Rise of the Kraken - Holy Power

Greetings fellow pirate enthusiasts, and welcome back to Rise of the Kraken. Today I will be talking about the followers of the drowned god and their cheery revelry. This is normally the section where I hang my head in shame and apologize that the deck I'm talking about is not top tier. As of two days ago, I have absolutely no idea what is top tier anymore. The restricted list bomb FFG dropped mercifully left Greyjoy more or less untouched, though we lost our beloved refugees. Excitement and confusion are sure to follow.

The Greyjoys have always been close to the sea, and the worship of "The Drowned God" is pervasive in their traditions. The Drowned God is not a particularly friendly deity, as to join up you get drowned right off the bat. For your services you get to attend some sort of poorly articulated underwater banquet at the bottom of the sea if you die near the ocean.

Worship of the drowned god translates into our card environment with some of the most resilient characters around. I'll go through the goals, the key cards, a few variants, and then talk about some of the issues with the Drowned God.

Deck Strategy
The common thread of the holy decks is comical levels of resilience. With enough saves and friendly triggers off of saves, the opponent killing your characters is frequently better for you than for them. While there are several different builds that work, all of them have weaponized valar. You should have an excessive number of saves to build up an excessive number of characters. Control and subsequent victory come from building up enormous volumes of characters that can endure through resets.

The deck has three critical plots, Valar Morghulis (Core), The Power of Faith (KotStorm) #1 and The Power of Faith (KotStorm) #2. Generally the first few turns are spent setting up, and then there's the Valar to clear their board (notice not your board) and then everyone's favorite Rise of the Kraken (KotS) to bring it home. The two Power of Faith turns can net a good chunk of power if you've got some renown out but are also good turns to win a load of challenges even when both yours and their board are flooded.

Key Cards

The Followers of the Drowned God
Aeron Damphair (VM) - He turns your saves into card draw (a weakness of Greyjoy) as a charagenda, and is also an very good character even after this.
Tarle the Thrice-Drowned (RotO) - He saves himself repeatedly, gets power, has a cup crest. As a side note, be careful saving him for claim, as you'll probably want him to save himself through both resets (yours, theirs).
Moqorro (VD) -We'll ignore the whole wrong god thing because his ability is so wonderfully Greyjoy. Taking a character who should be dead and instead making them a big angry monster is very good, especially against burn.
Victarion Greyjoy (VD) -Questionable God(liness), but a very good character. Renown on a holy character is great during your PoF turns.

The Meat - These are most of the Greyjoy characters with a holy crest, and throwing in holy neutrals is not a terrible idea. Many of you will argue they are not good cards. You are right. The abilities are frequently sort of meh, but the little cup in the corner is why they are there.
Drowned Prophet (AE) - If you saw this card and immediately didn't try to figure out how to reliably get out 8 influence, I don't understand you. If you want to know how to reliably get eight influence out from Greyjoy, the only answer is to cheat. I only condone this if you get away with it.
Drowned Disciple (KotS) - 3 gold for a 1 str card! n00b! Granted he's a dead card against burn, but he's got the right icons, and you will find the stealth useful for activating:
Follower of Two Gods (CD)-1 gold. Has cup. That's really all you need, but the nice trait and potential for two challenges are handy.

The Support - These are the key things to have supporting the holy deck. There is some flexibility depending on what else you are running, but these are pretty much always useful.
Confession (KotS) - If you will reliably have a holy character out, especially a cheap one (we're looking at you Mr. Follower), this card is very powerful. The "look at their hand" is good in and of itself, but getting to remove whatever scares you the most at the time is a great way to take away some unpleasant surprises.

Driftwood Crown (MotM) -I liked this card a lot before, and the life expectancy of attachments just went through the roof. The intrigue icon is hard to come by, and letting your big non-holy characters (Baelor Blacktyde (TIoR) etc.) swing for 3 challenges on your PoF turns is a big bonus.
Save Piles. There's not really one specific card here, but things like The Iron Mines (KotS), Risen from the Sea (KotS), and even The Iron Cliffs (HtS) will really make your board close to unkillable.


Some Deck Building Options
There are many ways to fill out the holy deck, but I'll talk about a few that only make sense if you're going to invest a substantial number of card slots in them. If you still have slots left over, I advise you use the search engine to find every card with "save" or "cancel" in the text.

Warships - This is specifically about the non-kneeling ones that are such good friends with Naval Escort (ASitD). If the goal is to keep your board totally saturated with unkillable characters, the easiest way to insure you win challenges on offense and defense is to make each of your boatswains into a Balarion. This involves things like Captured Cog (AHM) and River Blockade (RoR) which are useful on their own, but shine when combined with naval escorts. If you manage to get 6 or seven characters out with five or six boats that can feed naval escort, you should not be pretty set to win every challenge. Warships also synergize well with cleaning up after resets, as they are not affected by valar.

The other perk of this strategy involves reading the tea leaves and interpreting the omens given by the Drowned God Fantasy Flight. When I see cards like the Victarion Greyjoy (VD), I think maybe holy pirates and warships are supposed to work well together. When I see new packs hit with things like the Longship Golden Storm I giggle because I never matured correctly, but then it says to me that FFG is trying to make ships a thing in holy decks. Thus, while the new boat is of debatable use, it makes it seem somewhat reasonable that this relationship will get more love from the developers in the near future. If you are running Night's Watch and hoping the new round of packs will put your deck over the top, I wish you the best of luck.

Valaring for fun and profit - The holy deck is a fairly plot-centric deck, as your power of The Power of Faith (KotStorm) turns will feel like a very different animal from your other turns, and Valar Morghulis (Core) is essentially the best weapon in your arsenal. A very fun variation of this deck aims to cycle through your plots at a crazy rate to valar frequently and make sure PoF has a maximum up time. Bran Stark (Core), Island Rookery (TRS), Vale Rookery (TRS), and plots like Bungled Orders (OSaS) can have you sailing through your plot deck to get to the ones you love. Being able to Rise of the Kraken (KotS) on the same turn you valared can net you an impressive power grab if you managed to save most of your board (which you should be able to do). This is an extremely entertaining variation, and while not overly reliable/powerful, it is very fun.


Violent Left Turn Into Winter
As a general rule, deck building ends up being a personal choice. It's always good to get more people's perspectives, especially if your baseline is foolishly accepting what Gangle says. Another player (thanks Ire), another meta, a completely different take. He's taken the holy theme into winter and plays it as somewhat of a rush deck. This has several clever advantages that I clearly thought of before he pointed them out. Sam can really help your draw, and if you get the driftwood crown on Wintertime Marauders (ACoS), your power of faiths suddenly become cheat codes. My favorite subtlety is from the delightful mind games. As soon as you drop a squid house card with kings of winter on it, your opponent will invariably sigh and prepare for a miserable choking. The one thing better than an overwhelming rush is an unexpected overwhelming rush, so this will give you a better shot at picking up the unopposed power you need to win quickly.

A wonderful thing about the game is how different opinions develop based on different experiences. Ire is very fond of the old Aeron Damphair (KotS) and Priest of the Drowned God (KotS), both of which I have left decomposing in the icy depths of my card drawer for years. He piloted this deck well in a competitive setting, and while not being a tier 1 cookie cutter, it held it's own very well. The great thing about deck building is making a deck that suits your style and personal preference (even if his is wrong).

Agenda and Restricted Card
This just got interesting... As for a restricted card, there's not really a critical one. Refugees are now restricted, but there's not really anything on the list that cries out as a huge boost.
For the agenda, I more or less always use the Aeron Charagenda. Your card draw is a horrendous weakness without him, and your characters should be dying and being saved with great frequency.

Playing a Holy Deck
While most holy decks are very rush oriented. The Greyjoy holy rush I've found doesn't work overly well for the critical reason that your power grab is just not that great. Baratheon holy rush decks have Mel and 4000 characters with renown. You do not. They can win on the second turn (or first...I've fallen victim to this...). I've found that the beauty of Greyjoy holy decks is a much longer game where your board should just keep growing.

I frequently feel like I am behind the first few plots as I establish the board, but even more than most Greyjoy decks, this is designed to swing the game with valar. After valars, you should have most of your board still intact, and thus should be able to take advantage. In my experience Power of Faith is great for ensuring that you win challenges when both you and your opponent have heavy board presence, as you can attack with all your characters multiple times and then still have them available for defense.

While I had a specific matchup section, my mind is still blown by the alterations that are going to have to come to some top tier decks, so I'll just speak generally. The weaknesses of this deck are almost always card draw and power grabbing. Despite power of faith almost always being associated with rushes, I think this deck works better over a longer game where the power of your saves and resilience can really shine. For card draw, Aeron is great, though the opponent will frequently just stop military challenges that have a result of kneeling Maester Wendamyr (KotS) to feed you cards. The draw boats end up feeling like a must. Also, it is critical to notice that the motto is "what is dead can never die." What is dead can most certainly be discarded... Burn decks are 0 fun, though Moqorro (VD) gives some glimmer of hope...

Quick Note About Melee
As soon as you read something like "Power grab is a weakness" melee should instantly sound off limits. Unfortunately with melee games always seeming to end on the second plot, the resilience of these decks will just make your opponents seek out other victims while you sit with 5 power. It's fun to screw up people's plans by valaring repeatedly, but you're probably better suited to look elsewhere for victories beyond moral ones.

Thanks for reading, and check back in 2 weeks for JCWamma continuing his heartless discussion of clawing your way to victory. He'll be going through some of the strategy for building a championship caliber deck. While no one really knows exactly what that looks like after the FAQuake, the philosophy still applies.