CONTENTS

I Featured Card: Trochomancy (warning: possible spoiler)
II Tips for Beginners: Cards that cost blood
III Anarchs of Skulls
IV Decks: Knock Knock. Who's There? Zygodat. & Brinkskirmish

LIBRARY CARD SPOTLIGHT

From the preview of the upcoming Lords of the Night set:

Trochomancy
action modifier
[nec]: Remove 13 cards in the target Methusela's ash heap from the game to get +1 bleed. Not useable if there aren't enough cards in that ash heap. You cannot play another action modifier to increase this bleed.
[aus nec]: As [nec] above, but remove only 7 cards
[AUS NEC]: As [aus nec] above, but for +2 bleed

Obviously a bleed increasing action modifier is a welcome addition to the arbingers of Skulls arsenal, especially one that can give +2 bleed with no blood cost. Every HoS can use the card; only Mina Grotius is limited to the 'inferior' [nec] level. Of course, the card does have an opportunity cost beyond just taking a bleed action - your prey (or whichever methuselah you're bleeding) has to have some cards in their ash heap. But this 'cost' is one that we Harbingers are especially able to pay. Resource denial is one theme of our clan, manifested in various ways of burning out-of-play cards.

In group 2, Agaitas and Egotha have specials that can move cards to your prey's ash heap, as does Zygodat in group 4, and the three of them can each use Trochomancy at its top level. In a group 1/2 Trochomancy deck, non-Harbingers Le Dinh Tho and Dr. Jest are worth considering. Both have specials that drive your prey to discard. The highly-esteemed Le Dinh Tho can also play Trochomancy at its middle level, while the often-ignored Dr. Jest has [aus for] for block/ prevent defense and [OBF] that could be invaluable for generating the stealth (via Cloak the Gathering, Veil the Legions, and Psychic Veil) to push through your bleeds.

Then, of course, there is The Slaughterhouse, the card most often thought of as determining the flavor of the HoS as a clan. Burning your prey's library is a good way to annoy them, and it can cripple their ability to perform in the endgame, but in and of itself it had no power to oust when The Slaughterhouse was first printed. Brinksmanship changed that a few years later. The radicalness of the introduction of a non-pool-based ousting mechanism is, it seems to me, underappreciated. In any case, passing the Brinksmanship referendum, depleting your preys' libraries and preventing their withdrawal certainly has not become a popular strategy. Now finally there is a straightforward way to attack your prey's pool that has synergy with the HoS ability to attack your prey's library.

Trochomancy is also a way to attack another Methuselah's ash heap. Most decks will never try to access their ash heap, but there are some strategies that do involve doing so and Trochomancy can devastate such decks. Most any Imbued deck would be included here, as removing their Conviction cards from play will probably cripple them. They may not normally have seven Conviction in their ash heap, indeed they tend not to burn a lot of cards of any kind, but between Slaughterhouses, our vampires' special abilities, and the occasional Lupine Assault or Lessons in the Steel, we should be able to seed their ash heap enough to pay for Trochomancy and eliminate whatever Conviction was in there.

TIPS FOR BEGINNERS

Avoid cards that cost blood. That's the simple version of the tip. The more nuanced version would be to use cards that cost blood only when you can be fairly sure they will have the desired effect, that the effect is significantly better than is available from cards with no cost, and that your vampires can afford to pay the blood.

For example, a hand strike at +2 strength with no cost (superior Undead Strength) is generally better than a hand strike at +3 strength for a cost of 1 blood (superior Pushing the Limit), for several reasons. The improvement, 1 extra damage, does not exceed the cost. The cost makes your vampire more vulnerable, so that a vampire with only one or two blood might choose not to play Pushing the Limit (and a vampire with no blood cannot play it!), while Undead Strength has no such problems. Also, the opposing minion could dodge, strike to end combat, or prevent all damage from your strike. Then Pushing the Limit costs you a blood but has no effect at all on your opponent. A card like Uncontrollable Rage is an even worse investment - an action modifier played as an action is announced for a cost of 2 blood (at superior), it makes a vampire's hand strikes do +2 aggravated damage until the end of the action. That's a great effect, but your opponent sees it coming. They're very likely to avoid combat, end combat, dodge, or maneuuver to long range; then you're out two blood for nothing.

Of course, with proper card support it's possible for Pushing the Limit or even Uncontrollable Rage to be useful cards. Drawing out the Beast keeps the combat at close range, letting you play Immortal Grapple to prevent dodges and strikes to end combat, and Taste of Vitae will usually recoup the blood expense. But even with those cards in hand there's plenty that can go wrong. Frenzies and Grapples can be canceled (Drawing out the Beast is a Frenzy); damage can be prevented.

That's the worst thing about cards with a blood cost - paying the blood and not getting any result. Action cards are safest, since you only pay the cost if the action succeeds (that is, the action is not blocked or canceled) and, with the exception of bleeds and political actions, once an action succeeds it almost always has the desired effect. Bleeds are susceptible to being reduced or having their target changed (being "bounced"), and referendums can be voted down or canceled, but even so a blood cost on a bleed or political action is generally not the kind of negative attribute that it would be on a combat card. You just need to weigh the cost against the effect, and consider your vampire's ability to afford the cost. Compare Govern the Unaligned and Scouting Mission.

Govern the Unaligned
Cardtype: Action
Cost: 1 blood
Discipline: Dominate
[dom] (D) Bleed with +2 bleed.
[DOM] +1 stealth action. Move 3 blood from the blood bank to a younger vampire in your uncontrolled region.

Scouting Mission
Cardtype: Action
Discipline: Dominate
[dom] (D) Bleed with +1 bleed.
[DOM] +1 stealth action. Move 2 blood from the blood bank to a younger vampire in your uncontrolled region.

Because it's only paid when the action is successful, the cost of Govern is fully balanced by the effect (at either level). That doesn't mean the cost is negligible. A deck built around low- and mid- capacity vampires may prefer Scouting, as Govern could exhaust the vampires too quickly... unless you're only going to use a few such actions, in which case Govern is probably a better choice because you'll get more power from fewer cards.

There is one special danger to blood-costing action cards. Since you only pay the cost when the action succeeds, if you're not careful your vampire could have enough blood when you declare the action but end up unable to pay the cost by the time the action would resolve. In such a situation, the action 'fizzles', i.e. it ends unsuccessfully. If your vampire could pay part (but not all) of the cost, they must pay as much as they can but the action still fizzles.

One more thing to note about cards that cost blood - allies cannot pay a blood cost because they have life counters, not blood counters. So even a card that does not require a discipline and does not explicitly or implicitly require a vampire (Political Action cards, for example, implicitly require a vampire to play them) cannot be played by an ally if the card has a blood cost. However, some allies are able to play certain cards "as a vampire"; in that a case, the ally may burn life counters to pay for playing the blood cost of such a card.

OVERVIEW: HARBINGERS AND ANARCHS

Being an Anarch gives a vampire access to certain cards not usable by non-Anarchs. Most obvious are the 'threefers', the cards which have a use at the basic level of each of three disciplines.

Diversion. This can be one of the strongest of the threefers, due to the synergy between the three uses of this combat card. For the HoS, [for] "prevent up to 2 damage" is decent, but without access to the [cel] or [tha] it hardly justifies going Anarch. Mina Grotius would also have access to [cel] "gain one additional strike", so there are some possibilities there. Phagian has [tha] for a ranged strike to steal one blood, with an optional manuever, but it's not a strong enough combo to be using an 8-cap vampire.

Friend of Mine. This reaction card is the only threefer featuring two HoS disciplines, [nec] and [for]. Unfortunately, it costs a blood and its effects are better gotten via Spectral Divination and Telepathic Counter. No HoS can use the [obt] effect, which is unimpressive anyway.

Gear Up. All HoS could use this card at [nec], none can access either of the other two functions. That's ok, as moving a card from your ash heap to your hand and then untapping, all at +1 stealth, is the best of this action card's three functions. It's certainly worth the one blood cost, if there's a card in your ash heap you'd like to use on your turn.

Improvised Tactics. All HoS except Mina Grotius have [aus], and Zygodat also has [pot], but it's hard to see a use for this card except in combination with Trap, and not so much even then.

Loose Cannon. This is an interesting card, but only Gisela Harden had [dem] and only Phagian has [tha], so it's not offering our clan much.

The Mole. Both Unre and Phagian could play this card at [dom], but are unlikely to be Anarchs and could just use the much better card Deflection instead. Only Babalawo Alafin has [ani] and only Mina Grotius has [cel], and neither of those effects are hard for us to come by anyway.

Principia Discordia. Every HoS but Mina could use the [aus] action to burn a piece of equipment at +1 stealth. The less-useful [qui] and [ser] effects would only be available to Anisa Marianna Lopez and Unre, respectively.

Reformation. Only Unre would get much out of this card, and Unre the Anarch is unlikely.

Skullduggery. This action card would only be for Egotha, and only at [obf] to bleed at +1 stealth with an optional maneuver if blocked. Maybe there's some possibility for an Anarch Trochomancy deck with Egotha and Raful al-Zarqa?

Smash and Grab. This card offers a nice variety of mildly hostile actions, if you happen to be packing [ani], [dem] and [pot]. We are not.

Smoke and Mirrors. Egotha, again, is the only one who could benefit from this card, again only at [obf], this time for +2 stealth on a non- bleed, non-political action.

Undue Influence. Only Unre could use it, only at [qui]. It is of no interest to us.

What about non-discipline minion cards? Groundfighting might be useful anti-Grapple tech if your only combat defense is Spiritual Intervention. Fee Stakes could be useful for grabbing Baron titles, backed up by Emissary and Rant for vote push. Some of the political actions are ok, too. But there's one card that stands out as begging for the Harbingers of Skulls to use it.

Border Skirmish
+1 stealth action. Requires a ready anarch.
Each other Methuselah discards one card at random from his or her hand, and this anarch untaps at the end of the turn.

Any other Methuselah who is trying to carefully grooming their hand will be hampered by this action. It also accelerates a Slaughterhouse / Brinksmanship ousting strategy by attacking everybody's library.

Finally, there are some Anarch-requiring Master cards. Mostly, they offer improved hunting, intercept or stealth. The first two we aren't too much in need of, although there is theoretical synergy of Ghost Eater with other hunting tech. Stealthwise, though, it seems like Necromancy alone is almost, but not quite, enough to push actions through unblocked. Erebus Mask is nice, but another source of stealth like Anarch Railroad can really help.

DECKS OF THE MONTH

Both of this months decks are in the 'preliminary sketch' phase, so they are likely to need some of the card ratios adjusted (along with any other changes you might want to make)

I. Knock-knock. Who's there? Zygodat.

Crypt
4x Zygodat [AUS NEC pot] 6 HoS
3x Sennadurek [AUS NEC dom] Black Hand 6 Nag
2x Ingram Frizer [AUS OBF ani pot] Black Hand 6 !Nos
2x Roger Farnsworth [OBF aus] Black Hand 4 !Mal
1x Piotr Andreikov [aus] Black Hand 2 Tzi

Library
6x The Slaughterhouse
4x Blood Doll
1x Crematorium
1x Hungry Coyote
1x Maabara
1x Weeping Stone

1x Erebus Mask
1x Sargon Fragment

8x Reunion Kamut
2x Abbot

10x Trochomancy
8x Call the Hungry Dead
5x Cloak the Gathering
4x Veil the Legions

4x Spectral Divination

8x Telepathic Misdirection
6x Spirit's Touch
4x On the Qui Vive
2x Wake with Evening's Freshness

10x Psychic Assault
3x High Ground

Zygodat's special (she may burn two cards from the library of a Methuselah she successfully bleeds) helps pay for Trochomancy, as does The Slaughterhouse. Zygodat and Sennadurek both play Troch at double- superior, while Ingram or Roger play Cloak and Veil. Auspex bounce and light intercept make up the defense, with a little bit of pool return via Dolls and Reunions. Combat is Psychic Assault - it ain't much, but for a Black Hander it's not a bad one-card package; Spirit's Touch will sometimes get you to long, with a few High Ground to help.

II. Brinkskirmish

Crypt
4x Agaitas [AUS NEC for] 6 HoS
2x Kervos [aus val] 3 !Sal
1x Egotha [AUS FOR NEC obf] 7 HoS
1x Adonai [AUS VAL for] 7 !Sal
1x Thomas Steed [ani aus val] 4 !Sal
1x Wolf Valentine [VAL for] 4 !Sal
1x Doris McMillon [val] 2 !Sal
1x Franciscus [aus] 1 Cai

Library
10x Galaric's Legacy
6x The Slaughterhouse
4x Auspex
1x Anarch Railroad
1x Lupine Assault
1x Maabara
1x Powerbase: Los Angeles

6x Brother in Arms
1x Erebus Mask

16x Border Skirmish
4x Sense Vitality
2x Gear Up
1x Fee Stake: Los Angeles
1x Fee Stake: Perth

2x Brinksmanship
2x Consanguineous Boon

6x Burning Touch
4x Rant

8x Eye of Unforgiving Heaven

4x My Enemy's Enemy
4x Telepathic Misdirection
3x Delaying Tactics
2x Posion Pill

Play a few Border Skirmish each turn, get a couple of Slaughterhouses and a few Brothers in Arms in play, and try to stay alive until you can pull off the Brinksmanship / Rant combo. Give Auspex to your Brothers and let them get kamikaze with the help of Unforgiving Heaven.

NEXT NEWSLETTER

Lords of the Night will be released in a few days, and should include several new Necromancy cards and necromancing vampires. We'll take a look at these new cards next time.