So it seems to me that the keyword stealth is just one of those things they throw onto a character they want to be more interesting. Stealth is an extremely powerful ability. Any character you play who has stealth is effectively TWO characters. In combat that character adds their own strength PLUS removes the strength of another (usually the most powerful) potential defender on the opponent's side. Now if the character with stealth were to stand and attack again, the number of characters it counts as effectively multiplies and gets silly. On top of that, the ways to counter stealth are few and far between (Hodor or Ser Arthur Dayne) with the only reliable way being to have stealth as well. Deadly is another powerfull keyword but it doesn't stack. If you have say three deadly characters, still only one defender dies from them. Stealth stacks, however. 3 stealthers means three attackers and three defenders who are useless. A net gain of six for the price of three.

So in conclusion, I think this game could really use more counters to stealth. Or perhaps rethinking the average cost that should be given to a character with stealth. I'd say a 2 strength stealther should be at least 3 or even 4 cost.

On the other hand, since everyone has an access to characters with stealth (it's just that some Houses have more of it), it doesn't skew any balance as long as it's not a character with insane STR/Cost ratio on top of stealth (and most of stealth characters as far as I remember have 1 to 1 ratio and adding extra gold cost on them will make them close to unplayable,e.g. how many people will play Varys if only thing he had was Stealth and on top of that didn't have 1 to 1 ratio) So short of Wildings agenda there aren't that many characters to really "break" Stealth the way you say it can be done.

Not sure I agree with you on this one. There's some decent targetted removal these days with targ burn on the rise, stark murder, terminal schemes, etc. Keep in mind Frozen Moat, Nightmares, Meera, the plot that blanks chars, etc all get rid of stealth and other troublesome keywords.

And as BBSB alludes to, the more stealth there is in the environment, the less effective/useful it actually is (since an attacker with stealth cannot bypass a defender with stealth).

Counter to stealth? Arya. powerful stealth characters- Vipers Bannermen(restricted) I would say it's the draw engine it provides that can be manipulated that makes it restricted.

The new Darkstar is interesting.

Damon Dance. its that stealth+deadly thats amazing.

Meera Reed. Its the stealth plus some other great ability that makes them valuable. Just not the stealth.

NvE gets around Stealth as well, and looks like there will be plenty of these guys out soon.

snaggrriss said:

I do agree, but be careful… Damon does not get stealth or deadly until he is participating . So, on the defense, against a stealth character, he's pretty impotent.