I really like the new Kevan. Really strong for PBTT decks.

Fieras said:

I assume that it's the PbtT deck without the PbtT agenda, right?

I see a ton of people freaking out about Targ Burn and this CP. It doesn't make sense to me. Yes, Incinerate is awesome, but how many more events/attachments can you really run in your Burn deck before it stats becoming bogged down. Burn decks already run more locations/attachments/events than most decks; are you really going to be able to win with burn alone?

playgroundpsychotic said:

playgroundpsychotic said:

I agree it can do interesting things and create some interesting deck building and play options. I think it works nicely with poised wine. Also it probably makes Targ Burn more playable in Meele, as many characters there rack up the power, and that can swing the game in one turn.

I think in stark a kill any character event is probably better than steal a strength 2 or less character event.

My main complaint is that the attachment that falls off to easily. Lose an intrugie or power challenge plus normal attachment hate and or blanking; that's a pretty low bar, so whoever you steal will be going right back to it's owner next turn. It's basically a crappy military version of seductive promise. Anyway that's my take.

As far as Targ being over powered have you seen incinerate? That's almost an auto kill, for one influence. With all the terminal effect and strength reduction that have been added to Targ burn, I have a feeling there will be some restrictions coming soon.

sWhiteboy said:

It's not strength reductions it's the added terminal effects; especially ones without the no attachment restriction. It makes burning out any character that much easier. Also before KotHH, the resource management was much trickery/harder/slower. KotHH really smooths out the resource management.

Willas Tyrell should have the text, "If the Red Viper is on the board Willas Tyrell cannot stand"

tofubones said:

I think the thing most people forget about burn is that alot of the time its behaviour is no different then any other kill card. Is Incinerate brutal? Sure but so is No Quarter. The former requires a multi-card set up to completely rub out a medium sized character, the latter requires a unique and a military win to kill anything (which might be then saved). Neither is hard to pull off but Narrow Escape and the Hand's Judgement laughs at both of them anyways.

Further, this CP has 3 different cards that can stop Incinerate (and other cards). Is this the only cancel we'll see or the tip of the iceberg?

I'm not gonna deny that I find Ward amusing because I like stupid Mind Control tricks. I rate most Heroclix characters in the same way. I might like it a little too much because of constantly seeing KoF with huge stacks of power on him. Out of Stark, it tends to behave as an additional "kill" card further reducing your opponent's defenses even if its only temporary.

I for one like the martel attachment.

In a melee game, if you also have the melee atachment that gives deadly to your opp and power to you in intrigue can be incredible. You could win 6 power if the 6 attachments are in play and you kill one of your characters with deadly (yes, it says any character that dies, not just your opp)…all in all pretty nice. Makes for fun decks

playgroundpsychotic said:

i can use saves and dupes for kill effects, i can't for burn

jack merridew said:

Alot of the time you have no saves or dupes. No Quarter just "burned" a character of any Strength in that case. Alternatively, you rely on cancel to stop negative card effects.

In any event, your average burn requires more set up time then other kill effects. Targ card draw is still nothing extra-ordinary so setting it up can take a little more work. Admittedly, Incinerate is pretty potent. Its almost too good although its unusual for me to have more than 3 of the same trait out at any time and its almost always Dothraki weenies when it is. Its at least reasonably capped.

I agree with Jack.

I think that is the real trick of it… most burn decks run no theme besides burn. Now you have to include more dothraki or allies or knights or something to get that effect off, and at its best is mid to late game after the reset… I think it is awesome for non-burn decks. It will definitely go in my army and dothraki decks, but I have no intention of putting it into my burn deck. I'd ratehr use hatchlings feast and Threat from the north.

Oh, and Staton… the Stannis is dead sexy.

Incinerate takes at least 5 cards to kill a decent sized unique (STR 3). Brianne of Tarth+No Quarter takes two for an effect that can kill any STR.

That is why I'm not really all up in smoke about some of the new burn. It doesn't change the fact that burn does its thing. Now you can at least have more deck variety with the new burn cards. Maybe instead of running a "burn" deck, you are now running a Dothraki based deck with some burn support. Or, a Mercenary based deck with burn support. Orrrr and Army based deck with some burned support. So on and so forth…

sWhiteboy said:

Incinerate takes at least 5 cards to kill a decent sized unique (STR 3). Brianne of Tarth+No Quarter takes two for an effect that can kill any STR.

Its not an amazing card, but its still worth consideration.

sWhiteboy said:

Of the 5 cards, 3 are characters which are still standing and able to do challenges. If you suspect the Targ player has Incinerate you can't do much to stop it. 1 influence is very cheap, and makes it immune to Paper Shield, and it isn't challenge dependent.

Brienne + NQ means you have used the event and knelt Brienne. If you suspect the Stark player has NQ you can control Brienne before the challenge. Challenge dependent, so if you can block the challenge, or stop them making a MIL challenge, you can avoid it. You could even mitigate it somewhat by going first and getting some use out of you character before it dies. Obviously if they do get Brienne in the challenge no cancels can be used, but I would say the Incinerate combo is better.

You failed to keep in consideration those three other characters can be killed, bounced, have their traits blanked, etc that prevent incinerate from incinerating your target. What we can pull from this is that it is all context dependent. Your meta, your play style, and your house is really going to determine which is the worst to face and easiest to fight at any given time.

Of course the raw power of a 5 card combo is going to beat out a 2 card combo, nearly every game.
However, setting it up is a whole other consideration.

Glad to see this Kevan Lannister has a military icon. I always though it was strange that he had an intrigue icon rather than military.

Hmm… Going to be irritating here, but loose terminology irritates me.

Using Incinerate with several characters having a shared Trait on the table is NOT a combo. It's synergy. The card functions by it's normal mechanism, it's just played at a time where it's effect is maximized. It's like saying that Game of Cyvasse and the whole table of characters forms a combo.

Now Threat from the North with Hatchling's Feast could in some fashion be thought of as a combo, since the two parts create a strong effect by combining their individual effects. (A blanket strength reduction with a terminal is combined with a strong one-sided strength reduction to form a unilateral mass removal) Again, using Threat from the North with Incinerate to form a kill effect that can punch through Power of Blood regardless of any attachments, that would be closer to using a combo - and that's already quite a stretch really.

And, what I guess most people are worried about here is the fact that Incinerate is quite a cheap (1 influence) and easy (only restriction is challenges phase, no protection from having an attachment or having No Attachments) terminal effect, which could boost an already strong archetype past other competitive decks. Not sure how this will pan out. Personally I feel that if anything, Incinerate is just too 'easy'. A bit like BotS perhaps, since it doesn't cause play errors due to having limitations and is an easy way of correcting previously made ones. Anybody ever having counted on killing an attacking character with a Flame-kissed only to notice that it has No Attachments or an attachment? I never really felt that BotS really needed restriction due to the effect being too strong, more like being too easy and unlimited, if anything. But anyway, let the card play itself out first in competitive play. That'll tell us how it bounces.

Now the larger issue I feel is related to the inherent problem of powerful burn in general… Burn has a tendency to obsolete some of the games other interesting mechanics, such as running powerful unique characters and building a deck around their effects. I see it's value in providing a counter-force to those kinds of decks, but I'm slightly worried that the game is pushed further in this direction in the current environment… Essentially: Powerful burn leads to duplicates being risky (we were already halfway there due to Search and Detain and easy response/character ability cancel), which leads to all unique characters being run 1x only. Combining this with positive attachments being next to unplayable in the environment already, the feel of the game can deteriorate closer to MTG or something (lots of easy removal, emphasis on power-weenies, characters with comes into play/leaves play effects, oh, and immunities). In AGoT this may take an interesting twist due to non-unique hate, since we'll probably end up with 'best of' decks containing 1x of each of the most powerful in-house (and applicable neutral) unique. Which in turn will lead to decks feeling quite 'samey', even with different Agendas.

Me, I'm a bit saddened by the fact that the game could be making the same 'errors' (depends on your point of view I guess, and what you feel the game should be about) as other games have done a long time back, and have been ever since trying to repair. Attachments are a core part of the game, and they should play an important role. And by default they attach to characters (as the rules regarding Meera clearly illustrate). Yet the only character attachments that really see play are those ¤% Maester chains. And that's mainly since they come with the 'Buy a Maester, get all chains free' discount, and add a ridiculous exclusivity to the deal on top with Tin Link. Again, uniques are supposed to be important in the game, and key parts in forming your deck… and you should always be trying to protect them at all costs, while being scared for their health. Not throwing more and more named characters at the game, hoping one of them will stick, like some insane flood of lemmings. Although… one could argue that it is somehow nedly also, in a way…

Personally, I liked the fact that the mere fact of having an attachment was a kind of protection (like with Search and Detain and Hatchling's Feast), since this encourages to use those cards despite the inherent double negative.

+1 to WWDrakey;

Agree with everything said, especially those % maester chains.

playgroundpsychotic said:

But it's not a kill effect. It's an effect that could let your kill effects go through, if you control Maester Aemon. It's an effect that let's you get rid of characters your opponent would want you to kill, like Theon Greyjoy (how nedly!) or The Kindly Man (less nedly). If the spoiled text is worded correctly, you could even combine it with burn to take control of unkillable characters like Beric or Coldhands. I like the card.

Well put, WWDrakey. Though I might go even a little further and say that dupes will become non-existent if burn gets too strong. Is it there for certain? Hard to tell without the cards in the environment to do a little more testing, but burn of all flavors is getting a very large, very noticeable bump in this set, and it appears to be lacking the traditional clause used to help keep it in check. I've played through times in the game where Targ burn was top dog (Ice & Fire era) and I personally find it to be much less fun than Hyperkneel as top dog.

Kennon said:

I think that maybe dupes will have to get another errata, the same way they did in the last faq where they told us dupes worked for going to the deck. Something that saves from the 0str terminal effect. Maybe thay should give +2 until the rest of the phase if their str is 0 (so that it doesn't get abuse to push challenges through)