The language for the card, Frozen Moat says:

Challenges: Kneel Frozen Moat to choose 1 attacking character. Until the end of the challenge, treat that character as if its printed text box were blank.

Hodor says: Deadly. No attachments.
Hodor cannot be declared as an attacker. Hodor cannot be bypassed with stealth.

Here is the question: If I am the attacking and active player, the active player declares challenge type and opponent. Now, before active player kneels attacking characters...Can I use Frozen Moat to blank Hodor?

OR can I use it in the player action window before the challenge even started (the effect lasts "until the end of the challenge")? A sort of preemptive blanking. I am the attacking active player, and the Frozen Moat doesn't specify that the character be participating in a challenge, just that it be an attacking character. Aren't all characters I control "attacking characters" since I am the active player?

Basically, I wanted to use Hodor to attack, can it be done in this manner?

AceManUSC said:

No, it's not legal, and there are at least two reasons.

"Attacking characters" are those who have been declared as attackers in the challenge, not all characters controlled by the attacker, so a character must be participating to be a viable target for an "attacking character" effect.

There is no player action window between declaring the type of challenge and kneeling attackers.

I figured. Is there a way to make this work that I am too stupid to figure out? I was trying to turn the punitive nature of the Frozen Moat (its supposed to be used as a defensive measure, obviously) in a defensive role and turn it into an offensive use. Is there another, location or character ability I could use to surprise attack with Hodor?

AceManUSC said:

AceManUSC said:

The Boltons are a good idea. Thank you! I think using the Nightmares event is a decent option, but I don't know if its worth putting in a deck when you are only going to get to use it one time. At least with Frozen Moat, you can use it how it was intended every round, rather than have it be a one shot. So much for my ideas. Thanks everybody for the clarifications.

Yeah, well, depending on how soon Hodor dies, once might be all you have anyway. And, of course, the event has other uses and you can always build recursion into your deck.

The other option is to play Hodor, use something like Nightmares or Fortified Position to blank him, then play Milk of the Poppy on him. (Blanking out the "No Attachments" allows Milk to be played, after that, it keeps Hodor blank by itself.) Of course, there are probably easier ways to get a 4-STR, 2 icon character in Stark without going to so much trouble.

When it comes to Hodor attacking, you can either be clever and get him to attack, or efficient and leave him for defense. It's probably easier to give Shaggydog a power icon and jump a Lord into play.

You can also use Meera Reed if you want a reusable blanking effect.