European Championships 2012 – Last Chance Qualifier report

Finally it was time for the EC and this year I seemed to time my physical wellness being in the last stages of an aggressive and long-lasting cold. I was already qualified for the main event but still wanted to do my best and try to beat the tournament’s meta to reach as good a position as possible.
I expected lots of bleed and votes so I went with a Dominate weenie deck that I have played and fine-tuned a lot. The thing with the deck is that it packs loads of reaction cards and are able to cycle them using Heart of Nizchetus if they clog the hand. It doesn’t have as many bleed cards as a standard weenie Dominate deck but makes up for it with reactions and some other tricks.

Deck Name : Tupdog bleeds for 6
Author : Stefan Karlsson

Crypt [13 vampires] Capacity min: 1 max: 7 average: 3.07692

5	Tupdog	1	POT VIS		Gargoyle	3
1	Bryan Van Duesen	7	DOM THA aus pre		!Tremere	2
1	Reverend Blackwood	6	DOM THA obf	bishop	!Tremere	2
1	Selena	6	AUS DOM THA		!Tremere	3
1	Kurt Strauss	5	DOM aus tha		!Tremere	2
1	Brooke	3	dom tha		!Tremere	2
1	Ember Wright	3	aus dom		!Tremere	3
1	Saiz	3	aus dom		!Tremere	3
1	Heinrick Schlempt	2	tha		!Tremere	2

Library [73 cards]

Action [16]
  5x Create Gargoyle
  9x Govern the Unaligned
  2x Magic of the Smith

Action Modifier [13]
  2x As the Crow
  2x Bonding
  4x Conditioning
  2x Foreshadowing Destruction
  3x Mirror Walk

Ally [2]
  2x Nephandus (Mage)

Combat [4]
  4x Raking Talons

Equipment [2]
  2x Heart of Nizchetus

Master [14]
  1x Anarch Troublemaker
  5x Dominate
  2x Dreams of the Sphinx
  3x Lilith's Blessing
  2x Misdirection
  1x Pentex(TM) Subversion

Reaction [22]
  8x Deflection
  4x Delaying Tactics
  6x On the Qui Vive
  2x Redirection
  2x Wake with Evening's Freshness

Round 1

1	2	3	4	5
Stefan Karlsson	Ralf Weppner	Ali Almadhi	Balázs Kalóczkai	Martin Major
Tupdog bleeds for 6	Harbingers mill	Animalism weenie rush	Ventrue Grinder	Dmitra Alastor

My starting crypt is Heinrick, Brooke + 2 Tupdogs. Ralf plays Sudden Reversal on my round 1 Anarch Troublemaker and by the time I have the two !Tremere out he has Solomon Batanea so I expect some kind of a wall deck.
Ali goes full ahead at his prey from the start probably knowing Ralf’s deck. He has a very effective rush deck with a well flowing combat package but it burns a lot of cards. A problem that is going to be even bigger when it turns out that Ralf is playing with Slaughterhouses and utilises Zygodat’s ability. Balázs is playing Weighted Walking Sticks and Fortitude prevent and Ali has little problem handling that and make him not being able to do anything against Martin who builds slow and easy.
I keep drawing into Tupdogs when the old Tupdogs burns and this make me slower than I would like to be in the early stages. I am also stuck with many reaction cards even if I have the Heart early since Martin doesn’t play anything my deck is constructed to react to. I know his deck type and that it contains pool damaging cards so I can’t fully discard or cycle my reactions. Tricky situation. Luckily both Balázs and Martin discards Heart of Nizchetus instead of going for a contest with me. That would never have happened back home.
Both Ralf and Ali plays plenty of Minion Taps and I have some pool to go trough. Ralf plays some bounces but not that much intercept so I manage to land enough bleeds to get his pool to sink.
When Ali is almost decked he manages to oust Balázs. Martin tries to talk him into a withdrawal deal since he have managed to get both Heroic Might on one vampire and an Assault Rifle on another arguing that Ali isn’t going to be able to oust him. Ali ponders and I try to talk him into going all ahead for his second Victory Point. He decides to give it a go and launches at Martin with rushes but Martin is built up and defends well.
I oust Ralf the following round and Ali agrees to the withdrawal deal with an empty library, plenty of pool and four untapped vampires with Animalism. Martin starts to rush all my vampires, now having two Alastors, and I am an easy kill. He keeps his deal and Ali is allowed to withdraw. A frustrating start but a fun game!
Martin GW 2VP
Ali 1.5VP
Stefan 1VP

Round 2

1	2	3	4	5
Kornel Szekeres	Stefan Karlsson	Daniel Wiberg	Michal Kazmierczak	Michal Kochanowski
Giovanni rush and bleed	Tupdog bleeds for 6	Tremere / !Tremere bleed	Goratrix Wall	Malk 94 with Huitzilopochtli and masters

Heinrick Schlempt and three Tupdogs, how is that for a starting crypt? I get Heinrick out and Daniel immediately plays Pentex Subversion on him. I have Raking Talons on my hand and influences two of the dogs round 2, saving one in the uncontrolled region since Kornel discarded a Bum’s Rush the round before. I know Daniel’s deck inside out (having helped him optimize it the week before) so I know he isn’t packing any combat defence. Instead of trying to remove the Pentex I use my both action to rush and diablerize Daniel’s only vampire Selena. This puts a definite and quick end to his game.
The both Michals builds and I start to realise that the Goratrix wall will be very hard for me to ever be able to oust. Daniel lunges at him in despair and I am soon able to get him even if my own pool is low having had some bleeds redirected my way. Maybe I made a mistake not to try and deal with Daniel for him to go for one VP and helping him get that one but I was too low on pool to dare something like that.
Michal Kochanowski is playing very passive and at this point of the game I make the mistake to think of him as inexperienced. I talk him into not bleeding when I have no suitable reaction cards and I am aiming for a three-player game with him, me and the Goratrix wall. When I have the right amount of reactions I Misdirect Kornel’s untapped vampire and ask Michal Kochanowski to bleed into the Giovanni deck and I use my Deflections to bounce back the bleeds that gets bounced to me and Kornel is ousted.
I now want the Malkavians to do all my work for me and he has just finished his second round of Ashur Tablets and gets a lot of stealth back in his deck. Then he does nothing at all in his minion phase and that gets me puzzled. I also stay passive as do the Goratrix deck. In his next round Michal Kochanowski plays Temptation of Greater Power on Goratrix forcing Michal Kazmierczak to burn some pool. He then simply bleeds the two of us out with loads of stealth and bleed modifiers. A very smooth move from a patient and skilful player. Hats off!
Michal Kochanowski GW 4VP
Stefan 1VP

Round 3

1	2	3	4	5
Dennis Devriendt	Christian Wurst	Szilveszter Miklos	Csaba Pál	Stefan Karlsson
Cybele	Celerety gun weenies	!Toreador breed and bleed	Nephandus with masters	Tupdog bleeds for 6

I get a marvellous start, bleeding Dennis for lots before he even manages to influence Cybele out. Round two Heart of Nizchetus doesn’t hurt for getting the right bleed cards. Szilveszter blocks Csaba’s first Nephandus Mage which buys me some more time.
Dennis’ first and only action this game is a Neonate Breach damaging all his four opponents. There are no votes on the table and I have the edge and being the only player who actually want all the table to take damage at this point I don’t burn it. Everyone except Dennis is playing weenies so it’s a pretty powerful lone action dealing 16 pool damage. At the end of his round he is down at 1 pool and Szilveszter plays My Enemy’s Enemy on a bleed for 1 from Christian and Dennis is ousted.
Csaba is starting to get good table presence and I try and get my own Nephandus as defence but my Mirror Walk is DId. He plays with Haven Uncovered and it starts to look bad with a rushing prey. Fortunately Christian stays untapped instead of rushing me and he is low on pool. I hope that I will be able to oust him next turn. Szilveszter stays passive and Csaba attacks me but I have two ready vampires left when it is my turn.
I draw and replace a lot of reaction cards and can’t find any bleed cards even if I tap two of Christian’s vampires with Anarch Troublemaker and play Pentex Subversion on a third. Csaba beats my remaining vampires to torpor next round and has enough minions to take an easy walk around the table.
Csaba GW 4VP
Me 1VP

Three victory points is not a result I am happy with but I had a fun day with three good games and a lot of nice people. I misread the meta completely and didn’t have a bleeding predator any of the games which really made cycling the right cards really hard and I would have fared better with a more standard weenie Dominate deck. I would probably even have had a chance of the game win in round 1 and 3. As I was already qualified this was no catastrophe and only thing to do was reloading for Day 1. Next report is to follow in a couple of days.