Hello Westeros!
I didn’t have much time last month to do the tournament recap, so here is a short summary of both last month and this month’s ones.
One important new feature we have implemented in our Shanghai tournaments: every three months, players cannot make more than 1 list with the same commander. This means that every player will have a grand total of 6 different commanders every 3 months, which makes for some more original lists and varied games!
Participants therefore have a choice: play different factions or play different commanders in the same faction!
I decided to challenge myself and went with the second option, for an all Greyjoy trimester!
February Tournament
Link for the full list of players, games and lists:
https://asoiaf-stats.com/tournament/b5d22100-a10c-11ed-901b-57620ab9baa4
Victarion being my favorite commander and the one I’m the most used to, I decided to pair him with Erik Ironmaker which I’m less familiar with. Victarion list would obviously be played for Fire & Blood, while I reserved Erik for Dance with Dragons.
First game: Victarion Greyjoy vs Kevan Lannister
Fire & Blood
Well this was a pretty good game for me: all cards coming at the right time thanks to Rodrik, overall good dice, and the full power of the Greyjoy’s healing, thanks to Moqorro and his Ironmakers literally NEVER dying.
The most epic moment came when my Victarion did a surprise charge (thanks Wendamyr as usual) into Kevan’s Crossbowmen unit at the end of round 1. The Lannister Guardsmen went to retaliate on Victarion’s flank, but too late for Kevan. Unfortunately for Victarion, one second charge from the second Guardsmen unit cleaned his tray, but “What is dead may never die” popped up!
Aaaaand I forgot about the Imp of Casterly Rock and his free “Counterplot”…
Dead Kevan, dead Victarion on round 2, that was a bloody start to the encounter!
The rest of the game went more in my favor, with every wound taken basically healed back, and the victory taken with the Mountain dying.
A pretty good start for the Iron Captain, who unfortunately got Tyrioned, but his troops prevailed!
Second game: Erik Ironmaker vs Marseleen
Dance with Dragons
Very different list, with this time Victarion bringing Relentless instead of great cards.
To my surprise, Erik’s commander cards turned out really well, allowing for some decisive rerolls and a great use of pillage tokens.
The MVPs of the match were definitely Victarion and the Ironmakers, who slaughtered their way through Unsullied and Freed Men both, taking victory on the last minute, but Erik in Bowmen was a close second, as a great objective holder hidden behind Euron and Silenced Men (who finally died late game, but managed to protect their commander long enough).
Unsullied are a pain to deal with thanks to their huge number of attacks, but their low defense sort of palliates to this issue, so a pretty fun game once more!
Third game: Victarion Greyjoy vs Tyrion Lannister
Game of Thrones
Remember how my first game was near-perfect, all cards coming at the right time and overall nice rolls? Well this one was the complete opposite!
Rodrik failed me not once, but twice, and let’s just say my dice left something to be desired. Still, I made a few big mistakes, forgetting Moqorro’s “Supply Aid” early on round 2 and probably charging a bit too fast, most importantly with the wrong unit.
As such, the MVP of the match turned out to be the “Bribery” card Brent placed on my Victarion unit, which led me to charge instead with the Nute one, which led to them taking the most brutal Crossbowmen attack I had ever seen (9 wounds!), which led me to charge with unready Ironmakers (thanks “Intrigue & Subterfuge” on Erik), which led me to have wounds everywhere with not enough healing power in my cards to get back.
Surprisingly enough, while all these events were taking place, my Bowmen and Drowned Men kept scoring and ended up only losing by 1 point, but this was enough to push me from first place contender to 5th place!
A sad end for Victarion who met his match once again in the Halfman, who ended up winning the tournament!
March Tournament
Link for the full list of players, games and lists:
https://asoiaf-stats.com/tournament/bfa2d630-b41b-11ed-9229-5be7ec9a01ca
For this tournament I went with a Relentless Spam list and an Outflank heavy one.
My goal was to use the Relentless one for Here we stand, bringing Victarion back to score more points, and the Outflank one for Winds of Winter and probably Honed and Ready.
First game: Baelor Blacktyde vs High Sparrow
Here we stand
My biggest fumble in recent weeks… Even though the end score doesn’t reflect it, I made the most stupid mistake I ever made during that game.
I knew this would be an uphill battle, double Warrior’s Sons being a real challenge, even with the Champion’s Warcry recent nerf. But I was confident in my Relentless Spam plan, after all, scoring was more important than killing in that one, and having Victarion everywhere would give me a pretty solid advantage.
That is, if I actually used Balon when I should.
…
Basically, all goes well, I charge in with Vic quite early, he dies early round 2, perfect! Time for Balon! But wait, I change my mind, my Baelor unit is gonna take more attacks at the moment, time for Moqorro! But wait, I moved my Bowmen too forward, and now they are in immediate danger of dying from both the Mountain and the High Sparrow in Honor Guard! Let’s activate them first to retreat! Aaaaand… crap.
There’s one zone left and 1 NCU each left. His turn to activate. I’m internally praying to the Drowned God. Please make him focus on the field, please make him focus on the field. He does, until he turns his gaze towards the tactics board. And of course he places Varys on the last zone, and my Balon is all sad and unactivated. Salty tears indeed.
So this both allowed him to score one quadrant which I had planned to contest, while at the same time meant the revived unit would appear activated on the next round, provided he didn’t draw “Intrigue and Subterfuge” before that.
Brilliant play!
I got lucky; he did not get “Intrigue and Subterfuge” when drawing cards, nor when taking the Letters zone. Unfortunately, I made a second big mistake which was to claim my first zone with Moqorro and not Wendamyr, which meant Varys could not be contested when going on the field.
These 2 mistakes paved the way for my defeat, although I was satisfied with the end score, I still am quite mad at myself for these big blunders.
Second game: Baelor Blacktyde vs Oberyn Martell
Winds of Winter
The second game was against Martells and the terrifying Oberyn. I say terrifying because his poison is truly an annoying counter to the Greyjoys, who enjoy healing and resuscitating.
His list had quite a lot of movement thanks to the Starfall riders, healing with Harmen and the riders, and offensive power with both Dervishes and Royal Guard. I had originally planned to play my Dagmer outflank list for this game mode, but against the Martells, I felt Relentless Spam would probably have more of an impact, so ended up choosing that list.
The deployment went well for me, as I managed to leave the Skirmishers all alone on one flank, focusing on the rest of the army.
As in the previous game, my Victarion died quite fast after doing a lot of damage to the Royal Guard, and in doing so allowed me to put 2 victory points on the Starfall riders. Luckyily for me, my next attack did not destroy the Royal Guard, which meant that no victory points could be placed on my units. This allowed me to stay very offensive without being afraid of losing men.
The score was very tight until we reached round 4, during which the Martell resistance crumbled. Oberyn prepared for the Balon revival, but a Victarion-led unit of reavers with 1 pillage token is quite hard to face for Dervishes, who did not manage to survive more than 2 attacks. The Starfall riders managed to do more damage, but ultimately perished from a Relentless attack, granting me the victory.
Playing against Martells with Greyjoys was pretty fun, both factions being quite aggressive and mobile, so another fun game!
Third game: Dagmer Cleftjaw vs Eddard Stark
Honed and Ready
Two Stark lists possible: one with 3 wolves, one with 2 bowmen. Since it was an objective-heavy game, I opted for my Dagmer outflank list, which featured 2 Drowned Men units.
And boy was it a good decision!
I fell in love with the Drowned men on that game. Granted, having a unit of Ironmakers with Victarion and a Reaver captain allowed me to mind game my opponent, who chose to focus his troops on 1 corner of the map on round 1, giving me free access to the rest of the map (funnily enough, Lee did that to me on one of our last tournament games, when he brought Zorses with Outflank).
With this leeway, I planted one unit of Drowned men on the central objective, supported by Dagmer and his reavers on one side, while Bowmen and the other Drowned men unit would control the east objectives.
It was time for my Outflank, and Lee having put his troops in a very tight formation, it was not possible for me to come behind his lines. So I opted for simply appearing from the other flank, my big unit offering some protection in case he decided to turn his sight towards my eastern units.
The Drowned Men in the center of the table were certainly the MVPs of the game: they managed to withstand around 5-6 attacks from Tullys, Bowmen and even Ned! Granted, they benefited from some healing, but it was still a very impressive feat for such a small unit! Oh also, one of the worst attacks I have ever seen in tournament, the dice were not in the Starks favor in this game so it definitely helped…
The 3 vps scored by my units end of round 2 were too much of an advance for the Starks to come back, even though they had superiority in numbers at the end of the game.
It ended on a Dagmer victory, and a second place for the Greyjoys!
First place once again went to the Lannisters, a very bloody civil war deciding between the High Sparrow and Addam Marbrand, the former taking the crown!
I really enjoy the “6 Commanders Challenge”, as it forces players to push themselves and make more original lists, playing less used commanders and trying different units in the faction. I am quite satisfied that I managed to fully commit by at least playing each list once, which makes it an even more challenging event.
Next tournament, I am curious about trying the new Asha, or maybe give Euron another go, as I usually end up shooting myself with him, it could be fun to try once more.
On a side-note, planning to finally get the Greyjoy badge on Stats by playing a Roose Bolton-led list this coming Sunday, the last “Greyjoy” commander I’m missing…
The skill level is escalating, which is really great to see, with the Shanghai group constantly improving. And as usual, a big thank you to every players and SoGoFun for the prizes!
Spoiler alert: mine is Lysene Sellswords. It’s pillage time again!
Grob’
Chez Grob 