Creating an inner circle theme deck

Just a general hint from a real experience in my playgroup a few years back...

DON'T play Justicar Retribution... It's a BAD PLAN in an IC Deck. Especially a G2 ICs, but I'm sure its similar in a G4 IC deck.

Juggernaut1981 wrote:

Just a general hint from a real experience in my playgroup a few years back...

DON'T play Justicar Retribution... It's a BAD PLAN in an IC Deck. Especially a G2 ICs, but I'm sure its similar in a G4 IC deck.

That reminds me, need to put couple copies of Justicar Retribution in my prince deck, right now in a game have prey who has two ics out, one of which is Rafael who can change my Mustafa's votes.

Here's a sketch, based on an earlier concept by iclee.

Ousts by swarm bleeding with +1 and +2 bleed minions; it can put all of them into play with sufficient plays of Honor The Elders.

Survives with Murmur bounce and by bloating with Villein and Honor The Elders. (Kaymakli Nightmares is also useful here). It'll be hard to oust if it gets rolling, but there's a danger zone if it doesn't get moving earlier. Some Combat defense via S:CE.

The master module is key - everything there is focussed on crypt acceleration + blood gain. I think 3 Highways is the right choice; Info Highway is a lot better than either Zillah's Valley or Effective Management for this deck, as you'll need crypt acceleration all game, not just at the start. A Highway in play long-term means you can bloat for 3 a turn off of Honor the Elders, not just 2; multiple copies help you win contest-wars.

The Embraces are there for a couple of reasons:
1) After Villeining your IC back to not-much, they'll get more blood over time from HtE. Embrace is a good way to make use of that.
2) They provide steady pool pressure - if you have two +2 bleeders untapped, hardly anyone is going to block an Embrace bleed.
3) They can call Honor The Elders as effectively as an IC member.

On the shortlist for inclusion:
- some kind of card flow enhancer, in case you start jamming on stealth. That could be a couple of copies of Scrounging or Distraction, or a Sargon Fragment.
- classic big guy votes like Ancient Influence or Reins of Power. They're really effective, but they dilute the "theme".
- Giant's Blood

I like the way the crypt works out. With two of each IC, there are 6 crypt slots containing minions who can bounce, 10 who are sneaky, and 8 who can play Majesty / Voter Cap. Everyone in the crypt can play either Majesty or No Trace, and 6 can use Torrent to continue an action. So if you get a good mix out, you should be able to play all of the discipline cards in the deck with no trouble. I think in most cases I'd want to bring out MF or RdC first, as they bounce and are most likely to be able to get your first couple of votes off.

It would be very hard to stop this deck via blocking; it has the option of going over-the-top via CoT/Majesty or stealthing its actions through. CoT is quite easy to cycle when you have a +2 bleeder in play.

Crypt (Capacity min=11 max=11 avg=11; 12 cards)
==================================================
2x Adana de Sforza 11 aus CEL OBF POT PRE PRO Brujah:4
2x Hardestadt 11 cel pro DOM FOR POT PRE Ventrue:4
2x Josef von Bauren 11 cel ANI DEM OBF POT Nosferatu:4
2x Lutz von Hohenzollern 11 pot AUS DEM OBF PRE Malkavian:4
2x Mistress Fanchon 11 AUS CEL DOM OBF THA VIC Tremere:4
2x Rafael de Corazon 11 AUS CEL DOM OBF PRE Toreador:4

Library (86 cards)
=====================
Master (21 cards)
4x Effective Management
3x Information Highway
1x Kaymakli Nightmares
9x Villein
4x Zillah's Valley

Action (4 cards)
4x Embrace, The

Political Action (12 cards)
12x Honor the Elders

Action Modifier (25 cards)
5x Change of Target
3x Cloak the Gathering
3x Forgotten Labyrinth
3x Into Thin Air
2x Mask of a Thousand Faces
4x Veil the Legions
5x Voter Captivation

Reaction (6 cards)
4x On the Qui Vive
2x Wake with Evening's Freshness

Combat (10 cards)
5x Majesty
3x No Trace
2x Torrent

Combo (8 cards)
6x Murmur of the False Will
2x Swallowed by the Night

Here's a deck that I just won a small tournament with yesterday. No copies of Hardestadt in here, but if you're really married to the idea of using all six IC guys, you could easily replace a copy of Joseph with Hard-to-Stop. This deck doesn't ever intend to bring out Joseph unless the game is going really well anyway, and Hardy can just as easily be filed in the same category.

From some of your other comments, I'm assuming that you don't have some of the big-ticket items in this deck like Enkil Cogs, Heart or Monastery. For what it's worth, I didn't use the latter two at all in the games I played yesterday (well, I used the Monastery's +handsize but never tapped it for stealh) and didn't get much more mileage out of the Cogs. The deck should work just fine without that stuff.


Deck Name : Helipad Council 1.1
Author : John Eno
Description : ROFLcopters for big boys and girls.

Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 11 max: 11 average: 11

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3x Lutz von Hohenzoll 11 AUS DEM OBF PRE pot inner circle Malkavian:4
3x Rafael de Corazon 11 AUS CEL DOM OBF PRE inner circle Toreador:4
2x Adana de Sforza 11 CEL OBF POT PRE PRO aus inner circle Brujah:4
2x Josef von Bauren 11 ANI DEM OBF POT cel inner circle Nosferatu:4
2x Mistress Fanchon 11 AUS CEL DOM OBF THA VIC inner circle Tremere:4


Library [84 cards]

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Master [20]
1x Creepshow Casino
2x Dreams of the Sphinx
1x Giant's Blood
1x Golconda: Inner Peace
1x Information Highway
1x Monastery of Shadows
1x Secure Haven
7x Villein
5x Zillah's Valley

Action [4]
4x Flurry of Action

Action Modifier [24]
5x Elder Impersonation
2x Enkil Cog
5x Faceless Night
8x Lost in Crowds
2x Perfect Paragon
2x Voter Captivation

Combat [4]
4x Majesty

Equipment [5]
1x Heart of Nizchetus
4x Helicopter

Political Action [18]
5x Alastor
1x Anarchist Uprising
1x Ancient Influence
7x Kine Resources Contested
2x Neonate Breach
1x Political Stranglehold
1x Reins of Power

Reaction [9]
1x Eyes of Argus
3x On the Qui Vive
5x Telepathic Misdirection

Crafted with : Anarch Revolt Deck Builder. [Sun May 01 14:42:49 2011]

Ian Lee made a (mostly) IC member deck that used Petra Resonance and Alastor a lot. Lost in Translation and Villein are good for surviving. Giant's Blood and Golconda fit in well, as does Monastery of Shadows.