Siege Of Meereen Champion (8-1) Builders! 1.0

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• 1.0

With the Siege of Meereen recently concluding the South East Asian (SEA) and Oceanic circuit this year, I would first like to thank everyone who helped made this possible! From Australia and their Kingsmoot, Malaysia and the Treachery in Qarth, Singapore and the Sack of Astapor and Philippines with the Liberation of Yunkai. This second year of Thrones for this region has been a humble experience. I would also like to thank our one and only Hand of the King, Chewy Quah and everyone else who planned, sponsored and hosted each event!

I was notoriously known to be a Baratheon Loyalist in the SEA meta, and when i registered a Night's Watch deck this tournament all i heard was "WHY!?" And the reasoning is simple...

1) King Stannis was the only person in the 7 kingdoms who went to the wall and aided the Night's Watch when no one else cared. And a wise man once said: “I was trying to win the throne to save the kingdom, when I should have been trying to save the kingdom to win the throne.”

2) I loved core-set only Baratheon and it's heavy control style of decks, which also led me to build my beloved Veni-Sun deck (Bara-Sun). However these decks aren't as they used to be and i've been lost, wondering around finding a new deck to sate my hunger for control and defense.

And thus i stumbled across the builders deck on thronesdb and immediately fell in love with it:

https://thronesdb.com/decklist/view/9218/nw-kos-builders-9-0-northampton-regional-1.0

As the list was pre "Oberyn's Revenge", some changes had to be made for the meta shift of Flea Bottom and The Iron Bank Will Have Its Due.

As such, Veteran Builder and Flea Bottom was added into the deck. Although Flea Bottom is quite niche in this deck as it's main combo piece is Veteran Builder, Flea Bottom helps with Varys recovery or a Close Call scenario as well. But most importantly, Veteran Builder is amazing with Flea Bottom and a x1 for each is more than enough for this deck.

I was able to trigger The Shadow Tower twice in one game, the craziest was being able to sacrifice Veteran Builder, trigger Flea Bottom, sacrifice Veteran Builder again, all on an Abandoned Stronghold (having x3 Abandoned Stronghold in play), i was able to boost my Sworn Brother to 52 strength (10 builders and wall in play)... 52 freakin strength!

There are some scenarios where your opponent forces a challenge through to knock the The Haunted Forest down so that they can push a challenge which i have no icons available. No problem, Flea Bottom Veteran Builder back, stand The Haunted Forest, all is good again. Or simply stand The Wall, life is great with Veteran Builder and Flea Bottom.

I also dropped the following cards as a meta call,

x1 The Watch Has Need > x1 Nightmares

x1 Milk of the Poppy > x1 The Hand's Judgment

x1 The Haunted Forest > x1 The Hand's Judgment

x3 Nightmares and x2 The Hand's Judgment was due to the heavy amount of expected Greyjoys and Flea Bottom. Milk of the Poppy also lost some of it's value due to The Iron Bank Will Have Its Due and i often find myself having x3 The Haunted Forest overkill, especially now with the Flea Bottom Veteran Builder combo.

The general idea of how the deck works is exactly the same as the original Builders list and all credit goes to them. But some pointers to take note while playing this deck:

• Do not be trigger happy. Brandon's Gift is amazing and the gold curve allows you to play out your entire hand in a single turn. It's the greatest strength of the deck is also it's downfall. Being trigger happy and flooding out all your characters or locations is just begging your opponent to Valar Morghulis, Varys or Political Disaster. Always keep your hand at the maximum of your reserve as possible and don't play anything that you don't need at the very moment.

• Although being 1 additional gold and not being able to benefit from Brandon's Gift, ambushing Practice Blade can be very crucial (if you have the gold)

• Always try have as many builders standing for the dominance phase action window for Castle Black Mason. If you are able to trigger him twice per round, awesome! Don't forget to Isle of Ravens first before hitting him if there are stuff like Craven or Milk of the Poppy in the discard pile.

The deck really suffers against's Bara-Dom decks and the Hyper Viper. Bara-Dom is almost a 100% lose rate no matter how I play it unless luck shits on them and they never get the table and chair. And Hyper Viper requires me to have all 3 Nightmares or I immediately lose as well.

Tournament Report:

8 - 1, 3rd in Swiss (The one loss was due to time being called)

Game 1: Martell Crossing (Jimmy Jenkins/Thailand) [W]

• Met Jimmy in Malaysia last year for Treachery in Qarth, cool guy! I don't think he faced a builders deck before and did not know how to maneuver around it. Managed to get a full lock down as his crossing agenda was hurting him more due to The Shadow Tower and For the Watch!

Game 2: Stark Kraken (GeGe/Thailand) [L]

• Relatively new player and very new to builders as well. Was really fun playing with her as she was easily excited and animated. However, due to her lack of familiarity to the builders deck, the game was really slow. When time was called at 55mins, we only finished 4 plots, me losing 7 power to 8. With a bit more time i believe i would be able to seal the game as well.

Game 3: Martell Watch (Matt Wisbey/Hong Kong) [W]

• Has to be the funniest guy i played this whole tournament. It was a wall vs wall match up but unfortunately for him, i had x3 nightmares throughout the game for him. He did however make a really impressive play of using Ghost (Core) to disable 1 defender, sacrificing Wildling Scout, Flea Bottom it back and sacrificing it again to give 2 Ranging Party stealth, leaving me to defend a 25 str power challenge with 2 sworn brothers. It wasn't enough to win the game, but heck it sure did pack a punch. I currently owe him 3 beers, 1 for making him go through this stupid deck, 1 for winning that power challenge, and 1 for me winning without doing a single challenge against him. Matt, if you're reading this, till we meet again!

Game 4: Tyrell KOS (Elyssa/Singapore) [W]

• Fellow Singaporean and member of the Silent Sisters, Tyrell has never been much of a threat for this deck as most of their big guys tend to simply shut down with cravens or milks. By both being KOS, the reserve was +2 which was awesome for me. She did however pack Political Disaster but fortunately for me, I telegraphed it and searched for dupes and kept several locations in hand to flood the board once it hit.

Game 5: Martell Fealty (Emil/Malaysia) [W]

• Had a great time playing with Emil! We actually spent 2 days in Bangkok before the tournament and it was a really enjoyable time (much laughs and banter) He too played Political Disaster which i had a feeling he did, so i decided to search and dupe my locations before hand, which he then flipped Battle of the Blackwater, i totally derped out and ignored his plot as i thought it only affected characters, boy was 1 wrong. I did not realise it affected locations as well. This was followed by a Political Disaster the following turn. I still managed to recover, but that play did affect my board state quite a bit.

Game 6: Stark Fealty (CK/Singapore) [W]

• I have to face this guy every bloody tournament, and especially in the final round of Swiss. The game against CK was simple. rush before he rush me. Yes, as a builder, i had to rush, because i know he can totally zerg me down. But i had an advantage going against CK. I know he does not play Valar Morghulis nor Varys nor Political Disaster. So i pretty much spilled my whole hand out on plot 1, kept drawing as much as i could and played every card i could get my hands onto. Ck didnt manage to draw Catelyn Stark (Core) nor Winterfell Castle and the game closed on plot 5/6.

Top 8: Martell Rose (Joscar/Philippines) [W]

• This match up literally gave me nightmares the night before. I genuinely could not sleep as i was thinking of all the possibilities to beat the Hyper Viper as a Builder deck. I have never faced a Hyper Viper deck before (don't play much Ironthrone nor do many play it in SG). So the game plan was forged. No mil or power challenges so that he can't use His Viper Eyes. Get Wall ASAP to get the clock ticking against him, draw as much as possible and find Nightmares and The Hand's Judgment. There was no need to be worried about getting characters to defend the wall nor locations to help achieve the same thing. Every time i was over reserve, i dropped everything but my cravens milks nightsmares, everything else had to go. Fortunately for me, the strength of the Hyper Viper is drawing cards for both players, Joscar played a total of x6 The Dragon's Tail which gave me x3 Nightmares and x1 The Hand's Judgment. He proceeded with a x2 You Murdered Her Children punch with The Red Viper (Core) attached with Seal of the Hand. He had 3 gold remaining, i had 4. My 1st Nightmares, his 1st The Hand's Judgment, my The Hand's Judgment, his 2nd The Hand's Judgment. My 2nd Nightmares, his 3rd The Hand's Judgment. My 3rd Nightmares, Concede.

Top 4: Tyrell Rains (Chun Yong/Singapore) [W]

• Chun Yong is the defending Champion for Siege of Meereen 2016. He brought a Giant Tyrell Rains deck, decked out with Taxation. HIs goal, to flood the board with really big characters. However, i have Duel which helped kill The Queen of Thorns (Core) and managed to draw all x3 Craven and x2 Milk of the Poppy. He managed to discard my Isle of Ravens for intrigue claim was concerned me quite a bit as that was my main was of recurring my cravens and milks back. He ended up having to Valar Morghulis himself on plot 7, and I managed to kill his Margaery Tyrell (AMAF) with my Grizzled Miner attached with a Practice Blade.

Finals: Greyjoy Rains (Kenn/Malaysia) [W]

• And finally the finals. This game took a whopping 1 hour 45mins (2 hr time limit). It was the most intense game this trip. Truly worthy of being a finals match. It's too damn long to type it out here, but our reliable Chewy Quah actually typed out our entire game live on his iPad. You can read the full report here on facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10159474694390171&set=gm.1636576929688472&type=3&theater&ifg=1

It was an awesome and truly epic game and Kenn put up a really great fight! Mad respect for hanging all the way!

With that i conclude my report.

Till next year!