TWD - Nosferatu Hosting Loughman's Birthday

Nosferatu Hosting Loughman's Birthday
Heath, Ohio
December 5, 2021
2R+F
13 players
Karl Schaefer
www.vekn.net/event-calendar/event/9953

-- 2 GW 8 VP + 3 VP in final

Deck Name: Shambling into the Void
Author: Karl Schaefer
Description: I was hoping to play the new Ministry today, but with so many others planning to do the same, I played this instead.

This deck is first and foremost a Shambling Horde deck, getting a 4-life Horde for 1 blood after Angelique's special and a Perfectionist is rather great. The Legionnaires and AUS weenies help provide mass for horde bleeding. A solid defense with The Unmasking and bounce helps keeps you in the game even at low pool. The worst decks for you are voters that are cross-table or that have a lot of stealth that can routinely get by your intercept. There were no such decks for me today.

I had a lucky two opening rounds. I was able to sit mostly unmolested and slowly build as my predators were under threat. This enabled me to get two sweeps and enter the finals in first place.

Finals seating:
Kurt Kopp, new Anarch Gangrel wall: 0 VP ->
Me: 3 VP ->
Brad Cashdollar, Platnum Protocol bleed: 0 VP ->
John Mathys, V5 Malks: 2 VP ->
Mark Loughmn, Banu Haqim vote/combat: 0 VP

I decided to sit as far away from the bleed cannons as possible. They were stacked, so Brad was going to help John with bounced bleeds.

My opening hand was 3 Legionnaires and my opening crypt had no Angelique. I did have an Information Highway, so managed America and Hecate on turns one and two. I had The Unmaksing in play even before I recruited my first Legionnaire. This was useful as I was able to prevent Double Deuce from entering play. It cost me a Legionnaire, but Target Vitals left the vamp empty, making it a good target Mark's Judgment: Camarilla Segregation on the following turn. I was able to stealth a second Legionnaire into play.

Mark managed two actions, playing the aforementioned Judgment and calling Anathema on one of John's Malks. Before Mark was ousted, Kurt, seeing his future burned John's hunting ground with Rewilding.

After Mark was ousted, John had 4 vampires in play and the Anathema was at 4 blood. I offered to rush that vampire with my lone Horde to prevent Kurt from doing so. Losing a vampire was a bad deal, but having his prey gain 6 pool for it would have been worse. In the end John relented. I was 6 pool to the better and John had yet another person hampering his game. After throwing in a few bleeds for 1, Brad takes his turn.

Brad fires off bleeds of 7, 5, and 4. All of them are bounced. Kurt manages to survive and John is able to land his bleeds. Kurt risks another vampire, really he had so few options at this point.

I push hard on Brad, failing to oust. Most of my 1 bleeds are bounced and my Horde rush was stymied by Earth Meld. Brad tried to get through John. There is more bounce. Kurt has to start torporizing Brad's vampire just to draw cards, hoping for more wake. Kurt is oust by John. I get Brad down to 2 pool. He has one vampire left. I'm now John's prey. I bounce a bleed of 5 at 2 stealth to Brad to gain my first VP. John sends two more vampires while I'm locked. I use Funeral Wake to bring up two Hordes and try to block both bleeds. I catch the second one, sending the vampire to torpor. At the start of my turn, John has two remaining ready vampires with one blood each. After two Horde rushes, he has no ready vampires. With 6 ready bleeders and John at 10 pool, he concedes.

Crypt (13 cards; Capacity min=3 max=9 avg=5.142857)
==================
5x Angelique 9 AUS FOR NEC SER THA Harbinger of Skulls:6
2x Hecate 6 AUS FOR NEC Harbinger of Skulls:5
2x La Viuda Blanca 6 for obf AUS NEC Harbinger of Skulls:6
1x America Johnson 4 vic AUS Tzimisce:5
1x Pearl 4 obf AUS Malkavian antitribu:5
1x Tyler McGill 4 pre AUS Toreador:5
1x Veejay Vinod 3 AUS Nagaraja:6

Library: 72 cards. -- I recently shrank this deck from 80 to 76 to 72. Smaller is better

Master (14 cards)
==================
1x Barrens, The
2x Blood Doll
1x Direct Intervention
4x Dreams of the Sphinx -- this is from a phase of my deckbuilding where I relied on Dreams too much; 2 of these should be Villeins
1x Fame
1x Information Highway
1x Mob Connections
2x Perfectionist
1x Wider View

Action Modifier (6 cards)
==================
4x Call of the Hungry Dead -- the stealth package is light, so you have to time actions depending on potential blockers
2x Trochomancy -- ousts mostly with lots of bleeds for 1, these are to throw off the math

Action Modifier/Combat (3 cards)
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3x Breath of Thanatos

Action Modifier/Reaction (4 cards)
==================
4x Spectral Divination -- was more useful for intercept today; if intending to block a NEC vampire is usually the better choice for more intercept options

Combat (5 cards)
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2x Fake Out
2x Target Vitals -- just enough surprises to make them think
1x Trap

Ally (21 cards)
==================
1x Carlton Van Wyk
7x Emerald Legionnaire -- always try to recruit; I usually never recycle more than 3
1x Mylan Horseed -- never saw today; could probably be something else the unlock isn't critical, but the cheap bleeding is
12x Shambling Hordes

Equipment (1 cards)
==================
1x Heart of Nizchetus -- discard every time I saw it; smaller decks seems good without it

Reaction (14 cards)
==================
3x Eyes of Argus
2x Funeral Wake -- free with Angelique's special; so good when it's free
3x My Enemy's Enemy
3x On the Qui Vive
3x Telepathic Misdirection

Event (4 cards)
==================
1x Dragonbound -- managed my final oust in round 1 with this; sometimes important, sometimes not
1x FBI Special Affairs Division -- so critical against the Fortitude vampires I encountered
2x Unmasking, The. -- this card is broken

github.com/GiottoVerducci/TWD/pull/172