Yesterday during my groups weekly play session we opted to play decks that were LCG+ only (meaning core set and any available chapter packs) instead of our typical "anything goes".

After the third flame-kissed hit my trusty greyjoy pirates, I really, REALLY began to miss Qarl the maid. It did get me thinking, though. Is there any attachment control besides Krasnys mo Nakloz in the LCG environment?

FuriousG said:

Which pirates? I don't see Flame-Kissed used in situations where it doesn't kill before attachment control wouldn't help.

FuriousG said:

Other than Targ (they've actually got a ton)?

Lannister has "Compelled by the Rock." Baratheon has "Maester Cressen" (who is beginning to show up OOH around here quite a bit) and Zealous Collector (which might be useful now that KotS has put some usable Kingdom locations into the environment). Greyjoy got Scurvy Cutthroat back in KotS and WIntertime Marauders can work as attachment control to some extent. But that's about it. Attachment control is pretty scarce in LCG, really - and people are beginning to slowly come out of the "attachments aren't much good because they are doubly vulnerable" stupor we've been in since the Winter Block of the CCG.

This was just being discussed in the Martells from the future and the answer is it depends what you are looking for, because everything is house specific right now. In general the Targs have always had the best attachment control effects followed by Baratheon with the rest of the others having only a couple occasional very specific effects.

House Greyjoy has the Scurvy Cuthroat from Kings of the Sea, but he has to be in play already and you have to discard him to discard the attachment... but it only works when the attachment comes out and I believe his text makes him useless vs ambush or shadow attachments because they are not "played." Also in house Greyjoy is the Wintertime Marauders. If you are playing winter wina challenge with them and poof discard any non-unique card. Most attachments of course generally are, but I suppose most people given the chance to discard any non unique card in play would generally prefer to discard a character or location than an attachment (especially one your Targ opponent will just get back again).

Lannisters have their Fury plot assuming the opponent is a valid target. Shadow Tyrion can protect himself from attachments for the cost of a shadow card. They also have Compelled by the Rock, which is becoming a very popular card in some circles.

Baratheon has Maester Cressen who discards only Condition attachments, but a great many attachments are. They also have the Zealous Collector who kneels in dominance to discard any two attachments but only if you control 3 kingdom locations and there are not many in LCG right now. Still, there are 4 unique kingdom locations and 2 non unique ones in LCG format and I'm sure Princes of the Sun will have more, you just have to build for it.

Targ of course are the masters of attachment manipulation whatever it's flavor. Mad King's Legacy. Dragon Thief. Dany's handmaiden. Kraznys mo Nakloz. Ascetic Follower (who of course is mostly worthless against anyone but Baratheon). Destitute Horde. And last but deserving of special mention is Shadow of the East. If you absolutely MUST have attachment hate you can play the shadow agenda and use this card in any house for the extra 1 gold and if it's summer (meaning if you're playing vs Targ when you probably need it most) you get it back to your hand after each use.

House Stark and Martell both currently have no attachment hate, but Martell at least is waiting on Princes to become fully viable so who knows what may await us.

Of course if the problem is specifically Targ burn, like ktom said you guys are generally gonna be dead before you can discard the attachment unless they didn't die outright... and even then I think only Targ or Lannister can pull off an phase reverse. Again specifically when dealing with burn have you considered str pumps? If a burn effect doesn't kill you right off try using a greyjoy warship str bonus, Seafarers Bow or even Heart of the Kingdom. In other houses Lannisters have Sweet Cersei, Tunnels of the Red Keep and I'm you Writ Small (very good vs Flame-Kissed), and Starks have Winterfell Castle. You may still die at the end of the round when the pump wears off, but you may not if their 2nd finishing burn effect also wears off. Burn has always been kinda hard to deal with though.

I'd say bouncing opponents characters with Game of Cyvasse is pretty good attachment control, so Martell isn't that badly lacking in that department.

WWDrakey said:

Eh, it's alright for 'positive' attachment control. But the 'negative' attachments, ie the ones an opponent plays on my characters, are much more numerous and more troublesome. Game of Cyvasse is a lot less efficient if you're forced to use it on your own guys.

Bodyguards, Lightbringer, Aegon's Blade... All are annoying, but can be worked around with good board position and other forms of your own control.

Stuff like Flame Kissed/Dragon Skull, Milk of the Poppy, Motley, Flogged and Chained, etc are a lot harder to deal with and arguably much more frustrating as well.

I still would like a couple of reprints that any House could toolbox into their decks. Hand of the King form ITE would be perfect for this new low impact environment - it didn''t see a lot of play three eyars ago, but it is thematic and will appeal to casual players as well as fitting into the competitive toolbox.

Weapons at the Door would be nice as well - though I recognize JJ's concerns about it in the other thread. It wouldn't be an automatic slot in a tight deck - but might really help out Houses like Martell and Stark who are lacking in this regard.

But honestly - i really wnat more event cancel thn atatchment control at hte moment. Hand's Judgement is a start, but we need more. Lannister control causes more headaches than any number of weapons and bodyguards.

The flame kissed was more for exemplary purposes. By the third or fourth game I was sick of seeing motley and a few others, too. Also, no pirates in specific-- just a pet name for the squids.

I had never considered using the marauders to discard attachments. Possibly because the first time I saw them played the guy controlling them said "ok, now I get to discard a location or character" and I somehow subconsciously read the card to say location or character.

Nor had I considered compelled, mostly because that was almost universally the one chapter pack my entire group skipped. The cutthroat was another one I missed, but we only recently got the greyjoy expansion.

Strength pumps I had thought of, though. Its how I typically save from the burn effects.

Stag Lord said:

I agree with Stags on Hand of the King, or something like that. It's not too potent, but does let you take care of a particularly troublesome attachment and has a modest lingering postive. As JJ said in the Martell thread, Weapons at the Gate may be too potent and I don't want to see players going back to shirking attachments (*grumble* although Compelled by the Rock already has me almost there *grumble*). As for some in-house attachment control, how about giving my Starks a Frozen Solid type card, perhaps:

Sudden Frost

0s

Attach to a non-Stark attachment or non-Stark location.

Treat attached attachment or location as though its text box were blank.

LetsGoRed said:

Hand of the King would be nice. There are even a decent number of playable Small Council events in LCG to make the secondary effect worthwhile. And while we're at it, might as well bring Crown Regent back too.

And Targ really needs more lethal burn, we should bring back Consumed by Flame and House of Warlocks. Speaking of which Martell is missing character control why don't we bring back Locked in the Tower and Broken Arm. And there are not nearly enough cancels in the game we should bring back Prince's Loyalist, but get rid of that pesky doomed mechanic in the update.

Or, we leave all those cards in the past and deal with the fact that the LCG is different animal, there is very little that is easy, free, or one sided in effect, and I for one believe the game is better for it. There some things that could use some further fleshing out, but one sided effects are not it. Hopefully ultra-efficient (read overly powerful cards with no drawback) cards are just gone and the game can be about navigating the best course for each house and each deck with known limitations. There were so many complaints of the greying of the game during WED but now everyone seems to want to print an entire Chapters pack of neutral silver bullet cards.

I'm not sure whether that bothers as much or more than the calls for all of these reprints rather than new cards that achieves the main goal. We've been down that path already. Embrace change, look towards the future. Excelsior! (*chuckle*)

Maybe it's just me, but I'll take new cards over reprints 6 days a week. I'll take reprints over no cards, but that isn't really the choice we have to make is it?

You and I fundamentally disagree on what we wnat out of the game DM. *shrug* I wnat efficient cards, I want a toolbox, lock down deck that performs consistently and reliably nine times out of ten.

I want my opponent to have as an NPE experience as I can manage when he faces me.

That is where I am coming form and that is how most folks around here approach the game - especially at the big East Coast meetups in the summer and fall. To that end I will always argue for reprints of or replacements for the efficient rmevoal cards we had in the past - within reason. i undertsnad that the new environment is more padded gloves than bare knuckles - but that doens't mean holes in teh card pool don't need to be filled. Right now atatchment control and cancel (out of Greyjoy) are just not there in big enough numbers.

YMMV

Stag Lord said:

/agree.

and i'd add that GJ cancel isn't even that reliable. You need a kneeling charcater (only like two phases) and have to wait till round 2 for their best cancel. Seasick just meant that i put in a Chamber over one fiefdom into all my decks...

and like i said elsewhere, attachment control would make attachments more true to their actual cost. Right now for 0-2 gold you can neuter a character for the whole game with attachments.

How about this?:

Sudden Frost [stark]

1G

House Stark only.

Attach to a non-Stark attachment or non-Stark location.

While it is Winter, treat attached attachment or location as though its text box were blank.

Now is that far enough away from Frozen Solid to be it's own card? Hey, I just think a card called "Sudden Frost" would be neat.

I would like to see hand of the king (ITE) and Bastard (Crown of suns) back in the game as neutral attachment control. I think both cards offer enough possibilities for every house to have some serious attachment protection, without offering a universal package which makes playing attachments unworthy. Just my two cents on the topic.

SO I take it then that you wanted to keep Jaqen and Princes Loyalist then Stag?

There gets to be a point where it just isn't fun for me. If I want to make some regret being my opponent I have Muay Thai and MMA for that. When I sit down with my friends (even in a comepetitive situation) I want us to both enjoy the game, even If I am wiping the floor with them or they me. I don'tmind losing. I don't mind losing badly. I mind a game where I don't enjoy playing it because it feels like I'm not in the game. From an intellectual exercise I like to work my decks to that level and then I tear them apart. I destroyed my meta several years ago because I built a deck that just wasn't fun to play against and then another and another. I realized that while I enjoyed winning when my friends weren't having fun, my enjoyment was severely curtailed.

An efficient card to me is one that does what it is supposed to do without having to invest too much into it and has some versatility or is difficult to get around. Dragon Thief is an efficient form of attachment control. Compelled by the Rock likewise. Weapons at the Door is not efficient, it is ridiculous and there is no need for it in the game at present. Some people may want the card, but their want does not translate into need. Hand of the King is an efficient card, maybe a little too efficient, but not out of step with the new direction.

Sudden Frost with the Winter caveat would be a good card, other wise it shoudl be location or attachment. I'll always champion in House solutions over neutral cards that replicate a house theme. Neutral cancel, yes. Neutral draw, no. Any efficient draw just adds to Lannisters ability to always have the most efficient answers and gives them more versatility in achieving that draw. Create something efficient for the other houses and if the Lion wants access to it they can spend some of that gold Tywin craps out on its OOH penalty.

I think part of the issue is that you view efficiency based on what the game used to be (please correct me if I am wrong, I don't want to mischaracterize your position), an dI'm looking at efficiency based on where I think Nate is headed (or at least based on what he has set up to date in the LCG). I wouldn't say either of us is right, but I do hope that Nate is keeping things more "in hand" regarding power levels or cards... or more to the point that we don't get a lot of super strong auto-includes and massive effect cards with low costs. I like strong cards. I like game defining cards, but I don't like easy choices in deck building or in playing.

dormouse said:

Ok, yeah... 'cause Hand of the King is totally the same as Locked in the Tower, Broken Arm, and Prince's Loyalist. Thanks so much. When there was a recent card well-designed to fill a need and fit into the LCG environment, which I think Hand of the King would be... Why force design to reinvent the wheel, so to speak? It's unique and basically non-repeatable, and 2G for a single attachment discard isn't super-cheap, with a conditional extra effect. How is that a "free one-sided effect"; while say Motley, Compelled by the Rock, etc. are not?

With wishlists like this, it seems like there is an assumption/hope that FFG will one day print a Legacy pack or new Core Set. I've mentioned before that I would love to see a yearly Legacy pack with some old staples. And until FFG comes out and says it has no plans to do so, it's reasonable that topics like this one keep coming up and players feel like their feedback is being heard (especially as evidenced by the Martell expansion changes).

I too am bothered by Lannister having such good attachment control when they already have the market cornered on other facets.

I have also wondered if attachments aren't too strong right now, but I don't think that's the best way to look at it. In other words, I wouldn't argue this case in the specific, because card strength is so relative in terms of game context. I mean, we've all had powerful cards which have won us games that later sit in our hands for lack of a target or proper time to use them, depending on the matchup or board position. I guess there are exceptions to this in terms of particular cards, but I'd rather look at the big picture than try to argue that Fishing Net or Motley is unbalanced in the environment. All in the eye of the beholder, I guess. And there's nothing wrong with using the specific as evidence to back up general cases, which is generally how it's done, but I think we can get bogged down in the counter-arguments when I would instead boil it down very simply:

It is important is to have options, for all players and all houses. Not so much so that there are better or more options available to non-Targ players since attachments are Targ's specialty, but I truly believe that the more varied options we have, the more the game will have room to grow and evolve. Obviously there's a danger here as well if the choices are too lop-sided and decks start looking the same. A balance has to be the constant goal, if not achieved (because let's face it, card design is not an exact science).

Now whether those options are neutral, house-specific, or limited to certain houses without house-specific restrictions (much as Frozen Solid was an out-of-house option at one time - there aren't many options like that around, with Scurvy Cutthroat being too limited to pay extra for a penalty, and Daenerys's Handmaiden is pricey also) is another question. I would just like to see more options, and I'm in agreement that more cancel and attachment hate wouldn't go astray.

That was also (actually that part was mostly) in reference to calls for weapons at the Door to be reprinted, which I referenced later. I also called Hand of the King an efficient card that would fill the current profile. It should also be noted that compelled while super efficient (and probably a little too good especially in Lannister these days) was part of the Clash of Arms expansion set that became the first cycle of Chapter Packs, and was made legal as far as I can tell by all of us bitching and moaning.

As to why a new design cycle rather than a reprint? Because, as I said in another post, there has not been ny aindication that there will be reprints outside of the Core Set and it's House expansions. Each Chapter Pack to date has been advertised as "contain[ing] 20 different never-seen-before cards" and if they were going to include reprints KLE, the first set from design to release with the LCG era in mind would have been an excellent place to include reprints that fill the gaps we've had. So instead of calling for what could only be called a departure of the currently established development/release format and against their current marketing, I am asking for something that fits within it. I don't have any direct statements from FFG that reprints would be excluded from CP but there is no reason I can fathom why they would bother as long as the game continues to do well.

If they do new Core Sets and/or Expansions I could see said reprints being possibly included, but I think we all want some of these gaps filled before the next year or when they are close to selling out of the current stock of Core Sets. I'm assuming some of these will be answered in PotS and whatever is scheduled to come after KLE. That should be around the time a new Core Set should be coming out I think, if they are going to do a regular annual release (though to be honest I'd be surprised if they did that unless they cycled the houses and with DwD coming out around then, God willing).

dormouse said:

My apologies then. I missed that. From what I'd read, it seemed that most people were actually stating how they didn't want to see something like Weapons at the Door reprinted, so I missed part of your point.

If it's ok to have global character control like Westeros Bleeds and Valar, why is it bad to have global attachment control? Characters are much more essential to avoiding an NPE than attachments.

The global resets for characters all have characters they cannot touch or built in ways of preventing the removal of all characters by built in means that do not rely on a timely cancel. That is not btrue with attachments. When attachment control becomes so great that you can remove all attachments or all opponents attachments easily you end up with attachments being near worthless. This is one of the first times in a few years where a number of decks are running attachments as some part of meaningful piece of the deck rather than just a handful of decks running a handful of attachments. People are clamoring for attachment control because attachments are finally having a noticeable effect on games. I don't consider this a bad thing.

Besides with a couple of exceptions all those character hate cards, targeted and global also get rid of attachments, positive and negative... so in essence you have your global attachment control in both Westeros Bleeds and Valar Morgalis.

I would like to see some more specific targeted control, but in house, following house themes, skipping, Targ and Lannister, and possibly not as strong in Baratheon.

dormouse said:

I am clamoring for attachment control because one of the four houses in the core set and one of the historically most popular houses(Stark) has ABSOLUTELY NO ATTACHMENT CONTROL WITHOUT SPLASHING OUT OF HOUSE. If anyone should have to splash out of house it should be Lannister because they can **** well afford it. And characters with attachments are protected from some of Stark's primary kill cards. When Stark has no players in Joust at GENCON, you know things have gone too far. Stark has always been amply represented at GENCON even when they were not a top tier house.

You have the view that it is a good thing for attachments to "finally have noticeable effects on games." I for one have always seen attachments splashed in decks here in the East Coast metas, and thought that their inclusion was equal to their importance. I would say that right now, their effect on the game is disproportional to their cost. Part of the reason attachments were undercosted was their fragility. That fragility has vanished except for Targ and Lannister.

I guess on this point we'll have to agree to disagree.

I agree that Stark, Greyjoy, and Martell need attachment control. I don't agree with attachment resets, and I'd rather not see a neutral version, because if it is at all efficient Lannister will grab that too and be even stronger.

As to No Stark representation, Stark has been the house most often played by newer players, with the switch to LCG and no functional OP program leading up to Gencon I was not the least bit surprised there was no representation of it in Joust. It was represented in melee, so it isn't as if everyeone decided the House was unplayable, just that it was not good enough to face the most likely decks (read: Lannister). Their lack of intrigue, and honestly depth, has always kept Stark the choice of the fans, the Neds, while Lannister and to a lesser degree Martell seemed to attract the power gamers. I'm not sure you can conflate lack of attachment control with poor representation of Stark.

You say splashing of attachments has always happened, but how often do you see "splashing" of events or locations, or characters. Attachments appear to make up less than 10% of most competitive decks from the deck reports I have read in the past, with many decks running 2-4. I can't remember the last time I saw a competitive deck run less than 6 events or locations (and there are very logical reasons for this, none of which do I disagree with). I however look at a time when beneficial attachments were considered generally worthless and negative attachments barely worth considering, to know when they can play an integral part in someone's strategy and think it is about time. They are still fragile because you are always able to remove the character they are on for positive attachments, just far less than they were concerning the negative. Don't misunderstand I DO want more attachment control, but I want it specifically for the houses without. I just feel that where we were was way too far in the other direction. I feel were we are now is slightly to far on the attachment side.

So I guess we are going to have to agree to disagree, though I really feel the disagreement is a matter of degrees.