Scheming on the Sands - The Doran Martell Maneuver

Scheming on the Sands – “The Doran Martell Maneuver”

“I have worked at the downfall of Tywin Lannister since the day they told me of Elia and her children.”
-Doran Martell, A Feast for Crows

It’s time for another edition of Scheming on the Sands. In this edition we’ll talk about a play I call “The Doran Martell Maneuver”.

Background

The scenario I’m about to describe below has probably been theorized by plenty of other people but so far I haven’t seen anyone elaborate or describe it. I’ve managed to pull it off once myself much to the chagrin of my opponents. I call it “The Doran Martell Maneuver” because the circumstances in order to execute it are somewhat narrow but the payoff can be huge. Additionally, it requires some attentiveness to the situation at hand, patience and a bit of planning; something that Doran Martell would appreciate and has been accused of doing too much of in A Song of Ice and Fire.

One final point about this play is that it’s not strictly a Martell only play. There are ways for other houses to execute this sort of maneuver but as you’ll see in this scenario that Martell (in my view) makes the most of it.

The Setup

First, this maneuver is only possible in a Melee game. We have three players: Martell, Lannister, and Baratheon. It is the start of the challenges phase. The Baratheon player is the first player, has the Crown Regent title. The Lannister player has the Master of Whispers title. Our hero, the Martell player, is last and has taken Hand of the King; something the other two players should not have allowed.

Here is a staged setup to help illustrate the maneuver.



For a bit of thematic flare we have the high lords from each of the houses in play. The Baratheon player is in last place with 9 power under their control. The Lannister is tied with the Martell player with 12 power under each. Also, the Lannister player has 4 gold remaining in their gold pool.

The Baratheon player has a Superior Claim (KotStorm) in hand and has done the math. If he wins a power challenge, even if it’s opposed, with the event and character renown he’ll hit 15 power and win the game. He sees that the Lannister player has only two possible defenders for the challenge and that along with his title he can easily win without any consequences that he can see. Not to risk losing on the attack the Baratheon player commits all his characters to a power challenge against the Lannister player.



The Maneuver

The Lannister player in the meantime had been hoping to ride out the turn and win dominance in order to get the massive power grab from Tywin Lannister (LotR) and win the game himself since he has 4 gold in his gold pool to activate Tywinn’s response. However, before he has the option to think on how he’ll defend the incoming challenge from the Baratheon player the Martell player indicates that he wishes to use an Any Phase action.

Note, that at this point in the challenge the players are currently at the first Player Action window of the active challenge. In this window Any Phase and Challenge triggered effects can be played by any of the players and the window only closes after all the players consecutively pass, beginning with the first player.

In this case the Martell player chooses to kneel his Paramour for the 1 influence and play The Prince's Wrath (PotS) on Tywinn Lannister. This removes all the challenge icons from the card and effectively makes Twyinn unusable for challenges. On the second pass of actions in this window the Martell player activates his Orphan of the Greenblood (PotS) and removes all the challenge icons from Ser Kevan Lannister (LotR) who would normally have a power icon since Tywinn is in play under the Lannister player’s control.



On the third pass of the player action window everyone passes and it then closes. The next framework action window then opens. There is no stealth to declare but it is irrelevant since the two characters that could have defended the challenge can no longer be legally declared as defenders since they no longer have any challenge icons. In this case the Lannister player must declare no defenders.

Since the Martell player supports the Lannister player in the Small Council he chooses to support the Lannister player and commits Doran Martell. In the second Player Action window of the challenge everyone passes and then the final framework window opens.



The Baratheon player clearly wins, but that is the intention of the Martell player. The Martell player suspects the Baratheon player has something to push him to a win so he has to do what he can when he can to deny power. At step two of the framework action window the Martell player kneels the 2 influence from his title and plays Red Vengeance (PotS) choosing to have the Baratheon player claim from himself; the result is a 0 net power gain for the Baratheon player for claim as the Baratheon player is moving 1 power from his house card back on to his house card.



The challenge was opposed so there is no additional power for that. At step 4 of the framework action window the Baratheon player claims 1 power on Stannis Baratheon (Core) and 1 power on Robert Baratheon (Core).



At this point passive effects go off and the Baratheon player would get the choice on the order; he'll choose to give Robert Baratheon his extra power first then have vigilant and vengeful take effect. Ser Cortnay Penrose (KotStorm) and Doran Martell (TGM) will both stand due to vigilant and vengeful respectively.



Now the response window to the challenge is open and by the rules the Baratheon player gets first crack at responding since he is the first player. He is doing his best to stay ahead at this point and plays Superior Claim since he won the challenge by 4 or more. Martell player plays He Calls It Thinking (PotS) which cancels the attempted power grab. The Baratheon player has nothing to more to do so responses move to the Lannister player.

In this scenario it is largely meaningless for the Lannister player as most challenge responses require you to be the losing or winning player. In this case the Lannister player is not the losing player. The support action transferred the responsibility of “defending player” to the Martell player with the exception of claim; though the Lannister player did not have to fulfill the claim due to Red Vengeance. Additionally, since in this staged scenario the Lannister player has no card in their hand or any characters with relevant triggered effects there is nothing for him to do.

With no responses to play from the Lannister player he passes and it moves to the Martell player. He starts by activating the Ellaria Sand (PotS) response taking one power away from Twyinn Lannister and moving it to her. This now puts the Martell player at 13 power.



NOTE: He Calls It Thinking should be attached to a Martell character but in the rest of the scenario photos I mistakenly placed it in the discard pile.

The Baratheon and Lannister player no longer have responses to the resolution of the challenge so it continues on to the Martell player. He then activates his next response, the Taste for Blood (PotS) on Ellaria Sand. This claims one power for Ellaria putting the Martell player at 14 power.

The Baratheon player and the Lannister player haven’t magically conjured any more responses so it goes back to the Martell player who in an act of spite takes vengeance on behalf of Doran Martell for his dead sister and kneels Areo Hotah (PotS) to kill Twyinn Lannister.

Finally, on the last pass of responses the Martell player activates Taste For Blood on Areo to have that character claim 1 power bringing the Martell player to 15 power and winning the game.



Final Thoughts

Certain choices in the scenario were made for some thematic flare but were sub-optimal. Other choices were critical and possibly game changing. Let’s break down a few important points that apply to the broader meta and not just this scenario.

Red Vengeance the Power Claim
I’m the type of person that usually saves Red Vengeance to bounce military claim back to the attacker or to another player in the game as it allows Martell to get free kills in without having to commit characters and prevents them from having to even worry about saving characters from claim.

In the case of this scenario I had the Martell player use it during a power challenge. It turned out to be a zero-sum effect but that was the point. The Martell player read the board and saw that the Baratheon player was going for a hard push to take the game. The use of Red Vengeance insured that the Baratheon got no net power gain from the challenge.

Response Use & Order
This is hugely important in the broader context of the GoT:LCG. In most real world games this is generally not a big deal as chain responses are not that common and frequently don’t directly interact with each other unless it’s a save/cancel.

Had the Martell player not had He Calls It Thinking and been unable to play Red Vengeance the Baratheon player would have won upon playing his Superior Claim since the Martell player would not have had sufficient passes in the response window to activate all three claim/steal power responses in time.

Alternatively, if the Martell player was the first player they would have had the first response and been able to activate Doran Martell to force the discard of the Superior Claim before the Baratheon player could even play it and the Martell player could have saved the cancel for something else.

Finally, only after having activated the claim grab responses and Doran Martell (if necessary), if the Martell player by chance had not yet won then he activates Areo as his last response.

So during situations like this remember to play carefully since the first player has a fair amount of power, not just in determining the order of passive effects, but also first crack at responses.

Supporting a Title
When playing in a melee don't forget that supporting a title means much more than not being able to attack the person you are supporting. It's often forgotten what people can do through a support action. Even if you don't have all the crazy Martell effects you can support a player to prevent someone else from rolling over a near defenseless player in an attempt for an easy win. Additionally, winning a challenge while supporting someone will still net you all the benefits of winning a challenge that was direct at you.

Next Time

On the next edition of Scheming on the Sands; Dorne (PotS) gets a bad rap. We’ll investigate why this is the case and find some ways to make this location a bit more useful.