Voting in V:TES

In V:TES, there are a number of strategies Methuselahs use to oust their prey and claim victory. The default, of course, is to focus on bleeding. Others resort to walling up, and using cards such as Smiling Jacks, Anarch Revolts, and Antedeluvian Awakening, in order to take out their prey. Still others use combat to frightening effect, torporing minions, leaving no one to block crippling actions. And then, there is voting.

Voting is a strategy that, while effective, is one I've not used effectively. More often than not, I get stymied by other voters on the table, or else, my lack of experience with the strategy causes me to make mistakes. Still, it's hard to deny that voting is probably, after bleeding, the most efficient way to get rid of one's play.

Essentially, the strategy involves bringing out vampires with titles (votes) and playing vote cards in order to burn pool from your prey. At the same time, voting is versatile in the sense that vote cards have access to a number of effects. While some, such as Kine Resources Contested (affectionately known as KRC), Conservative Agitation, and, for the Camarilla, Parity Shift, focus on burning pool, others, such as Autarkis Persecution, Consanguineous Boon, and Political Stranglehold, can be beneficial to the entire table.

Voting's versatility allows players to make deals with the rest of the voters on the table; oftentimes, all one has to do is throw in Bribes, and some players will vote in the affirmative, without considering the consequences of their vote (much like the current political atmosphere).

Other cards which provide flexibility and utility are Banishment, which sends a vampire back to the uncontrolled region, forcing the controlling Methuselah to influence it out again, if possible, and Anathema, which causes a targeted vampire to burn if it goes to zero blood.

Another card which I saw used to terrible effect in a janky deck was Might of the Camarilla, which was last reprinted in the 10th anniversary set, making it difficult to find. The strategy involved bringing out a Justicar (3 votes) or an Inner Circle (4 votes), and giving it Necromancy (NEC), which no current Justicar or Inner Circle possesses. Might of the Camarilla causes players to burn a vampire in the uncontrolled region, including the voting player. The Methuselah then has a minion act with Possession, which allows him to bring back a burned minion from the ash heap, or, using Mistress Fanchon's ability to search the library for minion cards, use the Sargon Fragment in order to gain superior NEC, which would make bringing burned minions out easy. In the game we played, before we knew it, he had 3 Inner Circles and 3 Justicars, and the vote totals were the highest I'd ever seen; it took 29 votes to defeat a called referendum. (More details on this janky deck in a future deck.)

Of course, if the table is opposed to one's votes, one can push the votes, and this is facilitated by the discipline Presence (PRE). With PRE, one can attempt to control the vote by playing cards such as Bewitching Oration and Awe. After winning a referendum, playing Voter's Captivation allows a Methuselah to gain blood and pool, depending on the winning margin of the referendum.

Combat defense for PRE voting begins and ends with Strike:Combat Ends (S:CE), of which Majesty is probably the most used, since it allows a minion to burn a blood to untap. If one is a little more aggressive, there is Catatonic Fear, which causes 1 point of unpreventable damage, or Unholy Penance, which is placed on the opposing minion and gives one +1 bleed against the Methuselah. Still, Majesty by and large is the go-to S:CE card. One of the challenges of S:CE is that it gets shut down by Immortal Grapple, which only allows hand strikes, so it's important to pack maneuvers in order to get away from dedicated combat decks.

All in all, voting is a versatile, effective strategy in V:TES, and, with the acquisition of Parity Shifts via the 25th anniversary deck (even if nerfed. I'm not going into that discussion.), I will probably try my hand at building a more focused voting deck. Bribes, anyone?

Janky Stuff - Hermanas Hambrientas (concept deck)

In my previous post, I tackled the difficulty of using the Blood Brothers bloodline

Still, rising to the challenge, V:TES players have tried to make workable Brothers decks. I remember that, before I came into the game, someone using a Chicago circle deck managed to win a tournament, while my friend Paul has tried out the newer Budapest and Kiev circles.

Juggernaut of VTES had an idea to use the Mexico City Circle minions, which ties into my own deck concept.

In the role-playing game accessory, Mexico City by Night, the Las Hermanas Hambrientas (a.k.a. the Hungry Sisters) were an experiment by Tremere antitribu Elena Mendoza Vasquez to study whether the Blood Brothers were capable of creating new vampires (All other Blood Brothers are sterile, incapable of Embracing new vampires.). While Vasquez apparently succeeded, the result was a vampire that burned blood at a high rate (hence the "burn 2 blood" text on the Hermanas card). After the Tremere antitribu, including Vasquez, were obliterated in 1999, one of Vasquez's experiments escaped her chantry when an unsuspecting Harbinger of Skulls searched her lab. Now loose in the slums of Mexico City, the Hermana has continued to spawn, and now there are 20 Hungry Sisters, all starving for blood.

In V:TES, there are two Hermanas cards, the Mayor (4-cap, for san pot) and the Menor (2-cap san pot). Both burn 2 blood upon being controlled, else they burn. While this may be a rather difficult handicap, there is a way around it, although it's also tricky. The master card, The Hungry Coyote, gives Sabbat vampires +1 hunt, which means that, when either Hermana hunts after being influenced out, they'll be up to full capacity (unless they're blocked). While there are other blood gainer cards, such as The Rack or The Coven, the Coyote is probably the best bet to bring the Hermanas back up to full blood capacity.

For this deck, the main point of it is to bleed using Walk of Caine, aided by Stealth provided by Shell Game. If caught, one uses the Hermanas' Potence to fight.

And then, of course, there's Angelo, who can be part of any circle. By using his superior Sanguinus, one can use Unwholesome Bond in order to facilitate a number of Hermanas coming out at the same time.

The nasty surprise here would be Angelo using Coagulated Entity, with a lot of Hermanas in play. It could mean a ton of hurt for the opposing minion.



I haven't put this deck together, so I have no idea how it's going to do at a table. As Juggernaut observed in his own post, it's also a forward-moving deck, so defense is pretty much nil, unless you use the Haven Uncovered or Ambush on your predator's minions.

Also, this deck concept still has no Fortitude, so combat is going to be a little tricky, unless I go Juggernaut's route, and use Thrown Gates instead of Undead Strength. I may still try that instead of this current build, and I might also go to 90 cards in order to include some Fortitude damage prevention, but, for now, for better or for worse, here is the Hermanas deck (with Angelo).

Deck Name:   Hermanas and Angelo

Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 8, Max: 22, Avg: 3.5)
--------------------------------------------
  2  Angelo                             pot vic CEL FOR SAN          7  Blood Brother              G3 
  4  Hermana Hambrienta Mayor           for pot san              4  Blood Brother              G4 
  6  Hermana Hambrienta Menor           pot san                    2  Blood Brother              G4 

Library: (80 cards)
-------------------
Master (15 cards)
  4  Agent of Power
  2  Haven Uncovered
  1  Fame
  3  Tribute to the Master
  2  Effective Management
  3  Hungry Coyote, The

Action (18 cards)
  6  Computer Hacking
  2  Coagulated Entity
  6  Unwholesome Bond
  4  Ambush

Action Modifier (16 cards)
  6  Walk of Caine
  6  Shell Game
  4  Claiming the Body

Combat (27 cards)
  2  Free Fight
  3  Coordinate Attacks
  4  Octopod
  6  Brother's Blood
  8  Undead Strength
  4  Brute Force

Equipment (4 cards)
  4  Laptop Computer

Dominated

Back when I started playing, more than a decade and a half ago, I made it clear as to what I would play, and what I would not play. Of course, as I said in the post, "never" is such a long time, and I've shifted some of my self-imposed restrictions. For example, thanks to the Lords of the Night expansion, I've experimented with Assamite and Setite decks, albeit with little success so far. I've also long incorporated Immortal Grapple into a number of my combat decks, such as the Cock Robin deck, which I used in the Asian Championship in 2011. However, there is one concept, one that has been around since the game started, that I've long kept myself from using, and that is Dominate.

Dominate (DOM) is the bleed Discipline, as a combination of its library cards can bleed one's prey for a hell of a lot. Combine it with Obfuscate (OBF), and you've got a stealth bleeder that will absolutely tear through your prey's defenses (unless, of course, your prey decides to bounce it). DOM, on its own, is also effective at shutting down your prey's minions via cards like Seduction, and The Sleeping Mind.

As a defensive Discipline, DOM also shines. Cards such as Obedience takes care of minions coming after your own, while Deflection and Redirection bounce your predator's bleeds to your prey.

Other DOM cards of note are Graverobbing, which allows you to take control of your opponents' torpored minions; one of my friends built a gravedigger deck for this purpose, and would often wind up with half a dozen minions that weren't originally his.

Mind Rape allows you to take control of your opponents' vampires for a turn, and, depending on the target vampire, can be used to perform a good number of actions; it's a bonus if the controlled vampire has similar disciplines to your own.

Of course, there is the all-purpose DOM card, Govern the Unaligned, which can either be used to bleed for 3, or, early in the game, make it easier for your uncontrolled minions to rise from the crypt. I forget from which strategy guide I read it, but it recommends that you should block the early Governing down to the uncontrolled region.

All in all, DOM is a versatile Discipline, capable of dealing with a number of table concerns. This is why, back in 2004, I eschewed using it, since it was too easy to use. I felt back then it was a cheesy option, when I was still grappling with the niceties of the game's strategy and tactics.

My switching to using DOM in my decks has more to do with rising to the challenge of using the Discipline creatively, without falling into the easy grip of just stealthing the bleed through.

So far, I've built two decks which use DOM, and have conceptualized two others, meaning I've organized the deck list, but haven't put them together. They are as follows:

1. A Tremere/!Tremere deck - while built, I haven't played much with this; it's still pretty experimental. It's basically a toolbox, which I feel is a more responsible way of using DOM, but it's still pretty wonky, so I should play with it some more so that I can get a feel of how to use it properly.

2. Gotsdam, the Tired Warrior - So far, this is the deck I've been constantly tinkering ever since I incorporated DOM into my strategies. Gotsdam is versatile, and can stand up to the combat metagame in Manila. I've had a lot of fun using this deck.

3.  DOM Midcap - So far, this is a work in progress. Being mostly 5-cap vampires, Govern can only reliably used as a bleed card, which means this is basically a forward-moving deck, with little defense and combat options.

4. Giovanni powerbleeder - Technically, this deck doesn't rely on stealth to get its bleeds through, but rather, it relies on Call of the Hungry Dead to make blocks fail. This is also still a concept, because I haven't had the time to put it together. Also, I suspect I lack enough cards to make a separate deck, and I may have to take apart another deck, probably the Tremere, in order to build this.

I actually am intrigued by the possibility of building a version of the dreaded Malkavian '94 deck, a stealth bleeder archetype which has withstood the test of time, and remains terribly effective to this day.

While I probably won't completely embrace DOM and go all out on the bleeds, I will have to concede that it provides a lot of entertainment, due to its versatility. It will always be a useful tool in one's repertoire of tricks in Vampire.