This newsletter and many others can be found on the web at http://whitestar.ddg.com/vtes/newsletterarchive.html 5/1/2000 Editors Corner - Ethan Burrow, Prince of Austin We're one month closer to new cards, and I personally can't wait too much longer. Good thing is we have 2-3 tournaments coming up that our group will be attending, so we're tuning our decks now. Praxis Seizure Austin is this weekend, and I hope everyone in the area will attend. We're also going to likely start another sealed league before the new Sabbat comes out. If you haven't tried sealed leagues yet, I would highly recommend it (if you can get the unopened packs to do it). You can expect a lot of Sealed "New" Sabbat in Austin when it comes out. How the 5/1/2000 Rules Team Rulings affect the Toreador Antitrbu Life Boon - would rather have seen it banned than errata'ed since it only affected tournament play... but at least it will no longer affect tournament play like it did. Priscus untainted - Matteus can now gain us bribes and not screw us due to Scorn even if Gratiano is out. Yay! Banishment - nothing major, just a lot of cleanup and consolidation of rules. Although note that master skill cards no longer count towards capacity when uncontrolled. For a more detailed description of what was ruled, go to http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=617833863 Happy Families - Some of Austin's players take a look I thought some people would be interested to hear a couple of Austin's players take on the Happy Families deck construction ideas put forth by Legbiter. To inform those who are unaware, Happy Families attempts to evenly distribute your library between all the disciplines used by your chosen vampires, unskilled cards, and master cards using a weighting system. The end result is a deck that tends to flow very well, while trying not being degenerative. (Please add more if you like Legbiter ) Mike Ooi and I have both built happy family decks, Mike a Tremere and myself a Toreador. Incidentally, I limited myself to a box of VTES boosters (I had just received a shipment and decided to try Happy Families with one box much like Tatu and Legbiter did). Result : both decks did indeed have no trouble cycling cards. I don't recall either of us getting hand jams. I did notice that my political deck didn't have any punch, due to having to lump votes/bribes/scorns/etc into the non-skill category. It did manage a victory point here and there though. While they did manage to play well, they didn't manage to win reliably. We tend to have aggressive decks (intercept wall/weenie/combat/TheLasombra/etc), and I'm impressed at how well the decks hold up in such an environment. It's a good compromise between sealed and constructed decks. With Sealed having lack of focus, and constructed being a terror to new players, Happy Families may very well be a good deck design strategy to allow veterans to play with neonates without brutally scaring them away. Combat Options Last month I used the combat matrix to generalize a comparision between the clans on their combat effectiveness. Based on this matrix as well as the skill matrix established in a previous newsletter, I'll now open up a discussion on how to establish your deck as the combat king of the table. Combat is one of the aspects of the game where the flow of the game speeds up, and interaction between players becomes more crucial. Having the upper hand in these situations usually boils down to who has the better hand. While overall deck construction and hand jam always plagues even the most veteran player, having the right card at the right time usually is the difference between a full vampire and a burned vampire. My philosophy is to squeeze as much versatility out of each card as possible, to insure that you *have* the right card at the right time. Cards with multiple uses helps to provide this, as well as using skills that provide several cards with varying abilities. Don't expect to have the right card at the right time in combat playing with Serpentis ;-) While Potence has a *lot* of strike and hurt potential, it's versatility is quite weak. Even with Immortal Grapple, Potence by itself isn't very effective against other combat decks. It can be outmaneuvered, which denies the grapple. So your opponent can dodge or S:CE any ranged strike you send. You don't have any additional strikes, and unless you play with Mighty Grapple as your strike (which has versatility of being a strike and a press), you'll likely not be able to out press your opponent. Now I'm not saying Potence isn't a good combat skill. It just has less options available to it's skill stand-alone than other combat skills in the game. Potence alone may not win you the combat, nor the game. Many a potence rush deck has been shut down because the opponent had more maneuvers. Unfortunately, to ensure a dead vampire with a potence deck requires 4 card slots in your hand. The rush card (usually with a maneuver), immortal grapple, the strike itself, and taste of vitae to make sure your own vampire stays alive. Not much left in your hand to react to your opponent if they don't just stand still. With Celerity or Protean, you start to open up a host of options unavailable to Potence. In fact, Protean has arguably more options than Celerity. However since Celerity is far more prevelent, it tends to be a little more popular than Protean. Having an all Gangrel crypt limits your options. I mentioned Tremere Trap Decks from my last newsletter. I'll use this as an example to indicate why they are not as effective against other combat decks. Remember that while this type of deck might not be as effective against other combat decks, it will probably do well against a deck not expecting combat or not prepared for it. To make the deck work, you would need Trap, Apportations, your strike of choice (usually a first round and a second round), and if you're feeling saucy you'll add Blood to Water and probably Thought's Betrayed. A lot of cards, but necessary to get to the second round so you can do a lot of damage. To escape this, all one needs to do is press to end. If you didn't play thought's betrayed, they can also dodge. Which skills provide dodges and presses to end? According to the combat matrix several do; Celerity, Protean, Obfuscate, and Auspex via one card. Combat disciplines like Celerity and Protean offer much better versatility in their cards than you'll be using, and can probably produce more presses than you simply because their mix of cards will be more versatile. Example : Trap and Apportation will provide 2 presses to continue first round. The only other benefit the first round that either card can provide is a maneuver if you have THA (Superior Thaumaturgy). Celerity hypothetically can have the following cards to thwart your strategy: Flash - Also can provide maneuvers against other clans. Nimble Feet - Can also provide additional strikes Psyche - Can also be used to thwart combat ends Preternatural Evasion - S:CE Rapid Thought - Not only a maneuver, can also be used to make reacting minion pick first Vampiric Speed - Dodge and Press in one card. Celerity will dance circles around a Thau deck (or at least should). The above Thau strategy is offensive only, and really might have problems defensively. The Celerity deck can use it's cards both offensively and defensively. So it won't have a problem if you attack, they have 6 of the above options to get out of combat safely, while using the same type of cards offensively. The astute deck builder will mix lots of the above type of cards into their Celerity decks to provide maximum versatility for any situation. Card of the Month - Vampiric Speed To help illustrate combat options, I'll use Vampiric Speed this month. This is truly a useful combat card, and I'll show a case or two where it's versatility may not readily be so apparent. The inferior is pretty straightforward. It's advantage over the card Dodge is simply that you get to replace it. This is in of itself useful, and if you play Celerity there is absolutely no reason to play with the card Dodge unless you have allies or non-celerity vamps you wish to protect. The superior is where all the options open up (as with most skill based cards). At the superior you get an optional press in addition to the dodge. You can use this both offensively and defensively - and I'll describe how. Defensively - This is how most people view this card. Dodge your opponent's strike, and then use the press to end combat if your opponent tries to press to continue combat. Also very effective at escaping traps, although a persistant opponent will have additional presses so don't rely on just the Vampiric Speed to end combat. Offensively - When used with additional strikes, Vampiric speed can be very effective. Since we know it's rare to see additional strikes except for Celerity, you can dodge your opponent's strike with an optional press... then additional strike and do your own damage. These cases are where Disarm, Twisting the Knife, and Pulled Fangs can be used to *great* effect. If your opponent is still standing, press to continue and repeat. The only time you probably wouldn't want to do this is when your opponent has lasting combat effects and/or a Trap. At which point you can use the press to end. Very versatile. With only one card you can both protect your minion, thwart your opponents main strike, and then choose whether to continue or end combat. All this assuming you're not facing another Celerity or Protean deck, as they also have plenty of Additional Strikes and/or presses. Cards that provide differing abilities at Inf/Sup are golden. The more options available to you, the more likely you will win combats. ------------------------------- Ethan Burrow - Prince of Austin ethan@ddg.com http://whitestar.ddg.com/vtes/