Adam's NAC Deck 2 - Theo Beast Battle Royale

So I arrived at the NAC (Week of Nightmares) on a Wednesday morning. There were two tournaments scheduled for that day. For a while now I have been saying that everyone has been so "Master-card happy" (or dominate-happy I guess) that I wanted to make a Bruise Bleed deck that just rushed and made people cry when they are holding a hand of master cards.

So I decided that Wednesday would be my "combat" day. I will talk about my other deck ("Domingo's Signposts") in a future post. I actually like Domingo's Signposts better but this deck did surprising well so I wanted to post it as well. I was the first one out in the finals, due to my grand prey eagle-sighting my oust twice in the same turn (I died that next turn). My prey ended up winning the tournament. Rats! (but it was a good game :) )

Results: Finals on Wednesday's Week of Nightmares 2nd tournament. 2013

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Deck Name:   Theo Beast Battle Royale
Created By:  Adam Hulse
Description: A Theo + Beast Bruise bleed deck. Pick your fights to get your bleeds through.

At first I thought I would have to play wider view or effective management. But I realized that unless I drew 3 Theo or 3 Beast, I pretty much had the 3 vampires that I was going to play with for the game.
I decided to add a small deflection angle last minute. Only tried it once so not sold on it yet.

Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 11, Max: 28, Avg: 5.08)
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  1  KoKo                             pot                       2  Nosferatu
  1  Lupo                               pot                       2  Brujah
  1  Cameron                         dom pot               3  Lasombra
  1  Agatha                            obf POT               4  Nosferatu Antitribu
  1  Hector Sosa                    pre POT               4  Brujah
  1  Hugo                               POT pre vic         4  Brujah Antitribu
  3  Theo Bell                         cel dom POT pre 7  Brujah
  3  Beast                               ani cel OBF POT 7  Nosferatu Antitribu

Library: (90 cards)
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Master (14 cards)
  2  Fame
  1  Tension in the Ranks
  3  Haven Uncovered
  3  Blood Doll
  1  Retribution
  1  Powerbase: Montreal
  1  Anarch Troublemaker
  1  Dreams of the Sphinx
  1  Archon Investigation

Action (20 cards)
  11 Computer Hacking
  7  Bum`s Rush
  2  Preternatural Strength

Reaction (10 cards)
  3  On the Qui Vive
  3  Deflection
  3  Touch of Pain
  1  Delaying Tactics

Combat (43 cards)
  12 Torn Signpost
  12 Immortal Grapple
  4  Earthshock
  3  Slam
  3  Undead Strength
  6  Taste of Vitae
  2  Disarm
  1  Pulled Fangs

Retainer (2 cards)
  1  J. S. Simmons, Esq.
  1  Tasha Morgan

Event (1 cards)
  1  Dragonbound

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Lesson's Learned: 
What to change for this deck?
- Remarkably enough, not a huge fan of Dragonbound. Not because of the card itself, but the pool damage done does not seem to pay for the cost and if they have any combat, your weenie guys tend to hit torpor as well. And if it is your "lunge" card, meaning that you are holding it until you torpor many guys, chances are that that card could have just been another Fame or Tension and you can play before you start all the fights.

- More then one Anarch Troublemaker. Maybe even 3-4. You will always have a use for it. Tap down blockers and bleed and rush. Destroy pesky guns. Possible master cards to cut: Retribution (although I like the card a lot), Power Base Montreal. Can slightly increase master package, but then i would make sure The Barrens is in there.

- In the age of Villein, disarm is not worth it. Your regular punch will torpor them. Pulled Fangs is good though as it makes prey's cross table allies less likely to help them.

- Don't discount the power of... Storage Annex. There are many cards that one wants to save for a rainy day. This card helps this immensely. Find Master card slots is tricky though and it depends on personal preference.

- As stated in the description, not sold on the dominate angle. It will probably be a different deck with slightly bigger vampires with Potence Dominate. If I take out the dominate, Cameron becomes Jimmy Dunn.

- Touch of Pain is a great card. There is a different deck Potence + Followers of Set that I should make. Where you rush vampires, fight, do not torpor and then Temptation them. Touch of Pain with Crocodile Temple is pretty strong too.

- Consider Yawp Court as well. Best defense against vote decks really. But Master card slots are at a premium. Basically depends on personal preference.

What to do for a POT Bleed deck?
- Let your prey play his game. You need to let your prey go for his prey, let him take "beads" (i.e. pool or blood) off of your next prey. Sometimes its even okay to let him get a VP. Possible exception: If your prey is a bloat deck (Minion Tap - voter cap for example), that deck's goal is to put more beads on the table. You have to take it out quickly. Note: However, from my experience this may be to your own demise if your grand-predator is ineffectual against your predator. This dilemma bares further discussion. (future post)
- Your predator is going to lunge you. This is fact. Under the assumption that your combat trumps their meager combat, your predator's plan is to get about 3 minions (or 3 actions if you consider multi-act) and try to oust you in one turn. And if it doesn't oust you, gets you to low enough pool that even if you dunk one of their minions, it won't be enough to save you. Advice: Its amazing how many computer hack bleeds (or bleeds of one if you know they have bounce) you can get through on the promise that you won't rush that turn. Get your bleed in (getting not-combat cards out of hand), and then rush backwards. Remember, their goal is to kill you in one turn, so if you dunk 1-2 guys, they will rescue, do some hunts and get ready again. They may threaten to transfer out or ask their predator to go full-forward to "pay us back" for ruining their game. Ignore such statements. They are trying to oust you. If your defense is to make sure that they only have one minion, so be it.
-The number of minions your predator should have is dependent on your current pool. Its an easy way to determine whether you have to go backwards or not. People have different determinations, but I tend to do about 6 pool per dominate minion, or about 4-5 pool per voting minion.


Conclusion: 
Well, I'm glad I got around to posting this deck. I know that this type of deck is a "starter" for new players who just want to beat up things. Hopefully people use this deck as a template to see that you should add some bleed power to the deck to make it work.

From reviewing my post, I'm pretty sure I want to write a "Choosing your Master Package for POT Decks" article. But since I have a lot of NAC stuff to write, that will be have to be on the back burner. But I will get to it soon enough!

Thanks for reading guys!

Adam