Ambition (Remix) 1.0

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Ever since the GJ box hit, I have been trying to bust Growing Ambition. You all were excited about busted cards like Balon and Euron, but I was excited about our friend Citadel Archivist. He was the missing piece to make GA good. GA is by no means busted, but it's very, very good with that card available.

At first I tried to just use it to go grab renly and randy or brienne, etc, but that was too slow. I'd be over reserve or too far behind on the board. I needed something to benefit me right away, which meant events. Which meant using them to grab power, which meant LSR. It took me a bit longer than that, but that's the general thought process that led to this deck.

I was going to do a Wamma-style parody of Ignition here, but I'm not clever enough, so feel free to take up that mantle if you'd like.

I took the deck to Jesse's Name Day and went 5-2, then lost the play in to targ burn when KoF was crowned turn 1 by Matt Gehman. Boy, if I had a dollar for every time that happened to me, I could draft Matt Gehman in a WAR format.

I lost to Martell SoB and Stark SoB before losing in the extended cut. I'm sure you see a pattern there. There are definitely tools in the deck to deal with sea of blood and attrition, but they can still get you if you don't see pieces early.

Basic idea is use growing ambition when your board is ready to go for the win. If you have a knight (preferable KoF) and a lady on the board with a courtier, or 2 knights and a lady, you can get 12 power that turn off of Growing Ambition. Let me explain. With GA in shadows, you:

-Play meddling -Reset your discard if it isn't already empty using your crown of golden roses/garlan/informer trigger -kneel fealty, as it also reduces GA

• do some calculations as to what cards you need. To get your power, you'll need might of the reach, melee at bitterbridge, superior claim, lady sansa's rose, bounty of highgarden (which is free with meddling), and emissary of the hightower if none are already in hand. Then get either utility cards like off to gulltown, offer of a peach, or nightmares.
• trigger Knight of Flowers after each event you play
• On the power challenge, you can get 8 or 9 power, depending on if you have Garlan in play (2 for Superior Claim, 3 for Lady Sansa's Rose, 1 for unopposed guaranteed by melee at bitterbridge, 1 or 2 for claim, 1 for renown from melee at bitterbridge or KoF). This could actually be 10 power if you used off to gulltown on a knight of the reach, but I didn't get to do that on the day, only in testing.
• Use the emissary and select lady sansa's rose, and repeat again with either KoF or another knight for 4 more power.

Don't forget KoF triggers. There are a lot of them. Iron Throne will remind you, but in real life bring some tokens to track the triggers.

With some luck, you can do 3 challenges with 3 knights and get 15 in a single turn if you already have 1 LSR in hand, as that would allow you to play 3 of them. I did this once on the day.

A good use of GA is also to get another GA and archivist so you can use it each turn to get what you need. Paxter pays for this by himself if he's out. I used this trick once on the day to nightmares the wall every turn after I rushed to 10, and then won on time. Not my favorite way to win, but it's builders so I don't feel bad.

I should note, thought I do say "combo" in reference to this, I don't think it's a combo deck. It's also fairly fragile, so it's nothing like the loathed ladies deck or hyper viper. It is a fair deck that has a haymaker in it, which can also be re-tooled to simply answer whatever they may throw at you.

Definitely need some reps to be able to know what you need in a given situation, but it's fun to play for a while. Enjoy!

Tourney report:

Game 1: Martell SoB:

I combo'd out turn 2 to get to 12, then compelled because I knew he had to valar. I played out more knights and had GA in shadows with an empty discard pile. I should have gone for the win but played a bit scared, waiting to flip my second meddling the next turn, and he got over top of me to wipe me and I couldn't recover. Lesson learned - go for the win.

Game 2: Targ Crossing

I don't remember a ton about this game, but I do remember he opened up big and threw out a bunch of characters, leaving only 2 cards in hand after turn 1 challenges. I dohaeris and am able to combo out on turn 3 as his draws end up dead and I have the events to answer anything he may do.

Game 3: Stark SoB:

I never had a shot. He set up duped Alysane (who is crazy good) and flipped Heir to get King Robb, ensuring he gets SoB every turn. He sacrificed Core Cat for that trigger, allowing him to sacrifice the Rickon he had set up to cancel my At the Gates. I honestly didn't think he'd do it - bad call on my part. Should have opened Pentoshi. But that put me sufficiently behind along with getting Redwyne Straits torched twice that I never had any money or characters on board.

Game 4: Lannister Banner of the Wolf

I had everything I needed this game. A lady, GA in shadows, 2 knights on the board with knight of flowers being one of them, and a courtier. He wasn't presenting any threats with my loaded up begging brother on board, so I set up for an OTK turn 3 and did exactly that, using KoF in 2 challenges and another knight in the other with might and melee to get to what would have been 17 power.

Game 5: Bara Sun

Icon stripping hurts a bit, but off to gulltown shines here. I GA to almost get there (12 power, I believe) turn 2 and then compelled into meddling to close turn 4.

Game 6: GJ Sun

Drowned god that everyone loves. Fortunately for me, he had an atrocious mulligan of 2 1 gold locations, and I saw everything I wanted. I had a couple power from some unopposed challenges turn 1, so I flipped meddling turn 2 and closed using 2 LSRs (would have been 3 but he stripped 1 with His Viper Eyes, so good thing I had 2 power going into the turn or I would have had to go to plot 3).

Game 7: NW Wars

I see the pieces I want and get off a big power challenge with the power grab cards to go to 10 on turn 2. When I used GA to get those cards, I also grabbed another GA and an archivist to be able to use it every turn to grab nightmares, ensuring he never triggered his wall. Crown in play on KoF let me reset every turn and do this, so he simply got dom until time was called mid-round at 9-7. No resets were played, so by the end he had 15 or so builders in play and I had 4 knights, 3 of whom were cravened. This forced him to muster all his strength for a giant power challenge into me, but triggering about 10 events (2 of which were might of the reach) pumped my knight of flowers to over 40, where I could defend and trigger LSR to win at time 13-8, had we played it out. He conceded after the 2nd might was played. I do admit I am not sure I would have won this in an un-timed game, but it would have gone for hours.

Play-in Game: Targ HRD Meereen

I was set to get him on turn 2. Set up Knight of Flowers and a knight of the reach. We both flipped At the Gates and were gentleman about the deal, both grabbing gates of the moon. He marshalled first and crowned Loras immediately, crushing my dreams. In my hand I had elinor tyrell, growing ambition, lady sansa's rose, melee at bitteerbridge, and might of the reach, which meant I could combo to 13 turn 2 if I saw no other knights (I did draw another one, which meant I could have OTK on turn 2).

But alas, Crown of Gold is a card we live with, and he may well have had other answers. He beat me down and I could never get up, burning all my 1 str characters with 0 gold gifts of the widow triggers once burn Dany hit the board.

It was a fun day but I'm pretty sure I'm done with the deck after playing it the last month. I hope you all enjoy.