IMHO, this is the most fun mechanic we've had in awhile. Most other decks I've made actually fare better, but I have a lot of fun playing the Brotherhood. What kind of builds are you guys using, and how do you keep the power on the table?

Anyone try out the deck with infamy instead of the Brotherhood agenda? I heard a couple people mention it, but no reports of how it went. It seems like a brotherhood base with a Maester Agenda would draw into the infamy cards really well.

I've seen brotherhood out of lannister, using spending the winter stores to search for infamy attactchments do well.

Greg atkinson played a Lanny/Beric/TMP deck at kublacon, and if not for three pulled unders played on him, he probably would have won.

I like it out of lanny best, martell second best, and neutral third best.

I've tried it with average success out of Martell, though am thinking of moving it to Neutral.

Beric is golden, as is Anguy... Lem is pretty neat when you've got a lot of Brotherhood characters in play, too. Get some dupes on them and a flaming sword or two, then go nuts.

I had success with it out of Lanni, there are a few tweaks I would do to it now. (One being tearing up Ghaston Grey if my opponent tried to play it)

Check the link below for my discussion and deck description. I'll see if I can find the deck list anywhere and post that later.

www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp

Unfortunately I feel like Brotherhood is becoming more and more unplayable as time goes on. Lack of Neutral reducers makes them expensive, need for draw and attachment control (Milk, Fishing Net, Pulled Under, Motley, etc) keeps them somewhat unplayable out of certain Houses. Eastwatch (BH worst nightmare), GG, now Slander and Lies (BH even worse nightmare), Frozen Moat, and a variety of other cards all severely nerf Brotherhood.

To make them competitive again, I think there needs to be a Neutral Sea and/or Fiefdom, and I would like to see a BH character that cancels triggered effects on BH characters. What I would really like to see is an errata to the Agenda: "Opponents may choose and take power from your Brotherhood characters to fulfill the claim of P challenges initiated against you" changed to "If you have no power on your House card, Opponents may choose...." which would solve the Eastwatch problem while still making EW effective; i.e. if they want to disable all your BH characters, the opponent just can't make P challenges against you for a Round.

That being said, my favorite BH trick is playing them out of Stark with high initiative and 3x Old Nan... be first player every round, make your challenges, stack all the power on Beric and then use Old Nan to take away his BH trait when you are done. Since he is no longer a BH character, your opponent cannot take his power when they win challenges. Bay of Ice obviously helps the lack of Stark draw and Anguay helps rush...

I love the theme, love the mechanics - and this is from one of the biggest BH fans around (hell, Ghost of HH is about as random a character in the game, but IS Brotherhood!).

However, Skowza hit it all right on the nail. They just are not competative in the current environment. Highly played cards like Ghaston Grey (among MANY others) just own them. The risk doesn't equal the reward at this point. I did like Skowza's tweak, although I know it won't be done.

Multiplayer I have seen some better builds, and I think the Infamy stuff can certainly happen. In 1v1 right now, I just don't see it - too much easy attachment removal/blanking/etc.

How do you feel about it in melee.

I think the Brotherhood theme has worked out well. I'm glad to see them less dominant now, because I hate to see so much neutral in the environment. Although it made sense for a new theme to make a big splash when it was first out, I prefer Brotherhood to be more of a support theme than a dominant one.

Unfortunately, the main problem now is that Brotherhood is terrible as a support theme, because the effects are all dependent on doing something that normally runs contradictory to winning the game (keeping power off your house). What we need is more in-house cards that remove the inconsistency of the Brotherhood effect. An obvious example is Lanni getting another 2-3 efficient/good infamy cards, especially at the 0 or 1 gold slot. Bara might similarly get some very efficient ways to move power from their house card to characters...not all kinds of location-based effects, but something on a character with good stats. Basically, a 2-3 gold character without renown that instead says "after he wins a challenge, move a power from a character or house card and put it on him."

Another idea is to allow for pseudo-alternate win conditions. For example, certain types of combo or control decks might not mind keeping power off their house card. Maybe we could print a Greyjoy card that said "Any phase: Discard X power from your house to discard the top X cards from each opponent's deck"? In short, the goal should be to design in-house cards that are efficient enough to stand on their own but also happen to support existing themes, such as Brotherhood, seasons, shadows, etc.

Although I really dislike the idea of singling out old themes for support just to "correct" an environmental imbalance (I think this design strategy takes card slots away from other mechanics that would add more variety to the game), it certainly wouldn't hurt if the Brotherhood mechanic were less situational in general. For example, a STR boost akin to Rings' Ghost of HH (which gave a STR boost of +1 to all Brotherhood while it was standing, right?) would take some of the sting out of playing Brotherhood. If there were a few new bonuses like this specifically for Brotherhood, cards like Beric would begin to look pretty decent even without the "if you have no power on your house" effect.

Typically, the problem with trait-based decks is that they don't have enough pieces in play early to work...Sand Snakes are great if you have 3+ in play all at the same time, but usually that doesn't happen until late game. Brotherhood is different, since it's powerful effects are based on individual cards. But adding some more traditional trait-based bonuses/boosts would create a situation where Brotherhood is good early game (when there's no power on house cards), but then as those powerful effects are lost after round 1-2, the broader trait-based bonuses (STR boosts, etc.) kick in mid/late game. The deck would run in stages...kind of like transforming from a caterpillar to butterfly

Skowza said:

Very interesting that you find them expensive. Considering I would never play them out of the Neutral faction, they run best out of Lannister with all the extra gold. Or you could run them out of Martell and run 9 free limited gold locations and 4 neutral reducers not including the shivering sea.

While I've had fun out of Lannister, they do work well out of Martell, especially with the Maester of Lemonwood, To the Spears and Burning on the Sands.

I do like the Old Nan idea. Very clever.

Rise thread... RIIIISE

~~

We tried a brotherhood martell deck the other day. Anyone try putting Taste for Blood on Beric? Martell seems to have overall good synergy with brotherhood anyway, but this card seems really good if your opponent doesn't have the means to deal with it.

But yeah, I feel like this is probably the hardest deck to play now, with Lannister's silver bullet answers to power characters, and the off chance Beric can get blanked. I feel like just putting all your power on Beric isn't going to work anymore.

Anyone else think spreading out the power with dupes and saves is the only way to go now?

Widow's Watch is all that really comes to mind. And that Old Nan trick is a pretty good idea.

Twn2dn I think your on the right track, but you end up using a card slot to get rid of one power and discard one card. In that situation, its probably just better to run another Stoneheart. If you had a recycling event like...

"Deathbound.
Any phase: Choose an attacking character. That character gets +2 Str until the end of the challenge. If you win the challenge, move mathiasinifniteevent to your discard pile from your dead pile.
Response: after a Brotherhood character with X or more power leaves play, discard X power from your house to return mathiasinfiniteevent to your hand from your discard pile."

You need to have used it once already before you can get it into your discard pile to move power from your house, so its not an immediate fix.
You need to have characters with power leaving play (brotherhoods problem right now) for you to be able to get power off your house.
You can only reuse the +2Str bump when you have power on your house to get rid of.
You can only move off as much power as they had on them. So if they somehow get 6 power on your house, you have a hard time getting it all off.
The benefit is that you can use it more than once, so it gives you some sustainability in the long game.

Like an endless endurance that has a seconday effect but some play restriction. And it recycles off bad things not good things.

Maybe some day FFG will hire me to design cards all the way from Canada. And by hire, I mean free labour.
Nate, if your reading this, yes that was an offer

Here's a copy and paste from CardGameDB of the Martell deck that I used to win the MO Regional. Sure, Burning on the Sands and Venomous Blade together wouldn't work now, but there's probably a couple tweaks worth filling in those slots for Burning. I'd keep Venomous Blade because it combos so well with Anguy.

Brotherhood Regional

House (1)
House Martell (Core) x1

Agenda (1)
The Brotherhood Without Banners (RoR) x1

Character (36)
Anguy the Archer (DB) x2
Beric Dondarrion (IG) x3
Fanatical Follower (KotStorm) x3
Lady Stoneheart (MotM) x1
Lem Lemoncloak (MotM) x1
Orphaned Recruit (OSaS) x2
The Mad Huntsman (ASoSilence) x3
Thoros of Myr (RoR) x2
Tom Sevenstrings (RoR) x2
Ellaria Sand (PotS) x2
Ser Arys Oakheart (PotS) x1
The Red Viper (PotS) x2
Dornish Paramour (TTotH) x3
Flea Bottom Scavenger (AToT) x3
Maester of Lemonwood (BtW) x1
Orphan of the Greenblood (PotS) x3
Maester Cressen (Core) x2

Location (11)
Widow's Watch (GotC) x2
The Roseroad (KotStorm) x2
The Searoad (KotStorm) x2
River Row (QoD) x1
Shadowblack Lane (Core) x1
Street of Sisters (Core) x1
Street of Steel (Core) x1
Lord Doran's Chambers (PotS) x1

Event (5)
Burning on the Sand (RotO) x3
Ill Tidings (IG) x2

Attachment (8)
Taste for Blood (PotS) x3
Venomous Blade (TBoBB) x3
Flaming Sword (DB) x2

Plot (7)
At the Gates (GotC) x1
Valar Morghulis (Core) x1
To the Spears! (PotS) x1
Retaliation! (ASoSilence) x1
The Prince That Was Promised (IG) x1
Relentless Persecution (DB) x1
Spending the Winter Stores (QoD) x1

Rave, as you can see, I agree that Widow's Watch can be huge with the Brotherhood characters. I was rarely sad to see it, and once in action, it negated my opponent's reset pretty quickly. And wasn't half bad at stalling GG either. Unfortunately, there are several more cards now that hammer Brotherhood decks especially hard like Tin Link for Uber Beric's attachments and Slander and Lies. And of course more widespread use of Ghaston Grey is terrible for Brotherhood as well. I feel like I had another one or two to note, but can't recall them at the moment.

Wow. Looks solid. At the time, were you able to At the Gates in Maester Cressen as well? That seems like it would be a huge boon.

Did Fanatical Follower end up working out well for you? It didn't make the cut in the deck we built.

Ah, whoops. Yes, I was able to search for Cressen at the time as well.

Yup, the Followers seemed to work out pretty well at the time. I'd say they were usually 2 STR or better for 1 gold, but I was pretty paranoid about always having a Brotherhood character on the table at the time. By the time GenCon rolled around, I believe I'd taken them out to slot in some location control for GG. In general now, I'd say that there are probably stronger options to fill their slot, but then again, I didn't win anything after having taken them out, did I?

Thoros visits the thread!

While waiting for the Lanni box to come out, I made a brotherhood deck out of Stark, and it's my favorite Brotherhood deck so far. I touched on it before, but Widow's Watch has reshaped my whole gameplan for these guys.

Beric is nice, but with Widows Watch x3 and the threat of Rickon Stark, The Mad Huntsman and Anguy are the true stars of the deck. With Widow's Watch, it's easier to spread the power around, and not just put it all on Beric to be zapped off in one turn.

I like Mad Huntsman in Stark, because now you can boost him with Winterfell Tourney Grounds. With all the Brotherhood faces, I was getting non-kneeling renown pretty often.

Anguy being good is a given, but Anguy with a dupe is scary, 2 dupes is a real threat.

I also stumbled upon the awesome that is Widow's Watch + Ice. Or Widow's Watch + Rickon + Ice.

I also played a Brotherhood deck against Ellaria Sand for the first time, and it really isn't pretty. I had to create an answer for her, otherwise she would shut down the whole deck. Red Wedding was a pretty good fit.

I'm not sure if there is a good way to synergize with Bara, Rave... but the Storm's End Tourney Ground to get back dupes for a jousting Beric (and others) might also be cool. Lovin' the WfTG idea though... I've been looking for a good non-kneeler w/o renown to use it on. Thanks for the heads up.