Game Report: 4 rounds of v:tes!!!

Hi folks!

Finally I played some rounds of v:tes again. This time I found the time, money and energy to travel all the way back to Budapest so I could play 4 games of v:tes with my friends Csaba Greguss, Ferenc Vasadi and Kriston David. As you can see all tables were 4 players tables since we 2 other guys had to cancel the event.

1st game:

I have played an imbued deck only once before and it worked pretty good at that time. Since I want to give them a chance in a tournament I felt that I should take another opportunity to test the deck. After that one game in Veszprém I realized that many of the cards I had in the deck were not  actually useful so I removed them. I figured that since the Imbued are very card efficient I should cut down on library size and just go with what really matters so I ended up with a 70 card deck. 

The deck had a frenetic start: Fortschritt Library to fetch the Unmasking, than in the second turn I played my Information Highway. I had 4 different Imbued in the opening crypt one of them being good ol' Travis. Also important was that John O' Malley was in the starting crypt. I equipped him with a .44 Magnum via Angel of Berlin and started to rush constantly. He pretty soon got his Vigilance and Discern duo. I was lucky since both my prey and predator played different types of Presence vote decks. They were easy to block. My prey (Frankie) played a Montecalme deck which was based on Obedience as combat defense. Not really useful against Imbued. 

The cross table deck was a Cybele deck with Shatter the Gate which she did shatter, but at this time I was totally set up with Champions and whatever else an Imbued can have. Travis and Church of Vindicated Faith with Information Highway gave me the 3pool/round and bleed were no danger because of the two Champions in play. I made a Game Win with 3 Vp's and the Imbued are now at a 2 wins in 2 games ratio.

2nd game:

Well I violated some of my own rules I always write on this blog, so no wonder that I failed in this game. I played a Potence Dominate bruise and bleed with Gustaphe Brunelle as a star vampire. Since my cross table buddy played an Ishtarri .44 magnum based bruise and bleed deck I thought I don't need to rush backwards. Well my predators Thucimia was torporized by the Ishtarri but she received a Giant's Blood and came back to the game. I missed this chance to hit her back to torpor again because I thought the Ishtarri will do that. They didn't and Thucimia got a Secure Haven. Meanwhile I made a fast vp ousting Frankies Montecalme deck. He didn't drew enough Obediences. Since I couldn't attack Thucimia I tried to oust Csaba (Ishtrarri), but the Enkil Cog supported Thucimia was faster and I got ousted. The heads up was won by Csaba who played an Archon Investigation on Thucimia. 1 vp here. Could have been possibly more if I had played by my rules.

3rd game:

In the third game I played my Dmitra Alastor deck, which really didn't work out this time. I drew all 3 Assault Rifles in the first 10 cards, but didn't see any Alastor for quite a long time. Also only 1 Parity Shift showed up. I had to equip an Assault Rifle for 5 pool which was destroyed by a Canine Horde right away. I was a little upset to say the least and therefore made some stupid mistakes. 0 vp here.

4th game:

I gave that Thucimia deck a try and I just had a terrible draw. Neither a Villein nor a Haquims Law showed up to get me some pool. I also failed to draw an Enkil Cog. My predator played a Nahim Enosh + Elimelech deck which just stealth bleeded me out faster than I could do the same to my prey. 0 vp here.

Altogether it was fun playing v:tes again. Playing v:tes on a regular base seems crucial if you want to stay on a competitive level. It is important to have the routine. I really should start to play more again. I see big potential in the Imbued deck, but on my 120km long way back home I had some really interesting ideas for new decks. On 15th-17th April there will be another intensive v:tes testing weekend at my place. I am really looking forward to it!

by: Mephistopheles