OFFICIAL VEKN BLOOD BROTHERS NEWSLETTER VOL 1 ISSUE 2 MAY 2002
Chris Berger
"Is evil something you are? Or something you do?" - Morrissey
--------------------------------------------------
Contents
i. INTRODUCTION
ii. FICTION
iii. BLOOD BROTHERS IN VTES
iv. FOCUS ON SANGUINOUS
v. LIFE SUPPORT
iv. DECK BUILDING
--------------------------------------------------
i. INTRODUCTION
It has been a while since our last communication. We have been hard
at work, for the master has needed us. Little has changed since last
we spoke, but we have a little story for you. It's a bit long this
week, and it's mostly about our master. We hope you will love him as
we do. Or skip that part and get straight to the bashing. Either
way.
--------------------------------------------------
ii. FICTION
The Fragment, part ii: A Modern Major-General
...
Karoly, sitting quietly at his old-fashioned roll-top desk, sighed.
He reached down, opened the second drawer from the bottom, pulled out
a small glass jar. Gaunt fingers, made to seem thinner and more frail
by long, slightly-curled fingernails, twisted the cap from the jar.
It was upturned, its contents spilled out onto the desktop, a dark
grey ash. He ran his fingers through it, closed his eyes, tilted his
head back slightly, and thought.
He thought about the other Kindred of the city. To his face, they
always called him "Your Grace," "Sir", "Mr. Karoly." But there was a
subtext there. A whisper of their true feelings, inaudible to most.
He could hear their thoughts. There wasn't really anything special in
that. Many of the Kindred had that particular gift, some of them
stronger than he. What made him special was the message that their
thoughts conveyed. They wanted to ridicule him. Call him a relic, a
worn-out horse-faced bag of ash and bones. They recoiled at the sight
of him, the last remnants of flesh barely draped on a rotted-out
frame. Even in his darkened chambers, they could not stand to look at
him. But they dared not speak such things. They were scared. Like
only a few others, Karoly inspired a hellish fear. Many were the
Kindred he'd run out of his town simply by reaching a skeletal finger
toward them. He did not control the town, but he controlled many of
those who did. He liked it that way. But what he loved even more
than the fear was the foolish few who stood up to him, who tried to
wrench power from his clenched fists. He had put those ones to good
use. He laughed as he thought about them.
And a soft rustle disturbed his musings. He quickly herded the pile
of ash back into its jar, noticing that it was almost the same colour
as his hand. The jar was replaced back into the drawer, and the
ancient Tzimisce stood to face his favourite servant.
Kanari Halal was the almost whimsical name he had given it. The words
were in the language of his own homeland, a place he hadn't visited in
almost a thousand years. It meant "Dead Canary", or "canary of
Death", depending on the dialect. Kanari had 3 arms, one and a half
torsos, and two faces set on opposite sides of a peculiarly misshapen
head. One face was that of a young girl. Karoly had caught her
hunting nightcrawlers under the moonlight, almost 5 centuries ago, in
a park in Budapest. She had a strong spirit, and her will controlled
most of the shuffling movements of the ghoul. The other face was a
man with a broad nose and a high forehead. He had been the Ventrue
Prince of the city when the Sabbat had washed through. It had taken
only an hour to break his spirit, to have him begging for Final Death,
blood tears running down his cheeks. Karoly had taken a liking to his
pitiful groveling and attached him, body and soul, to the young girl
he had come to adore. And he had infected the amalgamation with his
own disease, so that he could watch the sickness wrack them as it
wracked him. When the ghoul died, and die it would, then would its
master go off into the darkness, never to return. But in the
meantime, he had business to attend to.
It nodded its grotesque head towards Karoly, and motioned towards the
doorway. It never spoke, anymore. It probably couldn't; all of its
teeth long since rotted out. It communicated in gestures and hisses
which its master had learned to interpret.
"Yes," screeched Karoly, "show the boy in."
The boy was Sal. He was about 6 feet tall, muscular, with a shaven
head. A slightly disturbing symbol has been carved in blood just
above his ear. He wore a plain leather jacket and heavy grey slacks
with a hole in the knee. Sal was holding a ripped piece of parchment,
and he sniffled a little before throwing it on Karoly's desk. It
rattled around, knocked over a jar of ink before coming to rest.
"You should be more careful with that," came the high, harsh voice
again. "That is a small piece of the True Book. We had thought it
lost to the Ventrue some years ago, but they left it behind. Really,
an ingenious hiding place, right in plain sight, but, at long last,
you have found it for me... Tell your brothers and sister that we are
one step closer. At long last, one step closer."
Sal sniffled again and looked over at the hunched ghoul near the door.
"Your pet's shedding again," he said, nonchalantly, before sauntering
out of the room.
Karoly followed Sal's gaze, to see an arm lying at Kanari's feet,
rotted off at the shoulder. One step closer, he thought. One step
closer.
...
--------------------------------------------------
iii. BLOOD BROTHERS IN VTES
Torrance Circle Brothers Flex Muscles in Baltimore
Eek... it really has been a while since I wrote a newsletter. The
Meddling of Semsmith storyline tournament has long since ended, with
the Lasombra narrowly winning over the Ravnos. According to Yoritomo
Jiriki's results (73 out of 76 tournaments), the Blood Brothers led
all Bloodlines with 3 wins (Ahrimanes coming second with 2 wins, and
the Salubri (!!!) getting 1 win. All the BB wins were for Torrance
Circle, which is a bit surprising, as many heralded Chicago as the
better circle, with smaller vampires. It may be that Chicago's lack
of fortitude was its downfall. We have yet to see exactly what these
results will bring about, but we can be proud of our showing.
Unfortunately, I did not play Blood Brothers, but instead gathered one
of the wins for clan Lasombra. See, my Tzimisce master owed a boon to
Gratiano, and... okay, okay, so I freaked out and picked a clan I
thought I could win with. Sue me.
But that's really old news. The big questions now are the new
expansions, Camarilla Edition and The Anarchs. What is in store for
the Blood Brothers? Well, the most likely answer is not much. We are
extremely unlikely to see any new vampires in Camarilla Edition,
although we might get some new pot/for vamps. Blood Brothers like to
play alone, though, so it might be hard to work any such vampires into
a deck. There may, however, be new potence and/or fortitude
discipline cards to whet our teeth on, and I anxiously await those.
The Anarchs might give us a slightly better chance. I'd put odds at
50/50 on whether or not we get any new vampires in the set. Anarchs
are primarily Camarilla or Independent, and we are strictly Sabbat,
but maybe they'll feel bad and throw us a bone. We might, for
example, get a new Chicago Circle vampire, or maybe we'll get a new
circle with just 3 vampires in it. Who knows, but just don't hold
your breath.
--------------------------------------------------
iv. FOCUS ON SANGUINOUS
Bats of a feather feed together
Unwholesome Bond
Action, Sanguinous
+1 stealth action.
[san]: This vampire gains X+1 blood, where X is the number of ready,
untapped Blood Brothers of the same circle as the acting vampire.
[SAN]: Add 1 blood from the blood bank to each Blood Brother in your
uncontrolled region of the same circle as the acting vampire.
Altogether, not a bad card. Not bad at all. Let's look at each level
independently:
At inferior, this is basically a restoration. Assuming you have one
other untapped Brother (of the same Circle), you gain 2 blood. (In
general, the +1 makes up for the acting vampire being tapped... it's
possible to gain a blood for the acting vampire as well, but that
involves strangeness like using Rutor's Hand to untap in the middle of
an action.) Usually, you'll gain anywhere from 2 to 5 blood from this
card, just for having inferior Sanguinous. It can easily replace
Restoration in your decks, but heck, you have Taste of Vitae for
filling up, so you don't need the inferior level too badly. Inferior
alone would probably allow for 2 or 3 copies in a deck.
At superior, it's a whole other ballgame. Basically, it's a
Recruiting Party that's common instead of rare. And Recruiting Party
is a great card. You also have the added bonus that more Blood
Brothers in play is always a great thing, for various Sanguine
reasons. The biggest problem is having enough Blood Brothers in your
uncontrolled region. Sure, it's nice in any case, but what if you
really want to abuse the card? Here are a few options...
One person suggested playing with a couple Nosferatu and using Kindred
Intelligence. That's a nice thought, and funny as hell, but it waters
down your crypt. You can have more uncontrolled vamps, but fewer
vamps that gain blood from Unwholesome Bond.
Another choice is, of course, Effective Management. It uses up master
slots, which could be more useful as skill cards (need that superior
fortitude), Haven Uncovered, Depravity, Fame, etc... But it's always
something to consider.
You can also use Info Highway and simply pay 1 to see 1 every turn
while using 2 transfers and some Unwholesome Bonds to keep things
moving. This is probably the slowest way to go about things, but the
Info Highways are good in themselves. No one likes to see a new
Torrance Circle vamp every turn.
And last, but not necessarily least, is Clotho's Gift. That's right,
Clotho's Gift. It's common (albeit C1), the line we're interested in
requires only obf, and it costs only 1 blood. Perfect, you say?
Well, there is the problem of actually getting obfuscate in our deck,
but lo and behold, one Blood Brother has obf. And look at that...
it's our pal Mark. The best Blood Brother in existence (and I
challenge any of you to argue with that ;) ). Mark can play an
outferior Clotho's Gift, then Freak Drive and play superior
Unwholesome Bond. It may not be the most ironclad combo out there,
but hey, it's gotta be lots of fun, right?
--------------------------------------------------
v. LIFE SUPPORT
Putting the blood in Blood Brothers
After just one issue, I have nearly run out of Potence/Fortitude cards
to talk about. Basically, they're just not that interesting. Potence
is all "I hit you hard", and Fortitude is all "you don't hit me very
hard." Hopefully the Camarilla expansion will give us something more
to talk about, but as it is, I am reduced to reviewing the
oft-maligned power-rare Freak Drive, and its place in a combat deck.
Freak Drive
Action Modifier, Fortitude
1 blood
[for] Only usable immediately after this vampire performs an action
that is not blocked. Untap this vampire.
[FOR] As above, but usable even if the action is blocked.
Okay, everybody and their brother uses this card in Ventrue decks.
You'd be insane not to. Ventrue can vote big and bleed big, so
Freaking will let them do both. Lots of people use Freak in
action-heavy decks. But combat decks can't afford to be action heavy,
so what is Freak Drive's place in such a deck.
And the answer, for most combat decks, is nowhere (and only a couple
combat clans have fortitude anyway). But the Blood Brothers have
largish vampires, and so they need to get everything out of their
vamps that they can. And with Walk of Caine, Coagulated Entity, and
Unwholesome Bond, there are a lot of actions they can take. Also,
since entering combat is not a defined action type, they can Ambush,
Bum's Rush, and Coagulated Entity all in the same turn. So, adding 2
to 5 Freak Drives in a Brothers deck can only help you out, even at a
1 blood cost. And it just might leave you untapped and able to use
those Gestalts you've been saving.
Of course, there's the increasingly pressing question of where to get
more copies of an R1 from Jyhad/V:TES, but hopefully we'll see a
reprint in Camarilla Edition. For the sake of the newbies, I hope
it's uncommon, although the bastard in me is happy with my 6 copies
and doesn't want anyone else to have any.
--------------------------------------------------
vi. DECK BUILDING
What to do other than fight?
Okay, I know I promised a new combo to confuse and amaze you (cf.
February's newsletter, which I'm sure no one still remembers), but
since I promised it "next month", I don't feel so bad about skipping
it. Anyway, the combo is not all the great, and pretty much parallels
the Baron/Soul Gem combo (minus the Soul Gem). I'm still working on
that deck, so I'll let you guys in on the secret when I'm finished.
In the meantime, I decided to try and do something with the Blood
Brothers other than fight, as I was inspired by the Prince of
Chicago's recent deck, in which he somehow forgot to add rushes to his
rush deck. He bloated enough to survive despite my Setites burning 4
of his minions, and ended up being the last person ousted (still no
VP's, but he didn't build the deck to be a non-rush deck, it just
ended up that way.) Those of you in the US will remember the big
"Elvis stamp" vote, wherein people voted over whether to release a
stamp with a picture of the young, vibrant Elvis or the old, bloated
Elvis. I think the young Elvis won, but this deck is dedicated to
that other Elvis, who was discovered dead on his toilet with his huge
King of Rock 'n' Roll ass hanging out.
Deck Name: Old Elvis
Created By: Chris Berger
Description: Brothers Bloat deck with Walk of Elvis/Caine for offense.
A splash of potence/fortitude for combat defense and intmidation.
Crypt: (13 cards, Min: 24, Max: 24, Avg: 6.00)
----------------------------------------------
4 Mark for obf pot SAN 6, Blood Brother, Bishop
3 Truman dom FOR pot SAN 6, Blood Brother
2 Karl FOR POT pre san 6, Blood Brother
2 Jack cel for pot san 6, Blood Brother
2 Ilse for POT pro SAN 6, Blood Brother
Library: (90 cards)
-------------------
Master (16 cards)
4 Dominate
2 Obfuscate
3 Tribute to the Master
2 Information Highway
3 Contingency Planning
2 Sudden Reversal
Action (18 cards)
8 Clotho's Gift
10 Unwholesome Bond
Action Modifier (18 cards)
5 Daring the Dawn
5 Freak Drive
6 Walk of Caine
2 Foreshadowing Destruction
Reaction (18 cards)
9 Deflection
2 Gestalt
2 Delaying Tactics
5 Wake with Evening's Freshness
Combat (20 cards)
6 Torn Signpost
5 Rolling with the Punches
4 Superior Mettle
3 Hidden Strength
2 Resilience
This deck's nemesis is a high-intercept deck that's too stupid to fear
your Brotherly combat might. Most Tzimisce players are over-confident
in their combat ability and will not hesitate to block you, even if
they don't know this deck. In those cases, you're best off just
ditching the Gifts and Bonds and looking for your Daring the Dawn and
bleed modifiers. Even that probably won't help you too much. The
other thing this deck hates is heavy bounce. If you're going up
against heavy bounce, don't play the Walks unless you have a
Contigency Planning, or if you just wanna Walk for 1. But you won't
be too scared of heavy bounce unless your predator is a vote deck, as
you should be able to bloat/bounce enough to usually not get ousted
until your bleeds for one can take out your prey.
Anyway, the deck is currently untested (but not for long... heh, heh,
heh), but if someone tries it out, let me know how things go.
Henrik Isaksson
diskussionsgruppsmeddelandet:5287ede4.02050...@posting.google.com
...
> At superior, it's a whole other ballgame. Basically, it's a
> Recruiting Party that's common instead of rare. And Recruiting Party
> is a great card.
This part I'm curious about... I've traded all my recruiting parties away as
I think the card is unusable! I really can't see a scenario where a !Ventrue
gets away with this zero-stealth action... How do you use it to make it
good?
--
Henrik Isaksson
Joshua Duffin
"Chris Berger" <ark...@ugcs.caltech.edu> wrote in message
news:5287ede4.02050...@posting.google.com...
> Deck Name: Old Elvis
> Action Modifier (18 cards)
> 5 Daring the Dawn
> 5 Freak Drive
> 6 Walk of Caine
> 2 Foreshadowing Destruction
I was just thinking about grafting Dominate in a Brothers
deck yesterday, and came to the conclusion that if I was
gonna count on having Dominate for Deflections, why not
use Conditioning instead of Walk of Caine? Sure, you'll
get max +2 bleed out of it most of the time, but it only
costs you 1 blood for that instead of 2, and if you get
DOM it's 1 blood for +3 instead of 3.
Then I decided that going down this path, there'd be no
reason to use Blood Brothers at all, and the deck would
probably be better as something like Dom/Pot bruise-bleed/
Govern bloat/Deflection. :-)
If the point is to capitalize on the Brothers' Brotheriness,
maybe drop the Daring the Dawns in favor of, say, 5 Disarms?
(good combo with all the prevention, and makes you much
scarier to Tzimisce and such. More power rares, though. But
would let you drop Contingency Planning, which I think kind
of sucks, for something more directly good for you, like
Effective Management.)
I'd probably use Blood Dolls over Tributes, too, but maybe
that's wrong.
Josh
has a somewhat more beaty blood bros bloat/toolbox deck
Xian
Hope like hell the other players don't remember (or realize) that it's
a 0-stealth action?
Alternatively: Seduction, Sleeping Mind, Daring the Dawn, or Day
Operation?
Xian
Sten During
Joshua Duffin wrote:
> If the point is to capitalize on the Brothers' Brotheriness,
> maybe drop the Daring the Dawns in favor of, say, 5 Disarms?
> (good combo with all the prevention, and makes you much
> scarier to Tzimisce and such. More power rares, though. But
> would let you drop Contingency Planning, which I think kind
> of sucks, for something more directly good for you, like
> Effective Management.)
>
> I'd probably use Blood Dolls over Tributes, too, but maybe
> that's wrong.
>
I have this scary picture of a BB-deck based around Unwholesome
Bond, Force of Will, Daring the Dawn and Walk of Caine with
the occasional Kiss of Ra and King of the Mountain. I'd put
Tribute to the Master into that deck in order to make sure that
my vampires actually has a decent chance to burn when bleeding.
Does this seem viable?
Sten During
Naram
> diskussionsgruppsmeddelandet:5287ede4.02050...@posting.google.com
> ...
> > At superior, it's a whole other ballgame. Basically, it's a
> > Recruiting Party that's common instead of rare. And Recruiting Party
> > is a great card.
>
Nice deck chris, I would put in a one more info hwy in case your first
one gets suddened (and you really need one to be able to pull off 3
blood/ turn at times.
Also you may want to consider 2-3 labyrinths to go with all that
obfuscate. Cause I will sure try to block you :).
> This part I'm curious about... I've traded all my recruiting parties away as
> I think the card is unusable! I really can't see a scenario where a !Ventrue
> gets away with this zero-stealth action... How do you use it to make it
> good?
Depends on the !Ventrue, here is a short list of combat deterence
Ideas:
-Lazvernius/Kyle/paragon POT/FOR angle
-for/tha (weather control)
-Keep it simple stupid, or KISS of Ra :)
There are some stealth options too, like
-obtenebraton
-torpor stealth (tm): daring the dawn/day op
See any of the Recent !Ventrue newsletters for ideas of "how to get
things done" (Copyright pending to Alex B.)
Naram
Naram
> diskussionsgruppsmeddelandet:5287ede4.02050...@posting.google.com
> ...
> > At superior, it's a whole other ballgame. Basically, it's a
> > Recruiting Party that's common instead of rare. And Recruiting Party
> > is a great card.
>
Nice deck chris, I would put in a one more info hwy in case your first
one gets suddened (and you really need one to be able to pull off 3
blood/ turn at times.
Also you may want to consider 2-3 labyrinths to go with all that
obfuscate. Cause I will sure try to block you :).
> This part I'm curious about... I've traded all my recruiting parties away as
> I think the card is unusable! I really can't see a scenario where a !Ventrue
> gets away with this zero-stealth action... How do you use it to make it
> good?
Depends on the !Ventrue, here is a short list of combat deterence
Chris Berger
"Naram" <stor...@msn.com> wrote in message
news:cbc63db8.02050...@posting.google.com...
>
>
> Nice deck chris, I would put in a one more info hwy in case your first
> one gets suddened (and you really need one to be able to pull off 3
> blood/ turn at times.
>
> Also you may want to consider 2-3 labyrinths to go with all that
> obfuscate. Cause I will sure try to block you :).
>
obfuscate stealth. Neither is a bad idea, but without playtesting the deck, I
wouldn't know exactly how to go about making room for them. If I get a chance
to put this deck together (the extra Clotho's Gifts are the sticking point at
the moment, strangely enough), I'll give that a try.
The Disarms that Josh Duffin suggested are a good idea too. And the main
reason those aren't in is that I don't have them, and so would never have a
prayer at playtesting the deck if they were in it. They would probably add a
great deal to the deck, though.
>
> > This part I'm curious about... I've traded all my recruiting parties away
as
> > I think the card is unusable! I really can't see a scenario where a
!Ventrue
> > gets away with this zero-stealth action... How do you use it to make it
> > good?
>
> Depends on the !Ventrue, here is a short list of combat deterence
> Ideas:
>
> {snip - a bunch of good ideas}
>
Okay, so the truth is, I forgot it was 0-stealth, which is why I thought it was
so good. I've only played with it a few times, but when it does get through,
the effect is pretty nice. That, I guess, is why Unwholesome Bond is so great
(+1 stealth) and Recruiting Party isn't as good. However, if you build you
deck around getting actions through (using any of Naram's ideas, or any of Alex
Brodhead's, from his newsletters), it can still be real nice.
Curevei
>maybe drop the Daring the Dawns in favor of, say, 5 Disarms?
My Chicago deck had Disarms and Sewer Lids. My Torrance deck has Dawn Ops and
.44s. While the latter deck had issues with a Rotschreck deck, I think I
prefer Dawn Ops as a way to scare people away from blocking Unwholesomes.
Xian
"Joshua Duffin" <jtdu...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:ab8obv$g3h8d$1...@ID-121616.news.dfncis.de...
> Then I decided that going down this path, there'd be no
> reason to use Blood Brothers at all, and the deck would
> probably be better as something like Dom/Pot bruise-bleed/
> Govern bloat/Deflection. :-)
Everything is better with Dominate, eh? :)
> If the point is to capitalize on the Brothers' Brotheriness,
> maybe drop the Daring the Dawns in favor of, say, 5 Disarms?
> (good combo with all the prevention, and makes you much
> scarier to Tzimisce and such. More power rares, though. But
Oh, look at me, I'm the magical man with 5 Disarms!
(Oh wait, I've got more than that myself...I should shut up.)
> would let you drop Contingency Planning, which I think kind
> of sucks, for something more directly good for you, like
> Effective Management.)
I agree. Contingency Planning is just for Malks who can't be bothered to bleed
responsibly. :) Also, Effective Management is the bomb for Blood
Brothers/Unwholesome Bond.
> I'd probably use Blood Dolls over Tributes, too, but maybe
> that's wrong.
In general, I'm in favor of Blood Dolls vs. Tributes in most decks, except where
you know you're going to have *lots* of minions, and Tribute has a chance of
reasonably generating an amount of pool equivalent to a good Minion Tap.
Xian
Chris Berger
"Xian" <xi...@waste.org> wrote in message
news:ab9lua$gbnp7$1...@ID-123937.news.dfncis.de...
>
> > would let you drop Contingency Planning, which I think kind
> > of sucks, for something more directly good for you, like
> > Effective Management.)
>
> I agree. Contingency Planning is just for Malks who can't be bothered to
bleed
> responsibly. :) Also, Effective Management is the bomb for Blood
> Brothers/Unwholesome Bond.
>
Change of Target is for all other non-stealth bleed. Contigency Planning is
for everything else (usually Lasombra, but also applies to any big bleeds that
are unblockable or at high stealth). It's a much better card than anyone gives
it credit for. Usually its biggest advantage is peace of mind. The number of
times that I have bled with Julia Prima for 7 and rested easy because of CP is
almost uncountable. Most of those times (actually all of them, IIRC), I wasn't
even bounced, but I wouldn't have bled that big without a CP in hand. Even if
you have to use it, it's well worth the effect. It would be a better-balanced
card without the 1 pool cost, but you can't bleed for 6 without *some*
protection.
> > I'd probably use Blood Dolls over Tributes, too, but maybe
> > that's wrong.
>
> In general, I'm in favor of Blood Dolls vs. Tributes in most decks, except
where
> you know you're going to have *lots* of minions, and Tribute has a chance of
> reasonably generating an amount of pool equivalent to a good Minion Tap.
>
I think Blood Dolls are pretty much interchangeable with Tributes in this deck.
Blood Dolls are better if you get them early. They end up being 1 blood per
turn for any number of turns, whereas Tributes are usually 3 or 4 blood *right
now*. Sometimes you need the blood right now. Blood Doll ends up being more
blood, usually, but Tribute is faster. Salt to taste.
Joshua Duffin
> news:ab8obv$g3h8d$1...@ID-121616.news.dfncis.de...
> > Then I decided that going down this path, there'd be no
> > reason to use Blood Brothers at all, and the deck would
> > probably be better as something like Dom/Pot bruise-bleed/
> > Govern bloat/Deflection. :-)
>
> Everything is better with Dominate, eh? :)
It seems like that lately, yeah... ;-)
> > If the point is to capitalize on the Brothers' Brotheriness,
> > maybe drop the Daring the Dawns in favor of, say, 5 Disarms?
> > (good combo with all the prevention, and makes you much
> > scarier to Tzimisce and such. More power rares, though. But
>
> Oh, look at me, I'm the magical man with 5 Disarms!
>
> (Oh wait, I've got more than that myself...I should shut up.)
ha! I actually don't have five of my own. Only three. I
just suggested 5 because that's how many Daring the Dawns
there were.
Josh
must get back to work
Xian
> > bleed responsibly. :) Also, Effective Management is the bomb for Blood
> > Brothers/Unwholesome Bond.
> >
> Not true. Spying Mission is for Malks. Perfect Clarity is for Tremere.
> Change of Target is for all other non-stealth bleed. Contigency Planning is
Okay, very true. However, I consider significant use of Spying Mission to fall
under the umbrella of "bleeding responsibly."
And let me just say it again. Sweet sweet Perfect Clarity.
> for everything else (usually Lasombra, but also applies to any big bleeds that
> are unblockable or at high stealth).
Lasombra, Malkavian...to-mah-to, to-may-to. :)
> It's a much better card than anyone gives it credit for.
Probably...I just can't justify using the master slots on them when I could
(usually) just as easily include Revelations or something else that'll do the
trick. Though that of course still leaves the Lasombra out in the dark...but
they're happy there, right?
> Usually its biggest advantage is peace of mind. The number of
> times that I have bled with Julia Prima for 7 and rested easy because of CP is
> almost uncountable. Most of those times (actually all of them, IIRC), I
wasn't
> even bounced, but I wouldn't have bled that big without a CP in hand. Even if
Ugh. Again, I prefer other methods of keeping the bleeds safe, because by
spending all that effort (1 for Govern, 1 for Conditioning, 1 for Julia's +1),
and then to have to blow a pool and a master phase action...yeesh.
And man, there's nothing like bleeding with Govern the Unaligned, Seduction (at
DOM), Perfect Clarity, Conditioning as your first action of the game vs. a prey
with only one vampire. :)
[Blood Doll vs. Tribute]
> I think Blood Dolls are pretty much interchangeable with Tributes in this
deck.
Could be. I admit to not closely reading the decklist. I just tend to
think...combat + Taste of Vitae = Blood Doll.
> Blood Dolls are better if you get them early. They end up being 1 blood per
> turn for any number of turns, whereas Tributes are usually 3 or 4 blood *right
> now*. Sometimes you need the blood right now. Blood Doll ends up being more
> blood, usually, but Tribute is faster. Salt to taste.
True...again, my thoughts on Blood Doll/Tribute/Minion Tap are generally:
Minions are 7 cap +, use Minion Tap.
Minions are 2-6 cap, and gaining blood through combat, use Blood Dolls.
Minions are 1-3 cap, and you plan on having many, use Tributes.
Admittedly, it will vary, based on the deck itself.
Xian