Conklaavi 2006 (Finland)

I'll put my winning deck here, with comments. It'll go to TWDA archive
this way?
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Conklaavi 2006
Turku, Finland
8th of April 2006l
27 participants

Tournament winning deck. Enters 2nd in final with 2 GW+6 vp's; wins the
final with 2 vp's.

Deck Name: The Birds
Created by: Antero Leppänen (where my idea came from, see comments).
Description: ANI/pro intercept/combat

Crypt (12)
1 Horrock Gangrel 6 vic ANI PRO
1 Janey Pickman !Gangrel 6 for ANI PRO
1 Celeste Lamontagne !Gangrel 5 for ANI PRO
1 Lord Ashton Gangrel 5 for pro ANI
1 Bobby Lemon Gangrel 4 pro ANI
1 Jezebelle Gangrel 4 ani for pro
1 Bothwell Gangrel 3 ani for
1 Mouse Nosferatu 2 ani
1 Zip Ravnos 2 ani
2 Tupdog Gargoyle 1 POT VIS

Library (90)

Master (12)
2 Animalism
4 Blood Doll
1 Fame
2 Heidelberg Castle
1 KRCG News Radio
1 Protean
1 WMRH Talk Radio

Action (6)
1 Ambush
2 Army of Rats
1 Big Game
1 Bum's Rush
1 Harass

Combat (45)
14 Aid from Bats
1 Canine Horde
12 Carrion Crows
6 Drawing out the Beast
4 Earth Meld
4 Flesh of Marble
2 Form of Mist
2 Form of the Ghost

Equipment (6)
3 IR Goggles
1 Ivory Bow
2 Leather Jacket

Reaction (12)
3 Cats' Guidance
6 Forced Awakening
3 Wake with Evening's Freshness

Retainer (9)
1 Mr. Winthrop
1 Owl Companion
7 Raven Spy

I quite much copied Peter D. Bakija's "Bats With Birds In Their Mouths"
as I was not feeling very creative. At first I wondered why it has no
Tastes or Pack Alphas as it means one has to recruit the Birds by
actions, and if in combat, one cannot recoup the blood lost. Then
again, with no transient intercept or rush, it means one has to have
both PA and RS in hand when going in combat, and if you add a Taste to
it, a simple 2-3 card combat suddenly turns into a 5-6 card combo.
Which is quite much, especially as mono ANI is in danger to run out of
cards in prolonged game.

So I had the core deck built but then I begun to worry whether mono
Animalism is too fragile, so I changed the crypt to g3/4
Gangrel/!Gangrel with the obvious weenie support, and filled the crypt
with 2 Tupdogs (I know they are a cheap choice...). The combat was
modified to include Flesh of Marbles and Earth Melds (which both saved
my hiney a couple of times) but the reduced number of Bats and Crows
was still enough to run opponents out of S:CE.

Playing this deck is quite simple. Freeze predator, kill if necessary.
Permit prey from doing anything but D actions (there lies a danger if
one's prey does not do anything else) and let the crosstable players
play their own game while building a Wall of Death. After it's down to
3 players (likely: me, my original prey and my grandpredator) my prey
should be easy to oust and do the final dance with the remaining
player. And this kind of deck is obviously very strong in 2-player
game.

Most obvious turn-off: crosstable voting.

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-Antero