Archive for category VTES

Atom Weaver’s Deck Bashing Challenge

Posted by Preston Poulter in Gaming, VTES on September 1st, 2010

I’ve long been an advocate of trying to make powerful decks from a limited selection of cards. Such “commons” decks thwart the argument that a given CCG is merely the realm of the those who want to invest large amounts of money into it if they can do reasonably well against such decks. This was the reasoning behind my Barbed Wire decks that I made and still sell that mostly use Jyhad card stock.

Another VTES player, perhaps inspired by my Barbed Wire decks, made his own limited card selection challenge: Atom Weaver’s “Deck Bashing Challenge.” This challenge revolves around making as competitive a deck as possible by combining two starter decks of your choosing. While I like the idea, I do have a few reservations about the idea.

For one, starter decks in VTES are much like Magic: the Gathering and are set specific. If one were to find a great combination of starter decks to make an excellent general purpose deck, the starters you were using might be out of stock two years down the road and simply be of little use to the proposed newbie who needed it. Secondly, the starter decks all revolve around a certain strategy; by combining two of them, all you are really going to be able to do is refine that strategy a bit. The starter decks themselves are not toolboxy enough to really serve as the blank slate that I like as a deck constructor. Of course, one could combine two separate starters, but that runs into it’s own problems. Lastly, VTES is a game that has always favored certain strategies such as sneak and bleed or vote and cap. Starter decks, such as the Malkavian or Venture starters from Keepers of Tradition, will be quite competitive whereas working with the other starters from that set means that you will be building a deck that will simply never be as competitive. That’s just the nature of VTES and CCGs in general.

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Atom Weaver's Deck Bashing Challenge, Barbed Wire Project, Magic:, Vampire: the Eternal Struggle

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Gangrel Dominate Deck: Stanislava and Ingrid

Posted by Preston Poulter in VTES on December 11th, 2009

Recently a purchaser of my Barbed Wire decks off of eBay asked me to make an advanced deck for him. I put together a deck that was a longtime favorite tournament deck. I had worked on it with Paul Johnson of the Los Angeles VTES crew. Here’s the decklist:

Crypt

7 x Stanislava, Gangrel Inner Circle Member, +2 Bleed, Allies can not block, retainers lose abilities in combat, DOM CEL PRO FOR ANI
5 x Ingrid Rossler, Prince of Geneva, +2 Transfers when ready, ANI PRO FOR dom

Library

Master Cards

Golconda: Inner Peace x3
Ecoterrorists
Dominate
Legendary Vampire
The Barrens
Dreams of the Sphinx x3
Storage Annex x2
Minion Tap x5

Actions

Restoration x2

Political Actions

Anarchist Uprising
Ancient Influence
Ancilla Empowerment
Banishment
Disputed Territory
Parity Shift x2
Reins of Power

Action Modifiers

Conditioning x3
Earth Control x5
Forced March x8

Combat

Claws of the Dead x4
Earth Meld x4
Forn of Mist x4

Reaction

Guard Dogs x5
Cat’s Guidance x4
Obedience x4
Deflection x8
Second Tradition: Domain x2

Combo Cards
Rapid Change x4
Murmur of the False Will x7

This deck would be classified as a tool box by most VTES players because it does a lot of different things. Read the rest of this entry »

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Tournament Report: Austin Qualifier, 2009

Posted by Preston Poulter in Gaming, VTES on September 6th, 2009

The two playgroups in Texas that I have any experience with are the Dallas and Austin playgroup. At one point, when I first started playing in North Texas around 2005, both playgroups were of comparable size. Unfortunately, last year, the turnout and enthusiasm for the Austin playgroup began to wane. Come this year, it seemed that the entire playgroup had fallen off the face of the Earth. When asked who was going to be attending the Dallas Qualifier for North American Championship, Ethan, one of the players there, texted us, “Austin VTES is dead.”

That was unfortunate. VTES, like any collectible card game, isn’t much fun if there’s not a community to play with. With the failure of the Austin playgroup, Dallas stood as the only regularly operating playgroup in Texas that I knew of. Worse still, the Lafayette, Lousiana playgroup seemed to be following a similar fate. It’s understandable that CCG playgroups die, and quite frankly amazing that a game such as Vampire: the Eternal Struggle, which was originally published under the name Jyhad in 1994, is till being played at all. The vast majority of CCGs that came out after Magic: the Gathering have merely been splashes in the pan that died out shortly after introduction. I remember playing the CCG Netrunner, which was the third game published by Wizards of the Coast under the monicker “Deckmaster” and enjoying it a good deal, only to see if soon fade from play altogether.

Let’s face it. If Wizards of the Coast can’t get a CCG off the ground, it just doesn’t bode well for the viability of the genre. That’s not to say certain games don’t find an audience, they do. But the key seems to a small publisher finding, nurturing, and responding to the needs of a small market. In our case, the small market of VTES players seemed to be getting smaller by the month.

It’s can be discouraging to watch the player base decline. You start to wonder when you should just get out of the game altogether or find a new hobby. Of course, we in Dallas have also had some victories in attracting new players. So it’s not all doom and gloom. Still, I didn’t like seeing the Austin playgroup fall off the map.