Fire and Blood - A Different take on Knights of the Hollow Hill

Welcome back to Fire and Blood, our series focusing on House Targaryen. I wanted to spend this week's edition of FIre and Blood talking about the winner of the Moonboy classic (Brett Zeiler) and his deck. Unfortunately, a quick glance into the archives shows that I already looked at John Bruno's winning deck and Brett's is only a few cards different. He did make some interesting updates (like To Proud to Bow!) but overall, both Zeiler and Bruno used the now-famous jumper/recursion archetype to great success. I, too, have been using a Targ jumper deck most recently and I know that the deck is riding an all-time high in terms of popularity, at least in the US.

What's sortof funny to me about this is anytime you see anyone posting about how they used a Targ KoTHH they always describe it as "But not Bruno's deck...." as though this was a sickness to be avoided or if there was some trophy for being more than fifteen cards different than the Worlds deck. You know, people were running jumper decks before Worlds and its fair to say that really any top tier decktype would share a large number of cards between the different iterations of it. I really felt that Bruno's fingerprints were best seen in: 1. Popularizing the Street Waif/Long Lances combo 2. Raising the profile of Recruitment 3. Using Confession with influence 4. Unleashing Waste Their Time as the Power Struggle plot in the plot deck. You'll see that Zeiler's deck uses all four of these points.

But there's been another deck rampant in the Midwest recently, using the same house and agenda but radically different principles upon which to succeed. It eschews all four of the above points and looks to the Shadows for control. Zach Bunn, proprieter of the Covenant Store in Tulsa and TeamCovenant.com online site, recently piloted his own version of the deck to a top 4 finish in the Chicago regional, to the winning spot in the recent Valar Midwestous tournament (sortof a mini-Moonboy) and to the first Swiss ranking and overall top 4 finish at the Moonboy. Let's take a look at Zach's deck and see how his outlook on this archetype differs:

Zach Bunn – Targaryen Knights of the Hollow Hill


Total Cards (61)

House (1)
House Targaryen (Core) x1

Agenda (1)
Knights of the Hollow Hill (MotM) x1

Plot (7)
Threat from the North (PotS) x1
Rule by Decree (Core) x1
Marched to the Wall (LoW) x1
Fury of the Dragon (AE) x1
Valar Morghulis (Core) x1
City of Spiders (TftRK) x1
City of Lies (CoS) x1

Character (29)
Magister Illyrio (VM) x3
Dragon Knight (TBC) x3
Killer of the Wounded (QoD) x2
Dragon Thief (AE) x2
Khal Drogo (Core) x2
Long Lances (THoBaW) x3
Shadow Parasite (HtS) x2
King's Landing Assassin (SaS) x3
Sorrowful Man (APS) x2
Young Griff (VD) x1
The Brazen Beasts (ARotD) x1
Ser Barristan Selmy (TftH) x2
Syrio Forel (TftRK) x2
Lyanna Stark (ODG) x1

Location (12)
Eastern Fiefdoms (Core) x3
King's Landing (SaS) x3
The Dragonpit (TftRK) x2
The Red Keep (TftRK) x2
Lady Daenerys's Chambers (Core) x1
Meereen Tourney Grounds (ODG) x1

Attachment (6)
Flame-Kissed (Core) x3
Dragon Skull (CoS) x3

Event (14)
The Hatchlings' Feast (ASitD) x3
Incinerate (VM) x3
Forever Burning (Core) x3
Favorable Ground (QoD) x2
To Be a Dragon (SB) x2
Ambush from the Plains (QoD) x1


The first thing you'll notice about Zach's deck is the incredible reliance upon King's Landing for draw. There's very little card advantage built into the deck, meaning that this deck isn't as built for long, 8+ plot games but seeks to control and destroy from the outset. Only the most efficient of cards are used, with the overall cost of the characters being lower than in the Jumper archetype outlined above allowing for efficiency through lack of resources. The agenda supplies the economy in large part, meaning Zach can draw a useful card almost every time. Forever Burning gives some advantage as well, but Zach leaves Recruitment out entirely and uses only a single Ambush from the Plains, meaning his recursion is a bit lower than the Bruno version.

The second major difference is in the location base. No Aegon's Hill--the Dragonpit takes center stage instead. An oldie but a goodie, the Dragonpit combined with Lyanna Stark and the sheer amount of Shadows means a HUGE swing in STR and another leg up towards reaching that terminal effect. Brazen Beasts acts as a win accelerant here, and almost all of the events and attachments are working towards one thing only: burn. Whereas the Bruno/Zeiler archetype focuses more on "toolbox control" (control of hand, board, etc.) Zach really only wants to kill your characters. With the King's Landing Assassin and Sorrowful Man aboard, they are never safe.

The other choice that is unusual is Favorable Ground. Most Hollow Hill decks rely so heavily on their locations that a location reset is a foe to be avoided, not a tool in your own deck. However, Zach mitigates this by running fewer than normal locations. Duplicates of his key ones can protect against this event (and it is actually a good way to remove Frozen Solid in a pinch). The Red Keep goes back to shadows, allowing Zach to usually come out of the reset ahead. This card is so strong against Martell and Lannister control archetypes as well as the mirror match. Sometimes it ends up dead, but the unexpected nature combined with the sheer power makes it a bomb in this pilot's hands.

The plot deck is a bit different than Bruno's, using two City plots for some income in addition to the control of Marched, Valar, and Rule by Decree. City of Lies gets the shadows rolling while the other City provides some claim 2 and more ability to get cards into shadows. The Fury is chosen here as the Power Struggle due to its higher stats, meaning Search and Detain is left at home. That means there are no answers to House of Dreams locations in the entire deck. Either Zach couldn't fit them in or didn't see the Dreams builds as a big threat....my guess is both, but leaning towards the latter.

Looking at this deck, I see that it breaks some assumptions on T1, tournament decks. The card advantage is lower than usual. The deck is more min-maxed than is usually seen as healthy. But to me the most exciting thing is that it is SO different from the other top four Moonboy deck, giving me some hope towards healthy diversity in the meta and a continued multiplicity of tournament-ready builds. So congrats to Zach for building his own ferocious Targaryen deck and to his recent tournament success. I look forward for more championships from the House of the Dragons.

Thanks again for reading....now go burn your opponents to the ground!