Today we're dipping our toes into some of the new
mechanics incoming, mainly the Denethor signet and the revitalized Ally card type.
•Denethor, Sitting Steward Ally • Home 3[K] & 4[K] • Man
Strength 6
Vitality 4
Denethor Signet
Each companion and ally here without the Denethor signet is strength -1.
Skirmish: Discard a card with the Denethor signet from hand to make an unbound companion (except Aragorn) strength +2.
"...upon the lowest step which was broad and deep, there was a stone chair, black and unadorned, and on it sat an old man gazing at his lap."I wrote the
twilight cost and knew I'd need to write something powerful and Denethorific to go along with it. So, signets. Signets
by all rights should've been Denethor's biggest tool, and frankly I love how freely he is about flinging his people away in pursuit of winning the war. And of course Denethor doesn't have to exert to do any of this: just sit, and order.
I've set all Minas Tirith Allies as "3[K] & 6[K]" but, well, since Denethor doesn't exactly make it through the battle, I thought moving him to 3 & 4 a little pinch of flavor. I did consider having a line like "After site 5[K], discard Denethor." but I think he's enough of a painted-target as it is, and there will be plenty of
ally hate in the posts to come.
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Fountain Guard Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength 9
Vitality 3
Denethor Signet
Knight. Damage +1. To play, spot 3
fortifications.
This ally may not roam.
"...and above the cheek-guards were set the white wings of sea-birds; but the helms gleamed with a flame of silver, for they were indeed wrought of mithril
, heirlooms from the glory of old days."Really super good at the two
sanctuaries, but these allies can't roam (meaning they're unable to leave their home sites). Cheap though, and a bonus to any fortification-heavy decks.
I really didn't want to stick the Denethor signet onto Fountain Guard (for reasons way too dependent on lore to apply functionally, for once) but I needed a good strong ally to showcase some of what's going on in Gondor. There are going to be much better fodder for Sitting Steward to abuse, but this would do in a pinch since he's only actually useful in skirmishes at two sites.
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Sword of the Citadel Artifact • Hand Weapon
Strength +1
Bearer must be a knight ally.
This artifact may be spotted as a possession.
Skirmish: Spot a
fortification here and exert bearer to make him or her strength +2.
"...and none wore it now in all Gondor, save the Guards of the Citadel before the Court of the Fountain where the White Tree once had grown."An option for a player willing to go all-in on the Minas Tirith culture (knights +
allies + fortifications, basically), able to be borne by an as-yet-undetermined number of characters. There could be a unique Fountain Guard, and I imagine
Imrahil would be a decent candidate. But there's bound to be a few knights represented as allies to represent the defense of the city. Characters we haven't seen before...
It's a great weapon but generally ceremonial, so its effectiveness comes with exertion. I had an effect just like that planned for the Fountain Guard, but decided to offload it onto the weapon itself.
I wanted this sword to be an Artifact but also be as vulnerable-to-discard as a possession. So, there.
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•By Our Valour Condition • Support Area
To play, exert a
ally.
Each time a
character is killed or discarded, add a
token here.
Regroup: Remove X
tokens here to reveal X cards at random from a Shadow player's hand. That Shadow player shuffles any revealed minions into his or her draw deck.
"'By our valour the wild folk of the East are stil restrained, and the terror of Morgul kept at bay; and thus alone are peace and freedom maintained...'"I don't feel like this card is quite finished but I mostly like the idea, and it synergizes well with Sitting Steward.
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Secret Soldiers Event • Maneuver
Stealth.Exert a ranger ally to wound a minion (or 2 minions if that ranger ally is roaming).
"He could see them stealing up the slopes, singly or in long files, keeping always to the shade of grove of thicket, or crawling, hardly visible in their brown and green raiment, through grass and brake."This card might look familiar.
I had the name before I had the idea of screenshotting
Secret Sentinels and simply putting a ranger twist on it; but that's what I ended up doing since the parallels between what each card is attempting to "say" are fairly apparent.
The wording is a little fine and relies on a concept which exists currently only in my brain: Roaming Freeps. Companions, Minions, and Allies each now have different rules for whether or not they're roaming:
Allies are roaming anytime they participate in any phase at a site other than those listed as their home sites. Elrond, a Site 3[F] Ally, is roaming if he does anything at literally any site except 3[F]. (
OWMWF makes the ally it targets roaming.)
Companions are roaming anytime the fellowship occupies a site lacking their culture icon.
Chamber of Mazarbul might be reprinted with
and
icons, meaning Gimli wouldn't be roaming here, but Legolas would be.
Minions work in nearly the same way as Companions, in that they're roaming at any site lacking their culture icon. However, this only applies until the current site matches the minion's site number, at which point normal non-roaming rules are in effect.
When extended to a 30-site game, there is one additional rule for roaming: if a [F],
,
, or [R] card appears outside of its matching site path, it's roaming. A
minion with a site number of 4[F] is roaming at any non-[F] site, in addition to the parameters detailed above.
Sooo, with all of that in mind, Secret Soldiers gets pretty good as you rally your ranger allies into skirmishes, since skirmishing away from their home site triggers their status as roaming. Of course, Shadow players can potentially use this against you, but in
's case roaming happens to be a thing of a specialty...