All Things Shagga - All The Renown

Welcome back to yet another article from everyone’s favorite author on the CardGameDB website (and yes, I’m fully aware that’s probably not accurate- just don’t disabuse me of the notion too hard). Last week, All Things Shagga entered new ground by adding Devestacia on my off weeks so that we could step the column up to a weekly appearance. We’ve discussed a couple ideas for things to do in the future, and one of those ideas is to expand the scope of the column.

Now, before you worry that we’re not going to be feeding any more goats, I will reassure you all that we’re certainly going to maintain a distinctly Shagga viewpoint to the column. The first step to continue our growth will be to try a little something different with our deck this week. Previous weeks have been centered on a particular character or mechanical interaction and the cards necessary to support that. Today, I’d like to take a look at a deck where every character is actually a key part of the overall theme by widening the focus of this build.

The renown keyword has long been considered one of the very strongest in the game, and quite possibly the strongest because it’s the only one that directly propels you toward the win condition. While chatting about the game last week with Staton, I wondered how many renown characters are available right now. Quickly, my Shagga sensibilities took over and led me toward the possibility of a deck with “all the renown.” Of course, theming a deck around this keyword leads us particularly toward Baratheon as the house choice since they have the highest concentration of renown characters, but there are enough neutral options that we’re able to round out the deck fairly well.

With a theme of this nature, we’ve wound up with such a wide spread of characters that it’s difficult to detail every single one, but I’ll hit on a handful that I find to be particular highlights.

Beric Dondarrion actually escapes notice for quite a few players due to his iconic abilities not being active without some pretty special circumstances, but don’t forget that even if you have power on your house card, he’s a four cost, three strength tricon with renown and positive traits. Deals don’t get too much more solid than that.

Joffrey Baratheon and Willas Tyrell are stars in this deck for a rather unassuming reason- they only cost two. While Willas may likely have some application to his ability, Joffrey will be left high and dry. Still, more often than not, they’ll be two cost renown characters, which are essential in trying to mitigate the higher cost glut that renown characters tend to cause.

Knight of Flowers and Robert Baratheon serve their standby role of pushing through multiple challenges, but with an interesting twist in this deck. While they’re often key targets for an opponent in the usual variety of deck, your opponent will have a much tougher time singling them out as the must deal with threat when every character you have is pushing you closer and closer to victory.

Just because all 32 characters make up the theme of the deck, doesn’t mean that we won’t need some other support cards to help round this out. As I mentioned earlier, renown characters tend to skew the deck pretty heavily toward the 4 cost range, so we need our locations to serve two purposes. First, they have to reduce costs or produce enough resources that we can reliably keep pumping out our threats turn after turn. Second, they need to help smooth out setup to offset the character base. Thankfully, playing all ten non-limited reducers that I can really helps both of these points.

With resources out of the way, the other base we need to cover to ensure the ability to keep playing our threats is draw. Conveniently, Baratheon was provided with an event that hasn’t seen a great deal of play lately, King Robert’s Debt. In the average deck, this would probably only draw one card. In the average Baratheon deck, it will more often draw more. But in our deck, it will very easily draw three as long as we have three characters to throw in on the same challenge. As well, Renly Baratheon fits nicely as a renown character for the deck, and has a very useful ability to draw.

With Renly in the deck, our plots will tend to skew toward Power Struggle plots in order to maximize the number of turns that he can be used to draw. As our Restricted card, Fury of the Stag both provides the coveted Power Struggle trait and provides five gold to spend with our reducers to play out our threat characters. Lineage and Legacy also provides the appropriate trait and gives us extra setup time to compensate for the more expensive characters, while Red Wedding and An Empty Throne can both be used to close out the game. Rounding out our plots, Loyalty Money Can Buy also provides setup time, Retaliation provides a high combination of gold and claim, and Relentless Persecution kneels out opponents’ for offense or defense while the majority of our characters are safe due to being unique.

The last bit of tech jumps back to locations for two copies of The Stormlands, which potentially adds the Power Struggle trait to the three plots that don’t normally have it in order to activate Renly. It’s even better with the other four plots though, by raising their claim by one during power challenges, which gives the deck even more power to close out games very quickly on top of the power that the characters are generating.

So, without further ado, here’s the list:

All the Renown


House (1)
House Baratheon (Core) x1

Agenda (0)

Plot (7)
Fury of the Stag (AE) x1
Lineage and Legacy (KotStorm) x1
The Red Wedding (PotS) x1
An Empty Throne (KotS) x1
Loyalty Money Can Buy (QoD) x1
Relentless Persecution (DB) x1
Retaliation! (ASoSilence) x1

Character (32)
Arena Knight (RoW) x3
Army of the Faithful (Core) x3
Beric Dondarrion (IG) x1
Brienne of Tarth (Core) x1
Former Champion (PotS) x3
Jalabhar Xho (ODG) x1
Joffrey Baratheon (PotS) x1
Jon Arryn (TTotH) x1
Knight of Flowers (SaS) x1
Knights of the Storm (KotStorm) x3
Lady Stoneheart (MotM) x1
Leyton Hightower (GotC) x1
Lyanna Stark (ODG) x1
Melisandre (RotO) x1
Qhorin Halfhand (LoW) x1
Renly Baratheon (TRS) x1
Robert Baratheon (TTotH) x1
Ser Barristan Selmy (Core) x1
Ser Eldon Estermont (MotM) x1
Ser Gerold Hightower (HtS) x1
Ser Jon Fossoway (MotA) x1
Stannis Baratheon (Core) x1
Thoros of Myr (RoR) x1
Willas Tyrell (VM) x1

Location (19)
Narrow Sea (Core) x3
Flea Bottom (TGM) x1
Great Hall (Core) x2
Ocean Road (WLL) x1
River Row (QoD) x1
Shadowblack Lane (Core) x1
Street of Silk (LotR) x1
Street of Sisters (Core) x1
Street of Steel (Core) x1
Seat of Power (WotN) x3
Highgarden (TftH) x1
King Robert's Hammer (TBoBB) x1
The Stormlands (KotStorm) x2

Event (9)
King Robert's Debt (OSaS) x3
Obey the King (KotStorm) x3
Distinct Mastery (Core) x3

Attachment (0)

Will Lentz picked up the moniker Kennon in his High School days and has used it everywhere the Internet reaches. His love of A Game of Thrones started not long after that, when he read the novels the same summer that the game launched in 2002. He finally found a store that carried the game about a month after release, and has been with it ever since.

He's been a vocal member of the community practically since its inception, and has been traveling to compete since 2005. Always the bridesmaid, but never the bride, Kennon's made the elimination round in several Regional events, been the only player to make back to back top 4 placement at two consecutive years of ChiCon (the largest AGoT tournament at that date), as well as making top 8 Joust in 2008 and final table in Melee at GenCon in 2009. In 2011, he earned his first titles, winning the LCG Days Melee competition and the Missouri Regional Joust and Overall.

In 2010, he became a founding member of the 2 Champs and a Chump, the first AGOT podcast, and in 2012 became a founding member of the Small Council initiative at CGDB.com.