Gargoyle Clan Newsletter for April 2006 I. Introduction II. Vampire of the Month: Cardano III. Deck of the Month: Boston Statuary I. INTRODUCTION To anyone relying on my monthly ramblings to provide meaning in your life, allow me to apologize for missing this March. My tardiness has been in large part due to business in school, and a recent increase in actually playing Jyhad. After years of trying, I finally convinced a local shop to carry the game. So I've been playing there, teaching new players, finding old players, and muscling my way to princely dominion over Northampton, MA. Since I have no shame, I'll mention that our first tournament is scheduled for June 17th. Feel free to metagame against Gargoyles if you decide to come. My other delay in writing this is more to the point: I've been trying really hard to design a Gargoyle deck that wins by neither bleeding nor rushing. My first major attempt in this direction has been a dead end, but along the way I happened on an interesting side path. The deck I was trying to build, and which would have made the non-existent March newsletter had it not sucked, was an attempt at voting with the Gargoyles. Needless to say, Fidus the Shrunken Beast stood out as an obvious choice with his +1 stealth on undirected actions such as votes. Since Fidus is a Tremere slave I went looking for titled Tremere who would provide permanent vote support and allow the Gargoyles to take the occasional directed action. Even for a deck dedicated to voting, the inability to bleed, rescue cross-table, or steal the rack is a daunting prospect indeed. The titled vampire I quickly settled upon was Cardano. A halfway decent crypt came together, and with Praxis Seizures for vote lock, Second Tradition and bounce for defense, and "the combo" for block deterrence, I thought I had a pretty good start. Sadly, I was wrong. I played the deck twice, with substantial modifications between games, and it totally failed to work both times, even when I was allowed the time and space to get it moving. So the Gargoyle vote deck has been scrapped, but the idea of using Cardano in a Gargoyle slave deck has stuck with me. II. VAMPIRE OF THE MONTH: Cardano (honorary Gargoyle) Cardano 9 Capacity [DOM FOR THA ani aus cel] Camarilla Prince of Boston Illus. Richard Kane Ferguson The first thing you'll notice about Cardano is that he looks like Josh Feuerstein (the VEKN Prince of Boston) might appear after an *extremely* rough night of Jyhad. Imagine yourself sitting at game after game constantly surround by dedicated rush deck players who all decide for some reason that you're "the threat". Meanwhile, imagine that Ben Peal is across the room sweeping tables with deck ideas he borrowed from you. That's the kind of night that would turn a clean cut, friendly guy like Josh into the scruffy, haggard maniac glaring icily out from Cardano's oval portrait. If you were the Prince of Boston, you'd wish you had superior Fortitude too. And that of course is Cardano's main selling point, especially if you're looking to throw him in with the Gargoyles. Fortitude is the most common superior discipline you'll find among the Tremere slaves, so having it on your handler of choice spells out SYNERGY in the kind of garish capital letters that even the Imbued know how to read. I'd make a list of all the reasons I love Fortitude combat, but it would be long, and I've already elaborated on the subject in previous newsletters. In any event, the discipline is flat out awesome for the obligatory Tremere in a Gargoyle deck because they become the targets for just about every rush action your opponents can throw at you. [FOR] will save you a whole lot of trouble when the inevitable combat starts raining down around you, and your Gargoyles won't have to spend so much time and effort watching for incoming rushers. Of course, you'll want more than that to justify spending 9 pool on a minion who can't play Raking Talons. Luckily, Cardano's got a little something for everyone. In addition to his truly unique [DOM FOR THA] spread, Cardano possesses a host of inferior disciplines, all of which are shared by a group 2 Gargoyle. Animalism, shared by Ferox is one of my favorite disciplines. Many of the cards require the superior discipline to be worthwhile, but a few stand out even at the basic level. Raven Spy is an excellent source of cheap, stackable intercept that barely gets better at the superior, while Pack Alpha's superior version seems primarily useful for cycling in a pinch. Guard Dogs and Rat's Warning are effectively the same card at basic, and either one works great in combination with superior Deflection: untap, bounce the bleed, and remain untapped for the next one. If damage prevention isn't enough combat defense, [ani for] provides access to Alpha Glint for S:CE, which Cardano can use most of the time given his meaty capacity. As with Ublo-Satha, inferior Celerity accomplishes little that isn't already covered by Fortitude. However, Forced March is just great for the Tremere in a slave deck. Since they can already untap cardlessly each time they're blocked, the slave handlers are bound to eventually get an action through. When that happens, an additional free untap is nothing to sneeze at. In practice, I've found that Forced March is most useful in this context for taking "free" hunt actions, making it something like a Minion Phase Life in the City. Auspex is probably Cardano's least useful discipline, as its primary effects are redundant with many of the better cards he can play. Also, if you want Auspex on a Tremere there are much cheaper places to get it. Eugenio Estevez and Luma, Stone Beauty make a pretty good start at a Tremere-Gargoyle [aus for] deck, but Cardano probably wouldn't make the cut even if the grouping would allow it. Martin Franckel has [AUS] at a mere third of Cardano's price. For those who really like to push the envelope of wacky discipline matching, Cardano can play Read the Winds or Quicken Sight at basic. I'll leave that to folks far braver than I. Of course, Cardano also has superior Dominate, and Dominate is good. Even though it is one of their in clan disciplines, [DOM] is actually rather expensive for the Tremere. The youngest members to possess it are all 6 capacity: Thomas Thorne, Valois Sang, and Muhsin Samir. Thorne just sucks in spite of any synergy his [ani cel] appears to have with Cardano, while Valois Sang is effectively only one discipline point ahead of Ehrich Weiss in a typical Gargoyle deck. Muhsin Samir would be good for his [pot], but his group makes it hard to match him with Gargoyles for the time being. The choices get a bit better at 7 with vampires like Astrid Thomas (ask Oscar what she tastes like), who also has [pot] and a Primogen title. The problem is that if I'm going to pay 7 or more pool for a minion then he needs to come with his own life insurance. Cardano's bidding price is high, but [FOR] earns him the job. A handful of useful inferiors, and a Prince title for Second Tradition, vote defense, and tournament organizing skills seals the deal. III. DECK OF THE MONTH: Boston Sanctuary Based on everything you've already read, there's little need to explain this deck. It's basically an adaptation of my previously published bruise bleed deck, with adjustments for Cardano. I haven't managed to win any games with this deck yet, but I've come close a few times. It's really fun to play on account of the fact that it uses 7 disciplines in addition to Flight and clan/title requirements. The sheer number of combat cards, especially damage prevention, might look unnecessary. However, such madness really is justified in my local metagame, and keeping Cardano alive is my first priority. Also, [FOR] is by far the most common discipline on my vampires, so those are the cards that are easiest to play. Deck Name : Boston Statuary Author : Cthulukitty Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 2 max: 9 average: 6.42 ------------------------------------------------------------ 4x Cardano 9 DOM FOR THA ani aus cel prince Tremere:1 2x Ublo-Satha 7 FOR POT VIS cel Gargoyle:2 2x Saxum, Master of S 6 FOR VIS pot pre Gargoyle:2 2x Luma, Stone Beauty 5 FOR aus pot vis Gargoyle:2 1x Jing Wei 3 dom tha Tremere:1 1x Mustafa Rahman 2 dom Tremere:2 Library [90 cards] ------------------------------------------------------------ Action [9] 4x Govern the Unaligned 3x Harass 2x Restoration Action Modifier [8] 3x Conditioning 3x Forced March 2x Seduction Combat [48] 1x Bond with the Mountain 1x Collapse the Arches 8x Immortal Grapple 6x Indomitability 3x Pounce 5x Raking Talons 4x Resilience 1x Roll 3x Rolling with the Punches 2x Soak 2x Taste of Vitae 2x Thrown Sewer Lid 6x Torn Signpost 4x Unflinching Persistence Master [14] 1x Arcane Library 4x Blood Doll 1x Chantry 2x Effective Management 2x Fame 2x Haven Uncovered 2x Perfectionist Reaction [11] 4x Deflection 1x Guard Dogs 1x Rat's Warning 1x Scry the Hearthstone 4x Second Tradition: Domain Crafted with : Anarch Revolt Deck Builder. [Thu Apr 13 20:24:58 2006] I hope people enjoyed reading this newsletter. Feel free to respond in whatever way entertains you. Maybe by next month I'll have come up with something a little different, but I doubt it. If Nights of Reckoning ends up seeing any major play in my local meta, I might write a newsletter on how best to totally hose mortal allies with the Gargoyles. Given my established preferences, it should be pretty easy to figure out what I might do. When Blood Weakens and The Slow Withering start showing up in every game, remember that Pounce and Raking Talons don't require disciplines. Jesse / CthuluKitty Prince of Northampton jessecn@student.umas.edu