Flesh is art, pain an artform, and your soul is my canvas.... 6/1/99 Editors Corner - Ethan Burrow, Prince of Austin I'm in the mood to ramble about the new leagues and the new cards this month. After the recent announcement of league play I couldn't have been happier. Sealed decks, ante, fixed resources, etc. have always been more fun for me to play than unlimited constructed play. I even have a local store lined up to host and help support our league in Austin once everything gets ironed out. (for those in the area I've talked with the owner of Dragon's Lair close to UT campus and he's been very supportive) My concern however deals with the also recent drying up of cards. Our group is now finding it hard to get our hands on Ancient Hearts, and I also hear that Sabbat supply lines are drying up as well. If league play is supposed to be fashioned after sealed as I expect it will, we'd better see some reprintings if the leagues are going to function. I for one don't want to play pure Jyhad for league play ;-) With the resurgence of sealed play locally as well as league play (and hopefully sanctioned DCI sealed tournaments), there will be plenty if not rampant demand for more cards to be on the shelves. Here's hoping the shelves aren't empty in the coming months. Lastly the new cards. We haven't really heard anything new since...a while. Is there *anyone* at WOTC reading this, and can you give us *any* new info on whether cards are even in conception phase, playtesting phase, anything? I'm starting to run out of Clan Specific cards of the month guys. Vampire of the Month - Antoinette DuChamp She may not be a Toreador-Antitribu, but for her cost she's a definate inclusion into your crypt. Two Toreador-Antitribu clan skills for a 1 CAP vampire cannot be ignored. She has the ability to bleed/vote, and survive combat if blocked, if handled correctly. As with most Caitiff however, she has a disadvantage - she burns an additional blood for actions and strikes requiring Celerity. Although closer inspection reveals the disadvantage isn't really as bad as it seems. How many actions require celerity? Only three : Cat Burglary, Distraction, and Speed of Thought. I have rarely seen these cards in play, and to be honest she only burns the blood if the action is successful. So you can still successfully play Cat Burglary if you need to, and if it's blocked, the disadvantage didn't come into play. She shouldn't even try to play the other two in my opinion, but if you need to cycle a card... How many strike cards require Celerity? Several actually, but they all fall into 3 categories - Dodge, Strike : Combat Ends, and Fast Hands. So unless you play Master Disciplines on her to increase her capacity to hold more blood; she cannot steal weapons, cannot S:CE, and cannot use Acrobatics. She can still dodge to avoid getting torporized or burned, provided she has a blood on her. Otherwise you still have the full range of maneuvers, presses, additional strikes, etc. to utilize as normal. As long as you plan your combat around the latter card types you should do just fine if you are only using celerity for combat. But remember you can S:CE and dodge with Presence combat cards. So if you play with Staredown, really the bottom line is you cannot steal weapons or use fancy "dodge and do something else" cards with Antoinette. Mixing Presence strikes with your celerity and avoidiing the special celerity actions will basically nullify Antoinettes disability, so why are you not playing with her? Card of the Month - Art Scam This card is pretty straightforward, you gain 2 pool. I recommend you grab as many of these as you can. With a lot of them in your deck, they can be a more effective way of pool gain than master phases can be. It won't jam your hand, it's at inherent stealth (and with Jost you can avoid casual intercept), and it's faster than using master phase actions to gain pool via investments. Speed as I mentioned in my last newsletter is a key strategy; and the faster you gain pool to muster more resources, the more pressure you can put on your prey. If you can play 3 Art Scam's in a turn, you can pay for another vamp, or another userful master card, or survive your predators small bleeds a while longer. To take this one step further, you could play with a mixed crypt of Toreador Princes and Toreador Antitribu, then play with Art Scam's and 5th Tradition/Minion Tap combo. It'd be a pool gain monster :-) Off to another tournament I go Next week I'll be at Dallas participating in the Praxis Seizure : Dallas tournament. Four of us from Austin are going up, and I anticipate we'll get a few people from cities surrounding the area, not to tournament yet in this region, and I'll bring back pictures and commentary for everyone :-) In my ongoing thirst to learn more about tournament meta-games, I'll likely keep tabs on all the deck types as well as bitch and moan about the latest card that seems to be too powerful. :-) Deck Medic/Strategy Corner Peter Bakija, in the recent issue of "The Fragment of the Book of Nod", listed five common tournament deck types. Which deck type would you choose to play in your next tournament? Stealth and Bleed Weenie Vote Weenie Bleed Pool Gain Rush Combat Other