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| Grashopper |
![]() Posted: Thu Nov 03, 2005 5:36 am |
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Joined: 20 Jul 2005
Posts: 44
Location: Schalbruch, Germany
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--- description ---
Shows how to make use of some of the new "Three Hunters" cards, and builds a new standard-legal fellowship that uses them effectively.
--- end description ---
Have you ever watched The Two Towers and just wanted to kick some butt with Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli? The Hunters are coming and it features some great cards to get these three to work together with some other companions to beat up a shadow. This article is about how to effectively make use of some of those cards, and assembles a new standard-legal (no Two Towers Block) fellowship that uses them effectively.
Hunters features one new Gimli, and two new versions each of Aragorn and Legolas, so let’s take a look first at our Hunters and decide which to use. Since there is only one Gimli (Eager Hunter), he goes in, but he’s a good one. His Hunter 3 makes him an impressive base 9 against non-hunter minions, and he retains his typical damage +1. This deck is going to have an archery bent, so we’re going to pack the rare versions of Legolas and Aragorn. Legolas, of the Woodland Realm is Hunter 1, an inherent Archer, and can exert himself to potentially add to the archery pool. Not bad! Aragorn, Thorongil is similarly useful in that he’s Hunter 2, giving him a base of 10 strength against non-hunter minions, a Ranger, and can add threats to exert minions with less strength than him, giving him some effective swarm protection.
Legolas and Gimli each cost 2 twilight, so they are going to be our starting companions, and we need a way to reliably pull Aragorn. We could pack four copies of him, but that could prove expensive on the pocketbook, given that he’s already one of the most sought-after rares online, and probably will be offline as well, so we need another reliable way to play him early. There are actually 2 sites that prove useful to doing this, East Wall of Rohan or The Prancing Pony. I prefer The Prancing Pony, but you can feel free to pack East Wall if you prefer to give exertions over a burden. I tend to bid 0 and take my chances on whether I go 1st or 2nd. If I end up going 2nd, one new way to make sure your sites don’t get swapped out is the new rare site, Mt Doom. Play Mt. Doom at site 2 and The Prancing Pony at site 3, and it can’t be switched out, guaranteeing you’ll get Aragorn out no later than site 3.
Now that we have our main companions and a way to get them out early, we need to think about who else will accompany them on their trip to Mount Doom. For that matter, we need to think about WHO they’ll be escorting, since that IS the whole point of the game. The new Frodo is nice, but as I mentioned above, this deck is going to have an archery bent, so we’re going to pack a Ring-bearer that can help us put as many arrows in the air as possible, and there’s no better Ring-bearer for this than Galadriel, Bearer of Wisdom (or BoW for short). See, she gets a bow, just from her name!  Ok, maybe not, but she can carry an elven bow, which helps our strategy. I’m going to give her the Ring of Rings as well. It’s really the perfect choice for this deck, as it not only adds to her low resistance, but it also allows her to trade wounds for burdens anytime, and since we ARE going to be adding threats, it would really suck if those threats wiped out our fellowship in one fell swoop. I originally packed the new Ring of Doom, but I got wiped a couple of times by the threats I added and it sucked, so in goes Ring of Rings.
Going along with our archery theme, our other companions should probably be elves as well, so in goes one copy each of Arwen, Queen of Elves and Men (great in wounding decks), along with Celeborn, The Wise (let’s get those events back), and Gil-galad as a strong fighter, and for more wounding in the regroup phase to setup some double moves. This gives us seven companions so far and five elves overall. Another non-elf companion that goes along extremely well with archery is Eowyn, Lady of Ithilien, so we’ll put her in as well. The significant amount of wounding this deck puts out will probably make double moves a real possibility, and you know what’s better than double moves? Triple Moves! So in goes Radagast, the Brown, which brings our fellowship to the limit of 9.
Now all these companions will need some toys, so let’s give them some possessions to play with. Archery is the theme, so four copies of elven bow go in, one for each elf not named Legolas, as well as 2 copies of the new Aragorn’s Bow. I’m packing 2 to help ensure it gets out, b/c it is so key to this deck being able to run down the site path. Trading threats for wounds is great, especially with... Gimli’s Battle Axe, Trusted Weapon is very tech here, as we have the ability to add threats for benefit with Aragorn or his bow, and with three threats out and carrying his axe, Gimli essentially becomes an archer as well (and strength +1 and damage +1). Gotta love it. Now if only there was some way to make Radagast an archer as well… Well, thanks to the new follower, Dinendal, Mirkwood Archer, there is! Just transfer this follower to Radagast, exert him and viola, nine companions, eight archers! If Radagast isn’t out, you can transfer Dinendal to Gimli as well. Gimli’s axe doesn’t make him an archer, so with 3 threats out and carrying his axe and this follower, he’ll give 2 archery wounds all by his lonesome. Other possessions we’re adding are 3 copies of Sword of the Fallen, the new sword that reduces a minions strength for each wound they have, the new Ithilien blade for Aragorn (works great in region 1, and all game against Shelob), a Ranger’s cloak for Aragorn, to give him a little more vitality, and finally Aragorn also gets 2 copies of his Knife of the Galadhrim**, great for finishing off abnormally large, exhausted minions. Eowyn also gets her sword, useful for adding an extra wound to make those high-vitality companions give out 3 wounds instead of 2. And Galadriel gets Nenya to help with some healing.
Now we’ve got a pretty good base, and just need to finish off the deck by adding some conditions and events that can help our companions out and fit with the theme. There are many available, but I’m going to tilt towards new ones introduced by the new Hunters block. Thus, in goes two copies of Forth the Great Hunters! A very versatile card, it can help wound characters, make them weaker, or cycle your deck, and it’s a perfect match for this deck. Also going in are two copies of Focus, which helps heal our fellowship and doubles as a pump for our elven companions. Celeborn’s text is too good to pass up using any events at all, so in goes two copies of seclusion and two copies of the new elven event, Point Blank Range. Point Blank Range doesn’t need to spot ELVEN archers, just 3 archers of any type to make it a +4 pump for any elf, which shouldn’t be too hard.
Other events and conditions that fit particularly well in the theme of the deck: Elven Marksmanship, Nocked, Many Miles
This fellowship cycles pretty well, as there are essentially only 5 cards in it that can’t be played in the fellowship phase, which can complement almost any shadow well. Below is the final decklist. I hope you’ve enjoyed this article and Go Forth and Enjoy the Great Hunters!
Ring-bearer:
Galadriel, Bearer of Wisdom
The One Ring, the Ring of Rings
Starting:
Gimli, Eager Hunter
Legolas, Of the Woodland Realm
Adventure Deck:
The Prancing Pony
8 other sites.  -- Gear the sites towards your shadow, but keep your fellowship in mind when doing this. You’ll probably want to think hard about using Cavern Entrance if you have Eowyn out, for example.
Free Peoples (33 Cards):
Gimli, Eager Hunter (starting)
Legolas, Of the Woodland Realm (starting)
Aragorn, Thorongil
Arwen, Queen of Elves and Men
Gil-Galad, Elven King
Celeborn, The Wise
Eowyn, Lady of Ithilien
Radagast, the Brown
2 x Aragorn’s Bow, Ranger’s Longbow
3 x Sword of the Fallen
4 x Elven Bow
Ithilien Blade
Ranger’s Cloak
Gimli’s Battle Axe, Trusted Weapon
2 x Knife of the Galadhrim
Nenya, Ring of Adament
Eowyn’s Sword, Dernhelm’s Blade
2 x Forth the Three Hunters!
2 x Focus
2 x Seclusion
2 x Point Blank Range
Dinendal, Mirkwood Archer
**Special thanks to JoseR for recommending Knife of Galadhrim during an online playtest |
Last edited by Grashopper on Wed Nov 09, 2005 4:37 am; edited 2 times in totalCheck out this Online Strategy TCG:
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| JoseR |
![]() Posted: Fri Nov 04, 2005 11:48 am |
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Joined: 03 Nov 2005
Posts: 1
Location: Georgia
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cool article!
It gives me the general idea how the deck works and how the new 'Forth the Three Hunters!' card is used.
The only small problem about the deck is that i would take out Eowyn's blade out of the deck.. It's difficult to draw 1 copy of eowyn let alone one copy of the blade. 
Instead i would add a third 'Forth the Three Hunters!' that card is very important and just too good! Having it out site 1 is key.
I like how you combined mount doom and the prancing pony, so that u can always have aragorn out before site 4. Nice combo. 
Thanks for the great details! I have to put a similar deck together now. 
Good job! |
| "May The Force Be With You" |
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| Cleston |
![]() Posted: Fri Nov 18, 2005 4:51 pm |
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Joined: 10 Aug 2005
Posts: 110
Location: Brasil
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hey,
I like it, but I gave you a 4 because I think you could have discussed a bit mroe about match-ups (always a good thing to know when considering decks you know nothing about), and about the sites as well. I never played archery decks, so, what should I do?
About the deck, what I don't like about that build is that you use so many weapons. I'd drop all the elven hand weapons in order to get some elven marksmanship or take up the bow, which are both very important for this deck.
More copies of Aragorn would also be fine, but I like the Mount Doom idea. But it's also important to keep in mind that some shadows would need it late game (like Orcs, in many strategies).
Keep it coming,
Cheers! |
- "If I die, your deck will crumble!"
Gandalf (any of them) |
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| Grashopper |
![]() Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 3:51 am |
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Joined: 20 Jul 2005
Posts: 44
Location: Schalbruch, Germany
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| Thanks for the feedback, Cleston. Yes, I know take up the bow and Elven Marksmanship work well in this deck, but I was trying to use as many Hunters cards as possible (as I stated in the article). The version of this I play online in tournaments has some minor tweaks, but the overall concept remains intact. |
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| AnxiousChieftain |
![]() Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2005 9:22 pm |
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Joined: 15 Jul 2005
Posts: 3947
Location: Maryland
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Nice job on the article. If I used it, I wouldn't have quite so many companions, but I'm different than most people.  |
| MODS RULE. - lem0nhead |
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| Guest |
![]() Posted: Tue Nov 29, 2005 1:30 am |
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| Very well written article, clear and easy to read. Archery is a fun deck to play and this would pair well with the Evil Man archery for minions. Excellent idea using Mt. Doom and PRancing Pony to ensure Aragorn is out by site 3. Looks like I'll be playing archery again with hunters! |
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| AnxiousChieftain |
![]() Posted: Thu Dec 01, 2005 6:12 pm |
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Joined: 15 Jul 2005
Posts: 3947
Location: Maryland
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| Congrats in advance, Grashopper. |
| MODS RULE. - lem0nhead |
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| Guest |
![]() Posted: Thu Dec 08, 2005 1:57 am |
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| woohoo! thanks AC, thanks Conor! |
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| Cleston |
![]() Posted: Thu Dec 08, 2005 5:45 pm |
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Joined: 10 Aug 2005
Posts: 110
Location: Brasil
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nice work grasshoper, you just proved me one won't need 10 pages of Wrod to get people's likings!
I shall write again, now that I took a month out after my win, my ethics will allow me to write once more.... |
- "If I die, your deck will crumble!"
Gandalf (any of them) |
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| ingold55 |
![]() Posted: Thu Dec 08, 2005 6:04 pm |
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Joined: 10 Oct 2005
Posts: 1199
Location: Out on the front line
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Very nice! well writen and it held my attention. if it can do that you have one good article.
I am a Gondor man myself, so i can't wait until you write one for Gondor!
once again very well writen!
ingold |
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