A Game of Thrones

so, I was just offered a decent trade over on BGG - Power Grid for AGOT. I've got a friend here in town who loves loves loves diplomacy, so i'm thinking it might be worth getting him into AGOT.

my question is, how hard is it to bring ports into the basegame w/o an expansion? I'm not a huge fan of expansions...right now I have better things to spend my gaming dollars on. but ports definitely sound like they need to come in.

from the little reading i've done, doesn't sound like much else is "necessary" from the expansions as long as we're planning on 5 players.

You can use just about anything to show where the ports are. Just have a list available at setup noting where the ports should be and which sea area they connect with. Then you're good to go.
Ports is the only necessary part from the 1st expansion, unless you also plan on playing with 6 players. Then you also get a new map overlay which really modifies the map in the south and makes the 6 player game even better than 5 players. But try the 5 player game first to see if it's your thing.
Excellent game!

cool,I'll just have to dig up some spare parts to mark the ports.

Hey I have some questions about ports too.

Which coastal cities have ports? All of them? Looked in the CoK rulebook, couldn't find the answer.

In the 5-player base game, with ports but no other variants, how balanced is the game? Is Lannister still in a noticably weak position?

You probably at least want to use the official variant where you shift Greyjoy down one of the power tracks (or whatever they're called) so he can't destroy Lannister on the first round. I think it's in the CoK rules. Even then, some people like to switch out a Greyjoy knight for a footman, or a Lannister footman for a knight...

Thanks! That sounds kinda screwy though. I guess I'll just tweak it to taste.

Dang, I need to play this one again. Really enjoyed it the first time, though I suppose my winning had something to do with that. Ports are pretty much a given; even with new players in that game, we used them but only them from the first expansion.

A bit of an expansion junkie here, and I just got AGoT. Are the ports the only REALLY necessary bit from the expansions? And the rebalancing of Greyjoy?

Yes.

Ports and the Greyjoy starting track make a significant difference to the game and I think should be added. You don't need the expansion to make thise changes. We played it before the first errata came out and made that Lancaster/Greyjoy recommendation. In our first game we saw the effects of Greyjoy overrunning Lancaster for ourselves and I wrote the new order into the base rule book because of the experience.

I like the capacity to play with a 6th player that Clash of Kings offers but I don't have any desire to play the higher point cards, seige engines or fortifications from the expansion.

In general though I like any game expansion that adds players. The number of 6 player games out there is much smaller than the 3-5 player set

I have a really, really simple way of tweaking up Lannister and weakening the naval factions. Set up the board as printed. Then, Lannister takes the Sword from Grejoy and the Throne from Baratheon, in addition to keeping the Raven. Simple, balanced, and true to the books.

HAHAHA

Stormcow wrote:

I have a really, really simple way of tweaking up Lannister and weakening the naval factions. Set up the board as printed. Then, Lannister takes the Sword from Grejoy and the Throne from Baratheon, in addition to keeping the Raven. Simple, balanced, and true to the books.

That's actually not a bad idea. People familiar with the books tend to gang up on the Lannister player anyway, from what I've heard.

I've only played AGoT once, but I liked it. For what it's worth, I hate Diplomacy. Years ago, I downloaded the 9-player variant, but since that required buying an extra copy of the base set, I never got around to putting that together. I would like to play AGoT again some time, and I would love to try playing a 9-player game someday. Maybe at a convention.