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Bret Smith
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A Game of Thrones » Forums » General
Fix of Westeros Card Issues
I, like many, have had some issues with the distribution of the Westeros cards, that have caused some of my games to be much less fun and more frustrating than I would like. I think I may have found a general solution that modifies some of the ideas already given to fix this. It sounds more complex than it is in practice:

Deck 1: Temporarily take out Winter is coming and separate what's left into two sub-decks. a)2 Mustering, 2 Supply, and 1 Last Days of Summer. b) 2 Mustering, and 2 Supply.
Shuffle both. Randomly take one card from from the 2nd sub-deck and add it to the first. Add Winter is coming back to the second sub-deck and re-shuffle. Finally, place sub-deck a (which now has 6 cards), and place it on top of sub-deck b.

Deck 2: Do the exact same thing as Deck 1, just using the Game of Thrones, and Clash of Kings in place of Mustering and Supply.

Deck 3: No change.

I think that this has several advantages. Firstly it allows for re-shuffling, but at the earliest, it will happen in the 7th turn (on average it will occur in the 8th or 9th). Secondly it keeps a bit of the 'Unknown' factor, as you have no idea whether it is Mustering or Supply that is 3 of the six cards. If there is still not enough uncertainty to suit your taste, simply include Winter is coming as a possibly card to pull from the 2nd deck when you add one to the first.

Played this last night, and it worked like a charm.

Oh, and another house rule we use, is that the Wildling Attacks card acts like the Winter is coming card if the Wildlings would attack at 0 strength AND no battle cards have been expended. As there is nothing to gain for anyone.

Sorry for the size, and I hope it all makes sense. But let me know what you think in either case. :0
Michael Hakansson
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Re:Fix of Westeros Card Issues
I just got my Game with Fedex yesterday and havn't played it yet but I have been following all of the discusions here and on groups.yahoo.com/group/agot_boardgame.

We are going to play our firts session tonight and your sugestions seems to be the best way to deel with decks :)

We don't get togeather 5 poeple to play that often and we woulndn't want our sessions to ruined with too "funny" draws then.

/Sillion aka Michael Hakansson, Halmstad, Sweden
Michael Hakansson
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Re:Fix of Westeros Card Issues
Now that I've played the game I know the whole point with the Westeros Card is that you can never know what card is coming next and plan your actions accordingly with this knowledge.

With this rule you can in some cases know what card is coming on turn 6. (If 3 Mustering, 3 Supply have been drawn or the Last day of Summer has not.

The card Winter is Coming is in the deck to always fix this issue. Maybe you can instead of doing nothing draw a new card with Winter is Coming after you have reshuffled the deck?
Matt Lahut
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Redmond
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Re:Fix of Westeros Card Issues
Sillion (#21183),

In fact, the rules require you to draw another card after you shuffle when Winter Is Coming.

Sadly, the card text doesn't say this, so it can lead to some confusion.
Bret Smith
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Re:Fix of Westeros Card Issues
Sillion (#21183),

Yes, there will be times when you will know what the 6th card will be. And I agree with you, that that is probably not in the best interests of the game, even if it will occur less than 10% of the time.

So, after thinking about it, I think the simplest option, is to go with my second suggestion. To summarize:

Westeros Deck 1:
Step 1: Separate the cards into two sub-decks:
Sub-deck a) 2 Mustering, 2 Supply, and 1 Last Days of Summer.
Sub-deck b) 2 Mustering, 2 Supply, and 1 Winter is Coming.
Step 2: Shuffle both.
Step 3: Randomly take 1 card from from Sub-deck b, and add it to Sub-deck a.
Step 4: Place Sub-deck a (which now has 6 cards), and place it on top of Sub-deck b.

Westeros Deck 2: Do the exact same thing as Deck 1, just using the Game of Thrones, and Clash of Kings in place of Mustering and Supply.

Westeros Deck 3: No change.

As Matt is correct (after flipping Winter is Coming you not only shuffle the deck, you draw another card after doing so), I think that this is the most elegant of solutions. Now there will never be a time when you will know what the next card up will be in any of the decks. However, the distribution is almost guaranteed to be more even than a purely random set-up.

What do you think? For that matter, what does everyone else think?
Darek Wodarz
Poland

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I have just bought game and after 2 games i think your idea is good. But i have 1 question: where do you add 1 card from sub-deck b? at the bottom of sub-deck a?
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