Last year I brought a "fun but competative" deck to the DC qualifier
because I had already qualified at the New Jersey event. To my surprise,
I won the event with mighty +strength strikes from the likes of Julio
Martinez, Beast and Mateusz. Julio's dominate defended me from stealth
bleeders.
This year I went with a "fun" deck in Jersey and failed to qualify. I
played a "good" deck at Totalcon and qualified. That brought me back to
"fun but competative" for this year's DC qualifier. Ever since I was
brutalized by a very nice Hordes deck at last year's NAC, I've been
meaning to make my own.
Before designing my deck, I consulted the tournament-winning deck archive
to see how others had done well with Hordes decks. I was surprised at how
few Hordes most of those decks were running. Of the four decks in the
archive, two run 12 copies, one has 14 and one has only seven. I decided
that my deck would be distinctive in that I would run more copies of
Shambling Hordes than any of the others. I sketched out a decklist with
18 copies, then checked my collection to discover that I owned 19 of them.
Nice guess. I decided to leave it at 18 because I couldn't figure out
what I might want to take out.
Round 1
Me: Giovanni Shambling Hordes
Pat Lusk: Giovanni powerbleed
Aaron Steele: !Gangrel rush/hack/Amaranth
Steve Holmer: War Ghouls
Adam (didn't get the last name): Fatima + Tariq intercept
It was soon apparent that Adam was extremely screwed sitting between two
ally rush decks. He didn't successfully pressure me all game since he
couldn't block Steve's early War Ghoul. Pat got out Isabel Giovanni
(worrying me slightly) and Ambrogino and bled Aaron for a lot. Aaron
couldn't block or backrush and was in a lot of trouble. His real problem
was lack of Beast. Beast wasn't in his deck at all. Instead he was
playing Gangrel antitribu. Couldn't tell you why.
Anyway, I played it cool for a little bit getting Hordes. I didn't want
the table to turn on me since I obviously had a good seat. Steve rushed
Pat to slow him down a little because Aaron was nearly ousted. This
probably wasn't a good job because Pat had to play his last Spiritual
Intervention to save Isabel. I rushed with three Hordes on Pat's next
turn torporizing Isabel and knocking all the blood off Ambrogino. I
played Dragonbound and ousted both Pat and Aaron the next round.
I encouraged Steve to go forward, which he did a bit halfheartedly, but
there wasn't any real doubt about what would happen. I was gaining pool
like crazy and had half a dozen Hordes out. Steve tried to wall against
me, but I killed his vampires and ousted him with bleeds and Dragonbound.
Adam hung on for a little while, but I simply overwhelmed him for the
sweep.
The highlight of this game was having Charismatic Andrea the Perfectionist
get a Shambling Horde while I had Path of Bone in play. The low point was
when I had someone (probably Andrea again so at least it wasn't expensive)
get a Horde while I had no allies in my ashheap.
Round 2
Ethan Levi: Turbo-Baron
Me: Giovanni Shambling Hordes
Jeff Thompson: Lasombra vote/bleed
Jason (didn't get his last name): Toreador antitribu bleed/block
Pete Oh: Kindred Spirits bleed with some intercept
I influenced Andrea with some concern, knowing Ethan probably had an
Andrea in his deck and a good shot at being able to contest for free.
Jeff brought up Gratiano, Banjoko and Aaron Duggan. He tried an early
KRC, but I was able to block with Jason's London Evening Star. It was the
beginning of a beautiful friendship.
Pete got out Rodolfo and Uncle George and got a Deer Rifle as he prepared
to leave his mark (somewhere) on the table. Ethan brought The Baron out.
I made a couple zombies and wondered how long I could stand against the
turbo action behind me. Jason got Venere Carboni and a few other
!Toreador. He and I managed to block all of Jeff's votes, but Jason ended
up taking a bleed or two. He had plenty of bloat to stay alive.
Ethan did the turbo thing a couple of times getting out free vampires. I
managed to block all the Force of Will bleeds, but it was still scary.
Eventually Ethan got a free Andrea and my chief Horde-maker was out of
commission.
Things started looking up when Pete got a couple of bleeds bounced to me.
I sent them on and Jeff could only bounce once (due to being tapped out
and not having Wakes). On my turn, I bled mercilessly, rushed with
Hordes and played Dragonbound.
Jeff tried to wall against me which unhooked Jason. Jason played a Palla
Grande and ousted Pete. Then he turned up the heat on Ethan. Ethan tried
to deal with Jason for a VP, but Jason had none of it. Ethan came close
to ousting me, but couldn't draw the final Force of Will he needed. I
killed Jeff. Ethan died. I wasn't sure where the 1v1 game would end up,
but then the table went to time anyway. 2.5 for Jason and 1.5 for me.
Round 3
David Cherryholmes: Assamite sleaze bleed
Greg Williams: Setite Enticement & Ecstacy
Me: Giovanni Shambling Hordes
Peter Kapsalis: Mata Hari infernal stuff with Blessing of the Name
This game was over in the blink of an eye. Peter spent a lot early and
David hit Greg like a ton of bricks. David brought out Badr, Melek,
Laurent de Valois and probably someone else. Greg got Ezekiel and someone
else. I got Andrea, Rudolfo and Gloria and made some Hordes. Peter
brought out Mata Hari and Elihu and got a Herald of Topheth.
Greg put a Temptation on Andrea and Enticed me once, but didn't live long
enough to ever steal Andrea. He should've probably Tempted backwards as
he might've lived a little longer. Peter and I rushed each other a bit.
Eventually the infernal costs and the few bleeds I got in did him in.
David and I found ourselves in a 2-way after only about 15-20 minutes of
play.
That 2-way favored David early since I had nowhere to bounce, but I think
it favored me in the long run. I ate some huge bleeds, but my pool cushon
was very large since Greg never hurt me much. I kept rushing and David
couldn't tap out because he had to block rushes against his Famed guy. He
also blocked with Melek a lot, which was funny because I had no way to
hurt Melek.
After a while, I played Dragonbound and torporized some of David's guys.
He had no bleed left and I was making more and more Hordes. He conceded.
3 VPs for me and 1 for David.
Finals
I was top seed with 2GW and 9.5VPs. Other finalists included Oscar Garza
playing a dem/pro bleed/vote deck, John Mickle playing low/midcap Ventrue
bleed/vote, Tobin Lopes with a Fatima rush deck and Wayne Chin playing a
Tremere intercept/bleed deck. I chose to sit as Wayne's prey because I'd
seen his deck before and felt like I could deal with it pretty well.
Seating was:
John->Tobin->Wayne->me->Oscar
John ended up looking strongest for much of the game. He fielded several
minions, was able to defend his pool pretty well and had strong offense
with dominate bleed and a few KRCs. Tobin would've been okay, but his
Sport Bike was blocked and he didn't seem to have any Psyche!s to match
John's Majesties. Wayne had a very slow start, fishing in his crypt for a
while. I had a very weird draw getting all my action modifiers and no
Hordes. I only got out two Hordes all game. Oscar's Zillah's Valley was
Suddened, so it took him a while to get out Rodolfo, Imogen and Greger. I
got Isabel, Rudolfo and Le Dinh Tho. Since Wayne was moving slow, I paid
one to see one and got Gillespi.
My offense for much of the game was just to dig stuff out of Oscar's hand
over and over. It was pretty annoying for him. Unfortunately, I couldn't
get to any Hordes, but I did get a few bleeds in. Gillespi's +1 was nice.
On the other side of the table, John kept working on Tobin and eventually
wore him down. Wayne was working on bringing up several minions to attack
me. I finally got a couple Hordes out and rushed Oscar. I knocked one of
his guys into torpor, so I played Dragonbound, to force him to tap out
rescuing.
John ousted Tobin. Wayne got some bleeds in on me. Oscar had zillion
Wakes and I couldn't oust him. The clock ran down and I foiled Wayne's
attempts to oust me. FBI Special Affairs Division and my untapped Jake
Washington was key here as I could block any of Wayne's bleeds with Jake
and the FBI would beat him up.
On what would probably be his last turn, John went for the kill, knowing
that if he ousted Wayne, he'd certainly win the tournament. He bled for 4
unblockably. Wayne bounced to me. I bounced to Oscar, who was ousted.
John kept at it, but couldn't kill Wayne without the bleed of 4. Wayne
attacked me a little, but couldn't break my defenses. Time was called
during my turn.
Deck Name : Now For the Main Event - Zombies!!!
Author : Matt Morgan
Description : Overwhelm the table with your need for tasty brains.
Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 3 max: 7 average: 5.25
------------------------------------------------------------
3x Andrea Giovanni 7 DOM NEC pot vic Giovanni:2
2x Isabel Giovanni 5 DOM NEC pot Giovanni:2
2x Rudolfo Giovanni 3 NEC Giovanni:2
1x Carlotta Giovanni 7 NEC POT dom obf Giovanni:2
1x Gillespi Giovanni 7 DOM NEC POT aus Giovanni:2
1x Le Dinh Tho 5 NEC aus dom Nagaraja:2
1x Gloria Giovanni 4 DOM nec Giovanni:2
1x Lia Milliner 3 dom nec Giovanni:3
/* Pretty obvious choices here. Le Dinh Tho was a last-minute
substitution for a 3rd Isabel. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have won
without him. */
Library [90 cards] // Yet again I make my deck too big. This should've
// been in the 70-80 card range. I never came close to
// running out of cards and there were certainly some
// key cards I wanted to draw.
------------------------------------------------------------
Action [8]
1x Far Mastery // Stole a Procurer in the 3rd round.
7x Govern the Unaligned // Used both ways. This ended up being a good
// number.
Action Modifier [12]
5x Call of the Hungry Dead
7x Seduction
Action Modifier/Reaction [4]
4x Spectral Divination
/* Pretty standard "don't block me" package. Could've been more cards,
but since the action starts at 1 stealth (2 with Andrea), this was
sufficient. I used the Spectral Divinations for intercept more than
once. */
Ally [20]
2x Leonardo, Mortician // He's better than Procurer. Don't even try to
// tell me otherwise!
18x Shambling Hordes // Good number!
Combat [10]
6x Fake Out // I hardly needed these. I was fortunate not to
// run into any gun decks.
4x Spiritual Intervention
Event [3]
1x Dragonbound
1x FBI Special Affairs Division
1x Unmasking, The
/* These events worked out very well. I was lucky in drawing them early
every round. Dragonbound helped me gain almost every VP all day. Six
cards in hand is plenty for a Horde deck since I don't rely on any
combat combos. Unmasking was discarded in round 3, but was critical in
round 2 and the final. FBI Special Affairs Division is just huge. It
makes a Horde with 1 life very useful indeed. I actually didn't rack
up very many counters on it. It mostly served as a deterrant. */
Master [17]
2x Acquired Ventrue Assets // Great card for this deck.
1x Barrens, The // Got it early in almost every round.
2x Blood Doll // I'm something of a Blood Doll addict, so
// it was kind of scary playing with only
// two of them. Worked out well, though.
1x Charisma
1x Creepshow Casino // Never really needed it, but I didn't face
// heavy intercept.
1x Dreams of the Sphinx // Gave me a turn 2 Andrea twice.
2x Fame // Can't live without it.
1x Giant's Blood // Played it right before Oscar was going to
// play his in the finals.
1x Jake Washington (Hunter) // Great with Unmasking + FBI or just eat
// him for the blood.
1x KRCG News Radio // Never needed it.
1x Morgue Hunting Ground
1x Path of Bone, The // This was nice, but not crucial.
1x Perfectionist
1x Specialization // I was surprised, but I hardly got any use
// out of this at all. I figured in a deck
// with 18 of the same card, this would be a
// killer. It ended up being practically
// useless.
Reaction [16]
7x Deflection
2x Poison Pill
7x Wake with Evening's Freshness
/* I had meant to replace 3 Deflections with Redirections to save blood,
but I forgot. Don't know if that would've made a difference. The
bounce was crucial in round 2 and the final but useless in rounds 1 and
3. Only played Poison Pill once and it didn't change the outcome of
the referendum. I keep trying with this card, but I've yet to have any
positive outcome. The only nice thing is the Hordes can play it. */
See everyone next year!
Matt Morgan
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