The melee began at 7pm local time. All I've heard so far is that there are 32 players, and Dobbler won his table the first game.

Anyone else have more info?

I would love to know how everything played out.

I just heard that a Martell Sandsnake deck won the melee. I hear there was a Targ dragons and a GJ maester's deck at the finals table (not sure what the 4th was), and apparently the GJ player would have won but forgot to unattach his last chain.

Pretty interesting that sandsnakes won melee...guess they've gotten a bit better with their new cards

The joust just started...no word back yet on the number of participants, etc.

My god! Berto was right all along.

Top 8 for Joust:

Chad Jamnik – Lanni
Joseph Beccker – Neutral (alliance agenda)
Dan Seefeldt--Greyjoy
Rick Reinhart--Stark
Kyle Vancil--Targaryen
Erick Butzlaff--Lanni
Lucas Reed--Martell
Brian Aurelio—Martell

Top 4: Lanni, Stark, GJ, Martell (Lucas Reed)

That's a pretty nice spread of Houses right there. Not sure I get the point of a Neutral Alliance deck, but it'll probably be clearer once we get more info. Can't wait to hear more, especially interested to hear what kind of decks all of those were. I'm hoping one of those Lanni decks was Clansmen, just because it's probably my favorite sub-theme.

Wow, two Lanni decks in the top eight - and Butzlaff's playing one. I really hope we get to see that decklist. I always thought it must be possible to build a winning Lanni deck, with all their gold and draw - even if many people think it's kinda lackluster these days. Thanks for the updates, Dan. Can't wait for more.

Chad Jamnik won joust with Lannister, Erick Butzlaff won melee with Martell Sand Snakes.

mason240 said:

Erick wasn't at the melee finals table. The Martell player was Andy Mills, and he was running the KotHH agenda.

Edit: Forgot to mention that 45 players participated in the joust.

Erick didn't win the melee. It was sandsnakes.

The joust winner and Erick were playing the same deck.

Final two are from the same Wisconsin meta I believe

Round of eight:

Chad J (Lannister Maester) beat Brian A (Martell Maester) Brian finished second in melee; Chad was only Swiss undefeated. My only two losses were to these guys.

Lucas (Martell Maester) beat Joseph B. (Neutral Alliance)

Dan S. (Greyjoy Winter) beat Erick (Lannister Maester) metamates

Rick R. (Stark Maester) beat Kyle V. (Targ Heir?). Dragons!

Round of four:

Chad beat Rick

Dan beat Luke

That's a lot of maesters. Was hoping for a bit more diversity. Anymore word on melee? Sand Snakes won it apparently, but what were some of the other top decks running?

Melee final tablein order of finish:

Andy M. Martell kotHH

Brian A. Greyjoy Maester

Kyle V Targ Heir

William C. Bara Summer

Thanks for the updates. Look forward to details!

Hi I ended up winning the Melee table with my Martell/KotHH Sand Snakes deck, in what ended up being a crazy, crazy table. OrangeDragon is correct regarding the final placement for Melee, and decktypes. I believe that without A Nest of Vipers and Dorea Sand, a Sand Snake deck isn't the greatest thing in the world. With those two cards, the deck becomes viable.

The game ended on turn 2, where three of us *should* have won that round.

Brian's Greyjoy Maesters deck had something like 18 power at the end of the game, with one chain still on his Agenda - unfortunately, during the first turn he forgot to trigger the Agenda's response. 4 of that power came from the Rhaegar's Harped Daenerys stolen with his Horn of Dragons, which was amusing.

Kyle probably found it less amusing - he was running a Baratheon Heir Dragons deck. Before Brian stole her, he had (I believe) 11 power on his house and 3 power on Dany. At the end of the game, Kyle had 12 power on his house, and Dany had 4 power on her, so Kyle was an auto-win at the end of Challenges phase.

My Sand Snake combo went off on the first turn, and on turn 2, I chose the Kingsguard title for myself, and redirected a military challenge (from Will, I think, although I don't entirely remember) to myself, lost, killed of poor Sarella, triggered Dorea's response and played A Nest of Vipers.

Three non-kneeling renown challenges later (with 5 snakes) took me to 15.

It was a very exciting game and I was excited to see Kyle and Brian go on to play in the top 8 in Joust. (Kyle, Will, and I all played the same decks in joust that we played in Melee, while I am pretty sure Brian played something different.)

In building the deck, I realized that the pieces I needed were: 3 Influence, The Red Viper, No Use for Grief, and A Nest of Vipers. A Nest of Vipers is not strictly necessary for the deck to work, but it is certainly very helpful. Influence was usually found in my opening hand (plus the 2 from the Agenda), and if not, I could either grab the influence title, or Summoning Season a Palace Spy. I'd also Summon TRV if I didn't have him. I think if Martell ever gets any kind of event search, this deck will just be disgusting and will have to be nerfed a bit, but I don't see that happening. If my opponents were suspicious and reluctant to kill off TRV while I had 3 influence standing, I'm usually happy to do it myself - Valar or Wildfire does a fine job, and Bungled Orders can make sure that I get to do it during Challenges phase.

If I don't have Nest of Vipers in my hand when TRV dies, or I kill off TRV during plot phase, House Dayne Skirmisher is there to make sure I can kill off a Martell character at will during Challenges to play the event.

Since there's no way for me to search for NUFG if I don't have it, I rely on the draw title, Counting Favors, House Messenger, Oberyn's Guile, and the House Dayne Skirmishers to get cards into my hand until I'm able to execute the combo.

Until that is able to happen, I stall with Red Vengeance, Burning on the Sand, and try to claim some renown with Beric, Barristan, and perhaps TRV if I feel confident that he won't die prematurely. Flaming Swords go on either Beric (for renown) or Obella or Dorea (to protect them from burn).

Make an Example and He Calls it Thinking should have obvious uses in this deck. Ser Barristan and Benjen are there in case something goes wrong and I need to try to reset the combo, or if I lose a lot of Sand Snake duplicates and would like to get them back into play. Marwyn is very versatile.

Without further ado, here's the decklist:

Martell/Knights of the Hollow Hill

Plots:

Summoning Season

To the Spears!

Wildfire Assault

Search and Detain

Valar Morghulis

Bungled Orders

Counting Favors

Characters: (32)

The Red Viper (PotS) x3

Tyene Sand x3

Sarella Sand x2

Obella Sand x3

Obara Sand x3

Dorea Sand x3

Nymeria Sand x3

House Dayne Skirmisher x3

House Messenger x2

Beric Dondarrion x2

Jon Arryn x1

Palace Spy x1

Benjen Stark x1

Archmaester Marwyn x1

Ser Barristan Selmy (Core Set) x1

Events: (18)

Red Vengeance x3

Burning on the Sand x3 [Restricted]

No Use For Grief x3

Make an Example x3

A Nest of Vipers x3

He Calls it Thinking x3

Locations: (6)

Dornish Fiefdoms x3

Summer Sea x3

Attachments: (4)

Oberyn's Guile x2

Flaming Sword x2

the melee final table definitely taught me to remember to trigger chains after every challenge. if i had triggered one wen i won my intrigue against andy with sand snakes, i could have won. it was a crazy final table with 3 of us all having a chance to win at some point on the second turn. kyle just missed due to my horn of dragons stealing dany who was a dragon. i forgot a link, then andy won.

My Neutral + Lannister Alliance deck was a variation of my Brotherhood deck (which was modified back in April for the proxy tournament). I don't have the deck list handy (will try to post tomorrow) but basically it was a Noble power rush deck. It ran every Noble with renown in the game except Balon Greyjoy, used the Lanni Alliance to play Devious Intentions, Gold Tooth Mines and some other cards for free. The idea was to keep power on my characters so it couldn't be stolen via power challenges. Turns three and four were my Power of Blood turns to keep my nobles safe and keep gaining power. It went 4-0 in swiss, eventually losing the final round to Chad and then I lost in the top 8 to Lucas Reed, both running the deck types I was most afraid of -- Lanni Kneel (I might have had a chance here, but he had enough of his pieces off the start) and then Martell control (Lucas had Ghaston Grey and Arrianne 1st turn, used Game of Cyvasse to return my big character to my hand, and second turn has Edric Dayne so I couldn't even get characters on the board to try and gain power. Being a rush deck, it had limited options for control and I knew I couldn't beat him, so I conceeded my match. Still, taking 5th with a deck even I wasn't sure would do well was something else. I think the biggest aspect was my opponent's just couldn't figure out what type of deck I was running, which worked in my favor.

alpha5099 said:

I've been playing a Sandsnake + No Use For Grief deck recently and, with the new Doreah Sand and Renown Event (forget the name) it has been winning left right and centre. Better in Joust than Melee. No Use for Grief, with the current sand snake cards is just awesome. Not unbeatable by any stretch (and if NUFG is cancelled, or you simply fail to get it, then you are stuffed) but when it goes off little will stop it. With the added sand snake mulligans this is about a 75% chance of pulling it off first turn. If an opponent gets back in the game drop a valar and with all your dupes they are back to square one again whereas you carry on smiting

The card that gave me the most trouble was Power of Blood, since it's quite difficult to kill TRV while it's active. There is Seasick, The Hand's Judgment, and Tom Sevenstrings that can cancel NUFG, but they are all cancellable with He Calls it Thinking, and I haven't seen anyone run the first two in quite some time.

Also from this weekend: Frequency of Obara showing up in my pre-mulligan hand? About 70%. Chances of her showing up afterward? 0%. It was quite strange.

Maesters seemed to be everywhere. what about neutral maesters? people playing the conclave and embrose or no?

there actualy werent a lot of maesters overall in the field. some of the maester agenda decks were only running 1 link as a toolbox for either draw or attachment removal. i ran 3 conclaves in both my gj melee deck and martell joust. the only other neutral maestersi used were 1x aemon and 3x oldtown scholar in the melee deck.

Wow.

Maesters.

Shocker.

Wasnt' really a Maesters deck - one chain. But, yes, as I just said in another post...why not.

I better do a quick TR before I forget everything.

We left NE Nebraska about 11.30, met Dobbler at the MN/IA border, and made great time. About 30 minutes after arriving and greeting all our friends, we got 'thirsty'. Bought some FFG beverages, but might have added soemthing. Obviously I wanted nothing to do with competative Melee (although props to the players, very little drama compared to GenCon), so four of us went up to the mezzinine and hit my cube draft. Lord of Brew, Complord, Jesse (Wyndwalker) and I had a great time.

Went out to the bar, and proceeded to buy WAY too many shots and drinks. Just like GenCon I think I peaked on the going out a day too soon. After the bar closes at 2am Dobbler and I go play some test games that I don't remember in the least and get to bed at 4.30 or so. Dobbler was up by 7.30...crazy. I slept in until 11.00+

So, after already knowing I would scrub out of the tourney since I was going to play trait manip Lanni no matter what...and having a raging hangover...I knew this want' going to be pretty. Over .500 would be just fine, thank you very much.

Deck - Lanni trait manip with Maester agenda (changed from Wildlings last second). Lots of control cards, but nothing too exciting. Got to wear my Cleagane new t-shirt and now I can taunt Will (Kennon) that I actually played Lanni in a big tourney. Oh, and I wanted to try out the new Jaime as well, so 3X of him - more on that later. *sidenote props to Erick and his crew for playing Lanni successfullly. I can never go 'full kneel' and would have loved to actually play their decks (Dissension is good vs. full kneel), but it was cool to see it played, and played successfully*

Game 1: Name forgotten, grrr...really nice younger local guy playing Targ Dragons.

I got out to a good start, and cleared his characters fairly quickly. He did, however, get out plenty of influence and did the Summer/location that pops people back into hand combo. He Valar'd 2nd turn (never a good sign). However, that meant that he could only get one dragon out a turn, and I was winning challenges left and right. By the third turn he could put out Balarion the Black, but I had Syrio in play, so he had to return him to hand. Fourth turn I Flee'd and that was game. 1-0

Game 2: Again, horrible with names playing Greyjoy Winter choke.

A fairly new player, but a great deck. I didn't get a good start, and could never quite get it to not be Winter (he Seasick'd 2 times where my Carrion would have shuffled the season away), and that sucked since Lion's Gate get's 'turned off' by Winter. One turn I could have discarded two of his characters with one Dissension, but it was Winter still. I also saw all three of his Icy Fishermen...so it was a drawn out loss for me. He would have beat me quite easily if he didn't make some mistakes and forget to trigger some responses. 1-1

Game 3: Bara Knights, no name remembered again...sigh.

He flopped soem good knights, and two of the little new jousting weenies, but I always had the answer, be it kneeling, Dissension, Writ Small, Lanni Pays Debts, Red Wedding + Lions Gate. Lion's gate pretty much owns Bara, and I was expecting more of it, unluckily. 2-1

Game 4: GJ choke again, this time Kyle S. was the owner.

I only REALLY knew Kyle from Facebook, but got to know him better over the weekend which was cool. Anyways, he kept a fairly bad hand, and I was able to wipe his board 2nd turn I believe other than one Warship. I had plenty of protection for the Valar, and it didn't go too many plots that I remember. 3-1

So, I was 99.9% sure either I win the 5th round and make Top 8, or lose and get to go eat

Game 5: I think one of Erick's friends (?) playing GJ winter choke (3rd time in 5 games - woot!!!).

A new player, but obviously had played other CCG's before. He played it fairly flawlessly. I think I flopped Gilly three times in this tourney, vs. GJ Winter all three times I think the only three games where I saw Jaime as well was post-flop vs. Winter (so...useless). He Fear of Winter'd 2nd turn, and hit my board pretty hard, I didn't have any claim soak. After that it was the usual GJ annoying slow win, I think a Valar was in there somewhere as well and he had plenty of saves. 3-2

I came in 15th or 16th out of the 42 (?, 45?) which was fine. I REALLY don't enjoy the metagame right now, and knew I was hurting vs. choke and Martell Maesters, most likely the two most favorite things right now. Luckily, I got to see many of the cards from the next pack, and most of the Lanni box was on display as well. So I think I will be pretty excited moving forward.

However, I did go 6-0 in cube drafts after Friday night, and then Saturday's draft of Erick's cube. Taking that with the drunk draft of GenCon (5-0) ~now I can put all my efforts into the non-game that is drafting (especially with everyone drinking)! What other format will I have gone 2-0 vs. Nate and Erick this weekend?

I am sure there is a lot more, but I better get to work. Thanks to all my old friends, and now new friends for making the trip. I had a great tiem as always, and I am so tired I might pass out at my desk...as always after an agoT weekend. ~Oh, and Wayne, NE (population 5,000) DID have more players than Missouri...so go back to your Skyrim, wusses

rings said:

Umm, Carrion Bird can't be cancelled. I hope you are misremembering this part about Seasick and Carrion Bird, otherwise you got hosed.

Dobbler said:

Wow. He got hosed. I did this against him, too, didn't even realize it was cannot be canceled.

That said, Seasick was money for me all weekend regardless of that faux pas. Newly Made Lord to take out their influence, if necessary, and then Seasick crushes them. Most rush decks use their influence (in the form of the Seas) to get out characters, so Seasick just becomes so much stronger then. I love that card.