Been a while since I posted a new deck here, and since the game is living a huge reneissasance in my area with sealed/constructed events and everything, I'm inspired to once again do so. Here is my latest brew:
Format: Expanded
Author: B0r0m1r
Ring-bearer:
Frodo, Son of DrogoRing:
The One Ring, The Great RingAdventure deck:
Buckland HomesteadSteward's TombNeekerbreekers' BogCavern EntranceMithlondGreen Dragon InnDammed Gate-streamThe Prancing PonySirannon RuinsFree Peoples Draw Deck:
1x
Smeagol, Always Helps3x
Aragorn, Elessar Telcontar1x
Aragorn, Thorongil1x
Faramir, Son of Denethor1x
Pippin, Wearer of Black and Silver1x
Sam, Resolute Halfling2x
Aragorn's Bow, Ranger's Longbow1x
Faramir's Bow1x
Faramir's Sword1x
Flaming Brand2x
Sting, Elven Long Knife1x
Anduril, Sword That Was Broken4x
The Shards of Narsil2x
Naked Waste2x
One Good Turn Deserves Another4x
Something Slimy3x
Community Living3x
Mind Your Own Affairs4x
Unheeded1x
Follow Smeagol2x
Gladden Homestead1x
There's Another Way1x
Hardy Garrison1x
Stewards' Legacy2x
A Light in His Mind2x
Scouring of the Shire4x
Shadowplay4x
Deagol, Fateful Finder2x
Elendil's Army1x
Daddy Twofoot, Next-door Neighbor1x
Robin Smallburrow, Shirriff Cock-RobinShadow Draw Deck:
1x
Gollum, Her Sneak1x
Gollum, Old Villain3x
Shelob, Her Ladyship1x
Grima, Servant of Another Master1x
Grima, Wormtongue2x
The Balrog, Demon of Might2x
Gothmog, Morgul Leader1x
Southron Leader1x Úlairë Enquëa, Lieutenant of Morgul
1x Úlairë
Lemenya, Eternally Threatening2x Úlairë
Nelya, Third of the Nine Riders2x Úlairë Nertëa,
Dark Horseman2x
Web1x
Ships of Great Draught1x
A Dark Shape Sprang4x
Captured by the Ring3x
Led Astray4x
Sudden Strike1x
We Must Have It4x
Deceit4x
Evil-smelling Fens1x
Fat One Wants It1x
Final Strike1x
Incited4x
Not Easily Avoided2x
Not This Time!2x
Promise Keeping2x
They Stole It1x
Treacherous Little Toad1x
Unabated in Malice3x
Saruman, Servant of SauronThe shadow is nothing special, just random Gollum ninja stuff. I'm not the biggest ninja player, so I'm sure it's not optimal or whatever, but the FP side needs the 4 copies of
Not Easily Avoided to function consistently. A bit of consistency can be give up for a bit more
raw power and originality with a
Dark Enemy shadow, in time I'll post a list for that version as well.
So for the FP, it has a bunch of combos, the basic focus is on the healing provided by
Resolute Halfling. Use
Son of Drogo to heal himself with Sam, then Sam heals himself. Once you are down to 4 cards stack a
card on
The Shards of Narsil, triggering
A Light in His Mind then take it back then repeat until the rule of 4 allows. Then discard down to 3. This allows 5 heals and 5 burden removal per turn (assuming nothing else is played).
I usually bid 2 to start at
Green Dragon Inn (but if I get outbid, chances are that it's either
The Prancing Pony or
Dammed Gate-stream which are also cool). Since I utuilize all 3 search sites with shadow number of 3, I can't play
Mount Doom. This is a flaw, which I may address.
The healing enables very liberal usage of
Sting, ELK, which further enables
Ranger's Longbow and
Smeagol, Always Helps.
The deck also has
Shadowplay +
Unheeded combo, which I find very potent in the expanded meta.
There are also maneuver tricks with
Daddy Twofoot,
Robin Smallburrow and
Hardy Garrison. Regain Initiative with
Daddy Twofoot, then use Robin to lose/regain it in one go (removes the activation cost of Daddy and triggers a wound). Return
Mind your Own Affairs or
Unheeded with it, depending on the situation. This will result in an additional loss/gain of initiative.
Playing
One Good Turn Deserves Another with the additional burden cost on exactly 4 cards also results in initiative loss/gain (so the burden cost is technically free here, and can wound stuff in the regroup).
Now, corsairs are a hard matchup, and there is not a whole lot the deck can do to combat them, but there are a few tricks.
Shadowplay +
Unheeded can completely counter
Corsair Marauder (thanks to the discarded when played rule), but there is another neat trick. If
Corsair War Galley is already set with 6 tokens,
Shadowplay +
Hardy Garrison can also trigger an instant kill (due to the loss of initiative when the first corsair is played), wich can prevent the corsair player from meeting spotting requirements.
If I see uruks, I a) kill Pippin ASAP and b) fetch
Gladden Homestead for protection until I do, because
Greed is very tough to deal with.
I play 2 different copies of Aragorn so I have the option to fetch
Thorongil with
The Prancing Pony and also to be able to get him against
Ugly Fellow. In other cases I prefer
Elessar Telcontar.
The deck is brand new, my record with it is 7-0 so far, so it will surely be optimized more heavily in the future.
Cards I'm considering right now are
Birthday Present (probably should be there already to be fair) and
Nimble Attack (Grond and corsairs are tough).
Pallando as well, probably would cut a copy of
Elendil's Army for it, but going up to 4 cultures can be rough. There is also potential with
Seeing Stone of Orthanc +
Derufin against the worst matchups of the deck, but getting both out would be hard.
For the shadow, well... a lot: lurker Gollum and more
Incited, You are a Liar and a Thief, and some more.
Also a version with
Captain of Ithilien,
Ranger of the White Tree, and
Madril, DoO will be tested with Ithilien Blades. Although I have a feeling that it's unnecessary here. Although I love the fact that when people see Madril, they usually (often wrongly) target him. Stewards" Legacy would be stronger, now it's just a random option to fetch with
Something Slimy if I do draw
Elendil's Army.
Notable exclusion is
Don't Look at them. I just can't fuel it. Also considering dropping
Follow Smeagol as
One Good Turn Deserves Another is superior here in every way.
Here are some replays:
https://play.lotrtcgpc.net/gemp-lotr/game.html?replayId=B0r0m1r$etzfuoyrs7ex8iwu - very tough game, narrow site 9 kill
https://play.lotrtcgpc.net/gemp-lotr/game.html?replayId=B0r0m1r$kpt6oieva7aahj46 - vs
HKOTN archery / sauron grind
https://play.lotrtcgpc.net/gemp-lotr/game.html?replayId=B0r0m1r$wctgi2gqq5sae617 - vs Straglers/Hobbits. Heavily favorable matchup
This is just an easy shell, the core combo can be built around in a million of ways, kudos to anyone comming up with a
Wraith variant. It doesn't even really need
, back in the day I played a full
deck, with just 4
The Shards of Narsil splashed, just need to draw 2 of them that way. Movie block adoptation very possible with
The Shire Countryside and such, but I won't spell out everything
Constructive criticsm, and bad mannered trolling are both welcome, cheers!