2C1C- Episode 180

Deck Created with CardGameDB.com Game of Thrones Deckbuilder


Total Cards: (81)

House:
House Baratheon


Agenda: (1)
1x Knights of the Realm (KotStorm)

Plot: (9)
1x Melisandre's Scheme (RotK)
1x Loyalty Money Can Buy (QoD)
1x Marched to the Wall (LoW)
1x Rule by Decree (Core)
2x The Power of Blood (Core)
2x The Power of Faith (KotStorm)
1x Valar Morghulis (Core)

Character: (45)
3x Acolyte of the Flame (TWH)
3x Brightwater Man-at-Arms (FF)
3x Dale Seaworth (AToTT)
3x Knight of Flowers (SaS)
3x Marya Seaworth (KotStorm)
3x Melisandre (RotO)
3x River Runner (TGF)
3x Royal Entourage (TTotH)
3x Stannis Baratheon (VM)
3x Vanguard Lancer (KotStorm)
3x Watcher of the Nightfire (AHM)
3x Renly Baratheon (Core)
3x Asshai Initiate (KotStorm)
3x Ser Parmen Crane (KotStorm)
3x Hedge Knight (KotStorm)

Attachment: (6)
3x Motley (Core)
3x Fanatic (RoR)

Event: (9)
3x Fiery Kiss (ODG)
3x See who is Stronger (KotStorm)
3x Nightmares (LoW)

Location: (21)
3x Aegon's Garden (Core)
3x King Robert's Chambers (Core)
3x Narrow Sea (Core)
3x Seat of Power (WotN)
3x Smuggler's Cove (KotStorm)
3x Stormlands Fiefdoms (KotStorm)
3x The Iron Throne (ASitD)
 

Deck Created with CardGameDB.com Game of Thrones Deckbuilder


Total Cards: (81)

House:
House Targaryen


Agenda: (1)
1x Heir to the Iron Throne (QoD)

Plot: (9)
1x Mad King's Legacy (Core)
1x The Aftermath (The Prize of the North)
1x Threat from the North (PotS)
1x War of Attrition (MotA)
1x Desolate Passage (TRS)
1x Dry Season (CbtC)
1x Stay of Execution (KotS)
1x Twist of Fate (APS)
1x An Empty Throne (KotS)

Character: (42)
3x Dothraki Outrider (AToTT)
3x Dragon Thief (AE)
3x Drogon (Core)
3x House Targaryen Loyalist (TPoL)
3x Jhogo (OSaS)
3x King's Landing Assassin (SaS)
3x Viserion (QoD)
3x Khal Drogo (Core)
3x Rhaegal (QoD)
3x Warlock of Qarth (QoD)
3x Shadow Parasite (HtS)
3x Shadow Seer (FtC)
3x Daenerys Targaryen (QoD)
3x True-Queen's Harbinger (QoD)

Attachment: (6)
3x Flame-Kissed (Core)
3x Harried by Dragons (VM)

Event: (9)
3x Forever Burning (Core)
3x Ambush from the Plains (QoD)
3x Pyrophobia (FtC)

Location: (24)
3x Eastern Fiefdoms (Core)
3x Great Pyramid of Meereen (AHM)
3x Khal Drogo's Tent (Core)
3x Meraxes (TBC)
3x Summer Sea (Core)
3x Temple of the Graces (Core)
3x Kingsroad Fiefdom (QoD)
3x The Red Keep (TftRK)
 

That.... actually sounds like a pretty awesome change, really. Now I almost want that to happen. It seems like it gives you so many more opportunities to try to fake your opponent out and juke them.

A thought on alternating marshalling actions, to help deal with the issue of increased technicality:

In Conquest, reducers are formatted as 'Interrupts', so they don't take up your marshalling action. If alternating marshalling was implemented in Thrones (and I think it could be a really fun change), I would recommend changing all the Seas etc to Interrupts as well. That way players won't have to worry about the technicalities of when to trigger their reducers (well, unless they're looking to cancel Seasick, but that's a different issue), and so the extra complexity that this change introduces would be minimised.

On getting rid of dominance: you have to be somewhat careful because you need an additional generation of power to keep power challenges relevant (unopposed is part of this), and for challenge meaning to escalate later in the game. Prized of course helps with this now. I will say that I agree that the dominance phase doesn't feel very exciting, although when you up the stakes (losing refugees, etc), decisions in the challenge phase do become weightier. I don't mind the phase existing, but I think maybe more effects like the Asshai Knight/Refugees should key off winning/losing dominance, so the stakes change (and increase) as the game progresses.

Another option might be the inverse of what you suggested: key it off your opponent's claim! If you 'weather' a claim 2 plot, you'll get more power for winning dom.

Alternating Marshalling actions is something I've had as a proposal for a while (and, as you propose, extend to alternating challenges in Challenges to keep *everything* consistent with the alternating structure). The idea of smoothening out the unintuitive nature of, say, choke actions in marshalling, isn't bad... but you have to be careful about the risk of potentially making initiative even less relevant.* It also further entrenches weenies, as you can play more of them until your opponent runs out of resources/cards on key turns... is that good?

Edit: *(I wrote this before Dave said exactly that. I swear)

As for influence, if you're going to 'alternate' marshalling actions and possibly want to bluff with extra gold (but still get to use it later for events), I think there's a stronger argument for merging the resource bases. I do see where influence works (targ), but in most other places it really doesn't work; the two resource bases are almost separate and therefore managing one barely influences managing the other (except in targ, where influence can act as gold sometimes). If you want to make influence better, I think it takes more than just adding more influence effects to other houses - I think you need to integrate it so using your resources one way or another is a decision point.

Edit 2 (Posting as I go along): Well... I seem to feature a lot in this cast .

Was the inclusion of Marched, which is also in the Stark deck, deliberate?

Nice episode guys.

Question, What is the name of the last song? I can see who it's made by but can't find him on Spotify.

You know, as far as getting rid of Dominance but still needing power gain to keep power challenges relevant, I do have to say that I think I like Prized even better for that, Istaril. To me that helps hammer home that my house does better when I get rid of your important stuff.

Happyred, the song title is "Fight the Sea."

Not going to rant this time, I promise! Just a single positive and a single negative (while I desperately try to limit complaints about inclusion of cards like Brightwater Man-at-Arms to self-referencing sections like this so I can have my cake and eat it too).

Firstly, props getting Dave on the cast. He's a great guy, a really intelligent player and a great thinker who I think everyone should value the opinions of, both for Targaryen specifically and the game as a whole.

Secondly, I dislike how you're handling plots - not in terms of selection, that's been broadly excellent (and I'd totally play War of Attrition all the time if it was 3 gold!), but in that I don't understand why you're not including 3 copies of each plot. I would've whined about this sooner but I only noticed it when you specifically mentioned having 2x of plots this time round. Why are you not giving the normal 3 copies? I know you can (with the obvious exceptions) only run 1 of each plot, but that didn't stop you including 3x of the Streets for instance, which you can only have 1 copy of also, or of the Chambers locations which no sane person will include 3 copies of (and 2 only in some very, very rare scenarios).

By upping it to 3 copies it means you don't have to include multiples of cards, also. It's weird seeing you add a second copy of Rule by Decree, Twist of Fate and Marched to the Wall. Why not take the opportunity to add more cards?

But otherwise, few niggles I'm repressing aside, I like the decks and the discussion a lot!

Oh, and just to weigh in on the rules thoughts:

- I think dominance is fine as it is. This might be me being a boring traditionalist "if it ain't broke" kinda guy, but I like the way it works now and wouldn't want it to change for no obvious reason. I also like effects that key off winning (or losing) dominance - like Alex mentioned, Watcher of the Nightfire is a great card to carry over for this kind of reason. I actually really dislike the include of The Iron Throne here (damn, I was doing so well not complaining!) because it broadly trivialises a part of the game I like, the balance of keeping STR standing and gold unspent for dominance.

- Not a fan of alternating marshalling/challenges. In fact, I've discussed it with Alex in the past, but I probably came across entirely moderate to him at the time - it's only now I've realised I dislike the idea! Essentially I dislike the major hit initiative's importance takes, I dislike how it removes a lot of the strategy of planning out your marshalling or challenges based on hypothetical actions your opponent may or may not take, and I dislike the added 'unruliness' - I kneel a reducer, you play a Much and More, a minute later I trigger a Sunset Sea, you play a Herald, a minute later I play a Character but by this point I've forgotten whether it was a Street of Sisters or a Street of Steel I knelt, and it will determine whether I'd rather play Enemy Informer or Castellan or whatever, etc.. This goes doubly so for Melee. It also removes the opportunity to bluff (or at least warps the opportunity into a different one that I'm not sure I prefer). Finally, for Melee, it makes it a lot harder to stop whoever's in the lead from winning (since if they're going last it means they get 3 challenges before them rather than potentially 9), and I feel like that upsets Melee's very delicate balance too much.

- I'm fine with Influence. I used to be strongly opposed to it, but I think that, if used well, it's fine. I like Ambush, Rhymes with Meek, Fire Made Flesh, Red Vengeance, even See who is Stronger (though if I were complaining about your deck choices that'd definitely be one of the ones I'd complain about ), but I'm not a fan of Westeros Bleeds, Storm the Gate and Favourable Ground - incredibly powerful cards that have this cost that is in theory difficult to play but is in practice easy. The idea of influence being a secondary resource that all houses would be expected to use in small quantities (with the amounts varying from house to house and decktype to decktype), that's a nice idea to me. The idea of "this deck is 20 influence then all the powerful influence effects because if you actually flood your deck with influence it turns out they're all undercosted", I very much dislike that. And I say that as someone who has played and loved Bara KotHH a lot for the last 18 months!

Finally finally, one last thing. I want to be able to be positive next week, so I'm going to make assumptions about your Lanni deck and pre-emptively slop you for making City of Shadows Lannister's agenda rather than something more interesting like House of Dreams. Shadows is a cool concept, but I really don't want you guys to go overboard on it and I feel like Will's (understandable) love of Shadows is going to push it to hard from the core. In particular I'm worried you're going to include Alchemist Guild Hall, which sets the new meta in stone as being a control-heavy shadows environment (particularly with the Kingsguard still around). Meanwhile, imagine the fun that could be had with a House of Dreams-themed core that had multiple interesting unique locations in it - Ashemark, Casterly Rock, The Inn at the Crossroads, Tunnels, Lannisport Brothel, (yes I am going to do this) Highgarden, all would be at least semi-playable builds without much effort and all would play differently. But I've decided to pre-judge you, because that seems reasonable on my behalf, and say "god damnit, why did you include City of Shadows, Alchemist Guild Hall, and probably Castellan??!?".Seems fair.

- Not a fan of alternating marshalling/challenges. In fact, I've discussed it with Alex in the past, but I probably came across entirely moderate to him at the time - it's only now I've realised I dislike the idea! Essentially I dislike the major hit initiative's importance takes, I dislike how it removes a lot of the strategy of planning out your marshalling or challenges based on hypothetical actions your opponent may or may not take, and I dislike the added 'unruliness' - I kneel a reducer, you play a Much and More, a minute later I trigger a Sunset Sea, you play a Herald, a minute later I play a Character but by this point I've forgotten whether it was a Street of Sisters or a Street of Steel I knelt, and it will determine whether I'd rather play Enemy Informer or Castellan or whatever, etc.. This goes doubly so for Melee. It also removes the opportunity to bluff (or at least warps the opportunity into a different one that I'm not sure I prefer). Finally, for Melee, it makes it a lot harder to stop whoever's in the lead from winning (since if they're going last it means they get 3 challenges before them rather than potentially 9), and I feel like that upsets Melee's very delicate balance too much.

 

I'm fine with Influence. I used to be strongly opposed to it, but I think that, if used well, it's fine. I like Ambush, Rhymes with Meek, Fire Made Flesh, Red Vengeance, even See who is Stronger (though if I were complaining about your deck choices that'd definitely be one of the ones I'd complain about ), but I'm not a fan of Westeros Bleeds, Storm the Gate and Favourable Ground - incredibly powerful cards that have this cost that is in theory difficult to play but is in practice easy. The idea of influence being a secondary resource that all houses would be expected to use in small quantities (with the amounts varying from house to house and decktype to decktype), that's a nice idea to me. The idea of "this deck is 20 influence then all the powerful influence effects because if you actually flood your deck with influence it turns out they're all undercosted", I very much dislike that. And I say that as someone who has played and loved Bara KotHH a lot for the last 18 months!

+1

Great ep. More vaapad!

Sorry, attending the Red Wedding this weekend delayed my response a bit, but I would say that proper card design is possible to address a couple of the issues brought up- initiative and influence.

In the case of initiative, the alternating structure of marshaling and challenges lowering the importance of initiative could be tackled by cards that trigger off of whether you win or lose initiative. What if half of the refugees worked off of winning dominance and half off of initiative? What about characters that gained deadly or renown if you were first player? There are a variety of effects that I can think of off hand that could be worked into the game to key off of initiative.

As for the ability for other houses to utilize influence, I'd argue that card design is still the determinant, rather than the concept of influence being poor. Take Plaza of Purification for instance. What if that was a Stark card instead of being in the house with all of the ambush. It would add some nice flexibility and possibly spawn a new deck type. Or imagine a hypothetical neutral event that would let you pay gold costs with influence for the duration of a round or phase?