Hi,

My friends and I have now had a few 4 player melee games, and I will admit we play a little slow at the moment, but after 4 hours and 6/7 rounds, we have no winner, and no prospect of a winner!! I am working on the basis that as we get more familiar with the game/cards we will get quicker, but cannot see how anyone can win.

During our games we often have one player who gets upto 8 or 9 power, at which point the other 3 tear them down. How does any one player ever manage to work up to 15 power when there are three other players all ready to focus their attention on stopping them?

We are all now playing with custom decks with cards from the core set and all (LCG) chapter packs (except Kingslanding).

I think it may be our approach to each round, the first two or three players are very defensive, leaving characters standing to fight off an expected attack, or to try and stop a challenge beating them by 4 STR (we do fear things like seductive promise and flaming pitch tower).

I also note that towards round 5, we often each have 4-6 characters in play, we do not use Valor or Wildfire assault much either, and the only time a plot card is revealed is during the plot phase..

So my question is, what are we doing 'different'? How do melee games go for the more experienced players out there? How many rounds does it take for you to win, how many characters are often in play and how do you overcome 3 other players all focussing on you when you are close to winning and stealing your power and killing your characters!?

I certainly would like to think one game we can have a winner!!

Thanks

Actually, you probably aren't doing things very different at all. Melee games are slow and there can be a lot of "down time" when you aren't doing much, which makes them seem longer. Four hours for 6-7 rounds is a little excessive, but not out of the norm for new players.

As new players, you may be "playing timid," as you kind of imply. If all 4 players are playing very defensively, the game will slow down. As you gain experience, the need to defend everything will start to ease, and you'll start to get a feel for the "1 step backwards, 2 steps forward" strategy of Melee. Resets (like Valar and Wildfire) are your friends for speeding up games. Not only do they make the players more vulnerable, they reduce the number of options on the table, which can help play.

Customizing your decks will help, as you may have already found. Revealing plots outside the plot phase will not necessarily speed up a game and may not even be good strategy, depending on how your deck is built.

Some things that might help the pace of the games:

- Remember that the person who wins initiative does not have to be the First Player. They can choose anyone who will become the First Player for the round. If the first person or two is playing defensively, think about choosing the weakest player - or the one with the least defensible board position, to go first. They will either leave themselves wide open for attack or, at the very least, pass quickly.

- Work up the whole alliance thing. If you can go the first round or three only worrying about two opponents instead of three, you might be able to establish yourself better and faster. Ultimately, it's every man for himself, but making deals, honoring them, backstabbing, etc. makes the game a lot more fun.

- Think aggressively. Westeros is a brutal world. And remember, in the end, it's about how much power you have, not how many characters you have. Sacrifices must be made.

I'm sure others will have better advice.

Thanks for your thoughts.. I do find the community on these forums has been a great source when learning and understanding the game.

I am sure we will get quicker, as we grow more confident with what we are doing!! Becoming more aggresive may take more time, and learning when to try the '1 step back, 2 steps forward', will prove interesting.

I am hoping that experience of more games will be the key. It would be nice if we were able, one day, to see a game between experienced players.

For now, I think I will try something a little different in every game and see what happens!

Power gets added to the game at a pretty slow pace if you are relying primarily on dominance. You can use cards like Lannisport to get more power, but probably the fastest way is to win unopposed challenges. Ktom didn't say it explicitly but a lot of his suggestions lead to good opportunities to win unopposed challenges -- clearing the field with Valar is a good way to open things up for unopposed challenges. Also, if you can make a pact with a player next to you not to attack each other (or use the supports/opposed aspects of the multiplayer titles), you can also free up your characters to attack rather than defend.

Sartar said:

One of the most basic strategies for this (and you've probably already found it, but some new players have trouble with the concept) is to let a challenge you know you're going to lose anyway - or can afford to lose - go unopposed. Especially in the early rounds, this ensures that your opponent has power for you to steal when you do a power challenge.

At the moment I think we are all being too defensive (I am in this melee group.)

Personally I spend a lot of time planning my deck and probably get too attached to specific cards and plans I have made. This means I really hate to lose cards due to intrigue and military challenges and get very defensive!

I'm assuming it isn't usual for people to have the same 6-8 characters in play from round to round? I could probably afford to loose some to a military claim.

What ended up happening last game was that there was some fear of the unknown from Targ and Lannister about my Greyjoy deck which meant I was the main target of two players. This allowed Stark to run away with the game somewhat until finally they turned on him instead! When we ran out of time the power on house cards was only about 6, 5, 5 and 3.

Dont be affraid of reset plots (Wildfire Assault, Valar), those will speed up the game not slow it down. Every deck should run at least one reset plot, so he could stop everyone from expand to much and also it helps to win more power for unopposed if everyone has less characters to defend with.

The other thing is OPPOSES, do not forgot about them they can bring some more power to the game.

I'm quite a new player too and during our 4 players melee we had the same problems, sort of. I'd say the game would last for about 3 hours, but we usually had a winner.

There are a few things to take into consideration:

- When you can win unopposed, go for it! It's a good strategy most of the time and it earns you a lot of power.

- Keep your Claim 2 plots and renown characters for the rounds you can really take advantage of them, and for the round you think you can win (Robert Baratheon for example should be played when you can win or with Lightbringer).

- Play a good amount of saves for your characters. Recursive ones are the best (Viserys, Davos, Lightbringer, Nymeria, Aemon...). So you can not defend in military and still not lose a lot of characters.

- Try to play draw cards

- Playing the reset cards is great, it speeds up the game.

- Do not care about losing cards or characters, or you will never attack. You win with power, not cards or characters. The most agressive player is usually rewarded, or the player who knows when to be aggressive (dpeending on situation, saves available, titles with redirection...).

Fai said:

Actually, it is a little unusual. The same 2-3 characters, maybe. But many of the experienced players are so aggressive and the game is so brutal that a lot of us don't count on a character lasting more than a round or two. As fabest says: if you can't break the mindset that characters and cards must be protected, you'll never be able to play aggressively. And if you don't play aggressively, the games will be long - especially in Melee.