In 2005, White Wolf released the Legacies of Blood (LoB) set, with the accompanying Ebony Kingdom (EK) expansion in 2009, to introduce the Laibon, the clans, or legacies, of vampires that populate Africa. The set was composed of 4 clans: the Guruhi, the Ishtarri, the Akunanse, and the Osebo, and each had their respective starter deck. In addition, bloodlines, first introduced in 2001, also had cards in the LoB set to help augment them; to some extent, this made it more difficult to be focused on building a Laibon deck. Still, the set had promise and had some interesting mechanics, although I can't recall if they were used a lot.
One of the key features of LoB aside from the new clans was the introduction of Orun and Aye trifle master cards. Aye and Orun are the modes of morality followed by the Laibon: Aye represents "Earth" and is how the Laibon deal with humanity, while Orun represents "Heaven" and reflect how the Laibon deal with the supernatural.
In the game, Aye allows Laibon minions to cancel frenzy cards and wake, if the minion has three Aye on it. Orun, on the other hand, treats the vampire as having a higher capacity and gives the vampire an extra vote for every three Orun it has. Realistically, this made using these cards difficult, since a player would have to pack at least three of either to make having it worthwhile. Card space being a premium, I can't recall an instance in my experience wherein a player tried using this in a game.
Another feature of the Laibon is the introduction of the Abombwe Discipline, which reflects the vampire's affinity to its Beast; it is one of the clan disciplines of the Akunanse. In the game, the discipline acts similar to Protean, although the number of Abombwe cards are quite limited, with only 13 available cards.
Like other factions, the Laibon have titled vampires: the magaji, who are numerous, and the Kholo, who is unique and clan-specific. Both titles have 2 votes in the referendum.
Because of their limited numbers, few Laibon decks have been successful in tournaments, with few decks winning beyond the set's initial release. With the release of 5th edition, it's unlikely that new Laibon cards or sets will be published, since V5 seeks to streamline the game, as demonstrated by the revisions to such clans as the Ravnos and the Tzimisce, among others.
Still, the allure and the challenge of making the Laibon work has gotten to me, particularly with the Osebo, which is the only Laibon clan I've actually worked with and built a deck of. With its discipline set of Celerity, Potence, and Auspex, I was envisioning building a block and fight type of deck; I used such a deck in last year's Philippine Nationals, with little effect. I'll write about that in my next post.
The Laibon would be difficult to find nowadays, with the sets being more than 15 years old. Still, they make for an interesting challenge for the intrepid deck-builder.
