Alright, I'll go ahead and post my tourney report in here and give some of the thought processes that went into the deck building process of my Missouri deck. You can see the decklist (with a few minor changes due to not having three samwells) here. The deck started as the standard Bara noble rush deck. I had been playing against Kyle (lannipanda) for a month before the tourney. I had built the deck to beat the lanni draw power, but was pretty bummed to learn that there weren't going to be that many lanni decks at Missouri once I got there. The deck still performed against the other houses pretty well, but I was really scared of the Greyjoy Winter matchup. I hadn't tested against them at all, but on paper it seemed like I would have a very bad chance at beating them.

The main theory behind the deck is that since you can't beat the draw power of lanni, make draw a non-issue. I did this by making my deck so redundant, through multiple copies of the cards I need, that I had what I needed by the first or second turn. In the off chance that I did need a bit more, the few draw cards in the deck would get me what I needed. The deck was flopping five and six card flops all day during the tourney, except for one instance, but we'll get to that later. In the early versions of this deck, my nobles were getting knelt out or burned or just getting made useless. I decided to add two extra copies of Eddard to the deck after the first couple of versions. This was the x factor to the deck. He just makes your opponent have to think so much more and he makes them have to dedicate so much more resources to dealing with the nobles. The fact that he's limit once per phase, instead of once per round, is amazing. There aren't few houses that can pile up control in once phase. Martell probably comes the closest with the challenge phase. Lannister has their control split between the Marshalling and Challenges phase.

Most of my turns ended with having two renown uniques on the board with two weenies for claim and a dupe/bodyguard/loyal guard or two. When playing the deck I had to let anything that didn't have renown act as claim soak. I would try and get out a bannerman as early as possible, alot of the times playing it as a character just to have something else out there to attack or defend. The distinct masteries really helped to just to make sure I had something standing during the challenges phase and to get me a few extra power when I needed it. I'll post more later.

Staton said:

and oh what a joy it was letting you wail on me, i'm glad it was for a worthy cause...

Yep, pretty cool deck. I agree that Bara wins or goes home in 1-3 turns, so there really isn't any reason to not run 3X of any card that you want.

Congrats again!

Actually I find that the deck can last well beyond turn 3. I usually had two uniques at the end of the first turn, and usually had at least one of them protected with a dupe/bodyguard/loyal guard. The second and third turn I almost always would play Power of Blood back to back. Which usually means that by turn four I would have three or four uniques with renown who are pretty well protected. So the opponent almost certainly doesn't want to use Valar because it would leave me with a clear board advantage and pretty close to winning also. There were quite a few games were I was able to just flip Red Wedding on turn four for the win also. Really the only house that can keep up with Baratheon's character production is Stark. Greyjoy can too, but they can't field enough of an icon spread to stop me from winning challenges. I think once people really start looking at all the Stark cards, instead of just looking at Siege of Winterfell, Stark is going to be the house to beat. They have very well costed characters, a great icon spread, and plenty of answers to almost any type of card. They could use a little draw, but I think between Sam and the Ravens it should get the job done with their in house draw.

Anyway! On to the tourney report.

Friday night cube draft

This was my first time ever "cube drafting", and I must say that it is SOOOOO much fun! If you have the chance to do this, you really must give it a try. I opened my first pack and there were about five cards that I knew I wanted, that would have caused me to draft in five very different ways. I ended up taking almost every knight related card I saw. I had Tourney Knight (don't pay ooh penalties on knights), Tourney Grounds (kneel to reduce next knight by 2 and ignore ooh gold penalties), the jousting knight that put a knight character into play from your dead or discard pile, and a few other Knight related cards. On top of this, I drafted the War of the Five Kings Agenda, which is the Siege of Winterfell minus the House Stark Only. I almost managed to draft King Robert from 5KE, Make Him Fly, Persuasion, and Enforce the Law. The one thing I was worried about was not having enough resources, but this turned out to not be a problem since I was able to draft The Gathering Storm and Rushed Attack.

Round 1-Raine(not sure of the spelling on this one)-Stark

This game was pretty one sided, which was too bad for Raine since she had drafted quite a bit of awesome stark tech. However, she hadn't drafted the original Blackfish, since he was in my deck. I was able to get out The Blackfish, King Robert, and Ice and Fire Jaime. I played Gathering Storm first round, and Rushed Attack second round, winning initiative both turns. The two rounds of two claim combined with my renown made this a short two turn game.

Round 2-Kennon-I forget which house, but he was playing with the Eyrie!

I was pretty impressed with Will's drafting of the Eyrie. ~Sadly enough for Will, that's about the only thing that impressed me. I think he just drew dead in this game. He only played a handful of cards the whole game and just didn't seem to get any character control. Luckily for me I was able to get out some renown and make it a quick game. I must say this was the only game where Rushed Attack didn't win me initiative and I had to lose three challenges that I could've defended if I could.

Round 3-I for the life of me can't seem to recall who I played this round or what happened during it. I guess I won. Hmmm. Hopefully someone else can remember and post. I think I might need to start taking a page out of Kennon's book and taking notes at tournies.

Round 4-Kevin-Martell

I was going into this one feeling pretty crappy. I mean, I know what Martell used to have, and it wasn't pretty. So of course he flops The Prince's Loyalist. Ugh! He was also kind enough to play some influence, because I would've hated to see him not be able to use The Loyalist! Anyway, the two turns of two claim military challenges, followed by him not being able to draw into anymore characters made this game short too.

I think that with those two two claim plots, plus my agenda meant that I could've played it from almost any house and have been fine. The Knight deck just was icing on the cake really. Also, being able to draft what amounted to a Baratheon Rush deck in draft made me feel alot better about playing it in the Joust the next day. I was having some doubts on if I should switch houses, but this seemed like an omen. One of those good omens, not one of the creepy ones.

Alright, now onto the joust tourney. That morning I got to remember why I hate writing out decklists. While writing mine, I had to help Andrew and Katie build a Stark deck that Katie would be playing, so it was quite hectic. Well, onto the games!

Round 1-Kevin McClure - Greyjoy Nights Watch (Mil and Intrigue agendas)

I was really surprised at the kind of deck he was running. On the one hand I thought that the deck was going to be crap, but on the other hand I knew Kevin was a very good player. I knew my deck liked five or six card flops, but I decided to go with a four card flop instead of risking the mulligan. Man that was a bad choice. I flopped core set Mel, Seat of Power, Narrow Sea, and Carrion Bird. He flops some Nights Watch guys that seem solid enough. I play my Fury to get some gold going early to flood the board with uniques. He plays Fear of Winter. This is when I realize what he's going for, and just how screwed I am. I play Bodyguard on Mel to keep her alive. He plays syrio into shadows I believe. I managed to win an intrigue to discard an epic battle event and was really surprised. Next turn Kevin plays three epic battles preplots and then throws down blockade. I try to lay out as much as possible but it just isn't enough. I had lost two characters the previous round to him and I just didn't get my draw going. I concede the next turn since I only had a few characters out and none in hand.

Round 2 - Zeiler-Stark Siege of Winterfell

Man, this is not looking good for me. I'm a bit surprised when he flops some direwolves and this location that makes your direwolves get stealth. I end up with a six card flop though, and feel pretty good about it. I have Robert Eddard and Mel out by the end of turn one, with a few non-uniques for claim soak. I try to defend as many challenges that I can, which turn out only to be mil, since he isn't really doing any other challenges. I managed tog et four power on robert first turn thanks to Distinct Mastery.He thought he had won on turn three, when he managed to get 15 power. Sadly for him I had out Mel, which means he was actually two power away from winning. I followed his challenges up with three UO challenges of my own for the win. Phew! close one!

Round 3 - Paul- Lanni-no Agenda

As soon as I sit down, Paul let's me know that he's running a Lanni Winter deck. While I'm happy that I have to face less kneel, I'm sad that I have to play a winter deck. The game is essentially a repeat for me. I draw renown dudes and I play renown dudes. Paul's location control is next to useless against me since I'm really only running reducers. He does manage to make it Winter around turn three, but it didn't matter as I already had everything I needed to win. I win the next turn by going first and doing a big power challenge.

Round 4- Andrew (Wreckingball)-Greyjoy Kings of Winter

Ugh! I have lots of problems beating andrew. He is an incredible deckbuilder and an even better player. Add this to the fact that he is playing the nemesis to my deck and you have an equation for disaster for me. The only thing that saved me this game was the fact that Andrew just couldn't draw any characters. I think I won on turn three thanks to the bannerman. I think I also made it Summer so I drew a few extra cards. It was a bittersweet moment though, since this meant that Andrew was out of the top 4.

Round 5-Justin (Jeppedo)-Stark-Siege of Winterfell

Well I had played Justin in the past and knew that he was a master at the Stark rush. I also knew that they could just shut down my power and military challenges. I managed to get another six card flop however and went full force from turn one. I got a bannerman out early on Robert, and I managed to flop Selyse. The uo intrigue challenge became my friend this game. I was lucky enough to get the samwell draw going off the flop too. I think I drew the most cards this game. I was drawing three almost every turn with gilly/summer agenda/samwell. On turn five I think, I managed to give robert and stannis intrigue icons and push home the mass intrigue with them and melisandre. Close one!

Top 4-Kennon-Martell

I had playtested my deck against Will's in preparation for this tourney, so I knew what it did for the most part. He was off to a good start, but he had absolutely no power icons and I had my ace in hole: Eddard Stark. He just shut down the small amount of control that Will actually drew. The Summer Champion however felt the full force of martell control and was either knelt or iconless every turn. Stannis was a beast in this game since the viper didn't come out. The game ended on turn four with Red Wedding on Stannis and Mel. Man, thanks again for suggesting that Will! Such a good card. I felt rather nervous though since I was either going to play Kevin, who I had lost to already, or Greg, who is a two time world champ. I don't like those odds one bit!

Final Table - Kevin-GJ Nights Watch (again)

I knew I had to have just an amazing flop to get past turn one. Luckily the Bara gods were with me. I flopped six cards, and drew into the six cards I needed the most: uniques, loyal guards, and royal entourage. My flop was better than Kevin's so I was fairly certain he wasn't going to Fear of Winter first turn. I was right when he dropped a preplot Epic Battle and then Rule by Decree. It didn't hurt too bad since I was able to discard Royal Entourage. I played Robert and Renly and brought the Royal Entourage into play. I also played a black raven to get some cards with Samwell. A Bannerman let me get quite a few challenges in with Robert. My early board position let me keep the Epic Battles in his hand and he never caught back up. I won with another well timed Red Wedding on Turn 4. Which is good, because I didn't draw very many dupes or loyal guards or bodyguards. I think Kevin played Valar, but I was able to go first for the win. Congrats Kevin on making it to the final table though! Although seriously, why do I have to keep playing you?! lol

Afterwards I joined the Bara table for a Civil War game. This is a very fun format! Especially with The Good God's Own Kiss in the mix! Although I am sad to say that I was the only player without that plot. ~I think they were conspiring against me. I never really got anything in this game. I had low gold plots, and tons of overpriced bara cards from westeros. I did get to play a white raven and proceed to make as many deals as possible. Katie proved her melee skills yet again by winning without any of us realizing she was even close. The one time I looked at her house she had like three power. Around turn six she does and intrigue against me and I can't defend. I discard a card and she goes "I win!" We all look at her house card with our mouths hanging open. Man, if anyone is ever at a melee table with her, keep an eye on her power count!

After watching a completely outrageous targ civil war game, we all went back to Greg's to build melee decks. Since I was feeling lazy I just decided to switch out Valar (I'm sure everyone else will be running a reset!) for Mutual Enemies, Red Wedding (I just know everyone will have tons of lords and ladies) for Counting Favors, and A Time for Ravens (I don't really need to make it summer for melee) for Summoning Season. I leave the draw deck alone and hope for the best. We play a practice game that night and no one will let me get past six power. I could've won three times by getting ten or so power, but each time everyone just knelt out my guys or blanked them. Man, I hope this isn't what happens the next day! I'll save you the suspense. This is exactly what happens the next day.