V:tES - a little look back

This commentary was long time due and only thing, that kept me back from doing this, was my love for this awesome game and my utmost respect for people running Black Chantry, because I truly believe that they are doing  what they feel is best for the game. They are putting a lot of work into it and they have managed to revive it when I lost my belief that our game will ever leave torpor again. It has been more than two years since announcement about V:tES being back in print ad we had multiple products to play with, as well as some keyword changes and rules changes. This is just bunch of my personal opinions and thoughts about what happened since that time.

I still think there was possibility for soft restart of the game, banning some stuff entirely and streamlining other things, while keeping most of the game intact. But since that did not happen, let's not dwell at this for long. I just still see some things that hamper accessibility of the game for new players that are kept in and let's be honest, V:tES was never really easy game to get in. So instead let's look at products and changes that happened in last 2 years.

Product overview

Se first thing we got announced on April 24th 2018 were 5 new products and wow I looked at them and thought they look awesome. KoT and HttB bundles brought back sought after and needed reprints while Lost Kindred  brought in new cards. I was sad that we did not have any starter for new players, but I was happy about what we got and was hoping for PCDs in near future. 

After that, we got announcement for Anthology I on October 21st 2018. Again, it was not meant for new players, which was a shame. But pure value of the reprints kept complaints down awe enjoyed lot of those cards.

Finally on 29th of December 2018 we got four new starters announced. And wow, they were packed. With valuable reprints, playable cards and even new vampires. They were playable out of the box and pretty strong at that.  I was hyped for new players with these. One thing bothered me though. It was the choice of including Nephandi starter with them. I was concerned of high contest rates with this deck. It looked like you could get cheap Nephandus deck for everyone, but then everyone would contest Antonio, which is star of that deck. I found that to be questionable choice. Especially when !Tremere deck is powerful deck by itself and if they built generic starter , you could easilly switch that crypt to have 3-4 different crypts and not contest that much. Still, I overall rated this as great product.

After that on May 26th 2019 we got announcement of 25th anniversary box and Stanislava starter deck. And man, it was packed full of value and needed cards. And while it is true that Stanislava deck is iconic for V:tEs history, I felt strongly that this is big mistake. We got another deck, that cannot be really modified. You either play it with crypt relying on Stanislava, or it does not work. If you try to switch it, you lose some part - dominate, protean, votes or something else. So from what I saw and experienced - most of the players stripped it for the cards. Which is understandable, but sad. And the rest? People who played it just ran into absurd increase in contest rates. 

30th July 2019 brought us announcement of First Blood starters and I thought they are spot on big thing we needed. Low cost and easy builds that are great for new players. Though I wish they had carton boxes and second print of them had price increase, I still think these are great. 

And these days, we are starting to see previews of cards from Fifth Edition box set. And while I love a lot of things about it, there are things I am not fan of. I love idea of selling it as standalone board game that can be expanded. I love inclusion of new rulebook and edge as well as counters. Though getting out rulebook while simultaneously  testing pretty huge rule change is unfortunate. But biggest letdown is lack of new library cards. This makes only small fragment of the cards desirable for older players and lot of them being just carton. Also this board game has not a small price tag for a new players to jump in it, albeit cost is justified. Again, decks are constructed well and there are desirable cards, just not that many of them. 

So these are all our new products. At this point I should also mention I work with a store that sells these products and not only, I am trying to play this great game, but also market it and sell it. And let me just say it is not easy and will not be if we continue this way. Of course each time we order items and sell them to collectors, but it's been harder and harder to get games going and to attract new players. But also old players have trouble with it because of issues pointed out.

Lot of people who believed in the game simply kept their cards, so 95% reprint product is simply boring or straight away irrelevant for them. Even if they bought products, they were faulty - wrongly cut corners, empty cards, misprinted cards and blurred texts. We had maybe one product line that was not faulty in some way? And I am expecting it to be same for this box set just based on statistics and previous experiences here. 

Evaluation

This has already gotten much longer than I wanted and I could go a while longer, but I think that we have to get a broad look on all aspects to see where problem with our game lies. We live in age, where games are competing for customers. Market is changing fast and new things are coming out on daily basis. V:tES died because it was hard to sell - to investors, companies and to players. Rigid game which is great for group of 4-5 player and less or more is meh or unplayable is just horrible concept. 

And since the game was picked up by Black Chantry, these problem was never solved. But in addition, other problems were added. Almost no new cards means that lot of veterans just lost interest. You can add quality issues on top of that.  New keywords such as Lock and Wake have brought more complications to the game. When I look on all wordings on cards throughout history of the game, it was mess even before these. Also we had some card changes that I do not mind, but were unnecessary in my opinion. 

Last nail in the coffin for me is the contest rule. This I see only as a hotfix for Stanislava and Antonio starters not being thought through. Vtes as a game has a lot of problems, but it being cruel and unforgiving is a part of the game. Star decks were always risky. Lutz or Arika are so strong, that risk of their contest is a part of their balance. How many times you have contested Zubeida? I myself have and had star decks, that were strong but risky in this area and I lost because of contest few times. But it was my choice. Every time. I chose to put the vampire in my deck well knowing what I am risking. I chose to influence him out and contest him. I either asked around if I would be contesting or I risked it. But each and every time, the game proceeded because of my decisions. So although  game may have problems, being cruel is not one of them. It was always part of the game. And trying to push this is, at least for me, only looking like trying to patch Black Chantry's design mistakes.

Solutions

Quality control. This should be the easiest to pin down. Make sure you are printing correct stuff without defects. If your customers don't believe in quality, they will not buy. Period.

Plan ahead please. Starters with high contest rate are horrible. But from what I understand, new illustrated rulebook is going to print and we are testing pretty huge rule change. So what now? We get inaccurate rulebook? Or is the rule already there and testing is just formality? Oh and please don't give people choice. I don't want to argue that my tourney has hard contest rules while people who arrived from far away city prefer soft contest. 

We need new cards. I know that testing and balancing new cards, hiring artists is a pain in the butt and its probably most complicated thing to do. But I do not want to buy another reprint deck. Lot of people does not want that. Few new vampires will not suffice. We barely got here in two years, but not much more farther. Fifth edition is huge letdown in terms of new cards for a lot of people.

Last few words

I firmly believe there are more things that can improve V:tES and give it chance to live, but those first three are priority. I am still little sad we did not have soft restart with simplifying some interactions and banning some stuff as well as doing some changes right when the game was restarted. I could see possibility of doing "legacy" format for older editions which have just confusing wordings or misprints. Just recently we had again mistake with newer player and jyhad prints of  "Venture Justicar" and Blood Rage. 

But let's keep that for future  debate. Though at this point I am very skeptical towards game as it is and its future, I will try to do my best to support it. I will try to get games going. I will attend tournaments. And I will try to sell and push V:tES. Because I love the game. There is no other like it. Sorry for me taking this long to spill everything out. I hope I did not bore you and hopefully we will meet at some random tournament, GP or EC. Sending my love to community.

Sincerely,

Michal "Regis" Dlouhý 

Player, prince , NC, retailer