144 replies to this topic

[TinyGrimes]

I've been hemming and hawing for a while now about the postives and negatives of publishing this deck. The downside is netdeckers will crush their friends, and potentially alienate them from AGOT. However, it seems to me that enough people know how good Bara is by now that my deck won't add to much fuel to the fire. 

 

The positive is getting more eyeballs on the deck. I'm sure there is some deck out there that will give this a really hard time. My meta hasn't been able to find it yet, but not everyone has access to the cards. So hopefully this thread will be more of a how do we beat this deck than anything else.

 

I posted a video containing the deck and some strategy tips (near the end). I hope you enjoy playing the deck as much as I do.

 

Also here is the CardGameDB list: http://www.cardgamed...-core-deck-r142

 

[TinyGrimes]

Hmm I am trying to figure out how to publish my deck on CardgameDB as well. I have clicked submit. Is there something that I am missing?

[Barnie25]

Hmm I am trying to figure out how to publish my deck on CardgameDB as well. I have clicked submit. Is there something that I am missing?

The submit function is a bit wonky, you have to scroll through your list to review it in order to be able to submit it, or so it seems.

[mnBroncos]

New challenge haha since had the battle of fealty vs banner with Staton I'd be up for a best of three at sometime against this deck. 

[TinyGrimes]

Alright it is published here as well: http://www.cardgamed...-core-deck-r142

[LaurenF]

I'm playing a very similar deck, with Summons in case Mel/Bob don't show up. I'm not playing the table/throne combo in order to make room for Seal of the Hand. I'm also trying out the much-maligned King's Hunting Party.

[JoeFromCincinnati]

I'm playing a very similar deck, with Summons in case Mel/Bob don't show up. I'm not playing the table/throne combo in order to make room for Seal of the Hand. I'm also trying out the much-maligned King's Hunting Party.

My brother plays this deck type as well, and table wins him the game every time.

 

Not to undermine the importance of being able to stand characters, Table is a very important card for Bara, in my opinion.

 

Are you consistently winning without the reliable power from Table?

[JoeFromCincinnati]

You brought up a good point when you said, even in a fealty deck, you never feel disappointed with, really, any card you draw.

 

Whereas most factions are incomplete or waiting for expansion on a theme so you have to fill fealty decks with lackluster cards, Baratheon was given a complete 60 card deck straight out of core.

 

I think as the power creep sets in with the upcoming chapter packs, Baratheon will fall back in line with the other decks that will become complete 60 card decks.

 

We'll see what comes out for other factions in the coming sets, but right now Baratheon is just sitting above every other faction simply because every card fills a role that is very coherent and satisfying to play together.

[fozzyfosbourne]

It kind of reminds me of Criminal from Netrunner's Core. I mean, look at this deck: http://netrunnerdb.c...ame-3-gabe-deck

 

For a long time, Criminal decks looked really similar to that deck. Some pieces changed, but mostly they were just upgrading some of the utility around the core strength of the deck which stayed mostly similar. 

[stevehouston]

I actually recommend everyone run 1x Fortified Positions to deal with a Bara-heavy meta.  It works very well in Night's Watch in general, but it can help set you up for the turn you play it as well as the following turn (blanking Stannis if he's on the board). 

[kizerman86]

It can also work well with Lanni, depending on the build.  Gold Cloaks on a Fortified turn are awesome.

[Crouton]

I think as the power creep sets in with the upcoming chapter packs, Baratheon will fall back in line with the other decks that will become complete 60 card decks.
 

 

Or, the more likely thing that will happen will be that FFG prints a cards called "Melisandre, You Seek Melisandre." A 0 cost non-loyal Bara event that allows the player to search his/her deck for Melisandre and put her into their hand. Then shuffle the deck.

[Vanzig]

Been playing on both sides with basically identical bara deck, the decks I find solidly beating it maybe 50-65% when played correctly are Greyjoy-Tyrell and Greyjoy-Baratheon. These same decks I'm winning like 75% or more against non-baratheon factions, so if they can go 50-50 with bara and steam-roll non-bara, they could win tournaments just fine.

 

The lynchpin of the entire bara strat is the iron throne, because it lets you activate painted table.

Sometimes it's best to just leave Painted Table unscratched and focus entirely on Iron Throne advantage.

We Do Not Sow his throne (not hard at all for bara with 2-4 stealth) while you play your own throne Or while having Euron win a single mil or intrigue or pow and now all the Thrones are on your side of the board and Painted Table is near-impossible to activate. (Especially if he has to commit his strength to POW challenges for Red Keep or lack card draw engine entirely)

 

Your bara-fealty has 0x Put to the Torch so once GJ gets domination (which I field multiple Iron Throne for to resurrect dead people) instead of 3 free power swing in your favor, every turn 1 power is going to GJ for dom and 0 additional bonus power for Bara.

If the game drags out, you can Confiscation his 1x Lightbringer and now his deck has 1 source of Renown in the entire deck on Robert and you'll want to be pouring all your control on Rob so he doesn't get to use it much. Combine with stealing his dominance you should hit 15 first big time.

 

Fitting Tyrell characters onto Greyjoy's best gives better brute force than any fealty deck. Once you secure dom for greyjoy, the extra 2 sources of Renown should grind out a win.

Fitting Baratheon R'hllor package onto Greyjoy gives the full set of extra kneels and Seen in Flames. Seen-in-Flame that upcoming Melisandre or Robert or Stannis or any enemy trick card you don't want to deal with. Kneels combo amazingly well with Greyjoy because they get you unopposed challenges when needed (such as to destroy Iron Throne or Red Keep so you can steal them) and they nullify the big dudes in a fealty deck.

Last match I had Stannis+Lightbringer and Robert Baratheon+Bodyguard out with some other knelt stuff (thanks Stannis) and the enemy had Euron Greyjoy with Seal of the Hand (basically two 7-strength tricons with amazing ability) + Asha + Theon.
He uses False on Robert. Wins as many challenges as he wants.

Next turn he kneels Robert again, free reign of unopposed challenges with stealth + stealth + euron super stats + euron with free stand.

 

Greyjoy with no banner has a harder time. It has worse control and strength and trickery than r'hllor banner and doesn't necessarily win a long grindfest game that Randyll Tarly, Margaery and Knight of Flowers would swing over for GJ eventually.

 

That Bara deck is definitely a strong tier 1 deck, but I expect an equal number of tournament placement for strong Greyjoy-banner decks because they have the best answers to Bara, that are no less useful against non-Bara decks (I've never played a match where We Do Not Sow and Euron's anti-location stuff were definite dead draws against any faction)

[Kingsley]

It's real early to declare something the "best core deck" in a game where the core set hasn't even been publicly released yet.

[Gamaran]

Lannister Fealty does decently well against this type of Baratheon Fealty, Lannisters can strong arm them in the Intrigue and deplete their hand to really punish Baratheon slow starts, Lannister fealty can get running with any two combo of: Tyrion-Cercei-Jaime-Tywin.

 

Tywin is also one of the few cards that can go face to face with Robert and win. Hear me roar also throws a lot of curveballs to Baratheons that think they will have a easy challenge phase and end up facing a huge guy unexpected. You can slow down the Bara with A Game of Thrones or Speed things up with Power Behind the Throne.

 

Also another flaw of your deck with low kill and stall with low income plots is that you are very weak to The Things i do for Love, if i get Tyrion and/or Tywin on the board i generally have so much money floating i can just push any character you marshal back to your hand and then try to intrigue it out of you, even Stannis or Robert. If this is done turn 3-4, you might be scrapping to try to play him again if you downed him with Noble Cause in the first place.

 

Tyrion is also very good at sneaking past your big guy to get the Power challenge for The Red Keep not to trigger and with the Lannister ambush you might have to overcomit to defend the Power in fear of the money Tyrion is floating. Treachery also works nicely to stop some of the nasty effects Baratheon use to stall the game out and no faction does a better job at playing Tears of Lys than Lannister, they have just too many ways of getting it through and float so much money so often that you can never really know when exactly its going to hit.

 

Lannisters break a lot of the rules all the other houses play by and that disrupts a lot of the Baratheon soft control gameplay, they ambush people in past the time Baratheon had a chance to kneel them, they cancel effects that sometimes Baratheons count on to keep the control on the board and flush big guys out into the board for 1 gold with event past the kneel. 

[ingsve]

I wouldn't be to worried about netdecking at this point with a fealty deck. Anyone trying to build a Bara fealty deck will come up with something very similar so it's not like the decklist is a big secret or anything.

[ToucanPlay]

Been playing on both sides with basically identical bara deck, the decks I find solidly beating it maybe 50-65% when played correctly are Greyjoy-Tyrell and Greyjoy-Baratheon. These same decks I'm winning like 75% or more against non-baratheon factions, so if they can go 50-50 with bara and steam-roll non-bara, they could win tournaments just fine.

 

My Greyjoy/Bara does very well vs Bara fealty, mostly based on having a more reliable ability to have the Iron Throne/Painted Table combo, due to location control. I'd even say it wins more than 50% of the games.

 

However it has some very weak matchups. Basically anything that is intrigue-heavy. I wouldn't count on winning 75% of your games vs intrigue-heavy decks that run a few Tears of Lys. In fact, I expect to have a negative win rate vs those decks.

[stevehouston]

Anyone wonder if they consciously made Bara slightly the strongest in Core Set because they are on the damn throne at the start of the books?  

[JoeFromCincinnati]

I played in a friendly tournament last night and, as expected, the top 3 decks were Baratheon.

 

But I was very happy because I built a Tyrell/Martell deck specifically for this tournament, and it played surprisingly well against Bara.

 

In my one match against a Bara deck, I was able to match him power for power, up to 12 vs 12.

 

This is a break through because I’ve never even come within 10 power of beating Bara fealty before, let alone 3.

 

Granted, he didn’t get Mel until turn 5, and once he did, he ended up winning.

 

But without Mel, the deck is actually reasonable to play against. It’s still a pain because Rob is a free challenge win per turn and Stannis makes it really difficult to keep your army standing. But then it is just another high mil/pow beat stick deck with some gimmicks.

 

Maybe if they errata Mel to say “when she is marshalled, kneel target character.” And completely remove the R'hllor interaction, the deck could fall from godlike unbeatable to merely Tier 1.

[szczudel]

I cannot imagine so costless kneel effect to maintain in AGOT environment and keep AGOT a decent experience. 

 

They must do something about that Mel. I do not mind kneel as mechanic but it needs some limitation - you should not kneel anyone you like without any cost. There must be some cost to pay to achieve that effect. Mel stands in opposition to that statement. 

Something like - kneel character with STR not greater than the cost of played card would bring balance to the game.

 

I have no illusions - first tournament I play, Baratheons will score top places. GJ will occasionaly beat them but in Swiss tournament they WILL have best results.