Legendre
12/2/2010 3:50:00 PM
On Dec 1, 9:51 am, brandonsantacruz <brandonsantac...@yahoo.com>
wrote:
> I'm curious to know what other people find fun about VTES.
> Brandon
Well, there's what's fun about the game and what's fun about ways to
play the game.
What's fun about the game (for me, obviously) is that you can almost
ALWAYS do something. Total paralysis is rare in VTES, and I tend to
frown on decks and cards which promote it. (Turbo decks, Pentex
Subversion, Brainwash). In many other complex destroy-your-opponent
games (Axis and Allies, Magic the Gathering, Monopoly) there comes a
time where a player can pretty much just give up. The most fun games
(VTES, Cosmic Encounter, Munchkin Quest, Mr. Jack, Poker) don't do
this.
There is almost NEVER a reason to just give up in VTES. (This is one
of the reasons why I think the play to win rule is f***ing stupid: you
almost never don't have a way to win in a game that is this social and
complex.)
This is one of the reasons that I prefer toolboxy decks, much like
Brandon: if you're running a specialized deck, your opponent will know
if you don't have any intercept by the time the final blow comes, and
you effectively have paralysis. But even if you're running an OBF/POT
rush deck with no permacept, why not toss in a few wakes and a few
elder interventions just to keep people guessing? If your opponent
has even seen you drop a single Pack Tactics, unless they've got
multiple stealth cards in their hand, there will be doubt. And where
there is doubt, there is *strategy*. Where there is no doubt, there
is only tactics. Toolboxy decks with outlying, cornercase cards
create doubt. Doubt is fun. One of my favourite movie quotes is from
the 13th Warrior: "Any fool can calculate strength. That one has been
doing it since we arrived. Now he has to calculate what he can't see."
I like the general power balance in the game, though I tend to think
Governs should only be a +1 bleed, and superior deflection should be
"Don't pay the cost of this card' rather than "Don't tap." Despite
the fact that Dominate is King, you CAN win a game with a Fortitude/
Obfuscate deck. That's awesome.
I like that there aren't that many "search your library" cards, and
that the ones that there are extremely limited (mostly either
searching one's crypt or searching for equipment or some other
qualification). Summoning should cost more blood (maybe half the
cost of the ally/retainer rounded up?).
I love combat (even though destroying your opponent's minions tends to
result in a little paralysis, at least to a degree). Most of my decks
have no fewer than 12 combat cards in them, and MANY have upwards of
25. I don't generally play games where there are decks that just
don't do combat, because it's not fun to have a combat where one
players has NO options. (My playgroup plays primarily with a group of
about 105 decks that I keep assembled that are designed to be more or
less balanced against each other.) The shuttling back and forth for
range, the pressing and counterpressing... it's exhilarating. If I
had a suggestion to make combat more fun, it would be to make rescuing
ANOTHER vampire from torpor only cost one blood (though I'd keep the
two blood cost for rescuing one's own self). This would make it
somewhat easier to recover from a particularly nasty combat and reduce
paralysis.
I love the table-gaming political aspect of the game, though much of
this is because it contributes to the doubt and possibility I
discussed above.
I love the huge variety of vampires available. I'd love it more if
the Jyhad vampires were errataed so the +bleeders didn't suck so
much. Still, one of my most powerful decks has Democritus, Ozmo, and
Lydia van Cuelen in it, so they can't suck THAT much.
I love that a game can take 4 hours. But maybe that's just because
it's fun. Axis and Allies can take 4 hours and I find that
unbelievably tedious.
And finally, I absolutely, positively, LOVE LOVE LOVE political
actions. I think they're the single best thing about the game, and a
stroke of genius. I just wish there were more viable actions and that
the basic vote strategy didn't come down so often to KRC.