Suns and Walls

Card draw simulator
Odds: 0% – 0% – 0% more
Derived from
How to Watch the Sun Rise 2 2 0 2.0
Inspiration for
False banner of the sun 0 0 0 1.0
Suns and Walls 13 9 13 4.0

Joe From Cincinnati 1672

This is a deck that I’ve been working on for some time.

I really liked the idea behind defending the Wall and using Ghaston Grey to slow down heavy renown characters or other extremely problematic characters.

But it wasn’t enough to make me want to play the deck competitively. I’ve always felt that, in order for a Wall deck to succeed, the other faction you play with must have some other kind of power gain capability. Stark and Sansa, Baratheon and the Chamber of the Painted Table, Tyrell and Renown etc. Martell paired with Night’s Watch just felt too slow and could be overrun.

In the last chapter pack, the King’s Peace, the Boneway was released to help that problem. I was a little hesitant because everybody in the community panned the card. Some called it useless, some said it was janky and easy to counter, some even called it worse than Brandon’s Gift! I was wondering “Am I crazy for thinking this works perfectly with Ghaston Grey and the Wall? Is that too many locations, and I’m just stupid?”

Then my buddy @Drakk won a store championship with the deck. He went undefeated and told me how dominating it was. That was enough of a reason for me to physically build the deck (which had, until that point, been sitting quietly in my decks section on Thronesdb.com) and take it to my local game night last week.

And Damn.

During this week and the last week, the deck went 6-2. Among those 6 wins were 2 Targaryen decks, a Lannister deck, a Martell Lion deck, and a Greyjoy deck. And most of the wins were in pretty dominant fashion. The two losses were against a Greyjoy and a Targaryen deck. The Greyjoy deck that I lost to was running 3 Raiding Longships and got 2 out. At that time, I only had 3 attachments in the deck (1 dawn and 2 noble lineages). I have since doubled the number of attachments to help with that match up, and I beat a Greyjoy deck this past week.

The Targaryen loss was a drawn out game where I didn’t see the Boneway for a long time and was delaying Drogo with Ghaston Grey and collecting power with the Wall (despite having to contend with 4 challenges per turn). Neither of us were running Wildfire, so I was unable to win any challenges, as he built up a 10-15 character board. If I had seen the Boneway one turn earlier, I would have won. The game went, I believe, 9 plots before he finally won 14-15.

The basic concept of the deck is pretty simple. The Wall makes your opponent want to push all their challenges through. The Boneway makes them not want you to lose so many challenges. Feast for Crows and the Iron Throne make winning dominance a priority for all the passive power gain a deck can stomach. Ghaston Grey punishes their big guys for winning challenges and Nymeria/Maester Cal/Confinement gives you a bit of control over what challenges they are allowed to run.

I am sad that I couldn’t fit Attainted into the deck, but I just had too many locations to fit in.

Try it out and let me know what you think! :D

7 comments

persiatic 1

I've been running a similar version of this, and while it's a pretty effective and fun deck to play it struggles hard if it falls behind. That is especially true vs Targ, they have usually very good setups and they will control the board hard

I'm just not sure how to beat Targ with this deck, it falls behind and can't catch up. Have you also had problems with Targ?

Joe From Cincinnati 1672

@persiaticI've only played 8 games, but it's 2-1 versus Targ fealty/Lion. I haven't really fallen behind with the deck yet. I basically have the Wall or Boneway out by the end of turn 1 most games, so I'm always accruing power. If I were to not get either in my initial draw and couldn't get either in my Building Orders turn, I imagine it may be a problem, but so far, with the 8 games, I haven't lost in a major way. Both games were very close and the deck felt competitive the entire time.

Maybe as I get more experience, I'll fall behind and realize how bad the deck is at recovering haha. It just hasn't happened yet.

I do have a ton of experience with Wall decks though, so maybe I'm just used to playing this style of deck. I'm not sure which is the case.

persiatic 1

@Joe From Cincinnati All the times I played against Targ I felt as I don't afford the tempo loss of playing the Wall early (boneway might be better) If they get to develop the board and especially when Dany hits the board it's really hard. Even though they never make any challenges with Dany due to ghaston or icon removal her constant -1 is really hard to handle. I even played with 3 milk but they have pretty easy ways of removing attachments.

Hopefully you find a good strategy :)

Joe From Cincinnati 1672

@persiaticyea, her -1 does hurt with chump blocking, but I didn't have too much trouble with her in the 2 games I won against Targ.

As for the tempo hit of the Wall, it's a necessary evil. There isn't a single game I'm happy to spend 4 gold on the Wall, but it's my win condition, so if I have to have a down turn to get my board set up for the next 3 turns, I do it. Targ is generally a bad match up for Wall decks though. So I definitely see where you're coming from :).

persiatic 1

@Joe From Cincinnati from your experience with Wall decks would you say this Martell build or Bara/NW is the more effective build now that you got some games in with this?

blueeyedbanditt 1

Like this a lot, will try it out - why Ranging Party over Palace Spearman?

Joe From Cincinnati 1672

@persiatic Unfortunately I cannot comment on Bara/NW as I have never played it. I kind of took a moral stance against Baratheon as main house early on in the game. I will say though, it seems strong and with Gendry could be getting stronger. It would be a tough call between the two. You're comparing the soft control of Mel to Ghaston Grey and the power gain of Chamber to Boneway. I think Bara/NW may edge it slightly, but not by much.

@blueeyedbandittI like Ranging party because it gets buffed by the Wall, which I always want out, because it's cost is lower than its strength and because it pairs with Benjen to prevent a ton of stealth getting through.

Plus, I don't really have the initiative to consistently go 2nd, so Palace Spearman would be a 4 for 4 bicon that is not affected by the Wall on any turn that I can't win initiative.

I think there may be room for 1 or 2 of them, but I"m not sure where.