Official VEKN Nosferatu Newsletter for January, 2007. Ahh, Raphael Catarari. What a weird vampire. Lots of good abilities. A difficult disadvantage. A reasonable size. Clearly, a vampire to build a deck around. So I did. To refresh everyonešs memory for the purposes of discussion, here is Raphael: Raphael Catarari (5) OBF, PRE, aus, pot, tha. G4. Sabbat. If Raphaelšs blood total is odd, he does not untap as normal. You may use a master phase action to add a blood to him from your pool or burn a blood from him. +1 bleed. Raphael is a pretty crazy vampire. A 5 cap with OBF, PRE and +1 bleed is nothing to sneeze at, in terms of bleed offense. His disadvantage, while not totally debilitating, can be kind of a problem if you arenšt planning for it. His Aus, Pre, Obf discipline spread matches up nicely with a handful of pretty solid mid-cap vampires to form the core of a good, weird, stealth and bleed strategy. To this end, I built this deck: ŗIšm Too Sexy For My Lips˛ Crypt: 2x Stavros (7) AUS, OBF, PRE 2x Isouda de Blaise (7) OBF, PRE, aus 2x Antoinette, She Who Watches (6) AUS, PRE, obf 4x Raphael Catarari (5) OBF, PRE, aus, tha 1x Tock (4) obf, pre 1x Maldavis (4) AUS, pre Library: 6x Blood Doll 3x Perfectionist 1x Shanty Town Hunting Ground 1x Auspex 1x Archon Investigation 16x Social Charm 16x True Lovešs Face 8x Majesty 8x Lost in Crowds 8x Swallowed by the Night 4x Spying Mission 6x Telepathic Misdirection 1x Precognizant Mobility 1x Rutoršs Hand 6x Disengage 4x Change of Target A very focused Stealth and Bleed deck with reasonable pool generation abilities, light combat defense, and some bleed bounce. The core of the deck is clearly the True Lovešs Face tricksiness, where you go to bleed with a Social Charm. If they try to block, you deny their block with the True Lovešs Face, unless they pay a pool. After they pay a pool, you increase your stealth and bleed them anyway. If they donšt bother trying to block, you just play the True Lovešs Face for +1 bleed anyway. If they manage to block you, you might squeak out on a Change of Target (costing them a pool anyway, like with Aching Beauty technology), or get out on a Majesty. You can reliably bleed for 3 at stealth and generate a pool on each successful bleed. The Disengage and Majesty (with a bit of maneuver support) can help against dedicated Rush combat. A few Spying Missions can cancel some bounced bleeds. A few Telepathic Misdirections can save you from some heavy bleeds when necessary. Raphael works pretty well in this deck--there are plenty of Blood Dolls, allowing you to tailor adjust his pool level when needed; Perfectionist for added blood flexibility; a Rutoršs Hand to give him an additional untap each turn; a Precognizant Mobility just in case he gets totally stuck. If he gets blocked or rushed, he can play Majesty and untap (even if he is untapped with an odd blood total, if he is untapped at the start of your turn, you can adjust his blood as necessary). When he goes to bleed with a Social Charm, if someone tries to block, he can True Lovešs Face for block denial, potentially cost your prey a pool, and then hit for a 3 bleed anyway (costing your prey 4 pool, but without the danger of being Archon Investigated). I considered including a Helicopter and/or a Metro Underground, both of which might still be worth including. The bleed defense of this deck is a tad light; just a handful of Telepathic Misdirections and no untap/wake potential in the deck, but if nothing else, Isouda can untap at the end of the turn by discarding the Edge. Likely not the best deck ever constructed, but a pretty consistent and sneaky bleeder that can survive pretty well and uses Raphael quite effectively. You can check out all of my old Nosferatu Newsletters at: http://www.lightlink.com/pdb6/vtes.html Peter D Bakija pdb6@lightlink.com http://www.lightlink.com/pdb6/vtes.html