FotR Uruk Possessions

[Not a Zombie]

Thought it would be fun to make a strategy option around  uruk possessions. This would slot into FotR block.

Uruk Shield
Possession • Shield
Bearer must be an  Uruk-Hai
The fellowship archery total is -1.
Skirmish: Exert bearer to cancel the strength bonus of a weapon born by a character he is skirmishing.

Uruk Armor
Possession • Armor
Vit: +1
Bearer must be an  Uruk-Hai
Bearer takes no more than 1 wound per skirmish phase

Uruk Helm
Possession • Helm
Bearer must be an Uruk-Hai
Bearer is strength +1 for each possession he bears

Uruk Bow
Possession • Ranged Weapon
Bearer must be an  Uruk-Hai
Bearer gains Archer

Uruk Armory
Condition • Support Area
Remove to play an possession from your discard pile.

[Phallen Cassidy]

It's hard to just stick to Fellowship block because of everything you could do with these cards in Towers But I'll try my best.

Overall, it's an interesting little stack of cards. The obvious problem is that to fully kit out a minion requires a lot of devotion, but I'm one of the few who says there's no real Uruk Beatdown deck in Fellowship block -- minions just don't get strong enough. Isengard also had great cycling in Abandoning Reason for Madness, which synergizes naturally with Uruk Armory.

Uruk Shield is a bit better than Uruk-hai Sword. 2 strength either way, but this is in the Uruk's favor for overwhelms. It would be more than a bit if not for the antisynergy with Troop of Uruk-hai. I don't think it's quite convenient enough to replace that minion outright (1 twilight to pull it with Armory and another to play it, makes Uruk Warrior almost the same) but if I were doing this possession-based deck I'd probably reduce my copies of the Troop to accommodate it. I think this is the best card of the lot: simple, thematic, effective.

Uruk Helm is, I think, better still than Uruk-hai Sword. Most Uruk-hai are odd-numbered strengths and 10 strength is the traditional "beat the bulk of Uruk minions" threshold, so when you really want out of Uruk-hai Sword is to come back out on top. Doing it for free is better than paying

Uruk Bow is in a very odd spot to cost. On the one hand, if it were 1 twilight for a wound that's very cheap, and this card would do fine in a Worry deck. On the other, it's not better than One Of You Must Do This, and if you're paying 3 to play this from discard then you've lost out on a 9 strength minion who might let you outnumber the Fellowship's top skirmishers and get 2 wounds instead of 1. What's implied to me from these cards is that you're getting one minion super jacked up and Uruk Bow as it is doesn't contribute there. The wound goes to some shmuck who by nature of your deck has no use for his vitality anyway. I think I'd probably either add some other text or reduce the cost to 1.

I can't quite figure out Uruk Armor. 1 vitality sounds really good, but there's not actually much you can do with it: just Uruk Guard and Uruk Captain if we're being realistic, though I would absolutely start testing Uruk Spy to see if an extra vitality is what that deck needs (I doubt it). It goes great with KoI who can protect vitality in every other phase, so even when your Uruk is losing both skirmishes it will very likely stay on the table and threaten doubles now. It could add some flair to the existing Uruk-hai deck in Fellowship block, neither necessary nor useless which is good to see. There's nothing that really attracts me to it in the beatdown context though. 1 extra vitality is meaningful against archery, but then you could just play Goblin Runner. I dunno. I really want to like this card but something's not there for me.

Finally the card that (I guess?) holds it all together, Uruk Armory. I like the costing, seems fair. You won't have the twilight to play all 5 possessions a minion from discard, but you could pull back another piece or two (especially Helm) to go with whatever you have in hand. But that's the trouble, if you have 2x of all these cards that's 10 right there, plus 2 for Uruk-hai Sword and you still want Savagery and probably Saruman's Ambition and definitely a few Abandoning Reason for Madness and there's still no minions. I suppose realistically you do just Helm, Sword, and Shield. Pull them from discard and spend (5) to make a minion strength +7 (assuming you can use the vitality to cancel a weapon bonus). Uruk Fighter could be fierce, damage +1, and 15 strength for 8 twilight -- that all sounds right. It has interesting implications for the FP when choosing to double too.

So yeah. It's a neat idea. All of these cards are worth considering in some context for Fellowship block, and that's good. I don't think they're all worth putting into the *same* deck, maybe 1x Armor and 1x Bow for the off chance that you can get all 5 together and that's the accomplishment in and of itself.

One last thing, Uruk Armory doesn't only play onto Uruks which means you can replay your Isengard Axe every turn. Is that intentional? The Orcs were the ones keeping the Armory stocked, I suppose. But if that is intentional then that's the use for the card to me: free +2 for your IsenOrcs until it's discarded, and stacks with Saruman's Snows.

[Not a Zombie]

Thanks for the feedback PC! Just a few clarifications: this is definitely intended to help the uruk beat down strategy and give some variety to FotR uruk decks. I don't expect anyone to ever have all of these possessions in a single deck, more pick a few to shore up weaknesses or support some different strategies.  Uruk-hai Sword was never a great possession unless you plan on doing a discard deck, otherwise there are better event options generally, so I wasn't particularly worried if a few of these were stronger that it.

Now on to some specifics:
Uruk shield: Agreed, this is my favorite. It would have a place in many decks without breaking anything.

Uruk Bow: I was thinking this could open up a uruk archer strat in FotR block. I debated on the cost, and I think you are right, (2) is too much. It becomes super powerful then in TTT (maybe) with uruk archers, but also takes up valuable deck space, so maybe its still fine at (1). I couldn't think of another interesting ability to add.

Uruk Armor: Agreed, not much use for extra vitality in FotR block on uruks. However, extra vitality can help vs archers. Basically anything that can keep uruks alive can help stop a double.

Uruk Helm I agree is very strong, but somewhat forces you to go the possession strategy.

Uruk armory was definitely only intended to arm uruks, the orc interaction was an oversight on my part. However, it doesn't seem too bad? I could go either way on this. One other option for this card that you did not mention, but was top of my mind: you can basically include a few "splash" possessions that don't normally see much play but help against specific strategies, and be able to pull exactly the right possession consitantly to make a difference. Kind of opens up a toolkit for uruks that is otherwise a bit lacking


Now I'm curious what your thoughts are in context of TTT and TS, and even movie block

[Phallen Cassidy]

Uruk armory was definitely only intended to arm uruks, the orc interaction was an oversight on my part. However, it doesn't seem too bad? I could go either way on this. One other option for this card that you did not mention, but was top of my mind: you can basically include a few "splash" possessions that don't normally see much play but help against specific strategies, and be able to pull exactly the right possession consitantly to make a difference. Kind of opens up a toolkit for uruks that is otherwise a bit lacking

That's true, I think if you've got this card then you want as many different possessions your deck can bear to get the most out of it. I didn't think about Lurtz's Sword, that'd be way more usable with this in Fellowship. From the cards here I think shield is the most splashable in that way. Armor's worth considering in any deck too, though I think it's got stiffer competition for deck space. In Towers, all 4 hand weapons it adds are worth using in this deck for different reasons, so plus your 4 and Lurtz's Sword that's 9 possessions to decide between. Well, really 5 hand weapons vying for space and then 4 others. Anyway, good point. It appeals to me because my playstyle already tilts towards having more utility cards than most. That flexibility allows the "same" deck to be tailored for different metas, which is what you hope to see in a card game: an endlessly evolving meta as players are trying to counteract one another.

Now I'm curious what your thoughts are in context of TTT and TS, and even movie block

It was a fun thought experiment, there's a lot that could be said in Movie and Towers for the new strategies introduced (archery, berserkers, trackers, battlegrounds, and site control). I'll try to spare everyone an in-depth analysis on all of them haha. My general opinion is that these push Uruk-hai too far in Towers but are welcome additions for Movie. I will say it's hard for me to guess how difficult it would be to find room for, say, 7 cards out of here (2x armory, 1x of the rest, and an extra 1x of whichever possession is best for your deck), and how much impact those 7 would have. Obviously you're not going to have everything you want all the time, maybe some of the benefit is curbed by instability.

The biggest issue is Uruk Spear, every Uruk deck already has a few of these. Being able to replay it whenever you need it might be too much for Rohan to handle. That's certainly unintended though, so I'll ignore that interaction going forward Beyond that, Broad-bladed Sword is leagues better than Uruk-hai Sword and many minions can take advantage of Uruk Armor's vitality, which in turn makes Uruk Helm more attractive. Uruk Shield has a much better partner in the Berserkers both removing FP strength and gaining their own strength, and it also has more targets in Towers since the average deck doesn't have to plan for things like Cantea and Troop of Uruk-hai (in Fellowship block, you just pump a Hobbit). Ranger's Sword, Blade of Aragorn in particular is a big hit. That said, I've never been particularly tempted to use Parry in Towers. Maybe it's all fine.

Uruk Armor was an odd card for Fellowship but by far the most interesting card in Towers. It basically doubles the value of archer minions, keeps support cards like Uruk Stormer alive, and of course serves Berserkers immensely. Berserks are best positioned to take advantage of these cards overall I think, they seem to get huge boosts against Rohan and DH and a mild bump against Ents and RBR. Any deck can take advantage of the option to get some more strength on the board, of course, I think there's still room for decks that don't use these cards but they're in the minority. Trackers using Weary is the main one that I think doesn't really have room.

Movie is different, of course, since Isengard is no longer top dog. Even Uruk Spear is less problematic because the mounts can be replayed by Swordthain, and permanent Broad-bladed Sword isn't too noteworthy since wounding decks all have good options outside of the archery phase. I guess Uruks don't move a ton against Elves, but they're already great against knights thanks to Saruman's Power. The text of Uruk Armor shines against Dwarves and a bunch of expendable possessions puts a huge damper on Blood Runs Chill. Eowyn, LoI is likewise clipped by Uruk Armor, though it may backfire for the Shadow player if one minion has it and another doesn't. Same mild boost from Towers against Ents.

Uruk Bow is still weird to me. I think at the cost is good, the stats line up in my opinion (good deal if you play it from hand, average if you play it from discard) and every deck could consider it. Maybe except archery, ironically enough. It kinda expands the minions you can use in archery, but it always being a combo with a minority of your minions holds it back. Making it better for archery definitely means increasing the cost, which is probably going to make it worse for non-archery. That's just how it goes: Raider Bow isn't a very attractive card for archery, and Southron Bow isn't a very attractive card for anything else.

The improvement to this card from Fellowship or Towers is that threats make a random archer from the bow matter more. A few wounds over the course of the whole game doesn't mean much, but with 3 threat wounds you're starting to hit characters other than the Ring-bearer. It all sounds about right. And yet... I dunno if I'd use it for much. I'm still only looking at it for +1 from Helm. Not a bad thing though, given the nature of the set? I guess what I mean to say is: it's an okay card, and that's okay

If Armory is kept to any possession then other than IsenOrc strategies getting the free strength, the main benefit would be to Wargs. I enjoy Wargs yet hate the skirmish-blocking ability so I'm going to be hopelessly conflicted for any buffs they'd get. I don't think it's a big deal in the end, I think Wargs are weaker in Towers than Movie anyway so the buff in both formats isn't as lopsided. Still don't wanna see IsenOrc swarms get a boost, but what can you do.