Dogpile 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

Doubling down on direwolves again with the Stark big box. Should be fun? Gotta win the high-claim challenges the deck is built around, though. Stealth on Wolves of the North and Arya Stark helps. Nymeria and Winterfell Kennel Master are strong together and can give me intimidate twice in the same round. I can intimidate in / challenges and then win the challenge after the opponent's is knelt. Grey Wind gives me more intimidate and can often insta-kill the victim of Wolves of the North's ability, and can be pulled into non- challenges if needed with WKM/Wardens of the North.

Ghost would be fantastic in this deck, but it's hard to imagine 9 other cards I would make room for, especially at the cost of Fealty.

When AtSK comes out, I will use King Robb Stark instead of core Robb for more add/remove character synergy.

General gameplay notes:

• There's quite a bit of stealth and intimidate in here, so going first is usually important. More than once I would really have liked the ~guaranteed initiative win from Sneak Attack, but it has negative synergy with the challenge math stuff. Initiative is why I don't use The Long Winter.
• A Storm of Swords really leverages the challenge math/intimidate cards. Well worth the lack of Winter synergy with Winterfell. In fact generally it's no problem for me to play around my own non-Winter plot with Winterfell.
• The Winds of Winter is risky to use against and Vengeance for Elia.
• Winterfell is amazing against Greyjoy (disables Throwing Axe, Raiding Longship, The Seastone Chair, Asha Greyjoy's stand, nasty events, etc.). Also very good against Mirri Maz Duur. I felt like it was less amazing against Lannister, but still great. And the +1 to everyone is excellent for this board-spammy deck.
• Winterfell Castle combo with Winterfell and a bunch of low-cost characters seems strong, but hard to find room for.
• Against Greyjoy, For the North! would be nice to enable more characters to help vs. Balon Greyjoy.
• I'm short of cheap (1 or 2 gold) military icons. Rickon and Shaggydog help some, but it makes me want a Direwolf Pup. Honestly...if Pup isn't good in this deck, it's never going to be good. Which may be the case I guess.
• The Wolfswood has yet to do anything great for me, but hope springs eternal.
• The first few times I tried this deck Wolves of the North didn't do anything. But since then it's been great. Even if you don't have a ton of wolves out, just -1 or -2 STR for the phase on the right victim can be a big deal.
• Syrio Forel is fantastic with old Catelyn Stark. Failing that, pairing him with new Sansa Stark (especially with Septa Mordane) is good too.

2016-07-20 Dragon's Lair tournament notes:

My first store tournament ever. I went 2-1 in Swiss but left before the elimination rounds. It was a very casual tournament, nice gentle introduction for several of us who hadn't done it before.

1. vs. Alex, mirror match. My first setup would have been something like Syrio and Bran and that's it, so I mulligan'd into, IIRC, an un-duped Arya with Ice and a WKM. I gambled on some way to get Arya into a challenge, didn't get it in round 1, and Alex confiscated Ice in round 2. I sort of stuck around for another round or two until First Snow followed by a PttS wiped me out and I resigned. I think Alex ended up 3-0 in Swiss so I don't feel too bad for losing my first tournament match to him. The fact that he has at least one Direwolf Pup was interesting to me, I may try harder to get one in here.
2. vs. Sean, /Fealty. I mulligan'd into a pretty good setup, and kept winning initiative and making him go first, where he would evaluate his options and generally make no challenges at all. That was a little odd before he got the Wall out (I suspect he's really used to having the Wall to defend) but it started sort-of working for him once he did get it out. However I managed to push through unopposed challenges in most rounds, generally with stealth on Old Bear Mormont, and started killing off his characters with the help of Winterfell to stop Maester Aemon. After several rounds of this he concluded I was gaining power faster than him, and resigned.
3. vs. Payton, /. I had a very mediocre setup and he got Mirri out early so I was very nervous, but I held her off with Winterfell and started using Wolves of the North to knock her strength down to where she wasn't a problem. I also surprised him with Nymeria and managed to kneel an important character pretty much every turn. Winning initiative was critical in this match and I got a bit lucky. I drew two Wolf Dreams and didn't need A Time For Wolves so avoided that low init, and he did me the favor of playing Snowed Under on another turn when I had a low init card and won the tiebreaker. After I survived a Wildfire Assault thanks to meeting it with a Marched to the Wall and using Septa Mordane to save an attachment-happy Arya, he resigned.