DC Qualifier!
Peter D Bakija
Pah.), I figure I'll start a DC qualifier thread. An excellent
tournament run by the always fantasitc PeteO in Rockville Maryland at a
cool game store called Dreamwizards (which was right next to a fantastic
Pho shop. I spent an awful lot of money on Vietnamese iced coffee
yesterday, I'll tell you what). I'm pretty sure there were 28 people. A
great crowd, a lot of fun games. At press time i.e. when Team Ithaca
left in shame after all 4 of us failing to make the finals, me being
fist guy on the list not to qualify (although of all of us, Sackett
managed to quallify with an Ana Dipitydo Shambling Hordes deck...) and a
fun game of Battlestar Galactica where Cylon Matt Morgan successfully
demoralized the rag-tag humans until they all died, the final consisted
of:
-Ruben with a speed Legendary Semla the Repugnant Parity Shift deck.
-Cherryholmes with an Assamite Loss bleed deck.
-Adam Hulse with a Troglodytia wall deck.
-Brad Cashdollar with a Nergal and the Turbo Beast deck.
-Tom Mickle with an old school, unblockable AAA vote deck.
In that order, although Cherryholmes had already been whacked by Ruben,
although it looked like Adam was pretty well set up and was holding
Ruben off. I'm pretty sure Ruben was top seed with, like, 3GW and all
but 1 VP of those he could have gotten (I, apparently, was the only
person in the room who was capable of dying to someone *other* then
Ruben in one of his games. You are welcome, Dave! :-)
I'm sure someone will post the actual results soon
I went in with lots of possible deck choices, but figured I'd go with a
tricksy Settite S+B deck that used a whole lot of The Eternal Mask (that
card that has a whole lot of words that are completely unimportant,
other than the ones that say +1 bleed at +1 stealth) and some mummies
and, primarily, 'cause it has enough dominate and deflection to not be
the bleed sink at the table. Which is pretty good when played locally,
and in theory, is pretty good in general. In retrospect, either of my
other deck choices probably would have done better, and been more
stylish.
In any case, my first game saw me sitting between an intercept CEL/stick
wall deck and an intercept FOR/stick deck. Unsurprisingly, I got shut
down a lot, kept lunging for the oust, getting foiled, barely avoiding
getting killed, and eventually getting through all the foil-Peter tech,
ousting my prey for a VP, just in time for Sackett to get the other 4VP
by killing everyone else at the table, with, like, 25 seconds left in
the game. My second game, I started out strong, killed my prey quickly,
had my next prey on the ropes, but then the table started working
together against me with, like, back damage KRCs and the like. I'm not a
big fan of making long term deals in games, but once the table turns
against you like that, the only real option is to try and make the table
turn towards you, so I made a deal with the Devil deal with Adam Hulse
that if he saved me from his prey ousting me, I'd oust my second prey
and leave him alone till he ousted his prey and it was heads up. So he
did, I did, I kept the deal, he ousted his prey, and by the time it was
him and me, he was a very well set up wall deck with 15+ pool, and I was
unable to bleed him fast enough, so Adam won 3/2. Game 3 was an
atrocious 4 player game where Ruben was my prey and Cherryholmes was my
predator and my buddy Greg was cross table. Ruben played, like,
Parthenon and Zillah's Vallley on turn 1, got Legendary Selma into play
really fast, and was beating the crap out of Greg. I got, like, my
second bleed AIed (so I lost a 4 cap minion), but Ruben was down to 4
pool and I DTed a Parity Shift, so I had a chance to oust him. I failed
due to a timely 2nd Tradition, and Ruben then got off the Parity Shift,
played a Kalmyaki Nightmares which got him 6 pool back and lost me my
vampire with Dominate that was about to get transfered out, going back
up to, like, 15 pool in one fell swoop. Greg's vote deck takes a few
actions, hurts Dave a bit, bloats a little with Voter Cap, but can't
keep up with Ruben and he dies. Dave is Lossing me to death rapidly, and
he Suddens my third Asher Tablets, so I rapidly fall over, but then Dave
runs out of Loss and can't kill Ruben before he dies. So I ended up with
3VP for the day, and was the top guy to not Qualify (qualification cut
off was 1GW/3VP).
In any case, a really fun tournament. It was great to see all of y'all.
Peter D Bakija
pd...@lightlink.com
http://www.lightlink.com/pdb6/vtes.html
"It's too bad she won't live! But then again, who does?"
-Gaff
John Whelan
> -Ruben with a speed Legendary Semla the Repugnant Parity Shift deck.
> -Cherryholmes with an Assamite Loss bleed deck.
> -Adam Hulse with a Troglodytia wall deck.
> -Brad Cashdollar with a Nergal and the Turbo Beast deck.
> -Tom Mickle with an old school, unblockable AAA vote deck.
>
> In that order, although Cherryholmes had already been whacked by Ruben,
> although it looked like Adam was pretty well set up and was holding
> Ruben off.
Per Adam, the final ended with Ruben sweeping the table. Congrats
Ruben.
Names and faces are a blur in my sleep-deprived brain, but I believe I
met Cherryholmes' Loss deck as my prey in my second prelim game. At
least, Lucretia did have trouble remembering where her Camera Phone
and Heart of Cheating went. His defenses seemed minimal, but he still
ousted faster than I could oust him. It scored a GW with 2.5 vp.
I met Adam's deck on my first table, a 4-player table, where we each
got our preys, and then timed out against eachother. My ousted prey
that game was a Great Beast deck, which never got off the ground. I
also vaguely remember playing against someone named Brad. But I think
there were two Great Beast decks in the tournament.
I was playing a Lucretia tool-up deck, which only earned one vp, but
never earned a game win, but managed never to be ousted. It never met
Ruben's deck, or perhaps it would not have been so lucky.
Peter D Bakija
> Per Adam, the final ended with Ruben sweeping the table. Congrats
> Ruben.
Yeah, that's the word on the street. So Ruben got 18 out of 19
possible VPs (2x 5 player games, 1x 4 player game, 5 player final).
How does that happen? Again?
> Names and faces are a blur in my sleep-deprived brain, but I believe I
> met Cherryholmes' Loss deck as my prey in my second prelim game. At
> least, Lucretia did have trouble remembering where her Camera Phone
> and Heart of Cheating went. His defenses seemed minimal, but he still
> ousted faster than I could oust him. It scored a GW with 2.5 vp.
Yeah, his deck was pretty solid--G4/5 QUI/OBF Assamites with stealth
and Loss. Very minimal, if any, combat. He got 2x game wins and then a
VP in the 4 player game with him, me, my buddy Greg, and Ruben. He
apparently got wiped out pretty quick by Ruben in the final. As Ruben
sat behind him.
> I met Adam's deck on my first table, a 4-player table, where we each
> got our preys, and then timed out against eachother. My ousted prey
> that game was a Great Beast deck, which never got off the ground.
Yeah, that was probably my buddy Ben. For some reason, his Nergal
Turbo Great Beast deck (which is actually generally pretty effective)
totally crashed and burned yesterday.
> also vaguely remember playing against someone named Brad. But I think
> there were two Great Beast decks in the tournament.
Yah. Brad did well. Ben did not. Who can tell why?
> I was playing a Lucretia tool-up deck, which only earned one vp, but
> never earned a game win, but managed never to be ousted. It never met
> Ruben's deck, or perhaps it would not have been so lucky.
Heh. I like that deck.
-Peter
The Lasombra
>So as no one has posted anything yet (wha? You wanna sleep or something?
>Pah.), I figure I'll start a DC qualifier thread. An excellent
>tournament run by the always fantasitc PeteO in Rockville Maryland at a
>cool game store called Dreamwizards (which was right next to a fantastic
>Pho shop. I spent an awful lot of money on Vietnamese iced coffee
>yesterday, I'll tell you what). I'm pretty sure there were 28 people.
28 people is an almost great number. The only problem is the two 4
player tables... I only had one 4 player table, in the first round.
Of the 5 finalists, I only played against Cherryholmes, and I think he
could have had that table a lot sooner if he hadn't been afraid of
Shawn Stanley's bounce/flick (which was mostly non-existent, in the
end). I had an opportunity to stop Cherryholmes from ousting Shawn
for 1 turn with a Hide the Heart, but didn't, in exchange for 3 turns
of no forward motion, hoping that I would get Sorrow's Famous vampire
dunked twice. Unfortunately, Sorrow's Reanimated Corpses and
Shambling Hordes were able to block all of Langa's built-in rush
actions and I only saw one Sense Death the entire game.
I should probably stop playing untested untuned unplayed Salubri
Antitribu decks in tournaments and put some effort into tuning one or
more of them into winning packages.
Game 1: Fame + Dragonbound for a 1.5 VP time out
Game 2: Fame - allies = loss, grand predator wins with 2.5 vps
Game 3: Predator's Choirs + Harmonies + Siren's Lures cut my pool in
half, leaving me crippled against his Malkavian dementation bleed
predator. War Ghouls from the prey smash all vampires (after I'm
ousted) so that the WG gets 3 VP and grand predator has 2.
Deck Name : Uriel's Eyes of Unforgiving Argus
Author : The Lasombra
Description :
Play up Uriel's Owl Companion effect to discourage predator's actions
and to ensure successful actions against your prey.
Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 3 max: 8 average: 5.91667
------------------------------------------------------------
3x Uriel 8 AUS FOR VAL ani obe bishop !Salubri:4
2x Dela Eden 8 AUS FOR VAL cel dom !Salubri:3
2x Aredhel 5 FOR VAL aus !Salubri:4
2x Langa 5 VAL for !Salubri:4
2x Nkechi 4 aus for val !Salubri:4
1x Rashiel 3 for val !Salubri:4
Library [90 cards]
------------------------------------------------------------
Action [7]
2x Abbot
1x Aranthebes, The Immortal
4x Sense Death
Combat [34]
6x Blissful Agony
6x Death Seeker
11x Eye of Unforgiving Heaven
7x Soak
4x Unflinching Persistence
Equipment [1]
1x Heart of Nizchetus
Event [1]
1x Dragonbound
Master [18]
3x Alamut
2x Auspex
1x Blooding by the Code
1x Code of Samiel
1x Dreams of the Sphinx
2x Fame
2x Rotschreck
6x Villein
Reaction [27]
2x Delaying Tactics
3x Enhanced Senses
7x Eyes of Argus
5x Hide the Heart
4x Melange
6x On the Qui Vive
Retainer [2]
1x J. S. Simmons, Esq.
1x Tasha Morgan
Kevin M.
> John Whelan wrote:
>> Per Adam, the final ended with Ruben sweeping the table.
>> Congrats Ruben.
>
> Yeah, that's the word on the street. So Ruben got 18 out of 19
> possible VPs (2x 5 player games, 1x 4 player game, 5 player final).
> How does that happen? Again?
It's pretty easy to figure out what's going on, actually. Ruben's
game is two-fold -- play a well-tested, hyper-focussed deck, and use
jedi mind tricks to get players to do what he wants. If players were
less greedy (or deaf) then he'd be less successful.
Also, note that Ruben isn't the only player who does this. Most of
the players I know act exactly like this. Perhaps Ruben is just
calmer and kinder than the rest of us! ;)
Kevin M., Prince of Las Vegas
"Know your enemy and know yourself; in one-thousand battles
you shall never be in peril." -- Sun Tzu, *The Art of War*
"Contentment...Complacency...Catastrophe!" -- Joseph Chevalier
Please visit VTESville daily! http://vtesville.myminicity.com/
Please bid on my auctions! http://shop.ebay.com/kjmergen/m.html
John Whelan
> Of the 5 finalists, I only played against Cherryholmes, and I think he
> could have had that table a lot sooner if he hadn't been afraid of
> Shawn Stanley's bounce/flick (which was mostly non-existent, in the
> end). I had an opportunity to stop Cherryholmes from ousting Shawn
> for 1 turn with a Hide the Heart, but didn't, in exchange for 3 turns
> of no forward motion, hoping that I would get Sorrow's Famous vampire
> dunked twice. Unfortunately, Sorrow's Reanimated Corpses and
> Shambling Hordes were able to block all of Langa's built-in rush
> actions and I only saw one Sense Death the entire game.
Yeah. I was at that table, preying on Cherryholmes. He was always
one villein or one oust ahead of me. If you had stopped him from
ousting, I think I would have taken him next turn.
salem
> Of the 5 finalists, I only played against Cherryholmes, and I think he
> could have had that table a lot sooner if he hadn't been afraid of
> Shawn Stanley's bounce/flick (which was mostly non-existent, in the
> end). I had an opportunity to stop Cherryholmes from ousting Shawn
> for 1 turn with a Hide the Heart, but didn't, in exchange for 3 turns
> of no forward motion, hoping that I would get Sorrow's Famous vampire
> dunked twice. Unfortunately, Sorrow's Reanimated Corpses and
> Shambling Hordes were able to block all of Langa's built-in rush
> actions and I only saw one Sense Death the entire game.
>
> I should probably stop playing untested untuned unplayed Salubri
> Antitribu decks in tournaments and put some effort into tuning one or
> more of them into winning packages.
or maybe Shawn should start being ousted less ;)
--
salem
(replace 'hotmail' with 'gmail' to email)
Jonathan_Sicari
Um, Was Alamut a placeholder for something else? Because it makes no
sense here.
Jonathan Haynes
Peter D Bakija
> It's pretty easy to figure out what's going on, actually. Ruben's
> game is two-fold -- play a well-tested, hyper-focussed deck, and use
> jedi mind tricks to get players to do what he wants. If players were
> less greedy (or deaf) then he'd be less successful.
Well, yes, there is that. I'm just amazed that it always seems to work
so well. Granted, in the game I played with him, he almost convinced
his prey to help him Parity Shift me, which he didn't even need the
help in doing, so, ya know, I guess people will listen to him.
But again, what I'm baffled by isn't that he wins a lot. He is good,
plays good decks, and consistently gets people to do stuff. It is the
"I get every VP available" thing. Most games are 5 player games. Which
means that even if you are hyper fast in ousting your first prey,
there should be someone far enough away at the table to be able to
capitalize and oust someone else at the table. I'd figure that his
grand prey or grand predator would be doing so reliably in most 5
player games.
-Peter
The Lasombra
> Um, Was Alamut a placeholder for something else? Because it makes no
> sense here.
Yes, for Lilith's Blessing.
I keep forgetting to fix the results since LB isn't in the ARDB yet.
I gained 12 blood from it in the game where I played it first turn.
2x Auspex
1x Blooding by the Code
1x Code of Samiel
1x Dreams of the Sphinx
2x Fame
3x Lilith's Blessing
The Lasombra
>So as no one has posted anything yet (wha? You wanna sleep or something?
>Pah.), I figure I'll start a DC qualifier thread.
Twenty-eight Methuselahs from Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina,
Georgia, New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio showed up to Rockville, MD on
Saturday, July 31st to wage war on one another and more importantly to
qualify for the continental championships of VTES. Ruben Feldman
dominated the competition, earning 3 GWs and 12 VPs before sweeping
the final table with his Nosferatu Princes deck.
Games were played in good spirit, and tables moved very quickly in
general. It was a good time had by all, if I do say so myself. Thanks
to everyone who came, especially those who came a long way to join us.
There were 8 qualifiers by the end of the day. They are:
Ruben Feldman
Brad Cashdollar
David Cherryholmes
Adam Hulse
Tom Mickle
Andrew Sackett
David Pennington
Kim Alishahi
Congratulations to our qualifiers. Hope to see you all in New Orleans
in September and in DC again in 2011!
Final standings are as follows:
Name Prelim GWs Prelim VPs Final VPs
Ruben Feldman 3 12 5
Brad Cashdollar 2 9 0
David Cherryholmes 2 7.5 0
Adam Hulse 1 6 0
Tom Mickle 1 4.5 0
Andrew Sackett 1 4
David Pennington 1 3
Kym Alishahi 1 3
Cory Busch-Kendall 1 3
Jon Mason 1 3
Peter Bakija 0 3
John Whelan 0 2.5
Christoph Boget 0 2
Forrest Nielsen* 0 2
John Alton 0 2
Selen Turkay 0 2
Matt Morgan 0 1.5
Peter Kapsalis 0 1.5
Jeff Thompson 0 1.5
Corey Porter 0 1
Mike Minker 0 1
John Mickle 0 1
Sonam Adinolf 0 1
Kevin Karpinski 0 0.5
Ben Kalb 0 0
Greg Galyanov 0 0
Shawn Stanley 0 0
Joesph Feeney 0 0
*That's right, 2 VPs with a Choir Deck :-)
Till then, happy bleeding!
Peteo
VEKN Prince of Washington DC
Stefan
> -Adam Hulse with a Troglodytia wall deck.
Is there any chance to see this decklist? I have been toying with the
same idea but never got it to work.
/ Stefan
The Lasombra
> > -Adam Hulse with a Troglodytia wall deck.
> Is there any chance to see this decklist? I have been toying with the
> same idea but never got it to work.
Adam has posted on the newsgroup in the past, so getting the current
build may be possible.
(You might consider emailing him, he's on the prince list page for New
York.)
It seems likely that it was a similar build to his earlier tournament
winning deck....
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/msg/1462daabee99b422
Peter D Bakija
<fd031f00-59e4-4e00...@j8g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>,
The Lasombra <thela...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> It seems likely that it was a similar build to his earlier tournament
> winning deck....
> http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/msg/1462daabee99b
> 422
That certainly looks like what he was playing. I mean, it seems likely
that it got tweaked some. But pretty close, I'm sure.
Kushiel
PeteO] wrote:
> Ruben Feldman
> dominated the competition, earning 3 GWs and 12 VPs before sweeping
> the final table with his Nosferatu Princes deck.
Well, let's see this warlock, then.
John Eno
Stefan
Doh! I remember studying this one a while ago, sorry for not checking
first.
/ Stefan
Peter D Bakija
<394b2c9e-6499-4bbd...@k19g2000yqc.googlegroups.com>,
Well, when I saw it, it was something like:
T1: Parthenon, Zillah's valley, some event (Bitter Sweet Story?)
T2: Probably another Zillah's, Selma.
T3: Legendary Vampire, Selma calls Parity Shift (which I DT), makes a
kid instead, probably freaks and bleeds for 3. Gets out Dimple or Duck
or someone.
T4 or T5: He's down to 4 pool, with 5 or 6 pool on uncontrolled
vampires. He played Kalmyaki Nightmares, gets 6 pool back, kills me by
shuffling my 7 cap with dominate about to come out back into my crypt.
Selma calls and passes the Parity Shift, going back up to 14 pool or so.
Probably freaks and bleeds for 3 again.
I die soon after this.
Kushiel
> Well, when I saw it, it was something like:
>
> T1: Parthenon, Zillah's valley, some event (Bitter Sweet Story?)
>
> T2: Probably another Zillah's, Selma.
>
> T3: Legendary Vampire, Selma calls Parity Shift (which I DT), makes a
> kid instead, probably freaks and bleeds for 3. Gets out Dimple or Duck
> or someone.
>
> T4 or T5: He's down to 4 pool, with 5 or 6 pool on uncontrolled
> vampires. He played Kalmyaki Nightmares, gets 6 pool back, kills me by
> shuffling my 7 cap with dominate about to come out back into my crypt.
> Selma calls and passes the Parity Shift, going back up to 14 pool or so.
> Probably freaks and bleeds for 3 again.
>
> I die soon after this.
Yeah, I've been on the receiving end of what's likely the same deck.
Hence my desire to see the decklist. Not to knock your commentary or
anything, but I need a gestalt for processing.
John Eno
The Lasombra
Peter D Bakija
<d1441bca-6070-46b4...@l20g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>,
Kushiel <invisibl...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Yeah, I've been on the receiving end of what's likely the same deck.
> Hence my desire to see the decklist. Not to knock your commentary or
> anything, but I need a gestalt for processing.
Well, ya know, I wanna see the decklist too. But it hasn't shown up yet,
so I figured I'd contribute what I could :-)
dcherryholmes
> met Cherryholmes' Loss deck as my prey in my second prelim game. At
> least, Lucretia did have trouble remembering where her Camera Phone
> and Heart of Cheating went. His defenses seemed minimal, but he still
> ousted faster than I could oust him. It scored a GW with 2.5 vp.
I remember yours as one of the more interesting decks. At least, it
was my first tangible experience with how good Enkil can be. Flipping
out nerd after nerd definitely led me to mis-clock the deck, and
towards the end Lucretia was a monster (btw, Monster would be good if
not already in).
--
David Cherryholmes
dcherryholmes
> Yeah, his deck was pretty solid--G4/5 QUI/OBF Assamites with stealth
> and Loss. Very minimal, if any, combat. He got 2x game wins and then a
> VP in the 4 player game with him, me, my buddy Greg, and Ruben. He
> apparently got wiped out pretty quick by Ruben in the final. As Ruben
> sat behind him.
Zero combat cards. Zero reaction cards. Zero Blood Dolls, zero
Vessels. It's a weird deck, but with Dreams and Visit and being 80,
the jam in the third round should never have happened. Stuff does,
but... dang. Going in first seed would have changed a lot.
--
David Cherryholmes
dcherryholmes
> Well, yes, there is that. I'm just amazed that it always seems to work
> so well. Granted, in the game I played with him, he almost convinced
> his prey to help him Parity Shift me, which he didn't even need the
> help in doing, so, ya know, I guess people will listen to him.
I talked my predator out of that. You can fight this stuff. ;)
... but you shouldn't have to.
--
David Cherryholmes
dcherryholmes
> Yeah. I was at that table, preying on Cherryholmes. He was always
> one villein or one oust ahead of me. If you had stopped him from
> ousting, I think I would have taken him next turn.
I had no Villein. My only pool gain was Haqim's or 10 pool for an
oust.
--
David Cherryholmes
dcherryholmes
> In article
> <d1441bca-6070-46b4-a310-35eb510ad...@l20g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>,
>
> Kushiel <invisibleking...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Yeah, I've been on the receiving end of what's likely the same deck.
> > Hence my desire to see the decklist. Not to knock your commentary or
> > anything, but I need a gestalt for processing.
>
> Well, ya know, I wanna see the decklist too. But it hasn't shown up yet,
> so I figured I'd contribute what I could :-)
>
> Peter D Bakija
>
> "It's too bad she won't live! But then again, who does?"
> -Gaff
I know hanging out at Pete's with him saturday night, I heard
something like "70 cards, 8 Zillah's, 3 Pathenon, and stuff." Nos
with fortitude crypt and all, but there's no way there's room in that
deck for combat defense, with the decent amount of stealth he was
packing. Combat aimed his way, or really solid quick block, would
have ate it. But there was none, so he rocked.
Peter D Bakija
<64ca32fd-83e0-48d5...@j8g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>,
dcherryholmes <david.che...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I know hanging out at Pete's with him saturday night, I heard
> something like "70 cards, 8 Zillah's, 3 Pathenon, and stuff." Nos
> with fortitude crypt and all, but there's no way there's room in that
> deck for combat defense, with the decent amount of stealth he was
> packing. Combat aimed his way, or really solid quick block, would
> have ate it. But there was none, so he rocked.
Oh, absolutely. Another one of those tournaments where I'm all like
"Huh. If I was playing a combat deck, I wouldn't have necessarily done
any worse than I did, but *man* would I have gotten to punish some folks
for an utter lack of combat defense..."
Gah.
Peter D Bakija
pd...@lightlink.com
Peter D Bakija
<786a9fd2-4ef2-468f...@i31g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>,
dcherryholmes <david.che...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Zero combat cards. Zero reaction cards. Zero Blood Dolls, zero
> Vessels. It's a weird deck, but with Dreams and Visit and being 80,
> the jam in the third round should never have happened. Stuff does,
> but... dang. Going in first seed would have changed a lot.
Yah, that was a rough hand jam. You coulda just let me live a turn or
two longer to burn through a bit more of Ruben's pool, recycled your
hand some, and then killed us both. Or maybe not.
Kevin M.
You're making several assumptions here which I'm not going to try
to explain to you in a text-based interface, so I'll just say that
when I see or hear people talking like this about Ruben, it's obvious
to me that those people aren't playing the same game that Ruben is.
Which is why they lose.
Peter D Bakija
"Kevin M." <you...@imaspammer.org> wrote:
> You're making several assumptions here which I'm not going to try
> to explain to you in a text-based interface, so I'll just say that
> when I see or hear people talking like this about Ruben, it's obvious
> to me that those people aren't playing the same game that Ruben is.
>
> Which is why they lose.
And again, I'm not talking about the "winning". I'm talking about the
"getting all the VPs all the time". Which isn't something that should
have anything to do with the game that someone is playing. It has to do
with other people at the table going forward and just average results.
John Whelan
> And again, I'm not talking about the "winning". I'm talking about the
> "getting all the VPs all the time". Which isn't something that should
> have anything to do with the game that someone is playing. It has to do
> with other people at the table going forward and just average results.
In this case, we are dealing with a deck that can distribute pool via
parity shift. That could be a factor.
Also, the goal for players is to win, which means they must prevent
other players from winning. There may come a point in a game where a
methuselah becomes such a big threat that other players stop trying to
"go forward with average results". They unite to stop the table
threat but -- at least in this case -- they fail.
adam....@gmail.com
mentioned some.
Lets see what I can answer/talk about.:)
The Tournament:
Thanks Pete for organizing! It was a great event.
I've been on a vtes lull due to the fact that 20% of my cards got
damaged due to flooding in my apartment. But I wanted to come and play
and see all the Vtes crew that I see so rarely. You guys helped kick-
start a little my creativity. I'll see what I can come up with in the
future!
Thanks to Kym for being our 9 hour driver (4+ each way) and congrats
for Qualifying! As one who rarely makes tournaments, maybe you would
like to post about how it went for you?
Troglodytia wall deck:
The decklist on the link supplied is somewhat close. However for a
while I used almost the exact same library but moved to group 5/6 so
one can use-and-abuse Hugh Angseesing... I mean Byzar (+1 stealth!).
The supporting vamps were Salubri anti and Harbingers. So that version
had more dominate in it and I decided to keep the extra dominate in to
try it out. Dispite getting into the finals (and the dominate helped
that) I think it is not as good a deck.
To Stephan: Hints for Troglodytia deck.
-Smiling Jack is nice but don't make it a theme because having a big
fattie leads to Block fails cards and Pentex.
-Take advantage of Necromancy! Wall decks can have the problem that
the few key actions they take can get blocked. Spectral Divination and
Call the Hungry Dead is worth it. You can even put in some fun cards
like Chair of Hades or Divine Sign.
-I think my new version will take more advantage of Trochomancy but
I'm not sure yet.
-I'm still not sure why I didn't put in an Enkil Cog in this deck...
Round 1:
This was a tough round. John Whelan was running around like a maniac
with Lucretia, tooling up while his Predator (War Ghoul deck) and
Nergal Bleed sat around and blocked nothing. I was holding a Pentex
early on the entire game and then ended up "beating myself". I Sudden
Revesal a third Ashur Tablet and then John proceded to bring out... Le
Dinh Tho. Of course. And I was light on intercept and sure enough, my
hope of stopping Lucretia ended in Epic Fail as the Pentex went to the
ash heap. I managed to get to time but that was really John's game to
win.
Round 2:
Peter Bajika got it pretty correct.
Adam Trog deck->Tremere Vote deck->(P. Bajika)Setite Eternal Mask-
>Kysaid Bleed->Nos Combat
At first glance, not a great table for me. Nos Combat trumps my
fortitude as I sit on my auspex cards. However Kysaid bleed bled
heavy, forcing Nos predator to be a nice wall for me as he went
backwards. I blocked the Tremere Vote pool gain and allowed myself to
take splash pool damage so that he can put pressure on Eternal Mask
deck which was killing the Kysaid bleed.
Kysaid bleed promptly died after a failed lunge. My first thought was
to not let my predator die, giving P. Bajika two VPs. But the Tremere
Vote and Nos decks started dealing about if Tremere kills the setites
he won't go forward for some amount of time. Meaning I still had to
deal with the potence combat.
So... Peter made the deal with me (the devil) and I prevented him from
being ousted with the understanding that he would kill the Nos Combat
that turn. And then just sit around until I kill the Tremere deck (who
was pretty resilent!).
Then the rest is as Peter said. I just had too much pool and just bled
him out.
Round 3:
Umm....
This was a tense table when I was surrounded by two New Yorkers. I
wasn't worried about my Prey Selen Stanislava deck... until I found
out that her prey was an ally deck with no deflections. Figures. My
predator's Sonam (Saulot) deck I knew was going to destroy me. I have
to have staying untapped as an option for my deck which can't be done
against Salubri. So... I "helped" (convince?) that he had to go. The
Toreador Vote deck took care of that for me. I could go into more
details but that would be a long post (already is :) ).
Anyway... that's all I got. Maybe I'll join you on this "Why Ruben
gets all VPs" question. I do have some thoughts on the matter... I'm
aside from the 'Ruben-is-Satan' theory.
Thanks again for the qualifier Pete!
OH! One more thing... (will be a separate post soon)
NEW YORK CITY QUALIFIER
Date: August 28th
Details to come!
Hope you guys can make it!
Adam
Kevin M.
> "Kevin M." wrote:
>> You're making several assumptions here which I'm not going to try
>> to explain to you in a text-based interface, so I'll just say that
>> when I see or hear people talking like this about Ruben, it's obvious
>> to me that those people aren't playing the same game that Ruben is.
>>
>> Which is why they lose.
>
> And again, I'm not talking about the "winning". I'm talking about the
> "getting all the VPs all the time". Which isn't something that should
> have anything to do with the game that someone is playing.
It doesn't have anything to do with the game YOU are playing, no.
Focussing on the math rather than Ruben's playstyle is an error.
John's post provides a clue, for those able to or interested in seeing it.
Peter D Bakija
> It doesn't have anything to do with the game YOU are playing, no.
> Focussing on the math rather than Ruben's playstyle is an error.
>
> John's post provides a clue, for those able to or interested in seeing it.
Kevin, you are full of oblique wisdom. How I get through life as blind
as I am is beyond me.
-Peter
Wedge
> It doesn't have anything to do with the game YOU are playing, no.
> Focussing on the math rather than Ruben's playstyle is an error.
>
> John's post provides a clue, for those able to or interested in seeing it.
He has parity shift and 1st tradition, what else is to figure out. I
do like the progeny in it, people likely think he is playing breed/
boon.
Matt
Kevin M.
> "Kevin M." wrote:
>> It doesn't have anything to do with the game YOU are playing, no.
>> Focussing on the math rather than Ruben's playstyle is an error.
>>
>> John's post provides a clue, for those able to or interested in
>> seeing it.
>
> Kevin, you are full of oblique wisdom. How I get through life
> as blind as I am is beyond me.
I am only full of oblique VTES wisdom. As are you, when you aren't
playing your usual "No, no, let me repeat it for the TENTH time" game.
Glad we didn't get into that here. Sorry you didn't learn anything.
Frederick Scott
> Peter D Bakija wrote:
>> "Kevin M." wrote:
>>> It doesn't have anything to do with the game YOU are playing, no.
>>> Focussing on the math rather than Ruben's playstyle is an error.
>>>
>>> John's post provides a clue, for those able to or interested in
>>> seeing it.
>>
>> Kevin, you are full of oblique wisdom. How I get through life
>> as blind as I am is beyond me.
>
> I am only full of oblique VTES wisdom. As are you, when you aren't
> playing your usual "No, no, let me repeat it for the TENTH time" game.
> Glad we didn't get into that here. Sorry you didn't learn anything.
Eh? Um, no. "As are you..." to Peter doesn't work. I always seem
to understand what Peter's getting at when he posts. There are times
I don't agree with it, but I've never noticed "oblique" to be his
problem.
Fred
Peter D Bakija
> I am only full of oblique VTES wisdom. As are you, when you aren't
> playing your usual "No, no, let me repeat it for the TENTH time" game.
> Glad we didn't get into that here. Sorry you didn't learn anything.
>
Ya know, Kevin, you *could* choose to have a normal conversation like
a normal person, and actually discuss something that could be
interesting and possibly share some clever insight. Or, you could
continue to be opaque and vaguely insulting. Although I guess you like
the latter better. Check.
-Peter
Kevin M.
> "Kevin M." wrote:
>> I am only full of oblique VTES wisdom. As are you, when you aren't
>> playing your usual "No, no, let me repeat it for the TENTH time"
>> game. Glad we didn't get into that here. Sorry you didn't learn
>> anything.
>
> Ya know, Kevin, you *could* choose to have a normal conversation
> like a normal person,
You continually make the mistake that I am a normal person.
> and actually discuss something that could be
> interesting and possibly share some clever insight.
As I said, trying to explain Ruben's motives and attitudes within
a text-based interface isn't something I'm willing to do.
> Or, you could continue to be opaque and vaguely insulting.
You began the insulting within this thread, not I.
> Although I guess you like the latter better. Check.
Best to look in the mirror for your answers and not blame others.
XZealot
> Peter D Bakija wrote:
> > "Kevin M." wrote:
> >> I am only full of oblique VTES wisdom. As are you, when you aren't
> >> playing your usual "No, no, let me repeat it for the TENTH time"
> >> game. Glad we didn't get into that here. Sorry you didn't learn
> >> anything.
>
> > Ya know, Kevin, you *could* choose to have a normal conversation
> > like a normal person,
>
> You continually make the mistake that I am a normal person.
>
> > and actually discuss something that could be
> > interesting and possibly share some clever insight.
>
> As I said, trying to explain Ruben's motives and attitudes within
> a text-based interface isn't something I'm willing to do.
>
> > Or, you could continue to be opaque and vaguely insulting.
>
> You began the insulting within this thread, not I.
>
> > Although I guess you like the latter better. Check.
>
> Best to look in the mirror for your answers and not blame others.
Not to pick sides, Kevin, but your responses definantly picked up a
flavor of "snarkiness" first.
Kevin M.
Many of my posts have that flavor. That's who I am.
But I insulted no one, as Peter is claiming. That's a disgusting lie.
Kushiel
> As I said, trying to explain Ruben's motives and attitudes within
> a text-based interface isn't something I'm willing to do.
*sigh*
What Kevin won't come right out and say here is that Ruben is able to
achieve these Flawless Victory-style wins because he's so much
prettier than the rest of us.
There, I said the thing that everyone was thinking but didn't want to
express publicly. With any luck, this honesty will act as soothing
newsgroup balm.
John Eno
XZealot
> XZealot wrote:
> > "Kevin M." wrote:
> >> Peter D Bakija wrote:
> >>> "Kevin M." wrote:
> >>>> I am only full of oblique VTES wisdom. As are you, when you aren't
> >>>> playing your usual "No, no, let me repeat it for the TENTH time"
> >>>> game. Glad we didn't get into that here. Sorry you didn't learn
> >>>> anything.
>
> >>> Ya know, Kevin, you *could* choose to have a normal conversation
> >>> like a normal person,
>
> >> You continually make the mistake that I am a normal person.
>
> >>> and actually discuss something that could be
> >>> interesting and possibly share some clever insight.
>
> >> As I said, trying to explain Ruben's motives and attitudes within
> >> a text-based interface isn't something I'm willing to do.
>
> >>> Or, you could continue to be opaque and vaguely insulting.
>
> >> You began the insulting within this thread, not I.
>
> >>> Although I guess you like the latter better. Check.
>
> >> Best to look in the mirror for your answers and not blame others.
>
> > Not to pick sides, Kevin, but your responses definantly picked up
> > a flavor of "snarkiness" first.
>
> Many of my posts have that flavor. That's who I am.
>
> But I insulted no one, as Peter is claiming. That's a disgusting lie.
You two work it out.
Meej
> XZealot wrote:
> > Not to pick sides, Kevin, but your responses definantly picked up
> > a flavor of "snarkiness" first.
>
> Many of my posts have that flavor. That's who I am.
>
> But I insulted no one, as Peter is claiming. That's a disgusting lie.
"... for those able to or interested in seeing it" certainly comes
across as at least "vaguely insulting," which is what Peter claimed,
since (as it's obvious he's *interested* in the topic) it implies he's
not *able* to see the clue.
So, no, frankly, it's not.
- D.J.
dcherryholmes
> What Kevin won't come right out and say here is that Ruben is able to
> achieve these Flawless Victory-style wins because he's so much
> prettier than the rest of us.
Well, having been there, I'd say a lot of that day's victory came from
playing a strong, basic deck: Nos Princes with a pile of P/J cards
that are among the strongest in the game. Further, being willing to
shrink it down to 70 cards by utterly discounting combat (I think,
haven't seen the deck list but played against it in two rounds), which
paid off, as it often does. Further still, playing votes that provide
a nominal ability to entice people into doing things they wouldn't
normally consider by offering pool. Lastly, he's a very calm, affable
player and, combined with point two and choosing deals that were just
on the knife's edge of plausibility, tends to make people accept. He
reminded me most of playing with Jay Kristoff, who also is able to
work a similar angle very well. I've never been much good at it,
myself.
--
David Cherryholmes
dcherryholmes
wrote:
> I've never been much good at it,
> myself.
Sorry to reply to my own post but it just occurred to me: I also tend
not to play decks that can work "I'll offer you this pool" and tend to
play decks that offer "I won't rush you or stitch your eyes shut."
Understandably, people react much more poorly to a threat than to a
gift, but I tend to try to avoid deals and just do what my deck does
anyway.
--
David Cherryholmes
Peter D Bakija
> Many of my posts have that flavor. That's who I am.
And you could choose not to do that in instances where it is easy to
do. Why you don't is beyond me. The issue is not that you come off as
snarky. It is that you come off as a complete dick to people who would
otherwise like to think of you as a friend.
> But I insulted no one, as Peter is claiming. That's a disgusting lie.
Oh, you and your "disgusting lies". I'll quote your initial foray into
this colorful exchange:
"John's post provides a clue, for those able to or interested in
seeing it."
Which is, ya know, vaguely insulting. Which is why I called it
"vaguely insulting".
-Peter
TorranceCircle
That, and he is a great player! Where is he from? Extarala has him
listed from SUI but when I played with him in Berkeley I swear he said
he was from Ireland!
Kevin M.
> "Kevin M." wrote:
>> Many of my posts have that flavor. That's who I am.
>
> And you could choose not to do that in instances where it is easy to
> do. Why you don't is beyond me. The issue is not that you come off as
> snarky. It is that you come off as a complete dick to people who would
> otherwise like to think of you as a friend.
Nope. Only to you.
>> But I insulted no one, as Peter is claiming. That's a disgusting lie.
>
> Oh, you and your "disgusting lies". I'll quote your initial foray
> into this colorful exchange:
>
> "John's post provides a clue, for those able to or interested in
> seeing it."
>
> Which is, ya know, vaguely insulting. Which is why I called it
> "vaguely insulting".
Oh, the fragile state of people's emotions, today! Waaaaa!
salem
> Peter D Bakija wrote:
>> "Kevin M." wrote:
>>> Many of my posts have that flavor. That's who I am.
>>
>> And you could choose not to do that in instances where it is easy to
>> do. Why you don't is beyond me. The issue is not that you come off as
>> snarky. It is that you come off as a complete dick to people who would
>> otherwise like to think of you as a friend.
>
> Nope. Only to you.
while I can't actually recall you being a dick to me personally, to my
perception you do come off as a dick to other people a lot of the time.
I hope you don't find that too insulting, vaguely or otherwise. It's merely
an observation.
--
salem
(replace 'hotmail' with 'gmail' to email)
salem
hang on. Kevin said it couldn't be expressed in a text based format. But the
above looks an awful lot like expressing it. Hmm, maybe it's just not
conveying _enough_ of the majesty that is Ruben.
Peter D Bakija
> Oh, the fragile state of people's emotions, today! Waaaaa!
Sigh.
Oh, Kevin. I'd ask "What the hell is wrong with you?", but really, it
would be a waste.
Moving on.
-Peter
Peter D Bakija
> That, and he is a great player! Where is he from? Extarala has him
> listed from SUI but when I played with him in Berkeley I swear he said
> he was from Ireland!
Heh--I had just this conversation with him over the weekend. He is
apparently a Swiss national of partial Irish decent (i.e. I'm guessing
one of his folks is Irish and one is Swiss), and currently living in
NYC working in the financial industry.
I don't want anyone here to think me wondering about how Ruben wins as
much as he does is in any way an attempt to slag on Ruben--he is an
incredibly nice and charming guy who plays good decks very well. Who
is apparently really good at convincing folks that he is doing badly
when he is actually winning :-)
-Peter
adam....@gmail.com
Us New York crew sometimes draw parallels between Ruben and the
Imbued. If people don't realize that he's the table threat off the get
go... etc etc. :-)
Peter D Bakija
wrote:
> Us New York crew sometimes draw parallels between Ruben and the
> Imbued. If people don't realize that he's the table threat off the get
> go... etc etc. :-)
Speaking of which--how did the final play out?
-Peter
The Lasombra
>On Aug 6, 11:27 am, "adam.hulse" wrote:
>> Us New York crew sometimes draw parallels between Ruben and the
>> Imbued. If people don't realize that he's the table threat off the get
>> go... etc etc. :-)
>Speaking of which--how did the final play out?
and what is the current contents of the TWD?
Ruben won't pass me in the Hall of Fame until that deck gets
posted.....
Ruben Feldman
The DC tournament was fun, thanks to PeteO for the organization and
the hospitality afterward where I managed to win with a horseshoe deck
that had loads of red cards (no idea what they did...).
Here is my decklist:
Deckname: Ugly Aggression
Author: Ruben Feldman
Result: 4GW 17VP
Selma 4
Suhaila 3
Dimple 1
Duck 1
Nikolaus Vermeulen 1
Murat 1
Dan Murdock 1
Parthenon 3
Zillah's valley 8
Pentex Subversion 1
Kamaykli Nightmare 1
Giant's Blood 1
Warsaw Station 1
Legendary Vampire 3
Archon investiation 1
Jake Washington 1
The albyrinth 1
Last Stand 1
Parity Shift 7
KRC 2
Conservative Agitation 2
Domain Challenge 1
Nosferatu Justicar 2
Consanguinous Boon 1
4th trad 2
3rd trad 2
Bitter Sweet Story 1
Anthelios 1
2nd Tradition 2
Mental maze 2
Lost in crowds 9
Elder Impersonation 2
Swallowed by the night 2
Faceless night 4
Old friends 2
Freak Drive 4
Generally games went pretty well for me, the choice of deck was
suitable. The harshest table was definitely round three, where I was
at 4 pool on turn 4 after some serious bleed in my face! I managed to
turn the situation around playing the Nightmare and getting my
influenced pool back.
@ Peter and Dave, I was seriously considering going backwards, if my
prey had damage votes. He would have gained the fact that i lay off
him and plan to go 1v1 against him after having giving him a VP. I
think it was a very legitimate deal and I honestly wasnt tryin to
manipulate him in to something ridiculous. It turns out he had no such
votes, so I was given no choice but to go forwards, and it was only
luckily that i managed to kill him in time and then even more lucky
that i managed to oust Dave...
After briefly reading the comments, I would have a lot to say about
everything said but to clarify the question: Why are my victories so
flawless in terms of missed VPs? - a major reason is actually very
easily explained. I feel that whatever deck I play, I will have a lot
of attention and people will be scared of what i can do, even if i
can't do it. Hence I don't lose much by playing a fast aggressive
deck. By doing so, the table quickly forms against me. At that stage
most players stop playing their game and try to stop me. A lot of the
time, by focusing so hard trying to stop me, they forget that the best
way to stop me could just be to play their game and become just as
much of a table threat as me.
For example, on the final table the following occurred:
- My prey played Alamut and told Adam (my grand prey) to let his
bleed of 4 pass so he could get 4 votes and call off my legendary.
Adam agreed and also proposed to spend his only action the following
turn calling the vote. So they did. Now in the scheme of things, this
did hurt me, however, it would have been worse for me had Adam played
his game, kept 4 more pool by blocking and spent a turn playing his
game (getting some intercept equipment, or some permanent out of his
hand...) This is because Adam's deck was the strongest defensive deck
and perhaps had a chance to survive long enough for me to get ousted.
- Brad (playing the Great Beast) made some sort of deal with his AAA
prey (Tom) for non aggression and in return Tom would do some damage
to me. Now Brad was throwing bleeds of 6-8 every turn and potentially
twice a turn (3 if skill placed). Had he just played his game, killed
his prey, i would have been in a very difficult position, having no
way to block him...
On the counter side of the argument, on round 1, my grand pred,
Christophe was leveraging his two votes on the Baron (which could make
stuff fail) to make me give him pool and damage his prey. His prey was
doing nothign for him and he was being bled in dementaton every turn.
He was playing his game and not putting all his resources trying to
stop me. That resulted in him ousting his prey, and had he been a
little faster at it or had he not drawn 0 shambling hordes, he would
have had a serious chance at beating me 1 on 1.
Frederick Scott
I don't know. Although this might be right in some instances, it
doesn't make sense as a general rule. What your argument boils down
to, in essence, is that the table should never gang up on the leader.
Or at the very least, it shouldn't have ganged up on the leader in
the face of your particular deck and playing style. To the contrary,
I've seen many instances where table hate has been very effective at
stopping an aggressive deck. While I certainly think each situation
needs to be thought through on its own terms, the long view of the
"you-should-play-your-own-game" argument is that it sounds suspiciously
like it's more geared to obfuscate the value of stopping the leader than
serious advice advocating a sound playing philosophy.
Just MHO - maybe not worth much...
Fred
The Lasombra
>Hello all, took my a while to remember about checking out the group!
>
>The DC tournament was fun, thanks to PeteO for the organization and
>the hospitality afterward where I managed to win with a horseshoe deck
>that had loads of red cards (no idea what they did...).
>
>Here is my decklist:
Command Performance
Rockville, Maryland
July 31, 2010
28 players
3R + F
Ruben Feldman's Tournament Winning Deck with 5 VPs in the Finals
Deck name: Ugly Aggression
Author: Ruben Feldman
Result: 4GW 17VP
Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 2 max: 9 average: 6.75
------------------------------------------------------------
4x Selma the Repugnant 8 OBF POT ani for prince Nosferatu:1
3x Suhailah 9 FOR OBF pot ser prince Ventrue:2
1x Murat 7 OBF POT ser prince Nosferatu:2
1x Nikolaus Vermeulen 7 POT ani for obf prince Nosferatu:2
1x Dan Murdock 3 aus obf Caitiff:1
1x Duck 3 obf pot Nosferatu:1
1x Dimple 2 obf Nosferatu:1
Library [70 cards]
--------------------------------------
Action [4]
2x Fourth Tradition: The Accounting
2x Third Tradition: Progeny
Action Modifier [21]
2x Elder Impersonation
4x Faceless Night
4x Freak Drive
9x Lost in Crowds
2x Old Friends
Action Modifier/Combat [2]
2x Swallowed by the Night
Event [2]
1x Anthelios, The Red Star
1x Bitter and Sweet Story, The
Master [22]
1x Archon Investigation
1x Giant's Blood
1x Jake Washington (Hunter)
1x Kaymakli Nightmares
1x Labyrinth, The
1x Last Stand
3x Legendary Vampire
3x Parthenon, The
1x Pentex(TM) Subversion
1x Warsaw Station
8x Zillah's Valley
Political Action [15]
1x Consanguineous Boon
2x Conservative Agitation
1x Domain Challenge
2x Kine Resources Contested
2x Nosferatu Justicar
7x Parity Shift
Reaction [4]
2x Mental Maze
2x Second Tradition: Domain
Haze
On the contrary, it reminds me of a strategy article on the old
vtesinla.org website. The basic gist was that the most skilled players
can ignore the chaos going on around them and stay focused on their
prize: a VP and 6 more pool. Clear your mind of anything that doesn't
matter. Getting distracted is what kills a lot of noobs, or even
experienced players who are tired and not thinking straight (to put it
politely).
Messing around with other players isn't a skill in itself, and you can
see it in a lot of boardgames. Munchkin is a good example -- even
those totally new to the game will jump on the "gang up on the leading
guy when he's just about to win" bandwagon. In VTES, the power to mess
around with another's game seems naturally tempting, and I think it's
a measure of player skill to do it when it really counts, instead of
whenever you feel like it.
Another way to put it.... if you're going to mess around with table
politics, make sure you have some actual bargaining chip. Making a
deal to not bleed for 10 so your prey can hit the "table threat" for 3
isn't really doing much. Neither is paying 4 pool to remove Legendary.
Now, if you could play Pentex, or Deep Song rush their justicar into
torpor, or even Kindred Spirits bleed them directly for 10, now you
have some actual control over this supposed table leader!
But on the other hand.... if you can do any of those, you can probably
do it any time you want. So secretly, you are the real table leader,
and if anybody knew about it they'd gang up on you instead. Better to
keep it secret, and wait for the right moment, eh?
Frederick Scott
> On Aug 6, 4:59 pm, Frederick Scott<no...@nowhere.com> wrote:
>> On 8/6/2010 10:56 AM, Ruben Feldman wrote:
interpreting to mean, 'as-opposed-to-ever-going-crosstable-against-
a-player-who-looks-threatening')
>>
>> I don't know. Although this might be right in some instances, it
>> doesn't make sense as a general rule. What your argument boils down
>> to, in essence, is that the table should never gang up on the leader.
>> Or at the very least, it shouldn't have ganged up on the leader in
>> the face of your particular deck and playing style. To the contrary,
>> I've seen many instances where table hate has been very effective at
>> stopping an aggressive deck. While I certainly think each situation
>> needs to be thought through on its own terms, the long view of the
>> "you-should-play-your-own-game" argument is that it sounds suspiciously
>> like it's more geared to obfuscate the value of stopping the leader than
>> serious advice advocating a sound playing philosophy.
>>
>> Just MHO - maybe not worth much...
>
> vtesinla.org website. The basic gist was that the most skilled players
> can ignore the chaos going on around them and stay focused on their
> prize: a VP and 6 more pool. Clear your mind of anything that doesn't
> matter. Getting distracted is what kills a lot of noobs, or even
> experienced players who are tired and not thinking straight (to put it
> politely).
Hmmm. Without having a copy of the article in hand to look at, I'd
be skeptical that it amounts to an admonition of never going crosstable.
Or for that matter, just because it was a strategy article didn't mean
it was a _good_ strategy article. I hear the 'focus-on-your-own-game'
mantra from time to time. Sometime it makes sense and I agree with the
speaker. Other times it's just an obvious table threat making an
attempt to sow obfuscation and discord.
> Messing around with other players isn't a skill in itself, and you can
> see it in a lot of boardgames.
As a general statement, that's just brutally bad. Yes, messing with
other players can absolutely be a skill in itself and I've seen
players who are brilliant at it. If this is your outlook, we'll never
agree and I can't even comprehend how anyone who's played any amount
of multi-player games could ever seriously express such an idea.
> Munchkin is a good example -- even
> those totally new to the game will jump on the "gang up on the leading
> guy when he's just about to win" bandwagon.
An example of that nature is worthless. Games differ from one
another massively. Apply the statement, "Messing with other player
isn't a skill in itself" to, say, Diplomacy or Machiavelli or
any number of classic multiplayer games centered on diplomacy and
you'll see how silly this whole line of argument is. VtES is a game
in which the level of cooperation and negotiation is truly disputed
amongst players and that's fine. I expect to hear disagreement
about it. But let's not draw analogies to completely different
multiplayer games and in order to show anything about VtES. They're
worthless.
< In VTES, the power to mess
> around with another's game seems naturally tempting, and I think it's
> a measure of player skill to do it when it really counts, instead of
> whenever you feel like it.
That I agree with - but this was not the dispute I was making to what
Reuben said. What he said sounded like, "You should NEVER go cross-
table." If I misinterpreted that, I apologize. Perhaps I'd need to
hear more about his ideas about when one should go cross-table and
when his "play-your-own-game" advice applies. I didn't hear any
distinction made so I assumed he wasn't advocating one.
Fred
Ruben Feldman
> Reuben said. What he said sounded like, "You should NEVER go cross-
> table." If I misinterpreted that, I apologize. Perhaps I'd need to
> hear more about his ideas about when one should go cross-table and
> when his "play-your-own-game" advice applies. I didn't hear any
> distinction made so I assumed he wasn't advocating one.
>
Yeah obviously I don't advocate this as a general rule. In fact i'm
not necessarily saying it's bad, I'm just saying it always put me in a
win-it-all or lose quickly scenario. Hence if i do win, I will get all
or most of all the VPs...
However, players often forget that the best thing they can do
sometimes (in fact very often) to counteract a table threat is to
improve their own position instead of bringing down the top dog. This
is often because bringing yourself up will advantage you over the
other 3 players as well.
A very good example of this also is the NAC final in Atlanta. I was
playing a very similar deck (few tweaks) and the two other vote decks
tried to stop me. Hugh, who was my grand predator successively
thwarted my votes using his joseph o'grady's burn 1 blood for 1 vote.
He also put minimal pressure on his prey in order to make it more
difficult for me. My prey, Matt, probably had no choice but to look
back (at least until i lost the vote lock, at which point i proposed a
deal which he refused). My predator was indeed playing his own game by
trying to oust me. In the end, the one who won was the only one who
wasn't involved in this and hadn't spent resources stopping me but
building himself the whole time.
Frederick Scott
>> That I agree with - but this was not the dispute I was making to what
>> Reuben said. What he said sounded like, "You should NEVER go cross-
>> table." If I misinterpreted that, I apologize. Perhaps I'd need to
>> hear more about his ideas about when one should go cross-table and
>> when his "play-your-own-game" advice applies. I didn't hear any
>> distinction made so I assumed he wasn't advocating one.
>
> Yeah obviously I don't advocate this as a general rule. In fact i'm
> not necessarily saying it's bad, I'm just saying it always put me in a
> win-it-all or lose quickly scenario. Hence if i do win, I will get all
> or most of all the VPs...
Sure. If everyone gangs up against you and _still_ fail to stop you,
then a table sweep is frequently an outcome unless people start
transferring out for spite, which there usually shouldn't be any call
for. If someone's built such a great deck and played it so well that
the entire table can't stop him, then I believe he should be given his
due. But it seems like a pathetic situation when an entire table
can't stop a single player from sweeping. Sometimes it happens,
especially when a player basically won the metagame along with just
being an excellent player. And I'd say sometimes you're right that
other players should just go for what they can get in that situation
rather than bothering to participate in a stop-the-leader crusade - if
the crusade hasn't much chance of working and they can get a VP or two
on their own. And sometimes, as you allude to below, a player actually
has a better chance of stopping the leader on his own by going for his
own VPs (and consequent pool rewards) than he does by cooperating with
others.
But these possibilities seem to me to be more the exceptions and not
the rules. More often, IMHO, the way to stop a leader you fear is to
cooperate with others. If a table starts cooperating soon enough and
cooperates effectively, they should usually manage to stop a leader
successfully. Whether that was a good idea for everyone involved
is often debatable, but once you've chosen the goal of stopping the
leader, usually doing so cooperatively is better.
> However, players often forget that the best thing they can do
> sometimes (in fact very often) to counteract a table threat is to
> improve their own position instead of bringing down the top dog. This
> is often because bringing yourself up will advantage you over the
> other 3 players as well.
Sure. Sometimes.
> A very good example of this also is the NAC final in Atlanta. I was
> playing a very similar deck (few tweaks) and the two other vote decks
> tried to stop me. Hugh, who was my grand predator successively
> thwarted my votes using his joseph o'grady's burn 1 blood for 1 vote.
> He also put minimal pressure on his prey in order to make it more
> difficult for me. My prey, Matt, probably had no choice but to look
> back (at least until i lost the vote lock, at which point i proposed a
> deal which he refused). My predator was indeed playing his own game by
> trying to oust me. In the end, the one who won was the only one who
> wasn't involved in this and hadn't spent resources stopping me but
> building himself the whole time.
Well, that sometimes happens, too. You expend resources attempting
to stop someone. You lose resources, the person you attacked loses
resources, so a third (or fourth or fifth) person who's resources
are relatively unaffected winds up with the advantage. In this case,
it might have been a mistake to concentrate your attacks on the
initial perceived threat. Alternatively, you might just be between
a rock and hard place. You deal with the threat you fear the most long
enough to survive and hope the other party (or parties) can be dealt
with later or perhaps they get bad draws or any number of eventualities
will occur that allow you to finally succeed - as long as you first
survive. If that doesn't happen, oh, well. It doesn't prove the
initial decision to focus on the initial threat was a bad one. Maybe
it was or maybe it wasn't.
Fred
Ruben Feldman
> > However, players often forget that the best thing they can do
> > sometimes (in fact very often) to counteract a table threat is to
> > improve their own position instead of bringing down the top dog. This
> > is often because bringing yourself up will advantage you over the
> > other 3 players as well.
>
> Sure. Sometimes.
>
This is where you are wrong I think, it happens a lot more often than
most players realize.
Decks are usually built to resist their predators and kill their prey,
not to protect themselves from or damage someone cross table.
Therefore your efforts to go cross table will usually be more
expensive and less significant. Players generally should really
evaluate the advantages of going cross table vs doing what their deck
is designed to do.
In addition, eliminating the table threat, if successful, will
necessarily create another table leader (usually his predator), which
puts you in an even worse situation since you've spent resources and
there are now less players to team up against the new leader. (also
you might have helped your prey get a VP and 6 pool).
Because I expect people to team up against me, I tend to play fast
decks which can quickly eliminate one player and so only have to deal
with three, one of which might have an interest in collaborating, or
at least not hindering me (my grand predator). As I mention above, a
deck's usefulness in a crosstable action is usually much reduced and I
count on the fact that players will not have had time to develop their
decks to make their crosstable actions against me count.
And I am not saying this is the only reason that I won with such good
results, there are plenty of other reasons too, but this I think is a
major one.
Frederick Scott
> On Aug 9, 6:52 pm, Frederick Scott<no...@nowhere.com> wrote:
>>> However, players often forget that the best thing they can do
>>> sometimes (in fact very often) to counteract a table threat is to
>>> improve their own position instead of bringing down the top dog. This
>>> is often because bringing yourself up will advantage you over the
>>> other 3 players as well.
>>
>> Sure. Sometimes.
>
> This is where you are wrong I think, it happens a lot more often than
> most players realize.
Well, we're going to have agree to disagree with about this. I will
say I hear this from very good players a lot - inevitably when they're
doing well in a game and wish to discourage cross-table hate. I'm not
saying this proves the advice is merely self-interest from the source.
I'm just saying...*shrug*
> Decks are usually built to resist their predators and kill their prey,
> not to protect themselves from or damage someone cross table.
> Therefore your efforts to go cross table will usually be more
> expensive and less significant.
This is an over generalization that conflates a lot of concepts to
arrive at the conclusion you prefer. Basically, it appears to me
that it all depends; the devil is in the details of each individual
situation. Things that resist one's predator's might do just as well
to stop a table threat - hence the popularity of Eagle's Sights and
vampires with that ability like Anneke. Things that attack one's prey
or predator, like rushes, might be used as well or better against a
cross-table threat. Other times, I'd say you're correct and efficiency
might be a factor. That's why I say sometimes cooperating is better,
sometimes playing your own game is better.
> Players generally should really
> evaluate the advantages of going cross table vs doing what their deck
> is designed to do.
Of course they should. I never held otherwise.
> In addition, eliminating the table threat, if successful, will
> necessarily create another table leader (usually his predator), which
> puts you in an even worse situation since you've spent resources and
> there are now less players to team up against the new leader. (also
> you might have helped your prey get a VP and 6 pool).
Fallacious inductive reasoning. Some table leaders are much more
threatening to others. Furthermore, eliminating a leader as a threat
doesn't have to mean taking him totally out of the game. Ideally,
you'd cut his threat down to where he's still a handful for his
predator and prey but no longer the threat to start rolling up ousts.
This is always tricky to gauge, of course. And some table leaders
are "all or nothing" propositions so you can't setup a balance no
matter how hard you try. Even so, though, the next "table leader"
isn't necessarily going to be as bad a threat as the first one was,
in which case you're certainly accomplished something.
> Because I expect people to team up against me, I tend to play fast
> decks which can quickly eliminate one player and so only have to deal
> with three, one of which might have an interest in collaborating, or
> at least not hindering me (my grand predator).
If true, then I notice this also gives you an incentive to want to sell
the advice that playing one's own game is better. If people listen to
that, fewer people will be likely to gang up on Reuben. Again, doesn't
make it wrong - but it also doesn't make it right, either.
> As I mention above, a
> deck's usefulness in a crosstable action is usually much reduced and I
> count on the fact that players will not have had time to develop their
> decks to make their crosstable actions against me count.
> And I am not saying this is the only reason that I won with such good
> results, there are plenty of other reasons too, but this I think is a
> major one.
Perhaps. I can't possibly judge games I didn't see. I've certainly
seen examples of players making the mistake you cite. It's just I
believe I've also seen examples of players making mistakes in exactly
the opposite way: looking out for themselves as an obvious table threat
builds up and ultimately, inevitably became unassailable and rolls to
an easy sweep. I hate hearing people propose rules that appear to me
to serve poorly very often.
Fred
John Whelan
> > Decks are usually built to resist their predators and kill their prey,
> > not to protect themselves from or damage someone cross table.
> > Therefore your efforts to go cross table will usually be more
> > expensive and less significant.
>
> This is an over generalization that conflates a lot of concepts to
> arrive at the conclusion you prefer.
Most generalizations are over-generalizations, in the sense that they
have exceptions. Still, what Ruben says is broadly correct.
Sometimes you do want to hit cross table. I'm sure Ruben knows this
as well as I. In fact, since he wins more often than I, I suspect he
knows it better, and has better judgment than I as far as when to make
exceptions to the rule.
> > In addition, eliminating the table threat, if successful, will
> > necessarily create another table leader (usually his predator), which
> > puts you in an even worse situation since you've spent resources and
> > there are now less players to team up against the new leader. (also
> > you might have helped your prey get a VP and 6 pool).
>
> Fallacious inductive reasoning. Some table leaders are much more
> threatening to others. Furthermore, eliminating a leader as a threat
> doesn't have to mean taking him totally out of the game. Ideally,
> you'd cut his threat down to where he's still a handful for his
> predator and prey but no longer the threat to start rolling up ousts.
> This is always tricky to gauge, of course. And some table leaders
> are "all or nothing" propositions so you can't setup a balance no
> matter how hard you try. Even so, though, the next "table leader"
> isn't necessarily going to be as bad a threat as the first one was,
> in which case you're certainly accomplished something.
All valid possibilities. But but the general idea expressed -- that
eliminating a table-leader will lead to another table leader, is
valid. And if that new table leader is not you, you have not much
helped yourself by eliminating the table threat -- and it is a built-
in feature of the game that such cross-table actions will be more
costly. It is true that eliminating a table leader could
theoretically result in deadlock -- but that is not much help to you
either, since your goal is to win.
> > Because I expect people to team up against me, I tend to play fast
> > decks which can quickly eliminate one player and so only have to deal
> > with three, one of which might have an interest in collaborating, or
> > at least not hindering me (my grand predator).
>
> If true, then I notice this also gives you an incentive to want to sell
> the advice that playing one's own game is better. If people listen to
> that, fewer people will be likely to gang up on Reuben.
Hah. True enough I suppose; but to me a bit moot. Because a default
"everybody gang up on Ruben" rule seems to me to be just a wee bit
unsporting. So, as far as I am concerned, I am just going to have to
play to win, in accordance with Ruben's general advise (which is
indeed generally applicable), and make exceptions to that rule only as
the situation arises and only as my (admittedly poor) judgment
dictates.
Ruben Feldman
I wouldn't lie on a public forum about my beliefs in the hope that I
can win more games, I think I am doing ok.
As John said, there is an inherent difficulty of going cross table.
You cited Eagle sight for example:
VS Prey/Pred: +1 intercept
VS Crosstable: Nothing, you can't even play speak read the winds, or
other similar untaps in conjunction
Also, Anneke is mostly used for her title/disciplines/clan rather than
her ability.
When you play a rush deck, you have a certain amount of rushes/actions
you will/can play during one game. Usually, they aren't even enough to
achieve two VPs (GW) and survive long enough to make them, so you
really want to rush crosstable (I would say unless absolutely
necessary, no)?
> On Aug 9, 6:52 pm, Frederick Scott<no...@nowhere.com> wrote:
>>>> However, players often forget that the best thing they can do
>>>> sometimes (in fact very often) to counteract a table threat is to
>>>> improve their own position instead of bringing down the top dog. This
>>>> is often because bringing yourself up will advantage you over the
>>>> other 3 players as well.
>>> Sure. Sometimes.
>> This is where you are wrong I think, it happens a lot more often than
>> most players realize.
> I will
>say I hear this from very good players a lot - inevitably when they're
>doing well in a game and wish to discourage cross-table hate. I'm not
>saying this proves the advice is merely self-interest from the source.
>I'm just saying...*shrug*
If you hear this a lot, especially from good players, then maybe there
is some sense in it... You think all the players you hear this from
are just trying to discourage crosstable hate because they want easier
games?
>Well, we're going to have agree to disagree with about this.
That's fine with me I suppose.
Ruben Feldman
> I wouldn't lie on a public forum (Or in real life for that matter :D)
>
> VS Crosstable: Nothing, you can't even play speak read the winds, or
Frederick Scott
> Frederick Scott wrote:
>>> Decks are usually built to resist their predators and kill their prey,
>>> not to protect themselves from or damage someone cross table.
>>> Therefore your efforts to go cross table will usually be more
>>> expensive and less significant.
>>
>> This is an over generalization that conflates a lot of concepts to
>> arrive at the conclusion you prefer.
>
> Most generalizations are over-generalizations, in the sense that they
> have exceptions. Still, what Ruben says is broadly correct.
...broadly correct, as far is it goes - but poorly applied to the
argument he was making, IMO.
> Sometimes you do want to hit cross table. I'm sure Ruben knows this
> as well as I.
Well, I don't want to get into too much of a pissing match around the
margins. If we all agree that sometimes you go cross-table and
sometimes it's not a good idea and you need to use some discernment,
we can probably write the rest off to newsgroup argumentation hubris.
But I didn't see Reuben allowing for it. The idea that _all_ of
Reuben's opponents' problems were that they were spending too much
time ganging up on Reuben and not enough time attacking each other
struck me as a little bit extreme, based on what I know of the game.
In fact, since he wins more often than I, I suspect he
> knows it better, and has better judgment than I as far as when to make
> exceptions to the rule.
Oh, he wins far more often then I and he certainly has better judgment
than me. I'm just pointing out the grain of salt with which one has to
take his advice, given his point of view. Or, for that matter, even if
he's totally sincere, it's been made clear that he plays a certain
style of deck which may give him a particular approach to the game
others might not find useful. If you're set up with a deck that tries
to race to victory, playing your own game is probably a lot more
critical than playing the balancing act he disparages. The advice
might not translate well to other play styles.
>
>>> In addition, eliminating the table threat, if successful, will
>>> necessarily create another table leader (usually his predator),
...
>> Some table leaders are much more
>> threatening to others. Furthermore, eliminating a leader as a threat
>> doesn't have to mean taking him totally out of the game. Ideally,
>> you'd cut his threat down to where he's still a handful for his
>> predator and prey but no longer the threat to start rolling up ousts.
>> This is always tricky to gauge, of course. And some table leaders
>> are "all or nothing" propositions so you can't setup a balance no
>> matter how hard you try. Even so, though, the next "table leader"
>> isn't necessarily going to be as bad a threat as the first one was,
>> in which case you're certainly accomplished something.
>
> All valid possibilities. But but the general idea expressed -- that
> eliminating a table-leader will lead to another table leader, is
> valid. And if that new table leader is not you, you have not much
> helped yourself by eliminating the table threat
I repeat, if the new table leader is not nearly as threatening as the
previous one, you certainly have. The classic examples of this are
weeny bleed decks or certain breed decks. Some things just can't be
allowed to roll.
> -- and it is a built-
> in feature of the game that such cross-table actions will be more
> costly. It is true that eliminating a table leader could
> theoretically result in deadlock -- but that is not much help to you
> either, since your goal is to win.
Your thinking is far too limited if the only gain you can see to
eliminating a table threat is deadlock. Real life games go many
different directions.
>>> Because I expect people to team up against me, I tend to play fast
>>> decks which can quickly eliminate one player and so only have to deal
>>> with three, one of which might have an interest in collaborating, or
>>> at least not hindering me (my grand predator).
>>
>> If true, then I notice this also gives you an incentive to want to sell
>> the advice that playing one's own game is better. If people listen to
>> that, fewer people will be likely to gang up on Reuben.
>
> Hah. True enough I suppose; but to me a bit moot. Because a default
> "everybody gang up on Ruben" rule seems to me to be just a wee bit
> unsporting.
Again, your thinking is far too limited. It was not my intent to
propose a metagame crusade against Reuben. I was just pointing out why
his advice might not necessarily be unbiased. Again, it's just to say
that while I acknowledge he's clearly a excellent player, you still
have to take his advice with a certain grain of salt. That's all.
> So, as far as I am concerned, I am just going to have to
> play to win, in accordance with Ruben's general advise (which is
> indeed generally applicable), and make exceptions to that rule only as
> the situation arises and only as my (admittedly poor) judgment
> dictates.
Sure.
Fred
Frederick Scott
(re: "Play your own game", as opposed to spending resources trying to
attack the leader and play a balancing act.)
>> I will
>> say I hear this from very good players a lot - inevitably when they're
>> doing well in a game and wish to discourage cross-table hate. I'm not
>> saying this proves the advice is merely self-interest from the source.
>> I'm just saying...*shrug*
>
> If you hear this a lot, especially from good players, then maybe there
> is some sense in it... You think all the players you hear this from
> are just trying to discourage crosstable hate because they want easier
> games?
Honestly, at different times I think either can be the speaker's motive.
Often it may well be both: the table leader is presenting to one of his
adversaries - whichever one he believes he can most likely dissuade - an
alternative strategy to victory. Whether the alternative is necessarily
the best thing for the target's purposes is immaterial to the speaker as
long as convincing the target to pursue it significantly helps the
speaker. Still, it's not an argument that's worth wasting much time
on unless it has _some_ merit to it that the target may perceive. So
it probably does have some merit.
And, of course, as players we like to talk strategy a lot on a
sincere level. So often enough, advice truly is coming from a
sincere place. Just not always.
Fred
John Whelan
> Again, your thinking is far too limited.
How so? As I said, I will make exceptions as my judgment dictates.
No limits.
> It was not my intent to propose a metagame crusade against Reuben.
> I was just pointing out why
> his advice might not necessarily be unbiased.
As I said, I will make exceptions as my judgment dictates. And in an
in-game context, I will take Ruben's advice (or any player's advice)
with several grains of salt. In an out-of-game context, such comments
seem ad hominem and unnecessary.
Frederick Scott
Bleh. Just saw this. No, they were neither ad hominem nor unnecesary.
Fred