Denethor, the way he deserves to be treated

[Durin's Heir]

"Denethor laughed bitterly. 'Nay, not yet, Master Peregrin! He will not come save only to triumph over me when all is won. He uses others as his weapons. So do all great lords, if they are wise, Master Halfling. Or why should I sit here in my tower and think, and watch, and wait, spending even my sons? For I can still wield a brand.'"

He must be the worst case of character underdevelopment by Decipher. In the story he's a bottleneck for everyone and defies both Sauron and Gandalf, having being decades ago a valiant and jealous Captain of the White Tower against the thriving menace of Umbar and Mordor, in rivalry to people's champion Thorongil (and even suspecting his real identity)... but in the LotR TCG he's completely irrelevant. Unnecessary, just another strength 7/8 Gondorian. With 2 versions that add threats/burdens to portray his insanity (Steward of the City & OtEoM; and fail miserably), and one that sets you up as the commander of the defense (LoMT; but overdoes it, and doesn't add threats/burdens to do so). And that's it.

Besides giving him uninspired gametexts (except LoMT and LRS), no card interacts significantly with him. There should be many cards that enhance, need or target him, but no: only Noble Leaders in his debut block; and Faramir PoI, Away On The Wind & Denethor's Sword afterwards (and Throne of Minas Tirith and Stewards' Legacy, except that those effects with Denethor are irrelevant). And that's all. No event, no Palantír, no silver bullet... NO SIGNET! Even non-canon guys like Turgon or Mablung have more power.

Rant's over. DC action starts now!

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First of all, Denethor should be a condition-like character (like Saruman). Since the office of the Steward was instituted by King Rómendacil I, the law stated that "he was not permitted to go to war or to leave the realm," so Denethor should remain in the background, commanding "'others as his weapons'" (like Saruman SotE or Rabble-rouser). The Unhasty keyword is the easiest way to keep him behind, giving him texts to aid his troops in the fray like Unknown Perils or TMAYOD (instead of ways to circumvent Unhasty's effect like Forest Guardian).

Second, Denethor is a focus of knowledge and power and thus should provide the culture strong drawing engines (just like Elrond, Gandalf, Dwarves and even Simbelmyne do in the previous sets). Gondorians in the previous Blocks were always stern warriors improvising against assaulting foes in non-ideal places and conditions, but here Denethor is the master of a stern and well-equipped army in a fortified city, waiting for the enemy in advance. So he should also gather resources and/or set up your support area.


•Denethor, Lord of the White City
Companion • Man
Strength 8  Vitality 3  Denethor signet
Unhasty. To play, add 3 threats.
Fellowship: Play a card to draw a card.
Maneuver: Play a event to exert a minion.
Regroup: Play a condition.
"'...Lord Denethor is unlike other men: he sees far.'"

Gather and deploy your resources in Fellowship, repair or replenish them in Regroup, and thwart your foes in Maneuver! Finally, a companion that can draw cards like Elrond LoR! But can't fight of course, so his vitality serves only for other cards (see below), or for archery if needed. Costs no twilight, but 3 threats is a weight that must not be taken lightly. (I'd have this replacing Steward of the City in Set 7.)

•Denethor, Son of Ecthelion
Companion • Man
Strength 8  Vitality 3  Denethor signet
Unhasty.
Each other Man is strength +1 and twilight cost -1 (except Aragorn).
Skirmish: Exert Denethor to make a companion strength +2 (except Aragorn).
"...a masterful man... learned beyond the measure of those days, and strong-willed, confident in his own powers..."

A strongly different version. Cannot draw cards or exert minions, nor does come into play without paying twilight, but increases the strength of his troops (thus, "no Aragorn") both passively and actively, and chokes a bit. Much harder and more perilous to start, but also more powerful in the middle and late game. You can start him along with Faramir IR or Vorondil, for a solid str 8 to 12 barehanded Man, but risking early swarms. (Erase Wizened Steward, and add this one in lieu. )


•Rod of the Stewardship
Possession • Staff
Vitality +1
Bearer must be Denethor. He is unhasty.
Boromir and Faramir are strength +1 and defender +1.
Each time a Man loses a skirmish, you may draw a card or exert a minion.
"'Or why should I sit here in my tower and think... spending even my sons? For I can still wield a brand.'"

"Nonetheless the Stewards never sat on the ancient throne... they bore a white rod only as the token of their office." This Staff is meant to portray (and increase) Denethor's powers as a strategist. Even the defeat of a thread can serve for a higher victory in the broader web, so resolving your losing skirmishes first synergizes with wounding events like New Errand and Men of Numenor, wounding possessions (Blade of Gondor / Ranger's Bow / Gondor Bow, and Knight's Mount), vitality subtracting fortifications (Citadel of the Stars / Stone Tower / Seventh Level) and even City of Men. And with maneuver events too, in Lord of the White City's hand.

Also gives his sons a bit of strength (str 8 weaponless, or str 9 with Son of Ecthelion) and a much valuable defender bonus (Boromir and/or Faramir will defend now what Denethor's unhastiness cannot), which makes them win (and lose) much better for his father's designs. Finally, gives more vitality to Denethor, which means more pumps by Son of Ecthelion (and more direct wounds by Foes of Mordor). And whatever else he might do by exerting...


•Denethor's Mail
Possession • Armor
Strength +1  Vitality +1
Bearer must be Denethor.
Skirmish: Exert Denethor to remove all game text from a minion skirmishing a Man (except card type and race). That minion may exert to prevent this.
"'Thus have I walked, and thus now for many years have I slept, lest with age the body should grow soft and timid.'"

"Thus pride increased in Denethor together with despair, until he saw in all the deeds of that time only a single combat between the Lord of the White Tower and the Lord of the Barad-dûr..." Denethor believed that Sauron was going to fight him personally at the end of a long Siege of Minas Tirith, and was prepared for such a duel. This armor is meant to show (and increase) his defiant and fighting spirit. He still directs others in the front line, but now in an assaulting way to nullify his enemies' expertises and intentions, unless those enemies strain to remain in their position.

So this Armor gives Denethor a new way to use his vitality, so he can erase the text of his troops' foes for the length of a skirmish, or let them add another exertion if they oppose (for those aforementioned wounding tricks' benefit, or Dunlending Elder's demise); combine with the Rod (losing skirmishes) for a better effect. Important keywords like Enduring, Damage +1 or Southron are threatened by this, so you can disrupt your opponent's plans heavily if he has enough spare vitality (more than his enemies at least).


•Denethor's Longsword
Possession • Hand Weapon
Strength +2
Bearer must be Denethor.
Shadow cards cannot discard or return to your hand cards borne by Denethor.
Assignment: Spot more minions than companions to make Denethor lose unhasty.
"...he was clad in mail beneath, and girt with a long sword, great-hilted in a sheath of black and silver."

Since he'll rely so much on exertions and vitality bonuses, needs a way to keep his possessions on (besides, he shouldn't be harassed in the battlefield by Cantea FTW or Grond HotU, nor will tolerate orders from a bossy simpleton like Wormtongue). Also Denethor gets a way to fight directly, though only in case your opponent deploys a force larger than what your troops can contain.



With all that might and new importance, he seems like a worthy target for an old-school silver bullet:

Thy Hope Is But Ignorance
Event • Maneuver
Spot a minion to wound Denethor 3 times. The Free Peoples player may add 3 threats or 3 burdens to prevent this.
"'For a little space you may triumph on the field, for a day. But against the Power that now arises there is no victory. To this City only the first finger of its hand has yet been stretched. All the East is moving.'"

Didst thou think that those 3 threats to play Lord of the White City were cheap? Now will block you from taking more threats, forcing to take 3 burdens or 3 wounds! It's kinda funny that the only book/film character that ever immolated himself (literally) had no card to kill him specifically. Until now.


Enough for a single post! I got more yet to come: a Palantír, events and conditions associated with it, and a Prince of the Halflings also. But later.

[Dictionary]

I think that the bulk of Denethor's mistreatment comes from Peter Jackson, although it is true that Decipher didn't really do enough with the character. I didn't necessarily mind the idea of having a strong ability and a penalty, but I think that ultimately the way it was done was rather poor.
Additionally, maybe there was an opportunity here to have the character in the game be more akin to the book instead of the film. For example, Gimli is somewhat of a joke character in the film, but this doesn't necessarily translate to the game.

I think that the card design here is fantastic and really captures the spirit of Denethor that we see in the book, although I fear that some of the cards are perhaps a little on the strong side. For instance, Lord of the White City plus Defend It and Hope would instantly kill Lurtz, correct? I do really like the use of Unhasty, although the rule would have to be tweaked, so that instead of only Gandalf cards allowing characters to skirmish, it would perhaps be cards that match the culture of the character? Finally, although I like the idea of the final card, I don't really think that Mordor needs a third Silver Bullet. perhaps it could go to as Harad and Umbar did hound Gondor a lot as well, though admittedly Mordor probably is most appropriate lore-wise.

[menace64]

Denethor signet

 

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He must be the worst case of character underdevelopment by Decipher. In the story he's a bottleneck for everyone and defies both Sauron and Gandalf, having being decades ago a valiant and jealous Captain of the White Tower against the thriving menace of Umbar and Mordor, in rivalry to people's champion Thorongil (and even suspecting his real identity)... but in the LotR TCG he's completely irrelevant. Unnecessary, just another strength 7/8 Gondorian. With 2 versions that add threats/burdens to portray his insanity (Steward of the City & OtEoM; and fail miserably), and one that sets you up as the commander of the defense (LoMT; but overdoes it, and doesn't add threats/burdens to do so). And that's it.

I echo Dictionary's response but I think we're all in complete agreement that Denethor has yet to be portrayed correctly in any medium. #$&*@! shame too, since he's at the top of a huge pile of my favorite Tolkien characters.

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First of all, Denethor should be a condition-like character (like Saruman). Since the office of the Steward was instituted by King Rómendacil I, the law stated that "he was not permitted to go to war or to leave the realm," so Denethor should remain in the background, commanding "'others as his weapons'" (like Saruman SotE or Rabble-rouser). The Unhasty keyword is the easiest way to keep him behind, giving him texts to aid his troops in the fray like Unknown Perils or TMAYOD (instead of ways to circumvent Unhasty's effect like Forest Guardian).

Second, Denethor is a focus of knowledge and power and thus should provide the culture strong drawing engines (just like Elrond, Gandalf, Dwarves and even Simbelmyne do in the previous sets). Gondorians in the previous Blocks were always stern warriors improvising against assaulting foes in non-ideal places and conditions, but here Denethor is the master of a stern and well-equipped army in a fortified city, waiting for the enemy in advance. So he should also gather resources and/or set up your support area.

Unhasty... on Denethor. Hmm. ... my first response is to hate it because it's such an Entish description and gunks up the flavor of the keyword... but I really like how it highlights that ONLY GANDALF can push Denethor to actually get something done... and it's not like the keyword's getting any use anyhow, right?

•Denethor, Lord of the White City
Companion • Man
Strength 8  Vitality 3  Denethor signet
Unhasty. To play, add 3 threats.
Fellowship: Play a card to draw a card.
Maneuver: Play a event to exert a minion.
Regroup: Play a condition.
"'...Lord Denethor is unlike other men: he sees far.'"

Might be easier to word the Maneuver event as: "Discard a event to exert a minion." since that's really what it's doing unless I'm missing something. If I have City of Men in my hand and play it using the Maneuver ability, the event doesn't actually do anything.

Maybe focus the Regroup ability to fortification rather than condition. That puts him in his City. Overall I like the concept of a burrito Denethor as a reflection of his strategery nature. I've got words and thoughts regarding cost/stats for a 'genuine rendering' of Denethor but not right now!

•Denethor, Son of Ecthelion
Companion • Man
Strength 8  Vitality 3  Denethor signet
Unhasty.
Each other Man is strength +1 and twilight cost -1 (except Aragorn).
Skirmish: Exert Denethor to make a companion strength +2 (except Aragorn).
"...a masterful man... learned beyond the measure of those days, and strong-willed, confident in his own powers..."

Haha this Denethor is just petty and I adore it. Perfect line-up of subtitle, flavor text, and effect (but not you, Thorongil!).

This Denethor is "the version" of Denethor that necessitates some Shadow players including Thy Hope Is But Ignorance. He's a huuuge target but one a player would be foolish to exclude from their deck, and wise to protect.

•Rod of the Stewardship
Possession • Staff
Vitality +1
Bearer must be Denethor. He is unhasty.
Boromir and Faramir are strength +1 and defender +1.
Each time a Man loses a skirmish, you may draw a card or exert a minion.
"'Or why should I sit here in my tower and think... spending even my sons? For I can still wield a brand.'"

First reaction: make it an artifact.
Second reaction:  no no, you're right, it should be a possession.

Maybe this possession should prohibit Denethor from bearing other possessions? It's all gains right now at 0 twilight cost.

What do you think of swapping out the Boromir/Faramir effect for "At the start of each assignment phase, you may make a knight defender +1 until the regroup phase." Just a thought that came to me!

•Denethor's Mail
Possession • Armor
Strength +1  Vitality +1
Bearer must be Denethor.
Skirmish: Exert Denethor to remove all game text from a minion skirmishing a Man (except card type and race). That minion may exert to prevent this.
"'Thus have I walked, and thus now for many years have I slept, lest with age the body should grow soft and timid.'"

Ditch the strength boost and I love it.

•Denethor's Longsword
Possession • Hand Weapon
Strength +2
Bearer must be Denethor.
Shadow cards cannot discard or return to your hand cards borne by Denethor.
Assignment: Spot more minions than companions to allow Denethor to skirmish.
"...he was clad in mail beneath, and girt with a long sword, great-hilted in a sheath of black and silver."

The assignment ability doesn't work, since only cards can allow unhasty characters to skirmish.

Thy Hope Is But Ignorance
Event • Maneuver
Spot a minion to wound Denethor 3 times. The Free Peoples player may add 3 threats or 3 burdens to prevent this.
"'For a little space you may triumph on the field, for a day. But against the Power that now arises there is no victory. To this City only the first finger of its hand has yet been stretched. All the East is moving.'"

Enough for a single post! I got more yet to come: a Palantír, events and conditions associated with it, and a Prince of the Halflings also. But later.

Mind if I hop in too?  

[Air Power]

Flavor-wise, I don't like using unhasty for Denethor, considering how many of his decisions were, in fact, hasty, but I do like having him as a "mastermind" who doesn't skirmish.  One option might be something like "While you can spot an unassigned  companion, Denethor may not be assigned to a skirmish."

Alternately, if you stick with the unhasty keyword, a solution to the  culture limitation on allowing the FP player to assign unhasty characters would be to word the longsword as "Assignment: Spot more minions than Gondor companions to make Denthor lose unhasty until the beginning of the regroup phase"

[Durin's Heir]

Flavor-wise, I don't like using unhasty for Denethor, considering how many of his decisions were, in fact, hasty, but I do like having him as a "mastermind" who doesn't skirmish.

Well, Denethor's decisions were hasty only in the film. In the book he didn't send Faramir to Osgiliath (and the outer wall Rammas Echor) due to pride but for strategic defense, and to reinforce it (the west bank was still theirs) not to retake it in a suicidal assault. He also ordered the cavalry (with Imrahil and even Gandalf at the head) to aid Faramir's retreat.

Unhasty... on Denethor. Hmm. ...

Unhasty might feel too, hrum... entish, true, but it's effect is exactly what is needed here, so I don't see a reason to create a new loaded keyword in order to do the same. Feels similar to Decipher creating the "Engine" keyword after "Machine," which is probably due to a lack of specification (Siege Engine and token Uruks say place/remove tokens on/from "a machine" instead of "an machine"), so they made a new keyword to create a clearer culture division. And those are unloaded keywords, I'd moreover avoid the unneeded creation of a loaded one.

Also "unhasty" is just one word, which is awesome for graphic cards design (and all my DCs try to respect the Decipher metrics). Meanwhile, a non-keyword explanation for the same like Saruman's skirmish and archery exclusion takes almost half of the whole card (3 out of 7 lines), so no version that avoids one or both phases ever had room for a lore text...

I do really like the use of Unhasty, although the rule would have to be tweaked, so that instead of only Gandalf cards allowing characters to skirmish, it would perhaps be cards that match the culture of the character?

You all 3 are right, Unhasty can be circumvented only by cards. Forgot to include a rule tweak, from "when a card allows it do so" to "when a card of its own culture allows it do so." Still, I'll use Air Power's take on the Longsword (but lasting only during that same Assignment phase, for length): "Assignment: Spot more minions than companions to make Denethor lose unhasty." Short enough to keep the 2-lines loretext intact.

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Additionally, maybe there was an opportunity here to have the character in the game be more akin to the book instead of the film. For example, Gimli is somewhat of a joke character in the film, but this doesn't necessarily translate to the game.

I think Denethor is here the opposite case of Arwen. Arwen is a muse in the books, in one film she confronts the Nine (though actually doesn't fight), and in the game she's a badass companion (never ally) in EVERY block, with strong skirmish skills and personalized gear. Low profile in books, medium importance in one film, and full power in all blocks of the game.

Denethor is in the books (RotK, LotR Appendices and Unfinished Tales) very strong-willed, diligent, learned and noble (though jealous and later despairful); he's egocentric, impetuous and almost schizophrenic (though still steadfast against Sauron) in the film... and practically unexistent in the game. Badass in books (in his youth, he regained eastern Osgiliath after more than 4 centuries of occupation!), a hot-tempered Alzheimer-struck uncle in film, and powerless in game.

They just stuck with their previous mechanics: 8-cards hand, choke, strong possessions, strong fighters with costless events, healing and support area wound/heal tricks; and so is why non-canon Knights and Rangers (and their Bows and fortifications) have more importance than the Steward. They didn't change the culture to include hand extension, threat/burden costs, heavy exertion to both sides, condition/possession discard (except Catapult) or information warfare (reveal opponent's hand, or look at the top of your deck). All that requires proper playtesting.

Defend It and Hope would instantly kill Lurtz, correct?

No, DIAH pays the cost and exhausts Lurtz, and then the exert effect takes place. Still, Elendil's Valor or Might of Numenor can exert him first, and then DIAH will kill Lurtz (and exert another minion). DIAH + Denethor LotWC can positively nullify Wormtongue in one blow.

Finally, although I like the idea of the final card, I don't really think that Mordor needs a third Silver Bullet.

Yes, lorewise Mordor is more appropriate, but we can still create a cultured bullet.

All the East Is Moving
Event • Maneuver
Exert a Man and spot X threats or X burdens to exert X companions (or wound Denethor X times). The Free Peoples player may discard X Free Peoples possessions to prevent this.
"'And even now the wind of thy hope cheats thee and wafts up Anduin a fleet with black sails. The West has failed.'"

Not a classic silver bullet, but this can finish Denethor in a single strike. Easterlings use burdens, while Southrons add threats, so they should be using this at will. What about corsairs? They can cripple the built-in counter by discarding possessions (while War Towers provides the ammo), which can relate somewhat to the story as the fear of an Umbarian raid made the southern fiefs send very little help to Minas Tirith.

Be careful when spotting burdens/threats to wound Denethor, since if you spot more than Denethor's vitality (trying to guarantee a kill), that option won't be fulfillable and will be discarded towards another fulfillable option (exert X companions) if exists. So in many cases a single wound prevention will be enough to save him (also, the lesser the wounds tried, the lesser the built-in counter's cost).

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•Denethor, Lord of the White City
Might be easier to word the Maneuver event as: "Discard a event to exert a minion." since that's really what it's doing unless I'm missing something.

Well, you're indeed missing something: phase events may only be played at their specific phase(S). So just like Bilbo BoTB cannot play NFFatROD in Regroup, Denethor LotWC cannot play City of Men at Maneuver. The idea is to give more importance to things like Elendil's Valor and Some Who Resisted, in a strategic way (so 1x DIAH gets rid of Grima).

Maybe focus the Regroup ability to fortification rather than condition.

Except that I hate fortifications. At least the way Decipher made them ("O great Sauron the Dark Lord, I know I won't survive a single stroke of your mighty hand, but would you please come with me and kill me at the Fourth Level of Minas Tirith, before the horrified eyes of my wife and kids?" "Well, SURE!" -Many miles and hours later- *BOOM!* "Ha, what a gullible fool!"). Also, except replaying Citadel of the Stars / Stone Tower there's few reasons to not play your fortifications in Fellowship.

Unique conditions benefit the most: Noble Leaders, Ithilien Trap, the Saga of Elendil... also, things like Long Prepared, Guarded and Unexpected Visitor get new applications.

Haha this Denethor is just petty and I adore it. Perfect line-up of subtitle, flavor text, and effect (but not you, Thorongil!).

The idea is to create a totally new subculture that centers around not Aragorn, and it's full power is actually hindered if Aragorn is present using a companion slot. All hail the Steward and his sons!

This Denethor is "the version" of Denethor that necessitates some Shadow players including Thy Hope Is But Ignorance. He's a huuuge target but one a player would be foolish to exclude from their deck, and wise to protect.

A way to protect him is Some Who Resisted (which also exerts a minion with LotWC)!

•Rod of the Stewardship
First reaction: make it an artifact.
Second reaction:  no no, you're right, it should be a possession.

First thought: I'll make it an artifact.
Second thought: why, it's a piece of wood with white paint and golden decorations... let Kings have artifacts, Stewards shall use possessions!

Maybe this possession should prohibit Denethor from bearing other possessions? It's all gains right now at 0 twilight cost.

Like Dwarven Axe, you still have to draw it.

What do you think of swapping out the Boromir/Faramir effect for "At the start of each assignment phase, you may make a knight defender +1 until the regroup phase." Just a thought that came to me!

No, Boromir and Faramir only, the Captain of the White Tower was always the Steward's heir. It's also much shorter to write (so more room for lore).

•Denethor's Mail
Ditch the strength boost and I love it.

The strength bonus is mostly a justification to make it cost . But the weight of the armor keeps him stronger, and his strength can be used in different ways than a direct fight:

Like An Old Patient Spider
Event • Skirmish
Exert Denethor to make a minion skirmishing an unbound companion strength -3. If that minion's strength is now lower than Denethor's, you may wound it.
"At length watchers on the walls could see the retreat of the out-companies... And then a trumpet rang from the Citadel, and Denethor at last released the sortie."

Pump for LotWC, wound trick for Son of Ecthelion. We can use his strength as a reference to trigger effects. Son of Ecthelion might be pumping himself just to trigger the wound!

[Durin's Heir]

Mind if I hop in too? 

There's plenty for the both of us, let the best Dwarf win!

Post anything you want (as far as is related to Denethor). Here's my take on Pippin:

•Pippin, Ernil I Pheriannath
Companion • Hobbit
Strength 3  Vitality 4  Denethor signet
While you can spot a Man, Pippin is strength +2 and gains the culture.
Skirmish: Exert Pippin to heal a Man or reinforce a token (limit once).
"...and rumour declared that a Prince of the Halflings had come out of the North to offer allegiance to Gondor and five thousand swords."

He's not a knight, 'cause he lacks the proper training of one (group and terrain tactics, and swordsmanship). Also, I don't want him participating in those horrible NPE fortification assassinations, you know there's international conventions against them (if was up to me, I'd make all fortifications transferrable only at sites 3 to 6 of their own block sites, and discardable at other sites for something very mild). So no, not a knight.

But still, he becomes a str+2 Hobbit, gaining access to Citadel of Minas Tirith, Noble Leaders, maneuver tricks (Elendil's Valor, BotWT) and skirmish pumps (Swordarm of the White Tower, Still Sharp, Great Gate...). And can heal or reinforce tokens (Ithilien Trap, Noble Leaders). And most important: can start with Son of Ecthelion, and be harangued by him! (Denethor SoE and Faramir WP each can give him str +4, and Boromir SoD +6, and Pippin may reload Boromir once for a total +17 str family effort!)

Also, he has the Denethor signet... but what does it serve for?


•Pippin's Sword, Troll's Bane
Artifact • Hand Weapon
Strength +2
Bearer must be Pippin.
Skirmish: Exert Pippin and discard a card from hand to wound a minion assigned to a companion with the Denethor signet.
"'Whence came this?' said Denethor. 'Many, many years lie on it. Surely this is a blade wrought by our own kindred in the North in the deep past?'"

All the Guards of the Citadel at least must have the Denethor signet (just like the Wraiths had in Set 8 the Aragorn one). So after Denethor, his Mail, his Rod, Great Gate and all your tricks exhaust a minion fighting a loyal servant of the Steward (or Denethor himself), Pippin can give it the last push in the brink. Pippin can also exhaust a minion so Denethor's Mail removes its text with more ease. And if a Troll happens to bow too low to bite Beregond's throat, Pippin will surely know what to do!

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Another counter to Denethor:

Most Bitter Treason
Event • Shadow
Spot X wounded companions and 2 cards to add or draw X cards. You may spot Denethor or Théoden to repeat once for each card of his culture in the dead pile.
"And in one matter only were their counsels to the Steward at variance: Thorongil often warned Ecthelion not to put trust in Saruman the White in Isengard..."

Wanted to show Denethor grieving over his past help and favour towards Saruman, the mastermind behind his heir's murder. A leader paralized in grievance (imagining Thorongil's face, telling him "I told you so!"). "Knowledge is a deadly friend if no one sets the rules" says the song, and both Saruman and Denethor were similar in their hazardous lust for knowledge.

Of course, can be used also with Théoden against the very overpowered skirmish power of . With him still on board, killing an expendable Elite Rider or Hrethel won't be effectless anymore.

[Durin's Heir]

4 more Denethor-signet cards. But first, a bit of context...

I believe that in King Block the generic forces should have blended together the TTT roaming and strength-fortification mechanics of Knights and Rangers. So then a leader of your choice would add his own twist: Denethor with attrition (heavy exertions) + new mechanics (hand extension, hand/deck revealing), or Aragorn being more intensive in the old school (choke, wound healing/prevention, boosts to defender+1 Men)... but competing one with the other so stacking both profiles is too hard to be practical.

They actually mixed the generic mechanics with Man the Walls, First, Second and Third Level, WWYL, ELIAG, Great Gate... but why packing those if you can erase Sauron himself with Gondor Bow + Fourth Level? Or overwhelm a Troll with Fifth Level + countless other fortifications? And replay all at regroup with Sixth Level?


•Expecting The Storm
Condition • Support Area
Faramir and each ranger (except Aragorn) gains the Denethor signet.
Each time a minion whose twilight cost is X is played, you may spot X Denethor signets and add to draw a card.
"...would sit long alone in his tower... foreseeing that the assault of Mordor would come in his time."

Denethor's signet for Faramir and Rangers, and a sort of inverse Greatest Kingdom Of My People fueled by those signets. You'll be drawing tons with 3 or 4 Denethor signets, which enhances Maneuver and Skirmish events (since it's past Fellowship). Sauron has many eyes and ears at his service, but so does the Steward.


•Bulwark of the West
Condition • Support Area
Boromir and each knight (except Aragorn) gains the Denethor signet.
While you can spot X Denethor signets, minions assigned to a companion with the Denethor signet are site number +X.
"'For few, I deem, know of our deeds, and therefore guess little of their peril, if we should fail at last.'"

Ancient Roads + Denethor's signet for Boromir and Knights (which enhances WWYL, Stand to Arms, Long Prepared and War and Valor). And for everyone already under Denethor's banner (like Pippin EIP).


Eyes of the White Tower
Condition • Support Area
At the start of your turn, you may spot X Denethor signets to look at the top X cards of any draw deck.
Fellowship: Discard this condition to heal Denethor or to shuffle your draw deck..
"...but he bought the knowledge dearly, being aged before his time by his contest with the will of Sauron."

(Not stackable.) You gain knowledge with this to make better decisions as to when to draw or discard from the top of your deck... but also does your opponent. Works according to the number of servants of Denethor you can count.


Armor of Black and Silver
Possession • Armor
Strength +1  Signet: +Denethor
Bearer must be a knight (except Aragorn).
Response: If Denethor is about to take a wound, exert bearer twice (or once and add a burden) to prevent that.
"'Who is the master of Minas Tirith?' the man answered. 'The Lord Denethor or the Grey Wanderer?'"

Finally, some protection for Denethor. For each guard Denethor has, he'll be a bit harder to take down.


====


Another counter to Denethor (I think menace64 will like this one a lot!):

Pride and Despair
Condition
Strength +1
Plays on Denethor. He loses unhasty.
Maneuver: Remove 3 threats and spot a (or ) palantír to make Denethor your fierce minion until the regroup phase; he's still a companion. His owner may exert him twice to prevent that.
"'And I? I will go now to my pyre. To my pyre!'"

A sort of Dark Fire for Denethor (with a pinch of A Shadow Rises). He becomes a fighter, but can change sides if there's enough threats and cannot exert twice, which makes exerting him much more dangerous. As your minion, you can pump him with Beaten Back, Flames Within, Rank and File and even Mordor Veteran (or exert him to play Hand of Sauron). Since he's still a companion, he will go to the dead pile if is killed by, say, Beregond or Gandalf (and will trigger remaining threats); or can kill a companion in skirmish (and then take threat wounds).

"'Work of the Enemy!' said Gandalf. 'Such deeds he loves: friend at war with friend; loyalty divided in confusion of hearts.'"

Requires "a (or ) palantír" to trigger... but where is the Palantír of Minas Anor? And what does it do?

[menace64]

Denethor as an Elrond/Aragorn hybrid ally who cares about Minas Tirith:

•Denethor, Steward of the High King
Ally • Home 3[K] • Man
Strength: 7
Vitality: 4
Signet: Denethor
Steward.
At the start and end of each of your turns, add a threat (or discard a knight or fortification from play) to draw a card.
Denethor may not participate in archery fire or skirmishes.
"But the throne was empty. At the foot of the dais, upon the lowest step whcih was broad and deep, there was a stone chair, black and unadorned, and on it sat an old man gazing at his lap."
7V85 (8U19)

Written to echo King in Exile, but lesser and more consumptive and instead of healing others this Denethor is constantly moving the board, pulling in additional resources in an ever-more-treacherous game. Gondor lacks card draw, but in my opinion you need exceptions to make such a rule, and Denethor is a primate candidate (that's a typo but I'm leaving it in) for such an exception: In all of Minas Tirith, only he can invoke the powers of the Numenorean, that faint mixture of elvish blood running-true only in the form of an expensive Ally.

Steward would be an unloaded keyword found only on Denethor at the start but expanded to others later-on. I further imagine a cycle of Shadow cards that get nastier when used against a Steward.

While digging through the RotK cardlist, this one jumped out at me as infuriating and WAY OVERDUE FOR CORRECTION:

Gondorian Merchant
Ally • Home 3[K] • Man
Strength: 5
Vitality: 2
Maneuver: If you have initiative, discard 2 cards from hand to make the site number of a minion +2 until the regroup phase.
"'...they talked now of Gondor and its ways and customs...'"
7V97 (7R97)

Decipher did allies dirty in Return of the King. There should've been lots of allies in Minas Tirith, little helpful squishy characters for Shadow cultures to target and for the player to protect. Instead we got the Merchant and with a Towers home site to boot, like a slap in the face. I've moved him to Minas Tirith and balanced his stats a little, but the rest of him is the same.

Child of Gondor
Ally • Home 3[K] • Man
Strength: 1
Vitality: 2
To play, exert a ally.
Discard this ally if you cannot spot 3 fortifications.
"'And there were always too few children in this city; but now there are none - save some young lads that will not depart, and may find some task to do...'"
7V111 (7C111)

Stupid-cheap, the bottom of what Minas Tirith allies might look like. Its only reason for existing is to add 1 to the number of characters you can spot.

----------

There's plenty for the both of us, let the best Dwarf win!

You cheeky bugger.  

•Pippin, Ernil I Pheriannath
Companion • hobbit
Strength 3  Vitality 4  Denethor signet
While you can spot a Man, Pippin is strength +2 and gains the culture.
Skirmish: Exert Pippin to heal a Man or reinforce a token (limit once).
"...and rumour declared that a Prince of the Halflings had come out of the North to offer allegiance to Gondor and five thousand swords."

I really like the interaction between this Pippin and Hidden Knowledge. Pippin's Sword works on himself which is neat. Support of the City is a beautiful line-up - thinking of that card bringing this Pippin into play for free makes me smile, like a page right out of the book. haha Unexpected Visitor! For the most part though cards target Men or knights, which allays most of the fears in sticking Pippin into the culture, but as you pointed out there are a lot of methods for boosting Pippin's strength - including an already-problematic card like Noble Leaders. I don't think Pippin ought to be pushed too far in the strength-boosting direction. He's still a Hobbit after all!

Correct call on withholding Knight. Still, I would suggest bumping him up to and cutting the skirmish ability. The incidental benefits of giving Pippin access to Hobbit-targeting cards and character cards is the buff here. With that alone he's the strongest Pippin printed, the Third Marshal of Hobbits. If you're serious about keeping him at , you could add "To play, spot Gandalf".

----------

I never liked fortifications very much either. I never bought into the concept of moving a bastion of stone onto a single minion. What do you think of fortifications that behave like these:

Rammas Echor
Condition • Site 2[K] - 5[K]
Fortification. To play, exert 2 knights. Limit 1 per site.
While the fellowship is at this site and you can spot 3 knights, minions lose fierce and cannot gain fierce.
"For ten leagues or more it ran from the mountains' feet and so back again, enclosing in its fence the fields of the Pelennor..."
7V114 (10U117)

64% of me wants these to be possessions, since they are physical objects privy to destruction.

Wall of White Stone
Condition • Site 3[K] or 4[K]
Fortification. Limit 1 per site.
While the fellowship is at this site, add 1 to the fellowship archery total for each knight bearing a ranged weapon you can spot.
"A strong citadel it was indeed, and not to be taken by a host of enemies, if there were any within that could hold weapons..."
7V127 (15R70)

And then a support card like...

Stout Resistance
Event • Skirmish
Add a threat to make a Man strength +1 for each fortification played on a site (limit +4).
"...the hardiest of the garrison stood at bay."
7V121 (7C121)

...can call upon the lasting presence of those fortifications as a cheap pump. This incentivizes the Shadow players to tech against fortifications in a way that can blend into site control decks in just about any number of ways, thus further encouraging the FP player to include multiple copies of fortifications or repair* cards.

One more ally:

•Beregond, Guard of the White City
Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength: 3
Vitality: 2
Signet: Denethor
Knight.
Beregond is strength +2 while a fortification is played on his home site.
"'It is over-late to send for aid when you are already besieged.'"
7V82 (7C82)

Also weak and cheap, but he's got the right signet and he's a knight who bumps to 5 base strength as a natural course of playing site-based fortifications.

•Pippin's Sword, Troll's Bane
Possession • Hand Weapon
Strength +2
Bearer must be Pippin.
Skirmish: Exert Pippin and discard a card from hand to wound a minion assigned to a companion with the Denethor signet.
"'Whence came this?' said Denethor. 'Many, many years lie on it. Surely this is a blade wrought by our own kindred in the North in the deep past?'"

Thank you from the bottom of the heart of the community for making a card that cares about the Denethor signet. It's a crime against humanity that Decipher deprived us of this!

That being said - change the culture to [Arnor] and make it an Artifact!

Most Bitter Treason
Event • Shadow
Spot X wounded companions and 2 cards to add or draw X cards. You may spot Denethor or Théoden to repeat once for each card of his culture in the dead pile.
"And in one matter only were their counsels to the Steward at variance: Thorongil often warned Ecthelion not to put trust in Saruman the White in Isengard..."

It's a little muddy.
"Spot 2 cards to add or draw X cards, where X is the number of wounded companions you spot. Then you may spot Theoden or Denethor to repeat this once for each card of his culture in the dead pile."

I haven't looked at your most-recent post yet. I'll be back

----------

*
•Gimli, Emissary of Stonewrights
Companion • Dwarf
Strength: 6
Vitality: 3
Signet: Aragorn
Damage +1.
At the start of your turn, you may spot 3 Dwarves to play a fortification from your discard pile, then heal a character of that fortification's culture.
"'...I shall offer him the service of stonewrights of the Mountain, and we will make this a town to be proud of.'"
7V6 (8C6)

[menace64]

•Expecting The Storm
Condition • Support Area
Faramir and each ranger (except Aragorn) gains the Denethor signet.
Each time a minion whose twilight cost is X is played, you may spot X Denethor signets to draw a card.
"...would sit long alone in his tower... foreseeing that the assault of Mordor would come in his time."

Oh snap - here you are already with some Denethor-flavored draw engines! Unfortunately this card is busted, since it's the best card-drawing engine in the game but for a culture that's typically bad at card-draw. But not all is lost! I suggest a fine tweak:

Each time a minion with twilight cost X is played, you may exert a ranger and spot X Denethor signets to draw a card (limit once per phase).

Now you can only do it once per phase and that card draw also comes with an exertion.

•Bulwark of the West
Condition • Support Area
Boromir and each knight (except Aragorn) gains the Denethor signet.
While you can spot X Denethor signets, minions assigned to a companion with the Denethor signet are site number +X.
"'For few, I deem, know of our deeds, and therefore guess little of their peril, if we should fail at last.'"

Perfect card name.
I like this card exactly the way it is, but if you accept my suggestion for ETS and you want both cards to mirror each other, I'd suggest adding "To play, exert a knight." It probably needs an exertion anyhow.

Eyes of the White Tower
Condition • Support Area
While you can spot X Denethor signets, play with the top X cards of your draw deck revealed during your turn.
Fellowship: Add a threat or discard this condition to shuffle your draw deck.
"...but he bought the knowledge dearly, being aged before his time by his contest with the will of Sauron."

Hmm. I don't think a hypothetical player would want to play with the top X cards of their draw deck revealed. Feels like a penalty, and the payoff is shuffling your deck. How about:

At the start of each of your turns, you may spot X Denethor signets to look at the top X cards of any draw deck.
Fellowship: Add a threat or discard this condition to make any player shuffle his or her draw deck.

Now you can go poking around other decks, too, catching glimpses of whatever army is heading your way.

Armor of Black and Silver
Possession • Armor
Strength +1  Signet: +Denethor
Bearer must be a Man (except Aragorn).
Bearer is a knight.
Response: If Denethor is about to take a wound, exert bearer twice (or once and add a burden) to prevent that.
"'Who is the master of Minas Tirith?' the man answered. 'The Lord Denethor or the Grey Wanderer?'"

I like the name as it parallels WoBaS. Great choice.

I think it should just be restricted to knights. "Bearer must be a knight (except Aragorn)." This way it feels more like a "promotion" for soldiers who become Fountaineers.
The Response effect is perfect.

Another counter to Denethor (I think menace64 will like this one a lot!):

Gimme gimme gimme!

Pride and Despair
Condition
Strength -1
Plays on Denethor. He loses unhasty.
Maneuver: Remove 3 threats and spot a (or ) palantír to make Denethor your fierce minion until the regroup phase; he's still a companion. His owner may exert him twice to prevent that.
"'And I? I will go now to my pyre. To my pyre!'"

YES PLEASE. I can only get so aroused. I adore the dual-spotting of palantir, highlighting the connection between the pair. I can imagine a cycle here of different palantiri.
The Maneuver effect is a bullseye, but I think the card still needs to be pushed a little bit - and while we're at it let's try twisting it even more tightly around The Weight of a Legacy since it's already adjacent to it.

Pride and Despair
Condition
Strength +1
Plays on Denethor. He loses unhasty.
Maneuver: Remove 3 threats and spot a (or ) palantír to make Denethor your fierce minion until the regroup phase; he's still a companion. His owner may exert him twice to prevent that.
"'And I? I will go now to my pyre. To my pyre!'"

Now it makes him bigger, building him up over time until he becomes a literal monster.

I look forward to seeing that Palantir.

[Durin's Heir]

A long response deserves another...

•Denethor, Steward of the High King

Steward would be an unloaded keyword found only on Denethor at the start but expanded to others later-on. I further imagine a cycle of Shadow cards that get nastier when used against a Steward.

I like his stats. But he's too expensive and his effect seems too weak by itself, and while Aragorn or Elrond LoR have impactufl effects whenever they are played, this Denethor has to be played early to have a considerable effect. So if you keep the drawing skill (instead of a special ability), make it draw 1 for free or 2 if discards a fortification (abandon a building) or knight (relieve a soldier from duty, which can be beneficial if is spent or bears Shadow conditions). Also, that expensive cost is too perilous being mandatory.

Steward might be loaded and used instead of Unhasty, something like "Steward characters cannot take archery wounds, and while you cannot spot more minions than companions, cannot participate in skirmishes." It'd absorb the last sentence of your Denethor (2 lines). Your original gametext is so extensive that uses all 7 lines of Decipher's standard, leaving no room for lore.

•Denethor, Steward of the High King
Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength: 7
Vitality: 4
Signet: Denethor
Steward. (loaded but not explained)
At the start and end of your turns, draw a card (or discard a knight or fortification to draw 2 cards). 
"But the throne was empty. At the foot of the dais... there was a stone chair, black and unadorned, and on it sat an old man gazing at his lap."
(4 gametext and 3 loretext lines.)

Still, given that allies cannot be played in starting fellowship and needs to be played early (with other cards depending on him), he'll need a fetching card.


While His Stewardship Lasts
Event • Fellowship
Choose one: play Denethor from your draw deck; or spot Denethor to play a knight, a possession or a fortification from your draw deck or discard pile.
"'Whatever betide, you have come to the end of the Gondor that you have known. Let me pass!'"

and Denethor is a primate candidate (that's a typo but I'm leaving it in)

Man, keep it that way! I really love your sense of humor!

Decipher did allies dirty in Return of the King. There should've been lots of allies in Minas Tirith, little helpful squishy characters for Shadow cultures to target and for the player to protect.

Yeah, the only ally is ridiculous (unique, exhausted and wrong block home), but they made such move not include unexpensive speedbumps. Allies didn't end up being protected but being sacrified for the Fellowship, the FP player had little to lose by throwing them to the lions. FOTR site 6 is often a lost cause; Towers sites witness ally immolation at 3, 4 and 6 (plus Treebeard's hastiness at 2 and 8). Newly introduced Threats punish the use of cannon fodder and they even reissued TPIIT, but apparently were still too afraid of allowing easy speedbumps in the most important Battle of the late Third Age. (Similar to the Palantír of Orthanc: fearing to make another OP palantír in TTT, they created one that cost twice for a worthless effect.)

Most farmers, grocers and leechers shouldn't fight, but there are better ways around it. One is making Shadow cards that exploit the dead pile (Houses of Lamentation and FotF do so, but should have been one per Shadow subculture at least). Another is using a keyword to make non-warriors fight by paying some significant price, like "to assign this character to a skirmish, the Free Peoples player must first exert a companion of the same culture or discard 2 cards of that culture from hand," similar to Morgul Spearman but culturally enforced (and very perilous in conjunction with threats). Let's call it "villager"... wait, already exists? Let's turn it loaded then (and retroactively!). And give those Mordor trench-delvers some catapult to use their battle-earned cephalic ammunition!

So Gondorian Merchant, Child of Gondor, Bergil, Ioreth, the Herb-master... all should be loaded "villagers" (or peasants, civilians, bureucrats, proletarians... anything but warriors). And all Hobbit and Bree allies (except Bilbo and Bounder). cards could then have their own Well Stored and Eowyn's Sword (though should work well with villagers of any culture).


As promised, a Mordor catapult and some raining heads:

Great Hurling Devices
Condition • Support Area
Engine. To play, exert a Orc.
The special abilities of fortifications gain this cost: "exert 2 companions."
Shadow: Exert a besieger and discard a card from hand to add a threat.
"...with many yells and the creaking of rope and winch, they began to throw missiles marvellously high..."

With 2 of these in play, your opponent will need 4 (four!) exertions to put a lame Fourth Level on your Troll (but doesn't touch "passive" gametexts like your fortifications). Also, can add threats for Mordor Veteran, Gorgoroth Agitator, Orc Ravager and Their Marching Companies.

Release the Prisoners!
Event • Assignment
Spot 2 engines to make the Free Peoples player make X unbound companions strength -X until the regroup phase, where X is the number of cards in the dead pile.
"For the enemy was flinging into the City all the heads of those who had fallen... and all were branded with the foul token of the Lidless Eye."

Plays after archery and potential threats, so that the warm corpses of recent cannon fodder add to this nasty surprise.

I don't think Pippin ought to be pushed too far in the strength-boosting direction. He's still a Hobbit after all!
Still, I would suggest bumping him up to and cutting the skirmish ability.

He's a Hobbit, yes, but one that killed a Troll chieftain! It was a fluke, I know, but so would be pumping Pippin by exerting Denethor and his two sons 7 times in total; very far from a base str 14 Last Alliance Supergorn. He must cost (with no spotting cost) to be able to start along with Denethor or Faramir; the healing is to allow him to save an exhausted Faramir or Beregond from death. Yes, he's the Prince or "Third Marshal" of Hobbits and gets access to and tricks, but if you factor in the general power creep including Sam GEW (and the fact that he's still weaker than a Gondorian Knight, using a companion slot in a deck) it should be justified.


Besides, Pippin is not the only Hobbit with a warrior character arc: 

•Merry, Master Holbytla
Companion • Hobbit
Strength 3  Vitality 4  Théoden Signet
While you can spot a Man, Merry is strength +2 and a valiant companion.
Skirmish: Discard a card from hand to make a valiant companion strength +2 or exert a minion assigned to him or her.
"'May I lay the sword of Meriadoc of the Shire on your lap Théoden King? Receive my service, if you will!'"

The culture doesn't give him access to pumps or possessions (save Banner of the Mark) in Movie Block, so being serves only to be spotted by Rohirrim Army or King's Advisor, or exerted for Mustering for Battle, or healed by Rekindled King or WSTF. The skirmish skill covers that weakness, turning cards into pumps for him or for any valiant Man, or mid-skirmish exertions for their foes. (Merrily, Valiant excludes Eomer TMoR, Elite Rider and Eowyn LoI; it actually gives nothing else to Merry except being spotted by Eomer VW, since all other valiant tricks and skills (even post-Shadows) need "Valiant Men.")

That being said - change the culture to [Arnor] and make it an Artifact!

Not [Arnor], since stands for all Numenor. But you're right, it should be an artifact. And have a sibling:

•Merry's Sword, Work of Westernesse
Artifact • Hand Weapon
Strength +2
Bearer must be Merry.
Skirmish: Exert Merry twice (or discard Merry's Sword) to make a minion assigned to a companion with the Théoden signet strength -3 and remove a keyword from it.
"No other blade, not though mightier hands had wielded it, would have dealt that foe a wound so bitter..."

Enduring, damage bonuses, even Southron or Nazgul, all keywords succumb to Merry's enchanted sword. So Merry can use his sword twice (losing it) to make Black Captain str -6 and lose both Nazgul (blocking All Blades Perish and pumps) and Enduring; then Dernhelm (Valiant + Théoden signet) can kill him with a str +3 pump and 3 wounds/exertions (a horse, her sword and gimme one more... Master Holbytla). Pretty straining but powerful.

I never liked fortifications very much either. I never bought into the concept of moving a bastion of stone onto a single minion.

Attaching fortifications to a minion is like directing that minion to your trap. But that should work only at certain sites or stretches of the sitepath (like stealths), and be discarded (abandoned) for some weaker effect like drawing or some limited healing at any site. The Set 4 site conditions do exactly that (Forests of Ithilien, Forbidden Pool, Henneth Annun & Ruins of Osgiliath), they should have stuck with that mechanic for fortifications.

What do you think of fortifications that behave like these:

Rammas Echor

Looks great in flavor but is too complicated. Playing conditions on sites requires having the site in play first (thus someone moving there first) to then pile up your defenses just before using them (or even after), which is the opposite of how slowly-built stone walls work. I'd use instead a Shadowplay "limit once" approach during assignment, so the more copies you have (defended segments of the wall) the more minions you stop at the Rammas:

Rammas Echor
Condition • Support Area
Fortification. To play, spot 2 Men.
Each time a knight is assigned to a minion at sites 2[K] to 5[K], you may make that minion lose (and cannot gain) fierce until the regroup phase (limit once).
"So the men of Gondor called the out wall that they had built with great labour, after Ithilien fell..."

Wall of White Stone

•Wall of White Stone
Condition • Support Area
Fortification.
At sites 3[K] and 4[K], the fellowship archery total is +1 for each Man bearing a ranged weapon you can spot.
Regroup: Discard a unique fortification to heal a Man.
"'...not even he could enter here while we yet live.'"

64% of me wants these to be possessions, since they are physical objects privy to destruction.

Just like Corsair Ships. Enola's Hobbit Draft Game has 3 fortifications (Great Barricade, Ancient Forges and Horn of Erebor), and we made them all possessions. But possession discard is scarce or unexistent for many Shadow cultures (, non-Corsair , Uruks and [gollum]) so that'd need to be fixed simultaneously. Battering Ram should discard fortifications!

Stout Resistance

Ditch the dependance on threats and sites, and add some damage potential:

Stout Resistance
Event • Skirmish
Spot X fortifications (limit +4) to make a Man strength +X (and damage +1 if you discard one of those fortifications).
"Under the south walls of the City the footmen of Gondor now drove against the legions of Morgul that were still gathered there in strength."

One more ally:

•Beregond, Guard of the White City

No, he cannot be weak, he killed 3 of Denethor's guards and held others at bay. Also he fought at the Black Gate, so must be a companion.

•Beregond, Guard of the Third Company
Companion • Man
Strength 6  Vitality 3  Denethor Signet
Knight.
For each wound on Faramir (or Man) you can spot, Beregond is strength +1.
Response: If Faramir is about to take a wound, exert Beregond to prevent that.
"...he drew a knife and strode towards the bier. But Beregond sprang forward and set himself before Faramir."

" Man," if you know what I mean!

•Gimli, Emissary of Stonewrights

Looks great. But fortifications might inspire him instead: "For each fortification you can spot over 2, Gimli is strength +1 (limit +4)."

========

I still owe you the Palantír of Minas Anor, which already have, but need to redact the post first.



Bonus: villagers!

•Ioreth, Wise Old Woman
Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength: 2
Vitality: 3
Villager.
At the start of your turn, you may add to heal a character at site 3[K] or 6[K].
Fellowship: Exert Ioreth to shuffle Athelas (or a tale) from your discard pile into your draw deck.
"'Ioreth, men will long remember your words.'"
(11U61)

Makes sanctuaries heal 6 wounds instead of 5, or heal a 3[K] or 6[K] ally at any turn.

•Herb-master, Warden of the Houses of Healing
Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength: 4
Vitality: 3
Muster. Villager.
Each time your character heals at site 3[K] or 6[K], remove or draw a card.
Fellowship: Exert Herb-master and add to play Athelas from your draw deck.
"'A great lord... and it is a thing passing strange to me that the healing hand should also wield the sword.'"

Doesn't heal but helps Athelas to do so, and turns healing at sanctuaries into drawing (or choke when doubling from 6). The synergy with Ioreth is two-fold: you can get one Athelas back into play by exerting both allies, and can use Ioreth's ally healing either for no twilight or to draw a card.

[Durin's Heir]

Pride and Despair

Now it makes him bigger, building him up over time until he becomes a literal monster.

Better and better! Replaces a cost of with an inconvenience (a fighting and stronger Denethor) that turns very convenient in the end.

•Expecting The Storm

Unfortunately this card is busted, since it's the best card-drawing engine in the game but for a culture that's typically bad at card-draw.

You're right, it needs a cost, but an exertion per draw is excessively straining. "Add " would be better, perilous during Shadow phase while your opponent is still playing minions. The Steward defying the advancing Shadow of the East.

•Expecting The Storm
Condition • Support Area
Faramir and each ranger (except Aragorn) gains the Denethor signet.
Each time a minion whose twilight cost is X is played, you may spot X Denethor signets and add to draw a card.
"...would sit long alone in his tower... foreseeing that the assault of Mordor would come in his time."

Armor of Black and Silver

I think it should just be restricted to knights. "Bearer must be a knight (except Aragorn)." This way it feels more like a "promotion" for soldiers who become Fountaineers.

You're right, would be better only for knights. But then I'll cut the cost to only.


--------


I made you wait a lot of this post, I'm sorry for that. But here is finally the Palantír of Denethor:

•The Palantír of Minas Anor, The Stone of Anarion
Artifact • Palantír
Plays on Denethor. To play, add 2 theats.
Fellowship: Exert Denethor to look at the top 4 cards of any draw deck. You may place 2 of them beneath that draw deck (and take the rest into hand if are yours).
"'...still the lords of Gondor have keener sight than lesser men, and many messages come to them.'"
(9R37)

A supercharged Questions That Need Answering machine for Denethor. Not only can draw the best 2 of the top 4 of your deck, but can also postpone (originally was discard) the best 2 of 4 of an opponent's deck, and does not refer to the twilight pool. So cycle and set up as if there was no tomorrow!

Eyes of the White Tower

Hmm. I don't think a hypothetical player would want to play with the top X cards of their draw deck revealed. Feels like a penalty, and the payoff is shuffling your deck.

The Palantír was the reason why I wanted Eyes of the White Tower giving that advance knowledge. But you're right that it gives it unnecessarily to your opponents also, so I'll use your version which is perfect. Then with 4 Denethor signets you'll know if exerting Denethor with the Palantír is worthy:

Eyes of the White Tower
Condition • Support Area
At the start of your turn, you may spot X Denethor signets to look at the top X cards of any draw deck.
Fellowship: Discard this condition to heal Denethor or shuffle your draw deck.
"...but he bought the knowledge dearly, being aged before his time by his contest with the will of Sauron."
(7R95)

Ditched also the threat-fueled shuffle for some much needed Denethor healing.

---

Here are 3 cards to enhance the power of Denethor's palantír:

Knowledge of the Distant
Condition • Support Area
Fellowship: Spot Denethor (or a palantír) to discard a card from hand with a twilight cost of X. Look at the top X cards of your draw deck (limit 10), take one into hand and return the rest in any order. Discard this condition.
"'I know the answer to many riddles.'"
(13C68)

Just Denethor looking for foreign information (like the Battle of Hornburg or Saruman's downfall), without confronting the Eye yet. Works well by itself drawing selectively the best card of a big bunch, but also can increase the reach of Denethor's palantír if you use the condition first discarding a card that costs 6+ (after taking one of those into hand you can place the best 2 and worst 2 of the remaining lot on the top 4). 


Contest of Wills
Event • Fellowship or Regroup
Palantír. Spot a palantír (or exert Denethor) to reveal any number of cards from hand. Choose an opponent who may reveal any number of random cards from hand. The player that revealed X more cards may add or remove , or draw 2 cards.
"'He is not so mighty yet that he is above fear...'"

Now this is meant to confront Sauron. Reveal information to force the Shadow player to choose between secrecy and twilight / 2 cards. But you reveal at will so that gives you the advantage, while your opponent reveals at random. Also, by offering a potential benefit of twilight / drawing 2 cards, you can bait the Shadow player to reveal more than you are able/willing to reveal, so you can actually win by losing the duel. And finally, by pondering simultaneously all those many posibilities, each with its own pros and cons, it's likely to cause your opponent to lose focus and take sub-optimal decisions during the rest of the turn.


The last of the three cards is meant to fetch the Palantír:

Appointed By Destiny
Event • Fellowship or Regroup
Tale. Spot Denethor to play a possession (or a palantír) from your draw deck, or exert Aragorn to play an artifact from your draw deck on himself.
"Denethor II was... more kingly than any man that had appeared in Gondor for many lives of men... Indeed he was as like to Thorongil as to one of nearest kin..."

Can play Contest of Wills from deck (due to the weird "palantír" keyword on that event). Besides the Anor Stone, Denethor can play hardware for soldiers, or Aragorn tokens of his royalty. If Aragorn had his own Palantír he could get it with this event, and spot it to play the previous 2 palantír tricks... well, he actually has one:


•The Palantír of Orthanc, Elessar's Right
Artifact • Palantír
Plays on Aragorn. To play, add a threat or discard the Palantír of Orthanc.
Fellowship or Regroup: Spot Aragorn with X vitality and exert him to make an opponent reveal X cards from hand. Remove for each Free Peoples card revealed.
"'...I had both the right and the strength to use it...'"
(12C45)

While Denethor's palantír draws cards (new mechanic), Aragorn's stone is meant to force Sauron to choke (classic mechanic) or reveal his Shadow cards. But does it in a different way than Contest of Wills: while the event reveals opponent's cards at random and can reveal more than the Stone, the Orthanc-Stone preserves your own secrecy ("'I spoke no word to him, and in the end I wrenched the Stone to my own will.'"). So they aren't so redundant and can potentiate each other (but be sure to use the Palantír first since its not random, then use the random revealing of Contest of Wills).

---

Now we have 2 different Palantíri... why not bringing also the third?

•The Palantír of Minas Ithil, The Stone of Isildur
Artifact • Support Area
Palantír. To play, exert a minion.
Each time the special ability of a palantír is used, you may add a threat.
Shadow: Reveal 2 Free Peoples cards from hand and place them beneath your draw deck to draw a card or add .
"...the palantír of Isildur came into the hands of the Enemy..."
(9R+47)

Gives pure or mixed decks a way to use FP cards in hand, so those dreaded FP hands are no longer a problem. Mix with Under Foot, Moving This Way or Seeking Its Master, oh my! The threat adding part punishes the use of Palantíri with a resource that feeds or boosts Fires Raged Unchecked, Mordor Veteran, Thy Hope is But Ignorance, All the East Is Moving and Pride and Despair. And this palantír can trigger Pride and Despair without relying on your opponent's Stones.

---

With all those threats being piled upon Denethor's mind, he'll need a way to remove them:

Still Defiant
Event • Fellowship
Tale. Exert X Men to choose one: add a threat to remove X burdens (limit 2), add a burden to remove X threats, or shuffle X cards from your discard pile into your draw deck.
"...for the Tower of Ecthelion, standing high within the topmost walls shone out against the sky..."

Very expensive, exchanges threats / burdens / discarded resources for wounds. A lucky Might of Numenor can ease their effort.

[menace64]

•Denethor, Steward of the High King
Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength: 7
Vitality: 4
Signet: Denethor
Steward.
At the start and end of your turns, draw a card (or discard a knight or fortification to draw 2 cards).  
"But the throne was empty. At the foot of the dais... there was a stone chair, black and unadorned, and on it sat an old man gazing at his lap."
7V? (8U19)

There it is! Blending Unhasty and the unloaded-Steward into a loaded Steward is bloody brilliant; after all, steward is no mere ranger and deserves special treatment. Steward feels perfect as one of those slightly-more-involved keywords that never needs to be explained, since every Denethor would have it* and naturally there would be a number of cards (across a span of cultures) focusing on it.  

*except maybe some "My sons are dead" -leaning torch-happy version.

While His Stewardship Lasts
Event • Fellowship
Choose one: play Denethor from your draw deck; or spot Denethor to play a knight, a possession or a fortification from your draw deck or discard pile.
"'Whatever betide, you have come to the end of the Gondor that you have known. Let me pass!'"

I think it's missing an "(except Aragorn)".
I like that it's a fetcher with a secondary function - a little more , a little less . feels a little inexpensive and this card would absolutely be a keystone card in a Steward/Minas Tirith deck and I'm totally cool with both of those statements turning true.

All this talk of stewardships has induced me to write a "Fourth Age" Faramir.

•Faramir, Steward of Gondor
Companion • Man
Strength: 7
Vitality: 4
Signet: Aragorn
Steward. Knight. Ranger. To play, exert Aragorn.
Response: If an unbound companion is about to take a wound, exert Faramir and add to prevent that wound.
10V? (This exact persona that never got used)

Keyword soup on this guy, not unlike his brother Boromir, Steward's Heir but blending in the ability of Eowyn, Lady of Rohan. I've bumped Faramir's cost/stats to parallel Aragorn, Elessar Telcontar.

Great Hurling Devices
Condition • Support Area
Engine. To play, exert a Orc.
The special abilities of fortifications gain this cost: "exert 2 companions."
Shadow: Exert a besieger and discard a card from hand to add a threat.
"...with many yells and the creaking of rope and winch, they began to throw missiles marvellously high..."

Great hurling devices, you say?
I like it. It's expensive and only double-impactful against fortification decks. The Shadow ability makes it useful to besiegers as a general rule of cycling the heads of your enemies out of your hand and onto their threat pile.

Release the Prisoners!
Event • Assignment
Spot 2 engines to make the Free Peoples player make X unbound companions strength -X until the regroup phase, where X is the number of cards in the dead pile.
"For the enemy was flinging into the City all the heads of those who had fallen... and all were branded with the foul token of the Lidless Eye."

My only observation is that events tend to invoke a physical cost. What if this required you to remove some number of tokens from your engines?

Yes, he's the Prince or "Third Marshal" of Hobbits and gets access to and tricks...

You convinced me   Now I want to extrapolate your Pippin into his Scouring of the Shire persona!

•Merry, Master Holbytla
Companion • Hobbit
Strength 3  Vitality 4  Théoden Signet
While you can spot a Man, Merry is strength +2 and a valiant companion.
Skirmish: Discard a card from hand to make a valiant companion strength +2 or exert a minion assigned to him or her.
"'May I lay the sword of Meriadoc of the Shire on your lap Théoden King? Receive my service, if you will!'"

I laughed at the idea of adding "To play, add a burden." to both this Merry and the previous Pippin, since from the perspective of the hobbits that is all they have become in the world around them. Like, I think this Merry is awesome and it reminds me of Friend to Sam, but in a deck built around exploiting his effect he's extremely good, I'd wager too good for . I hadn't considered the starting fellowship when I made my comment about Pippin probably costing so perhaps a little bit of Smeagol-adjacent costing might work here?

•Merry's Sword, Work of Westernesse
Artifact • Hand Weapon
Strength +2
Bearer must be Merry.
Skirmish: Exert Merry twice (or discard Merry's Sword) to make a minion assigned to a companion with the Théoden signet strength -3 and remove a keyword from it.
"No other blade, not though mightier hands had wielded it, would have dealt that foe a wound so bitter..."

"and remove a keyword from it." Oh no, Phallen, look out!
I love this card.

Attaching fortifications to a minion is like directing that minion to your trap.

I suppose that makes sense.  

Rammas Echor
Condition • Support Area
Fortification. To play, spot 2 Men.
Each time a knight is assigned to a minion at sites 2[K] to 5[K], you may make that minion lose (and cannot gain) fierce until the regroup phase (limit once).
"So the men of Gondor called the out wall that they had built with great labour, after Ithilien fell..."

•Wall of White Stone
Condition • Support Area
Fortification.
At sites 3[K] and 4[K], the fellowship archery total is +1 for each Man bearing a ranged weapon you can spot.
Regroup: Discard a unique fortification to heal a Man.
"'...not even he could enter here while we yet live.'"

YUP I like this a lot better. They do the same thing but 82% more cleanerer.  

Just like Corsair Ships. Enola's Hobbit Draft Game has 3 fortifications (Great Barricade, Ancient Forges and Horn of Erebor), and we made them all possessions. But possession discard is scarce or unexistant for many Shadow cultures (, non-Corsair , Uruks and [gollum]) so that'd need to be fixed simultaneously. Battering Ram should discard fortifications!

Those Dwarven cards are gorgeous! And I feel like there's no reason not to give every shadow culture some form of possession-discard potential. There ain't nothin' special 'bout possessions. Battering Ram really should eat fortifications, and Moria should be plunderers! (Heck, there's even a keyword in there: Plunder (If this character wins a skirmish, you may discard an opponent's possession).)

Stout Resistance
Event • Skirmish
Spot X fortifications (limit +4) to make a Man strength +X (and damage +1 if you discard one of those fortifications).
"Under the south walls of the City the footmen of Gondor now drove against the legions of Morgul that were still gathered there in strength."

 

•Beregond, Guard of the Third Company
Companion • Man
Strength 6  Vitality 3  Denethor Signet
Knight.
For each wound on Faramir (or minion) you can spot, Beregond is strength +1.
Response: If Faramir is about to take a wound, exert Beregond to prevent that.
"...he drew a knife and strode towards the bier. But Beregond sprang forward and set himself before Faramir."

And now I'm wondering why I've always seen Beregond as an Ally card.  

•Ioreth, Wise Old Woman
Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength: 2
Vitality: 3
Villager.
At the start of your turn, you may add to heal a character at site 3[K] or 6[K].
Fellowship: Exert Ioreth to shuffle Athelas (or a tale) from your discard pile into your draw deck.
"'Ioreth, men will long remember your words.'"
(11U61)

Makes sanctuaries heal 6 wounds instead of 5, or heal a 3[K] or 6[K] ally at any turn.

That's your second "WoW" subtitle in this post. Wow indeed!

•Herb-master, Warden of the Houses of Healing
Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength: 4
Vitality: 3
Muster. Villager.
Each time your character heals at site 3[K] or 6[K], remove or draw a card.
Fellowship: Exert Herb-master and add to play Athelas from your draw deck.
"'A great lord... and it is a thing passing strange to me that the healing hand should also wield the sword.'"

Doesn't heal but helps Athelas to do so, and turns healing at sanctuaries into drawing (or choke when doubling from 6). The synergy with Ioreth is two-fold: you can get one Athelas back into play by exerting both allies, and can use Ioreth's ally healing either for no twilight or to draw a card.

Herb-master (and to a lesser degree, Ioreth) needs tighter cultural enforcement - right now he fits in any deck, fetches his own Athelas which he himself can bear. "To play, spot your Steward."?

[menace64]

Here's a villager for ya:

•Herion, Minas Tirith Rat-catcher
Ally • Home 3[K] & 6[K] • Man
Strength: 4
Vitality: 3
Villager. To play, spot a fortification.
Fellowship: Exert Herion to reveal a card at random from a Shadow player's hand. If the revealed card is a minion, you may have that Shadow player place that card on top of his or her draw deck.

----------

•Expecting The Storm
Condition • Support Area
Faramir and each ranger (except Aragorn) gains the Denethor signet.
Each time a minion whose twilight cost is X is played, you may spot X Denethor signets and add to draw a card.
"...would sit long alone in his tower... foreseeing that the assault of Mordor would come in his time."

I reckon the answer to the question is "he has both signets" but what happens when Faramir has, say, the Frodo signet and then gains Denethor's?

So the flavor of the card is emphasizing Denethor's distant paranoia. Like, he hears about one Orc sniffing around Cair Andros and he sends another company into Itihilien. Oddly, you don't actually need to include Denethor in your deck to use this card, which I think I'm okay with since, really, this is a ranger card, not Minas Tirith. I think it's solid now.

---

•The Palantír of Minas Anor, The Stone of Anarion
Artifact • Palantír
Plays on Denethor. To play, add 2 theats.
Fellowship: Exert Denethor to look at the top 4 cards of any draw deck. You may place 2 of them beneath that draw deck (and take the rest into hand if are yours).
"'...still the lords of Gondor have keener sight than lesser men, and many messages come to them.'"
(9R37)

Is this the same palantir as Seeing Stone of Minas Arnor? If yes, I'm not insisting a name change or anything, just wondering. (It's not like Saruman had two different staffs... it just changed its name one day.)

What on Arda is a theat!? Sounds... icky. Also, the To Play bit should probably go before the Denethor bit. I'd recommend either "(and take the rest into hand if yours)" or "(and take the rest into hand if those cards are yours)".

I remember an article Scrye magazine put out for the release of LotR TCG. The standout part of said article compared some effects in LotR to similar effects in other card games (MTG, YuGiOh, and DBZ). Character power levels were compared, as were mechanics like card draw and movement. Seeing your palantir reminds me of scry from MTG and that is exactly what the cardfeel should be. LotR doesn't do scry because there are very few Wizards in Middle-earth, but you can scry if you build the right deck. Galadriel and her Mirror, or others with the palantiri.

I think it's a potent source of card advantage and not easy to remove or prevent. 2 threats is a steep up-front price tag, however, and in a format (and deck strategy) where threats (or theats, presumably  ) are a precious resource, more often than never you would draw this card and have no immediate way of playing it due to the number of threats already in play. That would probably be a sufficient balance I'd think. Do you run 3-4 to make sure you get it early, or do you run 1-2 and hope you don't lose control of the threat game?

---

Eyes of the White Tower
Condition • Support Area
At the start of your turn, you may spot X Denethor signets to look at the top X cards of any draw deck.
Fellowship: Discard this condition to heal Denethor or shuffle your draw deck.
"...but he bought the knowledge dearly, being aged before his time by his contest with the will of Sauron."
(7R95)

Make it unique, and maybe raise the cost to or somehow limit how deep you can scry. Denethor's eyes may not be blind but he's still a human* and a 1:1 exchange rate between signets and cards seems high. And I'm not necessarily against the Fellowship ability going off more than once in a single turn, but it should be slightly more expensive to access that Denethor healing.

*unless we establish how much better Sauron is at manipulating a palantir:

The Lidless Eye
Event • Response
Search.
If cards in your hand, draw deck, or discard pile are looked at or revealed by another player, spot 3 burdens (or 3 threats) and discard this card to reveal the top 10 cards of that player's draw deck. Add for each Shadow card revealed.
"'... no image of moon or star are left to me. I am naked in the dark. Sam, and there is no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I begin to see it even with my waking eyes, and all else fades.'"
(2U87)

Hearkens back to Eye of Barad-Dur (seriously one of my all-time favorite cards) and puts Denethor's ability with a palantir in check: if he pries where he oughtn't look, Sauron can easily ensnare him.

---

Knowledge of the Distant
Condition • Support Area
Fellowship: Spot Denethor (or a palantír) to discard a card from hand with a twilight cost of X. Look at the top X cards of your draw deck (limit 10), take one into hand and return the rest in any order. Discard this condition.
"'I know the answer to many riddles.'"
(13C68)

In terms of power level, this feels more like something Elendil should be using, not Denethor. Limit 2, maybe 3?

---

Contest of Wills
Event • Fellowship or Regroup
Palantír. Spot a palantír (or exert Denethor) to reveal any number of cards from hand. Choose an opponent who may reveal any number of random cards from hand. The player that revealed X more cards may add or remove , or draw 2 cards.
"'He is not so mighty yet that he is above fear...'"

I'd ditch the Palantir keyword here, since the problem is going to be a problem no matter what you do. Presently there's no way to quickly distinguish palantir cards from artifact cards, and we all just nod our heads when a card is supposed to be a Palantir. I'm down with errata-ing all of the Palantiri cards with the keyword, but adding that keyword to support cards would merely compound the problem lol  

I like this card the most of the little bunch here, since its power varies depending on several in-game factors. I'd make Denethor an outright requirement, though, and maybe try this wording: "The player that revealed X more cards may add , remove , or draw 2 cards." (Extremely clever wording already for intuitively transmitting what this card does, but now it talks to both FP and SH characters.)

---

Appointed By Destiny
Event • Fellowship or Regroup
Tale. Spot Denethor to play a possession (or a palantír) from your draw deck, or exert Aragorn to play an artifact from your draw deck on himself.
"Denethor II was... more kingly than any man that had appeared in Gondor for many lives of men... Indeed he was as like to Thorongil as to one of nearest kin..."

I can't help but split this card in half.

Appointed By Destiny
Event
Tale.
Fellowship: Spot Denethor to play a possession (or Palantír) from your draw deck.
Regroup: Exert Aragorn to play an artifact from your draw deck on himself.
"Denethor II was... more kingly than any man that had appeared in Gondor for many lives of men... Indeed he was as like to Thorongil as to one of nearest kin..."

Can play Contest of Wills from deck (due to the weird "palantír" keyword on that event).

I like Palantir as a keyword but I still think it only belongs on the actual artifacts representing them. Make Contest of Wills a Spell and use that somehow if you must but there comes a time when deck-fixing breaks the game. Right now we're revealing 10 cards or more a turn and filtering all over the place - swirl these mechanics and shuffling before a game becomes irrelevant. Fix your game too much and it evaporates.

---

•The Palantír of Orthanc, Elessar's Right
Artifact • Palantír
Plays on Aragorn. To play, add a threat or discard the Palantír of Orthanc.
Fellowship or Regroup: Spot Aragorn with X vitality and exert him to make an opponent reveal X cards from hand. Remove for each Free Peoples card revealed.
"'...I had both the right and the strength to use it...'"
(12C45)

Flip "To play..." and "Plays on...". I know that Recovered Seeing-Stone had some wonky wording but it's a weird and awful exception to how it's otherwise always been aligned.
I really like how this card spots Aragorn's vitality before the exertion, and goes on to heighten Aragorn's classic twilight-denial strategy. Perfect flavor. And holy smokes this fits in with my The Lidless Eye card, too! Haha!

---

Now we have 2 different Palantíri... why not bringing also the third?

(The balls on this dwarf!)

•The Palantír of Minas Ithil, The Stone of Isildur
Artifact • Support Area
Palantír. To play, exert a minion.
Each time the special ability of a palantír is used, you may add a threat.
Shadow: Reveal 2 Free Peoples cards from hand and place them beneath your draw deck to draw a card or add .
"...the palantír of Isildur came into the hands of the Enemy..."
(9R+47)

Question: Can the Shadow player actually target FP cards in their own hand? Aren't those cards inactive? Or is it that you can spot a card as FP/SH even if it's inactive?

Hmm. Now I'm wondering if there's a way to slow down a player's ability to use their Palantir. What do you think of slapping "Return this artifact to your hand." at the end of every Palantiri ability? That might let you juice these up a little bit more, while also restricting a player's ability to abuse their powers overmuch.

---

With all those threats being piled upon Denethor's mind, he'll need a way to remove them:

I figured he'd just be bad at removing threats as a natural weakness, rendering him dependent on outside assistance.

Still Defiant
Event • Fellowship
Tale. Exert X Men to choose one: add a threat to remove X burdens (limit 2), add a burden to remove X threats, or shuffle X cards from your discard pile into your draw deck.
"...for the Tower of Ecthelion, standing high within the topmost walls shone out against the sky..."

My above comment being said, I do like this card. The first two options are limited enough that the third option doesn't feel tacked-on. A useful and flavorful Minas Tirith card.

[azogsbane]

I love the ideas for Denethor in the original post above. Great points about missed opportunities on Decipher's part. I look forward to reading the various comments when I have leisure to. (Sorry for jumping on this super late, but I've been away for, well...years. Thanks to Covid, my brothers and I have started playing again.)