Tournament Notes
8-player Constructed (3+F)
New Orleans
November 18, 2000
First Round: (in order of transfer)
VPs
0 Will: Bleeding Bats
0 Leslie: Tzimesce block-n-kill
1/2 Me: Presence Weenies
1/2 Stacy: Bloating Nosferatu Archons
2 1/2 Norm: Lucita and Friends (Dom/For/Obt)
Notes: Having seen the Nossie deck the night before, I wanted to kill it, quickly. Unfortunately, I didn't have the bleed capability to catch up. However, my Tzimesce predator was up to his eyeballs in Aid-From-Bats weenies. So I had some room to move. Leslie learned to not attempt to reason with fools, as he and I both failed to talk/bribe Stacy into rushing either his prey or grand-prey, until his prey had netted 2VP.
Will did a whole lot of bleeding for 1, and effectively used the Bats to avoid close range combat, until Leslie drew into some Carrion Crows. Time expired in the round, with me about to oust an overtransferred Stacy. During the round, I grew a healthy fear of Norm's Lucita deck. It Governs at superior, then Force of Will/Conditioning if the minion is still ready.
Second Round: (in order of transfer)
VPs
1/2 Chris: Last Call for Pander's Legacy
1 1/2 Me: Presence Weenies
0 Phillip: Tzimisce of some sort
1/2 Leslie: Tzimesce block-n-kill
Notes: This round had several battles occuring simultaneously. First, there was the competition and maneuvering between myself and Chris, to affect the blocking and action choices of the Tzimisce decks. Second, there was the struggle for Leslie and I to keep Chris from obtaining vote lock. There were zero titled vamps this round, so multiple times, Chris' votes were cancelled by the edge, or a minor Dread Gaze, or a Surprise influence. If they weren't blocked in the first place.
For a new player, Leslie played a great game of aggressive intercept. However, Chris had enough Fake Out/Dodge to turn "block-n-kill" into "block-n-wave", Except for those pesky Carrion Crows. I did note that Chris prevented combat-card handjam by effective use of the Barrens. Political Ally was put to good use as a threat. There was some confusion about why I included it in the deck, but I was able to push 8 or 9 pool worth of bleeds over 3 turns, using the ally as a threat.
The result of all this maneuvering was that a lot of vampires stayed untapped. I was trying to block Chris' attempts to get the edge, Phillip stayed untapped to fend off my bleeds, and Leslie stayed untapped to block Chris' votes. So, the round timed out with the table collapsing. For some reason, Phillip had discarded a minion tap, instead of playing it to gain 4 or 5 pool, which left the door open for me. Leslie's four minions had been reduced to one torporized minion, thanks to a banished Dragos and a couple of run-ins with agg. damage courtesy of Phillip. Chris finally passed a Legacy of Pander (after 5 or 6 attempts), and had momentum. I had enough time to oust Phillip, but not enough to oust Leslie.
Third Round:
VPs
1 Phillip: Tzimisce of some sort
0 Me: Presence Weenies
4 Chris: Last Call for Pander's Legacy
0 ?????: Gangrel Wolf's Claws/Blood Rage
0 Leslie: Tzimesce block-n-kill
Notes: Boy meets Girl. Girl drinks half-gallon of punch, loses vertical hold, and freaks out. Boy carries Girl to bathroom, not to be seen until the next day, to prevent retching in the gaming room. Boy is replaced by Gangrel Fortitude Blood Rage guy, who makes me regret asking Boy to remove Girl from the area. To quote {local radio personality} Royal Marshall, "Just, Damn."
With no intercept to stop him, Chris ousted the over-transferred BR-guy, ousted me backwards for insurance, then probably got Leslie, who was weakened from the BR-guy's Wolf's Claws. I made a dinner run during the last half of this game, so I don't know details of how Phillip and Leslie were ousted.
Final Round:
VPs
1 Chris: Last Call for Pander's Legacy
0 Norm: Lucita and Friends
3 Me: Presence Weenies
1 Will: Bleeding Bats (ani-weenies)
0 ?????: Tzimisce of some sort
Notes: My overriding goal for this round was to bloat. Bloat fast, bloat far, and leave enough Presence minions untapped to fend off the upcoming bleed hoard. Blood dolls on turns 2, 3, and 4 helped out, as did Palatial Estate and a Hunting Ground. I discarded bleed modifiers and actions, to cycle into either locations and/or Majesty. I gave Will zero pressure, and let him try to get through the newbie, in hopes of putting pressure on Chris by time his vote machine got rolling. Newbie got out an archbishop, which canned the Pander deck. Norm bled a few times with Force of Will/DawnOp, but since I was doing nothing to my prey, I had an increasing base of blockers which could majesty and untap...those combats were almost like what Mummify could have been. I wish I had some copies of Catatonic Fear.
Then, Newbie-sub bit on the bribes and voted with his prey. A Cryptic Rider and unblocked Legacy of Pander later, and Chris' vote machine was suddenly rolling. Norm walled up, and I switched from bloat mode to bleed mode. Will had a rack pointed to a two-blood doll minion, and I used that to draw out his blockers to allow myself to bleed. To keep Chris contained, I arsoned his Barrens to reduce card-cycling, delayed one ousting con-ag, and may have D.I'ed another (I can't remember). To aggravate the newbie's day, I suggested that he could play changeling to increase his Pulsed archbishop's bleed from 3 to 4. I completely forgot that Chris had an Archon Investigation in his deck, and as luck would have it, he had the A.I. in hand. Crispy, crispy, Pulsed archbishop.
I had enough pool (and pool gain) to survive an 18+pool vote assault, and oust Will. I got a fourth blood doll, and soaked Chris' last damaging votes, which were Conservative Agitations for 1. Chris ran out of cards, and conceded as I was about to fetch my fifth blood doll.
Last Updated on 09/04/2002
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