Scheming on the Sands - Martell & Naval Enhancement

“Nymeria’s blood is in me, along with that of Mors Martell, the Dornish lord she married. On the day they wed, Nymeria fired her ships, so her people would understand that there could be no going back. ”
—Arianna Martell, A Feast for Crows

It’s time for another edition of Scheming on the Sands. For this edition we’ll take a look what the new Naval Enhancement mechanic means for Martell. Spoiler alert: the above quote should give you a good idea of what’s in store for Martell.

Naval Enhancement: The Basics

To start let’s review what the mechanic does. In essence, any character with the naval enhancement icon on a challenge icon behaves similar to but not exactly the same as Greatjon Umber (Core).

Let’s break down what the rules say…

Any time after an attack is declared, the attacking or defending player can kneel a non-participating character with a [naval] enhancement on the matching challenge icon and declare it as a [naval] attacker or defender in that challenge. This is performed as a standard player action during that challenge, and can only be declared before the challenge resolves.

So the timing and condition is a bit narrower than Greatjon Umber. Also, a character is only considered a naval attacker/defender if it’s brought into challenge from the previously described mechanic. A character who is participating normally in the challenge with the naval enhancement on an icon is not considered a naval attacker/defender; this is an important distinction to make since it determines if other effects go off or not.

Declaring a [naval] attacker or defender is a game mechanic, not a triggered effect or card effect. Characters with naval enhancements can still be declared during the initial declare steps in any challenge type they can normally participate in.

This is very important to understand. This means that the act of declaring a naval defender/attacker cannot be canceled or prevented through an effect like Brienne of Tarth (PotS). The only way to prevent the naval attacker/defender from coming in would be to kneel the character or remove the icon with the naval enhancement. On that point…

If a character loses all instances of a challenge icon that has a printed or gained enhancement, that enhancement has no effect (because there are no icons to modify); if that character gains that icon back, the enhancement again modifies that challenge icon.

Essentially it doesn’t matter how the character has the icon so long as the printed card has the naval enhancement symbol on the challenge icon the character has the enhancement available so long as there is at least one instance of the icon regardless of the source.

Stranded On Shore

As of the publication of this article we have seen the contents of the first three chapter packs of this cycle and Martell doesn’t look so good. There has been no Martell character released yet with a naval enhancement symbol. This effectively disqualifies the house from using several of the new cards so far released; Black Sails and Naval Superiority to be specific.

Also, what Martell has been given so far has been lacking, to be charitable; more on this another time. Word is that Martell is supposed to be getting characters with naval enhancements; we’ll have to see what we get if or when it ever comes around. The very thin silver lining is that in the three chapter packs that we have seen so far is that the Martell cards available are completely functional outside the context of the naval enhancement mechanic with the exception of Meadowlark (TGF). The new Quentyn Martell (TGF) and Doran's Scheme (TGF) are entirely usable without the naval mechanic and can function perfectly fine against other deck types.

When You Have No Boats, Learn To Swim

So when confronted with a Black Sails (RotK) deck or naval enhancement in general as a Martell player what is the approach you should take?

There’s really no reason to change your approach at all. Naval enhancement doesn’t fundamentally alter the way challenges resolve. The two things it changes the most is the timing of when characters can jump into challenges and adds another—specific—layer of effects on top of the already deep pile of effects present in the game.

Since naval characters—generally speaking—are already on the board by the time the challenge phase rolls around there should be no surprises and you should be able to allocate control not much differently than before. The main thing you’ll have to consider is issues of timing and commitment since an opponent with naval enhanced characters can bring in additional naval characters at whatever pace they see fit.

Even though the latest FAQ has reigned in Martell icon control its utility versus naval decks is still high. Since the enhancement is linked to the presence of the icon, by removing the icon you remove the ability for the character to operate as naval support; if your opponent is running effects that depends on committing naval attackers/defenders you gain a bit more by denying them that on top of the ability of using that character in a particular challenge.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t take a few moments to discuss Meadowlark in the context of this article. This card is almost universally panned. It was the lowest reviewed card in the last chapter pack review and it suffers from the fact it has to be errataed immediately because Fantasy Flight’s templating and editing have been slipping the past few chapter packs. Meadowlark is the only Martell card so far in this cycle that requires you to be playing against a deck built around naval enhancement to be effective.

I usually never want to discourage someone from trying to use a card; even this one. If you do want to use this card let me outline some things you need to consider at least. First, the effect is global, so if you do happen to have a naval enhanced character in your Martell deck it could be effected as well; from what we have seen available so far this is not likely.

The next thing to consider is that you are only removing the naval enhancement from the icon. In certain cases this might be a big deal; preventing the Black Sails response from triggering or activating the Naval Superiority (TGF) text. Meadowlark is a Challenge phase ability so it could be activated after a naval enhanced character has been committed just to prevent those effects from firing. I’d argue that bouncing the naval enhanced character with Gaston Grey or just stripping the icon—even after the fact—are better options that can also be applied to non-naval enhanced characters.

Finally, for a 2 gold unique location it’s expensive for such a narrow effect. Location control is only getting stronger and at its price point Meadowlark is a prime target for decks that are concerned with naval enhancement.

All that said, only time will tell how much of an impact the naval enhancement mechanic has on the game. The community has trashed a lot of cards in the past only to backtrack and discover that in the context of an actual game things are different than what they were theorized to be.

Looking for Co-Writer

Believe it or not writing a 2-3 page article every other week is more work than you might imagine. Also, I’m not the only person who has an opinion and sometimes I want to be lazy. So if you are interested in co-writing Scheming on the Sands send me or Darksbane a message via the forum and let us know how you want to contribute.

[I'm also looking for writers for 2 writers each for Lannister articles, Stark articles, and 1 writer for Baratheon Articles. Drop me a PM if you'd be interested in helping out. I'll be putting up a general announcement about this next week - Darksbane]

Next Time

On the next edition of Scheming on the Sands; no one in Westeros is sure of the Martell’s agenda. In the LCG the choice is yours. Now there’s more to choose from; we’ll take a closer look.