First Tilt - What the FAQ Means for New Players

Welcome back to First Tilt! Remember, First Tilt is an article series devoted to new players. We strive to provide advice on deckbuilding, game play, and commentary with a specific focus on how players that are new to the game or who might have a limited card pool and what you might need to do to be competitive in a game whose card pool expands by up to 200+ cards every year.

Today we're going to talk about the thing that's been the primary topic of conversation for the most of us on the boards - FAQ 4.0! I'm going to specifically be looking at what the ramification are for you as you're building your card pool and, hopefully, to provide some analysis on what this means for new players. (Hint: I think this is a GREAT thing for new players - contrary to the opinions of some.)

Expanding House X Articles

In the past, we've created some specific deck lists for limited card pools and specific advice on how to create a competitive deck. With the release of the new FAQ, most of those decks are still intact. Here's a rundown of the decks (with links to those articles) and how they were affected:

• Expanding House Lannister
  
  • Originally had no cards on the Restricted List
  • Still able to work - now only has one: Retaliation! (ASoSilence)
• Expanding House Stark
  
  • Originally had no cards on the Restricted List
  • Now the deck has two: Meera Reed (TftH) and No Quarter (TBC)
  • Recommendations:
    
    • Remove No Quarter
    • Remove 1X Knight of the Tumblestone (Core) (that was an error - we included 3X when you could only have 2X)
    • Bump Die by the Sword (LoW) to 3X
    • Add Catelyn Stark (LoW) 1X
    • Put in 1X Guard at Riverrun (LoW) (will help bolster draw)
    • Put in 1X Street of Sisters (Core)
• Expanding House Targaryen
  
  • Originally had no cards on the Restricted List
  • Still able to work - still has no cards on the Restricted List
• Expanding House Baratheon
  
  • Originally had no cards on the Restricted List
  • Still able to work - still has no cards on the Restricted List
• Expanding House Martell
  [Edited - thanks Shadowcat for helping me with my blindness... too much time spent with Fire-Breathing Dragons, I guess]
  
  • Originally had one card on the Restricted List: The Viper's Bannermen (PotS)
  • Now adds The Scourge (ODG) and Orphan of the Greenblood (PotS).
  • Recommendations: This is a tough one. Martell was probably hardest hit by some of these changes. Losing the Orphan and The Scourge seems like FFG is trying to nerf icon control in general. Here's my non-Martell take on changes:
  • Stick with The Bannermen
  • Remove the Orphans and The Scourge
  • Add in 2X The Prince's Wrath (PotS)
  • Add in 2X Lost Oasis (AToT) to help with some add'l control
  • Add in 2X Taste for Blood (PotS) to accelerate your power grab
  • Honestly... the better advice will be to retool the deck, because well, your setups are going to stink... stay tuned. We'll try for a retool soon.
• Expanding House Greyjoy
  
  • Originally had no cards on the Restricted List
  • Still able to work - still has no cards on the Restricted List

So, as you can see, from the Expanding series, only Expanding House Stark and Expanding House Martell were affected by this latest FAQ. What does this mean for you, the new player? What this now means is that your limited pool just got a little bit better. With all of the Refugees becoming restricted, the gold curve of every deck (except perhaps Targaryen) has shifted upwards just a bit. Plus, if you don't already have the Refugees of War pack, you don't need to run out and grab it because those are likely the last cards you want filling your restricted slot (unless you really need some specific Trait synergy like Dothraki or House Bolton.)

The other thing that makes your limited pool a bit better is that a good slate of power cards have now hit the restricted list further limiting the overall power of some of the Tier 1 deck types. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that the Tier 1 decks can't compensate and still remain Tier 1, but even with that compensation, you have a better chance at fielding a decent deck than you did just a week ago.

Philosophical Musings

There have been a few people who are very concerned that somehow this new Restricted List will cause fits for newer players because they've got too much to track. I completely disagree. I think the expanded Restricted List is a huge boon for New Players. I think the people who think this is going to be hard for newer players have forgotten how new players buy cards.

New players do not typically find a deck they want and then buy all the cards for that deck. Nope - they look at what they have and try to build whatever they can with that list and then only purchase stuff when they need it. What does that typically look like? They buy a Core Set and a House Expansion or two. Now take another look at the Restricted List: there were no new cards restricted from the Core nor the Expansions.

Narrow Escape (KotStorm) has been restricted for a very long time and, while Threat from the East (QoD) is a fairly new addition - I argue that it's meaningless to the new player because they didn't buy Queen of Dragons to use Threat from the East in their Targ deck.

Overall, the majority of the cards new players purchase to start with are all still perfectly legal. And, as I illustrated above, the first packs they've probably bought after the Core+Expansions are still mostly golden. This means that, for the most part, new players are still able to get into the game, buy some packs and field a now more decent deck than they would have been able to before.

I'm actually more excited about the state of the game now than I was a month ago.

The last thing I'll say is this. If your meta isn't allowing proxies - you need to impress upon them that they should change this stance. It's the only way to expand the meta while still selling cards. I used to be against proxies, but TinyGrimes completely convinced me otherwise and my experience has proven that out. Every single player that used proxies goes out of their way to buy chapter packs to replace proxies for cards they know they'll use regularly. Plus, they tend to go on a spending spree around Regionals to ensure the deck they want to play is legal.

Proxies take a huge sting out of the Restricted List. Encourage their use and you will not be disappointed. If you're a store owner and you're reading this - you need to consider allowing proxies during League Play - you will sell more Chapter Packs if you do because more players will participate and they'll start buying cards if they're serious. If they're not serious, you're expanding the number of players who participate and you'll get a larger number of serious players that way. Really. Try it.

Well, in the future, we're hoping to put a few more deck lists together dealing with specific archetypes and what it will take for you to build a Burn deck, a Choke deck, a Maester's deck, etc. with as small a card pool as possible. So... stay tuned!