At Your Disposal : Fame

Now this is an old card. Really old. As old as Jyhad.

But still one of the most common and effective offensive card used by combat decks. In fact, it is probably the most effective card that can deal damage to an opponent by sending his Vampires to torpor. There are some other cards that can do that too - such as Tension in the Ranks, Dragonbound etc, but they're either not as efficient as Fame, or has a cost that is not easily bypassed or absorbed.

Fame remains the undisputed leader of combat pool attack. What does Fame do?

I'm sure everybody knows. If not, you've probably not faced a good combat deck yet.

Fame will burn 3 pool off you if you have it slapped on one of your Vampire, and that Vampire goes into Torpor. After that, every Methuselah loses 1 pool every untap phase as long as the "Famous" Vampire remains in torpor. Now, remember that if the Vampire is rescued, and goes into torpor again, you get to lose another 3 pool. So, if that Vampire is repeatedly pounded into torpor, you will continue to lose 3 pool everytime that happens.

Planned well and executed well, Fame is deadly. Look at this scenario.

You have a 3-4 cap Vampire as your weenie support - most decks do. He became Famous once your predator slaps a Fame on him - and you won't usually see Sudden Reversals from other players in support of you against Fame, as it is not a big deal to any of them, except you, and that it is usually not immediately deadly - meaning you have to rely on your own Suddens against this, which to be honest, are not commonly used against Fame unless you know this situation very well.

After which, his Vampires, depending on his deck build, will start coming over to harass, ambush, bum's rush your famous Vampire. Now, unless his deck-building is somehow inefficient, or your deck is very combat able, there is a good chance that your famous Vampire will go into torpor. Following that, you immediately lose 3 pool - it's like a KRC. Supposed you got lucky and he ends his turn, you immediately lose another pool because of Fame, making it 4. So you see, by sending one of your minion into torpor, which is what combat decks do, he also makes you lose 4 pool, not to mention reducing your minion count and overall effectiveness.

Now, if you're unlucky, your predator has enough minions to work. Another minion, could just be a Web of Knives, or a random Embraced goon who will come across and rescue your famous Vampire. Remember, if you have blood on the Vampire, the rescuing Vampire can force you to burn blood to get out of torpor. Here the different combat decks will provide different solution to this - Assamites who uses aggravated damage will just happily forced your Vampire, who most probably have some blood left, to burn those blood and get out of torpor; Brujahs who had just squeezed every single drop out of your famous fella will then have to rely on interesting combos such as Humanitas and Catacombs. Or just bite the bullet and burn his own 2 blood to rescue your famous Vampire.

After that, needless to say, the next Vampire will happily come over to pound your *weaken* Vampire back into slumberland again - accompanied by a 3-pool lost.

Even if this is only executed once a round you get to lose about 4 pool every round, compounded by any bleed attacks that you may or may not be able to block due to a lack of minions. This combo is especially effective with weenie combat decks who has multiple actions and minions to do it over and over again. If the Famed target is an important or even critical Vampire that you have, and you're unable to defend against his combat assaults, then you're done for.

On a subtle level, Fame will also slow you down by making you doubly careful when taking action with that Vampire. It benefits your prey to send your Famed Vampire into torpor too, just to put you on the defensive.

Due to the 1 pool loss every round, don't be surprised that some random Vampire from across the table received urgent instruction from his Methuselah to rescue your famous minion. Fame adds up these damages quickly, and if accompanied by cards like Tension in the Ranks, or the natural combo Dragonbound, will burn 5-6 pool off you every round - it's very deadly.

There are very few ways to defend against this deadly card. Sudden Reversal and Wash are direct applications, but those are not always available. Diablerizing your famed Vampire when he is your source of pain is another option - painful but sometimes necessary. Blocking rescue attempts is costly, since it'll probably cost you another Vampire, but if you need to do that you need to do that. Throwing another Fame on another Vampire, contesting the unique card is also possible, but seldom used unless you're also a combat deck, or using it to help your ally (or even predator) to survive.

The best defense, is of course, to be able to survive combat. That however, is a totally different issue. (o.o)y