Really appreciate the feedback.
First problem is that this card bends the rules a lot. Does the minion stay here during its skirmish? What happens if it's overwhelmed?
The idea here is that you have to play Orcs in Shadow
then stack them on this card,
then during the assignment phase,
unstack them to be assigned to a skirmish. I think I need to make that a mandatory action. So you're not really getting a swarm going-- you're just protecting whatever minions you would normally be able to play so that they don't get murdered during maneuver wounding or archery. That's really all this card is supposed to do--which admittedly is still very powerful--but it's not supposed to be a swarming mechanic.
So again, what I'm trying to make it do (and can't seem to word it right) is this:
1. You play a minion during shadow (paying its twilight cost).
2. You stack up to 3
![Sauron [Sauron]](https://lotrtcgdb.com/forums/Smileys/classic/sauron.png)
orcs on this card.
3. They are immune to wounds during Maneuver or Archery.
4. They "deploy" during assignment phase and fight normal skirmishes.
I'm trying to give it the flavor of a bunch of orcs climbing into a siege tower, rolling through maneuver and archery, then jumping out for an attack during assignment.
Interesting. Needs checking if it won't make the UTWE - Hate - Orc Bowmen deck too strong. But probably not, too many cards needed to get tokens here.
Frankly I'm not even sure if this is powerful enough. You need a lot of
![Sauron [Sauron]](https://lotrtcgdb.com/forums/Smileys/classic/sauron.png)
engineers in a deck to really get lots of tokens on the engines you need, plus the spotting requirements for playing the engines. Realistically that means having 3-4 of each engineer, plus 4 of the
Catapult Trolls to pump the engines that already have tokens. That's a lot of cards already, and most of the engineer minions are going to be really small and weak. They probably won't be winning skirmishes. So I feel like I need to offset that fact by making the engines do all the dirty work that minions normally do. If so few of your minions are winning skirmishes (maybe with the exception of the trolls), you need those engines to do damage and slow down the Fellowship.
I'm wondering if I should change the wording to this:
Skirmish: "Remove 2
![Sauron [Sauron]](https://lotrtcgdb.com/forums/Smileys/classic/sauron.png)
tokens from here to make the Free Peoples player wound a companion not assigned to a skirmish."
Takes a spot in the deck, saves you just one twilight, has playing requirement. And useless in sealed deck/draft playing. I think it can easily get some more power.
You're right. I was super cautious about making this overpowered. How about this:
"The twilight cost of the first engine played each Shadow phase is -3".
That way you only need 1-2 of these in a deck for it to be useful. I feel like there needs to be a card that offers reduction
in twilight cost for these engines because they are (purposefully) very expensive.
I'll make the Troll fierce. I think I just forgot to add it.