Dagmer the Thrice Risen (Top 8 UK Nats) 1.0

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• 1.0

I didn't particularly want to post my list up. This is not the strongest deck you will find on thronesdb. However, it does feature 3x Dagmer Cleftjaw which I think you will agree is brilliant, terrible and hilarious. Consequently, I have some stories of Cleftjaw's Excellent Adventures.

The Deck

I heard some tales from a far away land about a man who played 3x Dagmer in a tournament and won it. I decided I would like to play 3x Dagmer. So I put 3x Dagmer in.

I also heard that renown was good so I put all the renown dudes Balon Greyjoy (CtA), Victarion Greyjoy, and Euron Crow's Eye in 3x too.

I'm a man that really enjoys a consistent deck, so plenty of 3x characters for reliability sounded good to me. I thought I'd throw in 3x Esgred for super stealth, and 3x Theon Greyjoy (TFoA) for some cheeky potential unopposed.

I had an idea that I wanted to play The First Snow of Winter and 2x Counting Coppers, so I thought I'd treble up on Wex Pyke and Lordsport Shipwright (who are still damn useful on a FSoW turn!). It was probably best that I chuck in some more dudes who would survive The First Snow of Winter so in went 2x Silence's Crew and a The Reader.

I started to worry that some of my dudes might die to Valar Morghulis and I would have some dead draws. So I put in 3x Aeron Damphair (Core) and 2x The Iron Throne for some cheeky resurrection/attachment control for my dudes.

With this all in mind, the locations and events selected themselves. 3x Risen from the Sea and Iron Mines for saves, some boats to help Dagmer Cleftjaw or Victarion Greyjoy or whatever. A Great Kraken too just because I have a soft spot for it. The Hand's Judgment went in because cancelled Risen from the Sea is a pain in the arse, and in practice, "Lord Renly's Ride" and Growing Strong played by the enemy always made me angry. So Handy J's went in. We Do Not Sow happens to be quite good early game against Arbor and Wall decks so that went in too.

Plots are all fairly low gold aside from A Noble Cause. Certainly not high enough to consistently play any of the 9x 7 cost cards and other stuff. So I put more limited in, upping it to 11 limited locations. I'm fed up of hearing people whine and complain about "I didn't see my economy" and I didn't want to be that guy, so I just put more in and hoped to draw them with a shitload of other options with my 2x Counting Coppers. Turns out it worked quite well.

How I Played The Deck

This is the easiest bit. I play A Noble Cause turn 1 usually, or Counting Coppers if my hand isn't great or I suspect Summer Harvest from the opponent. Turns 2 and 3 usually involved Counting Coppers, after which I have ALL THE ECONOMY and marshal big dudes without even using gold. Then I just wipe the board a bit and save my dudes, whilst defending power challenges and attacking power challenges and doing renown and location taking things. It seemed like Dagmer Cleftjaw would be better on small boards, and The First Snow of Winter and Valar Morghulis always puts a little pressure on the opponent.

UK NATIONALS

I was quite excited for turning up to my second UK Nationals. Unfortunately, the first one I thought it would be great fun to turn up with my Direwolf deck, starting well by Like Warm Raining a Fat Cat, but losing to stupid Lady and Sansa Stark (Core) shenanigans. Getting smashed by eventual winner Ryan Wood en route to going 3-3 was sad times.

On arriving in Liverpool for Nationals, my vision goes all sparkly and I end up with a migraine before round 1, which means all the pre-match relaxation is shelved in favour of a desperate search for drugs, and lots of them. Luckily, Calvin Green is a top bro and provided a pack of 10, 4 of which I consume immediately. Fortunately, I play Greyjoy a lot, so I'm not too worried about my performance with the deck, assuming I'll probably go 4-2 which I guess I'd be happy with.

Round 1 - Elliott Garvey - Baratheon Fealty - L

Great. Bara Fealty is always a pain in the arse, no matter if they run either Core Mel or Sniper Mel. I thought I might be okay if he doesn't get many big guys early, or unprotected. Setup he has duped Sniper Mel, turn 1 Stannis Baratheon (TIMC) with a Bodyguard, and turn 2 Robert Baratheon with a Bodyguard. GG. 0-1.

Luckily Elliott was a super nice guy, and sympathetic to my intermittent wailing due to head pain. Nevertheless, I hated him and took 2 more painkillers to console myself.

Round 2 - Calvin Green - Greyjoy Lord of the Crossing - W

Great. A game versus my saviour and provider of drugs, playing a fast Greyjoy Crossing which my Fealty deck can sometimes struggle with. In truth, this was my toughest win of the entire day, as I felt Calvin had the upper hand for almost the entire game. I just managed to eek out a win by consistently playing impactful characters, and feinting military challenges with Dagmer to threaten location theft, before going all in for power with the rest. I don't remember much about this except feeling bad for stealing all of Calvin's drugs, and stealing all of Calvin's hope of winning the tournament. 1-1.

Round 3 - Enzo di Rosa - NW Kings of Summer - W

I turn up for round 3 to find myself against Builders. Great. Enzo was another pleasant chap, although sadly he doesn't have a meta to play with and practice. Nevertheless, this was a tough match, helped immensely by playing The First Snow of Winter and Valar Morghulis at opportune moments, and having the The Hand's Judgment to cancel his Mutiny At Craster's Keep in the penultimate round to prevent him discarding my Balon Greyjoy (CtA) with 6 power on him. 2-1.

Round 4 - James Waumsley - Tyrell Rains of Castamere - W

2 more painkillers later and I don't really remember this game at all. I remember thinking "great". Every time I play Wam Wam it seems to be recorded on camera/watched by everyone and I lose. Sadly for James, I believe I got a fast start, although no We Do Not Sow to take out his (Arbor?). He managed to Varys at some point but it was too late to stop what turned out to be a straightforward win. 3-1.

Round 5 - Kostas Adamopoulos - Targaryen banner to the Rose - W

Great. I'd never beaten Kostas and was fairly intimidated by playing him. I suspected an opening of Summer Harvest and so I opened Counting Coppers, getting lucky and finding plenty of economy and some HJ into the bargain. Kostas had a smallish board of Rhaegal, Marge, and something else. I recall The First Snow of Winter was important in this game and I think I played in round 2. I cancelled an The Iron Bank Will Have Its Due to keep his board light, and Dagmer eventually got rolling, stealing his Plaza of Pride to stop his Khal Drogo from standing a lot. The game ended as Kostas conceded, but not before he hit my 13 locations with a banter Political Disaster. 4-1.

Round 6 - Callum Gillespie - Baratheon Fealty - W

I was starting to feel a bit better at this point, but Callum and I play a fair bit together and we had played this matchup quite a lot, with me winning 0% of the games. Great. Callum did Sniper Mel things I think and got Fat Bob out along with a support cast of loads of inconsequential characters. I got out what I could but Mel was damaging my hand, and my board wasn't enough to punch through his power presence.

There was a moment where Callum is 9-2 up and i miss a reaction on my Great Kraken, taking unopposed, before exclaiming "F#$K!". We both feel Callum has this in the bag and he tells me to take the power for it. This is a throwback to the Aldershot Regional Top 4 (see The Knight of the Blackwater for the video) where he misses his A Feast for Crows trigger, and I remind him, such is the level of respect between us.

Anyhow, round 5/6 and Callum is 13-7 (ish) up and he plays Wildfire Assault into my A Clash of Kings. I win initiative and go first, even though I'm still unlikely to push power challenge through Robert Baratheon. Fortunately, I topdeck an Esgred and a Lordsport Shipwright, to get unopposed intrigue and power challenges with my existing renown guys and great kraken triggers to fluke a win. 5-1.

We're both stunned by this development, especially as there were whispers that the Top 16 may no longer happen because issues with Jousting Pavilion, and a Top 8 may be set instead. If this had been known earlier, it meant that Callum would NOT have allowed my Great Kraken trigger as he thought he was comfortably into the Top 16. Some tension here, but the Top 16 happened and we were both through to the next day, myself in 5th after Swiss, and Callum around 11th.

Top 16 - Tom Clarke - Targaryen Fealty - W

Great. A former UK National Champion, although he was very keen to play down his chances of winning this game. He seemed to have a deck that focused on finding all of his pieces quickly, playing Counting Coppers and Wheels Within Wheels to find his key cards.

Early game, neither of us did much, poking at each other with insignificant challenges, whilst I marshalled Euron Crow's Eye, Victarion Greyjoy, duped Wex Pyke, and eventually Dagmer Cleftjaw, whereas Tom has Daenerys Targaryen, Viserion, Jhogo, a Targaryen Loyalist, and another minor character. Oh, and a fully loaded Astapor!

Round 4 was the crucial moment in the game, where Tom is first player. He plays Crown of Gold on my Aeron Damphair (Core), then proceeds to poke me with an intrigue challenge, and then a military challenge with Jhogo, both of which go unopposed. He passes to me with only Dany and Viserion standing.

I go in for an intrigue challenge with Wex Pyke, knowing that he would be reluctant to defend with Dany if he has a Dracarys! in hand, as he would like to threaten it on my renown guys which I can no longer recur with Aeron Damphair (Core). He triggers Astapor to reduce Wex to 0 STR, and I know I have to bite the bullet and go in for a military.

I declare Dagmer as a sole attacker, and a standing Daenerys Targaryen means he is only 4 STR. His only possible defender is Viserion. He kneels Viserion and plays Dracarys!. NOOOOO!!! Fortunately, I have a Risen from the Sea! Tom plays The Hand's Judgment. Luckily, my double Counting Coppers turn earlier afforded me a second Risen from the Sea! Tom plays his SECOND The Hand's Judgment. By the grace of the Drowned God, i play my THIRD Risen from the Sea, and Dagmer the Thrice Risen claimed Astapor for his own with 1 measly STR remaining!!! Amazing scenes.

There was no way back from this as I had duplicates for all my major characters, and Tom expected a Valar Morghulis from me to really push the advantage. He himself played Valar whilst I played A Clash of Kings to seal the deal.

Top 8 - Chris Jordan - Greyjoy Rains of Castamere - L

Chris was a lovely quiet chap who confessed he hasn't played in many tournaments at all. I was very wary of him, as he must certainly know what he is doing to reach this far in the UK Nationals. Furthermore, he is playing what I perceived to be a fairly bad match up for me.

Chris gets out Asha Greyjoy (Core) early with chud plus Maester Wendamyr with a Little Bird and a Priest of the Drowned God. Rain is forecast today it seems, as I have no intrigue to speak of. He also has a Great Kraken.

After Round 2, he is winning 9-2 due to Asha and the Great Kraken, although my The First Snow of Winter diminished his board significantly. The next round, we both have Balon Greyjoy (CtA), whereas I also have The Dagmer that was Promised in play. Cue the scenario where I win a military with Dagmer Cleftjaw attacking alone, I take his Great Kraken, i pass challenges, Chris attacks in intrigue to get unopposed through, and plays We Do Not Sow to remove his own Great Kraken from play, and subsequently takes my own Great Kraken from my hand! Round 4 saw me marshal Euron Crow's Eye and steal his Great Kraken again!

I always find Dagmer Cleftjaw allows so many funny little scenarios like this, and this is why I like him so much.

Anyhow, toward the end, I have pegged Chris back some and go to 14 power, only for a well timed Nightmares on Victarion Greyjoy to stop me hitting 15 power. Chris then took the win with Asha and unopposed to make the Top 8 and dump me out of the tournament.

More Words

I also took this deck to Varberg Morghulis too but I've written too many words and already told my Dagmer story so I'm done now.

Amusing Side Note

I played melee after I was knocked out of the joust and got put on a table with Elliott Garvey, the guy who beat me round 1. Needless to say I victimised him and crushed that man and it made me feel better about life again.

Other Words

Thanks to all I met over the weekend who I spoke to and had fun with, primarily Rebecca (of course), Callum, Calvin, and Mike Smith among others. Congratulations especially to Even Sorgjerd who won the whole thing and spared us all from Darren Hazelden lording it over us all as UK National Champion! :D