Help killing the hobbits

[Haszor]

One of the guys in my playgroup runs a hobbit deck that has some very nice comps and winds up being very hard to beat.  I don't actually want to have the exact deck that would work best as chances are I won't be able to build it.  Also I don't remember exactly what he has so I'll just drop what I can.
1x Frodo, Reluctant Adventurer
1x Sam, Great Elf Warrior (Start)
1x Merry, Friend to Sam (Start)
1x Pippin, Wearer of Black and Silver (Start)
2x Bilbo, Melancholy Hobbit
1x Tolman Cotton
4x A Promise
4x Fates Entwined
4x Everyone Knows
4x Hobbit Sword
2x Sting, Weapon of Heritage
3x Escape
2x O Elbereth Giltheneol
2x Tale of the Great Ring
I know this isn't exactly what he runs but it's something pretty close.  Next time I see it I'll update.

[NappyKorn]

you could try to bomb him with a sneaky gollum trick. Gollum, Old Villian and A Dark Shape Sprang. Build a support area full of pumping cards like Slippery as Fishes and Chasm's Edge and wait for him to put a possession on his Ring-bearer then bomb him. If you control the path gollum will be strength +2 for each copy of Slippery as Fishes and if he has his ring bound comps out +1 for each of those. Gollum, Old Villian on their RB is strength +2 for each card you toss from hand and assuming you toss all the cards except the gollum (which might come from your discard if you tossed one already) and the A Dark Shape Sprang that +12 to +14 more. Best case scenario 4x Slippery as Fishes at a river, his 3 unbound companions out and you hand tossed to pump Gollum is strength 39 I believe sounds like a potential overwhelm to me  . Of course this isnt going to work against many decks and once the surprise is sprung chances are it wont ever work again unless you hide your deck well by throwing in random cards so they see you toss a different culture into your discard pile each game. You also didn't say what ring they were using that Age's End ring will cause you problems as well.

[Haszor]

He uses ATAR most of the time, but the difficulty is his RB gets to maximum of around 10, then he can use Merry to jump him to 19 and I know he has events I just can't remember what they are.  Also in a best case scenario he can just drop the Tale of the Great Ring and only wind up with a wound.

[NappyKorn]

with all the open deck space you have to play with use some gollum skirmish events to put his The Tale of the Great Ring option to bed before it even starts, but yeah it is a gamble but you are counting on his having his events his Merry not having any wounds and such to keep him from overwhelmed when it basically takes you 1 card and him screwing up and dropping that possession on Frodo without knowing whats going on lol. Granted my best case scenario involved you having all 8 of your conditions out but that is made easy with a fellowship that runs a smeagol to burn with SFtF grabbing Not Easily Avoided and 2 of the needed conditions etc. If he does run condition discard by chance pack a few Deceits. Once again once your opponent sees the deck it will probably never works again unless you disguise it differently each time by replacing random cards with other random cards to make the deck look different when you reconcile your hand or just get forced to discard junk.

EDIT:

Just a quick throw together idea for you it might actually work in another way but remember it will work best paired with a fellowship that starts Gandalf, Leader of Men and some version a smeagol to burn with a SFtF.

Shadow (30) 
4x Chasm's Edge (13R44) 
2x Deceit (18R29) 
1x Not Easily Avoided (18R32) 
4x Slippery as Fishes (9R+29) 
4x A Dark Shape Sprang (10R19) 
2x Hobbitses Are Dead (7R61) 
4x It's My Birthday (13C51) 
4x Little Snuffler (13U52) 
4x We Must Have It (5C30) 
1x *Gollum, Old Villain (6C40) 

I've explained the first and probably main idea but if you see them playing a ring that doesn't have a response action you could opt to burn smeagol and grab 3 Little snufflers (if its a hobbit hope you get the 4th in hand b4 region 2). Then you just play gollum by either having him in hand, having a We Must Have it, or playing Not Easily Avoided to grab him hit most RBs with 3 Little Snufflers (dead if they don't run a response type ring) or if a hobbit RB hope you can get the 4th Little Snuffler by same means either drawing it early or by having Not Easily Avoided in play and some luck . Give it a try it might do your friend's deck in but like I mentioned the A Dark Shape Sprang Strat goes down the drain after they see it the first time unless you are good at disguising your deck.

[Haszor]

But with only one minion I'd have to save him for site nine in order to get him to the maximum strength and the odds of getting a possession on the last site are minuscule.

[bebpc]

wana beat this deck??
is prety simple, make a uruk hai deck with 4 saruman power
just pul big uruk and destroy the conditions, without conditions they are only weak hobbits

[NappyKorn]

I'm confused, why would you have to wait for site 9 for him to be at max strength? and yes it 1 minion but you have 4 events that can pull him from draw deck or discard pile. Chances are you wont have to wait for site 9 to overwhelm a ring bearer. If the first thing he plays at site 1 is a possession on Frodo and you have that event smack him with it cause that means he doesn't have his deck setup with A promise, A tale of the Great Ring. Frodo will be at strength 6 if he doesn't have any events in hand with him exerting Merry to gain +3 strength that's 9 strength. Play A Dark Shape Sprang (playing Gollum from your draw deck) meaning you have 7 cards left in hand to toss. Gollum is base strength 5 and 7 cards worth +2 each means Gollum is strength 19, 19 is more than twice 9 he is overwhelmed and you won at site 1  .

Unless some new rule is in effect that I don't know about since I was more active in the game your minions or their companions don't lose or gain strength according to how far along the site path they are. Infact the further along the game goes means they are setup better making it harder for you to overwhelm unless you are equally as setup as they are. Not to mention with you not playing minions that will make them feel safe in double moving and giving you more twilight to fool around with since it appears they are trying to choke you and even if you don't play minions you can use that extra twilight to get your conditions out which will prove vitality as they progress up the adventure path and set themselves up better .

As I mentioned as well with the option to blast em with Little Snufflers early since you say the play ATAR, the only thing a bit tough about that move is you'd have to bid to go first get a SFtF in hand, hopefully a Gollum (or We Must Have It) and the 4th Little Snufflers. You actually would have your reconcile from your first move, and possible your reconcile after they stop at site 2 and then your reconcile after you stop at site 3 to gather 2 of the 9 cards you'd need. It take a bit of luck to pull off the Little Snufflers trick on a Hobbit RB since they have 4 vitality, but it can be done.

Once again you just have to know how to setup and calculate strengths and hope you are ready for them to play that possessions on their RB when it comes. It is a hit or miss, but you cant be scared to pull the trigger when you see that possession played. Like my example showed if they pay attention to what they are doing leave you the twilight to cover Gollum's roaming cost and drop that sword at site 1 you can get Gollum to strength 19 with just the cards in hand and not a single condition or event in play on your part .

[NappyKorn]

wana beat this deck??
is prety simple, make a uruk hai deck with 4 saruman power
just pul big uruk and destroy the conditions, without conditions they are only weak hobbits

that too , beats my book I'm trying to publish here lol.

[FM]

Yeah, that was the first thing that caught my attention as well. Whenever a deck is crushing you, break it down by card type, to see if you notice a pattern. In this case, he has a bajillion conditions, and swords. Yeah. All you need to do is play cheap Uruks (mostly from Tower's Block) with some vitality and Lurtz's Battle Cry and other events that up the damage count, and pack 4 Saruman's Power. Even if he gets to activate Pippin, you'll still have someone left to engage the weak Hobbits left, and if strength alone does not kill him, the damage boost that he didn't see coming most likely will. Then, you just sit back and go about killing one at a time, until NOT assigning Pippin is not an option, and then Uruks start puring through in groups. Simple.
If you're worried about his ring-bearer being too resilient, you can always play Worry as well, pain in the #$&*@! card to deal with, playing only Hobbits.

[Yrael]

You are just lucky they aren't using sudden fury like my cousins do >_<. They get sudden fury, a promise, and consorting with wizards out on Bilbo, Aged Ring Bearer. So they have Frodo skirmish with the AE ring, add a few burdens, then have Bilbo skirmish, remove the burdens, but not take any wounds due to consorting, and then have sam win with Sudden Fury and heal everyone up >_<. Or if it's early, they'll have them all lose, and get like 6 sudden fury tokens.

What I have found though, is that Grond, Hammer of the Underworld works VERY well against this deck. I also have a Nazgul deck that has a good number of anti-condition cards, as well as a number of conditions to really mess him up. (More Unbearable +Stooping to the Kill on fierce Nazgul is so much fun )