A (The?) Tyrell deck in Stahleck melee top 16 without Sparro 1.0

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• 1.0

Hi! This is the deck that made Stahleck top 16 deck in melee and came close to reaching final with 14 power in my top 16 table. I also had a version of it in War of the Faiths this Spring without Megga Tyrell and with Superior Claim which I came second with and got very close to winning.

I have been playing Tyrell challenge removal many times at Stahleck and really enjoy the archetype. I think newer cards like Willas Tyrell (FUtG) and Chivalry of the South give a nice boost to it as well as recently released Megga Tyrell.

Card choices

I guess the biggest surprise of the deck is no Sparrows. As we saw in Stahleck top 16, it's a very strong melee card in the current meta. For me though, it has started to feel a bit boring, so didn't want to dedicate a lot of cards slots for it like Unexpected Guile (R) and Gate of the Gods.

I also dropped Delena Florent, since Queensguard got banned. I realised from previous experiences, that she doesn't really help me to win and sometimes when you remove characters from a challenge, you like them to stand to be able to defend challenges from other opponents. Unlike in joust, the softer control might actually be better.

I replaced this with more knights, Highgarden Courtier and Name Day Tourney to increase power gain, but I would remove these and add another Grand Melee for plots and replace Courtiers and Brienne the Blue with Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, another copy of Highgarden (Core) and maybe Former Champion. Other thing I increased with Megga was repeatable challenge removal like Butterbumps (MaV) and Septa Nysterica.

I would like to fit 3x The Knight of Flowers (Core) but setups were getting poor, so cut it to one. Other option is to go 1x Brienne of Tarth (GoH) but kept her 3x to be able to trigger Offer of a Peach. Warhammers are there to boost Renly or Willas and sometimes Ser Cortnay Penrose.

I think the choices that I made are more fun to play but still remaining competitive. Unfortunately I didn't have time to tune it the way I would liked and couldn't be arsed to even to cut it to 60 cards.

General strategy

The basic strategy for the deck is to find Renly Baratheon (FotS), Megga Tyrell or Willas Tyrell (FUtG) in your opening hand. Those are the key cards of the deck. Renly gives good tempo and allows to play tricks for free in challenges, Megga is easy power gain and Willas is very nice in manipulating challenges. In addition you would like to see some challenge removal, but it also likely that you draw that later anyway.

Usually I start with Late Summer Feast or The Maiden depending on the amount of gold I need. Second plot is generally Grand Melee if you have Willas or Chivalry of the South if you have a lot of challenge removal and/or stuff like Ser Mark Mullendore, When I Woke... or Scheming Septon. After the one, you often play the another or Sneak Attack, if you think you can close.

Backup package is the knights tech with Name Day Tourney but after increasing my challenge removal, I would remove this altogether.

Cool interactions

Some people used Willas Tyrell (FUtG) with the Jousting Contest but for me it was always a card that should be played with Grand Melee. Grand Melee is so much "fun" and causes a headache for opponents. I usually would try to pick Hand of the King with it, to be able to do an extra challenge to cause the headache with or either get unopposed. With The Knight of Flowers (Core) you can actually get very reliable unopposed even without Willas, if you have Hand of the King or Master of Ships title (they give the +1 for challenges). KoF was really good for me and would like to fit three copies in.

Remove from the challenge tech is also great with Grand Melee. People often need to defend at least with 3 characters. Of course it allows also power gain from Megga and sometimes getting a Chivalry of the South trigger.

Match report

Round 1 - a win

My first table of with my meta mate vonSilas, my 8 Regents teammate from couple of years back Comm and I also get to play argento for the first time. I think first round argento made me first player and I wasn't able to get a lot of power. argento was last and got a good lead with help of that and an impressive board of Stark good stuff. vonSilas also had quite a bit of power and most of them on Joffrey Baratheon (Core).

Second round argento played Calm Over Westeros to protect his power but was made first by Comm. We kinda teamed up against him, since hid board was impressive. I played Grand Melee myself and picked the Hand of the King title to be able to make couple of power challenges. I was able to gather a lot of power with my plot, title, Willas and KoF. vonSilas picked a lot of power on Joffrey and Comm mostly focused on building his impressive board.

Third round argento played Sneak Attack to finish. He Ward (R)ed Joffrey to get 14 power and marshaled Catelyn Stark (Core). I was sure that he would win now, since I wouldn't be able to remove anything from the challenge. Then I remembered vonSilas has one card in his deck that would save us. Luckily he also had it and marshaled Tywin Lannister (ChoS) to be able to play The Things I Do For Love on Joffrey and bounce him back to his hand. argento realised that he couldn't win and pushed a two claim power challenge on me since I was now leading. Couldn't stop it but managed to get a win with help of KoF and some rivarly power. Very close game and a win because vonSilas found his one card that would be able to get me the win instead of argento.

Round 2 - a win

My second table had very diverse geographical representation. Matthew from Australia, Kevin from the USA and DK from the UK. Kevin started with a very impressive board of Eddard Stark (WotN), The Blackfish (WotN) and some other characters. DK built his Martell board slowely with a lot of econ chuds and Doran Martell (Core). I had Megga Tyrell and two chuds and marshaled Renly Baratheon (FotS). Matthew had The Knight of Flowers (Core), a good backboard and knights chuds. Matthew started by making couple of challenges and getting some power, Kevin hoarded a lot of power, and claimed a couple of my chuds. DK started carefulle just grabbing around three power. I was able to finish strong and get around 8 power utilizing two rivals and some unopposed.

Second round Kevin was made first and also pushed for the win and had Ser Edmure Tully to steal the first power. DK flooded our Ricasso, The Red Viper (Core), [Quentyn Martell (SoD)] (/card/10011) and some other stuff. I also tried to go as wide as possible. Kevin was able to go close to winning but I noticed DK was the real threath. He had two power challenges and played To The Spears!. Luckily I think I drew Shrewd Diplomat from Kevin's Late Summer Feast to remove Viper from the first power challenge against me. Next target was Matthew, who was able defend just enough to stop DK at 13 power. I also managed to get to 13 power during my challenges and Matthew also got some power as the last player.

Third round was pretty much about who wins the ini wins the game. Me and Kevin played Sneak Attack but I was able to win the ini with help on The Maiden. Matthew had A Tourney for the King and would definitely finish if it got to him with his swarm of knights. DK's Summer deck didn't have that high initiative plots, so he wasn't able to win the ini. I chose Crown Regent as the title to be able to do my challenge wherever I wanted. After marshaling I noticed that the only player I can win it against is Kevin. I was calculating also Matthew's str boosts and DK's The Prince's Plan and I realised I should be able to win the challenge. So I went all in power to win it. DK's Water Dancer's Sword surprised me but luckily he didn't also have the Prince's Plan so I was able to push my challenge through and win.

Round 3 - third place

The last round of swiss I had once again a meta mate in my table with Antti. I also had achamp36 from France and Marton from Hungary. Good place to get that Hungarian flag for my passport. Antti had his cool Martell Bastards deck, achamp36 had Lanni MFG bigs and Marton was also running Tyrell Stag challenge removal. I was afraid of the mirrors beforehand, since they can get pretty stupid. First round Marton started slow with The Maiden and only marshaled Renly Baratheon (FotS). He also had Highgarde though. Antti got a bunch of bastard and I had a good board with Renly and Megga. achamp36 had Tywin Lannister (Core) and Ser Daven Lannister and Harrenhal (FFH), so a good start there as well. I think no one got a loads of power but achamp emptied quite a bit of our hands and was in the lead in my book.

Second round I think I played The Maiden myself to counter Marton's one. From this round on I managed to get some Megga triggers and Marton as well. Antti didn't get much power and achamp36 kinda made Marton to use his tricks and couldn't get that much power because of those. I chose my title mostly to stop achamp36 attacking my as the last player and I was able to save my tricks.

Third plot I think I played Chivalry of the South since there was plenty of challenge removal on board. It helped me to get quite a bit of power even though achamp36 once again defended well and was very good at not falling into traps but hand to kneel his whole board as a consequence. I might have been able to win it there if I calculated everything correcly, but didn't know achamp36's tricks (he didn't have any characters but I didn't know that) and made a big power challenge to get to 14 power. I think Marton also finished the round with 14 power with help of Oldtown.

Third round I needed to win ini, to get first Megga trigger to win the game. I think Marton and I both flipped Sneak Attack, had the Maiden in the use pile and had equal number of power. I randombly won the initiative, but achamp36 had The Stranger revealed which wiped quite a bit of power from the board. I think I dropped to 12 or 13 but Marton had Megga duped, so he stayed at 14 and was still closing. But achamp36 had Nightmares on Megga and another Nightmares as well. So I wasn't able to win, achamp36 used his resources to stop Marton and me from winning and Antti was able to win as the last player and with the help of his The Father. Very close table and I had to wait if two wins and a third place would be enough for the cut.

Top 16 - second place

My top 16 included Sara with Martell Faith Militant, AlexFdez with Tyrell Lion and Lennart Paga with Tyrell Stag like me. Lennart's build was very different though and realised that from the setup. It was resets, passive power gain and stall techniques. He made me first round and I played Late Summer Feast. I made a deal with Sara about her Exchange of Information and The Dragon's Tail (R) draw. I had Renly in setup, but really wanted to find a dupe for him. After draw phase Dragon's Tail, I also played the Pleasure Barge to find that dupe, but no luck. Didn't manage to get one for Brienne of Tarth (GoH) either leaving me vulnerable to a reset and negative econ modifier. I dared to do that, since I was able to marshal another Kingsroad after using one and had two The Bounty of Highgardens in my hand. First round challenges ended up with Lennart in the lead and I messed up a lot of my own challenges leaving me behind. Then Lennard played "The Last of the Giants" Varys (Core). Sara had The Faith's Decree but Lennart was able to negotiate her not using it, since she had the only dupe on Myrcella Baratheon (GoH) and Lennart promised not to Marched to the Wall her. So that was only thing that stayed on board.

Next round I played The Maiden to get some econ and try to re-populate again. I think I was able to get a decent board but not much power gain. Alex and Lennart were running away with the power. Third round Lennart played Valar Morghulis to wipe the board again. I played Chivalry of the South with 5 gold and got Renly out again with another character. A lot of focus was on Alex and Lennart who were leading. During Lennart's turn, he played sparrows, took Alex's power and made the power challenge against me. Sara used Faith's Decree for Unexpected Guile (R), which was kinda bad for me, since I wanted the Sparrows to get to shadows and get my plot trigger. I was ably to bring out Shrewd Diplomat with Renly, remove Sparrows from the challenge and get my plot trigger. Then made my challenge with Mullendore against Lennart for uo and rival, but didn't use my Mullendore trigger for Highgarden Treasury which I now realise would have won me the game if I remember the situation correctly. I might remember this wrong though. I did power challenge agains Sara for claim and rivarly and forced her to defend to stop me from winning and then she couldn't do the power back against me.

Last round I tried to Sneak Attack a win again, but Lennart played the Stranger that wiped the board again and drop me to 13 power. I was thinking about making Alex first but I was too afraid of his Loan from the Iron Bank and hand full of cards. So made myself first and tried to win in. With titles I was about to choose Master of Coin to get two bodies out but then changed to Crown Regent to be able to do the challenge against Lennart. This later proved to be a mistake, since Lennart was able to use Shadow Priestess kneeling my Ser Imry Florent to stop me from winning. With two chars I might have made it especially with Imry, but then someone else might have picked Crown Regent to stop me from winning, likely Alex. So in the end Alex marshaled a wide board and won the game with a power challenge against Lennart. Very deserved for Alex with his excellent deck and gameplay. He didn't even need Sparrows for the win.

So if you managed to read the wall of text this far, I think it was a great experience. I really enjoyed playing my deck, all the tables I played were interactive and really close and all were good spirited without any drama. I think it was the best the melee can get.

PS One thing about challenge removal. I got a feedback it's too strong. This might be true and maybe Chivalry of the South is not the most interactive plot. But then again I saw achamp36 playing really well against it, so it might be that people just need to adapt to it. Also, if you restrict Sparrows and hit something else in Tyrell, it might be ok.