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Maureen, Dark Priestess
Baali
Cap: 6
Group 4
dom obf DAI PRE
Independent: Maureen has one vote (titled). Once each turn, when Maureen
successfully performs an action requiring a Baali or Daimonion, you gain 1
pool. Infernal.
Robert M. Sachs
V:EKN Prince of Naperville, IL
"Who controls the past now,
controls the future.
Who controls the present now,
controls the past." ~ Zach de la Rocha
Thanks, White Wolf. Sure, it's above the power curve of the current
Baali, but I think that's maybe appropriate.
Regards,
Patrick
Columbus, OH
So she can pay for her own Infernal cost in some circumstances. You
could use her to play Call the Great Beast, then start playing
Condemnations, Contagion, etc. If you find yourself without a DAI or
Baali action in your hand, stick another counter on Call the Great
Beast: that's an action that requires a Baali. Avoid getting blocked,
of course, 'cause you'll need the pool.
By the way, this is the first-ever 6-cap printed with dom obf PRE.
Should fit pretty well with Susan Kadim, Catherine Dubois and
Amenphobos. Oh, and she has a vote for extra yesness.
Now stop staring at her Arwen ears, you perverts.
Just picture them as novelty fake plastic Spock ears, and hopefully
that'll purge impure thoughts out of most people.
(And if that _encourages_ you, you have my pity and/or mockery.)
-John Flournoy
(Next project: rehabilitate and make useful the Salibri
Antitribu clan. ;-) )
Fred
Er, let's not get ahead of ourselves. It would require Maureen 5 more
successful actions after the one which played the original CtGB card
to bring it into play.
Always annoyed me that they didn't use my suggestion for Call the
Great Beast: require 13 ritual counters but allow each subsequent
action after the original one to add 3 counters to the card. As it
is, it's really kind of pointless to expect anyone but Huitzilopochtli
(or another 10 cap) to play the card.
Fred
...making it a convenient ongoing effect that allows her to recoup the
pool you spent to keep her untapped in the event that you don't cycle
into another Baali or Daimonion card during your turn. Correct.
Eh? She'd need about 30 pounds of collagen to begin mistaking
her for Arwen.
Fred
First of all, it's not particularly clear to me that an action to put
a ritual counter on a Call the Great Beast card qualifies as an "action
that require Daimoinon or Baali". Playing the card qualifies. Putting
ritual counters on it is a card action restricted to the minion who
play it. There's sort of an inference there but it's not a direct one.
(LSJ? What's the thinking on such things?)
Secondly, even if it did, so what? Nice though the Beast is, I don't
think it's worth requiring 6 successful actions from a 6-cap - even if
you're recapping the infernal pool cost when the attempts are successful.
Fred
It requires a Baali, by card text. Not "This vampire" but "this Baali".
It is not restricted to the minion who played it. It is restricted to
the minion it is on (and further requires that that minion be Baali).
Not that it can be moved, but if it could, then there you go.
> Secondly, even if it did, so what? Nice though the Beast is, I don't
> think it's worth requiring 6 successful actions from a 6-cap - even if
> you're recapping the infernal pool cost when the attempts are successful.
He says that you do other stuff with her. Then, when you don't have and
don't draw into the other stuff, you use the never-to-be-completed
Great Beast ritual to recoup, at the end of your minion phase, the pool
you invested at the beginning of your turn.
--
LSJ (vte...@white-wolf.com) V:TES Net.Rep for White Wolf, Inc.
V:TES homepage: http://www.white-wolf.com/vtes/
Though effective, appear to be ineffective -- Sun Tzu
I'm glad someone else thinks Liv Tyler wasn't terribly elfin either. I
think most of the rest of Peter Jackson's elf choices were good, but
Liv only pulled off "the look" in a few scenes IMO.
Jeff
OK, that makes sense.
>> Secondly, even if it did, so what? Nice though the Beast is, I don't
>> think it's worth requiring 6 successful actions from a 6-cap - even if
>> you're recapping the infernal pool cost when the attempts are successful.
>
> He says that you do other stuff with her. Then, when you don't have and
> don't draw into the other stuff, you use the never-to-be-completed
> Great Beast ritual to recoup, at the end of your minion phase, the pool
> you invested at the beginning of your turn.
Yes, I caught that point. Even so, my counter-point is that you've
got a 6-cap you've invested in (the original pool for her capacity, if
not the infernal cost) who's taking actions and getting tapped every
turn (or during such turns) and you're not getting anything out of it.
That, in of itself, is bad IME.
I don't know. Without have tried to use her, I do like her and I think
she'll make a good vampire to have in a Baali-based deck. The Call the
Great Beast thing just seems like a silly tactic to me unless there's
something else about it I'm not catching.
Fred
It's not meant as a winning tactic in and of itself.
The point is, you put Maureen in a deck that ALREADY has a bunch of
Baali/Daimonion actions - and include 1 or 2 CtGB, so that you have the
fallback of taking a CtGB action should your deck fail to cycle into
one of the other actions. If you've got the CtGB, you can go ahead and
untap Maureen every turn, even if you lack a Baali/Dai action in your
hand, knowing that if you fail to come up with something better for her
to do during the course of your turn, you haven't wasted a pool
untapping her.
Think of it as a bonus safety net.
> Fred
-John Flournoy
...eventually. :)
> The point is, you put Maureen in a deck that ALREADY has a bunch of
> Baali/Daimonion actions - and include 1 or 2 CtGB, so that you have
the
> fallback of taking a CtGB action should your deck fail to cycle into
> one of the other actions. If you've got the CtGB, you can go ahead
and
> untap Maureen every turn, even if you lack a Baali/Dai action in your
> hand, knowing that if you fail to come up with something better for
her
> to do during the course of your turn, you haven't wasted a pool
> untapping her.
> Think of it as a bonus safety net.
>
> > Fred
>
> -John Flournoy
if you have a deck that already has dai or baali actions, you have a g2
deck (only barbaro is g3) and this pretty girl is g4...im waiting for
the others baali g4 and then we can see if she pass the line between
wallpaper or a gloriuos infernalist.
note: also she has dom, she cannot be so bad...LOL
> (Next project: rehabilitate and make useful the Salibri
> Antitribu clan. ;-) )
Now that's easy. Just give us more Salubri AT that have fortitude.
That's anough to start kicking ass and blessing names. (ducks)
--
hg@ "If you can't offend part of your audience,
iki.fi there is no point in being an artist at all." -Hakim Bey
Immediately. It just wasn't much of a point. :)
George
Next thing you know, people will start suggesting using sargon to bring
the beast, because you could actualy
gain the edge 7 times and get the beast!!! wow!!!!
So, get real... The beast is supposed to be played effectively by
Huitzi, or some other high cap vampire.
The new baali gal is a nice one, though maybe she could have been a
prettier one as well...
imo it is way better to use her to condemn or fetch heralds...
George
BUT, this is one of the most silly ideas i have ever heard...
What you are suggesting is like taking an ordinary Baali, puting a
blood doll on him and just pay his infernal
cost by using the blood doll and hunting each turn. Because this is
only what you are going to do, when the
Beast card reaches 10 counters, a Brujah will come flashing a grapple
and kick your sorry ass...
Use the Path to untap all your minions with the expenditure of just 1
pool and then find one good use for this new
cool vamp. Like Condemnations... Even making her charismatic and
fetching Heralds is a lot better than your silly
idea. What i believe that you are doing wrong is that you are trying
hard to use the new vamp's special when you
don't really have to.
None said that you should find a way to exploit this cool special to
the maximum extend, trying to do so with every
new card is wrong. Most of times, simple things work better.
In my opinion you should had focused on the nice 6 capacity and the
nice dom discipline next to the clan ones
Until there is a new dai action card that is really worth be done
repeatedely each turn and allow people to successfuly exploit
this new vamp's special...
George
Uh, no, that's not quite what I meant.
What I meant was, if you are already building your library to be based
around DAI or Baali actions, etc etc. Not necessarily 'if you have an
existing deck' which would be G2.
Even if no other G4 Baali are put out, it'd still be pretty easy to
build a DAI-heavy deck with 2-3 copies each of Maureen, Barbaro and
Valerius (assuming he doesn't change much from the early-preview) and
3-6 weenies.
Let's say you use 3 of each, plus a trio of tha/dom weenies, and you
can pretty easily build a dai/tha/dom deck (with or without a little
presence; 9 crypt cards out of 12 would have at least basic of
whichever of those 4 disciplines you care to include) - which could be
a lot of fun to play a bunch of Condemnation: Languids.
Something like 'Okay, Maureen makes your vamp Languid. Now, Valerius
dom-bleeds you. Or you can block, in which case I've got Thaum combat
and you can't press to end, ever.'
A CtGB or two would help with Maureen if you weren't drawing the
Languids or whatever other DAI actions you've got (Concordance?
Contagion? Etc.)
The specifics of such a deck are left as an exercise to others (at
least until I get my hands on some grubby little cards, heh heh.)
-John Flournoy
You are missing the point entirely. (See below.)
> What you are suggesting is like taking an ordinary Baali, puting a
> blood doll on him and just pay his infernal
> cost by using the blood doll and hunting each turn. Because this is
> only what you are going to do, when the
> Beast card reaches 10 counters, a Brujah will come flashing a grapple
> and kick your sorry ass...
No, that's not the point at all.
> Use the Path to untap all your minions with the expenditure of just 1
> pool and then find one good use for this new
> cool vamp. Like Condemnations... Even making her charismatic and
> fetching Heralds is a lot better than your silly
> idea.
This is exactly what I'm suggesting. Put Condemnations in. Play for
Charisma w/ Herald. Whatever.
The Call the Great Best is put in the deck NOT to try to get the Beast
Out - it is SPECIFICALLY for a deck like you suggest, when you happen
NOT to draw any Condemnations or Heralds or whatever. Don't even bother
to put more than 1 or 2 CtGB's in, because you ideally won't need to
take that option much.
Instead of starting your turn and saying 'I won't untap Maureen,
because I don't have anything in hand for her to do', you can go ahead
and untap her - as you take your turn and your other minions play
cards, if you draw into something better to do, like a Condemnation, a
Herald, needing to rescue a vampire of yours that unexpectedly got
torpored, grave-rob, whatever - do it.
And if you're almost done with your turn and you _didn't_ end up with
something for Maureen to do, then she takes the CtGB action to recoup
the cost of having untapped her. That way, untapping her in the hope
that you'd have something for her to do later in the turn doesn't cost
you.
So you NEVER have to leave Maureen tapped at the start of your turn
'because I don't have a use for her at this moment during my untap',
which is where a lot of Baali players are during their untap at the
moment.
Hopefully, if your deck is build well with lots of better actions for
her to take, you shouldn't need to use the CtGB option often/ever -
certainly not enough to generate the counters needed to actually summon
the Big Nasty; but it's nice to have that option as a fallback. If your
deck is flowing well, you can just discard the CtGB instead of play it.
(And yes, using the Path of Evil Revelations to untap her is even more
efficient on top of this, but a lot of people either do not own
any/enough Paths or aren't going to have the intercept to keep them in
play.)
> What i believe that you are doing wrong is that you are trying
> hard to use the new vamp's special when you
> don't really have to.
Neither Emmit nor I were suggesting building a deck around her special
with CtGB - we're pointing out that it's a useful fallback when your
primary strategy fails due to a bad draw on a given turn or whatever.
> None said that you should find a way to exploit this cool special to
> the maximum extend, trying to do so with every
> new card is wrong. Most of times, simple things work better.
This is FAR from a maximum extension; it's a very much a corner-case
idea. It's specifically if you're already planning to use Maureen's
special in other, better ways, as a fallback should your shuffle betray
you.
> George
-John Flournoy
I don't think people are missing the point the way you and Emmit
are claiming. You need to take into account that if someone isn't
particularly impressed with the benefits of gaining a pool to add
a counter to Call the Great Beast when the intent *is* to ultimately
bring the Great Beast into play, then he's obviously going to be
even less impressed with the no-hope-to-ever-get-the-Great-Beast
scheme.
> And if you're almost done with your turn and you _didn't_ end up with
> something for Maureen to do, then she takes the CtGB action to recoup
> the cost of having untapped her. That way, untapping her in the hope
> that you'd have something for her to do later in the turn doesn't cost
> you.
Sure. But this all assumes you drew the Great Beast card in the first
place. It's like, you seem to understand that specified action cards
come and go and are undependable in the course of drawing on your
library but you're totally obvlious to the same notion about Call the
Great Beast specifically. One of the huge drawback in using Information
Highway - assuming you find a game-long use for extra transfers - is that
you may well draw it long after you're done with a need for transfers.
Some people like to use it anyway but that's pretty debatable. This
use of Call the Great Beast, while not exactly the same thing, has many
of the same elements. It has to appear relatively high in your library
to be of much use. Not quite as specifically high as IH but then, its
benefits - that you might use it to cover a bet that you wouldn't otherwise
take with untapping Maureen and it might save the odd pool that way
are far less worthwile. Unless, of course, you're proposing to (!)
actually add *multiple* CtGB cards in order to encourage some regularity
in its early availability.
Again, to me, this just seems silly. Strange how discussion of Baali
strategy seems to bring that out in people (IMO).
Fred
With what ? The ears of Liv ? The Great Beast ? Jeff, Fred, LSJ, your
neighbour ?
I'm ain't no netiquette maniac, but I think we'd all appreciate that you
cite the text you answer to so we'd understand what you mean...
Thanks,
Orpheus
Sure, except that person is viewing it as 'a new way to gain a pool',
which I wholly agree is a crappy idea, instead of 'a way to not be
stuck losing a pool if you're already going to opt to spend it and take
a chance', which is my point.
> This
> use of Call the Great Beast, while not exactly the same thing, has
many
> of the same elements. It has to appear relatively high in your
library
> to be of much use. Not quite as specifically high as IH but then,
its
> benefits - that you might use it to cover a bet that you wouldn't
otherwise
> take with untapping Maureen and it might save the odd pool that way
> are far less worthwile. Unless, of course, you're proposing to (!)
> actually add *multiple* CtGB cards in order to encourage some
regularity
> in its early availability.
I wouldn't add more than 2 CtGBs for such a fallback, and only then if
I was heavily featuring Maureen in my deck, and even then probably only
1 since only she's ever going to benefit this way.
To be honest, I don't think most people would 'need' to get the CtGB
out _that_ early at all; mainly because early in a game, people are
being much less cautious about paying for infernal. (Perhaps much less
cautious than they should be.) It's later in the game, when the wasted
loss of a single pool has a dramatic effect on your total pool, that
this idea would be most useful.
And yes, I do understand the whole concept of 'but what if you don't
draw it'. Ideally, your deck should be cycling into the right kind of
action enough where it won't be needed. If you AREN'T cycling into
those cards, you're therefore cycling into something else, which could
be the CtGB. Or not.
Your comparison to Info Highway's not bad, but I expect it's a little
more analagous to Seattle Committee - a lot of players include one or
two Seattle Committee's as a backup to a handful of Galaric's or Go
Anarch's. They're already planning to use the GL or GA's, but the cost
of one card slot as a corner-case backup is worth it to them.
And if you're already planning to make a Maureen deck with a dozen
Dai/Baali actions, one corner-case card won't kill you. People include
single corner-case cards in their decks all the time as it is.
It's certainly not necessary, nor is it amazingly potent - it's just
got a not-immediately-obvious use to it, and one that under the right
(corner-case) circumstance could be very useful.
(And as has been noted, the utility of this idea goes WAY up if better
Daimonion/Baali actions are in the set.)
> Again, to me, this just seems silly. Strange how discussion of Baali
> strategy seems to bring that out in people (IMO).
Yeah, no kidding!
> Fred
-John Flournoy
Yeah, but its a corner case card that's corner case towards the
weakness of something in YOUR DECK. That's a crappy kind of corner
case, though I guess its more likely to show up than the corner case
where you're reliant on your opponents for the corner case effect...
Wouldn't be the first time. I've seen people go 'hm, some of my vamps
have Celerity, so I'll stick one Fast Hands in as weapon defense - I
might not face weapons, and I might not get out a cel minion, but what
the heck, it could be Just Right..' or similar things. Although that's
a bit more toolboxy in nature.
-John Flournoy
Piers
"David Wilson, Mask of a Thousand Names" <derv...@gmail.com> wrote in
message news:1105571452....@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
George
I agree with the following quoted statement:
(sorry but the new google interface, confuses me a little, and i mean
the "reply" button, where you just write text. I don't know how you are
supposed to quote the text you like when using this one)
ok, i got it now. sorry about the "silly idea" part, i take it back.
>
> The Call the Great Best is put in the deck NOT to try to get the
Beast
> Out - it is SPECIFICALLY for a deck like you suggest, when you happen
> NOT to draw any Condemnations or Heralds or whatever. Don't even
bother
> to put more than 1 or 2 CtGB's in, because you ideally won't need to
> take that option much.
>
Yeah, i read you now. Sorry for jumping to conclusions...
i take it back. your idea could work.. though putting in few CtGB (as
you are talking about a non-specific CtGB deck) would mean that you
will get a hard time drawing one in your hand.
Anyway, i hope we'll see a nice new Baali or dai action...
George
George
That said, I wouldn't expect more than 8 Baali. (though how they're
making a starter out of this (without duplicate vampires) is beyond me
(though it would be easy to just throw in 3 other vampires, but that'd
make collecting the boosters for Baalie kinda silly...).
I expect they are probably going to break their rule on the bloodlines
"supposed to exist as a suppliment to other clans" rule, though anarchs
did feature some non-clan oriented starters...
Exactly. It's like my mention of Talaq and Dark Sunrise in the other
preview card thread. Nothing game-shattering, just interesting.
Our collective understanding of V:tES on this newsgroup is pretty high.
I guess I could limit my remarks on the new cards to stuff along the
lines of "Maureen could play Govern *or* Legal Manipulations...and then
she could *totally* play stealth cards!" But most of us have travelled
those wide, swift roads to victory many times, and can see those
possibilities pretty quickly. Why not discuss the less obvious card
interactions that even very experienced players might not see?
Don't build a deck around recruiting Talaq to block, but if the vamp
bleeding you out plays Daring the Dawn and Talaq is tapped, play that
Dark Sunrise. Don't build a deck around Maureen getting the Great
Beast, but if you've got your Great Beast in play, remember the extra
copies you cycle out of your hand with Maureen have another use.
Assuming the vamps in the starter are reprints and not new Baali, I'd
expect the six Bloodlines Baali, Barbaro (or was he guaranteed to be
not available in this sort of thing?), Midget, two new group 3
starter-only Baali, and two useful sidekicks, like Lena Rowe or Basil.
He's a promo-only. For better or worse, he won't be reprinted (other
than in prize packs).
> Midget, two new group 3 starter-only Baali, and two useful sidekicks,
> like Lena Rowe or Basil.
I think since the new Baali are all likely to be group 4 (or at least,
some of the ones in the starter will likely be group 4), I wouldn't
expect to see group numbers on anything in the Baali starter less
than 3.
Fred
So, is it better now that they release new Baali or would it be better
if they
just released 2-3 to be mixed with the previous ones ?
George
Rather than ""hey I notice most of my vampires have [bad thing], so
I'll include something in my deck that'll help them do [just as good as
everyone else thing]. Cornercase, but when it shows up my deck will be
playing on the same level as everyone else." :) Sorry. I'm a baali
hater. (Not a baali playa' hater)
[its just the whole thing of pool gain being so difficult, action wise.
You're basically adding an additional one pool cost to every action a
baali performs, so they'd better be recouping at least that, on
average, with each action].
Keep in mind that grouping rule only applies officially on constructed
tournaments. So, I guess there won't be no problem if a starter decks mixes
vamps for whatever groups they think of. On the release note, it says that
each precon packs 2 starter only vamps (like all of the starters since
sabbat wars) so I expect the the rest of the baali crypt being build with a
few non-baali vamps and some or most of the G2 baalis.
Piers
Well, there would one problem: you couldn't just unwrap one and use it
in a constructed tournament. Not that they ever guaranteed you can (nor
is it advisable) but they haven't issued one yet like that. I guess I'd
be surprised.
> On the release note, it says thateach precon packs 2 starter only vamps
> (like all of the starters sincesabbat wars) so I expect the the rest of
> the baali crypt being build with a few non-baali vamps and some or most
> of the G2 baalis.
Actually, I expect the remaining Baali vampires in the starter to be ones
you can get in KMW boosters.
I suppose it's also possible they could reprint the 5 Baali from
from Bloodlines in the starters and possibly even augment them with new
group 2s or group 3s. I'm not really expecting that (which probably
makes it a slam dunk, my predictive capabilities being what they are...).
Fred
> The grouping rule is in the rule book its not tournament only, its one of
> the basic rules of the game.
> Im hoping for 12 Baali in the starter a mix of 3&4, ok so I reallt want them
> all to be 3 but thats not going to happen.
12 new Baali in a set of 162 new cards (that's 150 new ones in the
boosters and three in each of four starters)? Doesn't seem that likely to
me. I bet there will be 5-6 in the whole set (maybe not all in the
starter). Other recent sets have introduced about 5-6 new vampires per
clan. There's no reason to think this will be any different.
Assuming a similar booster distribution to Gehenna, there could be 58 new
vampires in this set (including the starter-only ones). Maybe something
like this:
6 Assamites
6 Baali
1 Brujah
1 Brujah antitribu
1 Caitiff
6 Followers of Set
1 Gangrel
6 Gangrel antitribu
6 Giovanni
1 Lasombra
1 Malkavian
1 Malkavian antitribu
1 Nosferatu (Echo)
1 Nosferatu antitribu
1 Pander
6 Ravnos
1 Toreador
1 Toreador antitribu
1 Tremere
1 Tremere antitribu
1 Tzimisce
1 Ventrue
1 Ventrue antitribu
That's 53 vampires, so give or take a few and throw in some advanced.
Maybe there won't be all those antitribu, but it seems like most other
expansions have had at least one of each major clan, so there's no reason
to think this one won't.
I'd have pretty mixed feelings about a starter that didn't have a legal
crypt. It wouldn't perturb my play or collection much, but it would be
too bad if a new player picked up a starter and wanted to run it in a
tournament but couldn't because of an illegal crypt.
Of course with all the new rules and updates, there might be something
that changes how grouping works.
Matt Morgan
George
George
i expect a modification to the grouping rule, even maybe a
bold change of the whole rule. Something like "you can mix
crypt cards of only 2 groups, whatever you like", so 1-3, 2-4
legal but 1-2-3, 1-2-4 illegal.
Well, let's wait and see.
George
i believe that it is nice... a nice step towards making
baali and the rest of the infernals more appealing.
Now, if we could ever get a nice way of making minions
BH, like Seattle Committee for anarchs, then i would
be really happy...
George
But the new infernal rule is fun. Makes Path of Evil Revelations less
mandatory for a Baali deck (and less valuable. Fortunately I just
ebayed mine. :P Sorry dude who bought it! I'm not a KMW playtester, I
swear!)
Excellent! Even if they don't print any Group 2 Baali, this alone
will augment uses of the existing Bloodlines Baali vampires somewhat.
(And, of course, it seems likely that a few Daimoinon and/or Baali clan
library cards will be along, as well.)
Fred
George
I just noticed that there are already 7 Assamites listed in the preview so
its looking possible
that there will be quite a few of each clan.
Piers
In each independent clan, sure. Not necessarily in the others.
Fred
Note that Maureen is one of the Starter-only Vampires.