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
.