Make Big-Caps Better

Ohlmann wrote:

If you agree that bad 11-cap can exist, the question is whether "reasonable" 10-cap and 11-cap need help. I am not sure of that ; after all, Cailean is pretty useable, as are a lot of high cap princes.

Cailean has dom, so he doesn't fit the criteria. Here's the list of those who do (15):

Aziz, Dammar of Istanbul
Cybele*
Gracetius
Hukros
Jamal
Nakhthorheb*
Samantha
Shalmath*
unnamed, The
Yong-Sun, Harmonist
Adana de Sforza
Eze, The Demon Prince*
Harrod
Josef von Bauren
Sutekh, The Dark God

I put an asterisk next to the four I believe don't deserve the bump (three have built-in untaps, one has an extra MPA and can untap via Truth of a Thousand Lies). That leaves 11 vampires out of 144 10+ caps, around 7.6%. Many would argue that The Unnamed doesn't need any bump (I disagree), which would leave ~7% of vampires in that wretched category.

Can we write them off? Well, there are plenty of bad cards (vampires and library cards) and that has been the practice. It is really hard to come back and fix some designer's shitty work later. Villein has helped. Can Lost in Translation make up the difference? I suppose it will take some playtesting to find out.

I aghree with ICL in that 11-cap are not that bad. Inner circle in particular, since 4 votes and 3 bleed is alway formidable. Sabbat 10-cap are the main pool of extremely unplayable vampires (Bela Kardoza and Hukros, for example)

DeathInABottle wrote:

Fair enough, and in this case, I agree with you: Van Bauren's terrible, and there's nothing in his discipline spread or special that makes him worth playing. (Adding DEM to a clan that already has OBF doesn't make for an interesting vampire. The generic +1 bleed/+1 stealth isn't enticing either.) He's just badly designed.

He have a very interesting discipline loadout, in that he is a good enough blocker (animalism and being pretty good at combat), a good enough voter (note that he can play Animalism Magnetism for vote push, have his vote at +2 stealth without card, and have 4 vote), and a good enough stealth bleeder (Kindred spirit for 3 with +1 stealth is not shabby).

But he is truly master of none : no 2nd trad, no govern nor permanent 3 bleed, no voter cap. If anything, he show to which extend some staples card overshadow everything else.

brandonsantacruz wrote:

I put an asterisk next to the four I believe don't deserve the bump (three have built-in untaps, one has an extra MPA and can untap via Truth of a Thousand Lies). That leaves 11 vampires out of 144 10+ caps, around 7.6%. Many would argue that The Unnamed doesn't need any bump (I disagree), which would leave ~7% of vampires in that wretched category.

Your list is funny, because the Unnamed and Adana have shown several time that they are more than strong enough - if anything, I see more potential in Adana than Raphael or Haaderstadt. There is deck around the Unamed that win tournaments ; can you say the same for Raphael, which used as a support vampire for Girls decks ? Or Elimelech, which about never played despite having the 3 keys disciplines in your analysis ?

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Can we write them off? Well, there are plenty of bad cards (vampires and library cards) and that has been the practice. It is really hard to come back and fix some designer's shitty work later. Villein has helped. Can Lost in Translation make up the difference? I suppose it will take some playtesting to find out.

Well, I see no particular reason to not write them off, as are a lot of vampires and other cards. The only reason to try to help them in particular is that some have very interestings special or loadout (Hukros for example)


Edit : to give more number, I was looked throught TWDA deck for some 11 caps, and I have counted thoses were the vampire were at least in x2 and was not just some occasional support (like a Lutz Deck with 2 Adana because she share )

Adana : 6 decks (very often as co-star)
The Unnamed : 8 decks

Elimelech, : 3 decks
Harderstadts, : 3 decks

Quite frankly, I think your criteria are way off and way too focused on way too narrow abilities.

Ok, I'm a fan of 11 caps and used to have similar veiws on their playability. as of right now, I think hazimel harrod and sutek are the worst. hazimel because every 11 in his grouping with fortitude is better (enky hardestadt saulot fakir) the others because they just aren't good at all. van b is bad but not the worst. if you play 11 caps, your decks probably built around then, the key is making the deck work. even sutek is in the twda. I'd love some 11 cap only cards, but g 4-5 11 caps are great, then the ones without fortitude, which I always tryto play anyway.

I think multi act or solid defense for 10+ would be cool, but I don't see any dire need for it.

ReverendRevolver wrote:

I'd love some 11 cap only cards, but g 4-5 11 caps are great, then the ones without fortitude, which I always tryto play anyway.

Side effect : Camarilla is widely advantaged, with its 13 11-cap, which all have 4 votes and tend to almost alway be at least playable (most often, their trouble is that they are roughly equivalent card for 2-3 less pool).

Compare to sabbat (3 11-cap, very different from each other, only one of them having vote), laibon (2 11 cap on the same clan), and independant (7 totals, but on average a bit underwhelming - they have only 2 votes and +1 bleed for most of them, without special not being significantly better)

10+ is certainly more balanced, even if Princes tend to be worth a lot more on average.

My main concern is that, as Girl will find deck have shown, some 10+ cap are already extremely strong, and you can have multiples 11 cap in play in non-joke decks. It may be very hard not to make thoses strong one even more dominant with 10+ cards.

brandonsantacruz wrote:

I think that every 10+ capacity vampire without AUS, dom, or inferior fortitude should get inferior fortitude (I'm looking at you, Josef Von Bauren). Vampires must either be able to bounce bleeds or multi-act (with a good multi-act card). I might even lower it to 9-caps. What do you all think?

I've been saying since the game was printed that Freak Drive is overpowered and should be changed and then there should be a rule inserted into the rulebook that says something like "during your minion phase, an 8-cap or above may burn 1 blood to untap."