Back to VTES-Baltimore
Back to Home Page
A VTES Sanctioned Tournament was held in Rockville, Maryland January 19, 2002. Fifteen people showed up; three from New York City, two from Pennsylvania (about an hour north of Philly), one from the Baltimore Area (Timonium, MD), and one from Annapolis, MD. The rest were locals to the Rockville/College Park/Gaithersburg Area.
The Tourney consisted of three rounds and a final. The following was reported by Jason as the final (fourth) round (all "I"s refer to Jason)…
The finalists: 5 Josh (blood brothers rush/bleed) 4 Trey (Tariq! rush) 3 Jason (Daughters/Toreador vote) 2 Colin (Malk Princes) 1 Mark (Kiasyd stealth/bleed)
Josh and Trey were forced to sit together because they were seeded last. Trey chose to prey on Josh. I had to sit next to one of them so I chose Trey because my
Majestys would be slightly more effective against him.
Plus I would be his predator so I could make deals to
survive until the time was right. Colin sat between
Josh and I because he didn't want to sit between 2
rush decks. Mark chose to prey on me.
So the order was this:
Mark -> Jason -> Trey -> Josh -> Colin
This was fine with me. My plan going in was to promise no damage to Trey if he didn't rush me. I would soak up bleed damage from Mark and occasionally bounce his bleeds until I could oust Trey in 1 turn.
Things started out bad for me. Colin got a prince
(Gregor - Stockholm) before I could call a praxis
seizure. He wouldn't agree to let me have a prince
because he wanted to have as much influence over my
votes as possible.
I made my deal with Trey and he agreed. Tariq started
eating Blood Brothers. Colin was pretty ineffective
as Josh was crushing him. Mark was bleeding me
steadily, but I was keeping my head above water with
blood dolls and tributes.
Now my patience paid off, Tariq rushed Josh and the
Blood Brother won, sending Tariq to torpor. Josh then
diablerized Tariq and my path was cleared.
Finally, I drew into a Toreador Justicar vote. With 2
ready Toreadors and a Bewitching Oration in my hand I
barely got it through (Trey failed to notice he had a
ready Toreador, but I would have thrown the edge to
pass it).
Josh eventually torporized Gregor giving me vote lock
for long enough to call Praxis Seizure: Stockholm and
contest Gregor's title (he couldn't pay to contest as
he was empty and in torpor).
I kept Trey around a couple turns so Josh's head
wouldn't turn my way. When I finally did oust Trey I
made yet another no vote/no rush deal with Josh. He
focused his attention on Colin and ousted him.
Now I had to do something. Josh was at around 9 pool
and I had 1 KRC. Mark was about to be ousted and that
would probably seal Josh's victory. Josh was almost
decked, but so was I. Mark bled me for 3, I sent it
to Josh. Now he was within ousting range if I could
draw another KRC on my turn. I called the first one,
it passed. I bled twice to cycle cards but still
didn't draw one. I had one vampire left with superior
presence and 1 blood with a Majesty in hand. I bled
for one and played a stealth card, drawing a KRC.
Josh tapped KRCG and blocked, but I couldn't majesty
and untap to call the vote because I would have to
hunt.
That was it, Josh ousted Mark and Josh and I were decked. He had Hungry Coyote and 2 blood dolls on both his Brothers, no way I could ever oust him. The store was closing so the game was about to go to time, I withdrew for 2 vps and second place.