Submission: Met Kalfu (Petro Loa)

Name: Met Kalfu (Petro Loa)
Cardtype: Retainer
Cost: 2 blood

Unique Demon.
Life 3
Samedi
Met Kalfu's controller can burn the edge to gain a life.
Met Kalfu can burn 1 life to change the sect of a non-titled vampire
you control to Sabbat, Camarilla, Independent Anarch, or Laibon.
Met Kalfu can burn 2 life to give this vampire a superior discipline.
If Met Kalfu is burned, then this vampire becomes Infernal.

Flavor text:
He was in a bind 'cos he was way behind and he was willin' to make a deal.
Charlie Daniels Band
Art notes:
Dark tones, showing a long cloaked man with red eyes standing in a secluded crossroads.
World of Darkness reference:
Samedi practice Loa. Met Kalfu is a crossroads Loa known to be aggressive and a good at making deals.
How does this card address a compelling game need?:
In general, group 4 and 5 Samedi are usually missing one superior discipline and are painted across multiple sects. I thought this was a thematic way of bridging those gaps.
Created by:
drstrange26

while thamatic, it's way to much stuff to do (recruit ally, change vampiresect, wait a while for Met Kalfu lifeto go up and only then give superior discipline) to be considered playable

What would you do to make it better? I am open to suggestions?

Have the basic level be a burn life trigger and not an action?

Master card?

How about make the card only the basic version with a burn life effect.
So it would only be one turn to change sect.

I added the superior level to make it more useful.

I would probably start with dropping at all change sect effect to make it simpler. I don't really see any need for samedi for "one sect" crypt. Gamewise it gives them next to nothing. Then discipline giving effect could be coupled with becoming infernal. Also I would switch ally life with effect cost. Give him 3 life and make an effect cost 2. This way, he can give disciplie the same turn he is recruited. At the end I would consider to make him requiring Samedi not necromancy to make him exclusive for a clan and not for all vampires with necromancy.

drstrange26 wrote:

Met Kalfu can take a +1 stealth action to change the sect of a non-titled vampire
you control to Sabbat, Camarilla, Anarch, or Laibon.
If this action is successful, the vampire becomes Infernal.
As above, but All Infernal costs paid by this ally's controller are moved to this ally's life.
Met Kalfu can burn 3 life to give a vampire a superior discipline.

Technical point: anarch isn't a sect. Anarch vampires are of the independent sect, and also anarch.

A second technical point: "If this action is successful, the vampire becomes infernal" - do you mean this employ action (so the employer becomes infernal) or Meta Kalfu's action you've just described (so the target becomes infernal)?

drstrange26 wrote:

How does this card address a compelling game need?:
In general, group 4 and 5 Samedi are usually missing one superior discipline and are painted across multiple sects. I thought this was a thematic way of bridging those gaps.

I'm not really seeing how this helps the Samedi.

It's not obvious that the inferior version is useful at all. Positively choosing to change sect is mostly quite rare, because most of the time it doesn't get you anything worthwhile. The few places where it can be worthwhile are pretty much always where there's some enticing tech to use, such as tossing in Mozambique Allure to power some extra Ravnos in a Tsunda Eldest are Kholo deck. (There not being enough Laibon Ravnos to steer the whole crypt in that direction, it helps a bit.)

Plus, you do that at the cost of infernalism, which is a lot. Is there really anything worthwhile that a Samedi can do as the wrong sect which is worth infernalism? Infernalism is tricky enough to deal with with the Baali, where their clan cards and Daimoinon cards (and Striga etc.) are sometimes trying to noticeably better to compensate for that. The Samedi do have Little Mountain Cemetery which in the mid-game could potentially be generating two pool a turn for you to pay for infernalism, but they also don't have the strongest defensive capabilities in the world.

Then, even if you do find that making Jack Dawson Sabbat is worthwhile, you can't rely on this so much because it's a unique ally, so you're going to find it hard to pull regularly, early.

So, getting it at inferior seems unlikely ever to be a solid move.

So at superior, the infernalism costs give him life, which is used to power the discipline granting. He starts with two life, and for him to get you a discipline and not die, he needs four life - so that's four pool you've paid for one discipline. A superior discipline, sure, but that's still a lot of pool. And again, it's quite difficult to rely on - if I want to patch over the cracks in my disciplines to build a more cohesive crypt, I probably want it more reliably. Also, depending on when the infernalism kicks in (see my wording point at the top), it could be very slow to generate that life.

Also, to get it at superior, I need a vampire with superior Necromancy already, which is actually quite thin on the ground. Only 6 Samedi have it, compared to 12 with THAN, 9 with OBF, and 8 with FOR. In group 2-3, only The Baron has it.

If you do find a good deck to build with it, the ally is also quite vulnerable. It doesn't have much by way of defence, so a rush deck could take it out. A single Weighted Walking Stick could kill it early on.

drstrange26 wrote:

What would you do to make it better? I am open to suggestions?

Have you considered the retainer route?

The superior could be anything you like, but it was to try to give some oomph and versatility. As Wikipedia tells me that Petro loa tend to be fiery and warlike, maybe some combat benefit might be appropriate.

While Kalfu/Carrefore is also associated with Satan and the wider crossroads demons in American folklore (real-world tales often relate to spitting/burying objects at crossroads to cure eye infections etc.), I'm not aware of any infernal Samedi. I agree however that a way of uniting the Samedi into a single sect could be useful for certain deck designs.

If using the ally brands the vampire infernal, is the intention that the ally would bestow Striga (non-discipline) in addition to any other 'normal' discipline (presumably no capacity increase though)? Is this more about Samedi or making minions infernal?

Being more of a bringer of misfortune, perhaps a more fitting ability would be to tap to cancel a combat card during combat (-1 intercept to a minion as they unluckily miss stuff might also be fitting, but Samedi have oodles of stealth).

I've previously thought that Loa cards for Samedi could be used much like Watchtower cards for Black Hand decks - each confers a slightly different bonus but there can only be one in play - were you thinking along the same lines?

Examples...
Master: Loa.
[Requires: Samedi]
[Cost: variable]
Put this card in play. Burn if another Loa enters play.
....
Marassa Jumeaux (the two who are three; everything and nothing): Tap and choose a sect, all Samedi are that sect until end of turn.
Ogun (warrior and metalworker): Samedi have +1 strength (simple version); Thanatosis strike effect cards may be used in conjunction with melee weapons (complicated version).
Erzulie (luxury/seduction/love): Tap and choose a minion younger than the acting Samedi when announcing an action. They can't block or play reaction cards.
Azaka (harvest and thunder): Tap to either gain an extra pool if you have the edge during untap, or to inflict one unpreventable damage to a minion opposing a Samedi during pre-strikes.
Ghede (life/death): Tap to transfer a blood from the blood bank to any unready or torpored Samedi.