Playing with a 4 card limit.
Samsman
I'm a VteS Player from Holland.
We play with a 4 card limit in our decks. And it works fine.
The question is more why not a 4 card limit for tournaments or fun
play.
It's easy to get 4xample 8 bum's rush or ambush cards.
But cards like tribute to the master(even not when you buy 4 boxes) ,
or some older rares from "sabbat" are NOT easy to get.
My other question is: Is there a trading site for VteS CCG.
I'm sill looking for some Sabbat Vampires of the Sabbat set.
Grtx From Holland
LSJ
>
> Hello
>
> I'm a VteS Player from Holland.
>
> We play with a 4 card limit in our decks. And it works fine.
Excellent. Glad you're enjoying the game - that's what it's all about.
Incidentally, we play with no card limit, and it works fine as well.
> The question is more why not a 4 card limit for tournaments or fun
> play.
The main answer is: because the cards were designed to be used in a
no-card-limit environemnt. Also many groups feel that card limits
unfairly give Stealth-Bleed decks a great advantage (since the
counters to such decks are hampered more than the S&B deck itself
is). Many groups that use a 4CL (or 3CL or 5CL or 6CL or "1CL on
uniques and XCL on others") house rule also impose a (usually
unspoken) "no cheese" rule - a rule that only "fun" decks (not
Malkavian Stealth-Bleed monsters).
--
LSJ (vte...@white-wolf.com) V:TES Net.Rep for White Wolf, Inc.
Links to revised rulebook, rulings, errata, and tournament rules:
http://www.white-wolf.com/vtes/
Sten During
> Hello
>
> I'm a VteS Player from Holland.
>
> We play with a 4 card limit in our decks. And it works fine.
>
> The question is more why not a 4 card limit for tournaments or fun
> play.
>
> It's easy to get 4xample 8 bum's rush or ambush cards.
> But cards like tribute to the master(even not when you buy 4 boxes) ,
> or some older rares from "sabbat" are NOT easy to get.
>
> Grtx From Holland
You're stirring up an eternal wasps nest :)
Anyway, it's a long debated issue that basically revolves around
card-rarity versus
game-mechanics. VTES in itself is not constructed for card-limits, which
of course
should be no hindrance for your playgroup to have whatever house-rules
you
feel happy with. I for one was introduced to this game in a group who
did have
a card-limit house-rule. However, after a while certain parts of the
game started
to seem very strange, so we looked up the actual rules and learned that
there
wasn't supposed to be any card-limits.
One very often used argument against card-limit rules is based on the
example
of a stealth-bleed deck hunting for example a dominate/presence
vote-deck.
I think you can find the numerous bleed-modifiers you could place four
each
of in the bleed-deck. For the voter the limit would be eight cards in
total.
Another example is your generic potence combat-deck that would be
limited to
four Immortal Grapple and four Psyche to counter Majesty, Catatonic Fear
and Staredown.
There are certain strategies which simply become impossible with a
card-limit.
Just try playing some of the cards meant for the Setites and you'll see
what happens.
With a card-limit you'll change the balance of the game. It may work out
fine
for you, but I feel that it's not only a card-limit but also a
game-limit. When
you encounter a deck with a sick amount of the same card it'll usually
be a rather
common card, and what's more important, the deck will probably don't
function
very well. Another problem with card-limits within the scope of
card-rarity is
that strictly mathematically you'll get more of some unusual cards and
less of
some. Let's assume you own five Majesty and three Catatonic Fear and you
feel that you really need exactly eight combat-ends cards - well there
you are.
Sten During
--
NetGuide Scandinavia AB http://www.netg.se/
Tankegangen 4 in...@netg.se
417 56 Goteborg Phone:+46 - (0)31 - 50 79 45
Sweden Fax: +46 - (0)31 - 50 79 39
X_Zealot
"Samsman" <jon...@zonnet.nl> wrote in message
news:d3320f72.0110...@posting.google.com...
> Hello
>
> I'm a VteS Player from Holland.
>
> We play with a 4 card limit in our decks. And it works fine.
>
> The question is more why not a 4 card limit for tournaments or fun
> play.
>
> It's easy to get 4xample 8 bum's rush or ambush cards.
> But cards like tribute to the master(even not when you buy 4 boxes) ,
> or some older rares from "sabbat" are NOT easy to get.
>
> My other question is: Is there a trading site for VteS CCG.
I will happily refer you to two trading sites:
Communal Haven trading site is:
http://www.melancholy.org/vtes/communal_haven/
Succubus Club trading site is:
http://vampire.tne.net.au/trades
mostly harmless
Samsman <jon...@zonnet.nl> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
d3320f72.0110...@posting.google.com...
> Hello
>
> I'm a VteS Player from Holland.
>
> We play with a 4 card limit in our decks. And it works fine.
In our playgroup we have a 4-card limit as well.
The initial reason for that was that we thought it was part of the rules
(which it wasn't of course), probably because some of us had played Magic
before.
After we've found out that we were actually wrong about the card limit rule,
we still kept it, because it worked fine for our games.
Recently I've been thinking about maybe trying to play without card limit,
but I'm still a bit sceptical. I've played NCL tournaments in the past and
the decks that were most successfull in that environment were all kind of
boring. Many people for instance played weenie vote decks with tons of KRC
or weenie combat decks with 15 Zip Guns/Dragon Breath Rounds combos in there
(the later is now no longer legal I think). Many decks seemed to focus on
just a few cards that were played repeatedly again and again.
Now I would be interested to hear from people who played with and without
CL, if this observation is actually correct or if it was just coinsidence.
Does playing without CL result in less creative deck building or in oder
words: do decks that are build around many copies of just a few cards get
the advantage?
Another reason for us keeping the CL is that it would seem that NCL gives
players with more cards an unfair advantage. Sure there are quite a lot of
good common cars, but there are some powerful rare cards (like e.g. Shotgun
Ritual or Freak Drive) that players with a lower budget have a hard time
obtaining in higher quantity.
So my second question would be: Aren't there quite some rare cards that when
used without CL can give a deck a great advantage?
Michael
LSJ
> Now I would be interested to hear from people who played with and without
> CL, if this observation is actually correct or if it was just coinsidence.
> Does playing without CL result in less creative deck building or in oder
> words: do decks that are build around many copies of just a few cards get
> the advantage?
Those two ideas are not the same.
Many copies of the same few cards != less creative.
The NL (no limit) side would argue that 4CL forces a homogenized environment
(every combat deck packs 4 Bum's Rushes, 4 Ambushes, etc.), which they (the
NL side) would consider "less creative". Finding the proper ratios of cards
vs. simply putting 4 copies of each useful (or nearly useful) card.
But no matter - whatever your group enjoys.
> Another reason for us keeping the CL is that it would seem that NCL gives
> players with more cards an unfair advantage. Sure there are quite a lot of
> good common cars, but there are some powerful rare cards (like e.g. Shotgun
> Ritual or Freak Drive) that players with a lower budget have a hard time
> obtaining in higher quantity.
The NL side would say that 4CL gives players with more cards an unfair
advantage. The cards are designed so that the commons are the most widely
useful - the player with few cards who has 12 Majesties but only 1 Catatonic
Fear can only play 5 of those, as opposed to Mr. Suitcase who can play
with 4 of each. Many more examples of this exist (where a rare can be
substituted for a closely-related common).
> So my second question would be: Aren't there quite some rare cards that when
> used without CL can give a deck a great advantage?
A well-built NL deck will have some advantages over a CL deck, sure: it
can use the "best" cards for its plan in the "best" ratios (without having
to dilute them with close-but-no-cigar variations on the cards). The
cards are designed to be balanced in this NL environment - adding an
additional restriction to the deck (CL) will naturally add a disadvantage
to the deck - that's the nature of restrictions.
A deck can be built around many copies of a card (rare or not), yes.
This doesn't give that deck a "great advantage" over all other decks
(unless all other decks are somehow restricted to 4CL).
James Coupe
<mostlyh...@chello.atNOSPAM!> writes
>Another reason for us keeping the CL is that it would seem that NCL gives
>players with more cards an unfair advantage. Sure there are quite a lot of
>good common cars, but there are some powerful rare cards (like e.g. Shotgun
>Ritual or Freak Drive) that players with a lower budget have a hard time
>obtaining in higher quantity.
They don't need to - that's the point.
--
James Coupe PGP Key: 0x5D623D5D
And if it's all right, I'd kind've like to be your lover EBD690ECD7A1F
'Cause when you're with me I can't help but be B457CA213D7E6
So desperately, uncontrollably happy 68C3695D623D5D
Curevei
>but I'm still a bit sceptical. I've played NCL tournaments in the past and
>the decks that were most successfull in that environment were all kind of
>boring. Many people for instance played weenie vote decks with tons of KRC
>or weenie combat decks with 15 Zip Guns/Dragon Breath Rounds combos in there
>(the later is now no longer legal I think). Many decks seemed to focus on
>just a few cards that were played repeatedly again and again.
>
>Now I would be interested to hear from people who played with and without
>CL, if this observation is actually correct or if it was just coinsidence.
>Does playing without CL result in less creative deck building or in oder
>words: do decks that are build around many copies of just a few cards get
>the advantage?
My take on the desirability of NCL is that NCL enables greater deck creativity.
However, while the decks created may be interesting, often the particular
plays they make aren't. In other words, they can be tedious to play against as
they do one thing over and over causing interactions between decks to be
predictable. I'd never design a CCG with NCL, but I wouldn't impose them on
V:TES either.
>Another reason for us keeping the CL is that it would seem that NCL gives
>players with more cards an unfair advantage. Sure there are quite a lot of
>good common cars, but there are some powerful rare cards (like e.g. Shotgun
>Ritual or Freak Drive) that players with a lower budget have a hard time
>obtaining in higher quantity.
>
>So my second question would be: Aren't there quite some rare cards that when
>used without CL can give a deck a great advantage?
Too many commons are too good, IMO, for this to be possible.
Talo...@hotmail.com
>Hello
>
>I'm a VteS Player from Holland.
>
>We play with a 4 card limit in our decks. And it works fine.
>
We used to play with something like that too. Sure, it 'works fine'
but it voids many deck strategies out there. Corruption decks for
instance.
Besides, why should my potence combat deck be limited to 4 undead
strengths? Makes no sense to me that my vampires should be limited to
using a very basic pot combat card 4 times in a game.
We have converted to purely deck limits and scrapped card limits, and
it works fine once you get used to it. It gives you more options as
well.
Try it.
T
James Coupe
<cur...@aol.com> writes
>>So my second question would be: Aren't there quite some rare cards that when
>>used without CL can give a deck a great advantage?
>
>Too many commons are too good, IMO, for this to be possible.
This is also true.
What also needs to be understood is that, as far as is possible, all
cards have a roughly equivalent "cost:effect" ratio. That is, some of
the rare cards can do powerful things, but they have a significant cost.
Just loading your deck up with them isn't going to do anything.
Frederick Scott
> Another reason for us keeping the CL is that it would seem that NCL gives
> players with more cards an unfair advantage. Sure there are quite a lot of
> good common cars, but there are some powerful rare cards (like e.g. Shotgun
> Ritual or Freak Drive) that players with a lower budget have a hard time
> obtaining in higher quantity.
I've been in a position at times to obtain whatever rare cards I may need and
you know, it doesn't help beyond a certain point. If you have any great ideas
for what "powerful rare cards" I can just go get and make some killer NCL deck
with them, please let me know. I really need the help! :)
By the way, I think a lot of people will dispute that Shotgun Ritual is that
good of a card. If you look at the aggregate cost you pay for the SR plus any
kind of first round Thaumaturgy strikes that would normally be limited to the
second round, I think you'll find that comparable first round strikes that do
the same amount and type of damage in a single card wind up being easier to use.
I haven't rigorously analyzed this but my cursory examination seemed to show
this.
As for Freak Drive, much though I like them, I have trouble using very many of
them in any Fortitude deck I've ever invented. One question: are you are of the
No-Repeat-Action rule for constructed deck tournaments? Without this rule, it's
possible to use a large number of Freak Drives (combined with say, 5th Traditions
to replenish blood levels) to execute various kinds of unbalanced strategies.
> So my second question would be: Aren't there quite some rare cards that when
> used without CL can give a deck a great advantage?
Most of us think not. If you have some specific suggestions, I think lots of
people here would happily discuss them with you.
Fred
Samsman
Could do.
The only thing is even after buying lots of boosters (and the store
runs out of it of cource), and get new ones after a month, because
they are sold out :).
That I don't have enough simple cards (like acrobatics,tribute to the
master)
So that I can build one deck but I don't have the cards for an other
deck,
and I have about 3 diff. celerity decks themes.
So if I needed lets say 10 cards acrobatics x 3 I need 30 and that's
the problem, i don't have them
even when I ask all my friends for it.
Not to say some sabbat rares, if I want more then 4x in a deck (if I
already can get 1). That's a little my problem getting those 4 sabbat
rares.
Grtx Samsman
Thnx For reply. to Every one
X_Zealot
> the problem, i don't have them
> even when I ask all my friends for it.
> Not to say some sabbat rares, if I want more then 4x in a deck (if I
> already can get 1). That's a little my problem getting those 4 sabbat
> rares.
If you need them in 3 different decks then just modularize them and switch
them between the decks between play.
Commments Welcome,
Norman S. Brown, Jr.
XZealot
Archon of the Swamp
mostly harmless
Curevei <cur...@aol.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
20011012133513...@mb-mq.aol.com...
>
> My take on the desirability of NCL is that NCL enables greater deck
creativity.
> However, while the decks created may be interesting, often the particular
> plays they make aren't. In other words, they can be tedious to play
against as
> they do one thing over and over causing interactions between decks to be
> predictable.
That's what I meant. I didn't want to imply that constructing NCL decks is
less of a challenge or less creative. But it seemed to me that it partly
leads to decks that are pretty boring to play against. Is this an
observation other people can confirm? Does NCL result in more predictable
games?
.
Flux
> > the problem, i don't have them
> > even when I ask all my friends for it.
> > Not to say some sabbat rares, if I want more then 4x in a deck (if I
> > already can get 1). That's a little my problem getting those 4 sabbat
> > rares.
>
> If you need them in 3 different decks then just modularize them and switch
> them between the decks between play.
Even better, you can just substitute by similar cards. Instead of 10
Acrobatics, why not use 5 Acrobatics, 3 Stutter-Step and 2 Side Strike (or
some such variation, depending on what you need).
I don't have that many cards myself (I doubt I have more than 3 copies of
any non-Starter rare, I don't trade much), but I still manage to have quite
a few decks built by using whatever cards I do have.
Flux
mostly harmless
LSJ <vte...@white-wolf.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
3BC709B3...@white-wolf.com...
> mostly harmless wrote:
> > Now I would be interested to hear from people who played with and
without
> > CL, if this observation is actually correct or if it was just
coinsidence.
> > Does playing without CL result in less creative deck building or in oder
> > words: do decks that are build around many copies of just a few cards
get
> > the advantage?
>
> Those two ideas are not the same.
>
> Many copies of the same few cards != less creative.
>
> The NL (no limit) side would argue that 4CL forces a homogenized
environment
> (every combat deck packs 4 Bum's Rushes, 4 Ambushes, etc.), which they
(the
> NL side) would consider "less creative". Finding the proper ratios of
cards
> vs. simply putting 4 copies of each useful (or nearly useful) card.
I think I might have expressed myself rather poorly. I didn't actually mean
that the deck construction process itself would be less creative or
challenging. My concern was that it could easily lead to decks that aren't
very interesting to play (against) because they just do whatver they do with
the same cars over and over again. And those decks would probably be quite
successful.
> > Another reason for us keeping the CL is that it would seem that NCL
gives
> > players with more cards an unfair advantage. Sure there are quite a lot
of
> > good common cars, but there are some powerful rare cards (like e.g.
Shotgun
> > Ritual or Freak Drive) that players with a lower budget have a hard time
> > obtaining in higher quantity.
>
> The NL side would say that 4CL gives players with more cards an unfair
> advantage. The cards are designed so that the commons are the most widely
> useful - the player with few cards who has 12 Majesties but only 1
Catatonic
> Fear can only play 5 of those, as opposed to Mr. Suitcase who can play
> with 4 of each. Many more examples of this exist (where a rare can be
> substituted for a closely-related common).
You've got a point there. But since you mentioned Majesty, this is one of
the cards that I would think can work to great advantage in a NCL
environment as it enables one to just act, end combat and untap until there
aren't any blockers left. Especially since the NRA rule isn't part of the
standard rulebook. Thinking about other similar cars (someone mentioned
Freak Drive, Form of Mist would be another example) that I think can easily
become unbalanced under the standard rules, I wonder why the NRA rule isn't
included in the normal rules?
Michael
mostly harmless
Frederick Scott <fre...@netcom.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
3BC74C38...@netcom.com...
> mostly harmless wrote:
> > Another reason for us keeping the CL is that it would seem that NCL
gives
> > players with more cards an unfair advantage. Sure there are quite a lot
of
> > good common cars, but there are some powerful rare cards (like e.g.
Shotgun
> > Ritual or Freak Drive) that players with a lower budget have a hard time
> > obtaining in higher quantity.
>
> I've been in a position at times to obtain whatever rare cards I may need
and
> you know, it doesn't help beyond a certain point. If you have any great
ideas
> for what "powerful rare cards" I can just go get and make some killer NCL
deck
> with them, please let me know. I really need the help! :)
Well Freak drive under normal rules (without NRA) is definitely one of them.
I can think of some other (uncommon) cards that could give players a great
advantage, without ever having played such decks before I should add
(because we play 4CL).
For example, a deck full of Form of Mist (used at superior) enables you to
just circumvent combat until noone is able to block anymore (and NRA doesn't
prevent this, since you only need to take one action to do it).
Or a stealth deck with a large amount of Minion Taps and 5th Traditions for
supreme blood support.
It makes me wonder if not at least *some* cards should be limited.
> By the way, I think a lot of people will dispute that Shotgun Ritual is
that
> good of a card. If you look at the aggregate cost you pay for the SR plus
any
> kind of first round Thaumaturgy strikes that would normally be limited to
the
> second round, I think you'll find that comparable first round strikes that
do
> the same amount and type of damage in a single card wind up being easier
to use.
> I haven't rigorously analyzed this but my cursory examination seemed to
show
> this.
Could be. Since I only have one Shotgun Ritual in my collection I never
actually tried to build a deck around it, but I've seen it used and even in
a 4CL environment it resulted in quite devastating effects. Of course it
could be that part of that was due to luck or coincidence.
> As for Freak Drive, much though I like them, I have trouble using very
many of
> them in any Fortitude deck I've ever invented. One question: are you are
of the
> No-Repeat-Action rule for constructed deck tournaments? Without this
rule, it's
> possible to use a large number of Freak Drives (combined with say, 5th
Traditions
> to replenish blood levels) to execute various kinds of unbalanced
strategies.
Which makes me wonder why NRA isn't part of the rulebook. I think in the the
normal NCL environment it probably should be.
Michael
Frederick Scott
>
> Frederick Scott <fre...@netcom.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
> 3BC74C38...@netcom.com...
> > and you know, it doesn't help beyond a certain point. If you have any
> > great ideas for what "powerful rare cards" I can just go get and make
> > some killer NCL deck with them, please let me know. I really need the
> > help! :)
>
> Well Freak drive under normal rules (without NRA) is definitely one of them.
Well, I'm not going to count that since NRA is a rule specifically created to
maintain necessary game balance. Bickering about whether it ought to be in
the game rules instead of being just a constructed tournament rule aside,
there's no point in arguing about whether the rules are balanced if you ignore
the set of rules that were created with that end in mind.
> I can think of some other (uncommon) cards that could give players a great
> advantage, without ever having played such decks before I should add
> (because we play 4CL).
>
> For example, a deck full of Form of Mist (used at superior) enables you to
> just circumvent combat until noone is able to block anymore (and NRA doesn't
> prevent this, since you only need to take one action to do it).
True, but a single WwEF or Forced Awakening works fine. If the initial block
was taken by a minion that was made available by such a play, then the blocker
need only increase his intercept to match the new stealth and block again.
And there's also all the usual prevention for S:CE. Form of Mist is a good
card but hardly a guarantee of victory. And protean is a discipline which is
seldom found in minions which can benefit greatly from the stealth and combat-
avoidance.
> Or a stealth deck with a large amount of Minion Taps and 5th Traditions for
> supreme blood support.
Minion Taps are commons. Fifth Traditions are nasty, albeit limited to Princes.
> It makes me wonder if not at least *some* cards should be limited.
Limiting, as with restricted cards in Magic, is basically an admission that you
have a problem with a card. To the extent that it reduces one's ability to
rely on powerful combos, it may be a reasonable concept. To limit a card which
is overpowered in and of itself, it's a self-contradiction which reduces the
game to luck of the draw of "good cards". Not that luck of the draw isn't a
factor anyway, I'd prefer not to make the situation any worse. Unless the
game is truly being dominated by the effects of a card (and I suppose Fifth
Tradition is probably as close a card as any in the game, for what it's
worth), I think it's better to allow all players to use the card as much as they
want. And if they get handjammed with the card, they have only themselves to
blame.
> > By the way, I think a lot of people will dispute that Shotgun Ritual is
> > that good of a card. If you look at the aggregate cost you pay for the SR
> > plus any kind of first round Thaumaturgy strikes that would normally be
> > limited to the second round, I think you'll find that comparable first
> > round strikes that do the same amount and type of damage in a single card
> > wind up being easier to use. I haven't rigorously analyzed this but my
> > cursory examination seemed to show this.
>
> Could be. Since I only have one Shotgun Ritual in my collection I never
> actually tried to build a deck around it, but I've seen it used and even in
> a 4CL environment it resulted in quite devastating effects. Of course it
> could be that part of that was due to luck or coincidence.
Frequently in CCGs, you'll run into a less-experienced player who believes
some rather mediocre card or another is insanely powerful. Usually, it's just
a question of his not having the experience or the careful analysis of the
downside of such a card. (I'll never forget seeing someone on a Magic newsgroup
rave and rave about Diamond Valley in a post in one of the early years.) I
think that's what we're dealing with in the original poster, particularly WRT
lack of experience in playing in an NCL environment.
> > As for Freak Drive, much though I like them, I have trouble using very
> > many of them in any Fortitude deck I've ever invented. One question: are
> > you are of the No-Repeat-Action rule for constructed deck tournaments?
> > Without this rule, it's possible to use a large number of Freak Drives
> > (combined with say, 5th Traditions to replenish blood levels) to execute
> > various kinds of unbalanced strategies.
>
> Which makes me wonder why NRA isn't part of the rulebook. I think in the the
> normal NCL environment it probably should be.
I agree. From Scott's responses to this point in a different thread, it sounds
as if there's some concern about the complexity it would cause to the rulebook,
which is also the document from which newer players have to learn the game.
Fred
James Coupe
<mostlyh...@chello.atNOSPAM!> writes
>That's what I meant. I didn't want to imply that constructing NCL decks is
>less of a challenge or less creative. But it seemed to me that it partly
>leads to decks that are pretty boring to play against. Is this an
>observation other people can confirm? Does NCL result in more predictable
>games?
That depends. NCL with toolbox results in some very non-predictable
games.
James Coupe
<fre...@netcom.com> writes
>Unless the
>game is truly being dominated by the effects of a card (and I suppose Fifth
>Tradition is probably as close a card as any in the game, for what it's
>worth), I think it's better to allow all players to use the card as much as they
>want. And if they get handjammed with the card, they have only themselves to
>blame.
Personally, I think I'd rather see some sect neutral ways of rewarding
big vampire players than a cut to Fifth Tradition, either in Bloodlines
or in the Camarilla base set. IMO, Fifth isn't *that* powerful - it's
just the next obvious candidate once previous obvious cards have been
fixed. What is powerful about fifth is that it's unique to the
Camarilla.
Possibly even a reverse tradition - cannot be used by a vampire who is
Prince or Justicar, with a capacity requirement.
Freedom from Bureaucracy
Action
+1 stealth
2 blood
Requires a vampire who is above 6 capacity who is not a Prince or
Justicar.
Put this card on the acting vampire. At the start of its controller's
next minion phase (before mandatory actions are taken), burn this card;
this vampire then gains enough blood from the blood bank to take it up
to capacity. The vampire with this card cannot cast votes during
referenda.
(Out of turn Malkavian decks. Oh, the horror.... *fades to black*)
Peter D Bakija
>>That's what I meant. I didn't want to imply that constructing NCL decks is
less of a challenge or less creative. But it seemed to me that it partly
leads to decks that are pretty boring to play against.>>
Boring to play against is a completely subjective statement--what is boring to
you is probably a good game to me. Thus, you can't really look as "boring" as
an objective result of playing the game by the rules.
I play in a pretty solid playgroup that really likes to push the game, and
makes lots of different decks all the time. When I make my decks, they are
generally pretty focused--my most obvious example is my Rush deck that does
nothing but Bum's Rush and kill opposing vampires. Every action. It doesn't
block. It has no intercept. No votes. No untap. Limited pool gain. Just lots
and lots of killing. Every action I take is generally a Bum's Rush followed by
the torporization of some vampire, until it becomes a good idea to bleed
someone.
Might this be considered "boring" by someone? Probably, but so what? It wins
sometimes, it looses sometimes. Where the interest comes for me is in the
strategic interaction between decks. I don't play VTES to see lots of different
cards (I've seen them all already) or funny card combos (while I certainly
appreciate them, they are generally too tenuous to actually play around). I
play to see how deck strategy "A" does against deck strategy "B". How does my
Rush deck do against a Stealth and Bleed deck? How about a weenie Presence
bleed deck? Or a Ventrue Vote deck? The individual actions of my opponent's
vampires aren't the focus of the games I play--it is about the large picture.
The tactics are just tactics. If every action my prey takes is a 5th Tradition
(after being Minion Tapped), I am completely unconcerned with whether or not
this is "boring". I am concerned with how the strategic aspect (a vast pool
gain deck) will affect whatever deck I am playing. I build decks to be
consistient and fairly focused. Other than my Rush deck, I am curently playing
a Minion Tap/FOR/Freak Drive/Bleed deck and a Toreador Tap and Bleed deck. They
both are fairly focused and generally take the same actions over and over
again. There are few, if any, surprises in these decks. Sometimes they win, and
sometimes they lose. Just like any other deck.
>>Is this an observation other people can confirm? Does NCL result in more
predictable games?>>
More predictable games? Possibly, in that if I am playing a deck with a focused
strategy and my prey is also playing a focused strategy, I generally know if my
deck will do well or not against my prey's deck, but there are still countless
other interactions to affect the outcome--luck, my predator, his prey, table
talk, politics, whatever. Nothing is ever certain, even with hyper focused
decks.
Peter D Bakija
PD...@aol.com
http://www.geocities.com/bakija6
"The Ramones are more important than the Solar System."
-Sean Finnerty
James Coupe
<mostlyh...@chello.atNOSPAM!> writes
>I think I might have expressed myself rather poorly. I didn't actually mean
>that the deck construction process itself would be less creative or
>challenging. My concern was that it could easily lead to decks that aren't
>very interesting to play (against) because they just do whatver they do with
>the same cars over and over again. And those decks would probably be quite
>successful.
A deck with focus will, by default, leave itself with many ways of being
attacked by a creative, innovative player with a strong deck.
Samsman
Thats why I made this topic we manage to do every game with 4 cards
limit, even with this limit we have not enough of some cards. and
after buying so many booster boxes and having every starter, I find it
very fustrating. that I still only have 3 catonic fears.
but its the same with flux we manage to have quite good decks and even
fun decks who can compete (even if they are stealth decks who may not
bleed at stealth untill 2 players remain.)
Grtx Samsman
Kevin M.
"mostly harmless" <mostlyh...@chello.atNOSPAM!> wrote in message
news:N6ey7.70846$Pg3.1...@news.chello.at...
Why not try to play NCL for a few weeks (or show up at a sanctioned tournament
to watch the decks play out) and see what happens? In theory -- and since you
haven't tried NCL, you are talking about theory here -- NCL decks aren't very
interesting to play or play against, but in reality that doesn't wash.
With NCL, you will be able to make an infinite amount of decks, rather than a
finite amount of decks, and I've never understood why players would choose to
cripple themselves rather than being able to run free. <sigh>
> > > Another reason for us keeping the CL is that it would seem that NCL
> gives
> > > players with more cards an unfair advantage. Sure there are quite a lot
> of
> > > good common cars, but there are some powerful rare cards (like e.g.
> Shotgun
> > > Ritual or Freak Drive) that players with a lower budget have a hard time
> > > obtaining in higher quantity.
> >
> > The NL side would say that 4CL gives players with more cards an unfair
> > advantage. The cards are designed so that the commons are the most widely
> > useful - the player with few cards who has 12 Majesties but only 1
> Catatonic
> > Fear can only play 5 of those, as opposed to Mr. Suitcase who can play
> > with 4 of each. Many more examples of this exist (where a rare can be
> > substituted for a closely-related common).
>
> You've got a point there. But since you mentioned Majesty, this is one of
> the cards that I would think can work to great advantage in a NCL
> environment as it enables one to just act, end combat and untap until there
> aren't any blockers left. Especially since the NRA rule isn't part of the
> standard rulebook.
It doesn't work this way in reality, ESPECIALLY against IG combat decks, which
you should have 1 or 2 of in your group so that people don't get too cocky with
S:CE. Also, there must be a dozen cards that restart combat, which "get around"
S:CE. Either the S:CE player always has a S:CE, which means his deck will never
oust its prey -- which means that the deck stinks and should be modified -- or
the deck runs the proper amount of S:CE (or too few) and you will eventually be
able to run him out, and then kick his butt.
> Thinking about other similar cars (someone mentioned
> Freak Drive, Form of Mist would be another example) that I think can easily
> become unbalanced under the standard rules, I wonder why the NRA rule isn't
> included in the normal rules?
Let's talk about your definition of "can easily become unbalanced" before you
start assuming that these cards can become unbalanced.
>
> Michael
>
Kevin M., Prince of Madison, WI
(remove PLEASENOSPAMME for direct reply)
"Know your enemy, and know yourself; in one-thousand battles
you shall never be in peril." -- Sun Tzu, _The_Art_of_War_
"Contentment... Complacency... Catastrophe!" -- Joseph Chevalier
....salem christ....
> mostly harmless wrote:
[snip]
> >
> > For example, a deck full of Form of Mist (used at superior) enables you to
> > just circumvent combat until noone is able to block anymore (and NRA doesn't
> > prevent this, since you only need to take one action to do it).
>
> True, but a single WwEF or Forced Awakening works fine. If the initial block
> was taken by a minion that was made available by such a play, then the blocker
> need only increase his intercept to match the new stealth and block again.
...and let's not forget that superior Form Of Mist counts as an action
modifier, and thus is restricted to being played once per action per minion.
hmm....per minion....
city gangrel, FoM, Mask 1000 Faces....hmmm....
if i hadn't just traded all my masks to a guy who was making a Command of
the Beast deck, i might give it a try....oh yeah, and i only have a few
FoM. oh yeah, and i'd just be better off with no FoM and just lots of Masks.
oh well...
salem.
Andrew S. Davidson
>> Well Freak drive under normal rules (without NRA) is definitely one of them.
>
>Well, I'm not going to count that since NRA is a rule specifically created to
>maintain necessary game balance.
And so is xCL. It's just a matter of choosing which house rule to use.
Andrew
James Coupe
s.net>, Andrew S. Davidson <a...@csi.com> writes
>On Sun, 14 Oct 2001 14:35:44 GMT, Frederick Scott wrote:
>
>>> Well Freak drive under normal rules (without NRA) is definitely one of them.
>>
>>Well, I'm not going to count that since NRA is a rule specifically created to
>>maintain necessary game balance.
>
>And so is xCL.
xCL seriously empowers sneak and bleed decks, relative to the other main
deck archetypes.
How is this creating game balance?
Frederick Scott
Well, the difference would that NRA succeeds and xCL fails. This is because NRA
was created to directly address a specific problem and does exactly that where as
xCL is this wide-ranging shotgun approach that does far more than it needs to to
deal with the problem it's aimed at and it deals with it in the wrong way (restriction).
Actually, when I think about it, I can't say enough about what a lousy way of
solving balance problems it makes to think up something like card limits.
Not that this has a thing to do with the point I was making when I wrote the above,
nor to any of the points to which I was responding. But since you interjected that
particular thought...
Fred
Jason Bell
"Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
> mostly harmless wrote:
>
> > It makes me wonder if not at least *some* cards should be limited.
>
> Limiting, as with restricted cards in Magic, is basically an admission
that you
> have a problem with a card. To the extent that it reduces one's ability
to
> rely on powerful combos, it may be a reasonable concept. To limit a card
which
> is overpowered in and of itself, it's a self-contradiction which reduces
the
> game to luck of the draw of "good cards".
Don't get too high and mighty about Jyhad over Magic.
Jyhad does have restricted cards, they are just restricted
by their play rules instead of their deck-inclusion rules.
Does Jyhad admit that it has problem cards when it restricts
Giant's Blood, Ancient Influence, and Political Stranglehold?
Magic has no such restrictions on how many times a card can
be played in a game by title, as far as I can recall.
Magic's restricted list is actually more fair than the
"only one may be played per game," since Magic does
not have the luck of the draw factor, where only the
player who plays the card first has a chance to play
a card (it is very likely that I won my last game of
Jyhad because I found my Giant's Blood first).
I also doubt Jyhad would have had to invent the
No Repeat Action floor rule if Jyhad had a card
limit (I'm not advocating card limits, but I am
becoming weary of the ridicule being heaped on
Magic by those arguing against XCL).
- Jason Bell
Derek Ray
wrote:
>Don't get too high and mighty about Jyhad over Magic.
>
>Jyhad does have restricted cards, they are just restricted
>by their play rules instead of their deck-inclusion rules.
Restricted by the cards' DESIGN, as opposed to bolt-ons.
>Does Jyhad admit that it has problem cards when it restricts
>Giant's Blood, Ancient Influence, and Political Stranglehold?
Absolutely not. None of the three are problem cards; they operate
exactly as designed, which is that one may be played each game. A
"problem" is generally defined as "not working as designed", or "broken
as designed". All three of these cards work as designed, and are
definitely not broken.
Problem cards are when you need to create a rule (or errata) AFTER
printing to specifically deal with the card. RtI was a problem card.
NRA dealt with a large class of what could be defined as 'problem
cards', but was more realistically just 'mechanic design flaw'.
>Magic has no such restrictions on how many times a card can
>be played in a game by title, as far as I can recall.
There's no need. Magic's designers know that a 4CL is standard for
their game, so they can easily design their effects to be viable under a
4CL.
>Magic's restricted list is actually more fair than the
>"only one may be played per game," since Magic does
>not have the luck of the draw factor, where only the
>player who plays the card first has a chance to play
>a card (it is very likely that I won my last game of
>Jyhad because I found my Giant's Blood first).
Contrariwise: not all decks benefit from inclusion of a Giant's Blood,
Ancient Influence, or Political Stranglehold. And not all decks will be
able to benefit from the card even if they draw it first; they may need
to hang onto it for some time until they CAN benefit.
--
Derek
PEACE, n. In international affairs, a period of cheating between
two periods of fighting.
Kevin M.
"Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com> wrote in message
news:6Nqy7.8695$7W.36...@typhoon.southeast.rr.com...
You ARE joking, right? If you believe that Magic has no "luck of the draw
factor", I'll play you Magic for $50 a game. Seriously, though, all CCGs are
going to have "luck of the draw factor" to some degree.
I had played Magic since it came out practically, and there have been about a
dozen 1st-turn-kill decks, where "luck of the draw factor" was absolutely
critical. I've played some of these decks, in tournaments, and they are
repetitive and abusive to the extreme.
> I also doubt Jyhad would have had to invent the
> No Repeat Action floor rule if Jyhad had a card
> limit (I'm not advocating card limits, but I am
> becoming weary of the ridicule being heaped on
> Magic by those arguing against XCL).
Anyone who has been doing that has been doing it in error, IMHO. It is
important to remember that Magic was designed with a 4CL, while Jyhad was
designed -- by the same guy -- with NCL.
>
> - Jason Bell
Frederick Scott
>
> "Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
> > mostly harmless wrote:
> >
> > > It makes me wonder if not at least *some* cards should be limited.
> >
> > Limiting, as with restricted cards in Magic, is basically an admission
> > that you have a problem with a card. To the extent that it reduces
> > one's ability to rely on powerful combos, it may be a reasonable
> > concept. To limit a card which is overpowered in and of itself,
> > it's a self-contradiction which reduces the game to luck of the draw
> > of "good cards".
>
> Don't get too high and mighty about Jyhad over Magic.
It's not about Jyhad vs. Magic. It's about restriction being a stupid
way to deal with cards being overpowered, which is true no matter what
game it's being used with.
> Jyhad does have restricted cards, they are just restricted
> by their play rules instead of their deck-inclusion rules.
> Does Jyhad admit that it has problem cards when it restricts
> Giant's Blood, Ancient Influence, and Political Stranglehold?
Clearly - when I'm complaining about restriction affecting luck-of-the-
draw influences on the game - I'm not talking about and don't care how
many times a card can be _used_. If you want to throw multiple copies
of a card in your deck which can only be _used_ once or for which you can
keep only a single copy on the table, go to town. The implications of
that are yours to determine whether they're worthwhile or not.
I agree that uniqueness or the one-time-play rules do tend to encourage
only keeping a small number of copies of a card in your deck and if you're
influenced by such considerations then luck-of-the-draw is going to make
a difference. But you wouldn't be influenced by it if it made that _much_
of a difference. For instance, I have a number of different clan decks
with stealth locations where I feel like drawing the location is pretty
important. So I throw 3-5 copies of the location in the deck rather than
only one. As a result, I usually draw the card by the time it's important.
The extra copies are easy enough to discard if I don't need them.
> Magic has no such restrictions on how many times a card can
> be played in a game by title, as far as I can recall.
>
> Magic's restricted list is actually more fair than the
> "only one may be played per game," since Magic does
> not have the luck of the draw factor, where only the
> player who plays the card first has a chance to play
> a card (it is very likely that I won my last game of
> Jyhad because I found my Giant's Blood first).
I don't see how you can come to this conclusion. Uniqueness is completely
fair about who draws the card first vs. second. Agreed, if you draw a
Giant's Blood after your opponent does, you're screwed. But again, if that
Giant's Blood were all that important to you, you'd play with multiple copies.
It's a minor thing.
Not so Magic! Not at all. Most of those things on the restricted list are
much more important than managing to be the guy who played the Giant's Blood
first. That's how they wound up on the restricted list in the first place!
And I don't care that both players _CAN_ play a Time Walk in the same game.
The fact is, you usually don't most of your cards in most games. It's unusual
for either player to draw the card and a huge luck swing if they do. It's
far more unusual for both players to do so. So the "fair" thing you're
talking about is highly unusual.
> I also doubt Jyhad would have had to invent the
> No Repeat Action floor rule if Jyhad had a card
> limit (I'm not advocating card limits, but I am
> becoming weary of the ridicule being heaped on
> Magic by those arguing against XCL).
Don't get me wrong. For the game being the first of it's kind, Magic was
an incredible invention and it's still a damn good game. What I'm heaping
ridicule on is the concept of restriction, not the game of Magic. It was
a bad idea when it was invented, somebody's half-assed compromise to keep
from having to face the music when players couldn't use cards they'd paid
a ton of money for on the open market. And nothing's changed. It's still
a bad idea. Case closed.
Fred
Jason Bell
"Derek Ray" <lor...@yah00.com> wrote
> On Mon, 15 Oct 2001 01:15:46 GMT, "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >Don't get too high and mighty about Jyhad over Magic.
> >
> >Jyhad does have restricted cards, they are just restricted
> >by their play rules instead of their deck-inclusion rules.
>
> Restricted by the cards' DESIGN, as opposed to bolt-ons.
>
> >Does Jyhad admit that it has problem cards when it restricts
> >Giant's Blood, Ancient Influence, and Political Stranglehold?
>
> Absolutely not. None of the three are problem cards;
Well then, if you take this tack, I suppose you'll have to
accept Freak Drive as a "problem card," since it required
the "bolt on" of the NRA floor rule. I suppose nearly all
the same-turn untap cards would be under this umbrella.
And once again, don't get high and mighty about Jyhad's
DESIGN superiority over Magic, considering the "bolt on's"
that had to be added to make the game work, the staggering
number of changes to card texts and errata, and its own
banned list.
Again, it is just annoying to me the abuse that Magic takes
from this newsgroup about its 4 card limit (a mechanism
that works very well for Magic), its restricted list
(which is duplicated in a more restrictive way by several
Jyhad cards), and any number of other reasons.
- Jason Bell
Jason Bell
"Kevin M." <kjme...@PLEASENOSPAMMEhome.com> wrote
>
> > Magic's restricted list is actually more fair than the
> > "only one may be played per game," since Magic does
> > not have the luck of the draw factor, where only the
> > player who plays the card first has a chance to play
> > a card (it is very likely that I won my last game of
> > Jyhad because I found my Giant's Blood first).
>
> You ARE joking, right? If you believe that Magic has no "luck of the draw
> factor", I'll play you Magic for $50 a game. Seriously, though, all CCGs
are
> going to have "luck of the draw factor" to some degree.
Perhaps I was insufficiently clear.
The luck of the draw factor I was referring to was one where
one player's luck of finding his restricted card prevents the
other player from ever playing the same card.
All card games that I know of have varying degrees of
"luck of the draw."
Hey, while we're here, I'd like to heap some abuse on the
uniqueness of vampires. I understand why the same player
shouldn't be able to play with 2 of the same vampire, but
that two players can randomly be caught in a contesting
situation across the table, next to one another, but in
all cases completely randomly is one of this game's
more irritating features.
> > I also doubt Jyhad would have had to invent the
> > No Repeat Action floor rule if Jyhad had a card
> > limit (I'm not advocating card limits, but I am
> > becoming weary of the ridicule being heaped on
> > Magic by those arguing against XCL).
>
> Anyone who has been doing that has been doing it in error, IMHO. It is
> important to remember that Magic was designed with a 4CL, while Jyhad was
> designed -- by the same guy -- with NCL.
Not exactly (though I agree with the sentiment).
Alpha and Beta Magic were not designed with a 4CL, and perhaps
even Arabian Nights were available before the 4CL rule was
installed. They were, however, designed with a rarity limit,
the mistaken notion that the rare cards would be less available
and therefore less used in each deck. But otherwise you are correct,
the vast majority of Magic cards were designed with the
understanding that only 4 copies would be available for any deck.
- Jason Bell
Jason Bell
"Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
> Jason Bell wrote:
> >
> > "Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
> > > mostly harmless wrote:
> > >
> > > > It makes me wonder if not at least *some* cards should be limited.
> > >
> > > Limiting, as with restricted cards in Magic, is basically an admission
> > > that you have a problem with a card. To the extent that it reduces
> > > one's ability to rely on powerful combos, it may be a reasonable
> > > concept. To limit a card which is overpowered in and of itself,
> > > it's a self-contradiction which reduces the game to luck of the draw
> > > of "good cards".
> >
> > Don't get too high and mighty about Jyhad over Magic.
>
> It's not about Jyhad vs. Magic. It's about restriction being a stupid
> way to deal with cards being overpowered, which is true no matter what
> game it's being used with.
I strongly disagree with this sentiment.
- Jason Bell
James Coupe
<Jason...@mail.com> writes
>> It's not about Jyhad vs. Magic. It's about restriction being a stupid
>> way to deal with cards being overpowered, which is true no matter what
>> game it's being used with.
>
>I strongly disagree with this sentiment.
If card is over-powered to an abusive level, making it completely luck
of the draw (rather than careful deck crafting) as to whether you get it
or not does not fix it - it simply makes it less common that the abusive
situation will occur. When it occurs, it will still be entirely
abusive.
Derek Ray
wrote:
>"Derek Ray" <lor...@yah00.com> wrote
>> On Mon, 15 Oct 2001 01:15:46 GMT, "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com>
>> wrote:
>> >Does Jyhad admit that it has problem cards when it restricts
>> >Giant's Blood, Ancient Influence, and Political Stranglehold?
>>
>> Absolutely not. None of the three are problem cards;
>
>Well then, if you take this tack, I suppose you'll have to
>accept Freak Drive as a "problem card," since it required
>the "bolt on" of the NRA floor rule. I suppose nearly all
>the same-turn untap cards would be under this umbrella.
Correct. Freak Drive, Majesty, and Earth Meld were the three 'problem
cards'. The restriction on Giant's Blood, however, is a design
decision; it allows a huge effect to take place for free during one's
Master phase without being susceptible to just putting 4 or X of Giant's
Blood in your deck and reloading your vamps constantly. (Note that a
card limit wouldn't restrict the effect enough.)
>And once again, don't get high and mighty about Jyhad's
>DESIGN superiority over Magic, considering the "bolt on's"
>that had to be added to make the game work, the staggering
>number of changes to card texts and errata, and its own
>banned list.
What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
*ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
permanently-fucked cards. Several of which were only for ante anyway,
and the current Mind Rape is still pretty damn good, just a lot
different. As opposed to how many on the restricted lists?
I don't claim that Jyhad was any better designed than Magic; they both
had some major flaws straight up. But I do think that card limits and a
huge-ass restricted list is a VERY poor way to fix problems. Errata is
painful, but nothing will ever be perfect the first time.
>Again, it is just annoying to me the abuse that Magic takes
>from this newsgroup about its 4 card limit (a mechanism
>that works very well for Magic), its restricted list
>(which is duplicated in a more restrictive way by several
>Jyhad cards), and any number of other reasons.
It's NOTICEABLY different to print a card with an inherent restriction,
as opposed to coming along and slapping it on a 'restricted' list later.
No duplication has taken place.
Actually, I generally give Magic abuse where it deserves: the
composition of its overall playerbase and the severe wallet-hoovering
approach that WotC takes towards that same playerbase.
Halcyan 2
>>DESIGN superiority over Magic, considering the "bolt on's"
>>that had to be added to make the game work, the staggering
>>number of changes to card texts and errata, and its own
>>banned list.
>
>What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
>that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
>*ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
>that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
>permanently-fucked cards. Several of which were only for ante anyway,
>and the current Mind Rape is still pretty damn good, just a lot
>different. As opposed to how many on the restricted lists?
I love Jyhad/VTES the way it is (and I don't mind the errata).
Speaking of "nuclear-strike" errata, besides the 7 banned cards and you also
listed Tomb of Ramses and Mind Rape.
Hmmm...there's Legacy of Pander (which has been effectively neutered now as
well). I'm also tempted to include Blood of the Cobra in there as well.
Halcyan 2
Sten During
>
>
> Speaking of "nuclear-strike" errata, besides the 7 banned cards and you also
> listed Tomb of Ramses and Mind Rape.
>
> Hmmm...there's Legacy of Pander (which has been effectively neutered now as
> well). I'm also tempted to include Blood of the Cobra in there as well.
>
> Halcyan 2
Well, add Fame to that list as well. No more unblockable Force of Will with an
added three + one pool-loss :)
Sten
--
NetGuide Scandinavia AB http://www.netg.se/
Tankegangen 4 in...@netg.se
417 56 Goteborg Phone:+46 - (0)31 - 50 79 45
Sweden Fax: +46 - (0)31 - 50 79 39
Derek Ray
>Halcyan 2 wrote:
>
>> Speaking of "nuclear-strike" errata, besides the 7 banned cards and you also
>> listed Tomb of Ramses and Mind Rape.
>>
>> Hmmm...there's Legacy of Pander (which has been effectively neutered now as
>> well). I'm also tempted to include Blood of the Cobra in there as well.
>
>Well, add Fame to that list as well. No more unblockable Force of Will with an
>added three + one pool-loss :)
No no no no. Not Fame. It wasn't rare, the errata didn't change its
function THAT much, and while the errata did destroy a number of decks
based around Fame, it also opened up a whole bunch of other decks.
Anyone who traded for lots of Fame (for some reason; I got plenty just
by opening boosters) can still be happy they did.
When I say "nuclear strike" errata, I mean the kind that totally,
TOTALLY changes the way the card works, and significantly alters the
demand for the card itself. Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and LoP all got
nuked (although Mind Rape is still worth 6 of in a deck). Return to
Innocence got nuked too, but then it got banned (which was just as well)
so it was already on the list.
Fame is doing just fine.
mostly harmless
Kevin M. <kjme...@PLEASENOSPAMMEhome.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
ngry7.61610$My2.33...@news1.mntp1.il.home.com...
> Why not try to play NCL for a few weeks
I've been suggesting this in my playgroup a couple of times, but so far the
response has been mostly negative. So we haven't tried it yet. That's one of
the reasons I psoted here and asked about other players experiences with
both CL and NCL game environments.
Thanks to everybody for the comments.
> (or show up at a sanctioned tournament
> to watch the decks play out) and see what happens?
I might actually do that.
> > Thinking about other similar cars (someone mentioned
> > Freak Drive, Form of Mist would be another example) that I think can
easily
> > become unbalanced under the standard rules, I wonder why the NRA rule
isn't
> > included in the normal rules?
>
> Let's talk about your definition of "can easily become unbalanced" before
you
> start assuming that these cards can become unbalanced.
When I said unbalanced I meant that certain cards used without limitation
could give a player an advantage over many other deck strategies. I had some
examples, however, since someone pointed out to me that Form of Mist is an
action modifier that can only be used once per action and Freak Drives don't
enable you to do the same action again under NRA, I running out of specific
examples and can only guess that there might be other cards (Fifth
Tradition/Minion Tap probably could be an abusive combo if it can be used
unlimited times in a deck)
Derek Ray
<mostlyh...@chello.atNOSPAM!> wrote:
>Kevin M. <kjme...@PLEASENOSPAMMEhome.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
>ngry7.61610$My2.33...@news1.mntp1.il.home.com...
>
>> Why not try to play NCL for a few weeks
>
>I've been suggesting this in my playgroup a couple of times, but so far the
>response has been mostly negative. So we haven't tried it yet. That's one of
>the reasons I psoted here and asked about other players experiences with
>both CL and NCL game environments.
Get them to nail down their reasons for playing with a CL. "it stops
stealth bleed" and "it stops boring, repetitive decks" are usually the
two you'll get.
Now bring a Malk S&B deck, with 4 of each DOM bleed card/modifier, and 4
of each OBF modifier. Tweak to taste. It should sweep, erasing the
first argument.
Then bring a weenie PRE bleed deck, with 4 of every PRE bleed card, 4
Marijava Ghouls, and 4 of every S:CE card. After THIS sweeps, you've
knocked the legs out from under the second argument, and can go on to
the business of getting everyone to convert to NCL.
Warning: you had better know your group really well before trying this.
Some people don't take well to object lessons, and it's never good to
prove a point at the expense of everyone hating you.[0]
>When I said unbalanced I meant that certain cards used without limitation
>could give a player an advantage over many other deck strategies. I had some
Not really. There are counters to everything. If someone uses Form of
Mist constantly to get past your blockers, quit blocking and watch him
start discarding FoM rapidly. Or play IG and knock his vampires' blocks
off. Or just play with plenty of Wakes and intercept, and block AGAIN.
>examples, however, since someone pointed out to me that Form of Mist is an
>action modifier that can only be used once per action and Freak Drives don't
>enable you to do the same action again under NRA, I running out of specific
>examples and can only guess that there might be other cards (Fifth
>Tradition/Minion Tap probably could be an abusive combo if it can be used
>unlimited times in a deck)
It takes a lot of work to support a pure Minion Tap/5th deck.
The first problem: +1 intercept shuts it down.
"So play the Nosferatu": now how will you oust your prey? It's
possible, but you have to build a Nossie vote deck well, since you don't
have Presence.
"So play the Malkavians": now how will you keep from getting your ass
kicked by the first combat deck to Rush you? It's possible, again, but
there's only so much Obedience out there.
"So play the Gangrel": now you're back to the "how to oust your prey?"
problem, except the Nossies are easier to build a vote deck with. d'oh!
"Fuck it, play the Brujah": well, you can oust your prey and kick
everyone's ass, and +1 intercept shuts you down...
Full circle.
James Coupe
<mostlyh...@chello.atNOSPAM!> writes
>I've been suggesting this in my playgroup a couple of times, but so far the
>response has been mostly negative.
Are these "We don't want to" negatives or "But NL means...." negatives?
There are many facets of NL rules that don't click into place properly
under xCL - the limitations on action modifiers, the limitations on
reaction cards and so on - which xCL players simply miss as balancing
factors. Under xCL, if you have two Lost in Crowds in your hand and can
only play one on the action (with no other stealth), it's a bit of bad
luck. Oh well. Under NL, that may be a facet of bad deck construction,
with improper card balances.
What may be useful is taking any of the posts/threads you find back up
your points on NL vs xCL, printing them out and just letting other
people read them themselves.
mostly harmless
Peter D Bakija <pd...@aol.comANTISPAM> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
20011014114214...@mb-mu.aol.com...
> Mostly Harmless wrote:
> >>That's what I meant. I didn't want to imply that constructing NCL decks
is
> less of a challenge or less creative. But it seemed to me that it partly
> leads to decks that are pretty boring to play against.>>
>
> Boring to play against is a completely subjective statement--what is
boring to
> you is probably a good game to me.
True.
[...]
> >>Is this an observation other people can confirm? Does NCL result in more
> predictable games?>>
>
> More predictable games? Possibly, in that if I am playing a deck with a
focused
> strategy and my prey is also playing a focused strategy, I generally know
if my
> deck will do well or not against my prey's deck, but there are still
countless
> other interactions to affect the outcome--luck, my predator, his prey,
table
> talk, politics, whatever. Nothing is ever certain, even with hyper focused
> decks.
My concern was that certain types of tsuch 'hyper focused' decks would get
an advantage over the majority of other deck strategies thus resulting in
players sticking to such decks, which I (and this is, as you correctly
pointed out, merely and utterly subjective) find rather boring. I often like
to play decks that concentrate on one strategy but also have a little bit of
everything in them. Now I could imagine that such toolbox oriented decks
would suceed less often in a NCL environment.
mostly harmless
....salem christ.... <s940...@bohm.anu.edu.au> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
Pine.SOL.3.90.1011015201322.7288A-100000@bohm...
> On Sun, 14 Oct 2001, Frederick Scott wrote:
>
> > mostly harmless wrote:
> [snip]
> > >
> > > For example, a deck full of Form of Mist (used at superior) enables
you to
> > > just circumvent combat until noone is able to block anymore (and NRA
doesn't
> > > prevent this, since you only need to take one action to do it).
> >
> > True, but a single WwEF or Forced Awakening works fine. If the initial
block
> > was taken by a minion that was made available by such a play, then the
blocker
> > need only increase his intercept to match the new stealth and block
again.
>
> ...and let's not forget that superior Form Of Mist counts as an action
> modifier, and thus is restricted to being played once per action per
minion.
>
Oops, I hadn't thought of that. Takes the wind out if the sails of my
example, I guess.
James Coupe
<mostlyh...@chello.atNOSPAM!> writes
>My concern was that certain types of tsuch 'hyper focused' decks would get
>an advantage over the majority of other deck strategies thus resulting in
>players sticking to such decks,
Why would they? You will leave yourself completely open to a number of
weaknesses which can be exploited. A Brujah cel/pot deck is completely
floored by relatively large amounts of damage prevention (which doesn't
have to be that much in the whole deck, really).
> which I (and this is, as you correctly
>pointed out, merely and utterly subjective) find rather boring. I often like
>to play decks that concentrate on one strategy but also have a little bit of
>everything in them.
This works extremely well.
>Now I could imagine that such toolbox oriented decks
>would suceed less often in a NCL environment.
See Britain.
Kevin M.
"Derek Ray" <lor...@yah00.com> wrote in message
news:ua9nsts79980onc62...@4ax.com...
Rutor's Hand? Ritual of the Bitter Rose? Of Noble Blood? Heck, even the
change made to 2nd Tradition was significant.
> Several of which were only for ante anyway,
> and the current Mind Rape is still pretty damn good, just a lot
> different. As opposed to how many on the restricted lists?
>
> I don't claim that Jyhad was any better designed than Magic; they both
> had some major flaws straight up. But I do think that card limits and a
> huge-ass restricted list is a VERY poor way to fix problems. Errata is
> painful, but nothing will ever be perfect the first time.
>
> >Again, it is just annoying to me the abuse that Magic takes
> >from this newsgroup about its 4 card limit (a mechanism
> >that works very well for Magic), its restricted list
> >(which is duplicated in a more restrictive way by several
> >Jyhad cards), and any number of other reasons.
>
> It's NOTICEABLY different to print a card with an inherent restriction,
> as opposed to coming along and slapping it on a 'restricted' list later.
> No duplication has taken place.
>
> Actually, I generally give Magic abuse where it deserves: the
> composition of its overall playerbase and the severe wallet-hoovering
> approach that WotC takes towards that same playerbase.
>
> --
> Derek
>
> PEACE, n. In international affairs, a period of cheating between
> two periods of fighting.
Kevin M., Prince of Madison, WI
LSJ
> > What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
> > that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
> > *ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
> > that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
>
> Rutor's Hand? Ritual of the Bitter Rose? Of Noble Blood? Heck, even the
> change made to 2nd Tradition was significant.
?
Ritual of the Bitter Rose's power is no less now than when originally printed
(nor any less than any given printing).
Second Tradition is no less powerful now than ever.
Rutor's Hand is mildly weakened from its original printing by the "only one"
clause, but it is strengthened by the ability to prevent damage in the
superior (an ability lacking in the original printing, since there's no way
to prevent out-of-combat damage without errata).
--
LSJ (vte...@white-wolf.com) V:TES Net.Rep for White Wolf, Inc.
Links to revised rulebook, rulings, errata, and tournament rules:
http://www.white-wolf.com/vtes/
Derek Ray
<kjme...@PLEASENOSPAMMEhome.com> wrote:
>"Derek Ray" <lor...@yah00.com> wrote in message
>news:ua9nsts79980onc62...@4ax.com...
>> What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
>> that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
>> *ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
>> that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
>> permanently-fucked cards.
>
>Rutor's Hand? Ritual of the Bitter Rose? Of Noble Blood? Heck, even the
>change made to 2nd Tradition was significant.
Rutor's Hand is EMINENTLY playable under the current errata; it got a
tiny bit weaker, but not much at all. Ritual and ONB never got errata
that I know of (why are they included?). 2nd Tradition is still one of
the premier cards, so I can't see how anyone got screwed by errata when
trading for 2nd Trads.
LSJ
> "Kevin M." <kjme...@PLEASENOSPAMMEhome.com> wrote:
> Of Noble Blood?
>
> ONB never got errata
> that I know of
Of Noble Blood: cannot target a titled vampire (errata).
Derek Ray
>Derek Ray wrote:
>> "Kevin M." <kjme...@PLEASENOSPAMMEhome.com> wrote:
>> Of Noble Blood?
>>
>> ONB never got errata
>> that I know of
>
>Of Noble Blood: cannot target a titled vampire (errata).
Oh. Yeah, that would make sense.
I still don't see that the errata was a big deal, though. It turned a
little-played card into a less-played card. (Never seen one hit the
table, myself).
Ben Peal
> mostly harmless wrote:
> >Now I could imagine that such toolbox oriented decks
> >would suceed less often in a NCL environment.
>
> See Britain.
In America, Jared Strait's been having success for years with toolbox
decks...
- Ben Peal, Prince of Boston
fu...@mindstorm.com
Gene Wirchenko
[snip]
>And once again, don't get high and mighty about Jyhad's
>DESIGN superiority over Magic, considering the "bolt on's"
>that had to be added to make the game work, the staggering
>number of changes to card texts and errata, and its own
>banned list.
They're comparatively minor compared with MtG. Played with any
Moxes lately (other than Type 1 rules)?
>Again, it is just annoying to me the abuse that Magic takes
>from this newsgroup about its 4 card limit (a mechanism
>that works very well for Magic), its restricted list
>(which is duplicated in a more restrictive way by several
>Jyhad cards), and any number of other reasons.
Does it really? I gave up on the game because of the escalation.
4CL makes escalation very easy. With NCL, the cards have to be better
designed in the first place.
Sincerely,
Gene Wirchenko
Computerese Irregular Verb Conjugation:
I have preferences.
You have biases.
He/She has prejudices.
Gene Wirchenko
>"Kevin M." <kjme...@PLEASENOSPAMMEhome.com> wrote
[snip]
>Perhaps I was insufficiently clear.
>The luck of the draw factor I was referring to was one where
>one player's luck of finding his restricted card prevents the
>other player from ever playing the same card.
>All card games that I know of have varying degrees of
>"luck of the draw."
In a tourney, you can play first and not have a draw phase for
the first turn or go second and have one. If luck of the draw isn't
very important in MtG, why was this rule added?
>Hey, while we're here, I'd like to heap some abuse on the
>uniqueness of vampires. I understand why the same player
>shouldn't be able to play with 2 of the same vampire, but
>that two players can randomly be caught in a contesting
>situation across the table, next to one another, but in
>all cases completely randomly is one of this game's
>more irritating features.
Clue: "S" is for struggle.
>> > I also doubt Jyhad would have had to invent the
>> > No Repeat Action floor rule if Jyhad had a card
>> > limit (I'm not advocating card limits, but I am
>> > becoming weary of the ridicule being heaped on
>> > Magic by those arguing against XCL).
>>
>> Anyone who has been doing that has been doing it in error, IMHO. It is
>> important to remember that Magic was designed with a 4CL, while Jyhad was
>> designed -- by the same guy -- with NCL.
>
>Not exactly (though I agree with the sentiment).
>Alpha and Beta Magic were not designed with a 4CL, and perhaps
>even Arabian Nights were available before the 4CL rule was
>installed. They were, however, designed with a rarity limit,
>the mistaken notion that the rare cards would be less available
>and therefore less used in each deck. But otherwise you are correct,
Yes, it was in an early issue of Scrye where it was admitted they
didn't figure on the game being such a success. Players would have
maybe only a couple hundred cards rather than suitcases full. Betting
on your product not being successful?
>the vast majority of Magic cards were designed with the
>understanding that only 4 copies would be available for any deck.
True, and you need that to hold it in line as well as it does
(which is poorly).
Peter D Bakija
>>My concern was that certain types of tsuch 'hyper focused' decks would get
an advantage over the majority of other deck strategies thus resulting in
players sticking to such decks, which I (and this is, as you correctly
pointed out, merely and utterly subjective) find rather boring.>>
You'd be surprised. I like to play hyper-focused decks (I often hear comments
like "Ya know, it *is* possible to build decks that use more than one
discipline..."), and I lose as often as I win--and many of my opponents play
much more well rounded decks than I do.
The trick about the hyper focused deck is that while it does do a single thing
really well, there are lots of other things that it can't do at all, and if its
opponent is a well rounded deck and happens to draw the right cards at the
right time, it can shut down the hyper focused deck, just 'cause it happened to
have the right defenses at the right time.
>>I often like to play decks that concentrate on one strategy but also have a
little bit of everything in them.>>
While I don't like decks like this personally, I have no reason to believe that
they don't do well overall. People post tournament winning decks all the time
that have weird, all over the place cards and disciplines. Also keep in mind
that certain strategies (vote and S+B) tend to have more room in them for
corner case cards than, say a Rush deck, due to the number of cards needed per
action. A S+B deck needs about 2 cards per action to be sucessful (a stealth
card and a bleed card) where a Rush deck needs like 5 or 6 per action to be
sucessful--thus if you are building an S+B deck, you have more opportunity to
include fringe element cards.
>>Now I could imagine that such toolbox oriented decks would suceed less often
in a NCL environment.>>
Go look at the Lasombra's winning deck archive. While certainly not an
exauhstive list of decks, it is the best list of winning decks we have. I think
you'll find that the decks in question are farily equally split between hyper
focused decks (like my Rush deck, for instance) and toolboxy decks.
Peter D Bakija
PD...@aol.com
http://www.geocities.com/bakija6
"The Ramones are more important than the Solar System."
-Sean Finnerty
Kevin M.
"LSJ" <vte...@white-wolf.com> wrote in message
news:3BCC6690...@white-wolf.com...
> "Kevin M." wrote:
> > > What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
> > > that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
> > > *ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
> > > that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
> > > permanently-[bleep]ed cards.
> >
> > Rutor's Hand? Ritual of the Bitter Rose? Of Noble Blood? Heck, even the
> > change made to 2nd Tradition was significant.
>
> ?
>
?
> Ritual of the Bitter Rose's power is no less now than when originally printed
> (nor any less than any given printing).
I never said it was LESS powerful, just that it received IMHO heavy errata.
> Second Tradition is no less powerful now than ever.
I never said it was LESS powerful, but the errata in 1998 letting you use it
when you were untapped increased its power level, I think.
> Rutor's Hand is mildly weakened from its original printing by the "only one"
> clause, but it is strengthened by the ability to prevent damage in the
> superior (an ability lacking in the original printing, since there's no way
> to prevent out-of-combat damage without errata).
Agreed.
> LSJ (vte...@white-wolf.com) V:TES Net.Rep for White Wolf, Inc.
> Links to revised rulebook, rulings, errata, and tournament rules:
> http://www.white-wolf.com/vtes/
James Coupe
<kjme...@PLEASENOSPAMMEhome.com> writes
>> Second Tradition is no less powerful now than ever.
>
>I never said it was LESS powerful, but the errata in 1998 letting you use it
>when you were untapped increased its power level, I think.
It restored it to the reading of the Jyhad version, if nothing else.
LSJ
>
> "LSJ" <vte...@white-wolf.com> wrote in message
> news:3BCC6690...@white-wolf.com...
> > "Kevin M." wrote:
> > > > What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
> > > > that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
> > > > *ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
> > > > that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
> > > > permanently-[bleep]ed cards.
> > >
> > > Rutor's Hand? Ritual of the Bitter Rose? Of Noble Blood? Heck, even the
> > > change made to 2nd Tradition was significant.
> >
> > ?
> >
>
> ?
>
> > Ritual of the Bitter Rose's power is no less now than when originally printed
> > (nor any less than any given printing).
>
> I never said it was LESS powerful, just that it received IMHO heavy errata.
Oh. Then you've picked an odd thread in which to make your assertion.
The current topic is cards that have been neutered by errata/reprinting.
At any rate, it currently plays as originally printed.
> > Second Tradition is no less powerful now than ever.
>
> I never said it was LESS powerful, but the errata in 1998 letting you use it
> when you were untapped increased its power level, I think.
Likewise - not currently neutered and it current plays as originally printed.
(except that it can be played while tapped even if the intercept is not
yet needed now).
--
Kevin M.
> "Kevin M." wrote:
> >
> > "LSJ" <vte...@white-wolf.com> wrote in message
> > news:3BCC6690...@white-wolf.com...
> > > "Kevin M." wrote:
> > > > > What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the
cards
> > > > > that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
> > > > > *ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
> > > > > that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
> > > > > permanently-[bleep]ed cards.
> > > >
> > > > Rutor's Hand? Ritual of the Bitter Rose? Of Noble Blood? Heck, even
the
> > > > change made to 2nd Tradition was significant.
> > >
> > > ?
> > >
> >
> > ?
> >
> > > Ritual of the Bitter Rose's power is no less now than when originally
printed
> > > (nor any less than any given printing).
> >
> > I never said it was LESS powerful, just that it received IMHO heavy errata.
>
> Oh. Then you've picked an odd thread in which to make your assertion.
> The current topic is cards that have been neutered by errata/reprinting.
Derek Ray wrote that "Problem cards are when you need to create a rule (or
errata) AFTER printing to specifically deal with the card."
Derek also wrote that "When I say 'nuclear strike' errata, I mean the kind that
totally, TOTALLY changes the way the card works, and significantly alters the
demand for the card itself."
I think my message fits in just fine with those as the ideas in the current
thread to which I was responding. :)
> At any rate, it currently plays as originally printed.
>
> > > Second Tradition is no less powerful now than ever.
> >
> > I never said it was LESS powerful, but the errata in 1998 letting you use it
> > when you were untapped increased its power level, I think.
>
> Likewise - not currently neutered and it current plays as originally printed.
> (except that it can be played while tapped even if the intercept is not
> yet needed now).
Agreed.
> LSJ (vte...@white-wolf.com) V:TES Net.Rep for White Wolf, Inc.
> Links to revised rulebook, rulings, errata, and tournament rules:
> http://www.white-wolf.com/vtes/
Kevin M., Prince of Madison, WI
LSJ
> > > > > Rutor's Hand? Ritual of the Bitter Rose? Of Noble Blood? Heck, even
> the
> > > > > change made to 2nd Tradition was significant.
> thread to which I was responding. :)
OK.
Except that Second Tradition, Rutor's Hand, RotBR, and Of Noble Blood
have not been "TOTALLY" changed. The changes (if any) to those cards are
minor and have not significantly affected demand for the cards.
--
Halcyan 2
>
>Oh. Yeah, that would make sense.
>
>I still don't see that the errata was a big deal, though. It turned a
>little-played card into a less-played card. (Never seen one hit the
>table, myself).
Well, before the errata, it would have been tremendously helpful for many types
of vote decks (esp. ones without Presence).
Since Of Noble Blood is an action (not political), a Gangrel or Malkavian
political deck for example could easily get one off to cause Arika or Alexandra
to lose 3 votes. Similarly, you could counter 5th Traditions and even ToGP's by
demoting the Princes and Justicars into lowly Primogen. Sort of ironic that it
requires that useless title of Primogen, eh? Maybe it should have been titled
"Misery Loves Company." =)
Halcyan 2
Phil Mattingly
>
[ snip ]
>
> Hey, while we're here, I'd like to heap some abuse on the
> uniqueness of vampires. I understand why the same player
> shouldn't be able to play with 2 of the same vampire, but
> that two players can randomly be caught in a contesting
> situation across the table, next to one another, but in
> all cases completely randomly is one of this game's
> more irritating features.
I see your point but I feel I have to defend one of my favourite
features of VTES.
I love the unique rule because it prevents the sort of situation you
find in Magic tournaments. Although Magic has some unique cards, they
are very few in number and in general you incur no penalty for the
playing the same cards as other people. In fact, it happens so often
that Magic players often plan ahead for the 'mirror match'
specifically.
The result is that if you turn up to a competitive Magic tournament of
one hundred players, you'll probably find 25 near-identical copies of
each of about three decks and the other 25 a random mixture. The
result is a pretty boring series of games. It happens because anyone
can copy a deck off the internet, turn up and play it without any
penalty. Usually the deck you copy is something that won a tournament
the week before or has been built by a well-respected constructor, so
you know it will be good. Sure, you can take a chance and build
creatively but you don't gain any real advantage for doing so instead
of taking a 'net deck'.
Now, imagine the same picture. A 100 player tournament. 25 people have
turned up playing the deck from that month's Giovanni newsletter, 25
with the deck from the Toreador newsletter and 25 with the deck from
the Gangrel newsletter. The remaining 25 are a random mixture of other
clans.
What happens? Absolute carnage for all those lazy people. Every round,
on average, three out of four tables will have two decks contesting.
Everyone who chose to play a net deck is at a significant disadvantage
and those who exercised some creativity prosper. This is a very good
thing in my opinion and one of the reasons why I now play tournament
Jyhad rather than tournament Magic. ;)
Having said all that, it is possible to play a popular clan and get
around contesting. The last tournament I played, I had eight Ravnos
and four Gangrel in my crypt. I ended up on a table with someone
playing twelve Ravnos (no, really :)) in two games but luckily we'd
chosen fairly different vampires and managed to step around one
another. This was helped by the fact that we had a little negotiation
about transfers in the first couple of turns. :)
All in all, I like the unique rule because if I found myself sitting
down at a table to both prey and be preyed on by identical Ventrue
vote decks regularly, I'd pack this game in pretty quickly.
> - Jason Bell
Cheers,
Phil
Jason Bell
"Gene Wirchenko" <ge...@mail.ocis.net> wrote
> "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com> wrote:
>
> [snip]
>
> >Perhaps I was insufficiently clear.
> >The luck of the draw factor I was referring to was one where
> >one player's luck of finding his restricted card prevents the
> >other player from ever playing the same card.
> >All card games that I know of have varying degrees of
> >"luck of the draw."
>
> In a tourney, you can play first and not have a draw phase for
> the first turn or go second and have one. If luck of the draw isn't
> very important in MtG, why was this rule added?
For no reason associated with "luck of the draw."
The nature of the game, playing resources from your hand to
the play area, gave a distinct advantage to the player going
first, in that they were able to deploy their resources first
with no corresponding disadvantage. The penalty of a card
now serves as the disadvantage.
Coincidentally, this is the same type of advantage held by the
player going 4th in a 5 player game of Jyhad, where his prey
does not get the advantage of having a predator with a play
penalty in return for going before him, as all other players
do.
>
> >Hey, while we're here, I'd like to heap some abuse on the
> >uniqueness of vampires. I understand why the same player
> >shouldn't be able to play with 2 of the same vampire, but
> >that two players can randomly be caught in a contesting
> >situation across the table, next to one another, but in
> >all cases completely randomly is one of this game's
> >more irritating features.
>
> Clue: "S" is for struggle.
Hint: "R" is for random, and hey, "P" is for patronize.
Sharing one or, god forbid, two vampires with another
player is a crippling game disadvantage that is completely
unrelated to strategy.
- Jason Bell
Jason Bell
"James Coupe" <ja...@zephyr.org.uk> wrote
> Jason Bell > <Jason...@mail.com> writes
>
> >> It's not about Jyhad vs. Magic. It's about restriction being a stupid
> >> way to deal with cards being overpowered, which is true no matter what
> >> game it's being used with.
> >
> >I strongly disagree with this sentiment.
>
> If card is over-powered to an abusive level, making it completely luck
> of the draw (rather than careful deck crafting) as to whether you get it
> or not does not fix it - it simply makes it less common that the abusive
> situation will occur. When it occurs, it will still be entirely
> abusive.
You've just offered an argument against once-per-game cards in Jyhad.
It is arguably worse for Jyhad, where your "careful deck crafting"
could easily leave you with 3 or more dead cards when a fellow player
uses his Giant's Blood early in the game to get card flow. In Magic,
at least you still get to play your restricted card if you find it,
regardless of whether your opponent has played his copy.
In either game, I see nothing wrong with allowing cards with enormous
game effects, as long as there are corresponding costs and restrictions.
At least Magic has the additional option of addressing abusive cards
through restriction, as opposed to having only text changes (Fame) or
banning (Return to Innocence) as available tools.
- Jason Bell
Jason Bell
"Derek Ray" <lor...@yah00.com> wrote
> , "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com>> wrote:
>
> Correct. Freak Drive, Majesty, and Earth Meld were the three 'problem
> cards'. The restriction on Giant's Blood, however, is a design
> decision; it allows a huge effect to take place for free during one's
> Master phase without being susceptible to just putting 4 or X of Giant's
> Blood in your deck and reloading your vamps constantly. (Note that a
> card limit wouldn't restrict the effect enough.)
Why do you allow one game to have a card design feature to
limit powerful cards (Jyhad's once-per-game) but do not allow
another's game design feature to limit cards that turn out to
be powerful (Magic's restricted list).
> >And once again, don't get high and mighty about Jyhad's
> >DESIGN superiority over Magic, considering the "bolt on's"
> >that had to be added to make the game work, the staggering
> >number of changes to card texts and errata, and its own
> >banned list.
>
> What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
> that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
> *ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
> that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
It's called Banishment.
Though you object down the thread, Fame qualifies as a card that
was destroyed and replaced by a totally new card called Fame.
> permanently-f*cked cards. Several of which were only for ante anyway,
> and the current Mind Rape is still pretty d*mn good, just a lot
> different. As opposed to how many on the restricted lists?
It has been awhile, but I don't recall Magic's Type I restricted list
(the only format with a restricted list) as being terribly large.
I suspect that from a percentage of cards standpoint, Magic's
Type I restricted and banned lists are smaller than Jyhad's,
especially if you include the cards that have been functionally
changed through errata and later printings.
> I don't claim that Jyhad was any better designed than Magic; they both
> had some major flaws straight up. But I do think that card limits and a
> huge-a** restricted list is a VERY poor way to fix problems. Errata is
> painful, but nothing will ever be perfect the first time.
I'm just not sure what superiority Jyhad's "well this card really isn't
what it says" has over Magic's "you can only have one of these."
I assure you that Jyhad's solution has caused my play group far more
grief than Magic's ever caused those I played with.
> It's NOTICEABLY different to print a card with an inherent restriction,
> as opposed to coming along and slapping it on a 'restricted' list later.
Yes, I agree that they are different. Magic's may be superior, since
the tournament organization has more options for dealing with cards
that unexpectedly become problems.
> No duplication has taken place.
I have no idea what this means.
> Actually, I generally give Magic abuse where it deserves: the
> composition of its overall playerbase and the severe wallet-hoovering
> approach that WotC takes towards that same playerbase.
Right. Of course, if I tried to make the same point about White Wolf,
I get flamed for defamation, restraint of trade, and slander.
- Jason Bell
Jason Bell
"Gene Wirchenko" <ge...@mail.ocis.net> wrote
> "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com> wrote:
>
> [snip]
>
> >And once again, don't get high and mighty about Jyhad's
> >DESIGN superiority over Magic, considering the "bolt on's"
> >that had to be added to make the game work, the staggering
> >number of changes to card texts and errata, and its own
> >banned list.
>
> They're comparatively minor compared with MtG. Played with any
> Moxes lately (other than Type 1 rules)?
This is an odd distinction, since Jyhad doesn't have any constructed
tournament structure except what corresponds to Magic's Type I.
> >Again, it is just annoying to me the abuse that Magic takes
> >from this newsgroup about its 4 card limit (a mechanism
> >that works very well for Magic), its restricted list
> >(which is duplicated in a more restrictive way by several
> >Jyhad cards), and any number of other reasons.
>
> Does it really? I gave up on the game because of the escalation.
> 4CL makes escalation very easy. With NCL, the cards have to be better
> designed in the first place.
I just don't understand the point you're trying to make here.
Please define the term "escalation" in this context.
I assume you mean the escalation of the power of whichever
cards were most recently printed. There's nothing about 4CL
that enables that, it's a decision by the designers.
- Jason Bell
The Lasombra
Jason >
> > Actually, I generally give Magic abuse where it deserves: the
> > composition of its overall playerbase and the severe wallet-hoovering
> > approach that WotC takes towards that same playerbase.
>
> Right. Of course, if I tried to make the same point about White Wolf,
> I get flamed for defamation, restraint of trade, and slander.
This is an odd distinction, since Jyhad doesn't have any constructed
tournament structure except what corresponds to Magic's Type I.
:>
WOTC requires you to buy cards on a continuous basis to continue to play
in tournaments that attract players by forcing out ALL of the cards
you own that are not in the current list of playable cards.
V:EKN requires you to not play with 7 cards that you may own.
Jyhad only decks are still tournament viable and tournament legal.
Show me the parallel.
:>
Carpe noctem.
Lasombra
(ps its not that I don't think collectable card games are a bad
idea for the purchaser (I do), but that I don't think you can
bash a company for making money when they acquire the rights
to a collectable card game and expect any sympathy for your position.)
--
Posted from rr-163-54-196.atl.mediaone.net [24.163.54.196]
via Mailgate.ORG Server - http://www.Mailgate.ORG
James Coupe
Bell <Jason...@mail.com> writes
>> If card is over-powered to an abusive level, making it completely luck
>> of the draw (rather than careful deck crafting) as to whether you get it
>> or not does not fix it - it simply makes it less common that the abusive
>> situation will occur. When it occurs, it will still be entirely
>> abusive.
>
>You've just offered an argument against once-per-game cards in Jyhad.
No, it's substantially different. There is nothing about once per game
that limits the number of times it occurs in a deck. Nor is there
anything about the restricted list that prevents two players both having
it and playing it.
>It is arguably worse for Jyhad, where your "careful deck crafting"
>could easily leave you with 3 or more dead cards when a fellow player
>uses his Giant's Blood early in the game to get card flow.
Which provides a significant cost to the card. If you want to
"guarantee" it, you're going to end up allocating some of the deck in
that manner to dead weight. That's a not insignificant cost.
>In Magic,
>at least you still get to play your restricted card if you find it,
>regardless of whether your opponent has played his copy.
This is a different paradigm entirely. Part of the effect of something
like Giant's Blood is worked around the costing elements that this
generates. A card like Giant's Blood is good. So I play it. You think
"Oh that's good." So you play it. It then becomes a pain in the arse
for both of us when the other plays it. So we move off. A canny
player, who can capitalise on such metagame shifts, will be able to
pounce in the gaps to their own advantage. Or a player might just get
lucky (it happens). It's a kind of self-righting mechanism; the more
something is played, the more it discourages that play.
>In either game, I see nothing wrong with allowing cards with enormous
>game effects, as long as there are corresponding costs and restrictions.
Certainly a potentially supportable point of view (though many might
argue that there are some lines you couldn't cross) - though recall that
when Magic's banned list, restricted list and 4 card limit were
introduced, many cards didn't have corresponding costs and restrictions.
>At least Magic has the additional option of addressing abusive cards
>through restriction, as opposed to having only text changes (Fame) or
>banning (Return to Innocence) as available tools.
Text changes result in a situation where you don't have to restrict the
card. Also recall that it is rare for Jyhad decks to be checked prior
to games (the rarity of surplus judges etc.).
Derek Ray
wrote:
>
>"Derek Ray" <lor...@yah00.com> wrote
>> , "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com>> wrote:
>>
>> Correct. Freak Drive, Majesty, and Earth Meld were the three 'problem
>> cards'. The restriction on Giant's Blood, however, is a design
>
>Why do you allow one game to have a card design feature to
>limit powerful cards (Jyhad's once-per-game) but do not allow
>another's game design feature to limit cards that turn out to
>be powerful (Magic's restricted list).
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic's restricted list an "oh, shit,
we made a whole lot of cards too powerful, how can we fix it" bolt-on as
well, as opposed to a design feature?
>> What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
>> that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
>> *ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
>> that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
>
>It's called Banishment.
first: I don't consider Banishment's errata major. The function of the
card is still the same; you just can't use it with weenies anymore. And
nobody who traded for 9,000 Banishments is going to be all THAT sad
about the errata, they're just going to whip out Democritus and go
nuking from THAT end.
second: it desperately needed to happen. Weenie decks with, say, Igo
Cryptic Riderring their Banishments through against Sheldon or Arika
were over-the-top good. I haven't seen anyone play a hard-core
Banishment deck in awhile, but they were damned vicious when they were
popular.
>Though you object down the thread, Fame qualifies as a card that
>was destroyed and replaced by a totally new card called Fame.
Hm. First errata: unique. That's minor. Second errata: controller
of Famous loses pool, not prey of Famous. That's still pretty damn
minor. Someone is still losing 3 pool, and the other stuff stays the
same. Anyone who traded for lots of Fame can still make plenty of decks
with Fame; they're just combat now, instead of suicide.
And it needed to happen for its own reasons (i-shoot-myself loop decks
were kind of ugly, even under NRA).
>> permanently-f*cked cards. Several of which were only for ante anyway,
>> and the current Mind Rape is still pretty d*mn good, just a lot
>> different. As opposed to how many on the restricted lists?
>
>It has been awhile, but I don't recall Magic's Type I restricted list
>(the only format with a restricted list) as being terribly large.
>I suspect that from a percentage of cards standpoint, Magic's
>Type I restricted and banned lists are smaller than Jyhad's,
>especially if you include the cards that have been functionally
>changed through errata and later printings.
That suspicion could stand to see some sunlight under the actual
numbers, although I object to your using -any- card that has been
errata'd; i'm trying to identify cards that were made unplayable by
errata, or just plain banned.
>> I don't claim that Jyhad was any better designed than Magic; they both
>> had some major flaws straight up. But I do think that card limits and a
>> huge-a** restricted list is a VERY poor way to fix problems. Errata is
>> painful, but nothing will ever be perfect the first time.
>
>I'm just not sure what superiority Jyhad's "well this card really isn't
>what it says" has over Magic's "you can only have one of these."
>I assure you that Jyhad's solution has caused my play group far more
>grief than Magic's ever caused those I played with.
Magic also never had to deal with completely-dropped support from WotC,
either. When you get abandoned by your parent company, you have to make
some allowances.
>> It's NOTICEABLY different to print a card with an inherent restriction,
>> as opposed to coming along and slapping it on a 'restricted' list later.
>
>Yes, I agree that they are different. Magic's may be superior, since
>the tournament organization has more options for dealing with cards
>that unexpectedly become problems.
Yeah, "Let's ban it!" is SUCH a popular decision among the players. At
least with "Let's change a few words on it!" they get to keep playing
the card.
>> Actually, I generally give Magic abuse where it deserves: the
>> composition of its overall playerbase and the severe wallet-hoovering
>> approach that WotC takes towards that same playerbase.
>
>Right. Of course, if I tried to make the same point about White Wolf,
>I get flamed for defamation, restraint of trade, and slander.
Not by me you don't. You just get tagged for being wrong. Nearly all
of the 'best' cards in Final Nights are commons. (Summon Soul,
Clandestine Contract, The Summoning, etc.)
Note that White Wolf is also providing plenty of downtime inbetween
releases, so everyone's pocketbook has a chance to recover, as opposed
to dumping out expansions every month, is it?
--
Derek
Curevei
>(the only format with a restricted list) as being terribly large.
>I suspect that from a percentage of cards standpoint, Magic's
>Type I restricted and banned lists are smaller than Jyhad's,
>especially if you include the cards that have been functionally
>changed through errata and later printings.
I don't think using Type 1 (aka Classic) for any sort of comparisons is
worthwhile. It has, over the years, dropped to about the 6th most prevalent
format far, far behind the ones above it: Type 2 (aka Standard), Extended,
block constructed, sealed, booster draft (other draft forms are common as
well). It's just not an important format, though, of course, it has its fans.
Frederick Scott
> Why do you allow one game to have a card design feature to
> limit powerful cards (Jyhad's once-per-game) but do not allow
> another's game design feature to limit cards that turn out to
> be powerful (Magic's restricted list).
Because once-per-game allows players to decide for themselves
how important the effect is and build their deck accordingly.
If I think the Giant's Blood effect is super-key to winning, I
can stick 7 or 17 or 70 of them in my deck in my effort to become
the first one who gets one out. This point means that if the
competition is important, players automatically build a
disadvantage into their decks which compensates for it.
Actually though, I think the real answer to your question is that
Giant's Blood is nearly as important in Jyhad as the cards on the
Magic restricted list. It takes up a valuable master card slot
and only gets built in (in my decks anyway) to large cap decks and
even then is sometimes used at fairly mundane times. (Yippee, I
refilled Democritus when he was down to 7. I'm so happy I could
just shit.)
Granted, it does prevent players from building "Giant's Blood decks"
which revolve around taking advantage of its refill properties. And
if Magic restriction were only used to curb that aspect of certain
cards, I would never have minded. But that's not what it's used for
by and large. Mostly, it's used so a great effect any time anywhere
regardless of whether you build a deck around it can only be lucked
into with one card instead of four. And it can be even be used
multiple times per game if one starts using various Graveyard-digging
cards (principally the also-restricted Regrowth but when you're talking
about things like Time Walk and Ancestral Recall, quite a few other
such cards become worth while). So it doesn't even prevent such things
from being used once per game.
> It has been awhile, but I don't recall Magic's Type I restricted list
> (the only format with a restricted list) as being terribly large.
> I suspect that from a percentage of cards standpoint, Magic's
> Type I restricted and banned lists are smaller than Jyhad's,
> especially if you include the cards that have been functionally
> changed through errata and later printings.
Actually, if they created a constructed type which allowed players to
use all cards from any editions except those that were banned, as Jyhad
does, the list of cards that should be banned for reasons of being seriously
and unfairly undercosted would make a *HUGE* list! That's one of the
reasons a lot of players give for not creating such a constructed type.
They can't even imagine doing it right, as has been done in Jyhad, because
SO MANY older Magic cards were misdesigned by the standards of the current
designers. This is why Type 1.5 is so biased towards older cards! This is
also why players consistently reject both Types 1.5 and Extended, which has
the same problem on a lesser scale, and stick to Type 2 - then complain that
Magic forces them to spend money on new cards constantly.
As an alternative to banning cards, the DCI could errata the old,
undercosted cards to bring them into line with the current card design
standards. But the DCI has throughout its history rejected the concept of
using errata for this purpose. The stubborn refusal to do either that or
ban any but the absolute worst problem cards was what caused the terrible
player frustration with Jyhad that kept it from ever developing much of a
tournament following when the DCI had control over it. Having bad tournament
rules, IMHO, ultimately affects player satisfaction with a CCG as a whole.
Most players - even non-tournament players - are ultimately unsatisfied with
unbalanced rulesets and look to the tournament rules and rulings to find a
balanced game. When Scott Johnson took over Jyhad and fixed all these
problems that the DCI's flawed philosophies caused, the game has seen a
renaissance which speaks for itself. White Wolf take a game Wizards of the
Coast couldn't make profitable and turn it around? Are they geniuses? I
don't think so. Their only genius was in putting a guy in charge who wasn't
hamstrung by DCI policy.
The DCI would do well to learn from this experience and create a play-
balanced constructed type which allows all card sets. But they'll never
learn.
Fred
Frederick Scott
> You've just offered an argument against once-per-game cards in Jyhad.
> It is arguably worse for Jyhad, where your "careful deck crafting"
> could easily leave you with 3 or more dead cards when a fellow player
> uses his Giant's Blood early in the game to get card flow.
Or you could 15 of them in just to run up against the guy who put 20 in
and beat you to the punch. Or the guy who put two of them in but got
lucky. You're correct.
That's why I say, the real answer to your problem is that no Jyhad card
has as unbalanced an effect in Jyhad as the cards on the restricted list
have in Magic. The only way Giant's blood is abusive is if one could
build a deck around its effect, which is a legitimate reason to limit
its utility to once per game. I think it would have worked just as well
to limit it to once per game PER PLAYER, but I suppose the designers felt
this was more fun and not all that big of a luck swing. As I posted
elsewhere, where this why Magic cards were restricted - and not that
the restricted cards simply had too advantageous of an effect in and of
themselves without building the whole deck around them - I wouldn't have
a problem with it.
> In Magic,
> at least you still get to play your restricted card if you find it,
> regardless of whether your opponent has played his copy.
Or, even if you've already played YOUR copy of it. Restricting doesn't
even prevent one player from playing Time Walk seven times while his
opponent plays his not even once. As has been pointed out to you before,
the fact that both players CAN potentially play a given restricted card
doesn't mean it happens very often. Usually, the restricted card has
uneven effects if it has any effects at all.
> In either game, I see nothing wrong with allowing cards with enormous
> game effects, as long as there are corresponding costs and restrictions.
Costs would do it. Restriction has nothing to do with costs. It just
means the unfair thing happens less often.
> At least Magic has the additional option of addressing abusive cards
> through restriction, as opposed to having only text changes (Fame) or
> banning (Return to Innocence) as available tools.
That's exactly our point. The quality of restriction as a tool is
inferior to banning and errata, both of which either eliminate the problem
entirely. Eliminating such problems is necessarily the goal.
Fred
Tim Eijpe
> Thats why I made this topic we manage to do every game with 4 cards
> limit, even with this limit we have not enough of some cards. and
> after buying so many booster boxes and having every starter, I find it
> very fustrating. that I still only have 3 catonic fears.
>
> but its the same with flux we manage to have quite good decks and even
> fun decks who can compete (even if they are stealth decks who may not
> bleed at stealth untill 2 players remain.)
>
> Grtx Samsman
Dude where are you from in the Netherlands?? Lemme just say thet we in
Utrecht played 6CL for years. We've switched to NCL for the last 2
years now, and it really isn't a problem. With that 4CL you need the
rare cards, while with a NCL commons are equally good or even better.
Drop me an email at tim....@mailandnews.com and come to Utrecht for
a game or 2. And if you need some common cards I got plenty left after
making 25+ decks. Really, the number of cards you own do not make you
need a CL, you simply have to toolbox your deck a little more...
Hey, I only own 5 or 6 Catatonic Fears...I prefer majesty anyway.
Tim Eijpe
Prince of Utrecht
Andrew S. Davidson
>>It's called Banishment.
>
>first: I don't consider Banishment's errata major. The function of the
>card is still the same; you just can't use it with weenies anymore. And
>nobody who traded for 9,000 Banishments is going to be all THAT sad
>about the errata, they're just going to whip out Democritus and go
>nuking from THAT end.
>
>second: it desperately needed to happen. Weenie decks with, say, Igo
>Cryptic Riderring their Banishments through against Sheldon or Arika
>were over-the-top good. I haven't seen anyone play a hard-core
>Banishment deck in awhile, but they were damned vicious when they were
>popular.
I don't see much evidence of this in the winning deck archive. The
closest examples are Legacy of Pander decks and they have been addressed
by errata to that card.
It seems reasonable to me that a weenie can propose a vote to ban an
Inner Circle member. What's not reasonable is that the same weenie can
cast enough votes to make it pass. The problem is weenie voting locks,
not Banishment abuse.
Andrew
James Coupe
s.net>, Andrew S. Davidson <a...@csi.com> writes
>I don't see much evidence of this in the winning deck archive. The
>closest examples are Legacy of Pander decks and they have been addressed
>by errata to that card.
No errata was issued for Legacy of Pander. The card was reprinted with
originally intended card text, however.
Derek Ray
wrote:
>On Fri, 19 Oct 2001 03:54:21 GMT, Derek Ray wrote:
>>second: it desperately needed to happen. Weenie decks with, say, Igo
>>Cryptic Riderring their Banishments through against Sheldon or Arika
>>were over-the-top good. I haven't seen anyone play a hard-core
>>Banishment deck in awhile, but they were damned vicious when they were
>>popular.
>
>I don't see much evidence of this in the winning deck archive. The
>closest examples are Legacy of Pander decks and they have been addressed
>by errata to that card.
Legacy of Pander was the popular means to pull it off, yes.
The problems have NOT been addressed, however.
>It seems reasonable to me that a weenie can propose a vote to ban an
>Inner Circle member. What's not reasonable is that the same weenie can
>cast enough votes to make it pass. The problem is weenie voting locks,
>not Banishment abuse.
No, the problem is Banishment abuse. Take a deck with a bunch of
low-caps with pre/PRE, backed by Gideon Fontaine, that already has a
couple Praxis out. The table has mustered enough votes on its own to
keep it in check, such that no vote can pass without the table's
approval OR without a big-PRE modifier.
Gideon calls a KRC, doing 3 to his prey and 1 to himself, with Bribes.
He plays Bewitching Oration on it too, just to make sure. The table
thinks about it, says "let's all gain a pool", and passes the vote.
Cryptic Rider. Banishment on the vamp with the most votes. Cryptic
Rider. Praxis Seizure, and suddenly the weenie deck has vote lock, and
Banishments start landing everywhere. Remember, he's GOT six or more
minions; he can do all this in one turn, though he may have more than
one turn if he happened to hit a voter who was empty.
Sure, it doesn't cost you pool if they were full (rare), but you still
lose the minion for a turn. And if you happen to catch Sheldon at low
blood, that's a -huge- swing in your favor.
I've seen it done, and it's not difficult to set up in your hand; it's
even less difficult to make sure that Gideon can play both a BO and Awe
at the right time to kick off the first "vote" in the Cryptic Rider
chain.
--
Derek
Gene Wirchenko
>"Gene Wirchenko" <ge...@mail.ocis.net> wrote
>> "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com> wrote:
>>
>> [snip]
>>
>> >And once again, don't get high and mighty about Jyhad's
>> >DESIGN superiority over Magic, considering the "bolt on's"
>> >that had to be added to make the game work, the staggering
>> >number of changes to card texts and errata, and its own
>> >banned list.
>>
>> They're comparatively minor compared with MtG. Played with any
>> Moxes lately (other than Type 1 rules)?
>
>This is an odd distinction, since Jyhad doesn't have any constructed
>tournament structure except what corresponds to Magic's Type I.
Unless it has changed since I was quasi-following MtG tourney
rules, you can't play with cards that are older than the current set
and the one before (plus, I believe, a standalone set if one of the
two wasn't one). Over time, this means that your cards become illegal
to play in a Type II tourney.
>> >Again, it is just annoying to me the abuse that Magic takes
>> >from this newsgroup about its 4 card limit (a mechanism
>> >that works very well for Magic), its restricted list
>> >(which is duplicated in a more restrictive way by several
>> >Jyhad cards), and any number of other reasons.
>>
>> Does it really? I gave up on the game because of the escalation.
>> 4CL makes escalation very easy. With NCL, the cards have to be better
>> designed in the first place.
>
>I just don't understand the point you're trying to make here.
>Please define the term "escalation" in this context.
>I assume you mean the escalation of the power of whichever
>cards were most recently printed. There's nothing about 4CL
>that enables that, it's a decision by the designers.
Escalation means that cards keep getting more powerful (on
average) over time. e.g. I got into MtG in Alpha. At that point,
many creatures had no special abilities. Last time I saw, few, new
creatures *didn't* have special abilities.
Uh, no. If you don't watch what you design, then you need
something like 4CL to make it work. It's much harder to design the
cards so they don't need such a crutch to be playable.
Gene Wirchenko
>"Gene Wirchenko" <ge...@mail.ocis.net> wrote
>> "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com> wrote:
>>
>> [snip]
>>
>> >Perhaps I was insufficiently clear.
>> >The luck of the draw factor I was referring to was one where
>> >one player's luck of finding his restricted card prevents the
>> >other player from ever playing the same card.
>> >All card games that I know of have varying degrees of
>> >"luck of the draw."
>>
>> In a tourney, you can play first and not have a draw phase for
>> the first turn or go second and have one. If luck of the draw isn't
>> very important in MtG, why was this rule added?
>
>For no reason associated with "luck of the draw."
>The nature of the game, playing resources from your hand to
>the play area, gave a distinct advantage to the player going
>first, in that they were able to deploy their resources first
>with no corresponding disadvantage. The penalty of a card
>now serves as the disadvantage.
It was not played like that for some time. Then the rule was
changed. What was the situation requiring it?
>Coincidentally, this is the same type of advantage held by the
>player going 4th in a 5 player game of Jyhad, where his prey
>does not get the advantage of having a predator with a play
>penalty in return for going before him, as all other players
>do.
The advantage in VTES is much smaller. Has it ever been possible
to win on the first turn in VTES? Even if so, to the extent it was
possible in MtG?
>> >Hey, while we're here, I'd like to heap some abuse on the
>> >uniqueness of vampires. I understand why the same player
>> >shouldn't be able to play with 2 of the same vampire, but
>> >that two players can randomly be caught in a contesting
>> >situation across the table, next to one another, but in
>> >all cases completely randomly is one of this game's
>> >more irritating features.
>>
>> Clue: "S" is for struggle.
>
>Hint: "R" is for random, and hey, "P" is for patronize.
>
>Sharing one or, god forbid, two vampires with another
>player is a crippling game disadvantage that is completely
>unrelated to strategy.
Methuselahs are struggling with each other for control.
Contesting reflects that. I like the tenseness that it adds. Tastes
differ.
Jason Bell
"Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
>
> That's exactly our point. The quality of restriction as a tool is
> inferior to banning and errata, both of which either eliminate the problem
> entirely. Eliminating such problems is necessarily the goal.
Again, it seems that you also have (unintentionally) made an
argument against once-per-game cards.
- Jason Bell
Jason Bell
"The Lasombra" <thela...@hotmail.com> wrote
> Derek >>
> Jason >
>
> > > Actually, I generally give Magic abuse where it deserves: the
> > > composition of its overall playerbase and the severe wallet-hoovering
> > > approach that WotC takes towards that same playerbase.
> >
> > Right. Of course, if I tried to make the same point about White Wolf,
> > I get flamed for defamation, restraint of trade, and slander.
>
> This is an odd distinction, since Jyhad doesn't have any constructed
> tournament structure except what corresponds to Magic's Type I.
>
> :>
>
> WOTC requires you to buy cards on a continuous basis to continue to play
> in tournaments that attract players by forcing out ALL of the cards
> you own that are not in the current list of playable cards.
>
> V:EKN requires you to not play with 7 cards that you may own.
>
> Jyhad only decks are still tournament viable and tournament legal.
>
> Show me the parallel.
There need be no parallel.
Hey, I have a 160 page paperback book here in front of me that
is priced at $15.00, from White Wolf Game Studio. I hear an
enormous sucking sound.
...
> (ps its not that I don't think collectable card games are a bad
> idea for the purchaser (I do), but that I don't think you can
> bash a company for making money when they acquire the rights
> to a collectable card game and expect any sympathy for your position.)
Right, Derek can bash WotC for it, but I can't bash WW for it.
My point exactly.
- Jason Bell
Jason Bell
"Curevei" <cur...@aol.com> wrote
Well then, there are exactly zero cards on the restricted list for
all of those other formats combined. But that sort of takes all
the fun out of the discussion, doesn't it?
- Jason Bell
Jason Bell
"Derek Ray" <lor...@yah00.com> wrote
> "Jason Bell" <Jason...@mail.com>> wrote:
>
> >Why do you allow one game to have a card design feature to
> >limit powerful cards (Jyhad's once-per-game) but do not allow
> >another's game design feature to limit cards that turn out to
> >be powerful (Magic's restricted list).
>
> we made a whole lot of cards too powerful, how can we fix it" bolt-on as
> well, as opposed to a design feature?
Maybe in the beginning (moxes and such), but the restricted list
also limits the ease of card combinations which have very large
game effects.
> >> What, all seven cards of the banned list? To this we can add the cards
> >> that got "nuclear-strike errata": Tomb of Ramses, Mind Rape, and..
> >> *ponder* well, ok, i'm sure there's at least ONE more card out there
> >> that got the Big Kaboom as far as errata, so call it 10
> >
> >It's called Banishment.
>
> first: I don't consider Banishment's errata major.
...
> Hm. First errata: unique. That's minor. Second errata: controller
> of Famous loses pool, not prey of Famous. That's still pretty d*mn
> minor.
I suppose your minor errata are another person's de-powering.
To claim that the errata preventing weenies from Banishing
was minor, or ending the Fame/torpor yo-yo was minor misses
the point that these errata put the brakes on powerful card
combinations or strategies that were being used to great
effect.
> >It has been awhile, but I don't recall Magic's Type I restricted list
> >(the only format with a restricted list) as being terribly large.
> >I suspect that from a percentage of cards standpoint, Magic's
> >Type I restricted and banned lists are smaller than Jyhad's,
> >especially if you include the cards that have been functionally
> >changed through errata and later printings.
>
> That suspicion could stand to see some sunlight under the actual
> numbers, although I object to your using -any- card that has been
> errata'd; i'm trying to identify cards that were made unplayable by
> errata, or just plain banned.
There are 49 cards currently restricted for play in Type I
tournaments. I feel comfortable saying that there are 7
times as many Magic cards as Jyhad/VteS cards.
Only 11 cards are banned, though the vast majority of those
are due to their dealing with ante (only two cards are banned
otherwise, both of which involve dropping the card from the
air onto the playing surface).
> >> It's NOTICEABLY different to print a card with an inherent restriction,
> >> as opposed to coming along and slapping it on a 'restricted' list
later.
Ah, but it is not so noticeably different to change the text of a card
in an important way (adding restrictions, changing play conditions),
that looks as much like a slap-on as a restricted list.
> >Yes, I agree that they are different. Magic's may be superior, since
> >the tournament organization has more options for dealing with cards
> >that unexpectedly become problems.
>
> Yeah, "Let's ban it!" is SUCH a popular decision among the players. At
> least with "Let's change a few words on it!" they get to keep playing
> the card.
No they don't. They get a new card with the same title.
I'm not being glib here. Fame, Banishment, Tomb, none of
these cards are the same as they were when originally
printed. And none of them were fixed because their play
conditions were confusing. I don't believe that your insistence
that the changes were merely minor, or even that the new cards
are good or useful cards counter that observation.
- Jason Bell
Pat Ricochet
> My point exactly.
It's a matter of whether this opinion will be well received. Being that
WotC refused to spend any more money on V:TES to make any money, they're not
really going to be in our favor 'round here. Being that WW essentially
resurrected a dead game (publishing-wise, anyway), the very game that we all
love to play, they've done a whole lot more to earn our favor that WotC has.
And, really, WotC has moved on from loving the games to just making the
money. Didn't that salon.com article you linked say all that? On the other
hand, Steve Wieck comes out to play in the Atlanta tournaments. And if
you've seen him, you know he doesn't do it just as a publicity stunt just to
make more money. =)
Also, several people here have expressed the view of being "sick of"
this, that, or the other about Magic, and moving onto V:TES, some of it
related to having to keep buying cards to keep up (and a lot of it other
stuff). Does anyone read the Magic groups, and if so, can they confirm
anyone there saying "I'm so sick of V:TES and it's NCL, and once-per-game
cards, and I'm glad I moved onto playing Magic?" (I'm not holding my
breath.)
[The rest of the points I don't have much to go on, and I won't blindly
go forth in ignorance. I played Magic all of twice, from the original set
with randomly shuffled cards for decks (how could I know any better? No one
knew what a CCG was!), and have steered clear of tables of it in the past,
mostly due to waves of immaturity and/or body odor coming from the tables.
As such, Type 1, Type 2, restricted, et. al. are a bunch of concepts I'm
glad I don't have to deal with playing V:TES; the game has enough to
remember! =]
--
Pat Ricochet
Soul Jar'rn Fool of Atlanta
Jason Bell
"Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
sorry for the snip
> The DCI would do well to learn from this experience and create a play-
> balanced constructed type which allows all card sets. But they'll never
> learn.
Never learn? They have an enormously successful tournament
environment. They have attendance at their pre-releases that
would make V:teS drool (or be unable to accomodate).
I'm not sure what Magic should learn from V:tES' decision to
change card texts as opposed to limiting access to problem cards.
- Jason Bell
James Coupe
Bell <Jason...@mail.com> writes
>Never learn? They have an enormously successful tournament
>environment. They have attendance at their pre-releases that
>would make V:teS drool (or be unable to accomodate).
>
>I'm not sure what Magic should learn from V:tES' decision to
>change card texts as opposed to limiting access to problem cards.
For WotC's purposes, they'd learn very little. Where being nice to
players, not continually forcing them to buy new cards, game balance[0]
and so on are concerned, WotC very often act in a manner entirely
contrary.
[0] I do recall Buyback entering the game. It was explicitly stated in
the rules that reductions couldn't affect Buyback. Presumably, it had
been play-tested that way. It didn't last very long, however.
R. David Zopf
snip
> Also, several people here have expressed the view of being "sick of"
>this, that, or the other about Magic, and moving onto V:TES, some of it
>related to having to keep buying cards to keep up (and a lot of it other
>stuff). Does anyone read the Magic groups, and if so, can they confirm
>anyone there saying "I'm so sick of V:TES and it's NCL, and once-per-game
>cards, and I'm glad I moved onto playing Magic?" (I'm not holding my
>breath.)
*snigger* Can't say I've ever heard that. :-) Wait. Let me say it
aloud... Okay, now I've heard one guy say it, but it still made me
laugh.
DaveZ/Atom Weaver
Regards,
R. David Zopf
guenh...@mindspring.com
Atom Weaver
X_Zealot
> Also, several people here have expressed the view of being "sick of"
> this, that, or the other about Magic, and moving onto V:TES, some of it
> related to having to keep buying cards to keep up (and a lot of it other
> stuff). Does anyone read the Magic groups, and if so, can they confirm
> anyone there saying "I'm so sick of V:TES and it's NCL, and once-per-game
> cards, and I'm glad I moved onto playing Magic?" (I'm not holding my
> breath.)
>
Man, I hate to be the one to say this. I have one of my players here in
Lafayette, La. who can not handle playing with NCL. He builds his decks
with a four card limit and then tells me how the game is broken with NCL,
yet can't show how. Apparently, some people can't handle freedom.
Comments Welcome,
Norman S. Brown, Jr.
XZealot
Archon of the Swamp
Frederick Scott
>
> "Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
>
> sorry for the snip
>
> > The DCI would do well to learn from this experience and create a play-
> > balanced constructed type which allows all card sets. But they'll never
> > learn.
>
> Never learn? They have an enormously successful tournament
> environment. They have attendance at their pre-releases that
> would make V:teS drool (or be unable to accomodate).
Apples and oranges. Magic has the advantage of being the first CCG on the
market. It is decidedly less complex which makes it attractive to a larger
population of players. It's natural that both of these advantages translate
into more popularity. It will always be impossible to compare the two
directly. None the less, my impression is that Magic has been going
consistently downhill for years in terms of sales and in the attendance of
tournaments. Jyhad clearly was going downhill while it was under the DCI's
watch and reversed field the instant it was transferred to LSJ. You tell me
what to think.
> I'm not sure what Magic should learn from V:tES' decision to
> change card texts as opposed to limiting access to problem cards.
"Limiting access to problem cards"? If you mean restriction, I'm pretty
sure Jyhad tournaments are more popular and well-attended than T1 Magic
tournaments. I think the DCI should learn that restriction is a lousy
means of play balance and that the popularity of your format will suffer
for using it in preference to tools that completely fix such problems.
Fred
Frederick Scott
I've said multiple times that Jyhad has no once-per-game card whose solitary
effect is anywhere near as unbalancing as any of the cards on Magic's restricted
list. If there were such a card, I'd probably agree with you that the once-per-game
limit is not a sufficient check on their effect.
Fred
Gene Wirchenko
[snip]
>cards, and I'm glad I moved onto playing Magic?" (I'm not holding my
>breath.)
[snip]
>knew what a CCG was!), and have steered clear of tables of it in the past,
>mostly due to waves of immaturity and/or body odor coming from the tables.
[snip]
Maybe, you should change your strategy and hold your breath? <g>
Gene Wirchenko
>Jason Bell wrote:
>>
>> "Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
>>
>> sorry for the snip
>>
>> > The DCI would do well to learn from this experience and create a play-
>> > balanced constructed type which allows all card sets. But they'll never
>> > learn.
>>
>> Never learn? They have an enormously successful tournament
>> environment. They have attendance at their pre-releases that
>> would make V:teS drool (or be unable to accomodate).
>
>Apples and oranges. Magic has the advantage of being the first CCG on the
>market. It is decidedly less complex which makes it attractive to a larger
Actually, it wasn't. It's certainly the first one with wide
popularity. I remember thinking that I had seen a CCG advertised in
early "Dragon". I confirmed it.
>population of players. It's natural that both of these advantages translate
Is it really less complex? It may have started fairly simple,
but now? There are so many exceptions, so many rulings.
>into more popularity. It will always be impossible to compare the two
It's similar to D&D vs. all other RPGs.
>directly. None the less, my impression is that Magic has been going
>consistently downhill for years in terms of sales and in the attendance of
>tournaments. Jyhad clearly was going downhill while it was under the DCI's
>watch and reversed field the instant it was transferred to LSJ. You tell me
>what to think.
Oh, what a straight line! Tell you what to think? OK. Send all
your money to me. I need it for living expenses until I start
college. (Really. My budget for the next three months is truly sad.)
>> I'm not sure what Magic should learn from V:tES' decision to
>> change card texts as opposed to limiting access to problem cards.
>
>"Limiting access to problem cards"? If you mean restriction, I'm pretty
>sure Jyhad tournaments are more popular and well-attended than T1 Magic
>tournaments. I think the DCI should learn that restriction is a lousy
>means of play balance and that the popularity of your format will suffer
>for using it in preference to tools that completely fix such problems.
Agreed.
Orpheus
Write me off and tell me which ones, I may jsut have them...
Darn it, I'll have to read all that thread about CL / NCL, and I KNOW I'll
have to say a few things, and I'll get started for more hours of doing
nothing but Jyhading...
I hate White Wolf. ;-)
--
Orpheus
orph...@wanadoo.fr
http://cypheranima.free.fr
news://news.zoo-logique.org/VTES-francophone
audio...@yahoogroups.com
Frederick Scott
>
> Frederick Scott <fre...@netcom.com> wrote:
>
> >Jason Bell wrote:
> >>
> >> "Frederick Scott" <fre...@netcom.com> wrote
> >>
> >> sorry for the snip
> >>
> >> > The DCI would do well to learn from this experience and create a play-
> >> > balanced constructed type which allows all card sets. But they'll never
> >> > learn.
> >>
> >> Never learn? They have an enormously successful tournament
> >> environment. They have attendance at their pre-releases that
> >> would make V:teS drool (or be unable to accomodate).
> >
> >Apples and oranges. Magic has the advantage of being the first CCG on the
> >market. It is decidedly less complex which makes it attractive to a larger
>
> Actually, it wasn't. It's certainly the first one with wide
> popularity. I remember thinking that I had seen a CCG advertised in
> early "Dragon". I confirmed it.
I guess you're going to have to give us more information than that because I have
no idea what you're talking about. But in any event, this is kind of an irrelevant
objection. Magic was the first game of its kind at the time and caught on without
the disadvantage of any existing, popular CCGs out there overshadowing it. I don't
think any technical objections to the statement that it was the first CCG in
existence really impugns my point.
>
> >population of players. It's natural that both of these advantages translate
>
> Is it really less complex? It may have started fairly simple,
> but now? There are so many exceptions, so many rulings.
It is, IMHO, a simpler game, yes. My opinion is that you find groups of people who
are less tolerant of complexity (e.g. younger children) willing to play Magic who
will not touch Jyhad. Granted, that's a subjective assessment but it's a definitely
a legitimate objection to Jason Bell's suggestion that popularity is proof of
peoples' desire to deal with play-balance problems using restriction rather than
banning or errata. Even if it's not a provable one. The point is, who knows what
the exact cause is of Magic's popularity compared to Jyhad? It has other things
going for it that have nothing to do with restriction.
> >into more popularity. It will always be impossible to compare the two directly.
>
> It's similar to D&D vs. all other RPGs.
It sure is. Likewise, it's hard to prove that anything D&D did was better and more
popular than any other RPG since D&D was always the first RPG. It was the one people
got used to and played because all their other friends played.
> > None the less, my impression is that Magic has been going
> >consistently downhill for years in terms of sales and in the attendance of
> >tournaments. Jyhad clearly was going downhill while it was under the DCI's
> >watch and reversed field the instant it was transferred to LSJ. You tell me
> >what to think.
>
> >> I'm not sure what Magic should learn from V:tES' decision to
> >> change card texts as opposed to limiting access to problem cards.
> >
> >"Limiting access to problem cards"? If you mean restriction, I'm pretty
> >sure Jyhad tournaments are more popular and well-attended than T1 Magic
> >tournaments. I think the DCI should learn that restriction is a lousy
> >means of play balance and that the popularity of your format will suffer
> >for using it in preference to tools that completely fix such problems.
>
> Agreed.
Fred
Orpheus
also
> > listed Tomb of Ramses and Mind Rape.
> >
> > Hmmm...there's Legacy of Pander (which has been effectively neutered now
as
> > well). I'm also tempted to include Blood of the Cobra in there as well.
What was the previous version of Blood ?
I don't know if anyone mentionned this already, but one of the biggest
"nuclear-strikes" IMO is Thoughts Betrayed !!!
It used to be "ultimate", and now is only a good card.
And didn't Kiss of Râ undergo a rise in power (as if it needed it) ?
> >
> > Halcyan 2
>
> Well, add Fame to that list as well. No more unblockable Force of Will
with an
> added three + one pool-loss :)
>
> Sten
>
> --
> NetGuide Scandinavia AB http://www.netg.se/
> Tankegangen 4 in...@netg.se
> 417 56 Goteborg Phone:+46 - (0)31 - 50 79 45
> Sweden Fax: +46 - (0)31 - 50 79 39
>
>
>
James Coupe
writes
>> > Hmmm...there's Legacy of Pander (which has been effectively neutered now
>as
>> > well). I'm also tempted to include Blood of the Cobra in there as well.
>
>What was the previous version of Blood ?
I believe he may be referring to the fact that hand strike portions of
the strike aren't considered hand strikes.
Since the card text says "as if it were ranged", and hand strikes cannot
be ranged, any hand strike portion does not function.
<URL:http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=eb4eb7f8.0107100923.6d6c1761%4
0posting.google.com>
>I don't know if anyone mentionned this already, but one of the biggest
>"nuclear-strikes" IMO is Thoughts Betrayed !!!
Unfortunately, some cards were just too good. The ability to almost
entirely neuter your opponent in combat would either have had to become
seriously expensive or become less powerful.
(Similar arguments were made regarding Tomb. Assuming you had 3
transfers (and on a 5 player table, the average number of transfers a
player gets in their first turn is 2.8) the card paid for itself, there
and then. Compare with, say, Short Term Investment or Protracted
Investment, which take far longer to pay for themselves, and the fact
that Tomb can generate far more pool.)
If you take Thoughts Betrayed and compare it to similar cards, we find:
- Immortal Grapple - which prevents certain kinds of strikes
- Drawing out the Beast - which prevents use of certain cards and
maneuvers
- Terror Frenzy - which, again, prevents certain cards and maneuver
- Hidden Lurker/Fast Reaction - which prevents strikes, but need blocks
(on whichever side)
- Dog Pack - which prevents Strike: Combat Ends (but is seriously
overcosted anyway)
and so on (there are probably a few others). We mix them all together,
create a card, and then make it cost a meagre 2 blood. And it was given
to Dominate, which was already a seriously useful mono-discipline. And
it could be used for offence (Tremere, which is where it was probably
intended to go) but also to shut down opponents for defence (Ventrue,
which is probably where it wasn't intended to go).
You'd have needed to up the cost of the card significantly - probably to
4 or so - to stop it being that horrid. Or tone it down.
>It used to be "ultimate", and now is only a good card.
Which is fine. It's still a good card.
>And didn't Kiss of Râ undergo a rise in power (as if it needed it) ?
It was clarified that Kiss of Ra blocked the action, rather than the
blocking minion. This is simply a reading of card text, however.
(Unused material snipped.)
John Bell
> Lafayette, La. who can not handle playing with NCL. He builds his decks
> with a four card limit and then tells me how the game is broken with NCL,
> yet can't show how. Apparently, some people can't handle freedom.
I have that exact problem in my group; just so happens the person that
"taught" all of us to play is the one who holds onto the 4CL and
various other rules misconceptions.
Each piece of errata, each ruling, I've had to fight him every step of
the way, since I started going to tournaments and learning the real
rules. People like Jay Kristof and Jeff Thompson have been great to
me at the tournaments, when I bombard them with questions.
I've gotten some of the people in my group to go with NCL and the
other VEKN rules, but we're having severe problems with a few people.
One solution we tried was go to other game stores to recruit newer
players, but in our area it seems everyone plays 4CL. I'm at a loss,
in how to convince people of the game balance that the VEKN rules
bring to the game.
John Bell
VEKN Cincy Prince
Flux
John Bell <webm...@spectrumdesigns.cc> wrote in message
news:a757ead4.01102...@posting.google.com...
> I've gotten some of the people in my group to go with NCL and the
> other VEKN rules, but we're having severe problems with a few people.
> One solution we tried was go to other game stores to recruit newer
> players, but in our area it seems everyone plays 4CL. I'm at a loss,
> in how to convince people of the game balance that the VEKN rules
> bring to the game.
I'm not sure if it works, since around here everyone plays by VEKN rules,
but one idea would be to lend them a NCL deck to play a few times. You can
then show them that that deck can beat some other NCL decks, and that it can
be beat by other NCL decks.
Or, you can bring a 4CL Malkavian S&B deck and show them how broken that
is...
...but don't try this if they have a bad temper and don't take lessons
easily. :-)
Flux
Orpheus
> but one idea would be to lend them a NCL deck to play a few times. You can
> then show them that that deck can beat some other NCL decks, and that it
can
> be beat by other NCL decks.
The same could go with CL decks.
> Or, you can bring a 4CL Malkavian S&B deck and show them how broken that
> is...
The same could go with a Malk S&B NCL.
> ...but don't try this if they have a bad temper and don't take lessons
> easily. :-)
"Lesson" seems a little pretentious, don't you think ?
I, personnally, intend to convince a few friends to try NCL, because I ALSO
find it interesting. Not because I find CL "broken". And I don't intend to
force anybody into doing it, just to propose a try to some friends ; maybe
they'll get convinced, maybe I won't, we'll see. But only ONE thing counts :
that we'll all have fun together. Because tat's what friends, and games, are
for.
Sorry if that seems a little harsh, Flux, it's just that I'm an utopist and
would like all the players, CL or not, to take each other's hands and go
bleeding... uh, dancing together, naked, in corn fields... darn, wouldn't
that be more like Rage than Vampire ? Darn....
Orpheus, very tired and slowly slipping into the hands of Insanity (who
tried Dementation on me ?).
>
> Flux
>
>
James Coupe
writes
>> Or, you can bring a 4CL Malkavian S&B deck and show them how broken that
>> is...
>
>The same could go with a Malk S&B NCL.
Not really.
Under NL, Malk S&B is fine. All the counters are available in spades.
Flux
Orpheus <orph...@wanadoo.fr> wrote in message
news:9qvk1g$hqj$1...@wanadoo.fr...
> > I'm not sure if it works, since around here everyone plays by VEKN
rules,
> > but one idea would be to lend them a NCL deck to play a few times. You
can
> > then show them that that deck can beat some other NCL decks, and that it
> can
> > be beat by other NCL decks.
>
> The same could go with CL decks.
The point is to show that NCL decks are not broken, ie, that any NCL deck is
balanced against another NCL deck. Of course, for this to work properlly
you'd preferably give them a NCL deck that they perceive as 'broken'.
> > Or, you can bring a 4CL Malkavian S&B deck and show them how broken that
> > is...
>
> The same could go with a Malk S&B NCL.
Not really, you can prepare for a Malk S&B deck under NCL, but it'll be much
harder to do so under 4CL. The point being that, S&B is broken under 4CL,
but not under NCL.
> > ...but don't try this if they have a bad temper and don't take lessons
> > easily. :-)
>
> "Lesson" seems a little pretentious, don't you think ?
Maybe, but I couldn't find another way to put it (then again, it's past 1 AM
here and English is not my first language, so you'll have to excuse my
innacuracies...)
> I, personnally, intend to convince a few friends to try NCL, because I
ALSO
> find it interesting. Not because I find CL "broken". And I don't intend to
> force anybody into doing it, just to propose a try to some friends ; maybe
> they'll get convinced, maybe I won't, we'll see. But only ONE thing counts
:
> that we'll all have fun together. Because tat's what friends, and games,
are
> for.
Surely that would be preferable, but the OP claimed he had already tried
reasoning with his fellow players with limited success, so some more
'agressive' tactics might be in order if he really intends to convince them
to play NCL.
> Sorry if that seems a little harsh, Flux, it's just that I'm an utopist
and
> would like all the players, CL or not, to take each other's hands and go
> bleeding... uh, dancing together, naked, in corn fields... darn, wouldn't
> that be more like Rage than Vampire ? Darn....
I wouldn't know, I never played Rage. Though I might have danced in
cornfields before... :-)
> Orpheus, very tired and slowly slipping into the hands of Insanity (who
> tried Dementation on me ?).
Not me! It was the blue octopus, in the library, with the violet spray can.
Really.
;-)
Flux