Early in my days as a fledging Methuselah, I experienced the terror of facing a No Secrets deck. Bann's No Secrets Akunanse deck taught me a grim lesson of how deadly a wall deck can be if facing a deck that is unprepared for them. When I played against him then, every single one of my actions was blocked - I tried to bleed, I was blocked, I tried to call a vote, I was blocked, I opened my fridge to get a bite, I was block. And blocked usually means death to aggravated hands from the Akunanses' Abombwe combat.
After the traumatic experience, I built an Akunanse No Secrets deck in commemoration of the event. However, this deck has evolved over time, and has moves a little from the original Abombwe focus to a more toolboxy approach, as with most of my decks, this deck now represents my take on a No Secrets toolbox.
Primary Path of Ousting
This is mainly a grind deck, blocking my predator and bleeding my prey, albeit slowly, but surely. It shines when the table reached the final stage, and is generally quite low profile and defensive in the early to mid game. It almost never sweep the table, but almost always survive to the end.
Bleeding with the Akunanses is slow and usually cumbersome. They have few stealth, and usually reserves them for the calling of the No Secrets, and they have few bleed modifiers, relying on permanent bleed enhancement such as Kduva's Mask and Ancestor Spirit. I have 5 younger Akunanse in the crypt, and when they're on the table they tend to add a lot to the bleed pressure, though they do not do much damage in a go, they will continue to grind down the enemy's pool. Very often I find the prey unwilling to commit their blocks against these little ones due to the risk factor involved in my aggravated combat. Suits this deck well.
Secondary Path of Ousting
There is only a single Army of Rats, so don't rely on it to win games. Blocking and sending the opponent's vampire to torpor, and then bleed with no opposition, is the deck's secondary choice of ousting the prey. No exactly a second path, but well...
Crypt
Uchenna is the cheapest Magaji that has all the necessary disciplines at superior. He is always my first choice if available. Failing that, I always try to get at least one Magaji on table, since they're my main defense with the efficient No Secrets. The 5 weenies are there to support and kill, but I usually only influence 1 to 2 of them in the early games to add some pressure to the opponent, and do some combat repair if need be. My aim in this deck is to have 2 Magajis with No Secrets on the table. Once that is achieved, and the Magajis are armed and prepared, the deck's defense is seldom penetrable to most skirmishes and can sometimes shut down my predator completely, especially if they are not ready for this kind of blocks.
Combat
I use Devil Channel Hands as my offensive weapon, and the Sniper Rifles as my defensive weapon. In this way I thought it would reduce the card requirement intensity, especially in the late game. I usually attack with my vampires, support it with Carrion Crows, and then strike with Devil Channel Hands while preventing opponent's hitbacks if necessary. If my prey cannot handle this attack, he'll more or less stop blocking my low bleeds (which can get pretty high in the later game when the vampires are well-equipped).
Meanwhile, for blocking, I use the Sniper Rifles and set range to long, again absorbing damage with FOR cards. This is very annoying to decks that cannot deal with range setting, and again, it shut down decks that cannot do range damage.
Terror Frenzy is there to deal with weapon decks, and make it expensive for combat enders. But there is only 2 copies of it so I use it very carefully. This deck is not very concerned about killing off the opponent's vampire quickly, so usually I just block, and if the enemy wants to run away so be it. There is always another day since there is no secrets that I do not know.
Defense
The Intercept of this deck is quite effective. With No Secrets and a Raven Spy or two I can handle most decks that are dedicated to stealth. There are enough copies of No Secrets to afford risking it occasionally, so I almost always will attempt to block the opponent whenever able.
This is one of my more defensive decks, so it usually shines in defensive roles and only gets more aggressive at the later part of the game.
Pool Recovery
Market, Powerbase: Montreal, and the Vessel packages formed the primary pool recovery for this deck. The Vessels are almost always placed on younger vampires and make them into pool gainers. I almost never drain my young vampires until they need to hunt, reserving one blood on them as a deterrent to use the deadly Devil Channel Hands. Most of the time people leave my little ones alone for me to bloat. My good intercept ability usually allows me to defend the Powerbase quite effectively.
Surprise Element
There are 3 copies of KRC in the deck, and when I can call through the vote I will do so. With 2 Magaji, sometimes supported by the Kholo, the Ancestor Spirit or the Mask, I can get quite some votes onto the table. It can suddenly turn the table against my prey, since few of them will be expecting Freaked Drived Magajis to call KRCs after bleeding.
Known Weaknesses
Dedicated stealth decks will just walk over this deck. Elder Impersonation and similar cards will remove the No Secrets every time I put them on. Ranged combat decks can slowly but surely grind my vampires down since the offensive combat for this deck is pretty blood intensive.
Allies can bleed or attack me with impunity, as No Secrets doesn't extend to them, so it is a bit issue against ally bleeders like the Servitors or Nocturns.
Playing the deck
Get Magajis on table, slap No Secrets on them, equip or Concealed Weapon a Sniper Rifle, and sit tight and wait for an opening to kill of the prey. I always bleed or do something with my Magajis since with No Secrets they can still defend my pool even while tapped.
This deck is very annoying to low stealth action decks such as PRE bleeders, or light stealth voters. Against Computer Hacking weenies this deck will just shut it down the moment it has No Secrets and Sniper Rifle. A table of 3 is where this deck shines the most, and I try all I can to quickly reach that stage.
Deck Name : Along Comes a Spider
Crypt [12 vampires]
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3x Uchenna
2x Umdava
2x Nkule Galadima
1x Socrate Cidibe
1x Hasani
1x Nestor Kaba
1x Dolie
1x Meno Ngari
Library [90 cards]
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Action [10]
1x Aranthebes, The Immortal
1x Army of Rats
2x Belonging Grants Protection
5x No Secrets From the Magaji
1x Wise Spider
Action Modifier [9]
2x Devil-Channel: Throat
3x Freak Drive
3x Predator's Mastery
1x Strange Day
Action Modifier/Combat [2]
2x Predator's Transformation
Action Modifier/Reaction [1]
1x Akunanse Kholo
Combat [31]
1x Canine Horde
3x Carrion Crows
4x Concealed Weapon
6x Devil-Channel: Hands
4x Rolling with the Punches
2x Skin of Steel
1x Soak
2x Superior Mettle
2x Terror Frenzy
6x Unflinching Persistence
Equipment [7]
1x Kduva's Mask
1x Reliquary: Akunanse Remains
4x Sniper Rifle
1x Sport Bike
Master [13]
1x Ancestor Spirit
1x Channel 10
1x Dreams of the Sphinx
1x Giant's Blood
2x Mapatano Utando
1x Mbare Market, Harare
1x Powerbase: Montreal
4x Vessel
1x Visit from the Capuchin
Political Action [3]
3x Kine Resources Contested
Reaction [9]
1x Cats' Guidance
2x On the Qui Vive
3x Predator's Communion
3x Terra Incognita
Retainer [5]
1x Mr. Winthrop
4x Raven Spy
(o.o)
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