All Things Shagga: The Kingsroad Cycle- Top 5

Welcome back, intrepid readers, to another instalment of All Things Shagga. We've returned after a brief hiatus due to server issues, and just plaing being awfully busy on my end. Of course, some of the server issues have been resolved, but I'm still in an awfully busy period on my end, so we don't have a deck to look at today. What we do have is one of the few remaining Top 5 Shagga card set retrospectives that we have left to address. Now don't worry though, once Fire Made Flesh is available on the site, I've got a couple interesting new decks coming your way.

The Kingsroad

A Noble Cause- Now this is a card that caused a wow factor! Most players read this and immediately had visions of renowned sugar plum fairies dancing in their heads. The ability to give darn near every character in your deck renown sounds frankly absurd at first glance, and the card seems like it would push the game in a very speedy direction. Of course, the flipside is that darn minus one draw effect really hampers your ability to keep that pressure up in a longer game. In the end, it seems that the popularity of these decks flared and sputtered, much like their individual performance in games, but boy do Shaggas like the candle that burns twice as bright!

Bloodthirst- Say what you will about whether or not this is good for the game as a whole, it has enabled essentially an entirely new decktype. Sure, it went under the radar as a Shagga card at first, and opinions were mixed on whether it would be a good Jaime card, but think about it. Bloodthirst decks take what we thought we knew about how to play the game and how to manage the challenge phase and wound up turning that on their head. The old uber-wipe decks probably qualify as one of the most tournament worthy combo decks that the LCG has ever seen and even the newer, less powerful Bloodthirst decks are still a force to be reckoned with.

Ashemark Knight- Here's one that's a bit more unassuming, much like Desperate Measures from the prior cycle. Ashemark Knight's ability actually isn't going to wow you, but he brings an amazing ability to dig for just the combo pieces you need turn after turn after turn. Of course, another thing that's not to be sneezed at is that he can in fact be the engine that enables the combo by allowing you to discard cards on purpose. Chuck some large armies for See Who is Stronger or toss some small locations for Supported by the Smith and I think you'll see what I mean.

Coldhands- Ok, ok, it's a champ card, and it's pretty darn Jaime in that it's targeted control and removal, but gosh darn it, it removes cards from the game! Does anything else do that? No! (Ok, I know that Obara Sand and Drowned Prophet do, but they only remove themselves.) How crazy is that?! I just get to knock your character out of the game completely! What's that you say? They can kill Coldands and bring it back? And I have to remove one of my own as well? Alright, I concede that they probably needed to balance it a bit, but holy crap look at that ability! It's so shiny!

Melisandre's Favor- This is another holy cow ability. You mean I just pay 3 gold and straight up take your character away from you? That's a huge swing! Ok, so it has to be something that can take attachments and it's only until the end of Dominance, but still.... I take it! It's mine! My precious.... And even better if you have enough power on that character to win me the game when I take it (dream Shagga play right there) but also good even if you just make a military challenge at me.

Actually, the Kingsroad cycle was a difficult one for me to pare the list down to just 5 choices. There were several nice engines introduced and quite a few wow effects that I just had to cut in the end to keep this list the same length as the others. What would have been on your top 5?