Anarchy in the Iron Islands! 3/3 Blackwater 2019 1.0

• Versions

The Deck

This deck was a follow up outing for Naval Superiority which hopefully would be much more chokey, fighting back against the big characters terrorizing the meta by denying economy and keeping up attrition against their characters.

While this guy certainly wasn't the most important card in the deck, the release of Botley Crew earns a shout out for prompting combining Night's Watch and Greyjoy. Small Theon is all I need to keep consistently removing someone for military claim while Hagen's Daughter along with Maester Aemon are durable characters since I am frequently unable to defend enemy military challenges. Being able to setup Nightflyer generally makes me feelgood as it's an excellent counter for gates and other econ locations and then goes away as nothing burns or political disaster fodder. The deck's own economy base and draw potential is a little light so it tries to cheat as much as possible, the Night's Watch recruiting package along with Flea Bottom, although this might not be the best use of the restricted card as it isn't leveraged very heavily. Benjen and The Knight join the crue because they provide a bit more military beef and power game to keep the game from going too long

Overall compared to my previous efforts this is much less of a tempo deck taking an early advantage. It has a lot of symmetrical removal, Mutiny At Craster's Keep and Marched to the Wall in particular, so relies on grinding the opponent out of cards characters and econ, and can't afford to miss a beat or it touches a live wire.

Hopefully this deck could take me to the top but still make sure my opponents don't go away mad. Anyway on with the show and actual performance.

Performance

Round 1

Fabian - Greyjoy Prince that was promised - Loss

Unfortunately not a lot to say about my round one performance. Fabian spent a lot of time umming and ahing over turn one plots, remembering i had previously been playing naval he dodged it by opening Valar Dohaeris. After this while I managed to clear some big characters, with no economy I was bowled over by Balon by turn 3, even having my white tree stolen.

Round 2

Alex O'Fee-Worth - Lannister Prince that was promised - Win

Round 2 I was up against the lord of bones himself, playing the top Lannister deck of the day. A very interesting clansmen deck with a prince Tyrion Lannister. He started with a classic setup of Tywin, reducer, roseroad, which would be sturdy against naval and location destruction so I opened with Valar Morghulis into his Time of Plenty. I used Nightflyer to clear Alex's Gates of the Moon and other economy but Lannister ambush shenanigans kept messing with my challenge maths and kept the board states more even. I wasn't opposing or doing power challenges much so power in the game rose dangerously high. However, when Tyrion couldn't stick to the board and I left Alex with no characters after a marched which allowed me to close out a fun game.

Round 3

Ben Allen - Baratheon Wars to come - Win

Ben had the kind of Baratheon good stuff deck that I'd expected to run into more. I missed with my opening naval into a Varys's Riddle, but managed to stabilize with a mutiny. I wasted my Nightflyer on a Dragonstone port so I could discard it to nothing burns and use it again, but failed to draw one and Gates of the Moon stayed online for the rest of the game. I kept clearing characters away, but because I often could only attack power totals once again got very even. I ended turn 6 on 14 power intending to valar for power from Benjen, but was matched by a The King in the North. Fortunately The Knight survived and with the death of Stannis Ben couldn't trigger any kneel and I pushed through a stealth challenge to win.

Round 4

Vojta Kubicina - Stark Faith militant - Loss

Back after lunch and Vojta setup a scary board with Greatjon Umber who I knew would be a problem along with other characters and I had setup mostly locations so I opened with valar into riddle. Vojta played the rest of the game superbly, he dodged my naval on turn 2 and consistently stayed on 4 gold plots to avoid triggering my underground vaults. This meant it was almost me getting choked out and with Stark's excellent card draw I ran out of answers for all of his characters and lost fairly quickly after that.

Round 5

George Ankers - Greyjoy Banner of the sun - Loss

George was running a very interesting deck, having Balon Greyjoy and The Fowler Twins work together for some Golden Storm action. He bit the bullet and opened At the Gates into naval and as he didn't build up much I thought I'd manage ok, however the twins prevented me from offensively using Theon. The next turn saw me flood out some chuds and a recruiter to steal George's claim soak, leaving me ready to march someone. But The Seastone Chair ended up coming down to kill my recruiter and prevented me from thinning the board. After this Balon with Maiden's Bane and Great Kraken was just racking up the unopposed power and renown to win the game.

Round 6

Simon Martindale - Stark Knights of the Hollow Hill - Win

This final round had a really good start for me, opening naval into a Marching Orders with a setup White Tree and Botley Crew, this meant no characters hitting the board round 1. The following turn was another marching orders which put down Eddard Stark and a smaller guy, I stole a Wolves of the North via Queenscrown which let me clear the other character and Mutiny Eddard before he could execute anyone. After this since Simon wasn't playing many locations the choke I applied was really punishing so he never rebuilt a board presence.

Final thoughts

Thanks to all my opponents for making it a fun weekend. Overall, I think the deck as it is now performed about as well as could be expected, none of my losses felt close and if I were to play this kind of idea again it would need some reworking, perhaps the recruit package goes for more location destruction as Greyjoys could recover even after political disaster quite well.