The last article was pushing 2000 words before I even started. Rather than create a 4000 word monstrosity of an article that most of my readers would stop reading halfway through, I decided to split the post. The deckbuilding portion of the post is now ready for your consumption. We’ll start with our primary deck, with the heroes Eleanor, Lanwyn, and Thalin.
The Lady of Gondor
The first thing we are going to need is cheap willpower, and lots of it. Unfortunately, our in-theme options are slightly limited. Luckily, one of the most thematically appropriate options is also one of the most powerful. The Ethir Swordsmen starts life as a 2-cost, 2 WP ally, and just gets stronger from there. Obviously, Eleanor’s escort included some swordsmen who were originally from the mouths of the Anduin river. Since we’re in Mirkwood, carrying a message about growing shadows under the greenwood, it would most certainly be appropriate to add some Silvan Refugees fleeing from the evil of Dol Guldur.
Past that, theme gets a little more tricky. It’s not unreasonable to believe that Thalin may have been accompanied by other Dwarves from Erebor. Bofur in particular will be extremely helpful in adding power to our quest. With his share of the treasure of Erebor, of course, Bofur would be a rich and powerful dwarf. Tagging along on a quest would be an odd thing for him to do. Unless Thalin is a relation of his, and Bofur is coming to keep an eye on his impulsive young relative.
I like it. Story canon is now set. Thalin is Bofur’s young nephew, with a history of rash decisions and impulsive actions. That’s still not really enough questing power – I’d like at least one more ally for questing purposes. Now we’re going to have to stretch out the theme a bit. Although the West Road Traveler is technically a Rohan ally, she has the wonderful distinction of being quite generic. Travelers in Mirkwood, heading west? Why not? There was a road that ran through it, and there are thriving townships of Woodmen living in the vales of the upper Anduin, the kin of the Beornings. Trade between the Beornings or other woodmen and either Dale, Esgaroth, the Mountain, or the Wood? Seems like a reasonable proposition. Although it is still over the “Edge of the Wild,” by half a century after the events of the Hobbit, it seems a much livelier and less desolate place. In another stroke of luck, the West Road Traveler has a location control ability that will be quite useful, especially when some of the locations in Mirkwood and along the Anduin have annoying travel effects, or detrimental effects for being the active location.
Now that we have quite a bit of willpower, let’s turn our attention towards location control. The Woodland Courier is a reasonably useful ally, especially for getting rid of a potentially game-ending turn 1 Brown Lands, or even preventing me from needing to travel to an Enchanted Stream. For additional control, we can bring along a couple of Rhovanion Outriders – friends of Lanwyn from Dale, no doubt. In addition to location control, they can also beef up our attack power. This should be enough to cover a great deal of our questing needs.
Next on the list is defensive support. Three Honour Guards for Eleanor are going to be absolutely essential. No self-respecting Gondorian noblewoman would leave home without them. At least, not if there was a chance that a Hill Troll would try to eat you for breakfast along the way.
To add some more defensive strength, we’ll want a full set of the Defender of Rammas as well. More soldiers from the lady’s escort, of course. A few Gondorian Spearmen would help support Thalin in his direct damage role and round out the combat potential of the deck.
For attachments, we’ll take some obvious ones. Ancient Mathoms for card draw, Gondorian Shields for Eleanor’s defensive needs. Unexpected Courage to make sure that Lanwyn can be ready for combat – her own readying effect will likely be largely countered because Thalin will be killing all of the Eastern Crows before they surge.
Two singleton cards – Black Arrow and a Magic Ring. A one-time +5 boost to Lanwyn’s attack will be helpful against the Hill Troll, if I can draw it. The Magic Ring will be Eleanor’s, providing readying so we can cancel treacheries and still defend, or healing to keep our plucky hero alive in the face of Evil Storms and Hill Trolls alike. As weapons for Lanwyn, we’ll pick Daggers of Westernesse – it’s either that or Blades of Gondolin, and we need the attack boost more than we need progress on the quest. Also, our threat is low enough that we should get good mileage out of the extra attack against enemies with an engagement cost higher than our threat.
Our final attachment will be the Necklace of Girion. Two extra willpower and resource generation on either Thalin or Lanwyn? All for the low, low cost of a single resource and an extra card in the staging area? Yes, please.
Events will just be staples of the spheres. The worrying potential of back-to-back Necromancer’s Reach aside, none of the treacheries in the first two quests are really awful enough to want A Test of Will to add extra support. In Mirkwood, though, it would really be nice to be able to cancel the When Revealed effect of a King Spider or Ungoliant’s Spawn. Two copies of a Hasty Stroke will help against the really nasty shadow effects. Foe-Hammer will draw even more cards, and Feint might let us kill a Hill Troll before it even gets a shot at us.
Along the Anduin, I will be dropping the two copies of A Test of Will in exchange for Ride them Down! If I can keep my threat down long enough to get my questing taken care of, then I can potentially write off that Hill Troll without ever engaging it.
Finally, between Eleanor and Lanwyn, I’ve got the traits necessary to run Well-Warned. Threat reduction will be helpful if I want to stay under the engagement threshold of the troll, or under the threshold of Evil Storm. The side quest Double Back will also aid in that endeavor as well.
The finished deck can be seen on RingsDB here.
The Prince of Mirkwood
For the second deck, our thematic analysis of Passage Through Mirkwood (and its narrative continuity with Journey Along the Anduin) pointed towards a thematic Silvan deck as our partner in this endeavor.
Just so we know what we have to work with, here is a list of all of the Silvan heroes:
- Legolas (Tactics)
- Celeborn (Leadership)
- Legolas (Spirit)
- Mirlonde (Lore)
- Haldir of Lorien (Lore)
- Rossiel (Lore)
- Argalad (Lore)
We are definitely strongly represented in the Lore sphere, which is definitely something to consider. Thematically, Celeborn is straight out, and Haldir of Lorien would be problematic. After all, these are Silvans of the Woodland Realm, not defenders of Lorien. If we’re going to be strict about it, Legolas, Mirlonde, and Argalad are pretty much all we have to work with. That’s not an awful hero lineup for a Lore/Tactics deck, but it leaves something to be desired as a companion for Eleanor’s party.
But the last Silvan hero on the list is a very compelling option here. Rossiel’s backstory indicates that she is from Lorien, but also has her traveling to southern Mirkwood. She is a mortal enemy of the spiderspawn of Mirkwood, and could easily have noticed the growing darkness there. In fact, she could even have been the one who brought it to Thranduil’s attention in the first place.
All of these thematic gymnastics have nothing to do with the fact that I want to run a Rossiel victory display deck. Nothing at all, I tell you.
So, we could do Rossiel, Mirlonde, and Argalad. Or we could replace either Mirlonde or Argalad with either version of Legolas (probably the Tactics variant, because he’s just generally more useful). And, since Argalad’s ability essentially means a point of damage on the Hill Troll every round, or extra support for Thalin’s direct damage, what we’re really looking at is the choice between Mirlonde and Legolas. Which is really a question between 2 more starting willpower and 4 less starting threat, or a powerful ranged attacker, native access to the Tactics sphere to boost Argalad’s attack power, and an actually useful ability.
I think we can all see where this is going here.
Starting out, we’ll look at the set of Lore silvan allies. Silvan Tracker is definitely in, given all of the direct damage effects we’ll be seeing. A couple copies of the Galadhrim healer is a better choice than the Daughter of the Nimrodel, frankly. I mean, I like the repeatable healing of the Daughter, but 2 cost vs. 3 cost is a big deal when I only have two lore heroes. Theme-wise, the healers could have accompanied Rossiel on her journey. Henamarth Riversong is an automatic 2-of. The remaining allies are all troublesome in some way or another. The Mirkwood Runner is a thematic win, but is expensive, and I don’t need attack power. The Galadhrim Minstrel is thematically…difficult, I suppose. Why is a minstrel coming into the greenwood on a spider hunting mission? They could be part of Rossiel’s delegation as well, and the ability could be useful. But there may well be better choices.
Three copies of the Galadhon Archer, on the other hand, are going to be extremely useful. We are in dire need of additional attack, and the direct damage will help wear down the Hill Troll that much faster.
At present, we only have 10 allies, and there’s not much more to draw on that’s in theme. Gandalf is almost always thematically appropriate, given that apparently he is supposed to be in the area anyways, looking for Gollum. But that’s still only 13 allies. So now, I’m going to consider a choice that, on the surface, is thematically weird.
Wandering Ents.
I know, I know. Ents are from Fangorn, very rare, and really have no business being in Mirkwood. But awakened trees – Huorns, if you will – are found in the Old Forest, much, much farther away from Fangorn than the Greenwood is. And, if ancient Elves once gave Ents the gift of speech, could Rossiel – at great need – rouse a Huorn-like tree in the Greenwood? The ally is useful enough that I’m going to say that she could.
Now, let’s quickly add Rossiel’s normal events into our list, as well as a few card draw events. 3 each of Daeron’s Runes and Deep Knowledge, 3 copies of Keen as Lances, and 3 of Out of the Wild. Expensive, but still worth playing even if we have to save up for it. 2 copies of The Door Is Closed!, to supplement Eleanor for cancellation. 2 copies of None Return, to get Rossiel’s defensive boosts up in a timely fashion. The locations in Journey Along the Anduin don’t have many traits in common at all – the only two that do are Brown Lands and the East Bight. Hardly enough to justify Leave No Trace. That points towards Rossiel as a defender, rather than a quester. And frankly, I’m fine with that.
That means that we ought to add in some defensive attachments to boost her up. An extra Gondorian Shield from Eleanor’s deck will help in some measure, as will a Cloak of Lorien. Giving her Elven Mail will boost her frail hit point total, while sentinel is always useful. Finally, she most definitely ought to wield a Burning Brand, so that errant shadow effects don’t throw wrenches into our defensive planning.
While we’re looking at attachments, Protector of Lorien will be quite useful, both for questing support and for emergency defensive boosts. And the Bow of the Galadhrim is the single best attachment that Legolas can wield for our purposes. To round out our selection of attachments, we can add 2 copies of the Long Defeat, to help offer card draw or additional healing to Eleanor and her deck.
Now, let’s take a step back and look at our deck at the moment. One of the weaknesses we identified in Eleanor’s deck was a lack of starting willpower. This deck hasn’t really brought much to the table on that account. Only 2 more willpower from Rossiel from turn one. However, Argalad essentially functions as a repeatable Radagast’s cunning, so we can add another 2 to our effective questing power. So we’re not as badly off as it appeared at first glance. But we probably ought to add a few more cards to help first-turn questing. Secret Paths is a very useful one, especially for dealing with the threat of a turn 1 Brown Lands. Finally, Hands Upon the Bow will let Legolas erase a weaker enemy from the staging area, reducing threat and adding progress at the same time.
Am I confident that these decks are consistent enough to work out well? Not yet. But they look fun enough to deserve a few test runs, to see how they feel. While I do my deck testing in preparation for the start of our narrative adventure, I will also write up the prologue – how we got to the start of our campaign. Stay tuned for the next installment of Agents of the White Council!
The finished deck can be seen on RingsDB here.
