Introduction: Apart from some very powerful and expensive characters the clan Brujah gained mainly new and interesting extra disciplines on their vampires. In this issue I will take a look on a special use of Obfuscate, formerly only mastered by Miranda Sanova, now shared by such diverse vampires as Tayshawn Kearns, Joshua Tarnopolski and our mighty justicar Jaroslav Pascek. Fiction: Initiation Rites "We call it pickling pork snouts: The introduction of fresh meat, err, freshly embraced neonates into the mechanisms of our clan. In theory it's very simple: If in the presence of an elder clan member, shut the fuck up. If you don't know if the other guy is an elder, shut the fuck up! In short: Shut the fuck up and do what you're told. But I always had a weak spot for them mucky pups, and it's supposed to be fun to be immortal, right? So they get the Arnold Simpson-treatment on the regional folkore, Brujah-flavor. And no, before you ask, my nickname isn't Homer, despite the grandiose bullshit our, err, esteemed chronicler unloaded upon you last month. Yeah, gotta tell them never to mess with the chronicler. It's a fate worse than death - it means oblivion. Existence without a story told. Anyway: Today's topic is one of my favorites: the "Hole in the Wall" gang. Where that name comes from is left as an exercise to the you kids, just one more hint: The first hole was Arika-shaped..." (Scene from a video project started by Gengis with the title 'Behind the seen: The inner logic of a mass-charade revealed') Strategy: First Strike The concept of First Strike has not seen much play yet, mainly because there are very few cards that actually grant it. Most often you'll see a Muddled Vampire Hunter doing his 4 before you can react, other options are only usable when blocking (Backstab, Veil of Silence) or while destroying or stealing weapons (Fast Hands, Shattering Blow, Blessing of Durga Syn). The rest is limited to rather exotic disciplines: Only Akram masters the Silence of Death (Qui) as far as Brujah are concerned, but the Camarilla Edition finally brought us three Brujah vampires that can use the most recent addition to the first strike arsenal: Shadow Feint (Obf/Cel). The following lines try to a) shed some light into the rules side of striking first, and b) show some possible combat angles/strategies. Here's a good description of what First Strike does, posted to the newsgroup by Flux: First Strike is a 'new' strike resolution that happens before the normal strike resolution. That means that all the effects of the First Strike (including burning blood to heal damage) will happen before the normal strike can be applied. If that means that any minion goes to torpor, combat ends immediately, and any further strikes are 'lost'. What repeatedly caused huge discussions is the second important bit: First Strike doesn't beat Dodge or S:CE. The order of strikes resolving is 1. Any Strike: Combat Ends 2. Any Strike: Dodge 3. Any strike done with First Strike 4. Any other strike While First Strike effects have been mainly geared towards Assamite combat so far, giving these discussions at least some ideological fuel, Shadow Feinting Brujah couldn't care less: If the range is close, you just grapple your opponent and kill him before he can react. The basic utility of First Strike is preventing counter-strike tactics - no more mutual destruction, no more pokes in the eye by Gangrel or Tzimisce. It doesn't solve the problem of them maneuvering away (although a healthy number of Flashes or Drawing out the Beast should solve this) and - more importantly - of damage prevention. Also, while I normally recommend Torn Signpost/Blur as the most efficient way of delivering the pain for Brujah, exploiting First Strike means that you have to put everything into that first strike - which means stuff like Increased Strength, Pushing The Limit etc. is what you are looking for. But it's not only about hitting harder and faster, it's also about control: If you know you can kill them before they can harm you, your blood management via Taste of Vitae becomes a lot easier, i.e. you can risk more: If they have no environmental/pre-range damage source or Fortitude, you can happily Minion Tap Joshua down to two, rush Darrel Boyce, smack and taste back. Card of the month: Shadow Feint Celerity/Obfuscate, combat, 1 blood Only usable before range is determined (cel/obf) This vampire gets First Strike this round. (CEL/OBF) As above, and this vampire's strikes cannot be dodged this round. Together with Silence of Death this is the only card in the game that gives unrestricted access to First Strike. Well, that is if you don't consider having both Obfuscate and Celerity on a minion a restriction. Luckily you get most of the goodness at inferior, the "strikes cannot be dodged" part at superior might be great for Assamites or City Gangrel Antitribu, but Immoral Grapple takes care of that as far as the Brujah are concerned. For our clan this card is another option to narrow down your opponents chances to escape, by eliminating strike back from the equation. Vampire of the month: Tayshawn Kearns Brujah 4, cel obf pot I'm still not too hot on Tayshawn, as in general utility he's basically a Dre for one pool extra cost and a wasted discipline. Then again he's the cheapest vampire in the whole game to play both Shadow Feint and Immortal Grapple. Put a Potence skill card on him, and everything is great. Deck: Sudden Death This is a hard-hitting pure combat deck that centers around Shadow Feint to deliver huge amounts of hand damage without giving the opponent a chance to strike back. The disciplines used are Cel/Obf/Pot, cheapest found on the above-mentioned Tayshawn Kearns, but also on Joshua Tarnopolski and Jaroslav Pascek. The deck only really needs superior Potence for bigger strikes, so that's what the skill cards are for. The rest of the crypt is made from the Nos/!Nos that come with Celerity. Beast is a very obvious choice, while I left out Calebos (!Nos 8, +1 strength) for Kurt Densch (Nos 8, +1 intercept), as Kurt's intercept special augments Pascek's +1 intercept, thus making a casual intercept theme workable in the deck, which I thought could be a good idea due to the huge minion size and relative slowness. Playtests were very promising so far, but while having the intercept never hurt, the problems didn't lie in the area of blood management/defense (MT/Taste works like a charm in this deck), but in ousting power - it simply takes ages to bleed out your prey(s). So I'm trying an extra Fame and the occasional Legal to speed things up a little at the moment. Anyway, here's the original version of the deck that took 4 out of 5 VPs in its first ousting on a combat-heavy table. One other thing: The same concept is workable using mainly Nosferatu/Nosferatu Antitribu, and maybe even a bit more elegant, because you can use Drawing out the Beast to avoid their maneuvering to the safety of long range. The crypt choices are a little tougher though (it being a 4-discipline deck). You have to either use group 3 Nossies (Casino, Kurt) or - to make Peter Bakija a very happy man - group 1 in the form of *fanfare* Tiberius (5, ani cel obf pot) and *shudder* Harrod and/or Lucretia. Beast and Calebos are the natural Sabbat additions. Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 13, Max: 35, Avg: 6,08) ---------------------------------------------- 1 Arnold Simpson (Brujah 2, pot) 2 Beast (Nosferatu Antitribu 7, ani cel OBF POT) 1 Gengis (Brujah 3, aus cel pot) 2 Jaroslav Pascek (Brujah 10, CEL for obf POT PRE, Justicar) 2 Joshua Tarnopolski (Brujah 7, CEL obf pot PRE) 1 Kurt Densch (Nosferatu 8, ani aus cel OBF POT) 3 Tayshawn Kearns (Brujah 4, cel obf pot) Library: (90 cards) ------------------- Master (18 cards) 1 Barrens, The 1 Dreams of the Sphinx 1 Fame 4 Haven Uncovered 1 KRCG News Radio 6 Minion Tap 2 Potence 1 Rumor Mill, Tabloid Newspaper, The 1 Tension in the Ranks Action (11 cards) 4 Ambush 6 Bum's Rush 1 Rampage Reaction (5 cards) 5 Wake with Evening's Freshness Combat (56 cards) 10 Flash 8 Immortal Grapple 6 Increased Strength 7 Pushing the Limit 8 Shadow Feint 8 Taste of Vitae 5 Torn Signpost 4 Undead Strength Final Words: Well, that's it for now. Sorry, no Salubri deck as promised after last month's Gangrel Antitribu-feature in Ben Peal's Salubri Newsletter and Legbiter's Euro-Brujah offering in the Gangrel Antitribu one - I'm working on that ;-) Thanks for reading Skaffen www.8ung.at/colddawn "Only the dead see the end of war." (Plato)