Saturday saw the long overdue return of A Game of Thrones the boardgame second edition (that’s a mouthful to say) to the table.

The impetus to get it back was to play it with the third and largest expansion for the game Mother of Dragons.

I bought the expansion early on during the big global event if memory does not fail me on this. For sure it was during said event.

So at some point I was going to want to play this again.

To help encourage getting it back to the table I did add it to two of the gaming challenges I set up at the start of the year.

So a couple of months back I setup an event on the Fenland Gamers discord server. I had three players (including myself) able to commit to playing the game. With a fourth unsure.

We needed four players to be able to use the new map of Essos and House Targaryen. Which is one of the major attractions of the expansion.

In the days, even weeks before I did try getting the playmat for the game. Sadly there were none in stock, those on eBay that looked affordable had a massive (£70+ postage!). Even a couple of pleas on a Facebook gaming group went unanswered.

On the day the unsure sadly was not able to make it. But as I was getting that news and about to start putting away the extra map and Targaryen pieces in walked Jimmy and an unexpected Nathaniel. We had a fourth.

A brief note on setting up before the players arrived. Which you know I like to do. For this game I setup as much as I could before everyone arrived. However which houses were controlled by players and which were to become vassal houses couldn’t be done until everyone had arrived. Luckily everything a player needed for each house was bagged, decks ready. So once selected all they had to do was grab everything for that house. Then it was just a matter of getting the components needed for each vassal house from the houses components.

Whilst waiting for Jeff to arrive we started choosing our houses for the game.

I went first and chose Targaryen. I wanted this house in the game, the only way to guarantee it was to choose it myself.

Here are how the houses ended up being chosen.

• Stark – Jimmy
• Baratheon – Nathanial
• Targaryen – Me
• Tyrell – Jeff

The vassal houses were: Lannister, Greyjoy, Martell, Arryn.

Oh we were also using the Tides of War deck in combat.

Then battle commenced.

Despite repeated warnings throughout the game about Jeff and how he was clocking up strongholds and castles in the name of House Tyrell. Jimmy and Nathaniel kept attacking me whilst leaving Jeff mostly alone.

Then the moment came when I declared Jeff had won the next round. By then there was nothing they could do. They tried in vein to delay the inevitable. But their efforts were futile.

It was interesting that even at the moment I had declared Jeff’s impending victory he too had not fully seen it.

If only someone had warned them earlier!

All I did was sit back and watch events unfold as predicted, whilst inflicting a final bit of humiliation to Nathaniel as payback for the constant naval attacks by capturing the Baratheon castle.

I’m a fan of the earlier two expansions A Feast for Crows (four players) and A Dance with Dragons (six players). But for me Mother of Dragons beats them hands down.

The vassal system introduced adds a new additional tactical element to the game from choosing which house to take control of, to how you are going to use them that turn. Granted it adds considerably to the play time (there are rules handling if a player has to leave during a game, they also become a vassal!) The vassal system replaces the neutral force tokens of the base game, and I really do prefer it.

I liked House Targaryen and the dragons. Although it does add a rather big target to your back. I think Nathaniel and Jimmy were too focused on my threat with the dragons enabling Jeff to exploit that distraction. But they were cool to play and have their alternative win condition. Plus their specific Westeros deck did seem to encourage a bit of wheeling and dealing with the other houses.

The Iron Bank cards were interesting, although Jeff was the only one who bought one. I think more plays are required before I can make my mind up over these.

I like that you can use the other expansions house cards with this one. So if you only play Mother of Dragons they are not just collecting dust. Plus for now another reason to get the game back to the table!

Mother of Dragons will be my preference when it comes to playing A Game of Thrones. Unless time is tight and the player count matches up the other expansions won’t get a full outing.

I had a blast and can’t wait to revisit Westeros to get my revenge and recapture the Iron Throne.