Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Fiction
- Strategy — Flushing your hand
- Card Analysis — Gemini’s Mirror
- Sign Off
Introduction
I’ve been very busy since the last newsletter, helping to organize the Jyhad Online tournament and suffering through a long spell of sleeplessness.
You’d think that insomnia would at least give you more hours to work with, but the sad truth is that those hours are spent in a state where very little work can be done.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could eliminate the need for sleep altogether? Wouldn’t it also be great if we could lift trucks, run like the wind and read people’s minds? Hmm, where am I going with this…
Fiction
(The following was used as my entry for the fiction contest that LSJ recently mentioned on the newsgroup. I don’t know if it’s any good or not, but I figured some people might like to read it. Enjoy!)
There were several things that bothered Smudge about his current predicament. Primary of these was the large table leg protruding from his chest. But the pain and paralysis this gave him had long since blended into boredom and hope for an eventual release. Of course, judging by what had happened to many of the other vampires staked in the cold storage facility, that release may end up being less than pleasant.
Still, it had to beat staring at the floor for weeks on end, not to mention the rather obese kindred that had been so cruelly lain atop him. Actually, it might be several vampires on top of him. It’s hard to tell when one’s head is frozen looking straight forward. A part of Smudge hoped he didn’t look too goofy with his mouth agape, eyes and fangs making his true nature both obvious and pathetic at the same time.
Smudge recalled being captured by the Sherriff, thinking that this was your average everyday cop-hassles-lowlifes affair. As a Caitiff, he had never been popular and being chased out of town or beat on by the Sherrif was like a sport for the elevated Brujah bully called Hector Sosa. Smudge would have tried to run if he knew that this time would be more than the usual “Gimme your lunch money and get the fuck outta Windsor” routine that Hector was known for. No, this time Hector brought friends and did not seem interested in talking at all.
Before he knew it, Smudge felt a sharp pain in his undead heart and then darkness as they threw him into a body bag to take wherever the hell he was now. When the bag was eventually unzipped, he found himself here, in what must be some kind of meat-packing facility or abbatoir. And he wasn’t alone. At least thirty other high generation licks were in there with him, many of whom he recognized. All were staked and laid out like sandbags, one atop the other.
It wasn’t until the Prince of the city came in one night and casually diablerized Smudge’s fellow Caitiff Hasina that Smudge realized that he was absolutely fucked. This was not some kind of temporary detainment centre. This was a goddamned smorgasbord… a buffet for the big cats. If his mouth wasn’t paralyzed along with the rest of him, Smudge would have screamed.
Over the next few weeks other vampires, including Hector, would come in for their nightly snack. Hector, to his credit, seemed reluctant at first. Maybe he acually believed his own bullshit about diablerie being bad after all. Kind of a do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do sort of thing. Hector must have been real hungry though because any pangs of consciense didn’t stop him from devouring one of the staked vampires. Hector must have noticed the rage and hatred in Smudge’s eyes because he promptly flipped Smudge over onto his stomach so that he couldn’t watch.
Smudge had no way of knowing how many vampires were left in this bloody buffet. The weight on top of him was some consolation, as it meant that he probably wouldn’t be the first one to go.
As Smudge lay there recalling the events that led him here, the door opened again.
“Which one do you want, ma’am?” A familiar voice… Hector was back. With a friend, apparently.
“That large one looks disgustingly unkempt. Bring me the one beneath. I will wait in the lounge.” It was a woman’s voice. Though her accent was your standard haughty uptight British dowager-type, Smudge could tell that she was old. Vampire old. You could just tell with the older ones. And it looked like Smudge would be her tasty treat for the night.
As the weight was pulled off of him, Smudge was inadvertently knocked off the table he was on and onto the bloody floor. The stake in his chest was knocked clean out due to the angle of his fall, causing a sharp pain but freeing Smudge from his paralysis.
Not questioning his good luck, Smudge waited until Hector approached him and then sprang. Hector noticed the missing stake too late to prevent him from stopping Smudge’s fangs from entering his leg. Now it was Hector that was paralyzed, frozen in the ecstatic embrace of a vampire’s kiss. Smudge drank deep until there was nothing left. Serves the bastard right, Smudge thought to himself as he devoured the Brujah’s very soul.
When the deed was done, Smudge felt stronger than before, strong enough in fact that he might have a chance. He scanned the room fully for the first time since he had entered it. Yes, definitely a meat locker of some sort. There were five vampires remaining including fat-ass, all staked. Smudge wasn’t sure what to do with them. If he freed them, he might end up as their lunch as they frenzied for his blood. Not my problem, Smudge thought to himself and shrugged.
Smudge removed Hector’s leather jacket and put it on himself, barely covering up his blood-stained shirt. Better not to freak the mundanes, he thought to himself. He rifled through Hector’s jeans, taking his car keys and wallet.
Smudge grabbed the heavy sealed door and pulled. Locked from the outside, it seemed. He called upon the power in his blood to enhance his strength and pulled the handle right off with a loud snap. After this, Smudge was able to easily push the broken door open. Trying to be as silent as possible, Smudge tried to figure out where he was and what he was going to do.
Proceeding down the hallway, he passed what appeared to be a smoking lounge. Sitting in a leather chair was the probable owner of the uptight prissy voice he had heard earlier with Hector. Standing beside her was a single bodyguard. Great.
The woman had not noticed Smudge as she sat there reading, occasionally looking up at a wall clock and tapping her foot impatiently. When she looked back at her fashion magazine, Smudge slipped past her unnoticed.
Smudge found the front door and scanned the parking lot. Parked close by was Hector’s black SUV. Funny, he had always hated seeing that vehicle but right now it was the best thing he had ever seen. He grinned as he unlocked the car door and slipped into the driver’s seat. Smudge started the engine and sped off into the night.
A few days later it would all be over, but for now Smudge had a few more days of immortality to enjoy.
Strategy — Flushing Your Hand
The ability to ‘cycle’ cards is very important in V:tES. There are several cards that allow you to cycle through your cards to something useful, such as Dreams of the Sphinx, Visit of the Capuchin and The Barrens.
As good as Voter Captivation is, it can only be used if you get past the referendum stage with a passing vote. Granted, this is easy to do with a deck that intends to win referendums, but if you can’t win one, your ability to cycle through your cards will suffer.
Other cards are easier to cycle because their usage is relatively open-ended. A non-combat deck featuring Celerity will be likely to get in at least one combat in any given game. Why not include a few copies of Flash? You can maneuver away from the Immortal Grapplers (since we know they’ll usually be present) and if the Potent vampire tries to keep the combat going for another grab, you can press to end. Let’s say there are no combat decks at the table and you have a hand full of Flash. Allow your bleed to be blocked, Flash to go to long, Flash to continue, Flash to go to long, Flash to continue… etc. A maneuver will not save your vampire from every situation, but then neither will a Majesty.
Another card that cycles easily is Swallowed by the Night. Need stealth? Play it at inferior. Need to get away from a grappler? Play it at superior. This diversity makes a hand of seven cards look more like eight. You can also cycle through a hand of Swallowed by the Night if you know your opponent has some intercept, since using it as a modifier does not prohibit it being used in the resulting combat.
Taste of Vitae is usually seen in combat decks, especially those that do a lot of damage to opposing vampires. But it doesn’t have to be. If you know that your deck is anemic (ie low on vampire blood) you could use this card to prevent yourself from a forced hunt, in the same way that Life in the City is. Life in the City might be more useful generally speaking, but every little bit of blood helps.
Aura Reading is another card that gives several options. Most of the time it is used at inferior, in order to see the opposing methuselah’s hand, but the superior can be used to get rid of useless cards in your hand. What use is knowing your opponent’s hand if you know that yours is probably much worse?
One thing you can probably say about most winning decks is that they usually go through a lot of cards. I have not done so, but I would imagine that if you were to compare the size of ash-heaps of the various decks at the table, the winner’s would probably have the largest pile. A free-flowing deck is often a winning deck, all other factors aside.
Card Analysis — Gemini’s Mirror
[*** Note — Our playgroup had originally misread the superior version of the card, causing my original analysis to be somewhat off. I have therefore corrected this below. –Wes 3/25/04***]
Gemini’s Mirror
Combat
1 blood
Common
[obf] Strike: dodge with an optional maneuver
[OBF] Only usable before range is determined. When resolving each strike against this vampire, flip a coin. If it’s tails, the strike has no effect on this vampire. This lasts until heads is flipped or combat ends. A vampire can play only one Gemini’s Mirror at superior each combat.
The Black Hand expansion gave Obfuscate users a great new way to avoid certain death with this baby.
Although paying 1 blood for a combat card may seem expensive, it’s basically the same cost you would be paying if the opposing vampire slapped you with hands at one strength.
How many types of combat does this card work against?
Against an Immortal Grapple-based combat, you have several things going for you. First of all, many such decks are not able to maneuver back to close, and some of those will choose to throw Sewer Lids at you. Even if they do catch you at short range, they’ll still have to have that precious Immortal Grapple in-hand, meaning they just cycled two cards (so far) just to catch you. If played at superior, Gemini’s Mirror can be potentially better or worse, as you may be able to completely counter their strikes. It’s a 50/50 chance of course, but to my mind, those are better odds than you usually face against a dedicated combat deck.
Against Fortitude-based Trap/Undead Persistence decks, neither option will help much, I’m afraid. Trap resets whenever a card is played, so the maneuver plus dodge will only perpetuate the effect of the Trap, making it rather useless. The superior version might work if you managed to get ‘tails’ five times in a row. Although this is unlikely, if your vampire is going to die anyway, you may as well risk it. Basically, Gemini’s Mirror is not the best card to play against a Trap deck. Can’t win them all.
Against Assamite combat, the inferior may be best. Assamite combat usually relies on controlling the range. Most want to be at long range; others need to be at close. The key therefore is to deny them that choice in the first place. Of course, any Assamite deck worth its weight will probably have other maneuvers to counter yours, but then they have to deal with the dodge you now have. How many Assamite decks do you regularly see that are able to answer both of these problems? Moot question I suppose, since no respectable player would ever play Assamites (yuk yuk).
Animalism combat is harder to avoid. Carrion Crows is environmental damage and thus not affected by Gemini’s Mirror. Same thing for Murder of Crows. The strike from Aid from Bats doesn’t need to connect to give the press to a second round of combat, and taking one damage from Aid from Bats is the equivalent of paying one blood for the card anyway.
Decks with additional strikes are tricky. Since they feature Celerity, they likely have lots of maneuvers. And they obviously will still hit you regardless of any Dodge, albeit less than they would. Best to play at superior where you can counter approximately half of their strikes. This is almost as good as playing Skin of Steel, if you draw ‘tails’. If you draw heads, you just wasted a card and a blood.
As a general rule, a combat deck will usually catch you more often than it doesn’t. It is, after all, what that deck was designed to do. This card will make catching you a lot harder to do, which may not completely stop them, but it will stop them most of the time. For a robust combat defense, I highly recommend this card to all defensive Obfuscate users.
Most of the time, this card will be used at inferior. The superior is random and thus unreliable. In most scenarios, a dodge is as good as Strike: Combat Ends, and in many situations a maneuver is about as good also. This card won’t let you end combat, but maneuvering and dodging is going to keep you alive more often than not.
Sign-Off
I hope you enjoyed this month’s newsletter. I always look forward to hearing from my reader(s) so feel free to drop me a line with questions or comments.
I often get asked to review and make suggestions for decks built around the Followers of Set. While I am flattered that people would ask me for my advice, I must admit that I find complying difficult at best. The reason for this comes down to the fact that Setite decks are very metagame- dependent in my opinion. A deck that works well in one place will be utter crap in another. This can be said of many decks, but I think Setite decks much more so. Just be prepared for things like stealth-card ratios to be an open question at best. The number of stealth cards you need depends on the number of times people tend to block you. Nobody ever blocks me ’round here because they all know that I’m harmless.
That sounded more like a rant than it was intended. In any case, please don’t stop sending me your decks. And keep me informed of your successes. Any success with a Setite deck is a success for us all. Hail Sutekh!
Cheers,
WES
Author: Andrew ‘Wes’ Weston
[Original Post: rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad]
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