For a game that the makers claim they attempted to be as realistic as possible the marching orders by utilizing ship transport is way too powerful and makes no sense at all. In one turn a foot soldier can march from Castle Black to Sunspear if the player owns three ships and they are placed in Narrow Sea, Shipbreaker Bay, and East Summer Sea. That is ridiculous and the most unrealistic thing in the game. Ship transport was a slow dangerous mode of travel.

I would love to see a custom option where ground troops can only utilize one ship a turn. We have a house rule in our games in person where this is done and it makes the game much better and strategy becomes more important. We allow a marching order to use two ship transports if the player expends two one power token. For example: Stark has a foot soldier in Castle Black and a ship in both the Shivering Sea and the Narrow Sea. If the foot soldier in Castle Black wanted to move south it could only be moved as far as Widow's Watch in one turn. However with the custom rule the foot soldier could utilize one more ship and land on Mountains of the Moon if the player used one power token.

IMHO games get boring. Players try to build up ships quickly and one foot soldier in Winterfell can win/destroy the game by jumping halfway across the world in one turn which removes all strategic planning in the game and makes it just a race to muster ships and place support/raid orders in the sea.

I would love there to be an option to make soldiers only go as far as one ship can take them. No one else thinks it's silly that a foot soldier can get to the other side of the world in one turn? Even a airplane couldn't get him there that fast!!!

imho GoT is more like a chess with elements of randomness, I wouldn't try to find a bit of realism in it... for sure it is not even close to the basics of complexity of Westeros (no religion, no social affairs, no external influence and so on).

Still, your idea is interesting, worth the exploration.

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As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well spent brings happy death. LDV

Well, FFG has stated they are attempting realism. They added the Tides of Battle rules to simulate the randomness of war, adding siege engines and fortifications. The people I play with in person now prefer to play with the limited sea travel house rule. It just makes for a more strategic game and less who gets the most ships first wins. There is a reason GJ and BAR win almost half the time. With these rules in place you no longer need to modify GJ because it's "too strong".

No one seems to ever play with the Tides rule either, which IMHO makes it less of a counting up to ten game and gives battles a little bit of randomness. Having one extra point may not guarantee victory anymore, but having two of three will still do that for you. Without a little bit of randomness the games end up being decided by which House you get in the beginning a lot of times.

Since ships are so important the ports were implemented. With them you are able to get your lost sea-area back, or even raid a support so that your enemy can not take your town easily.

Your scenario is that Stark could march from castle black to sunspear with just 3 single ships.
First you also need a ship in the shivering sea to move like that and second to be able to do that you have to defeat baratheon and martell on the sea. And further more, with only one ship in each seaarea you can be easily defeated by enemyships. In order to move to Sunspear all your ships need to survive that long and even in that case you have to be able to defeat martell. If a player is able to occupy shipbraker bay and east summer sea, then baratheon and martell were making major mistakes.

If a player is making a mistake on the land, he could be punished by the others by taking his towns or other import areas. This is how the game often works: anyone is making a mistake and someone else benefits from it.

I guess that the modification of GJ would still be necessary even if there would be that the option to limit movement over the sea. The reason is that GJ has a very big advantage in the beginning.

But i like your option where you have to pay tokens (for the long journey of the army), that could work

As far as i know tides of battle is not implemented yet. Thats why no one is using it.

one ship can be supported from behind and even three ships in port can't remove the one ship in the sea connected to your land. then soldiers from across the world can land on your shores in one turn even tho you control the port. the ports were made to try to remove the excessive strength of ships but didnt work. how many times do ports come in useful in your games? almost never. they are just there, no one uses them. the only use is to slow greyjoys first move. after that 90& of games ports are no longer even used. Game of Thrones is more about land battles than sea battles. In this game the sea is much more important than the land.

I agree that it is very hard to get out of a port without the support of another player. Even though I'm not 100% sure of the efficiency of the proposition, if it's a simple option to implement (not able to evaluate the work it really represents ) it should get it's chance. The community would than be able to play and to choose to use it or not. If a polls decides about it, it will be most probably killed as we are all refractive to change at different level. Battle variant is not the most popular, it's a hard landing playing the first game, but the more game you played, the more you appreciate it.

If it's complicated, then that's another ball game, I would prefer the ressources to be dedicated to 2nd ed. options

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Jousting, battling, feasting, drinking and whoring...just like King Robert !  

I disagree with this opinion about the ports.

1) Ports are crucial in defending seas, especially in changing conditions on tracks.
1b) Port in SE is very important for Martell trying to take Shipbreaker Bay
2) Ports are important in making money too (trade + safe region for Consolidate Power orders)
3) Ports are important in reorganizing units due to the supply level.

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As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well spent brings happy death. LDV

The ports are also the only chance to get a sea-area back. When you ran out of sea-areas and there are no ports then you can give up.
But with the ports you have a chance to get your sea-areas back.

I totally disagree with your opnion hodor.


1) Realism
You say that its unrealistic that Units can move several Areas over Sea in one turn while only 1 on Land. But you forgot that Ships are much faster than soldiers which means you can travel a much longer distance than on land in  the same time.
You also forgot the parallels to the Books (Spoileralarm)
Stannis moved his whole army up the the north and noone noticed it because he was that fast.Greyjoy also raided Tyrells Coast out of nowwhere.

2) Balance between Land and Sea
Yes, Ships are important and its almost impossible to win a game without having any ships. They defend your coasts and give you the possibility to attack over greater distances. But they cant conquer cities or Areas for your supply and its impossible to win without any Landunits. But if you feel better you can imagine that every Ship isnt only a ship but some troops on it too who are able to fight and raid.
You are right when you say that the control of the Sea gives you a huge advantage because you are able to support all Landareas around. But thats why the ports are made. You can simply raid the Supportorders in the adjacent areas and you are also able to retreat to a port if you loose a fight on the Sea or conquering the Seaarea back. I agree totally with ThyLears post here.

3. Battle Variant
I dont agree with phwenque and i dont really like this option. Yes, it makes the game a little more realisitc, but thats not the point. First of all, aGoT is a Strategy-game with only a few luck-moments (unlike Risiko) and im fine with that. You cant also bluff with your HCs anymore (i really like it! )
But yes, its a nice alternative to the normal games but it never ever should be the standard-variant


4. paying powertokens to move
sounds like an interesting new idea, but there are many things i want to see iomplemented before that (e.g. new HCs, swapping Housepositions etc.). It also changes the whole balance of the game (especially Martell and Tyrell are getting weaker).

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"Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life." , Terry Pratchett

Just a small add-on to the discussion.  The ability to move an army multiple times by moving into a territory that has an unused march order means that an army can move three times on land.

This would mean you could go from King's Landing to Lannisport in a turn, or King's Landing to the Twins, or Castle Black to Seagard. So in fact units can move multiple times on land as well as sea.  Granted it requires more march orders.

In my mind the issue is how we are looking at a turn.  I generally consider a turn to be a great length of time, say a season, or 90 days.  Some believe that medieval armies marched about 10 miles a day.  This equates to 900 miles, or almost 1500 km. Ships at that time traveled about 140 miles a day, or about 12600 miles in a season, or over 20,000 km.

This goes to ElPopelos point, it was with ships that the great empires emerged out of the medieval age.  They say Westoros is 3000 miles from the Wall to Dorn, giver or take.  In the game an army could march, if the path was clear, from Castle Black to Yronwood in three turns using three marches each time.  By my estimate that is 2700 miles, and just shy of getting to Sunspear.  By boat it is no problem in one season.

Anyway, if we think of the time frame as longer and recognize that the ability to move was limited by coordination and logistics, rather than speed of the army or fleet, I think you will find that FFG actually does a decent job, in a board game environment, of reflecting some realities.  For those who have played War of the Ring, you will probably agree that FFG has provided some the best game engines in some time.

Last edited by Eli Cash on 2013-Jun-28 19:11, edited 1x in total

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