The Reprint issue
jason...@iinet.net.au
reluctance on the part of WW to reprint certain top tier cards. Unless
I'm mistaken, Deflection and Govern the Unaligned have not been
printed in boosters since Camarilla Edition (although Deflection was
in Black Hand Starters), yet Scouting Mission and Redirection have
been reprinted in far more recent memory (both are vastly inferior to
the aforementioned, especially in regards to Redirection). The most
recent example is KoT, a Camarilla focused Edition which failed to
reprint arguably the most powerful Camarilla effect in the game thus
far - Parity Shift.
This strikes me as a disingenuous and somewhat flawed method of
discouraging the play of these cards. Are the designers under the
impression that by not printing PS or Def, these cards will no longer
be played?
If the cards are deemed too powerful for the game, simply remove them.
If the cards are seen as acceptable, they must be acknowledged as top
tier and kept in rotation with a reasonable frequency. By failing to
reprint them, WW succeeds only in:
1) Disadvantaging new players, who don't have access to older printed
editions, and are thus forced to play with inferior replacements
(Scouting mission, Redirection, etc) unless they turn to Ebay.
2) Inflating the Ebay/secondary market prices for these cards, since
any person wishing to construct a competitive deck will want to use
them, regardless of them currently being in print or not. There is a
lot of 5 Parity Shifts on Ebay atm sitting at over US$20, with under a
day to go. Deflection is selling on Ebay atm for $1.50 each, and this
card is a COMMON.
This issue was brought to my attention recently when some new players
to our group were asking for deck advice, and I realised that the
(common!) cards I was recommending they use were going to be pretty
difficult to get a hold of.
I'm failing to understand how this policy can be considered reasonable
or responsible, and am wondering if there is a solid explanation
behind it?
jase
echia...@yahoo.com
> Having looked at the last several sets released, there appears to be a
> reluctance on the part of WW to reprint certain top tier cards. Unless
> I'm mistaken, Deflection and Govern the Unaligned have not been
> printed in boosters since Camarilla Edition (although Deflection was
> in Black Hand Starters), yet Scouting Mission and Redirection have
> been reprinted in far more recent memory (both are vastly inferior to
> the aforementioned, especially in regards to Redirection). The most
> recent example is KoT, a Camarilla focused Edition which failed to
> reprint arguably the most powerful Camarilla effect in the game thus
> far - Parity Shift.
>
> This strikes me as a disingenuous and somewhat flawed method of
> discouraging the play of these cards. Are the designers under the
> impression that by not printing PS or Def, these cards will no longer
> be played?
>
> If the cards are deemed too powerful for the game, simply remove them.
> If the cards are seen as acceptable, they must be acknowledged as top
> tier and kept in rotation with a reasonable frequency. By failing to
> reprint them, WW succeeds only in:
Sorry but I don't think your argument holds any water. In particular,
White Wolf's reprints of Rares clearly demonstrates the holes in your
logic. Mind Rape. Heart of Nizchetus. Heart of the City. Bowl of
Convergence. Ossian. The Unmasking. Fixed War Ghoul. Fixed Succubus.
Uncommon Freak Drive. Multiple Freak Drives in a starter. Common Form
of Mist. Yeah, you're right. White is so *totally* trying to hose the
newbies by making awesome cards unattainable. ::rolls eyes::
xcver
>
> - Zitierten Text anzeigen -
So anything from you on the particular cards in question? being
Deflection and Parity Shift.
It's nice that they put those cards back in, but some are really 1 ofs
in decks, while obtaining 8 deflections and 6 parity shifts is quite
the challenge for a newbie.
seba
however the issue is not on powerhouses (although were still waiting /
dreading a reprint of protec thine own). the problem is much more
about backbone cards. cards that do not swing games on thier own but
are the bulk of many decks. as such they are usaly play in multible
copies (havent ever seen anyone willingly play just a singel
deflection). whilst it is great that you can obtain cards that make up
certain decks (war gouhl, shamblinghord etc.) far more decks are
buildable off deflection and govern.
when deciding on what to include in a set as reprints i personaly feel
one should take several factors into account.
1. how much play does the card see (TWDA as a good pointer here)
2. how is the price for the card on the secondary market (too high
prices will sever players, especialy new players, from certain crads
untill you reach a point where you can only play a great number of
decks if your a long time player or spend more money than the others.)
i feel that being new to the game should not be a mesure of what decks
you can build on a resonable budget. sure if you play something like
40+ rares in your deck it will cost more but especialy common cards
should not be the money portion of your deck (8 deflection = 12$ seems
somewhat wrong to me)
on the contrarie i dont feel that this is a major problem jet. most
cards that see a lot of play are beeing reprinted an WW is definatly
trying to make a good job. in the case of deflection, govern and other
cards of such high play ratio i hope that the will see print again
soon for the sake of new players.
to summ it all up if a card is played a lot it has to see reprint if
only for new players.
greatings from germany
p.s. i still feel that heart of n. and unmasking have climed to such
secondary card prizes that the should have been throwen into the
starter decks as both had ebay prises somewher tripple the cost of a
starter. and dont tell me something oh no i dont want to buy starter
decks when the contain cards that realy make it worth your while.
whats more when i can buy a heart for the price of a starter it cant
cost more when i dont even get the other cards from that starter (best
way ever to limit the price of such cards)
Blooded Sand
>although were still waiting /dreading a reprint of protect thine own
Stop dreading, it is banned and thus unlikely to ever get reprinted
coincoi...@hotmail.com
>
> 2) Inflating the Ebay/secondary market prices for these cards, since
> any person wishing to construct a competitive deck will want to use
> them, regardless of them currently being in print or not. There is a
> lot of 5 Parity Shifts on Ebay atm sitting at over US$20, with under a
> day to go. Deflection is selling on Ebay atm for $1.50 each, and this
> card is a COMMON.
Some common cards from KoT are going on ebay for more than $1.5 each
(deep song, eyes of argus...)
So WW should make sets with only top commons, or something like this?
I think that, by reprinting mirror walk and on the qui vive, they have
already made a huge effort.
Blooded Sand
A large part of that is the artificial rarity these cards have, see
all previous discussions re this. This would of course not have
happened if the cards where not powerfull in their own right, but it
is also largely due to the fact that a common from this set that is
not a reprint is harder to get than any other common
coincoi...@hotmail.com
>
> > Some common cards from KoT are going on ebay for more than $1.5 each
> > (deep song, eyes of argus...)
> > So WW should make sets with only top commons, or something like this?
> > I think that, by reprinting mirror walk and on the qui vive, they have
> > already made a huge effort.
>
> A large part of that is the artificial rarity these cards have, see
> all previous discussions re this. This would of course not have
> happened if the cards where not powerfull in their own right, but it
> is also largely due to the fact that a common from this set that is
> not a reprint is harder to get than any other common
My only point is that 1.5$ for a common card is not a non-sense at any
rate.
Peter D Bakija
wrote:
> Sorry but I don't think your argument holds any water. In particular,
> White Wolf's reprints of Rares clearly demonstrates the holes in your
> logic.
To be fair, I think his argument holds more water than not; yeah, WW
liberally reprints sought after rares (see: War Ghoul, Bowl of
Convergence, whatever else you mentioned), but it *is* really bizzare
that common staples like Deflection, Govern, and Parity Shift (all of
which are arguably overpowered) have not been reprinted for a long
time, while less good "replacements" (Redirection and Spying Mission)
have been reprinted liberally. To someone who was looking for a
pattern of attempted play environment adjustment (i.e. trying to
remove overpowered cards) will certainly see it in the incredibly
obvious omissions of these particular cards (Deflection, Govern,
Parity Shift).
Is that defenitely something that they are doing? No, not at all. But
it is certainly possible. And even if it isn't, *not* reprinting these
cards does put newer players at a disadvantage--not having access to
Deflection, Govern, and Parity Shift (there are others, but these are
the best examples) is problematic. Meaning that they need to get them
from the secondary market. Which isn't that hard, but still, the point
stands.
> Mind Rape. Heart of Nizchetus. Heart of the City. Bowl of
> Convergence. Ossian. The Unmasking. Fixed War Ghoul. Fixed Succubus.
> Uncommon Freak Drive. Multiple Freak Drives in a starter. Common Form
> of Mist. Yeah, you're right. White is so *totally* trying to hose the
> newbies by making awesome cards unattainable.
Yeah, see, the difference is that none of those cards have less good
replacements like Deflection and Govern do that seem to be taking up
the slots that Deflection and Govern *should* be in.
-Peter
Tetragrammaton
I think there's no actual will, by WW, of not reprinting a given card by
being it deemed too powerful.
I think, however, that as the whole card set enlarge from year to
year, it becomes more and more difficult to track down all the needed
and consistent reprints for a given new set.
As much as KoT ended up with less new cards than what was announced for
months just out of internal communications error, then it's likely that
several missing reprints there were just out of errors, rather than
intentional non-reprints.
On the other side, i think that WW should end up relying more on volunteers
to keep up going with the developement of the game, since at this point it's
pretty obvious that, above all for core sets, she can't truly put the needed
resources for producing bigger card sets for the best (while on smaller set
the job has been done well enough so far, NoR apart).
just my 2 cents
Emiliano, NC Italy
www.italybynight.org
xcver
I really would've liked the new cards to be either used in the
starters as well or have a slight above average occurence in the
packs. Because it is easy to get your clutches on a say...spirits
touch if you don't draw one because they've been in lots of sets but
so much harder to obtain cards like deep song, villein etc. etc.
seba
yeah good point ... just realised i should check current bannings more
often ;) just glad i didn't mention MoM too ^^
greatings from germany
witness1
> On Jan 6, 1:47 am, "echiang...@yahoo.com" <echiang...@yahoo.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Sorry but I don't think your argument holds any water. In particular,
> > White Wolf's reprints of Rares clearly demonstrates the holes in your
> > logic.
>
> To be fair, I think his argument holds more water than not; yeah, WW
> liberally reprints sought after rares (see: War Ghoul, Bowl of
> Convergence, whatever else you mentioned), but it *is* really bizzare
> that common staples like Deflection, Govern, and Parity Shift (all of
> which are arguably overpowered) have not been reprinted for a long
> time, while less good "replacements" (Redirection and Spying Mission)
> have been reprinted liberally. To someone who was looking for a
> pattern of attempted play environment adjustment (i.e. trying to
> remove overpowered cards) will certainly see it in the incredibly
> obvious omissions of these particular cards (Deflection, Govern,
> Parity Shift).
>
> Is that defenitely something that they are doing? No, not at all. But
> it is certainly possible. And even if it isn't, *not* reprinting these
> cards does put newer players at a disadvantage--not having access to
> Deflection, Govern, and Parity Shift (there are others, but these are
> the best examples) is problematic. Meaning that they need to get them
> from the secondary market. Which isn't that hard, but still, the point
> stands.
I've noticed myself running low on Parity Shift and Deflection lately,
but I sure have a _lot_ of Govern the Unaligned with upside-down card
backs.
-witness1
lon...@dlc.fi
> but it *is* really bizzare
> that common staples like Deflection, Govern, and Parity Shift
Um, Parity Shift is an uncommon.
I also think that one popular staple card that hasn't been for quite
some time now is .44 Magnum.
Cheers,
Janne Lönkka
www.ahmametal.com
www.myspace.com/iwearnohelmet
Peter D Bakija
> On Jan 6, 3:53 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote:
>
> > but it *is* really bizzare
> > that common staples like Deflection, Govern, and Parity Shift
>
> Um, Parity Shift is an uncommon.
Um, yeah, I know. But it is a common staple. Not a Common card. In any
case, the point is the same.
-Peter
djfen...@gmail.com
> but it *is* really bizzare
> that common staples like Deflection, Govern
I don't think it’s that bizarre. This is an interesting subject to
me. A few people in my playgroup have always bemoaned Dominate as
'broken'. Dominate's dominance is typified by Govern the Unaligned
and Deflection. As noted above, there are worse versions of these two
cards that have been printed after they were, Scouting Mission and
Redirection.
Where did Redirection and Scouting Mission come from? While we are at
it, let's throw Forced Awakening in here as it is a nerfed version of
Wake with Evening's Freshness from the perspective of comboing with
Deflection. They were all first printed in the Sabbat set. I
theorize that because of certain characteristics of the Sabbat set,
these three cards were meant to supplant their better versions. What
characteristics are these? Well, Sabbat was meant as a base set.
This may not mean much to us now as V:TES releases a base set every
two years and the most significant change they bring is to introduce
new vampires for higher numbered groups. But consider where and when
the Sabbat set was designed. It was created by people at Wizards of
the Coast (WotC) in the mid 1990's, a company where the Magic: the
Gathering (M:tG) mindset of how set rotation works may well have
permeated into its other properties. The Sabbat set very well may
have been meant as a game reset in a way. Much like the Magic
'blocks', certain sets of cards would only be allowed in
tournaments.
So think of the V:TES base set and the two that followed as one
'block' and Sabbat and what was to theoretically follow as another
(yes I realize the game died for a time after Sabbat). In the old
block, it was pretty obvious how good Govern, Deflection and Wake
were. So, they created new versions of these stock cards with nerfed
effects for the next block. As the game died for a time after Sabbat,
formal rules making the library cards from the Sabbat set the new
standards for tournament play never surfaced.
Set rotation as a concept is current represented in V:TES by crypt
group restrictions, with few restrictions on library cards. Cards
like Protect Thine Own and Edge Explosion have been banned, but Govern
and Deflection have never been deemed game-breaking enough to warrant
their expulsion from the tournament scene. By not reprinting them,
the current design team is doing a sort of 'lazy banning' of these
cards. It does disadvantage new players, but better that than
disadvantaging every player, new and old, that wants to do well at a
tournament without having to play Dominate. ;)
witness1
BASELESS SPECULATION: it's entirely possible that these cards are
currently "on parole" so to speak, under consideration for ban or
alteration, and the powers that be don't want players (especially new
players) to end up with a bunch of cards that got seriously devalued
right after they were reprinted.
-witness1
John Flournoy
> 1) Disadvantaging new players, who don't have access to older printed
> editions, and are thus forced to play with inferior replacements
> (Scouting mission, Redirection, etc) unless they turn to Ebay.
Got more examples of "Etc"? I've noticed that people on this issue
tend to start their list as you did with Govern and Deflection (and
Parity Shift), and then claim that this is a pervasive problem of
'they must use inferior cards' without providing more than the first 2
examples.
Also, worth noting that Scouting Mission isn't automatically, always
inferior to Govern, else noone would ever play it (and people who
clearly have access to both sometimes do; there's multiple TWDA decks
with SM but not Govern because for those decks, Govern was the
inferior choice.)
Similarly, there have been winning decks from longtime players that
have chosen to use Redirection and not Deflection, because in those
cases Deflection was the inferior choice.
There's a difference between 'you must use inferior cards' and 'you
must use alternative cards, and find ways to build decks that utilize
them effectively instead of the same old decks everyone else always
plays'.
> 2) Inflating the Ebay/secondary market prices for these cards, since
> any person wishing to construct a competitive deck will want to use
> them, regardless of them currently being in print or not. There is a
> lot of 5 Parity Shifts on Ebay atm sitting at over US$20, with under a
> day to go. Deflection is selling on Ebay atm for $1.50 each, and this
> card is a COMMON.
>
> This issue was brought to my attention recently when some new players
> to our group were asking for deck advice, and I realised that the
> (common!) cards I was recommending they use were going to be pretty
> difficult to get a hold of.
Lots of cards haven't been reprinted lately, where variations on those
cards have been printed instead - not just the two obvious staple
Dominate cards.
If every set always had Deflection and never had an alternative card,
that would reduce the interest level in acquiring those new sets. Note
that the commons that tend to sell for a high price are the ones that
are either brand new or out of print.
Here's a counter-example. How much have you ever seen Enhanced Senses
sell for? That's a powerful, staple card that has been reprinted in
lots of sets - but not in the last four - and yet nobody is spending a
dollar a piece on them. Because despite the fact that they go into
many, many, many decks, nobody who has been playing the game for any
appreciable length of time needs more copies of it. No old player gets
enthused opening a new set and saying 'oh boy, they reprinted Aid from
Bats - AGAIN!'
At whatever point Deflection gets reprinted, the presence of that card
will spur demand for that set to some degree, same as reprints of
other useful, out-of-print cards that are in demand do.
And maintaining an overall level of demand for each ongoing release is
how the game stays in production.
> jase
-John Flournoy
Peter D Bakija
> group restrictions,
But see, it isn't "set rotation" in the sense that some things are
excluded by virtue of what is printed. Yeah, you could try to limit
the number of people who use Deflection, but unless Deflection is
actually removed from the play environment, this doesn't accomplish
anything other making new players pay too much money on the secondary
market for old cards that are good and not reprinted.
>but Govern
> and Deflection have never been deemed game-breaking enough to warrant
> their expulsion from the tournament scene. By not reprinting them,
> the current design team is doing a sort of 'lazy banning' of these
> cards.
Which is what people are reacting to. 'Cause as a "lazy ban", it
doesn't actually work. As these cards are easy enough to get (i.e. if
someone new starts playing in my group, and they need a handful of
Governs, I'll give them some. But not everyone has old players around
to hand them cards), not reprinting them doesn't actually work as a
way to limit their use. These cards should either be specifically
removed from the environment or reprinted regularly. The middle ground
doesn't work.
> It does disadvantage new players, but better that than
> disadvantaging every player, new and old, that wants to do well at a
> tournament without having to play Dominate. ;)
It isn't better that. As everyone new and old who wants to do well at
a tournament does have to use Dominate (not actually, but for purposes
of continuing the example). Making it hard to get Deflections for
newer players doesn't make fewer people use Deflection.
-Peter
jwjbw...@gmail.com
> Which is what people are reacting to. 'Cause as a "lazy ban", it
> doesn't actually work. As these cards are easy enough to get (i.e. if
> someone new starts playing in my group, and they need a handful of
> Governs, I'll give them some. But not everyone has old players around
> to hand them cards), not reprinting them doesn't actually work as a
> way to limit their use. These cards should either be specifically
> removed from the environment or reprinted regularly. The middle ground
> doesn't work.
Possibly, a "fix" of such overpowered cards is being tentatively
considered. Perhaps other options are also being considered, such as
new cards that hose bleed bounce. In the meantime, before a decision
is made, the design team is perhaps reluctant to reprint with the old
text.
Redgab...@aim.com
is it really necessary to be such an unmitigated jerk at every
opportunity? Your quaint reply would have been fine with out the last
jab but by doing so you made it very easy for any one reading to
dismiss any point you may have had valid or not. ::rolls eyes::
Back to the topic at hand i think that the lack of access to old crypt
groupings for new players is a greater deficit to over come than a
lack of govern shift ect. imo group 2 is far above any other in terms
of power and altho im not going to filter threw the archive to gain
evidence for an argument that can easily be dismissed with well its
been out longer hence more wins i suspect that recent history gives my
argument credibility. In either event if for nothing but the sake of
variety i hope that WW continues reprinting older cards in the form of
the very stylish 10th tins. Even old players would shell out for cool
deck tins and new bordered versions of vampires.
Peter D Bakija
> Possibly, a "fix" of such overpowered cards is being tentatively
> considered. Perhaps other options are also being considered, such as
> new cards that hose bleed bounce. In the meantime, before a decision
> is made, the design team is perhaps reluctant to reprint with the old
> text.
Sure. This is possible. But if there are any changes to text planned
(although in the instances of, say, Govern and Deflection, there
really isn't any change of text that would both fix them and make them
sensible), KoT was the time to change the text and reprint them,
otherwise, we are probably waiting till next year for such a change.
There are lots of possible reasons why the DT would choose to not
reprint these cards.
-Peter
Peter D Bakija
<4ba09b37-bec9-4c26...@p2g2000prf.googlegroups.com>,
John Flournoy <carn...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Got more examples of "Etc"? I've noticed that people on this issue
> tend to start their list as you did with Govern and Deflection (and
> Parity Shift), and then claim that this is a pervasive problem of
> 'they must use inferior cards' without providing more than the first 2
> examples.
Well, I don't think it is actually that pervasive of a problem--like,
I'm not here defending the idea that this is a vast conspiracy. But the
three obvious examples (Govern, Deflection, Parity Shift) are the
obvious examples as:
A) These cards are very, very powerful.
and
B) They are cards that all logic would dictate would have been reprinted
in the most recent base set.
Again, I'm not going to say that, for example, the lack of a recent
reprint of Sub-Machine Gun is *also* evidence that something is amiss
(as it isn't), those three particular cards are a really glaring
example. There might be a couple others if I think real hard. But those
three cards are *certainly* a glaring omission.
> Also, worth noting that Scouting Mission isn't automatically, always
> inferior to Govern, else noone would ever play it (and people who
> clearly have access to both sometimes do; there's multiple TWDA decks
> with SM but not Govern because for those decks, Govern was the
> inferior choice.)
Sure. This is completely true. Scouting Mission and Redirection are not
just worse in an absolute sense than Govern and Deflection (their
cost/effect relationship is completely reasonable). And there are
certainly situations where you would want to use Scouting or Redirection
in place of the other two. But in a general sense, Govern and Deflection
are more desirable, and while it is good that *both* versions exist for
the purposes of deck design, it is bad that the versions that are
generally viewed as the more powerful ones are harder to get for newer
players.
> There's a difference between 'you must use inferior cards' and 'you
> must use alternative cards, and find ways to build decks that utilize
> them effectively instead of the same old decks everyone else always
> plays'.
Sure, but just making Govern and Deflection and Parity Shift a pain in
the ass for newer players to get isn't really a good way to go about
this. As older players are going to be using the same old decks that
everyone else always plays. And newer players are going to say "Huh.
It's kind of stupid that I have to use Redirection instead of
Deflection, just 'cause I got into the game late..."
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
The Kaiser
players are attempting to make "Patterns in the Chaos," so to speak.
I often think that the set design is more random than not. There are
clearly poor decisions that are repeatedly made regarding how the
larger sets are designed. When Legacies of Blood came out, it was
very difficult to get the new Bloodline discipline cards. True, it
was nice to be able to open the old ones again, but after you opened
your fifteenth Rock Cat that you desperately wished you could trade
for a single Raking Talons (or insert whatever similar example you
would prefer) it got very old. Third Edition wasn't much different.
The set wasn't released so long ago that we have forgotten how hard
Mirror Walk was to get. And now KoT has the same issues. Reprinting
certain cards in order to "rebalance" the secondary market is a fine
idea - there's no reason to be paying upwards of 20USD for an
Unmasking. However, there really should be more care taken when
reprinting. Again, I fear that the current policy may be closely akin
to throwing darts at a wall. If Deflection and/or Govern are too
powerful to reprint, why is Conditioning fine? I would argue that
it's a bigger issue than Govern at the very least. And if
Conditioning is fine, why is Aire of Elation not fine? And why do we
need more copies of Brick Laying to wallpaper bathrooms with? Is that
cloud in the sky a bunny rabbit or a toaster oven??
TTFn
jwjbw...@gmail.com
> On Jan 6, 2:46 pm, jwjbwhe...@gmail.com wrote:
>
> > Possibly, a "fix" of such overpowered cards is being tentatively
> > considered. Perhaps other options are also being considered, such as
> > new cards that hose bleed bounce. In the meantime, before a decision
> > is made, the design team is perhaps reluctant to reprint with the old
> > text.
>
> Sure. This is possible. But if there are any changes to text planned
> (although in the instances of, say, Govern and Deflection, there
> really isn't any change of text that would both fix them and make them
Govern -- costs an additional blood at inferior
Deflection -- costs an additional blood at superior
John P.
> No old player gets
> enthused opening a new set and saying 'oh boy, they reprinted Aid from
> Bats - AGAIN!'
<<snip>>
Well I'm the exception that proves the rules then John, I always
appreciate seeing aid from bats.... no I'm serious. Its a staple card
in the deck we give to newbies. Always seem to run out. :)
John P.
Winnipeg
Peter D Bakija
> Well in an effort to totally derail a good topic. I have to ask Eric
> is it really necessary to be such an unmitigated jerk at every
> opportunity?
Why are you asking this as a response to John Flournoy? And without
any quoted text to make this statement make more sense?
> Back to the topic at hand i think that the lack of access to old crypt
> groupings for new players is a greater deficit to over come than a
> lack of govern shift ect.
Meh. You don't really need the older vampires to be competitive. Many
of the G1 vampires are wildly underpowered. And while a good chunk of
the G2 Sabbat vampires are kind of admitedly stupidly good, there
aren't so many that it is going to make that much of a difference to
actual game play (i.e. for every Sheila Mezzarin, there is a Dodd...)
> imo group 2 is far above any other in terms
> of power and altho im not going to filter threw the archive to gain
> evidence for an argument that can easily be dismissed with well its
> been out longer hence more wins i suspect that recent history gives my
> argument credibility.
I don't think it necessarily does. Yes. Arika (G2) is wildly
overpowered. And the Sabbat set vampires seem to have been designed by
throwing darts (again, see Sheila Mezzarin vs Dodd) where some G2
Sabbat are really good for their cost and some are really bad for
their cost. But across the board, I don't actually think that G2
vampires are particularly necessary to be competitive. Even remotely.
John Flournoy
Cool for you guys - we tend to just build a new deck out of our boxes
of giveaways whenever we run out of existing ones for newer players to
try, rather than stick with one type.
> John P.
> Winnipeg
-John Flournoy
Peter D Bakija
<14a4ff3a-5822-4aec...@m22g2000vbl.googlegroups.com>,
"John P." <jtpa...@mts.net> wrote:
> Well I'm the exception that proves the rules then John, I always
> appreciate seeing aid from bats.... no I'm serious.
Heh--I was totally psyched to see a new run of Aid from Bats with a cool
new picture. That woman is *totally* releasing the bats!
jason...@iinet.net.au
> Got more examples of "Etc"? I've noticed that people on this issue
> tend to start their list as you did with Govern and Deflection (and
> Parity Shift), and then claim that this is a pervasive problem of
> 'they must use inferior cards' without providing more than the first 2
> examples.
Well .44 Magnum is another that springs to mind immediately. This is
another "top of the curve" card that hasn't been reprinted in a long
while. But at no point have I claimed that this is a "pervasive"
problem. It does however strike me as questionable behaviour, and I
find it hard to justify to my newer players. One of the big selling
points of VTES for people coming from other games is the lack of set
rotation and the reasonable (comparitively) prices in the secondary
market. And yet, in the same discussion I have to tell these guys that
they're going to be paying $1.50 each for a common that they virtually
must have if they want to run a Dominate deck. Why? For no better
reason than WW haven't bothered to reprint it in 5+ years.
> Also, worth noting that Scouting Mission isn't automatically, always
> inferior to Govern, else noone would ever play it (and people who
> clearly have access to both sometimes do; there's multiple TWDA decks
> with SM but not Govern because for those decks, Govern was the
> inferior choice.)
>
> Similarly, there have been winning decks from longtime players that
> have chosen to use Redirection and not Deflection, because in those
> cases Deflection was the inferior choice.
No, dude. Just don't go there. Redirection is IN EVERY WAY inferior to
Deflection. It's age capped, and worse, it only works on vampires, not
minions, in an environment that is becoming far more ally-centric. On
two separate occasions in the Oz nats last year, I saw decks ousted by
my Imbued deck because the poor fools chose/were forced (I'm not sure
which) to run Redirections instead of Deflections as their bleed
defense.
There may be "multiple decks in the TWDA" that use Scouting mission to
the exclusion of Govern. But if there's a mathlete with the time, I'd
really be interested in learning the ratio of Govern to Scouting in
the TWDA. I suspect, as I'm sure you do, that Govern outnumbers
Scouting by a vast, vast majority. Why? Because it's better. Simple as
that.
These cards are alternatives, yes. But they are INFERIOR alternatives.
> Here's a counter-example. How much have you ever seen Enhanced
Senses
> sell for? That's a powerful, staple card that has been reprinted in
> lots of sets - but not in the last four - and yet nobody is spending a
> dollar a piece on them. Because despite the fact that they go into
> many, many, many decks, nobody who has been playing the game for any
> appreciable length of time needs more copies of it. No old player gets
> enthused opening a new set and saying 'oh boy, they reprinted Aid from
> Bats - AGAIN!'
I don't really consider that a valid example. There are far, far more
ways to generate cost effective +2 intecept effects (many of them are
not resticted by clan or discipline) than there are to generate
targettable bleed redirection effects that effect minions (as opposed
to vampires) and is unrestricted by age - in fact I can't think of
any, but my knowledge isn't encyclopedic). Deflection is quite unique
in it's effect (and thus, is quite powerful, arguably too powerful).
I have played Auspex decks in the past that didn't pack ES, and I
wouldn't consider it an absolutley vital component - it can be
replaced/usurped by other effects. I do consider Deflection pretty
much essential. If you play with an "alternative" bleed redirection
card, you are doing yourself is disservice imo. I realise this is only
my opinion, but if you disagree, you can be my prey anytime :)
> At whatever point Deflection gets reprinted, the presence of that card
> will spur demand for that set to some degree, same as reprints of
> other useful, out-of-print cards that are in demand do.
So you're saying it's acceptable not to print staple cards for 5+
years in order to generate interest in the set when they finally
decide to reprint them? And that it's acceptable to print (and
reprint, and reprint again) inferior replacements in the meantime to
fill in the space where those superior cards should be? I find that a
strange point of view. And it does little to explain why Parity Shift
was not reprinted in the first Camarilla focussed set in 6 years.
> And maintaining an overall level of demand for each ongoing release is
> how the game stays in production.
Yep. But being forced to play with a deck full of second string,
inferior cards because the producers refuse to reprint the good
versions is one way the game loses players.
There is a happy medium here. Atm, WW is sitting on the fence in
regards to these cards. They lack the will to outright ban them, but
refuse to reprint them, and the people who are being disadvataged are
not guys like you and I who have been playing since the 90s, but
newers players who need all the encouragement they can get.
That is a real disservice to the game imo.
jase
acheronni...@gmail.com
[especially .44],Deflection. [heh, eurobrujah would cringe :)]
It would make sects about right. Then print some cool camarilla card
with good power-level, and all people are happy :)
Govern was reprinted lately and i dont see it banned, really. Even
considering it's very powerful.
jwjbw...@gmail.com
> Govern was reprinted lately and i dont see it banned, really. Even
> considering it's very powerful.
Govern should cost 2 blood at inferior, to bring it in line with the
rest of the dominate +2 bleed cards.
The scheme should be that Presence has the best bleed actions, and
Dominate the best bleed modifiers, so that one should need both
disciplines to have the largest, most efficient bleeds.
Govern gave dominate too much. Later, the design team compensated
with another big mistake -- Aire of Elation -- providing a presence
bleed modifer almost as good as the Dominate bleed modifiers (just as
good, if you're Toreador).
Aire of Elation is a serious violation of design principles. I would
be happy to see it banned.
Peter D Bakija
<f2409ccc-59c7-4b20...@z27g2000prd.googlegroups.com>,
jwjbw...@gmail.com wrote:
> Govern should cost 2 blood at inferior, to bring it in line with the
> rest of the dominate +2 bleed cards.
Which would make it bad, like the rest of the dominate +2 bleed cards.
Which really, would probably be fine. But if you are going to do that,
why not just outright ban it?
> The scheme should be that Presence has the best bleed actions, and
> Dominate the best bleed modifiers, so that one should need both
> disciplines to have the largest, most efficient bleeds.
That seems reasonable.
> Aire of Elation is a serious violation of design principles. I would
> be happy to see it banned.
You really see Aire of Elation that much, and it is something that
strikes you as particularly brutal? I mean, yeah, it's pretty good. But
if you *aren't* the Toreador, it is less good than Threats (and Threats,
while perfectly balanced, is far from a game breaker), and if you *are*
the Toreador, you have limited delivery mechanisms. Yeah, there is more
celerity stealth than there used to be, but it is all pretty
inefficient; there are more Toreador with Obf than there used to be, but
in, say, G3/4, there are 4 of them at 6+, which is not super efficient
(I don't have easily accessible numbers on G4/5, but I don't think they
are any better off). Like, I see where you object to Aire in a design
sense, but in an actual sense, it seems like a very limited issue.
ben...@gmail.com
- Ben Peal
jason...@iinet.net.au
And Sensory Deprivation.
And Form of Corruption.
One of the single best and most sought after cards from bloodlines,
and they don't reprint it. Yet they reprint trash like "The grandest
trick"?
A staple ( and arguably the most powerful) Chimerstry card, used as a
primary defensive mechanism for most Ravnos decks I've ever seen, and
they don't reprint it in the first indi focused expansion since Final
Nights?
And sure, Form isn't *uber* but it's one of those cards I'd consider
defining for the Serpentis discipline.
It really, truly boggles my mind.
jwjbw...@gmail.com
> In article
> <f2409ccc-59c7-4b20...@z27g2000prd.googlegroups.com>,
> jwjbw...@gmail.com wrote:
> > Govern should cost 2 blood at inferior, to bring it in line with the
> > rest of the dominate +2 bleed cards.
>
> Which would make it bad, like the rest of the dominate +2 bleed cards.
> Which really, would probably be fine. But if you are going to do that,
> why not just outright ban it?
I don't want to ban it at all, nor do I think it will have that
effect. The only thing wrong with the rest of the dominate +2 bleed
cards, is that Govern is clearly better. Otherwise, they'd be
somewhat playable. And Govern will always be playable by vampires
with DOM as a more more flexible version of Fourth Tradition.
> > The scheme should be that Presence has the best bleed actions, and
> > Dominate the best bleed modifiers, so that one should need both
> > disciplines to have the largest, most efficient bleeds.
>
> That seems reasonable.
>
> > Aire of Elation is a serious violation of design principles. I would
> > be happy to see it banned.
>
> You really see Aire of Elation that much, and it is something that
> strikes you as particularly brutal? I mean, yeah, it's pretty good. But
> if you *aren't* the Toreador, it is less good than Threats (and Threats,
> while perfectly balanced, is far from a game breaker), [...]
I just think it sucks as a matter of principle. Yeah, its hard on the
Toreador that they don't have dominate. But if they are DO happen
have dominate as an out of clan discipline, even at inferior, it ought
to make a difference. But no Toreador, with AUS PRE CEL dom, or even
AUS PRE CEL DOM, is going to bother with Conditioning when they have
Aire of Elation. It makes out-of-clan disciplines pointless,
gravitates towards letting a few disciplines do everything, which then
screws older vampires who have paid for slots in disciplines which, it
turns out, they don't really need.
Even a Brujah elder, with CEL PRE POT dom, will not use Conditioning,
because Aire of Elation is just as good.
> [...] and if you *are*
> the Toreador, you have limited delivery mechanisms. Yeah, there is more
> celerity stealth than there used to be, but it is all pretty
> inefficient; [...]
I don't deny that the Toreador might have needed some help. I just
don't think this was the way to do it.
brandons...@yahoo.com
It wasn't until the KoT draft when I tried to play Brick Laying that I
realized how bad the card is. Aire of Elation would be like gold to me
if it was in a starter, but no dice. Same deal with Deflection. It has
taken me about a year to get a dozen Deflections, which is barely
enough to make two dominate-bounce decks with. Sure, there are other
dominate-bounce cards, but why should I have to choose them based on
the fact that WW hasn't bothered to print Deflection since 2003? What
year is it now? 2009? For a card that is such a staple, this is a
crime against the new player. Please print this as a common in the
next mini-expansion!
Brandon
John Flournoy
> > Got more examples of "Etc"? I've noticed that people on this issue
> > tend to start their list as you did with Govern and Deflection (and
> > Parity Shift), and then claim that this is a pervasive problem of
> > 'they must use inferior cards' without providing more than the first 2
> > examples.
>
> Well .44 Magnum is another that springs to mind immediately. This is
> another "top of the curve" card that hasn't been reprinted in a long
> while. But at no point have I claimed that this is a "pervasive"
> problem. It does however strike me as questionable behaviour, and I
> find it hard to justify to my newer players. One of the big selling
> points of VTES for people coming from other games is the lack of set
> rotation and the reasonable (comparitively) prices in the secondary
> market. And yet, in the same discussion I have to tell these guys that
> they're going to be paying $1.50 each for a common that they virtually
> must have if they want to run a Dominate deck. Why? For no better
> reason than WW haven't bothered to reprint it in 5+ years.
.44 Magnum is an excellent additional example, yep. I wasn't meaning
to say that -you- were claiming it was a pervasive problem; that was
more of a generalization about other recent discussions.
Also note: I totally agree that Deflection is long overdue being
reprinted. My basic point is that it doesn't inherently need to be in
EVERY set, and that printing alternatives some of the time is a
positive thing. Though not necessarily to the degree that Deflection
specifically encompasses currently.
> > Similarly, there have been winning decks from longtime players that
> > have chosen to use Redirection and not Deflection, because in those
> > cases Deflection was the inferior choice.
>
> No, dude. Just don't go there. Redirection is IN EVERY WAY inferior to
> Deflection. It's age capped, and worse, it only works on vampires, not
> minions, in an environment that is becoming far more ally-centric. On
> two separate occasions in the Oz nats last year, I saw decks ousted by
> my Imbued deck because the poor fools chose/were forced (I'm not sure
> which) to run Redirections instead of Deflections as their bleed
> defense.
Redirection is NOT in "EVERY WAY" worse than Deflection. A crypt full
of large DOM vampires is often better off using Redirection because
the age limit doesn't matter when you're using 10 and 11 caps, and how
often do you -actually- see heavy ally-based-bleed decks? Most play
environments see zero, unless you run into an occasional Imbued deck
(and a lot of play environments and/or tournaments have no Imbued
decks whatsoever, or ally-based decks of any kind.)
It is, however, frequently worse than Deflection. Nobody is arguing
that. However, there are certain decks which do much better with
Redirections - saying 'Redirection fails against decks of type X' may
be accurate, but does not account for '...but is better against every
deck that is NOT deck type X for this deck being played',
If you want to argue with 'an Imbued deck totally hoses decks that use
Redirections because it doesn't work on them' style arguments, a
counter example would be 'Blood Denial decks totally hose Deflections,
because the poor fools chose to use a card that costs blood that their
vampires don't have.' And so on.
> There may be "multiple decks in the TWDA" that use Scouting mission to
> the exclusion of Govern. But if there's a mathlete with the time, I'd
> really be interested in learning the ratio of Govern to Scouting in
> the TWDA. I suspect, as I'm sure you do, that Govern outnumbers
> Scouting by a vast, vast majority. Why? Because it's better. Simple as
> that.
Yes. Govern is better overall in the collective of every deck possible
to build than Scouting Mission.
Which is irrelevant to my point, which is that there exist a subset of
decks for which Scouting Mission is a better choice, and therefore
Scouting Mission is not _automatically_ an inferior card in every
circumstance.
> These cards are alternatives, yes. But they are INFERIOR alternatives.
Most of the time, I agree. But it isn't an inferior alternative _all_
of the time, only if you choose to always play decks that clearly are
better with Govern.
People would obviously generally rather own Governs, because they work
better in more decks. Regardless of that, you can still build decks
where owning only the alternatives is fine, because the deck you built
is better served by the other cards.
>.Deflection is quite unique
> in it's effect (and thus, is quite powerful, arguably too powerful).
Sure. I'm not remotely saying that Deflection isn't powerful. And I
probably could have picked a better example than Enhanced Senses, but
whatever.
> So you're saying it's acceptable not to print staple cards for 5+
> years in order to generate interest in the set when they finally
> decide to reprint them? And that it's acceptable to print (and
> reprint, and reprint again) inferior replacements in the meantime to
> fill in the space where those superior cards should be? I find that a
> strange point of view. And it does little to explain why Parity Shift
> was not reprinted in the first Camarilla focussed set in 6 years.
I'm not saying it's acceptable in the case of Deflection; I'm saying
that in general not reprinting every staple card every time is going
to happen, and should.
Clearly most people think Deflection is long overdue a reprint, and
likely Parity Shift as well.
If and when it does get reprinted, that'll reduce the need to see it
in the sets immediately following that one, though (so long as it
doesn't stretch into overly long time spans between printings such as
exists now.)
> > And maintaining an overall level of demand for each ongoing release is
> > how the game stays in production.
>
> Yep. But being forced to play with a deck full of second string,
> inferior cards because the producers refuse to reprint the good
> versions is one way the game loses players.
Pointing out that your group has had new players upset over this issue
is a good way to bring it to WW's attention, certainly.
-John Flournoy
brandons...@yahoo.com
OMFG don't get me started. This card hasn't been printed since 2001,
yet they did print Nightmare Curse (without reasonable crypt support)
and Fantasy World! Is there a worse card (that hasn't been banned) to
see flying around when you are playing some fatty deck? I could see
banning the card or adding errata, but the low availability of SD is
highly annoying.
Brandon
Tetragrammaton
> In article
> <f2409ccc-59c7-4b20...@z27g2000prd.googlegroups.com>,
> jwjbw...@gmail.com wrote:
>> Govern should cost 2 blood at inferior, to bring it in line with the
>> rest of the dominate +2 bleed cards.
>
> Which would make it bad, like the rest of the dominate +2 bleed cards.
> Which really, would probably be fine. But if you are going to do that,
> why not just outright ban it?
Considering to change a card that has been in the game as it is
for 15 year seems utter nonsense to me, at this point.
Evey ccg game *do* need its powerful and unique cards (as long as they're
not broken, that is not the case with GtU) to stir the play and the
strategies.
Trying to flat everything to balance every single card is not the right way,
imho .
my 2 cents
Jakob Sievers
> There may be "multiple decks in the TWDA" that use Scouting mission to
> the exclusion of Govern. But if there's a mathlete with the time, I'd
> really be interested in learning the ratio of Govern to Scouting in
> the TWDA. I suspect, as I'm sure you do, that Govern outnumbers
> Scouting by a vast, vast majority. Why? Because it's better. Simple as
> that.
The TWDA contains approximately:
295 decks with Govern the Unaligned
67 decks with Scouting Mission
(lynx -dump "http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm" | grep -i '...' | wc -l)
1878 copies of Govern the Unaligned
263 copies of Scouting Mission
(lynx -dump "http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm" |
grep -i '...' |
sed -e s/[^0-9]//g | awk '{count+=$1} END{print count}')
cheers,
-jakob
James Coupe
>Peter D Bakija wrote:
>> You really see Aire of Elation that much, and it is something that
>> strikes you as particularly brutal? I mean, yeah, it's pretty good. But
>> if you *aren't* the Toreador, it is less good than Threats (and Threats,
>> while perfectly balanced, is far from a game breaker), [...]
>
>I just think it sucks as a matter of principle. Yeah, its hard on the
>Toreador that they don't have dominate. But if they are DO happen
>have dominate as an out of clan discipline, even at inferior, it ought
>to make a difference. But no Toreador, with AUS PRE CEL dom, or even
>AUS PRE CEL DOM, is going to bother with Conditioning when they have
>Aire of Elation. It makes out-of-clan disciplines pointless,
>gravitates towards letting a few disciplines do everything, which then
>screws older vampires who have paid for slots in disciplines which, it
>turns out, they don't really need.
It makes it "pointless" for precisely one card. Dominate has a variety
of other cards that the Toreador are quite happy using. Indeed, one
very strong deck-type in years gone by has involved Group 1/2 Toreador
with Dominate - principally, Anson, Anneke, Alexandra - and Obedience.
And yes, I'm sure some such decks think about using Aire of Elation too,
but the Dominate is being used.
You also see some decks along these lines using Deflection (because it's
better for bounce than Telepathic Misdirection).
http://www.thelasombra.com/decks/twd.htm#2k6germanqualifier is a pretty
good example of the Toreador's Dominate not being overlooked.
Will it be overlooked in some decks? Sure, pretty much all disciplines
on all vampires are overlooked in some decks. If you can use a cheaper
vampire, use one if that'll be better for you. That's no different to a
Ventrue bleed deck "wasting" its in-clan Presence, because it's using
Dominate for one reason or another.
--
James Coupe
PGP Key: 0x5D623D5D YOU ARE IN ERROR.
EBD690ECD7A1FB457CA2 NO-ONE IS SCREAMING.
13D7E668C3695D623D5D THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION.
jwjbw...@gmail.com
James Coupe wrote:
> jwjbw...@gmail.com wrote:
> >Peter D Bakija wrote:
> >> You really see Aire of Elation that much, and it is something that
> >> strikes you as particularly brutal? I mean, yeah, it's pretty good. But
> >> if you *aren't* the Toreador, it is less good than Threats (and Threats,
> >> while perfectly balanced, is far from a game breaker), [...]
> >
> >I just think it sucks as a matter of principle. Yeah, its hard on the
> >Toreador that they don't have dominate. But if they are DO happen
> >have dominate as an out of clan discipline, even at inferior, it ought
> >to make a difference. But no Toreador, with AUS PRE CEL dom, or even
> >AUS PRE CEL DOM, is going to bother with Conditioning when they have
> >Aire of Elation. It makes out-of-clan disciplines pointless,
> >gravitates towards letting a few disciplines do everything, which then
> >screws older vampires who have paid for slots in disciplines which, it
> >turns out, they don't really need.
>
> It makes it "pointless" for precisely one card.
I was trying to express a general principle. You are about to object
that there still might be a point to "dom" on an AUS PRE vamp, such as
playing obedience. I suggest you interpret "it makes out-of-clan
disciplines pointless" as a relative, rather than an absolute
statement. Certainly, after Aire of Elation was printed, there was
much less point to "dom" on a AUS PRE vampire, than there was before.
When one of your pockets gets picked, you don't say "It's okay, I
still got a few bucks in the other pocket" and sit around waiting for
that to get picked as well.
It goes deeper than "one card". Bleed modifiers are the dominate
forte. Dominate has a number of other cards, like conditioning, that
are balanced with conditioning. For a vampire that already has
superior presence, there is no particular point to any of them, unless
one has superior dominate.
> Dominate has a variety
> of other cards that the Toreador are quite happy using.
In addition to obedience, I imagine they might also benefit from
seduction and the sleeping mind ... until and unless some future
design team comes along and gives Presence, Auspex or Celerity some
substantially equivalent powers.
> Indeed, one
> very strong deck-type in years gone by has involved Group 1/2 Toreador
> with Dominate - principally, Anson, Anneke, Alexandra - and Obedience.
> And yes, I'm sure some such decks think about using Aire of Elation too,
> but the Dominate is being used.
There are excellent reasons why Anson, Anneke and Alexandra see play
that have little to do with their access to inferior dominate. Since
these were already great vampires to begin with, yes, someone managed
to find a way to put their inferior dom to use. Note that the hugely
playable Anson has aus rather than AUS, meaning he would prefer
deflection for bounce, whereas my hypothetical focussed on Toreador
with in-clan disciplines at superior.
preac...@gmx.at
> jwjbwhe...@gmail.com wrote:
> >Peter D Bakija wrote:
> >> You really see Aire of Elation that much, and it is something that
> >> strikes you as particularly brutal? I mean, yeah, it's pretty good. But
> >> if you *aren't* the Toreador, it is less good than Threats (and Threats,
> >> while perfectly balanced, is far from a game breaker), [...]
>
> >I just think it sucks as a matter of principle. Yeah, its hard on the
> >Toreador that they don't have dominate. But if they are DO happen
> >have dominate as an out of clan discipline, even at inferior, it ought
> >to make a difference. But no Toreador, with AUS PRE CEL dom, or even
> >AUS PRE CEL DOM, is going to bother with Conditioning when they have
> >Aire of Elation. It makes out-of-clan disciplines pointless,
> >gravitates towards letting a few disciplines do everything, which then
> >screws older vampires who have paid for slots in disciplines which, it
> >turns out, they don't really need.
>
> It makes it "pointless" for precisely one card. Dominate has a variety
> of other cards that the Toreador are quite happy using. Indeed, one
> very strong deck-type in years gone by has involved Group 1/2 Toreador
> with Dominate - principally, Anson, Anneke, Alexandra - and Obedience.
> And yes, I'm sure some such decks think about using Aire of Elation too,
> but the Dominate is being used.
>
> You also see some decks along these lines using Deflection (because it's
> better for bounce than Telepathic Misdirection).
>
> good example of the Toreador's Dominate not being overlooked.
>
> Will it be overlooked in some decks? Sure, pretty much all disciplines
> on all vampires are overlooked in some decks. If you can use a cheaper
> vampire, use one if that'll be better for you. That's no different to a
> Ventrue bleed deck "wasting" its in-clan Presence, because it's using
> Dominate for one reason or another.
>
> --
> James Coupe
> PGP Key: 0x5D623D5D YOU ARE IN ERROR.
> EBD690ECD7A1FB457CA2 NO-ONE IS SCREAMING.
>
> - Zitierten Text anzeigen -
By the way, was Obedience reprinted in KoT? I don't remember if I
pulled some out of my boosters. If it wasn't reprinted in KoT, when
was the last time it was? And it has to be added to the list of
Govern, Deflection, Parity Shif as being sorely missed. :)
Glad I could stay on topic. ;)
xcver
> > good example of the Toreador's Dominate not being overlooked.
>
> > Will it be overlooked in some decks? Sure, pretty much all disciplines
> > on all vampires are overlooked in some decks. If you can use a cheaper
> > vampire, use one if that'll be better for you. That's no different to a
> > Ventrue bleed deck "wasting" its in-clan Presence, because it's using
> > Dominate for one reason or another.
>
> > --
> > James Coupe
> > PGP Key: 0x5D623D5D YOU ARE IN ERROR.
> > EBD690ECD7A1FB457CA2 NO-ONE IS SCREAMING.
> > 13D7E668C3695D623D5D THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION.- Zitierten Text ausblenden -
>
> > - Zitierten Text anzeigen -
>
> By the way, was Obedience reprinted in KoT? I don't remember if I
> pulled some out of my boosters. If it wasn't reprinted in KoT, when
> was the last time it was? And it has to be added to the list of
> Govern, Deflection, Parity Shif as being sorely missed. :)
>
>
> - Zitierten Text anzeigen -
Obedience was in those Editions:
Jyhad:U VTES:U Sabbat:U SW:PV CE:U Third:U
so last time it was in 3rd Edition.
I don't think it is missed quite as much as deflection or govern.
Obedience shines when you block or get rushed. Often decks just want
to focus on their forward motion with Dominate though and won't have
obedience there. AAA excels with it cause it's also super good with
second Tradition.
Peter D Bakija
"Tetragrammaton" <no...@usa.com> wrote:
> Considering to change a card that has been in the game as it is
> for 15 year seems utter nonsense to me, at this point.
Sigh. No one is actually trying to change or ban a card here. It was a
discussion about how some folks (including me) found it wonky that
Govern and Deflection (and other powerful staple cards) haven't been
reprinted for a while. John was just suggesting ideas of how Govern
could possibly be reworded to be not overpowered, in the name of
discussion.
Peter D Bakija
<a5f94c56-157c-4073...@g1g2000pra.googlegroups.com>,
jwjbw...@gmail.com wrote:
> I don't want to ban it at all, nor do I think it will have that
> effect. The only thing wrong with the rest of the dominate +2 bleed
> cards, is that Govern is clearly better. Otherwise, they'd be
> somewhat playable. And Govern will always be playable by vampires
> with DOM as a more more flexible version of Fourth Tradition.
Yeah, see, if Govern cost 2 blood at inferior (and presumably still 1
blood at superior), I don't think it would see much play; yeah, it would
be slightly better than 4th Tradition in a DOM deck (as it has a back up
use), but in general, paying 2 blood to bleed for +2, even if it is
theoretically balanced, isn't something that is generally worth doing.
Free Scouting Mission would be *vastly* better than 2 blood inferior/1
blood superior Govern.
> I just think it sucks as a matter of principle.
Oh, sure. I've gone on record with tirades about things that suck as a
matter of principle (see: Ian Forrestal). But in reality, I don't think
that Aire is remotely problematic (see also: Ian Forrestal). It being
tied to the Toreador makes it much, much less good than Conditioning
(and if it isn't being used by the Toreador, it is much, much less good
than Threats). So while in an absolute in a vacuum design sense, Aire is
kind of wrong, in practice, it just isn't worth worrying about (until
they print either a dozen Toreador with obfuscate, or a free celerity +1
stealth/+2 stealth card, which I don't see either of which happening).
Peter D Bakija
<fc5d0773-1c05-4c7a...@z6g2000pre.googlegroups.com>,
jason...@iinet.net.au wrote:
> And Sensory Deprivation.
> And Form of Corruption.
Form of Corruption was just reprinted in Lords of the Night. Fixed in
the Settite starter.
Tetragrammaton
> In article <j6Z8l.33941$J84...@tornado.fastwebnet.it>,
> "Tetragrammaton" <no...@usa.com> wrote:
>> Considering to change a card that has been in the game as it is
>> for 15 year seems utter nonsense to me, at this point.
>
> Sigh. No one is actually trying to change or ban a card here. It was a
> discussion about how some folks (including me) found it wonky that
> Govern and Deflection (and other powerful staple cards) haven't been
> reprinted for a while.
As said elsewhere here: i think that's just a mistake due a whole number of
cards that enlarges from year to year, making difficult
to track down effectively what's in need to be reprint and what's not.
Closed session, too, was ignored for reprint in KoT, for example.
Announced number of new cards in KoT was wrong.
Some vampires in KoT were not printed due error (or other mistake) too.
So i think that the point discussed (cards "banned" trough exstensive
non-reprint) is just moot.
It's clear enough that WW has not all of the resources otherwise needed to
produce big (or sometimes, less big as NoR) sets without incurring in some
mistakes (be it in playtesting as NoR, designs as the trophies/kmw, reprints
as KoT, printing as with third edition, web sites updates as with several
released sets, or combinations of these).
Peter D Bakija
"Tetragrammaton" <no...@usa.com> wrote:
> As said elsewhere here: i think that's just a mistake due a whole number of
> cards that enlarges from year to year, making difficult
> to track down effectively what's in need to be reprint and what's not.
In the case of Govern and Deflection (which are incredibly obvious,
incredibly powerful staple cards), they get replaced by other, less
useful cards (Redirection, Murmur, Spying Mission, etc). So it isn't
just an issue of it being difficult to track down what needs to be
reprinted.
> Closed session, too, was ignored for reprint in KoT, for example.
Sure. So were lots and lots of other kind of occasionally useful but not
real vital cards. In the case of Govern, Deflection, and Parity Shift,
which are really obvious glaring omissions, one wonders if it was done
purposefully. Which is what the point of this thread was.
> It's clear enough that WW has not all of the resources otherwise needed to
> produce big (or sometimes, less big as NoR) sets without incurring in some
> mistakes (be it in playtesting as NoR, designs as the trophies/kmw, reprints
> as KoT, printing as with third edition, web sites updates as with several
> released sets, or combinations of these).
This isn't an issue of mistakes. It is highly unlikely that they just
forgot to reprint Parity Shift. Or just accidentally put Murmur (a
recently printed, effective but not overly so, easy to get card) in the
Ventrue starter instead of Deflection (a not reprinted for a long time,
absurdly effective, kind of hard to get card if you are new to the
game). It is possible it was an art issue (as brought up by LSJ
recently) or possible that it is any number of other issues. But the
original poster in this thread was pointing out that it wasn't really a
good idea to make it hard to get incredibly powerful staple cards (such
as Govern, Deflection, or Parity Shift) hard to get for new players.
Should these cards get printed in every set? No, of course not. But
unless they are going to be removed from the environment (i.e. get
banned, which I don't think is either necessary or desirable), they
should be regularly cycled into the game, so that new players can get
them. Govern was in 3rd, so ok, fair enough. Deflection hasn't seen
print since Camarilla (which isn't real good for newer players), and the
same for Parity Shift. Yeah, Closed Session also hasn't been reprinted
since Camarilla, but the number of decks that want to use Closed Session
is *vastly* smaller than the number of decks that want to use, say,
Deflection.
Tetragrammaton
> In article <GL49l.34513$J84....@tornado.fastwebnet.it>,
> "Tetragrammaton" <no...@usa.com> wrote:
>> As said elsewhere here: i think that's just a mistake due a whole
>> number of cards that enlarges from year to year, making difficult
>> to track down effectively what's in need to be reprint and what's
>> not.
>
> In the case of Govern and Deflection (which are incredibly obvious,
> incredibly powerful staple cards), they get replaced by other, less
> useful cards (Redirection, Murmur, Spying Mission, etc). So it isn't
> just an issue of it being difficult to track down what needs to be
> reprinted.
>
>> Closed session, too, was ignored for reprint in KoT, for example.
>
> Sure. So were lots and lots of other kind of occasionally useful but
> not real vital cards. In the case of Govern, Deflection, and Parity
> Shift, which are really obvious glaring omissions, one wonders if it
> was done purposefully. Which is what the point of this thread was.
>
both in kot and in the past sets).
>> It's clear enough that WW has not all of the resources otherwise
>> needed to produce big (or sometimes, less big as NoR) sets without
>> incurring in some mistakes (be it in playtesting as NoR, designs as
>> the trophies/kmw, reprints as KoT, printing as with third edition,
>> web sites updates as with several released sets, or combinations of
>> these).
>
> This isn't an issue of mistakes. It is highly unlikely that they just
> forgot to reprint Parity Shift.
Why not ?
If WW wasn't able to produce a single web page in advance to create
some hype for KoT (or LoTN or other sets, we know), or to update internally
the information that there would be *not* 60 new library cards in KoT (as it
has been presented for months), then i can't see why they could not forget
to reprint all the useful cards for KoT.
A big set with 400 or so cards, it's pretty obvious that with so limited
resources can be victim of (unintentional) mistakes.
For that reason i'm saying (and i will propose) that WW should rely more on
the volunteers chain to end up with a good product for our beloved ccg.
Peter D Bakija
"Tetragrammaton" <no...@usa.com> wrote:
> To me wasn't purposefully, just mistake (as we got so many other mistakes
> both in kot and in the past sets).
If you think that, great. The original poster was bring up the point
that it isn't a good thing, mistake or no, and questioning that if it
was done purposefully (i.e. was an attempt to remove or limit the
arguably overpowered cards in question from the environment), it wasn't
a good idea. I seriously, seriously doubt that not reprinting Deflection
since Camarilla is just an oversight. And that not reprinting Parity
Shift in KoT was 'cause they just forgot.
> Why not ?
'Cause, frankly, it is kind of insane to think that they just forgot to
reprint Parity Shift in the new, base Camarilla set. And far more
sensible to think that it wasn't reprinted for a specific, if obscure,
reason, possibly including, but not limited too:
-A questionable attempt to limit the use of the card in the play
environment.
-Thinking it is just too powerful for limited play, and wanting KoT to
be a good set for limited play.
-It being on the "maybe we'll ban it" list, and they didn't want to
reprint it right before they removed it from play, if it was a
possibility.
-It was too expensive to get the art rights, and they didn't get a new
picture in time.
> If WW wasn't able to produce a single web page in advance to create
> some hype for KoT (or LoTN or other sets, we know), or to update internally
> the information that there would be *not* 60 new library cards in KoT (as it
> has been presented for months), then i can't see why they could not forget
> to reprint all the useful cards for KoT.
There is a vast difference between updating a website and designing a
card set.
Tetragrammaton
>> If WW wasn't able to produce a single web page in advance to create
>> some hype for KoT (or LoTN or other sets, we know), or to update
>> internally the information that there would be *not* 60 new library
>> cards in KoT (as it has been presented for months), then i can't see
>> why they could not forget to reprint all the useful cards for KoT.
>
> There is a vast difference between updating a website and designing a
> card set.
Yes, the latter can be more far more complicated, and more prone to errors,
imho.
Anyway, it seems that the real reason behind this is a copyright issue over
older cards.
So the point made in the topic (intentional non-reprint due cards disliked
being deemd overpowered in the long run) was moot anyway :-)
jason...@iinet.net.au
> .44 Magnum is an excellent additional example, yep. I wasn't meaning
> to say that -you- were claiming it was a pervasive problem; that was
> more of a generalization about other recent discussions.
>
> Also note: I totally agree that Deflection is long overdue being
> reprinted. My basic point is that it doesn't inherently need to be in
> EVERY set, and that printing alternatives some of the time is a
> positive thing. Though not necessarily to the degree that Deflection
> specifically encompasses currently.
Yeah, I'm not saying it needs to be every set. But I find it
objectionable that WW have:
a) Negelcted to reprint it for 5 years.
b) Have instead reprinted/created cards intended to replace it that
are, on the whole, wallpaper when compared to it (Murmur, in
particular, Redirection to a lesser extent)
Sensory Deprivation is in exactly the same position (replaced by
wallpaper like Nightmare Curse/Reality)
And this doesn't even cover Parity Shift, which is a far more baffling
omission.
> Redirection is NOT in "EVERY WAY" worse than Deflection. A crypt full
> of large DOM vampires is often better off using Redirection because
> the age limit doesn't matter when you're using 10 and 11 caps, and how
> often do you -actually- see heavy ally-based-bleed decks? Most play
> environments see zero, unless you run into an occasional Imbued deck
> (and a lot of play environments and/or tournaments have no Imbued
> decks whatsoever, or ally-based decks of any kind.)
We'll just have to agree to disagree here, dude. Perhaps it's because
of a greater frequency of ally decks in my meta, dunno. I think if you
play Redirection as your bleed defence, fatty crypt or no, you're
doing yourself a great disservice.
> Most of the time, I agree. But it isn't an inferior alternative _all_
> of the time, only if you choose to always play decks that clearly are
> better with Govern.
Indeed. So ultimately, by not reprinting it with decent frequency, WW
are limiting to new players to building decks that are better with
Scouting Mission. Which, if the TWDA is anything to go by, is an
extraordinary minority. Similarly, if we accept your arguement that
Redirection is better in some rare circumstances (I don't but for the
point I'll wear it) then by not reprinting Deflection, WW are limiting
new players to building those rare decks if they want to be
competitive.
> I'm not saying it's acceptable in the case of Deflection; I'm saying
> that in general not reprinting every staple card every time is going
> to happen, and should.
Yeah, but that was never my point. I've never claimed it should be in
every set. But five years is far too long between drinks. Coupled with
the glaring omission of other "power cards" from recent sets, when it
seems obvious to most that they should have been reprinted (Sense Dep
in Lords, Parity Shift in KoT) I'm finding it hard to believe this is
pure happenstance, and wonder about WW's motivation for the above
mentioned "lazy ban" of these cards.
jason...@iinet.net.au
> I could see
> banning the card or adding errata, but the low availability of SD is
> highly annoying.
If they're going to ban it, then just ban it. The opportunity to ban/
reprint/errata Sense Dep was in LotN, and that ship has sailed.
Now we're just left with new players who want to but can't play Ravnos
competitively because their primary defensive mechanism is virtually
impossible to find.
Meanwhile there's old b*astards like me running around stitching up
the faces of anything that looks at me cock-eyed, just because I was
lucky enough to be playing this game when Dark Sovs came out.
It's just blatantly unfair, and a strange way to treat our precious
new player base.
librarian
>> .44 Magnum is an excellent additional example, yep. I wasn't meaning
>> to say that -you- were claiming it was a pervasive problem; that was
>> more of a generalization about other recent discussions.
>>
>> Also note: I totally agree that Deflection is long overdue being
>> reprinted. My basic point is that it doesn't inherently need to be in
>> EVERY set, and that printing alternatives some of the time is a
>> positive thing. Though not necessarily to the degree that Deflection
>> specifically encompasses currently.
>
> Yeah, I'm not saying it needs to be every set. But I find it
> objectionable that WW have:
>
> a) Negelcted to reprint it for 5 years.
> b) Have instead reprinted/created cards intended to replace it that
> are, on the whole, wallpaper when compared to it (Murmur, in
> particular, Redirection to a lesser extent)
>
Ok, stop right there. Murmur is great. It has 2 uses - either it's
bounce, *or* it's plus bleed. At no cost. For me, cards that can do 2
different things are very useful. Deny and Swallowed by the Night come
to mind. Or Deep Song.
best -
chris
jason...@iinet.net.au
I'm not denying the card has its uses. I wouldn't ever call it "great"
but I can see where it would be played. I just said it's wallpaper
when compared to Deflection.
Deflection bounces any *minion* at inferior for the cost of 1 blood.
With DOM, it leaves untapped to bounce/block the next bleed.
You need DOM to even use Murmur as a bounce, and it only works on
younger *vampires*. And it taps you.
In terms of bounce, there is simply no comparison.
jase
Salem
> I've noticed myself running low on Parity Shift and Deflection lately,
> but I sure have a _lot_ of Govern the Unaligned with upside-down card
> backs.
I'm all out of Deflections. I keep trying to substitute Murmur or
Redirection, but I keep finding really need to be able to play it at
[dom] not [DOM], and on older vamps.....*sigh*
--
salem
(replace 'hotmail' with 'gmail' to email)
Tetragrammaton
Very lucky of you in getting a new player base, in fact :-)
Morgan Vening
wrote:
And just a quick look at the first dozen or so that include both
Scouting Mission AND Govern, more than half have Freak Drive/Forced
March. While this is just speculation on my part, I'd be fairly
confident saying that without the NRA rule, the Scoutings in those
decks would be more likely to be extra Governs.
Morgan Vening
ira...@gmail.com
> Even a Brujah elder, with CEL PRE POT dom, will not use Conditioning,
> because Aire of Elation is just as good.
A Brujah elder with those disciplines should be using Iron Glare.
And if for some reason you don't want to use Iron Glare, Conditioning
is still better than Aire of Elation in that situation because of The
Slow Withering. And because you have tossed in dominate weenies to
play Deflection, so it's better to have Conditioning that they can
play, too. :)
Ira
Malone
> Having looked at the last several sets released, there appears to be a
> reluctance on the part of WW to reprint certain top tier cards. Unless
> I'm mistaken, Deflection and Govern the Unaligned have not been
> printed in boosters since Camarilla Edition (although Deflection was
> in Black Hand Starters), yet Scouting Mission and Redirection have
> been reprinted in far more recent memory (both are vastly inferior to
> the aforementioned, especially in regards to Redirection). The most
> recent example is KoT, a Camarilla focused Edition which failed to
> reprint arguably the most powerful Camarilla effect in the game thus
> far - Parity Shift.
>
> This strikes me as a disingenuous and somewhat flawed method of
> discouraging the play of these cards. Are the designers under the
> impression that by not printing PS or Def, these cards will no longer
> be played?
>
> If the cards are deemed too powerful for the game, simply remove them.
> If the cards are seen as acceptable, they must be acknowledged as top
> tier and kept in rotation with a reasonable frequency. By failing to
> reprint them, WW succeeds only in:
>
> 1) Disadvantaging new players, who don't have access to older printed
> editions, and are thus forced to play with inferior replacements
> (Scouting mission, Redirection, etc) unless they turn to Ebay.
>
> 2) Inflating the Ebay/secondary market prices for these cards, since
> any person wishing to construct a competitive deck will want to use
> them, regardless of them currently being in print or not. There is a
> lot of 5 Parity Shifts on Ebay atm sitting at over US$20, with under a
> day to go. Deflection is selling on Ebay atm for $1.50 each, and this
> card is a COMMON.
>
> This issue was brought to my attention recently when some new players
> to our group were asking for deck advice, and I realised that the
> (common!) cards I was recommending they use were going to be pretty
> difficult to get a hold of.
>
> I'm failing to understand how this policy can be considered reasonable
> or responsible, and am wondering if there is a solid explanation
> behind it?
>
> jase
While there have been some interesting observations and speculations
amidst the general bickering in this thread, much of it is based on
mistaken assumptions.
Deflection is not out of print. There are 4 copies of it in the BH
Tremere starter.
Govern the Unaligned is not out of print. There are 3 copies in the
KMW Alastors starter and 5 copies in the 3E Tremere starter and, if
I'm not mistaken, some in the 3E Player's Kit Tremere demi-deck.
While demand for Deflection may be nearly unquenchable, it is entirely
reasonable to choose not to reprint cards that are still in print
elsewhere.
brandons...@yahoo.com
I made a deck recently featuring Murmur that has all superior dominate
and tries to destroy all of your pred's minions who are >/= the
capacity of my vamps. Doesn't work against bleeds coming from high
caps you haven't killed yet, but that is what redirection/deflection
are for. In most circumstances, Deflection is far more efficient in
terms of capacity or how much of your library you dedicate to making
your bounce work, but this is not one of them.
I don't think that it's a good argument, at least in terms of making
gamers happy, that if you can find a card in some starter or set out
there it shouldn't be reprinted. How far back does that go? Does the
fact that someone in Australia is selling a box of DS for $175
prohibit SD from being reprinted? I hope not... Also, why should new
players have to go scavenge through 3rd ed !Trem decks and BH decks to
get the basic dominate cards they need? The crypt cards that are being
printed now are 4/5, creating a problem for said scavenger (most of
all DS, which has been erratad).
Brandon
Malone
> I don't think that it's a good argument, at least in terms of making
> gamers happy, that if you can find a card in some starter or set out
> there it shouldn't be reprinted. How far back does that go? Does the
> fact that someone in Australia is selling a box of DS for $175
> prohibit SD from being reprinted? I hope not... Also, why should new
> players have to go scavenge through 3rd ed !Trem decks and BH decks to
> get the basic dominate cards they need? The crypt cards that are being
> printed now are 4/5, creating a problem for said scavenger (most of
> all DS, which has been erratad).
>
> Brandon
I guess you were responding to:
"While there have been some interesting observations and speculations
amidst the general bickering in this thread, much of it is based on
mistaken assumptions.
Deflection is not out of print. There are 4 copies of it in the BH
Tremere starter.
Govern the Unaligned is not out of print. There are 3 copies in the
KMW Alastors starter and 5 copies in the 3E Tremere starter and, if
I'm not mistaken, some in the 3E Player's Kit Tremere demi-deck.
While demand for Deflection may be nearly unquenchable, it is entirely
reasonable to choose not to reprint cards that are still in print
elsewhere. "
If so, you're pretty far out in the woods.
(1) I didn't say (or remotely imply) "shouldn't be reprinted."
(2) In the USA at least, KMW, BH and 3E starter boxes are easily
available on the ordinary market at 40% below list price.
(3) If people aren't willing to "scavenge" for cards, they have to
buy (or borrow or trade for) singles. If Deflection had been
reprinted in KoT boosters, you would've had to "scavenge" thru a
hundred of them to statistically expect the five copies that you are
*certain* to get in a BH starter.
brandons...@yahoo.com
Am I?
> (1) I didn't say (or remotely imply) "shouldn't be reprinted."
> Deflection is not out of print. There are 4 copies of it in the BH
> Tremere starter.
> While demand for Deflection may be nearly unquenchable, it is entirely
> reasonable to choose not to reprint cards that are still in print
> elsewhere. "
While you did not directly state that deflection should not be
reprinted, you do seem to imply that it would be "entirely reasonable"
to not print it since it is available ("in print," if it could be
called that).
>
> (2) In the USA at least, KMW, BH and 3E starter boxes are easily
> available on the ordinary market at 40% below list price.
Who would buy boxes at retail price? Paper is cheap, not nearly $120/
box.
> Govern the Unaligned is not out of print. There are 3 copies in the
> KMW Alastors starter and 5 copies in the 3E Tremere starter and, if
> I'm not mistaken, some in the 3E Player's Kit Tremere demi-deck.
Govern is probably less of an important card than deflection,
especially since many decks just splash dominate in order to survive.
At inferior, conditioning is similar to Govern and readily available.
Govern is also available on Ebay for about $4 for 10.
> (3) If people aren't willing to "scavenge" for cards, they have to
> buy (or borrow or trade for) singles. If Deflection had been
> reprinted in KoT boosters, you would've had to "scavenge" thru a
> hundred of them to statistically expect the five copies that you are
> *certain* to get in a BH starter.
New cards are most readily available to new players. At Eudemonia in
Berkeley, for example, they have a good amount of KoT and Twilight
Rebellion with some LotN and 3rd ed. They may have have sold out of
SoC boosters, I'm not sure. If you want to support these sets, you
need vampires who are group 4, 5, or both. Short of buying boxes of
BH, which really don't work well with the new set (it's 2/3), in order
to get deflection, how about including it in a starter? What about as
a promo (where each player gets 2-4) until we do get a starter or see
it in a small set? If you want new players to be able to get into the
game very easily, staple cards like deflection need to be much easier
to come by.
If I initially mis-characterized your argument, I apologize. What you
replied with would suggest that I did not.
Brandon
Kevin Walsh
> On Jan 6, 8:20 pm, jwjbwhe...@gmail.com wrote:
>
> > Even a Brujah elder, with CEL PRE POT dom, will not use Conditioning,
> > because Aire of Elation is just as good.
>
> A Brujah elder with those disciplines should be using Iron Glare.
>
Vanguard.
Kevin Walsh
jason...@iinet.net.au
> Deflection is not out of print. There are 4 copies of it in the BH
> Tremere starter.
This thread is about the difficulty new players have in acquiring
these cards.
You're saying it's acceptable for them to be reduced buying starters
full of vampires they can't use (group 2/3) and clan and discipline
cards they might not want to play or can't use (if, say, they were
building a Gio/Ventrue/!Ventrue/Tremere/Lasombra/Kaisyd deck) to
acquire four staple *commons*?
This
is the cheapest !Tremere starter on eBay that ships to my neck of the
woods. With shipping, my players would wind up paying almost $28 for
four Deflections and bunch of cards they can't/won't use.
It's hard to get guys enthused over this kind of policy. It would be
like saying to a new magic player "Yeah, there's no land in this set,
but that's okay, you can buy starters from 5 years ago on ebay. They
have land in them, guaranteed."
Thrall of Arika
> > Deflection is not out of print. There are 4 copies of it in the BH
> > Tremere starter.
>
> This thread is about the difficulty new players have in acquiring
> these cards.
>
> You're saying it's acceptable for them to be reduced buying starters
> full of vampires they can't use (group 2/3) and clan and discipline
> cards they might not want to play or can't use (if, say, they were
> building a Gio/Ventrue/!Ventrue/Tremere/Lasombra/Kaisyd deck) to
> acquire four staple *commons*?
Though they lack a starter, Tremere are fully supported in KoT. This
leaves the 12 vampires and 5 library cards that would be "unusable" in
the BH !Tremere starter. And since there are 12 vampires, new players
can now go ahead and build !Tremere decks, using all the Tremere
discipline goodness that comes in KoT.
> This
>
> http://cgi.ebay.com/Sealed-Tremere-antitribu-Black-Hand-Starter-Deck_...
>
> is the cheapest !Tremere starter on eBay that ships to my neck of the
> woods. With shipping, my players would wind up paying almost $28 for
> four Deflections and bunch of cards they can't/won't use.
I agree, if you're looking for just Deflections, buying a relatively
hard to find starter isn't the way to go. But you also exaggerate the
"cards they can't/won't use"
The deck offers a lot of cards that aren't available in KoT, that an
aspiring Tremere player would love to have, and some nice auspex and
dominate cards for the other clans. Far Mastery, Scouting Mission,
Bonding, Blood Doll, Enhanced Sense, Forced Awakening, Precognition.
Nevermind the bolstering of Thaumaturgy, and Apportation, Blood Fury,
and a goodly number of Thefts.
> It's hard to get guys enthused over this kind of policy. It would be
> like saying to a new magic player "Yeah, there's no land in this set,
> but that's okay, you can buy starters from 5 years ago on ebay. They
> have land in them, guaranteed."
I think it's more akin to saying "There's no multi-land in this set,
just basic lands. They do the job, but maybe not as well as these
other cards". Your example is too extreme. You can't really play magic
without land. You can play VTES without Deflection.
Most newer players I know of often wish they could get their hands on
older sets, for more vampires, more cards. If a new player is truly
engrossed in the game, they'll be more than happy to pick up the BH
starters at some point. I do agree it can be hard on the pocketbook. I
lament that I couldn't afford much of the original Anarchs when I got
back into VTES, and missed out on ever getting a Gangrel starter, for
the vampires that I can't get anywhere else. I can't imagine I'm the
only one who would love to have copies of older vampires.
I too am disappointed that Deflection wasn't reprinted. Though I've
played from the start, I've only recently gotten a somewhat decent
number of Deflections, to support more than one deck at a time without
having to scavenge from another deck. But looking at the Dominate
cards that were reprinted, there's not a lot of wiggle room.
Seduction, Graverobbing, Dominate Kine and Conditioning were in the
same state as Deflection/Govern, reprinted in a starter or two, but
not seen since Camarilla. Mind Rape even more so. Chain of Command was
from Gehenna, so it's been a long while for that. So really the only
questionable card is Murmur of the False Will from Lords, which I'm
fairly sure is filling in the spot Deflection would have been if
printed.
Given the suggested difficulties of reprinting original Jyhad cards, I
would guess that Murmur was selected to provide a method of bounce, as
well as to offer greater flexibility. Though Deflection is great, it
becomes dead once the game is down to two players. Murmur is at least
still playable.
Chris, Thrall of Arika
jason...@iinet.net.au
> The deck offers a lot of cards that aren't available in KoT, that an
> aspiring Tremere player would love to have, and some nice auspex and
> dominate cards for the other clans.
Yeah, but what if the player doesn't have a Tremere deck, and wants to
play, say, Lasombra? He's got to buy the starter for the Deflections
and then he's left with a bunch of cards that aren't much good to him.
New players usually have a limited budget, pick one clan they like and
build from there.
> I think it's more akin to saying "There's no multi-land in this set,
> just basic lands. They do the job, but maybe not as well as these
> other cards".
Yep, you're right. This is a much better example :)
jase
brandons...@yahoo.com
A new player who wants to play Lasombra has a lot more problems than
just Deflection. Malk/!Malk would be one of the easier themes to
support (hooray, cheese!), while Ventrue Lawfirm would be tough
without your key cards like Deflection, Parity Shift, Govern... To
their credit, WW saw fit to give the Ventrue enough DOM to try and
make Murmur work. Plus Change of Target, Freak Drive, and Majesty were
reprinted.
Brandon