Smeagol BOG Ring-bound Rangers/ Battleground Hunter Uruks

[Gate Troll]

Free Peoples (30):

Starting:
The One Ring, Ring of Rings x1 (Ring)
Smeagol, Bearer of Great Secrets x1 (Ringbearer)
Faramir, Captain of Gondor x1 (Starting)
Ranger of Ithilien x1 (Starting)

Companions:
Ranger of Ithilien x1
Mablung, Soldier of Gondor x2

Possessions:
Faramir's Sword x1
Gondorian Blade x4
Faramir's Bow, Ithilien Longbow x1
Ranger's Bow x4
Faramir's Cloak x1

Conditions:
Boromir, My Brother x1
Ithilien Trap x1
Ancient Roads x4
Invigorated x2
Poor Wretch x2

Events:
Arrows Thick in the Air x2
War and Valor x2
Not Listening x2



Shadow: (30)

Minions:
Force of Uruk-hai x2
Invincible Uruk x2
Uruk Common x2
Mauhur, Relentless Hunter x2
White Hand Butcher x2

Possessions:
Isengard Siege bow x3 
Spear of the White Hand x2
Weapon of Opportunity x2

Conditions:
Suffered much loss x4
Cleaved x4
Fortitude x1

Events:
Brutality x4



Sites List:

Sites (9):
Fortress of Orthanc
Slag Mounds
Hill of Sight
City of Kings
Helm's Gate
Osgiliath Reclaimed
The Great Gates
Gate of Mordor
Mount Doom


Strategy: Get out plenty of Ancient Roads out to make the minion's site number's higher. Use Arrows Thick in the Air, Damrod, Ranger of Ithilien and Mablung, Soldier of Gondor to exhaust minions. Gondorian Ranger adds to the high site limit ensuring that 
even Dunlendings will have trouble staying un-roaming while Gondor archery takes out minion after minion. Smeagol can vaporize left-over
minions and use Poor Wretch to keep himself from being overwhelmed. Not listening allows you to repair the Ringbearer and Ring of Rings keeps his resistance 9. Pathfinder allows you to play Battleground sites instead of your opponent's sites to help Faramir's Sword and you shadow side. Take advantage of Suffered Much Loss to make all your sites gain Battleground.  Use Fortitude to keep your Uruks alive and flatten companions with your mix of Hunters and Battleground Uruks. Brutality gets nasty quickly, as all sites are Battleground thanks to Suffered much Loss and this deck has several powerful Hunter Uruks up its sleeve to keep things unpredictable. Cleaved hurts archers like Greenleaf and packs a punch vs. any archery deck. Any questions, comments, or constructive critiscm would be appreciated. 

[leokula]

Nice twist for RB rangers to add smeagol cool!

Think Damrod is a waste... you should add a Ranger of Ithilien, cause he's tough. I wouldn't use 2x Men the Walls since you already have 4x Ancient Roads and 2x Gondorian Rangers.

Your deck has 35 cards and only 3 of them are companions... I really think you can have a hard time drawing them...I have an elven telepathy deck with 37 cards and sometimes have a hard time getting one of my 4x gandalf, mow. I'd definitely add more or even start denethor, lomt to pull them later, not mentioning denethor can set you up with whatever other card u need.

Just my 2 cents, nice idea

[Gate Troll]

Yeah, but Denethor would die because he's unbound. See Bearer of Great Secrets gametext. BTW, I replaced both Man the Walls with  two Rangers of Ithilien to help cycling comps and changed Damrod to a Ranger of Ithilien.

[leokula]

hey ho!! ur absolutely right completely ignored smeagol's drawback...

edit: nice changes think it looks more solid now... ranger of ithilien with a sword is a 10 damage+1 companion!

[DáinIronfoot]

Suggestions:

- Start with one of the Rangers of Ithilien. I know Mablung is all kinds of awesome, but it would be a shame to NOT take advantage of Ranger of Ithilien's starting cost reduction. Throw in an extra copy of Mablung to ensure you get him eventually.

- Add Faramir's Cloak. Almost a must in this kind of deck.

- IF you find that healing is an issue, toss in some Invigorated. Simply awesome in this deck.

- And again, IF you can find room, Tireless wouldn't be bad since you should be able to meet all four conditions at times and get the maximum strength +4 boost.

- I've never found much use for it myself, but a copy or two of Concealment wouldn't be a terrible idea.

So, overall:

Move one copy of Ranger of Ithilien to starting fellowship
+1 Mablung, Soldier of Gondor (move both copies to deck)
-2 Gondorian Ranger (really don't see the need to have them with all those Ancient Roads)
+1 Faramir's Cloak
-3 War and Valor
+1 Invigorated
+2 Tireless

Just my suggestions. I won't be offended at all if you leave it unchanged. I would STRONGLY recommend finding a place for Faramir's Cloak, though.

[Gate Troll]

I added Faramir's Cloak and an Invigorated. I didn't add Tireless though, because it relies too heavily on chance,
and it's with a possible strength +4 instead of War and Valor which is with a almost definite strength +3 damage +1 bonus.

[MR. Lurtzy]

You have two faramir's in your starting fellowship.

[Gate Troll]

You have two faramir's in your starting fellowship.

Where? 

•EDIT• 500th post! w00t! 

[MR. Lurtzy]

I see you just changed it.

[Gate Troll]

Yeah, after I posted. I meant to write Ranger of Ithilien and ended writing Ithilien Ranger. 

[Gate Troll]

Okay, really stupid question but, does your starting fellowship count towards your card total? SdA doesn't seem to think so.

[MR. Lurtzy]

Besides the ring-bearer and ring it does.

[SomeRandomDude]

Um...why Smeagol? Style points? Do something with him, or drop him. Smeagol
+ rangers are begging for a choke deck. So I'd run like, some sorta choke engine. Safe Passage + We Must Go Warily, anyone?

Cut Poor Wretch and Boromir, My Brother, Not Listening, Pathfinder.

Add Safe Passage, We Must Go Warily x 4 (free move if played right), play Ring of Doom (board wipe Smeagol only used in best circumstances, and he has a good resistance already, vitality will help more), then run a Smeagol based site-path control engine, like, the card that makes the site number -2, and run the Uruks on the back of Suffered Much Loss. But pick a site type that runs Battlegrounds as well as another site type.

[Gate Troll]

NBarden, the deck wasn't made to be specifically a choke deck. We Must go Warily is unnecessary and Safe Passage is useless as the deck runs only Battleground sites. After playtesting I cut x2 We must go warily, a few possessions a pathfinder and a few events. The deck is now as small as possible.

[SomeRandomDude]

Hm...well, if you're not running choke, then why are you running the Smeagol ring-bearer? If you run the Smeagol ring-bearer, run choke. Otherwise, Boromir's always a nice RB. Or Frodo. Because right now, Smeagol is only there for style points, with no synergy with the rest of the deck, and requiring a lot of protection. I'd just as soon run Boromir.

You see, Smeagol + Ring-Bound rangers really works as a blending of the best of two choke cultures, Smeagol and Gondor.

As for Safe Passage, if you notice, I mentioned that the Uruks could be run on the back of Suffered Much Loss. Vulnerable? Yeah, but I mean, virtually every deck is running sitepath control anymore. Except IB, which you're toast against anyways. You can maybe run it with Plains, there tend to be Battleground/Plains sites, and then Suffered Much Loss is a good way to ensure battlegrounds.

No mean to be harsh, but my opinion is that Smeagol just doesn't work in this deck. If you want Smeagol to work, you need to run it choke and pair it with something synergistic to a good sitepath (say, Forestguls). As is, I think your best bet is to run it with Boromir RB.