Gulf Coast Roast – Dallas

So, I can summarize how this trip compared to Lafayette.

I did much worse in results.  It wasn’t as enjoyable.  But, do those two things relate?  Perhaps.

It was still fun.

The travel logistics with Lafayette were involved.  The travel logistics here straightforward.  Chris, tournament organizer, picked me up from the airport.  The Uber back to the airport on Monday was l-o-o-o-ng.  I got to wondering if the chatty driver was messing with me.  But, my flight ended up delayed 1.5 hours, so spending a lot of time talking to a guy in the sign business was better spent than the time falling asleep waiting for plane to arrive.  In between, just walked from ABnB to J Gilligan’s and back, managing to miss any of the significant rain (and the hail).

I had Texas BBQ twice.  The burnt ends weren’t real burnt ends, which isn’t shocking when real burnt ends are from a fraction of the brisket.  They were also overcooked, but I liked them.  Sausage was good.  When I went back, I got ribs and brisket.  I got too much, it all started to eat the same as being rather soft.  They only had one BBQ sauce, and it was pretty boring after a while.  One of the reasons I don’t rate places on Yelp is that there’s nuance to reviews.  The food was done well.  It turned out to be twice as expensive as their website, which annoyed me.  Twice.  I would have been happier only going the one time.  Rest of food I got on trip was food, just not very notable other than the Cajun restaurant’s boudin link being really boring.

The main problem with this trip was lack of any break.  With Lafayette trip, after Norm picked me up from transit center, we had time to kill, so I got something like a nap.  Then, the pace was just kind of slower.  With this trip, I get up at 3:50AM Thursday morning and we are playing pick up games until like 1:50AM Friday morning with no break.  I can’t sleep in, and trying to go back to sleep in the mornings before heading out didn’t work, so I was horribly sleep deprived, jet lagged, and trying to control my allergies which get triggered by lack of sleep every day.  Day I got back, I just kept nodding off after I got home when I had work to do.  Tuesday was still recovering.

Why take so long to get to games?  Well, I kind of sucked.

In many pick up games and eight rounds of tournament play, I got one table win … playing someone else’s deck.  In fact, every time I borrowed a deck, I got at least one VP.

This just further reinforced the idea that I’m playing a different game from the people who are winning tournaments.  I’m still playing as if the past seven years of cards didn’t exist and I am playing in my state.  It’s like how at EC Berlin in 2017 I was a pitiful minnow (or whatever, I don’t know anything about nature) getting feasted upon by not-minnows.

I made significant mistakes.  Only one was obvious, but I feel like I played the last tournament pretty badly even though my deck played way differently than I expected, though maybe that’s because I was playing it wrong.

First tournament:

Rd1

Ian (nuToreador wallish) -> Dean (!Ventrue disciplines) -> Darby (Ravnos all forward) -> Norm (Banu Haqim) -> Joey (Banu Haqim)

So, my one clear obvious mistake, in that my prey also decided not to take the action and my predator didn’t and my grandpredator didn’t try with his one minion that could, was not removing Pentex from half of Norm’s minions.  Darby’s situation didn’t actually bother me a huge amount until the infamous, “not remove Pentex” round the table.

Given that he ripped through the prelim rounds, taking three Second Tradition decks in succession with Anathemas from two different players on his dudes, why wasn’t I more concerned?  Well, lack of experience with the build was some of it.  Then, there was how Dean’s ash heap was Governs, Conditioning, etc. with like one card that wasn’t plus bleed.  But, Dean didn’t go forward for a couple of turns before Darby started feasting upon Banu Haqim souls.

As Darby’s grandpredator, I got to play some cards.  For instance, to get my predator to show some respect, I burned his eight cap with Dragon’s Breath Rounds off of his rushing my prince with my not having a gun in play.  It’s almost like I don’t like being rushed or having to deal with obnoxious combat.

I Parity Shifted to give Norm and Joey each 1 pool, but it didn’t make any difference.  I wasn’t sure if it would.  I could have gotten more pool off of Voter Cap if the table was more inclined to appreciate my largesse.

Well, anyway, I had no ability to deal with Ravnos.  My only prince didn’t even have CEL for Psyche!.

Rd2

Devin (Lasombra blood denial) -> Clint (something that votes) -> Sidney (nuTzimisce) -> Darby!! -> Ian

Okay, I forgot that I made some other obvious mistakes.  I brought out a 4-cap.  That 4-cap lacked AUS and wasn’t a P/J.  So, I just reduced my pool by 4 to help Darby get 4 VPs.  I discarded a couple cards, but I only played one card before I was ousted.

Second tournament:

Rd1

Ian (Lasombra Pot Creation Rites) -> Dean (Aus/Dem/Obf) -> Joey (nuSalubri) -> Jon (Brandywine)

I thought this was going to go fast, at first, with Salubri being pretty good against Brandywine.  But, Dean’s deck was more toolboxy, and he kept things like Delaying Tactics when all my votes do is bloat.

Once the Brandywine Death Star was formed, I got ousted by Madness Network.  I had no ability to hurt her because I … chose poorly.  I was running close combat with only a splash of answers for ranged, and Brandywine had Shadow of the Beast.

Joey crumbled.  This game timed out.

Rd2

Oscar (Vlad Chameleon) -> Chris (Matasuntha) -> Clint (nuTzimisce) -> Sagan (Valkyrie) -> Ian

This was my sort of game.  Game.  Not tournament game.  This would have been an insanely fun casual game.

Oscar Chameleoned Clint crosstable.  Then, he did it again.  Oscar seemed strong, like pineapple.  Oscar Banished my first dude.  Clint played Scourge of the Enochians.  That I didn’t draw any Creation Rites until the game was destined to time out was little solace.  I also got agged by my predator, never bringing out more than two minions.

Then, the tidal action reversed.  Clint Graverobbed … BOTH … of his stolen minions.  Clint’s position actually seemed reasonable at a certain point.  I had virtually no sense of Chris’s game as we didn’t use the end of the tables so it was hard to see what was going on at the other end.

With one minion in torpor, I bled Oscar for 1 at 1 stealth and ousted him with 40 seconds left.

If this was a finals, this would have been like my perfect game.  Do nothing until my inevitable victory … without even playing the point of the deck.

Rd3

Preston (Sabbat? vote) -> Justin (Banu Haqim) -> Ian -> Mark J. (Banu Haqim) -> Adrian (midTzimisce)

Adrian got a VP after I rescued one of his two minions and one of Preston’s two minions.  Mark got Adrian, running out of time before I could rescue Justin’s minions for a third time.

I kept asking for time around the 1 hour mark as I wanted to unlock a personal achievement.  Yeah.  This is a problem.  Other people are doing winning.  I’m just trying to come up with amusing stories to share that aren’t amusing to people who care about results.

If I had won this game, that in the first hour of play, sandwiched by two Banu Haqim decks, I only got into one combat and, in that combat, the BH vampire did not steal any of my Lasombra’s blood, but my Lasombra stole two of the Banu Haqim’s blood, this run on sentence would be full of awesome.

If I had won this game, that in two hours of play, sandwiched by two Banu Haqim decks, where I don’t recall a single instance of having blood stolen from any of my vampires, whether Creation rites or any of my three titled Lasombra, this would make for an epic story.

My playing Shadow Step to set range, Dark Steel, IG, Roundhouse, and still coming up one damage short because of Rego Motum was not encouraging.  Mark did essentially run out of cards where I could have won the endgame with more time even with his .44, but it was too pathetic too late.  I did successfully diablerize one of his vampires to get a .44 and Heart, but my Graverobbing was blocked.

So, I really need to put in the cards that make rescuing cheaper as it seems like the only thing I really do to affect games …

Third tournament:

Rd1

Sidney (Matasuntha w/ nuGangrel) -> Ian (Samedi Ashur Tablets) -> Norm (sortanuGangrel) -> Kelly (Brandywine) -> Andi (Barons w/ Cel)

This was a cluster.  Kelly transferred for two turns, then Norm played Kaymakli Nightmares, so Kelly blocked some stuff before he died.  Andi and I both lacked predators.  Sidney just got a slow start, got his Convert Famed, and was more concerned about Norm than me.

I twice beat Sidney on Ashur Tablets.  Not so hard when the point of my deck is to play one any turn I want to play one and slowly edit my deck throughout the game while gaining pool off of the new Ascendance.  Another obvious mistake, I managed to screw up my transfers.  I think twice.  However, my deck gave me Camera Phone and stealth, so Reg just kept bleeding Norm for 3, while Norm didn’t bother blocking my Reanimated Corpse, so he was eating 5 a turn for a couple of turns.  All that early stealth was useful for ignoring my predator, as well.

So, I have a bunch of dudes with a bunch of blood and tons of pool, and the game collapses to the two-player as Andi calls three Reckless Agitations with two landing to take out Sidney.  I get Andi down to 3 pool …  Then, all my guys get torped as Andi’s deck finally draws into his intercept, and my Ivory Bow isn’t as good as his Celerity with .44.  He takes equipment from me.  I hang on until time runs out.  He might have gotten me if he could finish his turn.  I was just utterly crippled.

Ah, VTES.  Not Shadowfist swingy, but it’s a CCG.

Rd2

Sagan (nuNos) -> Clint (nuTzimisce) -> Andi -> Ian

Not unexpected.  I knew I was dead as I have no meaningful defense to Reckless Agitation.

Well, the theory is that I bloat off of Ashur Tablets.  I didn’t draw Ashur Tablets.  Nor did I draw a Villein.  I got a Sengir Dagger.  Later Gran Madre.  In this entire game, I never once got into combat being sandwiched by combat decks with my deck with more combat cards than stealth cards.  It’s my superpower.

I rescued Clint’s minions three times.  Well, he did get a VP after I was ousted as he and Sagan conspired to get Andi out of the game.

Yup, put cards in that reduce cost of rescuing (in terms of actions and/or blood).

Rd3

Ian -> Joey (nuSalubri) -> Preston (Beast Under Siege) -> Mark J. (Unmada Dabbler)

This was frustrating in that my prey and axe were doing things that set me up well for two VPs, but it didn’t help me.  I got a different draw, which is not surprising when my deck has lots of one-ofs and two-ofs.  Mark Revelationsed the only Deflection in my deck, which turned out fine for him, though I think the safer play was to just do anything to get Preston out of the game as Joey’s deck and my deck didn’t really hurt Mark’s.

I couldn’t burn a Madman’s Quill, so I got bled for a lot.  I think a mistake here was thinking that the deck plays differently than how it was conceived.  I thought my deck was only likely to get two dudes in play and hope I can oust people somehow that way.  I got four dudes in play, but I didn’t need the fourth one.  That was seven less pool that could have kept me in the game one more round, where maybe I get a VP.

Joey did yeoman’s work of getting the crap beat out of him over and over and still got Preston.  Mark cleaned up.

I played three decks that did the fight thing.  I chose badly to have two of those be close combat oriented.  Pretty much everyone’s opinion is that I need to stop playing jank, myself included.  The NAC last year was a data point for how my preferred deckbuilding style is overly self-punishing as I give myself very little opportunity to succeed and I’m just not better enough in play skill than my opponents to get away with that.

Lafayette was an illusion [sic] in that two of the finals I made I really didn’t belong.  Tables fell in ways that didn’t make much sense.  In six Gulf Coast Roast tournaments, the only finals I made where I felt like I deserved to be there was when playing new cards in a mostly serious deck (that did get off Machine Blitz).

What will I play at Origins?  Well, only about two months to find out.

As for pick up games, I brought two decks specifically to play against people who didn’t know me well and kept playing against people who didn’t need to see the decks.  I actually only took five pictures of games on the trip.  Took three of food to send to coworker.

I did play my Trophy deck in all of one game.  I played it badly, not clipping my prey’s wings when 75% of his minions were in torpor.  I held off on getting a couple of trophies early because there are 12 in the deck, and I had an easy mark.  Another dumb play.  I finally broke down and got my two trophies, though my Clan Respect choice wasn’t optimal.

I did have a Secure Haven. It got burned.

Here’s standard Guillaume deck I borrowed after first VP where just needed to draw one stealth for second VP.  If only there was a way to draw cards in a Guillaume deck.

Late Saturday night – Oscar left Sunday morning and Mark J. was borrowing his Ivan deck, I put Ivan down with Toreador w/ Obtenebration.  This was the casual deck I played by far the most as it was weirdly not useless.  Had no real oust plan, but it could wreck Mark’s Inside Dirt deck with all of the reduce, intercept.

Devin played my “autopilot” Baali of the Name 1.1 deck at the end of a night.  That was probably not wise.   I never got to play Baali of the Name 1.1 in a casual game.

Thanks to Chris for running and helping me get away from the airport and lending me his power decks.  Thanks to everyone who listened to this crackpot.  Thanks to Mark for arranging ABnB, Devin for shuttling folks and stuff and food.

I need to stop with the early morning flights.  They are harsh on me.  And, maybe, I’ll relearn how to build a normal deck that can oust people.

Amateur Marches On

Before Lafayette, played a three-player at local store using precons as I had just gotten the new ones in the mail.

Gangrel won as I couldn’t get through with Tzimisce, though my early game seemed pretty good and Papillon plus Homunculus was entertaining.  Gangrel could have taken out Ravnos but let them oust me even though I had no real way to do anything after a certain point.

After Lafayette, the coincidence of having the Prince of New Orleans in town for a couple four-player games.

First game, think the order was Devin (Lasombra blood denial) -> Ian (Salubri precon mashup) -> David (Procurers & friends) -> Brad (Brujah precon).

I didn’t like the number of minions David had as my deck was focused around block denial, but they were so squishy that it didn’t really matter.  I just kept drawing block denial over and over and over without getting any bleed cards.  I kept defensive stuff, including damage prevention even when far away from the real combat deck.  Brad eventually got David under control and got Devin down to 2 pool but couldn’t finish him off.

What I had no defense against was Summon the Abyss.  Oh, sure, it was technically blockable with the intercept cards I had in hand, but I never blocked them.

I finally bled David for 2, and he died.  Then, I survived a bit of combat and got block denial when actually useful to oust Brad with this funky, new card called Govern the Unaligned.  Devin scooped.

Game 2

Ian (Ravnos w/ Pre) -> Brad (Salubri precon) -> David (Lucian Orun bleed) -> Devin (newRavnos Animalism)

I could largely ignore Devin’s deck.  Ravnos SB would have been much harder to manage.  While Brad was away from table, David ousted Devin with bleed of like 9 at stealth.  I put Week of Nightmares in play.  David’s pool, though, was sucky, so he dissolved.  I eventually ousted Salubri as I had enough pool to get four minions in play.

Other

Okay, so I occasionally get in CCG play locally.  Far too infrequently.

Meanwhile, I’ve been doing more Frosthaven scenarios.  It takes 3 hours to get one scenario done on a Friday night.  I’d rather play Saturday but had other stuff I needed to do last two weeks.  This Saturday, may actually get two scenarios in.  I’m thinking I need to adjust playing Deathwalker to two-player play.  I think guides assume you have frontline characters.  I’m still having a really awkward time managing Shadows.  I was one turn from exhausting Friday night, which I guess adds to the drama and makes it feel like scenarios are a real challenge, but I know I’m being horribly inefficient in how I manage cards.

Meanwhile, one of those things I had to do was my first session of John Carter of Mars RPG home campaign.  I am not a Roll20 fan.  The logistics of Roll20 always seem insane to me when I don’t care about looking at maps as I can visualize scenes … in my mind.  Eventually got hang of basic dicerolling through my journal character sheet and the damage dice macro.

It’s early.  I can’t take away much.  But, the lightness of the system is definitely appealing to me.  The players are JC fans.  There wasn’t a ton of narrative development, and I don’t know if sessions are typically like this or not.  If they are, that’s fine.  The pacing is just so much faster than my other RPG play in recent years, so I do need to adjust some if this pace is typical.  Get in a mindset of “action, action, action”, perhaps.

We also did another playtest of Mutants & Masterminds for converting to that in the supers game.  I could totally pad out this post with a transcript of the combat against the Candy Crew.

Round 1:

Princess gets in. Mongrel – wait for others, Perception 25. Victor goes in, Stealth 27.

Princess crits Cinnamon Styx. Mongrel also crits Styx. Two bruises. Victor Dazes Gobstopper (doesn’t need to be passed off, Feint would be passed off). Kid Robot multiattacks Styx, another bruise. Xeno punches Wicked Licorice, bruise.

Styx mental flame aura. Mongrel dodge, 34. Victor, 18. Victor Toughness, bruised and staggered.

Gumball Rally appears and goes after Mongrel with nunchaku. Misses (with a 3). Licorice punches Xeno for no effect. Gobstopper gets gooey.

Round 2:

Victor Inspires. Princess bruises Styx. Mongrel hits due to Inspire, does nothing. Kid Robot bruises Styx. Xeno punches Licorice, crits, Licorice rolls a 1 and collapses.

Styx AoEs. Mongrel 22, Victor 14. Mongrel spends HP to reroll to 18, bruised and dazed. Victor spends last HP to reroll to 22, bruised (2). Gumball misses Victor (with a 2). Gobstopper punches Princess, bruised.

Round 3:

Victor Neural Scramblers Gobstopper, power attacks 2, hits easily, she makes DC 22 Will. Princess goes after Styx, still, misses. Mongrel crits Styx “Rawr, I hate cinnamon!”, bruise. Kid Robot Force Bolts Styx, 3 degrees of success. Xeno Eye Beams Styx, hits. 2 degrees of success.

Styx AoEs. Mongrel makes dodge, fails DC by 10, bruised (2) and staggered. Victor fails both and drops.

Gumball hits Princess, can’t hurt her. Choco-Nut Golem misses Princess. Gobstopper misses Princess.

Round 4:

Princess bruises Styx with all out attack. Mongrel misses. Kid Robot and Xeno attempt teamwork attack, Kid misses. Xeno does bruise on Styx.

Styx AoEs. Mongrel drops. Princess HPs to be bruised. Xeno ignores. Kid Robot ignores.

Gumball hits Princess, who ignores it. Golem grabs Priness, she shrugs out. Gobstopper misses even with Princess’ all out attack. Rerolls giving Princess HP, rolls a 1 but hits anyway. Princess rolls 20 on toughness to ignore it.

Princess all out attacks Styx, hits, Styx rolls 1 and drops … finally. He transforms into human while unconscious.

Kid Bolts/Xeno Beams Gobstopper, DC29, Gobstopper rolls 1, staggered.

Gobstopper throws Golem at fliers. Kid gets restrained.

Gumball doesn’t reappear.

Princess and Xeno both try to punch Gobstopper. End up setting DC37, Gobstopper drops.

So

It’s a lot more like the pre-pandemic days for me.  That’s obviously good in some ways.  I do have to adjust to having more to do week to week.

Also watched end of Wheel of Time season 2.  It’s more of the same – “this was so much cooler in the books”, “what’s going on with characterXYZ?”.  Now, I do wonder if the show can take this in an interesting direction with the Forsaken in season 3, where before I didn’t think they had anything interesting to say.

April is almost here, and it should give me an idea if I’m overextending some.  I haven’t had my regular Tuesday night design meetings or Thursday night Iron Empire sessions, so I may end up feeling quite busy.

I still need to get tokens together to send in a transmute box to figure out where I stand trade goodswise.  Plus, there are non-gaming things to do.

Refreshing to not be worried about L5R for a while?

Gulf Coast Roast – Lafayette

Why didn’t I write this a week ago?

I was exhausted at the end of the trip.  As is typical when I get back from a vacation, besides needing a vacation, I needed to get caught up on things going on here.  I had the time but not the will.

So, I was working up until I took an Uber to the airport Wednesday.  Got into New Orleans Airport around 11:30PM.  I had chosen to stay at an airport hotel Wednesday and Monday under the theory that I’d use the airport shuttle and it be less “involved” than staying downtown.  Sure, I knew that meant Ubering between the hotel and New Orleans proper, but I don’t know what I don’t know.

Like, I didn’t know until close to my trip that the airport shuttle stopped running at 11PM.

I get into room at midnight.  I get up at 5AM to head out to downtown New Orleans around 6AM as people are wont to do.

To get my 7:40AM bus to Lafayette.  So, I get my first experience of the city – I had never been to Louisiana before – by sitting in the bus/train station for over an hour.

Manage to get to Lafayette and Norm picks me up.  We get food, where as a first timer at the chain, they gave me free stuff, which I found curious as to how much they endeavor to find out whether someone has never been to their chain.  I make the mistake of getting a burger, but I wanted something easy to eat.  I’ve got to stop getting burgers when I travel even if the best meal I’ve ever had in London was getting a burger and fries (yes, fries, this was an American style restaurant).  He does some miscellaneous tasks, and I get something of a short nap, then we are off to Vidor, Texas.

Casual play!!

Because we get in early, we go check out the ABnB.  It’s a shack, with storage units on the property and nothing else.  It was beautiful inside.  Modern, straight, I found out the towels were really soft.

We get to Kelly’s store.  Time for six games of VTES.  Of which, I played in five, as I needed some dinner.  Standard thing for me to do in the South and Midwest is to go get some Chinese/Asian food.  I asked them if I could change the protein on one of their dishes, and they did that.  Also, it was actually spicy.  There are Thai places in my hood, you know, the San Francisco Bay Area, where the food isn’t spicy.  Not nearly as spicy as the Thai food got on the Big Island, of course, but not like the “Thai” food I’ve gotten in Northwest Arkansas.

First game, I play Blood Brothers w/ Vic deck.  I only took seven decks as I knew I’d have to carry all my luggage around with me a significant amount.  Logistically, this reminded me in ways of my trip to Stockholm.  I had to figure out how to get from Arlanda to where Henrik was, had time to kill until he got off work so walked around Stockholm’s islands with all my stuff, learned how to ride the bus, learned how to take train to get closer to Arlanda then bus when I left.  Certainly not precisely the same.  But, you learn from doing.

Only two of my decks were new, and one was modified from an existing deck.  Something about having work to do but also leaving things to last minute.

Procrastination for the w- … finals!

I think Clint, my prey, was playing Brujah.  I weathered some fighting.  Chance, my predator, was playing something that also fought, I think, kind of hard to remember as many details more than a week later after playing something like 17 games and drinking lots of sugar.  Then, there was the usual play of Deep Ecology by …

I was an ineffectual predator.  For one thing, I couldn’t get the right combat cards in hand at the right time to threaten prey in combat.  Not even with this geniusy setup.

Block those D actions with the power of Fortitude.  Hey, quiet, there’s actually a Blood Brother in the picture.

Stuff happened, I got ousted.  I was shaking my head when Clint was doing something, and it wasn’t for the reason he thought.  I was just shaking my head at the power of new cards.

I think it was game two I sat out for spicy Chinese food, maybe it was game three.  Game two/three, played Transfusion.  Table was set up well for me, so I got … two VPs.

Yup, set up well.  Good ole Dracon as predator.  Fortunately, I was there to support my good buddy and rescued … it from torpor and put a blood on him with Transfusion.  Then, after he got Animalismed back into torpor again, rescued good ole Dracon again and put a blood on him.  Good thing Transfusion has some use to it, right?

After ousting prey, moved around corner of table.

Fame was on my guy in endgame, with Kelly having 1 pool.  But, he had Edge, and I couldn’t get through and he could.

I, then, borrowed a deck from Norm.  I had his Vampiric Disease deck mostly working.  Norm was my prey, of course.  Chance my predator with Lord Tremere and others.  I would try to get into combat with Lord Tremere, but so did his predator, so Chance’s game kind of sucked.  I lost control of my position as I wasn’t really doing things efficiently and Norm gained pool.  We talked about changes to the deck.  I found the rush combat angle clunky.  Something else seemed off to me, but I don’t remember.

Norm made the deck more blocky and played it in later game.  I borrowed Chance’s Arika deck in one of these games.  Got down to three players, and I kept putting 3 pool damage on my predator, playing Dementation bleed to preserve the three player, ousting Norm with bounce, having double Banishment to buy me enough time to take a game.  Ha ha!  Victory!  With someone else’s deck …

You know, I thought we played six games, with my playing five.  But, I also borrowed Kelly’s Trujah deck and played it badly.  This was the game of infinite (or at least five) Golcondas, including my Golcondaing myself and my prey’s Cock Robin.  I didn’t do well.  So, that’s five games of my playing.

But, I’m pretty sure it was in Vidor that I played Tzimisce SB.  I know I was on the end of the table and just kept bleeding.  I think this was last game as I was trying to play something quick so that we could get some sleep.  I stopped taking pictures … of any of my games, only have food pictures left from my trip as I send those to coworker.

I know I got at least one VP.  That deck just peters out.  It lacks control elements.  The original version – Living Lolita Loca – is still probably better even with the stuff that was relevant when it won and not so much now just because it can swarm and it’s faster.  But, any version of this at this point leaves me wanting more bloat and more control.

We use the shack.  I had leftover Chinese food that I put in fridge and even remembered to get when we left.  Norm and I drive back to Lafayette.  We go to daiquiri place and meet up with Brad and Chance.  I get a burger.  Well, in my defense, this is their main entree.  I was not thrilled.  I also asked for fries crunchy, like I asked at other place for country potatoes crunchy.  I know why I bother – I hate making french fries.  I want some place to exist that does french fries correctly, like the Foster City Red Robin did in the long, long ago.  Of course they weren’t crunchy.  Keep in mind, I don’t drink alcohol (outside of special occasion stuff), so I’m just drinking Dr. Pepper.  Also, the dark environment may be vampire conducive, but I kind of like natural light during the day.  Not direct sunlight – my Fortitude dots are low – but side light.

We get to Sanctuary early enough for some set up and to play a pickup game.  I play Transfusion again as some different players.  Chance is in this game.  I oust Oscar and don’t remember much else from this game.  Was there another pickup game?  I don’t know.  I know there was a smoothie coupon at stake in a game, and Kelly won it, though he passed it to me.

Smoothie time.  So, I go Mocha Madness.  Good.  I spend so much time talking, thinking, and researching food these days.  I don’t really care that much about what I eat.  I care way more about what I drink.  What form of flavored sugar, anyway.

There’s a tournament.

Rd1

Norm (Barons) -> Brad (Brujah) -> Oscar (Nos) -> Ian (Ravnos w/ PRE) -> James (Gangrel)

So, this was a cluster.  Norm and Brad contend all game that they survive.  They contest.  James puts nominal pressure.  Oscar brings out Sheldon, Nikolaus, later Selma.  He keeps dropping Army of Rats, Creeping Sabotage, and … far more importantly … Judgment: Camarilla Segregation.

I bring out Delizbieta.  I feel like I had someone else who got beat up and I sacced to a JCS, but I don’t remember.  I brought out Ezmerelda, who never acted, having to blow up to keep me alive on my unlock.  So, I bring out another Ezmerelda … who never acts, having to blow up to keep me alive on my unlock.  Time’s a wastin’.  Norm is contesting with both predator and prey.  I put Week of Nightmares in play and bleed for what I think was first time in game at around 1.5 hour mark.  James doesn’t block, and I bleed for four.

Judgment: Camarilla Segregation proceeds to oust James.  Then, Norm.  Eventually, Brad goes under from multiple.  Oscar and I play out endgame even though I can’t really do anything to him as I don’t have enough free stealth and I just keep losing pool every turn.  Now, admittedly, the techy play would have been to blow up Delizbieta so that I had no non-Camarilla vampires in play, but I don’t know if that makes any difference.  Oscar can just Creeping Sabotage more or whatever.

Yup, “do nothing until my inevitable victory” kicks in, again.  This also begins the meme of the weekend (for me).  Best card ever – J:CS does nothing but give me game wins.

Rd2

Devin (Beast rush) -> Ian -> Dean (Nocturns) -> [blanking, had same name as someone else, James?] (Banu Haqim) -> Oscar

Devin was busy removing Oscar’s offense.  Banu Haqim had predator and prey both under control.  This was an easy game for me.  Minimum 1 VP.  Pretty much just waiting to get two.  So, of course, I wait too long and Devin gets unleashed and prevents my inevitable victory.

Finals

No decisions for me.

Sidney (Malks) -> Ian -> Kelly (Brujah) -> Devin -> Chance (Ministry)

And, so begins the rushfest.  Kelly placed himself last to give himself time against the stealth bleeders.  We think other positions would have worked, too, but he won, so it was the right decision.  I got Ezmerelda out.  She kept me alive.  Delizbieta learned Dominate.  Maybe I got out Gabrin, maybe I only thought about it.  I wasn’t ever really a threat, though I did bounce to Kelly, which concerned him.  I just weathered the stealth bleed as Kelly and Devin killed Sidney, so I survived two SB decks as team rush eventually made Chance irrelevant.  Obviously, my Sensory Overload on one of Sidney’s Malks was … irrelevant as it just got beat up by rush.

As is usually the case, you don’t want to be my predator with bleed.  Sure, I can’t deal with a lot of decks forever.  Just long enough that you will either die to someone else or burn so many resources can’t finish off a table.  Well, okay, this is just in general.  Next tournament we see me not impacting my SB predator in any way.

I didn’t get bled out.  Kelly backousted me with Reckless Agitation.  Yup, yet again being backousted by vote or crosstabled by vote.  Prevents those inevitable victories.

Kelly wins.

Friday night, I stay at ABnB with Chance, Sidney, and James.  It’s not as nice inside as other place.  Creaky floors.  Well, whatever.  I was comfortable enough.

Saturday morning, I go with Sidney to Waffle House.  First time ever for me.  I do have a picture, but this is a gaming blog (in theory).

I liked my patty melt and hash browns better than the daiquiri place’s burger and fries.  End up at Sanctuary and I get Pomegranate Plunge.  It’s decent.

Were there pickup games?  I assume so.  I remember one other pickup game I played in and it was later.  I don’t remember borrowing any more decks.

Grand Prix

Rd1

Ian (8-cap vote) -> ?? (Toreador gun) -> Clay (Arika & friends) -> Devin (DoC Crescendo) -> Clint (Malks)

I didn’t last long.  Oh, I got to play a number of things, including masters that cost me pool.  My prey did something quite odd.  Discarded Concealed Weapon.  Discarded .44.  Put Haven Uncovered on one of my guys and … didn’t use it.  He did pretty much nothing in the game.  Might have helped me to get rushed to cycle out of combat ends.

Anyway, I could have done 4 pool damage to my predator early on.  It just seemed too early to go that route.  Well, since Clint swept, guess it wasn’t too early.  I could have reduced him to like 4 pool with votes, and Devin may have been able to finish him off.  Because what Devin didn’t have was Shattering Crescendoes to blow up Clint’s board.

Rd2

Felipe (Imbued) -> Chance (Banu Haqim) -> Ian -> Matt (Gangrel)

I so easily could have killed Felipe at any time.  I did hit him for 5 with one vote.  It was argued that I should have backousted Chance late in the game, and that would have worked better than my not being able to get Matt.  Even with the power of three stealth Zip Lines, too much intercept around me, plus I lost vote control to the Banu Haqim.

Game timed out with my demise being the “oh, well” demise.  I tried to collapse the table for one VP, but the table didn’t go for it.

Rd3

Norm (Gangrel) -> James (Gangrel) -> Seth (J:CS) -> [blanking] (Kiasyd) -> Ian

Norm Thinged a lot.  Seth perturbed my predator.  I still ended up getting bled for a lot eventually, though there was hardly any for a long time as I was too busy to block early and lost interest in blocking later.  May have been a bunch of combat in the Kiasyd deck.

I do the usual thing in this meta, I bring out Sarrasine Advanced and Katarina Kornfeld to be utterly immune to best card ever.  As is apparently always the case in the Gulf Coast, someone else’s J:CS ousts my prey and grandprey, and I make sure to have the right pool splashes to sweep, only bringing out Sobayifa when my pool is sufficient.

Finals

I had a choice of seating.  I probably made the wrong choice.  Impact of that choice affected Justin.  Justin wasn’t in a bad position.

Clint -> Kelly (Gangrel) -> Sidney (Ravnos) -> Ian -> Justin (Ghede)

Well, I did virtually nothing.  I called two votes.  Didn’t help that I played masters costing pool rather than just ones giving pool.  Sidney decided to blow up the table.  Dropped Club Illusion.  Kelly won again.

So, unlike other games where I could have started backousting but didn’t.  I did look to begin the process, but it was too late.  My view was that my best chance was to salmon, as all “good” vote decks want to do.  I meet my rush predator in an endgame where I think I have the advantage.  Gives him plenty of time to rip up everyone else to stop problematic ousts, while I suck enough bleeds while salmoning that I can’t just build up.

But, then, other people could have played differently, too.  I think Justin could have started by crosstabling Sidney.  Let Clint do some damage to Kelly before blowing up Clint rather than first rush going after Clint.  Kelly still gets Sidney but may put some resources into defending versus Malks.  I’m hanging around.  Maybe that’s a hard thing for Justin to manage as it takes him time to get Clint off the table.

Last night at ABnB.

Sunday, Chance and I get brunch, where I make the mistake of getting another burger, then head over to daiquiri place.  I get homemade chips.  Now, being from California, I asked what the chips were made of.  While I suspected (and mentioned) potatoes, there’s tortilla and more esoteric stuff that seemed unlikely like plantains.

The potato chips were okay.  Unevenly cooked so some were too soft, some too crunchy.  Get to locale, get Blueberry Bliss.  It is ridiculously hard to drink compared to the Mocha Madness.  Had to drink some of it without straw.

Rd1

Clay (Ariadne Amaranth) -> Sidney (Tzimisce bleed) -> Ian (Banu Haqim) -> Chance (Tha/Vic) -> Norm (Banu Haqim)

And, so begins the day of no Judgment: Camarilla Segregation.  I must of have cursed us.  Us being Norm and me who were playing same crypts for most part.  His deck is much more Second Traditiony, with Anathemas.  My deck is much more Flamethrower.

I Magic of the Smith and get out Ivory Bow.  I don’t have a lot of pool, but I can survive all of Sidney’s stuff.  I DI his first .44.  He eventually gets a .44.  I Machine Blitz, additional strike him into torpor.  What makes me sad is that Clay collapses.  Norm gets Sidney pretty easily as Sidney was trying to play with two minions and doesn’t have much pool.  I get Chance through a lot of low bleeds.

The endgame is rough.  I have Flamethrower to beat Marduk.  Fame on Norm’s guy doesn’t help me much as I’m lower on pool.  We eventually time out.

Rd2

Norm -> Ian -> Jason(?) [yeah, my brain has smoothed over the years] (Choir) -> [sigh] (Tupdog/Nephandus) -> Dean (!Ventrue)

I got 3 VPs.  I maybe could have had more.  I possibly could have had less, where Dean’s game was awful.  My prey was not in a strong position, but he got 2 VPs.  Yet again, Flamethrower wins combats, where I could afford to contest late in the game, too.  Almost timed out.

Banu Haqim combat is really dumb.  My Kalinda with 1 blood tries to hunt and Norm blocks, leading to us both doing three strikes and stealing 1 blood each time.

Finals

I probably choose poorly again.  Being Brad’s prey usually works really badly for me.  I just wanted to be away from Norm, though my recent history of trying to be crosstable from like decks has turned out really poorly for me.

Brad (Anarch unnamed & friends) -> Ian -> Matt (Nos) -> Justin (Clown Car) -> Norm

So, Norm wrecked Justin with extreme prejudice.  I kept hoping to collapse to three-player with Matt and Norm.  Was not to be.  I couldn’t really defend against Brad’s deck.  Sometimes, Anathema and rush are better than Flamethrower.  In the three-player I wasn’t involved in, Brad ousted Matt, which meant he won regardless as to whether Norm got him or not.

At some point, I played my Black Hand deck in a pickup, with Oscar as my prey with boring old Samedi Bear-Baiting.  I don’t know how anyone puts up with the mindnumbing nature of BH decks.  Never again.  I do think I should play more decks with engines.  Just not my CCG style in any CCG.  At some point, I got an al pastor burrito from a nearby food truck.  With both salsas, that was quite decent.

I also got another Mocha Madness.  Was making me cold in the finals.

Sunday night, Dean takes me to my Lafayette hotel.  That hotel was better than the airport hotel in Kenner.  I got breakfast at the hotel that was tolerable.  I considered walking to transit center for my bus back to New Orleans, but I found a reasonable Uber.

My bus ride back wasn’t as nice as my bus ride over – a lot more people.

I walk from bus station to Turkey and the Wolf, which was suggested by card floppers.  I pass by some architecture, but I’m already beat up and need to eat.  I get the fried bologna sandwich, where you could barely tell there was bologna given the chips and Russian dressing and big bread.  It was okay.  My crinkle cut fries were crunchy.  Still undercooked but a marked improvement.

I Uber to Kenner hotel.  And, lie down.  Talk to my friend for like 1.5 hours while lying in bed with TV on.  Next morning, walk over to Daisy Dukes Diner for hot sausage po boy and red beans.  It was fine.  Too much sausage.  After taking half of it off, the sandwich was in a good balance.  Eating the other sausage was not terribly interesting.  Have a pic of this, too.  Never had red beans as a dish before.  I amount it to chili, so I cease to care as I eat chili all of the time, like last night.

I *did* actually consider getting the fish basket to have seafood in Louisiana, New Orleans adjacent.  But, nah.

So, my stages in New Orleans itself consisted of:  sit in bus station, walk from bus station to hipster sandwich shop, eat at sandwich shop.

I can check Louisiana off as another state where I’ve done something of significance.  Still haven’t hit the halfway mark.

Thanks Norm for organizing, for shuttling me around, getting the ABnB, and putting up with my harping on the Normkiller that is Judgment: Camarilla Segregation.  Thanks Kelly for having us at your store Thursday, putting me in contact with Texans to stay with two nights, smoothie coupons.  Thanks Brad for smoothie coupons.  Thanks Chance and Sidney for driving me around and ABnB.  Thanks to Dean for taking me to other hotel.  Thanks to everyone else for making it a really great gaming trip.  It had been so long since I saw Devin, I didn’t recognize him immediately.  I recognized Oscar, of course, and we talked quite a bit.  Really nice to be able to talk and hang out with other players.

My games were really fun.  Even the tournament games.  Even getting blown off tables and cowardly/iniquitously being backousted while at 1 pool.

That was a lot of travel logistics to deal with.  Norm suggested other possibilities, but I had in mind the possibility of actually touristing in New Orleans, so I thought my plans made sense.

What am I forgetting?  I don’t see a reason to post decklists in this post, anyway.  I do have casual play pictures, so I should do a casual play report for a couple different events sandwiching this trip.

CCG February, Part 2

Sunday was just as busy.  Gaming didn’t start until 1PM, though.

Played two games at Victory Point Cafe.

Game 1

Rick (AUS Ass) -> Ian (I Love Cheap Thrills) -> Mark (Saulot Wall) -> Alex (Newlubri)

Rick brought out Tegyrius, Al-Ashrad, and eventually Tariq.  He rushed me once through Priority Contract and Lost bled me multiple times.

I bring out Marino Reymundo Vásquez, and a Tupdog.  Later, Ladislas Toth, The Torch.  I drew barely any combat cards in this game.  So, Ladislas blocks Saulot’s Magic of the Smith at three stealth and gets beat up.  I had bleed cards early.  Drew bunch of Redirections, which would have helped, but I lacked wakes.  Then, drew Mirror Walks.

Mark tooled Saulot up with a large amount of junk so that he could hit for 6 Agg.  He had three other vamps.  He had early Powerbase Montreal, which I took, then Rick took, then Alex.

Alex got to do some stuff with Salubri, but he couldn’t really deal with the combat around him.

Eventually, Rick conceded to Mark, though it was funny to see someone rush Saulot when he could do 6 Agg at close.

Game 2

Ian (DoC SB) -> Alex (Ravnos SB) -> Rick (Toreador Vote/Bleed) -> Mark (Nefertiti)

I bring out Anarch Convert on turn one, and he gets various bleeds in and some Blood Doll hunts.  I put Yseult and Gael in play.

Alex gets new Ravnos in play.

Rick gets midcaps in play and one becomes Toreador Justicar.

Mark gets Nefertiti in play, brings out Khay’tall right before the end.

Rick just hammers Mark, so Mark is doomed.  Alex drops Week of Nightmares and finishes off Rick.  I bleed out Alex with Heidelberg moving J.S. Simmons around (I did play multiple Aires of Elation earlier, so Alex didn’t have much pool for me to eat through).

My comment at the end of the game, “You have now seen the true power of Polaris Coach.”  I had a Polaris Coach in my hand when the game ended.

Even with VPC being rather expensive place to play, it was a pleasant experience where I got to get home much earlier than expected, even had time to add yet another task for the day on way home.

So, we didn’t do a lot.  What was my takeaway?  I had one, I think.  I need to build new decks.  I don’t have much reason to build certain decks in casual play.  It was different from Shadowfist the day before.  Shadowfist requires far more … well, far more thought, though I’m not sure that’s the optimal word.  Even though the result of the second game was not predicted and not expected, VTES is just much more predictable in what happens.  It’s the surprises on the margin that make it sufficiently surprising, where Shadowfist is too swingy for how I play games.

Obviously, VTES is vastly more comfortable for me.  I understand situations far better.  Alex took out Rick a turn earlier than I might have expected, but it wasn’t unexpected for him to get Rick before Rick got me.  I had good pool after using Vessel, Blood Doll, and Villein with minions that had plenty of blood due to Concert Tours.

But, VTES isn’t so much about deck construction to me, anymore.  What makes the game entertaining is how games play out with all of the individual moves and the impact they have on the other players.  With Shadowfist, I don’t have the context of deck interactions to see the downstream impact of plays.  But, I also can build lots of decks that I haven’t made before.  Ultimately, in any CCG, a bunch of stuff is functionally similar or the same, but it still feels different because of theme.  VTES doesn’t have nearly as much theme to me.  The first game had some pretty anemic combats.  That was great.  I tried to point out that the appeal of soccer is not in scoring but in the potential for scoring, and the appeal (to me) of VTES combat is not in carnage but in the potential for … doing more than 2 damage to an opposing minion.

Playing a CCG, actually, playing any game gives me ideas.  Oh, I don’t necessarily remember the deck ideas I got from Saturday and Sunday.  As I’m attending a game convention this weekend, one where almost everything I preregged for was a RPG event, I’m not in a CCG frame of mind.  I actually have a variety of things to deal with, including getting around to sending in a True Dungeon transmute box.  My new VTES precons just arrived yesterday, so I can try to think of how to use even more new cards.

I’m just rambling.  Playing CCGs is great.  Wish it was weekly and not like quarterly.  Because of the discourse being competitive focused, it would be good if I could actually test tournament ideas, but I won’t be able to do that for … three weeks.

I can only play when other people play, so I hope others maintain enthusiasm for local play.  Deck lists?  I’m not as into posting VTES deck lists as the Shadowfist ones are much funnier.

Obvious next post should be DunDraCon 2024.

CCG February, Part 1

I decided to split this up as I want to post decklists from Shadowfist play, so this should be long.

Saturday, I played, apparently, seven games of Shadowfist.  This was part of our quarterly playday scheduling system.

Game 1 (3 players)

Earl (Monarchs) -> Ian (Multifaction) -> Paul (Multifaction)

My deck shall remain a mystery as it didn’t do what it was supposed to do.  In fact, it didn’t do anything.  Paul’s deck also didn’t do anything.  Earl won pretty easily.  I remember playing some foundations and Paul trying to get his second faction running.  Wait, some of this is coming back to me.

Earl played Flambards.  He played Fire Mystic.  He played Fakhir-al-Din for the win against really nothing.  One of my first two sites was Proving Ground, and Earl took it pretty early, and that was when the game essentially ended.  My Gao Family Banquet Hall slowed him down slightly.

Game 2 (3 players)

Miguel () -> Ian (Corrupted) -> Tim (Scrappy Kids)

I tried to rein in some recursion with Scroll of Pain in response to Inauspicious Return, but I only got one Scrappy Kid with it.  What smaller dudes I put into play just got wiped by Final Brawls.  Miguel didn’t have a lot going on, either.  Tim just kept progressing until victory.

Game 3 (3 players)

Ian (Ancestral River Home) -> Tim (as above) -> Miguel (Butterfly Raid)

I didn’t have a good start in that nobody was coming for my Ancestral River Home.  I finally hardcast Queen of the Ice Pagoda.  Someone did my Ancestral River Home in and I put out White Ninja.  I should have taken a picture of this game rather than the other games as it got dumber.

What was really dumb on my part is that my deck actually requires Monarch resources for certain cards, and I couldn’t get a second resource.  Not that it mattered as I had the game under control pretty much throughout.  Queen got attacked some but never went away.  They were concerned with Netherworld Returns, which of course wouldn’t be in this Modern deck.  Now, if Queen did go down, I could play Fire Emissary to … end up with smaller character and still have only one Monarch resource.

I won without ever playing Fire Emissary.  In fact, in the entire course of the game, only one card ever hit my smoked pile.  I finally got a second resource off of Aide de Camp (after I already had seized Kinoshita House and Fox Pass was doomed).  Miguel couldn’t get in the game as his Butterfly Knights weren’t threatening enough, and I started bullying his dudes.  Tim couldn’t get in the game between not being able to defend from my monsters and because I run Diamond Beach in this deck, which wrecks his strategy.

In the end, Queen had a Hovercraft.  White Ninja had Living Legend.  Beaumains was bullying.

I posted recently that the aphorism “I win because nobody else does” applies well to both my Shadowfist and VTES play.  I can win good VTES games.  But, I only ever seem to win bad Shadowfist games.

Game 4 (3 players)

Tim (Eunuchs) -> Miguel (Ascended) -> Ian (Badger)

Miguel kept messing with my power generation, using Sulphurous Cenote to stop IKTV Radio Outpost flips.  He had a much, much cooler play than that, though, in this game.  He was doing well, and he played Inside Job against me.  Inside Job where you play for free a card in someone else’s hand.

I had two copies of Attack of the Fifty Foot Badger in hand.  What he didn’t pay attention to (not that he would have chosen differently) was that I had a copy of Abandoned Old Shop in hand.  I had already discarded another Old Shop.  I got bailed out by the sheer geniusosity of my deckbuilding.

I play Abandoned Old Shop, bounce Badger back to my hand.  End up playing a Badger.  End up putting Specialist and Stance of the Wandering Toad on my Badger so that it would grow by 2 every turn.  Miguel had some annoying stuff, but he lacked fighting and stuff got cleared out.  I did Brain Tape one of his guys as I didn’t want to do mine when The Emperor left play.

Meanwhile, Tim was just winning.  Wasn’t like we did anything to his Eunuch army.  So, he just did stuff even with a Badger in the ‘hood.

Game 5 (4 players)

Drew (Lotus) -> Paul (Battle-Matic) -> Miguel (Battle-Matic) -> Ian (Corrupted)

Tim was going to get picked up soon and Earl sat out.

Well, I did stuff in this game with my Corrupted damage deck.  … just not Corrupted damage.  I put Stalking Horrors in play, and it had zero damage bonus.

Drew was quite strong for a time.  But, I Poisoned Wound his Infernal Army, and he didn’t have much in the way of characters after.  I never had much in play, though I was a threat for a bit.  Paul wasn’t doing much offensively, but he was in the game.  Miguel won.

So, this was a good game.  Everyone got to do stuff.  This was the game where I commented “If only Lotus had some way to remove characters.” as Drew and I failed to murder the souls of dorks with Battle-Matics.  Actually, if I had another turn, I would have drawn Incendiary Blast.

Game 6 (3 players)

Ian (SWS Ascended) -> Earl (Revivication Shard) -> Paul (Multifaction)

Drew and Miguel left.

This was a sad, pathetic game.  So, of course, I won.

My Bunker Security did a lot of early work against Earl.  This allowed me to burn for power with Old Buzzard and Shamali Storm help.  Earl couldn’t recover, having only Registry of the Damned in play at one point.  Paul was struggling with resources, then I took his Netherworld Trickster with Katerina Sa to remove his only Dragon resource.  I finished things up with The Mouse, never using her to steal stuff as there weren’t things worth stealing.

Game 7 (3 players)

Earl (as above) -> Paul (Monarchs/Lotus) -> Ian (Influence)

I failed my Influence deck.  I overcommitted when trying to clear out annoying characters in play, and Earl played Underworld Coronation.  After that, I had nothing that mattered.  Earl was impaired by Paul’s Sacred Wigwam.  I probably made a mistake not going after that.  We kept trying to rein in Paul, but it’s hard to regulate someone far ahead in three-player, so Paul eventually won.  His recursing Avenging Darkness was so, so bad for me.  Syndicate does not like having its characters messed with, and Catching Bullets never works for me.

Decks

I’m not going to post every deck.  Just the ones with fewer than 40 cards.  Just happens to include the two that won games.

Badger Time!
(30) Jammers/Guiding Hand

Jammers (14)
Characters (10)
4x Absolute Maniacs
2x Attack of the Fifty Foot Badger
4x Netherworld Scavenger

Edges (3)
3x Aftershocks

Events (1)
1x “What’s the Worst that Could Happen?”

Guiding Hand (4)
Characters (3)
3x Wasteland Gardener

States (1)
1x Stance of the Wandering Toad

Factionless (12)
Feng Shui Sites (7)
2x Abandoned Old Shop
1x Ancient Trollbridge
1x Beached Supertanker
1x Echoing Cavern
1x Golden Sky Island
1x Salt Mine

Sites (3)
3x IKTV Radio Outpost

States (2)
1x Brain-Tape
1x Specialist

Echoing Enclave
(35) Ascended

Ascended (25)
Characters (15)
2x Bunker Security
2x Cut-Out
2x Katerina Sa
2x Kennedy Rose
3x Old Buzzard
1x Shamali Storm
1x Street Rat
1x The Mouse
1x The Professional

Edges (4)
1x Deep Pockets
3x Long Term Investments

Events (4)
1x Anonymous Tip
1x Forged Orders
1x Inside Job
1x Playing Possum

States (2)
1x Framed!
1x Ghillie Suit

Factionless (10)
Feng Shui Sites (10)
3x Echoing Cavern
1x Golden Sky Island
1x Isolated Banyan Grove
1x Salt Mine
2x Sunken City District
2x Walled Enclave

River Running
(35) Monarchs

Monarchs (21)
Characters (7)
2x Aide de Camp
1x Beaumains, the Mongrel Knight
1x Fire Emissary
1x Lord Hawksmoor
2x Queen of the Ice Pagoda

Edges (3)
3x Summoning Circle

Events (10)
1x Amnesty
1x Avenging Thunder
2x Blood Lust
2x Brain Fire
1x Deafening Thunder
1x The Warrior’s Calm
1x Twin Thunders
1x Vengeance in the Ashes

States (1)
1x Soul Fire

Factionless (14)
Characters (3)
1x Sprung-Li
2x White Ninja

Feng Shui Sites (7)
5x Ancestral River Home
2x Diamond Beach

States (4)
1x Hovercraft
2x Living Legend
1x Public Enemy No. 1

Post Holidays

So, my holidays trip ended weeks ago, yet still haven’t posted anything.

Well, here’s a thing.

Prior to trip, got a three-player VTES game in.  Just usual Jackal play when prey has Ministry and other player has Banu Haqim.

Then, Badger gets busier.  Without much offense, only got 2 VPs.

Part of the trip was wedding and bachelor’s party all less than a week after Christmas.  Busy time for folks.

Brother’s brother-in-law won first two (real) hands as we played through East while Big Trouble in Little China was being watched by others at the Air BnB.  He may have played before, he may not have.  Both hands were fairly valuable, so when we quit, he would have been still like a 1000 points up with my being around even.

The primary activity for the bachelor’s party was riding roller coasters.  Only four of the nine roller coasters were in operation, and we only had time to do each once.  My takeaway was that the order mattered.  We did from most dramatic to least.  That’s not how to tell a narrative.  Felt anticlimactic.  We tried to do first one a second time but were probably 10 minutes too late as we got to the park very late as there was terrible traffic.

The relevance to gaming is obvious.  Should be some element of building to a climax.  Maybe there’s a different takeaway.  I hadn’t been on a roller coaster in so long I couldn’t think of one since riding the mini one in the Oriental Pearl Tower in Shanghai.  I didn’t know what to expect both in general and in terms of advancements.  Oldening has also affected what affects me most.  What changes with knowing what to expect or not?  I’m not sure.  This post isn’t terribly profound, it’s more here’s what I’ve been up to for the last month.

I didn’t get to play VTES during the trip as the organizer for local play was traveling himself for the holidays.

There are always cases of ideas being generated when out of usual environs, but I didn’t really think of anything profound.

I did play Iron Empire while traveling.  We are still at Winter Court.  Mostly going through events.  Since returning, played more sessions and had a side adventure where there was even combat!  Of the three PCs, only my courtier took any damage, and I was in significant wound penalties and got left behind to hide in the muck.  Ah, the true power of playing low Honor character.  Survival before Honor!

When the Denver CRUSH group got together after the holidays, half the players lacked enthusiasm for continuing and our planned conversion to Mutants & Masterminds 3e from Aberrant seemed like it might not happen.  But, looks like we are going to go forward.  I had my first experience with M&M3e in a playtest session.  Our one combat scene took a very long time.  Apparently not just lack of familiarity with the mechanics on the part of myself and our GM (who was playing).  There are obvious benefits to dumping Aberrant as Aberrant isn’t intended for four color comicbook style stories.  It’s early, so maybe the system will feel less grindy when we play more.  But, I do think that rolling the same type of die over and over again feels more grindy than rolling different dice.

I can’t think of much else.  The subject line doesn’t even refer to the activity in past month but rather my situation currently with having the energy to look back.  I do feel that I missed many opportunities to post more, where this blog isn’t putting out much content.

Well, next post is obvious, but I don’t really have a plan for what after that.  We have a Shadowfist play day coming up in February, so something involving CCGs but probably going to be more RPG stuff with maybe some boardgames.  Then, I have a badge for DunDraCon – I have no sense as to what I’m going to end up doing.

The Best of … 2020

So, I didn’t so much miss a deadline as much as I just forgot about my annual tradition.

One of my brothers had a wedding Saturday, so the last week plus has been kind of busy.

I actually had a plan for posting before my best of post something, but it has been hard to be concerned about normal things.

Anyway, 2020 was not a good year in various ways.  As I just start looking back at what I wrote as I write these posts, let’s see what I want to call out.

January

Fascinating.

Eleven Decks, Eleven Notes – Part 1

Somehow, this entire series … started in 2020 … ended before we stopped playing.

This is precisely the sort of thing I should do more of – build decks, talk about how the decks perform in actual games.  Of course, it’s kind of hard to play decks when there’s no one to play with.

Other parts are probably noteworthy, too.  After all, they aren’t short play reports, even if I included TV reviews or whatever in some of them.  Can get an idea how bonkers Shadowfist is by trying to describe games in partial detail, though it’s not like I haven’t done SF session reports before.

Advanced Play – L5R & Gloomhaven

I was trying in 2020 to get back to doing more analysis and less navel gazing.  Well, not that anyone needed to hear my Gloomhaven analysis so long after the game came out, but I write about things I do.  Advancing Tatakisu might have been interesting for how I both try to know how to min/max, then do something weird.

Off Court

Why do courtiers exist in a fantasy world where Hell is just to the Southwest?

I’m still playing Akarui.  Team Akarui just won an actual Winter Court event.  Obvious thing for a team of Imperial Herald, Tortoise, and Yasuki to win – shrine building.  Yup, build that shrine better than all of the other teams, which I think all had shugenja on them.

And, that’s why courtiers exist – to have multiple ranks in Engineering, to have Lore: Shrines, to have partners with a bunch of ranks in Lore: Rokugan, to have Ebisu’s Blessing and to have lots of koku koku bills to throw at spiritual projects.

February

Unstable

I almost skipped over this, but this was the most interesting thing in February.  It’s long, so it must be good.

I was just talking to one of my GMs yesterday about how contested rolls in R&K are bad because the system has too much variance.  This article is a lot about how variance creates problems with combat.  Now, maybe it’s just because L5R has lethality.  Maybe a system that wasn’t bad to begin with (most are, bad that is) with low lethality or enough metacurrency to not die can embrace variance.

March

Roll & Defeat

Speaking of the problems with contested rolls and variance …

April

Rather Not Walk

Choo choo.

ARe Wards

More direct about what players like me want and what isn’t as important.

Fiction Destruction

So, how good is my writing?  Much like my cooking, I’d say highly variable.  I don’t care much about getting better at these sorts of things as much as I just like being wrapped up in the narrative (that includes the narrative of cooking).

This is really, really long, but that just means it’s got to be better.

May

Building L5R Characters – Emerald Empire

*shrug*  If people want L5R content, I might as well write about L5R stuff.  How do I know people want L5R content?  I check what articles are getting views at times and it’s mostly old L5R articles.

Friendliness Rating

I try at times to create things for people to use.  Whether I ever use this idea I have no idea.

Gen Con – Early Years

Some Gen Cons are very similar to others.  And, yet, lot of stuff going on every year relative to other cons.

[Classic ] Gen Con SoCal 2004 [12/8/2004]

Why call out this classic post?  Charmed, I’m sure.

[Classic] Gen Con 2004 [8/26/2004]

I had seven posts in May, so it wasn’t like I chose every one.  First time playing Heroes of Rokugan!

June

Fight, Right?

Yet another take on what makes combat better or worse.

August

Gen Con 2020 – Oh, The Horror!

For posterity, the virtual Gen Con.

[Classic] True Dungeon V1 Feedback [2020-8-3]

Well, as much as 2021 was my favorite year for VTD, most recent VTD was vastly better than VTD1.

September

Card Qualit-ies

I am a CCG designer/developer.  Like a real one.  I’ve created other games, but those weren’t actually sold to people for actual money.

October

Brain Squishy

Who doesn’t want to know more about what sort of gamer type I am?

November

Midwest Gamefest 2020

As possibly the only Midwest Gamefest I’ll ever participate in, figure why not.  Besides, had Battle Interactive.

December

Camping Tools

Sure, other people have their lists.  Here’s mine.

So, 2020 was 2020.  I’m trying to get this wrapped up as family is having New Year’s dim sum lunch.  While there’s probably more to say about the year, I guess I’ll just let it go.

Giving Again

Played VTES on the 13th.  Only three player game, but it was a solid game.

I rescued Arika so that my predator had a predator.  She didn’t go down again, so we eventually got ousted.  I did have a window to bleed my prey out, but he drew into additional Deflections, and I didn’t get another crack.

Got together with a friend in person for first time since pandemic started.  We had played some stuff through online meeting software.  We played This War of Mine …

… of course.  We did not come close to succeeding.  We made zero progress on first objective.  Learned that getting wounded is really, really bad.

So, one of my recent thoughts was same old, same old – I love CCGs and RPGs and a few specific things like mahjong, but there are plenty of games I don’t have the same level of enthusiasm for.

But, before getting more into that and trying to relate to something else recently, time for me to use an analogy.

I’ve seen the ending episodes of Naruto already, but they are being shown on Cartoon Network and so I have been watching those and some episodes I skipped.

Anime is anime.  Fight anime is fight anime, though Naruto has a lot more going on than Dragonball Z, Bleach, YuYu Hakusho, or a bunch of other stuff.  It’s more similar to Yu-Gi-Oh! in having a very long character development arc.  Then, lots of other things are of a similar ilk to what I’m slowly getting at.

Want to know the difference between D&D and high fantasy?  See the difference between earlier Naruto and end of series.  What inspired my thinking about this recently is Obito.  Obito’s present is a perfect example of something you *could* do in a RPG but will frustrate folks who focus on the mechanics of such games.  High fantasy isn’t about mechanics.  Well, most written fantasy isn’t about mechanics including game fiction.

It’s such a struggle … in my experience … to capture dramatic moments that occur in scripted works because the point of a game is that it isn’t scripted.  You roll or flip or allocate or whatever and you win when you weren’t supposed to win and lose when you weren’t supposed to lose, and the narrative emerges from decisions and randomness rather than being predetermined.

Um, okay, everybody already knows this.

So, let me bring up failure again.  I have a recent example that makes me want to belabor this topic as well.

In our Iron Empire campaign, we are at Imperial Winter Court.  Our Statuses are high enough that this is plausible.

There are a bunch of events going on every week.  We participated in five so far while still being in first month of three month WC.  None of the three of us have won any, and we usually don’t place at a reward level.  This is reminiscent of The Princess Police campaign, though I know one PC did well in some major event there (in a session I missed), possibly did well in a second event, and another PC might have done well in some other event.  But, then, those characters were vastly more experienced, and there were more of them.  I accomplished nothing in the events I participated in.

Our experience levels aren’t high enough to plausibly compete in contests/tournaments.  Sure, one PC has Earth 4 and Agility 4 and another has Air 4.  I don’t have any trait above 3.  It’s just not feasible to compete against multiple NPCs with traits of 4, even with superior strategy and tactics.

Which in and of itself is fine.  It would be thematically weird for inferior participants to win heavily contested events.

But, what does losing mean?  We had a 49% chance of placing in the most recent event with our final roll.  At least, I think we would have gotten some reward if we had made that roll.  But, I/we didn’t.  So, what does that mean?

Naruto (the two series) has an epic story arc, not just for the main character but also for some other characters.  Boardgames interest me so much less because they rarely ever produce any stories, which is interrelated to how they don’t normally allow for bringing one’s own personality and style into the games like CCGs and RPGs do.

When I ask what does it mean, I mean what does it mean for a character/party/campaign narrative?  It makes sense in a module that there’s only success and no failure for things like contests as they are just opportunities to shine while questing for the 4th XP.  But, why, in a home game, have any sort of event where only winning matters?

The point of rolling dice is to have stakes.  I can “internalize” failure.  I feel the failure as a player.  I can portray my character as a loser – it’s not like we are really heroes, at least not in this chapter.  But, that doesn’t fit my character’s situation.  He’s not supposed to win any of these things.  He’s an inexperienced generalist.  His schtick is to roll 4k3 on pritnear everything as base roll to support a wide range of activities.  So, why should he care if he doesn’t win?

So, why should he care about any of these events?

One thing interesting about play in this campaign is that it’s very different from the bulk of my L5R play, admittedly a lot of which was living campaign.  I view the system as a system of success with failure being more like a botch.  You blow your Tea Ceremony roll, and you lose like a rank of Glory or gain Infamy or whatever.  But, that’s not how this play is.  This play is more like other systems where failure is routine and success at things you want to succeed at is … maybe not an exception but … an achievement.

I keep harping on the same things for a reason – I keep experiencing the same things.  It’s hard to get excited about talking about things that aren’t relevant to my play.

Achievement.  PCs don’t have to always achieve.  They should fail at least some of the time.  But, they should routinely achieve something.

Sure, I’ve gone in two different directions.  On the one hand, I’m promoting the idea that failure should matter narratively.  On the other, that achievement should be common, though there are obviously different levels of achievement.

If I don’t achieve my ultimate goal at WC, that’s fine.  My goal is … extravagant.  But, I should feel like I can achieve something.  I don’t have any sense of what I can achieve.

Yet another reason combat is such a good activity for parties.  Not dying is an achievement.  Killing your enemies is an achievement.  Conserving spells is an achievement.  One-shotting some dude is an achievement.  There are so many opportunities to feel like you are accomplishing something.

I’ve been thinking about social challenges in recent months for various reasons.  A huge problem I find with social challenges in my RPG play is that I have no sense of what I’m achieving or not, of what I can even achieve or not.  I got an idea to write out what PCs can accomplish in various activities should I pick up the mantle of GM again, as I’ve grown weary with the nebulous nature of trying to make some impact on the world that isn’t mowing down things trying to kill me.

The way to do any sort of significant activity is to have a PC’s engagement with the world change in some way whether successful or not.  There are lots of ways to accomplish this, like having some NPC offer to help a PC do better in an event or have some NPC claim something of import that a PC failed to claim through their loserinesses.  NPC could have bet on the PC and be pissed at a poor showing.  NPC could be happy a PC sucked “My baby was sure they were going to lose to you, but now is so supremely happy to be less of a loser than you are that I’ll now offer you a job to go to the Stinky Swamp to eliminate the Demon of Disgustingness and claim these four pretty trinkets I keep in my pauper’s hut.”  Butterfly effect of some insignificant match leading to … murder.

It’s hard getting good mechanics for contests, at least with L5R R&K systems.  I thought our last event had good mechanics.  But, I went out of my way to prep for the event, and it didn’t really matter either in terms of making the player decision to prioritize the event or in terms of the results of failing to achieve anything of note.

We have had seven sessions at WC, and I don’t think a single thing of import has changed over that span for our characters.  It’s okay to have some sessions where a particular PC doesn’t have any narrative advancement.  Should be significantly less than half.

So, I’m being ranty again.  It’s my nature.  Being thankful and grateful are much less so.  I’m grateful that I consider these sorts of things as more major problems in my life.  I’m grateful when someone cares about this blog.

Pair Problem

Tried again to play VTES last night.  Failed.

So, two of us played Star Fluxx, then Traveller.  I didn’t realize there was a Star Fluxx, where I hadn’t played Fluxx in a decade or something.  I was reminded why I don’t play these games.

Traveller game was brutal.  I lent him my Safari deck, and I played some Beowulf deck that theoretically did things with connections.

Round 1

We both end up on same contract.  I can do subplot, he can’t.  He gets 2 VPs, I get 4.  I used Modular Hold out of paranoia.

Round 2

I forget to use Modular Hold out of paranoia on same contract (first one was out of my opponent’s deck, this was out of mine).  I get stopped by my own complication.

Meanwhile, my opponent has two Luxury Suites in play and doesn’t get stopped by clearing five complications, putting him at six Safari counters.  He gains 7 VPs.

Ian 4 VPs, not-Ian 9 VPs.

Round 3

I get through contract I was already on and gain 5 VPs.

Opponent gets 4 VPs from contract, 2 VPs from subplots, 2 VPs from Luxury Suites, and 3 VPs from hitting seven Safari counters.

Winner 20 VPs, not-winner 9 VPs.

This is how we imagine tournament play would be like, if there was any.  Three rounds if decks just race and don’t really affect each other.  Points out that 4S Scout deck is likely too slow when Safari ship can do what we expect Subsidized Merchant ships to do.  Now, the Safari deck will explode into a fine red mist against serious piracy, but that’s true of most decks.

So, let’s say the two of us are the only two committed enough to show up, given that we are typically the two who show up.  What can we do besides keep playing a CCG I created?

Ultimate Combat!, of course!!  I’m supposed to show off the better Magic next time.

Wheel of Time …  So, I traded away my collection.  I, then, discovered I have my friend’s collection I was using to elevate one of my laptops.

Gloomhaven/Frosthaven came to mind as last reasonable thought.

BattleTech (maybe Alpha Strike) came to mind as last unreasonable thought.

Why is it difficult at all to think of a two-player game in case other people don’t show up?  Not like history is short on two-player games.  I played rummy at Lyon’s when I was growing up waiting for food.  I should have a shogi set around somewhere.  Etc.

Because I’m not into filler.  I’m more inclined to play filler games with 3+ players because I’m hanging out with a group of people and don’t really feel that strongly about what to play, plus it’s harder to decide on any game more people you have.

I like games.  I play solitaire constantly throughout days, then do things like make a CCG or write up RPG rules in a couple hours.  But, I don’t like them equally.

And, much of my gaming isn’t really about the games being played.  Lot of it has been casual play.

So, when I play a two-player game, I focus more on the game I’m playing.  I want to care what the mechanics are, what the experience will be like.

And, so, that’s why I immediately thought of Ultimate Combat!.  Besides, it’s fast and easy and I can just grab one box.  You know, what some CCGs sold themselves on early on before people started arguing stack timing and trying to figure out layers.  BattleTech of any type isn’t just grab a box, and it’s kind of ridiculous to be playing a minis game instead of a CCG when there are lots of minis things going on at the store throughout the week that I could, in theory, join.  I wouldn’t.  I don’t paint minis, for one thing, so I don’t fit in.

Gloomhaven isn’t the most portable “in case we can’t play what we intended to” option.

Could always play more Traveller, but I’m not sensing a desire to get deeper into the game.  I have my L5R LCG collection still; maybe the game would be more fun if I built all of the decks rather than being played competitively.  I have my Buffy collection.  My Tempest of the Gods collection.

Ooh, having to look up Tempest of the Gods as I blanked on the name, realized we could be playing Dragon Dice!!

Yup, this is what it’s like for gamers:  try to figure out what to play, then make terrible decisions.

Fangs and Farflung

Such a bad title.

Anyway, I’m going to local game store weekly for VTES.  So, why haven’t I written about our games?

Well, few reasons.  One reason is that some of the games have been three-players.  More important, methinks, is that some of the players are inexperienced.

I’ve always adjusted my decks based on metagame of groups I’ve played with.  For some groups, it’s slowing decks down as it’s not terribly interesting to … pretty much anyone to get ousted quickly or lose all of their minions or whatever.

I did play my Recruitment Exercise deck in one game just to play it since it was built, and it was tedious.  I’ve played modified precons.  I played Brujah precon.

Some of the more memorable things are just misplays, so it’s just not that compelling to write about.

Then, twice now, we’ve ended up not playing VTES at all as only two of us showed up.  We played Traveller.

We had a two-hour learning game of a precon against one of my old constructed decks that was a quirky build.  The precon won easily.  It shouldn’t have been that easy.  Maybe I’m bad at deckbuilding.  Maybe that deck is trash.  Maybe getting the best possible crew draw on round one out of a precon is actually kind of good.  I could keep murdering his crew with what I had on the board.  He got stuck more rounds than I.  He was essentially bankrupt when I got to 20 VPs.

We played this week.  I brought what I would consider tournament decks.  You know, if Traveller had tournaments.  Gazelle Piracy versus Subsidized Merchant Sleaze.

I had him run Gazelle in first game.  We both got off to terrible starts.  He Gorbashed my Voypa to prevent me from gaining 3 more VPs (and Replenishing) on round one.  I have a tendency to overbuy stuff, so I probably put too much stuff in play.  While I limped towards more VPs, he hit me a couple of times with sad pirate actions, then finally got a Missile Barbette in play to blow me up.

We switched decks.  Both decks had much more normal starts, but his permanents didn’t match the contracts that well, so he only gained 4 VPs on round one and 4 VPs on round two.  He would have been able to gain 13 VPs on round three, but I bankrupted him.  Did 13 damage on round two and just finished off on round three, where he would have come up one VP short of 20 even if he didn’t bankrupt due to Subsidized Merchant disad.

Maybe piracy is broken.  It always feels broken, even if it doesn’t win, as it’s just very griefy and noninteractive.  Maybe, even with every card worth money, we should have sideboards in tournaments, though two out of three matchups would take way too long.  Maybe my decks don’t meta enough against piracy, as this deck had only one RVD Superdense Armor and wasted slots on Search and Seizure, which doesn’t do anything against Gazelle Missile Madness.

I’m thinking I need to run 3x RVD Superdense Armor plus 3x Llaegzko’s “Surplus” Outlets to power them out in first two rounds.  Need more than one in play at same time.

Oh, the irony.  Before pandemic, I was showing up weekly at Game Kastle Fremont to show Traveller and often had no one to play with.  Now, I’m playing more of my CCG while making no effort to do so other than bringing decks to different Game Kastle to establish a weekly VTES presence.

I have unplayed VTES decks.  I guess I should do some Traveller deckbuilding in case it continues to be a fallback option.

I should note that VTES deckbuilding using just V5 cards is rather unexciting in many ways – I’m just playing same library cards I’ve always played and using same disciplines that have been around since Jyhad.

Well, here’s a post about CCG play.  Weird, eh?