Autor: Obake Máximo

DECK CONTENTS: Khan’s Defiance

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 27/08/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

Release date: January 22nd, 2007. General description: Regular-size expansion for Lotus Edition; the first to include dual Lotus/Samurai legality bugs. Sets size: 156 numbered cards (50 common, 50 uncommon, 50 rare, 6 fixed). Extra cards: 50 rare foils, plus 59 fixed deck reprints. Total size: 265 cards. CRAB DECK (fixed portion) Stronghold: Kaiu Shiro Events (1) Birth of the Blood Heir Holdings (11) A Favor Returned Gifts and Favors Crystal Mine Iron Mine x2 Personal Librarian Rich Coffers Secluded Village x2 Secluded Waystation x2 Personalities (12) Hida Daizu x2 Hida Dayu...

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The Cards Tell the Tale (II): The Training Grounds, by Ben Peck

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 12/07/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

The original TRAINING GROUNDS set was released along the Diamond Edition base set, and was the LTP product for the Reign of Blood era, and depicted a battle between the Lion Clan and the Shadowlands forces. The product packaging (a sturdy two row box designed to hold around 800 cards) had a wraparound battle scene which was also used to illustrate several cards in the set. Sadly it seems the full widescreen picture is nowhere to be found, except for the featured central part, with the two enemy leaders facing off, so well need to use our imagination to picture the full scene, as depicted...

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The Cards Tell the Tale (I): Training Grounds II, by Miguel Coimbra

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 11/07/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

Repeating the trick used for their previous LTP product, the art department decided to use this wraparound image for the product packaging of Training Grounds II. LTP (that Learn to Play) products usually appeared once for each legality arc, near the release of the basic set for a given story arc (in this case, Lotus Edition, or The Age of Enlightenment). Again they usually featured a more discrete conflict, limited to two factions. In this case, they were the Crane and Dragon Clans, and the conflict was called the War of Silk and steel. This widescreen artwork, by newcomer to L5R Miguel Coimbra,...

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What’s in a Sect

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 01/05/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

While belonging to a Clan (or bloodline) is part who what a Vampire IS, and it can’t be changed (well, there are exceptions, as we already have seen). A Sect is an organization that you chose to BELONG to. Of course, the circumstances of your Embrace (sort vampiric birth), like who is your Sire, which city, and when it happened has lots to do with it, it is not something that is in your blood and you need a super duper arcane magic ritual to switch. THE CAMARILLA When the game was first published, this was the default sect. It didn’t even say so in the cards, because… of course you are Camarilla....

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Homunculus II: Search Harder

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 14/03/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

For searches by Clan, Sect or Type, go to: Homunculus Helper Basic V5 Disciplines (11) ANIMALISM – alphabetical or set order AUSPEX – alphabetical or set order BLOOD SORCERY (also THAUMATURGY) – alphabetical or set order CELERITY – alphabetical or set order DOMINATE – alphabetical or set order FORTITUDE – alphabetical or set order OBFUSCATE – alphabetical or set order OBLIVION ***coming soon POTENCE – alphabetical or set order PRESENCE – alphabetical or set order PROTEAN – alphabetical or set order Legacy Disciplines...

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On Disciplines (or lack thereof)

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 12/03/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

What are disciplines? In essence, disciplines are blood-powered “superpowers” a vampire can have in the World of Darkness. Some of these disciplines are more common to many vampires of a particular clan, even the younger ones, while others require centuries of experience to learn by a few vampires outside that clan. Here, you can search our stock of VTES cards, filtered by Discipline In VTES game terms, icons on crypt cards determine which powers that particular vampire has access to. Also, these icons come in two flavors: basic, with the icon inside a square, and superior, with the same icon...

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Antitribu no more

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 05/03/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

Antitribu were a concept introduced to VTES in one of the earlier sets, the fifth and final one by WOTC. Until that point there were only vampires from the 7 clans of the Camarilla (8 if you count the Caitiff), plus the four Independents (and, back then, Camarilla was the default sect, with the Independents specifically spelled as “non-Camarilla”. With the release of THE SABBAT in 1996, this changed, and the titular sect was explicitly indicated in all the crypt cards in the set. Besides the 2 clans who were specifically aligned with the Sabbat (Lasombra and Tzimisce), we got the antitribu...

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Bloodlines: Harbingers of Skulls

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 19/02/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

What is a Bloodline? A bloodline is a small “family” of Vampires, usually an off-shot of one of the main 13 Clans, with some common characteristics, history and/or outlook. Sometimes it is more complicated than that! HARBINGERS OF SKULLS When a Bloodline is not an off-shot? When they are the main tree of the “family”. The Harbingers are what’s left of the Capadocians, one of the original 13 Clans, which was “usurped” by one amongst them, Augustus Giovanni, who killed the clan Founder, all but hunted his progeny to extinction, taking his place as the head of the new clan Giovanni. As things usually...

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Bloodlines: Ahrimane

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 05/02/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

What is a Bloodline? A bloodline is a small “family” of Vampires, usually an off-shot of one of the main 13 Clans, with some common characteristics, history and/or outlook. Sometimes it is more complicated than that! AHRIMANE The Ahrimane Bloodline is usually considered an off-shot of the Gangrel antitribu. It is, and it isn’t… not exactly. Over kindred history there have been two branches of this bloodline. The original Ahrimanes were born (and, apparently, were extinct) during the Dark Ages, in Scandinavia. However, the branch related to VTES is the more modern branch, born again through...

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The Book of Nod – «for Dummies» edition

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 05/02/2024. Publicado en Novedades.

Working with all these cards to prep and upload an usable database for the VTES store has made me reminisce about the rich World of Darkness (WoD, from now on) milieu. You see, I never was into RPG games, but at the time, working at a game store had me fascinated about this series of huge games under the collective WoD umbrella, of which Vampire the Masquerade (VtM) was, by far, the most popular and best selling. The WoD is our world, only darker. Its history, is ours, but even bloodier, with all kinds of supernatural beings plotting and maneuvering at the very fringes of the collective vision...

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An alternate Gold Edition

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 11/05/2023. Publicado en Novedades.

Once upon a time, when Wizards of the Coast was publishing L5R, Shokansuru (not Daigotsu) was going to be the main bad in the original plotline for Gold Edition/The Four Winds Era. Howevever WotC dropped the game, plans changed and this storyline was dropped. Who was Shokansuru in this version of the story? We had first meet him during Fire and Shadow (Hidden Emperor era). It seems like Feydn Rafiq (an assassin from the Ivory Kingdoms, in the Honor Bound set) came to Rokugan looking for him. From context, Shokansuru should be the «chanting ruhmal» mentioned in the card, and he is shown summoning...

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UNRELEASED TALES (I): The sad -and somewhat stupid- story of Hatsue and Yozo

Escrito por Obake Máximo en 06/03/2023. Publicado en Novedades.

It has been almost 20 years, so I apologize if some details are fuzzy, or I get some of them wrong. This went down during 2004, at Gen Con Barcelona. I think this was the last event to carry the Gen Con brand in Spain. Barcelona, along with Madrid, was one of the oldest hubs of OP activity for L5R, with a very active community, and an experienced team of TO’s. The official Spanish distributor at the time was Millennium and they got a storyline tournament for us to run. It was a huge thing for us! By now, I really don’t remember if this was a single day thing, or a 2 or more day event, with qualifiers...

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