End of 2010

Have a great 2011!!!

Poll Result: What do you think of bleed bounce?

Hi folks!

Here is the result of the lates poll, regarding your opinion on bleed bounce. Eighty votes were cast:

I never play without them!

7 (8%)

Essential in every tournament deck.

17 (21%)

Very good, but not essential.

55 (68%)

Totally overrated!

1 (1%)

It's no surprise that the vast majority of the people think that bleed bounce is very good. I am happy that only 21% think that bounce is esssential in every tournament deck. I was afraid that number would be higher. To those 8% who never play without them: give some decks a try that don't use bounce and see how good the can work!

by: Mephistopheles

Lord of the Rush

‎"One Hektor to kill them all, One Hektor to find them, One Hektor to rsuh them all and in the combat diablerize them"

Silent Nights

Hi folks!

As I am about to graduate from another school I need to write a thesis (again, bah!) and will have quite a bunch-o-exams in January, so there will be only very little blogging this month. However, I will return to you guys! I hope that the year 2011 will bring many many posts and articles and a good v:tes year!

by: Mephistopheles

Killer Combo: Blood Tempered Shield

Hi folks!

Another one of my less killer Killer-Combos, but maybe the most funny one. At least in my eyes. Nothing extra to explain here. Blood Tempering will make the Shield to prevent 2 damage every round of combat. Wow. Give it a trap and your done.

I will try to build this with Mata Hari and include Talbot's Chainsaw and Kevlar Vest. Seems to be fun...

by: Mephistopheles

What a flavor text!

Hi folks!

I just came along this by accident and I couldn't go pass this. There is a little flavor text on Anesthetic Touch: "Just relax; this won't hurt, much.Blanche Hill, Salubri"

It just reminded me of a deck I played for maybe more than 2 years. It was my favorite deck at that time and I played many finals with it, though I could never win one. Well, I should have quoted Blanche when playing it!

This was the final version:

Deck Name: Blanche and Friends

Created By: Martin "Mephistopheles" Major

Description: Fresh Blood Vienna

2009.03.01

2 GW 9 VP 0VP 2. place

Crypt:

----------------------------------------------

4 Blanche Hill aus FOR OBE 6 Salubri

1 Blackhorse Tanner AUS DOM FOR 7 Ventrue Antitribu

1 Edward Neally aus DOM FOR pre7 Ventrue Antitribu

1 Owain Evans cel pre AUS DOM FOR8 Ventrue Antitribu

1 Vanessa aus DOM FOR pre6 Ventrue Antitribu

1 Ranjan Rishi DOM for PRE 5 Ventrue

1 Catherine du Bois DOM for obf pre5 Ventrue

1 Ingrid Russo for DOM4 Ventrue Antitribu (was a typo here earlier)

1 Lana Butcher dom for 3 Ventrue

Library: (60 cards)

-------------------

Master (10 cards)

2 Vessel

2 Dominate

4 Heidelberg Castle, Germany

1 Pentex Subversion

1 Giant`s Blood

Action (18 cards)

8 Spirit Marionette

9 Govern the Unaligned

1 Slaughtering the Herd

Action Modifier (19 cards)

8 Conditioning

5 Daring the Dawn

1 Command

2 Repulsion

3 Freak Drive

Reaction (9 cards)

1 Delaying Tactics

5 Deflection

3 On the Qui Vive

Combat (4 cards)

4 Superior Mettle

Upcoming Event: Praxis Seizure Budapest

Hi folks!

Name: Praxis Seizure Budapest 2010

Date: 18th of December, 2010

Location: Cantina, Budapest (you'll find a link to google.maps on the page "gaming sites")

Format: Constructed, 3R + Final

Entrance Fee: 1800 HUF, includes a booster

Come and join us!

by: Mephistopheles

Tournament Report: HNC Final Nagymaros

Hi folks!

I've played my Nana Buruku deck again. I've chosen that deck again, because I didn't want to play any untested deck and this was the only I wasn't bored with yet. I managed to make a 1GW 4VP's which isn't a bad result but was not enough to make it to the final. I won a game where I made a very fast VP and let my predator die. After that I waited for my new prey, a Malkavian sb, to oust my new predator (Inner Circle vote). On the 1 vs. 1 I've played a Frontal Assault and the game win was mine. I could have won the first table too, if my last Ashur hadn't been washed away. I ran out of cards, so I couldn't oust anymore and my predator played an Enkidu deck I could never beat in combat. I could have made a Game Win with 3 VP's there and than died on the 1 vs 1 against Enkidu, but as I wrote before: I ran out of cards. So I finished somewhere between the 8th and 10th place from the top 40, that's ok.

I didn't stay to watch the final, but I was told later that a Trujah deck won and our new National Champion is Peter Botos. Here is his winning deck:

Deck Name: True Power
Created By: Botos Péter

Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 13, Max: 36, Avg: 6,75)
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
1 Tyler McGill AUS pre 4 Toreador
1 Andre LeRoux aus 3 Toreador
2 Veejay Vinod AUS 3 Nagaraja
4 Lydia AUS FOR POT TEM dom pre9 True Brujah
4 Al–Muntathir AUS FOR PRE TEM obf qui8 True Brujah

Library: (90 cards)
–––––––––––––––––––
Master (16 cards)
1 Tabriz Assembly
3 Perfectionist
3 Dreams of the Sphinx
1 Anarch Troublemaker
4 Villein
1 Wider View
1 Pentex Subversion
1 Giant`s Blood
1 Remover

Action (12 cards)
7 Vaticination
3 Summon History
2 Mind Numb

Action Modifier (24 cards)
11 Domain of Evernight
2 Crocodile`s Tongue
2 Recurring Contemplation
7 Tangle Atropos` Hand
2 Freak Drive

Reaction (18 cards)
3 My Enemy`s Enemy
3 On the Qui Vive
6 Eyes of Argus
6 Telepathic Misdirection

Combat (10 cards)
10 Outside the Hourglass

Ally (1 cards)
1 Veneficti (Mage)

Equipment (3 cards)
1 Guarded Rubrics
1 Heart of Nizchetus
1 Codex of the Edenic Groundskeepers

Combo (6 cards)
6 Quicksilver Contemplation

Congratulations to Peter for winning with this nice deck!

For me this tournament marked the end of an era. Some time after the release of KoT I changed my play style and started to build and play combat decks only. Oddly enough the majority of people state that you can't win with combat decks, or they say that it is at least unlikely to win with them. Well, before KoT I played decks like tap and bleed, power bleed, stealth-vote, etc. and never won a tournament (well I did win 1 unofficial one with a toreador anti tap and bleed) although I played like ~15 finals at least. After switching to combat I played less than 10 finals but won 5 tournaments within 1 and a half year! Who says you can't win with combat?

Well, but as I told you this era has come to an end. I won't play my Brujah Alastor, Nana Buruku and Hardestadt decks on tournaments anymore. In order to avoid getting stuck it's now time to move on and try new ideas and new ways. 2011 will be the beginning of a new era. Since my major goal was to enter the Hall of Fame, which I achieved this month, I will be able to play much more relaxed. Now the goal has changed: fun is now more important than winning and I am looking forward to this!

by: Mephistopheles

Thoughts on: game theory leads to deck building

Hi folks!

I realized that almost always building a new deck starts with a basic idea like "I want to try this vampire (or clan, or library card, etc)" or "I want to build a stealth-vote (or wall, rush combat, etc)". So the basic idea is given by either cards or a deck type. In the second step you build the deck, or at least the basic outline of it. In the last step you might think about meta game choices, surprise cards. Finally you play it and then fine tune it. This is the way I did my deck building.

So here comes the question: why not figuring out first what effect you want to have on the table? You first make thoughts about what you want to see happen in general and only after you figured this out you start looking for cards in the second step only? I give some examples so you see what I mean:

1st example:

You have a theory that an important part of v:tes is blood management. So you start looking for ways how to ruin everybody else's blood support. You want to see this effect on the table: everybody looses the blood on his vampires at a dramatical speed. This will make the table collapse very fast. You of course want to be more or less immune to this effect which will put you in a winning position. After you figured this you look at the cards and find some possibilities:

a) Play imbued, cause they are immune to blood loss causing cards. Pack the anti-blood cards: Society of Leopold, Vampiric Disease, Gehenna Block, Young Bloods, Gregory Winter...

b) Step outside the current mentality! Build something like this: Parthenon for extra Master phases, a crazy lot of Vampric Disease + Society of Leopold. Use group 2 Ahrimanes, because Howler has a built in maneuver and Carrion Crows + Aid from Bats + Swiftness of the Stag is strong and you will be able to maneuver a crazy lot. Add some Terror Frenzy's to play at inferior against other decks with lot of maneuvers. Superior version helps you getting rid of other vampires blood (because of the Disease a superior Majesty will cost 3 blood). Maybe play Engling Fury and Vulture's Buffet for your own blood support. You have very good intercept available! While having the entire table suffering from the Disease and collapsing fast you can make sure that your prey will get hurt the most! Throw in a Smiling Jack to finish the table off in the end game.

c) Make a Spirit Marionette deck based on Eurayle Gelasia Mylonas and The Ankou. Use Spirit Marionette + Heidelberg to steal a vampires and empty them! Instead of bleeding you will have a mandatory hunt action! The Ankou will then punish...

Maybe you don't like The Ankou and want something else? Go for a Eurayle + Tremere! deck so you have two vampires to Spirit Marionette with. Instead of building the classic bleed deck you can go for a wall like version with Sniper Rifle and play some Society's on the vamps you already drained the blood off...

This c) version doesn't effect the entire table. This can be an advantage or a drawback. It still follows our idea to ruin our preys blood management.

2nd example:

In this example you also want to make the table collapse as fast as possible, but this time doing direct pool damage. You can play weird things here: Antediluvian Awakening, Curse of Nitocris and Contagion. Should your prey have the Nitocris he or she burns 3 pool right away. To get hurt less than others get some pool gain! Let us take a look what provides pool gain while enabling us to play the cards above: Kindred Spirits with Petaniqua! Make the deck extra fast! Use Zillah's Valley and all those 8 cap Malkavians or Malkavian antitribus who have +1 bleed. Villein will give you some pool back to be hurt less than others. Don't mind blood management here: obfuscate stealth, Kindred Spirits and Eyes of Chaos are for free. Don't mind defense too much: the table will collapse and therefore be over so fast if things go well.

3rd example:

I posted this idea on the newsgroup already. This is again an idea where you want to put pressure on the entire table and put it in a situation where you will be the strongest player. Even worse: put people in a loose - loose position. This idea of mine came from a conversation with Ralf Lammert. He noticed that the current trend shows a rise of big cap vampires. So you have the change to act first and act undisturbed! You put an Anarch Convert (or use it and put an anarch into play, depending on transfers) into play and get a first turn Constant Revolution (you might need play 8 or so)! It comes into play with a counter already. If most of the table plays big caps, the Constant will have 3-4 counters before they even have the chance to remove it! You basically need to defend for few turns, since once it reaches the 7th counter people either cycle their entire hand or take pool damage. Throw in a Smiling beside this. Eagles Sight will prevent your prey from making a vp.

I hope you enjoyed this article as much as I did. I will try some of these ideas next year in the new v:tes season. Have fun!

by: Mephistopheles

/this article reminds me a little bit of Physics, like the M-theory is developing right from the other direction than what theories we had before/

Thoughts on: cost for combat cards

Hi folks!

I've just read something on the newsgroup that inspired me to write this brief article. A guy asked if Dissolution was a good card or not. There was one reply to this which I really liked. The idea is plain and simple: if a combat card costs you blood than it have to give you a real boost, otherwise it's not worth playing it. I tend to agree with this. When playing a combat deck you must always be aware that others will hit back. So when you enter combat you will get damaged yourself (most likely) therefore playing cards with blood cost will cause your vampires to run out of blood quickly, leaving them vulnerable. A good combat deck needs to solve the blood management first! Back to the original point: in order to take the disadvantage of paying blood for a combat card it has to give you a big boost.

Let's look at these cards:

You can see that all of these cards provide a press or a maneuver with an optional press. When we compare Dissolution to Flash we see that they are basically the same. There is no question that Flash is the better card. Dissolution costs you a blood, but gives you no boost in exchange that another free card couldn't give you. Of course there is the discipline issue. You might want to play a combat deck where celerity is not available. Since Protean however does good aggravated damage you might not need any press in your deck. A maneuver is much more important. I will come back to this.

Let us compare Flash to Resist Earth's Grasp first. Both are pretty much the same when we consider the inferior celerity level of Resist. Resist does cost a blood, but it provides an awesome boost: stealth! This is a boost worth paying for with most decks. A Brujah or Brujah antitribu can use this stealth to pass an important political action like Party Shift or Dogs of War. A bruise and bleed version can use this to go for the oust. Any rush deck can use this to stealth over any ally (Jake Washington, Procurer, Tye Cooper) when trying to "hit the target".

Back to the Protean issue, lets take a look here:

These are both better alternatives to Dissolution. Quick meld can be used for a free maneuver or can be used for an additional maneuver at the cost of 1 blood. It is a better card than Dissolution because the cost is optional. Claws of the Dead's strength is the aggravated damage. You need to make a choice here! You either mix Quick Meld and Claws to be able to stay at close and hit aggravated damage (let's say you play 6 Quick Melds and 8 Claws) or you go for Claws only (14 copies). The drawback is that a maneuver + aggravated damage will cost you 2 blood which is a lot. There is an advantage though, which is reliability. You will always have your main combat weapon (the aggravated damage) available. Your choice here shouldn't be made on an emotional base here (like "Oh, I like this artwork" or "Oh, more different cards are more fun"). You should take a look at your deck and consider your blood management: if you can prevent and refill your vampires (Amaranth, 2 Hunting Grounds, +blood when hunting, etc) than you should go for reliability and pack 14 Claws. In the other case, when blood support might be a problem you should go for the free maneuver!

This is just an example. Next time you build a combat deck take the time to check all the available combat cards and try to figure if those cards that cost blood are really worth to cost (= good boost that free combat cards can't provide). You might find a cheaper option.

by: Mephstopheles

/well, it didn't finish as a brief article. I hope this article is of any use actually and that it made any sense to write this/

New page: Trading Zone

Hi folks!

I've added a page to my blog called Trading Zone. I will list those cards there I am looking for or I don't need anymore. Feel free to write me an e-mail! I will keep that page always updated. I want to do trade within Europe only, for overseas a trade must be of value otherwise I don't think it's worth it.

by: Mephistopheles

/please do not comment your trade proposals here, all trading should be done via e-mail or facebook/

Killer Combo: Derange + Sacrifice

Hi folks!

Okay, don't take this too seriously. It should sound more like this: funny combo. You know I like the vampire Louhi so from time to time I try to figure out what to play with her. And here we go:

I guess you can see the idea here. It's like playing with a PTO again. Since you have a Cardinal, you can also use the derange to get vote lock. Throw in some Banishments for the 7-9 caps and annoy your playgroup with this.

by: Mephistopheles

/I am working on Hungarian translations, so don't expect any smart post until I am finished with that./

Magyar oldal a blogon! (Hungarian page on my blog)

Kedves Magyar olvasóim!

Az alábbi mappába lesznek feltöltve a magyarra lefordított cikkeim:

Hun Fragment mappa

A "Magyarul" jelzésű oldalra is kirakom majd a linket. Az oldalon fel fogom sorolni az összes dokumentumot egy rövidke összefoglalóval.

Kellemes olvasást kívánok!

by: Mephistopheles

___________________

Hi folks!

There will be a page where I upload my articles I translated into Hungarian. I just announced that now. The main page (this one) will stay in English only.

Cheers.

Thoughts on: the top view (1st part)

Hi folks!

It's been awhile since my last brainstorming article. Today I want to write about some ideas concerning table dynamics, long term planing and well whatever comes to my mind while writing this.

More than often I see players playing "short-sighted". They pop out their first vampire and start running their deck's script. It often reminds me like a simple program written with if-then-else and do-loop-while. After let's say the first "mandatory" actions like Govern the Unaligned at superior or Magic of the Smith are done they focus on how I call it "1,5 sides". The 1 being their prey the 0,5 being the predator. From time to time when a very strong cross table player seems to become unstoppable they think of "how are we gonna stop him from winning?". Well it's this kind of attitude to the game that I think will limit them and make them less successful players.

Rule 1.: at every single moment during the whole game you should focus on the question "how am I going to win this table?".

Let us assume you play in a tournament in your country with players you know, since most of the tournaments you play will fall into this category. This means that even before the game starts you already have some sort of information. You will most likely know things like A is very fast and aggressive, B likes to talk a lot and loves to make deals, C can be easily frightened and D is very passive in the beginning. Make sure you look at the guys and recall everything you know about them. After the first few turns everybody will have a vampire in play and most likely have discarded and/or played a couple of cards. At this point stop thinking about your game. Take those 30 seconds or that minute to look at everything. From the information you already got you can most likely tell all the decks strategies you see! Like A is obf-dem stealth-bleed, B is a vote deck, C is a wall deck and so on.

Rule 2.: Focus on the game and gather all the information you can get!

It is now that you can start planing your long term strategy! I can't emphasize enough at this point that v:tes is not about gaining a vp! You want the game win, nothing else. The number of possible situations is of course potentially endless. Therefore I am going to give some examples only.

Example number 1.:

You play a wall deck or a toolboxy deck with good blocking potential. Your prey plays a Khazar's Diary deck. Your predator plays a non-aggressive deck which you can handle pretty good. Your grand prey plays a deck you know you won't have serious problems with. You are very much afraid of your grand predator.

So what to do with this setup? You are lucky here since this one is easy. You have a free go on your prey so go for it! What do we know about the Khazar's Diary deck? It's plain and simple: it's strength is in having a crazy lot of minions in play. The bottom line says it's ousting plan is swarm-bleed. The more minions it has the harder it is to stop. So what do we do? Block everything it does. Everything. Remember we have an easy to deal with predator. Don't mind blocking an occasional bleed for 1 or 2 instead use that blocking potential against your prey. You just have the right deck against him.

Let's look at the table's dynamic: you crush into your prey. This keeps the pressure entirely off your grand prey who can become strong. Remember, in this setup it's a deck you will be able to deal with. A strong grand prey will without pressure on him will be able to go forward resulting in a weak grand predator. Remember that is the guy we are afraid off. The drawback is that your predator may have less pressure on him, so he can come forward. Remember it's a deck you can deal with. Take some minor damage that's ok. Hit him a little when needed to make him more careful so he slows down.

Pretty soon there should be a new game situation: you made your oust. Great! No it's important to remember that this game is not about vp's! Let's look at the new situation. Strong prey, but a one you can deal with. Weak grand predator, but with a deck that can hurt you. Strong predator with a deck you can deal with. At this point it's time to switch directions. You want your new prey to make his oust, but don't help him if you see he can make it on his own. He should use up his own resources. Start weakening your predator, but be careful: you don't want to back oust him! By the time you got the pressure off you there are 2 possible situations: a) your new prey made the oust, b) he didn't yet but will soon. In the case of a) you can now start going forward again. You have a situation where you have 2 other players left, but small or no pressure on you and two decks you can handle. You should win here. In the case of b) you might wait a little, use the time to prepare for the endgame, otherwise it's the same situation. You should have the Game Win here for sure.

Rule 3.: Never mind (a) deck(s) who could do you harm getting ousted, even if your prey makes the vp.

Even if those decks are cross table. Remember how I started the article. There might be a situation when that guy thinks "I need to stop him (that be you) from winning".

Rule 4.: Think about table dynamics and plan your game according to it.

You have two goals here: 1) keep pressure off you. 2) prepare an endgame which favors you.

Rule 5.: Game Win => Victory Points

Enough for today. In the next part of this article I will analyse starting situations which are much worse for you than this one. With the right strategy and patience you can win games you never thought that winning them is possible.

Please remember: it's of course not that simple. You might need to table talk a lot, you might need to switch strategies due to unexpected events, you might need to make very though decisions, but never forget that most important think in v:tes is (I truly believe in this) your attitude (remember Rule 1.!!!).

by: Mephistopheles

Hall of Fame: Hungary now with 4 players!

Hi folks!

With Csaba Greguss joining the Hall of Fame we now have 4 players with at least 5 official tournament wins. This list could be much longer if we had reported our tournaments and posted the deck lists on the newsgroup. I hope in the near future some of our top players will join the Hall of Fame, too.

by: Mephistopheles

/Balázs "Mufti" Sebestyén is likely to enter the HoF soon, since he has already 5 reported decks in the TWDA, but somehow nobody noticed it yet/

Registering for the HNC Final

Hi folks!

You can register here: http://vtes2010.redsign.hu/

If you are not in the top 40 you can still register! You will find yourself on a waiting list.

Thanks RedSign!

by: Mephistopheles

Pictures from HNC Budapest

Hi folks!

Here are some pictures taken at the tournament by our guests from Belgrade.

You can find more pictures on v:tes group Serbia.

by: Mephistopheles

HNC Ranking updated

Hi folks!

Last update for this year. The top 40 players are invited to the final round in 2 weeks. Since there are going to be players from these top 40 who can't attend the tournament rank 41-50 should prepare to get an invitation.

Congratulations to Gyula Erdos for finishing on rank1 with an astonishing 17 Game Wins and 76,5 Victory Points!

by: Mephistopheles

Tournament Report: HNC Budapest

Hi folks!

Yesterday was the final preliminary tournament of our National Championship, held in Budapest. After this event the top 40 players will play the final tournament in two weeks to decide who will be our National Champion in 2010.

This time 38 players attended the tournament, 3 from them came from Belgrad and 1 from Kosice. Thank you guys for coming!

I decided to play with my Nana Buruku deck, which was a very good deck choice this time:

1st table: Ben Peal (Samedi bloat&bleed) - Ferenc Borbely (Omaya + 1 caps) - Me (Nana Buruku) - Mihaly Antal (Ishtarri bleed) - Robert Laszlo (Legendary Unmada)

The game started with a very good crypt draw for me and a bad one for my predator who didn't find Omaya in the starting crypt. The 3 weenies appearing behind me seemed scary at first, but then I remembered which deck this was and I knew that I can produce enough pool to be safe. I could focus on my prey, who seemed very strong early on, since he delayed a Parity Shift and bled Unmada quite hard. Fortunately he ran out of combat defense cards so I could torporize his minions. Meanwhile Ben Peal had many Samedis doing many actions and ~20 pool or so. I made my fast vp and started pushing my next prey, torporizing his lonely Unmada. Ben gave him a rescue and started to look for ways he could play against me. In my turn I played a Fear of Mekhet onUnmada, this way I could start rushing Ben. Unmada burned and I made my vp. To avoid being blocked by Omaya when bleeding my prey I played a Pentex on her. I made my second vp. My prey felt like pushing forward so I torporized all of his weenies. At this point it was clear that I had to deal with a 1 vs. 2 situation so I played my Dragonbound sacrificing my predator. The heads-up against Ben was pretty easily solved by a well timed Frontal Assault. 1Game Win and 4 Vp's.

2nd table: Zoltan Komora (Kabebe + Undele No secrets) - Csaba Pal (Samedi) - Tamas Csepregi (Gerald Windham) - Me (Nana Buruku)

When Gerald Windham hit the board I felt like back rushing. Tamas tried to convince me not to rush him, but you know what the combat deck doctrine says. I rushed him. I had some respect for the Samedi deck at this time so I tried to find a middle way: I didn't torporize Gerald, just left him at 0 blood. This gave me some extra turns I used to put pressure on my prey. Unfortunately Tamas played a Secure Haven on Gerlad. Notice: when in doubt always back rush first. Later on he recruited a Ponticulus, so the back rush option was no longer available. I had to use a crazy lot of resources against my prey, but after like 60 cards I finally mad my oust. I went for my next prey right away since he was low on pool. At this time I had already pressure coming from my predator, but I had some reaction cards in my hand, which allowed me to still take actions. I managed to block a bleed, which was more than helpful. :)

Basically this was another 1 vs 2 situation, but this time I felt like being fast enough. I made a big mistake at this point since I played a Frontal Assault and noticed after playing it, that I can simply oust my prey with all those Deep Songs played at inferior. I ousted my prey, but lost 4 pool, since my next prey Tamas had 4 minions. On the 1 on 1 situation the blood dolls kept me alive and a Pentex Subversion played on the only Tremere that had blood left gave me the game win. 2GW 8VP

3rd table: Gabor Veres (Salubri anti) - Peter Ducai (Louhi) - Istvan Cserdi (1caps vote) - Balazs Kaloczkai (Lodin and friends) - Me (Nana Buruku)

Terrible table here. I drew 4 Nana's in 5 vampires and Wider View didn't show up. My grand predator gave up on the game when he noticed that he was stuck between an early Fabricia and Lodin. He decided to totaly stop doing anything forward and didn't even block his preys Parity Shifts with his Carlton. Hard to understand. With 2 vampires and a very late 3rd one I couldn't play my game. 0 Vp

Final Seating:

1st: Ferenc Vasadi alias Frankie: Lucian the Perfect mega bleed

2nd: Goran Ivanovic: Kyasid stealth bleed

3rd: Me: Nana Buruku

4th: Balazs Pahi: Renegade Garou's

5th: Peter Korsos: Temporatrix

The seating:

P. Korsos -> Frankie -> B. Pahi -> Me -> G. Ivanovic

I choose to sit in front of the Garou deck, figuring that no one wants to sit between us. I was pretty sure that I can handle the Garou's with the Carrion + Aid from Bats module. The game started with the Kyasid pushing right away on his prey. My predator called a Gangrel Justicar and what a surprise! The Kyasid delayed it! The Kyasid brought out Omme and established vote lock at the table. Balazs asked Goran if he may pass a Gangrel Justicar and since the answer was not satisfying for him he rushed Omme with his Garou. Two Target Vitals torporized Omme. After this action he could path his Justicar and his Praxis Seizure. After this turn I launched my attack on the Kyasid and made my vp. Meanwhile: Frankie didn't draw enough stealth so Balazs's Unmasking and Carlton kept him safe. Peter, having no predator could build up and oust Frankie. This is were the playing stopped. With the 3 of us left this was the situation: Balazs had no chance to oust me, since I was stronger in combat and had a lot of pool. I could't oust Peter, since I have no way to deal with Goratrix. Peter couldn't oust Balazs since his "endless combat" trick is killed by Carlton's "endless dodge". What happened? Time out of course. Since I was the higher seated player, I won.

And here is the winning deck:

Deck Name: mINIMAL sTYLE

Created By: Mephistopeheles

Description:

Fast and aggressive rush combat. Make 1st vp asap and decide who to stay 1 on 1 with. Follow the basic combat doctrine to backrush first and than play without a predator.

Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 8, Max: 32, Avg: 4,5)

--------------------------------------------

1 Beetleman obf ANI 4 Nosferatu

1 Bobby Lemon ANI pro 4 Gangrel

1 Bothwell ani for 3 Gangrel

1 Clarissa Steinburgen ani obf 3 Nosferatu

1 Lisa Noble ani 1 Caitiff

1 Mouse ani 2 Nosferatu

4 Nana Buruku ANI POT PRE 8 Guruhi

1 Stick ANI 3 Nosferatu Antitribu

1 Zip ani 2 Ravnos

Library: (76 cards)

-------------------

Master (21 cards)

3 Animalism

9 Ashur Tablets

2 Blood Doll

2 Fame

1 Fear of Mekhet

1 Frontal Assault

1 Pentex Subversion

1 Powerbase: Montreal

1 Wider View

/could need more copies of Animalism skill card. Fear of Mekhet was a metagame choice and burned a Legendary Unmada. Wider View never showed up when needed. Frontal Assault is pure gold!/

Action (13 cards)

13 Deep Song

/just the right number/

Reaction (8 cards)

2 Cats` Guidance

1 Delaying Tactics

3 On the Qui Vive

2 Sense the Savage Way

/my version is really not about blocking. Random intercept is good to

keep people guessing and blocking deflected bleeds/

Combat (33 cards)

10 Aid from Bats

2 Canine Horde

10 Carrion Crows

4 Target Vitals

5 Taste of Vitae

2 Terror Frenzy

/very solid combat package, Target Vitals and Terror Frenzy are extremly

useful/

Event (1 cards)

1 Dragonbound

/discarded when drawn too early and taken back into hand after a completed Ashur Cycle in the midgame. Awesome bonus to your ousting power/

by: Mephistopheles

Upcomming Event: HNC Final, Nagymaros

Hi folks!

This years HNC Tournament serious is coming to an end this weekend in Budapest. After that round the top 40 players from the HNC Ranking will be invited to play the finals in Nagymaros, to determine this years Hungarian National Champion!

The HNC Final will be held on November 27th, 2010 in Nagymaros. The player finishing top ranked on the HNC Ranking list will be rewarded. That player is already determined, since there is no way that anybody could take away rank 1 from Gyula Erdos. Congratulations Gyula!

by: Mephistopheles

Deck idea: A new way for Ravnos

Hi folks!

Norman Brown aka XZealot posted like endless decks on the newsgroup. For some people this seemed to be pretty annoying. Well you can't please everyone, right? I myself found some of XZealot's ideas pretty amusing, but there was one deck that caught my attention:

Ravnos Whack-a-Mole

The basic idea is that you steal all the pool from your prey's uncontrolled region. Should any vampire pop out you just send it back with Reality.

You can build a pretty cool swarm bleed module around it with Tumnimos and weenie Ravnos vampires. Week of Nightmares will give you ousting power and Chimerstry has pretty good stealth and combat defense available. I'm sure that my version of this deck would differ in many cards, but the basic idea is really cool. Thumbs up!!!

by: Mephistopheles

Tournament Report: Dragon's Breath Rounds Budapest

Hi folks!

17:30 Budapest, Hungary…

A bunch of guys and girls approaching to a club called DragonFlame, to get some Vtes experience on Friday evening at a new tournament, 2 rounds + final. 24 players attended, some of them are the new generation of the Hungarian VtES community, embraced at the latest tournaments called „the Progeny Tournament”. At the end, some elder Matuselahs arrived to show the embraces the tricks of the game.

22:45 Final

A former Hungarian champion who has just returned from Scotland for some games, Adam, played with Nana Buruku - animalism/ Ashur Tablets. His Prey is Najdzsel , one representative of the new generation, played with 1-cap vamps KRC/Conservatives/Titles/breed deck. His Prey is Lady Kitti, a Malkavian s&b with Korah and Rodolfo. Then came myself, Mr_Toreador, just arriving from Paris and I used Uta Kovacs and the gang to secure my way to the final. My prey was Balu, one of the louder but (in  ) experienced players of the group - he played a Lodin + Ventrues Vote deck.

After some confrontation between Lodin and Nana Buruku, the latest was diablerized, so Adam’s play had been slowed down. Then Najdzsel had the chance to bleed Kitti 1by1, and I was bled by 3 by 3 on stealth. After some turns, Kitti was ousted and Balu and me were on 1-1 pool, Najdzsel finally had the votelock. Balu had 2 Radios (WMRH+KRCG),+ Ossian, so Najdzsel had no real chance to oust him, so he decided, to oust both of us with one KRC. Here came the surprise #1: Balu gave me 1 intercept for one pool and self-ousted for blocking the vote seeing no chance for himself at that point. I survived on 2 pools after the +6. In my turn I bled Adam out from 16 pools. It gave me +1 turn, while I sufered 2 more votes and bleeds. Najdzsel at 8 pool, influenced out his 7th ready minion, so he went down to 6. After some card cycling, Rutor’s hand crushed down via a Governed and Conditioned bleed through the mirror…

3 GW 12,5 VP

by: Csaba "MrToreador" Greguss

/The tournament was held on 05.11 and might become a regular Friday night event in the future. - Mephistopheles/

Killer Combo: Crocodiles Tongue + Kiss of Ra

Hi folks!

It's been a while since my last Killer Combo post. This ones strength is that the cards are very usable on their own too, so you don't necessarily need to wait for both to show up. This combo can do what most combat decks fail to achieve: send a vampire to torpor with two cards only and causing it four damage. Do this once, next time people will be afraid blocking you!

Some vampires to consider playing this combo with:

Bruce de Guy

Well, I think nobody will expect you to play such a combo with him. Since he is a Cardinal another one of your vampires can go for a diablerie action or just play a Graverobbing, which is even more fun. Add Banishment to the deck!

Gotsdam, The Tired Warrior

Basically you play the good ol' Grinder deck enhanced with this combo. Crocodiles Tongue will help you against allies too, which is important since you might want to play with Daring the Dawn!

Lydia, Grand Praetor

She can fetch the Ankara Citadel with Summon History making Kiss of Ra even more effective since it will cost her only 1 blood. You most likely want to play the Domain of Evernight + Outside the Hourglass combo instead, but maybe you want to use something else...

Mary Ann Blaire

With her built in bloat action you will always have something you want to get passed. Play this combo once and nobody will care about those 2 pool. Isn't that nice?

I hope you liked this one. There are some more vamps out there who could use this so it's up to you. Give it a try and have fun!

by: Mephistopheles

New National Coordinator

Hi folks!

Since we had no active National Coordinator I applied for it. I hope I will be able to put Hungary on the international v:tes map. I always had the feeling that we were/are pretty isolated from the international v:tes community. This was one of the main reasons why I decided to run my blog in English.

For any player who wants to visit us for casual games or Tournaments please feel free to contact me for assistance, if needed:

major.martin.tibor@gmail.com

by: Mephistopheles

Upcomming Event: HNC Round in Budapest

Hi folks!

The HNC Round in Budapest will be held on November 13th at a place called Cantina. The address is Budapest VII. Alsóerdősor u. 3. Registration Fee will be 2000 HUF which will include a Booster and a bunch of Promos. The extra money saved from the event will be used for the prizes in the HNC final.

You may attend the tournament even if you don't plan to play any further HNC Rounds. Any guests are very welcome! For help finding accommodation please contact me via e-mail.

by: Mephistopheles

Soon to come: HUN FRAGMENT on You Tube

Hi folks!

I am planning to launch a channel on YouTube for this blog. I plan to make some interviews and videos of our playgroup and tournaments. Hopefully I can upload the first video this month!

by: Mephistopheles

/might be in December only, you know it depends on the.../

Poll Result: What kind of crypt do you like to play?

Hi folks!

Here is the result for the latest poll (47 votes were cast):

Mono Discipline	3 (6%)
Common Disciplines (more than 1)	7 (14%)
All Big Cap	2 (4%)
Mono Clan	23 (48%)
Star Vampire with weenie support	5 (10%)
Mixture of different disciplines	7 (14%)

Mono Clan turned out to be the most popular, which didn't surprise me. I like to play mono clan decks, too. I am little disappointed by the fact that big caps are so unpopular. Might this be because of Pentex Subversion?

by: Mephistopheles

I'm running out of tournament deck ideas...

Hi folks!

Since the NAC I've spent many hours thinking of new tournament decks to build, but I found it hard to match all those criteria I have developed:

1. I need to be able to rush vampires.

2. I need an effective combat package.

3. I need to be able to generate (lots of) pool.

4. I need either modest intercept or bleed bounce.

5. Ousting power should not rely only on torporizing or burning vampires.

So far I have three decks that fit these criteria.

1. Brujah Alastor

Pro: Very versatile, but still reliable. Has massive pool gaining ability with Parity Shift, Voter Cap and Grooming. Rush ability and Combat is fixed, saving resources. Another great advantage is that the deck can produce 3-4 stealth on critical actions. Second Traditions is awesome of course. Ousting Power is supported by perm +bleed through New Carthage, also Parity Shifts help to reduce your preys pool pretty fast. Can achieve total vote lock.

Contra: Can be very vulnerable in the first ~30 minutes. A bad draw in the early stage or an aggressive predator can ruin your game.

2. Nana Buruku + weenie Animalism

Pro: Many minions, that can cause a lot of damage either through combat or by bleeding. Very effective in combat. Ashur tech saves resources and provides you with pool. Also PB: Montreal and a hunting weenie gives an additional 2pool/turn when needed. Has access to some intercept via Animalism. Very good ousting power. Maybe my best deck for the 1GW 3 VP strategy.

Contra: Can have serious trouble when facing other decks with combat options like Akunanse or Apparition Ravnos. Very vulnerable to cross table ousts which are likely to happen. Combat Ends stealth-bleeders can be a serious problem, too.

3. Hardestadt eats the world

Pro: Can become very overwhelming. Diablerizes vampires, so whats dead, stays dead. Can produce large amounts of pool if the Amaranth - Villein engine starts working. Though it lacks intercept it can bounce bleeds, which is great. Very fun to play.

Contra: It's a star vamp deck, which is always a vulnerable deck type. Carlton is a real issue. Has problems against Animalism combat and decks running plenty of prevent cards.

Right now I am looking for another deck that could become No. 4 in the list. Any ideas? Potential candidates are Akunanse and Blood Brothers, though both have disadvantages: Akunanse can't handel S:CE and isn't weenie enough, Blood Brothers seem to lack stability: no bounce and Gestalt isn't really my favorite Intercept source to play...

Feel free to comment. Any ideas are highly appreciated!!!

by: Mephistopheles

HNC Ranking updated

Hi folks!

Yeah!!! UPDATE!!! MU-HA-HA!!!

by: Mephistopheles

HNC Debrecen: pwned by Peter Korsos

Hi folks!

Too bad I had to miss this event, too. I really missed something there, namely Peter Korsos winning with this lovely Temporatrix deck:

Deck Name: Temporatrix
Created By: Korsós Péter
Description: Goratrix+ Pocket out of time = Endless combat

Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 8, Max: 40, Avg: 5,08)
---------------------------------------------
1 Marciana Giovanni dom 2 Giovanni
1 Mustafa Rahman dom 2 Tremere
1 Ohanna dom 2 Malkavian
1 Samson dom 2 Ventrue Antitribu
1 Brooke dom tha 3 Tremere Antitribu
1 Saiz aus dom 3 Tremere Antitribu
1 Lia Milliner dom nec 3 Giovanni
1 Gloria Giovanni nec DOM 4 Giovanni
4 Goratrix vic ANI AUS DOM THA10 Tremere Antitribu

Library: (90 cards)
-------------------
Master (22 cards)
3 Dreams of the Sphinx
1 Erciyes Fragments, The
1 Giant`s Blood
5 Infernal Pact
2 Pentex Subversion
1 Rack, The
1 University Hunting Ground
2 Vessel
4 Villein
2 Wash

Action (10 cards)
4 Clotho`s Gift
4 Magic of the Smith
2 Rutor`s Hand

Action Modifier (21 cards)
3 Conditioning
7 Domain of Evernight
3 Enkil Cog

8 Pocket Out of Time

Reaction (21 cards)
9 Deflection
3 Delaying Tactics
3 On the Qui Vive
1 Rewind Time
5 Sense the Savage Way

Combat (4 cards)
4 Rego Motus

Ally (4 cards)
2 Nephandus (Mage)
2 Tye Cooper

Equipment (4 cards)
1 Bowl of Convergence
1 Heart of Nizchetus
2 Talbot`s Chainsaw

Combo (4 cards)
4 Quicksilver Contemplation

Congratulations to Peter Korsos! Finally there is an HNC round which is not won by Guyla Ferdos (who still was in the final though)...

by: Mephistopheles

Game Report: Tatu Sawosa Wall

Hi folks!

As you (might) know I wanted to build a Cesewayo deck. Since I don't own any copy of Epiphany and also lack some Magic of the Smith I still didn't built it. So I came up with another concept for Osebo using Tatu Sawosa as a main vampire. The basic idea of the deck is to build up with permanents like Enforcer, Preternatural Strength and Well-Marked. Combat cards are basically cut down to Immortal Grapple, Disarm, Thrown Sewer Lid and Taste of Vitae. The deck features a strong Auspex module. Ousting power is Fame and Dragonbound.

So I gave that deck a try and it did pretty well. We played a 4 player table, I had an Anarch Diversion Gunner as a prey and a Striga - Concordance - Fractura Baali predator. Cross table buddy was a Blood Brother. The permanent stuff angle worked out really well. Nobody could block my rescue actions while I could block, that gave me an advantage. One of the turning points was when Tatu Sawosa playd a Legend of the Leopard stealing a Venificti with it. My prey had an Aranthebes in play, so when I tried to bleed him next turn he tried to block the Venificti. At this point I played my surprise card: Veil the Legion and bled him out.

At this point my predator was sort-o-dead, so it was basically down to the Blood Brother and me. I Pentexed one of 'em, and torporized two others. Unfortunately I had a Fame on my weenie support. I ran out of wake cards for Tatu Sawosa (she had hands for 4 + Well-Marked) so my only chance to defend Pentex was blocking with the weenie. I've got torporized and the Blood Brothers won. When I played the Slam in that last combat, I replaced an Eyes of Argus. Had I seen that 1 card earlier so I could block with Tatu the game win had been mine. If I hadn't blocked that last action the Blood Brother would have played a Hive Mind for untaping and an Oppugnant Night afterwards, so I'd be dead, too.

I still have a good feeling for this deck, it neads some little tweaks here and there, but it has potential.

by: Mephistopheles

First Imbued Experience

Hi folks!

I've just played with the Imbueds the very first time. Kevin was right, I've just played them 'cause I've got the booster boxes for free. However it turned out that it is actually fun to play them. There are just so many things you have to think of. It's a little bit more challenging than to play Govern-Stealth-Conditioning.

Well it was a four player table. My prey played a Ravnos anarch vote deck, my cross table buddy played an Aching Beauty deck and my predator played some Salubri/Harbringer toolbox. My predator was busy surviving so I could get some stuff. Angel of Berlin gave me an Ivory Bow and a Crusader sword. I didn't drew Travis in my crypt, but pool was still not a problem. Vampiric Desease turned out to be a cool card and Young Bloods just rocked the house. Since the Toreador didn't felt like cross table ousting me, I could safely build up strength and oust my prey. In the end I made the sweep.

Seeing the deck from the inside is pretty interesting. It's actually very similar to the Khazar's Peasant deck: if you want to stop that deck you just need to block everything right away. I don't know if I will take the deck to a tournament, but it was good to get to know my enemies...

by: Mephistopheles

HNC Ranking updated

Yep!

After HNC Veszprém the Ranking got updated. Awesome. Indeed.

by: Mephistopheles

/I couldn't join the event, that's why there is no tournament report/

Deck idea: Osebo Vote Deck

Hi folks!

I was just looking through my 7 displays I took home with me from the NAC and the idea stroke me like a lightning. Cesewayo seems so strong to me, I must build a deck around him. Since I like to play toolboxy decks I can't ignore his 4 votes. Together with Kisha Bhimji and an Osebo Kholo, I can have 8 votes on the table. Add cards like Ancestor Spirit, Kduva's Mask and Sense Vibration to it and you can easily call your politics with 10-12 votes.

Also Cesewayo has a very strong defensive ability. He can get some Aye and a No Secrets from the Magaji, too. Superior Dominate will make Obedience a No-Brainer, also I can try to fit in some Govern the Unaligned's.

Of course he can get a very card effective combat on him with Well-Marked and Preternatural Strength. Maybe a Blood Shield will fit in there, too. Combat is not my main strategy here, I will go with permanent solutions only with the exception of Resist Earth's Grasp.

The only problem I see is pool management. Since I'd like to play with Kduva's Mask, Monastery of Shadows and maybe some other equipments like Sniper Rifle and Blood Shield, I need to generate sufficient pool. Ancient's Influence and Powerbase: Tschwane might not be enough. Maybe I should go for the Rack + Vessel module. Another option could be Bamba + Con Boon with Carver's Meat Packing Storage for possible blood support on Cesewayo.

Well, I will build an alpha version of the deck and give it a try. Too bad I don't see when I will have time and opportunity to play v:tes in the next few weeks...

by: Mephistopheles

HNC Ranking updated

Thats right!

I've missed the tournament in Hatvan, but the organizers sent me the final standing. Once more Guyla Ferdos showed that he dominates the Hungarian v:tes scene and won the tournament with 1 Game 3 Victory Points in the final.

by: Mephistopheles

/next HNC round will be held on October 10th in Veszprém/

Thoughts on: survival against stealth bleed decks

Hi folks!

Just a little brainstorming from my hotel room in Orlando, Florida. This is about how to survive a stealth bleed predator, supposing you are not playing a wall deck.

1. Total block denial

This is the most important point. You want to make your predator's hand jam with stealth and reaction cards as fast as possible. Key point here is that you never let him cycle any stealth card, so you never block. Make sure your grand predator never tries to block the stealth bleeders undirected actions, like hunting or actions like The Call. Should your predator try to cross table act in order to provoke a block attempt (stealing Montreal, Rack, etc.) make sure you convince the target player to decline the block attempt.

2. Try to cancel card drawing master cards

Should you play with Sudden Reversal or Wash keep them for your predator. At the early stage of the game don't mind your prey playing a minion tap or whatever. You really should focus on surviving first. Fortunately v:tes is not a turbo game, you'll have plenty of time to deal with your prey, supposed you survive! So save those Sudden's for cards like Dreams of the Sphinx, The Barrens or similar cards. Remember, we want our predator jam on useless cards.

3. Try to convince your grand predator not to bleed

Most of the popular stealth bleed deck play with bleed bounce. This is why you want to convince your grand predator not to bleed, not even for one! This way your predator will not only jam on stealth cards, he will also jam on reaction cards! You might need to offer your grand predator something in return, like calling the KRC's 2/2 or even 1/3 or just to back rush. Whatever helps you making your predator jam on his hand!

4. If playing combat, always back rush first

This very basic rule of combat decks applies even more if you have a stealth bleed deck as a predator. Let's say Gilbert Duane hits the board behind you. If your predator promises you not to bleed for two turns if you don't rush him you should reject! It's better to take a bleed for 6 right in the beginning and get rid of a threat than to let him Govern down 1-2 times and then face 2-3 vampires you might not be able to handle by the time you realize the threat!

5. Make use of the tables sympathy

You'll have it! More often you will notice that even your own prey will be willing to help you. An aggressive stealth bleed will almost always end up in being the table hate number 1. Since you will be his "victim" you will have the tables sympathy. Make use of it! Grab every resource you can (getting pool from another players Parity Shift, getting the Montreal, etc.) and try to get other players to rush/vote against the stealth bleeder.

Normally it shouldn't take you long to get your predators hand jammed. Let's say you achieve your goal after 25-30 minutes after the start. Another 30 minutes of defensive play should help you recover. You will still have an hour left to play for the game win!

All this only works with certain deck types. I think in modern v:tes it is important that your tournament deck has ways to produce pool. It can be the Ashur/Liquidation tech, Parity Shift or Con Boons, Blood Dolls and cards that add blood from the blood bank to your uncontrolled vampires, etc. Being able to generate pool is a basic requirement for a tournament deck, at least in my eyes.

This strategy needs a lot of self-control and more often plenty of table talk, but for me it worked. Next time Morel hits the table behind you remember this article and give it a try.

by: Mephistopheles