Combat - why is it currently considered weak ?

Izaak wrote:

If you're facing a Ventrue vote deck, then obviously you don't start piling on all the combat cards. Play a single Aid from Bats and see what he does. Figure out how much combat defense he's packing (and what sort of cards). You don't have to worry too much about him killing you. So just play 1 card a combat (instead of 2 or 3).

It doesn't work that way. You play the Crows, they play the Majesty.

In which case you each played one card and they are 1 blood down (from Majesty).

You play just the Bats, they take the 1 and move on.

In which you played one card, and they take one damage. Then you press with the Bats and hit them again (with Bats, or if you want to conserve cards, with hands).

If they're particularly annoying they splahsed Hidden Strength as well and press against your bats.

In which you each played a card, and no one took any damage. You haven't gained anything against them, but you also haven't lost any ground against them.

Animalism thrives in an environment where people play next to zero combat defense.

Yes it does.

In any other environment it's really the weakest of the bunch.

This is where I disagree. It can routinely beat guns and due to Drawing Out the Beast + Aid from Bats. It's generally stronger than combat. It'll beat melee weapon decks, or Catatonic Fear + Target Vitals.

Heavy Fortitude decks can deal with the environmental damage from Carrion Crows, but decks that rely mainly on preventing damage from the opposing strike, have more trouble.

In which case you each played one card and they are 1 blood down (from Majesty).

In which you played one card, and they take one damage. Then you press with the Bats and hit them again (with Bats, or if you want to conserve cards, with hands).

In which you each played a card, and no one took any damage. You haven't gained anything against them, but you also haven't lost any ground against them.

You're missing a fairly important point here. You also played the rush and, more importantly, have used one of your ~16-17 actions in the game to do exactly zero damage to your prey *and* allowed your prey to play one of his defensive cards right before his turn, giving him -at worst- the same offensive options during his own turn, and likely better ones.

This is where I disagree. It can routinely beat guns and cel/pot due to Drawing Out the Beast + Aid from Bats.

I'm sorry? DotB beats celerity now? I concur it's kinda annoying (but certainly not trumping) with guns, but if the celerity deck is an actual rush deck instead of a random cel/pot bruise module, he'll just maneuver back with one of his many multipurpose celerity maneuvers and punch you for 2. Twice.

It's generally stronger than thaumaturgy combat.

"Generally" meaning thaumaturgy combat that doesn't pack Walk of Flame, which tends to be thaumaturgy combat of the bruise variety. And that still breaks about even with Animalism because you trade 2 blood for 1 blood in Tha's favor for the first few rounds.

Heavy Fortitude decks can deal with the environmental damage from Carrion Crows, but decks that rely mainly on preventing damage from the opposing strike, have more trouble.

There's a good reason why Hidden Strength, Indomitability and Rolling with the Punches are generally seen as the best prevent cards.

Izaak wrote:

You're missing a fairly important point here. You also played the rush and, more importantly, have used one of your ~16-17 actions in the game to do exactly zero damage to your prey *and* allowed your prey to play one of his defensive cards right before his turn, giving him -at worst- the same offensive options during his own turn, and likely better ones.

If your predator/prey is playing S:CE, then don't rush him when there's a good chance he has combat defense.

Get into combat with your prey from bleeding (cardlessly if needed) rather than wasting an action to block him.

If it's your predator, then get into combat when you block him.

This is where I disagree. It can routinely beat guns and cel/pot due to Drawing Out the Beast + Aid from Bats.

I'm sorry? DotB beats celerity now? I concur it's kinda annoying (but certainly not trumping) with guns, but if the celerity deck is an actual rush deck instead of a random cel/pot bruise module, he'll just maneuver back with one of his many multipurpose celerity maneuvers and punch you for 2. Twice.

DotB takes care of guns. Against you can use Terror Frenzy (sorry for the confusion). Terror Frenzy works well against a lot of other combat decks.

It's generally stronger than thaumaturgy combat.

"Generally" meaning thaumaturgy combat that doesn't pack Walk of Flame, which tends to be thaumaturgy combat of the bruise variety. And that still breaks about even with Animalism because you trade 2 blood for 1 blood in Tha's favor for the first few rounds.

In the early game, when minions have lots of blood (or if you are playing big caps with ) that's true. But if you're playing weenies, which is far more likely you don't have much blood to steal. Usually its going to be weenies vs mid-caps, so sending your weenie to torpor is worth it to do 6 damage to a mid-cap.

There has already been a recent discussion (in the past couple of weeks) regarding vs in combat.

Heavy Fortitude decks can deal with the environmental damage from Carrion Crows, but decks that rely mainly on preventing damage from the opposing strike, have more trouble.

There's a good reason why Hidden Strength, Indomitability and Rolling with the Punches are generally seen as the best prevent cards.

Rolling with the Punches yes, (but to deal with Crows + Bats, you need to spend 3 Rollings to take no damage).

Hidden Strength and Indomitability see play, but I wouldn't necessarily label them as the "best." Plus, it still takes 3 Indomitabilities to counter the damage from Crows + Bats. With 1 Hidden Strength, you get a press but you are still losing 2 blood (from damage or from X).



On a different note, oh look my karma went down again. How interesting....

I'm sorry? DotB beats celerity now? I concur it's kinda annoying (but certainly not trumping) with guns, but if the celerity deck is an actual rush deck instead of a random cel/pot bruise module, he'll just maneuver back with one of his many multipurpose celerity maneuvers and punch you for 2. Twice.

Maybe you already know and where just nitpicking but that should most certainly be a terror frenzy. DotB is mediocre, TF really makes ANI combat shine. For some reason people keep mentioning DotB though, which I always assumed was just a mistake.
EDIT: echiang just said the same right above me, I'm writing too slow obviously.

Also regarding the trade of S:CE and crows/bats, the biggest point I'd argue is not how many cards are thrown whichever way but that you lose the action without completing anything.

echiang wrote:

Combat is tough to play and there are many things that can stymie it, but it gives you a lot more options. It is easily the most effective of the three when you come upon a troublesome predator that really needs to be eliminated from the game for you to win. You can make lots of useful deals by offering to take out certain vampires. Well-timed rushes can eliminate threats and/or get other troublesome players ousted (i.e. torporizing their only blocker). So combat gives you A LOT more control over the table than either bleed or vote.

That's true, but it does not work too well for two reasons :

* to put any significative number of vampire in torpor and not coming back (I.E. one to three depending on vampire size and strategy), you need to put a lot of effort. An extreme amount if the target have even half-hearted efforts against combats.

To make thing worse, they tend to be no middle ground in combat effort : either you utterly destroy the vampire, or you do next to nothing. That's a part of why people say "combat is not fun for other player" : when a combat deck is in good shape to win, with the current rule and card pool, it generally mean that he have destroyed almost all vampire of his prey and/or predator. Then he can work to actually win.

That's the sense of the "enter combat tap both party" that I have evoked. If at least you could use combat to have some temporary advantage over a player, kind of like what Mind Rape or Spirit marionette do, it would be way better than having to transform them into fine paste.

* before doing all thoses options like cross table rush or upstream rush, you should already in reasonable shape for winning, I.E. either putting pressure on your prey or having pulled the teeths of your predator. As said above, it take a lot of time and effort, especially when you encounter a resilient target

So, to be short, combat could give you a lot of nice cross-table option if you are able to put enough combat to win combat, and enough anything else to do something else. You could also just use Horseshoe, Shattering Crescendo, Mind Rape, even Soul Jar or Brick Laying, that can also be cross-table and work way better - or, to be more precise, give for a reasonable amount of setup an advantage useable immediatly.

On a different note, oh look my karma went down again. How interesting....

Oh so you DO care!

It wasn't me (this time) actually, although I probably should have for you making yet another post that seems to be based on some sort of fantasy VTES.

Unrelated: If you'd ask me they should just get rid of this entire karma crap because it means exactly zip. You click the - because you don't like me. I click the - every time I see someone make a post that is complete nonsense and/or has nothing to do with competitive V:TES. You happened to make a lot of those lately.

Get into combat with your prey from bleeding (cardlessly if needed) rather than wasting an action to block him.

I'll assume block needs to be rush here, but really... people block those bleeds for 1 or 2 where you play? Really? That must be amazing!

Facts:

a) Animalism is good combat UNTIL you run into 1) prevent 2) S:CE 3) other combat. Since none of these see a lot of play in today's meta, Animalism rocks.
b) Celerity beats Animalism 99% of the time. The 1% is the game where the stars align and you packed EXACTLY the right mix of DotB and TF and Bats/Crows to win against a specific mix of Celerity. Oh and draw into them as well.
c) Thaumaturgy without Walk of Flame breaks even for a few rounds and then loses out. Incidentally, this is exactly what I wrote but for some reason you feel like contradicting it and then start telling it works like that. If it packs any significant amount of Walk of Flame say goodbye to Animalism.
d) Running into S:CE as Animalism is ALWAYS bad. You can think up 26 more scenario's and wrap it in pink if you want, but it's bad 100% of the time. Like, ya know, it's 100% of the time bad when someone Delays your vote and that at least untaps your guy.
e) The main selling point of Hidden Strength is that it can be free, cycles easy, and denies any rushers the Taste of Vitae *and* comes with a press against Traps, Nephandi, Grapple and that Abombwe card popularized by Brian Morris. Then the bonus-effect is that it shits on animalism and shuts down silly aggropoke. It's easily the best prevent card. Indomitability should have read Armor of Vitality (which prevents 3 at inferior fortitude). I confused the cards.

I'd assume, that someone who played for as long as you have should know all this, but apparently there is some sort of subset of experienced VTES players that do not understand basic fundamentals like this.

If you want to argue for the sake of it, feel free but then just tell me so I don't feel the need to waste my time responding to that nonsense. Your name being yellow doesn't mean you're right. In this case, like in the TWDA thread, you're just dead wrong.