Taking the Fight to the Trolls

Welcome to the deckbuilding post for Conflict at the Carrock. Last time, we looked at the way the quest functions, which we will let guide our deckbuilding.

The most prominent feature of the quest is the final boss fight with all four Trolls. This is no easy task, especially since we have essentially committed ourselves to building decks that can take them all on at the same time. In addition, the quest demands that we be able to pace ourselves; if we advance too early, we will find ourselves facing the Trolls before we are ready to do so.

So first, let’s talk about theme. Our narrative has taken us to the borders of the Beorning lands. Their leader is currently Grimbeorn the Old, but he shows up as an objective-ally in the quest, so we are not going to be permitted to bring the new Grimbeorn hero card. That is a pity, because he would be an excellent companion on our little streak of Troll-hunting.

We’ve also been working rather closely with some of the Dunedain that Aragorn brought with him from Eriador to aid in the hunt for Gollum, so we can justify filling out our hero complement with Dunedain.

However, one really interesting idea would be to include the hero Beorn. Beorn is a very useful hero – he’s capable of covering the early game’s defenses all by himself, freeing up hero actions to quest or to kill enemies. In addition, he fits the theme here, with only the small problem that he is most likely dead by this time. On the other hand, Beorn’s death is never given a date. If we give him a preternaturally long lifespan (or even just make him rather young when he encounters Bilbo and his company), then we can justify it. I think the fun factor is worth the chronology issues here. After all, we’re already breaking the timeline. Might as well have fun in our parallel universe. It’s settled. Beorn dies somewhere between this quest and the War of the Ring. And if we lose Beorn in this quest, then we’ll even have a glorious death scene for a hero – a first for this series.

This pushes us towards having a deck filled with mostly Tactics cards – we have two Tactics heroes in our fellowship, and it will make the most sense to put them in the same deck. Building a primarily Tactics deck with also be a first for this campaign. Of course, we can always bring in some of Eleanor’s Gondorian retinue to fill out the ally slots, but our need for a deck that can hold its own in combat as well as the quest’s proximity to the Misty Mountains points me towards another tribal deck that will remain remarkably difficult to justify thematically throughout the rest of the campaign: Eagles. This possibility is further strengthened by the unique ally Landroval, who we can use to get around the rather strict limitations imposed via Beorn’s card text.

An intervention by Eagles in response to a Troll infestation of the Carrock, combined with Eleanor’s party and a few Dunedain who have accompanied Beorn to find out what has become of his son? Sounds like a setting ripe for interesting storytelling!

So, let’s take a look at building the decks:

Eagles at the Carrock:

For our first deck, two of the three hero slots have been filled. Beorn and Thalin will be working together. Including Landroval in the deck means that we will want our third hero to either be from the Tactics or Leadership spheres, because we will need some way to pay or get around Landroval’s expense. Given the lack of any Tactics Dunedain heroes other than Aragorn – who we have already established is off continuing on the hunt for Gollum – we find ourselves pointed towards Leadership. This gives us access to Sneak Attack for Landroval, letting us get the use out of his ability for one resource instead of five.

Our list of Leadership Dunedain heroes is short, but luckily, we have a perfect fit. Amarthiul is a decent defender, a good attacker, and his ability will smooth out the resources, letting him pay for our Eagles cards as well as the few Leadership cards we’ll want to sneak in the deck.

Now that we’ve got our hero lineup, let’s look at the allies.

First, we’ll want 3 copies of the Winged Guardian and the Vassal of the Windlord. These are the bread-and-butter of an Eagles deck, offering cheap, disposable combat power. We’ll also want 3 copies of the Eagles of the Misty Mountains. In addition to being an excellent ally just based on their stats alone, their combat stats are boosted any time an Eagle leaves play. This gives us an enormously flexible ally capable of doing just about anything we need it to.

To complement our Sneak Attack shenanigans, let’s bring in at least 2 copies of the Descendant of Thorondor. At 4 cost, he’s expensive to bring in, but Sneak Attack not only bypasses that issue, it gives us even more value for our resource by triggering his direct damage a second time when he returns to hand at the end of the phase. If Eagles of the Misty Mountains are already in play when we do that, we can place him facedown as an attachment that boosts them even further. Between a copy of Landroval and a speculative copy of Gwaihir (he’s useful, but expensive, and we’ve already got a lot of expensive allies in the deck already), we’re almost done. 3 copies of Honour Guard (one of the most effective ways to keep Beorn from taking damage) round out the tactics allies.

However, one thing we are lacking so far is a powerful defender capable of tanking Troll attacks. Useful Beorn might be, but he’s not up to taking a pounding from 4 Trolls, turn after turn. For that, we’re going to want to beef up Amarthiul’s defense, and one of the best ways to do that is with Dunedain Signal attachments. Towards that end, let’s include 3 Weather Hills Watchmen to dig them out of the deck.

That brings us to 19 allies. A little on the low side, but not worrisome at the moment. For attachments, the first to make the list are 3 copies of Dunedain Warning. Getting one or two of these in play on Amarthiul are going to get his defense high enough to block Troll attacks. Since we have Watchmen to dig out Signal attachments, let’s bring 3 Dunedain Marks as well – we also need to kill the Trolls, not just tank their attacks. The clincher here is going to be Support of the Eagles. With this, we can boost Amarthiul up to enough attack to go one-on-one with a Troll and come out fine. It also gives us multiple options for boosting his defense – if the Dunedain Warnings haven’t come out, then we can boost his defense another way.

We are also going to need a way to ready him. All of our attack and defense boosting have – amazingly – not eaten up his restricted slots, so we can slot in 2 copies of one of the most powerful defensive cards in the sphere: Armored Destrier. With this attached, we can defend the Troll’s attack, and then either block another attack or strike back with Amarthiul’s considerable attack.

A copy of Black Arrow for Lanwyn and 3 Gondorian Shields for Eleanor will round out our attachment list. We’re up to 34 cards, with enough room to add a flexible selection of events.

3 copies of Feint are an auto-include, of course, along with 3 copies of The Eagles Are Coming. We have already determined that we need Sneak Attack, so that’s 9 cards to add to the list. We’re at 43 cards now, with 9 slots left before we reach my preferred deck size of 52. We can cut down to 50 if we don’t find anything worth including, but I often find that 52 cards lets me include one or two more important cards without sacrificing too much consistency.

One of the upcoming adventure packs – The Withered Heath – has a powerful event card that will be exceptionally useful here. Beorn’s greatest weakness is his low defense. Although he doesn’t exhaust to defend against attacks, his low defense means that he will take damage. And, since he’s immune to player card effects, he can’t be healed or have his defense boosted.

However, we are not powerless to increase his odds in combat. In particular, cards that reduce the attack value of incoming attacks, or cancel damage without targeting a hero can extend his lifespan dramatically. Beorn’s Rage, from the aforementioned adventure pack, is exactly what we are looking for here. After Beorn defends an attack, we can play the card to reduce the attack value by 2. And since it reduces the enemy’s defense as well, Beorn’s counter-attack will be that much more effective. Since the card isn’t loaded into OCTGN yet, we will proxy it using 3 copies of the Core Set event Quick Strike.

In the same vein, the side quest Keep Watch will be useful here. Although it won’t affect the unique Trolls in the final boss battle, we can use it to reduce the attack of the Muck Adders, regular Hill Trolls, and other assorted enemies we will find in the wilderness near the Carrock.

Speaking of side quests, we also would probably like to include Prepare for Battle to get some card draw – which this deck is sorely lacking – and Gather Information, to let us pull either our single copy of Landroval or one of the other side quests out of the deck.

For our final 3 cards, I decided to put in an interaction more aimed at fun then mechanical power. The event Ranger Summons is a Signal card, so it can be pulled out of the deck with the Weather Hills Watchman. When played, it lets us shuffle a copy of the ally Ranger of the North into the encounter deck. While this is not a consistent card, it is a great deal of fun. In addition, the Ranger has the surge keyword, and would give us another card that can trigger Lanwyn’s special ability.

At 52 cards, this deck is looking quite nice. Let’s see what we can do with the other deck.

Eleanor and the Hunters

With our Tactics deck, we’ve already committed to the use of side quests. Keep Watch is just so powerful with the hero version of Beorn, and Gather Information is important to make sure we can pull it. Incidentally, side quests offer an answer to the second potential issue this quest puts us up against. Questing to side quests lets us avoid advancing the quest until we’re good and ready to do so. And the hero most conducive to the use of side quests happens to be a good Dunedain friend, Thurindir.

So, what does a deck with Eleanor, Thurindir, and Lanwyn look like?

The first thing we are going to want is questing power. We won’t need to go overboard on it, but we don’t want to skimp either. 3 Ethir Swordsmen from Eleanor’s guard, 3 Dunedain Pathfinders to quickly advance our board state, and 2 West Road Travellers give us a nice core to work from. 2 copies of Arwen and 2 of Bofur keep us narratively consistent, and Arwen will give Amarthiul or Eleanor sentinel to block Troll attacks anywhere on the board.

We will need some location control to deal with the locations the Pathfinder brings with him, so let’s add 2 Northern Trackers in addition to Lanwyn’s brothers, who we are representing with Rhovanion Outriders so far. Both of these cards add some additional attacking punch to the deck. Although we probably won’t want to engage many enemies, it’s nice to be able to handle them without needing to panic, especially since the combat-focused deck is very light on Ranged attackers to help us out.

In addition, 2 copies of the East Road Ranger will give us early willpower to clear out side quests, and attack power once we are focusing more on the main quest again. That sort of flexibility will be valuable once we need to switch abruptly from questing to fighting the Trolls. We’ll also include 2 Wardens of Healing, to help us recover from any damage we do take.

That gets us 20 allies in the deck, and I can’t resist the urge to add 1 copy of Sulien, a Dunedain ally that I very seldom find a use for. At 3 willpower for 4 cost, she’s not a bad purchase just for stats, but her ability is more well-suited for 3- or 4-player games, where the staging area can fill up with locations, threatening to block all progress the players could make.

Since we’re bringing Thurindir, we’ll include Gather Information – this will be the side quest we choose for our opening hand. Double Back will be the second side quest – we don’t really need the threat reduction, but it’s narratively appropriate and it gives Thurindir another willpower boost. Still, if we end up deciding not to bother with all of the side quests we have to choose from, this will probably be it.

For attachments, we will start out with our usual fare. 2 Unexpected Courage, 3 Ancient Mathoms, and a Magic Ring for Eleanor. If we are including side quests for Thurindir, the Legacy Blade is an auto-include. With only a little bit of investment, if can add +2 or +3 attack to Lanwyn, letting her meaningfully contribute to the task of Troll-killing. 2 copies of The Road Goes Ever On will let me translate completing one side quest into finding another one – this lets me use Gather Information to pull other important cards from the deck instead of only using it to find more side quests.

We will also want condition removal to deal with the Sacked! treachery cards. Having a Dunedain hero makes me want to try out Athelas – a card which I seldom put into a deck. Between the Wardens of Healing and the Dunedain allies, I should have enough actions to be able to use one to get rid of a sack.

Finally, let’s include some cards to help the other deck. Since Amarthiul wants to keep enemies engaged with him to trigger his abilities, Entangling Nets will help make sure that those enemies are much easier to defend against while we leave them alone. Similarly, we can add a Song of Wisdom and some Burning Brands to cancel shadow effects – especially given the existence of shadow effects that reduce or ignore defense. If we need to smooth resources, the song+brand could also be given to Eleanor, to let her defend against Troll attacks without fear of a bad shadow effect overcoming her defensive capabilities.

Finally, we’ll add some events in. Deep Knowledge and Daeron’s Runes are standard inclusions in a Lore deck, and they help us see enough of our deck to have an answer to whatever the quest throws at us. For the final 3 slots to bring us to 52 cards, let’s add in 3 copies of Well-Warned. Again, the threat reduction isn’t strictly necessary, but in an ideal world, we don’t want to engage many enemies with the Spirit/Lore deck. Keeping our threat low while letting the other deck engage and deal with the enemies is a decent idea, if we can pull it off.

And that’s our decks. Go ahead and check them out on RingsDB here, and be sure to keep an eye on this space for more content! In addition, I’ve already recorded and posted the video of my runthrough. Watch it here.