While HBO’s Game of Thrones was a global television sensation, there’s no denying that it sometimes departed dramatically from George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire source material. One famous example is the notorious Ramsay Bolton, the Bastard of the Dreadfort, whose television counterpart became a considerably different villain compared to the horrifying figure Martin originally put on the page.

Book Ramsay is a much less polished character than Iwan Rheon’s version, lacking much of the charisma and calculated cool that made the television character such an entertaining villain. The Ramsay of A Song of Ice and Fire is physically repulsive, volatile, deeply insecure, and almost feral in his cruelty, with Roose Bolton frequently treating his impulsiveness as a liability.

Further, unlike in the show, Ramsay remains alive in the books and could have a major impact on the events of Winds of Winter. The infamous Pink Letter (which claims Stannis has been defeated and threatens Jon Snow) has an uncertain authorship in the novels, leaving Ramsay at the center of one of the saga’s biggest unresolved mysteries. While we may be waiting some time to learn of the Boltons fate in the books, The Way of Whispers reunites fans with the family in a brand-new update for Legends.

Game of Thrones: Legends has recently announced a massive update to its faction system, reorganizing them to resolve some common complaints about gameplay among longtime players. The Way of Whispers faction is a Bolton-based faction that includes Champions that adhere to a “Bolton-style” of combat, primarily focused on Bleed effects and “dodging attacks as enemies defeat themselves.”

Strangely enough, there are no actual Bolton Champions in Game of Thrones: Legends, at least for the time being, but the new update raises possibilities for future Champions to be added specifically to this faction lineup, such as Ramsay or Roose. For now, The Way of Whispers faction includes the following Champions, primarily based on their kits including Bleed/Whispers:

• Aemond Targaryen
• Cersei Lannister (Queen Of The 7 Kingdoms)
• Osha
• Petyr Baelish
• Tyrion Lannister (Lord Of Casterly Rock)

The faction restructuring is a sprawling gameplay update for Legends that longtime players will appreciate given it’s intended to address what many have argued is a shallow roster and a “lack of star power.” The broader overhaul is designed to give every Champion a meaningful faction while making smaller groups more attractive to build around.

Alongside The Way of Whispers, Zynga is introducing the entirely new Sun’s Dominion faction while expanding the Free Folk into Beyond the Wall, the Greyjoys into Lords of the Tide, and the Brotherhood Without Banners into the much broader Scattered Banners. The update will also add 17 new dual-faction Legendary Champions, significantly increasing the number of possible team combinations without removing any Champion’s existing faction affiliation.

The update comes with some balancing changes as well, where teams activating multiple faction bonuses will now receive diminishing returns and faction buffs are being standardized to prevent certain groups from having disproportionately strong advantages. Three new stats (Gem Resistance, Crit Resistance, and Resilience) are also being introduced, alongside several adjustments to gem damage, Poison, and defensive abilities.

The overhaul should make faction-based team building considerably deeper without making multi-faction squads overwhelmingly powerful, and is a massive improvement that Game of Thrones: Legends fans will certainly appreciate when it goes live later this month.

Game of Thrones: Legends

Systems

Released

July 25, 2024

Developer(s)

Zynga

Publisher(s)

Zynga

Multiplayer

Online Multiplayer