Ineffective as a predator

[TorranceCircle]

The last few games I've played have been brutal. I seem to always be
stuck as a weenie deck's prey. This forces me to stop most if not all
forward pressure. This has caused other players to accuse me of being
a "wall deck" or being ineffective. My reaction is, "well, yeah, what
do you expect. I'm not going to transfer out."

What happens then is something I hear Darby say a lot, "The player
with no pressure wins the game." I guess what I want to say is that
if you are playing an aggressive deck make sure you can seal the deal
and make the oust. If you can't, you are only setting up your grand
prey.

I have heard Matt Morgan and Hugh Angseesing say they often let their
prey play and don't interfere too much with their prey's game. I still
am trying to wrap my mind around how to do this and get GW and VP.
Dennis, Matt, and Robert in my play group are so good at this. I could
give a few examples of this but that would be so long.

[floppyzedolfin]

Here's a fact: If you do nothing, your prey's pool will lower down to
13-16.
So, if you keep little pressure (two bleeds for one), they aren't too
scared of you (even though you have 4 dudes with Dominate), and you
can get that down to 8-10.
Afterwards, it'll be time to play your deck. But as Ginés says: "It's
OK if a player is ousted, as long as it's not you."

[Peter D Bakija]

On Jan 18, 5:46 pm, TorranceCircle <torrance.cir...@gmail.com> wrote:
> The last few games I've played have been brutal. I seem to always be
> stuck as a weenie deck's prey. This forces me to stop most if not all
> forward pressure. This has caused other players to accuse me of being
> a "wall deck" or being ineffective. My reaction is, "well, yeah, what
> do you expect. I'm not going to transfer out."

Yeah, that happens. If you sit down and have a really aggressive
predator, all you can do is wall up and try to survive. That is how
the game goes. If you have a really aggressive predator, and you
ignore them and go forward, you get killed fast and don't do anything
but help the guy who is killing you win more. If you wall up and act
as a 30 pool bulwark for your prey, you don't do anything other than
help the guy who is your prey win more. Neither situation is better in
an absolute sense, but at least walling up might make you outlive your
predator. People can't really, with a leg to stand on, complain about
you walling up and trying to survive against a very aggressive
predator (see: Malk '94, weene PRE tap and bleed, whatever). You are
probably going to die in either case, so die in the way that makes you
happier.

> What happens then is something I hear Darby say a lot, "The player
> with no pressure wins the game."  I guess what I want to say is that
> if you are playing an aggressive deck make sure you can seal the deal
> and make the oust. If you can't, you are only setting up your grand
> prey.

Yep. The man with no predator wins the game. That is how VTES goes.
Sometimes you get put in a situation where going forward gets you
killed outright where walling up might help you outlive your predator.
This is what happens when someone plays a very aggressive deck. Their
prey walls up and tries to survive, and their prey gets a free ride.
This is one of the downfalls of a very aggressive deck. I mean, yeah,
once and a while, someone plays a deck that can't do anything forward
regardless of their predator; this is not unreasonable to point out
(i.e. "Uh, yeah, that deck can't really oust anyone. And just makes
it's prey win.") But someone walling up and trying to weather an
incredibly aggressive predator is just a rational reaction to a very
aggressive predator.

[Aaron Clark]

I am the one who called you a wall deck, mostly because I enjoy saying
unkind things.

From observing you, I think that you get paralyzed whenever your
predator has more minions than you, regardless of the type of
minions. The last game we played, you complained when I had out three
Brujah without Presence and two Arms Dealers and you had out two mid-
cap Toreador and were a turn away from getting out Francois Villon. I
was weenie-bleeding you, apparently, although I didn't produce a
single Computer Hacking. You handled me quite well, and even bled
almost every turn, but you didn't get really offensive until I was
down to two ready vampires (and one Arms Dealer?) after Matt and I
beat each other up.

Not every predator is going to sit around and build to mid-game.
Shane certainly isn't going to; his card collection is more limited,
so why wouldn't he go with strong weenie strategies? The game in
which his Fortitude weenies swarm bled you, you just go unlucky. You
didn't get a single one of your 6 princes in your opening crypt. No
Seconds, no Parity Shift. Since you didn't take one offensive action
towards me, my Deflections and other reaction cards were dead weight
in my hand. You stupid wall, you ruined my game (of course it
couldn't also be that I played a half-ass deck and got destroyed by
dedicated combat, now could it? mmm...)

It seems the successful decks 1. have a decent defense, 2. build up
over time, 3. have an ousting mechanism, and 4. can survive the crazy
harsh combat that appears at every game in this town. Your Torrance
Circle deck does all those things, and that's why it's successful.
Your other decks are more dependent on being in the right kind of
seating position. I certainly think you need more blood recursion
when you play fattie decks. But what do I know? My decks usually
stink bad and either rely on having an aggressive predator or rely on
NOT having an aggressive predator.

[Jeff Kuta]

S

[Jeff Kuta]

On Jan 18, 2:46 pm, TorranceCircle <torrance.cir...@gmail.com> wrote:

Scourge of the Enochians in every deck. Weenies will disappear.

[Pagan]

> Scourge of the Enochians in every deck. Weenies will disappear.- Hide quoted text -
>

Well Scourge isn't that good as it won't happen early very often and
only touches 1-2 caps. If you hate weenies that much an Enhanced
Senses and a combat card solves alot of problems.

Frankly if your predator attacks you hard early then you have to
defend yourself. If the rest of the table starts complaining tell
them to do something about it. Generally any player who hits his prey
hard that early and isn't a pure S/B deck will only cause them and
their prey to fail to get any VPs.

[TorranceCircle]

On Jan 19, 10:00 pm, Pagan <pa...@obtenebration.org> wrote:
> > Scourge of the Enochians in every deck. Weenies will disappear.- Hide quoted text -
>
> Well Scourge isn't that good as it won't happen early very often and
> only touches 1-2 caps. If you hate weenies that much an Enhanced
> Senses and a combat card solves alot of problems.
>

I understand what you are saying, if you are the first prey you are
probably dead before scourge can have a significant effect.

However, I think what Jeff is saying is worth trying. Why? because a
metagame will change based on whats in the metagame. If everyone knows
SotE WILL be played, then eventually thinking will adjust and 1-2 caps
will be less prevelant.

[TorranceCircle]

This is all true. Part of what I was trying to articulate was that
frustration with the player who is stuck in this position is
misplaced; which you have alluded to in your post. Frustration with
the player who is playing the deck that puts people in this position
is not misplaced. I mean, if you are going to play this style then
make sure you have every chance to bleed through the first two prey
that you will have and then take your chances with getting a sweep. If
you have only enough mojo to cripple your first prey for a prolonged
time before you can oust, then your deck isn't any better than the
deck that sits and survives with no reasonable chance to oust. I have
had problems with this myself, I have to admit, but I have no problem
being told so- when it is the case.

[TorranceCircle]

> I am the one who called you a wall deck, mostly because I enjoy saying
> unkind things.

No, No, thats not true. Its your Jedi Mind Trick! trying to get me to
do something I don't want to do. ;)

>
> From observing you, I think that you get paralyzed whenever your
> predator has more minions than you, regardless of the type of
> minions.

I do. I am rusty. The memorable quote on extrala has been on my mind.
"In cards, the greatest sin is mistaking bad play for bad luck." I
misread your deck and your plan.

>The last game we played, you complained when I had out three
> Brujah without Presence and two Arms Dealers and you had out two mid-
> cap Toreador and were a turn away from getting out Francois Villon.  I
> was weenie-bleeding you, apparently, although I didn't produce a
> single Computer Hacking.

This is was what I read. 4 small cap brujah + 2 arms dealers from my
predator. I have two minions, one with basic auspex, When I see those
particular minions and nothing else my assumption of whats coming
is...camera phones, concealed weapon + flash grenade....not a rushing
vampire + arms dealers to get weapons for that minion. Some of those
rushes, which I was not ready to handle would have come my way too, if
it weren't for Matt being forced to try to oust you before he was
ousted.

>You handled me quite well, and even bled
> almost every turn, but you didn't get really offensive until I was
> down to two ready vampires (and one Arms Dealer?) after Matt and I
> beat each other up.
>

I would have been more confident if I had equipped the .44, but Scythe
blocked it (that punk!). I began to read that you and matt were going
to be focused on each other for awhile. If Matt was ousted, then you
would have been focused on James. Either way, I was sure I could bleed
and try to get out Francios (especially since some of your minions
were empty).

> Not every predator is going to sit around and build to mid-game.
> Shane certainly isn't going to; his card collection is more limited,
> so why wouldn't he go with strong weenie strategies?

His deck was fine. It was a good deck. I apologised to him later for
being a poor sport, a jerk, and a d$#%.

>The game in
> which his Fortitude weenies swarm bled you, you just go unlucky.  You
> didn't get a single one of your 6 princes in your opening crypt.  No
> Seconds, no Parity Shift.

Back to the quote on extrala, being swarm bled was bad luck. Swarm
bled by a fortitude undead persistance/indomitability deck is bad
luck. Shane gave me time though. I did not take advantage of it. This
was bad play. I should have recognized sooner that Horatio was not
going to be able to make himself a prince. As soon as I recognized
this I should have started discarding to get to cards I could use. It
took me too long to recognize these facts, this was bad play. I was
able to get out three minions. Instead, I should have fished until I
found a prince. I would have rather had two minions, one being a
prince, than three that can do nothing with a hand full cards
requiring a prince. It was just bad play.So bad.

> You stupid wall, you ruined my game ....

Its what I do best, ruin YOUR game! ;)

>
> It seems the successful decks 1. have a decent defense, 2. build up
> over time, 3. have an ousting mechanism, and 4. can survive the crazy
> harsh combat that appears at every game in this town.  Your Torrance
> Circle deck does all those things, and that's why it's successful.

Torrance Circle says, "Walk on home, boy...."

> Your other decks are more dependent on being in the right kind of
> seating position.

Again, I am rusty. I seem to recall being better at mitigating this.
Of course, I could also be delusional.

[Jeff Kuta]

Exactly. Event cards are rarely wasted slots IMO if you expect
something to happen with them. Scourge is easy to design away from and
it really screws over weenie/breed decks. While 1 may seem prayerish,
if 3 people each play a single one, then the likelihood of it hitting
the table is fairly good. For the huge effect the card has, it is well
worth it IME. I put one in every deck I make that doesn't rely on 2-
caps for success.

Your local metagame will quickly shift away from weenie decks if the
Scourge regularly hits the table. Just be consistent or else they'll
creep back in.

Jeff