Travelers Obey the Tenets, Columbus, Ohio: March 20, 2011

Travelers Obey the Tenets
Columbus, Ohio
March 20, 2011
27 players
2R + F

www.comicshopplus.com/site/showthread.php?t=1297

David Wilson's Tournament Winning Deck

Deck Name : Homeland Recurred
Author : David Wilson
Description : The deck was a lot of fun, but it really needed a lot of cycling. The Recure the Homeland was the all start with Burst of Sunlight and Target Vitals, it really did lots of damage. The trick of this deck is to tool up while bounding bleeds forwards and backwards around the table, the My Enemies Enemy are quite intentional, as this deck doesn't go forward too hard, which means my prey gets going, taking table pressure off my grand predator, I try to fix that here. The allies and Terrell Harding (wider view needs to be here) suck some blood off as a means to stop deflections when you do lunge forward. In round one after having 2 allies burned and my first vampire with a vessel, blood doll, Ivory bow and Rutor's hand on turn 4, I managed to lunge for 12 undeflected 4 turns later with the Heidelberg, all the time just bouncing and tweaking blood off vampires. Society of Leopold takes a very close 2nd to all star card, it really allowed me to stop other methheads as needed. This deck was something I tooled with on JOL, it never did well and I rebuilt it the morning of the event, it does have flow problems, so note if you play it, you will be discarding every turn if you want a chance in hell. Truth be told, my win came from luck, and my ability to capitalize on it. The last bit of advice, ditch the harvest rites, trust me, they suck here. Thanks to Jay for getting such a large showing from Columbus and to the Newark crew for making it out!

Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 5 max: 7 average: 5.83333

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2x Terrell Harding 7 AUS THA cel dom obf !Tremere:3
2x Elena Mendoza Vasq 6 AUS THA dom obt !Tremere:3
2x Selena 6 AUS DOM THA !Tremere:3
2x Yasmin the Black 6 AUS THA dom pre !Tremere:3
2x Alejandro Aguirre 5 ani aus dom tha !Tremere:3
2x Hannigan 5 AUS THA dom !Tremere:2

Library [90 cards]

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Action [16]
2x Graverobbing
2x Harvest Rites
2x Magic of the Smith
4x Recure of the Homeland
6x Rutor's Hand

Action Modifier [11]
4x Conditioning
7x Mirror Walk

Ally [10]
1x Carlton Van Wyk (Hunter)
1x Gregory Winter
2x Impundulu
2x Nephandus (Mage)
2x Ossian
2x Young Bloods

Combat [9]
3x Burst of Sunlight
2x Rego Motus
4x Target Vitals

Equipment [8]
1x Aaron's Feeding Razor
1x Bowl of Convergence
2x Guarded Rubrics
1x Heart of Nizchetus
1x Ivory Bow
1x Local 1111
1x Ruins of Ceoris

Master [21]
4x Blood Doll
2x Corporal Reservoir
2x Giant's Blood
2x Heidelberg Castle, Germany
2x Hungry Coyote, The
3x Perfectionist
2x Society of Leopold
4x Vessel

Reaction [11]
5x Eyes of Argus
3x My Enemy's Enemy
3x Telepathic Misdirection

Retainer [4]
1x J. S. Simmons, Esq.
1x Malajit Chandramouli
1x Robert Carter
1x Tasha Morgan

I don't know if people want these types of details, but here you go:

A brief account of table 1, note most of the details approximate the spirit of the day, I am sure I have things wrong.
1) David !Tremee
2) Craig !Ventrue Toolbox
3) Sebastian Nos Cock Robin
4) Chris Beefcake Surprise
5) Tony Enkifuckingdo

I will recount pieces for those interested. I popped out Elena Mendoza Vasquez, and got a Rutor's at inferior, popped back up with a Recure the Homeland. Next turn got a vessel on her and a blood doll, grabbed an Ivory Bow for protection from Enkidu and a Carlton Van Wick. Enkidu then rushed her, earth controlled to get over carlton and burned her. At that point it was painfully clear I was in lots of trouble. I got out Terrel Harding and then was able to survive Enkidu, as in I only went to torpor. After that I got out Alejandro Aguirre, who then with Carlton and his special kept Enkidu held off for 2 turns. My prey was also bleeding me with Doyle Fincher for 3 with deep song. I ate most of it, with perhaps 2 bounces to my prey. After Carlton was dead, Alejando took a trip to torpor, I was hanging on barely with a Nephandus and Terrel Harding.

You'll notice I've not mentioned my prey, that is because he and I didn't interact, he was all about governing and bloating and bleeding and I sadly had to let him do it. I was however watching the deflects from me go out as well as counting the slew of wakes he used to try to stop his prey from capitalizing on Chris getting wacked hard when he tried to go into Enkidu. I got Alejandro out of torpor with Recure, then tried to steal 1, read it ONE blood with Terrel off of ONE of the 4 ventrue anti's owned by my prey, please note I was a total speed bump here. My prey responded with a wake, block, WWS, Trap. His prey had just ousted beefcake. I tapped Alejandro and called it a day. My next turn consisted of staving off Enkidu with some other random ally and taking a bleed to drop me to 2 pool. My prey got into some combat with Cock Robin and Owain, leaving them both in torpor. My prey then ate Cock and left Owain in torpor (he was tapped out)

I noticed his pool was now 12, and given my prey just diablerized Cock Robin, so I knew it was time to strike. On my turn, I sent my Nephandi over to blow up Owain, knowing that he would wake and stop if he could. He did not, and instead said he'd see me in the parking lot! I always love spirited conversations. Terrel Harding grabbed JS Simmons and he already had Robert Carter from the earlier turn, and bled. No block, added the conditioning which was in my hand since the opening draw, bleed of 6 (1 + 2 + 1 + 2). Then tapped my heidelberg, moved retainers to Alejandro, who bled, no block, dropped the conditioning, also from the opening hand, and 6 more pool gone, my prey was ousted, I was at 8 pool. I popped out Yasmin (leaving myself at 4 pool).

My next prey sebastian was really wrecked at this point, he got a vampire out of torpor on his turn, and Enkidu showed mercy and came for me again. He burned Yasmin without breaking a sweat, I wondered why I brought her out. I got bled to 1 pool by Doyle. On my turn, I was able to get past the very injured Sebastian and gain a 2nd vp and 6 more pool ( now at 7 pool). Now with only Enkifucking do and Doyle, the final struggle commenced. I had some other ally out which got killed, and I got bled. I then bled with Nephandus who was blocked with Guard Dogs by Enkidu and Enkidu burned a lot of combat cards, something I took to mean he was fishing. I took a final toss with Terrel for 5, which wasn't blocked and poor Tony counted the five pool out ( I had Tasha now too) and said next? (he was out of pool). I said um ... you're dead and he looked depressed, he was clearly looking forward to rushing Terrel next turn. In the end it was 1 GW 4 vps, from near death.

Congratulations!

I am happy to see another Tremere win. But I have just one question: where are the Removers?

I had the removers in an earlier version of the deck, but what I found was that Selena and Yasmin's actions were just too useful elsewhere, and I didn't have space for making other vampires black hand. The way that I play it as well makes them not so useful to me, as if someone is blocking me, they can normally beat my stealth, and if they are going to bounce me, I make sure I am prepared for it. It was a hard choice cutting them, but it was certainly for me the right one.