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Deck 4 - Burninating the Peasants (aGoT LCG)
Posted by
Hastur360
,
18 July 2012
·
1,321 views
Game of Thrones Targaryen Burn Hastur360 trogdor
Next up on my deck break down list is my Targaryen Burn for A Game of Thrones LCG. I will begin by stressing I have been playing agot for about 6 months now. I am in no way an expert on this game nor am I a tournament player. I do play at the store I manage and we have close to about 10-12 players that have all been playing for roughly the same amount of time. Most of the players aren't strangers to card games or games in general. Some are very competitive and some more laid back. I think during this time every house and just about every basic deck type has flooded the meta in our environment. I know players from our group are browsing and using this fine site regularly.
So enough about that lets get on to my deck.
First off it is obviously run out of House Targaryen and I am using the Knights of the Hollow Hill (MotM) agenda. I started playing this deck awhile ago and it has grown and changed quite a bit.
Lets start with Plots, since they are exactly where I think you should start with, in just about every deck. Of course this is generally after you have figured out what House you want to play and have a basic idea for your deck. With my plots I wanted to get some BURN love, some control and some trickiness (also Gold). First up for plots is my general first turn plot, The First Snow of Winter (ODG). After reading some deck builds and some articles (and comments to them), I am really liking this as a player's answer to playing the Knights of the Hollow Hill agenda and giving up their setup. It can be quite a boon to send a few or two small cost characters back up into your opponent's hand.
After that plot I generally play it by opponent and situation. Up next might be Fury of the Dragon (AE) for a good gold turn, if I am not facing Baratheon or Greyjoy, or maybe Spending the Winter Stores (QoD) if I drew light on attachments after initial and mulligan. If I drew good with attachments or have The Hatchlings' Feast (ASitD) and I have a decent amount of influence out I may go for Threat from the North (PotS). I generally reserve Called to Court (ODG) and/or Search and Detain (HtS) for when I think my opponent may play Valar or when I have a bouncy type of character out or in hand (or both) and I want to replay them. More on the bouncers later. Retaliation! (ASoSilence) is my only 2 claim plot and I tend to use it later in the game when I have control of the board.
Next lets take a look at the characters. While designing and playing through earlier versions I found that at times I hit a lot of no attachments type of characters and sometimes characters with high strength that were hard to burn down.So I wanted to look at other possible removal for those types of characters. I also wanted to include tri-con characters as much as I could in my build to give me a fair spread of challenges.
I looked at "bouncing type" of characters. Characters that could be put into play for an effect and then bounced back out of play to be used again, hopefully. I initially had a Summer deck and used Summer Encampment (SA) to do the bouncing. Then I started looking at plots and found Called to Court and Search and Detain to be pretty useful in general and could also be more reliable than getting out Crown of Meereen (QoD) and also having out Summer Encampment. While that combo is more of a permanent every turn type thing getting it going isn't so easy unless I am willing to play Building Season (Core) along with Spending the Winter Stores. Which I am not, I am already giving my opponent an attachment (which I will more than likely discard once they use it). I also took a look again at Xaro Xoan Daxos (Core), he was tri-con, good cost, good strength and he could bounce a character back to my hand. I also came across Ambush from the Plains (QoD) (generally my inintiative is 3 or better unless I am Spending the Winter Stores, and then it can be if a Kingsroad Fiefdom (QoD) is out), this card alone will allow me to bounce many characters. It also has synergy with Magister Illyrio (VM) who in turn has good synergy with my Ambush characters and my one Shadows character, King's Landing Assassin (SaS), who is also one of my burn cards. In a pinch Maegi's Promise (QoD) can also put one of my "enter effect" characters back in play. So my bouncers consist of Ser Jorah Mormont (WLL), Daario Naharis (WLL), Dragon Thief (AE), Dragon Knight (TBC) and even Xaro Xoan Daxos, himself. They are all good plays with Ambush From the Plains, some more than others. Ser Jorah, Daario, and Xaro are all tri-cons to boot! Khal Drogo (Core) helps trigger Illyrio and can be a nice surprise on my opponent.
Ser Jorah Mormont and Daario Naharis give me a tool to deal with some of those non-attachment or high strength characters through trait hate. I also included in the deck Rhaegar's Harp (BoRF) to attach to high strength or bothersome characters to discard out with Ser Jorah and Daario.
Ser Barristan Selmy (TftH) is my main defender and one of my favorite cards. Sure if a character is immune or cannot be effected by a character ability he isn't the greatest (but looking through the card database I can only come up with about 6 characters that won't be effected). Of those 6 none are armies and can be dealt with in other ways. With Forever Burning (Core) being completely recyclable and attachments that can be regained through Lady Daenerys's Chambers (Core) you should have a decent amount of pitch-able cards. Last but not least is Jhogo (OSaS) who helps with the card draw in the deck.
Lets move on to looking at the locations. So one of thee most needed things in this deck is, INFLUENCE. I included just about as much as I could feasibly pack. First off I have two from my agenda alone, then 3 in-house fiefdoms, 3 in-house seas, 3 Kingsroad Fiefdom and The Red Keep (TftRK). Lady D's Chambers is in for attachment recycling. I included Xaro's Home (Core), Bay of Ice (KotS) and Meraxes (TBC) for card draw. Meereen Tourney Grounds (ODG) helps to burn and if I burn correctly with the amount of unique characters I have I should be able to occasionally trigger the bigger burn off of it. Also to help in the burn category I put in Aegon's Hill (TTotH). What better way to burn, than to just take it right out of your opponent's hand? It can also help you decide what to play on your turn without having to do it blindly. This is a great card to get in the opening hand.
Next up are the attachments, they are pretty self explanatory and I know I will probably take some heat (sorry couldn't help myself with the pun) for one of them. That one being Harried by Dragons (VM). I find this a great finishing card and also a great card to just eek out a challenge by. It also helps to thin my deck and draw possibilities. Flame-Kissed (Core) is pretty much the essential Burn card. It has synergy all over the place in this deck. Last is Rhaegar's Harp, and I showed earlier what it can do for synergy in the deck and can also help out with giving me an additional trait for Incinerate (VM).
Incinerate leads us into the events and for the most part I have discussed many of them earlier. Incinerate is mainly for the characters I cannot touch with attachments and possibly character abilities. Forever Burning and The Hatchling's Feast can help to lower strengths for many of the kill/discard burn effects in the deck. Ambush from the Plains and Maegi's Promise can allow me to replay entering play characters multiple times.The Shadow of the East (AToT) brings more attachment hate along with the Dragon Thief.
So there is my deck in a a very large breakdown.
A few tips on playing the deck are of course to burn down as many intrigue icon characters as you can as they are the bane of a burn deck and you do not want to discard cards unless it is on your own terms with Ser Barristan Selmy.
Try not to play too many characters out into play as you probably won't need to and this will allow you to circumvent Valar and board clearing effects. Generally have Ser Barristan, Jhogo and Illyrio out. With occassional other characters here and there, but I usually don't play every character out.
Below are some weird observations and number crunchings I did while researching my deck's effectiveness:
Incinerate has the following traits to work off of.
6 Ally
3 Knihgt
2 Lord
2 Dothraki
2 Mercenary
2 Queensguard
1 Traitor
At the very worst 1, 2 minimum in general (3 with Harp) and maximum of 6 (7 with the Harp out on a non-ally).
There are 154 characters in the game that have the No attachments trait. 24 are knight; 11 are ally; 10 are mercenary; 2 are ally/mercenary (Gold Cloaks and Veteran Spearman); 1 a knight/mercenary (Bronn, Core); 4 can have a Boon placed on them. So 39 of the 154 can be effected by Daario/Ser Jorah/Rhaegar's Harp combo. The rest can probably be burninated with Events and Character abilities.
Out of 85 Army characters generally the largest strength characters, 67 have no attachment restrictions, 55 of those 67 have 4 or greater strength; 5 are Mercenary; 1 is an Ally; 18 have a gold cost 5 or greater making them hard plays (though 13 of those can have their cost reduced in some manner, and 1 can be put directly into play by an alternate means). 26 have a gold cost of 4. My main answer to these is a combination of King's Landing Assassin, Dragon Knight, The Hatchling's Feast, Incinerate, Forever Burning, Illyrio/bouncing things/ambushing characters and watching and seeing the warning signs to hold Threat from the North. A full on Army deck will probably just steamroll this deck though.
Well thanks for slogging through the whole thing if you dared and I look forward to any comments or suggestions.
*Edit: Took out x2 The Shadow of the East for x2 Meereenese Brothel.
House (1)
House Targaryen (Core) x1
Agenda (1)
Knights of the Hollow Hill (MotM) x1
Character (20)
King's Landing Assassin (SaS) x3
Dragon Knight (TBC) x3
Ser Barristan Selmy (TftH) x2
Ser Jorah Mormont (WLL) x2
Xaro Xoan Daxos (Core) x2
Daario Naharis (WLL) x2
Khal Drogo (Core) x1
Jhogo (OSaS) x1
Magister Illyrio (VM) x2
Dragon Thief (AE) x2
Location (18)
Summer Sea (Core) x3
Eastern Fiefdoms (Core) x3
Kingsroad Fiefdom (QoD) x3
Meereen Tourney Grounds (ODG) x2
Lady Daenerys's Chambers (Core) x2
Meraxes (TBC) x1
Xaro's Home (Core) x1
Bay of Ice (KotS) x1
The Red Keep (TftRK) x1
Aegon's Hill (TTotH) x1
Meereenese Brothel (BtW) x2
Event (13)
The Shadow of the East (AToT) x2
Forever Burning (Core) x2
Maegi's Promise (QoD) x2
Ambush from the Plains (QoD) x3
The Hatchlings' Feast (ASitD) x2
Incinerate (VM) x2
Attachment (9)
Rhaegar's Harp (BoRF) x3
Flame-Kissed (Core) x3
Harried by Dragons (VM) x3
Plot (7)
Fury of the Dragon (AE) x1
Spending the Winter Stores (QoD) x1
Threat from the North (PotS) x1
Called to Court (ODG) x1
Retaliation! (ASoSilence) x1
The First Snow of Winter (ODG) x1
Search and Detain (HtS) x1
So enough about that lets get on to my deck.
First off it is obviously run out of House Targaryen and I am using the Knights of the Hollow Hill (MotM) agenda. I started playing this deck awhile ago and it has grown and changed quite a bit.
Lets start with Plots, since they are exactly where I think you should start with, in just about every deck. Of course this is generally after you have figured out what House you want to play and have a basic idea for your deck. With my plots I wanted to get some BURN love, some control and some trickiness (also Gold). First up for plots is my general first turn plot, The First Snow of Winter (ODG). After reading some deck builds and some articles (and comments to them), I am really liking this as a player's answer to playing the Knights of the Hollow Hill agenda and giving up their setup. It can be quite a boon to send a few or two small cost characters back up into your opponent's hand.
After that plot I generally play it by opponent and situation. Up next might be Fury of the Dragon (AE) for a good gold turn, if I am not facing Baratheon or Greyjoy, or maybe Spending the Winter Stores (QoD) if I drew light on attachments after initial and mulligan. If I drew good with attachments or have The Hatchlings' Feast (ASitD) and I have a decent amount of influence out I may go for Threat from the North (PotS). I generally reserve Called to Court (ODG) and/or Search and Detain (HtS) for when I think my opponent may play Valar or when I have a bouncy type of character out or in hand (or both) and I want to replay them. More on the bouncers later. Retaliation! (ASoSilence) is my only 2 claim plot and I tend to use it later in the game when I have control of the board.
Next lets take a look at the characters. While designing and playing through earlier versions I found that at times I hit a lot of no attachments type of characters and sometimes characters with high strength that were hard to burn down.So I wanted to look at other possible removal for those types of characters. I also wanted to include tri-con characters as much as I could in my build to give me a fair spread of challenges.
I looked at "bouncing type" of characters. Characters that could be put into play for an effect and then bounced back out of play to be used again, hopefully. I initially had a Summer deck and used Summer Encampment (SA) to do the bouncing. Then I started looking at plots and found Called to Court and Search and Detain to be pretty useful in general and could also be more reliable than getting out Crown of Meereen (QoD) and also having out Summer Encampment. While that combo is more of a permanent every turn type thing getting it going isn't so easy unless I am willing to play Building Season (Core) along with Spending the Winter Stores. Which I am not, I am already giving my opponent an attachment (which I will more than likely discard once they use it). I also took a look again at Xaro Xoan Daxos (Core), he was tri-con, good cost, good strength and he could bounce a character back to my hand. I also came across Ambush from the Plains (QoD) (generally my inintiative is 3 or better unless I am Spending the Winter Stores, and then it can be if a Kingsroad Fiefdom (QoD) is out), this card alone will allow me to bounce many characters. It also has synergy with Magister Illyrio (VM) who in turn has good synergy with my Ambush characters and my one Shadows character, King's Landing Assassin (SaS), who is also one of my burn cards. In a pinch Maegi's Promise (QoD) can also put one of my "enter effect" characters back in play. So my bouncers consist of Ser Jorah Mormont (WLL), Daario Naharis (WLL), Dragon Thief (AE), Dragon Knight (TBC) and even Xaro Xoan Daxos, himself. They are all good plays with Ambush From the Plains, some more than others. Ser Jorah, Daario, and Xaro are all tri-cons to boot! Khal Drogo (Core) helps trigger Illyrio and can be a nice surprise on my opponent.
Ser Jorah Mormont and Daario Naharis give me a tool to deal with some of those non-attachment or high strength characters through trait hate. I also included in the deck Rhaegar's Harp (BoRF) to attach to high strength or bothersome characters to discard out with Ser Jorah and Daario.
Ser Barristan Selmy (TftH) is my main defender and one of my favorite cards. Sure if a character is immune or cannot be effected by a character ability he isn't the greatest (but looking through the card database I can only come up with about 6 characters that won't be effected). Of those 6 none are armies and can be dealt with in other ways. With Forever Burning (Core) being completely recyclable and attachments that can be regained through Lady Daenerys's Chambers (Core) you should have a decent amount of pitch-able cards. Last but not least is Jhogo (OSaS) who helps with the card draw in the deck.
Lets move on to looking at the locations. So one of thee most needed things in this deck is, INFLUENCE. I included just about as much as I could feasibly pack. First off I have two from my agenda alone, then 3 in-house fiefdoms, 3 in-house seas, 3 Kingsroad Fiefdom and The Red Keep (TftRK). Lady D's Chambers is in for attachment recycling. I included Xaro's Home (Core), Bay of Ice (KotS) and Meraxes (TBC) for card draw. Meereen Tourney Grounds (ODG) helps to burn and if I burn correctly with the amount of unique characters I have I should be able to occasionally trigger the bigger burn off of it. Also to help in the burn category I put in Aegon's Hill (TTotH). What better way to burn, than to just take it right out of your opponent's hand? It can also help you decide what to play on your turn without having to do it blindly. This is a great card to get in the opening hand.
Next up are the attachments, they are pretty self explanatory and I know I will probably take some heat (sorry couldn't help myself with the pun) for one of them. That one being Harried by Dragons (VM). I find this a great finishing card and also a great card to just eek out a challenge by. It also helps to thin my deck and draw possibilities. Flame-Kissed (Core) is pretty much the essential Burn card. It has synergy all over the place in this deck. Last is Rhaegar's Harp, and I showed earlier what it can do for synergy in the deck and can also help out with giving me an additional trait for Incinerate (VM).
Incinerate leads us into the events and for the most part I have discussed many of them earlier. Incinerate is mainly for the characters I cannot touch with attachments and possibly character abilities. Forever Burning and The Hatchling's Feast can help to lower strengths for many of the kill/discard burn effects in the deck. Ambush from the Plains and Maegi's Promise can allow me to replay entering play characters multiple times.The Shadow of the East (AToT) brings more attachment hate along with the Dragon Thief.
So there is my deck in a a very large breakdown.
A few tips on playing the deck are of course to burn down as many intrigue icon characters as you can as they are the bane of a burn deck and you do not want to discard cards unless it is on your own terms with Ser Barristan Selmy.
Try not to play too many characters out into play as you probably won't need to and this will allow you to circumvent Valar and board clearing effects. Generally have Ser Barristan, Jhogo and Illyrio out. With occassional other characters here and there, but I usually don't play every character out.
Below are some weird observations and number crunchings I did while researching my deck's effectiveness:
Incinerate has the following traits to work off of.
6 Ally
3 Knihgt
2 Lord
2 Dothraki
2 Mercenary
2 Queensguard
1 Traitor
At the very worst 1, 2 minimum in general (3 with Harp) and maximum of 6 (7 with the Harp out on a non-ally).
There are 154 characters in the game that have the No attachments trait. 24 are knight; 11 are ally; 10 are mercenary; 2 are ally/mercenary (Gold Cloaks and Veteran Spearman); 1 a knight/mercenary (Bronn, Core); 4 can have a Boon placed on them. So 39 of the 154 can be effected by Daario/Ser Jorah/Rhaegar's Harp combo. The rest can probably be burninated with Events and Character abilities.
Out of 85 Army characters generally the largest strength characters, 67 have no attachment restrictions, 55 of those 67 have 4 or greater strength; 5 are Mercenary; 1 is an Ally; 18 have a gold cost 5 or greater making them hard plays (though 13 of those can have their cost reduced in some manner, and 1 can be put directly into play by an alternate means). 26 have a gold cost of 4. My main answer to these is a combination of King's Landing Assassin, Dragon Knight, The Hatchling's Feast, Incinerate, Forever Burning, Illyrio/bouncing things/ambushing characters and watching and seeing the warning signs to hold Threat from the North. A full on Army deck will probably just steamroll this deck though.
Well thanks for slogging through the whole thing if you dared and I look forward to any comments or suggestions.
*Edit: Took out x2 The Shadow of the East for x2 Meereenese Brothel.
House (1)
House Targaryen (Core) x1
Agenda (1)
Knights of the Hollow Hill (MotM) x1
Character (20)
King's Landing Assassin (SaS) x3
Dragon Knight (TBC) x3
Ser Barristan Selmy (TftH) x2
Ser Jorah Mormont (WLL) x2
Xaro Xoan Daxos (Core) x2
Daario Naharis (WLL) x2
Khal Drogo (Core) x1
Jhogo (OSaS) x1
Magister Illyrio (VM) x2
Dragon Thief (AE) x2
Location (18)
Summer Sea (Core) x3
Eastern Fiefdoms (Core) x3
Kingsroad Fiefdom (QoD) x3
Meereen Tourney Grounds (ODG) x2
Lady Daenerys's Chambers (Core) x2
Meraxes (TBC) x1
Xaro's Home (Core) x1
Bay of Ice (KotS) x1
The Red Keep (TftRK) x1
Aegon's Hill (TTotH) x1
Meereenese Brothel (BtW) x2
Event (13)
Forever Burning (Core) x2
Maegi's Promise (QoD) x2
Ambush from the Plains (QoD) x3
The Hatchlings' Feast (ASitD) x2
Incinerate (VM) x2
Attachment (9)
Rhaegar's Harp (BoRF) x3
Flame-Kissed (Core) x3
Harried by Dragons (VM) x3
Plot (7)
Fury of the Dragon (AE) x1
Spending the Winter Stores (QoD) x1
Threat from the North (PotS) x1
Called to Court (ODG) x1
Retaliation! (ASoSilence) x1
The First Snow of Winter (ODG) x1
Search and Detain (HtS) x1
Have you ever ran into a problem with your opponent not having allies, mercenaries, etc. to target? (Ie. If you haven't got Lady Daenerys's Chambers yet.)