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Most of the following will address tournament-style deck construction, as that is what rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad tends to focus on. Otherwise, specific environments will be discussed, but house rules are not generally taken to be the standard mode of discourse. I'm really blowing my own horn here, but this was largely written in response to a newcomer's question about how to build a deck, and there hadn't been anything written all that recently...so I decided to help out.

There are three standard styles to deck-building. Generally, beginning players start off with the simplest, building a deck around a single clan and utilizing all of the clan disciplines (i.e. Ventrue or Gangrel), or focusing on two. (i.e. Brujah celerity & potence or Malkavian obfuscate & dominate). There [used to be] a number of informative starter decks on the Vampire: Elder Kindred Network site. Beyond single-clan decks, most decks attempt to combine 2 or more disciplines while recruiting the most useful vampires for the concept. Some fairly classic examples of this are the thaumaturgy & celerity deck (focusing on Anvil, Thomas Thorne, and perhaps Cardano and some other Tremere), or presence and dominate (using mainly Ventrue and larger Toreador).

Try adding animalism for added versatility to your celerity-thaumaturgy deck.

There are a few crypt databases available on the net which can allow you to select the smallest vampires possible with the disciplines you are interested in, or by some other criteria; as well, you could construct your own database. (Of the ones available on the net, I prefer Ethan Burrow's Crypt Monger -- mainly because it has full text of all the vampires and a pretty easy interface.) Beyond that, there are a wide variety of "theme" decks which revolve around concepts such as "European Brujah" or the now-defunct (due to new rulings) Tremere-Talbot's Chainsaw-Chantry-Fame deck.

Tying into your method of deck-building is what strategy you intend to use to oust your prey. Although a fair amount of decks rely on other methods to hassle their prey, the three major tactics in Jyhad are Bleed, Vote, and Combat. There are a few sub-types of each, and too many smaller variations to list. No tactic is inherently more valid or more likely to win than any other, assuming you play Jyhad as intended by the designers, without card limits. (If you care to read more about why card limits are not required in Jyhad, see Mark Langsdorf's superb page. Certain disciplines lend themselves to one tactic or another, thus influencing which vampires will make up your crypt. Dominate and Presence are the best disciplines for bleeding when paired with another discipline or gimmick for the specific sub-type. Celerity, Potence, Protean and Fortitude are largely combat disciplines. Vote decks are generally based around Presence, as the rules have recently been modified disallowing the playing of more than one vote card to support a vote per political action.

Each of the tactics, as mentioned has a number of standard sub-types. Briefly, these will be listed, along with the most common versions.

Note: Any text in this color is commentary by PDB6.

Bleed

Stealth & Bleed: The ubiquitous Malkavian Obfuscate & Dominate bleed deck. Throw in a lot of stealth, some bleeding actions, and many bleed modifiers. Largely tries to avoid combat. Short, brutish and nasty.

Good and basic, but lives and dies by the local game environment. When your prey stops trying to block you, your hand becomes horribly gummed up by stealth, and the Malkavians are incredibly succeptible to Rush combat. However, in a low combat game, the good old standby Malk S+B can be very effective. This sort of deck is often incredibly maligned by the Jyhad playing public ("Cheezy," "Lame," "Boring," "Unimaginitve"), but as one of the archtypical strategies of the game is very important (Much like "Scisors" in "Paper, Scisors, Rock") and is very challenging to play in a well developed Jyhad environment.

Bruise & Bleed: Generally a simple Brujah deck, using presence to bleed, and beating up anyone unfortunate enough to block them. Obviously at home with combat.

Another good, basic, and easy to build design. However, suffers from the "What if my opponent doesn't do what I want them to?" syndrome. To be scary at combat, a B+B deck needs a good supply of combat cards, but if no one ever blocks it, they will clog your hand until your ability to bleed is hamstrung, and you won't be able to get into fights to cycle. In a game environment where everyone just blocks out of habit, this deck can be very handy.

Tap & Bleed: Generally Ventrue or Toreador using Presence and Dominate to tap out their prey's minions, and then bleeding. Generally uses strike:combat ends or damage prevention to survive combat. Good voting defense, as most princes are Ventrue/Toreador.

Often heartier than the generic S+B deck, as it has the option of combat defense, this sort of deck can be very effective. Is easily shut down by untap decks that use Wake or Aid from Rats. (Ed. note: more often known as "Rat's Warning". Heh.)

Weenie Bleed: Get a pile of cheap minions out, start bleeding. Keep getting more out. Ignore losses. Quick and easy.

This sort of deck tends to be incredibly effective, and as such they often dominate to urnament situations. It is pretty easy to make a very fast weenie Pre or Dom deck that uses only 1, 2, and 3 point vamps that starts out fast, bleeds very quickly, and never slows down. A local terror belongs to Steve "I bled someone once for 14 in one turn because of a stupid Misdirection" Wampler is such a speedy Pre horde deck that uses 30 (!?!?!) Social Charms. That deck wins alot.

Vote

Straight Presence Vote: The most viable version these days, largely small vampires with presence from any clan, using the same tactics in combat as Tap & Bleed. Uses hostile votes to oust prey.

Good and reliable, with combat defense from Majesty. Is completely shut down by regular +1 Intercept, however.

Titled vote: Largely Ventrue & Toreador, getting out princes and others, using permanent "on-table" votes to control the politics. Often based around Presence as well, using S:CE to avoid combat.

Often backed by obscene pool gain by way of Minion Tap/5th Tradition due to all the large princes.

Weenie Vote: Has been rendered much less effective by the new ruling regarding vote-pushing. However, can still work if a number of Praxis Seizures are thrown in. Relies on getting these out early, declaring a few small vampires princes, and passing votes on these votes. Hostile votes to oust, ignore combat losses.

Still very effective, but a bit fragile. Needs to call a praxis seizure immediately, and often will need the edge to pass it. If it can get off the ground, it will still be a potent threat.

Combat

Rush Combat: Generally Gangrel, Brujah, or Nosferatu-based. Ousts prey by putting their minions in torpor or burning them, forcing the prey to spend pool to get out more vampires. Arguably less direct than other methods. Uses directed "get-into -combat" actions to defend against voters or bleeders. (Bum's Rush, Ambush, Wynn's special action)

Very strong :-). Ok, has trouble actually ousting folks in a speedy manner, and really needs to control the table to win, but is far more viable than most people give it credit for. Rush decks need to be incredibly focused and very consistent to work, so there really isn't any room for bleed, intercept, untap, or vote cards. The Gangrel are harder to make work than the Pot clans, as they don't have the very necessary Immortal Grapple.

Intercept Combat: Tremere or Toreador with guns using Auspex to intercept the actions of their prey (and usually predator). Slightly less reliable than Rush, because it relies on intercepting others' actions, rather than actively seeking combat.

Tough, due to the needed card mix. To provide reliable intercept (so you always have enough), you need about 25-33% Auspex cards. Then you need to have enough combat to be a good fighter, but in combat you will be just as likely to draw a Intercept card as a combat card you need. Intercept decks in general are iffy because at best they get 2 VPs--the one from being the last guy at the table and the one from ousting the other last guy at the table.

As mentioned, none of these strategies is dominating with no card limits. There are also basic defenses to consider when building the deck. In general, most combat decks already have their defense against Vote and Bleed decks decided...either attack the minions hurting you, or intercept their actions.

Against bleeding, there are a few defenses aside from combat (and crunching all of the bleeder's minions). The most effective is known as Bleed Bounce. By using cards like Deflection and Telepathic Misdirection, a predator's bleeds are redirected (generally to the original victim's prey). This generally puts a Bleed deck in a deep, deep hole, as the deck is not only failing to affect the prey, but it is helping the prey come closer to ousting his own prey. Intercepting bleeds, especially stealthed bleeds is valid, but often harder to pull off than any other method. Finally, bleeding can be ignored by either gaining more pool than is removed, or racing the bleeder to the end.

Voting defense is generally divided up into intercpeting the votes, rushing the voting minions, or countering with enough votes to make the referendum fail (Debate). Again, the tactic used will likely depend on what your deck concept is. If you're already building a vote deck, Debate is probably the best defense. Some bleed decks go with debate, using Presence or Dominate to influence the voting. Others can manage to intercept the votes, and then hope to get out of combat quickly.

Combat defense is usually Avoidance, Survival, or Fighting Back. Avoidance consists of using Strike: Combat Ends to end combat, or cards that stop combat utterly (Living Manse; Mariel, Lady Thunder; Obedience, etc.). Survival is dodging the opposing minion's strikes or preventing the damage with Fortitude (generally). Fighting Back is obviously, beating up the opposing minion more than your minion gets beat up.

Crypt selection depends on your concept, as a Weenie Bleed deck won't work if you select vampires that are all 8,9, or 10 capacity. As well, it is common for most decks that do not rely on titles for voting power or defense to try to find the smallest available vampires with acceptable levels of the required disciplines. Many rush decks strive for an average crypt size of 3 to 4. Minimum crypt size, as you probably know is 12 vampires. There is no restriction against multiple copies, though having a crypt consisting of 12 or more copies of one vampire is really only the stuff of theme decks (and only very rare ones at that). Whether or not you want to have vampires that have all of the disciplines your deck is structured around may be based on other abilities that those vampires possess whether or not is necessary for all vampires to have all of the disciplines, and whether or not you decide to include Master Skill cards in your library.

Libraries, on average, contain between 10-20% master cards, with 15% being fairly standard. Most of the rest of the cards in the library are up to personal preference and deck concept. One should be very careful about the proportions of each card that is placed in a deck, though...too much of the wrong thing can leave you with nothing in your hand to use at exactly the wrong time (hand-jam). The ability to gain more pool is important to most decks, and should be considered when constructing the deck. This involves master cards or possessing the Edge over multiple turns, and is likely to be a problem for many newly-constructed decks.

As a quick summary, I'll try to organize the single-clan decks and their major variants under the major deck styles. I'll throw in the expansion clans too...(!Clan meaning the antitribu --Sabbat-- version of that clan)

Bleed

Stealth & Bleed:
Malkavian, !Malkavian, Followers of Set, and Nosferatu (obfuscate + laptop computers)

Bruise & Bleed:
Brujah, Giovanni, !Brujah, Lasombra, Toreador (celerity + presence + guns)

Tap & Bleed:
Ventrue, !Ventrue

Vote

Titled Vote:
Ventrue, Toreador, Lasombra (?)

Presence Vote:
Ventrue, Toreador, Followers of Set (with obfuscate for stealth ?)

Combat

Rush Combat:
Brujah, !Brujah, Gangrel, !Gangrel, Nosferatu, !Nosferatu, Tremere (with celerity or fortitude)

Intercept Combat: Tremere, Tzimisce, Toreador (ausepx + celerity + guns)

Beyond that, much of what you need to know as a starting player can be found at the official V:EKN web site run by White Wolf.