My 1st Deck (Having Never Played VTES)

Once upon a time, there was just WWEF, and it was the best card in the game. It was ubiquitous for the obvious reason that nothing came close to doing what it did. Then, Forced Awakening appeared and people would actually use it with bleed bounce and burn an extra blood because those were the two options.

For a long, long time Wake and Forced were played. Wake's bestness waned even back when it didn't have much serious competition. Then, On the Qui Vive was printed. It is scary how much better OtQV is than Wake, even though the do not replace until untap restriction existed long before OtQV came into being.

Because OtQV has a limitation, even if it's not as important in this sort of deck as it would be in a superstar deck (in which case, your Matasuntha/Goratrix/whoever is likely running Eyes of Argus), there are reasons to have other wake effects. Then, if you are running Baali or Aksinya or whatever, Eluding the Arms of Morpheus starts looking more attractive (or Animalism plays). I still play Wake because I remember when it wasn't inferior to another card and I rely heavily on being tapped after I hunt, but it's not nearly as exciting, where Forced Awakening isn't likely to hurt a lot in this bounceless deck, though FA isn't going to work with Carlton on the off chance you control him.

Now, my last TWD did run a Fillip, but I wouldn't put much stock in that (probably want to ignore all of my tournament winning decks, anyway, if you want to build decks people think are good).

LivesByProxy wrote:

My biggest problem besides finding the right balance / mix of cards, is that I want to play certain clans, but those clans don't have really have the disciplines necessary for the strategy I wanted to implement, on top of the Grouping rule making things more constrained.

The game tends towards either: do a lot of normal damage, or do a bit of aggravated damage. It isn't impossible to do lots of aggravated damage, but it generally requires more effort - and often unnecessary effort.

The way the aggravated damage rules work, doing 4 normal and 1 agg damage at the same time is almost as good as doing 5 agg damage at once.(*) When handling damage that is dealt at the same time, the normal damage is handled first - using up blood, then sending you to torpor (wounding you) when you hit zero. Then the agg damage comes after. So if, for example, I have 2 blood and you hit me for 4 normal damage and 1 agg damage:

- The first two points of normal damage take me to zero blood.
- The third point of normal damage, I have no blood, so I can't heal it, so I go to torpor (wounded).
- The fourth point of normal damage is superfluous: I have no blood, and I'm already going to torpor.
- The point of agg damage comes along. I am already wounded (going to torpor), so I have to burn a blood to prevent destruction. I have no blood, so I burn.

So you don't always have to stack up a lot of agg damage on the strike, and some of the options for that are difficult or expensive.

Not playing Potence, you lose out on the option of Immortal Grapple (which is annoying!). However, the way combat works is that your cards like Claws of the Dead, Wolf Claws etc. can all be played after both strikes are declared but before you move into strike resolution. So if you're using cards like those, you can wait to play them until after you know if your opponent is playing Strike: Combat Ends or Dodge etc. This isn't perfect, but it is better than wasting the blood in advance and only then finding out it's a waste. (You can still pay the blood and cycle the card, if you want.)

If you play with Gangrel or Gangrel antitribu with Animalism/Protean, you have the option of tossing in Carrion Crows, which is generally considered very good. It's only one per combat, but doing 2R damage (with ANI) is really handy - and the damage resolves at the same time as your strike.

Target Head and Target Vitals are both free, and both allow you to get extra damage on the strike., Yes, your opponent can discard a combat card(s) to get rid of them (varies depending on the card), but also very useful. Potentially works whether you play Ani Gangrel/!Gangrel, or City !Gangrel. If going the Ani route, you could toss in a few Scorpion Stings - it's not the best card on the planet, but people not knowing if they can survive with 2 blood or 3 blood is interesting.

Retainers are a possibility, but require some effort and careful blood/pool management, and they also take up actions - or require the use of Pack Alpha. Dog Pack is playable for anti-Strike: Combat Ends, but is expensive. Some decks make use of some of the damage retainers, although Target cards are probably simpler and more efficient to use, at least early on.

For anti-S:CE, City !Gangrel have Celerity where Psyche! is an option, though it's tricky to use well - you may be throwing down set-up cards in combat which don't persist into the new combat from Psyche! Useful when playing with guns, though.


(*) There are some differences, such as if you're facing someone who has damage prevention cards that only affect non-aggravated damage, and that sort of thing. Interesting, does happen, but not generally the major focus of deck design.

LivesByProxy wrote:

@ Brandon: I see now that relying on Protean for agg damage is kinda unnecessary, but I thought Burning Wrath was a bit too expensive. :/ I was actually reworking my crypt to make use of OBF Spying Mission and looking at some Camera Phones, Deep Songs and Army of Rats (a fair number of my guys have animalism), and Guarded Rubric - I've got some Black Hand vamps, notably my girl Nails <3

Relying on aggro damage with a ton of +strength from potence AT THE SAME TIME is unnecessary. Like has been said before, these things overlap for no particualrly good reason. The bigger issues in my opinion for your deck in no particular order are:

1. ) how do your minions survive combat. Iimagine if enemy can ALSO play claws of the dead, so a 2-cap can torporize your vampire no matter how much strength he has..

2.) how do your vampires get the blood back if they go low

3.) how do you oust.

@ ICL: I really like Preternatural Strength, but since no one else mentioned it as an option, I kinda assumed it was bad. I like it in theory though.

Preternatural strength isn't bad, but you have to waste an action for getting it.

Also, what is the difference between Qui Vive, Evening's Freshness, and Forced Awakening? The differences seem superfluous at best.

Differences:
-Qui vive is probably best, but one minion can only play one between your turns. So if you use it once, you cannot use another until your next turn. This makes a difference if you want to block multiple actions with same minion. But if you have no better options from discipline cards, qui vive is probably best of these options.
Imagine that you might for example want to cycle wakes off your hand during opponents actions even when you have no intention of actually blocking.
Qui Vive works on ALLIES (it says minion rather than vampire), the other two only work with vampires. With Qui Vive you can wake your war ghoul to block for example (if you had one).

- Wake with evenings freshness is pretty weak, because it doesn't replace itself for combat (or intercept) cards when you are blocking. Also cycling them off your hand during opponents actions when you don't actually care about blocking doesn't work well since wwef isn't replaced until your untap. Lack of immadiate replacement makes wwef REALLY poor choice for a combat wall in my opinion.

- Forced awakening replaces itself immediately, is not restricted to one per turn the way Qui vive is, but you have to pay pool if you don't block; which makes it weaker choice for decks that aim to bounce bleeds rather than block. Even when you want to block, actually managing to block actions in this game is non-trivial due to huge amount of stealth and block fails.

If you play gangrel etc animalism minions, you should consider at least in some cases Sense the savage way . Its a pretty good if you want to block and have minions that are large enough and have animalism. It can also be played for intercept if you are already untapped (one minion cannot use two same reactions during same action) .

ps. Regarding ICL's suggestion, I really recommend you change all wolf claws into claws of the dead. The maneuver is WAY more important than press, especially if you hit aggro damage (combat ends if opponent is in torpor so press is meaningless) and already are using immortal grapples (which provide a press). Immortal grapple does zip if you aren't close. You WILL need maneuvers to ensure you are close. Even if you don't aim to use claws for maneuvers, its really good to have a backup plan. You wan't to use immortal grapple as much as possible, since decks you really want to hit hard will have combat ends coming out of their ears.

As stated already, there are quite few reasons not to use potence, and a billion to use it.
I once punched apalonious at 2 blood for 5 agg with ferox (signpost (3) plus slam (5) and had raking talons) . As funny as it is, there are more efficient ways to burn a minion outright. I recommend muaziz and Ariadne, due to ability to sling agg then amaranth. The added efficiency is needed, since the table reacts quite heinously to a deck that's minion removal strategy burns 11 caps outright.
Just hitting for 5+agg routinely isn't a hard setup (hektor, preturnatural strength, heroic might, you're there, or enkidu or matusuntha rush with uncontrollable rage and you're there) but mathematically you spend 2 blood or more to burn something, needing at least 1 card plus in combat ways to deliver the payload of ouch, when either of the archons net you all that minions bloodl with less setup.

I was one of those players early on who sat quietly with a malk wall until everyone was on 1-2 beads a vamp, then eagles sighted my prey and had Anatole pull out a flamethrower, so I get the satisfaction of completely removing a reasource , and before you've played a bit you feel like vamps you put in the dirt always pop back up so ashing them is better, but once you play a bit you'll get how combat evenly depleting resources and intimidating cross table sis more efficient, since it keeps your minions healthier via taste and doesn't put all your resources into leaving a flaming crater one time.
Speaking of, if this is the sensation you're after, I did list this deck out a bit ago that I haven't built yet called "leave a flaming crater"

www.secretlibrary.info/index.php?deck=view&id=26665

ReverendRevolver wrote:

As stated already, there are quite few reasons not to use potence, and a billion to use it.

Depends if you can prevent aggro damage or not

Just hitting for 5+agg routinely isn't a hard setup (hektor, preturnatural strength, heroic might, you're there, or enkidu or matusuntha rush with uncontrollable rage and you're there)

note: Matasuntha blur and claws of the dead: Hit 3+3 normal damage and 3 aggro for the last strike. This tends to take care of things.

Yes. Yes it does.
The linked deck packs this. But after I posted the link I remembered being stupid tired when I listed that deck and the crypt is inconsistent and I did dumb things like include fueled by heart's blood and omitted cog.
I've also seen Hardestadt tear a signpost and grapple before hitting for 9 agg with claws and island of yairos. I've had my Marge khan hit by lazvernious for 5 agg and only had a soak in hand.
There are| certainly delivery systems for flaming fists of death that kill anything without 10 blood and outright, but being in decks that use that as part of the strategy "I could if I wanted to..." Instead of that being what the deck does is key.
Matusuntha/Enkidu is the best balance for not wasting the payload thanks to already running Earth meld and psyche, it packs enough psyche to exhaust the opposing Methuselahs hand and knock off beads. It's going to crush key minions via rush/blocks, has the option to enforce statements like "if jephta and Keith go forward and are tapped they live, otherwise they die. Oh, and if one bounces, they die. And ...." But it can also reduce an owain that's keeping your pretty afloat to Ash, while doing rushes that can be tasted to refill.

Any deck that does what lives by proxy says is what he wants it to do has to be able to do other things, or you get a deck that does with style and cool stories. I've made those decks, you eventually want to win once you've collected enough "losing with style" points.
(True faith cock Robinaka holy cockdeck, voting grotesques, jozz and Reiner with tons of skill cards, mata Hari and 2 caps with hunting ground farm...you eventually get tired of losing before doing something cool and build other decks that use good cards to do something that wins but isn't as commonplace.)

I have certain reservations about combat (needing damage prevent and/ormultiact if any vampire exceeds 4cap leads to me using fortitude in every Nosferatu build) but I've played decks to know these are important to not losing often.
If you get some games in, things click faster.