The first point to address when designing a Rush deck is that in a consistent combat deck you will need a lot of combat cards, so you will probably not have a great deal of space in your deck for other ways to oust your prey, like Bleed modifiers or damaging votes (such as Kine Resources Contested,) and as a result, your main method of ousting your prey (and hence road to victory) will be by destroying their vampires. Hopefully, by destroying their vampires, they will be forced to spend more pool to get out more vampires, which you will then kill, eventually ousting them by bleeding what little pool they have left.
Another result of the large amount of combat cards that you will need in a Rush deck is that your defenses are limited, and your best defense will be a good offense -- namely killing your predators vampires as well. As this is both your main offense as well as defense you need to be sure that every action you take and every combat you get into will (at least theoretically) end with your opponent in torpor or burned to make it worth your time. A Rush deck that revolves around hitting opponents for 3 damage once per combat or shooting them with a Magnum for 2 damage and then letting combat end will probably not be particularly effective, as most vampires can survive such a hit once or twice and still act effectively.
Thus, a good Rush deck should use either aggravated damage to send its opponents to torpor in one shot or either big regular damage strikes (5 -7 points per strike) or multiple smaller ones (2 or 3 points per strike, with multiple strikes per combat.) Aggravated damage has the advantage of sending opponents to torpor quickly, allowing you to avoid too much damage in return as well as having the possibility of burning them, but tends to send vampires to torpor with most of their blood on them so getting out again won't be all that difficult. Regular (non aggravated) damage has the advantage of reducing your opposing vampire's blood to zero and sending them to torpor that way, making it more difficult to get them out of torpor as well as costing your prey or predator more pool in the long run, but has the disadvantage of using more cards and requiring larger card combinations to be effective than aggravated damage does.
Celerity is a natural match for Potence, allowing plenty of maneuvers to get to what ever range you wish to fight at, be it close or long, as well as multiple strikes to make every round count, making the Brujah a premier combat clan. Obfuscate can provide maneuvers and presses (although not as well as Celerity,) and Animalism can provide some back up as well (mainly from Drawing out the Beast.) This makes the Nosferatu good fighters, but generally not as good as the Brujah in this arena. One of the best cards in the arsenal of any Potence user is Immortal Grapple, which will be discussed later in this article.
Along with the Haven Uncovereds you should use you Master cards for Pool gain (Blood Dolls, Minion Taps, Hunting Grounds); defense cards (Major Boon, Archon Investigation); hand cycling (The Barrens or Fragment of Nod); and a few Skill cards if you can fit them in. Try to keep the total Master card percentage fairly low, in the 10-15% range, since if you cycle your hand at a high rate and you have too many Masters you will eventually end up with a Hand full of Masters and be unable to fight effectively. The remainder of the Rush deck should revolve around appropriate combat cards and perhaps a small smattering of non combat cards, like Praxis Seizures (for vote defense and surviving Diablere) or bleed defense, but every non combat card you add to your deck increases your chance of drawing a useless card in a fight. Sure, bleed modifiers and intercept cards can be helpful, but if you regularly draw Conditionings when you need Torn Signposts your combat ability will suffer.
The bulk of your combat cards, which will probably compose around 50-75% of your deck, are dependent on what sort of combat you wish to excel in, but try to be consistent. The more focused your combat ability, the better your deck will work. Most combat disciplines have multiple means to the same end, namely killing things, and you should generally pick one angle and go with it. For instance, Potence can provide either close range hand attacks (Torn Signpost, Undead Strength, etc.) or ranged combat (Thrown Sewer Lid, etc.). If you try to utilize an even spread of both ranged and close in attacks you will occasionally benefit from your flexibility, but more often you will end up with ranged attacks to use at close range or hand attacks when stuck at long range. The better plan is to pick a good focus for your combat selection and try to excel at that. Again, using Potence as an example, if you plan on always fighting at close range you can load up your deck with Torn Signposts, Undead Strengths and Immortal Grapples, and then plan on using Drawing Out the Beast to insure close range combat, or pack plenty of Flashes for maneuvering to close range. If you plan on ranged combat (making the archetypical Brujah "Pitch" deck,) then you should pack plenty of Thrown Gates, Sewer Lids, and Flashes. The exact amount of each combat card to use is up to personal choice and experience. For instance, in a 90 card close range Potence combat deck, 10 Undead Strengths and 10 Torn Signposts are not unreasonable. Again, each discipline has multiple combat options, and it is in your best interest to pick one and go with it, rather than dabbling in all directions.
In the face of many S:CE cards you may feel that playing a Rush deck is completely futile, but there are ways to handle the dreaded S:CE. In Potence's arsenal is Immortal Grapple, one of the most powerful combat cards in the set. Immortal Grapple is played after range is determined but before strikes are picked, and once an Immortal Grapple is played, both combatants may only use Hand Strikes for the remainder of combat. This means that your opponent cannot play a S:CE card or use Dodges, Weapons of any sort, or any non Hand Strike (like Thaumaturgy or Quietus Strikes.) If you are playing a close range Potence combat deck packed with Torn Signposts and Undead Strengths, then after Immortally Grappling your victim you will pummel him into torpor and take little damage in return. To make sure your Immortal Grapple cards will be useful you need to insure close range, so pack plenty of maneuvers (probably Flashes,) or use other cards like Drawing out the Beast and Storm Sewers (both of which are powerful cards in a Nosferatu combat deck.)
Celerity has Psyche!, which can be used to start a combat over after your opponent plays S:CE, nullifying their S:CE. However, relying on Psyche! becomes a game of who has more of which card in their hand. Psyche! is a very good addition to any long range combat deck (like the "Pitch" deck,) which cannot rely on Immortal Grapple, as well as being available to clans without Potence. A less satisfying solution to S:CE is a permanent attack opportunity such as Haven Uncovered, which allows multiple attacks on the same vampire in a turn.
A great weakness of the Gangrel is that they have no access to any good anti-S:CE cards, and will suffer immensely in the face of a heavy S:CE deck. They can use Scorpion Sting to avoid Dodges, which helps them somewhat, and Dog Pack is a specific anti-S:CE card (but it is expensive and fragile,) or they can dabble in out of clan disciplines to gain access to Immortal Grapple or Psyche!
Less dangerous to a combat deck, but still a concern, are Dodges and Fortitude damage prevention. Dodges can be dealt with in the same way as S:CE, as well as by pressing into new rounds of combat (making Trap a great friend of Rush decks.) Fortitude can be a large problem, but big or multiple strikes will usually score some damage against any but an all Fortitude deck, and Skin of Steel type cards can be combated with presses again. Skin of Steel will stop all of your damage for a strike or a round, but will cost your opponent a blood to use, and if you can keep pressing they will eventually run out of either blood or Skin of Steels.
A second weakness to a Rush deck is its inability to defend itself other than by killing threats. Because of the great number of combat cards needed to make a consistent Rush deck there is little room for intercept, bleed bounce, or untapping cards. When building your deck you will inevitably come to the decision of whether or not to include Wake with Evenings Freshness (WWEF) cards, and in a good pure Rush deck I would leave them out. WWEF cards are very useful if you can intercept or bleed bounce your predator, but in a Rush deck you won't have enough of these cards to make using untap cards worthwhile. Remember again that every non combat card you add to your deck increases the possibility of drawing a useless card in a fight (which is your main purpose,) making your combats less effective, and if you are killing reliably you won't need to use intercept or Bleed Bounce.
The most overwhelming strategic problem of the Rush deck is that killing vampires does not directly work towards your goal of ousting your prey. If you kill your prey's vampires they will have to pay more pool to get out new ones, but if you are only torporizing them rather than burning them they may get out of torpor, and then you are no better off than before. Add to this that you may very well have to spend a great deal of effort killing your predator's vampires in defense, and ousting your prey will seem to be a very lengthy job.
A way to deal with this is to keep your crypt full of small vampires (2's, 3's and 4's,) to insure that you have a lot of vampires to attack with every turn. This will also help you bleed your prey quickly after all of his vampires are dead. Another way is to make sure to burn your prey's vampires, so he must pay more pool to continue acting in the game. Aggravated damage can burn vampires, as can Diablere, but if you are going to rely on Diablere you should probably use Amaranth cards to save yourself some time. You will also need to either resign yourself to having your vampires burned in a Blood Hunt or protect them with voting power by using titled vampires or Praxis Seizure/Justicar/Crusade cards.
An additional small problem to consider is that if you are constantly in combat your vampires will take a lot of abuse. Against non combat decks, you will take limited damage, but if you are in a fight with another combat deck you may get seriously mangled. Fortitude can help a great deal here by preventing damage as well as providing maneuvers and presses, making the Gangrel in a great position for combat. Clans with Celerity can use Dodge and Additional Strike cards, but this won't help you if your opponents are relying on S:CE (but then you won't be taking much damage in return.) Capitalizing on long range combat can also help you avoid damage, as well as using Steal Blood strikes (if you are the Tremere, usually). The Taste of Vitae card is a great help to combat decks, as you can refill your vampires very quickly in a fight, so these are useful in most big strike combat decks.
I have avoided discussing the use of weapons in Rush decks, as weapons tend to be fairly ineffective and should be avoided in most Rush decks. They are very expensive for what they do, and should probably be only used in defensive roles or in weird specialized combat decks.
Even with all of their potential problems, Rush decks can be very effective if designed well. Rush decks are especially effective if introduced into a play group that is not expecting combat, as your deck will be unhindered by combat defense and will shake up your play circle as everyone struggles to build decks that can deal with a new combat threat. Along with changing the local play dynamic, good Rush decks will push other players to come up with new plans for their previously powerful decks. There is nothing more satisfying than hearing the Ventrue you just Immortally Grappled say "What do you mean I can't play my Majesty?" as you pummel them into nothingness. With practice, experience and imagination, you will eventually design Rush decks that are just as effective as Stealth and Bleed or Vote decks, and a lot more fun to play.