Author Topic: Top 16 decks from Worlds 2004 (Read 44793 times)

jcb213 · « **on:** March 04, 2011, 06:58:51 PM »

ununtrium · « **Reply #1 on:** March 04, 2011, 09:22:20 PM »

Many thanks for taking the time and trouble to post the deck lists. I have little experience in building decks, so this information is invaluable to me. This should give me plenty of opportunity to jumpstart my lotr tcg education

BTW, is there a source for the decklists of later worlds events? I would be interested in anything that incorporated cards from the WotR block, just to see, if people were able to build worthwhile decks.

Again, your effort is appreciated very much.

macheteman · « **Reply #2 on:** March 04, 2011, 09:40:38 PM »

wow, most of the decks included gollum and captured by the ring... gp for the post!

jcb213 · « **Reply #3 on:** March 05, 2011, 05:12:52 AM »

Quote from: ununtrium on March 04, 2011, 09:22:20 PM

BTW, is there a source for the decklists of later worlds events? I would be interested in anything that incorporated cards from the WotR block, just to see, if people were able to build worthwhile decks.

Decipher posted decklists on www.dgma.com. That site is now down, but you can use the internet archive (www.archive.org) to see cataloged versions of the site from various dates, so you can pick a date around the end of the year for whatever year you want and then look under the decklist link on the left.

Witchkingx5 · « **Reply #4 on:** March 05, 2011, 01:27:07 PM »

Good Ol' Sullivan played LR... oh how I miss his articles and tournament reports...

Kralik · « **Reply #5 on:** March 05, 2011, 07:17:44 PM »

Fantastic work! Thanks for taking the time to dredge these up.

Kralik · « **Reply #6 on:** March 05, 2011, 07:22:19 PM »

Quote from: macheteman on March 04, 2011, 09:40:38 PM

wow, most of the decks included gollum and captured by the ring... gp for the post!

I noticed also that nearly every deck includes good ol' Shotgun Enquea. Gotta love that guy!

ununtrium · « **Reply #7 on:** March 06, 2011, 07:09:03 AM »

Quote from: jcb213 on March 05, 2011, 05:12:52 AM

Decipher posted decklists on www.dgma.com. That site is now down, but you can use the internet archive (www.archive.org) to see cataloged versions of the site from various dates, so you can pick a date around the end of the year for whatever year you want and then look under the decklist link on the left.

Many thanks for the help. I found a couple of decklist I have to look through, but it looks very promising. Found several Star Trek Second Edition decks from the time, when it first came out, too!!

Imrahil · « **Reply #8 on:** March 07, 2011, 09:26:39 PM »

It's fascination to see the difference between top tier decks and my own woeful attempts, although I suspect that it might be the players, rather than the cards that make the real difference.

MuadDib85 · « **Reply #9 on:** March 16, 2011, 02:37:18 AM »

Quote from: Imrahil on March 07, 2011, 09:26:39 PM

It's fascination to see the difference between top tier decks and my own woeful attempts, although I suspect that it might be the players, rather than the cards that make the real difference.

That's the great thing that sets this game apart from nearly all other tcgs... Both deck and player must be good to win against good decks/players... Having the best deck doesn't mean you will always win.

Imrahil · « **Reply #10 on:** March 19, 2011, 11:44:01 AM »

It's amazing to me how popular the elf-man deck was, considering that I feel it's fairly weak. I can see it surviving fairly easily for a couple sites and then getting utterly destroyed by a number of things. I like the deck overall, but I don't understand how it was so successful.

hrcho · « **Reply #11 on:** March 19, 2011, 11:52:38 AM »

Quote from: Imrahil on March 19, 2011, 11:44:01 AM

It's amazing to me how popular the elf-man deck was, considering that I feel it's fairly weak. I can see it surviving fairly easily for a couple sites and then getting utterly destroyed by a number of things. I like the deck overall, but I don't understand how it was so successful.

What kind of Man-Elf deck are you thinking of? I know my such decks are very powerful and all the others I've seen were also very, very powerful.

It's usually something like this: Frodo, Arwen, Greenleaf, Aragorn and Faramir. Put a bow on everyone, add a few Gondor Bowmen and along with Elrond, HtGG and Vilya you're good to go against almost anything.

Imrahil · « **Reply #12 on:** March 19, 2011, 12:07:10 PM »

Which is exactly the variation I would run myself.

What I find most surprising about the top man/elf decks is that few of them actually run the bows or the Gondor Bowmen, and only a couple run actual telepathy. Personally, my elves are almost always either archery or forearmed decks, otherwise they just aren't able to do the job. A couple of the decks listed here don't have any "pumps" either than Noble Leaders, which suggest to me that a loaded Witch-King or Easterling Captain could be a serious problem.

I'm also amazed by the variety of the Shadow sides, considering that Sullivan would have had me believe that everyone was either running Beasterlings, Morcs, Besiegers, or Enduring Nazgul.

jcb213 · « **Reply #13 on:** March 19, 2011, 12:54:13 PM »

The best man/elf from that era didn't need archery beyond Greenleaf. The deck focused on 5 vitality Greenleaf and Aragorn ROTN with Anduril and Last Alliance. All the other companions were expendable and replaced with a new companion. The deck could kill a minion with Greenleaf in the archery phase and another with Aragorn in the skirmish phase, use tricks like Stone Tower & Citadel to kill something, use Dervorin to discard something in the regroup, use Sting to get rid of a fierce minion, etc, then heal with Elrond and Shadow Between and move again. Once it was set up it was very difficult to kill and it would just let the other companions die and then replace them. If you got in a pinch you could always have Aragorn go defender +3 or +4 to keep yourself alive, and if he was still alive at 9 there wasn't much the shadow could do. It had a good chance against anything, so it was popular among good players because they could rely somewhat on their ability to outplay people in any matchup. It could also be run at 30 cards for maximum efficiency or bumped up a few with tech cards.

I have noticed that many (not all) of the decks people post on here focus on playing 5 companions and keeping them all alive, but that wasn't a very popular strategy back then except in Dauntless Hunter decks. Most decks played 9 companions and had one or two key companions while the rest were all expendable. When you aren't worried about keeping everyone alive you can double move a lot more.

Heavy archery just wasn't as effective then because Corsairs killed your bows, Grond killed your bows, Cantea FTW killed your bows, Easterling Polearms stopped the archery, etc. It was much more reliable to play the way you see the list because you didn't get totally hosed by strategies built to stop direct wounding. You'll also notice that the man/elf decks played 0 possessions because of all the possession hate running around at the time.

Imrahil · « **Reply #14 on:** March 19, 2011, 02:06:44 PM »

Hmm...thanks for the explanation jcb, sometimes the decklist just doesn't tell the full story.

I do agree with you that our decks seem to rely on 5 or 6 comps, whereas most of the ones posted here can balloon out to nine as needed. It's an interesting idea, and one that I think will change my builds in the future.

jcb213 · « **Reply #15 on:** March 19, 2011, 03:09:44 PM »

Something else to note about the man/elf build that ran rampant at worlds that year is that it had been refined and tweaked through multiple sets. It was good when RotK came out, but relied on Arwen with Gwemegil & Asfaloth. Most of the cards are from sets 1-7. In Siege it gained the new Sting which could help with a double move. In Reflections it got huge boosts from Glorfindel (who replaced Arwen and freed up the cards slots from Gwemegil/Asfaloth for other stuff, which was also good since possession weren't as reliable anymore because of Corsairs and Grond) and Aiglos (which enabled Greenleaf to have 5 vitality and was great in the regroup to kill a minion so you can double). In Mt Doom it got another good card in Tale of the Great Ring and a way to pull the fortifications in Base of Mindolluin.

But, the core of the deck was already intact when RotK came out and people refined it into the list you see here. Various high caliber players were all responsible for tweaking it (for example, world champion Mike Dalton played it a bunch around reflections and he popularized the use of Citadel of the Stars and Stone Tower in the deck). That's why almost all of the lists are identical with only 1 or 2 cards different - it was so fine-tuned at that point that people didn't mess with it much because it was just solid.

Imrahil · « **Reply #16 on:** March 19, 2011, 04:35:33 PM »

Well if I had 4 RotN I would try it because it does look interesting. I'm still surprised because (based upon what I remember), the meta at the time was mostly possession dwarves with BRC. But I guess all the possession hate is a response to the surge in popularity enjoyed by the dwarves prior to the tournament.

But the mortality rate must have been very high considering that every time a Castamir hit the table two people would die (nobody has the strength to mess with him once he's exhausted, so Lego and forts are the only option). Broad-bladed swords were also very popular, and polearms, so I'd have to play against it to fully appreciate the potential.

jcb213 · « **Reply #17 on:** March 19, 2011, 05:39:21 PM »

Your options for Castamir are:

Legolas shoots him 4 times
Legolas shoots him 3 times then use Citadel
Legolas shoots him twice then use Stone Tower
Aragorn with Anduril and Last Alliance fights him twice, taking a wound each time, then Dervorin discards him or you move again and shoot him with Legolas
Faramir with Last Alliance fights him twice (since he can't exert for Raider Halberd he won't overwhelm Faramir), then Dervorin discards him or you move again and shoot him with Legolas
Frodo fights him and Boromir pumps Frodo, then Boromir dies in the fierce
A gondor companion uses Noble Leaders to not be overwhelmed and then someone dies in the fierce
Two companions die (if you don't have any other options, which is mostly likely at site 2 which is why you should be careful not to put too much in the pool if you can't deal with Castamir at site 2)

Realistically, even if Castamir kills 2 guys once he is exhausted you can easily move again and then shoot him with Legolas since he will have no way to heal.

It's definitely not easy and you will get stopped by Castamir sometimes, but you do have a variety of ways of dealing with him. Multiple Great Hill Trolls at sites 5-9 is actually much worse since they discard whatever conditions are key and then you have a hard time dealing with multiple big fierce guys.

Don't get me wrong, the man/elf deck isn't unbeatable by any stretch of the imagination, it's just really solid against a variety of things.

Dwarves just weren't popular after Aggression got banned (which was between Reflections and Mt Doom) because Honed wasn't nearly as good and you couldn't BRC away the entire support area since you weren't more than damage +3. They got really good again once Black Rider came out and you got Thrarin companion and No Pauses No Spills to draw cards. I actually think Dwarves are still really good in movie block, but they aren't quite on the same level as Elves with Galadriel LR, Man/Elf, or Knights.

Imrahil · « **Reply #18 on:** March 19, 2011, 08:48:26 PM »

I never would have thought of the Faramir tactic, thanks for the comprehensive list. i think I am going to try this deck.

I also think that if you're trying to set up a Shadow kill then dwarves are the way to go, and that's where their true strength lies. They may not always get you to site 9, but they are very effective at getting you a sweet shadow hand. Especially with Dunharrow Plateau to play Preparations or Here is Good Rock off the start.

Also, a decent Corsair build is going to run Red Wrath and Wind that Sped Ships to counter comps like Aragorn and Cirdan. so you'd think it would be pretty easy to snipe him early, or build a killer shadow hand with Ships of Great Draught on the double.

Imrahil · « **Reply #19 on:** March 20, 2011, 12:55:43 PM »

Except that Ranger's Bow (like Sting) is a possession, and therefore fuels the token orgy.

I don't even want to think about Dwarves with Aggression. :-)

Ringbearer · « **Reply #20 on:** March 22, 2011, 05:15:03 PM »

I became 17th at the PS right after reflection.... it was nasty... It went so far that a judge responsible for deckchecks jokingly said afetr the tourney he'd kill the first beard he'd encounter.

jcb213 · « **Reply #21 on:** March 22, 2011, 06:18:01 PM »

Yeah, Aggression was totally broken. I remember thinking it didn't seem too bad when I first read it until playing in the Origins PSE right after Reflections came out. Aggression to draw 4 cards. Play a bunch of free dwarf stuff. Play Defending the Keep to replay Aggression from discard. I'm also now pretty much guaranteed to have 8 shadow cards (usually MORCS) in my hand for my next shadow phase. I'll rinse and repeat next turn.

Oh, and I've got 2 or 3 Aggression in play so Gimli + Ring of Fury can BRC away your entire support area. And it made Honed a ridiculous pump to boot.

Ugh, that was a disaster. But, it did get x-ed almost immediately after that PSE. Aside from Mordor Fiend getting x-ed before it came out, I think Aggression was the fastest card ever to be x-ed.

Panch · « **Reply #22 on:** December 14, 2011, 08:53:54 AM »

Dan Clark, what a guy!!!

Author Topic: Top 16 decks from Worlds 2004 (Read 44793 times)

Kralik

Kralik