Tribal Stewards 1.0

• Versiones
• 1.0

Hi there! Here is my SuperSteward deck, which was my main "competitive" deck since the release of GJ box. I've also played a lot of NW Rains previously, but this one is slightly different - whole idea started from the Rat Cook and Vanquish the Unbelievers combo.

As you can see, the whole point is to play full-stewards deck. I'm still surprised that this NW order is so underplayed, while stewards in general have better cards than rangers and much more interesting than builders ;) considering also that both crucial Maester Aemon (Core) and NW reducer chuds are stewards it was pretty easy. Only Benjen Stark, Ser Waymar Royce and Janos Slynt (TSC) were necessary additions because of their icons and abilities and 1x Old Bill Bone is a staple in current meta, blocking many agendas. "The Rat Cook" is absolutely crazy strong if you are able to flood the board with stewards, therefore I already stole with him probably every 7 and 6-cost character in game. Tywin, Cersei, Daenerys, Khal, Asha, Euron, Robert, Renly, Wyman, Robb... I've stole them all ;) But, only stealing isn't enough. Here comes Vanquish the Unbelievers, the plot that I absolutely love because of it's "downside". Sadly there are very few good stewards outside Night's Watch and I really like to kill'em all. My favourite moment was when I stole duped Renly on The King in the North turn, turned all my economy and then he passed away. This combo works really good and often, sometimes there is also possibility to use Rat Cook with mid-challenges Wildfire Assault, but if you have already a lot of stewards, Wildfire isn't always best idea. Also, Vanquish kills Benjen and I like killing my Benjen.

Character base is quite obvious. 3x of best NW stewards - Jon Snow (WotW), Bowen Marsh, Maester Aemon (Core) and Satin were staple since the very beginning. I used to play also 3x Three-Finger Hobb (this guy is CRAZY good draw), but had to make space for one of the brightest stars of the deck - Owen the Oaf. This guy with Wall OR any chud (he likes Satin the most) is nearly sure trigger of "The Rains of Castamere", passing through Daenerys or Asha smoothly. In defense on the other hand he can singlehandedly turn off Sea of Blood or other bad agendas, just give him Practice Blade or play "Off To Gulltown". There are also great Cunning Stewards here, able to attack with Owen or defend anything; bunch of great 1-ofs (Samwell Tarly (WotW), Sweet Donnel Hill, Dareon, Small Paul - I use their text quite often!) and tricky Donal Noye, who sometimes spices up the game with A Pinch of Powder. Rest is quite obvious, both in plots and other cards. Nightmares were latest inclusion and they help a lot against nearly everybody, but definitely the most against Winterfell. Out of this card, Starks are beatable for this deck and it's huge advantage in current meta.

In pre-Owen times I played it in Champions of Westeros League and achieved top32, losing to very nice and well-driven Tyrell/SoB deck based on Garlan. Yesterday I brought it in this version to Fracas (mainly because Bara box wasn't permitted and all my newer decks are using cards from it) and missed the cut... being 9th with top8 (also missed the final in melee ranked at 5th place - happens :D) Here is short report.

Game 1, Matiusza (Stark/Crossing Win) Crossing is way easier than Fealty for me and this game showed it - Wyman got Craven, I stole Catelyn and killed with Wildfire and Matiusza didn't draw other intrigue icons. Wall appeared quite late, but I was controlling the game. Very nice opponent!

Game 2, Radek (GJ/Fealty Loss) Radek is very good player and I doubted if I'm able to survive all the location hate and We Take Westeros! - and I was right. I knew that if he has both Nothing Burns Like The Cold and We Do Not Sow AND Pillage Balon in setup he will have my Wall sooner or later - and he did already in second round. I was able to kneel it easily with Owen, so still tried - but while t3 Valar killed both Balon and Victarion, Radek vinced my Aemon (second Vince, he used one t1!) on Owen and I conceded.

Game 3, SirKamlot (Targ/Lanni Loss) Thankfully my opponent was very kind, so it was still a nice game - but I made so TERRIBLE mistakes, that I felt really mad. Long story short - I gave Practice Blade to Owen and forgot that he won't stop neither Gregor nor Drogon and when I was able to pinch easily Tyrion with 4 attachments and 4 power (Boy King), I didn't count his Widow's Wail and won by 4... SirKamlot killed my Aemon t1 with Ilyn and Nightmares and played 2x The King in the North (we played 9 plots), but I think that despite that I would be able to eventually win without these mistakes. When time was up, I conceded though, he deserved it.

Game 4, MJT (Lanni/Rains Win) Ok, now it was sheer luck - it's probably my easiest matchup (Cravens and Owen are shutting it down entirely) AND when I had 3x Owen and 2x Jon in hand MJT hitted with Heads on Spikes some location... I also made a mistake and let his Janos to trigger Wildfire with my full board, but Jon, Bowen and Owen survived, so it was still quite easy. I felt almost guilty after this game - a year ago on store championship we also played the same matchup (it was the game for King of Swiss) and Cravened t1 both Cersei and Jaime... I think MJT hates playing with me and I can't blame him :(

Game 5, Wilkot (Stark/Fealty win) Wilkot is another player from our Warsaw meta, so we play quite often and we both knew our decks. He had Greatjon in setup and quick Meera + Wyman + Catelyn + Skagos (Bran cancelled Rat Cook), but I had also good draw and quite quickly played Wall. Even Wyman's draw wasn't able to deal with Bowen and I just won by having better board. Yes, it's possible even with Stark!

Game 6, Tomek (Tyrell/Dragon win) Also a good start (this deck has bad start very rarely though), putting Craven on his only big dude (Garlan). After surviving The King in the North turn game was mine since I nightmared and then stole Renly (ofc on Vanquish turn), made a lot of intrigues with Spider's Web and Vanquish and cleared his hand. Even his Arbor on setup and well-played Political Disaster wasn't enough.

With 4-2 I've missed the cut - but as for NW, I'm still happy with this deck results. Built just to exploit one shagga combo, it proved to be very good and flexible. In post-Bara-box meta it is probably much weaker - tried it on FCD tournament and got crushed (but on my defense, I made some big and very bad changes there and it wasn't good idea) - Baratheon with all their power are hard matchup. GJ are also very tough (mainly because this plot should be restricted immediately or never printed), t1 Drogon may be also a problem. Other matchups are quite even (Stark, another NW) or easy (Tyrell, Martell, Lanni, Targ without Drogon during first 2 turns).

To sum up: Rangers can attack, Builders can defend, but Stewards can do both + steal. And Rat Cook is like 3x Crown of Gold, deal with it. #OP #pls #restrict