Rise of the Kraken - Rainbow Hulk

This time on Rise of the Kraken we will be taking a look at locations. More specifically locations that you would want to play Out Of House (OOH) since GJ is currently the best house for using OOH locations. First we will glance at the usual suspects on how to either lower the cost of these locations or blatantly cheat them into play for our uses. Secondly we will look at the most useful OOH locations house by house.

The Enablers




Refurbished Hulk
Reliable, cheap and sturdy hulk. One copy alone in play is able to remove the OOH penalty from the locations that we are splashing for. Now if we get more than one in play the deal gets even better. The Limited keyword brings in some extra protection in case of opposing Newly Made Lord or Favorable Ground. Now the cherry on top of this imposing hulk is the fact that it is Warship which gives nice synergy for our Longship Maiden’s Bane and supports our fleet with the help of Naval Escort.

First Mate
Unlike the Hulk, First Mate brings some recursion on the table. The plus on his ability is that the cost can be completely bypassed no matter if the location comes from your hand or from discard pile, no golden dragons needed here. The ability is also repeatable which is always nice. However there is plenty of negatives on his ability. Limited Response: Stops all nice ways of trying to abuse his ability more than once in a turn and also completely negates the usefulness of other First Mates, I guess there can only be one. The recursion also has few of its own restrictions, firstly you have to win a military or power challenge with him, quite sad that if you manage to give him intrigue his ability just won’t work there. Secondly he can only be used for Warships, which limits what location types can be splashed with him.

Iron Lore
A powerful event for recurring any location without paying the OOH cost. This one comes without a trait limit which makes it far more flexible than the First Mate. However Iron Lore can be only used for recursion so you need to have a way to get those locations in your discard pile if you want to bypass the OOH gold penalty with it. The Any Phase: brings even more flexibility here as you can surprise your opponent with a suddenly appearing Rhaeny’s Hill to ruin their day.

NOTE: It should also be remembered that cards which specifically say “pay cost X” cannot be cancelled by paper shield as cost 0 is still considered to be cost in this case.

Weathered Crew
Last, and also, least we have Weathered Crew. His ability is harder to trigger than that of the First Mate as you would have to build your deck with Reinforcement events in mind. The crew also has the same Warship restriction as the First Mate, but unfortunately they can only recur ships so you need to also be able to fill that discard pile of yours if you want really good use of these guys.

So Greyjoy has these 4 cards to use to help them in using the OOH locations. 2 of them are more centered on Warships while the other two are fit for most anything. There are also some other cards like Plunder which can help with the OOH gold penalty, but in that case we are trusting our opponent to have certain kind of deck.

The Locations to splash

House Lannister

The Lannisters locations are good for added control and draw.

Golden Tooth Mines: So, what is the most common weakness in the Greyjoy builds? draw? GTM fixes most draw issues by bringing in repeatable draw and with multiple copies we can easily get closer to that elusive drawcap. Definitely one card to be considered when you are looking for OOH locations to run.

The Iron Throne: GJ has plenty of cancel, but getting its hands on one more repeatable source of cancel should not be overlooked. With the help of The Iron Throne you can cancel all those pesky comes into play character abilities and keep your Alannys standing for the bigger threats.

Pentoshi Manor: Considering how much hate this card gets currently it is probably well worth using it OOH as well? Challenge denial is good, and considering how good GJ is at emptying the board of characters there should be no problem if the opponent chooses the “take power” option.

Lannisport Brothel: Not a usual choice, but it can be extremely handy to deal with some of the peskier characters in the opposing side.

Trebuchet: This card gets its own special mention. It is not in the same power level as the other Lannister cards listed here, but it is a card which is needed for the ultimate mill combo. This nice little siege weapon combined with We Take Westeros! can mean a complete deck mill.

House Stark

Unfortunately The House of the Wolf has barely anything worthwhile for us. The most powerful locations they have, like Harrenhal, are restricted for their house only and that Bear Island still defies GJ. Still there are some toys here to play with, even if they are not quite as flexible.

White Harbor Dromon: The Warship trait here means that we can better cheat this location in, as well as some other added synergies from the trait. The dromon can be used to gain more speed in the form of renown (which GJ has fairly little) and also for supporting the naval theme thanks to the added enhancement icon.

Northland Keep: This card exists? Yeah and it is not bad for GJ. Actually it is quite a lot better for the Krakens since we have ways to raise strength reliably. With this we gain added control which can also be used to push the unopposed theme further.

Frozen Outpost: Suddenly that Old Ways starts to look even more like an annoying agenda choice. GJ also has some nice war crest characters which get plenty out of this one. With this and Wintertime Marauders on the board your opponent quite likely will forgo the military and power challenges.

Frozen Moat: The Red Viper annoying you? This quite likely will stop his visits for good.

Storm Dancer: Another Warship! This one is not the most reliable one, but still a viable source of draw. Still, there are better ways to go since GJ will rarely be able to trigger the additional effect on this with their lack of shadows.

House Martell

Martell, much like Lannister, can be used for added control. They have several good locations which cannot be splashed as well like Ghaston Grey and Sunspear Tourney Grounds. We will not let these kind of small things stop us.

The Scourge: Restricted OOH card… really? The Scourge, while restricted, can be a worthy addition to GJ’s location arsenal. It is either repeated character control or it is reducing the opponents hand, both of which are really nice for GJ. There is some nice added interactions in this location and the GJ event Ours for the Taking. You can use Ours for the Taking to copy The Scourge and your opponent will be unable to return the icons back since the Ours for the Taking is doing the icon removal.

Qhoyne: Another icon removal tool. This one can only remove one specific icon, but it is flexible enough to have other uses. The -1 strength can be useful to have with intimidate as well as stopping some of the weenie challenges from the opponent. No longer will a lone Carrion Bird terrorize your board.

Shores of the Summer Sea: More recursion tools? More recursion tools!

Greenblood Vessel: Martell also brings the possibility to use the most mightiest Warship in the whole Westeros! Redwyne Fleet has nothing on this ship nor King Robert’s Hammer. Now, more seriously, GJ is still lacking those green eye icons and with this someone, like say, claim-raise Victarion can sport one.

Hellholt Docks: Again a rarely seen location from the Martells side, but it has nice synergy with some of the GJ cards. Hellholt Docks is either choking your opponent or leaving them vulnerable to Scaling Ladder or to the even more fierce Captain of the Iron Fleets discard effect.

House Baratheon

Baratheon has some of the best tools that can be borrowed. The Baratheon locations can be used to help with decks speed or to secure a better board position.

Pyre of the False Gods: A location which can be used to recur our Iron Lore? What’s not to like?

Oakenshield Port: One of the best power gain locations in the game and it has no Baratheon restrictions on it. With the use of this GJ gains explosive speed to close the game. Especially nasty if you manage to discard and recur it repeatedly.

Brightwater Keep: One of the best locations to get in Greyjoy. Helps dealing with the intrigue claim as you will never lose a card that you want to keep. This one comes with extra protection by having the No Attachments keyword on it.

Huntress: Another Warship for our First Mate. While Huntress has some restrictions on it the added Melee and Renown are well worth it. It also shouldn’t be too difficult for a GJ to find a viable Lord to use this ability on.

Altar of Fire: Much like Baratheon GJ has it own set of holy cultists. Drowned God should be pleased by this little offering of burning altar in his halls. Added hand destruction can never be ignored, especially one this powerful. The addition of Damphair’s Drowned makes this card more viable for the Krakens.

House Targaryen

No wonder Euron is trying to unite our fleets with the Dragons. Their locations bring in the most game altering effects and best of all… they have no house restrictions!

Rhaeny’s Hill: For an all out GJ location recursion deck this is the card which wins it all. Getting all characters from your opponents dead pile on your side during challenges will win you the game, especially if you get to do it more than once.

Aegon’s Hill: One of the things GJ is most known for is its offensive Valar. With Aegon’s Hill your opponent has no choice, but to overcommit on the table and let your Valar sweep in, if they don’t, the Hill will just kill their characters anyway. This location also creates a good combination with Rhaeny’s Hill by giving you more characters.

Visenya’s Hill: Strengthens the mill theme GJ has. Suddenly milling can be quite devastating for your opponent. More devious ways to use this is to hit your opponents jumping cards that got into discard. Say your opponent has Preston Greenfield jumping in and out of shadows and you managed to discard one from your opponent. Move that to his deadpile and now if Preston goes into shadows he will be unable to come back as there is already one copy in dead pile.

Meraxes: This is a complete dream come true for GJ. A Warship which gives draw and dominance strength. This card fits too perfectly for GJ.

Flaming-Pitch Tower: Have you ever felt that burning stuff might be as fun as drowning? well not as much, but still close. Strangely Targaryen has a location with a burn effect and a terminal combined with it. The requirements for the effect are not hard to trigger with GJ’s characters and strength pumps and it gets rid of some of the more nasty characters that GJ would otherwise be unable to touch, hello Red Viper.

While this list consists of 5 cards from each of the other great houses there are still some left behind. What locations would you use in GJ OOH?