Rise of the Kraken - Our Way is The Old Way

This time on Rise of the Kraken we will be taking a look at the shiny new Greyjoy toy, The Old Way (FF). Over this last cycle FFG have made sure every house has its own agenda, and The Old Way is ours.

First off, let's start with a good ol' batch of negativity - this agenda does not seem to be too powerful. Essentially what it does is make every challenge unopposed. The only exceptions are challenges where one player has a hidden STR pump. Now, Greyjoy has a fair few STR pumps, most notably Longship Iron Victory (KotS) and Naval Escort (ASitD), but because these aren't hidden, an opponent will often just give you unopposed power instead.

So, unopposed power is great, right? It's how you win games after all. Well, true, but Greyjoy actually doesn't have as many strong cards working off the theme as you'd think. There's a few, for sure - The Reader (TGF), Rise of the Kraken (KotS), Hammerhorn Raiders (THtW) - but for the most part the effects are either over-costed or just kinda mediocre.

In short, The Old Way just doesn't impact the game significantly. What it does do however, is be fun. It lets you create a thematic feel with the Greyjoys throwing down in ruthless fashion - like it or not, their way is The Old Way. And what's more, despite my opening negativity, perfectly strong decks can be built around it.

When you look at this agenda, your gut instinct says "this will be perfect for my high claim aggro deck!", but really ask yourself, how much different does killing a participating character make when you're trying to wipe the board with military challenges each turn anyway? No, what this agenda says, 90% of the time, is "challenges are unopposed". And what decktype benefits the most from unopposed challenges? Why, Rush of course!

In Joust Greyjoy aren't too well-known for Rush, but in Melee (a subject I look to return to in the near future) the house of the squid won both Worlds and Stahleck's Melee championships in 2013. The builds were far from identical, but Ryan Jones's Worlds-winning Melee deck translates over very well to Joust - to the extent that he played it in Joust too, changing only a couple of cards, and performed well enough that he was able to secure the Overall Championship.

What is this magical deck? Holy Rush. Marrying this type with The Old Way has a few different advantages:

• First and foremost, it's a Rush deck. Unopposed power means we reach 15 quicker. Simple enough.
• Because Holy decks skew heavier on intrigue than a typical Greyjoy deck it means we actually get three challenges rather than two to put the opponent in a difficult situation with the agenda.
• We will look to push hard on our two The Power of Faith (KotStorm) turns, and on those two turns we will almost certainly have more STR on attack than the opponent will on all three challenges, making these three turns even more potent than they normally would be.
• In our Holy characters we have a list of characters that synergise amazingly well with the agenda all-round, which I'll get into in more detail shortly.
• There is, trust me, no sweeter feeling than winning by losing a challenge and saving the character who would've died to the agenda with Sacrificed to Two Gods (ARotD) to get the 15th power. No. Sweeter. Feeling.

So now that we're thoroughly convinced that this is the deck/agenda pairing for us, how to build it? Well, firstly let's look at the Holy characters we have.

Aeron Damphair (KotS) is an obvious choice. In a normal Holy deck I can actually see a case for running Aeron Damphair (VM) instead for the intrigue icon, but here we need the resilience that he offers. With that decision made, let's flesh him out with some quality non-uniques. In the current meta, with Ally-hate reasonably uncommon, Godswood Attendant (KotS) is a thoroughly underrated neutral card. On a Power of Faith turn that trigger can prove very nice. Note that you don't have to discard the card, only you get to see it, and you can choose any player's deck including your own. Filtering what you can draw is a very underrated, powerful tool. Priest of the Drowned God (KotS) is perfect for this deck, thanks to the consummate ease with which he can interfere with challenge maths. Drowned Disciple (KotS) is always a frustrating card due to the low STR, but ultimately the prospect of him becoming a non-kneeler with all three icons and stealth on the Power of Faith rounds is too strong to pass up.

Finally for non-uniques, on the cheaper end Greyjoy have two options - one of them amazing, one of them thoroughly rubbish but still worth including to round out the cost curve. Look at Damphair's Drowned (FaI) and Follower of Two Gods (CD), then back to me, and tell me which one's which. This should not prove tricky.

On the other unique characters, we have some very nice options. Victarion Greyjoy (VD) will always be a powerful rush card due to being a non-kneeler with Renown, but his passive text can also help mess with challenge maths. Moqorro (VD) is both a strong body and also a great save, particularly if you can trigger it in the challenge phase to (say it with me) help mess with challenge maths. The last in-house Holy character we'll be including, Tarle the Thrice-Drowned (RotO), was basically purpose-built for this agenda. On the rare occasion our opponent can beat us in a challenge when we attack, they're just feeding us more power.

Finally for the Holy guys, there's a couple of solid neutral choices - Thoros of Myr (RoR) is a cheaper Victarion (albeit without the challenge maths manipulation or Greyjoy house affiliation), and High Septon (LotR) is, like Tarle, putting the opponent in a delightful catch-22 situation.

For the rest of the character base we essentially want the obvious choices for most Greyjoy decks right now. The only character I'm going to draw particular attention to is Asha Greyjoy (FF), who was presumably designed with this agenda in mind - on attack, having a naval enhancement on all three challenge icons is great for messing with the opponent's head, and on defense, if we have less power on our house she can oppose a challenge without dying.

In the location base, we essentially have a choice between "Warship or non-Warship?" This example build goes without the 'ships, simply for reasons of space. This does deny us some STR pump capabilities and makes Victarion worse, but ultimately I think it's better to focus more on the power-grab, and a card like Naval Escort is good fun for making the opponent go insane but isn't helping us hit 15 with the utmost speed.

The rest fills itself out reasonably simply - with cheap holy characters we want Confession (KotS), a great card for pulling nasty effects out of the opponent's hand (particularly the likes of Westeros Bleeds (Core), a card that's otherwise trouble for us). Sacrificed to Two Gods was already mentioned as being ideal for this deck. The plots write themselves for the most part too.

There is a choice on restricted. I went with Fury of the Kraken (AE) here for a couple of different reasons - firstly, it's a great card; secondly, it enables To Be a Kraken (SB), a tremendous answer to kneel decks that otherwise prove problematic (and to a lesser extent, an answer to burn); and thirdly, one of the weaknesses of this deck is draw (we're generally trying to win before card advantage becomes a huge problem), so to offset that I'm running Bay of Ice (KotS), and the high initiative value helps a lot there.

Other principal options for your restricted would include Island Refugee (RoW) (improving setup is always good for rush), Narrow Escape (KotStorm) (adding some more resilience is very good, especially since most of our power won't be on characters) and Asha Greyjoy (WLL) (her other version is amazing, but a non-kneeler with Renown is obviously great for Rush).

Without further adieu, here's my example build.

"Our Way is the Old Way"

Total Cards: (60)

House:
House Greyjoy

Agenda: (1)
1x The Old Way (FF)

Plot: (7)
1x Fury of the Kraken (AE)
2x The Power of Faith (KotStorm)
1x Rise of the Kraken (KotS)
1x Take Them by Surprise (LoW)
1x Forgotten Plans (KotStorm)
1x Valar Morghulis (Core)

Character: (30)
2x Aeron Damphair (KotS)
3x Damphair's Drowned (FaI)
2x Drowned Disciple (KotS)
2x Follower of Two Gods (CD)
3x Godswood Attendant (KotS)
1x High Septon (LotR)
1x Thoros of Myr (RoR)
1x Tarle the Thrice-Drowned (RotO)
3x Priest of the Drowned God (KotS)
1x Moqorro (VD)
1x Victarion Greyjoy (VD)
1x Coldhands (THtW)
1x Alannys Greyjoy (ODG)
1x Asha Greyjoy (FF)
1x Baelor Blacktyde (TIoR)
1x Greydon Goodbrother (TK)
1x Maester Kerwin (VM)
1x Maester Murenmure (CbtC)
1x Maester Wendamyr (KotS)
1x Qarl the Maid (AJE)
1x The Reader (TGF)

Attachment: (1)
1x Longclaw (ASitD)

Event: (9)
3x Confession (KotS)
3x Sacrificed to Two Gods (ARotD)
3x To Be a Kraken (SB)

Location: (20)
3x Sunset Sea (KotS)
1x Street of Silk (LotR)
1x Street of Sisters (Core)
1x Street of Steel (Core)
1x Shadowblack Lane (Core)
1x Bloody Keep (KotS)
3x Gatehouse (KotS)
1x Aeron's Chambers (KotS)
3x The Iron Mines (KotS)
3x Bay of Ice (KotS)
2x Longship Iron Victory (KotS)



Other cards that could be worth considering:
- As mentioned more Warships is a potential route to go down.
- If you don't mind enlisting the help of greenlanders, Ser Lancel Lannister (TPoL) is a tremendous boon for the deck in helping add some raw STR, and can also be reduced by the Sunset Sea (always look to splash Lannister characters in Greyjoy before any others for that reason). Likewise, on the rare occasion you could afford her, Melisandre (RotO) would be an amazing addition. It's unreasonable to assume we'd be able to play her at some point with the streets and the high gold plots, but even so she's just too unreliable for a deck that struggles for draw, even if she is arguably worth her six gold cost.
- On the subject of draw, this deck lacks it. Finding room for a couple of copies of Ser Jaime Lannister (TK) and Ser Preston Greenfield (TK) would help alleviate that.


One thing I like about this deck is that it's quite easy to build. If you have a copy of the Core set, the Kings of the Sea, Kings of the Storm and Lions of the Rock house expansions, and the Forgotten Fellowship and Valar Dohaeris chapter packs, you can get the core of the deck. Getting the remainder of the holy characters would then be your first port of call, so additional recommended chapter packs would be Fire and Ice, Chasing Dragons and Rituals of R'hllor, as well as A Roll of the Dice for Sacrificed to Two Gods. With that done you have every single key card for the deck, the rest is essentially "packs that good Greyjoy cards come in", those that you will be looking to own regardless of decktype.

Quick Addendum: Since writing this article, another way of playing this deck has been presented to me - Stall. This involves making the opponent go first and then putting out a wall - be it through big armies, warships paired with Naval Escort (ASitD), or literally The Wall (RotO) - so big that the opponent won't be able to push any challenges through, which in turn makes them scared to attack at all since they'll lose a character every time they do so. I do not yet have enough experience to write about this decktype myself, although I hope I will do in the future. For now I cannot see exactly how this deck eventually wins, and depending on whether it goes the character route or the location route it seems incredibly vulnerable to either Westeros Bleeds (Core) or Favorable Ground (QoD), so I'm not convinced it's a great idea in the current meta. That may change though, and it may be a way of playing the deck that I return to in the future!


Have any experience with the decktype, or any ideas and suggestions for other cards to consider? Feel free to post your thoughts and comments below!

Next time, we'll be looking at Melee, and why Greyjoy is just so gosh darn good at it.