There are only two weeks left until my very first VTES tournament in Cambridge, and I have officially entered the emotional state of a child waiting for Christmas morning. I am very excited. I am also preparing like a Tremere apprentice who has just been told there will be an exam, a practical demonstration, and possibly a public execution if things go poorly.
Naturally, this means research. Lots of it. Reading, thinking, rethinking, and staring at decks like they might reveal secrets if I glare hard enough. Unfortunately, actual play opportunities have been a bit scarce lately, so I was genuinely thrilled when David (who also happens to be one of the tournament organizers, no pressure there) reached out and asked if I wanted to get a game in.
Of course I did!
So today I drove to Cambridge to meet up with David and Manuel, ready to put theory into practice.
Lately I've been thinking a lot about what deck I actually want to bring to the tournament. When I first started playing, I was very taken with the idea of a star vampire, you know, the big-cap powerhouse you include multiple times so something impressive is guaranteed to happen. For my Tremere deck, that role initially went to Ian Carfax, Justicar and undisputed winner of the Best Moustache in the Camarilla award. Karl Schrekt was also on the shortlist, but Ian had the edge.
In practice, though… Ian never really shined. Worse, I learned a painful but important lesson: some combat decks don't care how important your star vampire is. They will happily punch them straight into torpor in a single combat. And then you're left staring at the table, wondering how your entire strategy ended up face-down with zero blood and all of your dignity gone. So while I still love the idea of a star vampire, I've decided that in the current meta, I'd rather bench him and go wider instead of taller.
With that in mind, I made a few adjustments. The deck is still very much a wall/toolbox thing (I'll fully understand the difference one day, I'm sure), but now it leans more on numbers than on a single shining hero. Govern is still doing a lot of heavy lifting, some habits are hard to break. And I just love Dominate.
Manuel brought his ever-reliable Assamites, while David showed up with a Sabbat Path of Death deck, because nothing says "friendly practice game" like zombies. Since there were only three of us, we agreed that the first player to oust their prey would win.
Manuel wasted no time dropping Al-Ashrad onto the table as well as Smiling Jack, who then proceeded to sit there like an immortal biker mascot and slowly drain all joy and pool from the room. We tried. We really did. But Jack stayed. David, meanwhile, surprised me with zombies that hit far harder than I expected, plus Sakura, who kept unlocking after successful actions like she had somewhere better to be.
The game was tense from start to finish. Ousting opportunities appeared, vanished, and reappeared, usually stopped at the last possible moment by a well-timed wake card. All three decks felt evenly matched, which made every decision feel important and every mistake feel immediately educational. In the end, Manuel emerged victorious, well played, well deserved.
As always, I learned a lot. New card interactions, better sequencing, and one very important rules clarification, special thanks for finally explaining what "limited" actually means on a card. That one had been quietly mocking me for weeks.
In two weeks, I'll be sitting down at my first tournament. I'm excited. I'm nervous. I'm looking forward to meeting new players and getting more games in. And if I manage to secure a few victory points along the way? That'll just be the cherry on top of an already unforgettable experience.
The game never ends, only pauses. I'll see you at the next move.
Custodian Hargrave
