Targ Lion, Bristol Regional, 9th/41players with Tourney Repo 2.0

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I’ve never written a tournament report, however my partner convinced me that I should give it a go, and that you guys might be able to pinpoint where I can improve.

I haven’t been playing card games very long; AGoT is actually my first LCG. I’m normally a Stark player, however as it was my first ever regional I decided to play a deck that I felt was a little more competitive and flexible. So I jumped on the bandwagon and played Targ Lion.

Character Choice Although Mirri Maz Duur has proved a complete pain in the bottom in most of the games I’ve played against her, I decided not to include her in my deck. I’m still getting used to the new cards and didn’t want to be worried about focusing on pulling off her attacks each turn; especially when I really wanted to be focusing on getting renown characters out to grab power more quickly. So instead of the Mirri kill, I decided to include Ser Gregor Clegane, Drogo, and Jamie for the increased kill, but still gaining power for doing so with renown. Jorah was also included to help gather a little renown (which actually won me my third game).

I also realised that I would most likely be facing Mirri during the tournament, and that I would need some way of combating that. I’ve always liked playing Dany and her dragons, so I decided that I would also put her in the deck with 3 Dracarys, to help me kill off the 5-strength annoying characters. Dany with Drogon also means that Dany can help gather renown, and her insight helps with the card draw problem that Targ so often have.

Plots Due to the multitude of high-cost characters in my deck, I knew I’d need some high-economy plots. I therefore included Trading with Pentoshi, Calling the Banners, and Supporting the Faith to help get enough gold for those high cost characters. I wasn’t too worried about losing left-over gold after playing Supporting the Faith, because I was playing 3 Tyrion, and knew that I could always get gold by initiating an intrigue challenge (so I could play dracarys/ptts). I also reasoned that, other than Lanni decks, it would be difficult for other factions to gain gold for events during the challenges phase. I also put Rebuilding into my plot list, to give me a chance of shuffling Crown of Gold, PTTS, Milk, Dracarys, or Treachery back into the deck. Rebuilding is also nice as it gives me 5 gold and has a reasonable amount of initiative. My other plots included Summons, for obvious reasons; Counting Coppers to help with the card draw problem, and lastly Blood of the Dragon. My main reasons for putting this plot in were to help with using Dracarys on those higher-strength characters and for killing Viserys and allowing myself to remove unwanted attachments.

Round 1: Win Opponent: Tristan. Deck: Night’s Watch fealty

Tristan set up Old Bear Mormont, Maester Aemon, and a couple of others for the first round. I had Tyrion with a couple of other characters, and a Tears of Lys in hand during our first round. On my turn I did an intrigue with Tyrion, and stealthed past Tristan’s only other intrigue icon. I was quite surprised that Tristan knelt Maester Aemon so that the challenge wouldn’t be unopposed, as he hadn’t found the Wall so unopposed challenges weren’t an issue yet. I played my Tears on Mormont, and as Aemon was knelt already he couldn’t save him. I also then did a military and was able to kill off a chud in the same turn. In the next turn I was able to intrigue the Wall out of his hand, which he’d only just picked up and had been unable to play out. Tristan really struggled without the Wall out and with Mormont dead, and I was able to kill off his bigger characters quickly enough to stop him from setting up a big board. He managed to get the Wall out near the end of the game, but I’d already managed to get far enough ahead on power, and took the win.

Round 2: Win Opponent: Nick H. Deck: Mirror Match! Targ Lion

I was a bit nervous playing this game, as we were recorded on the top table. However, that also means I can give a full commentary on this game, as I’ve managed to watch it back and remind myself of what was played and why I did certain things during the game. So if you’re interested in watching the game itself, you can find it on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dn9CEK3o9A

I set up Unsullied, Jorah Mormont, a ChudMuffin™, and a Kingsroad to Nick’s Hound, Jorah, chud, and wildling scout. I needed gold, as I had a couple of big characters in hand that I wanted to get out, so I played Trading with the Pentoshi- as did Nick! All the gold! Result :D

I chose to go second as I had a Crown of Gold in hand, and wanted to see what he set up for me to Crown. To my horror, he played “Mirri Mirri”- who, at 5 strength, was just out of range of my Crown of Gold. He also played a Tyrion. Now, this is the point in the game where I made my biggest decision. I had completely forgotten that the Hound could participate with Mirri, but that his reaction with him going back to hand would mean that she was technically participating alone. I decided to Crown Mirri, with the intention of playing Blood of the Dragon next turn to kill her outright. I then Milked Tyrion, to help stop Nick from being able to afford the Hound bouncing in and out of hand. Some people may have done it the other way around, but I had completely forgotten about the Hound reaction. I also played out a Tyrion to fund my own events.

As I was therefore confident he would be safe, I played out my Drogo.

Bad idea.

So of course, he uses the scout to give Mirri stealth, puts 1 strength Mirri and the Hound into a power challenge, and stealths Drogo. I knelt Unsullied and Tyrion to block, however, a Widow’s Wail comes storming into play, very annoyingly boosting Mirri to 3 strength, and winning him the challenge.

Bugger.

Not only was Drogo now dead, but she was out of reach of my Blood of the Dragon plan for next round. Grr.

I still managed to grab 4 power from a successful power challenge and an unopposed intrigue challenge (discarding the Hound! Woo!), so finished the first round 4-1.

I had Ser Gregor in hand from the draw in the previous round, so I played Calling the Banners to help play him. With the threat of Mirri on the board, I at least wanted some way of almost certainly defending military challenges to avoid losing 2 characters a round, plus I also played out a Plaza of Punishment to set up for an attack on the now-3-strength Mirri.

In his marshalling, Nick played Viserys; again trampling all over my ideas- Blood of the Dragon would mean that Viserys would die and discard the Crown of Gold. It also meant that, surprisingly, I didn’t want to do any military attacks. In this turn, he also set up a Jaime.

I managed to block Mirri’s attack this turn, and also blocked Jaime’s military attack with Ser Gregor, and at the end of the round I was winning 6-2. Nick played confiscation and, unsurprisingly, discarded the Crown. I summoned, hoping to find a dragon to use with the two Dracarys I had in hand- but only found chuds and another Ser Gregor. I took the dupe- at least Mirri couldn’t kill him outright then!

Nick won a challenge with Mirri, and I’d luckily picked up a Treachery, which I of course used to stop her reaction. He then attacked with 9 strength (which seemed rather suspicious!), so I defended with Ser Gregor, triggered his pillage, and got a Syrio! Of course, Nick’s Tyrion was quickly chosen as part of Ser Gregor’s reaction, and I happily waved Tyrion off the board. On my turn I did an intrigue, and discarded a PTTS from his hand- definitely glad I opposed that military! I finished the 3rd round on 11-3.

In the final round I played Rebuilding to his Noble Cause. I chose to go first and managed to marshal a dragon, as did Nick- so for the first time in the game, the Dracarys threat was real. During my turn I got an unopposed intrigue with Jorah, and then did a military with Ser Gregor, which I won. I took the renown, meaning I was only 1 short of the win, and then used pillage.

The misplay At this point in the game there was a misplay. As a one cost chud was pillaged, I chose his Viserys to be also killed as part of Ser Gregores reaction. The only attachment on the board was Nick’s widow’s wail. My understanding of Viserys’ reaction was that as it is an interrupt, not a forced reaction, you could choose for it not to be triggered. However Nick said that the interrupt wasn’t an option, and proceeded to remove his own widow’s wail from Mirri. As I’m not the most self-confident in these matters, and Nick seemed pretty sure, I just assumed I’d misunderstood and he removed widow’s wail. Later Richard told me I was right, and the widow’s wail didn’t need to be removed. Although I know the rules quite well (as Richard is a bit of a rules freak) I’m not confident enough to contradict what someone says in a game - looks like I’ll need to be a bit more assertive!

The win The widow’s wail wouldn’t have affected the game in the end though, as I then proceeded to do a power with Tyrion, Unsullied, and a chud, stealthing the Hound (who had reappeared), and with a Dracarys ready to fry anyone who defended. I won the challenge, and the game.

Round 3: Win Opponent: Kevin Deck: Martell Watch

I’ve known Kevin for a little while now since we met at a tournament in Portsmouth, so it was nice being able to chat with someone I knew and feel a bit more relaxed during the game. However, I’m extremely unfamiliar with both Martell and Night’s Watch cards, so I was a bit concerned about what horrible events he might have in store!

My set up was quite nice, with Jorah, Viserys, Unsullied, and Drogo with his Arakh all being out by the first turn. Unfortunately I don’t remember many details about this game; however he did use Vipers Eyes to look at my hand and discard the Ser Gregor I’d been preparing to play out next turn.

I really struggled for economy this game and somehow managed to not find a single limited location in the whole game. Luckily, I did manage to have Daenerys and a dragon out during the game for the Dracarys threat. I only managed to pull off Dany’s insight and restand once though in the entire game, which was disappointing.

Kevin played Dawn, which was making his character steadily stronger (sorry- can’t remember which character!), so I played Blood of the Dragon to kill my Viserys and discard it.

During the last turn I did military with unkneeling Drogo for renown, and then a power with Drogo to get 2 more.

I only needed one more power, however I think Kevin hadn’t realised this, as my power was pretty spread out over different characters. I went in with a 2nd military using Jorah and a couple of others, but I’d forgotten that the Wall was giving his rangers extra strength. I realised after declaring that Kevin could have won the challenge; however, not realising I only needed the one power to win, Kevin only knelt one character in defence.

Jorah took his renown, and I won the game.

Round 4: Mod Loss Opponent: Ryan K Deck: Baratheon Fealty

Ryan was really nice and we had a good random chat about Psychology and mind reading before the game; it was only later that I found out he is reasonably a well-known player and has done well in lots of tournaments with his Baratheon deck. Quite glad I didn’t know before the game- I always struggle to stop my emotions over-running me (if you don’t believe me, check out my hands shaking in the video of my second game!), and when I know someone is a particularly good player, I can easily get into a negative mind set before the game even begins!

I started with 2 treachery in hand, which I was very grateful for- coming against the kneel package was something I had hoped wouldn’t happen today, but I’d tried to prepare for it by putting a couple of milks and treachery’s into my deck. Ryan managed to get the whole dominance set up with Iron Throne, Chamber of the Painted Table, the new Tobho Mott Armory location, and the Red Keep really quickly into the game, making it very difficult for me to gather power.

Ryan also managed to get Mel, Bob, and Stannis out.

Unfortunately, there’s not a lot my deck can do against the Stannis lock. Daenerys was out with her dragons, but spent almost the entire game knelt. I didn’t have Jaime and Drogo on the board all game. I managed to treachery Mel’s reaction twice, but it didn’t really help as Stannis and Bob meant that most people were getting knelt out every round.

At one point, I managed to Milk Stannis. For one blissful standing phase, all my characters stood proud and tall … until he played confiscation as his next plot and everyone started kneeling again.

During one round, I had just picked up a Drogo but had been unable to afford it, and Ryan played Seen in Flames. He looked at my hand, containing 2 Dracarys, 1 PTTS, and a Drogo, and discarded the Drogo. Boo!

However, when I did a military challenge, he seemed to forget my hand; letting me win by 5. I was extremely suspicious now- was there some crazy event that would let him throw my PTTS back at me that I hadn’t heard of?! Nope. He’d just forgotten. My luck was (kind of) in!

Then I had a decision to make.

I decided to put Bob to the sword. He had 2 renown power on him, plus Lightbringer to let him re-stand. I’m still unsure as to whether it might have been better to use it on Stannis to get out of the kneel lock; but as Ryan was steadily getting closer to winning, I thought losing the renown power would at least slow him down a bit.

It managed to slow him down enough at least- the game went to time with Ryan leading at (I think) 9 power to 3, so I took a mod loss for this game.

Round 5: Loss Opponent: Richard W Deck: Greyjoy Fealty

So, at the end of round 4, I’d won 3, mod lost 1. I would be paired with another person who was 3-1, and basically whoever won the game would go through to the top 8, whoever lost would just miss out.

So when they announced the pairings, and they called mine and Richard’s name, there was a massive groan from the room- it was the end of the day, and most of the 41 players had twigged we were a couple by that point (we’d met about 15 of the people there already in other tournaments).

Seeing as I’d never beaten Richard in a tournament setting, I wasn’t particularly optimistic for the game, however I was determined to do my best and try and get into the top 8 (if I won the game, I would have actually been launched into 3rd place!)

It wasn’t to be.

Richard set up a duped Balon, a ChudMuffin™, and a Kingsroad. I set up with a Rhaegal, Unsullied, and a Kingsroad. I played Pentoshi, and Richard played Heads on Spikes. Considering I was sitting there with Daenerys, duped Drogo, and the Mountain, I was only ever-so-slightly concerned… however he somehow managed to miss all of these and hit my Jorah instead.

Phew!

Extremely annoyingly, Richard set up 2 shipwrights, which, on my marshalling turn when I played another Kingsroad, he knelt both of to stop me using them.

I think this is probably what won him the game. On that round, with the Kingsroads and Pentoshi, I would have been able to play out 2 of my 3 big characters. However, because I couldn’t use the Kingsroads in conjunction with plot gold, I was unable to get 2 out. As I didn’t see any other economy the whole game, losing that 2-character drop really threw off the Maths for the rest of the game, and I was unable to play the Mountain at all. In the first round, I decided to go for Daenerys and Viserion.

Richard had many high-initiative plots and managed to go first each turn. This meant that, although I managed to get Drogo out, I was unable to get in my 2 military challenges as I was having to defend a lot. He also had Euron out, who kept stealing my Kingsroads; allowing Richard to play out lots of big characters. On either the second or third turn, I managed to Dracarys Asha (that was a happy moment!).

When Richard went in for the win, he tried psyching me out (as he is often prone to do; he knows I’m terrible at lying!) by asking me straight if I had Dracarys (which I did). I have no idea how, but somehow I managed to keep a straight face. This is where me and Richard differ a lot in play style. If it’s for the win, he will often just go for it and hope for the best. I’m the opposite. I over-think what my opponent may or may not have in hand, and play it very carefully so I’m sure I can win.

Normally, me being overly-careful is my downfall. However, Richard barging in guns blazing for a final challenge with Balon and Euron was delightful- I burnt that horrible little Balon to a crisp with Dracarys (and Daenerys standing), thereby making him lose 2 power in the process. He still won the challenge though, and was dangerously close to winning.

Unfortunately, I had no more high-initiative plots left. Richard played Clash of Kings, won initiative and went first, at a point where I was on 14 to his 12. He managed to win his power challenge with Euron participating, launching him to the full 15, and kicking me out of top 8 position.

Suffice to say, there were a lot of jokes about him walking home that night and sleeping on the couch!

I’d love to hear any feedback you guys might have on my deck or my play, so please feel free to comment