Strategy Event Absimiliard's Army by Ilya Ginsburg (Ector@mail.ru) Name: Absimiliard's Army [Gehenna:R] Cardtype: Event Gehenna. Do not replace until a Methuselah is ousted. Requires at least one other Gehenna card in play. During each Methuselah's untap phase, he or she may put the top card of his or her library in play. That card represents a ghoul ally with 2 life, 2 strength and 1 bleed. If the ally is burned, it is removed from the game. When a Methuselah is ousted, burn this card. Remove all such allies from the game when this card leaves play. To make use of this event, a deck should satisfy three requirements: A). It should be able to play the Army early enough. To achieve this, you can use Fortschritt Libraries, Sibyl's Tongues or different cycling cards and abilities (i.e. Distraction). Since Absimiliard's Army requires another Gehenna card, you have to include many Gehenna cards or many tutors. B). It has to overcome "do not replace until a Methuselah is ousted" somehow. Having one card less is very bad for any deck. Quick ousting isn't an answer, since all the allies will be burned with the Army, and if you can oust quickly without the allies, you can play without the Army. C). You should benefit from the Army more than the other players (especially your predator and your prey). The latter requirement is the most interesting. There are at least three ways to abuse the Absimiliard's Army: 1). Steal the opposing ghouls. This can be done with Entrancement or Restructure, but the best way is the merged Sebastian Goulet that can steal an ally as a +1 stealth action without any cards! 2). Know the top cards of your library to keep needed cards and convert unwanted cards into ghouls. This gets you "free Barrens". Kurt Densch provides such "scouting" for free and Maris Streck shows the top five cards for an action. Yoy can also use Thin-Blooded Seer, but nothing is better than Weirding Stone (if you're playing Tzimisce, of course). 3). Mill the library of your prey, to make (s)he unable to use Absimiliard's Army, using Harbingers of Blood and Nightmare Upon Nightmares for serious milling. The latter approach is used by Rahma (synesios), Prince of Nice, in his Gehenna Challenge article describing the same Absimiliard's Army. Alas, I'm late, but since my approach is completely different from Rahma's I think my article can be admitted to the Challenge. The only thing I can say about Rahma's deck... it seems very unstable to me. But, probably, all the decks based on Absimiliard's Army aren't very stable, and, frankly, I've never played Harbingers, so my opinion shouldn't count :) Here is the approach I like most: use merged Sebastian Goulet. Once more, I'm too late, since there is a tournament-winning (!) deck based on this idea, created by Eric Torstensson, but I swear that I invented the idea myself prior to knowing about the deck: ********************************************************************** Name: The Guests Description: Inspired by the Leonard Cohen song "the Guests"... A neo-stealth/bleed with a nice twist of gehenna. Get one or two VP's and then play Absimilard's Army and wait for a while. If anyone who isn't you takes a ghoul, steal it with your merged Sebastian. Since the numbers of masters are quite low, the Veil of Darkness hits everyone else harder than you. Author: Erik Torstensson Crypt (12 cards total): 3x Sebastian Goulet 3x Sebastian Goulet Adv. 1x Suzanne Kadim 1x Catherine du Bois 1x Badr al-Budur 1x Reverend Blackwood 1x Juggler 1x Count Ormonde Library (89 cards total): Masters (10 cards): 4x Visit from the Capuchin 2x Fortschritt Library 2x Blood Doll 2x Gambit Accepted Actions (15 cards): 10x Govern the Unaligned 1x Dominate Kine 4x Flurry of Action Allies (1 card): 1x Mylan Horseed (Goblin) Events (10 cards): 3x Absimiliard's Army 1x The Unmasking 1x Recalled to the Founder 1x Fueled by Heart's Blood 1x Nightmares upon Nightmares 1x Conquest of Humanity 1x Thirst 1x Veil of Darkness Action Modifiers (28 cards): 4x Cloak the Gathering 4x Seduction 2x Elder Impersonation 3x Faceless Night 5x Lost in Crowds 3x Spying Mission 7x Conditioning Combat Cards (10 cards): 1x Fast Hands 2x Bone Spur 3x Weighted Walking Stick 4x Flash Reactions (12 cards): 6x Deflection 6x Wake with Evening's Freshness Combo (3 cards): 3x Swallowed by the Night ********************************************************************** This deck is really interesting and it really makes a good use of Absimiliard's Armies. Stealth-bleed is one of the classic archetypes, and you really can rely on it: most of the time it will bring you at least one VP. Moreover, DOM/OBF stealth-bleed is the most powerful and versatile thanks to the Governs, Conditionings and Deflections. But, obviously, Absimiliard's Army isn't the main theme of this deck: the only tutor cards that can fetch it (or a gateway event for it) are two Fortshritt Libraries. The Armies are used as good support cards here, along with the other Gehenna events. Now, let's proceed to the deck that was specially designed to gain most benefit from the Absimiliard's Army. It uses merged Sebastian Goulet (as did the previous deck) to steal allies from your prey and predator, but this deck has only four copies of Sebastian instead of six, so you'll never look at four copies in your crypt opening. This deck relies on getting The Unmasking and Absimiliard's Army fast enough to control the board: you and your cross-table allies can use the created ghouls for defence until you will be ready to oust your prey. Finally, this deck doesn't use Fortshritt Libraries since this card can be played only once per game... what would you do if another player would play it first? No, I'm not kidding - I'm really going to achieve these goals with a brilliant anti-Malkavian card, Sibyl's Tongue. This card allows fetching ANY card from your library, and you can play any number of them, not just one. Thus, you can use only one Sebastian Goulet (adv), which is much worse than the base version, and fetch Gift of Experience to get a merged one. Likewise, you can fetch The Unmasking and Absimiliard's Army. You need just three cards to make the engine work, and your chances to get them early enough are pretty high if you have eight Sibyl's Tongues and three Armies. ********************************************************************** Deck Name : Absimiliard's Faithful Army Author : Ilya Ginsburg Description : Sebastian Goulet + anti-Malks + Sibyl's Tongues... Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 3 max: 8 average: 6.09 ------------------------------------------------------------ 3x Sebastian Goulet 8 DOM OBF cel pre pro !Gangrel:3 1x Sebastian Goulet (Adv) 8 DOM OBF cel pre pro !Gangrel:3 2x Dolphin Black 6 AUS DEM OBF !Malkavian:2 2x Uncle George 5 DEM aus dom obf !Malkavian:3 1x Kite 7 AUS DEM obf pre bishop !Malkavian:2 1x Persia 5 DEM aus obf Malkavian:3 1x Claven 4 aus dem obf !Malkavian:2 1x Yorik 3 dem obf !Malkavian:2 Library [90 cards] ------------------------------------------------------------ Action [28] 8x Govern the Unaligned 9x Kindred Spirits 3x Madman's Quill 8x Sibyl's Tongue Action Modifier [22] 6x Confusion 3x Elder Impersonation 3x Faceless Night 3x Forgotten Labyrinth 3x Lost in Crowds 4x Spying Mission Action Modifier/Combat [5] 5x Swallowed by the Night Ally [1] 1x Mylan Horseed (Goblin) Event [4] 3x Absimiliard's Army 1x Unmasking, The Equipment [1] 1x Ivory Bow Master [13] 1x Barrens, The 5x Blood Doll 1x Gift of Experience 1x Hungry Coyote, The 1x Information Highway 1x Secure Haven 3x Visit from the Capuchin Reaction [16] 4x Deflection 3x Obedience 3x Redirection 6x Wake with Evening's Freshness Crafted with : Anarch Revolt Deck Builder. [Thu Oct 21 23:15:26 2004] ********************************************************************** The deck is somewhat similar to "The Guests" - it's also stealth-bleed, though much less focused and definitely not as reliable. This deck needs some time to assemble its engine, and it should have good defenses. All vampires except for Sebastian Goulet and Persia are Malkavians antitribu that can play Sibyl's Tongues or bleed. Persia and Kite can intercept +1 stealth actions which may be crucial against a voting deck. Uncle George is especially good since he has Dominate, and he can bleed with Govern or play Deflections. Bloating is another form of defense, and this deck bloats fairly well. If you have The Hungry Coyote, your vampires can get a lot of blood which can be collected through your Blood Dolls. Obviously, Governs and Kindred Spirits can provide pool, too. The weakest part of defense is combat. Malkavians antitribu are known for their almost complete inability to survive combat. Combat defense of this deck (not counting Absimiliard's Army ghouls, of course) is limited to Obediences, Ivory Bow and Secure Haven, unless you manage to steal some War Ghouls :) You may try Black Spiral Buddies and get some support cards for them (Charisma, Dodge), but the deck would still remain weak in combat. No deck can be strong in everything, though... Playing this deck is really difficult, as you should change your plans according to the changing situation. Carefully choosing targets for your Sibyl's Tongues is vital. Sometimes you will be able to influence Yorik or Claven on the first turn; if you have Sibyl's Tongue, you may fetch Information Highway to get the other vamps quickly. Generally it's better to influence Sebastian first as he can play superior Govern on the smaller vampires. Normal fetching sequence is The Unmasking and Gift of Experience, then Absimiliard's Army. However, if your predator or prey plays a rush deck, you should fetch Secure Haven for Sebastian first, since without him your plans are doomed, and sometimes you'll need Ivory Bow to protect other minions. If your predator bleeds heavily, you may fetch Mylan Horseed to untap Sebastian, since all bounce cards in this deck require Dominate. Finally, if your vampires have low blood, and you still lack two of the primary three cards, you may fetch The Hungry Coyote to restore blood and bloat. Survival is the primary task of this deck, and the harsh situation should only slow it instead of completely destroying it. Try to make alliance with your grandpredator and promise him/her an army of ghouls if (s)he would help you with your predator. If your grandprey is able to cause serious harm to your prey (a rush deck, for example), try to negotiate with your grandprey as well. You may also use your Kindred Spirits as threats. Remember that only the first Sibyl's Tongue is free, all the rest cost some blood. In the good situation you'll play only 3-4 Tongues (for 0,1,2 and 3 blood, respectively), but sometimes you'll need to play fifth and even sixth that would be very painful. The Hungry Coyote can help you play even those. In most cases you would play Visit from the Capuchin to avoid card loss of Absimilard's Army, but nothing prevents you from playing the card early. This deck really needs to find cards quickly, and it's much better to spend your Visit and find what you need than to keep it and to waste Sibyl's Tongue for a card that might be the top card of your library! As usual, any ideas and comments are appreciated. Ilya Ginsburg aka Ector (Ector@mail.ru)