Saturday, July 31, 2010

UK National VtES Championship 2010

The UK National VtES Championship 2009 will be held on September 18th, 2010 in Reading, United Kingdom.

UK National Cup 2010
  • Location: Copa Bar, 76-78a Kings Road, Reading, Berkshire, RG1 3BJ
  • Date: Saturday, September 18th, 2010
  • Time: 12:00 – 20:00
  • Proposed Schedule:
    Registration 11.45-12.00
    Round 1: 12.00-14.00
    Round 2: 14.15-16.15
    Round 3: 16.30-18.30
    Final: 18.30-20.30
  • Format: Constructed: 3 rounds + final round
  • Organizers: Hugh Angeseeing
  • Fee: £4
  • Prize Support: All attending players will receive a booster and a number of promos.
More information (directions, et. al.) can be found in the UK VtES forum (Anarch Free Press).

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Memorable Quotes (Part 85)

"The clock is (the) enemy #1 in VtES." -- Matt Morgan (american VtES player)
Reference: VtES Usenet Forum

CCG, TCG & LCG

There has been some discussion about the future of VtES in the past few weeks. One aspect of the discussion was if VtES could be continued to a Living Card Game. I have put up a poll regarding this question (see sidebar). For a basic understanding of the terms here are the definitions for both Trading/Collectible Card Game vs. Living Card Game.
  • (c) by Fantasy Flight GamesLiving Card Game (LCG)

    n. A Fantasy Flight Games trademark for Collectible Card Games (CCGs) sold in non-random booster packs.

  • Collectible Card Game (CCG)

    n. Also known as Trading Card Game (TCG). This type of game uses a basic rule structure and a large assortment of cards which each have characteristics that contradict or supplement the basic rules. Each player selects a number of cards that they own to create a deck which they use in the game. This allows players to predetermine their strategies. The game rules define how many cards must be used and how many copies of each single card are allowed. Cards are sold in "booster packs". Packs contain a fixed number of cards and usually include one "rare" card, some "uncommon" cards, and the bulk of the pack contains "common" cards. Rare cards are generally more powerful or efficient than uncommons or commons, which can lead to the problem that the person who has spent the most money on cards wins. The original collectible card game was Magic: The Gathering. Its incredible success spawned dozens of copycat games. Some were good; many were awful. Other examples are Middle-earth CCG, Pokemon and Netrunner.
Definitions derived from the Board Game Geek Glossary.

Fantasy Flight Games have summarized the reasoning for the introduction of Living Card Games on their "A Game of Thrones" website (which is the first LCG) in late 2008.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

"I LuV PaRIs!"


I found this promotional poster for the VtES EC 2010 in Paris in the spanish VtES forum. Unfortunately there was indication who created this .. masterful piece of art.

Monday, July 26, 2010

Results Scottish EC Qualifier 2010

On July 24th, 2010 the Scottish VtES EC Qualifier 2010 was held in Edinburgh, Scotland with 17 players attending the qualifier tournament. The final standings were as follows:
1. Erol Ongün (GER) -- 1 GW 4 VP -- 3 VP -- Tryphosa Stealth/Defense
2. Frank Connell (ENG) -- 2 GW 6 VP -- 1 VP -- True Brujah toolbox
2. Johannes Walch (GER) -- 1 GW 4 VP -- 1 VP -- Toreador Vote feat. Anson
2. Maciek Bernart (POL) -- 2 GW 8 VP -- 0 VP -- Toreador AAA Vote
2. Rafal Matysiak (POL) -- 1 GW 5 VP -- 0 VP -- Animalism Weenie Wall
Congratulations to Erol for his win of the Scottish ECQ 2010. Photos of the event can be found on Flickr.

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Did you know, that ... (Part 44)

.. after luring your opponent into combat with "Dawn Operation" when playing "Catatonic Fear" in the resulting combat the damage caused by "Catatonic Fear" is not aggravated. The reason for this is that "Dawn Operation" only makes the damage in the resulting combat aggravated while "Catatonic Fear" inflicts the damage after combat. On the other hand the extra damage inflicted by "Drawing out the Beast" played in a combat under "Dawn Operation" is at the end of a round, which is still in combat and that would make that damage aggravated.

Reference: VtES Usenet Newsgroup.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Memorable Quotes (Part 84)

"If you don't metagame, you'd doomed to failure. DOOMED." -- KevinM
Reference: VtES Usenet Newsgroup.

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Rest for the weary

As some of you may have noticed the frequency of the posts on this blog has decreased somewhat during the past few weeks. The reason for this is that I am a bit tired of VtES right now. There are several reasons for my weariness:
  • I think I played a bit too much VtES (yes, that's possible). Playing once or twice during the week plus a tournament each weekend in the past few months was probably not the brightest idea.

  • Heirs to the Blood and also Ebony Kingdom was not the big inspiration I hoped for. Ebony Kingdom was basically an "Aye & Orun expansion, a mechanism which I think is a bit to complicated for tournament decks in general. The Heirs to the Blood expansion on the other hand made a number of existing bloodline decks much stronger (Kiasyd S&B, Daughters Vote, etc.), but it didn't contain many cards which woke the urge in me to build decks around them. Look at Lords of the Night instead, which had with "Spell of Life" and "Khazar's Diary".

  • The utter silence that surrounds VtES in the moment combined with the current discussion in the VtES Usenet Newsgroup about discontuining VtES is not really inspirational for me. I mean, if VtES would stop being produced, I wouldn't stop playing VtES immediately, but in the long run I just need an influx of new cards (both crypt and library cards).
What are the consequences? I will not stop playing VtES right now nor stop blogging here for quite a while. Just reducing the intensity for the moment.

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Memorable Quotes (Part 83)

"I have crushed players with Basilia + Trophy: Domain + Trophy: Domain + Trophy Hunting Ground + The Rack" -- XZealot

"I missed you, XZealot!" -- John
Reference: VtES Usenet Newsgroup.

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Legendary Vampire 2010 Tournament

During the VtES European Championship 2010 in Paris, France an invitational tournament named "Legendary Vampire" will take place. On Friday, October 29th, 2010, in parallel to the Last Chance Qualifier 25 of the best VtES players of the world will participate in this constructed tournament.
You can find more information on the official VtES EC 2010 in general and the tournament schedule in particular.

Monday, July 5, 2010

Did you know, that ... (Part 43)

.. if Victor Pelletier is subject to a Banishment and comes back to the controlled region, he can either choose to retain his title (at no cost), or can even choose to forfeit his current title and get another title (at full cost according to his cardtext)? As usual, vampires remember their traits, titles, etc. when they are moved back and forth between controlled and uncontrolled region, but Victor's special ability allows him choose to gain one of the three Camarilla titles (as per his cardtext) each time he's moved to the ready region (or otherwise put into play).

Reference: VtES Usenet Newsgroup.

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Results Colorado NAC Qualifier 2010

On June 26th, 2010 the VtES Colorado NAC Qualifier was held in Longmont, Colorado with 12 players attending the qualifier tournament. The final standings were as follows:
1. Kelly Schultz (USA) -- 1 GW 4 VP -- 5 VP -- Laibon feat. Lutz & Tupdogs
2. Bill Troxel (USA) -- 2 GW 9 VP -- 0 VP -- Malkavian antitribu S&B
2. Kevin Butcher -- 2 GW 6 VP -- 0 VP -- Brujah Big Cap Vote
2. Micah Ceithaml (USA) -- 1 GW 5 VP -- 0 VP -- Tzimisce Rötschreck Wall
2. Matthew Ferrar (USA) -- 1 GW 4 VP -- 0 VP -- Followers of Set S&B
Congratulations to Kelly for his win of the North Central NAC Qualifier 2010. You can find the tournament winning deck in the VtES Usenet Newsgroup.

Friday, July 2, 2010

Memorable Quotes (Part 82)

"The game is about removing pool, not moving it around all the time"
-- spectator commenting the final table with four decks playing Parity Shifts during the Belgian VtES ECQ 2010.

Thursday, July 1, 2010

Deck of the Month: June 2010: The World's Biggest Small Multirushers

This month's deck is the tournament winning deck "The World's Biggest Small Multirushers" played by Darby Keeney.

The deck is an evolution of the well-known Tup Dog deck, taking it to the next level with the help of some "Heirs to the Blood" cards. The deck uses The main evolution is that the deck is able to multi-act with the Tup Dogs, giving the player more bang for this buck pool.

But read Darby's extensive remarks yourself.



Powerbase: Los Angeles #1
Strategicon - GAMEX 2010
Los Angeles, California
May 29, 2010
12 players
2R + F

Deck Name: [2010 TW] The World's Biggest Small Multirushers
Author: Darby Keeney
Comments: Many thanks to Fred Scott for lending me 2 Tupdogs for this tournament. Generally, I have found a 2.5:1 Tupdog-to-!Tremere ratio to work out pretty well, though a long string of Dogs at the top of one's crypt is frustrating.
The objective for this deck is to get additional mileage from the tupdogs... decreasing their effective cost from 1 pool per action to 0.5 pool per action and further leveraging both the rush and the slave option (rush first, untap, available for slave clause, take an action of the slave clause is not needed).
The deck is supposed to carry 1 more Ashur Tablet, but I seem to own only 5 at this time. 4, 6 or 7 seem like the right numbers to me, depending on your risk tolerance and recycling needs.
Synergies: Carver's + Dragonbound and Carver's + Vessel are pretty clear. Carver's + Raw Recruit is an indefinate hold on a Recruit target (that could not be Graverobbed). Carver's not affecting Tupdogs is a bonus.
Heidelburg can save master vampires from dangerous hunting requirements, can empty a Tupdog of before it explodes and allows 2 Hand of Conrad actions per turn.

Crypt [18 vampires] Capacity min: 1 max: 5 average: 1.72222
------------------------------------------------------------
13x Tupdog 1 POT VIS Gargoyle:3
1x Esoara 5 DOM aus for pot !Tremere:4
1x Janine 4 aus dom tha !Tremere:4
1x Ember Wright 3 aus dom !Tremere:3
1x Keith Moody 3 DOM !Tremere:4
1x Saiz 3 aus dom !Tremere:3

Library [79 cards]
------------------------------------------------------------
Action [13]
5x Dive Bomb *//stealth multi-rush as a "spare" Tupdog action
1x Goblinism *//destroy location as a "spare" Tupdog action.
2x Graverobbing
3x Raw Recruit *//additional slaves from a "spare" Tupdog action.
2x Thin-Blooded Seer *//Tupdog "spare" actions.

Action Modifier [8]
8x As the Crow *//makes my Tuppers freaky.

Ally [1]
1x Nephandus (Mage) *//safe removal of torporized minions.

Combat [39]
8x Brick by Brick
8x Immortal Grapple
4x Lead Fist *// critical to circumvent "prevent 1" decks
9x Raking Talons *//probably should be 10.
10x Stonestrength

*// a "good" combat ran "set close and agg hands, grapple, prevent and untap"

Equipment [2]
1x Hand of Conrad *//recycle Tupdogs, should probably be duplicated.
1x Sargon Fragment, The *//recycle everything else

Event [1]
1x Dragonbound

Master [13]
5x Ashur Tablets *//tune late-game combat as needed.
1x Carver's Meat Packing and Storage *//anti-weenie.
1x Dreams of the Sphinx *//combat support or free Tupdogs.
1x Fame
1x Heidelberg Castle, Germany
1x Powerbase: Montreal *//free Tupdogs
1x Secure Haven *//to contest and to save a slave master.
2x Vessel

Political Action [2]
1x Ancient Influence *//eradicate your prey and call as a "spare" Tupdog action
1x Reins of Power *//eradicate your predator and call as a "spare" Tupdog action