Category Archives: Rivals

Bad day at the office

March 24, 2022Game day, Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivalsDarren

Life had once again aligned the two schedules of Diego and myself so that we could once again have a morning together playing Vampire the Masquerade Rivals.

We selected our prebuilt clans for the morning. Both of us went with the “default” leader for our clans.

To decide who was first player we rolled two of my “who goes first” dice. Diego won that one. I should have heeded the warning sign.

This mornings games couldn’t have started off any worse for me.

Turn one for Diego, play Constant Surveillance and shutdown my Agenda.

My thoughts were to hold off playing another vampire until my next turn, and instead draw two cards trying to dig for some alchemy cards. Which I had none off in my opening hand. And that was my first and only mistake in the game.

Despite drawing four cards in that opening first turn of mine I didn’t find a single alchemy card. Which made Diego’s next turn sting just that little bit more.

Turn two for Diego was to attack my leader in my haven. I had nothing to do but take the beating and watch my leader get sent to torpor, and Diego get one of the quickest and easiest wins possible.

Game one over and done with.

Game two it was my turn to start.

I wasn’t making the same mistake twice.

This second game lasted much longer, and went the distance so to speak of an agenda points win.

I had the early lead on that front, but that was capped at a max of six points from my agenda ability. Diego soon caught up, and then went ahead.

I was much happier this second game. I was getting alchemy cards and attaching them to vampires. We were up to three S.A.D. Agents in the Street. I was more than happy to leave them there as a problem for Diego as I could absorb their damage by spending a prestige.

In the meantime I started picking off citizens in the street. Sadly not fast enough to catch up with Diego who grabbed an agenda point win.

Vampire the Masquerade Rivals Scores for Second Game

We followed up Diego’s comprehensive victories at Rivals with a game of Port Royal.

This was a different experience to the two player game I played with “has to keep pushing his luck” Jeff.

Diego was a much more cagey player. I don’t remember either of us not getting to choose a card on our turn through two ships of the same colour being out.

But like our second game of Rivals after I took an early lead Diego closed the gap and took the lead by completing at the time the only contract that had been drawn. A second contract did appear near the end in which I was in a better position to claim. However the cards didn’t work in my favour, and Diego was able to get the final two points he needed for the win.

Although I lost this morning. I still had a great time. I look forward to our next Vampire Thursday Morning.

Pirates and Vampires

March 10, 2022Game day, Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivalsDarren

I suppose I better start the post off with wishing everyone a very geeky Happy Mario Day.

In other news Libertalia Winds of Galecrest arrived yesterday. But more about that a bit further down in this post.

First we need to talk about the other game I played with Diego this morning.

Diego and I started our morning of gaming off with a two player game of Vampire the Masquerade Rivals.

It was Tremere vs Gangrel.

I think Diego and myself are starting to focus on the clans we want to start building around. I definitely am.

Diego might be right that in a two player game Tremere might be a tad on the op side.

Being able to stay in your haven, play rituals, and slowly drain your opponents blood is pretty powerful. Unless an event drags your leader or coterie into the streets that is when you become pretty exposed.

I think I’m starting to get an idea where I want to go with the deck.

Although there is the ritual Blood Makes Noise, that gets some extra prestige. I’d like a way to get more. During this game I was down to a single prestige. All Diego had to do was deliver that killing blow to get the win. Plus I had a 4 bp vampire in hand I wanted to play but just couldn’t.

I like the Seek Knowledge ritual. Anything that aids getting to cards you need quicker to good by me. Add in Defense of the Sacred Haven to increase the secrecy of vampires in your haven certainly makes it harder for your opponents to attack. Plus stops single S.A.D. attacks from the street.

I’m starting to lean towards having more reaction cards in the deck, and a lot less attack cards. Possibly a 70:30 split in favour of the reaction cards.

The final scores of our game, with me getting an agenda point victory.

Final scores for Vampire the Masquerade Rivals

Onto our second game of the morning.

Did anyone think I wouldn’t take Libertalia with me to Diego’s?

Before leaving I had decided to sleeve two of the six decks because that’s all I thought I had sleeves for. But as luck would have it I had more than I thought. Enough to do all six decks, but not the Automa deck. Which wasn’t a problem it’s not as if I’d be using those cards anytime soon.

My initial impressions of playing Libertalia for a first time ever, and as a two player game, is I love it.

Naturally I’m going to talk a bit more about the game after I’ve played it with more players. There is a lot to say about the bits I like.

But with the Midshipman tile acting like a “third” player in a two player game. It works so well, it has no overhead, and so simple, it’s genius.

There is some great decision making to make during the game. The reputation system to resolve tiebreakers another simple, genius idea.

I think with the Calm side of the board for a first play the level of player interaction and “meanness” is just right. It’s not overly nasty. Although I think if a new player is going to play who is not a gamer they might need a little heads up that they could end up not getting any loot on a turn.

The final scores confirming Diego’s revenge for losing our Rivals game.

A great mornings gaming with one of my favourite people to game with. Days off don’t get much better than this.

Blood and cake!

March 1, 2022Game day, Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivalsDarren

Last week Diego and myself had arranged to visit Jeff to play some Vampire the Masquerade Rivals. Yesterday was the prearranged day.

I’d stopped at Asda on the way out and picked up some pastries to go with our beverages.

When it came to choosing our clans I decided I wanted to sit safely in my haven replacing the blood of my rival, so I chose Tremere. Jeff went with Brujah because he knew that clan from his learning game in the later months of last year. Diego went Gangrel. You can see who our leaders were below.

My rival was Jeff, Diego was Jeff’s, and I was Diego’s.

Multiplayer is such a different game to a two player game.

I needed Jeff to be more aggressive towards his rival Diego. But Jeff spent too much time early on taking out mortals in the street. Leaving Diego free to annoy me.

Luckily I had a ritual out that increased my havens secrecy, which bought me breathing space from Diego.

Jeff only had two vampires out. So when he did eventually start taking on Diego a window was starting to open for me. Which became wide open when Jeff attacked Diego in his haven and both the target and attacker got taken out and sent to torpor. Leaving Jeff with a solo vampire on three blood in the street.

I was able to knock out Jeff’s only remaining vampire to grab a victory by KO!

It was an opportunistic win. Next turn Jeff would have grabbed the win.

After my glorious victory in Rivals we played a game of Potion Explosion.

This has been a game I’d wanted to try since it came out a few years ago. However as far as I knew no-one I knew had a copy. But that changed last Friday when Diego bought it along and played it. So I commented at the time I’d like to try it and could he bring it along Monday.

Which brings us nicely to our time after our three player game of Rivals and a coffee and cake break.

I’m not sure how I feel about Potion Explosion.

I enjoyed the game. But did I like it? I didn’t hate or dislike it. I’d play the game again.

The game has that table presence, that wow factor, which has people not playing saying “what’s this game?”

Which is why I’m unsettled by my reaction to the game. I like it when games make you feel strongly about them even if it’s a negative reaction.

I can’t put my finger on why Potion Explosion makes me feel this way.

As you can see compared to the others my final score was not even close.

I had a great morning gaming with two amazing friends. A fantastic way to end the shortest month of the year.

Undecided. Is that a clan?

February 27, 2022Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivalsDarren

Tomorrow Diego, Jeff, and I are going to be playing a 3 player game of Vampire the Masquerade Rivals.

I’m taking everything I have for the game with me. We will be using the precons. But I don’t have the foggiest which clan I’m going to play.

Nothing is speaking out to me at the moment.

With Diego taking his cards as well more than one of us can choose the same clan to play.

Which doesn’t help me make a decision.

I need to start deck building then I won’t have this issue!

Funky Vampire Morning!

January 6, 2022Funkoverse, Game day, Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivals, Vampire Wednesday MorningDarren

My first gaming of 2022 was with Diego this morning.

The session started off so well with home made cheese cake and espresso coffee (for once hot! – Diego’s words not mine). I hadn’t expected the cheese cake but it was a most pleasant surprise. Despite only a couple of days earlier having teased Diego that he had made cake for another friend they had had round for coffee, but never me.

After a most enjoyable (ok it was amazing but need to under play it) slice of cheese cake the rest of the morning went down hill from there.

Our first game of the morning was a two player game of Vampire the Masquerade Rivals.

Once again it was a precon match up. We will get round to building our own decks. Honest.

Although I did manage to get all of my coterie out, I only drew one Alchemy card. Which was a pain.

However I did take out three citizens from the street. But I wasn’t taking them out fast enough to get the win.

I was undone by that ol’ Tremere blood magic. With Diego playing Grigori as his leader he was soon replacing the blood on my 1 blood potency vampires and then sending them to torpor when he paid for stuff with that blood.

Maybe I should have been more aggressive and attacked Grigori.

The final score of our game, confirming Diego’s victory.

Our next game was one I’d been wanting to get to the table for a while, Funkoverse.

I played Boom, Slash, Splash or T-Rex, Raptor and Jaws with Ghost companion. Whilst Diego chose The Black Widow, Arya with Needle, and Doc Brown.

Although I own a few of the Funkoverse sets, and therefore have a few maps. Having never played the game before I had no idea which maps were good for a first time play. So I chose the map on top of the stack of “smaller” map boards. Which just happened to be the map from the DC101 set. Diego chose which scenario we played for the map.

The scenario we played (chosen by Diego)

I’m not sure what advantage Jaws gets being submerged. I know whilst submerged it can’t do assist, challenge, or interact actions. It’s very thematic that’s for sure. But tactically I’m confused why you would want Jaws to be submerged.

We had done one big rules misplay. Once we interacted with a points marker we didn’t put the marker on the cool down track. We kept having a nagging feeling that we were missing something during the game. What was stopping you from camping next to a marker and interacting with it for both of your actions? If we had played it correctly I think there would have been different decisions and tactics used by us both.

I have to say Funkoverse looks lovely on the table. You are either a fan of the big headed character design or you are not! I obviously am a fan.

Game play wise, it might not be the most complicated skirmish game. But I like how it’s so quick to learn/pick up. It makes it very accessible I think.

Despite the fact I had already put together my team, I love how quick and easy team selection can be. It can be as simple as “I like that character, that character and that character”. Or you can look for synergies and make it a more complicated, in-depth affair.

Having double sided maps and four scenarios per set means you get a little variety in game play per set. However I think there is little or no variety in scenarios between sets. But I need to check that they are indeed similar/same.

This particular map did feel crowded with two three character teams. But that might have been to its advantage if we hadn’t done the misplay.

The final scores sadly show another Diego victory.

I look forward to getting Funkoverse back to the table, maybe with one of the bigger maps, different scenario, even with more players. Plus with the Thanos expansion it introduces ultimate mode, a one verses many game play. Which would be interesting to try.

After our gaming I had to pop into my place of employment to pick up a couple of things that I hadn’t been able to get elsewhere the day before. But thanks to Diego my purchases increased by a couple of items.

This weeks gaming

December 18, 2021Fenland Gamers, game night, Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivalsDarren

Thursday morning was another Rivals session round Diego’s.

I had floated the idea two or three days before that we might build our own decks to play with. However it turns that idea was a bit optimistic taking into account work/life stuff and being knackered! So precon decks it was.

This time it was a battle of the clans from the two expansions. I was playing Tremere from the Blood and Alchemy expansion. Whilst Diego went with Gangrel from the Wolf and Rat expansion.

Our first game was probably our fastest game ever.

Diego won the roll off with my who goes first dice. Which meant I drew 2 vampire cards. One of those was Grigori.

Naturally to make best use of his leaders ability, agenda and haven Diego needed vampires in the street. Which would play in to Sonja Valentine’s ability.

With me putting out Grigori on my first turn. I was soon replacing the Gangrel blood on his leader with Tremere blood.

My leader (right) and vampire I played first turn(left)

The blood on his leader got less and less from activating abilities, it eventually got to the point where the only blood keeping his leader alive was my Tremere blood. Whilst this was happening I was thinking to myself “don’t play a vampire, don’t play a vampire”. All the time keeping my best poker face on trying not to show I was about to deliver the winning blow.

In my hand waiting for that moment of there to be no more Gangrel blood on Diego’s leader, and only my Tremere blood was Extinguish Vitae.

Diego finished his turn. Sonja replaced the final bit of Gangrel blood with Tremere blood. Then I took my first action which was to play Extinguish Vitae. I had defeated Diego’s leader and his only vampire to get the win.

Game two Diego had learnt his lesson and would not be making the same mistake.

The second game was very much more of a fight with the two of us trading blows looking for that moment to grab victory. The game ebb and flowed between us both having brief moments were one of us might have a slight advantage or we’d start gaining a bit of momentum before having our plans foiled by the other.

I think it helped in this game that I didn’t find Grigori, or that I didn’t draw that many ritual cards. Although I did get a Seek Knowledge out early on to give me some extra card draw to try and find answers!

In the end my undoing was “self inflicted” when I forgot about the end of turn trigger on the ongoing event The Hunger. I only had three prestige left, four vampires out, none at full health. Even if I had remembered I wasn’t able to mitigate the loss of prestige.

But a great morning of playing Rivals. We just need to get others interested and playing.

Last night was the last fortnightly Friday gaming session of 2021. Once again it was really well attended. Which is great to see.

I hadn’t planned on bringing any games to the evening. But my judgement got the better of me, and I threw in two or three “filler games” just in case.

It’s a good job I did. We were short of games that played at the higher player count.

We had two tables split as a group of five and a group of six.

Our table started off playing a very new arrival (came Tuesday if I remember correctly) Dune Betrayal.

A Resistance style game with a Dune theme. What’s not to like about it? Well obviously a lot if you are not a fan of the books/films, hidden traitor style games or sci-fi. But other than that nothing!

Obviously this was a “learning game”.

I have to say compared to Resistance (which you will naturally do) Dune Betrayal does seem over complicated. And I think even if you haven’t played Resistance that it would seem that way too.

However the mechanisms used in Dune Betrayal do get round that who to pick with zero information for the first mission that Resistance has.

Despite the feeling of being over complicated I do like the round structure of having three rounds drafting action cards, then two targeting rounds before all is revealed and scoring takes place.

What I like about them is that each round players are possibly revealing which side their identity is on by which action cards they are taking, and also who they are playing target cards on or not. Even by whose trait cards they look at.

And I do like that once a trait card has been seen it gets secured/locked so no one else can look at them. Plus you have no idea which of your two trait cards the person has seen.

I think like others of its ilk, this game is reliant on who you are playing with. Get the mix wrong and the game is not a fun experience for anyone.

Sadly for the bad guys House Harkonnen lost both games. Which obviously means House Atreides won both. I was on the losing side in both games.

Our tables second game of the evening was For Sale.

I’m so glad I added this classic to my collection. It’s just out and out fun.

Plus I’ve played it twice now, and won both games!

We finished the evening with a game of No Thanks.

Another fun classic. We played two rounds.

The other table played Jamaica and Love Letter 2nd Edition (it supports up to six players). A big thank you to Diego for leading that table.

I think it can safely be said the Friday gaming has ended on a high.

Next up the Christmas Eve Bohemian Villages Championship. The banter/smack talk ramped up last night. It’s going to get worse over the next few days.

Some food for thought on VtM Rivals Website plus other places

December 11, 2021rant, Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivalsDarren

In the last couple of days Renegade have been taken to task over on their Vampire the Masquerade Rivals discord server for (and I’m paraphrasing here) not showing much love to the official website and forums (there was other issues with the card database but I think that’s a subject for another post). Which in turn gives a misleading impression about the game being unsupported.

It’s fair criticism.

Now we know that Renegade staff are busy folks. They probably wear many different job hats. The world wide shipping problems can only be adding to their work load. Plus add on top the ever changing, fluid even, global event and all the curve balls that throws at businesses and it’s staff. Life at Renegade (and many other companies) must be stressful and interesting at best.

Before I go off on a “rant” I would like to praise Renegade for how accessible they are on discord and twitch. They really do engage with the community on those platforms really well.

However. There is always a however. Not everyone is on those two platforms. Despite being on the other platforms, users of those platforms are left feeling at best second class and at worst ignored. Considering one of those platforms is their own website and forums, it’s shocking.

Let’s face it new and prospective players to the game their first port of call on line isn’t the games discord server. It’s more likely the official website (or bgg), which has been pointed out above that impression isn’t good.

For me the template or example websites Renegade should be looking at are the Wizard of the Coasts ones for Magic the Gathering and Dungeons and Dragons, plus the D&D Beyond site.

Here are the sort of things I’d like to see going up on a more active official website.

Articles about game play, such as new mechanics (extra actions for example), deck building, how to play the precons (I know it’s rough and not well written but something along the lines of my Toreador deck post, and yes I need to write the others).
Articles about the Prince of the City events. Not only a tournament report but a follow up article breaking down the deck stats gathered at the event.
Articles sharing and summarising rules and faq videos like the one that went up this week.
Articles highlighting community groups.
Card errata articles (often covered in twitch streams and discord!).
Articles on lore.

Granted this sort of thing is a lot of work. But it’s work that can be shared around. It’s work that the community manager could be co-ordinating, and creating some of.

Why some-one is not actively monitoring and responding on the official forums is beyond me. If they can do this for discord, then not doing their own forums is shocking, and they have no excuse. You either up the game on the forums or close them down and direct players to discord.

In an ideal world I’d like to see Renegade streaming Vampire Wednesdays to Twitch and YouTube simultaneously (it is possible, others do it). Or have the Twitch feed uploaded to YouTube within 24 hours of streaming (something that rarely happens). Plus actually interacting with comments left on their videos. Do you know how quickly the Facebook live videos Jamey Stegmaier of Stonemaier Games streams get put up on YouTube? Granted they are unedited. But usually within one or two hours.

This isn’t a job application. Although for myself and many in the Rivals community it’d be a dream job. It’s an open plea to Renegade to up their game for a game I and many others love playing. It’s a call to action for Renegade to engage with players on other platforms. To treat them the same as those on discord and twitch.

Hopefully they will listen.

Through the letter box

November 26, 2021Cyberpunk Red, expansions, new arrivals, Rivals, Scythe, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivalsDarren

Life has changed a bit since Nan left us. I have a part time job now that sees me start work at 5am. But finishes midday (at the moment) which leaves me the rest of the day to be there for Mum. So you can imagine I’m pretty tired by the evening and usually asleep by 7pm!

This week has been particularly tiring as I worked what I dubbed the long week so that I could be around today when a second stair rail is fitted to Mums stairs to help her get up them.

So I’m pretty knackered. And it might be understandable why there has been no posts during the week.

Gaming wise obviously I’ve not played anything since last Friday. However there have been some arrivals.

Last weekend saw the arrival of the latest and second expansion, The Wolf and The Rat for Vampire the Masquerade (VtM) Rivals.

It’s arrival bought a new dilemma on how to store the game and both of its expansions. The core game box is no longer large enough to hold everything. So I started thinking about alternative storage solutions. High up on the possible solutions were the MtG storage boxes for cubes or lots of Commander decks. And that is an option I may eventually go for. However I decided to repurpose my quiver that was currently home to various rpg decks for the new home of my VtM Rivals cards.

There’s room for the third expansion (currently in production) so it’s bought me a little time before I have to get a second or alternative solution.

Naturally tokens for the game are kept separately now, and I need a folder to store the rulebooks. But that’s just how things are. Although I should look into some stickers to decorate the folder.

There was one hiccup with this preorder of the expansion. The promo Tamaska & General Flint Alt Art Cards were included. But the Victor Temple Promo card wasn’t. Apparently it hadn’t arrived in time to be sent out with the preorders. Which I’d argue that Renegade Studios knew and should have been proactive in letting customers know before shipping started. The promo will be sent out at a later date. So we will get it. But when, who knows? I’m more concerned that it will be packaged properly and not destroyed in the post. Plus this is extra expense for Renegade.

On Monday the first three organised play kits for VtM Rivals Season 1 arrived. I’ve not even opened the box for those yet. I suppose I should do just to check over the contents. Depending on how next weekends learning games go, I might be able to start to organise some events!

The start of the week saw the launch of an EU specific web store for Stonemaier Games. Which meant my Champion account was moved over to that web store, and all my orders will be through there now. And to celebrate its launch Jamey gave EU customers an extra 10% off if they used the provided promo code he emailed out.

Champion discount and a further 10% off! Ok the temptation was too great. Before I knew it the spiral bound version of the Scythe Complete Rulebook, some of the plastic token storage containers, and four of the double sided neoprene Wingspan player mats were in my shopping basket.

Why four mats and not five? I don’t intend to play Wingspan at five players ever ever again! Famous last words I know. But if I only have four player mats it’ll be hard to play at the higher count.

Yesterday also saw the arrival of another preorder. This one was for the Cyberpunk Red rpg.

Inside the package was the Cyberpunk Red Data Pack and Netrunning Deck. I’ll look at these in more depth in another post (possibly if I remember).

So that’s all the stuff that landed this week. Thanks to the randomness of the whole shipping crisis currently going on who knows when my preorders for the Arnak or Imperium expansions will appear. Potentially The One Ring second edition Kickstarter might arrive before Christmas too.

Anyway it’s a Commander session this evening that I’m very much looking forward too.

Vampire Wednesday Morning on a Tuesday madness!

September 15, 2021Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivals, Vampire Wednesday MorningDarren

Tuesday morning was this weeks Vampire Wednesday morning!

It threw out my usual weekly routine of doing the weekly shop on a Tuesday morning. But sacrifices have to be made for the greater good. And that greater good was I needed a break. Especially after having to miss the club night last Friday.

This weeks Rivals game would be a three player game.

Our third player was a friend of Diego’s Peet. He had never played the game before. But had done his homework and watched some of the how to play videos on YouTube.

This is how the clans broke down for the game:

Brujah – Peet (rival me)
Ventrue – me (rival Diego)
Malkavian – Diego (rival Peet)

As you can see from the fact I played Ventrue, that I continued to work my way through the core set clans. I just need to try Malkavian (so Diego won’t be playing them again next session). After that I’d like to try some deck construction using the core set, before trying the two clans in the Blood & Alchemy expansion.

Diego wanted to try the Malkavians in multiplayer to see if they worked better than in a two player game. And Peet got Brujah because they are a easier deck to pilot for a first game.

I think one of the hurdles for new players to a card game like Rivals, and this is so true in something like Android Netrunner is learning the terminology.

In Rivals it’s things like Haven, Torpor and Coterie. Netrunner it was such terms as clicks, runs, and ice.

Unlike Diego who has played in the World of Darkness in years gone past. Rivals is my first time experiencing this world. I have no allegiance to a particular clan. At the moment my decision process is based on do they look cool, and mechanically/tactically do they fit with play styles I like?

At the start of our game Peet warned us that he’s a competitive player. Sadly he didn’t play the Brujah deck aggressively enough. Which allowed Diego and myself to get our slower decks going.

Agenda wise I was in the lead. I had two titles attached to two vampires. Boosted my havens secrecy to 2. Had a vagrant attached to my leader. I was ready for the appearance of an S.A.D. Agents in the street.

Peet finally started to attack my leader. Which I was more than able to handle. However he left one of his vampires open to attack from Diego. Which was enough of an opening for Diego to drain Peet’s remaining prestige whilst attacking that vulnerable vampire. And that gave Diego the win.

It was a fun game. I need to look at the Ventrue deck and see what cards are there, and the synergies. I would like to have hit more titles and have more ways to gain extra prestige. Which it might have and I just didn’t draw into them.

VtM: Rivals Toreador Pre-Constructed Deck

September 2, 2021Rivals, Vampire the Masquerade Rivals, vampire the masquerade: rivalsDarren

Despite having written two posts yesterday, the second could easily have been scheduled for today, I’m back with another post today.

As we await the opening up of pre-orders for the second expansion for Rivals, The Wolf and The Rat (Gangrel & Nosferatu clans). I thought I’d start looking at the Core Set and the first expansion Blood & Alchemy (Tremere & Thin-bloods clans) in an adhoc series of posts.

These posts will initially look at the pre-constructed decks (as I play them), followed by posts looking at deck building.

I’m going to give a big disclaimer before I do though. I don’t have lots of game time playing Rivals. Heck so far I’ve played it twice! So I can’t be called an expert by any standards. What I will bring to the table when I look at the decks is my experience from playing MtG, Epic the Card game and Android Netrunner.

This inaugural post will be looking at the Toreador clan pre-constructed deck from the Core Set.

The image below is the official deck list for the Toreador deck.

You can pick up this deck list and others here

The rule book gives the following description for the Toreador deck.

Ideally in your starting hand you want one of the Unhosted Action – Ongoing cards, and an Attack card that increases your attack (such as Biting Comment, Seduction or Baseball Bat).

Your first turn you need to be attacking a City Deck Mortal in the Street and attaching it as a retainer to Lixue Chen. Plus playing the Unhosted Action. Unless your Unhosted Action is Beauty is a Beast then you need to play that first and use it’s ability to aid in the attack. Depending on the mortal being attacked you may not need to play an Attack card, and can save that for a later turn.

So let’s look at the cards.

Agenda/Haven/Leader

Looking at the agenda, haven and leader the word that is on all three cards is retainers. This is telling me that this deck is the Rivals version of an MtG voltron deck. I want to be attacking City Deck Mortals in the Street and attaching them as retainers to the vampires in my Coterie. Not only do I get an extra agenda point, the vampire heals one blood plus the retainer buffs the vampire in some way also making them more powerful.

Faction Deck

I like that Bella Forte and Iris Lokken synergise so well with Search Engine. Being able to control the top card to get maximum benefit from these two is really powerful.

Having two vampires that do something with retainers is good. Whether it is stealing an opponents retainers with Liza Holt or getting an influence buff from them like Muhammad Zadeh.

There are two vampires that can block ranged attacks. The jury is still out on how good these are for me. My limited play hasn’t allowed me to fully appreciate these cards.

Muhammad and Iris get nice influence boosts to sway those scheme votes. Iris is great for trying to get your own scheme through. But Muhammad once buffed with retainers is great for voting on your own schemes or an opponents.

Library Deck

42.5% or 17 cards of the Library Deck are Attack cards, with 1 duel use Attack/Reaction card. That’s a pretty big signal to me that this deck should be attacking, whether it’s your rival or City Deck Mortals in the street. I like how there are cards to drain your rivals prestige, steal a retainer or get a buff from your own retainers.

12.5% or 6 cards of the Library Deck are reaction cards, not including the duel use card. Only Fleetness fits in with the retainer plan. The other is ok for it’s shields and absorbing damage.

7 cards or 17.5% cards are Schemes. Two do something with prestige. Although it sticks in my throat with the group hug cards where I’m helping everyone. My favourite of the three is Balance of Power as it can be used to weaken my rival. I suppose in a multiplayer game you could try and politicise them and strike a deal to play them.

With 22.5% or 9 cards being these ongoing Unhosted Actions. I like these as they fit in nicely with the overall game plan. I do like Search Engine, don’t under estimate being able to control that top card of the deck. Apart from its great synergy with the two vampires mentioned above. Just being able to filter what you draw next is really powerful.

There is a single title card making up 2.5% of the deck. It feeds into the influence plan for schemes. But not sure how good this card is.

Let me know what you thought of this post in the comments below.

Whitespider1066

A badly written board gaming diary