Danish ECQ 2012 – Tournament Report

After drinking my semi-illness away at Mikkeller Bar together with Alex, Isak, Peter, Randy, Hugh, Nikolaj and Mikkel I was relieved to wake with a slight hang-over instead of the fever-heavy head I had the last couple of mornings. Our great host Christian was frying eggs and bacon and after a hot shower I felt that this would be a fantastic day for V:tES.
The deck i chose for this tournament was one that hadn’t seen many games before. The central theme being the card Cavalier, I had no experience using it since I never drew a single copy of the card in the two games I tested the deck with but I still felt it would be fun and maybe even effective to try it out in this environment.

Deck Name : Lasombra Cavaliers
Author : Stefan Karlsson

Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 8 max: 10 average: 9.25

2	Ambrosio Luis Moncada	10	DOM OBT POT PRE aus for	cardinal	Lasombra	2
2	Antonio Delgado	9	DOM OBT POT tha	archbishop	Lasombra	2
2	Francisco Domingo	9	DOM OBT POT PRE pro	archbishop	Lasombra	2
2	Gratiano	8	DOM OBT obf pot	priscus	Lasombra	2
1	Angelica, The Canonicus	10	DOM OBT POT cel obf	cardinal	Lasombra	2
1	Ayelea, The Manipulator	10	AUS DOM OBT THA pre	cardinal	!Tremere	2
1	Marcus Vitel	10	DOM FOR OBF OBT PRE	prince	Ventrue	3
1	Marconius	9	DOM MYT OBT pot	archbishop	Kiasyd	2

Library [66 cards]

Action [9]
  7x Govern the Unaligned
  2x Mind Rape

Action Modifier [20]
  3x Conditioning
  3x Private Audience
  4x Shadow Play
  4x Shroud of Absence
  2x Shroud of Night
  4x Voter Captivation

Master [21]
  5x Cavalier
  1x Coven, The
  2x Dreams of the Sphinx
  1x Elysian Fields
  1x Giant's Blood
  1x Information Highway
  1x Monastery of Shadows
  1x Pentex(TM) Subversion
  4x Villein
  4x Zillah's Valley

Political Action [11]
  1x Anarchist Uprising
  1x Ancient Influence
  1x Ancilla Empowerment
  3x Banishment
  3x Kine Resources Contested
  1x Political Stranglehold
  1x Reins of Power

Reaction [5]
  5x Deflection

I feel the strength of this deck is the crypt. 8 different vampires with good titles and superior DOM and OBT in the same grouping makes for a potentially good set-up. The idea is to play Govern the Unaligned or Mind Rape, untap with Cavalier and then play a political action. With Ambrosio’s or Antonio’s special you should even be able to have an untapped deflector at the end of the turn. All well in theory.

Round 1

1	2	3	4
David Luhaæær	Isak Esbjörnsson Bjärmark	Stefan Karlsson	Alex Ek
DEN	SWE	SWE	SWE
Hektor and Lorrie Rush	Kiasyd S/B with Masters	Lasombra Cavaliers	!Toreador Breed/Bleed

I know what Isak is playing and how very fast his deck is. Fortunately David’s deck rushes forwards and I am happy to vote for Lorrie to live both times she plays Amaranth. Alex builds up but doesn’t really get anywhere because of David having a couple of Potence weenies up each round. The Cavalier curse seems to continue and I don’t draw one this game either making my deck slow.
Eventually David needs to focus fully on defending against Alex and Isak’s recovery is going well. I manage to get Alex quite low on pool and I have two Deflections on my hand to defend my own pool, not much bigger than Alex’. Alex makes a tough call and plays Mind Numb on my untapped vampire virtually back-ousting me to buy enough time to be able to oust David before Isak secures the win in the duel.
The game looked good in the beginning but when David and I lost momentum it went downhill. Sorry for the lack of details in this report but it was a really uninspiring game for me. One fun thing I remember though from after I was out was when Alex had a Pentex on Isak’s Dame Hollerton and Isak attempted to contest it. David washes. Isak uses his master phase action with Anthelios instead to get the Pentex back on his hand and taps Parthenon to play it again. Alex plays Sudden Reversal.

Isak GW 3VP
Alex 1VP

Round 2

1	2	3	4
Stefan Karlsson	Hugh Angseesing	Jesper Woldiche	Ali Almadhi
SWE	ENG	DEN	GER
Lasombra Cavaliers	3xA + True Brujah	Stickmen	Lasombra Bruise/Bleed

This time I get my Cavalier but no crypt acceleration. Ali gets mid cap Lasombras into play and I am assuming he plays stealth/bleed. When I get Ambrosio to my ready region my first acton is to play Mind Rape on Dr. Julius Sutphen Advanced since I have no Deflections on my hand. Both Hugh and Jesper gets a slow start with a good build-up. The next round I bleed with Julius, using his blood as stealth but I get deflected. I now have Gratiano in play and he bleeds for four and Hugh plays Archon Investigation. Most of the time that card is not that bad news since it usually means your prey is playing a bad deck but not this time.
Naturally I have to struggle for survival here as Ali bleeds me some and I don’t have any bloat worth mentioning. Bleeds are sent all over the place and some of them ends up at me. I am at 11 pool with only Ambrosio untapped and Ali has three vampires with Dominate. I have two deflections on my hand so I hope for the best. Ali’s first action is to rush Ambrosio. Himself being low on pool makes this a big risk since if he taps out he will most likely die himself next turn. I try and convince him into that if he has not got what it takes to bleed me out this turn he needs to rush backwards to try and survive another round himself. Unfortunately he doesn’t agree and Ambrosio is in torpor. I convince Hugh to rescue him since he can’t get the game win if Jesper gets two Victory Points.
Jesper has a bad round and even if at lots of pool he doesn’t risk anything and stays untapped with a couple of vampires to defend against Hugh’s next round. Ali also plays defensively and I get another round. I don’t remember how but I managed to get blood on Ambrosio somehow and with help from Dreams of the Sphinx I have all three big cap-friendly vote cards in my hand. Hugh has voting power so I simply ask him which of the three he would prefer. He goes for the Political Stranglehold and I have 6 new shiny pool.
Jesper manages to oust Ali and in the next round me. I didn’t watch the duel but Hugh managed to oust for a table split.

Hugh 2VP
Jesper 2VP

Round 3

1	2	3	4	5
Rudolf Garski	Nikolaj Vang	Christian Nislev	Stefan Karlsson	Mikkel J
GER	DEN	DEN	SWE	DEN
Anson Guns with Infernal Pursuit	Shambling Hordes	Tremere/!Tremere big cap vote and bleed	Lasombra Cavaliers	Renegade Garous

No crypt acceleration again but I have several stealth cards on my starting hand. Mikkel discards a Renegade Garou first turn and I decide to keep my stealth cards to be able to do something. Christian also gets a slow start and influences Mistress Fanchon out in three turns. Nikolaj starts to build but stays pretty passive assuming that Rudolf is goíng to bleed him very hard. Later in the game Nikolaj tells us he thought Rudolf was playing the same deck he won the Danish Championships with the day before and that’s why he stayed untapped with so many minions all the time.
Mikkel realises he will have a hard time beating Rudolf’s bloat engine so he does his best to beat him in combat. One of his Garous equips with a Desert Eagle and he manages to get Anson to torpor and with my votes he is allowed to eat him. I do my actions to damage Mikkel’s pool and when Fransisco tries to bleed for 7 he reduces it with a master card to 3 and Fransisco burns.
Christian has left my pool alone mostly bloating and getting more vampires out and Mikkel is low on pool and realises he is in a lost spot. I am afraid he will go all out on my full Ambrosio with his two Garous and try and delay my oust one round (I am about to bring out Ayelea) but he instead goes all out against Rudolf and I manages to oust him the next round with a bleed. Ambrosio has Cavalier so I also manage to banish Christian’s newly influenced Malgorzata with help from Private Audience. This way I hope to be able to use Ayelea’s special on an untapped Malgorzata next round to get most benefit from it.
Rudolf rushes Ambrosio to torpor but I still have some hope to accomplish something when Mistress Fanchon instead banishes Ayelea. I talk Christian into rescuing Ambrosio from torpor in return for not using Ayelea’s special on any of his vampires for the entire game. Rudolf rushes Ayelea to torpor and plays Graverobbing so it is not hard for me to keep that deal. The next round Nikolaj Graverobbs her and has her as a threat towards Christian.
I know my game is over but I try to be stubborn and stay as long as possible. I get Rudolf to help me instead when Christian starts to seriously remove my pool. This has been a very slow game and I know timeout is near so I use all my resources to just survive. When two hours have gone I am at 1 pool with no ready minions but I have Pentex Subversion on Mistress Fanchon who is Christian’s only ready vampire.

Stefan 1.5VP
Rudolf 0.5VP
Nikolaj 0.5VP
Christian 0.5VP

Again I had a terrible tournament. My deck is not strong enogh. Sure, when I get a good turn I get a lot done but over all the deck is just to slow. I had a fun time though and especially the third game was very challenging with many turnarounds.
When I got home the first thing I did was to disassemble most of my decks and build some new, hopefully better, ones for the upcoming spring tournaments. So I guess in the end this weekend was a good learning experience and I look forward to compete again.
Big thanks to Christian, Nikolaj and Jesper for a great gaming weekend!

Danish National Championships 2012 – Tournament Report

After some days of fever and illness I felt well enough to make the trip to Denmark for a weekend of Vampire-flipping. I decided last minute what to play and wasn’t really comfortable with any of my deck for this unexplored meta. I decided to go with a deck that has done pretty well while testing it and that I felt could handle a little of each.
It is a bruise/bleed deck with Dominate and Potence and as we all probably know this archetype isn’t the strongest. What makes it work is Gustaphe’s built-in rush and Tangle Atropos’ Hand at outferior Potence. Using Tangle I can cancel those Deflections and bleed anew, forcing my prey to either take the bleed or block me. The percentage of bleed cards might look too high but they disappear very fast if I have to play Tangle Atropos’ Hand. Relentless Pursuit is there to get rid of not wanted cards (mostly combat cards) and does that job pretty ok. Anyways, here is the deck list:

Deck Name : Tangle Atropos' Fist
Author : Stefan Karlsson

Crypt [12 vampires] Capacity min: 2 max: 8 average: 6.16667

4	Gustaphe Brunnelle	8	ANI DOM POT obf	primogen	Nosferatu	4
1	Don Michael Antonio Giovanni	7	DOM NEC POT	2 votes	Giovanni	4
1	Lord Vauxhall	7	DOM OBT POT THA		Lasombra	4
1	Accorri Giovanni	6	DOM POT ani nec		Giovanni	5
1	Black Wallace	6	DOM POT obt tha		Lasombra	4
1	Virginie, Prodigy	6	DOM POT obt	bishop	Lasombra	4
1	Gianmaria Giovanni	5	POT dom nec obt		Giovanni	5
1	Almodo Giovanni	3	dom pot		Giovanni	4
1	Jackson Asher	2	dom		Ventrue	4

Library [74 cards]

Action [14]
  2x Bum's Rush
  12x Govern the Unaligned

Action Modifier [14]
  8x Conditioning
  6x Tangle Atropos' Hand

Combat [23]
  2x Increased Strength
  5x Relentless Pursuit
  5x Target Vitals
  4x Taste of Vitae
  7x Thrown Gate

Master [10]
  2x Anarch Troublemaker
  2x Dreams of the Sphinx
  1x Giant's Blood
  1x Haven Uncovered
  2x Misdirection
  2x Pentex(TM) Subversion

Reaction [13]
  7x Deflection
  2x Delaying Tactics
  4x On the Qui Vive

Thirty-three players showed up and If I got it correctly it is the largest tournament so far in Denmark which is nice for this dead game of ours.
It was hard work enough for me to take notes and pictures, still not being all well, so I completely forgot about my Thought’s from the Guest Star-concept this weekend so you have to do with only normal round reports.
I will also tell you right now that this tournament result was extra important because of a bet me and my travelling companions made. The one of us with the worst result have to change their name to Apache Jones on Facebook for one week.

Round 1

1	2	3	4
Nikolaj Wendt	Stefan Karlsson	David Luhaæær	Nikolaj Vang
DEN	SWE	DEN	DEN
Baali with Aksinya	DOM/POT Bruise/Bleed	Matthias with AUS weenies	Shambling Hordes

I get an all unique crypt and start my build-up. David tries to block my superior Govern the Unaligned but I use Tangle Atropos’ Hand once or twice for those actions (having a plethora of Govern on my starting hand) so I get all three attempts through and soon have Gustaphe, Acorri, Black Wallace and Jackson in play.
Nikolaj W gets a slow start and builds up with Tend the Flock and mostly stays untapped. I get to throw every single action at my prey and good news is he doesn’t use guns but prevents with fortitude so I can easily get rid of combat cards when I need and don’t get that hurt in the process. I keep drawing my Tangle Atropos’ Hands and they draw many cards from the table. Two bleeds ends up at Nikolaj W and he just blocks which lets me bleed again.
Nikolaj V is also a little passive, handjamming on master cards so most of the action is me bleeding David and him trying to defend. I think I go through more than half of my deck but eventually David is ousted. Nikolaj V still has pretty much pool and Nikolaj W starts to bleed me. He also steals two Shambling Hordes from Nikolaj V making my life hard.
The both Nikolajs team up against me and those Baali bleeds start to hurt. I have used so many resources and am low on blood so I don’t manage that squeezed situation and Nikolaj W ousts me and in the duel he also kills Nikolaj V.
If I was to rank this game in difficulty level A-C where A being “the impossible game”, B “the tricky game” and C “The easy game” this would definitely be a B. If I have had a better long-term plan from the very beginning instead of just bleeding my prey as there were no tomorrow things might have been different. Maybe I needed to deal with Nikolaj V early on to avoid two opponents in the three-way game. But I guess Nikolaj W’s slow start made me over confident so it didn’t feel needed from the start.

Nikolaj W GW 3VP
Stefan 1VP

Round 2

1	2	3	4	5
Mattias Bäckström	Frank Moeller	Jonatan Berg	Stefan Karlsson	Norbert Flasko
SWE	GER	SWE	SWE	HUN
Ravnos Anarchs with Undue Influence	Euro Brujah	Tzimisce Wall	DOM/POT Bruise/Bleed	Malkavian 94

I can tell from the start that this is an impossible game for me. My prey plays a pretty strong archetype with good ousting capabilities and my grandprey plays a deck with very little defence and almost as little offence. Grandpredator plays a strong deck and my predator plays a deck that can really mess with my set-up. Even more so since I soon get to experience that he plays with Starvation of Marena and other long ranged combat that is hard fort my slight gate throwing to match.
I manage to delay one of Norbert’s Parity Shifts and slow him down a little and stay somewhat alive even if I am low on blood on all my vampires. Frank has a pretty slow start building up but he don’t care about Mattias’ bleeds for one at all and eventually starts to work Jonatan. This gives me some room to try and hurt Norbert. He makes some decisions in my favour as blocking a mandatory hunt that I make which with Thrown Gate and Target Vitals get me up to 4 blood and makes me able to bleed unhindered with my other Vampires. I get him down to two pool and he is up for the Parity Shift again but Mattias threatens to play Poison Pill. Discussion arises and Norbert instead decides to Parity Shift from Jonatan instead, virtually ousting him in the process. I don’t remember who was ousted first but I also manage to bleed Norbert out soon thereafter.
With Frank’s superior combat coming my way (he still doesn’t care a bit about taking a couple of bleeds for 1 each round) things are starting to look bad. I am fortunate enough that he runs out of manoeuvres for a while and I can actually match him in combat long enough to be able to bleed Mattias out. In the long run Frank has minion superiority and a better set-up and he wins quite easily but I am actually happy to squeeze 2 Victory Points out of a game that looked impossible.

Frank GW 3VP
Stefan 2VP

Round 3

1	2	3	4	5
Mikkel Petersen	Kristofer Wårell	Stefan Karlsson	Oskar Müntzing	Peter Kärrberg
DEN	SWE	SWE	SWE	SWE
Tunnel Runners	Lasombra Bruise/Bleed	DOM/POT Bruise/Bleed	Madame Guil Alastor	Tremere Vote/Bleed

The seating in this game is pretty promising. Peter, Mikkel and Kristofer gets their builds going and I also start my standard Govern superior chain. I remember discarding both Inner Strengths round 1 and 2 since I have no Thrown Gate in my hand. I keep drawing few or no red cards for most parts of this game. Fortunately Oskar don’t get his deck going and he does little other than blocking me early game. Since I don’t have no combat his minions stay on the table and his pool is in no danger.
Kristoffer gives me quite a beating but when Mikkel gets his third Tunnel Runner in play he needs to start playing on the defence. Mikkel has Jacob Fermor in play and his Tunnel Runners constantly uses Computer Hacking to bleed for 3. Peter is controlling much of it from the start and even if Oskar steals his Parity Shifts with Erciyes Fragments he has no serious pressure. I continue to draw terribly and I sit with mostly Govern the Unaligned on my hand when my vampires get hammered by Kristofer’s close ranged combat. Peter helps me a little with both a rescue from torpor and pool from a Parity Shift. I also get a Giant’s Blood on one of my vampires for trying and steal Erciyes Fragments. I try and make a deal with him to be able to receive 1VP but he feels he can control the situation himself.
Kristofer is at 2 pool and Mikkel on 9 (i think) when Peter manages to oust them one after another. My cards starts to work for me and I manage to survive this very long game with no hope for more than 0.5VP.

Peter GW 2.5VP
Stefan 0.5VP
Oskar 0.5VP

I had a terrible tournament. The first game I could have played a bit better and the last game my deck just played tricks on me from the start to the end. I am happy with my performance in the second game but overall the tournament was a big disappointment. I still think my deck is pretty good but it is more opted against a meta with less combat. One thing I will change for the future is to add a couple of Bondings, I remember a couple of occasions where that would have helped me to get my bleeds through. In the first two games I played my deck so it almost ran out so the amount of cards is good. I feel that I can discard no or few bleed cards so maybe i should increase the amount a little. The Tangle Atropos’ Hand trick consumes a lot of bleed cards when it works as intended.
In the next couple of days I will be writing the report for the Danish Qualifier so it hopefully be posted soon. Overall I had a fun day with very nice opponents, a handful of frustrations and a well-organized event. I hope to go again next year!
And no – I am not called Apache Jones on Facebook. Isak Esbjörnsson Bjärmark made an even worse result.