A Game Of Thrones Theme List Extravaganza

One of the main reasons players adore ASOIAF: The Miniatures Games is how you can recreate epic moments from the books/show. Battle of the Blackwater, Hardhome, The Whispering Wood. These are the moments we want to recreate or form our own. I want to look at some moments from the first book and translate them to the tabletop.

Thank you to everyone who let me know they enjoyed the previous themed article I did with the Brotherhood. The lovely comments have inspired me to make another one sooner rather than later.

This time, instead of being specific to a Faction, I wanted to make it specific to one of the books, A Game of Thrones. There were a lot of clashes in the first book that we are not given a lot of perspective too, it is always off handed information from someone hearing this happened, or a post-match interview.

However, there is plenty of information on who took part in these fights and what happened for us to construct some forces out of them for the tabletop game.

Mountainside Clash

One of the first conflicts in the books is around the arrest of Tyrion Lannister and his subsequent imprisonment at the Eyrie. This saw Catelyn’s forces of Riverland supporters become engaged in an ambush with the Mountain Clansmen. Whilst we do have the Stone Crows to make a Mountain Clansman force, we have nothing else, and it will be difficult whilst also being boring to make. So instead, we will make a Free Folk list in a Vale Wildling theme.

As always, Board Man Gaming has amazing homebrew rules for ASOIAF: The Miniatures Game. He did make some great Mountain Clansmen rules to go with the House Arryn Faction. Check them out here – https://boardmangaming.wixsite.com/boardmangaming/post/house-arryn-expansion

I was debating running a Catelyn led Brotherhood list for this section, but thought since we have Roderik we might as well make it just a Stark list. How many times do you get to bring out the old lad? So with Roderik taking the lead, Catelyn runs the NCU board with Petyr Baelish who has assisted her up to this point. Bronn and Willis Wode then become our Attachments.

We needed one more point to be able to bring both the Winterfell Guardian and Bronn, so the Winterfell Guard were picked to reduce an Attachment by a point. It also continues a theme of loyal guardians to the Lady of Winterfell.

For Catelyn’s party we have gathered Tully Sworn Shields and Tully Cavaliers to represent the Riverlands forces that came to her aid, with the Winterfell Guardian acting as a mounted Willis Wode. It has been a long time since we saw anything new for the people of the Riverlands, and we haven’t even got Edmure Tully. I am unsure what the developer’s thinking is in avoiding big characters like Edmure or Jason Mallister, but putting out Patchface, Lyana Mormont, and Tybald, all incredibly minor characters and Tybald isn’t even in a released book!

The Moon Brothers clan were the main force that attacked Catelyn, but I thought it would be fun to make all-stars cast for them instead. So Shagga, Timmet, and Chella, all needed to eb in this line up whilst representing their clans in the Units picked. Obviously, there are no NCUs so these Attachments are to replace the valuable activations for the game.

When ASOIAF: Tactics is released, I would be curious to see if this clash would work better in the skirmish style, but as it stands, I am quite happy with what I have made.

Riverlands a Flame – Wendish Town, Mummer’s Ford and Sherrer Holdfast

In the Brotherhood theme article, we made a list for Beric’s forces when they fought the Lannisters on the Mummer’s Ford. I wanted to make a Mountain led list to go up against this list I made for the Brotherhood.

I wanted to avoid using any characters that were in King’s Landing at this time since they are busy trying to deal with Ned and Robert politically, plus they aren’t that competent to even help the brigands in the Riverlands. Petyr would be the only one I could use since he manipulated all of this, but decided against him since every list has a high chance of containing Petyr anyways.

Tywin Lannister gave the Commands to Gregor Clegane, and Kevin was effectively the right-hand man of the campaign into the Riverlands. Both are expensive NCUs but fit nicely into this list, it did determine that we will be running a low activation style. Had to get Mountain Units in so doubled up on whilst adding in the Clegane Attachment from the Attachment Box. It left us with an awkward 3pts to fill.

Turncoats could work with mercs being picked up in Lannisport for the third host for the Lannisters. The Brave Companions came into play just before this point as well, so paying off some people in the Riverlands who don’t look to their liege lords favourably seems adequate. With 1pts left, I wanted an Attachment for the second Mountain’s Men Unit that you don’t see too often and isn’t a named character. The Enforcer sounds like it would be perfect for the task they have been given and adds an interesting Order into the mix for the force.

I have enjoyed building these two lists so much that I really want to play with them sooner rather than later!

Battle of the Green Fork

One of the most famous battles from the first book is the Green Fork. It is one of the few that we get a perspective of while it is happening in the form of Tyrion Lannister. The clash is a ploy by Robb Stark which catches the Lannister forces off guard and blocks them into the Riverlands. The token force from the North is brutally beaten and was led by Roose Bolton.

This would be a great opportunity to run a Bolton Faction list early in the timeline of the War of the Five Kings, but it wouldn’t represent the Northern forces coming to fight. So, this will be a Stark list, with Neutrals. The Lannister forces have a lot of characters on the field that we may have to cut some of them or focus on one section of the fight just to accommodate them all.

These lists may seem wild, but trust me on this one. For the Stark side there are a lot of characters that I doubt we will ever see in the tabletop game, however they do have more presence than other characters like Lyanna Mormont. Roose Bolton is leading a mainly Stark force with some significant Karstark presence, it is mentioned that there were shield walls of Karstark Spears, so we had to bring both units in this list.

There was also a mention of Roose possibly shooting on his own forces with the bowmen and is a design implemented into the Bolton archers. Tyrion does end up taking down a Flayed Man in the book with a spike on his helmet, so had to include them. This is also one of the few times that Hand of the King Ned makes sense, so he is thrown into the mix. The extra Attachments are to represent some of the lords that were present but don’t have models.

The Lannister list is a little more complex, with the aim of fitting in as many of the characters present as we can rather than something that looks coherent. Whilst Tywin is commanding the force, he does so from the back and doesn’t hit the field, making him perfect for NCU, but Kevan is in the mix with the main force. Since we would be spending points on an NCU that isn’t present I thought it best to make Kevan the second NCU and allow the battle to focus on the vanguard forces.

For Commander we went with Addam Marbrand who held one flank with a contingent of heavy cavalry, hence the Knights being included in the list. He himself is in some Halberdiers due to their being a large portion of the force with spears and pikes. Tyrion joins the battle with his Stone Crows with The Mountain joining him, Bronn is also there with some Lannisport troops, this is to represent the smallfolk from Lannisport that fought in the vanguard.

The plan Tywin has is to have one flank by the river to be undisciplined forces and tempt the northern forces into committing on that flank, thus breaking through the lines. Then Tywin would wheel the main force led by Kevan into the northern forces and push them into the Green Fork. However, this didn’t work as the forces were not led in a way that showed an untested command and had to push the forces back instead.

This is one of my favourite battles in the book since it gives us a look at the Lannister Tactics. One thing that is important before this battle, is the proxy skirmish between Addam Marbrand’s Outriders and Brynden Tully’s Outriders. If one of Addam’s forces got through and noticed Robbs forces splitting off, then the plot wouldn’t have worked. But due to it, Tywin was surprised, and the lack of information on the enemy resulted in a loss even though they won the battle. It is something rubbed in Tywin’s face following this and some other skirmishes.

Battle of the Camps

CMON have already made a narrative mission for the Whispering Wood, so rather than repeat what they have done, I wanted to do the following fight that results in the devastating defeat of the Westerlands forces, Battle of the Camps.

One important thing to note here is that there is no Commander in the game for the Battle of the Camps, Lord Brax is the only person of note at the time who leads some forces. I hope CMON does consider making some of the vassals of Lannister into a Heroes Box. Brax, Lefford, Lannisport, Marbrand, Westerlings etc, would all be great additions and spark a new design within the Faction.

These lists are kind of an opposite for the Green Folk, with the Stark forces being a bunch of named characters all present, and the Lannister force being mainly Units with few named people.

To best represent Lord Andros Brax, I wanted one of the vassal Commanders and since Addam was used in the last fight, I went with Gregor for this. I was tempted to use Tywin or a Stormcrow Commander but unsure what would best represent the heavy armoured Andros. Since most of the forces are not unique, we have gone with a mainly Lannister Unit force, with Guardsman and Halberdiers. There is a moment in the fight where they go on the defensive in formation which these two Units are perfect at.

The Clegane Brigands are added in to represent the light cavalry that Robb goes up against in the fight, and it is a perfect place to have the Maimed Jaime model in game as well since he was just taken. Kevan and Tywin are again the only NCUs that make sense here since most of the others have not made a play towards the fights and are mostly in King’s Landing trying to deal with Ned.

For Robb’s force it is far more difficult. I wanted to include all the 2pts characters in a house specific Unit, which is possible without Grey Wind and any NCUs, but this seemed to be a stupid idea. Reworking the forces a bit, Umber Cavalry was present alongside Brynden’s Outriders who were making sure no one knew the ambush was coming. Karstark and Mormont forces were present, so Robb was put with a Karstark Unit that wants to be in combat, and then Maege gets to take to the field as well.

For NCUs, this would have been a perfect moment to include some Riverland NCUs but sadly we have none. Hoster Tully observes the battlefield and is the only moment he does anything in the books, it’s quite a heartwarming moment when he sees the siege lifted and his grandson’s banners flying. We better get some good Hoster Tully rules from Tactics! We are stuck with Catelyn and Eddard for NCUs, and this is the last time you will get a Ned NCU so worth doing.

This is a battle I wish we had more characters for so we can represent it better and perhaps could be a 50pts one. It would be a cool scenario to design a three-way battlefield if possible and make each section an objective to hold. I love this game for the creativity it sparks.

Hope you all enjoyed some more themed lists; I had a lot of fun making them and planned to do some of my favourite moments in the future especially for some tournaments coming up where I always try to run themed forces.

Let us know which moments you would like me to try and make some themed lists for!

Have any questions or feedback? Drop us a note in the comments below or email us at contact@goonhammer.com. Want articles like this linked in your inbox every Monday morning? Sign up for our newsletter. And don’t forget that you can support us on Patreon for backer rewards like early video content, Administratum access, an ad-free experience on our website and more.