Got my Chapter Packs today. I'll spoil what I can, as again we are playing BSG at the store.

First off, each house got a Refugee. All text boxes are the same as Refugee of the Citadel. Otherwise, here are their difference:

Bolton Refugee. Stark. House Bolton, Refugee. Mil and Int --F83

Mountain Refugee. Lannister. Clansman, Refugee. Mil and Pow --F85

Highgarden Refugee. Bara. House Tyrell, Ref. Int and Pow --F86

Island Refugee. Greyjoy. Ironborn, Ref. Mil and POw --F88

Refugee of the Plains. Targ. Dothraki, Ref. Mil and Pow --F90

Vale Refugee. Neutral. 1 STR. House Arryn, Ref. Mil, Int and Pow --F97

Now, the last of the Commons:

Head of a Dwarf. Lannister attachment. 2 Gold. Item. Text: Attached character gains Infamy. If attached character's controller would claim power for his or her House, that power must be placed on a character with at least one Head of a Dwarf card attached, (emphasis mine)-- F82

Dragonstone Scavenger. Targ. 2 gold, 3 STR Mil and Pow. Traitor. text: After you play DS from your hand, choose a player with a Targ or Bara House card. Discard a card at random from that player's hand. --F91

Pit Viper. Martell. 2 gold, 2 STR. Mil. Creature. Deadly. Response: After a challenge resolves in which Pit Viper attacked alone, discard Pit Viper from play (cannot be saved) to choose and kill another participating character. --F93

Later, I'll type up the "rares."

Wow, no discussion yet? Guess I could have just typed up one big document.

Here's the "rare" cards. Let’s look at Location hate first:

Bandit of Winter. Stark and Greyjoy. 2 Gold, 2 STR. Mil, Pow. Ally, Traitor Text: If it is Winter, Bandit of Winter gains “After this card is played from your hand, discard a Stark or Greyjoy location from play.” –F94

River Bandit. Bara and Lanni. 2 Gold, 2 STR. Mil, Int. Ally, Traitor Text: If it is not Summer, River Bandit gains “After this card is played from your hand, discard a Bara or Lanni location from play.” –F95

Bandit of Summer. Martell and Targ. 2 Gold, 1 STR. Mil, Int, Pow. Ally, Traitor Text: If it is Summer, Bandit of Summer gains “After this card is played from your hand, discard a Targ or Martell location from play.” –F96

Sure, these are seasonal dependent, but any location hate is useful. Bandit of Summer is just a little late for me to use in the League to get rid of that **** Flame Pitch Tower, which always costs me games. But I'm glad to see these cards.

And here are the Final Four:

War of the Five Kings . Event. Epic Battle . Plot: After the Dom phase this round, there is an epic phase in which each player may initiate an additional challenge of his or her choice. Instead of the normal claim effects, any player who loses one of these challenges as the defender must select his or her next plot card at random. –F99

Alannys Greyjoy . Greyjoy, Unique. 2 Gold, 2 STR. Int, Pow. Queen, House Harlaw . If there is another Queen character in play, Alannys Greyjoy cannot attack, defend, or trigger her character ability. Any Phase: Kneel Alannys Greyjoy to choose an opponent. If that opponent does not kneel a character with higher STR than Alannys Greyjoy, discard a card at random from his or her hand. –F89

Needle. Stark, Unique, attachment. 1 Gold. Item, Weapon . Attached character gets +1 STR and gains Stealth. Repsonse: After you play a character with Stalwart from your hand, kneel 1 Influence to attach Needle from your discard pile to that character. --F81

Arena Knight . Bara. 4 Gold, 3 STR. Mil, Pow. Knight . Vigilant. During POW challenges, Arena Knight gains Renown. –F87

Now, folks can say what they will about traits as Flavor Text, but I love that Alannys has the House Harlaw trait. So Nedly! Her artwork is amazing, though Nick-ler thinks it doesn't fit (it is a bit too "regal," I'll admit). WotFK as an Epic Battle is pretty interesting, and can hose the best laid plans. Plus, now there are 3 Epic Battle cards per house. Will it mean we'll see more Epics? Doubt it, but now there are options, at least.

Needle actually works better on 5KE Arya, but Eddard Stark with +1 Str and Stealth turn after turn! Nothing to scoff at. Arena Knight is okay, just another Renown guy for Bara, but Vigilant it such a nice ability.

Even with the Refugees taking up 7 slots out of the deck, I'm pretty happy with this pack. This provides for the weenie deck from Seven Hells, and now that I think about it using an Epic Battle the same time as reveling Valar with these refugees can muck things up (course, you still better be able to win dominance). I'm glad each house Refugee has a different trait, though these almost work better in Standard than in LCG (though, again, the set was designed for Standard as well as LCG). Coming so quickly on the heels of Raven's Song I expect we could start seeing the the Kings Landing CPs coming out late March or early April, in time to be used in the next League. One can only hope.

Our store got them in also, but unfortunately I left the house without my wallet so I'm going to have to hold off for at least a week before I make the trip to pick them . I love the refugees. IF they had a cost we could use the kingdom reducers for some of them... of course they are free so not an issue. Keeping gold or winning dominance, these should help speed up some of my slower decks nicely.

Pit Viper... heh, niiice.

The traitors... so interesting. Much madness will ensue in melee. In Standard the Stark traitor deck looks pretty strong despite the errata to the converts.

I am not sure but the way you discribed the Location hate cards it seems that tha abilities are not a responce: but a passive abitily. So if that is true and for expamle Stark does not play against Stark or Greyjoy, then he would have to discard his own location each tme he plays a character.

Needle does compliment 5KE Arya nicely (which makes sense given that these cards were designed to be an expansion to 5KE) and Nedly (MILD SPOILER ALERT: Needle being taken from Arya (discarded) and then finding its way back to her later). CS Eddard is a lock for any Stark LCG/League deck --with limited draw available and not too many heavy hitting characters, Eddard's Deadly and Renown is valuable-- and, as JJ points out, Needle will work nicely with him.

Rozy said:

Yes, these are passive abilities, but they are seasonally dependent. So, in a Mirror Match they can used effectively to hurt your opponent, but otherwise you'll want to play them when the season restriction is not active. They are like the discard traitors, but more selective.

Head of a Dwarf with Mel out could be nice.

I'm just glad Stark got some more access to int icons.

Nice thinking there with Head of a Dwarf and Mel.

I was thinking playing Head of a Dwarf on an opponents newly marshaled Refuge or any jumper in general. Should make them have to make some tough descisions.

Actually the ideal combo is Mel, Head of a Dwarf and Marked for Ransom... you have a serious power lock.

All gained power must go on that character, it doesn't count towards their total, and they can't kill it for claim.

Of course they can still remove the attachments or kill Mel (though a Burning Sword and a second Marked for Ransom can help there) but until they do so... trouble city.

sadly marked for ransom is not a lcg card, where it is a lot harder to get rid of.

if they do kill of the head of dwarf charcater for claim i'll trade a charcater of my choice for power on their house card.

JerusalemJones said:

plus, play the martell guy and you are pretty much safe. My martell deck has three martell locations in it...and they are discard to reduce seas.

Lars said:

Well... According to tzumainn's MArked for Ransom is a Clash of Arms Promotion. I'm not sure there has been a definitive statement about the promo cards for the Chapter Packs being LCG legal or not. As a Night's Watch I'd probably allow them until I heard otherwise. Have we had something from FFG that specifically excludes them?

The Card itself has the ITE logo on it (or at least the Five Kings) and you've probable heard ktom (~)rant about tzu always listing the promos wrong.

dormouse said:

Yes, we have. The tournament rules state that the authorized cards for the LCG format are Core Set, the Clash of Arms cycle, the Time of Ravens cycle and the next Chapter Pack cycle, which we just learned will be called "King's Landing." It doesn't say anywhere in there that promotion cards are legal, and promo cards were always listed separately in the "authorized cards" section in past years.

As for whether Marked for Ransom is a Clash of Arms or an ITE promo, look at the "Gorold Goodbrother" entry (under the 5KE promo cards) on tzu's site. There is a comment by "FFG" that this is really an ITE promo and to look at the set symbol. It has been confirmed that this comment was made by FFG Nick while he was still with the company. So all the times when I have said "go by the set symbol for the promo block, not by which set was being sold when it was released as listed on tzu's site," it was because that is the ruling FFG has made.

Also, CCG promos are probably very much NOT in the spirit of the LCG limited, accessible-to-all card pool. If FFG decides to do white-bordered promos, that logic may change, but until then, I think I'd be hard pressed to tell a new player in the LCG era, "if you want that card he's playing, you should have gone to a National's Tournament a year ago."