I. Introduction
II. Card of the Month - Hanging Fermata
III. Vampire of the Month - Sayshila
IV. Strategy of the Month - Choir
V. Deck of the Month - 2 Storyline finalists' DoC Choir decks
VI. Conclusion
Introduction
In this Playbill, Hyllan and I will return to an old theme this newsletter will focus on the Daughter of Cacophony Choir decks as an alternative to traditional bleed, vote, or combat decks.The nice thing about Choir is that because it is not a bleed it cannot be bounced.At inferior it is a non-directed stealth action and at superior it is a directed stealth action.A player does not need to worry about other voters or bruisers at the table competing with the strategy.The downside is that it is difficult to pull off a Choir victory because it requires a lot of choir cards and at least a couple vampires with Melpominee to carry it off.
Cards of the Month - Hanging Fermata:
Hanging Fermata
Type: Master out-of-turn
Cost: None
Rarity: C
Requirement: Daughter of Cacophony
Text: Play during your influence phase. No Choir cards are burned during this influence phase. Not usable if you played a Hanging Fermata during your last turn.
Hanging Fermata opens a couple options to a Choir deck.First, it can be used to increase the number of choirs in play, thereby increasing the blood loss from a superior Choir.Second, it can be used defensively to maintain Choirs in play for an additional round in the event that the superior Choir is blocked in the current round.
The first option may not be the best option, but it does allow aggressive Choir players to increase the bang for the buck.Because vampires cannot repeat actions, the daughters can only play one choir during a turn.If one only has 3-4 daughters in play, a successful Choir can only bleed for 4-6 pool in a turn, which is less than if they were to successfully bleed with a presence bleed modifier.With Hanging Fermata, a successful Choir of 3-4 vampires can do 10-14 damage, if each vampire does an inferior Choir the first turn and all but one does an inferior Choir the next with the last vampire performing a superior Choir.However, by using this option, the player is deciding that it is worth a master phase action to do an additional 2 pool damage.Without the Hanging Fermata, a player could do 4-6 pool damage the first turn with 2-3 inferior and one superior, and then the next turn do another 4-6 pool damage with 2-3 inferior and one superior, for a total of 8-12 pool damage in two turns versus the 10-14 damage using the Hanging Fermata.
The second option may be the wiser and safer approach to using Hanging Fermata.By using a Hanging Fermata as a "back-up" in case the superior Choir on one turn is blocked, it allows the Daughters to attempt the superior choir again the next turn.It would also allow the player to increase the number of inferior Choirs in play or to take other actions while still holding their inferior Choirs. Basically, the player is using a Master Phase Action as back-up after building up and having the efforts thwarted.It gives you a second chance to pull off the Choir.
As a master card, Hanging Fermata takes up a valuable master card slot in a deck and requires one to use a master phase action to play. Only a couple Hanging Fermatas should be included in a deck.Also as a master card, it can be "suddened".This is also why it is risky to use Hanging Fermata as an offensive master as the opponent can merely foil the plan with a Sudden Reversal.With the defensive approach, it requires an opponent to do more to prevent the Choir - the opponent has to block with intercept the superior Choir stealth action and then also have to prevent the Hanging Fermata with a Sudden Reversal.
Vampire of the Month - Sayshila:
Sayshila
Capacity: 7
Group: 4
Disciplines: FOR, MEL, PRE, dem
Text: Independent: During a referendum, if Sayshila is ready, you may tap her to give another titled vampire you control 2 additional votes. Opposing minions cannot use presses to continue against her.
Sayshila is the new "big girl" in the Daughter of Cacophony role.She is a 7 capacity vampire with all superior in-clan disciplines and no disadvantage.While 7 is still within the mid-cap range, it does approach a large capacity with corner-case special abilities, so her value in a weenie or mid-cap deck will be stretched.Her larger mid-cap size also allows her to be one of the few Daughters that can effectively use Phantom Speaker.The other Daughters are generally too small to use Phantom Speaker effectively against other mid-capacity decks. Sayshila with a 7 capacity also has access to cards like Approximation of Loyalty and Legendary Vampire.
With her superior presence and her special ability, Sayshila does make a great bloodline addition to many vote decks, namely anarch vote decks that appear to be using daughters effectively.Her ability to give another titled vampire you control 2 additional votes during a referendum is nice.It has to be a titled vampire you control, but it can be used during a referendum, not just political actions, so it can be used in blood hunts.Or during votes like Free State Rants which reduce the titled vampires' votes.The difficulty of her first ability, of course, is that she has to be untapped to use it and she can't use it on herself if she gets a title.Still with Fortitude and a 7 capacity, she can use Freak Drive to untap after taking actions.
Her other ability is nice against combat decks.The fact that there cannot be presses to continue combat with her limits most combat to one round.So if she can prevent first round combat damage, she does not have to worry about going to a second round.This is a corner-case ability, because it is only really useful against decks that rely on additional rounds during combat.But again with her superior fortitude this ability does add to her defensive ability.
She does not have a weakness like the other Daughters in either intercept or combat.She has the added bonus of having dementation, so she might play nicely with anti-Malks.
Strategy of the Month - Using a Choir
[As an aside, why didn't White Wolf fix the picture on Choir in Legacies of Blood?It continues to have a picture of men singing, or at least of bearded women singing.The Daughters are an exclusive all-women clan (with one exception- but that exception is a Secret).]
When approaching how to design a Choir deck the first thing one needs to consider is that one will need to reliably draw at least 2-3 choir cards in a turn.To assure that choir cards are drawn fairly reliably the deck needs to be composed of 25-30 percent choir cards.Thus, in a 90-card deck there should be 23-30 choirs.What this also means is that one's 7-card hand will load up on choir cards, so a way to dispose or "set aside" choir cards may be useful.
Another consideration when making a Choir deck is figuring out how to get enough vampires that have melipominee or can play melipominee cards to achieve a 2-3 choirs in a turn.Small to lower end mid-capacity vampires are desireable for this task.If the vampires are too large, they might not come out soon enough or there might not be enough to do a successful choir.In addition, if the choir angle falls apart, having a small army of weenie/lower-end vampires can be useful for a bleed assault.
Like with any deck, consideration should also be given to pool gain and combat defense.The deck has to build up to a minimum of 3-4 vampires.While building, the vampires will need defense as well as a player's pool.Because few opponents "waste" reactions or intercept to block inferior choirs, instead saving them for the superior Choir, Perfectionist is a great archtype master to use in a Choir deck for blood gain (which can be pulled off with Blood Dolls).While vampires usually can gain blood with Perfectionist when playing inferior Choir, a player must decide if that is the best use of a master slot in a deck.The two decks below do not use Perfectionist, prefering other master cards instead.
If a player is going to attempt a Choir deck, the deck should remain focused.Daughters are good at a lot of different approaches - presence bleed, voting, combat defense.It is easy to lose focus and add some cards "just in case", but with almost any deck the more focused, the more likely success.A couple cards for "just in case" is okay, but it is not recommended to try to make the deck part bleed and part choir or part vote and part choir.It dillutes the chances of a successful choir deck, or bleed or vote deck.
As with any Daughter deck, be aware that they are weak on intercept. Either ignore this weakness or find alternative means to intercept.
Decks of the Month - DoC Choir Decks
This newsletter is going to examine two "successful" Daughter Choir decks from recent storyline tournaments.The first was designed by RavATwoFaces and won the Torino (or is it Turin?) storyline deck, which was made with Legacy of Blood legal cards.The second is a pre-Legacy of Blood Choir deck designed by Forrest and took fourth place at the Baltimore storyline tournamet.
(from rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad)
Deck Name : passeggiatrici & papponi
Author : RavATwoFaces
About the deck name:
'passeggiatrici' is a 'kind' italian name for 'harlots' and 'papponi' is the italian name for the people who protects 'harlots'... sorry but I don't know the english translation.
Mood:
you can change 'Frederick the Weak' with'Sarah Raines' or 'Antoniette Du Champ' (the change was planned but I forgot it for the tournment).
Suggestions:
If you find room for 1-2 Persistent Echo (to combine with Choir) it can be a good surprise during the game: other players can think you will play an hanging fermata as you have no more vamps with MEL and you play a superior CHOIR instead.
Crypt [14 vampires] Capacity min: 2 max: 6 average: 4.29
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2x Gaël Pilet 6 FOR MEL chi pre Daughter :2
2x Yseult 6 FOR MEL PRE Daughter :3
2x Angela Preston 5 MEL PRE for Daughter :2
2x Delilah Monroe 4 MEL for pre Daughter :2
2x Céleste, The Voice 3 mel pre Daughter :2
1x Zhara 4 ani for pre Ishtarri:3
1x Lolita 3 for pre !Toreador:2
1x Muse 3 ani for mel Daughter :2
1x Frederick the Weak 2 pre !Brujah:2
Library [90 cards]
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Action [23]
23x Choir
Action Modifier [23]
2x Change of Target
4x Freak Drive
9x Missing Voice, The
2x Phantom Speaker
6x Siren's Lure
Ally [8]
8x Procurer
Combat [17]
4x Backstep
2x Death of the Drum
3x Dodge
4x Hidden Strength
4x Majesty
Event [2]
1x FBI Special Affairs Division
1x Unmasking, The
Master [17]
7x Blood Doll
2x Direct Intervention
2x Dreams of the Sphinx
3x Hanging Fermata
1x KRCG News Radio
1x Paris Opera House
1x Spontaneous Power
Some personal observations just from looking at RavATwoFaces' deck, not having seen it played or talking with RavATwoFaces.Notice he used 23 Choirs.This is near the minimum that one should have in a reliable Choir deck.He used a novel way for pool gain and blocking- Blood Dolls with Procurers.The Procurers would act essentially as hunting grounds for his vampires, which he could pull off the vampires with the blood dolls.The Unmasking gives the procurers +1 intercept, so he could use them as blockers in a pinch. They are weak in combat, but he has a couple undiscipline combat defense cards that they (or his vampires) can use.
The use of Death of the Drum is interesting.But he does have backstep, probably because it also helps his Procurers in combat as well, to go to long range.With Death of the Drum, backstep, and a superior melipominee vampire, he can do 2R aggravated in those instances when an opponent blocks his superior choir.
The Dreams of Sphinx are a way to draw into choirs and to discard choirs.It increases his hand size and allows him to dump unneeded cards during the discard.The Spontaneous Power allows one of his non-Melipominee vampires to use melipominee discipline cards, such as choir.
I agree with RavATwoFaces that Persistent Echo cards would be a good addition to this deck.It effectively increases the hand size, saves a melipominee card (such as Choir or Siren's Lure) for future use, and cycles a card.With small vampires though the cost of persistent echo could add up, but he has procurers to reload the vampires.It is probably even safe to substitute a couple Choir cards for a couple Persistent Echo cards.
Notice he uses 3x Hanging Fermata.This is a safe number.He should draw one by the time the vampires are ready to do a choir and they don't take too many of his master slots.
One thing that does surprise me is that he has a lot of Missing Voices and Siren's Lure.Though if the hand does jam on Missing Voices the nice thing about them that is easily cycled by Daughters at inferior melipominee.
Deck Name: Choir Deck Storyline deck
Created By:Forrest Nielsen
Crypt: (12 cards, Min: 11, Max: 25, Avg: 4.33)
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1 Ember Wright aus dom 3, Tremere antitribu:3
1 Brooke dom tha 3, Tremere Antitribu:2
1 Ian Forestal AUS DOM THA 8, Tremere Antitribu:2
1 Muse ani for mel 3, Daughters of Cacophony:2
2 Celeste mel pre 3, Daughters of Cacophony:2
2 Angela Preston for MEL PRE 5, Daughters of Cacophony:2
2 Gael Pilet chi FOR MEL pre 6, Daughters of Cacophony:2
2 Delilah Monroe for MEL pre 4, Daughters of Cacophony:2
Library: (90 cards)
-------------------
Master (16 cards)
2 Blood Doll
2 Dreams of the Sphinx
2 Effective Management
2 Infernal Pact
1 Spontaneous Power
1 Paris Opera House
2 Specialization
2 Tribute to the Master
1 University Hunting Ground
1 From a Sinking Ship
Action (33 cards)
28 Choir
3 Legal Manipulations
2 Entancement
Action Modifier (18 cards)
5 Freak Drive
4 Missing Voice, The
5 Siren`s Lure
1 Aire of Elation
1 Kiss of Ra
2 Daring the Dawn
Reaction (8 cards)
3 Defelection
5 Wake with Evening`s Freshness
Combat (15 cards)
2 Majesty
4 Resilience
2 Soak
7 Staredown
Forrest's deck was made pre-Legacy of Blood.He did not have the benefit of Hanging Fermata or Persistent Echo, which should increase the effectiveness of a Choir deck.
The deck has 28 Choir cards.It would be safe to substitute some for Persistent Echo cards.Maybe 23 Choir cards and 5 Persistent Echo cards.
For pool gain, this deck uses Specialization.Specialization is ideal for a Choir deck, because the deck is loaded with Choir cards.The Choir cards are not needed early game and Specialization allows a player to cycle the cards and gain a pool.It is a fairly reliable source of pool gain each turn.
For blocking and intercept, this deck basically drops any hope of trying to block/intercept opponent's actions, focusing instead on the choir aspect.However, the off-clan of Tremere-antitrube does have dominate discipline, so there are a couple surprise bleed bounce cards for those large bleeds.
This deck uses Tremere-anti as the off-clan because they have a number of options, in addition to the Spontaneous Power, to use melipominee cards.Tremere-anti can use Infernal Pact, has Ian Forestal, and can recruit Infernal Familiar.
The combat is fairly straight forward- presence end combat and fortitute prevent damage.These two forms of combat cards usually work effectively to preserve the vampires.Some strong combat decks can get around these effective forms of combat resolution, but then again isn't that usually the case.
There are a couple of presence bleed cards in the deck.As the deck is building up, these presence bleeds are useful in putting pressure on a prey early game.Or with Freak Drive, it allows vampires to, in addition to playing Choir, to bleed for a substantial amount, which might also "distract" a prey's vampires to block the bleed rather than the superior Choir.
Conclusion:
We've now concluded our discussion of the Daughters of Cacophony Choir Strategy and reached the end of this Playbill. Hopefully we have shown how Choir can be used as a successful strategy and given you some ideas on your next Choir deck. The next Playbill will include a strategy discussion about Camarilla, Sabbat, Independent and Laibon Daughter Decks. We look forward to greeting your brain again soon.
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