, although I am not sure how this would effect any future deck building. Another solution could be that all blood placed on uncontrolled vampires can be transferred between uncontrolled vampires without cost. From an uncontrolled back to pool would still be 2 transfers per blood, as per the current rules. This would mean that contesting would really really be an active choice. If someone brings out a vampire you have placed blood you, and you have another vampire to bring out, you can just move the invested counters over to it. Archie

[ quoted text not captured ] After some consideration, the second suggestion has a big flaw. Cards like Govern the Unaligned would (basically) lose their restrictions. You play it as worded but then would be able to move that blood to another vampire, which could be of any capacity. It would still only work when you had many vampire in your uncontrolled area (and they would still have to be smaller to play the card) but might still be too good a side effect. Archie

[ quoted text not captured ] Archie, The second suggestions is a variation on two of the solutions presented in another thread. Basically they are "get rid of the vamp & move the blood" one with an additional cost of 4 transfers and one without. Changing the "bloat back" transfers seems like a suggestion that will not meet with "general consesus" about game balance. And I agree. The issue is getting the blood from one crypt card to another crypt card for "not massive cost". So I think the "crypt card leaves play + move blood to crypt card" possibly with a 4 transfers cost seems fair and effective.

On Aug 18, 6:41 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > If extra bloat is not good for the game: > Replace the undo influence rule (i.e., two transfers to move a counter from > uncontrolled to pool) with: > > Expose a crypt card that would contest a unique card controlled by another > player to remove that card from the game and redistribute the blood counters on > that card among your other uncontrolled minions and/or your pool. > > Coupled with a similar rule for contested cards: When yielding a crypt card, > redistribute <as above>. The proposed rule above would significantly lessen the consequences of being in the unlucky position of contesting a crypt card with another player. Nice improvement! Unfortunately, the rule above also has a large impact on two other strategies (which both occur much more often than contesting crypt cards): 1) Partially transferring onto a crypt card with the possibility of bringing it out the following turn. For example, I might put 2 onto a 6-cap, then decide whether or not to bring out the minion next turn. Using the undo influence rule I can reclaim the 2 pool, or spend 4 more to bring it out. 2) Gaining pool through cards that add counters directly to cards in the uncontrolled region. This is a significant defensive element of the game, and it's rare to play a game where this doesn't occur. Perhaps you would consider keeping the undo influence rule, and simply adding the 2 contesting-related rules you mention above? That way, you still address the rare case of contesting, but you don't eliminate the interesting strategies of #1 and #2 that I list above. It seems to me that cards like Grooming the Protege or Flames of Insurrection are well-balanced given the defensive options in #2. If we remove the defensive option in #2, then many cards become weaker, which means they will get played less, which makes the game overall less interesting IMO. One of the things that I love about VTES is the diversity of viable decks, and I'm reluctant to support any change that would reduce the number of playable cards. IMO, bloat in the form of the undo influence rule isn't broken, because it usually max's out at 2 pool per turn. It's an interesting element of defense, but a good predator will do more than 2 pool damage per turn. If the actual design problem that you're trying to fix is, "the game is too slow" (i.e. "extra bloat is not good for the game"), then why not try a more direct change, like "gain 10 pool and a VP for an oust" ? Removing one of many defensive options won't address the fundamental issue that players have a strong incentive not to get ousted. Thanks for listening, Ira

Ira Fay wrote: > On Aug 18, 6:41 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> If extra bloat is not good for the game: >> Replace the undo influence rule (i.e., two transfers to move a counter from >> uncontrolled to pool) with: >> >> Expose a crypt card that would contest a unique card controlled by another >> player to remove that card from the game and redistribute the blood counters on >> that card among your other uncontrolled minions and/or your pool. >> >> Coupled with a similar rule for contested cards: When yielding a crypt card, >> redistribute <as above>. > > The proposed rule above would significantly lessen the consequences of > being in the unlucky position of contesting a crypt card with another > player. Nice improvement! > > Unfortunately, the rule above also has a large impact on two other > strategies (which both occur much more often than contesting crypt > cards): > 1) Partially transferring onto a crypt card with the possibility of > bringing it out the following turn. For example, I might put 2 onto a > 6-cap, then decide whether or not to bring out the minion next turn. > Using the undo influence rule I can reclaim the 2 pool, or spend 4 > more to bring it out. This is not unfortunate. See also bringing a 2-cap into play (cannot take the pool back if you guessed poorly) or Secret Horde (can't sac two counters to gain 1 pool if you guessed poorly). > 2) Gaining pool through cards that add counters directly to cards in > the uncontrolled region. This is a significant defensive element of > the game, and it's rare to play a game where this doesn't occur. Again not unfortunate. See also the "loss" of the ability to use transfers to pull counters from controlled vampires simply because the undo influence rule had the restriction "uncontrolled" on it. > Perhaps you would consider keeping the undo influence rule, and simply > adding the 2 contesting-related rules you mention above? Considered, of course. With the result that, since they are both introduced to address the same contesting issues, both are not needed. > That way, > you still address the rare case of contesting, but you don't eliminate > the interesting strategies of #1 and #2 that I list above. Then what about the interesting strategies that are lost by restricting undo influence to uncontrolled? > It seems to me that cards like Grooming the Protege or Flames of > Insurrection are well-balanced given the defensive options in #2. If > we remove the defensive option in #2, then many cards become weaker, > which means they will get played less, which makes the game overall > less interesting IMO. One of the things that I love about VTES is the > diversity of viable decks, and I'm reluctant to support any change > that would reduce the number of playable cards. Of course, any card that uses the rule being changed or removed will be affected. It doesn't necessarily make the game less interesting, of course, as other uses may be examined and/or players will use more strategy regarding resource management.

[ quoted text not captured ] The difference here is that you get the card you payed for, even if it turns out not to be optimal. And you got it immediately, too, not having to wait another turn (or more). It's good for the game that you can change your mind about cards payed for in installments, that will remain unusable until payment is completed. -witness1

[ quoted text not captured ] Arguably, sure. It's also arguable that having to accept responsibility for bad decisions is good for the game (encouraging more strategy in making those decisions in the first place).

[ quoted text not captured ] I'm not sure I understand what "more strategy" means in this context. Are you saying that people will have more strategic options to consider? The opposite is clearly true. Are you saying people will think harder about the consequences of their actions? I'm not sure that's the case, either. It certainly encourages using smaller minions so as to avoid even finding yourself with this dilemma. Someone who's at any serious risk of being unable to finish paying for the minion has just as easy a decision to not invest under the proposed rules as they do to invest under the current rules. It's also simply not the case that a player isn't "accepting responsibility" for a bad decision when utilizing the transfer-back rule. Spending a round with relatively fewer resources (having access to neither the pool invested nor the card it is invested in) was itself a negative consequence of the decision whether the player ultimately chooses to finish that investment or not. Likewise, though the transfer cost to recover the pool is sometimes inconsequential (the case of 2 pool transferred onto a 6-cap) it is often not (4 pool transferred onto an 8-cap or more), taking multiple turns to recover the pool if things go poorly. The transfer cost cannot be ignored if the changing circumstances have caused the player to desire one of his other uncontrolled minions (rather than none of them), introducing a new strategic choice. Is there some other interpretation of "more strategic" that I should be looking for? -witness1

witness1 wrote: > On Aug 20, 9:04 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> Arguably, sure. It's also arguable that having to accept responsibility for bad >> decisions is good for the game (encouraging more strategy in making those >> decisions in the first place). > > I'm not sure I understand what "more strategy" means in this context. People will have to use more strategy. Planning. Making good choices or accepting the consequences of choices that turn out not to have been good ones. See also being stuck with installment payments for Paying 1 pool to contest (you don't get that back if you later yield). Strained Vitae Supply (can't transfer that back if you later decide you'd rather have the pool).

On Aug 20, 10:58 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > On Aug 20, 9:04 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> Arguably, sure. It's also arguable that having to accept responsibility for bad > >> decisions is good for the game (encouraging more strategy in making those > >> decisions in the first place). > > > I'm not sure I understand what "more strategy" means in this context. > > People will have to use more strategy. Planning. Making good choices or > accepting the consequences of choices that turn out not to have been good ones. > > See also being stuck with installment payments for > > Paying 1 pool to contest (you don't get that back if you later yield). You get the effect of forcing the opponent to pay or yield, which is what you payed for. > Strained Vitae Supply (can't transfer that back if you later decide you'd rather > have the pool). Perhaps that's part of the reason I've never seen the option to put a pool on that card exercised. Doesn't seem like any more strategy exists as a result. -witness1

witness1 wrote: > On Aug 20, 10:58 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> witness1 wrote: >>> On Aug 20, 9:04 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >>>> Arguably, sure. It's also arguable that having to accept responsibility for bad >>>> decisions is good for the game (encouraging more strategy in making those >>>> decisions in the first place). >>> I'm not sure I understand what "more strategy" means in this context. >> People will have to use more strategy. Planning. Making good choices or >> accepting the consequences of choices that turn out not to have been good ones. >> >> See also being stuck with installment payments for >> >> Paying 1 pool to contest (you don't get that back if you later yield). > > You get the effect of forcing the opponent to pay or yield, which is > what you payed for. Really? I generally pay as an investment in getting control of the card. >> Strained Vitae Supply (can't transfer that back if you later decide you'd rather >> have the pool). > > Perhaps that's part of the reason I've never seen the option to put a > pool on that card exercised. Doesn't seem like any more strategy > exists as a result. And I've never seen Australia. So I guess it doesn't exist, either.

[ quoted text not captured ] Out of sheer interest: this whole discussion started because the punishment (consequences) of contesting can be quite harsh, and might need some form of change in the rules so that the (unintended) punishment doesn't have such a huge impact on one's game of V:tes, agreed? It appears to be difficult to come up with such a change, without changing something else as well (so far, bloat / poolmanagement always seems to pop up as being a source of unwanted effects - not so strange since poolmanagement is exaclty what we're fooling around with here). So far, concerning contesting, the following situations may occur: 1) Contesting a unique library card: this invites for tactical play (in game-terms: two methuselahs wish to make use of unique *whatever* and neither of them gets to until the other forfeits). 2) Purpously (tactically) contesting a crypt card: the kind of contesting where you get to decide to start influencing a crypt card of which you know someone else already controls (because it's in play already, for example) - a mechanic that occurs when you wish to take away your prey's last blocker or whatever other reason you might have for the intended contest. 3) Accidentally contesting a crypt card (the UFO-melting-rock-paper- scissor-with-laser-beam occurrance - I had such a laugh about this comparison...): the contesting of a crypt card two folks started to influence without knowing the other's intent. Ad. 1 - I think we all agree this doesn't need a rule change, since most of the time it doesn't involve a lot of pool or a card that much needed in a deck that it cannot continue without it. Ad. 2 - I'm not sure if this form of contesting needs a rule-change. I stated that, in this case, someone starts influencing a minion that is already in play. So if it's a low-cap minion, it will not have such a big impact on your game, since you have probably more of them out. In case of the contest taking away your last blocker; you've been tactically ousted - wooo to your predator for smart play. If it's a high-cap minion, it's gonna take multiple turns to get on the table, and you will have some time working on more defense. So impact may be bigger, but you should still be able to play since your support cast may be out as well (didn't bring support cast; you made a bad decision and it's your own fault things went bad - I know I am a bit blunt here...). Situation I don't think needs a rule-change. Ad. 3 - Not knowing someone else is influencing the same minion can really fuck up the game, for either of the methuselahs involved in the contesting, especially if it's the first you try to bring out. Even in the previously described situation where you bring out a high-cap minion, and then someone else brings out the same minion in his next turn and states "sorry mate, we're contesting, but I need this guy for my deck". Even though it might be a bit of an asshat statement; the guy still didn't know you were going to bring out the same minion as he. So either way, you both (or at least one of you) gets screwed because of sheer coincidence / bad lottery draw / whatever you will call it. This situation is the one that might need a change in ruling. I hope I made clear the difference in situation in each of the above examples. Now my question is - is it even possible to separate these situations so that only the last one will benefit from a change in rules? The suggestion of revealing a contested minion and redistribute the pool to other cryptcards or your pool still seems viable to me, and I fail to see how a card like GtU can be greatly abused in a situation like this. The situation that needs attention is already a very rare occasion (think everyone agrees on that too), so how the proposed solution to this problem could be intentionally abused is beyond me. Worst case scenario: someone has a 5 cap in play. I have the same one in my crypt. I use GtU in a correct way and move three counters to the card. Later I influence two more, I reveal the card, state it's contesting, and redistribute the counters to a 10 cap which wasn't a viable target for the GtU in the first place. I assume this is the kind of abuse as described a couple of times in this thread. Now in this case, since everyone on the table can see to what card I am influencing, everyone would really know the difference between a coincidal contest, or my atempt to abuse a change in the rules, right? So the question still stands: is it possible to separate these situations so that only the last one will benefit from a change in rules? Because if it is, it seems to me that the proposed change (by I think it was LSJ who made it up) the problem will be solved. What am I missing here?

Mark wrote: > On 20 aug, 15:04, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> witness1 wrote: >>> On Aug 20, 6:46 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >>>> See also bringing a 2-cap into play (cannot take the pool back if you guessed >>>> poorly) or Secret Horde (can't sac two counters to gain 1 pool if you guessed >>>> poorly). >>> The difference here is that you get the card you payed for, even if it >>> turns out not to be optimal. And you got it immediately, too, not >>> having to wait another turn (or more). >>> It's good for the game that you can change your mind about cards payed >>> for in installments, that will remain unusable until payment is >>> completed. >> Arguably, sure. It's also arguable that having to accept responsibility for bad >> decisions is good for the game (encouraging more strategy in making those >> decisions in the first place). > > Out of sheer interest: this whole discussion started because the > punishment (consequences) of contesting can be quite harsh, and might > need some form of change in the rules so that the (unintended) > punishment doesn't have such a huge impact on one's game of V:tes, > agreed? Well, and the revelation that came out of that: The undo influence rule (2 transfers to move a counter back to your pool) was added to the ruleset to address that issue. > The suggestion of revealing a contested minion and redistribute the > pool to other cryptcards or your pool still seems viable to me, and I > fail to see how a card like GtU can be greatly abused in a situation > like this. > So the question still stands: is it possible to separate these > situations so that only the last one will benefit from a change in > rules? Because if it is, it seems to me that the proposed change (by I > think it was LSJ who made it up) the problem will be solved. > > What am I missing here? The proposed rule is proposed as a replacement for the undo influence rule. The uproar is not how GtU can be abused under that new rule, but rather a wish to keep its bloat utility via keeping the old undo influence rule.

On Aug 20, 11:07 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > On Aug 20, 10:58 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> witness1 wrote: > >>> On Aug 20, 9:04 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>>> Arguably, sure. It's also arguable that having to accept responsibility for bad > >>>> decisions is good for the game (encouraging more strategy in making those > >>>> decisions in the first place). > >>> I'm not sure I understand what "more strategy" means in this context. > >> People will have to use more strategy. Planning. Making good choices or > >> accepting the consequences of choices that turn out not to have been good ones. I'm still not sure where the supposed more planning will come from. Nor more good choices, nor more acceptance of consequences of non-good choices. > >> See also being stuck with installment payments for > > >> Paying 1 pool to contest (you don't get that back if you later yield). > > > You get the effect of forcing the opponent to pay or yield, which is > > what you payed for. > > Really? I generally pay as an investment in getting control of the card. Right. You either got that, or you got the effect of your opponent paying one pool (and coming closer to yielding). Even if you later lose the contest, you got the effect of your opponent paying extra pool. You also got the effect of one of your opponents resources being out of play for an extra turn. Whatever else is true, you didn't get nothing for something. > >> Strained Vitae Supply (can't transfer that back if you later decide you'd rather > >> have the pool). > > > Perhaps that's part of the reason I've never seen the option to put a > > pool on that card exercised. Doesn't seem like any more strategy > > exists as a result. > > And I've never seen Australia. So I guess it doesn't exist, either. Excellent. My plans for world domination are nearly complete. -witness1

witness1 wrote: > On Aug 20, 11:07 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> Really? I generally pay as an investment in getting control of the card. > > Right. You either got that, or you got the effect of your opponent > paying one pool (and coming closer to yielding). Even if you later > lose the contest, you got the effect of your opponent paying extra > pool. You also got the effect of one of your opponents resources being > out of play for an extra turn. > > Whatever else is true, you didn't get nothing for something. Unless xe yields the Info Highway and plays another (xer only option for a master phase action that turn) -- the same Info Highway xe would have discarded if you had yielded. Nothing for something. Oh noes. So a Methuselah shouldn't be considered ousted if xe has any counters on uncontrolled vampires, then? You'd have to bleed through those counters as well before the oust is considered successful. Otherwise, that Methuselah will have gotten nothing for the something on xer uncontrolled vampires.

Despite having read through all the posts (albeit in one long go) can someone (LSJ?) list the current wordings of the proposed rule changes, whatever they are. This thread is pretty long and it might be good to sum up the results so far. Or is this done in another thread that I have missed? Archie

On Aug 20, 12:19 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > On Aug 20, 11:07 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> Really? I generally pay as an investment in getting control of the card. > > > Right. You either got that, or you got the effect of your opponent > > paying one pool (and coming closer to yielding). Even if you later > > lose the contest, you got the effect of your opponent paying extra > > pool. You also got the effect of one of your opponents resources being > > out of play for an extra turn. > > > Whatever else is true, you didn't get nothing for something. > > Unless xe yields the Info Highway and plays another (xer only option for a > master phase action that turn) -- the same Info Highway xe would have discarded > if you had yielded. Nothing for something. Oh noes. Minus an MPA. > So a Methuselah shouldn't be considered ousted if xe has any counters on > uncontrolled vampires, then? > > You'd have to bleed through those counters as well before the oust is considered > successful. > > Otherwise, that Methuselah will have gotten nothing for the something on xer > uncontrolled vampires. No, actions can have consequences. Likewise, I wouldn't read your last several posts and conclude that you believe every card in the game should have Strained Vitae Supply's burnability in the name "more strategy". Maybe I should. -witness1

[ quoted text not captured ] Depending on your bloat preference, the proposal is EITHER Extend influence both to controlled and to contested vampires. OR Replace the undo influence rule (i.e., two transfers to move a counter from uncontrolled to pool) with: Expose a crypt card that would contest a unique card controlled by another player to remove that card from the game and redistribute the blood counters on that card among your other uncontrolled minions and/or your pool. Coupled with a similar rule for contested cards: When yielding a crypt card, redistribute <as above>. (and some verbiage to handle external Banishment-like effects similarly)

witness1 wrote: > On Aug 20, 12:19 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> Unless xe yields the Info Highway and plays another (xer only option for a >> master phase action that turn) -- the same Info Highway xe would have discarded >> if you had yielded. Nothing for something. Oh noes. > > Minus an MPA. Not. Explicitly covered above. >> So a Methuselah shouldn't be considered ousted if xe has any counters on >> uncontrolled vampires, then? > > No, actions can have consequences. Exactly. Making transfers can have consequences. > Likewise, I wouldn't read your last several posts and conclude that > you believe every card in the game should have Strained Vitae Supply's > burnability in the name "more strategy". > > Maybe I should. Tilt away.

On Aug 20, 1:38 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > On Aug 20, 12:19 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> Unless xe yields the Info Highway and plays another (xer only option for a > >> master phase action that turn) -- the same Info Highway xe would have discarded > >> if you had yielded. Nothing for something. Oh noes. > > > Minus an MPA. > > Not. > > Explicitly covered above. Regardless, if I wasn't generally okay with the idea of other players minimizing the effect of my decisions by playing cards, I wouldn't play card games. > >> So a Methuselah shouldn't be considered ousted if xe has any counters on > >> uncontrolled vampires, then? > > > No, actions can have consequences. > > Exactly. Making transfers can have consequences. Okay. Maybe you could respond to the _rest_ of post 275, then, instead of picking nits with verbiage. > > Likewise, I wouldn't read your last several posts and conclude that > > you believe every card in the game should have Strained Vitae Supply's > > burnability in the name "more strategy". > > > Maybe I should. > > Tilt away. Likewise. -witness1

witness1 wrote: > On Aug 20, 1:38 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> witness1 wrote: >>> On Aug 20, 12:19 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >>>> Unless xe yields the Info Highway and plays another (xer only option for a >>>> master phase action that turn) -- the same Info Highway xe would have discarded >>>> if you had yielded. Nothing for something. Oh noes. >>> Minus an MPA. >> Not. >> >> Explicitly covered above. > > Regardless, if I wasn't generally okay with the idea of other players > minimizing the effect of my decisions by playing cards, I wouldn't > play card games. ? OK. I was just responding to the nothing for something argument. >>>> So a Methuselah shouldn't be considered ousted if xe has any counters on >>>> uncontrolled vampires, then? >>> No, actions can have consequences. >> Exactly. Making transfers can have consequences. > > Okay. Maybe you could respond to the _rest_ of post 275, then, instead > of picking nits with verbiage. Posts aren't numbered. I responded to your post to which that was a response in its entirety. >>> Likewise, I wouldn't read your last several posts and conclude that >>> you believe every card in the game should have Strained Vitae Supply's >>> burnability in the name "more strategy". >>> Maybe I should. >> Tilt away. > > Likewise. ?

On Aug 20, 1:47 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > On Aug 20, 1:38 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> witness1 wrote: > >>> On Aug 20, 12:19 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>>> Unless xe yields the Info Highway and plays another (xer only option for a > >>>> master phase action that turn) -- the same Info Highway xe would have discarded > >>>> if you had yielded. Nothing for something. Oh noes. > >>> Minus an MPA. > >> Not. > > >> Explicitly covered above. > > > Regardless, if I wasn't generally okay with the idea of other players > > minimizing the effect of my decisions by playing cards, I wouldn't > > play card games. > > ? > OK. I was just responding to the nothing for something argument. Sure. I'll remember to include a lengthy set of disclaimers every time I make a debate point in the future. > >>>> So a Methuselah shouldn't be considered ousted if xe has any counters on > >>>> uncontrolled vampires, then? > >>> No, actions can have consequences. > >> Exactly. Making transfers can have consequences. > > > Okay. Maybe you could respond to the _rest_ of post 275, then, instead > > of picking nits with verbiage. > > Posts aren't numbered. > > I responded to your post to which that was a response in its entirety. Doh. I didn't even use the right number anyway. > >>> Likewise, I wouldn't read your last several posts and conclude that > >>> you believe every card in the game should have Strained Vitae Supply's > >>> burnability in the name "more strategy". > >>> Maybe I should. > >> Tilt away. > > > Likewise. > > ? I'm sure all the disclaimers I add to my future statements will help people understand my points more than they hinder discussion. -witness1

witness1 wrote: > On Aug 20, 1:47 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> witness1 wrote: >>> On Aug 20, 1:38 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >>>> witness1 wrote: >>>>> On Aug 20, 12:19 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >>>>>> Unless xe yields the Info Highway and plays another (xer only option for a >>>>>> master phase action that turn) -- the same Info Highway xe would have discarded >>>>>> if you had yielded. Nothing for something. Oh noes. >>>>> Minus an MPA. >>>> Not. >>>> Explicitly covered above. >>> Regardless, if I wasn't generally okay with the idea of other players >>> minimizing the effect of my decisions by playing cards, I wouldn't >>> play card games. >> ? >> OK. I was just responding to the nothing for something argument. > > Sure. I'll remember to include a lengthy set of disclaimers every time > I make a debate point in the future. No disclaimer needed. You posit that this nothing for something is some sort of deal breaker for the proposal. I show that it isn't. You move on to something about playing cards to generate effects, which, while nice, has nothing to do with the argument at hand. >>>>>> So a Methuselah shouldn't be considered ousted if xe has any counters on >>>>>> uncontrolled vampires, then? >>>>> No, actions can have consequences. >>>> Exactly. Making transfers can have consequences. >>> Okay. Maybe you could respond to the _rest_ of post 275, then, instead >>> of picking nits with verbiage. >> Posts aren't numbered. >> >> I responded to your post to which that was a response in its entirety. > > Doh. I didn't even use the right number anyway. Posts aren't numbered, so there is no "right number". If you're using Google's numbers, note that they change over time (as more posts are made).

On Aug 20, 2:02 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > On Aug 20, 1:47 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> witness1 wrote: > >>> On Aug 20, 1:38 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>>> witness1 wrote: > >>>>> On Aug 20, 12:19 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >>>>>> Unless xe yields the Info Highway and plays another (xer only option for a > >>>>>> master phase action that turn) -- the same Info Highway xe would have discarded > >>>>>> if you had yielded. Nothing for something. Oh noes. > >>>>> Minus an MPA. > >>>> Not. > >>>> Explicitly covered above. > >>> Regardless, if I wasn't generally okay with the idea of other players > >>> minimizing the effect of my decisions by playing cards, I wouldn't > >>> play card games. > >> ? > >> OK. I was just responding to the nothing for something argument. > > > Sure. I'll remember to include a lengthy set of disclaimers every time > > I make a debate point in the future. > > No disclaimer needed. > > You posit that this nothing for something is some sort of deal breaker for the > proposal. ? -witness1

[ quoted text not captured ] witness1 wrote: > It's good for the game that you can change your mind about cards payed > for in installments, that will remain unusable until payment is > completed. http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/msg/70dc434e7460633c

On Aug 20, 2:02 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > Sure. I'll remember to include a lengthy set of disclaimers every time > > I make a debate point in the future. > > No disclaimer needed. > > You posit that this nothing for something is some sort of deal breaker for the > proposal. I posit no dealbreakers. I posit, instead, that there are things which are (as a general principle) good for the game, and specifically that the ability to recall or redistribute one's investment in a yet-unplayed card is one of them. Concurrently, I question the idea that making this cost irretrievable somehow adds strategy or planning, and invite anyone who thinks it does to explain where and how this strategy is generated. I point out, specifically, that there are not-insignificant negative consequences to the pool retrieval as it stands, and specifically ask how making the consequences worse (or at best neutral, by way of eliminating a choice that would have ended up not being made anyway) increases the amount of strategy involved. I am directed toward some cases in the game where a player is unable to retrieve costs paid for effects other than playing his own cards which appear to end up having no effect if some other circumstance arises. I point out that (as a general rule) in the one case, the cost DOES have an effect, and that in the other case, the specific effect mentioned is so rarely used that it's not a strong argument against the general principle. In turn, it's pointed out that in a very specific subcase of the first effect, the general rule can be overridden by a card play on the part of another player. DARN AND GASP. This means that the general principle must be totally flawed in a fundamental way, and it could not possibly be the case that there is simply another general principle (that cards can be played to positive effect) with which the former sometimes conflicts, and that one or the other will take precedence in a given case, because I have not previously made disclaimer to that effect. -witness1.

witness1 wrote: > On Aug 20, 2:02 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >> witness1 wrote: >>> Sure. I'll remember to include a lengthy set of disclaimers every time >>> I make a debate point in the future. >> No disclaimer needed. >> >> You posit that this nothing for something is some sort of deal breaker for the >> proposal. > > I posit no dealbreakers. > > I posit, instead, that there are things which are (as a general > principle) good for the game, and specifically that the ability to > recall or redistribute one's investment in a yet-unplayed card is one > of them. Concurrently, I question the idea that making this cost > irretrievable somehow adds strategy or planning, and invite anyone who > thinks it does to explain where and how this strategy is generated. It does. By the "actions have consequences" paradigm. You need to invest more in your planning when making transfers to vampires when making transfers from vampires isn't so free. > I > point out, specifically, that there are not-insignificant negative > consequences to the pool retrieval as it stands, and specifically ask > how making the consequences worse (or at best neutral, by way of > eliminating a choice that would have ended up not being made anyway) > increases the amount of strategy involved. By making the strategist work a little harder at resource management. The more freely resources can be shuffled around and converted, the less one needs to focus on resource management.

On Aug 20, 3:19 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > On Aug 20, 2:02 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> witness1 wrote: > >>> Sure. I'll remember to include a lengthy set of disclaimers every time > >>> I make a debate point in the future. > >> No disclaimer needed. > > >> You posit that this nothing for something is some sort of deal breaker for the > >> proposal. > > > I posit no dealbreakers. > > > I posit, instead, that there are things which are (as a general > > principle) good for the game, and specifically that the ability to > > recall or redistribute one's investment in a yet-unplayed card is one > > of them. Concurrently, I question the idea that making this cost > > irretrievable somehow adds strategy or planning, and invite anyone who > > thinks it does to explain where and how this strategy is generated. > > It does. By the "actions have consequences" paradigm. > > You need to invest more in your planning when making transfers to vampires when > making transfers from vampires isn't so free. Only if the practical consequences of such are actually interesting. If the end result becomes "never transfer to a large minion prior to payoff" instead of "sometimes transfer to a large minion ahead of a payoff", there's no increase in the amount of planning. Even "rarely transfer ahead of a payoff" can be less strategic, depending on the values of "sometimes" and "rarely". I'm interested in speaking more about the specific impact. > > I > > point out, specifically, that there are not-insignificant negative > > consequences to the pool retrieval as it stands, and specifically ask > > how making the consequences worse (or at best neutral, by way of > > eliminating a choice that would have ended up not being made anyway) > > increases the amount of strategy involved. > > By making the strategist work a little harder at resource management. > > The more freely resources can be shuffled around and converted, the less one > needs to focus on resource management. Funny. I tend to think of the ability to shuffle and convert resources as PART of resource management. To be sure, 1:1 instantaneous conversion destroys strategy. 1:0 does as well. If only there could be some middle ground, where resources can be converted and shuffled, but at some cost to the player. -witness1

LSJ <vte...@white-wolf.com> wrote: >Ira Fay wrote: >> Unfortunately, the rule above also has a large impact on two other >> strategies (which both occur much more often than contesting crypt >> cards): >> 1) Partially transferring onto a crypt card with the possibility of >> bringing it out the following turn. For example, I might put 2 onto a >> 6-cap, then decide whether or not to bring out the minion next turn. >> Using the undo influence rule I can reclaim the 2 pool, or spend 4 >> more to bring it out. > >This is not unfortunate. It seems unfortunate to me that we lose something that was described in the Jyhad rulebook as a real possibility. In the Jyhad rulebook, Nora changes her mind over her investment. Apparently, the designers had considered this possibility and thought it was a good idea. Presumably, they had realized and considered that the transfer-back option could be used for this, not just defeating the problems that contesting unique vampires brought to bear. Clearly, Nora's actions still have consequences - she is 2 pool down for the duration of the time it is on the "wrong" vampire - but the consequences aren't irrevocable. Perhaps one of the lessons they learned from the contested vampire situation was that irrevocable decisions regarding vampires weren't a good idea more generally. In the very early game, you can make bad decisions because there is no information (in many situations, certainly). It's that lack of information that can cause the contestation issues they were resolving - I have 8 pool on Lazarus, you bring out yours before me, neither of us knew what the other was doing. The transfer back rules can also potentially compensate for the lack of information in other situations - I start bringing out a big vampire, find that my predator is about to swarm me, change my mind and bring out some of my weenies, and bring that pool back from Saulot when I get the chance. Or the other way round - Nora might well be bringing pool back from an part-influenced weenie to bring Saulot out, once her grand- predator has crippled her predator. This mind-changing possibility seems to have been intended in the final rules, even if an earlier draft of the rules lacked it. Removing a strategic option that the original designers introduced into the game seems unfortunate, unless it's breaking the game somehow. The ability to change your mind on influencing doesn't seem to be breaking the game currently. -- James Coupe PGP Key: 0x5D623D5D YOU ARE IN ERROR. EBD690ECD7A1FB457CA2 NO-ONE IS SCREAMING. 13D7E668C3695D623D5D THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION.

[ quoted text not captured ] Sure. That's fine if they were in a closed system in fixed supply. But that's not the case here. Resources are put into play freely from an unlimited supply (the bank). Pool tends to be more important and therefore harder to generate spontaneously, in contrast to blood which is less important and can be generated easily. Counters on uncontrolled minions are generated fairly easily, like blood on the minion rather than pool in your pool. But the undo influence rule breaks down that distinction (unnecessarily, given what it was introduced to do), letting the easily available blood leak more freely into the pool. > To be sure, 1:1 instantaneous conversion destroys strategy. 1:0 does > as well. If only there could be some middle ground, where resources > can be converted and shuffled, but at some cost to the player. Yes. And the cost for this pool doesn't seem to be in line with the rest.

[ quoted text not captured ] Hmm, why do we have to replace the Undo Influence rule? Why can not only the "Expose a crypt card..." rule be added. It means that basically game play is as it is today, but with the added effect that if you happen to have a card that would contest you lose no momentum. Hence, your statements about the "The game is about playing other decks." still holds true. Archie

Archibald Zimonyi wrote: > Hmm, why do we have to replace the Undo Influence rule? Why can not > only the "Expose a crypt card..." rule be added. Don't "have to". But, since it is an alternative way to address the same issue, it is put forward as an alternative (i.e., a replacement).

On Aug 20, 3:46 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > Ira Fay wrote: > > On Aug 18, 6:41 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > >> If extra bloat is not good for the game: > >> Replace the undo influence rule (i.e., two transfers to move a counter from > >> uncontrolled to pool) with: > > >> Expose a crypt card that would contest a unique card controlled by another > >> player to remove that card from the game and redistribute the blood counters on > >> that card among your other uncontrolled minions and/or your pool. > > >> Coupled with a similar rule for contested cards: When yielding a crypt card, > >> redistribute <as above>. > > > The proposed rule above would significantly lessen the consequences of > > being in the unlucky position of contesting a crypt card with another > > player. Nice improvement! > > > Unfortunately, the rule above also has a large impact on two other > > strategies (which both occur much more often than contesting crypt > > cards): > > 1) Partially transferring onto a crypt card with the possibility of > > bringing it out the following turn. For example, I might put 2 onto a > > 6-cap, then decide whether or not to bring out the minion next turn. > > Using the undo influence rule I can reclaim the 2 pool, or spend 4 > > more to bring it out. > > This is not unfortunate. > > See also bringing a 2-cap into play (cannot take the pool back if you guessed > poorly) or Secret Horde (can't sac two counters to gain 1 pool if you guessed > poorly). As I mentioned in my original post, I believe such a change would be unfortunate. The reason it's unfortunate is because it would reduce the strategic depth* of the game. * "Strategic depth" is related to both the number of choices available to a player at any time and the consequences of those choices. LSJ seems to be focusing on the consequences of those choices, but I believe number of choices available matters too. If we remove the option to transfer back from a partially-influenced minion, we remove choice from the player (and increase the consequences of making a poor influence decision.) Personally, I think the consequences of making a poor partial-influence decision are already harsh enough, and I see no need to make them harsher, but that's just my opinion of the way the game currently plays. > > 2) Gaining pool through cards that add counters directly to cards in > > the uncontrolled region. This is a significant defensive element of > > the game, and it's rare to play a game where this doesn't occur. > > Again not unfortunate. > > See also the "loss" of the ability to use transfers to pull counters from > controlled vampires simply because the undo influence rule had the restriction > "uncontrolled" on it. I believe losing such a defensive strategy would be bad for the game, because it will make many cards less playable, and decrease deck variety. As a general design philosophy of a CCG, I believe that changing fundamental rules of the game should only be undertaken if a significant improvement would be made. As far as I can tell, no one in this thread (other than LSJ who may be playing devil's advocate) seems to think that the game would benefit from removing the undo influence rule. What is the benefit that would be achieved? I see the following impacts, among others: - Greater consequences for poor partial-influence decisions = Bad for the game IMO - Reduced choices available to the player in the influence phase = Bad for the game IMO - Removal of a defensive option (pool gain through transferring back) = Bad for the game IMO - Easier decisions during the influence phase -> faster decisions -> faster games = Good for the game IMO - Old rulebooks are no longer correct, must teach old players returning to the game another rules change = Bad for the game IMO - Govern the Unaligned is weaker = Good for the game IMO - Flames of Insurrection is weaker = Bad for the game IMO And the list goes on. I'm curious to hear what LSJ sees as some of the largest benefits (and largest drawbacks) of removing the undo influence rule. And if he's just playing devil's advocate and isn't seriously considering making this change, then I'd rather just let this issue drop and stop worrying about it. But at the moment, I feel like LSJ is seriously considering removing the undo influence rule, and I currently think that change would be bad for the game. > > Perhaps you would consider keeping the undo influence rule, and simply > > adding the 2 contesting-related rules you mention above? > > Considered, of course. > > With the result that, since they are both introduced to address the same > contesting issues, both are not needed. I disagree. Regardless of why the rules were introduced, the current state of VTES is that the undo influence rule doesn't address the high consequences of contesting crypt cards, but it does allow for interesting choices during deck building and the influence phase. Therefore, it's possible to add the 2 contesting-related rules LSJ mentioned without changing the undo influence rule. By adding the contesting rules, we fix the problem with contesting crypt cards, and by leaving the undo influence rule, we leave the strategic depth that it provides. > > That way, > > you still address the rare case of contesting, but you don't eliminate > > the interesting strategies of #1 and #2 that I list above. > > Then what about the interesting strategies that are lost by restricting undo > influence to uncontrolled? I would be happy to consider the strategic depth that would be added by allowing influence to controlled minions. Off the top of my head: Blood Doll and Vessel would be a lot less useful. It would be a lot less risky to spend pool to bring out more minions. Cards that give you more transfers would become much more valuable. The influence phase would take a lot longer, since there would be so many more choices. It would be a significant change to explain to old players returning to the game. I'd rather expand influence to controlled minions than remove the undo influence rule. But I'd most prefer to make neither change, since making any large rule change has a large default negative value IMO; it obsoletes old rulebooks and makes the game harder to learn for returning players. > Of course, any card that uses the rule being changed or removed will be affected. > > It doesn't necessarily make the game less interesting, of course, as other uses > may be examined and/or players will use more strategy regarding resource management. I agree that making a rules change doesn't necessarily make the game less interesting. In this particular case, when I consider removing the undo influence rule, I believe it would actually make the game less interesting, for the reasons I stated above. Thanks for listening, Ira P.S. I'd like to take a moment to acknowledge how incredible it is that the lead game designer of this game is having an ongoing design conversation with the player base. It's really amazing, and I deeply appreciate it. Thank you, LSJ!

On Aug 20, 3:45 pm, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > witness1 wrote: > > Funny. I tend to think of the ability to shuffle and convert resources > > as PART of resource management. > > Sure. That's fine if they were in a closed system in fixed supply. > > But that's not the case here. Resources are put into play freely from an > unlimited supply (the bank). Some kinds are unlimited, sure. Blood from hunting. Others require card text to achieve this end, and are otherwise restricted to the 30 starting pool, up to 90 library cards, and 12 or more crypt cards. Plus the Edge. I'm not sure any of that meets the criteria for "freely". > Pool tends to be more important and therefore harder to generate spontaneously, > in contrast to blood which is less important and can be generated easily. > > Counters on uncontrolled minions are generated fairly easily, like blood on the > minion rather than pool in your pool. In some cases, the opposite is true (Grooming the Protege vs. Minion Tap). I'll grant that it is usually easier to generate counters on uncontrolled minions than pool, but dispute that it is like blood on the minion. Art Museum puts counters only on Toreador; Society Hunting Ground puts counters on any ready vampire. Enchant Kindred requires a superior discipline to put 2 counters on an uncontrolled minion; Restoration puts the same amount on a ready vampire at inferior, gains one extra at superior. Hunting is a +1 stealth rulebook action, no methuselah can put counters from the bank on uncontrolled minions without card text. > But the undo influence rule breaks down that distinction (unnecessarily, given > what it was introduced to do), letting the easily available blood leak more > freely into the pool. Possibly. > > To be sure, 1:1 instantaneous conversion destroys strategy. 1:0 does > > as well. If only there could be some middle ground, where resources > > can be converted and shuffled, but at some cost to the player. > > Yes. And the cost for this pool doesn't seem to be in line with the rest. I'm not sure that's generally true. Consider playing a hunting ground + a Blood Doll to generate one pool per turn with minimal impact on the rest of your game - no cost to your actions or your transfers. Similarly, consider playing Arcane Library + Information Highway to achieve the same effect with the same relatve impact - 2 pool, 2 MPAs, no net change of transfers, no net change in actions per turn. This is a simplistic analysis, to be sure - each combination has strengths and weaknesses beyond the specific goal of gaining pool. Specifically, transfers tend to be plentiful in supply once your pool total has reduced to a point where buying investing in your current crop of uncontrolled minions becomes foolhardy. Something else to do with transfers - such as removing one of your contestable minions in an attempt to replace it with an affordable one - could help mitigate that fact. Regardless of all that, if the cost actually is out of line with the effect, it should be fixed without regard to changes in contestation. If false, it should remain unchanged regardless of contestation changes. After all, the rule doesn't appear to be serving it's purpose of mitigating the consequences of contestation (and even if it is, we seem plenty capable of coming up with alternatives). -witness1

Please add my vote in favor of removing "transfer back". My main objection to transferring back is that it is unfaithful to world being described within the card game. It hurts the flavor of the game. An ancient vampire (the Methusaleh) who uses resources in a bid to influence or control a younger vampire would not be able to recuperate that investment without first totally controlling the vampire. Like investing money to start a business or time to complete a project, you can't recuperate your investment until the enterprise is completed. Using Dominate and Presence cards to gain pool is not faithful to what those cards represent. The cards represent a vampire using their mental powers to sway a younger vampire to their Methusaleh's cause. Right now the Methusaleh can somehow gain general resources by relinquishing this partial mental control. I certainly use the transfer back rule for bloating when I can, but it weakens the flavor of the game. It makes the influence phase mechanical, with less room to describe a game-world concept. Making the CCG mechanics reflect game world concepts as well as possible makes the game stronger and more interesting to me. Another positive is that removing transferring back would probably speed up game times. Removing the transfer back rules still leaves room for new cards that allow you to transfer back from uncontrolled vampires, but as a card function, not a basic game function: Relinquish the Reins Master Remove all blood from cards in your uncontrolled region into the blood pool. Add a number equal to half the blood removed (rounding down) into your pool.

On Aug 20, 5:54 pm, Aaron Clark <aamacl...@gmail.com> wrote: > My main objection to transferring back is that it is unfaithful to > world being described within the card game. It hurts the flavor of > the game. Unlike, say, walking away unscathed from the stream of napalm spurting from the nozzle of your flamethrower because I wearing a leather jacket? Flavor is less important than gameplay. If that's not true for you, there's not one but two great RPGs in which the opposite is true. John Eno

Aaron Clark <aama...@gmail.com> wrote: >My main objection to transferring back is that it is unfaithful to >world being described within the card game. It hurts the flavor of >the game. > >An ancient vampire (the Methusaleh) who uses resources in a bid to >influence or control a younger vampire would not be able to recuperate >that investment without first totally controlling the vampire. Like >investing money to start a business or time to complete a project, you >can't recuperate your investment until the enterprise is completed. That's a fairly simplistic view of what the influence phase represents. If you cast your mind back to Nights of Reckoning, one of the points people raised was that no Imbued would ever listen to a Methuselah. Except the point was raised that minions were influenced out in a number of ways - bribing corrupt officials, arranging happy coincidences, setting up middle men etc. The 2 pool that's been spent on Ranjan Rishi that turns into 2 pool on Gideon Fontaine instead need not represent direct efforts to buy Ranjan's favour, but could represent wedging your interests into something more generically Ventrue and suddenly finding yourself changing tack as to the exact outcome (hence the extra delay). Of course, exact card plays may stretch the suspension of disbelief to breaking point, but this is a card game in which snakes ride motorbikes while elephants follow them around. So realism has never really been the be-all and end-all of the game. [ quoted text not captured ]

> Of course, exact card plays may stretch the suspension of disbelief to > breaking point, but this is a card game in which snakes ride motorbikes > while elephants follow them around. So realism has never really been > the be-all and end-all of the game. I think realism took a little crack cocaine, LSD and then took a holiday with Ozzy Osbourne during the 80s... before it decided to buddy up with VTES... A hellhound can operate a motorbike, carrying a sniper's rifle, wearing a flak jacket and IR goggles gain intelligence from listening to the radio and reading 4 newspapers... A vampire can have an RV, Elephant, 5 ravens scouting for it, a flamethrower, a leather jacket (which protects him from everything from kitchen implements to epic flaming swords and flamethrowers) and be massively occupied by a single letter sent from Vienna...

[ quoted text not captured ] In an effort to add a little transparency to the fact that the changes are being made to the transfer rules, I've gathered a few of the options into another thread. There is one from LSJ, a variation I've made and I can easily add in the variations to allow transfers to be made from Ready Minions (but in general that concept seems to have been shot down)... http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/msg/f235c62866e17e24

On 20 aug, 22:22, Ira Fay <ira...@gmail.com> wrote: > As I mentioned in my original post, I believe such a change would be > unfortunate. The reason it's unfortunate is because it would reduce > the strategic depth* of the game. I don't agree. Don't even see what you're talking about. How would it 'reduce strategic depth'? You think its strategy that every deck get a little better when you add dominate (and on a lower level: presence) to it? Those disciplines are good because of the amount of bleeding you dan dish out with them, but more because of the 'transferring back to your pool' bonus. I read multiple threads on this, where 'the community' states that decks are better with dominate. Taking away the bonus on tranferring back on that discipline will force people to start using investment cards again or something. And you can still gain pool with blood dolls, vessels, hunting grounds or a combination of those. Difference is: you can use those strategies with all decks you play. Hence more different strategies on the table. > * "Strategic depth" is related to both the number of choices available > to a player at any time and the consequences of those choices. Agreed. Hence taking away the bloating part called the 'transfer back' rule gives folks far more choices. More strategies will pop up again. Me thinks.

Mark <markan...@gmail.com> wrote: >On 20 aug, 22:22, Ira Fay <ira...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> As I mentioned in my original post, I believe such a change would be >> unfortunate. �The reason it's unfortunate is because it would reduce >> the strategic depth* of the game. > >I don't agree. Don't even see what you're talking about. How would it >'reduce strategic depth'? Partial influencing (to get a vampire out quickly when you decide to) and mind-changing vs bloat, while related, aren't the same thing. You might, for example, decide that mind-changing with "real" pool is allowed (i.e. counters that have come out of your pool), but that all "fake" pool (which has come from the blood bank) works like Tomb counters, for example. Not that I'm arguing that that's what should happen, but the two aren't the same thing. >You think its strategy that every deck get a >little better when you add dominate (and on a lower level: presence) >to it? Those disciplines are good because of the amount of bleeding >you dan dish out with them, but more because of the 'transferring back >to your pool' bonus. Typically, I've seen far more people graft Dominate on for bounce than for transferring back. But if you want to gain pool at the Presence level (2 from a +1 stealth action), then Art Scam exists and Dark Mirror of the Mind exists. The reason you'd typically rather play Presence for Enchant Kindred typically isn't for the raw power of the pool gain but for the dual- purpose of the card, which is certainly very good indeed. Being able to switch from aggression to pool gain and back again is handy. [ quoted text not captured ]

On 21 aug, 09:47, James Coupe <ja...@zephyr.org.uk> wrote: > Mark <markangel1...@gmail.com> wrote: > >On 20 aug, 22:22, Ira Fay <ira...@gmail.com> wrote: > > >> As I mentioned in my original post, I believe such a change would be > >> unfortunate. The reason it's unfortunate is because it would reduce > >> the strategic depth* of the game. > > >I don't agree. Don't even see what you're talking about. How would it > >'reduce strategic depth'? > > Partial influencing (to get a vampire out quickly when you decide to) > and mind-changing vs bloat, while related, aren't the same thing. > > You might, for example, decide that mind-changing with "real" pool is > allowed (i.e. counters that have come out of your pool), but that all > "fake" pool (which has come from the blood bank) works like Tomb > counters, for example. Not that I'm arguing that that's what should > happen, but the two aren't the same thing. I agree it's not the same. But I still don't see how taking away the bloating coming from that "fake" pool will reduce strategic depth. There's no depth in everyone who can using the same 'strategy'. Taking that away, me thinks, invites people to make up other strategies for regaining pool. Hell, it might even ask for some creativity instead of bluntly throwing the same cards into your decks over and over again. That was the part I was commenting on. When we first started playing, and weren't on the level yet that we fully understood the strenghth of the transferring back rule, I can assure you the game table saw lots of interesting concepts of people desparately trying to gain some more pool. There were cards on the table then that I have never ever seen anymore after. Meh, you get my point. > >You think its strategy that every deck get a > >little better when you add dominate (and on a lower level: presence) > >to it? Those disciplines are good because of the amount of bleeding > >you dan dish out with them, but more because of the 'transferring back > >to your pool' bonus. > > Typically, I've seen far more people graft Dominate on for bounce than > for transferring back. > > But if you want to gain pool at the Presence level (2 from a +1 stealth > action), then Art Scam exists and Dark Mirror of the Mind exists. The > reason you'd typically rather play Presence for Enchant Kindred > typically isn't for the raw power of the pool gain but for the dual- > purpose of the card, which is certainly very good indeed. Being able to > switch from aggression to pool gain and back again is handy. Agreed on as well. But still. They came up with a way to bounce for clans without dominate as well. With ridiculous cost and conditions compared to the dominate or even auspex version, but still... I don't HAVE to make use of dom or aus to be able to bounce anymore. And as far as the 'bloat' cards go... I know there are a lot of other cards that can be used in the same way. But still. Removing the transfer back rule makes these cards do what they were supposed to in the first place: bring out more minions, and a little faster than usual. And if you made a mistake - made up your mind about putting counters on an uncontrolled minion? Tough luck. THAT's the strategy part. Bring out the minion anyway, throw on a blood dool / use minion tap / use whatever other still viable way to regain your pool. THAT's the strategy part. And in case of a contesting minion? Good - that's when the 'new rule' kicks in (not for nothing the transfer back rule got removed), in which you can reveal the minion and redustribute the counters. I just think all this calls for more and mainly different strategies instead of reducing it.

On 20 elo, 23:22, Ira Fay <ira...@gmail.com> wrote: > As I mentioned in my original post, I believe such a change would be > unfortunate. The reason it's unfortunate is because it would reduce > the strategic depth* of the game. > > * "Strategic depth" is related to both the number of choices available > to a player at any time and the consequences of those choices. > > LSJ seems to be focusing on the consequences of those choices, but I > believe number of choices available matters too. If we remove the > option to transfer back from a partially-influenced minion, we remove > choice from the player (and increase the consequences of making a poor > influence decision.) Personally, I think the consequences of making a > poor partial-influence decision are already harsh enough, and I see no > need to make them harsher, but that's just my opinion of the way the > game currently plays. Really? More often than not I find the bad consequences nonexistent. If I'm not in an immediate danger of being ousted I will always keep 1-2 (depending on capacity and GtU-like factors) pool in the uncontrolled region, even if I'm unlikely to actually get that vampire out. Whether I will take this advantage at an insignificant risk or not doesn't really involve strategic depth.

[ quoted text not captured ] Since this is a 350+ posts, I don't know if this has been said before, but... If you are afraid of Contesting, play Thanks for the donation! It's brilliant!

Baaliprimogen wrote: > Since this is a 350+ posts, I don't know if this has been said before, > but... If you are afraid of Contesting, play Thanks for the donation! > It's brilliant! True. But the supposition ("afraid of contesting") is not a part of this issue. Contesting crypt cards (or being in the position to contest) is too unlikely to worry about or be afraid of as far as deck construction goes. The issue is what penalty is exacted (by way of which rule is used to handle the resources involved) the rare times it does come up.

[ quoted text not captured ] ... and what other effects (like bloat) that rule has.

I don't consider keeping a few pool onto an uncontrolled vampire midgame so it's ready to appear quickly a *mistake*. It is often a good strategic choice -- it involves some risk (like, if I suffer greater pool loss than I thought was likely, I might not be able to pull back that pool fast enough) but could really multiply my forward momentum. Removing the possibility of recouping the pool at all will decrease the strategic depth of the game. So if 'no undoing transfers' is enacted, I'd like to see card-based ways to restore mid- game and end-game choices. Willing Applicant Master: trifle. 1 pool Put this card and one blood counter on a vampire of capacity 6 or greater in your uncontrolled region. This uncontrolled vampire can only gain counters during your influence phase; any other counters it would gain go to the blood bank instead. You may burn this card to move all counters from this vampire to your pool. Burn this card when this vampire becomes controlled.

On 21 elo, 23:47, Malone <kffos...@indiana.edu> wrote: > I don't consider keeping a few pool onto an uncontrolled vampire > midgame so it's ready to appear quickly a *mistake*. It is often a > good strategic choice -- it involves some risk (like, if I suffer > greater pool loss than I thought was likely, I might not be able to > pull back that pool fast enough) but could really multiply my forward > momentum. Removing the possibility of recouping the pool at all will > decrease the strategic depth of the game. Why? Having pool in the uncontrolled region would still be a viable option, it would just be less of a total no brainer. I don't see how the option to gain something at a low to zero cost adds to the strategic depth of the game. For example, if there was a rule that gave every player the option to gain one pool at the start of their turn you wouldn't say that this new option increased strategic depth, would you? > So if 'no undoing > transfers' is enacted, I'd like to see card-based ways to restore mid- > game and end-game choices. > > Willing Applicant > Master: trifle. > 1 pool > Put this card and one blood counter on a vampire of capacity 6 or > greater in your uncontrolled region. This uncontrolled vampire can > only gain counters during your influence phase; any other counters it > would gain go to the blood bank instead. You may burn this card to > move all counters from this vampire to your pool. Burn this card when > this vampire becomes controlled. Well, there's always Kaymakli Nightmare.

On Aug 21, 12:33 am, Mark <markangel1...@gmail.com> wrote: > On 20 aug, 22:22, Ira Fay <ira...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > As I mentioned in my original post, I believe such a change would be > > unfortunate. The reason it's unfortunate is because it would reduce > > the strategic depth* of the game. > > I don't agree. Don't even see what you're talking about. How would it > 'reduce strategic depth'? I'll try again. Strategic Depth is defined by number of choices available and the consequences of those choices. There are also other factors, but those are the two big contributors to strategic depth. If you remove the undo influence rule, there are fewer choices for the player during the influence phase, and therefore strategic depth is reduced. It seems like you're saying: This change would weaken Govern the Unaligned [I agree], and therefore a greater diversity of cards, disciplines, and deck types will be played [I disagree.] Even though Govern the Unaligned will be weaker under the proposed rule, it will still be plenty strong to play it for the bleed and influence acceleration. Many other cards that are interesting (Grooming the Protege, Flames of Insurrection) will also be weakened, but likely weakened to the point of not seeing play. Decks will still need to defend themselves under the proposed rule; it's simply that bloat via +1 or +2 pool during the influence phase will no longer be possible. Decks that were previously relying on that type of defense will no longer be viable. Since this rule doesn't add any new or interesting defensive options, I believe that fewer new deck types will be created. We'll simply see more focused decks. I infer from LSJ's posts that he thinks the game is too slow, or rewards sitting back and waiting too much. I think that point has a lot of weight. But, I don't think the solution is removing interesting defensive strategies. Personally, I think Govern and Powerbase: Montreal are interesting, because they require actions or provide table actions, all of which create interaction. If I were the designer, I'd experiment with stronger incentives for ousting, like +10 pool instead of +6 pool. Or maybe 6+X, where X is the number of players remaining the game after the oust. And if there is a problem with bloat via uncontrolled (and I don't think there is), then create a card like: The Winnowing Burn an uncontrolled minion in your prey's uncontrolled region as a (D) action that costs X blood, where X is the amount of blood on that card; any blood on that card is returned to your prey's pool. Ira

Ira Fay wrote: > On Aug 21, 12:33 am, Mark <markangel1...@gmail.com> wrote: >> On 20 aug, 22:22, Ira Fay <ira...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >>> As I mentioned in my original post, I believe such a change would be >>> unfortunate. The reason it's unfortunate is because it would reduce >>> the strategic depth* of the game. >> I don't agree. Don't even see what you're talking about. How would it >> 'reduce strategic depth'? > > I'll try again. > > Strategic Depth is defined by number of choices available and the > consequences of those choices. There are also other factors, but > those are the two big contributors to strategic depth. > > If you remove the undo influence rule, there are fewer choices for the > player during the influence phase, and therefore strategic depth is > reduced. But the consequences of the remaining choices (namely, the consequences of the choice to transfer onto a minion) is increased, balancing out (and more) the loss of the "choice" to undo transfers.

[ quoted text not captured ] Agree to disagree (about the "balancing out and more" part.) Also, I don't understand why "choice" is in quotes - I see that choice occur in almost every game I play, and it's a significant part of the current state of VTES (regardless of why the rule was originally introduced.) Thanks for listening and discussing with us! Ira P.S. One thing gives me comfort: if I had to bet on who is a better designer of VTES, me or LSJ, I'd put my money on LSJ. :)

"Ira Fay" <ira...@gmail.com> wrote in message news:43aa3167-96f8-4a4f...@l5g2000pra.googlegroups.com... > I infer from LSJ's posts that he thinks the game is too slow, or > rewards sitting back and waiting too much. I don't know if he thinks that. But I've thought that for quite a long time. > I think that point has a > lot of weight. But, I don't think the solution is removing > interesting defensive strategies. Personally, I think Govern and > Powerbase: Montreal are interesting, because they require actions or > provide table actions, all of which create interaction. Agree with you about Powerbase: Montreal. I'm not so sure about Govern the Unaligned because the guy who uses it to bloat typically will construct his deck to make sure that it's usually effective and hence, although he might pay the price in other ways, I don't see how this "creates interaction" in any strong way. > If I were the > designer, I'd experiment with stronger incentives for ousting, like > +10 pool instead of +6 pool. Or maybe 6+X, where X is the number of > players remaining the game after the oust. I don't think that would be a worthwhile direction in which to tinker. The rewards for ousting are fine; the problem is that 1) VtES is the kind of multiplayer game which is suseptible to the "gang-up" factor that tends to balance and hence stablize play in response to a player who makes good progress against his goals; and 2) the available cards and rules facilitate this sort of balancing too much. As a result, good players will typically think defense and staying in the game first and offense, ousting, and nailing down victory points only when and where there survival is pretty much assured. There are certainly exceptions to this, but on the whole I've always found play tilted too much towards defense. Adding some pool as reward for oust doesn't effect this equation much as far as I can see. You still can't collect it if you're dead and to the extent it rewards a successful oust, it will also have a lot of balancing tendency to make players defensive based on the reasoning that their predator would _likewise_ be rewarded for ousting them and so they better be on their toes to prevent it. Cancel cancel. What it would really do is tend to destablize play more after each oust and this doesn't strike me as a positive thing. IMHO play after each oust is destablized about right: the ousting player is rewarded with good momentum but it isn't a slam dunk for them to go on and sweep - and that's exactly as it should be. The problem, IMHO, is that play can get too stable _before_ ousts are made. To counter this tendency, I'm not too sure exactly what the game needs but it's probably good to look at the kinds of things that currently tend to destablize play outside of an oust. For instance, Week of Nightmares and Palla Grande with weenies tends to do it. In general, any kind of weeny build-up strategy seems to force play, although a lot of those things have been forestalled due to the unpopularity of weeny decks in the game. I understand why that's so, but it gives us a clue about what kinds of cards might be worth designing to encourage less stability in play: cards that have some element of extreme but temporary advantages (or disadvantages when played on a prey might also work). > And if there is a problem with bloat via uncontrolled (and I don't > think there is), There's a million ways to build the deck that just bloats successfully - at the cost of any ability to do anything else. Generally, the cost tends to be too high to make these decks worth building. To the extent that such decks are worth building, the answer would be to saddle the key card(s) involved with more disadvantage (or ban them entirely). Fred

On Aug 21, 7:00 pm, suoli <suoliruse...@gmail.com> wrote: > On 21 elo, 23:47, Malone <kffos...@indiana.edu> wrote: > > > I don't consider keeping a few pool onto an uncontrolled vampire > > midgame so it's ready to appear quickly a *mistake*. It is often a > > good strategic choice -- it involves some risk (like, if I suffer > > greater pool loss than I thought was likely, I might not be able to > > pull back that pool fast enough) but could really multiply my forward > > momentum. Removing the possibility of recouping the pool at all will > > decrease the strategic depth of the game. > > Why? Having pool in the uncontrolled region would still be a viable > option, it would just be less of a total no brainer. It's not a total no-brainer now. Keeping more than two pool in the uncontrolled region already carries significant risk; even keeping one or two there carries more than zero risk. > I don't see how > the option to gain something at a low to zero cost adds to the > strategic depth of the game. I don't know what you're refering to. Gain what? >For example, if there was a rule that > gave every player the option to gain one pool at the start of their > turn you wouldn't say that this new option increased strategic depth, > would you? Huh? What on earth are you talking about?

[ quoted text not captured ] Consequences balance out the loss of choice? What does that mean? But maybe the semantics are unimportant. The ability to partially influence vampires of capacity greater than 4 mid-game without the spent pool becoming completely unretrievable will not be replaced by any new strategic option. Certainly, the game would still be playable; it would still be the same game, even. People would make new decisions based on the new rules and their consequences. But an option (and one that I and surely many other people exercise regularly) that once existed no longer would. So maybe rather than "strategic" depth being lost, "tactical" depth would be lost.

On 22 elo, 05:13, Malone <kffos...@indiana.edu> wrote: > On Aug 21, 7:00 pm, suoli <suoliruse...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > On 21 elo, 23:47, Malone <kffos...@indiana.edu> wrote: > > > > I don't consider keeping a few pool onto an uncontrolled vampire > > > midgame so it's ready to appear quickly a *mistake*. It is often a > > > good strategic choice -- it involves some risk (like, if I suffer > > > greater pool loss than I thought was likely, I might not be able to > > > pull back that pool fast enough) but could really multiply my forward > > > momentum. Removing the possibility of recouping the pool at all will > > > decrease the strategic depth of the game. > > > Why? Having pool in the uncontrolled region would still be a viable > > option, it would just be less of a total no brainer. > > It's not a total no-brainer now. Keeping more than two pool in the > uncontrolled region already carries significant risk; even keeping one > or two there carries more than zero risk. Okay. I'll call keeping 1-2 a total notverymuch-brainer. > > I don't see how > > the option to gain something at a low to zero cost adds to the > > strategic depth of the game. > > I don't know what you're refering to. Gain what? The advantage that you gain by having those counters in your uncontrolled. Usually this means the chance of getting a crypt card out faster if you actually do decide that you need it. > >For example, if there was a rule that > > gave every player the option to gain one pool at the start of their > > turn you wouldn't say that this new option increased strategic depth, > > would you? > > Huh? What on earth are you talking about? The relationships between options, costs of those options and strategic depth. The above example illustrates that if an option doesn't have a meaningful cost it might not add strategic depth to the game.

Frederick Scott wrote: > The problem, IMHO, is that play can get too stable > _before_ ousts are made. To counter this tendency, > I'm not too sure exactly what the game needs[...] Players who aren't afraid to let someone die really quickly, even if this person isn't their prey. This and meaningless early-game alliances are the biggest reasons that players mishandle 5-player VTES. Kevin M., Prince of Las Vegas "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 Please visit VTESville daily! http://vtesville.myminicity.com/ Please buy my cards! http://shop.ebay.com/kjmergen/m.html

"Kevin M." <you...@imaspammer.org> wrote in message news:mzJjm.147011$zq1....@newsfe22.iad... > Frederick Scott wrote: >> The problem, IMHO, is that play can get too stable >> _before_ ousts are made. To counter this tendency, >> I'm not too sure exactly what the game needs[...] > > Players who aren't afraid to let someone die really quickly, > even if this person isn't their prey. > > This and meaningless early-game alliances are the biggest > reasons that players mishandle 5-player VTES. Well, you can have whatever opinion you want about how people misplay the game. It doesn't fix the problem, unless you want to say there isn't a problem. That's a matter of taste. But I see what I think are overly static games in which all the players are really good players, so I think it's hard to blame quality of play for this. Fred

Frederick Scott wrote: > "Kevin M." <you...@imaspammer.org> wrote: >> Frederick Scott wrote: >>> The problem, IMHO, is that play can get too stable >>> _before_ ousts are made. To counter this tendency, >>> I'm not too sure exactly what the game needs[...] >> >> Players who aren't afraid to let someone die really quickly, >> even if this person isn't their prey. >> >> This and meaningless early-game alliances are the biggest >> reasons that players mishandle 5-player VTES. > > Well, you can have whatever opinion you want about how > people misplay the game. It doesn't fix the problem, unless > you want to say there isn't a problem. That's a matter of taste. Letting someone die really quickly fixes the problem so often that I see it as integral to "fixing" the problem of table stability. > But I see what I think are overly static games in which all > the players are really good players, so I think it's hard > to blame quality of play for this. They aren't good players if their goal is to sweep at all costs instead of letting 1-2 players die and then getting the GW. [ quoted text not captured ]

LSJ wrote: > > Unless xe Apparently Black Water, the notorious security contractor for the US Govt has changed their name to Xe. http://www.xecompany.com/ Not to be confused with the longtime foreign currency exchange site: www.xe.com best - chris

[ quoted text not captured ] Which rocks, is awesome, and works fantastically. /me loves xe.com/ucc, it has saved me, literally, hundreds of thousands...... > > best - > > chris

Played a JOL game with the contesting rules. Moved 4 pool onto Adana when I was at 18 pool, and no other copy of Adana in my crypt or in play. Then got bled for 8, putting me at 6 pool. That pool was stuck there since I couldn't draw it off, and I couldn't blow her up because she wasn't contesting/potentially contesting with anyone. That sucked. I'm not out yet because my predator had deck failure, but not because of anything I had/have done. Would that extra 4 pool back into my pool make a difference? Maybe. best - chris

[ quoted text not captured ] I've been ousted a few turns after I played an Investment or Secret Horde, too, before I had time to even recoup the initial investment. That sucked.

[ quoted text not captured ] Was this game specifically set up to test the contesting rules? (i.e. 2x AAA-Toreador, 2x Eurobrujah or 2x Super-Saulot/Super-Una?)

[ quoted text not captured ] Exactly. Having pool invested somewhere is a significant penalty even if you are allowed to pull it back later. -witness1

[ quoted text not captured ] Resource management is a necessary skill, yes.

On Aug 24, 9:37 pm, Juggernaut1981 <brasscompo...@gmail.com> wrote: > Was this game specifically set up to test the contesting rules? (i.e. > 2x AAA-Toreador, 2x Eurobrujah or 2x Super-Saulot/Super-Una?) No. We hadn't considered that yet. It was "try the game with the suggested rules as suggested", and then added "you need to have X cards in your deck that add blood to uncontrolled minions to see if they suck more". We might play trumped up decks to be more likely to contest next time. I like the idea of everyone using the exact same deck, myself :-) -Peter

[ quoted text not captured ] Sure. (of course, Investments and Secret Horde are cards that rarely see play, while 11-caps are always seeing play.) Correct me if I am wrong, but one of the subtexts in this whole contesting debate is that it sucks when one of your fatties is contested. So I was under the impression that the rule under discussion is to ameliorate the problem when you have put blood onto an uncontrolled (fattie) crypt card. In my one-game experience, the rule hurt me instead of helped me. And didn't help out at all the situation it's supposed to be fixing, since I wasn't in danger of contesting anything. It would have been better for me if I had vamps that were the same. This would lead to more superstar decks, and less divers crypts. Which is ok, if that's the way you want to take things. My suggestion would be that you can burn a vamp in your crypt to get the blood back off it, regardless of whether it is in danger of being contested or not. best - chris

librarian wrote: > LSJ wrote: >> librarian wrote: >>> Played a JOL game with the contesting rules. Moved 4 pool onto Adana >>> when I was at 18 pool, and no other copy of Adana in my crypt or in >>> play. Then got bled for 8, putting me at 6 pool. That pool was stuck >>> there since I couldn't draw it off, and I couldn't blow her up >>> because she wasn't contesting/potentially contesting with anyone. >>> That sucked. I'm not out yet because my predator had deck failure, >>> but not because of anything I had/have done. Would that extra 4 pool >>> back into my pool make a difference? Maybe. >> >> I've been ousted a few turns after I played an Investment or Secret >> Horde, too, before I had time to even recoup the initial investment. >> That sucked. > > Sure. (of course, Investments and Secret Horde are cards that rarely see > play, while 11-caps are always seeing play.) Of course, 11 caps aren't always seeing play, while Investments and Secret Horde see play more than rarely. > Correct me if I am wrong, but one of the subtexts in this whole > contesting debate is that it sucks when one of your fatties is > contested. So I was under the impression that the rule under discussion > is to ameliorate the problem when you have put blood onto an > uncontrolled (fattie) crypt card. OK. Correction: Losing the uniqueness lottery sucks more than it should. The rule under discussion is to ameliorate the problem you have when you lose the uniqueness lottery. The rule under discussion is not about ameliorating the effects of poor choices (or choices that turn out to have been poor choices) in the game. The particulars of the rule regarding the replacement of the original lottery-loss-ameliorating option with another are, indeed, designed exactly to make those choices "stickier", as that is the change chosen to remove the extra bloat the original rule permitted. > In my one-game experience, the rule hurt me instead of helped me. The removal of undo influence will, of course, hurt anyone who would be helped by undo influence (and, likewise, help anyone who would be hurt by undo influence -- this group tends to be the predators of the first group). > And > didn't help out at all the situation it's supposed to be fixing, since I > wasn't in danger of contesting anything. So it did help. (That is, the premise being false, any conclusion may be asserted). > It would have been better for > me if I had vamps that were the same. This would lead to more superstar > decks, and less divers crypts. Which is ok, if that's the way you want > to take things. How would it have been better for you to have 12 copies of the same vampire? > My suggestion would be that you can burn a vamp in your crypt to get the > blood back off it, regardless of whether it is in danger of being > contested or not. That seems like it would add more bloat to the game, especially for GtU user. Which seems like it would be bad for the game.

LSJ wrote: > librarian wrote: >> LSJ wrote: >>> librarian wrote: >>>> Played a JOL game with the contesting rules. Moved 4 pool onto >>>> Adana when I was at 18 pool, and no other copy of Adana in my crypt >>>> or in play. Then got bled for 8, putting me at 6 pool. That pool >>>> was stuck there since I couldn't draw it off, and I couldn't blow >>>> her up because she wasn't contesting/potentially contesting with >>>> anyone. That sucked. I'm not out yet because my predator had deck >>>> failure, but not because of anything I had/have done. Would that >>>> extra 4 pool back into my pool make a difference? Maybe. >>> >>> I've been ousted a few turns after I played an Investment or Secret >>> Horde, too, before I had time to even recoup the initial investment. >>> That sucked. >> >> Sure. (of course, Investments and Secret Horde are cards that rarely >> see play, while 11-caps are always seeing play.) > > Of course, 11 caps aren't always seeing play, Ok. while Investments and > Secret Horde see play more than rarely. > Really? I disagree, but we'll have to leave it at that, since "rarely" is subjective. >> Correct me if I am wrong, but one of the subtexts in this whole >> contesting debate is that it sucks when one of your fatties is >> contested. So I was under the impression that the rule under >> discussion is to ameliorate the problem when you have put blood onto >> an uncontrolled (fattie) crypt card. > > OK. Correction: > > Losing the uniqueness lottery sucks more than it should. ok. (I don't agree, but that argument is long passed) > > The rule under discussion is to ameliorate the problem you have when you > lose the uniqueness lottery. > ok. > The rule under discussion is not about ameliorating the effects of poor > choices (or choices that turn out to have been poor choices) in the game. > ok. Needed to adjust more to the new rules, I made a play using "old-rule think". > The particulars of the rule regarding the replacement of the original > lottery-loss-ameliorating option with another are, indeed, designed > exactly to make those choices "stickier", as that is the change chosen > to remove the extra bloat the original rule permitted. > I found this sentence somewhat obtuse, so I'd like to reduce it somewhat: The rule under discussion is designed to make choices "stickier" by removing the bloat from the original rule. I'm not sure what you mean by the term "stickier" - more difficult? Requiring more thought? Spending more time on it (like a sticky web page)? All of the above? >> In my one-game experience, the rule hurt me instead of helped me. > > The removal of undo influence will, of course, hurt anyone who would be > helped by undo influence (and, likewise, help anyone who would be hurt > by undo influence -- this group tends to be the predators of the first > group). > >> And didn't help out at all the situation it's supposed to be fixing, >> since I wasn't in danger of contesting anything. > > So it did help. Yeah, it helped Peter... > > (That is, the premise being false, any conclusion may be asserted). > >> It would have been better for me if I had vamps that were the same. >> This would lead to more superstar decks, and less divers crypts. >> Which is ok, if that's the way you want to take things. > > How would it have been better for you to have 12 copies of the same > vampire? > You misunderstand. If had any vamps that were the same as any other vamps on the table, then I could have brought back my pool. And I can control that by having more similar vamps in my crypt. Not necessarily 12 vamps the same, as you concluded. But regardless. >> My suggestion would be that you can burn a vamp in your crypt to get >> the blood back off it, regardless of whether it is in danger of being >> contested or not. > > That seems like it would add more bloat to the game, especially for GtU > user. Which seems like it would be bad for the game. You say "seems". Are you willing to be convinced otherwise? Or do you just say "seems" to be disingenuous? best - chris

librarian wrote: > LSJ wrote: >> The particulars of the rule regarding the replacement of the original >> lottery-loss-ameliorating option with another are, indeed, designed >> exactly to make those choices "stickier", as that is the change chosen >> to remove the extra bloat the original rule permitted. > > I found this sentence somewhat obtuse, so I'd like to reduce it somewhat: > > The rule under discussion is designed to make choices "stickier" by > removing the bloat from the original rule. > > I'm not sure what you mean by the term "stickier" - more difficult? By removing the ability to undo something, the thing that cannot be undone sticks around. It's stickier. In this case, the thing that cannot be undone is the choice to move a pool counter to an uncontrolled minion. That choice is stickier. >>> It would have been better for me if I had vamps that were the same. >>> This would lead to more superstar decks, and less divers crypts. >>> Which is ok, if that's the way you want to take things. >> >> How would it have been better for you to have 12 copies of the same >> vampire? > > You misunderstand. If had any vamps that were the same as any other > vamps on the table, then I could have brought back my pool. And I can > control that by having more similar vamps in my crypt. Not necessarily > 12 vamps the same, as you concluded. But regardless. Ah. Yeah. Different situations would mean that different things would have been better. That's nothing new. Having the 12 vampires in your crypt be more similar doesn't have anything to do with losing (or, I guess, winning, in your perspective) the uniquess lottery, which led me to conclude as I did. This particular observation, though, that it would have been better had you lost (won) the uniqueness lottery seems flawed, since you likely would not have moved pool to it if it was already controlled by another player. And even if true, there's nothing to suggest that this would lead to more superstar decks. Not that superstar decks are bad for the game (any more than S+B decks are bad for the game or toolbox decks are bad for the game). >>> My suggestion would be that you can burn a vamp in your crypt to get >>> the blood back off it, regardless of whether it is in danger of being >>> contested or not. >> >> That seems like it would add more bloat to the game, especially for >> GtU user. Which seems like it would be bad for the game. > > You say "seems". Are you willing to be convinced otherwise? Or do you > just say "seems" to be disingenuous? Yes, I've stopped beating my wife. I say "seems" because that's how it seems. For an abusive example: stuffing up an uncontrolled 2-cap vampire with 3X counters from X GtU actions from a school of X 3+ cap DOM weenies and then flashing him for pool gain (still having your full four transfers ready to go to get another). You are welcome to convince me that that is not how it seems. If you mean the second "seems", then I suggest that an argument against that deserves its own topic.

LSJ wrote: > librarian wrote: >>>> My suggestion would be that you can burn a vamp in your crypt to get >>>> the blood back off it, regardless of whether it is in danger of >>>> being contested or not. >>> >>> That seems like it would add more bloat to the game, especially for >>> GtU user. Which seems like it would be bad for the game. >> >> You say "seems". Are you willing to be convinced otherwise? Or do >> you just say "seems" to be disingenuous? > > Yes, I've stopped beating my wife. > > I say "seems" because that's how it seems. > > For an abusive example: stuffing up an uncontrolled 2-cap vampire with > 3X counters from X GtU actions from a school of X 3+ cap DOM weenies and > then flashing him for pool gain (still having your full four transfers > ready to go to get another). > > You are welcome to convince me that that is not how it seems. Nope, you've convinced me - aren't you convinced yourself? If so, I think you can drop the "seems". > > If you mean the second "seems", then I suggest that an argument against > that deserves its own topic. Indeed. best - chris