Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Nehemiah... What to do?

So the question is... What do you do with this vampire?
He's got all the lovely Temporis cards at his disposal...
Serpentis & Presence make him a nice matchup with the Followers of Set.  Potence & Obtenebration make hims a nice fit with the Lasombra if you'e after something more violent and less S&B.

But what a lovely little card text... All that stuff you wanted in your hand later, just toss it back into the library to get it later.

On the downside, Nehemiah really lacks a stealth discipline.  He's combat durable; Temporis, Presence, Potence and to a lesser extent Obtenebration and Serpentis offer some interesting combat options.

The immediate thought I have is about Followers of Set with Potence, which is moderately common in the larger members of Groups 3-4-5.  Shemti, Bupe and Clea all have at least [pot] which makes for plenty of interesting cross-overs with Nehemiah.  Do you run a variation on the [POT][SER] + Corruption/Temptation decks?  Beat the blood of them, then borrow them and bleed your prey with their own minions...  The problem becomes Stealth... While Typhonic Sleaze... aka Typhonic Beast... can give you some serious Potence-Stealth... it still doesn't help those Temptations land IF you put them on with Nehemiah.  Maybe instead Nehemiah is your backup... the Rusher who can then untap himself using Temporis and do other dodgey shennanigans.  If you use the [POT] defensively, you can again, exploit Temptations by putting them backwards... then with a combination of Touch of Pain, Frozen Object and Rush beat the blood off until you can then borrow the minion and bleed your prey with your predator's minion.  Another very viable option... but feels like it could be lacking on the ousting roids while speed-bumping your Predator.  A Form of Corruption could help with getting the needed goons for the forward pressure... but then again it's not like that's creating a 3-bleed here.  Potentially Enticements should be the kill-switch... but there is another card needed in plentiful supply...  Horseshoes can also be a key card in this deck, but then you're running MANY actions and combat and not much else.

Being a Trujah with Votes, Nehemiah also screams VOTE WITH ME... So who do you match him to? He's half-brothers/sisters in the Brujah?  That would then make his [SER] & [obt] dead space.  Indie-Vote is an option, which again puts you at the doorstep of the Followers of Set... but again... bye bye [POT] unless you're going to make it a feature of the rest and use Iron Glare...

I feel like I should be making a few Nehemiah decks.  But I almost feel like I'm only using a half-a-vampire if it isn't a FoS + Potence deck.

Do other people have ideas on what you should make with Nehemiah?  I'm hoping for it to be at least Tier 2 when its done... just another surprise out of the bag.  Like my Disciplineless Brujah Breed'n'Vote'n'Bloat...

Monday, February 27, 2012

Stayin Alive...

Yes, I did quote the Bee Gees.
About a month ago now, our FLGS decided to change its opening hours... which meant that our Traditional Monday Night VTES was no longer an option at our FLGS.  Out of some loyalty to the FLGS (which has been a supportive venue of VTES for a long time in the past) we tried to move to Thursday Night VTES.  However, this has had dismal attendance; from up to 15 players, and a usual number of 12, down to less than 4 for three weeks or so in a row.

So it seemed that time had come for a change of venue.  And today will potentially be a fateful day for more than just politics... it might mean it is one of the last times we play VTES at the FLGS which has been a part of VTES in Blacktown basically since VTES began being sold.

Our FLGS has been a great venue for all sorts of things as well.  I used to help organise a 30+ player Convention-Style monthly D&D group which had run for something like 6 years (I was involved during all of that time, about 18 months as a player and the rest as a DM).  It's got a strong board-game group (apparently Friday nights are PACKED, and not just because a few of the die-hards love playing their Marathon 18XX games which start Monday night at 6pm and finish on Sunday night at 6pm), a few different RPG groups (Pathfinder, 4th Ed D&D and some other games have run), a war-gamer group (specialising in WW2, WW1, Medieval and even back to Bronze-Age warfare), a table-top war-game group (such as Warhammer and the Privateer Games products) and the obligatory cash-cow MtG: FNM (which is actually ThuNM at the FLGS).

So instead, we'll be heading to Blacktown Returned Services League Club to see if their venue will be good for Monday Night VTES.  Pros: Adult beverages on sale not that far away, decent quality counter-meals.  Cons: Difficult to recruit players in from other games if you're not being 'seen'.  I may just have to convince some others (particularly a friend of mine) to maybe play some social games on other nights of the week as a way of gathering in interest from people who already play other games.

So thanks to our FLGS, you've been our home for a long time.  Best wishes for the future.  Maybe when times are different, we may go back to having VTES at our FLGS...

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Australian National Open 2012

In a change from past years, the Australian Princes have voted to separate the Continental Championship from the Australian National Championship.  Consequently, I'm happy to let the wide world know... (on behalf of the Princes of Australia & Steve Harris our NC)

Australian National Open Championship
Saturday 21st April
Good Games
857 George St, Sydney
$10 entry, 10am Reg
3 Rounds + Final

This tournament is a Qualifying Tournament for the Oceania Continental Championship.
Prize support for this tournament has been donated by Australia's Online VTES Store

Monday, February 20, 2012

Juggernaut VTES Counters

After doing some numbers and a lot of mockups, it became fairly obvious that I can't make the Counter Cards myself to the quality I'd like for the price I'd like...  So instead I got them printed from a Print-on-Demand company I found online.  They are printed on 3.5" square cards and the photos below show you them on their own and in comparison to an unsleeved VTES card.


I can potentially get these printed in plastic shrink-wrapped sets of 12.  If people around the world would like these, or some of the other artwork I have for different counters.  I would need at least 6 weeks (based on the last job) before I would receive the cards AND then in a couple of weeks I'd probably be able to get a few sent around the world.

List of Counters I have at the moment that I could easily send:
  • Anarch Counters
  • Corruption Counters
  • Hostage Counters

Saturday, February 18, 2012

Burning Wrath 18 Feb 2012

This is a short summary to put the big things out there...

Congrats to Paul Azzopardi for winning the final with 4VPs.
It was great to see everyone there.  We used the multijudge system so that we had two tables of five.  Everyone brought something fairly brutal since every table lost a VP within 30min and finished within 1.5h (time limit of 2h).

Our Qualified players were
  • Andrew Chirgwin (Organiser)
  • Paul Azzopardi (winner)
  • Katy McDonald (finalist in her first tournament!)
  • Will Allison
  • Nick Miller (Prince of Sydney CBD)
  • Ben Froggatt

For a more detailed report, please go to the VEKN Forum post here.