With the release of Terminal Schemes and now No Quarter, is there now too much targeted kill in the environment? No Quarter itself is problematic, with the easiest trigger of any targeted kill event. Burn is becoming stronger to the point of being overwhelming, dupes are no longer helpful with Search and Detain.

This game is becoming a veritable slaughter fest. Armageddon, if you will. And the more it moves this way, the less incentive there is to run dupes or linchpin characters, which is sad. Bara for sure could use a leg-up. What can be done?

Danigral said:

Just waiting for an old CCG player to say, "Back in the day of 'Put to the Sword'......"

I don't think there are any targeted kill events that paper shield can't stop? And the ones that you brought up can both be saved by dupes. I agree that search and detain is strong, but it can backfire slightly if you play a higher int plot card. I am very excited for no quarter+brienne though in my stark deck...what do you mean you have maester aemon with 2 dupes, 17 chains and hes 19 strength, oh that's right you can't trigger anything I'm sorry...

goshdarnstud said:

goshdarnstud said:

Beat me to it! But to be fair, back in the early days of the CCG, the Terminal Schemes equivalent was Tears of Lys, that couldn't kill a character with an intrigue icon.

Terminal Schemes is tons better, mainly because it can kill anyone and doesn't have a limit.

One thing I do like about the state of targeted kill now, is that Martell doesn't really have easy access to any of it, arguably being the best house.

I do agree there is a lot of it, but if anyone should have access to the easiest kill card, it is Stark. That has been their theme forever.

Dupes no longer being helpful because of 1 plot that may or may not go off is reaching though...

I wish there were more ways to save from terminal effects like burn. Off the top of my head i only know of risen from the sea, but even that only gives a +1 buffer. Are there any others?

Rave said:

You know, I guess Baratheon got a little bit of a leg-up since Terminal Schemes targets non-House Tyrell characters. It can't kill Knight of Flowers. haha.

Martell has one of the best targeted kill in the game in VB - at least it is meta-defining.

It's not only Search and Detain that reduces the usefulness of dupes, but any response cancel that Martell has a lot of (HCIT and now the Tourney Grounds), as well as Targ burn. That's not a stretch.

I believe that the other ways to prevent going to the dead pile for good from a burn is to "save and return" or "return from dead pile" recursion.

1. characters like Ser Davos Seaworth CS (not paying 1 gold) and Viserys CS have this built-in.
2. events like Retreat or Narrow Escape.

Oh and there is the "cannot be killed" (Ser Beric Dondarrion, Coldhands, Maester Lomys, Power of Blood plot for those with Noble crest) and "cannot be discarded" for Threat from the North.

dh098017 said:

Many times overlooked card from the coreset. Retreat. Works on burn and every targeted kill, very helpful if you have few key characters that need to survive

Now back on topic, I still haven't yet seen terminal schemes played often, and well I did place no quarter on my stark decks but removed them and placed die by the sword back as it was easier to trigger than the new one. I think the current format has slowed again to favor control more and since control is more favored there is even more kill control around in decks.

Search and detain. Well I even made a discussion to this as I see it way too strong and when it backfires the worst case is that they are returning a 1 cost location. Seriously the effect and those plot stats, just what.

Ruvion said:

I was thinking that it would be good to have a smidgen more "cannot be killed" keywords in certain houses. Characters that save themselves as you mention, though, usually aren't the targets of targeted kill in my experience.

goshdarnstud said:

Back in the day of 'Put to the Sword'.....

There you go! Case closed! ~~~~~

Seriously though, I really don't see any more target kill other than in plot form (Search is crazy).

However...I do want to dust off my 'little targeted location kill' rant again. Yes, character control is getting 5-10% better (in Lanni Schemes will replace...? Lanni Pays? Writ Small? Dissension? Does it ever even go in Bara decks?).

But location removal is the same old crap (unless you are GJ, don't get me started on the decision to make Bandit Lord GJ). Especially in plot form. It is getting to be that houses with a really strong location set or a way to easily prolong games (read: Targ) are getting a serious leg up.

Just one HIGHLY playable card like Put to the Torch (win military = kill two locations) or Fire from the Skies (win military AND intrigue = kill a character and location, both < or = 3 cost) would be nice for houses like Lanni or Martell. Or even better, 2-3 location control plots to get location control option to 25% of the character control options.

rings said:

I think Fire From the Skies is a great idea, but it should discard character and locations at 2 cost or lower. 3 cost is too high in my opinion. Though the event would be easily canceled so maybe not.

Danigral said:

Interesting. With burn and now Search and Detain, I guess the game wants us to play attachments again.

Of course, there is the idea that you will never see Terminal Schemes or No Quarter in a Targ or Martell deck, so burn and the response cancels aren't a factor for the houses that can run those events, which I'd assumed was the basis for this thread.
So I guess I should've said: do you think that the utility of dupes is reduced significantly against Lanni, Baratheon, or Stark because they run 1 copy of Search and Detain in their plot deck?

VB is good, but it IS limited in its use. I think most people would agree that the main bummer of targeted kill is that it will hit your renown characters, and there's like... 3 renown characters that VB can hit.

Also, Martell throws away so many options just to play that card, I'm almost happy to see it most of the time.

Rave said:

IF the want us to play attachments, some playable ones would be nice. I really like Widow's Wail, and Bara has some nice ones. But as in my article, even with the Warhorses coming out, they are few and far between. Oh, and some of Targ's best burn these days ignores attachments. *eye roll*

I do think dupes are lessened by the one copy of Search and Detain. Plot control is just always 10X superior than other control.

VB is great, because it is used in combonation with other cards - if you VB their weenies away, then claim is much more important. That GG or Game of C just got 25% better. And so on. But I agree Martell has to say no to some great cards.

Targeted kill to me is a pace thing, not a renown thing. If I use something 'free' to get rid of your 4 cost character with a dupe, I am most likely in a much better position than I was a second ago. On VB it probably increases your military claim by 1, and might decrease one of your opponent's claim by 1 (by getting rid of their only intrigue icon for example), not bad for 2 cost once and free after that (usually). Not to talk about VB too much since we have already ad naseum - just as an example.

Rave said:

Almost, but not quite. I was talking about the entire meta, with Terminal Schemes and No Quarter as the proverbial 'straw', not just about Stark and Lanni/Bara intrigue-heavy decks. When I think about playing a rush deck with three copies of a key character, I shudder, because it can be burned, returned to hand and dupes discarded, dupes cancelled, etc. The dead cards are becoming too much of a risk imo.

And yeah, +1 to rings that there should be some better attachments. I'd love to see some more attachments that cannot be discarded like Northern Steel. And another +1 re VB.

Personally I don't see either No Quarter or Terminal Schemes really impacting meta in ANY direction, least of all making running triplicates of uniques unfeasible. While both cards provide some new deck types with access to directed kill, they are both still saveable and don't push any existing decks based on character-control over the top.

But that's not to say that running (3x) of unique characters as a basis for decks isn't becoming increasingly risky, just that the cards causing this are quite different. While Search and Detain is the most obvious culprit here, I'd say that the recent influx of easy and affordable character ability and generic triggered effect cancel combined with the ramping up of Burn is another part of the reason.

For reference, the cards I'm talking about are: Lannister Iron Throne, Alannys, Martell Tourney Grounds.... Hell, even Painted Table works in this regard. All repeatable and extremely cost efficient, all able to hit your duplicate saves, while also filling several other needs.

Personally I'd say that the Champions cycle and the Lannister box have increased the efficiency and flexibility of control builds so much that the whole meta is swinging in that direction quite fast. Naturally there are some exceptions (Power Behind the Throne and Siege of Winterfell -based decks are pretty good at hitting the Control-builds where it hurts), but I'd say the general trend is in that direction.

Many of the most powerful control-elements are currently based around locations, which makes the lack of efficient location removal in some houses even more obvious than before... if the power-level of locations is getting ramped up this fast, I would expect an increase in ways of countering them as well (in other houses than GJ). Naturally the increase in control (especially character control) also makes attachments even more risky, as if they were very reliable to begin with. So... I guess I'd have to agree with the need for some more solid attachments in the environment, or maybe just something that made existing attachments more feasible (something along the lines of Alchemist's Shop, but granting characters some immunities to balance out the double-negative of running attachments to begin with).

WWDrakey said:

I agree with pretty much everything here, with the exception that I think targeted kill does have some influence on the risk of running duplicates. Something that has always been the risk of running dupes is the timing of playing that character. Do you risk playing it with one copy in hand hoping to draw into it next turn, or do you hold it in hand until you get the duplicate? Targeted kill to me tips the scale toward holding it in hand, so that you don't have the possibility of turning those dupes into dead cards. The downside of this is that now that character is sitting in your hand and is subject to intrigue and discard, and also the opportunity cost of drawing another usable card. However, when that decision is removed (i.e. you don't run dupes) you are freed to weigh only the relative advantage of marshalling that character in the present moment. This consequently results in more min-maxing instead of "linchpin character synergy" in deckbuilding because each character will be considered only on the basis of its efficiency, not it's ability in the context of the rest of the deck.

Thoughts?

Danigral said:

I agree, and I feel the only reason you should run dupes is if your character is the lynchpin of your deck. I don't know why I would run 3x of any character in a rush deck, except maybe Val, and that depends on the deck.

I think the designers understood this also, and that is why it gives us bodyguard and that 2 cost bara guy that you can attach as a dupe.

I'd actualy say No quarter would have very little effect on the environment - Stark Murder has been relatively absent from the environment, as most other Stark Murder cards have generally been too restrictive (Bear Island, Guilty etc.). Die by the Sword is still probably the preferred kill for most Stark Siege (War crests are generally more common in Stark Siege than unique characters), and I don't think Stark will want to run 6 Kills in the same deck.

I've played a number of different card games in my day. The biggest thing that kills a card game in my opinion is that removal effects become so consistent that the only cards that end up mattering are ones that either get played for free, are immune to most removal effects or are removal effects themselves.

That's why I quit yugioh and lost interest in magic. It's all the meta was. Removal, stuff that get's played for free and stuff that is immune or resistant to removal.

It's not fun, especially in A Game of Thrones where the story is supposed to revolve around the various interesting personalities presented in the book series.

Kingsguard said:

I completely agree on the 'free' to play cards. I'm a little too hungover to give a compelling arguement here, but I think the game would be a better game if all zero cost cards were also 'limited'.

Kingsguard said:

I agree that when characters start dying to consistent, cheap removal it takes you out of the AGOT state of mind. Deaths of unique characters should have to be carefully planned and rare.

botounami said:

I agree absolutely! You don't see unique characters in the books dying. I mean can you imagine reading a series where the supposed main character dies in the first book? What fan of fantasy would ever read something where they were never sure if a character they bonded with or felt was important to the story died?

Oh, and.... ~

Penfold said:

LOL. Well, you could read Jordan's Wheel of Time.

[sort of spoiler]

They all go through a bunch of ridiculous crap and never die. Closest thing they get is they might lose a few fingers...

Penfold said:

Awesome. Sarcasm for the win.

People, the defining part of aGoT is people dying. While I agree that uniques should be more powerful to make up for their inhearent weakness, I think that is a cool wrinkle in the game. Heck, when the card pool gets this big, I would rather play Highlander to get more of a variation between games (this was reinforced by watching the OCTGN games where even after the system dropping, it seemed like I was watchign the same game every time).