The Grand Melee - Usual Suspects

Welcome back to the Grand Melee! As Regionals season is now well underway, this week’s article will have a look at some of the common archetypes you can expect to face during a Melee tournament. This is by no means a comprehensive list, rather it’s a reminder of what are think are strong decks that can be expected to perform well in the hands of an experienced player. I will try and explain their strengths and weaknesses and hopefully give a little advice into how to counter them best. Also remember you are not alone on a Melee table, and that everyone is out there to win it, so if you cannot directly hinder one of these archetypes, chances are someone else will be able to. Don’t hesitate to enlist the help of the player with the deck best-suited to fight the opposing players; especially if you are then better suited to edge them out for the win.

Let’s get this underway with a classic deck: Stark The Siege of Winterfell (LoW). This is a staple archetype, both in Joust and in Melee. I feel it is even stronger in Melee for multiple reasons. This deck will always find a weaker opponent to push its military challenges through, the Kingsguard Title really helps them get extra military wins, and finally the power provided by the agenda really helps for a game-ending power-rush. There are a few variations of this deck, but all of them focus heavily on military (doh!) with cards like Northern Cavalry Flank (SA). They will have ways of winning military challenges and cards that reward them for doing so, like No Quarter (TBC). The ways to slow them down remain the same though. Do not declare military challenges against them if you can! Keep your military defences high! No wins in military challenges means no power for them. I realise you cannot do this all the time, but even one challenge less per turn could break their chances of winning. A much easier way to hinder them is to grab the Kingsguard Title before them. This will allow you to defend against them more easily and prevent them from getting an easy redirection.

Next up is another Melee classic: Targaryen Dragons. I feel this is one of the strongest decks right now. Its sheer rush capabilities are frightening. I’ve seen them pull off first turn wins. This is especially true for those than run the Heir to the Iron Throne (QoD) agenda. Like the Siege decks, they focus on one challenge primarily, namely Power. That alone is a strong asset in Melee, meaning it will be hard to drag them away from the win. Being a very offensive deck, they might run cards like Loyalty Money Can Buy (QoD), or Lineage and Legacy (KotStorm)to protect themselves. Otherwise they will run Melee classics like Superior Claim (KotStorm) to pull off the win as soon as possible. One example of such a deck can be found here: http://www.cardgamed...e-with-dragons. Like the Siege decks, however, there are a couple of ways of hindering them. Unsurprisingly, grabbing the Crown regent before them will annoy them. But most and foremost, kill Daenerys Targaryen (QoD) on sight! She is the real engine behind this deck. And she has renown as well. Another possibility is the run Shadows and Spiders (LotR) as these decks tend to be weak in intrigue. This works exceptionally well against those that play the agenda as they usually forfeit intrigue altogether. As an added bonus this also works quite well against Siege decks.

One cannot consider strong Melee archetypes without mentioning House Baratheon. While it is no longer the ultimate powerhouse it was when the Melee format began it still has so many rush capabilities that it is always a force to consider. In my experience, the strongest stags in Melee are Asshai decks. These decks have a good spread of icons and will often be able to pick their targets to their advantage. Furthermore the The Power of Faith (KotStorm) is an extremely good closing plot. Especially when supported by Melisandre (RotO). These decks are very well rounded and can be quite difficult to stop because of that. They probably won’t win on turn one or two, but turn three is the average. In terms of fighting them I would look at character control. They need their renown and their character abilities, so cards like Frozen Moat (BtW) and Nightmares (LoW) can really hurt them. Their other issue is that they usually don’t have a massive strength, so if players collaborate, they can usually limit the number of challenges the Baratheon player can push through as they lack the cards to help them win challenges. Of course this can be a double-edged sword as the Baratheon player will know what is going to happen.

The last archetype I will mention here is what I call the Lazy Lannister. The idea behind this deck is to win power through other means than challenges. There are many cards that allow this such as Winter Festival (WotN), Orphaned Recruit (OSaS), Maester Creylen (FtC) and the infamous Infamous! (LotR) These cards allow the Lannister player to win either in the Marshalling phase or through the action of others during the challenge phase. And this is very difficult to prevent as you cannot stop doing anything during the Challenge phase. Furthermore it’s hard to stop him from recruiting anything either. This seems like a very strong deck to stop. Fortunately it is not that unstoppable. It normally doesn’t have a massive board presence, so its defences are usually weak. You can also cancel Infamous! or the Recruit. This is one of the decks that can both go horribly wrong or have a stroke of god luck on any given day and can feel unstoppable sometimes. Maybe that’s its main weakness, it’s a bit unstable to always be brutal.

Notice there are no Martell or Greyjoy decks in there. This is not because I feel they can not win a Melee but because many different archetypes are possible out of these Houses and I cannot list them all here. The field is quite open right now, as long as you play an aggressive deck The only other advice I can give you is to pack some counters, like Paper Shield (QoD). They will always come in handy. And on that bombshell, I’ll see you next week! Thanks for reading!