Is there a reason it is golden? (instead of the usual silver chainmail of attachements)

I also noticed that Rhaegar has some fancy partern running down the right side of his card.

anyone know why they decided to do that?

eygji said:

That was one of the original chapter packs right when FFG decided to switch from CCG to LCG

The Gold bordered LCG cards were supposed to originally be like a "Rare" equivalent since only 1 copy of those cards was released in chapter packs.

I believe they simply decided to not do the "LCG Pseudo-Rare" concept so those few cards are the only ones with the special borders. I like the touch on Rhaegar's Harp myself... I wish they did some more pseudo-rare with different borders but probably not since they changed packaging again.

It is because they were "mythic" cards and would actually have been an additional level of rarity, with fewer printed than the standard rares. Thankfully the switch to LCG did away with this terrible concept that has made so many additional cards difficult to obtain in CCG's.

I do find it amusing that they were headed down this path when they decided to reverse gears entirely. Kudos for Christian, Nate, et al. for deciding to buck the CCG system mid-stream.

Well everyone else pretty much nailed it, but I for one am glad they are still using the pattern down the side.

All of the "To be a __" events, the house specific keyword events, the epic battles events, and some characters have them. To me, it makes them a bit more special. (Much like it would if it were a "rare" card.)

Yeah - that would have been a really bad direction for the game to head and we can be thnakful we never went that route. Given teh current state of CCGs - i'm pretty confident GoT would be dead at this point if they ahd kept teh CCg model and "ultra rares" woudl ahve been one of the nails in the coffin.

In another sense - Rhaegar's Harp is golden becuase its one of the most efficient trait manipulation cards in the game. And its easily recursible with Lady Dany's Chambers and other discard manipulation tricks. If you are going the Targ wildling route - one not make Jorah or Daario or Rhaeger himself a wildling and get all the benefits of your multiple Agendas?

Stag Lord said:

Because Varys can play the Harp too...

So can a Carrion Bird.

I thought gold bordered/fancy patterns were simply denoting legendary (or pre-SoIaF) characters/locations/items/events (like Ser Arthur Dayne, Tower of Joy, and Balerion). Did not know there was a mythic rarity baggage attached to it before the LCG switch.

If any game designers are checking this forum, I'd like to say, "Please make more fancy cool cards like this!" Not too many, but for really neat ones, it's a really nice touch.

If I'm not mistaken, some cards are 'stand-outish' with their design. Shadows Ser Barristan seems to have a unique color and look.

anavasoothed said:

Barristan has standard template - it's just very pretty illustration

The cards from Lords of Winter have a more colorful printing than the others.... anyone noticed that?

Ruvion said:

I think this answer is the closest to the truth.

The special patterns were used for "Legendary" cards. Legendary cards represent things of great significance in the Song of Ice & Fire world that either pre-date the books, or are imaginings of what might have been. Rheagar Targaryen is an example of both. In the books he died during the Battle of Ruby Ford (another legendary card, predates the events of the books) & never became King, so his legendary card imagines where he would be if his side had won that battle.

People in the community said that these were originally created to be Ultra-rares, but that never happened, and I don't know if they were correct.

perthius said:

Considering that the information is coming straight from a "card of the week" article published back when they first came out, I think it's pretty safe to say they are right. The additional art elements on those three cards (Rhaegar, Rhaegar's Harp, Battle of the Ruby Ford) denoted an additional level of rarity planned for the CCG expansion that became the Clash of Arms Chapter Pack cycle. It never happened because of the switch to the LCG format, but the art elements remained.

The cards chosen for this planned level of rarity were themed to be "Legendary" in terms of the source material. It is probably worth noting that the "Legendary" cards published after Clash of Arms do not have the art elements (Jon Arryn, for example).

Which is a real bummer. I think the legendary frame effects would be a blast to add to future printings of characters/places/events that were from a pre-novel period.

I don't think the 'super-rare' legendary cards would have changed the CCG model at all. They were all uniques, and house specific I believe. And only maybe 5 times as rare as a regular one. They wouldn't have been remotely hard to get.

It didn't hurt the game when the Eyrie, Sam, and ??? were super rare (and necessary, and nuetral) in the first two sets...to be honest it probably increased sales. I know people don't like the idea, but it has been proven again and again in games that things like super-rares and foils increase sales. *shrug* Magic, YGO, LoTR and others wouldn't do it to reduce sales

All that being said, I love the LCG format. Just sayin...

Dude - c'mon. Eyrie, sam and Ptt? were still gettable if you bougth a box. These freaking thinsg would have required so much more of an investment and would have gone for stupid money on eBay. It would have turned lots of people off - especially in THAT community, which was never MtG level competitive anyway.....and would have boosted sales in a shrinking player base. Its a **** good thing they never want down that road at all.

Stag Lord said:

Couple of things:

- My recollection is that FFG's only excursions into exceptional rarity for the AGoT CCG were by accident in the original Westeros set when a printing error or warehouse accident (I forget the lore) accidentally printed different amounts of the rare sheets. So rares like The Eyrie, Mel and Sam ended up being harder to come by. The scarcity of Sea of Storms rares had more to do with a dramatically smaller print run than usual for expansions.

- The other "hard to get" rares from later years, like the Winer-block Sam, House of Talons Eyrie, Sky Cell and Ptt? had nothing to do with how the cards were printed and packaged and more to do with the fact that such great cards were hoarded when found. If it was more than that, it tended to be regional (couldn't find a Vale Ward to save my life, but other people outside of the Midwest were lousy with the suckers).

Which brings up another point. I doubt that "ultra-rare" Rhaegar, Rhaegar's Harp and Battle of the Ruby Ford would have done much for the secondary market had the LCG switch not happened. Quite honestly, the cards themselves were not good enough to hunt down for most decks. I think most people would have hunted down one each for collections, then not tried too hard beyond that. They don't see that much play even with wide, easy availability.

ktom said:

That's one of the things I like about the LCG format. Having played with the LCG a while now, I realize that some of my CCG format card evaluations are influenced by how much the card costs on the secondary market. It's nice to evaluate cards without that extra factor in the back of my mind. It will be even nicer with the next cycle and the change in the card distribution.

I never said I like the super-rare aspect (I heart LCG format!), just that any game that did it sold more cards. Prove me wrong if you want to quote examples, while I show you multiple games where super-rares and things like foils have increased sales. *shrug*

FFG also would have done a good job of making house-specific, unique cards supers. Unluckily then a precedent would have been made for maybe not doing this for something like an event like PTT? and that would have truly sucked.

rings said:

Do you think it would have held true for AGoT? I didn't start taking the game seriously until the switch to LCG so I don't know that much about the CCG days (I played casually with a small collection but wasn't interested in investing in another CCG). Based on the boards and the people I have played in person, it seems like AGoT appeals to a different crowd compared to games that have foils/super rares, but perhaps that is the result of the LCG format. I would think that the source material and rules structure (which favors longer more complex games that are a bit more skill intensive and less luck based) would also draw a different kind of player.

dormouse said:

ah, i didn't realize they were going for Mythic Rares... yikes. good call on the LCG decision. and the recent 3x decision is even better.

the gold on the cards and special card border adds a neat bit of flare to some cool cards, especially famous historical figures such as Rhaegar. especially since i first saw them before i read the books, so it definitely peaked my interest as to who this rhaegar guy was, and what was so amazing about his harp. it would be neat to see more like this in the future... but sparingly.

YEah, it has worked for other games in the past but I serious doubts whether it would have boosted the sales appreciably for this game. I certainly wouldn't have bought more product, I would have just waited for the secondary market to kick in and see if there was any value for the cards I had and if the playability of the ones I didn't was worth the purchase.

And that is part of the problem with Rhaegar et al is that the effect is simply not good enough to spark a rare chase. He is no Queen's Favorite (which arguably was already the format for super rares in this game, the tourney promos).

A card would have to be an auto-include in a specific deck build if not every deck build in order for it to be worht the chase for me. I also have a feeling that most Thrones players are not completion-ists, their desire to have a play set of a card seems pretty much based on whether it is extremely playable or something of importance in the books for them.