Official VEKN Tzimisce Newsletter - November 2001 (3)2 ------------------------------------------------ Contents: I.Introduction II.Fiction III.Tech IV.Card of the Month V.Itch VI.Deck of the Month ------------------------------------------------ I.Introduction After some months in torpor, the Tzimisce Newsletter is back. It is with great honour and pride that I succeed to Joe Churchill as editor of this newsletter. I hope I will be able to pass on some new insight on playing the Fiends. Not including this introduction, the newsletter will have five regular chapters. First, as many other editors, I have tried my hand at some fiction and, although it does not involve the characters depicted in the cards, I hope you will enjoy it all the same. In the Tech section, I will unveil some strategy points, talk about card synergy, occasionally rant against one thing or another or share a tournament report. The content of Card and Deck of the Month chapters is pretty obvious. Itch will be some form of Card of the Month but in the sense that this section will deal with those very annoying cards every Tzimisce player hates and the best way(s) to scratch that itch. ------------------------------------------------ II.Fiction 06/10/2001. London. Location undisclosed. "Look at them..." murmured the elder. From the far side of the room, some shuffling noises and a creature raises its head from behind some boxes. No taller than a boy of seven, the ghoul immediately stopped whatever it was doing to attend the vampire. "My lord ?" "No Erik, I was not talking to you..." Having survived decades as a ghoul in the service of the powerful and somewhat alien Tzimisce, Erik rushed to his master's side. Better play it safe than ignore a hidden order. "Anything I may do, master ?" *sigh* "No Erik, I guess your ears are far too sensitive, I cannot speak to myself in peace; we will rectify this very soon, won't we?" "But master, like so I can better serve..." promptly begged Erik, remembering the hours of excruciating pain endured last time an adjustment was needed. "I shall be the judge of that!" shouted the vampire "Do not fool yourself into thinking that you can advise me! Your services are appreciated but you are by no means irreplacable, understood ?" "Yesmastersorrymasterasyouwishmaster" "That's more like it, remember that you live because I only allow it...and I shall do so for now...I do not care to waste my precious time on you right now...but be warned..." "Yesmasterthankyoumaster" "Yes, yes, return to your duties" said the ancient with a dismissive gesture of the hand. "May I ask what was the matter, my Lord ?" cautiously asked Erik. "I said return !" started the elder, anger in his voice, but suddenly calmed down and continued with the voice one affects when talking to a slow child "my dear Erik, I wonder how you survived so long, curiosity will get you fed to the dogs one day. Very well, the trip has been successful so far so I am willing to indulge you...I was referring to the humans, the kine as we call them, so unaware, so ignorant of what lies just beyond their dulled senses...Oh they feel so safe in their small reality, placing themselves above all of God's creation, better than the sheep and the cow they devour by the billion. Fine. The kine are nothing but cattle to us, mongrels, barely better than the inhabitants of the Barovitch kennels. "Juicebags" as the young Sabbat call them; interesting the richness of language demonstrated by new Kindred, all so disrespectful yet ingenious in their combination of words none the less, proof that Metamorphosis is everywhere. A worthy subject for future study...but I digress...Where was I?" "Humans, my lord ?" tentatively suggested Erik. "Yes, yes, humans. To which you do not belong anymore my dear servant..." "And I am grateful, my lord..." "Do not interrupt!" snapped the ancient, the rage building up once more. Erik's survival instinct took over and stopped any sounds coming from the ghoul. In the silence, his master's anger usually ebbed away rather quickly...usually. This time again, it did work and the vampire went on with his monologue. "Humans, yes, to be ruled and fed upon at our whim, to be used and abused and cast away...instead we hide, pretend we are kine, play the Camarilla's farce that is the Masquerade...until we can overthrow the pawns, the puppets of the Antediluvians, how can they so readily believe that the Ancients are just a myth, we killed our progenitor, Lugoj Blood-breaker commited Amaranth on the Eldest thus freeing the clan from its doom. We will keep the war of attrition against the Camarilla, until their elders awake and consume them, then the Sabbat, the Sword of Caine will cut them down while they sleep, bloated from the blood of their foolish descendants, and..." "Yo, matey, can I get my money now!" shouted a voice from behind the ancient and his ghoul. "Who dares?!" roared the leder, pivoting towards the origin of the interrupting sound. Mr Bishop had made his way to the third floor of the building and was now standing inside the room, panting and sweating, flushed by the effort. Being in the removal business, he was strong but muscles do not show very well under a large beer belly and layers of fat. He appeared anatomically closer to the walrus, up to the moustache and one protruding tooth. Besides, these days he was constantly reminded of the weight of his age, lifting and carrying had become much more strenuous in the past few years. Fortunately, doing undeclared work paid good and nobody was ever asking for a clean bill of health, just a few more months and he'll have enough to open his own business, a chip shop on the coast, his lifelong ambition... "Yeah mate, we finished taking all those crates down to your basement" "Crates?! What would I do with crates? you simpleton." “Easy man, your little son with the big ears told us to shift all of the seven crates labelled CE down to the second basement...me and the boys agreed to do it tonight, but we were gonna be paid extra..." "Son? Have you lost your mind, kine?" "My lord, I believe that Mr Bishop is referring to me, isn't that right, Mr Bishop?" "Yes mate, now where is my money?" "Of course, of course, if you would care to follow me, we will take care of this financial matter, would cash do, Mr Bishop?" said Erik, not really expecting for a negative answer. Playing on the greed of humans had become enjoyable for the ghoul over the years, a poor distraction from his life serving a cruel and temperamental master. "Yeah, sure, cash, fine. You're lucky I don't charge you extra for making me wait." "Most generous of you, this way please." Erik proceeded to guide the tired worker towards the next room. "Just send the peon on his way, he should be grateful to leave with his life. That is payment enough...oh I do mourn the old days, when the kine were weak and fearful, when they sheltered at night in their dwellings, hoping not to be invited to their lords' table..." mumbled the ancient vampire to himself. "Bit weird your boss ain't he?" said Mr Bishop to Erik as they entered the study, as cluttered by boxes as the previous room. "I would not say so in front of him, Mr Bishop, he is...ahem...an actor and in character for a role tomorrow, please sit down, the money is in here somewhere..." replied Erik, worried that the heightened senses of his master might have picked up the offensive phrase. "Yeah, sure, sure, whatever..." said the human, before clearing a chair for himself and sat down with much creaking from the hapless furniture. The wood straining to support the sudden weight. "Oh by the way, we've had some small problem with one of the crate, it seems it got damaged during transport cuz when we took it downstairs, some kinda dust kept pouring from it...I hope we didn't break the ashes of your boss' grandma..." Mr Bishop could barely contain his laugh at such a clever joke, those don't come often anymore, he really should write it down before he forgets. "I beg your pardon?" asked Erik, somewhat more preoccupied by where the brown enveloppe with the cash had got to. "Yeah, some dust or earth or whatever was in the crate, all over the stairs..." "Earth you said?! That's bad, very bad..." panicked Erik. "Not to worry, man, the boys have swept everything, your stairs are clean..." said Mr Bishop, half-thinking about charging an extra for the cleaning job. He wouldn't have to share that with the others too. "What have you said, worthless worm!?!" boomed the ancient voice. The elder was standing right behind the surprised man who jumped right out of his chair, heart racing like never before , and turned to face the towering kindred. Fear quickly built up in the eyes of Mr Bishop as the face of the vampire contorted into a rictus of pure rage and hatred, features somehow melting and moving to create a horrifying mask. "You have spilled the soil of the Homeland! The very earth from which I emerged, earth older than your pathetic civilisation!" "T-tt-take it easy, man, we d-d-ddidn't break nothing, alright? Tak-ke it-t easky, okay?" choked Mr Bishop. "Insolent fool!! I *twack* will not *twack* take it *twack* easy !!!*twack*..." Only after the sounds of cracking bones and rending flesh had subsided, did Erik feel safe enough to come out of the box he hid when the master jumped on the unfortunate kine. Erik heard his master's commanding voice. "Erik! Clean up this mess, will you? And send Boris and Andrei to take care of Mr Bishop's associates, they must be quite worried..." ordered a now much calmer Tzimisce. Boris and Andrei...a shiver ran through Erik's spine. Boris and Andrei, two ghouls usually assigned to haven security and since they eat anything and everything they do the occasional cleaning job as well. Those sick freaks enjoy it too...The twisted twins as the master likes to call them; 7' of muscles and bony spikes, sharp teeth and lots of them...models of brutal efficiency, the master had been working on this particular design for about half a century now. Boris and Andrei must be his 7th or 8th attempt at the perfect bodyguard, the last ones were shredded by Lupines, we'll see how long those two will last, not too long, hoped Erik. He couldn't stand being around them, never knowing if they were going to end his life before the master did. Might not be much of a life but Erik somehow had grown attached to it. "Oh, Erik?" "Yes master?" "Find a suitable place to display our new friend, will you?" "Yes master." What? New friend? Not again, thought Erik, slowly turning to see his master's new creation...Christ! a chair!? He turned the poor bastard into a chair! Bones for the structure, flexible but strong ribs for the seat, the whole wrapped with pulsating tissue and organs...still alive...the kine is still alive, probably (hopefully) not conscious but alive none the less. Blood coursing through the veins and arteries creating delicate but transient patterns, digits and other appendages randomly twitching...Erik was going to have to touch this horror to move it to the office. Surely his master would enjoy having the occasional VIP sit on the very particular piece of furniture. Some kind of warped statement of the working class supporting the rich or something; Erik had given up a long time ago trying to understand his master's alien logic. Besides, Erik thought, the chair would fit in well with the tapestry made out of the family previously owning the building... ------------------------------------------------ III.Tech In this first issue, i'd like to comment on the typical Tzimisce deck, packed with intercept and wakes. It seems fairly logical that a Tzimisce player would tend to gravitate around the Wall concept. With the two in-clan discplines of Auspex and Animalism, one can quickly design an efficient "No Passaran" deck, blocking every single action attempted by prey or predator, even occasionally reaching across the table with Eagle's Sight and slapping around an uncooperative minion. Besides most of the cards needed for a good wall are common cards, and with the Sabbat War Tzimisce pre-contructed being of great quality, it's only natural that new players would try to build their very own Wall deck. I'm actually curious to know how many of those new players (Sabbat War and onward) have stuck with the Tzimisce... A lot of players only rely on in-built stealth of their votes or other actions and fully expect to see everything go unblocked (as it was commonly the case during the EC, why oh why did i decide to play a different deck?). The feeling of power when you can deny a vote deck from ever reaching the referendum stage, just when they are just dying to call that nasty Parity Shift on you...geeez, that's so sad....if at first you don't succeed, try again and get your face pounded again. The 90 card limit of a deck entails that you WILL run out of transient intercept, wakes, combat cards, etc...the same way some other player WILL run out of stealth, bleed modifiers, votes, Majesties...That's why including permanents is vital for any deck, even moreso for a Wall deck generally build for the end game. It does cost you an action and you risk being blocked yourself, not that the ensuing combat should matter (then again...) but you'd loose the card. Permanent intercept allows you to attempt to block many actions to draw out the stealth, even a single untapped minion enables you to do so against zero-stealth actions. Another school of thought involves declining to block anything the super sneaky (30+ stealth cards) does, letting him choke on his stealth and hoping that his own predator will dispatch him quickly enough. It does work in certain cases but it leads to the situation where your predator will have so much stealth in his hand that there is no way you can block him when he goes for that killing bleed for 9! There is always trusty Telepathic Misdirection for that i guess :) However the difference between a Wall deck that wins a table (3+ VPs) and one that runs out of steam and dies might reside in the timing and choice of which action(s) a Tzimisce player decides to block. Once the other Methuselahs know that your deck can intercept nearly everything, they will either stop taking any actions at all or try to trick you into blocking actions (preferably cardless like hunting or stealing your Powerbase:Montreal, or even simple bleed) performed by expendable minions. There is no secret rule to help a Wall deck player decide wath should be blocked. Any action can potentially result into your ousting...how many times do one look back on the game and thinks if only that early bleed for one had been blocked i would still be on one? Best way to learn, trial and error, consider it some form of evolutionnary pressure, either you learn, adapt and survive or you give up and switch to another deck concept/clan/game. Survival of the fittest in a way or maybe of the most stubborn... ------------------------------------------------ IV. Card of the month For this month's COM, I have chosen to dissect and study the only vicissitude card to grace the Final Nights set: Malleable Visage: Action Modifier, Vicissitude, 1 blood [vic] Usable when an ally you control is blocked, before combat begins. The combat is cancelled; untap the acting minion and tap this modifying vampire. This vampire enters combat with the blocking minion. [VIC] As above, but usable when a vampire you control is blocked. First the basic observations: Action Modifier: only during your turn, to be used when blocked, sending the blocking minion for a few rounds against Dragos. Cost 1 blood: Relatively cheap, even moreso with Meshenka or the path of Metamorphosis in play. Let's compare Malleable Visage to two cards that have a similar effect: Malleable Visage vs Change of Target: Change of Target is free and disciplineless, usable by any minion (allies and vampires) making for higher flexibility, but not only it untaps both minions, it also doesn't let you do any damage to the blocker so he's left untapped ready to block again. Using Change of Target is however a great away of drawing out wakes and transient intercept, until Eternal Vigilance and/or some permanent intercept (revenant/sport bike/guardian angel...) hits the table and you might be in real trouble, oh sure you won't get hurt...until you run out :) Malleable Visage vs Hidden Lurker: Both require a blocked minion, both allow to choose one of your minion to send again the blocker. However one of the point often raised against Hidden Lurker is the fact that it takes two minions to (hopefully) take down one opposing vampire. On the plus side, it gets nicely around SCE or any nasty strike but you have to make the most of it and be pretty sure to send the opposing to torpor at least, or inflict some serious bodily harm. Combat defence (or offence) is far from being limited to strikes, if your strike for 24 agg is shrugged off by a Skin of Steel then you've wasted two actions (and a lot of cards) that might have been better used. How does Malleable Visage compare to those cards then? Well, like Change of Target, it might save your acting minion (e.g. Horatio) from a beating but like Hidden Lurker, allows you to send somebody big and strong (e.g. Lambach) to take down the blocking vampire or alternatively, sacrifice an expendable minion at the hands of Beast :) Malleable Visage includes both a defensive and an offensive use, making the card relatively flexible and useful in most Tzimisce decks. Basic only playable when an ally is blocked. Worthwile allies in a Tzimisce deck...let's see...mmm...War Ghoul, War Ghoul and War Ghoul. The problem that i see is that the War Ghoul has only one worthy action (rush, what else?) so with the NRA, if you play malleable visage then the ghoul will sit there untapped (while Meshenka kick the hell out of the hapless blocker) but you rushed for a reason (usually) and if you got blocked then you didn't reach your target, so it appears as a waste of action of sort. Granted, having an untapped war Ghoul can be a good deterent against your predator, and allies are not affected by Kiss of Ra or Daring the Dawn...still, in a typical Tzimisce deck, basic Malleable Visage doesn't seem to be worth the slot. Then again, we have now two Giovanni with vic (namely Silvia and Andreas Giovanni), and they have also access to some great allies that some very worthwile actions e.g. Pupeteer (not exclusively Giovanni), Brigitte (with 2 bleed) and Felix (1 bleed and +1 stealth Arson at cost of 1 pool)...In this case the use of Malleable Visage can be truly amazing. Arson some location with Felix, get blocked, play MV and send Silvia to Disarm/Decapitate/inflict pain, then bleed away with Felix...but that's more a subject for the Giovanni Newsletter, isn't it? It is really at superior that Malleable Visage becomes an above average card. The option of replacing any of your blocked minion by another depending on whether you want to fight or not, all the while leaving the original acting minion untapped free to attempt another action if needed, seems to me rather good indeed. Can't rush (rush actions blocked or secure haven) that troublesome minion who keeps on blocking your empty vampires when they hunt? Use Malleable Visage and introduce him to pain. Laz has intercepted Lambach while hunting on zero blood? wouldn't it be great if you could replace your favourite vampire with somebody more expendable like, say, Lolita Houston, she might even survive the experience....not :) By playing a few Malleable Visage in your deck, you will keep the other players guessing; is that really Horatio hunting or is it Lambach in disguise waiting to be blocked ? ------------------------------------------------ V. Itch Let me present to you the bane of all Tzimisce intercept decks, giving nightmares to any reactive Fiend everytime the card is even rumored to float around, here is: Kiss of Ra, The: Action Modifier, Fortitude, 3 blood [for] Only usable when a vampire who does not have Fortitude attempts to block this acting minion. The blocking vampire burns 2 blood, and the action is now blocked. [FOR] As above, and the blocking vampire goes into torpor. He who has never seen his Meshenka tooled up with every possible permanent (Eternal vigilance, Bone, couple of Revenants, etc...) kissed by the Sun God, and promptly diablerised is a lucky bastard indeed :) When Sir Walter Nash announces a bleed with GtU (at basic), the maximum stealth he can master is a +1 with a Bonding, but is he packing a KoR or not? That when you end up second guessing yourself, are you taking the bleed for 3+ or risking the unlife of your main minion in a blocking attempt? Granted you could declare no blocks and deflect the prince to your prey. A Ventrue deck is usually packing at least a couple of those nasties (as well as others, like Hostile Takeover but that's another story) so be always weary of a vampire with FOR (and at least 3 blood) attempting an action you are bound to want and be able to block. As VTES is mainly a game of resources, it could be safer to some extent to draw out the Kiss of Ra or at least some of them. Instead of risking Meshenka, send Wendy or better Corine, as the latter is threatening enough to make them want to avoid combat. And even if she hits torpor well the action was blocked so it can't be that bad in the end. And you still have somebody else to defend the torpid Corine and hopefully rescue on your turn (or better, ask a cross-table ally to do it, generally your grand prey might be willing to do so if you blocked one of your prey's actions). Remeber to always check the disciplines of the minion you intend to block and the amount of blood on it as well. One could mention Direct Intervention against Kiss of Ra, but that would be too easy, wouldn't it? Problems against votes? DI! against combat? DI! against Sneak & Bleed? DI! I admit it helps and i would be the first to DI a nasty KoR but i prefer not to rely on drawing a DI at the right time or basing my whole defence on it. I have been Kiss of Ra'd countless times, to the extent that i have been toying with the idea of including a few Fortitude skill cards in my main Tzimisce deck, then i could add Freak Drive for added forward pressure with loosing blocking potential, and skin of steel/superior mettle, and Masochism, and King of the Mountain (KotM+Blood of Acid)...in the end i would have to find about 25 slots in my deck ;) Still that made me realise that there is no Tzimisce at all who has fortitude which strikes me as odd. Could this be done on purpose to maintain the Tzimisce weakness to Kiss of Ra? ------------------------------------------------ VI. Deck of the Month This month, I'm presenting a deck whose engine was described in Joe's last newsletter. And since it is my first newsletter, i'll give you two decks for the price of one, both using the same core but with a very different feel. Based on the power of koldunic sorcery, i give you the Bloodform/Weather Control deck(s). The angle of the first deck presented by Joe was building up superior vicissitude through skill cards, whereas in the decks below, they start with VIC and where needed get the extra tha/THA (skill card or Veneficorum). Granted, as long as they don't get tha, your vampires are very likely targets (and with reason), with four copies in the crypt, you should however be able to influence out Vykos, start the killing, cycle to a skill card and then bring the next one out. I've had the opportunity of trying out the first deck and the reactions (once they understood what was going on) ranged from amused to totally disgusted...up to the point that somebody said that such degenarate decks are the reason why some play with card limit... It started out as a fun deck, but i believe the WCB engine has tournament potential. Since it takes half the deck, it's (just) a matter of deciding what to do with the other half, what focus you want for your deck. I honestly don't think the deck is that degenerate, the ways of ruining the deck are numerous if not mainstream. And i shall name the ones that specifically counter the engine: Undead Persistence, Dawn Operation, any form of agg damage (provided you are not sent to torpor in the pre-range stage), Ex Nihilo and certainly so more... Deck Name: Kupala's Wrath Created by: Pierre Description: Loosely based on your typical rush deck (4 havens and 6 Ambush), there is a great synergy between the cards, especially WCB+Tracking(sup)+Taste Crypt: (13 cards) [Min: 32, Max: 32, Avg: 8] 2 Caliban (ANI AUS VIC, Tzimisce, 6) 2 Corine Marcón (ani AUS VIC, Tzimisce, 6) 1 Heinrick Schlempt (tha, Tremere Antitribu, 2) 2 Lolita Houston (aus VIC, Tzimisce, 4) 1 Magdelena Schaefer (THA, Caitiff, 2) 1 Roreca Quaid (tha, Tremere, 2) 4 Sascha Vykos (ani AUS dom THA VIC, Tzimisce, 8, Priscus) Library: (90 cards) Master (21 cards) 3 Blood Doll 1 Dreams of the Sphinx 2 Fame 4 Haven Uncovered 4 Minion Tap 1 Powerbase: Montreal 6 Thaumaturgy Action (9 cards) 6 Ambush 3 Pulse of the Canaille Combat (52 cards) 12 Bloodform 7 Taste of Vitae 3 Telepathic Tracking 30 Weather Control Equipment (8 cards) 3 Leather Jacket 2 Living Manse 1 Sargon Fragment, The 2 Veneficorum Artum Sanguis How to play the deck: Well, no major trick, remove the threats from the table, remind your prey/predator that Weather Control can be stacked and can't be prevented. Use your +Bleed permanents for constant forward pressure (that is when there's nobody left). Recycle your cards with the Sargon. The Fame/haven/rescue could be your only road to victory. Blood/pool management is crucial, blood is usually easier to come by with the Tastes but your sources of pool gain are very limited, always go for the powerbase, if they block they die, simple. I think it would pay off not to go all out and rush somebody as soon as possible, like you would with a weenie potence deck :) It seems much more preferable to let the other vampires (and your own) spend their blood, having to use 12 Weather control to take down Arika, while very enjoyable, exert a terrible strain on your card resources. With this deck, you WILL run out of cards, quicker than you would expect with a "normal" rush deck. Deck Name: Secrets of Kupala Created by: Pierre Description: Same crypt and same WCB core as Kupala's Wrath, much more geared toward its prey, Table Wins next year, better get ready ;) Crypt: (13 cards) [Min: 10, Max: 32, Avg: 5.38] 2 Caliban (ANI AUS VIC, Tzimisce, 6) 2 Corine Marcón (ani AUS VIC, Tzimisce, 6) 1 Heinrick Schlempt (tha, Tremere Antitribu, 2) 2 Lolita Houston (aus VIC, Tzimisce, 4) 1 Magdelena Schaefer (THA, Caitiff, 2) 1 Roreca Quaid (tha, Tremere, 2) 4 Sascha Vykos (ani AUS dom THA VIC, Tzimisce, 8, Priscus) Library: (90 cards) Master (13 cards) 3 Blood Doll 1 Dreams of the Sphinx 3 Minion Tap 6 Thaumaturgy Action (10 cards) 5 Pulse of the Canaille 5 Revelations ActionMod (4 cards) 4 Changeling Reaction (11 cards) 5 Forced Awakening 6 Telepathic Misdirection Combat (45 cards) 11 Bloodform 4 Taste of Vitae 30 Weather Control Equipment (3 cards) 2 Living Manse 1 Sargon Fragment, The Combo (4 cards) 4 Plasmic Form How to play: Having not had the time to try out this version of the deck, i can only speculate. I would say that this deck, despite its gruesome engine, requires some finesse to work effectively. Again Blood/pool management will make the difference between victory and defeat. Tool up a vampire as soon as possible with a Pulse, nuke the bounce with Revelations (basic), wake/deflect the odd big bleed to your prey, and keep on bleeding like a Kook :) As always, they block, they die, plus you have the extra stealth to (try to) pass that all important killing bleed (remember to Revelate first). I may (or may not) be playing this deck at the upcoming Milton Keynes tournament, so hopefully i'll have a bit more insight on the flow of the deck. ------------------------------------------------ VII. Next Month. By the time i finish writing next month instalement, Bloodlines will have been released so i will definately make a rundown of the cards useful for the Tzimisce but i'm not expecting much as none of the bloodlines presented possess vicissitude, a few have Auspex and/or Animalism tho. So we could be treated with some new cards (more intercept anyone?), all the info in Tech. If i manage to remember to contact the author, i will have a deck based around Kraken's Kiss for your perusal and appreciation. In Itch, i will talk about the demoralising duo, Elder Impersonation and Call of the Hungry Dead. Some more fiction, if i haven't received death threats advising me to stop (or else). Card of the Month, mmm, i haven't decided yet... Well, that's it for this month, i certainly hope you enjoyed the newsletter. Comments, suggestions, decks, strategy articles, money and alcoholic drinks always welcome. Direct all correspondence to folie@hotmail.com Farewell.... TPOTH Koldun