Things have been a little slow on the forums lately, so I thought I'd start this thread. My impression is that the competitive scene is much more diverse now than it was a year ago, but if I had to order the strengths of houses/builds, my best guess would be something like...

1. Any house with wildlings (though I would rank Stark and Targ near the top)
2. Martell summer
3. Greyjoy Winter weenies (I haven't seen many people run these builds lately, but I think they remain extremely powerful)
4. Baratheon rush
5. Lannister hyperkneel or shadows
6. Targ (or just Targ "burn"?)
7. Martell KotHH or "vanilla" (ie not a "House Dayne" or thematic deck)
8. Stark

A couple notes: First, this is a very rough list of general trends...not to say that a "vanilla" stark deck couldn't win a tournament of course. For example, there are some interesting combo decks (including a neat Beric deck and the Bara Army decks from the Ice and Fire tourney) I've heard of/seen that would probably be near the top. Second, once you get past the top 2-3 rankings, I suspect metas have very different experiences...Targ may be dominating one meta while Baratheon rush dominates another.

One broader observation though...does Lanni still dominate your meat? I find that while Lanni is very strong against Bara, it struggles against Stark and some other builds just enough to ensure that the overall performance is low. (Of course, very good players still do well with Lanni.) Just wondering if people observe similar or different rankings.

Good thread.

Funny - in my experience, Baratheon matches up well with Lannister - if you draw your vigilant stuff and get a couple of stand cards on the board. I actually struggle more with Martell and Stark challenge phase denial decks. I can play around kneels - but I can't get my STR back up after it has been reduced.

That being said - I generally agree with your rankings - though i'd have greyjoy Winter lower than Baratheon rush. Tehy are just as challenge pahse dependent as the Baratheons, but tehy are way more reliant on small characters - leaving tehm vulnerable to Threat, Blade etc.

Wildling builds are very strong - I keep coming back to rings' question fo a few weeks ago while building: "How does this deck handle multiple 8 STR stealthy, deadly tricons?" You need to factor that in for just about eveyr build you make - its that easy for the wildlings to dominate.

I based my choices off of what I consider to be the best overall build right now and, assuming that deck gets played frequently, what best stands up to it while not losing its competitiveness against other houses.

1. Stark Wildlings followed closely by Targ Wildlings - High claim, armies, Val, and Narrow Escape make this build a beast.

2. Straight up Lanni hyper-kneel - Handles #1 the best, while still a very good deck vs. the rest of the pack.

3. Beric/Brotherhood combo deck out of Martell - Also handles #1 well, but can beat itself if you don't get a piece to the puzzle.

4. "Vanilla" Martell KotHH - Good control build, but extremely slow at the start.

5. Bara Rush - Always a threat, and a great way to pick off slower builds.

6. Targ Burn - I'm convinced Targ Burn would be one of the best builds out there right now if it wasn't for all the Wildling decks running around. A great build, but it just isn't compatitive vs. big army decks.

7. Martell Viper Rush - Again, another deck type that takes a hit against Wildlings, but is good vs. other builds.

8. Stark SoW - Another great rush deck that other decks need to be ready to face, or get rolled.

9. GJ Winter - A Great control buld when and if all the pieces are in place. Struggles vs. rush decks.

Stag Lord said:

9-strength, Stag Lord...9-strength...

Obviously, considering the couple of wins lately by the best North American player, Stark Wildling would have to be near/at the top. They run quite well out of Lanni and Martell as well.

Worlds and the huge German tourney are a little jaded considering the cut from 6 to 3 North Agendas, but Wildling did well there too. That being said, Lanni kneel did very well at Worlds and again at Ice and Fire.

I agree that Targ is under-represented. I think the right build could be very strong (multi-claim with burn).

I am not sold on Brotherhood yet. Too fragile IMHO. Martell has a chance though, as does Dobblers (and others I am sure) builds using Infamy instead of the agenda. However, I think both are very susceptible to solid meta cards which I am wary about (MWNK and the Bara location, and Milk to a lesser extent since it can be controlled easier).

I don't think anything else IS competative at this point. Wish it was. GJ might be close, but I wouldn't run it out of Winter *shrug* Maruaders are not enough to move me over. I just haven't seen Bara get over the edge anywhere, they always scare me...I always beat them handily. So, it would go:

1. Wildlings - Stark, Martell, Lanni in that order. Too consistent. Too easy to set up. Too easy to keep going w/ Narrow.

2. Lanni shadows/kneel. Draw + income always will be good, add in kneeling for tempo and a built in way to push out resources for later (i.e. an easy way to overextend and not pay for it often) and survive Valar even better (Shadows of course).

3. Targ control, probably with Dobbs agenda. +4 income is worth it. Access to the best and most underused card in the game (Bleeds). Claim and recurrsion burn. IMHO one of the better 'draw' cards in the game (the gal that gets cards out of discard). I need to put together this build and test it out.

Targ burn is good rings (look who you're talking to) but DJ has it right:

How do you handle wildlings? Burn has never done well against armies (I got annhilated by wulfen for about three months last fall - just stark amries v targ burn - not even wildlings yet) and it feels like i have been trying to solve this problem for years (even before the new blood came in - stark has ALWAYS been big in the Northeast).

I cabn't put tehm at three - straigth Martell summer is **** good and I think Dan has them placed about right.

1. Wildlings

2. Lannister kneel (Shadows may be a touch too slow for a Baratehon or Stark Siege deck)

3. Martell control

Yeah, I agree that Targ seems very viable at the moment but has struggled at competitive tourneys because (a) wildlings are just too big to burn reliably and (b) Targ is generally underrepresented and consequently doesn't make the headlines. I'm curious Rings, has Targ done well lately in your meta? I think it probably has all the tools, but I haven't seen it do as well around these parts lately.

Not to go off on a tangent, but to use Street Waif as an example, I think this is the case where the effect is very strong, but it just doesn't seem to perform as well as hoped in most games I've played. It rarely nets me 2 cards (as a Flea Bottom Scavenger would), and does little to get my draw engine going, since the Waif recurs cards rather then digging me deeper into my deck. In many Targ builds, there just isn't any space for a 2-gold, 1-STR character that is discarded to Threat from the North. It's *MUCH* easier for me to run multiple copies of Val (even 3x) to supplement season- or shadow-based draw. If I run a more aggro-focused deck with To Be a Dragon, then Waifs usually make the cut...if there's no TBaD, then I usually don't include Waifs. I think there's also great potential for using Hrakkar Pelts with Waifs, but since attachment slots are at a premium in Targ, I haven't seen this done very often.

To me, Targ is in a strange situation: It has a ton of fantastic cards with great effects that *should* make it a tourney competitive house. But these cards/effects are often very difficult to meld together into a cohesive, tier-1 competitive deck. I think part of this difficulty has to do with the challenge of managing two resource curves, and part of it is due to weak/unreliable in-house draw. Rings (and Stag, as demonstrated in NYC not too long ago) may be onto something in running Targ with Dobbs agenda, but I think such a build still lacks consistent draw, doesn't it? Have you two or others been finding this build effective?

As summer was finally starting to end, and winter was coming, it finally came to pass. The wall failed. The night's watch was too weak to hold them back, as there simply weren't enough strong individuals to hold it against the advancing hordes. And oft times whole sections of rangers were caught before they were able to reach it, or reached it only to see wildlings climbing all over it, with spikes made of hard northern steel. While petty lords and ladies squabbled for power in the dark hall of King's Landing, no one was vigilant enough to the threat rising from the north.

Some brave souls yet fought on, even though their time was coming to a close. Winterfell lay under siege, while its strong protectors tried to push back the hordes from the north. The Lannisters, loathe to relinquish their hold on power, fought on with intrigue, dirty tricks and misdirection, but the wild men of the north put the fear of winter into them. The brothers Baratheon tried for one quick push, but were thwarted in their attempts by the sheer number of foes. Even the Red Viper himself lead the vanguard on many a mission against the unkept savages, but to no avail, as even stealthy raids or weapons coated with wenom had little effect on them. House Targaryen, its queen bereft of her true strength, fought on against the northern foes with fire and steel, even allying themselves with the knights of hollow hill. However, the Wildling hordes seemed to be blessed with supernaturally good luck, in addition to their strength and vast numbers. Whenever all seemed to be lost, their luck would turn to allow them to narrowly escape defeat.

As the unshaved and unbathed armies rolled from the north, House Martell was the first to understand the hopelessness of the situation, but others soon also abandoned their traditional Bannermen in support of Mance Rayder, the King in the North. Finally, even the honorable House Stark turned to supporting Mance Rayder, led by a man who used to be one of the closest knights to Ser Brynden Tully, The Blackfish. And thus all hope was lost and Mance Rayder began his reign on the Iron Throne.

WWDrakey said:

Twn2dn said:

Its absolutley a problem - and its what keeps this build from being tier 1. Val is not an answer because of the nature of the deck I liek teh synergy between Hrakkar Pelt and Illyrio's - and KL does give you a solid engine (like you ran on Black Friday 2009). Teh agenda smooths out your resource curve and finally makes managing the two streams do-able - so that is a big boost. But you need to work on the draw effects.

I was hanging in there with your Martell deck until your engine kicked in. Martell can steam roll you if you let them get the jump on you adn we were close until you pulled the 11+ card pick up the turn you dropped the Valar.

There are soem small draw engines for Targ - but nothing like the efficiency of Martell and Lannister, and that's pretty much the only thing keeping them in the secodn rank. Burn is really strong, ambush is a stratgey again, and their character base is improving - its much better than it was at regionals.

@Drakey: Awesome

While what others are mentioning about Targ is true in terms of why it lags behind other Houses (even though I still think Val is generally very good for it), Narrow Escape alone makes it non-competive, in my opinion. Until Narrow Escape goes, which I doubt it will, I don't think I'll be considering Targ burn any time soon. Maybe an aggro build with the Dothraki, but I can't see myself building my deck to be able to pull off multi-card combos to burn a bunch of your characters only to have them come back or lose my hand. That on top of crappy weenies is a recipe for disaster, in my opinion.

I dunno - Targ is Ok at INT and the aggro Houses that suck at INT usually run Narrow Escape. I pulled them on INT challenges all afetrnoon at Black Friday and since I wasn't drawig well, it really didn''t hurt to cancel the one or two I really had to.

Small sample - but I'm not too worried about NE. Just the double play in one turn scares me - but I hope that is getting fixed.

And like you said to me - maybe run Confession - the agenda gives you a big step towards the influence required. Granted - events are at a premium in a Targ deck, but if you're that worried about NE go heavy INT + Confession x 3.

I certainly see the points made above.

Funny though, I think a lot of Targ burn can happen in different phases which can dilute the power of Narrow Escape more than any other house. You just have to make sure to use the burn smartly and maybe couple it with plot control and high claim. Some event cancel is good as well - I really like Hand's Judgement right now. You can't Narrow Targ well if they have good control options in the Plot, Draw, Challenge, and Domiance phases!

On the draw power, Waif almost always nets me 2 cards ont he first turn she is out, and 1 after that, if she isn't used for claim/Venom bait. Maybe my builds are different, but I can't remember a time she didn't have a target - many times Flame-Kissed or Bones. I don't combo her with anything else (other than the To Be event of course, which is pretty cool when it goes off). I like cards that are very efficent on their own, or can easily combo with other cards that are solid on their own. Lastly on this subject, I think Targ does the best using King's Landing - they have some serious synergy with their other locations like Dragonpit. ~I won't start arguing with Stag Lord again on the fact that every deck needs Val at least X1 Dobbler had a very strong Targ Shadows deck that still scares me, ~if he just took out all the combo fluff he loves so much

Really, my issue with most Targ players are that they are combo players, and Targ has a lot of combo choices. To me, I look at their cards and see close to the most efficient characters in the game, and close to the most efficent events in the game (Forever Burning is still silly, especially with Threat), the best use of control plots, the best control of attachments and the best attachments, the best recurrsion (and I don't usually like recurrsion), the best way to control claim (Bones, Viserys).

I agree that the biggest issue is handling Wildlings. You can either meta against them (Traitor, MWNK combo, Too Proud to Bow which is really good out of Targ), or find other efficent ways to get around them that are still playable against other houses (Distraction, King's Landing Assassin, Aggo's Bow and the other two weapons, Seductive, Parting Blow is good in Targ, Confession, etc.). Or hope that other character control (burn) coupled with high claim will do it for you. Personally, I would go with the good efficient cards but I need to test some of them out (can't wait to get one of the weapons out, take the army out of the challenge, and then Seductive it...and then use Waif to get my Seductive back!).

I think they could give Wildlings a run for their money out of any house (they play well vs. Stark Wildlings since they get rid of Grey Wolf easily, well vs. Martell since they can hopefully control Blade better, so-so vs. Lanni), can dominate Brotherhood (they laugh at all the good 3/2's Brotherhood has, they get rid of annoying attachments), beat GJ pretty easily (good resource curve, GJ runs a lot of saves and 1 strength guys)...

IMHO of course!

PS - Drakey for the win! Great post man...

@WWDrakey

Well done, ser.

Kennon said:

I already agreed, but read it again and got the chills in an alternate history sort of way.

Reminds me of when I used to play Legend of the 5 Rings where the best performing houses in various tournies actually did change the environment (i.e. who is Emperor, who gets to merge in a minor house, who gets to be 'Hand of the King'). If this was L5R, after the past year, GRRM would be writing something exactly like Drakey.

it would be nice if GRRM was WRITING THE FRAKKING BOOK.

Stag Lord said:

I think Confession is an auto-include for KOTHH. It definitely goes into your deck before Hand's Judgment does if you're running the Agenda.

And yes, great post Drakey!

Great post, Drakey!

In terms of house rankings, it sounds like Wildlings are so dominant that it's really hard to gauge what the order would be like if the build were less prevalent. Again, I agree that Targ has some of the best ways for dealing with Brotherhood decks, as well as GJ and Stark (in part b/c Targ has playable attachment control), but as previously mentioned (sounds like Stag agrees here too), drawing into those great options can be challenging.

Great to hear that people liked my alternate history!

Regarding Targ (Burn), I think I'm in agreement with everybody... Good cards and strong effects, but getting the deck actually running smoothly and consistently is a problem. One that is mainly caused by the still a bit weak draw effects. Stag has a good point with Val, the fact that you have to put her in a Targ deck tells you more about the state of Targ draw and Val's overall silliness than her being suited for Targaryen. KotHH smooths the resources out nicely, now if only there were some good (not conditional and costing an arm and a leg like Maegi) ways of drawing cards on the first two turns, to make up for the lost setup. I also think that rings has a good point with spreading out your kill effects, and the confessions seem to be a good idea. And event cancel is always useful. So working around NE shouldn't be a problem for these kinds of decks, if the pieces just fall into place...

But I think that the real question is: Could Targ become strong and consistent enough to knock Mance of his throne? Can anything?

@rings: Does trying to make a draw/save recursion engine out of Hrakkar Pelt + Lady Daenerys Chambers + Pentos count as being too comboey? Err... Guilty as charged. =)

@Rogue30: You should blame finite for that part...

I'm a strong believer in player strength is more important than his build.

So, you said the best Usa player won the last 2 "big" tourneys with Stark/Wildlings, then conclude that Stark/Wildling is the strongest build. But I think not.

I prefer to think in terms of house strength better than build Strength. Mainly, because from some build to another there is a difference of 5-9 cards. By example, Lannister Hyperkneel, any Lannister deck includes (or should) 3x GTM, Castellan, 2-3 Toll Gate, 3 enemy informers and such. Including 3x Distraction makes you Hyper? Then, including 3x Wrong Dwarf? and the 6? City plots? alchemist guild? Well, any of this options is possible, so what constitutes hyper kneel and what not? I prefer to think that Lannister is the strongest house, and any competent player with them can make you bite the dust.

And I think, in terms of house balance, the game is mostly balanced.

Martell, in every build, is just dangerous. You can see this deck: http://guardiadelanoche.com/foro/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=6243 (english friendly decklist)

He was the winner in a tourney here in Spain last weekend, not a big tourney, just 21 people, but the top 3 of last Spain Nationals were there, so the level was pretty good. And I can't think of any build seen here before that match this deck.

2º Place was for greyjoy, a really simple deck, warships, saves and intimidates. And he didn't even use the raiders army... Nor winter, of course.

3º Place was for this deck: http://guardiadelanoche.com/foro/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=6244 (not so english friendly). Neutral Beric with tons of war crest and insane draw.

4º was stark, SoW, 5º Targ of the Hollow Hill, 6º Stark agendaless....

Talking about some builds...

Bara Rush: Rush is not a strategy . I guess its noble heavy build, with saves, Standing effects and renown. Well, i think any BaraKnights is way Stronger. Stukov made 4-0 in the Octgn euro tourney with this kind of deck, and he is in semis.

Wildlings: They are strong for sure, but tier 1? with any house?

Targ Hill: They need draw, lots of draw, and quickly to compensate for no setup. Else, they are too unstable to win 6 or 7 games in a row (what you need to win a tourney)

I don't think the problem with Targ is that it lacks good cards, I think the problem is that there are so many moving pieces in a good burn deck that it works beautifully or horribly. I put together a list for a burn deck that looks amazing on paper, but when you start losing little parts here and there I have no doubt it will fall apart. I don't think it will stand up very well against wildlings because you cant consistently kill 8 str characters. You can kill lots of characters with str 3 or lower easily, but even when it gets up to 4 your resource allocation gets a little tricky.

I think that's a really good point about the moving pieces, and I think that it also plays back to player skill as well. You have to be on top of your game every single turn so that you don't miss moving a piece to the correct place with most Targaryen builds, otherwise a couple mistakes will have your whole gameplan thrown off. So that's one difference in that builds like Wildlings are much more forgiving if you make a little mistake here or there.

I'd prefer to think in terms of House strength rather than build strength as well - but the Wildlings make that impossible.

And yeah - the Wildling deck is pretty much Tier 1. Pretty much out of any House. Stark, Targ and Lannister Wildling builds are pretty much a given. I've seen it done well with Greyjoy and Martell. Ok - maybe Baratheon doesn't mesh well with them - but they probably could: 9 STR deadly tricon armies are pretty much money whatever your house carsd says.

And its not just that finite won a couple of big recent events with them - its all the local metas reproting how prevaelnt adn succesful these builds have been.

Since last summer.

I don't see any reasonable argument against Wildlings not being the best so far. Smaller tourneys non-withstanding (21 is nothing to sneeze at though!). Instead of telling us what won, tell us how many Wildling decks got beat on the way up. Of course, if no Wildlings play (or are played by newer/less experienced/skilled players) they won't place

It just comes down to efficiency - cost 2, 9 strength, 2-icon, stealth/deadly/war crest armies...1-cost, 4-strength, non-unique tricons with stealth...0-cost, 2 strength, stealthy Vals drawing you 1-3 cards/turn...

(yes I understand you only get one of those a turn...but still).

No house has that kind of consitency. No house can put that kind of offense and defence together. You can mix and match it against whatever power cards you enjoy (Blade, Lanni draw/kneel, Targ burn).

*shrug* I just don't see the downside unless you are rushing or scared of being meta'd against (mainly MWNK...maybe Traitors or new trait manip decks)...

Back to Targ!

I really do have to check it out. I just see really solid cards out there and have seen some pretty scary builds that I think get lessened by people getting enamored with very strong combos. Targ has won a few Worlds, and it is based on the same strengths - burn is good and unsavable, they have good claim control and the best attachment control, ever since influence (and then ambush) they can build a good resource curve (better than anyone except Lanni). Card draw is the one weakness you have to get around, but I really think you can.

Contrary to popular belief, having huge amount of card draw is not paramount to winning consistently. Having good card draw that gets you efficient/useful cards that you can put on the table does. I would rather draw 1-2 extra a turn and play my hand than 3+ (with revealing effects). Other players like choices, but you pay for that and hopefully you have made a deck that is efficient where you are happy with every draw.

Guess I need to put one together and try it out!

Am I missing something? I keep seeing tricon thrown around in refrence to wildlings when they don't have any except Mance (and I guess you might be able to count skinchanger). Unless I'm mistaken in thinking that tricon meant all 3 challenge icons.