The Flayed Man

“Roose Bolton is our Warden of the North. He will deal with Stannis.”
   –Cersei Lannister, A Feast for Crows

The history of A Song of Ice and Fire is filled with monsters—from the reign of Maegor the Cruel, through Mad King Aerys, up to characters like Ser Gregor Clegane, Joffrey Baratheon, and Ramsay Snow. Still, in A Game of Thrones: The Card Game, you have the chance to take these despicable characters and make them your monsters, helping you win the Iron Throne and claim victory over your opponents. The next chapter of A Game of Thrones: The Card Game arrives in Kingsmoot, the third Chapter Pack of the Flight of Crows cycle, now available at your local retailer or online through our webstore!

Kingsmoot continues the themes and traditions of the game’s fourth cycle by continuing to add fuel to the bestow keyword and new ways for you to place gold on your characters and impact the game. Sixty new cards (three copies each of twenty distinct cards) make their debut in this expansion, and among them, you’ll find Lyseni pirates, Dothraki handmaidens, Dornish knights, and outlaws from the Brotherhood Without Banners. With a rich assortment of new tactics and strategies to introduce into your decks, this Chapter Pack finds a home in any player’s collection.

Into the Dreadfort

The increasing presence of the bestow keyword is one of the major motifs that can be found throughout the Flight of Crows cycle, but it’s not the only one. This newest cycle of cards also rewards players for forging alliances between the Great Houses, and finding new uses for the Banner agendas found in the game’s Core Set. Though both cards can be brought in line with fealty to House Stark, the House Bolton cards in Kingsmoot are the latest entry in this cycle’s theme of bringing the factions together.

Ramsay Snow (Kingsmoot, 41) is a monster in any sense of the word, and he’s not choosy about where he inflicts suffering. In fact, when this character enters play, both players must immediately sacrifice a character if able! House Stark does have ways to capitalize on forcing both players to sacrifice a character— Robb Stark (Core Set, 146) and Catelyn Stark (Wolves of the North, 2) foremost among them. You may even be running a deck that tries to destroy your opponent’s board with The North Remembers (The Fall of Astapor, 42)—a deck where Ramsay Snow may add just enough pressure to break your opponent. Still, there are at least as many opportunities when you use Banner of the Wolf (Core Set, 203B) to bring Ramsay Snow over to House Lannister.

The Lannisters excel at killing off their opponent’s characters and shrinking the board. With cards like Ser Gregor Clegane (The King’s Peace, 49), Trial by Combat (Calm Over Westeros, 90), Tower of the Hand (Wolves of the North, 30), and Ser Ilyn Payne (True Steel, 109), it’s easy to see how you could destroy the bulk of your opponent’s forces in a single bloody challenges phase. With the recent release of Valar Dohaeris (The Archmaester’s Key, 20) reducing the average number of characters on the board, Ramsay Snow fits right in.

You certainly could pay the five gold to marshal Ramsay Snow—and there are undeniable advantages to playing Ramsay Snow in marshaling when you’re first player. If only one or two of your opponent’s characters are left, marshaling Ramsay Snow would make him sacrifice another character before he has the chance to marshal any protection. Still, why pay for what you could have for free? Harrenhal (For Family Honor, 50) can be used as a Challenges Action to drop any Lannister or House Bolton character into play for free, and Ramsay Snow is a perfect target. The character that you put into play with Harrenhal would ordinarily be killed at the end of the phase, but if you use Ramsay Snow’s ability to sacrifice himself, you’ve lost nothing, and you’re ready to play Ramsay Snow again the next time you draw him!

And there’s no reason to stop with Ramsay Snow either. Both Roose Bolton (Ghosts of Harrenhal, 81) and Dreadfort Maester (The Archmaester’s Key, 2) make perfect targets for Harrenhal, because they can sacrifice themselves before they would otherwise die at the end of the challenges phase. Between them, the Boltons can form a formidable ally for your House Lannister decks, and they grow even more powerful with the addition of their ancestral home, The Dreadfort (Kingsmoot, 42).

The Dreadfort, like Ramsay Snow, has limited usefulness in a traditional House Stark deck: after one of your characters is sacrificed, you can kneel The Dreadfort to stand a House Bolton or non-Stark character. In a Lannister Banner of the Wolf deck, however, where nearly every character would be House Bolton or non-Stark, The Dreadfort can let you get even more value out of your characters, potentially overcommitting to one challenge but standing one of your participating characters to shore up your defenses again. With two new cards joining their forces in this Chapter Pack, House Bolton undoubtedly merits consideration from any Lannister deck dedicated to wiping out your enemies.

Our Blades Are Sharp

With the new House Bolton cards of this Chapter Pack, you face two choices. Will you stay loyal to House Stark and your past loyalties, or will you forge a new alliance with your erstwhile enemies in a bloody bid for power?

Make your decision when you pick up your copy of Kingsmoot (GT25) at your local retailer or online through our webstore today!