Hej guys, I was thinking about balancing the win rate of different houses. By reading this forum I stumpled upon a great idea that you can combine house cards with the house cards from Dance with Dragons expansion. Now I saw all sorts of ideas by changing cards for Greyjoy, Tyrell, Lannister, Martell etc.

Nevertheless, if you look at 6p game statistics it is pretty clear that Stark and Greyjoy have an enormous lead compared with other houses. Therefore, I would first try to balance them out and then if there are still problems buff the "bellow average" houses of Martell, Tyrell and Lannister. Now if you have Dance with dragons expansion, you can:

MAIN PROPOSAL

- instead of Balon Greyjoy use Rodrik the Reader (if you win this combat, you may search any Westeros deck for a card of your choice. Shuffel the remaining cards and then place the choosen card face down on top of the deck)

- instead of Rose Bolton use Black Walder (one sword icon)

I think this change is good as you nerf 2 most OP 2 strenght cards in the game and weaken the houses with highest average win rates. Rodrik the Reader is still a very strong card if you can win with it and Black Walder has a sword, which is a welcoming edition to Stark's house cards.


POSSIBLE CHANGES

Now you could also try to buff "bellow average" win rate houses of Martell, Tyrell and Lannister. Baratheon is almost balanced and so his cards can stay the same.

The most sound alternative for Lannister is to ditch Kevin Lannister and use Ser Adam Brambert (when you are attacking all your participating knights (including supporting Lannister knights) provide a combat strengt of +3 instead of +2). Since you use your knights more and especially use them to support from SS, this cards is more usefull.

For Martell you could use Areo Hotah from DwD edition where he has 2 fortifications. Another option is that instead of Nymera Sand you use Ser Gerik Drinkwater (if you win this combat, you may move one position higher on the influence track of your choice). Naturaly, it is also possible to change both cards at the same time. Although, I am not sure about taking Nymera Sand away as now you have only one card with forts in your hand. Is this really a buff? I don't know. Take this one with a grain of salt.

I am also not convinced for Tyrell. Some suggest switching Mace for Mace from DwD that has one sword and one fortification. I am not sure this is a clear cut buff. Sure it is more usefull for sea battles and fights where enemy has only knights, but many times I would rather have normal Mace that counts as a 5 cards due to the fact that he automaticly kills an enemy footman. Another suggestion is to get rid of Alester Florent and get Paxter Redwyne (if the battle area is a sea, all Tyrell ships (including supporting Tyrell ships) contribute +2 combat strengt instead of +1). Again, it is true that now invading and defending sea areas is easier, but now you have only one card with fortification. I am also not sure whether this is a buff.

CONCLUSION

I am sure that changes to Greyjoy and Stark are necessary from the balacing point of view, but I am not so sure for other houses. Power dynamics might change in unexpected ways if we implement all these changes. At the same time some changes are not seen as clear buffs. I did not test these changes in practice, but will do as soon as possible.
Please tell me what you think about these suggestions.

SOME NOTES

I heard suggestions like change Balon Greyjoy to 1 strenght and Asha Greyjoy to 2 strenght, but if I want to play a real game with real cards I dont want to print them on a piece of ordinary paper. I want to play with original cards and I dont want to destroy the by writing something on them. I also dont want to "change the board" by merging some territories or drawing crowns on some places. I dont want to trash my beautifull board.

Maybe changes for Stark are still to strong as he has 4 swords now and is great in defence (with his low cards) and great in attack (with his high cards). Maybe you can experiment with giving him Steelshanks Walton (1 fortification) instead of Rose Bolton and then Damon Dance for Me (1 sword) instead of Ser Rodroc Castle. Now Stark is weaker as he has a sword on his 1 strengt card and one fortification on his 2 strenght card, where sword would be a stronger alternative. But he needs a nerf as he has great position. He can turtle up in the north and then wait out the game (safely consolidating power). Also since Greyjoy loses his OP Balon Greyjoy, Stark does not need to be so affraid and have OP card (Rose Bolton) himself.

Last edited by franc on 2018-Oct-25 01:07, edited 5x in total

Nerfing those cards significantly hampers both of those houses.  Balon is a critical cog in Greyjoy’s deck as it forces your opponents to sell out to defend areas. Stark needs to be able to withstand an invasion, and without Roose he basically has a deck of vanilla cards that don’t have useful abilities.

I understand wanting to balance the game, but one of the things that makes the game great is that it is asymmetrical and therefore each house has different advantages and disadvantages. The game would be vastly less interesting if each house had an identical 16.7% win rate.

While I disagree with Duckfield that identical win rates should not be the goal*, I agree that you can’t just remove the strongest card from a deck and replace it with some vanilla single sword without collapsing that house’s entire strategy.  Stark and Greyjoy are powerhouses entirely because of Roose/Balon, and without them they will be nothing. Or at the very least, entirely different houses that don’t play anything at all like a slightly nerfed versions of the 2nd edition.

*this does not mean that house decks should be mirror images of each other; houses should have different strengths and weaknesses, but if played properly, rather equal chances of winning

Are these changes going to have a significant impact on how Stark and Greyjoy play the game? Absolutely.

Stark will change to most basic setup where all his high cards are perfect for attack and all his low cards are perfect for defence. You might say this is boring, but it is a very effective deck. This is exacly the distribution of swords and fortifications you want on you cards.

Greyjoy will lose his auto win card and get a unique ability to determine one westerous event. His deck will become more flexible and not just great at winning battles. C'mon guys, this Balon Greyjoy card is ridiculus. Everyone is afraid to use a high card against him as it will be rendered useless if he choses Balon. Simple existance of auto win gives him to much of advantage. I don't understand what were the developers thinking. Balon should be 0 strenght card. If you want to attack or succesfully defend you need crazy military advantage, it is just so wrong. This is the reason why I want to get rid of this crazy card.

I would argue these changes are good. Why should these two houses keep their OP cards? I don't agree with the notion that we should not intefere even if some houses have higher win rate. We should strive for more balanced approach. We don't lose diversity as houses already have different starting positions and even after changing house cards Stark and Greyjoy still have their unique new playstile. Maybe these changes are boring for some players, but I think they do achive what I intended them to do. To lower win rate of two strong houses.

Regarding Stark being unable to prevent invasion after the changes. Well no, Greyjoy is also nerfed so his invasion is not as scary as it was before. Baratheon invasion is also not scary. Stark's cards are simple, but effective. High cards are used to kill units and low cards are used to prevent casualties.

Lastly to adress Ser Hodor, I don't belive Stark and Greyjoy would colapse into nothing with these changes. Stark has entire North and is usually left alone up there. It is hard to invade. I don't see this change in house card to severly criple him. Also I don't know why Greyjoy would be devastated. He still has other strong cards and gets a unique card that anables him to force mustering, supply, game of thrones, clash of kings etc. These two houses are strong due to their map position and house cards. By changing house cards I am trying to lower their enormous win rate.

Also nobody said anything about my suggested changes to other houses

Last edited by franc on 2018-Oct-25 11:08, edited 2x in total

Stark is left alone because he will win most any war of attrition. He almost never loses units and almost always inflicts casualties. But to be able to do that, he MUST have Roose Bolton. Once Ned is used, Stark is a lamb. Sure his units won’t die but he won’t kill the invading enemy either, and will slowly die instead of slowly turn the tide. Baratheon would benefit hugely from this change.

Greyjoy losing his auto-win card is terrible for game balance. Lannister starts the game with the Raven and 3 stars. In a battle, the stars are worth +2 or +3 (+1 for support/march and +2 defense). His northern neighbor ALSO starts with 3 stars.  Greyjoy has the sword, but must invade to actually make progress in the game. This is balanced by the fact that his deck is fantastic in attack,  it overall weak in defense. His main defense is careful use of Balon, the threat of him rather than the use.

I won’t comment on the other changes you suggest because I think all of them are unnecessary. The game is an asymmetric game that requires political and military alliances. In my experience, the vast majority of games are played incorrectly by several players because they are playing 1v1v1v1v1v1 instead of an ever shifting balance of 2v1v3 and a million other combinations. The second Balon is used, all greyjoy neighbors should look to take advantage. Stark enemies should try to bait a Roose or convince Baratheon to Patchface him.

You’re looking for a way to play the game in a straightforward Risk way that makes combat more fair. You should be trying to play in a way that focuses more on the political aspects of the game and how to maximize the cards in existence. What a great way as Lannister to convince Stark and Tyrell to help you but to say “Look at his OP deck. We need to ally” while simultaneously telling Baratheon that Stark’s Bolton card is imbalanced and should be dealt with earlier than later. The choice is yours.

Still agree with Duckfield.  For one, Stark is hardly ever left alone (at least in ranked games on this site), but he definitely won't ever be if he loses Roose.  At that point, he has exactly one good card, that Patchface can toss out at will.  Baratheon would make a feast of Stark every game at that point.  Hell, I'd probably be content to leave Lannister and Tyrell to fight over King's Landing most games if I had that easy of a path into the North.

Also, Duckfield is absolutely right that Greyjoy both needs Balon to make up for the rest of his crappy cards, and that they need to be expanding immediately to stay viable (and keep the game balanced).  You can look at my House Analysis thread for Greyjoy for (much) longer explanations of why exactly I think that is.

But suffice to say, a tiny bit of nerfing can go a very long way to throwing the game completely off its axis.  I'd start with the smallest changes possible.  Perhaps remove one of Ned's swords, and start all GJ's land units in Pyke, to cut down on his immediate CP lead.  1 token can go a long, long way in an early clash.

I feel like you guys are talking about games where all 6 players are experienced. In this case even big house imbalances can be overturned as they all know they have to ally against Stark and Greyjoy. Sadly, not all of us can experience this in real games played. For me it is hard to find 5 other people to play for 6+ hours and thus I almost always introduce new people in the game. We always have noobies playing with us. In this case it is better to do something about balancing out OP houses.

New and even casual players do not know anything about optimal strategy, best house to attack etc. This is the reason why it isn't such a tragedy to switch Rose Bolton for a card with a sword icon. Regardless, Stark has star orders and ability to muster, therefore he can protect himself from sea invasion from Baratheon. Also with my suggested changes I don't see why Baratheon would automaticly go north. Now Lannister has a room to breathe and will most likely press east. So I feel like now Baratheon will fight Lannister more often.

If players aren't capable of strategizing at a moderate level, then any attempts at balancing such a complex game are pointless.  They are not going to recognize that with Greyjoy weakened, Lannister should press east more aggressively.  They are going to pick their enemies more or less at random and feel their way out, just like before.

Trying to balance a game with noobs is a futile endeavor, not least because exactly who and what defines a "noob" mindset is a moving target.  The only way to actually balance a game between total novices and veterans is to remove all the actual strategic elements and make it a game of War.

But by far the simplest solution is to the problem you are describing, is to just have the noobs play Stark and Greyjoy, and the most experienced be Tyrell and Lannister.

You are right in a sence that with new players their choice of enemy is quite random. Nevertheless, because Lannister position and house cards require advance strategy in order to not get crushed by a Greyjoy, it is better to nerf Greyjoy a bit. From my personal experience they almost always fight for Riverrun as their territories are so close.

This is what I am doing so far, but it is becoming boring to play same house all the time.

If you are playing with new players a lot why not use Tides of Battle cards to give some unpredictability and naturally balance most of the issues out?

Last edited by Simoneon on 2018-Oct-31 08:04, edited 1x in total

I feel like you guys are talking about games where all 6 players are experienced. In this case even big house imbalances can be overturned as they all know they have to ally against Stark and Greyjoy. Sadly, not all of us can experience this in real games played. For me it is hard to find 5 other people to play for 6+ hours and thus I almost always introduce new people in the game. We always have noobies playing with us. In this case it is better to do something about balancing out OP houses.

New and even casual players do not know anything about optimal strategy, best house to attack etc. This is the reason why it isn't such a tragedy to switch Rose Bolton for a card with a sword icon. Regardless, Stark has star orders and ability to muster, therefore he can protect himself from sea invasion from Baratheon. Also with my suggested changes I don't see why Baratheon would automaticly go north. Now Lannister has a room to breathe and will most likely press east. So I feel like now Baratheon will fight Lannister more often. Fair point. I certainly am commenting from an experienced level game perspective. That said, in order to get to a place where you can consistently play with experienced players, you either need to find 5 experienced players near you or help your playgroup level up.

Here's the thing. What determines an experienced player to a non-experienced player isn't whether they can use strong house cards correctly. What determines an experienced player is how well they can shift from a house's enemy to that house's ally when the situation dictates. Or how well they can shift from a peaceful neighbor to a hostile neighbor when the neighbor has overcommitted him or herself too far. If you take pains to help your playgroup evolve from seeing the game as one of Risk where allies last all game,to a game of Politics where house diplomacy changes by the resolved action, all these imbalances will seem very trivial.

A true high level game here ends with just about every house on 4 castles, struggling to grab a barrel here and there and conserving tokens to perhaps win on supply/tokens. In the context of that game, Balon and Roose are merely footnotes.

To sum it up, Balon and Roose are just cards deployed by a person, as are Loras, Doran, Stannis and Tyrion (who, in the right situtation is a Balon-lite or even better). What dictates outcomes is not the cards, but how the cards are deployed and (most importantly) REACTED TO by the rest of the table.

Last edited by Duckfield on 2018-Oct-31 17:00, edited 1x in total