Tournament Report: Belgrade Constructed

Hi folks!

I've just received a tournament report from our Serbian friends. The tournament was held on 19th march 2011.  So here it is:

Tournament was great. There were 24 players: 4 from Croatia, 3 from Hungary, 1 from the USA (Ben Peal), two from Kragujevac (Serbia) and the rest were our locals from Belgrade and those feeling that way. :) I was playing with ANI weeney deck feat. Nana Buruku (deck list in the following post). Generally, it rushes left and right and bleeds for 2 with deep song, based upon the Ashur tablet’s recursive power so to not be left without cards. The tournament went this way for me:

Round 1

We played at a four-player table, which isn’t bad since GW is the same as with five-player tables. The chance was less, I presumed, to use all library cards or that my prey would take 3 VPs before I oust. The sitting order was Zsolt Cziraki (HUN-aka Colos-Tremere with Jar of skin eaters that isn’t s&b in fact :)) – Ivan Jelisavcic (Dmitra Alastor) – Dusan Kosanovic (Thetmes rush raper with DOM support) – Milos Krstic (aka Krle, or me, with Nanu Buruku). I started slowly with bleeding Zsolt for 2 pool, which ended on my cross table buddy who, despite having Dmitra with Alastor and Assault rifle was ousted in 4^th or 5^th turn due to bleeds for 3-6 on stealth.  Since meanwhile my prey equipped a jar and offered Dule to burn one of my vampires with it while Dule would rash and torporize/grave rob me, I decided to offer Zsolt to split VPs 2-2, which he accepted, so he torporized Thetmes and diablerized him. We did the rest commonly. Oh yes, also my star vampire was the 5^th influenced so I I was stuck with a handful of master cards, but somehow I managed to survive.

2VP 0GW

Round 2

This round was the longest during the torunament, most likely due to 2 wallish- and an infernal decks. The latter didn’t push forward, but were only defending. The five-player table contained the following players: Vladimir Maric (aka Vlada the Evil – Unnamed s&b with Shatter the gates I think, I didn’t exactly see what the deck did) – Djordje Belajac (!Tremere wall feat. Chaundice which rushes) - Gabor Szabo(HUN-Mordechai Ben-Nun wall with combat equipment) – Vladimir Saulic (CRO-Stanislava vote&bleed) – me.

My first acton when Stanislava was influenced was to torporize her, since I could hardly survive bleed and vote onsets each turn, so I decided to backoust that deck and replace it with a much more beneficial wall without many bleeds and stealth. It became much easier after that, but while I was devastating infernals (some with rush, others with bleed), I was thinking how to pass through the Chaundice that prevents most of my damage and may come close with Immortal grapple and aggr dmg. Btw., even in 6-7 vampires, Vlada didn’t draw the problematic Unnamed so I didn’t spend much resources on him). Luckily, Chaundice ended in torpour by Ben-Nun, with the help of Dawn operation, so I diablerized her during my turn (despite the fact there was one vote on the table and I controlled the Edge. That cost me 5cap vampire, which was burned by Carlton during my predator’s turn). From then forward there wasn’t a vampire to stop me torporizing all the vampires on the table and oust the 2 remaining players with the help of Dragonbound.

4VP 1GW

Round 3

I entered the 3^rd round pretty sure I had enough VPs for the final round, but I wanted more VPs to be 100% sure in that and to have a better seating place in the finale. It was a five-player table: Stefan Petrovic (aka Stravicni with Kiasyd s&b deck, which bleeds for 6 per turn with each vampire if he isn’t heavily pressed) – Goran Damjanic(CRO-aka Zeleni with bruise/wall Ahriman and Howler as the star vampire) – Nikola Zmiro (Kragujevac playing with Tzimisce wall deck with g4 vampires - Count Vladimir Rustovitch,Duality, etc.) - Zvonimir Ljubotina (malk/!malk s&b g4-5 with Brainwash) – me. The plan was as follows: I influenced Zip (2 cap ani) (he removes Brainwash if need be), and would backoust or slow down Malk, kill the prey which shouldn’t be able to oust his prey playing wall deck and then let the wall decks devastate one another or continue to backoust, which should bring me a certain VP and entrance in the finals. But... there was no Brainwash, I was pushing a bit forward, a midcap Malk was influenced and immediately torporized, followed by another Malk (all have inf. Obfuscate and cannot combat end), while my prey wouldn’t influence less than three vampires at once, hoping that would give him the time to do something. Then my predator also decided not to influence more vampires in vain. Then he played the best card for me at that moment - Kaymakli Nightmares – and degrade my prey to initial state. Due to lack of time to influence all three vampires at the same time, my prey influenced them one by one and I torporized them in according order. Dragonbound finished him.  Meanwhile, Howler torporized Duality and then came the Count Vladimir Rustovich who allows bleeds for 1 due to his fear of Ahrimanes. After one turn pause (whereby  I made no actions but composed in my hand the cards I’d need for combat with Ahrimanes, which combat mode is quite similar to mine, but with more maneuvers, which might cause me problems in combination with Howler’s built-in +1 str and maneuver) I made ready for total annihilation of two ANI decks. Then (I quote Milosh) a scene from Hungarian horror movies occured: Howler got Pentexed, which in combination with inferior ANI of the two remaining Ahrimanes gave me one VP (Terror frenzy kicked ass here). Then I realized that I could gain game win and probably be top seated in the finals. After the one-turn pause, my preys were still under heavy attacks (the moment when I returned 11 Deep songs by Ashur tablets from the graveyard to library (with 2-3 cards only!) astonished my predator).  Since my new prey had only one ready vampire, Anthelios summons the Pentex from the graveyard after which the Tzimisce player couldn’t handle 5-6 bleeds for 2, meaning I gained another VP. While all this was happening, Malk influenced 2 new vampires nd tried to oust me quickly so he could take 2 VPs and gain a chance to reach the finals, but although one bleed for 4 was successful, the other was Archon Invest. Guess what then... The only remaining vampire was Pentexted and that was the end of the game for Malk.

VP5 GW1

Final round

After a short break, we start the final round by determining players’ seating places, by the player placing (after the 3^rd round): first was Slaven Karakas(CRO-aka Karo-malk s&b with flame throwers and lots of refirections and bleed reductions); Stefan Ristic (aka Kica-Black hand lasombre g4/5 s&b/toolbox); Zsolt (HUN- with unpleasant jars) who wanted Lasombra as prey; Vlada the Evil (Unnamed) who also wanted them for prey; me (Milosh the Illiterate (suggestion by translator :)) who chose Lasombra for predator (it seemed to me he was the easiest predator and that Infernals would trouble him before he attacked me and I had to backrush him) and Malk for prey (generally, he doesn’t have good defence from my combat cards and I may destroy his equipment with aggravated dmg using Cannine horde). In short and more literate: the final table looked like this: Malk--->Tremere jar--->Unnamed--->Lasombra--->me.

The beginning suited me fine. Lasombra defended himself from the Unnamed (influenced in the 2^nd turn using Infohigh + Dreams) while I was killing Malks one by one. At the same time, after influencing several Tremeres, Zsolt tried to equip them with some Jars. He managed to do so only once, because others were cancelled by the Unnamed’s (with Sup Maleficia) Evil eyes (yes, he managed to draw all these cards in just 3-4 turns). Soon afterwards, Malks were ousted, and so were Lasombra. I let Tremere push forward for several turns, hoping that only one weakened player would remain so we could play 1 on one since I feared aggr dmg on both sides (similar to the 1^st round only now my predator was unable to push forward and my prey mustn’t  backoust me). Several Governs later Infernals were gone and I was preparing for final push against Tremere and one Gargoyle (Cedric if I remember correctly). Then again the horror with Pentex (applied to the Gargoyle since he is the only one who could withstand combat save for Tremere equipped with Jar), several Deep songs, which left only the Gargoyle and the Jar carrier. Despite the Pentex’s contest in the next turn, Deep songs in my turn killed the Gargoyle and using Cannine horde I destroyed the Jar of skineaters and that’s the end of the game for Zsolt and victory for me. :)

Final score: 1GW for me,1VP for Vlada and 1VP for Zsolt.

Thanks to:

Everybody who played and engrossed this happening with their prsence (particularly Ben Peal and our neighbors from Croatia and Hungary, and the lads from Kragujevac), Chupa who had labored to make the tournament superb, guys from the C22 Club, all those who lent me cards for the torunament, Martin Major and Erik Torstensson for inventing the decks which inspired mine and Pentex TM Subversionu for giving me birth.

Tournament name : Preys VS Predator:Belgrade

Location : Belgrade,Serbia

Number of Players: 24

Deck Name : Nana Buruku with ani weenies

Author : Milos Krstic

Description : Pretty straight-forward ANI deck based on Erik Torstensson's and Martin Major's decks with Nana. Strategy is to backrush 1st ask questions

later. Took 1GW and 3VPs in final,2GWs 11VPs pre final.

Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 1 max: 8 average: 4.83333

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4x Nana Buruku 8 ANI POT PRE Guruhi:4

1x Celeste Lamontagne 5 ANI PRO for !Gangrel:4

1x Petra 5 ANI OBF aus Nosferatu:4

1x Beetleman 4 ANI obf Nosferatu:4

1x Bobby Lemon 4 ANI pro Gangrel:3

1x Stick 3 ANI !Nosferatu:4

1x Mouse 2 ani Nosferatu:3

1x Zip 2 ani Ravnos:3

1x Lisa Noble 1 ani Caitiff:3

Library [90 cards]

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Action [16]

15x Deep Song

1x Entrancement

Combat [36]

13x Aid from Bats

2x Canine Horde

10x Carrion Crows

4x Target Vitals

5x Taste of Vitae

2x Terror Frenzy

Event [2]

1x Anthelios, The Red Star

1x Dragonbound

Master [25]

2x Animalism

1x Archon Investigation

9x Ashur Tablets

2x Blood Doll

1x Carver's Meat Packing and Storage

2x Dreams of the Sphinx

1x Fame

1x Fortschritt Library

1x Frontal Assault

1x Liquidation

1x Pentex(TM) Subversion

1x Tension in the Ranks

1x Tribute to the Master

1x Wider View

Reaction [11]

4x Cats' Guidance

1x Delaying Tactics

4x On the Qui Vive

2x Sense the Savage Way

Tournament report written by Milos Krstic.