SALUBRI ANTITRIBU NEWSLETTER Welcome back to the Terrordome! Volume 1, Issue 2 May 2002 Author: Atrovent the German Chainsaw =================================================== TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction Discussions - The !Sal Bloodbath Talkshow Card of the Moment - Blessing of the Name Deck of the Moment - Chainsaw Massacre Dogma 75 Sign Off =================================================== INTRODUCTION Use the Edge to get the Edge! Samiel, our beloved Samiel, is dead. Cry, cry blood, oh brothers and sisters of the chainsaw, our beloved butcher is no more. And to you, you grinning magicians, fear the Vengeance of Samiel, for he will still hunt you in our dreams! He has Blessed our Names! Do you already hear the chainsaws soft murmuring? And don't say we are mad! No, we aren't! Never! We are blessed! Our Names are Blessed! Harharharhar! Atrovent, the German Chainsaw. =================================================== DISCUSSION: THE !SAL BLOODBATH TALKSHOW Oh, were I to know the discussion my last newsletter was to create (over 40 postings on the newsgroup, some more letters to me), I would have changed . nothing. Hey, this is the lifeblood of the jyhad, isn't it? Wouldn't it be awfully boring if just one man would do the talking? On the other hand, this chapter went so big that I decided to skip some of the new topics I planned to introduce in favor of diving deeper into old ones. This may be argueable, but hey, it's my point of view! So, come on, here are some more bloodbites to be swallowed: The Highlights of last month's discussions.But what does it do? It's simple: Aggravated damage for simple Melee Weapons! That's something no clan has discovered before us. comment: Ancient hearts, 1995, Quietus, Blood Agony Okay, quit grinning. So I would take something back. But just to cover the secret that we undermined the Assamites to test some of the tricks of the trade before we emerge as the major gamebreaking power we are today (ahem. Or something close to this. Or a little bit worse. Or, oh, go to hell and hunt some Baali there, nitpickers!). Thanks, Reyda, and I'm still testing your suggestions about the Ritual of the Bitter Rose! The Garrote is only useable at close range (which melee weapon isn't, but it's mentioned on the card, and so I'll repeat it faithfully) comment: some people may try to use it with shadow strike =) Yeah, of course. Since it's an obtenebration card and therefor not easily available for !Sal, I faithfully ignore this kind of things. Conclusion: With the possible exception of the Garotte and the Brass Knuckles, the Gas-powered Chainsaw will be my weapon of choice for this stage of the Eternal Struggle! Comment: meat hook is a good option too, since you can strike and use the press as many time as you want and then throw a sword of the righteous for the last round for that burning blow. Presses tend to destroy weenies, and except for Adonai most !Sal are very small. Some people suggested to try Garottes instead of Chainsaws. It may be an option. I haven't tested them yet, but I'm grateful for any experiences my esteemed fence-hockers are prepared to offer an will test them myself once my gaming group is fed up with the marvelous sound of my namesake, the chainsaw! Another comment mentioned Sword of the Righteous vs. heavy S:CE. In this case, use the card after Fast Reaction to kill some nasty opponents and swarm your prey with your weenies. I was able to build some pressure with this tactics, though it won't work that great vs. PRE-weenies. You may try Adonai bleed - blessing of the name - D-attack to help him discard the S:CE but it's not reliable (and doesn't work vs. non-camarilla). Fast Reaction is usually good versus your predator, bur sometimes you can catch your prey while hunting, equipping, voting or whatever and put this card into good use, not just to circumvent S:CE. On to the discussion about last month's deck: 2 Iadala, Prophet of Guadalajara !Malk 4 AUS dem if successfully equipping, untap her at end of turn comment: She's pretty good, but as equipping her with a weapon is ridiculous as she can't fight without aid from blessing of the name, I don't know what ELSE she does... She can Pulse of the Canaille, Heidelburg, intercept and prepare a fast reaction ... Don't underestimate a simple Gas-powered chainsaw for blocking weenies or intercepting vampires with low blood level. And she's cheap for her abilities. Comment: And what do you do against a Torn Signpost undead strength shit? So they do +x hand damage vs Doris McMillian. Okay, we'll both go to torpor (aggrevated damage). I have Sense Vitality if I can't live without Doris. Him, too? How long do they fight? And if you don't want to fight, stake up some additional Blissful Agonies and let him have fun with someone else (his prey or predator, whatever you are not, if you are at superior valeren of course). Comment: Animalism long rang? Two very popular tournament deck types. IR-Googles, two auspex maneuvers. May not be enough, I'll have to see, in an dogma 60 deck. In the meantime, I'm on Dogma 75 or 90, and would further improve the Auspex cards (with maneuvers) since equipping proves to be reliable even in bigger decks. Still testing! Another reader commented on this issue: Mine play Trap and Undead Persistence and wait until you run out of Grapples and maneuvers. Then they hit you for 5 agg and go to torpor, where someone else can play Sense Vitality on them. They're weenies. Treat them like weenies... ie. disposable. I've not tried this tactic yet, so I leave it for you to comment. Thanks for the suggestion, though! Comment: Sweet, you're golden. Now spend the 6 turns equipping with all these things, getting blocked, and not having a sword of righteousness on hand to knock them into torpor, cause you're over loaded with equipment. Another comment mentioned that equipping may get blocked early on. Yeah, if this happens you're toast. It did sometimes (usually some early blocker stopped the equipping actions, though Gift of Bellona helps) until I took Baltimore in the deck. This one is key, so there should be some more of it in the deck, but even in the case you described you usually have a few vampires out there to equip and maybe to Heidelburg. Most of the items are good on themselves to survive early battles even with the wrong cards. But I never experienced an equipment-hand jam with the deck so far, and I played several matches. Usually I'm done with most of the equipping actions I need after the first three turns, then redistributing starts... To enhance speed, I play with Vast Wealth and may include another one. Sadly, those equipping actions are blockable. Port of Baltimore is a great card for equipping and unblockable once in play. It's essiential to equip as soon as possible, even using Thomas Steed to search and a blessings of the name to equip him in the same turn early on. If one guy is equipped, use him for other equipping actions and Heidelberg for transfers. Early on, a weenie with aus is recluctant to face a chainsaw, later on a big guy may be reluctant to face a chainsaw of the righteous. But of course you are right, once the flow of equipment is interrupted early on, you are most surely doomed. And one last all-out-attack on my deck: >This deck has no heavy bleed defense, Intercept, Blessing of the name, auspex and fast reaction to remove stealth/bleeder, Adonai D-Attack if he's camarilla... >no heavy bleed, Pulse of the Canaille on Adonai, +1 Bleed inbred and Burning Touch is a bleed of 5. Add a heidelberged Laptop Computer for more fun. >no voting capacity, Yeah, intercept will have to do it, since no !Sal has votes. > no way around SCE (fast reactions hit your predator, NOT your prey), see above comments. Another reader suggested: Blissful agony is actually one of the better S:CE hosers in the game, but obviously only works if you are blocking (and have more than one in your library). If you're blocking, you can wait until you see the opposing minion play S:CE before deciding to Blissful Agony him. (.) Basically, it ends up looking like Psyche! -- the opponent spends two S:CE cards to your one Blissful Agony... except for the prerange crap you toss around making your melee weapons aggravated. I find it much more effective to take the person that I'm in combat with and throw them to their predator or prey, as appropriate -- whoever is inclined to kick their ass ANYWAY. This for additional information. I plan on presenting a blissful agony deck in one of the future editions. Please, hold the line! (Back to the interrupted all-out-attack) >and really isn't an aggresive intercept deck (that is, it doesn't intercept its PREY)... Why not? Auspex intercepts, Sport Bike, Blessing of the Name... My prey in the game I mentioned was a Brujah with Magnums and somesuch. He never got a gun to one of his Ladies. >How the WORLD did you oust your prey with this? Two preys. Brujah guns and !Ven/Harbringers. I did it with a weenie flow. Constantly attack with four !Sal a round, each equipped like an arsenal. Blessings of the Name. Kill the blockers if you see some, if something goes wrong, use Sense Vitality. Use Sword of the Righteous only if you're quite sure the opponent won't run away or S:CE. Naturally, this deck or the new Dogma 75 presented below is not tested vs. every kind of opponent or combinations of prey- and predatordecks. There are some constellations where it'll die most horribly, i'm sure of this. What deck isn't? An early version was smacked down very quickly, but lacked some key cards later added. See my comments on the platests and the Dogma 75 deck offered below. Please try either deck and tell me of the results! And thank you all for the comments and discussions, even the attacks, for they sharpen the mind and may always detect some flaws! Just to keep matters in hand (partly) and finally get to something new, I'll delay discussions about comparability of Sal and !Sal, Fame/Sense Vitality decks and Ritual of the Bitter Rose to another newsletter yet to be written. =================================================== Now something new: CARD OF THE MOMENT: Blessing of the Name Name: Blessing of the Name [BL] Cardtype: Action Clan: Salubri antitribu Cost: 1 blood +1 stealth action. Usable by a tapped Salubri antitribu. You may not play this card if you have a Blessing of the Name in play. Put this card in play and choose this acting vampire and up to 2 other minions you control. Untap the chosen minions. The chosen minions have +1 intercept and inflict +1 damage with melee weapons while this card is in play. During your next untap phase, burn this card and tap the chosen minions. Okay, last month I said the !Sal aren't good at stealth, this time I contradict myself. So what? Blessing of the Name is worth such little inconsistence. And you may argue if a +1 Stealth is good. Ah, mumblings beside the point (or is it "beside the edge"? Whatever!)! So, how does Blessing of the Name works? It's pretty simple. You need a tapped Salubri Antitribu. That's not a hard goal to achieve, for there are countless methods to do this to your own vampires. Since we are the Salubri Antitribu, equipping with melee weapons is a wonderful way to do this and use one of the boons, +1 damage with melee weapons, simultaneously (if our victims like to fight, that is). So go to your local Al's Army Apparatus or other trademark shop in your neighborhood, buy the newest shining thing in his little shop of goodies and go test it. You have to pay him for it, unlike your local car dealer, for just testing his goodies, but if we continue our purchase pact with him, I'm sure we'll get a discount on melee weapons sooner or later. Or just buy a Garotte, Poker or some of those other weapons with flaws, they are cheap this days. But I digress. To get a maximum of this card, you'll have to have two other minions tapped, ready for another action. Note that the term is minion, not vampire. And there is no comment on this minions to be !Sal. Another raid for Ambrosius with his Talbot's Chainsaw, anyone? No, that won't happen, for Talbot's Chainsaw isn't a melee weapon. And another minor point, you can't do repeat actions. But you can equip him, untap him and use the Chainsaw in one round (without the +1 bonus, of course. Talbot! Do your job properly, next time!). How else could you use it? Anybody with Freak Drive, Rutor's Hand and so on could tell you volumes on this. If you can't imagine a thing, go hunting. Go for a bleed after you have this nice Blessing upon your weapon . er, name. It is more fun to do it properly equipped. Just another thought: If you have the Baali invited in your house (was there some minor misunderstanding in our common past?), you may save the cost for untapping your infernal friends or their Herald of Tophnet or whatever this layer of hell is called and untap them with a Blessing. Blessed Demons? Oh well, I won't dig to much into this topic to keep my mind sane. Who's giggling? Show yourself! Come to me, and I'll let my gas-powered chainsaw sing for you! Okay, just let me clean my beloved weapon from all this wasted blood. Ah, the flavor of licking a blooded blade! Where was I? Ah, the Blessing of the name. Let me assure you, after a few Blessing on the Name of a nice !Sal horde at your disposal in a given stage of the Jyhad (a cardgame you may have heard of), your grandprey and grandpredator will get a terrible yawning, an urge for ordering pizza and so on when it's your turn. Your prey won't get this, he will instead develop an urge for blocking or, failing this, for towels or other sweat-reducers. With Blessing upon the Name, you will easily be able to play seven actions in the third round. Say Doris, Wolf and Thomas are already there, Wolf has a Laptop. It's easily achievable in weenie-town. Action phase: Doris equips with a Leather Jacket. Thomas searches for a gas-powered chainsaw. Wolf equips with this newly recovered trademark weapon. Thomas untaps all three with Blessing of the Name. Wolf goes for a bleed with a computer hacking. Potential bleed: 3. Potential damage: 4 points, maybe aggravated with Sword of the Righteous (see last newsletter). The action is resolved. Heidelburg is used to move Laptop and Chainsaw to Thomas. Thomas imitates Wolf. Doris goes for a bleed. At the end: untap Doris, for she has equipped with the Leather Jacket this turn, even if nobody can remember it was this turn and not one severeal rounds ago and even if the Leather Jacket is already burned. She has +1 intercept until your next untap phase, something you predator might overlook (Doris has no auspex). If you have Pier 13, Port of Baltimore in action, chances are that you have another (pseudo-) equip action in your influence phase. If you play a Wake on Thomas, he is still blessed, has +1 intercept and +1 damage on his chainsaw. People tend to overlook this, but not often, it's a rather rude awakening. In your next untap phase, the Blessing upon the name is burned. Sadly, you can't burn the card, tap the Blessed Ones, then untap them regulary (it's the untap phase, isn't it?). Minions untap first, then all other things like Powerbase: Mexiko or whatever happen. But don't cry to hard for having all your minions tapped. Just play another Blessing upon the name, untap and catch a unsuspecting prey by surprise. If you plan to do this in advance, be a nice !Sal and inform your prey that all of your guys are tapped next round thanks to the aftershocks of the Blessing, so he has nothing to fear. He won't believe you anything at all in the future, of course, but that's just so bad. If he's on his guard, just let the bad effects wore of and start the aerobic exercises next round again: And tap and tap and tap and untap and untap and untap and tap and tap and tap - when does the pizza arrive? It's good for the kill to equip with Laptops first, then bless and bleed (and Heidelburg) - chances are your prey was calculating with less bleed then you can deliver. Our Action modifier for +1 bleed (Burning Touch) or Adonai with his inbreed +1 bleed can further ensure your plan, though Adonais thirst has no surprise factor and, a bad sight for your weenies, you need superior valeren for bleed modifying with Burning Touch. Oh, one thing not to be forgotten: You can only play one Blessing per round, even if you have more than three targets, since the card stays in play. After the round, it's burned. You still can't find a way to tap a minion? Try the Sargon Fragment (or Charlotta Giovanni) to dive for the last-Round-Blessing and untap again. To end this topic, a few drops of water to your wine, ehm, blood: Blessing on the name is a card that will be intercepted whenever possible, so some of those strategems won't work. So what? Just see it as a cards that says: Usable by a tapped Salubri antitribu. You may not play this card if you have a Blessing of the Name in play. Enter (another) combat with an opponent minion of the choice of your prey or predator who must have at least +1 intercept (it's +1 stealth). If he refuses (to block), he has to face dire consequences. This would be pretty good all on itself, wouldn't it? =================================================== Deck of the Moment: North American Chainsaw Massacre Dogma 75 (The deck is an "improvement" (I hope) to last months Dogma 60 (cards) deck) Okay, i worked over the North American Chainsaw Massacre since it's last performance and tested it on our Friday Night Jyhad. This time we were only three people, my prey was a Gangrel, my predator a Harbinger (everywhere Fortitude, sigh). Since both players knew my deck from last session, they tried to stop my equipping actions early on, which gave me some trouble. I got Adonai pretty well equipped, but my opponents made sure no other vampire of mine got their equipment (chainsaw). It went better once Baltimore entered. Note: I got to play with Creepshow Casino to get more stealth on equipping actions. Since last test I ran out of cards fairly quick (see first newsletter), I increased my deck from 60 to 75 cards, adding more combat cards. It was no trouble to get the equipping started at all, but Heidelberg appeared late again (note: put in one more?). This was bad since in the late game, I had only Adonai with lots of equipment (IR-googles, flak jacket, gas-powered chainsaw, leather jacket.), my other surviving minion,Thoms Steed, had no equipment at all and spend most of his time hunting (note: Palatial estate and Ritual of the Bitter Rose to get some costs back in?). Since equipping went fairly well regarding the availability of the cards (thanks to Baltimore, Vast wealth, Thomas Steed and so on), next match I think I'll increase to the magic 90 cards, perhaps adding some more intercept to balance that account. How the match ended? After two hours, it would have been a draw, the Gangrel ruled the table but hadn't managed to oust his prey. I wasn't able to bleed him once, but hold my position, burning vampires with chainsaws of the righteous left and right (a prey with two pulse of the canaille? I think not.). Since we play without time limit, the Gangrel managed to sweep the table after Adonai made his last stand with only two blood left facing a nearly full capacity Wynn, who wasn't able to prevent six points of aggravated damage (chainsaw, sword of the righteous, Venegance of Samiel). It's better to burn out than to fade away! 0 VP, sadly. In another game this weekend (with the same unmodified deck) we were five players; my predator was a Ravnos and my prey a Lasombra. Equipment flow was good again and I managed to burn a minion of my predator early on to break his spirit, then concentrated on my prey and managed to reduce him to a lonely Moncada the No-blocker with three blood left and five pool. I had four vampires in the game, all with chainsaws and some additional equipment, all tapped but three Wakes on my hand. This was the moment my predator was ousted by the Tremere. He played Sleeping Mind and ousted me with Govern and Conditioning. He had a Misdirection, so not tapping out wouldn't have saved me, but I was angry with myself nonetheless. The Tremere had no trouble killing the Lasombra (no, not The Lasombra, but the Lasombra) afterwards, thanks to my previous work. The conclusion? Equipping was reliable, but to much equipment and no poolgain can even bring a weenie horde in dangerous regions. The deck (75 card version, I put the Dogma 60 version before the card name and the Dogma 75 version after it, so you can see what I changed and discuss it): Crypt (unchanged): Doris McMillon 2 val 2 Wolf Valentine 4 VAL for press to continue combat vs. Tremere 2 Thomas Steed, The Angry 4 val aus ani melee weapon searcher 2 Kervos, The Lietenant 3 val aus 2 Iadala, Prophet of Guadalajara !Malk 4 AUS dem if successfully equipping, untap her at end of turn 3 Adonai 7 VAL AUS for D action to attack camarilla, +1 bleed, +1 strength vs. Tremere (60 cards) Library (75 cards) 11 Combat Starter 15 3 Fast Reaction 3 1 Telepathic Tracking 0 2 Nose of the Hound 2 4 Forced Awakening 6 1 Wake with Evening's Freshness 4 11 Combat winner 16 6 Sword of the Righteous 7 2 Vengeance of Samiel 2 1 Blissful Agony 1 2 Taste of Vitae 3 1 Sense Vitality 3 4 Bleed 9 2 Pulse of the Canaille 2 2 Burning Touch 7 9 Equipment (non-melee-weapon) 10 2 Leather Jacket 2 1 Flak Jacket 1 2 Laptop Computer 2 1 Pier 13, Port of Baltimore 2 2 IR Goggles 2 1 Sport Bike 1 4 Equipment (melee-weapon) 4 4 Gas-Powered Chainsaw 4 9 Master 9 1 Elder Library 1 2 Powerbase: Mexico City 3 1 Powerbase: Chicago 1 2 Blood Doll 2 1 Fame 0 1 Heidelberg Castle, Germany 1 1 Vast Wealth 1 5 Intercept 5 1 Melange 1 2 Enhanced Senses 2 2 Spirit's Touch 2 2 Equipper 2 2 Gift of Bellona 2 4 Combo 4 4 Blessing of the Name 4 =================================================== SIGN OFF Okay, this was the second newsletter for the Salubri Antitribu. I hope you enjoyed it (again?) and I'm interested in how much fuss I'll generate this time. Comments and help are always welcome, Atrovent the German Chainsaw, Oliver.volland@gmx.net Law of Selective Gravity: An object will fall so as to do the most damage.