All Things Shagga - Draft

Hey guys, welcome back to yet another installment of your favorite Shagga playstyle devoted bi-weekly A Game of Thrones The Card Game column. Ok, ok, nevermind the fact that it’s the only bi-weekly Shagga themed AGOT column- I’m sure it’s still your favorite anyway.

This week, I want to do two things- marvel at the fact that we’ve made it 50 articles in (wowza!) and prop OKTarg on graciously hosting a bunch of awesome people at his house over the weekend so that we could hold a draft tournament! The laid back setting, good food, and beer made it one of my top rated AGOT experiences.

This being a Shagga column, we do talk about alternate styles of play beyond the normal joust and melee from time to time. By far my favorite of those alternate formats is draft and now AGOT finally gets to enjoy it once again! For those of you unfamiliar with the format, you basically build a deck as part of the tournament. You’ll take a small set of random cards, choose one secretly, then pass what’s left to the player next to you, while the player on the other side passes you what’s left from their pack. Eventually, you construct out of what you’ve been able to acquire. There are a couple other details, like trading which direction you pass cards that make more sense once you’ve set down at an event to see them in practice. As well, you only play with five plots, have a forty card minimum deck, and have a special draft only agenda at your disposal that enables you to pick a single other house that you don’t pay out of house penalty on, though you do require an additional 5 power to win the game.

We may take a decidedly Jaime bent here as we discuss the event at Buzfest 2014, but I thought you all might like a look into my decision making process as I went through some of these packs. Before we do, though, I want to lay out a few ground rules of consideration for draft, and the order in which I generally consider them.

• Draft characters. I can’t understate how important it is to make sure that you don’t get to greedy with bombs in other categories like events and forget your normal ratios. Try to make sure that you have at least half of a deck’s worth of playable characters. Maybe even more than that in a format like this.
  
• Removal is the bomb. Repeatable removal is a hydrogen powered super bomb. In draft, players almost certainly don’t have redundancy at their disposal (see last year’s Crafting the Theory on redundancy). If they have a beastly character on the board, that’s almost certainly the only copy of it that they have. If you can remove it, they’ll be scrambling to pick up the pieces. If you can keep removing the most troublesome character each turn, they likely won’t have the card efficiencies to keep up
  
• Card advantage is king. These are small decks, with a limited pool and likely little redundancy. If you can draw or dig further, the more likely you are to hit those bomb cards in amongst the filler and put them to use. A couple turns of drawing a single extra card is huge, because your opponent is that much less likely to be doing the same.
  
• Respect the curve. You’ll want to be playing characters to the board every turn. If you get behind, the tools to reset things to your advantage are few and far between. Make certain that you’re not so loaded up on expensive beatstick cards that you can’t put at least 3 cards down on setup and/or play an extra claim soak chud each turn.
  
• Beatsticks are there to beat face! Do keep your curve in mind, but don’t be afraid to ****** up the kind of character that’s going to change the game the instant they hit the board. Just like everything else, your opponent is less likely to have an answer, so when you present a threat, they’ll really be under duress. If the stick is big enough, don’t even be afraid to go out of house to get it.

Ok, so let’s take a look at a couple rotations worth of picks. Choices in bold.


Pack A- Pick 1

Seasick, Vanguard Lancer, Shadowblack Lane, Hired Swords, House Tully Recruiter, Catelyn Stark, Robert Baratheon, Drogo’s Horde, Storm the Gate, Orphan of the Greenblood.

Ok, there are several good choices here, including soft control in the Orphan and a soft reset in Storm the Gate. However, the first is a temporary answer, and the latter can be resource intensive. Several of the weenies stand a good chance if we were in the middle or later portion of a pack, but here at the beginning, we really ought to ****** up the biggest bomb that we see in the pack if it’s at all playable in our deck. Robert might be on the more expensive side at four gold, but he ends games in a hurry if left unanswered. This can be especially important if we have a 5 power deficit to make up by playing with the Treaty agenda.

Pack A- Pick 2

House Dayne Knight, Forever Burning, Poisoned Knife, Misinformation, Hellholt Engineer, Drogon, Red Vengeance, Maester Cressen, Blockade.

Wow, there’s a couple explosive cards in this pack, so it really make me wonder what was picked before them. Those standouts are Drogon and Red Vengeance. Influence can be tough to come by unless you really draft some sub par cards to get the resources because the draft starter doesn’t really include much, so Red Vengeance out. Drogon, on the other hand, has an impressive four strength for his four cost and his stealth is likely to push across any military or power challenge that we need him to. To top it all off, he’s repeatable removal! He won’t knock much off by himself, but if you can kill a straggling one strength chud, you might just get something big with your follow up military challenge.

Pack A- Pick 3

Condemned, Guilty!, Fanatical Follower, Milk of the Poppy, Goldcloaks, Knights of the Storm, Pyromancer’s Cache.

Windmill slam pick right here folks! I don’t care if it takes us into a third house and potentially complicates our resources (at least we have the Alliance plot)- it’s a nearly unconditional extra card every single turn! Really, that considered, it’s no surprise that it was frequently used in houses other than Lannister in joust constructed before being restricted. In draft, it’s even better. The draw is more important and your opponent might not be able to remove it at all.

Pack A- Pick 4

Lord Tyrion’s Host, Fishing Net, Dornish Hermitage, Drowned Disciple, Daenerys Targaryen, Knights of the Storm, The First Snow of Winter.

Now the decision is a bit more difficult. There’s nothing particularly impressive in Baratheon or Lannister, though the Host and the Knights are respectable characters. The First Snow of Winter on the other hand, is a great soft reset plot, and one that we’re unlikely to see floating around in many packs. Daenerys Targaryen on the other hand, is pretty big effect to have on the board, and we do have a bit of Targaryen already. I hate to pass on the removal again, but I need to remind myself that characters are key. She’s a bomb as well, so Daeny it is.

Pack A- Pick 5

Dragon Theif, Condemned, Khal Drogo, Trident Reinforcements, Shade of the Evening, Poisoned Wine.

We’re firmly in the middle of the pack now, and so it’s unusual to see a character of Khal Drogo’s caliber still not chosen. Based on the play that he sees in constructed joust and the annoyance that he can be, I would expect that to carry over nicely into draft. I’ll ****** him up for sure in order to make sure of his bouncing stealth. It seems that I’m pretty firmly committed to Targaryen of some variety. Also, take note of what’s left in the pack. It’s almost entirely Targaryen. It seems that no one else is taking Targaryen for their primary house, so this bodes very well for me doing so. I’ll likely have the choicest cards with little competition.

Pack A- Pick 6

Vanguard Lancer, Hired Swords, House Tully Recruiter, Drogo’s Horde, Storm the Gate.

Well, we see more mass removal come back around, but at the moment I’m looking pretty heavily at Targaryen. There might still be a bit of a need for a Baratheon treaty, but I have hopes that I can get away with just splashing Robert so that his power grabbing can have even more impact. That leaves the choice between Hire Swords and Drogo’s Horde. Since I’ve already grabed several cards on the expensive end of the scale, I really need to respect the curve and take the Hired Swords.

Pack A- Pick 7

Forever Burning, Hellholt Engineer, Red Vengeance, Maester Cressen.

There’s still a Red Vengeance floating around? Holy cow! Is that enough to make me change houses? Eh…. Not really. It’s still at a difficult price point because of the influence investment. Forever Burning on the other hand, combos nicely with Drogon and has can be returned with influence or gold, all while being in house.

Pack A- Pick 8

Condemned, Gold Cloaks, Milk of the Poppy.

Well, I might as well take something neutral that’s left at this point. I can’t guarantee winning dominance for Condemned, but a nice cheap Milk of the Poppy stops beatsticks like an opposing Robert Baratheon right in their tracks.

Pack A- Pick 9

Knights of the Storm, Daenerys Targaryen.
It’s hardly even a choice now, is it? I should really grab up a duplicate of a very strong character like Daeny, plus she is a queen, so she gives me a better chance at drawing extra through the Pyromancer’s Cache that I took earlier.

Pack A- Pick 10

Poisoned Wine.

Life is good, eh? There’s still a reason that it’s a last pick, but I’m not sad to see it at all. Plays nicely with Drogon and can really alter challenges.

Pack B- Pick 1

Blockade, Longship Iron Victory, Tywin Lannister, Knights of the Storm, Jack of All Trades, Riverrun Messenger, Edmure’s Host, ???, Kingsmoot Hopeful, Oldtown Scholar.
Wow, honestly, this pack is pretty terrible for me. There’s nothing Targaryen at all, even counting the one event card that I couldn’t see in my picture of the pack for this writeup, and the only Baratheon card is pretty expensive, which doesn’t really make me want to delve deeper into the extra house to pick that up as my first choice. I would default to the card advantage of Longship Iron Victory, but the drawback on it makes it pretty much unplayable without a heavy Greyjoy commitment. Blockade is a great card, but I’m unlikely to have the additional resources to make it as one sided as I would like. With all of that considered, I take Jack of All Trades in order to be mindful of the curve. He’s cheap, but the flexibility of all three icons is likely to useful.

Pack B- Pick 2

Threat From the North, Drogon, The Hand’s Judgement, Enemy Informer, Riders of the Red Fork, Wars are Won with Quills, Riverrun Messenger, Much and More, Street of Sisters.
Holy crap, what a difference one rotation makes! This pack has four very viable choices for me. Street of Sisters is always a really great utility resource card that’s good on setup and accelerates the turn you play it, but I still feel like I need something higher impact in my first few picks if at all possible (see Jack of All Trades above, ugh). Much and More is a great dig card that can help me find the limited answers I have when I need them, but again, it feels like this can wait for a more midrange pick while I grab the actual answers or threats themselves early. Threat from the North is a phenomenal plot for Targaryen as anyone who’s played constructed knows, but I’m wary of it due to low gold. With the sometimes finicky resources of draft, even a soft reset worries me. Drogon on the other hand gives me great challenge capability, removal, and a duplicate of another key character for the deck, greatly increasing my odds of drawing him.

Pack B- Pick 3

Maester of Lemonwood, Seat of Power, Drogo’s Horde, Rumors of War, Fishing Net, Distinct Mastery, Riverrun Messenger, Hired Swords.

Here, I honestly probably made a mistake. The Horde I was bound to pass over due to the extreme expense and my lack of other Dothraki, so I really should have respected the curve and taken the Hired Swords to fill out my roster of cheap characters for setup and claim soak. Plus, three strength on what is arguably the most important challenge in draft for two gold is nothing to sneeze at. Instead, I was too busy thinking about my very low event count and I ought to look for a couple to pick up so that I could surprise an opponent at a key moment. Too bad I didn’t even put Distinct Mastery in my deck in the end.

Pack B- Pick 4

Maester Myles, Maester of Lemonwood, Westeros Bleeds, Distraction, Wars are Won with Quills, Shadowblack Lane, Scurvy Cutthroat.
Westeros Bleeds is tempting, but I really don’t have much influence available. Distraction is also tempting, for a solid bit of tempo in its soft control, but here I took a gamble and snatched up the Shadowblack Lane as we got into the mid pack. I don’t really have much in the way of intrigue icons yet, but I might be able to fix that, and the thought of grabbing that Street of Sisters as it comes back around so that I can have multiple non-limited locations is awfully appealing.

Pack B- Pick 5

The Citadel of Oldtown, Maester of Lemonwood, Fishing Net, Guilty!, Edmure’s Host, Seductive Promise.

Wowza, this one seems like a slam dunk for sure. There’s not anything in either of my houses, but there is that fantastic control card, Seductive Promise. With a four strength stealthy dragon, I’m very likely to win a power challenge by four strength, so the ability to generate a two character swing as I steal a clutch non-unique is just what a slower Targaryen (likely Treaty) deck wants.

Pack B- Pick 6

Longship Iron Victory, Tywin Lannister, Kinghts of the Storm, Edmure’s Host, Blockade.

Well, well, well, don’t you look familiar, Mr. Terrible Pack. It looks like there’s really only one reasonable choice here- Knights of the Storm. It’s pretty beefy so it helps with Seductive Promise and the renown will speed me on my way to 20. Plus, maybe we’ll see a Seat of Power come back around.

Pack B- Pick 7

Riders of the Red Fork, Wars are Won With Quills, Riverrun Messenger, Threat from the North.

It’s a sign! Ok, so I was already reasonably sure that no one else was delving to heavily into Targaryen, but still, I was a bit surprised to see Threat from the North come back around. It’s a strong play that I’m likely to get a little bit of combo use out of, and since I know that I have it now, I can make sure that I go a little heavier on –STR effects to take advantage of it.

Pack B- Pick 8

Drogo’s Horde, Rumors of War, Seat of Power.

Bingo! Just what I wanted! I’m honestly a little surprised to see it still floating around so late because it’s such a powerful staple for Baratheon in constructed, but it seems that the other players must have been skeptical. I’m willing to ****** it up to reduce Robert, the Knights, and probably some other stuff I may pick up.

Pack B- Pick 9

Maester Myles, Maester of Lemonwood.

Well, he is a soft control effect at least. I’m unlikely to play him myself, but at least I might be keeping a borderline useful and potentially frustrating ability out of my opponent’s hands.

Pack B- Pick 10
Guilty!

Well, they can’t all be gems, can they?

So there’s a look at how a couple packs worth of drafting went for me. I just noted the two packs this time around, but if you readers enjoy the play by play, I’d be happy to log the entire draft the next time that I’m able to play in one.

The Deck:
Buzfest Draft

House (1)
House Targaryen (Core) x1


Agenda (1)
Treaty x1


Character (23)
Hired Swords (QoD) x1
Renly Baratheon (Core) x1
Daenerys Targaryen (GotC) x2
Robert Baratheon (Core) x1
Drogon (Core) x2
Blue-Lipped Warlock (QoD) x2
Viserion (QoD) x1
The Red Viper (APS) x1
Old Red Priest (Core) x1
Killer of the Wounded (QoD) x2
Khal Drogo (Core) x1
Fiery Followers (SB) x1
Advisor to the Crown (QoD) x1
Knights of the Storm (KotStorm) x1
Vanguard Lancer (KotStorm) x2
Oldtown Scholar (FtC) x1
Jack of all Trades (KotS) x1
Maester Cressen (Core) x1


Location (11)
The Roseroad (KotStorm) x2
Flaming-Pitch Tower (TWot5K) x2
The Searoad (KotStorm) x3
Shadowblack Lane (Core) x1
Narrow Sea (Core) x1
Summer Sea (Core) x1
Seat of Power (WotN) x1


Event (3)
Forever Burning (Core) x1
Seductive Promise (Core) x2


Attachment (7)
Pyromancer's Cache (TWot5K) x1
Poisoned Wine (Core) x3
Flame-Kissed (Core) x2
Shade of the Evening (QoD) x1


Plot (5)
Threat from the North (PotS) x1
The First Snow of Winter (ODG) x1
Wildfire Assault (Core) x1
Alliance (PotS) x1
At the Gates (GotC) x1


Tournament Report:

Round 1- Sean
Sean was playing a Baratheon deck, though I can’t recall now if he had treatied. I believe he might have had a treaty to Greyjoy. I had an early lead with Drogon, a Flaming-Pitch Tower, Robert, and a couple weenies, but he deftly maneuvered me into losing them all to Storm the Gates, which I had somehow forgotten about, despite seeing previously. Next turn, I scrambled to recover, since I thought his Brienne of Tarth likely to shut down my Tower now that I couldn’t stealth around her. Thankfully, Poisoned Wine was a life saver and I spent my four gold that turn play two copies of it on his two scariest strength three characters- while my plot was Threat from the North. With his heavy hitters gone, Sean just didn’t really draw into more characters, and the Tower’s effective two claim military challenges sealed the deal.
1-0
Round 2- Rachel
Rachel was playing a Targaryen treatied to Lannister deck that I was a bit worried about since she could be using some of the same tricks as myself. She started out strong with Cersei beefed up with an Aegon’s Blade and a Blood of the Dragon. Thankfully, Blood turned out to be a Condition attachment, so my Cressen was able to take it out of commission on the next turn. With the strength boost gone, I was able to win a power challenge by 4 to knock off her other big character with the Tower(I believe it was Viserion), and military claim shortly made work of Cersei. She just wasn’t really able to recover again after that.
2-0
Round 3- Ben
Ben had drafted a Stark deck with several of the high strength Edmure’s Host that were likely to cause some issues for me by virtue of being very difficult to burn. Unfortunately for him, his deck just wasn’t very friendly to him with resources, and I landed an early Viserion who was able to knock out the couple that he did get on the board. He did have a Frozen Solid in hand at one point to blank the Tower, but since he had Alliance revealed as his plot, he opted to play a couple out of house cards instead- Lannisport Brothel and Quentyn Martell. This turned out to be his downfall, as I luckily pulled the Frozen Solid on my intrigue challenge that turn, and he was just not able to keep up with two characters dying each turn.
3-0

Thanks to the small field, and a favorable working of chance, this left me as the only undefeated player of the evening, but in the interest of more games and more excitement, the decision was made to proceed with a Top 4 cut for the tournament. This necessitated figuring Strength of Schedule, which turns out to be a pain. Keith won the coin toss to squeak in as the 4^th seed, however, and away we went!

Semi-Finals- Keith
Keith was playing a Lannister Treaty Martell deck. This is certainly something that would worry me, since the real backbone of my deck turned out to be Dragon fueled Flaming-Pitch Tower burn, which is all challenge based. If he could kneel or icon strip my characters, I was going to have a hard time. Of course, then he also revealed a five or six card setup to my three, which was likely to set him off on a very good foot most games. Unfortunately for him, I had Threat From the North available to me, and just as I fear when piloting Lannister against Targaryen in constructed, his setup was effectively negated as he lost a couple gold weenies, an Orphan of the Greenblood, and I believe something else. I couldn’t marshall much, so my Poisoned Wine to remove another character and his well timed Game of Cyvasse during the first challenge phase meant that the entire first turn was effectively a wash for each of us. Unfortunately, Keith had already inadvertently blown through quite a few of his more useful cards to get there, and my second turn Pyromancer’s Cache started giving me more options. The Red Viper also finally made an appearance in one of my games, and while I feared another Cyvasse or a Milk of the Poppy, nothing appeared and he steadily powered me on to victory.

Finals- Ben
Annnddd….. this one is a bit anticlimactic to report on, sadly. This game went almost exactly the same way as our first game. He was resource strapped and this time didn’t draw Frozen Solid. He did have a Brienne of Tarth who could have mucked up my plans, if I didn’t get a stealthy Drogon on the board ASAP. Still, I will give Ben credit for holding out and hoping that his deck gave up the goods, all the while bluffing me until I spent all of my gold and he was able to bring a Pyromancer’s Apprentice out of shadows after I had spent all of my gold to knock out my Tower. I had earlier tossed my second copy to keep icons on Drogon after Ben used the Scourge, so he was able to break a lot of my control elements. Still, I had enough other characters on the board by then that I was able to keep pushing through challenges for the win.

And there you have it, folks, the first ever All Things Shagga on draft, and probably the most Jaime installment that I’ve done so far. Did you like it? Would you like to see packs and picks for an entire draft in the future? More discussion of deckbuilding decisions out of my draft pool? Let me know in the comments.