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So as you know from my reviews, I like to rank game reviews in three categories: gameplay, hobby, and lore. As you can probably guess, unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last decade and a half, the lore of A Song of Ice and Fire (from whence sprang Game of Thrones) is pretty robust. And I have to say that the gameplay of this rank-and-flank miniatures game is quite excellent, playing off both the brutal battles of the books/shows as well as the intrigue and political machinations. What I’m less enthusiastic about, however, is the hobby side of the game. But we’ll get to that.

A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game Review: Gameplay

I have said before on this site that I don’t like rank-and-flank games, but I think I’m beginning to be won over. I was very soured on Warhammer Fantasy, but I think that had a lot more to do with the INCREDIBLE rules bloat that surrounded the game. (I also really hated Mantic’s Kings of War.) But my recent foray into Conquest: The Last Argument of Kings, and now A Song of Ice and Fire are making me think that, when done right, rank-and-flank can indeed be very fun. In fact, in the case of this game, it makes the game what it is.

So what is the game? A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game is a game where you can play as one of seven factions: Stark and Lannister (which come together in the 2-player starter set), and then Greyjoy, Night’s Watch, Free Folk, Targaryen, and Baratheon. The game has alternating activation (which is a big plus in my book) as well as interrupting reactions to those activations (another big plus). Armies are point-based, with 40 points being the standard game (the starter set gives you 30 points per side).

The game is played in one of five Game Modes:

• A Game of Thrones: there are several objective markers placed around the board and as you capture each one you gain unique powers.
• A Clash of Kings: You begin the game with just a fraction of your total army and you gain more as the game progresses.
• A Storm of Swords: This is a siege, with one player as attacker and one as defender. (I’m gonna talk about this more in the hobby section of this review)
• A Feast of Crows: This is about mental fatigue and morale as there are numerous piles of corpses littering the battlefield.
• The Winds of Winter: Both armies have secret missions that they must accomplish.

I am a big fan of this generally, as I’ve always been of the opinion that the pitched battle is narratively boring and should be restricted to tournament play only. (That said, this game is known for being one of the best competitive games in tournaments, even accommodating for Game Modes.)

As it’s rank-and-flank, you line up your forces in neat little rows on movement trays. As you take wounds you lose models, and as you lose complete rows of models then things get worse for you.

There are four basic types of units: Infantry, Cavalry, Monsters, and War Machines. Generally speaking, you don’t get a lot of Monsters and War Machines in a 40 point game. Some, maybe, but not many. There are also Non-Combat Units which matter a great deal to the game, who never appear on the battlefield. These units are people like Cercei Lannister and Sansa Stark. They will be important in the political machinations which give you extra abilities in the game.

The gameplay is relatively straightforward. In an Activation Phase you nominate one unit to Activate. This can be a combat unit or a non-combat unit. It can perform one action. For combat units the options are Maneuver, March, Retreat, Attack, and Charge.

The non-combat units may choose a place on the Tactics board, which offers six abilities which will take effect as soon as the non-combat unit is placed there. These include things like making an enemy unit take a panic test, or giving one unit a free attack action. I am really love the inclusion of the Tactics Board, and I think that it gives the game a lot more complexity. (Both sides of the game use the same Tactics Board, so if Cercei Lannister takes Option 2–restoring wounds to a unit–then Sansa Stark couldn’t then take that same option. Knowing when to use the right non-combat character at the right moment can win you the game.)

That’s the basics of how to play. It’s very straightforward (and I’m not going to get into the details of what an Attack means or what Maneuver means) and you’ll pick up on things very quickly.

One thing that I love about the game is that, among the terrain that is placed, are generally at least two corpse piles which lower a unit’s morale if you’re near them–and the corpse piles can earn victory points that actually go to the corpse pile and aren’t chalked up to either side until the battle is ended and we see how everyone is positioned. This reminds me a great deal of the Gore mechanic in Sludge War, another game that I loved.

A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game Review: Hobby

I kind of love the hobby side of A Song of Ice and Fire, but I also kind of hate it.

For starters, the miniatures are above average–for a board game. They’re better than your average D&D miniature, and the plastic is higher quality. But they are very static. The nice thing is that you can literally open a starter set of House Targaryen and immediately begin to play the game with the models straight from the box, no assembly necessary. The downside is that this means a huge number of the miniatures are monopose. And I am on the record as not minding monopose miniatures generally when a box of ten Space Marines are all monopose–but they’re all in DIFFERENT poses. In this game, you may have twenty swordsmen and there are three poses for them to be in. There isn’t any customization, and the special characters are few and far between.

Painting the miniatures was equally frustrating. Now, I 100% loved diving into this box and painting up my Umber Berserkers. They all were wearing ragged clothes and looking a rough, and it was fun to paint one guy’s boots brown and one guy’s boots tan, and even though there were twelve berserkers in only two poses, they were fun to paint. On the other hand, when I got to the 24 Lannister Guardsmen, which came in three poses–and which were in uniform armor, it got really boring to paint a bunch of guys who gave me no opportunities to play around. And, not to be mean to this game or anything, but A Song of Ice and Fire is not the kind of game that I’m interested in kitbashing.

I will say that all of the horses were a joy to paint. There are four Stark Outriders in the 2-Person Starter Set, but I also had previously gotten the Targeryen Starter Set which is almost nothing but horses. All of them gave me PLENTY of opportunity to have fun and be different. I love that Targaryen box.

But here’s where the hobby aspect really breaks down for me. You can see in all the pictures that I’ve posted for this game that the units are playing around big craggy rocks or near farm buildings. But the game expects you to play everything in 2D.

Now, I don’t doubt that you could take the 2D corpse pile piece and turn that into a 3D corpse pile that is entirely kitbashed, and it might be fun. But I have never seen the game played this way. The closest I’ve seen is when Miniac made a custom table for playing A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game and added little ponds.

But that’s what I said I was going to complain about with the Siege Game Mode. The game gives you three 2D sections of battlements that you are defending and it is just so… meh. If you’re going to play a wargame with a siege you should build a model of a castle wall that you’re defending. I have no doubt the CMON could sell plastic miniatures of all of their 2D terrain (which also includes Forests, Weirwood Trees, Palisades, Ruined Walls, Bogs, and Hedges) and sell them for good money.

What I will say A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game has going for it in the hobby department, at least for me, was that I felt like I was painting an army that didn’t need my entire brain. It’s like when you paint a board game. You wouldn’t paint a Zombicide miniature to the same quality that you’re painting a Space Marine, and that was the vibe I got from painting A Song of Ice and Fire. They were average miniatures for people who didn’t want to try too hard. And, if that’s what you want, then great. It scratched that itch for me.

A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game Review: Lore

I don’t have a lot to say about the lore side of this game except that it is very robust. The game is technically based on the books, not the TV show, so the models are not made to look like the actors. But the world that George R.R. Martin has created is pretty impressive, and fans of either the books or the show will not be disappointed. There are plenty of units just in each faction’s starter box, but there are a ton of additional units that you can buy to supplement your army.

And, I will say that the use of cards and Non-Combat Units makes the flavor of the game feel like the flavor of the books, where what goes on behind the scenes matters just as much as what goes on on the battlefield. So, it gets points for that.

A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game Review: Overall

I’m going to rank it this way:
Gameplay: a solid 7/10
Hobby: a halfhearted 4/10
Lore: a big 8/10

The gameplay is great. From what I understand this game has lost a lot of steam after the disastrous last season of the TV show, but I hope that the new show will generate new interest in the game. We may see new units and houses released, depending on where the story goes. Still, there seems to be a solid fanbase of the game, and I’m excited to get a few games in.

I do wish that the models were better and that the boards had more options for quality terrain, though. Still, a thumbs up from me.