OFFICIAL VEKN KIASYD NEWSLETTER VOL I ISSUE II MARCH 2002 ------------------------------------------------------------------- "The Kiasyd are demons clothed in flesh. Trust not their nice manners and polite smiles and "How do you do?" they are maddened freaks behind their careful facades, and they are more than willing to twist you reality into any hell that pleases their whim. Malkavians with the blood of faeries running through their veins, the darklings could put one of the madmen to shame with his tricks. " Paulo, Lasombra priest 1. Editorial 2. A little History - The Nagaraja 3. Vampire of the Month - Bartholomew 4. The AUS/NEC Anomaly 5. '..cannot attempt to block this action again' 6. Deck - The Nagaraja Alliance 7. Deck - Saint Bartholomew's Day Massacre Prevention Deck 8. Outro ------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. EDITORIAL Welcome to the slightly belated second issue of the Kiasyd newsletter. This month we are going slightly off the recommended safari trail and taking a look at Necromancy and the Nagaraja. I never planned it that way but that's how it turned out. ------------------------------------------------------------------- 2. A LITTLE HISTORY - The Nagaraja Who do we have to blame for the appearance of such a hated Bloodline? The Mages of the Euthanatos Tradition were experimenting with Kindred blood, as you do, and some of the more adventurous it seems managed to become vampires without having to be Embraced. This unwholesome tinkering led to the creation of the Nagaraja who, unlike most kindred, must feed on the flesh of their prey. Not only are they hated for their unnatural feeding habits and their mastery of Oblivion, they are also assumed to have created the Samedi, the denial of which they insist. ------------------------------------------------------------------- 3. VAMPIRE OF THE MONTH Bartholomew Kiasyd 9 AUS dom MYT NEC obt Sabbat: If Bartholomew is untapped at the beginning of your turn, you gain 1 pool from the blood bank. Cold iron vulnerability. What a bizarre vampire. A nine capacity vampire with two 'in-clan' disciplines at inferior, two 'out of clan' disciplines at superior and an amusing little special. He is the perfect vampire for one of those four discipline decks, say aus/dom/myt/obt, and has been used in one or two decks using all his disciplines, one of which you can find here: http://www.vtesshetland.com/Decks/Kyasid_Necrospex.txt (taken from the newsgroup) Seeing as the Nagaraja share some disciplines with Bartholomew and that they have yet to make their debut with their own newsletter I have built a deck based on the Bartholomew/Nagaraja alliance (listed later in this issue). ------------------------------------------------------------------- 4. THE AUS/NEC ANOMALY Bloodlines has brought out a minor surge of vampires with a new combinations of disciplines. As this is the Kiasyd newsletter and Bartholomew is our Vampire of the Month we will take a look at the Auspex and Necromancy combination. Here is how the contenders shape up: Vampires with AUS/NEC Agaitas 6, Harbingers of Skulls Kanimana Belghazi 7, Nagaraja Egothha 7, Harbingers of Skulls Bartholomew 8, Kiasyd Unre 9, Harbingers of Skulls, Bishop Augustus Giovanni 11, Giovanni, 2 votes Vampires with AUS/nec Raful al-Zarqa 6, Nagaraja Matthias 7, Salubri Ian Forestal 8, Tremere Antitribu Vampires with aus/NEC Le Dinh Tho 5, Nagaraja Gisela Harden 7, Harbingers of Skulls, Priscus Gillespi Giovanni 7, Giovanni Anisa Marianna Lopez 8, Harbingers of Skulls Ambrogino Giovanni 9, Giovanni, 1 vote Regina Giovanni 10, Giovanni, 2 votes Vampires with aus/nec Beatrice L'Angou 5, Kiasyd Sarrasine 7, Followers of Set Marianna 8, Giovanni A fairly mixed bunch in there as you can see. The Harbingers of Skulls feature heavily as would be expected, all three of the Nagaraja are there as well. There are six votes plus a Priscus albeit form fairly high capacity vampires. Auspex really comes into it's own at superior for cards like Pulse of the Canaille, Revelations, Telepathic Misdirection, and all those +intercept cards with nifty bonuses at superior. Necromancy is a robust discipline with loads of interesting effects. intercept, stealth, blood gain, library card renewal, vampire reclamation, combat ends, amusing allies to name a few. It does fall down on not being a terribly offensive discipline in most cases and therefor needs the Dominate from the Giovanni and the Nagaraja and now the Auspex from the Harbingers to make things happen. As far as the Kiasyd are concerned they may as well leave it to the Harbingers to play with. They have their Mytherceria and Obtenebration for stealth and Dominate for offence and defence so why do the Kiasyd need Necromancy? And Auspex for that matter. Well, Bartholomew obviously thought there was a reason. ------------------------------------------------------------------- 5. '..cannot attempt to block this action again' There exist today four cards of a special variety. Blanket of Night Action Modifier Obtenebration 1 Blood [obt] +1 stealth. [OBT] Only usable by a vampire other than the acting minion when a minion attempts to block an acting minion you control. Tap this modifying vampire to cause the block to fail; that blocking minion cannot attempt to block this action again. Call of the Hungry Dead Action modifier Necromancy Only usable when a minion is attempting to block. [nec] The blocking minion gets -1 intercept. [NEC] This acting vampire burns 1 blood to cause the block to fail. The blocking minion cannot attempt to block this action again. Elder Impersonation Action Modifier Obfuscate 1 Blood [obf] +1 stealth. [OBF] Only usable when a minion attempts to block. That minion's blocking attempt fails (do not tap that minion). That minion cannot attempt to block this action again. Psychomania Action Modifier Daimoinon/Presence 1 Blood Only usable when an ally or younger vampire is attempting to block. [pre]: Cancel the current action and untap this acting vampire. The blocking minion is not tapped. [dai]: The block fails. The blocking minion cannot attempt to block this action again. [DAI]: As [dai] above, and the blocking minion takes 1 damage (damage not preventable). Recent experimentation with these 'block fails' effects has shown that even the most persistent blocker can be thwarted. At worst your attempt is blocked (with the possibility of your opponent using a card, such as a wake, which he/she may not otherwise have needed to use for that action), and at best the action becomes virtually unblockable due to your opponent having no other means of blocking. In the event of a block or even a deflected and blocked bleed a Change of Target or Krassimir's special will waste even more of your opponent's defensive cards. The 'block fails' effect works well with actions at inherent +1 stealth or combined with permanent stealth enhancements such as Repulsion and the Erberus Mask. Although the four cards above have similar effects they do have different costs. Blanket of Night is perhaps the one that will be used less frequently in any given deck due to it needing a 'spare' untapped vampire to play the superior effect. Psychomania's disability lies in only being used when a younger vampire is blocking. However, I have been recently educated in advantage of the [pre] effect of this card. Unlike Change of Target, the acting vampire may take the same action again after playing Psychomania at [pre] as there is no card text that says otherwise. Both Call of the Hungry Dead and Elder Impersonation have my vote as being the best of the bunch with perhaps Call of the Hungry Dead coming out on top as there is no cost for the inferior effect. ------------------------------------------------------------------- 6. DECK - The Nagaraja Alliance "The greatest fear is the fear of the unknown --fear of death. You know not from whence you came, but I, my friend, know where you will be going, for I have been there. I could take you there, but you would not like what you would find. Your fate is inevitable, but serve my interests, and I will protect you from it for as long as I can. " This deck is really in its embryonic phase and the crypt is quite scruffy although it is quite tricky deciding what stays and what goes. Le Dinh Tho's ability is very useful for the bleed deck making the casual deflection a thing of the past. With 72 cards in the deck there is room for expansion and I think I may increase the bleed actions/modifiers for the likes of Isabel with her solid DOM/NEC. I have been working on an Ex Nihilo/Soul Gem combo but have yet to make it come to anything. Ex Nihilo's permanent stealth would make the Call of the Hungry Deads slightly more effective and the Soul Gem would banish the need to fill up the post Ex Niholoed vampire. Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 20, Max: 32, Avg: 6.58) ---------------------------------------------- 1 Ambrogino Giovanni aus DOM NEC POT THA 9, Giovanni, 1 vote 2 Bartholomew AUS dom MYT NEC obt 8, Kiasyd 2 Kanimana Belghazi AUS DOM NEC pro 7, Nagaraja 1 Gillespi Giovanni aus DOM NEC POT 7, Giovanni 1 Andrea Giovanni DOM NEC pot vic 7, Giovanni 1 Raful al-Zarqa AUS dom nec obf 6, Nagaraja 1 Le Dinh Tho aus dom NEC 5, Nagaraja 2 Isabel Giovanni DOM NEC pot 5, Giovanni 1 Beatrice L'Angou aus dom MYT nec 5, Kiasyd Library: (72 cards) ------------------- Master (12 cards) 1 Auspex 2 Blood Doll 1 Direct Intervention 1 Dominate 1 Dreams of the Sphinx 2 Heidelberg Castle, Germany 2 Minion Tap 1 Necromancy 1 Sudden Reversal Action (19 cards) 2 Haunt 6 Mind Rape 3 Pulse of the Canaille 1 Revelations 1 Riddle Phantastique 4 Scouting Mission 2 Summon Soul Action Modifier (8 cards) 6 Call of the Hungry Dead 2 Seduction Reaction (15 cards) 3 Deflection 2 Delaying Tactics 3 Obedience 3 Telepathic Misdirection 4 Wake with Evening's Freshness Combat (7 cards) 4 Absorb the Mind 3 Spiritual Intervention Equipment (3 cards) 1 Deer Rifle 1 Leather Jacket 1 Sargon Fragment, The Combo (8 cards) 4 Aura Absorption 4 Spectral Divination ------------------------------------------------------------------- 7. DECK - Saint Bartholomew's Day Massacre Prevention Deck Thanks to Michael for sending me his Kiasyd monster. Created By: Michael Felipe de Assis Correia Description: A Kiasyd deck that I played in the recent storyline (baltimore)tournament in London. I eventually came 6th out of 31 players (just missed the final by about 1/2 a VP), so I'm pretty pleased with my first Kiasyd deck - I'll be playing them again! Basically a very, very defensive deck that held out against most predators (bleed, combat or political) extremely well, with sneak-bleed and other actions to vex my prey. The deck is built around the idea of getting Bartholomew out and keeping him untapped throughout the game for pool gain (though it worked wonders in one game where I didn't draw him anyway): Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 22, Max: 32, Avg: 7.00) ---------------------------------------------- 3 Bartholomew AUS dom MYT NEC obt 8, Kiasyd 2 Beatrice L'Angou aus dom MYT nec 5, Kiasyd 2 Kassiym Malikhair dom for MYT OBT 6, Kiasyd 2 Julia Prima aus DOM myt OBT 7, Kiasyd 3 Gratiano DOM obf OBT pot 8, Lasombra, Priscus Library: (90 cards) ------------------ Master (14 cards): 1 Political Hunting Ground 2 Secure Haven 1 Police Department 2 Chanjelin Ward 2 Sudden Reversal 1 Puchase Pact 1 Festivo dello Estinto 2 Blood Doll 1 Dominate 1 Obtenebration Retainer & Equipment (3 cards): 1 J.S. Simmons 2 Leather Jacket Action (16 cards): 2 Cardinal Benediction 3 Riddle Phantastique 1 Govern the Unaligned 4 Scouting Mission 1 Kine Dominance 2 Slaughtering the Herd 2 Far Mastery 1 Shadow Twin Action Modifier (20 cards): 2 Change of Target 2 Bonding 2 Conditioning 2 Foreshadowing Destruction 4 Shroud of Night 6 Shadow Play 2 Stone Travel Combat (9 cards): 4 Absorb the Mind 5 Shadow Body Reaction (25 cards): 3 Telepathic Counter 6 Folderol 2 Eyes of the Night 3 Deflection 4 Obedience 4 Wake with Evening's Freshness 3 Forced Awakening Combo (3 cards): 3 Aura Absorbtion ------------------------------------------------------------------- 8. OUTRO Next time: Julia Prima is in the house with some more all out bleed. The nasty Mind Rape may make an appearance and maybe a guest appearance by who knows whom. In the meantime enjoy yourselves my little fang-ed fiends. John Barclay sinkus@hotmail.com Just left of the middle of nowhere.