I started playing A Game of Thrones LCG around a year ago or so, Stark being my very first House tried, then Baratheon. I've been playing a Baratheon deck (either Knight, Maester, Asshai,Kingsguard, or any combination of those themes and mechanics.)

I won a lot. Early I almost though for a while Baratheon was imbalanced. (Of course, me and my friends all just started learning the game.)

Now, the reason for this forum post is for any Baratheon fans to share some of their favorite cards, combos, tactics, and difficulties.

Also, the two most recent chapter packs released seemed to be "Light" in usefulness as far as Baratheon is concerned. (New Ser Davos not a Lord? Really?) Not a huge fan of the new event ( A United Cause ) in Trial by Combat either. (Card search is pretty boss, but so is massive amounts of power on your house).

The main thing that draws me to Baratheon (besides all the Knights, which is a big part of it,) Are the save and character recycling effects ( See Who is Stronger , Ser Parmen Crane with Baratheon Lords), and Stand effects ( Obey the King , Marya Seaworth , Highgarden .)

The pressure and control of King Robert's Host (and Lineage and Legacy ) is great too.(Not to mention all the Kings we have to make it less expensive.)

What do you guys think, any Baratheon fans?

I used to use Banner for the Storm to give Melisandre and Ser Eldon Estermont Vigilant ( Robert Baratheon was the other option if I drew into him first). If I could get Knight of the Flowers in there too, it was pretty much over. Also with The Iron Throne , it was just mean.

I don't really care for Bara, but I have a lot of respect for the house. I've lost way too many times due to being careless and them getting like 6 or 7 power off of one challenge.

The best Bara deck I ever saw was Fieras' Treaty of the South with a ton of nobles, the Eddard Stark that protects nobles, and 2x (i think) Power of Blood. It would consistently win turn 2 or 3. And if you Valar'ed too late, he could lock you with Power of Blood. We don't really have much Bara in the meta, so I don't know how they perform now VS. Search and Detain, and some of Lannister's new anti-renown effects.

-I like the idea of having The Laughing Storm in setup to protect against Rule by Decree.

-Another concept I like is having a deck that makes use of Maester Malleon's' Tome to toss their Valar and just power rush to victory.

I guess it's not technically Bara, but I made a Stark Alliance off of OCTGN with these as some key cards:

Crown of Azor Ahai x2
Crown of Winter x1
Maester Malleon's Tome x3
Carrion Bird x3
Summer Port x3
Summer Champion x3
Knight of Flowers x1
Gilly x1
To be a Wolf x3
Spending the Winter Stores
~~~
Fill the rest with good renown and you're good to go.

I could get the combo first turn about 60% the time, and about 85% of the time second turn with To Be a Wolf. Being Stark, I also ran No Quarter x3 to deal with opposing power-rush. Maester Malleon's Tome also goes well on Knight of Flowers.

That Melisandre , with the Iron Throne (and maybe even Storm's End for an extra power and give Ser Eldon even more) is such a killer combo.

I always seem to use the Rituals of R'hollor Melisandre though. It still draws a lot of power (along with the added pressure of the kill effect,) but I'd probably rush to victory more often with the Defenders of the North one. (2 power for undefended? And I get 3 undefended challenges per turn with KOTS Robert , Ser Eldon , and The Fox's Teeth ? Yes please!)

Also, I really love the Baratheon Wall . I haven't found a really good way to set it up properly. (I tend to put it out at the wrong time with Building Season, and end up too poor.)

Winter is hard to use super well with Baratheon too. I find the crown delicate.. and the raven's gold choke is a pain too.

I dunno. Too many steps to line it up really easily (2 dead plots to get the raven and the wall.)

Still, I think there is something there.

Rave said:

I really like the idea of Baratheon/Stark Alliance decks. (Although, when I build it I thought I'd grab the Eddard that makes the claim 0, and the Catelyn that blocks Intrigue challenges.) But that Maester Malleon's Tome move is brilliant!

Laughing Storm is the best. His effect I always find an asset, and deadly the cherry on top.

The Laughing Storm is a really good card, but its tough to pass on Narrow Escape when playing Baratheon. Or even the Fury Plot. I just can't seem to use it for my restricted card.

Are there any sensible new ways of getting draw in Bara ? I played treaty deck and i had to use Pyro cache with Alliance plot to even get draw...

Knights Agenda, Fancy King Renly and Bay of Ice come to mind. If the deck is quick enough I might even run Val. Lucky Bones is weird, but maybe good with To be a Stag?

AceManUSC said:

To freely quote Cato the Elder:

Ceterum censeo ridens tempestas esse removendum de indice restricto

Ratatoskr said:

I love that Google Translate makes that out to be: But I think the weather was laughing remove them from the restricted list.

That seems apropos... it's Laugh-able that the Storm is restricted.

I've actually never used Narrow Escape before. Seemed to me it would just get cancelled by whoever had the advantage. And unless I was running a balanced Baratheon with intrigue, The Laughing Storm 's ability would seems to work well.

I'll have to look up combos with it.

Is the Painted table too expensive to play?

Archrono said:

Shortlist (Correct me if I'm wrong):

- With Threat from the East for either 3 cards to yourself, but opponent has to draw 3 and discard 3 (drawcapping them in the process). Or just have your opponent one-sidedly discard 3.

- With Ghost of Harrenhal to draw 1 card by kneeling her.

- With Seal of the Crown (out soon, spoiled) to create a situation, where your opponent can only draw 1 additional card per round, but you can hit the cap (using other tech).

- With both Seal of the Crown AND Threat from the East to draw 3 and make your opponent draw 3, random discard 3 and then choose and discard one more. Oh, and they're drawcapped again.

- With Stormland Scavengers to mitigate their drawback when not playing against Bara or Targ.

I still feel the best "draw" for Baratheon is a 5+ flop. Getting deep into your deck at the outset plus the additional card from the Knight agenda can usually get you the pieces you need to threaten the win by Turn three.

Of course there is so much control in teh environment that this is rarely reliable, but if you get lcuky an can avoid Ghaston Grey, icon removal, kneel, Valar, Maesters, burn, et al - you can acheive spectacular effects.

Maybe this year TLS will come OFF the Restricted List right before Regionals starts! "Twould be poetic indeed.

The design philosophy at FFG is clearly stating that Baratheon should not and will not be a viable house in its current form. The design team doesn't want aggro decks to be able to win before a control deck can get set up. So rush will continue to lack support and Baratheon will continue to get under powered support for its recursion and holy crest themes. Until we see some cards get rotated out I doubt Baratheon will ever be a competitive house, and even then it will be in a completely different direction than where the house has headed in the last ten years.

Agreed with Staton. I'm playing Bara at regionals - but not with any high hopes. Given the rigth setup (like in teh "One Turn" thread below) I cna beat any House. I'm just pretty sure I won't draw that four times in one afternoon.

Staton - email me when you can. You still have my address, don't you? (It hasn't changed - and likely never will).

You won't win. You lose to Martell almost every game. The "turn 1 set up" is all well and good until you get hit with Burning on the Sand, or Orphan, or Viper's Rage, or GG. Other houses get stronger cards. Baratheon gets under powered tech that isn't playable compared to already existing cards.

Also I'll shoot you an email. I still have it. Is it took much to hope that you know how to text? lol

Honestly from the little I have played around with Bara, mostly on OCTGN the only house it seems that I can't at least get a 50/50 with is Martell. Some of the other things you named, burn and maesters in general are very difficult if they get a good set up, but narrow escape does help against burn so does that new shadows event, firey kiss(i think that's the name.) That being said would I ever go to a tournament with hopes of winning with a Bara deck...no. Now if the Martell house card was banned from that tournament, I think it it would be a completely different game.

Control decks are great, they are a ton of fun to play with because, at least to me, they make me feel like I am in control of the game. They allow me time to draw the right pieces to slowly gather up enough power for the win. I simply think that Martell has too much in the way of control right now, combined with either Maesters or Summer for draw. Personal experience about a week ago I played a game against my wife's Martell/summer(the deck that is in the finals in the octgn tournament). First round she had the scourge, GG with Arienne and a VB in shadows. First turn retaliation hit me with a 3 claim intrigue, arienne back in her hand to put a refugee back in mine. Valar next turn to wipe out my solid set up. At that point, I had to play at least 3 characters over 3 str to even have a chance for a challenge to go through. Because 1 was going back in my hand, 1 was getting icons removed and anything less than 2 str was getting eaten by the blade. That's not even taking into consideration the cyvasse, orphan, lost oasis or cheaper/more nobles that could have made it worse...

As Staton mentions there are other cards that are just as powerful that I didn't even think about. Burning on the sand+Shadows and Spiders(plot) is brutal, vipers rage can be awful if drawn at the correct time. The worst part about the handful of these cards that are not events they don't really hurt set up. Orphan is 0 cost, GG is 1 cost, Dagos, Edric, Myrcella are all 3 cost or under, VB only cost 2. Compare these cards to the good cards from Bara. Most of the cards that lead to fast wins for Bara are 4 cost characters with renown or power grab events...

Staton said:

You're kidding, right?

COMPUTERS are for emails.

TELEPHONES are for phone calls.

I have never sent a "text message".

I'm not using a telephone. I'm using a smart phone.

What do you guys think about the Black Cells? I've seen some slower more deliberate Bara decks use that card to great effect, in particular this Asshai deck with a intrigue/hand discarding theme.

I love the Black Cells. One of the better control cards in the game. I'm playing aorund with a Baratheon Shadows deck that uses the Sister of Truth and Syrio for mutliple Cell triggers - than opens up a delayed Rush. Thing is: other Houses do the Shadows/control thing more efficiently and I feel like this wold be more efficient out of Martell or Lannister.

Stag Lord said:

Since no one else answered me, Stags you gonna be using the painted table at all in your Bara decks?

Yeah pretty much. Baratheon just doesn't have much incentive to run Shadows beyond the cards themselves. They have Queen of Thorns and that's it. They don't have something like Hidden Chambers or Dragonpit or stuff like that. If I was going to play a Baratheon deck though, it'd be a shadows one.

@Jack, yeah I think its definitely an awesome card. Not too expensive at all. Plus you can combo it pretty well with The King's Ground, which also combos well with King's Landing and Masey's Hook.