THE BASICS Editor: Jon Cooper Content: 1. What you need. 2. Who you need. 3. Deck from hell. The ramblings that follow are the first of an irregular bunch of newsletters dedicated to the big fat mess that is The Great Beast. Rarely seen at tournaments and sneered at by most rational players, the Great Beast has yet to make a real impact on the scene. In this opening edition we will look at basic strategy and contenders for the ritual and offer a few thoughts and ideas to hopefully give sacrificial food for thought to those brave enough to venture along the burning path to abject humiliation and failure. 1. SO, YOU WANT TO SUMMON THE GREAT BEAST DO YOU? Call the Great Beast Cost: 1 blood +1 stealth action. Put this card on the acting Baali and put X ritual counters on it, where X is the capacity of this Baali. This Baali may put a ritual counter on this card as a +1 stealth action. When this card has more than 10 ritual counters, burn this Baali and choose three Disciplines; this card becomes a unique clan less independent infernal vampire with 9 capacity, 4 strength and 3 bleed. The Great Beast has the chosen three Disciplines at superior. Move 9 blood to him from the blood bank. The Great Beast can enter combat with any ready minion controlled by another Methuselah as a (D) action and can prevent 1 damage each combat. Lets take a closer look here. To get this bad boy rolling requires the following steps: 1. A Baali vampire. 2. The Call the Great Beast Card in your hand. 3. Be able to perform the Call the Great Beast action without getting blocked. At this point you now have a tapped vampire with a Call the Great Beast card slotted on it. Sit back. Enjoy it. Soak in the feeling. 4. Now, without being ousted, rushed, banished or generally knocked about you have to get 11 or more ritual counters on this card. This will involve performing a +1 stealth action to place a ritual counter on it unless you have the good fortune/great skill to have called it with an 11-cap vampire in which case you have achieved step 5 and are on the road to enlightenment. 5. Choose 3 Superior skills that will allow your newly formed Creation to run amok around the table. This IS the tricky bit. Now that's a lot of pain and potential misery to go through for the end product so you HAD better make sure it's worth it. To really utilize the beast you have got to take advantage of both his bleed potential and more excitingly, his ability to rush and inflict grievous harm upon your opponents. What you have quivering on the table in front of you is not just a 9-cap vampire, but a goddamm FORCE of nature. It can rush any ready minion as a D-action. It has 4 Hand Damage and can prevent 1 damage per combat, plus it can bleed for 3 AND has 3 Superior Skills of YOUR choice. With this in mind lets look at possible contenders for the ritual... 2. WE ARE EEEEEEEEEVIL........ The following contenders spring to mind when thinking of building a Great Beast deck. Now for this issue I will focus on the most economic ways to deliver him to your service and in later issues will look at variants and other possibilities for the dark ritual, but to be going on with we have: Huitzopotchli... He is 10 big points of burning Baali, eager to make a pact with infernal forces and dial the 666 hotline. He is the right clan, a good size (one skill card makes him Beastable) and has a feast of skills, plus a pretty good ability. High Preist Angra Mainyu... 8 points of sweaty Baali is still feasible but will require a bit more work and planning. A few skill cards will cut down the time till blast off, but otherwise your going to be spending a few actions to set him off. The Other Baali... Questionable whether these guys really cut it. 7 points is too much work to be worth considering IMO and as for Sargon, forget it. Qadir Ul-Ghani... 9 points worth of vampire AND the ability to change clans as an inbuilt action? That'll be Qadir then. Nice brace of skills to boot. Well worth a look. Just a few to begin the dark descent into devilry. Of course the card "Clan Impersonate" lends itself to a wide plethora of other possibilities, but does start to tie up your actions and throws another chain in the link. Here are a few that could conceivable be worth the extra effort... Spider Killer... 10 points and an auto +1 stealth is a nice combo plus he has some good combat orientated skills. Stupid name though. Lucretia, The Cess Queen... 10 points and similar abiltity/skill set to Spider Killer. Also no chance of contesting her as I cant think of any deck that I have ever seen that uses her! Inner Circle Members... Again, all these guys have the size to instantly transform into the beast upon calling so reduce the amount of actions taken plus they all have a wide array of skills and some good strong powers chucked in for good measure. Admirable. Choosing the RIGHT man for the job is of paramount importance as you will need someone who the deck can still function and defend around without the Beast being present. That said, here is the first featured Deck From Hell. THIS MONTHS DECK FROM HELL Deck Name: Call 666 D-E-V-I-L Created By: Jonco Description: The three skills used for the beast in this deck are: TEMPORIS OBEAH and VICISSITUDE. Yeah, i know what your thinking, but stick with me here. I built this deck solely on the grounds of the combat cards. The whole combo is Inner essence, vitae block, lapse (set range OR deny strike), chiropteran marauder (manouver OR agg hand damage) and anesthetic touch. Now this deck relies on you having a Call the Great Beast in your hand when, or not long after, Huitzilopochtli hits the table. The lost in crowds hopefully will stealth it through, plus the combo cards work quite nicely too. Domain of evernight offers a +1 stealth at outferior and anesthetic touch gives a dodge for auspex. The domain of evernights and clothos gift give the beast a good few actions each turn so bleeding untap rush is relatively easily achieved. It does need a bit more playing and tweaking but I would consider taking this to a tournament at some point in the future. Maybe. Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 25, Max: 40, Avg: 8.25) ---------------------------------------------- 5 Huitzilopochtli AUS DAI DOM OBF PRE POT 10, Baali 3 Ian Forestal AUS DOM THA 8, Tremere Antitribu 3 Matthias AUS FOR nec OBE 7, Salubri 1 Richard Tauber AUS tha 4, Tremere Antitribu Library: (78 cards) ------------------- Master (10 cards) 2 Dreams of the Sphinx 1 Fame 1 Golconda: Inner Peace 1 Infernal Pact 5 Minion Tap Action (13 cards) 5 Call the Great Beast 4 Clotho's Gift 4 Renewed Vigor Action Modifier (13 cards) 6 Domain of Evernight 6 Lost in Crowds 1 Repulsion Reaction (8 cards) 4 Telepathic Misdirection 4 Wake with Evening's Freshness Combat (34 cards) 6 Anesthetic Touch 2 Breath of the Dragon 6 Chiropteran Marauder 4 Inner Essence 6 Lapse 4 Taste of Vitae 6 Vitae Block Any ideas, suggestions, deck ideas or comments please feel free to email me at jonmichaelcooper@btopenworld.com Your thoughts are welcome. Remember the Great Beast is not real and the chances of you summoning him are very low so, please...Don't have nightmares. Goodnight.