Official VEKN Malkavian Antitribu NEWSLETTER, February 2006 VOLUME V, Issue II 1. INTRODUCTION Looks like February is going to be a month of a "friendship" between anti-Malks and Harbingers of Skulls. Malone, my Harbinger colleague, created a Slaughterhouse deck with some good old !Malkavian stealth & bleed. I like the theme a lot (especially since the "star" of the show was Artemis, who wasn't my Vampire of the Month yet), and I was going to propose my own variant of the deck, which was completely different. But actually my demented mind created four different Slaughterhouse decks: one stealth-bleed, one intercept and two voting decks. One of the decks even had no Harbingers at all! (Guess how I made it? :)) Finally, I was exhausted and forced to choose the last deck, which I like most - see my Deck of the Month below. 2. WHAT ARE WE TALKING ABOUT? (just for novices) Name: The Slaughterhouse [BL:C1] Cardtype: Master Clan: Harbinger of Skulls Cost: 1 pool [Burn Option] Master: location. Tap to burn up to 2 cards from the top of your prey's library. Destroying opponent's library is one of the popular victory strategies in Magic, but not in VTES. Magic decks are smaller, there are strong milling cards, and depleting the library leads to a victory without any other cards. If you are going to use Slaughterhouses, you should have a lot of them, and this takes a lot of pool and a lot of master phase actions. And you don't immediately win after depleting your prey's library, though playing without cards may be hopeless for him. You may play Brinksmanship to really oust your prey through depleting his or her library. Name: Brinksmanship [Anarchs:R] Cardtype: Political Action Cost: 1 pool Political Card - Worth 1 Vote. Called by any vampire at +1 stealth. If this referendum is successful, put this card in play. Any Methuselah who has exhausted his or her library and begins his or her untap phase with less than a full hand must attempt to withdraw. On that Methuselah's next untap phase, if the withdrawal fails, that Methuselah is ousted. If any Methuselah successfully withdraws, you are ousted. If you don't remember the withdrawal rules, that's normal - almost nobody does :) A player must announce his intent to withdraw during his untap phase. For the withdrawal to succeed, the player must meet the following conditions: * None of his minions enter combat until his next untap phase. * None of his minions lose (or spend) any blood until his next untap phase. * He do not lose (or spend) any pool until his next untap phase. Obviously, the withdrawal is nearly impossible if your predator doesn't want you to withdraw. He can just bleed with any vampire, and the withdrawal would fail if the bleed would succeed (for 1 or more), or if you block it and enter combat, or if you deflect it with Telepathic Misdirection/Deflection, as these cards cost blood. So, if you manage to push Brinksmanship and mill the entire library of your prey, and force your prey to play or discard at least one card, you would probably oust him. All you need is a lot of votes (to push Brinksmanship), a lot of pool and MPAs for the Slaughterhouses, and a lot of time. Not too reliable strategy, right? 2. CARDS OF THE MONTH Name: Powerbase: Tshwane [LoB:R] Cardtype: Master Master: Unique location. Requires a ready Laibon. Tap this location to reduce the cost of a card you play by 1 pool (this location is not tapped if that card was canceled as it was played). Any Laibon may steal this location for his or her controller as a (D) action. Powerbase: Tshwane can save you a lot of pool. If you are playing a lot of cards that cost at least 1 pool (like the Slaughterhouse), you are going to save 1 pool each turn. There are no free cards providing 1 pool per turn in the whole game - such cards usually have some disadvantage, and Powerbase: Tshwane is no exception - it may be stolen. Fortunately, if you are the only player with Laibon vampires, nobody would be able to "steal" this card. This card is far more reliable than Powerbase: Los Angeles, since players won't be able to convert their vampires to Laibon without special cards, as they can do to get some Anarchs. And even most decks with Laibons won't get serious benefits from the Powerbase unless they were specificaly built around it. That's why you may generally rely on keeping the Powerbase for yourself, and in the right deck it is amazing! For instance, my Deck of the Month contains 17 cards that cost at least 1 pool, and in this deck Powerbase: Tshwane can easily save 10 pool or even more. Obviously, you should get it early, but aren't we talking about !Malks with their Sibyl's Tongues? :) Name: Maabara [LoB:R] Clan: Harbingers of Skulls Cardtype: Master Master. Unique location. You may tap this location to move a card from your ash heap to this location. You may use a master phase action to move a card from this location to the top of your library. Any vampire may burn this location as a (D) action. Card recycling is very good, especially in a combo-deck that relies on certain key cards. This card is somewhat similar to The Sargon Fragment: both allow you to play a single card in your ash heap again and again. The Fragment is more likely to be contested, and the card retrieval action can be blocked, but Maabara is going to be stolen unless you can protect it. You don't need to play an intercept deck to protect Maabara - one Guard Duty may be enough, especially in combination with a good weapon like Ivory Bow. Even if you lose Maabara, you may still return it with Anthelios, Red Star or the Sargon Fragment. Surely, spending a MPA for Maabara's ability is harsh, but if you have more than 1 MPAs per turn (The Parthenon, Rumors of Gehenna and so on), this card becomes extremely advantageous. Again, Maabara is especially good with Sibyl's Tongues,since it allows you to recycle Tongues and play the first one several times. 3. VAMPIRE OF THE MONTH Name: Babalawo Alafin [LoB:V] Clan: Harbingers of Skulls Group: 4 Capacity: 7 Disciplines: ani AUS FOR NEC Laibon. During your untap phase, if Alafin is ready, you may discard two cards (draw afterward). If the two cards are the same, each other Metuselah`s hand size is one card smaller until his or her next untap phase. Babalawo is a Laibon Harbinger, so he enables all the key cards - Slaughterhouses,Powerbase:Tshwane and Maabara. His disciplines aren't too fascinating - it's really hard to make a combat deck, or a voting deck, or any other powerful deck with Harbingers' clan disciplines and inferior Animalism. !Malkavians share only Auspex with Babalawo, so he's just going to stay untapped and deflect bleeds. But this really doesn't matter - the primary reason of using Babalawo is his wonderful ability. The ability may seem not outstanding, but in the Slaughterhouse/Brinksmanship combo deck it's really fantastic. You need to cycle your hand until you find at least one Sibyl's Tongue. Then you play the Tongue for Maabara, play Maabara and return the Tongue from your ash heap or cycle for another one. You can get all the cards you need in this manner, and play them several times. Babalawo's ability speeds up your plans and provides the possibility to mill your prey's library before he succeeds to oust your grandprey. It's really crucial for the deck. What about the second part of the ability? It may seem unimportant from the first sight, but it's also very good in a Brinksmanship deck. Suppose you've succeeded in milling your prey's library and played Brinsmanship. But how are you going to force your prey to lose a card from his hand? He may just sit with a full hand of cards and bleed his prey or hunt. But if you have Babalawo Alafin, you may just discard two copies of any card (Maabara or The Sargon Fragment can get a second copy from your ash heap), and your prey WILL lose a card and will be forced to withdraw at his untap phase. 4. DECK OF THE MONTH Deck Name: Bloat and Slaughter in the House :) Created By: Ilya Ginsburg Description: A Brinksmanship deck with some demented titled vamps Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 26, Max: 35, Avg: 7,5) --------------------------------------------- 3 Alicia Barrows AUS DEM OBF POT PRE 9 !Malk Archbishop 2 Quentin King III obf pre AUS DEM 7 Malkavian Prince 2 Fleurdumal cel tha AUS DEM PRE 8 Toreador Prince 4 Babalawo Alafin ani AUS FOR NEC 7 Harbinger 1 General Perfidio Dios dem obf AUS 5 !Malk Bishop Library: (90 cards) ------------------- Master (23 cards) 8 Slaughterhouse, The 3 Dreams of the Sphinx 1 Maabara 1 Powerbase: Tshwane 1 Parthenon, The 1 Presence 3 Minion Tap 1 Creepshow Casino 1 Powerbase: Madrid 3 Information Highway Action (11 cards) 5 Call, The 5 Sibyl`s Tongue 1 Guard Duty Action Modifier (21 cards) 3 Voter Captivation 4 Forgotten Labyrinth 4 Elder Impersonation 4 Lost in Crowds 5 Cloak the Gathering 1 Awe Political Action (12 cards) 1 Political Stranglehold 1 Ancient Influence 3 Parity Shift 1 Brinksmanship 1 Rumors of Gehenna 2 Autarkis Persecution 3 Banishment Reaction (6 cards) 6 Telepathic Misdirection Combat (8 cards) 8 Majesty Ally (1 cards) 1 Mylan Horseed (Goblin) Equipment (3 cards) 1 Sargon Fragment, The 1 Bowl of Convergence 1 Ivory Bow Event (1 cards) 1 Anthelios, the Red Star Combo (4 cards) 4 Swallowed by the Night This is an extremely "peaceful" voting deck that just tries to generate pool and stay alive until the "day D". Try to influence Babalawo first and cycle cards for Sibyl's Tongue unless you already have it in your starting hand - in that case you can influence an anti-Malk to play it for The Sargon Fragment, then recycle the Tongue back with it and get Parthenon and Dreams/Info Highway while influencing Babalawo. When you get The Sargon Fragment and Sibyl's Tongue, you should fetch Powerbase: Tshwane and Parthenon, then concentrate on amassing Slaughterhouses. It's very likely that the other players won't understand that you're playing a Slaughterhouse deck, and you should use this advantage. Avoid playing Slaughterhouses too early - if you happen to draw them, just discard them using their Burn Option or Babalawo's ability. You will be able to return them back afterwards. Surely, you should make deals playing this deck. Try to stay alive and slow down the game until you will deploy your Slaughterhouses. All your political actions somehow help you to control the table - you may take pool from the "rich" players and give it to the "poor" ones with Parity Shift, slow down players that are close to oust their preys with Banishments, provide extra possibilities to the weakest decks with Anthelios and Rumors of Gehenna or just feed everybody with Autarkis Persecution. Deal with the other "slow" decks against any "fast" decks like stealth-bleeds. This deck should make its combo engine work as soon as possible, so it has large number of acceleration cards: three Dreams, three Info Highways and five The Calls. Note that all these cards make good combos: you may use Dreams to find Info Highway or The Call, or you may use Info Highway to get 3 pool provided by The Call,and so on. Use the Presence skill card to enable Majesty and Voter Captivation for Babalawo, make him count for Political Stranglehold, and let Mylan Horseed untap him. You should make one vampire a "guardian of Maabara" with Bowl of Convergence, Ivory Bow and Guard Duty. Babalawo would be good for this purpose if nobody's going to block the equip actions and there are no heavy combat decks that could easily torporize him. Note that General Perfidio Dios has an "inbuilt Guard Duty" effect (without +1 intercept, though), so you may just get him Ivory Bow to detract possible attackers without stealth. If you fail to get the "guardian" cards, you may still play Maabara, especially if you have a Parthenon in play: use the first MPA for Maabara, tap it to return the needed card, then use the second MPA to put the card on top of your library. With Rumors of Gehenna and Anthelios in play you will even be able to exchange some other master card in your hand with Maabara in your ash heap, play Maabara and immediately use it - that way you will still recycle one card each turn even if your opponents would constantly burn your Maabara. And if you won't find Maabara, you may play Guard Duty to protect counters on Powerbase: Madrid :) Well, that's all for February. Hope you like my deck as I do - and true combo decks are really beautiful, aren't they? :) As always, all comments and ideas are appreciated. Yours, Ector