Kennon said:

interesting that none of them have an intrigue icon....so maybe keeping your characters in hand could work.

Also, the new martell event is a good way of stopping this in the one challenge you really don't want to lose. Misinformation also lets lanni protect their hand for a turn (or they can just a gtm to replace one of the two cards they might lose), fiegned retreat also works if you can 2 influence on the flop (or red keep into shadows).

lost oasis is also an other instreasting option if you have a martell cahracter out as you can start kneeling icons, orphan of the green blood, princes wrath also are nice. so is game of cyvasse if you have an int icon out.

stark and their fury 1st turn can be helpful or greyjoy against stark. having your own syrio (never a bad option) is useful. plus something has to go wrong for either of these houses to not have lots of weenies out. an interesting build would be to flop 3-4 weenies and as your one card stealth giving euron...

lanni...well lanni really only needs either a castellan or agh on the flop and then a secondary kneel effect in hand to really limit the damage

targ had a lot of good answers brought up, threat is really nice and burn can get syrio or any of the other annoying weenies.

bara...saves are nice I also think the vigilant atrtachment guys get around the plot (ktom?)

yeah it has the potiental to be brutal, but so does greyjoy winter with a marader on the flop, with a suport and white raven in hand and flipping power of arms as its plot....its just good deck building

I just want to point out one thing that was overlooked so far relating to Forgotten Plans reprinted to deal witht his plot: Fear of Winter creates a lasting effect ("...until you reveal a new plot.") that Forgotten Plans would not cancel by blanking. It is essentially a When Revealed plot, without the When Revealed wording. Unless I am understanding it wrong (which I could be).

If there WAS going to be an errata for this card, making it When Revealed would be the best way to go. So far there is only one possible cancel the new Old Bear Mormont but as the environment grows, this could change.

I personally love this plot, and have been on both the giving and receiving end of it. It changes strategy immensly, and can be horrible to face when you are in a back-to-the-wall situation. But players adapt, and the game adapts. Valar Morghulis can be just as bad a plot, and Greyjoy has so many answers to keep control afterwards (never mind running Bran out of House to save and then switch into another plot like Fear of Winter). I wouldn't want to see it banned. Just because so many people play it doesn't make it overpowered (the Gathering Storm never got banned until it hit the Legacy melee list, and then also only in Joust apparently since they didn't want separate banned lists).

One other question: how does it work with Cat of the Canals? Does the card effect the player so she doesn't get to be played as a second card, or would playing her not be affected by FoW?

Interesting hwo this discussion has evolved. Dobbler siad at thet outset he didn't wnat to tlak about abns or errata, and i certainly don't think the Plot warrnats any suc action. But he did ask if we thought ti changed the wya you approach the game - and there is no question it has for me. dormouse and i have diametrically different approaches to deck building and this Plot has certainly moved me squarely over to his method. I'm not a fan - yes: the Bolckade/RBD hting ahs been aorund forever - but adding another Plto to teh chain just enhcnaes the NPE.

And tis not just Stark that exploits this Plot - almost any House can - it really does become all about the flop.

Stag Lord said:

to go back to kevin's point, so does lanni kneel, targ burn, stark murder, greyjoy winter, bara rush. now just add weenie and FoW control....

Whatever - you're missing teh point. It's one card. And a Plot to boot - somehting you can have total control over that your oppoennt cannot in any way effect.

There's a difference between an evolving staregy changing my approach to deck building and one freaking card doing the same. i like adjusting thkngs becuse a new strategy has changed my premeses. That's dynamic and cahllenging. One poorly conceived card though? It doesn't sit as well.

Again: not the end fo the world, just somehting annoying that we have to deal with. Dobbs did a good sevrice in getting this thread up - i think some veyr productive counter measures were discussed.

JerusalemJones said:

JJ: I'm pretty posiitve Forgotten Plans will blank the effect of Fear of Winter.

It would be nice if it did, because I really think Forgotten Plans or a similar effect would be good for the environment. Power of Blood is becoming too powerful and there are just so many lasting effects from plots right now that anything that can blank them (even if it was an ability that lasted just for a phase) would be a nice addition to the game. I like the fact that there are little options to affect plots but I would still like to see those options in the game.

Kennon said:

Power of Arms first turn makes it so that unless they have enough stealth to get past all of your war crests, having only ONE that can defend will probably be enough. The lessened income isn't a problem on Power of Arms if they are playing Fear of Winter since you can only play one card anyways. This is a viable option with Targ too, as war crest based decks with them are pretty strong, and they have the direct burn to survive long enough to get that going.

kpmccoy21 said:

Yes, because if you get that strong start and your opponent can only play one card in response to it, AND you have claim 2, you're immediately putting them on their heels. Then when you Blockade, they cant recover. You have to be able to disrupt their first turn enough so that they don't feel they are able to Blockade in the second round. Difficult but not impossible by any means.

To me, the combo with the Epic's are the larger problem. You pretty much guarantee (with the right build) quite a few (2-4) military wins at two claim, and a 2nd turn RBD to hit their hand for 4 cards. Dobbs almost winning first turn seems like a problem to me, because I can see that happening with regularity to be honest...or at least the game is over for all practical purposes. I don't see that with Lanni kneel *shrug* (see: Lanni not showing well right now), although more ally hate would never be refused in my mind

To Ktom - I agree that it is part of the meta, and we should all suck it up That being said, there is no problem in my mind complaining about the game when something is overpowered enough, or moving in a direction peope (i.e. me, and at least some others have agreed) isn't as much fun.

The great thing about aGoT is that most people play to have fun. My point was IMHO this card/combo/strategy makes the game less fun, and I am worried about the direction the game is going in.

Let's face it, cards have been made that just are not good for the game - banning is serious and I hate it (and to be honest, I don't support it in this case yet), but if it makes the game more fun for pretty much everyone...why is it so bad again? Is it a 'slippery slope' argument? Stark Traitor decks at one point were bad for the game, and I didn't cry when they left. To be honest, I really haven't had an issue with any bannings - knowing that in the back of my mind each one has made my playing experience more fun.

JerusalemJones said:

There is no such thing as "essentially a When Revealed plot." Can you "essentially" cancel it with Old Bear? No? Then it doesn't act like a When Revealed plot. Without an activation trigger, it is a constant effect. Forgotten Plans takes out both the text effect and the "until you reveal a new plot" limit, so would counter Fear nicely. The "until you reveal" text is really more about juggling the plot states during the transfer to the used pile.

JerusalemJones said:

Since her immunity isn't active when she's in your hand, this is something of a non-issue, is it not? And anyway, since the effect creates play restrictions on the game state without actually being applied to any individual cards, immunity doesn't offer any protection to an individual card.

rings said:

Yes, this is something I totally agree with. If I hadn't been able to use a control card on the Blackfish, then it would have been game over first turn with nothing I could do. As is, it was over second turn with nothing I could do. Yes, to a certain extent you can blame that on my deckbuilding, but from the way this works, it makes it entirely about deck construction and nothing about gameplay. I think that's a very bad state to be in where a sequence of plots robs such a huge percentage of possible gameplay from opponents. Sure, Lannis kneel and the like steal options once cards have hit the board to target, but again as someone who has faced both recently, it feels much worse to never have the chance to play the cards in the first place.

Also, I agree with Stag's post about this being an issue because it's an "at will" sort of happening through plots, but quoting multiple people on these boards is just too much of a hassle.

rings said:

I have to emphasize Rings' point here because I feel this is by far the most pressing issue: the possibility of a First Turn Win.

To me, nothing creates a more negative play experience in a card game (ccg, tcg, lcg, etc) than uber combos that can reach the win condition first turn (or almost reach it like Dobbler's post raises the point). As someone who has dabbled in many different card games with my kid (from original Pokemon to Spoils to online TCG recently) I can say that when power creep or whatever anyone wants to call it reaches the point where the whole first draw determines the entire game (because of super powerful first and second turn wins) then the game becomes MUCH less fun very quickly.

What was always so appealing about Game of Thrones was that it always seemed a strategic and tactical game where a properly built deck could easily recover from a bad flop. Unlike the "kiddie" card games like Pokemon and Naruto, Game of Thrones was *never* about that perfect flop that guaranteed a win. I remember some amazing flops I had when I started in the ITE/5Kings era. People were able to turn around almost perfect flops I had where I thought I was going to dominate because even with a great flop there was no way to win in 1st turn.

Games where first turn Wins or even just Lockdowns are possible create very different deck building and limit the diversity of playable strategies to a great degree. Essentially deck building becomes entirely dominated by the imperative to not lose on the flop to the first turn win combos. From my experience in many other card building games, this will lead to less diversity and more homogeneity for competitive decks.

The reason that Stark benefits so much now from Fear/Blockade/Rule by Decree is clearly because of their new Agenda that suddenly turns a Stark quirk (much efficient military and very little intrique) into a dominating Power grabbing advantage. That Agenda is really insane when building around it with the Plots that are currently out.

LaughingTree said:

Fully agreed. If any part of the combo needs to be nerfed/banned/whatever, it's the agenda, not the plots. The series of plots is good, but not unbeatable. There's plenty of ways to stall your opponent out through those three plots and recover.

LaughingTree said:

To head off this hysteria before it starts, how many turn 1 wins occurred at the Regional? NONE! How many possible turn 1 wins? ONE

Fluke things happen in CCG's, I've seen close to turn 1 wins a couple times in casual play. No overpowered cards involved, just crazy awesome luck. I don't see consistent turn 1 wins happening, though Greg and Kevin feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

Obviously the bigger concern is 2 or 3 claim 2 military challenges.

I never thought First Snow was overpowered, since everyone had access to use it and build around it. I don't think Fear of Winter is overpowered for the same reasons.

Just because I don't like the current play environment does not make it broken or bad for the game. Personally, I thought last fall and winter were low points of the LCG with the King's Landing Expansion skewering the game too much to the control play style, but that's just my play preferences not coinciding with the then current environment. That doesn't make the environment at that time bad. I think the complaint against Fear is other people experiencing similar dislike with the new direction they think the game is going.

When Stark wins GENCON, lets start talking about banning/nerfing the agenda. Every summer Stark that has a strong build, everyone starts worrying about it being bad for the game, yet they never even make it to the final game. Some other heavy control build keeps them from being even close to contenders. Lets revisit this if that changes.

I don't think the turn one win is the problem. I think that the game being decided on turn one is the problem. Sure greg or kevin didn't win on turn 1, but how many games were pretty much over on turn 1 regardless of power totals?

I'd say there's a pretty good chance that the game I played against each of them was, though I can't speak for anyone else that played them.

Yeah and both games I played against Kevin were over on turn 1. I lost the first one and I won the second one. So the fear of winter decks are the ultimate win or go home decks. Although I think more often than not its win.

kpmccoy21 said:

1. I agree the first turn win hasn't been shown to be consistant - as stated I think the game basically being over turn 1 (no characters, the start of next turn going down to 4 cards and your opponent has 6-10 power) is much more of a worry. I am not an expert on the decks yet, but this seems to not need a lot of luck to pull off.

2. I think you are very wrong on the first paragraph above. Maybe if YOU don't like the current play environment it doesn't make it bad for the game, but when a majority of players don't like it...sorry to say that is bad for the game (you didn't like last year, and trust me a lot of people left during that environment). This isn't the case yet, but I see a definate NPE trend starting with this combo, or the fact that you have to play around your opponents "un-cancelable always on time plots" with subpar counters.

3. I do agree with the second paragraph. I would really like Stark to be strong and playable. They haven't had a ton of Worlds success (Dobbler's 2nd place the highest I can think of?), and I would love for them to win. However, I don't want them to win like this...or with the old Traitor deck. Kind of like I don't want the US to win the World Cup based on us being able to use steriods and no other team could. Stark isn't the only house BTW that can use these tactics...just probably the best at this second due to Agenda (GJ being a close 2nd due to saves).

4. Lastly - I have said it 100 times - plot and agendas are the two hardest cards to balance. Especially agendas considering they are impossible to target (almost). This Stark deck uses a set of plots and an agenda that only can be countered by playing a certain kind of deck I believe (and could be wrong), and that is the worry. "Play this deck or go home" is no fun.

All that being said, I wouldn't mind nothing happening. It would show its power (or not) at Worlds which is only two months away. Obviously Bara can beat it, so it isn't...um...unbeatable!

rings said:

As to the game being over after turn 1, I played a Greyjoy deck that used those plots at the DC Regional, and against Lanni Shadows I had the game "over" after turn 2 or 3. Paul came back and beat me in the 9th plot. In Game of Thrones, it isn't over til you have the 15th power. The game can still be won after horrendous openings.

I agree that if large numbers of people become dissatisfied and leave the game, it becomes bad for the game. My point was that me personally disliking the environment does not equal large numbers disliking it or leaving the game. So far only a handful of players from the Midwest Melee have shown a dislike. Are Staton and Kennon speaking for the other dozen players who attended? Are those people leaving the game? Are Staton or Kennon leaving the game? The point of the boards is to promote discussion and ultimateltely purchasing and playing the game. While Kennon and Staton should bring their concerns, I personally have not seen Fear of Winter lead to people leaving the game or even threatening to leave the game. If that were to occur, then I would take the concerns as much more than a personal dislike of where the game has evolved recently.

kpmccoy21 said:

Sorry to double post, but the above statement is incorrect and I wanted to apologize before I antagonized others in the thread. Other people from around the country and world have chimed in, and I did not mean to disregard their contributions. What I meant was that Kennon and Staton have been the primary proponents of this plot cycle and deck archetype are creating a NPE. But they are not alone in voicing their dislike. Sorry.

kpmccoy21 said:

Honestly, there were only two decks at the Midwestern Melee playing this plot cycle that I remember. Both were powerhouses, and I'm sure everyone knew it by the end. lol

I played Greg in the joust, and luckily he got a not so great flop on me. But after the plot cycle, the game might as well have been over.

If decks like these pop up and become more frequent, I believe it will make people want to leave the game. I know I don't want the game that used to be fun, come down to who has the better flop. Then you aren't really playing the game, your pretty much playing rock paper scissors. But these are only my opinions on the matter.

LaughingTree said:

Yeah, I actually agree with this. I don't want to discount the innovation that goes into deckbuilding to create a deck that can exploit the combination of these plots so well (Dobbler/others--great combo with epic events btw), but I think the combo is relatively easy to play once you know how it works. Worse, the deck itself is relatively easy to play...sort of an auto-pilot experience, I think. (At least, this is often how I feel when I play my Targ deck, which runs this sequence.) The last thing I want is for AGOT to be one of those card games where people download "uber competitive" decklists and take them to tourneys. I know that's not something many AGOT players are as likely to do, but the point is that it takes a lot of the strategy out of the game, as LaughingTree mentioned.

By the way, and not to open up a can of worms, but I do want to point out that it seems like some of the people who are pointing out the risks (and harms) of this plot are the same people who are running it too (me included). In other words, I don't think this is an issue of people being upset because they are losing games, and then immediately posting about how broken Fear of Winter is. I think people who have concerns about this plot are worried because of how it affects their deck building and play experience...at least I am.

kpmccoy21 said:

Well, to be fair to the rest of my meta, none of them really frequent these boards. Dobbler is on often, Husemann only started posting this week, and Jeppedo rarely if ever looks at them any more. So I'll do a little polling with the other other 7 or 8 members over the next week or so and see what their feelings are.

Kennon said:

I hear that Husemann is a lurker. I also hear his vote is that this plot combo is ******* frustrating and makes him not wanna play. lol