NB's Spotlight On...

[SomeRandomDude]

Welcome to NB's Spotlight On.... We trust that you'll have an enjoyable experience reading my series of mini-articles that attempt to make overlooked cards playable.

I would like to remind you that these decks are very much for the casual player, and are more a fun use of an overlooked card than anything else.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you find this helpful!

~NB

[SomeRandomDude]

The Defender of Osgiliath may have fallen, but another valiant ranger rises to fill the old Madril's shoes, and uphold the honor of that blade from Ithilien

Today's spotlight on....

Madril, Loyal Lieutenant!



When a hero falls, another steps in to take his place. Earlier this year, loyal IB players were forced to say goodbye to Madril, Defender of Osgiliath, as he hit the X-list. But in his place came Madril, Loyal Lieutenant, and although not as powerful as the old Madril, still makes Ithilien Blade playable, although you do have to work for it.

So, let's examine Madril. What makes this guy work?


(1). Twilight cost. 3. Tough to start, but paired with a Ranger of the White Tree, you can still fit two (good) companions in your starting fellowship.
(2). Card Type. Companion. Which means they have to kill him to get rid of his sweet ability. No, not even the evil which is Grond can kill him.
(3). Stats. 6/3/6. Hunter 1. Not bad. However, with a little luck, he'll never be fighting.
(4). Text.
-(A). "While you can spot a roaming minion, your Gondor conditions cannot be discarded from play by Shadow cards." WOW! This makes him a MUST for ANY deck that makes minions roaming! And it allows you to use your key conditions that make a Madril deck work properly.
-(B). "Maneuver: Exert 2 rangers to make a minion site number +2 until the regroup phase." Here's what makes him worth his weight in gold. With a MANEUVER ability to make minions site number plus, his potential combo with Ithilien Blade makes him well worth using.
(5). Rarity. Starter. Buy a deck, and you get him for sure! As well as being able to trade for him dirt cheap.

However, although stepping into the role of Madril, Defender of Osgiliath very well, Ithilien Blade will never be the same. Ithilien Blade is no longer an easy discard a bunch of minions, you now have to work for it, and it is necessary to include other mechanisms for dealing with minions.

But, I'll get on to that later. Here's a sample deck using this Madril.

(38 cards)

Frodo, Hope of Free Peoples
The One Ring, The Ring of Doom

Madril, Loyal Lieutenant
Ranger of the White Tree

Aragon, Thorongil
Faramir, Captain of Ithilien x 2
Damrod, Dunadan of Gondor x 2
Silent Traveller x 2
Pippin, Wearer of Black and Silver x 2

Sting, Elven Long-Knife x 2
Ithilien Blade x 4
Aragorn's Bow, Ranger's Longbow x 3
Faramir's Bow, Ithilien Longbow
Brego, Loyal Steed
Throne of Minas Tirith x 2

Gondorian Merchant x 2

Faramir's Company

Soldier's Cache x 4
Sixth Level x 2
The Faithful Stone x 3
Houses of Healing x 2

Phase 1- The Ithilien Blade. So obviously you have Madril, Loyal Lieutenant and Gondorian Merchant working hand in hand to make minions roaming, with some Soldier's Cache to help. Kill with Ithilien Blade.

Phase 2- The Faithful Stone. The whole deck reinforces tokens like crazy, leaving you TONS of tokens on The Faithful Stone. Minions can't fight.

Phase 3- The Machine Gun. Aragorn's Bow, Ranger's Longbow adds threats to wound minions. Sting and Frodo remove those threats. Go at it again. Oh yeah, Brego pwns as well.

Phase 4- FIGHT! Your companions are tough enough to handle it. Silent Traveler gets tokens when he fights, but if you feel like you need more skirmishing ability, you can add Watcher at Sarn Ford or Unyielding Ranger.

Phase 5- Heal! Tokens aplenty, give enough to Houses of Healing so all your guys heal. Faramir's Company and Damrod also help.

Ithilien Blade is not dead, it is simply a little more complicated. Which is how it is supposed to be. But with an effective use of Madril, Loyal Lieutenant, you can easily make a deck worthy of the Ithilien Blade.

Until Next Time!

~NB

[SomeRandomDude]

10s of thousands. But there is no such army....or is there?

Okay, artistic license. Maybe not 10s of thousands (that would be a pretty big deck), but a heck of a lot! Which brings me to my spotlight for today...

White Hand Sieger!



He's cheap, he has a spotting requirement, and he's strength 7.

Can you say, SWARM?!?!?!?

Swarm seemed to die with Moria. Sure there was a futile attempt at Orc swarm, but that died the the banning of Demoralized. Underground swarm is still fun to play, but again, not that powerful.

Until now.

The swarms of today must cope with a radically changing gameplay than the old Moria swarms. Directed wounding, or archery en-masse. Sure, there was Greenleaf back then, but now you have Nocked, Weapons of Lothlorien, Rumil, Silvan Elf and Orophin, Silvan Elf, as well as a host of other directed wounding cards. So how do you deal with this? Easy. Pack a punch as well.

Let's take a look at the card itself now, shall we?

(1). Twilight cost. 0. Wow. Amazing. 0 twilight for a minion, can you say SWARM?!?!?!
(2). Non-unique. This card is not unique. Meaning that you can drop all 4 for free! Again, can you say SWARM?!?!?!
(3). Card Type. Minion. Meaning it fights. Can you say...okay, I think you can.
(4). Text. "To play, spot a Uruk-hai minion and you must control a site." Ah...so there's the catch. You have to spot a minion already, AND have control of a site. Oh well. No matter.
(5). Rarity. Common. Sweetness, eh? Why NOT run this in every deck you can find? That is, Uruk-hai swarm...okay, okay, I know. Bleah.

So, what do we do with a card like this? We swarm. Duh. Shall we start with ALL OUT MEGA SWARMING AND KILLING?!?!?!?

Let's get going!

(38 cards)

Minions:

0
White Hand Sieger x 4

2
White Hand Scout x 4
Uruk Village Rager x 4
Pursuing Uruk x 2
Determined Uruk x 4
Vigilant Uruk x 4

3
Uruk Infantry x 2
White Hand Invader x 4

Conditions:

Poised for Assault x 2
You Do Not Know Pain x 2

Events:

Strange Device x 4
You Do Not Know Fear x 2

The point? Get a cycling FP, set up your conditions, wait till you have a couple Strange Device, then draw cards, and slam. You can also hope Determined Uruk pays off, with the White Hand Invader combo. Bwahahaha. Did I mention you will have a lot of card drawing? Oh yeah, did I mention Vigilant Uruk? Twisted Evil

The second deck is what I term "bomb," because its half beatdown, half swarm. Observe.

(34 cards)

Minions:

Beat 'em up:
White Hand Marshal x 2
White Hand Destroyer x 3
Advancing Horde x 2
White Hand Invader x 3

Finish them off:
White Hand Sieger x 4
Vigilant Uruk x 4
Determined Uruk x 4
Uruk Village Rager x 4

Conditions:

Poised for Assault x 2
You Do Not Know Pain x 4

Events:

You Do Not Know Fear x 2

Use the beat up minions to take down a couple companions, then swarm out the rest. And grin. Its times like these you wish Demoralized wasn't banned.

Oh wait...it isn't in expanded....Twisted Evil.

(38 cards)

Minions:


Watchful Orc x 2
Pitiless Orc x 2
Orkish Breeder x 2


Uruk Village Rager x 4
White Hand Sieger x 4
White Hand Scout x 4
White Hand Veteran x 3
White Hand Marshal x 2
Determined Uruk x 3

Conditions:

Goblin Hordes x 4
Demoralized x 4
Poised for Assault x 2

A little trickier to pull off. Exert to trigger both Demoralized and Determined Uruk, after setting up the Orc side of the deck. If all goes well, you should be generating mass twilight from your exertions while drawing tons of cards to swarm with.

So, grab yourself a few copies of White Hand Sieger, and start swarming like crazy!

Until Next Time!

~NB

[SomeRandomDude]

Silent and hitherto unnoticed, he has an amazing ability that is waiting to be used.

Today's Spotlight On...

Silent Traveler



As is common in the later sets, many worthy and fun cards are released to be quickly overshadowed by a broken card. This companion was one of such. His release with hunters was quickly overshadowed by the infamous Madril, Defender of Osgiliath/Ithilien Blade combo.

Madril has been x-listed, but the banning was so soon before the release of the next set that the potential for Gondor in the Hunters set was completely overlooked.

No longer.

This companion has amazing potential that is begging to be used. So use it we will.

Let us analyze the card now.

(1). Twilight cost. 2. Great twilight cost, allows you to start two of them, or one of them and another companion, such as Faramir, Captain of Ithilien or some other companion that will help the fellowship stay together until you can set up the deck.
(2). Non-unique. This card is not unique. Completely awesome. His text can now be compounded by 4 for ultimate token reinforcing.
(3). Stats. Here's the catch. With 5/3/6 stats, his ability cannot be used without some risk. His hunter 1 bonus, however, gives him a basic 6/3/6 stat of a typical cost 2 companion, and he can be boosted a little with an Ithilien Blade or something.
(4). Text.
-(A). "Ranger." I see Faramir's Bow, Ithilien Longbow. And other fun stuff that only rangers can have.
-(B). "At the start of each skirmish involving this minion, you may reinforce a Gondor token." How cool is that? The text spells many amazing combinations with various Gondor cards. The Faithful Stone, Heirs of Gondor, Noble Leaders, and Brego, Loyal Steed. This text is begging to be used.
(5). Rarity. Common. Anyone can get a hold of a few of these. So what's not to love about this guy?

So how are we best going to use him? Well, he must fight. He must use tokens. Wait a minute, how about using tokens to fight?

(34 cards)

Faramir, Bearer of Quality
The One Ring, The Ring of Rings

Silent Traveler (Starting)
Gondorian Prowler (Starting)
Pippin, Wearer of Black and Silver (Starting)

Silent Traveler x 3
Tradesman from Lebennin x 2

Ranger's Cloak x 4
Faramir's Bow x 2
Ithilien Blade x 4

Man the Walls x 4
Noble Leaders x 2
Heirs of Gondor x 3
Soldier's Cache x 2

Throne of Minas Tirith

Defenses Long Held x 4

The point is simple. The minions are roaming via Faramir's Bow and Man The Walls. Silent Traveler reinforces Heirs of Gondor and bam. Instant +2 strength. Pippin combo can make for an easy kill, and an easy token. Faramir's auto-roam text also makes for a great instant minion kill combo, as well as being able to afford losing some companions once the roaming combo stops working completely, if necessary, which I highly doubt.

So this deck gives you a small taste of what he can do. Well....how about trying out his crazy reinforcement abilities in a wounding deck?

(34 cards)

Boromir, Bearer of Council
The Ring of Rings

Silent Traveler (Starting)
Pippin, Wearer of Black and Silver (Starting)

Silent Traveler x 3
Aragorn, Thorongil
Faramir, Captain of Ithilien
Mablung, Ranger of Ithilien

Aragorn's Bow, Ranger's Longbow
Faramir's Bow, Ithilien Longbow

Soldier's Cache x 3
Sixth Level x 2
Noble Leaders x 3
Houses of Healing
Man the Walls x 4

Throne of Minas Tirith x 2
Ithilien Blade x 4
Brego, Loyal Steed x 2
Ranger's Cloak x 2
Anduril, Sword That Was Broken

Load Aragorn up with vitality boosts, and use Brego to guzzle tokens and slam minions. Let some fight to get tokens with Silent Traveler, and then kill with Pippin.

The strategy doesn't rely all that much on Silent Traveler, however, a Brego combo is too fun NOT to mention.

A very closely related deck is one that refuses to let minions fight. The strategy is simple. Observe.

(35 cards)

Boromir, Bearer of Council
Ring of Rings

Silent Traveler x 2 (Starting)

Silent Traveler x 2
Madril, Loyal Lieutenant
Damrod, Dunadan of Gondor
Aragorn, Captain of Gondor
Faramir, Captain of Ithilien

Ithilien Blade x 4
Aragorn's Bow, Ranger's Longbow
Faramir's Bow, Ithilien Longbow

The Faithful Stone x 4
Soldier's Cache x 4
Sixth Level x 3
Invigorated x 4
Houses of Healing x 2
Man the Walls x 4

The point of this deck is to reinforce The Faithful Stone like crazy and then stop them from fighting when its crucial. Crazy healing allows abusing Madril and Ithilien Blade, finally mopping up anything else with Aragorn's Bow.

Now for the greatest deck of them all, the grand finale featuring such a powerful combo that you'll have to see abused.

(31 cards)

Boromir, Bearer of Council
The Ring of Rings

Faramir, Captain of Ithilien (Starting)
Silent Traveler (Starting)

Silent Traveler x 3
Aragorn, Isildur's Heir x 4

Faramir's Bow
Ithilien Blade x 4
Throne of Minas Tirith
Anduril, Sword that was Broken

Noble Leaders x 3
Heirs of Gondor x 2
Support of the City x 4
Houses of Healing
Storied Homestead
The Faithful Stone
Man the Walls x 4

The point of this deck is to get a bunch of your awesome conditions, and Aragorn gets plain huge. Silent Traveler's get Ithilien Blades and can themselves get pretty large and clobber everything in their path. Tokens aplenty, great pumping, this deck just clobbers everything in its path!

The Silent Traveler is silent no more. His ability to throw out tons of tokens for guzzling makes him perfect for any deck using tokens. Grab a few copies of this awesome common and start abusing the raw power of Gondor tokens!

Until Next Time!

~NBarden

[SomeRandomDude]

They have a burden. A mission unfulfilled that calls out to them. They are the Free Peoples of Middle Earth, not a slack people, but with a little bit of toying with their minds, you can watch them fall surely to the power of the ring.

Today's spotlight on....

Sense of Obligation!



This card has been around for awhile, but its big comeback didn't start until the release of Age's End. Why? Ulaire Nertea, Dark Horseman. Yes, this guy's ability to prevent an entire race from being assigned to a skirmish rocked the world, with ANY deck that didn't run rainbows getting the ring-bearer run over. But, that's not all this card's potential is good for. Any crazy self-assigning minion deck will love the card Sense of Obligation.

Let's first take a look at what makes this card tick.


(1). Twilight cost. 2. Decent, nothing out of the ordinary here.
(2). Non-unique. This card is not unique. This makes for a tricky situation, since you can only pile one per companion, and if a companion not bearing this condition doesn't get assigned, the whole point of the deck breaks down. But, the more out, the more payoff you have.
(3). Card Type. Condition, and a condition borne by a companion for that matter. However, cards that key off of companions winning skirmishes (Anduril, Sword that Is Broken, Pallando, Far-Broken One), can be easily avoided with a self-assigning minion strategy.
(4). Text.
-(A). "To play, spot a minion. Bearer must be an unbound companion. Limit 1 per bearer" Typical here. Can only load up 1 per companion, its culturally enforced and bearer must be an unbound companion. Restrictions.
-(B). "At the end of each assignment phase, if bearer is not assigned to a skirmish and a companion who does not bear a Wraith condition is, add a burden." Okay, so if you can just get ONE companion who doesn't have a condition assigned, bam. Burdens aplenty.
(5). Rarity. Uncommon, tolerably easy to get a hold of.

So, obviously the point of a Sense of Obligation deck is to assign minions to a companion not bearing it. The way to do this? Self Assigning Minions! So, let's see how this works.

(30 cards)

Ulaire Nertea, Dark Horseman x 4
Bill Ferny, Swarthy Sneering Fellow x 4
Ulaire Toldea, Messenger Of Morgul x 4
Ulaire Cantea, Black Assassin x 4
Mauhur, Relentless Hunter x 4
Ulaire Enquea, Duplicitous Lieutenant x 2

Sense of Obligation x 4
Hatred Stirred x 2
Out of Sight and Shot x 2

The point of this deck is to simply drop 4 copies of Sense of Obligation on companions, and then choose to fight those without conditions. Nertea picks companions he can't fight, while Ferny, Toldea, Cantea, and Mauhur pick those they can.

Hatred Stirred is good for getting back your conditions if they get discarded. The point? Get 4x Sense of Obligation and then with fierce Nazgul add 8 burdens per turn. Sweetness, eh?

However, this deck is NPE because there's nothing that the FP can do to prevent it (except discard conditions). So, I propose giving them the choice of who fights.

(35 cards)

Ulaire Lemenya, Lieutenant Of Morgul x 2
Ulaire Toldea, Messenger Of Morgul x 3
Ulaire Enquea, Duplicitous Lieutenant x 2
Ulaire Cantea, Black Assassin x 2
Ulaire Nertea, Dark Horseman x 2
Mauhur, Relentless Hunter x 2
The Mouth of Sauron, Lieutenant of Barad-dur x 3
Bill Ferny, Swarthy Sneering Fellow
Orc Inquisitor x 4
Morgul Hunters x 4

Sense of Obligation x 4
Desperate Defense of the Ring x 4
Thin and Stretched x 2

Okay, so it SOMEWHAT let's the Free Peoples pick. But why be nice when you can be so mean?

The point? Load all the companions each with Sense of Obligation and Desperate Defense of the Ring. Fight? Burden. Not Fight? Burden. Then grab a self-assigning minion to pick who to assign himself to and trigger Sense of Obligation anyway. Fierce? All the better. Would you like....17 burdens per site? (NOTE: Absolute BEST case scenario, but still possible).

So get a hold of this killer uncommon and some self-assigning minions, and watch it start raining burdens!

Until Next Time!

~NB

[SomeRandomDude]

The Uruk lust for blood, gore, and plunder unleashed in a powerful, common condition.

Today's spotlight on...

Deathly Roar!



With the release of Rise of Saruman, this card passed below the radar. Bigger and better cards were released, like Saruman, Servant of Sauron. The card was not even spoiled until Age's End, when in was spoiled en masse with all the other Rise of Saruman, Treachery and Deceit, and Age's End cards. Its easy to see how in all those sets, on card can easily pass below the radar.

But no more. I'm here to tell you that this card packs a big wallop. First, let's look at the mechanics of the card.

(1). Twilight cost. This is the only drawback to the card. You can't drop it simultaneously with several Uruks. However, once you do get it in play, it pays back its cost in gold.
(2). Non-unique. This card is NOT unique, and thus, you can have up to 4 copies in play simultaneously. This is the real strength of the card, the attribute that gives it its power.
(3). Card Type. Yeah, its a condition, but some of the most broken, powerful cards out there *cough* Goblin Hordes *cough* are also conditions.
(4). Text.
-(A). "Each time the Free People's player plays a possession or artifact, place an Uruk-hai token here." With an ability to accumulate tokens itself, and at a rapid pace with several copies out, this guy packs a wallop against any strategy packing a bunch of possessions, such as Rohan, and artifacts, such as Gondor.
-(B). "Each time an Uruk-hai minion wins a skirmish, you may remove a token to exert a companion." THIS is what makes the card all it is. Each time an Uruk-Hai wins a skirmish, you get to start exerting companions. While this may not look big, imagine this with 3 or 4 copies out. That's right. 4 to 5 wounds from ONE skirmish won. THAT's assuming you don't have damage guys. Then with Hunters, they get to come back again. Combo with Tracking the Prize, Following Uruk, and Saruman, Servant of Sauron, and you have a machine riding on the back of Deathly Roar that will exhaust an entire fellowship by winning a few skirmishes. THAT's power.
(5). Rarity. That's the sweetest part about this. Its COMMON! Which means that ANYONE can get a hold of four copies and grind your opponent to dust!

So, how would an effective deck using this card work? Glad you asked. I'm not using the aforementioned combo, since I already mentioned the aforementioned combo, so here's another deck relying solely on Deathly Roar and You Do Not Know Pain.

(39 cards)

Chasing Uruk x 4
Ugluk, Ugly Fellow x 3
White Hand Guard x 4
Uruk Rogue x 2
White Hand Destroyer x 2
Barbaric Uruk x 4

Deathly Roar x 4
Fearless Approach x 4
Weapons of Control x 4
Poised for Assault x 2
You Do Not Know Pain x 4

Violent Hurl x 2

The obvious combo here is Deathly Roar/Weapons of Control. Once you've amassed some tokens, simply throw down weapons of Control and watch the token pile up. Use to exert. Control sites as much as possible for You Do Not Know Pain. Uruk Rogue is in there to drop down along with a few Deathly Roar, since they'll be hogging some of the twilight. And by himself he's fierce, strength 16 and damage +1.

The best part of this deck is YOU pick who gets exerted. As a finisher, leave everyone except the RB wounded, drop a Barbaric Uruk with a White Hand Guard and overwhelm the RB. Or, liberate enough sites with You Do Not Know Pain to make him high damage. The same can be done against any companion that is especially annoying you.

Well, when everyone's exhausted, winning a skirmish means an almost certain kill. Kill them one by one, or however many by however many, until there's just the RB. Then kill him as well. You'll have to pair it with Dwarves or some other cycling/filter FP.

So, get a hold of 4 copies of Deathly Roar and beat some people up!

Until next time,

~NBarden

[SomeRandomDude]

"The finest rockets ever seen. They burst in stars of blue and green."

Well its back!

After a long time of inactivity, I'm proud to announce the return of NB's Spotlight On...and what a return! Today, we re-enter with a bang, taking you to an antiquated card that has never seen its true potential, as its own, built-in infinite loop.

Today's Spotlight on...

Fireworks!



First, as always, a look at the mechanics of the card.

(1). Twilight Cost. 1 twilight. Not too shabby. But in the way we'll be using it, either the low twilight will come in handy, or twilight cost won't matter much at all.
(2). Card Type. It is an event. Meaning that it works with other copies of itself in its gametext as we see later on. This is an EXTREMELY huge benefit.
(3). Text.
 (A). Spell. Well...Gandalf likes doing a bunch of stuff with spells, let's see if we can work with that.
 . Fellowship: Being a fellowship event, it allows you to work its magic with other fellowship events/actions that make it quite the useful card.
 (C). "Spot Gandalf to shuffle up to 2 or up to two events from your discard pile into your draw deck." Bingo. Here's where we see the combo. You use 1 copy to get the event you want, then use another copy to nab 2 Fireworks back. Now picture this. YOU ARE DECKED OUT WITH ONE OF THESE DUDES. You now have an infinite recursion engine.
(4). Rarity. 'Tis a common, easy to acquire, don't you agree?

Eh? Pretty nifty, don't ya say?

Here I deviate from the standard form of my articles and take a peek at something I call synergy. The point of Fireworks is to operate whilst decked out. So...the point of the deck is to deck out. So, you build a shadow that cycles the deck like mad. And keep your deck at 30/30- 60 cards even.

A couple options come to mind.

1). Have a good shadow that cycles well.
Answer:


Goblin Armory x 4
Goblin Scimitar x 4
Goblin Swarms x 2
Relics of Moria

Goblin Runner x 4
Goblin Scrabbler x 4
Goblin Backstabber x 4
Goblin Scavengers x 4
Goblin Flankers x 3

Um...okay. THis is the most basic, fundamental deck of all time. Moria swarm, 30 card. You can go swarm out big with card drawing like crazy, anything that wins comes back again with Goblin Swarms, and the Armory/Relics of Moria combo = almost guaranteed 8 extra twilight, 4 extra cards per turn. Yeah? Yeah?

Or...

2). Have a shadow that cycles like insanity.

4x Hides
4x Chasm's Edge
4x Slippery as Fishes
4x Captured by the Ring
2x Hidden Even From Her
1x Unabated in Malice
4x A Shadow Rises
2x Web
4x Gollum, Old Villain
1x Goblin Runner

The point of this deck is get out all of Gollum's conditions and hopefully you'll have a massive fierce damage +1 Gollum knocking people around for dirt cheap. Captured By The Ring nabs the Gollums in the deck, Hides cycles, and you've got a sweet deck that can hit hard if they play the deck wrong. But mostly, this deck cycles and dumps cards like absolute MADNESS. That's the real point.

So...now that we've got some shadows out of the way, let's take a look at the capacitys of the deck.

Well, 1 copy shuffle 2 copies into your deck. So, you can stick 4 cards into your deck, then the 2 fireworks, and have another fireworks left over. This allows you to set up 8 cards in your hand for the next site. What if we speed this up? Let's take a look at some possibilities of accelerating this and making it worth your while this turn. Unfortunately, Fellowship Phase drawing is limited to 4, thanks to the aptly names "Rule of 4", but we can still do some stuff outside of it.

Echoes of Valinor- Here come your skirmish events. But Gandalf has to win.
Mellon!- Possibilities. BUt its a one-shot thing. You play 2 Fireworks in the fellowship phase to get 2 Fireworks in your deck for the repeat of the loop and two other cards, then you've got Mellon! to get 'em to ya.
Gloin, Son of Groin- Draws 3 cards.
Aggression/Memories of Darkness/Rohirrim Guard- Okay...so its a possibility. Don't shoot me. Open format, fair game.
City of the Trees- Has to be paired with elves, but from the next card we take a glance at, get, it's looking like a quite possible option.
Woodhall Elf, Exile- Bingo. Nabs in the Manuever phase. What more can you want? Other than Aggression...
Elrond, Lord of Rivendell- The elf idea is looking better and better, now isn't it? But there may be better alternatives.

Okay, so there's more options, but this kinda gives us a cool idea for what we want to do with the deck. Now let's take another look at something else. What exactly would we to recur over and over?

Well...the strength of this strategy is not playing the same event over and over, but being able to grab ANY event necessary to your strategy. So, let's take a shot at this.

First format to nail, expanded.

(30 cards)

Galadriel, Bearer of Wisdom
The One Ring, The Ring of Rings

Rumil, Silvan Elf (Starting)
Legolas, Greenleaf (Starting)

Elrond, Witness to History
Gandalf, Returned x 4

Fireworks x 4

Mirror of Galadriel, Dangerous Guide
Glamdring, Foe-Hammer
Elven Bow x 2
Shadowfax, Roaring Wind

Alatar, Final Envoy
Woodhall Elf, Exile

City of the Trees
Echoes of Valinor
Not the First Halfling

Under the Living Earth
Mighty Steed x 2
Deep in Thought
Strength of Spirit x 3
Citadel to Gate
The Terror of His Coming

The strategy of this deck is to get Mirror of Galadriel and Woodhall Elf to combo for some massive cycling on top of flat-out card drawing to set up a barebones Not The First Halfling engine (Alatar and Returned helping greatly there). Then, once you cycle through/draw through and survive until you deck out, Fireworks shoot off and you get whatever cards you need back. Mighty Steed each turn, twice a turn, anyone? Strength of Spirit/Greenleaf? Strength of Spirit x 2/Citadel to Gate combo? Yup, seems like fun. I used Witness to History over Lord of Rivendell because he can bring Echoes of Valinor back over and over, and with Strength of Spirit...yeah. Shadowfax can also eat tokens to drop minions.

Seem fun? Sweet! Let's take a whack at another decktype in open that may be a little bit funner to use...bwahaha.

(32 cards)

Frodo, Resolute Hobbit
The Great Ring

Gandalf, Leader of Men
Gloin, Son of Groin

Dain Ironfoot, King under the Mountain
Rohirrim Guard
Aragorn, Heir to the Throne of Gondor
Legolas, Greenleaf
Rumil, Silvan Elf
Orophin, Silvan Elf

Aragorn's Bow, Ranger's Longbow

Ring of Fury
Gandalf's Hat
Glamdring, Foe-Hammer
Dwarven Axe
Mirror of Galadriel, Dangerous Guide

Aggression x 2
Memories of Darkness
Brooding on Tomorrow
Echoes of Valinor
Proud and Able

Calculated Risk x 3
Fireworks x 4

Citadel to Gate
Strength of Spirit x 2
The Terror of His Coming
Ease the Burden

Well...the strategy here is to spot a dwarf. Then, once you've done that, you have Memories of Darkness, a damage Gloin, Aggression, and now you're drawing card in fellowship. Mirror of Galadriel once again ensures you get the cards you want, by perhaps sticking Fireworks under your deck, and then you can go Citadel to Gate/Gorn's Bow combo for some massive fun. Orophin can clean up any left-overs, assuming Gorn can't, and anything still left over, leave it to Dain and a condition discard (it comes back with Memories of Darkness anyways...).

Well thanks again guys for taking time to read this and learn a few tricks you may not have known about the old card, Fireworks. And just a hint, the Strength of Spirit/Citadel to Gate/Aragorn's Bow combo may see its way in some of the expanded games I play ya.

Until Next Time,

~NB