Review of the Assamites in the Unaligned

Klaital wrote a great initial review of the new cards for the Assamites in the preview thread. I thought it would be wise to split these off into their own thread.

As a review - Klaital wrote the following:

New Assamites:
Mateusz Kazimirski, Biker of Blood.
Rating: 3.5
I rate 4 caps with superior and inferior slightly higher than those with three inferiors, his special likely wont matter much in most cases, he will likely mostly be seen in mono-celerity gun decks, and is quite solid for those, but probably wont be seen much anywhere else, perfectly fine card.

Wise Frog
Rating: 2
This is in my opinion one of the worst vampires in the whole set, his special, not being overly powerful to begin with, also does not really combo so well with his disciplines, being a combat special, and his only superior discipline being obfuscate. Overall, its a vampire that I might sometimes use to fill out a crypt, but wouldn't ever be happy about it.

Omer
Rating: 5
Its Abd al-Rashid, with a ski mask. Very solid vampire that I would expect to see in pretty much every assamite deck using his grouping, not much more to say than that.

Enam
Rating: 4
This is something that hasn't been ever seen before, an Assamite prince! At first glance, her discipline spread looked quite lackluster, but when I thought about it more, it wasn't that bad, she is perfect fit for any Alamut vote decks,superior quietus lets her bleed with Loss, and basic obfuscate is usually enough to get things through. She also gives you the option to slip in some parity shifts to your Assamite vote deck, which is never bad idea, right? Looking forward to get to try her out.

Flavia, Avenging Angel
Rating: 5
Well, 6 cap with all in-clans at superior, what more could you ask? Pretty much all you could hope for in a 6 cap and like Omer, will likely be in every group 6 Assamite deck, not much else to say there.

Imanna
Rating: 4
Here is another very solid vampire to Alamut vote decks, lacking the princely goodness of Enam, but makes up for it in superior obfuscate.

Abid Bin Haji, Scholar of Mirrors
Rating: 4
All in-clans at superior, and a very useful out of clan at superior, giving him access to bleed bounce. About only gripe I have about this guy is that he is group 6 and can't be grouped up with Dmitri Borodin. But still, very solid.

Rebekah
Rating: 5
This is one of my favorite cards in the entire set, she is pretty much perfect, you can do anything with her, block, bleed, vote, fight. The hardest part is going to be in thinking what to focus your deck to, and then find appropriate supporting cast to go with it, but she is great star vampire to a variety of decks.

Al-Ashrad, Amr of Alamut
Rating: 3
Al-Ahsrad, while considerably better than the basic version due to two extra discipline levels, suffers from the same problem as his buddy Tegyrius, in that he needs to be merged to get his title, which is generally more trouble than its worth, especially since his title is pretty much just 4 votes, unlike Tegy's which gives access to lot of powerful cards, leaving him rather average.

New Assamite Clan-Specific:
Nar-Sheptha
Rating: 2
It is card for very specific decks only, mainly star vampire rush decks, but quite useful in those.

Priority Contract
Rating: 4
This card is great, trifle contract with built-in quite generous pool gain for dunking the target, this should make Assamite combat quite a bit stronger archetype, and will likely replace Provision of the Silsila in all decks since they can't both be used at same time I believe.

Focus the Blood
Rating: 4
Inner Essence for Assamites, this is very nice and helps to offset the blood costs in most quietus cards quite nicely.

New Quietus:
Dam the Heart's River
Rating: 5
This card can single-handledly make Assamites to actually prefer quietus over weapons as their main combat module, very well designed card.

New Celerity
Zephyr
Rating: 3
This is really odd multi-acting, but it is still multi-acting, which never hurts. Obviously its best in decks without much stealth, like say toreador, still not really sure how much play it will see.

New Celerity/Quietus:
Sanguine Entrapment
Rating: 2
I guess lot of people are excited about this card, I am however not, its almost in the Sanguinary Wind level of narrowness, I would have liked it so much more if it would have also given a maneuver or even a press. But as it is, I doubt I will play this ever, its just too narrow effect to be worth a card.

Scribe wrote:

Dam the Heart's River
Rating: 5
This card can single-handledly make Assamites to actually prefer quietus over weapons as their main combat module, very well designed card.

This to me by far is THE card that we got in this expansion set. I think this will definitely be a staple in any Quietus combat deck. Not only does it deal additional damage but it will cost the opposing minion blood/life just to strike. If you couple this card with Wave of Lethargy, now combat for the opposition becomes quite costly (regardless of what they do). Flipping love it. Oh, and did I mention that DtHR has no cost? There is absolutely no reason not to use this card.

I like Nizzam with Dam the Heart river. Carrion crow for 3, then hand for 2 aggravated. Or Aid from the bat for 2 normal damage. And you have a card to prevent combat end and yet keep your carrion and dam effect.

Scribe wrote:

Priority Contract
Rating: 4
This card is great, trifle contract with built-in quite generous pool gain for dunking the target, this should make Assamite combat quite a bit stronger archetype, and will likely replace Provision of the Silsila in all decks since they can't both be used at same time I believe.

And yes, you can play a Provisions after the Priority Contract is burned per LSJ here:
Google Link

The burning of a contract is NOT part of the requirement of the Provisions. It can't be - otherwise you could never play it if you burned a vamp in combat. The Priority Contract works the same way.

So yes, this card is even more bad ass than you,might have initially expected.

Please re-post with card text.

Scribe wrote:

Scribe wrote:

And yes, you can play a Provisions after the Priority Contract is burned per LSJ here:
groups.google.com/forum/m/#!search/Jyhad$20provision$20of$20the$20silsila/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/uxVdANRdxAE

This link does not work for me