Pipeweed, need advice

[neopium]

Hi everyone!

I have built a Pipeweed deck inspired from http://www.decktech.net/lotr/decks/decks.php?deck=29139 and http://lotrtcgwiki.com/forums/index.php/topic,6966.0.html

I took ideas from both decks and tried to make something out of my cards collection.

The basic idea of the deck (composed of 35 free people cards) is to draw cards like crazy and recycle Gondor bowmen as much as possible to kill minions before they know it.

Adventure path:
Hobbiton party field
Wold of rohan
Hall of the kings
Balin's tomb
City gates
Minas Tirith fifth circle
Osgiliath channel
Anduin banks
Dagorlad

Starting fellowship:
Frodo, old bilbo's heir
The one ring, such a weight to carry
Gandalf, the grey pilgrim
Smeagol, slinker

Free people:
Aragorn, heir of elendil x3
Faramir, son of denethor x2
Bilbo, retired adventurer x3
Gandalf's pipe x2
Aragorn's pipe x2
Bilbo's pipe x2
Old toby x4
Glamdring
Aragorn's bow x3
Faramir's bow
Sword of gondor
Red book of westmarch x2
Sting, Baggin's heirloom x2
Moment of respite
Gondor bowmen x4

On the Shadow side, I have a classic Sauron wound, but that's not the topic (even though I can post it if you are interested).

My problem is that the fellowship does not work. It is very funny to play (you draw a lot of cards and recycle well), but I depend a lot on drawing Aragorn, his bow and gondor bowmen or I get killed quickly.

Quite frequently (I have played it less than 10 times), I find myself struggling to survive during the first turns, adding tons of burdens to prevent Smeagol from being overwhelmed and I find it hard to double move until I finally draw aragorn. But by then, my opponent is often already far away and the only thing I can do is try to kill him with my shadow side...

I would like the free people to be able to win, but I don't know what to change... I tried to remove gandalf and start with aragorn, but this didn't work out very well (only two pipes... burdens removal, healing and tales recycling gets less efficient).

Of course, I would like to keep the main theme of the deck, i.e. pipes and gondor bowmen.

Please help :-)

[tanzhamster]

Are those Red book of westmarch really needed? I mean aren't you cycling enough allready with the pipeweeds?
So i would cut them and add one Aragorn (cause you really need him early) and maybe Gandalf's Staff.

And maybe you could change Moment of respite to a condition discard event of the gandalf culture (deep in thought, sleep, caradhras or grown suddenly tall).

[neopium]

Thanks fo the advice.

I tried that once (replaced Red book of Westmarch and moment of respite by another copy of Aragorn, Gandalf's staff and sleep, caradhras.

I don't know if I was unlucky, but I didn"t draw any pipe during the game... I however had Aragorn quite quickly (site 3 if I remember correctly).

The gondor bowmen recycle didn't work (no pipes...), so I think it still need some refinements...

[tanzhamster]

When you change something you have to play several games with the "new" deck. Otherwise you can't decide if it is better or not.

[jdizzy001]

pipeweed decks are fun, just don't forget, they aren't power house decks. at least ive never seen one. but as mentioned be sure you have condition discarding in there and multiple copies of key cards. since you are running a pipedeck be sure to have plenty of weed

[neopium]

pipeweed decks are fun, just don't forget, they aren't power house decks. at least ive never seen one. but as mentioned be sure you have condition discarding in there and multiple copies of key cards. since you are running a pipedeck be sure to have plenty of weed

I know they are not tournament winning decks and I don't want them too. I indeed want to have fun. But this means that I would prefer playing some combo before getting exploded by my oponent ;-).

Regarding the weed, I just have 4 of them (plus the capability to recycle them with Bilbo). I was indeed wondering if this is enough. In the movie block, there are only two pipeweed cards, so I don't have a lot of alternatives...

[FM]

I'd consider playing 6.

[jdizzy001]

i agree with FM, 6 is a good number of weed cards. i've used weed decks in the past. my experience is that 4 copies means you will most likely draw 1 or 2 in a game (depending  on deck size) but if you have 6 copies of weed and cycling with bilbo you should be fine.

[FM]

Plus, of course the calculations are much more complicated that this, but basically, taking a 33/33 card deck into account, 6 weeds will mean you'll see 1 in roughly 11 cards, basically meaning that every time you get to dump a hand (like playing a good shadow turn or the opponent double-moving), you'll draw 1 pipeweed.

[jdizzy001]

as long as you pipes are out, 1 weed is all you need

[FM]

Arguably. You need to activate the actions of each pipe separately, so for each pipe you need a weed, and assuming a good setup, you might be talking about 1-2 pipes PER TURN, so weeds are, in fact, needed. More than 1.

[neopium]

Thanks for your advice.

I will try 6 pipeweeds then.

In the mean time, I have built an alternative deck, still based on pipeweed, but more focused on tales and those who can benefit from them: gondor guys. One of the main drawbacks of the first version was that I was always waiting for Faramir and Aragorn to come out. So this time, I decided to start with Gondor. The only interest of Gandalf was to draw more and to remove the burdens of Smeagol, but this is way too weak compared to the gondor bowmen. Here is the second attempt (built before integrating 6 pipeweeds).

Starting fellowship:
Frodo, old bilbo's heir
The one ring, such a weight to carry
Aragorn, Heir of Elendil

Boromir, defender of Minath Tirith x2
Denethor, lord of Minath Tirith
Faramir, son of Denethor x2
Bilbo, retired adventurer x3
Aragorn's bow x3
Old toby x4
Aragorn's pipe x2
Bilbo's pipe x2
Gondor bowmen x4
Faramir's bow
Ranger's sword
Sword of gondor x2
Red book of westmarch x2
Sting, Baggin's heirloom x2 (I should use another one, this one has no interest in this deck anymore)
Banner of the white tree x3

It's really a different kind of deck... but I still am waiting for my companions to arrive... I tried several games but I still need to improve it... 6 pipeweed... Maybe getting rid of Sting...

[jdizzy001]

Arguably. You need to activate the actions of each pipe separately, so for each pipe you need a weed, and assuming a good setup, you might be talking about 1-2 pipes PER TURN, so weeds are, in fact, needed. More than 1.

True. I was refering to using just 1 action. If you got 3 pipes out and smoke gorns pipe you heal 3 comps. WUT UP!