Houses Minor Themes

By Toqtamish, in 1. AGoT General Discussion

So with the current round of chapter packs having an increased amount of support for a minor theme of each House I was wondering if anyone could run down exactly what each minor themes about ? And how they play ? I know they are:

Baratheon: Asshai

Greyjoy: Raiders

Lannister: Clansmen

Martell: Sand Snakes

Stark: Boltons (traitors!)

Targaryen: Dothraki

Asshai -> "Asshat" : Intrigue Icons, Holy Crest (Meaning confession, and in CCG land Power of Faith), they aren't a solid theme usually, more of a collection of card control and attachment control, and Mel usually does something to power them up. Targ also has some asshai. (One of them in LCG fetches attachments for example). I didn't play in the IAF Block to remember what they did then.

Dothraki -> Military icons, war crest. Targ's rush strategy, the new cards have a theme of adding hand destruction to military challenges.

Raiders -> Completely new. Greyjoy traditionally has "Ironborn". (Which was used more as a restriction on Salt Wife and a few other cards.) Euron is the only card so far revealed that plays off "raiders".

Sand Snakes -> I can remember two cards from Winter and VED block that played off this trait, neither are in LCG. Generally its a flavor trait. Martell's sub trait is house dayne which keys off putting gold tokens on them, and using them as +1 STR buffers, and currency for saving house dayne characters.

Clansmen -> Well, Chella bounces locations, and Timmett has protection when knelt. In AHoTa lannister was given these guys, and the theme was less than 6 power these guys did awesome stuff.

House Bolton (traitor) -> In AHoTa they were cheap characters but had intrigue icons, but would easily switch sides.

Honestly, we don't really know. What bloodycelt has told you is how characters with those traits have been portrayed in the past. Some (like the Sand Snakes) haven't had much meaning to date and, as he said, one is completely new.

Keep in mind that these are specific traits for each House. Depending on how you look at it, a "theme" may be more about a specific strategy or use of game mechanics. For example, traditional "themes" of House Targaryen are burn/STR manipulation and attachment control. Traditional themes for House Baratheon are Renown and capitalizing on power challenges. Traits can support one theme or many - and do not necessarily have to have anything to do with things that were associated with the particular trait in the past. So it's really hard to know what "themes" each of these traits will support at this point.

As for raiders, here is what I was thinking. FFG refers to the strategy of taking cards off the top of your opponent's deck as "Raiding."

The only currently released raider, Motley Crueman, takes cards off your opponent's deck. Seems to me like "Raiders" are characters that do "Raiding."

ktom said:

Honestly, we don't really know. What bloodycelt has told you is how characters with those traits have been portrayed in the past. Some (like the Sand Snakes) haven't had much meaning to date and, as he said, one is completely new.

Well if anyone could say what "themes" are going to be in future packs... it would be in an FFG Article, or a spanish spoiler site.

Today for example: Brotherhood -> Really awesome when you have no power on your house card, and have an agenda to help keep them on.

Toqtamish said:

So with the current round of chapter packs having an increased amount of support for a minor theme of each House I was wondering if anyone could run down exactly what each minor themes about ? And how they play ? I know they are:

Baratheon: Asshai

Greyjoy: Raiders

Lannister: Clansmen

Martell: Sand Snakes

Stark: Boltons (traitors!)

Targaryen: Dothraki

Just going by traits you can also consider subthemes:

Stark: Direwolf, House Tully

Targaryen: Dragon

Martell: Maester

LaughingTree said:

Just going by traits you can also consider subthemes:

Stark: Direwolf, House Tully

Targaryen: Dragon

Martell: Maester

Direwolf focuses military

House Tully on power grab

Maester is cheap military icon for Martell with Maester of War

oh and House Dayne for Martell as well