Skirmishes in the Dark : 30-07-2010

Yeah, first post in August~

The night of 30th July, in the year 2010, Games Garage.

Anyway, was late arriving at Games Garage, wife-sama sent me there with lots of books I wanted to pass to BK, clearing up some space at home to stack other books. Those who are interested to read all those very old codex or army books of Warhammer and Warhammer 40K please go look for BK, I have a full collection of those with him now.

The good thing was (or bad thing) that not many Methuselahs were there when I arrived, and they were playing Kingsburg instead. I had to sit around looking cool until their game concluded and we finally started Vtes. Methuselahs arrived periodically later in the night until we had a full force of 11, but that was later...

Randomized Seating for game 1

Fad's Lutz vote, bleeding

G1's Cock Robin, bleeding

Bann's Spell of Life, bleeding

My Along came a Spider, bleeding

Ben Sum's Assamite vote.

A most distressing seating for me, since I know it was unlikely for me to be able to block both sides that were probably heavy on Obfuscate, and had lots of +1 Stealth action to start with in the first place - Bann's Spell of Life was particularly problematic since my No Secrets from the Magaji wasn't going to help when the mummies arrived, and it was highly unlikely that I could get myself ready before all 5 Spells hit the table.

On the side of my allies, I found Fad's objective pretty clear, and that was to kill my other ally - G1, and I was actually hoping G1's intercepts could come into play to help a little against Bann. The good thing was that Ben Sum was pretty jammed on his crypt and hand, and wasn't very effective the whole game.

I brought out Uchenna as my first vampire, got an early Villein and No Secret, but wasn't ready to attempt to block Bann until he had 4 Spell of Life on table. Halim Bey was Bann's key vampire with a Charisma on, and soon he had all 5 spells ready. But Bann's crypt was pretty messed up so he spent a couple of turns getting heavy vampires into the uncontrolled region. Meanwhile, despite having Amaravati on table, Ben was out-voted by everybody - Fad's Lutz, G1's Cock Robin, and I eventually had Umdava and an Akunanse Kholo on Meno Ngari - giving me 6 votes against pretty much everything he wanted to do, this vote defense also relegated Fad's vote deck to a bleed deck instead since most of his votes against G1 would be turned down by me and G1 combined. (just about a 1 vote difference anyway)

The game went on and it was pretty close, Ben brought out another vampire and lowered his pool to 5, Army of Rats plus effective bleeds with ABO stealth allowed me to oust him. Despite losing a good number of No Secrets already, I still had enough to challenge Bann's attacks and repeatedly defended my pool against his mummies with my vampires stacked with intercepts.

The final turning point came when everybody had about 2 pool left, it was a who kill who thing. Fad was going for the kill with a bleed, and successfully sneaked past Cock Robin's Second Tradition, but his Old Friend's bleed boost was cancelled by my Direct Intervention. That allowed G1 to kill off Bann and gave me the time I needed to oust Fad.

Once that was done, I was in a much better position to handle G1, and ousted him after a superior Terror Frenzy prevented a blood-lacking Cock Robin from fighting properly and sent him into torpor with a Sniper Rifle.

Final VP Count

Me - 4 VPs plus GW

G1 - 1 VP

Randomized Seating for Game 2

Bann's TupDog, bleeding

BK's !Salubri, bleeding

LF's Toreador Guns, bleeding

YY's Ishtarri vote, bleeding

Derek's THA bruise, bleeding

My Angry Dragon.

After retiring Air Rock, my Angry Dragon is the most combat heavy deck I have. As with the Air Rock, this deck excels in sending vampires to torpor but rarely win games. But when it does it does it spectacularly.

Well this wasn't such a night.

It started off pretty good for me, attacking Bann's Antonio d'Erlette with a Settite weenie while the Path of Typhon was in play and quickly sent him to torpor. Bann got pretty pissed after that, and decided to use his TupDogs backwards. By then I already had Bupe Kuila on table and she had the service of Mr Wintrop. I wasn't that concerned until Derek successfully DOM bled me for 7 with Seduction.

On the other side, BK's Qawiyya had successfully sent LF's Anneke into torpor and after that LF simply refused to bring out any vampires at all, making BK's oust very very challenging, since his deck had very little bleeding power. All that gave YY a great big advantage, which was removed when BK and me went in together and sent all his 4 vampires into torpor. But by then he had already ousted Derek with votes and bleeds, putting his pool at a great level.

I was too focused on Bann and didn't go and diablerize YY's vampires, I soon paid for this oversight when YY's vampires came out of torpor and started to send those annoying votes my way again. I was able to block a couple, and soon was over-ran by his votes.

BK's Qwaiyya proved to be no match against Bann's TupDogs, but by then Bann had run out of most of his Dogs, and his pool wasn't rich enough to handle YY's votes, Bann fell to YY after he ousted BK.

Final VP Count

YY - 5 VPs plus GW

Bann - 1 VP

(o.o)