I like this kind of "general topic" and I think we need something like this to discuss the current meta-play.

Some new players appeared in the boards and when I started building, I desired a lot a topic like this...And some experienced players will find it useful in order to understand some mechanics/interaction between and in-between Houses-decks.

I've some curiosities and ideas about common buildings and I'd like to know your opinions about them.

Everyone is invited to expand the conversation.

The LCG is becoming a great format, whit lots of different choices (more than we actually think).

There are some stereotypes I've found/met, in different ways and I'd like to understand what do you like the most, which House you think is going to be great and other stuff.

I'll give a couple of "starting points", but if everything goes right, we're going to make this topic bigger and bigger, adding some personal Point of views and experiences about common/rare decks.

Everyone can add something or simply answer/reply quoting the House-part most important to him.

STARK - Is winter coming?

I love Stark. They are a "crossroad" of aggro and control archetypes. They changed a bit, but I like them, even if they're not my first choice.

Wolves can be cruel, with they're kills and in the LCG point of view, they're taking some "tricky" aspects (shadow mechanic interactions, new Catelyn, Arya) that can improve they're basics SERIOUSLY.

Winter give them a couple of more options, but I'm not sure that it's going to be they're FAVOURITE way, as someone states.

Stark Army deck is a wonderful alternative (I tried a "basic" army deck and it's pretty...Big ;-))...A more control oriented deck is possible, with less chars and more events (add guilty, lethal counterattack)...BEAR ISLAND decks are devastating...

ANYWAY, there's something wrong with them...They're pretty efficient in short and long games, but I can feel like their 1000 possibilities tend to be nothing compare to a more basic building and even with that, I'm not seeing anything that's REALLY good.

I'd really like to understand why and where are some design/understanding flaws (if any).

It's like Winter is coming...But not tonight, if we get what I mean.

LANNISTER - Hear me roar

There's nothing to add here. I'm just writing something for the newcomers or less Lannister oriented players.

They're kind of Control/Resource advantage is totally insane. I play mostly Lannister decks. I know the family pretty well and I can say that when you play it, you can feel some weird "inner-power" coming out...Don't think I got stoned... ;-)

I'm just saying that Lions seem to be capable of everything...taking care of the obvious drawback: they're slow. Worlds are a great example that brought to me some past "MtG" experiences (NO, I DON'T COMPARE AGOT TO MTG and who knows me, knows...)...

When everyone is pretty sure about a format and five players are playing the most powerful deck, the experienced/talented players build up the "unexpected"...

Greyjoy destroyed Lannister, in some cases and that's the demonstration to what I've said.

So, don't think Lannis are overpowered just because they seem "GIANT" or "UBER-CONTROL-LIKE"...They've their drawbacks, and they can be easily defeated, with experience, good play choices and lot of patience.

The current Lanni environment allows Lannister player to build up strong decks that are, in many cases, very hard to master...A single, little mistake against them may mean "DEFEAT", but so it's the opposite statement...

So, with this, i say "Lanni are very strong"; but I say, at the same time, that they're not PLAYING BY THEMSELVES and that they're not so easy to make work.

BARATHEON - Hey, Stag, come on!

As you may notice, I'm not an aggro-fast player, but Bara thrill me a lot.

I see lots of tournament and caual Bara decks. I saw that someone did pretty well at worlds and at recent local competitions...But I'm not satisfied about them.

I started playing in the last months of the "past-era". I never played in a tournament, but I built up a Bara Split and another building with the tyrell sub-theme...They were awesome, funny and efficient.

The BARA spirit was to make some unexpected "blow outs", when the oppo is still trying to count the amount of tokens you got.

I did something extraordinary in LCG (more than 15 tokens in a couple of turns), but that was a strange case...

Don't misunderstand me: i LIKE the fact that LCG is not that Fast (I quit CoC was for the risk to close most of the games at turn 2).

But I guess that BARA need some "speed-up".

I'm not a world champion or a super-bara-player, but I'm not that dumb... ;-) So I tried LOTS of Bara versions and I've NEVER found something near competitive...

I know that it may depend by my "control-addiction", but it cannot be the whole thing. So I ask you what's the matter with them?

I did not like BARA SPLIT, cause it was wrong (I really think so) and it's wrong in Classic-Highlander (the only standard STRONG stereotype who desn't care about format change)...But I'm not that happy to have the basically the MOST AGGRO familiy (in AGOT power terms) with lots of HIGH COST POWERFULL CHARS and a fiew of valuable weenies (Bastard of Robert is great for Stealth, Knight of the rainwood is ok, but what else?).

I don't know if the SPEED is the solution...But I know that current Baras have no CONSISTANCY in the early game against strong archetypes like LAnni-Kneel, or Greyjoy winter.

Maybe I'm wrong, but we've to wait.

In MULTIPLAYER I found them pretty well, because sometimes you tend to take care about more "tricky" opponents and when you realize Bara are high on power it's too late ;-) That's Bara Spirit!

I'LL GO ON later with Targ, Greys and Martells...

Please feel free to add/change everything you want...

Enjoy.

Well, I'll quickly wade in a little about Baratheon and Stark. I think one of the problems these both houses have (in addition to draw) is the lack of choice regarding basic characters in the 0-2 gold price range. I'm leaving out unique characters from the analysis here, as well as the general characters that all houses have: refugees, heralds, scavengers, bandits...

Baratheon

A quick search with tzumainn shows that Bara has actually gotten one (!) new character in this price range since the Core Set. So what you're left with is:

1-gold: Zealous Collector (the new card), Bastard of Robert, Old Red Priest

2-gold: Royal Guard, House Tyrell Guard, Renly's Courtier, Knight of the Rainwood

Well, none of these cards are actually that useless, but the lack of choice is a bit weird, especially when comparing with the abundance of choice at 3+ gold. Most of these cards are pretty ok as they are, but they don't really form or support the core functionalities of Baratheon decks. Bastards are good with power challenge -centered decks, Royal Guards with vigilant decks (well, ok with those, still think this is overcosted for the useless stalwart)... Knight of the Rainwood is a decent solid card for its cost, and slots nicely into a knight themed deck. Old Red Priests and Zealous Collectors are good if you want to go Asshai... Renly's courtier could be good, but hard to find good targets (that are non-unique) and the low STR hurts.

...but you need to have quite a lot of cards from this price range, and with this pool what you end up having is one weenie that slots into your idea for the deck and several that really don't. For example compare this with the usual Lannister hyperkneel: weaponsmiths, stewards and attendants all slot in quite nicely to your deck idea. To be fair, it seems that Lanni hasn't gotten any house specific 0-2 gold chars lately either, only practical believer - which doesn't see much use.

Stark

They've actually gotten one more card during the expansions than Stark or Baratheon, so let's have a look.

0-gold: Hungry Mob (new)

1-gold: Midnight Sentry (new), Direwolf Pup, House Tully Recruiter

2-gold: Knight of the Tumblestone, Kennel Master

Ok... so we have 4 mono-military chars, one mono-power thats a reducer and a run-of-the-mill knight that at least has a war crest. Umm... you can... make a deck that only does military challenges with these! or... maybe a deck that only does military challenges? or... etc. The fact that refugees are in the environment, and most houses have either good chars to soak your military with or repeatable saves makes this pool very limited.

Final Notes

Again, the same lack of new cards in this price range can be found for Lannister, but the cards they do have are pretty good for most of their deck types. Targaryen has gotten much more new cards since the core set, and so have both Martell and Greyjoy. I actually think that once princes of the south comes out Martell will be really strong, since they already have very good low-cost chars and the expansion will probably bring in the big 'uns.

Ok, that's all from me, feel free to discuss, mock, talk about uniques etc.

Hey, mate, that's the kind of anaylisis I think we need...That's the spirit ;-)

I absolutely agree.

when building those decks I feel that choices are pretty "forced" in many cases and those choices are not...house specific, if you get the meaning...

Stark need more dynamism sometimes, and the weenies we have are just a, not useless, but not so useful add to their main strategy.

Maybe Bara would have like those kind of chars a bit more...

The "powerful" Ultra-Big-renown-vigilant guys of Bara are useless, if you think about the fact that at that point of the game, Lanni (so to say) will have total control of the board and Greyjoy will have destroyed everything that moves.

I don't know what's the solution, but for Bara, a more "weenie utility" chars design would be a good helo, for sure.

I see Stark as an evolving house and I'll wait until I can see more they're aggro-control spirit and less stasys in their buildings.

I'll finish the analysis about remaining houses later...Now, if you want, let's say your thoughts about uniques (or go on to discuss on little guys)

I was hoping to start a similar thread, so thanks for saving me the time and effort. I was more interested in deck archetypes specifically, but this broad analysis should cover that and more. This is my take on the Three houses listed so far.

Stark-I really hope winter is coming , because all they do is win military and lose games. The Winter Mechanic doesn't seem to help them because they can't balance the resources well enough to handle the -1 gold. Multiplayer works for them because they have the time to gradually build up, but a slow start in Joust will kill you. Shadow tech seems too much based on winter to really fill in their holes in Joust. I'm really hoping that the next cycle of chapter packs will fill help fill out the Northmen and take them out of the basement in Joust. It's been a while since Stark has been this bad in Joust. Right now I would say Stark is ranked 5th out of the six houses in Joust, and the only reason they aren't 6th is the Martell expansion has not hit. When Princes of the South releases, they will be firmly entrenched at 6th unless the expansion provide the key cards Stark lacks.

Lannister- Absolutely nothing lacking In House except alot of Renown. Gold-check. Draw-check. Effective Character Control-check. Attachment control-check. Location control-check. Play Either Season-check. Strong Shadow Tech-check. They may not play themselves, but they sure as hell can build themselves. The fact that they are still perceived as the top House after Greyjoy won GenCon speaks volumes as to how strong they are. I still would say they are the Top House in Joust, with Greyjoy being their only strong Foil. And with the lack of Rotation in LCG, I don't think their place in the top 2 is in serious jeopardy for long while to come.

Baratheon- Always the Bridesmaid....Until the release of the Greyjoy Expansion, Baratheon was the second best house in LCG behind Lannister. With their Summer tech, Vigilant, and alot of Renown, they could hold their own and with a few breaks even beat Lannister kneel occasionally. Their control elemants got stronger with their Shadow tech. But I haven't seen or heard of either Bara Control or Bara Rush being able to consistently hang in there with Lanni and Greyjoy. RIght now I would put Baratheon third in Joust, but they actually have more versatility in deck building than any other House. Baratheon is the only House I can think of with 2 strong builds.

Baratheon just isn't quite fast enough. As DB says - by the time you get the two or three high cost renown guys on the board - Lanni, Targ or Greyjoy will have the lock. I firmly believe that just a touch more vigilant could accelerate them enough to pull off the turn three win they need to hit.

Shadows seems to be everyhwere at the moment, wiht msot decks I see playing at least 1 card in shadows every turn - form the flop on out. I kind of like Baratehon's shadow control cards - and if they can control shadows, Robert and KoF are really good aggro cards.

KP - i know we had this discussion at the Moot, but I don't think Baratheon was ever number 2. Even last summer, Targ could make it and keep ti summer for as long as they wanted - and given the darw and the gold, I think that put them in the second spot. I still think they are there: Targ can use recursive brun to control just about any chaarcter short of an army. They have amazing discard recursion and the best dead pile recursion available in LCG - positioning them weell to come back from resets. And now, with the latest chapter apck, htey can even get away from atatchment burn a little bit since they have a good character and a decent event they can rely on.

Targ's character base covers all three challenges nicely, they have a decent mix of crests and they have attrtacive options at just about every slot. They also feature some very strong lcoations, and they kind of have to build location heavy decks. I think Targ actually needs to run only about 25 characters and that they cna get away from the thrity character threshold a little - more so than any other House. I really like where they are at the moment - I'm just waiitng for a more playable Dany to arrive. The Core set one is OK, and she makes a lot fo decks just for the renown, but she also gets cut a lot because the ability just isn't that strong, and I'm used to more ipmactful versions for her.

I think Bara Summer wanted Targ to keep it summer. Bara Summer rush could normally Rush past Targ before they could lock, though maybe that was a local phenomenon. But didn't Alec's Bara Summer deck place higher that either Dan or Luke's Summer Targ decks at Kingsmoot this past July?

I would normally Rank house/build like this right now, based on build not player.

1. Lannister/Kneel

2. Greyjoy/Winter

3. Targaryen/Burn

4. Baratheon/Either Rush or Control

5. Stark/Anything

6. Martell/Anything

To me, 3 and 4 are somewhat interchangeable and Stark is 5 only because Princes hasn't hit shelves yet. As soon as Martell gets its Resource base and key uniques, they will probably jump into the top 3.

kpmccoy21 said:

Top six at Kingsmoot were:

1 Erick B. "finitesquarewell" - Lanni
2 Corey F. - Lanni
3 Casey C. - Stark Summer
4 Lucas R. "Maester Luke" - Targ Summer
5 Alec I. "skeletonator" - Bara Summer
6 Dan S. "Twn2dn" - Targ Summer

Couple of curiosities...

1- What's about Stark Summer? What cards did he play?

2- What do you think can be the "core" of a Bara control deck?

thanks ;-)

About Lannis: I'm currently playing a Lanni/Winter Deck and it does pretty well, considering the great resource advantage...Some problems against Greyjoy, though.

(Some problems = Agony ).

Casey's deck was defintiuely a rogue deck and I give him points for playing it so well. It was pretty much stark murder - he went Summer for the draw effect and the gold and read the meta well. It would be a much riskier play now with so many more viable Wintr builds - especially the good Greyjoy ones.

I guess I'll continue with the little guys then...

I tried to have a better look at what unique low cost (0-2 gold) characters the houses mentioned so far have gained since the core set, and was pretty surprised at what I found for Baratheon. There's only one new unique character for Bara in this price range, the new version of Selyse Baratheon. That means the total amount of new characters for Baratheon in the low cost range in all three chapter pack series is 2. Well, I'm discounting the generic characters here again (heralds, refugees, bandits, scavengers), since these are available to all houses.

Similar numbers for Stark: 8, Lannister: 4, Targaryen: 8, Greyjoy: 8, Martell: 9.

I counted the uniques in Kings of the Sea as new chars for the Core Set Houses and Martell. Stark has actually gotten quite many decent low-cost uniques lately it seems. Good for them. =) Also Lannister hasn't been getting many low-cost characters, but I think the idea here is to reflect the fact that they should be the "richest" house, and thus have no problems with gold. A similar idea may be in motion for Baratheon, but Summer Port not withstanding this really hasn't materialized.

The reason for looking at the little guys? In a usual deck (I'm basing this on dormouse's guidelines to have at least some kind of reference) you should have approximately 60% of your characters from this range (18 of 30). And I'd say the presence of resets in the environment makes low cost characters quite important. As does the lack of a plot that hurts weenies (see another thread for the discussion on this). So I'd think that this lack of choices in the low cost range is not helping Baratheon at all, and makes it more vulnerable to GJ and Lannister decks. Just a thought. At least it makes deck building much less rewarding.

...when in doubt, use statistics. =)

Gotta agree with the analysis on the house order in Joust. Martell will prolly bounce quite high once princes is out, and Stark will be left far behind. There might be some kind of rock-paper-scissors -thing forming between Greyjoy, Lannister and Targaryen, but that's probably just my imagination...

EDIT: The numbers are without Secrets and Spies.

Totally agree with your analysis...Consequently, I have to say that I'm not that wrong when I say that there are some "design" flaws.

Anyway, this thread is not a "complaint" about game design (or it's not just that)...

What I'd like to do now is to reach the end of the "house spoil" so to "open" the conversation and give some hints about Targs and Greys.

TARGARYEN - Burn me, baby!

I guess Targs are (or are going to be) my second house. I'll like their basic mechanics (I remember when the Core set was, at the beginning, we were here talkin' about the Targs Power on melee games).

I think what we got nowadays is the "reflection" of that "power", but now we're going to have something more. That seed has grown.

"The seed is strong", so to say. ;-)

Targ offer great choices, and it's a house I'd really like to master. They have wonderful attachment recursion (I'm workin' on it) and that's the seed I'm talkin' about. They've the possibility to work well even in a building with less than the average char quantity (26-27 are usually fine with them)...The price to pay can be a "locked" set up, if you abuse of attachment.

There is a wonderful icon balancing and crest dinstribution...They have strong attachments and locations, they have nice utility chars, even for "combo" oriented decks (I know "combo" in this game sounds weird...What I'm talkin' about is something like "different small combos" to lock; if you get it) XD.

They work well with Summer and I don't know excactly what will happen with "Blackfyre".

The first little "drawback" I'd notice is that the "work well with summer" seems more like "need Summer to work well". It's not a real "house addiction to Summer", but it's an help that they need, cause they need several cards to obtain burn/recursion effects...Someone would say that sometimes the game is not worth the candle...But that's not completely true. They're effects are awesom and powerful when active...Their kinda attachment lock/recursion is pretty aggressive and i guess it's "normal" to put a little bit more effort to obtain it. They do lots of funny things just with a couple of attachments...That cannot be for free ;-)

Anyway, this is the House right now. If you want it to be "competitive", I think you have to go summer or, at least, you have to rely more on impact and less on attachment/recursion...But in this case, I guess it'd be better to pick up another house. Targs have strong identity and that's the biggest merit/flaw: you can play build different decks, but you'll HAVE (at least "now") to take the SAME CORE for each building in order to be competitive with, let's say, Lannister.

Right now I'm building a "Bones of a child" deck, where I'd like to abuse of it with the "chambers" and "street waif". Maybe I'll post the list, one day or another... ;-)

Dragons have a strong personality and strong cards...I guess they need something more to be less dependent on its own identity than this...But, really, I don't know what.

I'd like to know your opinions, here, cause I'd really like to make them be the "unespected" Lannis enemey ;-)

GREYJOY - Oh, yes mate. That's 15.

I think we don't have to say lots of things here.

We waited for them...But now here they are, stronger than before.

They are incredibly reactive to winter and they are the best in taking advantage of "their own season".

We can talk about them for years, but the fact is that "Kings of the sea" is pretty strong by itself (with the right amoung of copies, eheh) ;-)

They have powerful and cheap interactions (save/cancel, unopposed, do that after unopposed, conditional power claim)...They do well everything they want (maybe there's some lack on "discard" strategies).

They have wonderful uniques, great attachments and destructive locations. If you don't wanna go Winter, you can still get good chances to overrun almost any oppo, with Stealth/Unopposed stuff.

I played lots of games with Greys VS Lannis (some insane playtest with a couple of players of my meta), and I've to say that they're the worst oppo Lannis can get (as we said before).

I made the mistake to play a Lanni Winter Deck against them...That was totally self-destructive...

By the way, I won some games with Lannis and when I did, it was totally dependent on set-up/first turn choices. You HAVE to play WELL (more than usual) and you HAVE to get rid of them at the beginning. If you don't do that, the game will become insanely difficult (Valar, soon or late, will come, and that'll be the ultimate twist). The "saves" allow them to play the strongest reset in the game, in "greyjoy" terms. They can get rid of any kind of oppo.

But I've something to specify here too...I don't know if it's completely true, but I guess it is...They risk to be "mono-thematic" in the long run, cause they've lots of "autoincludes" and they're not receiving lot of love in the last few CPs. I'd be pretty sad to see this funny house to be "mono-Winter" or the like...put down the chars, grab powers, end...I think it's weird that they're so strong in doing that...What are Baratheon going to do?..."Hey Bob, Stannis...YOU'RE FIRED!!!...Euron does it better than your freaky guys!"

That's it, for now! Your turn again, guys ;-)

WWDrakey made good points about "small guys"..:And it can be discussed again...

But now I'd like to know your opinions about the "Big Guys"...

Who has the best Uniques? Who has the strongest "Big Stuff"?

Some may say Baras, other Greys...

I don't know where's the truth...I.E. I can play Lannister whit a low number of uniques, while I'm playin' other houses (like Bara), I really need LOTS of them (as well as for Stark)...Is it a good thing? I'm for the versatility and I'm not a "3x everything" guy, but sometimes the deck seem too much "uniques-addicted".

I can play Lannis with 4/5 Uniques and lots of utility stuff...And I have a strong deck, maybe the strongest....

Does the fact that you HAVE to play lots of Uniques mean that the House is not well developed? Or is it just a matter of "style"?

I think its a negative if your houses' strongest cards aren't unique. I don't play the game for Castellans of the Rock and Enemy Informants. I play because I like the Ice and Fire Universe and enjoy having Dany or Tyrion on the Board. If the best cards in the games are non-uniques, then I believe there is a flaw in the design of the game. Unique strong characters from the books(POV and Importyant non-POV characters) should be the Game Breaker/Game Changer characters in the game, not generic ally/army character. I realize this is more of a Ned Perspective, and the Jaimes and Shagga will howl. But that's why I play the game and that's what I want from my play experience.

Strongest Uniques probably go to Baratheon, though Targ is right there behind them. Targ's problem is that all their strong uniques clog up the 4 gold spot. Baratheon has some stronger uniques in the 3 gold slot. I like the Greyjoy uniques, but they are a distant 3rd. Stark's uniques are more integral to their success as a house than Lannister, but card for card, I think Lannister has much stronger uniques. Lannister uniques tend to be less situational than Stark uniques and their redundant uniques aren't really that conflicting. There is usually a superior version of the Lannister unique that makes the choice obvious.

Oh yeah, mate, I started playing this game for the same reason... :-)

I was just trying to make an analysis ignoring this...And I'm not saying that Strong uniques are an error...and I'm not telling that strong "utilities" ar an error, neither.

In an "esterior game design analysis" you're totally right. The game is westeros-centered and I agree with uniques twisting the games...But we have to enjoy the whole environment and you should agree with me that, even in that prespective, sometimes the "low profile guys" are more important than "big guys".

POV chars are not necessarely the ones who change the storyline. :-)

I like the idea on having a twisting "shadow tyrion" in play who conspinres while Robb is tryin' to summon his "big" allies and Dany steals gold to pay his own mercenary...but I like the fact that Silent Sisters, ignored, can inspire some "fear" in their "silent walk" and that an "insignificant" Scurvy Cutthroat threatens the life of a Lord "killing" that fu...ed Bodyguard!

Sorry if I tried to be funny, but that's the concept.

So, in game-design terms (and in narrative terms, in some ways) I find that while you're right about the "uniqueness of uniques", I've to add that a game Unique centered can be very boring, 'cause the risk is something like a "who plays the big guy first wins the game" stuff.

;-)

There have always been strong non-uniques who have a Westeros flavor. I'm not against them at all. In order for your house to be strong, you need both strong uniques and non-uniques. What I'm against is an optimal deck not needing to run uniques. I think the best cards should be uniques, not that nonuniques should be weak or unplayable.

And as long as the LCG keeps the feel of the series, it will never be a race of uniques. Valar Morghulis, all men must die.

My deck ran a lot of "wall" like characters such as Bringer of Laws with Aegon's Blade.

I used Summer for extra gold and card draw. I figured at the time that for Stark to have card draw I needed to run ravens, Summer, Samwell, and Epic Battles with the reducer locations to draw (which have been errated or ruled to not work that way anymore).

The real key to the deck was to grind my opponent down with targeted kill, wall like characters, and grinding them down with challenges and getting off as many Epic phases as possible.

It worked well. I'm not sure if it's viable now, and if it is I'm sure that Targ could do it better. It was a long bus ride up, though, so I had a lot of time to think and that's what I came up with.

Thanks a lot, Casey. I was very curious. ;-)