The Gangrel Do Not Fight

When I first started playing V:TES, as I mentioned in my Bindusara's Diary interview, I started out with the Gangrel preconstructed deck from the Anarchs set; if I remember right, I got two of them, because, unlike the newer preconstructed decks released by Black Chantry, the preconstructed decks needed several cards to make them competitively playable. Still, I loved the fact that the Gangrel, via Protean (PRO), had easy access to aggravated damage, which, unless one's opponent used damage prevention, or Strike:Combat Ends, normally meant one's opposing minion was going into torpor. While I dabbled with the non-aggresive side combat side of PRO (Earth Control, Form of Mist, etc.), I didn't really build any deck which made heavy use of it.

Until now.

I was thinking of a deck that could block (intercept) and get actions through (stealth). While Auspex (AUS) is the premier intercept discipline, and Obfuscate (OBF) the premier stealth discipline,  the Gangrel have access to Animalism (ANI), which is no slouch at intercept, and PRO, which has both stealth and some intercept. With that in mind, I set out to build a deck which did not make use of aggressive combat. Instead, I tried coming up with a deck which could bleed and block, and possibly survive combat.

Mind you, this is still a work in progress, but basically, it's a toolbox deck. It's either the minions bleed with Deep Song, augmented by either the Laptop or Tier of Souls (well, for three of them anyway), or put pressure on the table via the Jack, and defend it.

Horrock, with his built in Path (Protean cards cost one less blood), is the center, with both Pickman and Lamontagne as back-up. The others are midcaps that simply round out the crypt.

I still have to put this together, and test drive it, but I do have a good feeling about this. Another player in our circle, Faust, has used the PRO strike:combat ends in his own deck, and has had good results with it. A little bit of tweaking, and this deck shoudl be good to go.



Deck Name:   The Gangrel Do Not Fight

Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 19, Max: 24, Avg: 5.41)
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  3  Horrock                            vic ANI PRO                6  Gangrel                   G3
  2  Janey Pickman                 for ANI PRO                6  Gangrel Antitribu    G4
  2  Celeste Lamontagne         for ANI PRO               5  Gangrel Antitribu    G4
  1  Spider                             ani for CEL PRO           6  Gangrel Antitribu     G4 
  1  Bernard                            ani for pre pro              5  Gangrel                    G4 
  1  Dr. Allan Woodstock      ani aus for PRO            5  Gangrel                    G3 
  1  Jacob Fermor                         ani tha PRO            5  Gangrel                    G4 
  1  Jezebelle                                ani for pro               4  Gangrel                    G4 
  
   
Library: (90 cards)
-------------------
Master (14 cards)
  2  Smiling Jack, The Anarch
  2  Tribute to the Master
  2  Dreams of the Sphinx
  1 Ecoterrorists
  1 Ennoia's Theater
  1  KRCG News Radio
  1  WMRH Talk Radio
  4  Vessel

Action (14 cards)
  2  Shadow of the Beast
  2  Army of Rats
  8  Deep Song
  2  Tier of Souls

Action Modifier (8 cards)
  8  Earth Control

Reaction (22 cards)
  4  Eyes of the Beast
  6  Sonar
  4  Cats' Guidance
  2  Guard Dogs
  6  Instinctive Reaction

Combat (22 cards)
  6  Claws of the Dead
  6  Earth Meld
  6  Form of Mist
  4  Form of the Ghost

Retainer (4 cards)
  4  Raven Spy

Equipment (2 cards)
  2  Laptop Computer

Combo (4 cards)
  4  Rapid Change

The Nosferatu Justicar

In case you've read the post on the Gangrel Justicar, and were wondering about how the Cock Robin deck was built, here it is:

Deck Name:   Cock Robin Bruise-Bleed
Created By: 
Description: 

Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 24, Max: 40, Avg: 7.66)
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  4  Cock Robin                         aus for ANI OBF POT  10 Nosferatu                  G3  Justicar
  1  Ferox                                   ani FOR POT VIS          7  Gargoyle                   G2 
  1  Ferox                                   ani FOR POT VIS          7  Gargoyle                   G2 
  2  Nikolaus Vermeulen            ani for obf POT              7  Nosferatu                  G2  Prince
  2  Calebros                              obf pot ANI                     5  Nosferatu                  G2  Prince
  2  Teresita                                for ANI OBF POT          7  Nosferatu Antitribu   G3 

Library: (90 cards)
-------------------
Master (16 cards)
  4  Vessel
  2  Villein
  2  Smiling Jack, The Anarch
  2  Fortitude
  1  Powerbase: Montreal
  2  Haven Uncovered
  2  Fame
  1  Rack, The

Action (13 cards)
  6  Deep Song
  3  Ambush
  2  Tier of Souls
  2  Army of Rats

Reaction (15 cards)
  6  Second Tradition: Domain
  3  Instinctive Reaction
  3  Sense the Savage Way
  3  Cats' Guidance

Combat (40 cards)
  8  Carrion Crows
  6  Torn Signpost
  6  Drawing Out the Beast
  6  Immortal Grapple
  4  Armor of Vitality
  4  Superior Mettle
  2 Rolling with the Punches
  4  Taste of Vitae

Retainer (6 cards)
  6  Raven Spy

As you can see, it's probably a little easier to use the smaller princes (Nikolaus and Calebros) than Decker and Rossler. Still, since there are more vamps in the previous deck that have Fortitude (FOR) at superior, that's two extra card slots for something else; in this deck, only Ferox has FOR at superior. Sadly, FOR is not a Nosferatu clan discipline.

Expect, though, a lot of jokes at Robin's expense when he comes out.

The Gangrel Justicar (concept deck)

Originally, I started out trying to tweak my Cock Robin deck to be more of a toolbox, but, along the way, over discussions with other Methuselahs, I decided to switch it to using Xaviar ADV, who's the Gangrel Justicar (given the RPG story, I would have thought that it would be the other way around, but, anyways ...). Doing that meant that I switched Potence (POT) with Protean (PRO), and added some Gangrel tech, such as Ecoterrorists and Ennoia's Theater.

So, basically, the point of the toolbox deck is to do many things relatively well. Thus, there are several possibilities with the deck:

• It can attack others using the Smiling Jack. At the same time, the amount of Animalism (ANI) intercept, along with the Raven Spy permacepts allows minions to defend it;
• It has some bleed capability with the Deep Songs and Tier of Souls;
• Making an opposing minion Fame-ous makes it a torpor target, which then burns 3 pool from the minion's Methusleah;
• Or, as the Cock Robin deck, it can fight, although strike:combat ends is always a possibility without Immortal Grapples.

 The crypts is centered around three main vamps: Xaviar ADV, Mark Decker, and Ingrid Rossler. Any of them can use the Second Tradition, although, unlike the Cock Robin deck, it might be harder to get all three out, if ever they're in the opening crypt. Well, it's a work in progress, considering that I haven't built or tested the deck yet.

Still, the hypothetical draws (via FELDB) seem promising, so we'll see how it works out.

Deck Name:   The Gangrel Justicar

Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 23, Max: 40, Avg: 8.08)
----------------------------------------------
  4  Xaviar (ADV)                  aus cel pot ABO ANI FOR PRO10 Gangrel         G3  Justicar
  2  Ingrid Rossler                   dom ANI FOR PRO         9  Gangrel                    G2  Prince
  2  Mark Decker                    ani for obf pot CEL PRO  8  Gangrel                    G3  Prince 
  1  Beckett                              cel ANI FOR PRO           7  Gangrel                    G3 
  1  Antonino                           ani pre pro FOR               6  Gangrel                    G3 
  1  Dr. Allan Woodstock        ani aus for PRO                5   Gangrel                    G3 
  1  Lord Ashton                     for pro ANI                       5  Gangrel                    G3 
 
 

Library: (90 cards)
-------------------
Master (16 cards)
  1  Ecoterrorists
  1  Ennoia's Theater
  2  Fame
  2  Haven Uncovered
  1  Powerbase: Montreal
  2  Smiling Jack, The Anarch
  1  Sudden Reversal
  4  Vessel
  2  Villein

Action (13 cards)
  2  Army of Rats
  6  Deep Song
  1  Rewilding
  2  Thing
  2  Tier of Souls

Reaction (15 cards)
  3  Cats' Guidance
  3  Instinctive Reaction
  6  Second Tradition: Domain
  3  Sense the Savage Way

Combat (40 cards)
  6  Armor of Vitality
  6  Carrion Crows
  6  Claws of the Dead
  6  Drawing Out the Beast
  4  Rolling with the Punches
  6  Scorpion Sting
  4  Superior Mettle
  2  Wolf Claws

Retainer (6 cards)
  6  Raven Spy