Official VEKN Malkavian Antitribu Newsletter, September 2006 VOLUME V, Issue IX 1. MY TOP FIVE 3rd EDITION VAMPS Third Edition has a lot of good new vampires. As usual, some of them are very good, and few are simply amazing. Here you'll find a Top5 of the best new vampires (from my humble point of view, of course). To avoid unneeded emotions, I have to clarify that "best vampires" mean "the vampires that provide easiest way to the victory" here. There are many cool vampires that I'd like to tinker with myself, but when I'm building a tournament deck, I need winners, so here they are! ------ 5th place ------ Name: Antonio d`Erlette Capacity: 5 Clan: Tremere Antitribu, g4 Disciplines: dom for pot THA Sabbat: While Antonio is ready, you may spend four transfers to search your hand or library (shuffle afterward) for a mage ally Antonio could play. Put that ally in play with life equal to his starting amount (pay cost as normal). Good disciplines and outstanding ability! Dominate, Fortitude and Potence can provide Antonio a place in a weenie deck with these disciplines. Superior Thaumaturgy without any Auspex forces me to think about Cryptic Mission decks and Tupdog/Create Gargoyle decks. And, certainly, recruiting Nephandi without any actions (and without any chance to block these actions) is amazing. Why he's only fifth? Because I don't see a straight way to victory here. In Gargoyles deck with Tupdogs/Create Gargoyles, Antonio is just slightly better than any other !Tremere with dom/tha, since he has Potence and can play Immortal Grapple if needed. If you want to use larger Gargoyles, he may be much better due to his Fortitude, but still won't be the major guy on the table. Recruiting Nephandi can make him a true star, but are Nephandi really that good in the world of Frontal Assaults and anti-allies tech inspired by reprinting of War Ghoul? ------ 4th place ------ Name: Hektor Capacity: 9 Clan : Brujah Antitribu, g4 Disciplines: for CEL POT PRE QUI Sabbat priscus: Damage from Hektor`s hand strikes is aggravated. Baali get +1 bleed when bleeding you. Hektor is an extremely effective combatant, as anyone could expect from a vampire with permanently aggravated hands. Besides that, he has CEL/POT/for that can make avoiding his hands nearly impossible. And he's got a good title, too! Though I like Hektor very much, I should admit that winning with him won't be easy. He has absolutely no stealth (not counting cards like Alacrity) and absolutely no intercept, so he can react only to hostile political actions - cast his votes and play Scalpel Tongue. Hektor is limited to rush decks, Trophy Hunter decks and various "bruise" decks, such as "bruise & bleed" and "bruise and vote". Neither of these deck archetypes is easy or provides a fast and clear way to win. Actually, I'm going to build a Trophy Hunter deck with Hektor, but I'd prefer to have an ability like Lambach's "may burn 1 blood to make the damage from his hand strikes aggravated for the current round", to control what damage you will deal and to burn the opposing vampires, not just torporize them (for instance, play Torn Signpost and Blur, but make the damage aggravated only for the last strike). Inferior Fortitude needs to be upgraded to superior ASAP, if you want Hektor to life longer and play superior Freak Drives/Forced Marches. Xaviar is much better Trophy Hunter than Hektor, and he's going to be much better combatant almost in any deck archetype except for the bruise'n'vote (superior Fortitude and auto-prevent are wonderful!), but nobody calls Xaviar "the best vampire" even in Anarchs :) Hektor is cheaper and generally has more votes; he has access to all Sabbat goodies, so he's also very good vampire, but there are better ones. ----- 3rd place ----- Name: Klaus Konrecht Capacity: 8 Clan: Toreador Antitribu, g4 Disciplines: for pot AUS CEL PRE Sabbat cardinal. A 8-cap Cardinal, with all clan disciplines at superior AND two more disciplines at inferior!!! The true power is in your hands. I can tell a long story about the decks you can build with him. Klaus shares pot/CEL/PRE with all Brujah/!Brujah, for/CEL/PRE with all Ishtarri, AUS/CEL/PRE with all Toreadors/!Toreadors. You may even find him good companions in for/pot/CEL/PRE (Hektor, Jaroslav, Lucinde), and, finally, Madame Guil shares ALL his disciplines at the same levels! What does he lack to be the best one? Stealth. There are brilliant titled vamps that can vote at stealth, which is much more stable and reliable than "bruise'n'vote". Unlike Hektor, Klaus isn't that intimidating, so if you want to clear you way, you should give him a gun or try the prevent/Disarm combo, which is far from being reliable. Klaus is a good blocker, cheap and efficient, and I guess that the most effective decks based on him would play in "The Wall" style, performing Creation Rites and waiting for Palla Grande :) Looks solid enough... ----- 2nd place ----- Name: Armin Brenner Capacity: 10 Clan: Brujah Antitribu, g4 Disciplines: ani obf CEL FOR POT PRE Sabbat Archbishop of Washington, D.C. When a referendum Armin calls passes, you gain 1 pool. Armin is a voter of your dream. Any vampire with Obfuscate, superior Presence and two votes is a good stealth-voter and deserves to be played, but this Roman-style ruler offers much more. Add superior Celerity, and you can play Scalpel Tongue at superior, which is very effective both proactively and reactively. Add superior Fortitude, and your fatty isn't more limited to Majesty as the combat defense; moreover, he can perform several actions per turn with Freak Drive/Forced March, and the latter even provides +1 stealth! You can easily mix Stavros with Ubende and Mukhtar Bey and get a wonderful stealth-voting/bleeding deck. Note that I didn't write a word about his Animalism and Potence! Finally, his ability is just amazing in a stealth-voting deck. You are going to pass unblocked, since you've got stealth, and you're going to push your referendum, since you've got votes, so Armin is going to bring you 1 pool per turn. This isn't as reliable as Hartmut Stover's ability, and you cannot gain pool on the turn you've summoned Armin, but the extra pool source will make your position much stronger. If you have Black Forest Base in play, Armin will generate you 3 pool per turn WITHOUT ANY CARDS, or 5 pool with Voter Captivation - your S&B predator is going to cry for desperation :) Don't forget to include Mylan Horseed to untap Armin and make sure that hostile Mylan won't burn your Base... So, who is the champion? Is there any vampire better than Armin? Yes, there is! And the name is... STAVROS!!! 2. VAMPIRE OF THE MONTH ----- 1st place ----- Name: Stavros Capacity: 7 Clan: Malkavian Antitribu, g4 Disciplines: dem AUS OBF PRE Sabbat priscus. Stavros is an uber-effective vampire - he offers the unique combination of low price and high efficiency that is a feature of the most famous weapons like T-34 tank or Kalashnikov SMG. Any 7-cap vampire with superior Obfuscate and Presence is going to be popular, since these two disciplines are primary for stealth-voting and stealth-bleeding decks, and there are NO cheaper vamps with these disciplines at superior, except for Raphael Catarari, which has a serious disadvantage. This alone should demonstrate how powerful Stavros really is, as he has much more than just these disciplines! Let's start with his title. There are no cheaper vamps with OBF/PRE I said? If you want the title as well, you won't find even suitable 8-caps with the needed features except for Stavros, and even 9-caps will offer you 2 votes at best, while Stavros can provide you 3 votes being a mere 7-cap. This is an immense power! Just for demonstration, let's imagine that LSJ would decide to create a 7-cap "Arika" (i.e. a very good vampire similar to Arika that would be nearly broken). What features of Arika are the most valuable and fearful?Superior Obfuscate, Presence and votes; maybe superior Dominate for Governs and Fortitude for Freak Drives. Her ability is very nice, and +2 bleed too, but most of the time she wins through stealth-voting, backed up with occasional stealth-bleeding and Governs. So, should LSJ wish to create a "7-cap Arika", he'd end up with something like this: Name: 7-cap Arika Capacity: 7 Clan: Ventrue Disciplines: dom FOR OBF PRE Camarilla Prince of Dreamland. Now the reason of Stavros' first place should be obvious to everyone: he is almost the same as the imaginary "7-cap Arika"! OK, his disciplines may be worse, as Fortutude is much more important for stealth-voter and stealth-bleeder than Auspex, but he is very close. Most of the time you'll have to influence much larger vampire than Stavros to get almost the same performance, and everyone should be familiar with the fatties' problems: they come into play too late, they are too expensive, and losing them is a disaster. Yes, you can compensate for these problems: use Zillah's Valleys, Minion Taps etc. etc, but you will risk of missing these cards early, or drawing too much of them when you'll need other cards. You will spend three turns influencing Armin Brenner without acceleration, and even when you get him (for 10 pool), he won't protect you from your S&B predator,which is going to bleed you with two vampires. This may result in a loss if you lose a lot of pool and be unable to influence the second vampire, since Armin has only 2 votes and he isn't going to outvote your opponents alone. With Stavros, the situation may be completely different: you can influence him on the second turn, and he may bounce even the first bleed of your predator - or at least make the predator bleed you with caution. The same difference may be crucial against the "title-squatters", or a horde of Presence-weenies with Praxis Seizures or Crusades: even if they manage to push the first Praxis Seizure, Stavros will say "no" to the future attempts. The most important advantage is the fact that you can live (and win) even if you lose your Stavros: he is so inexpensive that you'll often be able to influence another copy! That's why Stavros holds the champion title. Obviously, our champion isn't a "traditional" !Malk, as he has only inferior Dementation, but nevertheless, you may Call him with an older vampire and he may play Madman's Quill at inferior to get a heavy bleed or benefit from the superior effect played by someone else. Stavros can also play Blessing of Chaos, which is a very good anti-bleed card. But most of the time he is going to play in Obfuscate/Presence decks, both stealth/bleeding and stealth/voting. Superior Auspex that he provides besides the other goodies, is extremely valuable in every OBF/PRE deck, because these decks usually recruit Followers of Set (there are no other clans with these clan disciplines, and small vampires having them as out-clans aren't numerous), and the Setites usually cannot block or bounce bleeds. Playing without bounce isn't pleasant at all, as other players are usually happy to bleed you as heavy as they can and bounce bleeds to you - nobody loves the "cheesy" OBF/PRE decks on the table. Having superior Auspex makes Stavros simply amazing in every deck with OBF and PRE: he is uber-effective, and you use almost all his potential! An experienced deckbuilder will easily find some other vamps with superior Auspex to make sure that he'll get at least one such vampire in play. Low-cap S&B deck may use Antoinette, She Who Watches, while heavy voting decks may prefer Quentin King III or Alicia Barrows. 3. CARDS OF THE MONTH Name: True Love`s Face [KMW:C] Cardtype: Action Modifier Disciplines: Obfuscate & Presence [obf][pre] +1 bleed. After playing this card, you cannot play another action modifier to further increase the bleed for this action. [OBF][PRE] Only usable when a minion attempts to block. That block fails (do not tap that minion). That minion cannot attempt to block this action again. The controller of that minion may burn a pool to cancel this card as it is played. This is a "hallmark" card of Setites, though they should be large enough to play it at superior, and Stavros can play it at both levels, too. The inferior effect isn't very impressive, but it's better than inferior Aire of Elation, if you aren't playing Toreadors,because it's free. Most obf/PRE decks have superior Presence, though, and they will refer Aire of Elation unless blood is a problem or they are afraid of bounce/Archon Investigations. Superior version is very interesting: it resembles Elder Impersonation and Crocodile's Tongue. Though its effects may be canceled, unlike Elder Impersonation's effect, canceling them will cost a pool, and this loss cannot be reduced or bounced. So,generally, you will get at least "unpreventable bleed for 1" if your prey will cancel True Love's Face and block you. The best result would be playing this card AND pushing your action: hit your prey for 3 with KRC and make him lose 1 more for True Love's Face is much better than the single KRC. The primary strength of this card is its flexibility: there are no other Obfuscate cards that combine bleed-increasing effect with "block-fail" effect (or even with a stealth effect). One of the major problems of S&B decks is hand jam, when you are getting only stealth without bleed or only bleed without stealth. True Love's Face helps a lot against this problem: if you can play it at superior, it will never be a dead card in S&B. Name: Black Forest Base [Third:R] Master: unique location. Requires a ready Sabbat vampire. Once each turn, a Sabbat vampire may call a referendum to give his or her controller 2 pool from the blood bank as a +1 stealth political action. Any Changeling may burn this card as a +1 stealth (D) action. This card is extremely good, because it provides you an opportunity to gain 2 pool per turn without any political actions in your hand. This is especially precious if you play with vampires of different clans and cannot generate pool with Consangineous Boons. Yes, you could play Diversity in that case, but it may provide much more pool to another player, which isn't good. Black Forest Base is almost a no-brainer in any Sabbat voting deck, and even a non-voting deck with enough votes (Hektor, for instance). Besides gaining pool, it provides you a wonderful opportunity of playing Voter Captivation (gaining 2 more pool) and cycling all voting modifiers that lay dead in your hand without any political actions. Likewise, you can burn an unneeded political action for a vote, AFAIK. This opportunity may be even more important than gaining 2 pool! Black Forest Base is a location, which means that it can be stolen or destroyed. A voting deck can protect it against Disputed Territory (unless another voting deck has more votes), but not from Rampage or similar effects. Hektor or another dangerous combatant can be assigned to Guard Duty against them, and be sure to include Mylan Horseed to prohibit stealing your Base with him. If you are playing Sabbat voters, Mylan would probably find a job in your deck anyway. If any opponent is playing Shadow Court Satyrs, your Black Forest Base is doomed :) 4. DECKS OF THE MONTH Deck Name: Stavros S&B Created By: Ilya Ginsburg Description: obf/PRE stealth-bleed with AUS for bounce Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 18, Max: 26, Avg: 5,58) ---------------------------------------------- 2 Stavros dem AUS OBF PRE 7 !Malkavian 2 Antoinette cel obf AUS PRE 6 Toreador 2 Ankh-sen-Sutekh obf PRE SER 6 Followers of Set 1 Raphael Catarari aus pot tha OBF PRE 5 !Nosferatu 1 Tock obf pot pre 4 !Nosferatu 1 Axel Von Anders cel obf pot PRE 5 !Brujah 1 Zhenga obf pre SER 5 Followers of Set 1 Ezekiel obf pot PRE SER 6 Followers of Set 1 Robin Withers dom obf pre 4 Ventrue Library: (90 cards) ------------------- Master (17 cards) 1 Ferraille 2 Dreams of the Sphinx 2 Information Highway 3 Obfuscate 1 Barrens, The 2 Wash 3 Blood Doll 1 Powerbase: Los Angeles 1 Opium Den 1 Temple Hunting Ground Action (23 cards) 2 Waters of Duat 6 Enchant Kindred 5 Enticement 6 Legal Manipulations 4 Social Charm Action Modifier (22 cards) 4 Lost in Crowds 4 Faceless Night 6 True Love`s Face 1 Aire of Elation 5 Spying Mission 2 Elder Impersonation Reaction (10 cards) 2 On the Qui Vive 3 Wake with Evening Freshness 5 Telepathic Misdirection Combat (10 cards) 10 Majesty Ally (1 cards) 1 Carlton Van Wyk (Hunter) Retainer (2 cards) 2 Marijava Ghoul Combo (5 cards) 5 Swallowed by the Night This is a straight and simple obf/PRE stealth-bleeding deck. Stavros isn't the "star" here,since no S&B can be built around a single "star", but he is extremely good, and he really makes the deck much better. Any deck can benefit from having votes; any S&B appreciates a vampire with both "stealth" and "bleed" disciplines at superior, but Stavros also serves as a support vampire with Auspex! He is even better in this deck than Korah was in the obf/DEM stealth-bleed, because Auspex is fairly common among Malks/!Malks, but not among obf/PRE vampires. This deck has four vampires with superior Auspex (two copies of Stavros and Antoinette,She Who Watches), and if you feel that your predator can launch heavy bleeds, you should dig until you get at least one of them. Since Obfuscate and Presence are Setites' clan disciplines, this deck should have a lot of Setites. Unfortunately, there aren't too many good low-cap Setites with obf/PRE in the 3/4 group, so this deck has only four of them. Ankh-sen-Sutekh is awesome, Ezekiel is just solid, and Zhenga was included as a low-cap Enticer :) There are some Setites' cards in the deck: Ferraile, Opium Den, HG, Waters of Duat and five Enticements, so you'd better get at least one of your Setites. This deck generally can afford fetching new vampires from your crypt, so I didn't double Ezekiel; feel free to do it if your environment is harsh. This deck should be very stable and difficult to stop, since its average capacity is low, and there are no heavy "stars" that are common in the Setites S&B decks. Killing any one vampire won't stop this deck - if you manage to torporize the vampire you wanted, since a lesser vampire (especially Waters of Duat) or Carlton may block your rush. Needless to say, Majesties and Swallowed by the Night offer a solid protection for your primary vamps,and it requires a dedicated combat deck to torporize your vampires. The crypt is very solid, and it isn't much worse than any S&B crypt. Besides Stavros, there are two new vampires from Third Edition: Axel von Anders and Raphael Catarari. The latter is an interesting gamble that can be easily shut down by Gregory Winter or Cryptic Missions, but you may just avoid influencing him if you expect these dangers. Only three vampires have inferior Presence, but, alas, only three have superior Obfuscate as well, so you should upgrade your vampires with the provided Obfuscate skill cards if needed. If you don't expect intercept, you may get rid of the skill cards, placing them on your Waters of Duat - this way you'll get some additional bleeders. If the intercept is present, play Waters without skill cards, they will at least protect you from rushes or help to "overload" intercept. Card selection is pretty obvious here, as most cards are traditional in the S&B decks. You need Dreams and Info Highway for acceleration, and Dreams also help cycling your hand,which is crucial. The Barrens and Powerbase: Los Angeles are primary cyclers, and you'll really need them, since hand jam is a major threat for this deck. Washes will deny pool regaining of your prey, and they are going to be better that Sudden Reversals, IMHO, since you aren't going to paralyze your prey, just to prohibit the pool-gaining masters. There are only three Blood Dolls here, because you will generate enough pool from your Presence-based actions, and your vampires will need their blood to play Majesties, Legal Manipulations and Marijava Ghouls. You even have a Hunting Ground to avoid hunting. Opium Den and Ferraile are just the best clan-based cards you could use, and if you can use them, why not? Extra votes and extra stealth will never hurt. The action package should ensure bleeding for 3 with almost every vampire, but not more than for 3, to avoid Archon Investigations and problems with bounce. Play Enchant Kindred at superior if you can: this deck never stops recruiting new vampires; the more you have, the better. Bleed is focused on actions to gain the benefit from Marijava Ghouls and gain some pool. You have only one Aire of Elation, mostly to confuse your opponents,since True Love's Face is much more reliable (blood-wise and bounce-wise). You may also play superior True Love's Face on the crucial action like getting Marijava Ghoul, and your predator may decide that attempt to blocking it isn't worth 1 pool :) Always try to divide your bleed evenly among vampires, i.e. one vamp bleeds with Social Charm + True Love's Face, another with Legal Manipulations, then Ankh-sen-Sutekh bleeds with TL'sF, and so on. The stealth package is rather slim for a S&B (20 stealth cards + 6 True Love's Faces), but you should be able to compensate this with Marijava Ghouls, Opium Den and Majesties,that your can "trade" for a Wake of your prey. Sometimes you'll be able to fool your prey by pretending that you have no stealth: allow him to block your first action and play Majesty, then play superior TL'sF on the second action, make him lose a pool and then add stealth :) The defensive package includes Telepathic Misdirections and Wakes, as usual. Since you'll have only one vampire with Auspex most of the time, you cannot play a lot of On the Qui Vives: your bouncer should be able to wake two times per turn. But two On the Qui Vives shouldn't hurt, and you may replace them with Telepathic Misdirection sometimes. Deck Name: Stavros vote Created By: Ilya Ginsburg Description: Stavros and Armin Brenner shine as stealth-voters Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 28, Max: 37, Avg: 7,75) ---------------------------------------------- 3 Armin Brenner ani obf CEL FOR POT PRE 10 !Brujah 2 Mukhtar Bey obf pot FOR PRE QUI 7 Caitiff 2 Quentin King III obf pre AUS DEM 7 Malkavian 3 Stavros dem AUS OBF PRE 7 !Malkavian 2 Ubende for obf qui CEL PRE 7 Ishtarri Library: (90 cards) ------------------- Master (17 cards) 1 Powerbase: Madrid 2 Obfuscate 2 Dreams of the Sphinx 2 Information Highway 1 Yawp Court 3 Minion Tap 1 Purchase Pact 1 Elysium: the Arboretum 1 Secure Haven 1 Black Forest Base 1 Legendary Vampire 1 Wash Action Modifier (28 cards) 6 Voter Captivation 4 Freak Drive 2 Aire of Elation 4 Forgotten Labyrinth 4 Lost in Crowds 4 Faceless Night 4 Spying Mission Political Action (16 cards) 2 Banishment 8 Kine Resources Contested 1 Disputed Territory 1 Kindred Segregation 1 Domain Challenge 1 Diversity 2 Parity Shift Reaction (9 cards) 5 Telepathic Misdirection 2 Wake with Evening`s Freshness 2 On the Qui Vive Combat (10 cards) 10 Majesty Action (1 card) 1 Blessing of Chaos Equipment (2 cards) 1 Heart of Nizchetus 1 Seal of Veddartha Combo (7 cards) 3 Scalpel Tongue 4 Swallowed by the Night Now, this is a strong stealth-voting deck that fully exposes Stavros' potential. There are two "stars" here: Stavros and Armin Brenner, and they both are truly amazing here.Stavros is cheaper, more stealthy and has more votes most of the time; he also serves as a blocking/bouncing support. Armin is a platform of Banishments, Scalpel Tongues and Freak Drives, he's also much better with Minion Taps and Voter Captivations. This deck uses Obfuscate, Presence,Auspex, Celerity and Fortitude, but the last three are just support, and you are going to have at least one vampire to play all the cards almost every time. There are five vampires with superior Auspex, five vampires with CEL/PRE and SEVEN (!) vampires with Fortitude in your crypt. And every vampire has at least two votes! Let's review master cards first. Since you have six Sabbat voters in your crypt, Powerbase: Madrid seems obvious, as well as Black Forest Base. You'll need the acceleration (Dreams and Info HWs) as any other good deck. Minion Taps will help you to generate some pool early and free some place for Voter Captivations :) You can't miss Legendary Vampire in a voting/bleeding deck full of 7-caps: in fact, if you draw it, you should seriously think about recruiting a new vampire for it, 4 extra votes are always good,not to mention about +2 bleed. As long as Rush is your worst enemy, there are various defensive masters: both "end combat" cards and Secure Haven. And you have a Yawp Court to contest this card of your opponent - this is a constant threat that should be eliminated at any cost. Wash can be a nasty surspise if you cancel a Minion Tap of your prey. I guess that political actions are pretty clear, as well as the stealth package. Since this deck can Freak Drive to untap, it can bleed after voting (or before voting to get the Edge),and there are few Aire of Elations to punish your prey for believing that you can bleed only for 1 :) If you have Scalpel Tongue and expect to use it as a reaction, you may just leave Armin or Ubende untapped. There are two permanent bleed enhancers: Legendary Vampire and Seal of Veddartha.You should play the Seal on a vampire with Auspex (preferably Stavros) that should eventually be able to play Freak Drive and bounce bleeds. If you play Blessing of Chaos on the same vampire, he will protect you against sudden bleed modifiers. Well, that's all for September. As always, all comments and ideas are appreciated! Yours, Ector