another loop

[Mc Tono]

I

The Leaving Forever loop has been sitting here collecting dust, but this is the first I've heard of a deck that implements it fully, complete with a kill method (mass archery), and a Shadow that can survive the mass discard. Hat's off to you, Mc Tono!

Out of curiosity, what site were you able to pull this off?

Ah there it is!
I couldn`t find it. Searched far and wide. Great!
A few weeks ago I started playing Standard and saw Gil Galad. I heard about his ability and figured this one out. I couldn`t believe that no-one had seen this before.

I tried this deck about 4 times and pulled it off all 4 times. two times site 5 one time 6 and one time 4. Depending on the opponents deck.
Yesterday I played Gil-Estel. He played a siteswapping manuever-and-archery-skipping gandalf balrog deck. And I won. (although that balrog is the worst minion against this deck) Pulled it off at site 5 regroup-moved to 6. Healed next fellowship, played fellowshipcards in hand (radagast/shadowfax)  removed burdens and ran 3 steps firing at will.

[SomeRandomDude]

This deck is sweet. Out of curiosity, do you have any way of making it infinite? Like, some way of adding tokens in the regroup?

Methinks that Hearth and Hall might accelerate the process.

[Mc Tono]

what do you mean by infinite? this way there is an infinite loop. Infinite tokens means reinforcing and that`s not an option I think.

Hearth and hall should reinforce quickly and let you draw quicker with leaving forever when the loop is not yet complete, after that it doesn`t matter.

There are other ways of course, I have also the option of starting Gandalf and burning glorfindle. Sets up pretty fast also. (including his hat removing the twilight in the regroup  )

[SomeRandomDude]

I'm missing the infinite part. I'd think that infinite would require...

1: Regroup token reinforcement.
2: Ability to discard token conditions in the regroup phase.

[Elf_Lvr]

Leaving Forever could discard your token conditions.

Not sure about reinforcement, though.

[SomeRandomDude]

There's the infinite! Sweet!

[Elessar's Socks]

You get infinite tokens by replaying the token conditions (not by reinforcement). Ideally you'd have at least two token conditions that can discard themselves in the regroup phase (one helping Gil-galad replay the other before discarding itself), but only Secluded Homestead does that, and it's unique. So the workaround is to use Leaving Forever to discard the conditions. To make the loop generic, with one token condition in play (with at least 3 tokens) and the target condition in the discard pile:

1. Remove the first token (2 left) to play the target condition from your discard pile.
2. Remove the second token (1 left) to play Leaving Forever from your discard pile.
3. Remove the third token (0 left) to play the second token condition (with at least 3 tokens).
4. Discard Leaving Forever to discard the first token condition.
5. Repeat for the rest of the conditions you want to play.

For the drawing engine, the target condition would be Leaving Forever itself, which would be discarded immediately to draw 2.

It is pretty sweet. The mere fact that it's a loop might mean it'd be kicked from Standard/Expanded eventually, but it'd be interesting to see how it holds up against other decktypes, and how far it can be honed.

[Gil-Estel]

It was a great deck, but in this game he has been extremely lucky. I had just the deck for crushing him. But at site 9 he had only seen 1 balrog and 3x gollum, though they are a major part of my deck. I didn't draw captured, and the only balrog came with Sudden Strike. Nevertheless, it was awesome to see him discard all his conditions in the regroup, then simply playing them back with Gil-Galad.
I'm curious about this deck vs others, for example massive archery decks. I guess it would be in some trouble. The advantages:

-massive drawing
-massive archery
-a few strong companions
-some strength adders which come back

Disadvantages:

-no healing
-it generates quite some twilight

[Mc Tono]

Massive archery is allways a problem, (maybe a single copy of lorien`s blessing would do the trick, replay it with gil and a threat). 2 healings with focus on aragorn is little healing indeed. I don`t care about twilight in the regroup, normally 12 arrows and no conditions for the shadow would do the trick (especially with take up the bow) I`ll post my Gandalf's hat version soon..

[Milo]

Hello.
My first post on this message board Well, I've been thinking about such a version of elves from some time and that's what I've made - in this new so called 'Austria' format.

9R+ Galadriel + 11R the One Ring, RoR
Orophin 17S
Rumil 17S
Smeagol 19P

Gil-galad 18R x4
Leaving Forever 7R x4
Elven Marksmanship 11R x4
Something Slimy 15U x4
Uncertian Future 11U x4
Namarie 17U x4
Safe Passage 11R x2
One Good Turn Deserves Another 11U x1

Shadow:
All Veils removerd 1R x2
Morgul Gates 1R
Black Breath 1U
Not Easily Destroyed 1U x2
Return to its master 1R x3
Wraith World 2R x3
Nelya 2R x2
Enquea 2U x2
Resistance Becomes Unbereable 2U x4
His Terrible Servants 2R x3
Helpless 2U
Ring of Asperity 9R
Ring of Rancor 9R
Gollum 9R+
All Blade Perished 1U x3
How FP should be played was described precisely some posts ago so there's no need to write it again I've just made the deck less "vital' but it cycle far faster. And it's ok, because it's a killing version, not running one. After Leaving forever combo you should gather 8 cards you need to kill opponent. For example on 'strength' deck with Isildur + RoR you should have: Nazgul+Resistance Becomes Unbereable+Gollum+His Terrible Servants+3x Wraith World or Retur to its master + All Veils Removed+ Something For Hobbits with RoD (the most difficult one I think, along with Denethoring) you need Enquea+Helpless+Return to its master+ring of asperity+3x Resistance becomes unbereable + Gollum. And so on... With that amount of cards and that cycling it's very possible, you will be able to do this on 2-nd or 3-rd site.
Smeagol gives you pool removal, a bit of site control and faster cycling (Something Slimmy). All you need is bid high and play Damned Gate-Stream first. You don't care about burdens, after 2-3 sites usualy is game over - you kill or you can surrender

[SomeRandomDude]

The problem is that you need to run. Because you deck yourself out on the shadow which gives the freeps a free ride if you fizzle with the attack.

I think you should perhaps play Out of Sight and Shot, Hatred Stirred, stuff that nabs from discard and stuff that shuffles stuff into your deck in order to make a viable shadow.

But yeah. The deck looks unreliable and I think you need to make it more stable.