V1: Gimli, Dwarf of Erebor

[Hobbiton Lad]

Or a slight homage to his previous version:

•Gimli, Dwarf of Erebor (V)
Companion • Dwarf
Strength: 6
Vitality: 3
Signet: Aragorn
Damage +1.
Regroup: Exert Gimli and discard X tales to reveal X cards from the top of your draw deck. Take all cards into hand and place the rest beneath your draw deck in any order.

[macheteman]

it would be better to pull a gloing and draw x cards and then place x cards beneath your draw deck. but whatever.

[hrcho]

  •Gimli, Dwarf of Erebor (V)
Companion • Dwarf
Strength: 6
Vitality: 3
Signet: Aragorn
Damage +1
At the start of the regroup phase, you may exert Gimli to play a tale from your discard pile.

So far, I liked this one the most. It has flavor, it has power and yet it is tempered and I think in just the right amount.

[FM]

I also don't see the flavor of turning conditions into tales. There is not much of a tale behind From the Armory, My Axe Is Notched or Stout and Strong for example. Tales are stories from past adventures which inspire the fellowship to be better.

Ah, yes, but when the sole Dwarf in your party is describing the bounty of mithril in their armories of old, telling how Dwarves bested the Hill Giants by being Stout and Strong, and more to the point, when he tells the Hobbits about what happened in Helm, these ARE tales. Just saying.

As I said before, fetching any tale is out of flavor for what this Gimli should do, specially since the ones he'll fetch the most will end up being and . Perhaps we're going at it the wrong way?
I was thinking about Fellowship block, and about the other blocks as well, and what I noticed, specially outside of FotR and using Reflections, is a lack of ways to build decks. Or, at least, CREATIVE ways to do it, when you factor in those blocks. Also, Farin and Fror did very little for you, since you never knew which one to start, and never got them in the right order. First, I though about making Dwarf of Erebor like Farin and Fror, but geared toward other Shadows. It wouldn't work, at that point he knew nothing of the other Shadows. Also, I know Rare companions tend to have the more powerful effect, but every instance of them (C, U and R) have very different abilities, catering to different decks, so they all might be played depending on the circunstances. Taking this into account, I do think this Gimli should cater to an unnadressed deckbuilding concern. So, what do Gimlis have to offer in Movie?

-Hand unclogging and cycling;
-Choking;
-Strength (permanent - if conditions are met -, one-shot and one-shot to other companions);
-Crowd control (wounding after skirmish);
-Protecting conditions;
-Damage (with strength).

So, let's think about deckbuilding concerns, Gimli-wise:
-You play a full deck, meaning the decks play out the same (huge dwarves, move, ignore everything else), or;
-You splash a Dwarf, in which case he's "cute", but does very little, since most splash versions only care about the skirmish phase, meaning he won't forward strategies a lot, being more of a tag-along strength pump.
The two exceptions to those are the condition-protecting one (does he see any play at all? it doesn't seem likely...), and the original Dwarf of Erebor as a splash for combo decks that only care about cycling and not much about the Fellowship.
With this in mind, I think Dwarf of Erebor, flavor aside (for now), should in fact cater to the splash variety, but since I'm still trying to grasp flavor by its fingers before it slips, I think it should cater greatly to decks, as a splash companion. I'll start my brainstorming from here, so, what I have so far, combining what everyone has said:
-Shouldn't be a "build-around-me" card;
-Signet should change to Gandalf (I assume the REGULAR Dwarf of Erebor will still be played, so, signet is not actually something we need to keep unchanged);
-Should perhaps do something with tales;
-Shouldn't require a boatload of cards to work, or he sucks as a splash companion;
-Shouldn't be SO specific as he ONLY splashes decks, neither so universal that he splashes EVERY deck.

Considering this all, I've got:

•Gimli, Dwarf of Erebor (V)
Companion • Dwarf
Strength: 6
Vitality: 3
Signet: Gandalf
Damage +1
At the start of the regroup phase, you may exert Gimli to play a tale from your draw deck or take a card into hand from your discard pile.

I know that there are not a lot of tales anyway (something that should be adressed in the future), and this Gimli both helps decks, splashes nicely in decks that might play Gandalf (or loose cards, like Let Folly Be Our Cloak, A Wizard is Never Late and Gandalf's Cart) but end up discarding him, giving you tools for building new decks, as now you have a more reliable way to get Gandalf into play even with fewer copies, if your deck fuels the discard pile a lot. It also plays well in tale-oriented decks (or that play singletons as silver bullets), as he can find the needed tale, and since discarding tales is not quite that commonplace for Dwarves, playing from the draw deck gives you a wider range of possibilities to actually START playing silver bullets if you didn't already, not to mention fitting in slightly with the whole cycling theme, since he effectively thins your draw deck every time you pull something from it.
Last, by keeping it to the regroup phase, you somewhat limit the uses he might have, sacrificing hand space for his versatility, which might be a fair trade.

[Thranduil]

I agree with (and admire) your thought processes, FM, but disagree with your conclusion! As a designer, a card which gets tales from the draw deck and cards from the discard pile is deeply weird to me. Those are 4 different directions you're trying to put on 1 card.

What about this?

•Gimli, Dwarf of Erebor (V)
Companion • Dwarf
Strength: 6
Vitality: 3
Signet: Gandalf
Damage +1.
At the start of the fellowship phase, you may exert Gimli to play a or condition from your discard pile.

ASIDE: I'm not sure how much people want signets or resistance—I know I definitely would rather signets were phased out and we kept resistance on all companions, but I'm willing to be disagreed with!

An alternative to work with tales would be:

"At the start of the fellowship phase, you may exert Gimli to play a tale condition (or possession?) from your discard pile."

Or, at a stretch, I might think of something like:

"Fellowship: Play a or character from your hand to return a tale card in your discard pile to your hand."

Another idea:

"Each and tale you play is twilight cost -1."

I'm considering if actually fellowship phase abilities work better as they are used before you've moved and only maximum of one phase per turn.

[FM]

You know, the concept that tales are STILL conditons deeply eluded me! Can't believe I let that one slip. Sure, he can do stuff to conditions, and tales would simply fit in. However, I think limiting to tales might end up being better, simply because, well, now you've designed a near-immortal Gimli.
Play Axe of Erebor. Play Dwarven Heart, heal him twice, discard the condition with Axe, suck up 1 damage, exert him next turn, play it again healing up to full. And this is with just ONE condition. Conditions are pretty wild on design, so messing with the whole spectrum might warrant preparations. The idea of fetching cards from the discard pile came from the fact he can fatch the spells Gandalf decks tend to have (and have to play), open more design space with recyling, and slightly helping overcome the drawback of Bearer of Obligation if need be. But I liked the thought process more than the idea itself, perhaps it can jump-start us in the right direction (even if it's not the direction I suggested).

[Thranduil]

Good point about Dwarven Heart, that would be a problem... Suggests the other ideas are more sensible then!

And you're right that we're not looking for finished products yet—just ideas to get us on the right track. Good card games will probably have a hundred cards designed and thought about for each card that gets printed!

Thran

[macheteman]

Thanks hrcho and macheteman. I'm glad to see you guys collecting the on my idea. [Bastards!]
-wtk

hahaha, epic!

on a signets/ resistance note, i really think that signets are important to keep with the fotr/movie flavor. but perhaps we could even combine the tales and the signet something along the lines of:

discard a tale and spot x aragorn signets (or whatever signet we want. even "spot X different signets") to shuffle X tales into your draw deck. (or: to remove )

i realize this takes things in a different direction, but i think that signets were an underdeveloped idea, gandy sigs being the exception.

even still, i feel that for the tales strategy, wtk's version of gimli does the most while still being balanced. once you start grabbing and conditions or events, you have a whole new animal.

but "if that be the will of the council..."

[Tbiesty]

ASIDE: I'm not sure how much people want signets or resistance—I know I definitely would rather signets were phased out and we kept resistance on all companions, but I'm willing to be disagreed with!

Since signets are a fotr/movie thing, I personally would prefer to keep them.  There is a lot of potential for signet-based strategies, they just weren't utilized a lot.  However, the design of these virtual cards/sets gives us an opportunity to make use of underutilized things like tales, valiant, and signets in new creative ways.

[Thranduil]

ASIDE: I'm not sure how much people want signets or resistance—I know I definitely would rather signets were phased out and we kept resistance on all companions, but I'm willing to be disagreed with!

Since signets are a fotr/movie thing, I personally would prefer to keep them.  There is a lot of potential for signet-based strategies, they just weren't utilized a lot.  However, the design of these virtual cards/sets gives us an opportunity to make use of underutilized things like tales, valiant, and signets in new creative ways.

I would agree with this, that one of the targets for us should be signets as they are and always have been underused. But, I'm very conscious of the fact that they're just not as elegant or as interesting (to me, at least) as resistance, and I also want these cards to be applicable in later sets.

My approach would be to make some cards that are specifically designed to support signet strategies—but otherwise ignore them on V-cards and use resistance instead. But this is really a discussion for another time, I think. For now, let's work with whatever we have for Gimli.

Thanks hrcho and macheteman. I'm glad to see you guys collecting the on my idea. [Bastards!]
-wtk

hahaha, epic!

on a signets/ resistance note, i really think that signets are important to keep with the fotr/movie flavor. but perhaps we could even combine the tales and the signet something along the lines of:

discard a tale and spot x aragorn signets (or whatever signet we want. even "spot X different signets") to shuffle X tales into your draw deck. (or: to remove )

i realize this takes things in a different direction, but i think that signets were an underdeveloped idea, gandy sigs being the exception.

even still, i feel that for the tales strategy, wtk's version of gimli does the most while still being balanced. once you start grabbing and conditions or events, you have a whole new animal.

but "if that be the will of the council..."

I think I would also rather go for tales rather than — specifically.

Thran

[hrcho]

... "spot X different signets"...

Now, this is a very nice idea and something that should definitely be used (if not with Gimli, then with another card from this or future V-sets)

[Hobbiton Lad]

My approach would be to make some cards that are specifically designed to support signet strategies—but otherwise ignore them on V-cards and use resistance instead.

I could be wrong, but aren't all companions considered to have a base resistance of 6 if they don't have a specific resistance value? Including a signet actually makes the card more flexible because you allow it to interact with cards that affect both resistance and signet, rather than just by cards that affect resistance only.

[Thranduil]

My approach would be to make some cards that are specifically designed to support signet strategies—but otherwise ignore them on V-cards and use resistance instead.

I could be wrong, but aren't all companions considered to have a base resistance of 6 if they don't have a specific resistance value? Including a signet actually makes the card more flexible because you allow it to interact with cards that affect both resistance and signet, rather than just by cards that affect resistance only.

Yes, but you might also want the freedom to change a character's resistance from 6, and you also might want to have an ability referencing resistance—both of which are very difficult if not impossible for a character with a signet instead.

... "spot X different signets"...

Now, this is a very nice idea and something that should definitely be used (if not with Gimli, then with another card from this or future V-sets)

Yes, I don't think we should get distracted by signets in this discussion. I think tales is a strong enough idea on its own that we don't need to mix it with signets as well. Save signets for another card in this or future V-sets.

Thran

[macheteman]

  •Gimli, Dwarf of Erebor (V)
Companion • Dwarf
Strength: 6
Vitality: 3
Signet: Aragorn
Damage +1
At the start of the regroup phase, you may exert Gimli to play a tale from your draw deck.

i think this gimli could be the best for contributing to the tales strategy while not exploding into completely new strategies. the draw deck ability fits the dwarven digging theme, and also makes gimli useful for setting up a little more quickly. still works well with gorn/gondor bowmen but rather than repeatedly replaying, it helps those bowmen come out when you need them. also very useful for cutting down on multiple copies of cards which can be another problem with tale decks. for instance, Red Book of Westmarch. to be useful, you need it early, but its unique. this gimli would allow you to use only one copy in your deck, freeing you up for more cards.

haveing heard all the perspectives so far, i like this idea the best. kudos to ket, i just like the draw deck better.

cheers

-mm

[Thranduil]

I like it too. But, historically, culture has been better at recursion than tutoring (are there any tutors?). This doesn't mean we shouldn't do it, but it is something to bear in mind (in fact I think in general there aren't enough tutors in LotR and enough cultures that can do it).

Also, I think the digging flavour might come off better with something like "Reveal the top 3 cards of your draw deck; play a tale revealed, and discard the rest" or something similar.

Thran