As always a prettier one is located with all the rest of the family at
V:EKN Texas -
http://whitestar.ddg.com/vtes/sections.php?op=listarticles&secid=2
with lots of other content to swallow up your free time.
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12/01/2001 Editors Corner - Ethan Burrow, Prince of Austin
I'm in one of those lulls because we have enough players for one game,
but not enough to reliably have 2 games running at once. So we either
play 6 player games or a bunch of 3 player games. We just can't seem
to break the 7 reliable players barrier, although once every month or
two we will get 10 players to show up. Our recent tournaments haven't
really improved my spirits with regards to attendance, so I'm going to
start focusing on growing our playerbase with demos over the next few
months. I think most of the problem is that the coastal cities that
seem to be getting high attendance have dense populations compared to
Texas. Thus we're not able to pool from the surround areas, since the
surrounding area for us is cattle pastures and not urban communities.
I'll keep the torch up for the Southwest, but Sorrow and I have been
working hard to promote events in our area and we're barely able to
replace players as they stop playing, much less grow our playgroups. I
anticipate losing a couple of players next month due to graduation,
which will help create other playgroups in South Texas...but it'll be
at least 4-6 hours away from us .
p.s. I'm bitter about the Massachussets attendance. I admit it.
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Card of the Month - Powerbase: Madrid
The Powerbases added in Sabbat War are among the best Powerbases in
the game. I'm really starting to like the utility of Powerbase: Madrid
towards improving the voting power of Sabbat clans. Most Ventrue
voting decks put in Ventrue Headquarters without thinking. For the
same pool cost as the Ventrue Headquarters, any Sabbat clan can use
the Powerbase: Madrid for the same use. The drawback for being sect
specific instead of clan specific is the ability to take an action to
remove the counters it accumulates. Oh, and you need a titled sabbat
vampire for it to even work ;-)
Pros
-Can gain up to 4 counters, allowing it to outvote the Ventrue
Headquarters if left alone for 4 turns.
-During your untap, you are guaranteed at least one counter for your
turn except for the turn you put it into play.
Cons
-Other Sabbat clans trying to vote may contest with you.
-If you leave it untapped for vote defense, it may be the target of an
action to remove the counters. While this may be unfortunate, it does
tie up an action that could have done something more productive, and
you can rebuild the counters.
-Needs a ready *titled* sabbat vampire (although they can be tapped)
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Homework Assignments - an exercise in creative deckbuilding
Last newsletter I assigned a Follower of Set deck that could survive a
Stealth/Bleed deck at the table. This is apparently a hard one, as I
haven't received any submissions yet...and players in Austin are still
trying to field potential submission decks that continually fail to
work. Therefore I'm going to hold a poll at the home page for V:EKN
Texas to determine if this assignment should continue, or whether to
assign a new homework assignment. Please go to the poll and vote!
http://whitestar.ddg.com/vtes/
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Using the Influence Phase and Why People Gang up on Weenies
As many other newsletters and luminaries have said before, number
and/or efficiency of your actions is what drives how much pressure
your deck can put on another. How you achieve those actions, is by
bringing up minions to take those actions as quickly as possible.
Whether you bring up a horde of minions quickly, or a big vampire as
quickly as possible, speed is key. If you don't bring up a minion in
3-4 turns, chances are your deck will not live out the next 3-4 turns.
What actions you take once you have your first minion(s) up will also
determine the meta-game for your region of the table, and may very
well define it for the whole table. If you bring up 4 minions and
start to computer hack with each one on turn 2, you have broadcasted
yourself to the table as a threat. Your prey will wall up and try to
survive, and your predator will either have no pressure or your
grand-prey will bloat and allow your predator to kill you...for fear
of you sweeping the table before they can get their decks up and
running.
Bloating - Playing cards and taking actions that either gain pool
or stabilize your position defensively. Usually does not involve
in acting or threatening your prey in any manner.
Consequently if you bring up a big minion and spend the next 2-3 turns
bloating, your prey will have no pressure. If your prey is aggressive,
they will also create the dynamic described above. Some decks
recognize this, and bloat with some degree of defense knowing that
their prey may very well get the first VP while they may still need to
defend against their predator.
Most decks that reach the finals nowadays I think have managed to find
the compromise between the two. Weenie decks are targeted by the table
for destruction, and rarely win finals anymore (at least in my neck of
the woods). Wall decks usually can't get enough VP's. With the
compromise deck slowly builds while still applying pressure. Then when
the moment is right, they hit hard for the oust.
Speed or efficiency during your influence phase is a major contributer
towards how people will perceive your deck in the meta-game.
Ironically, I've found that as long as you bring up just one minion a
turn it doesn't feel that threatening. Even if you're using Govern the
Unaligned or Enchant Kindred to bring up Mid-Cap to Fatty vampires. By
the time they realize you have 40 pool of vampires up, it's usually
too late. To give you and idea of which cards feel more threatening
than others to your opponents, I've classified most of the cards to
improve your influence phase into 2 categories : Speed and Efficiency.
Speed - Get out as many vampires as fast as possible
Information Highway - The staple swarm card.
Powerbase: Montreal - No pool to play, you get a pool if you control
the card by your influence phase. One of the best cards in the game
IMO.
Zillah's Valley - 8 Caps in one turn, usually with a title. Can really
cripple speed decks if the fatty has adequate defenses. This moved
Fattie decks from an uphill battle to possibly being as threatening as
weenie decks.
Summon the Serpent - Once you see how fast Followers of Set decks can
get 6+ minions by turn 3 if you don't block these, you start to block
them. Oddly this card feels more threatening than the next group of
cards even though the effect is very similar. (Effective Management
and a cheaper Scouting Mission in one card).
Effective Management - Usually this is a open announcement that you
are playing a weenie deck. It also announces to the table that you
bring out minions faster than you can spend your pool.
Efficiency - Get out vampires using the least amount of pool or in a
less threating manner
Tomb of Ramses - Leaves a minion with less blood, so it feels less
threatening that if Zillah's was used, especially on large vampires.
Dreams of the Sphinxv - A more versatile yet temporary version of
Powerbase: Montreal.
Recruiting Party - Not really fast enough to concern most Methuselahs,
if they can afford a free block they usually do however.
Fourth Tradition - Not as versatile to use as the cards below, but
does allow all Camarilla clans some form of bloat.
Vampire specials - Nikolaus and Haakon are two that come to mind, most
people overlook them and take time to setup so not too threatening.
Govern the Unaligned, Enchant Kindred, Scouting Mission - This last
bunch is the sneaker that usually decides many games. Most people
don't block these simply because they're glad they weren't bled with
them. But over time it equates to usually 2 free minions. The
versatility of these cards is why Dominate (and now Presence since
Enchant Kindred was updated in Sabbat War) win so many games. It's the
efficient bloat that can also bleed when the time is right. If you
take nothing else from this article, recognize that you should block
these actions if you can, lest you be overwhelmed before you know it.
This list is probably not exhaustive, but you get the idea :-)
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What to expect in the future
I'm thinking that the Daughters of Cacophony are probably going to get
some attention in my future newsletters. I was pleasantly surprised to
see Celerity finally get another card that wasn't a combat card, so
we'll see how well some of the other cards fit into the Clan. I'm also
wondering if the Baali will fit in. Well, we'll see in a couple of
days ;-)
I'm also toying with a 'Presence and another Discipline' series, where
I take Presence, one of the most versatile disciplines in the game,
and combine it with another versatile discipline to see how well they
work together. I can guarantee the problem will be the crypt for most
of them, but I'll give it my best. Till next newsletter.