Return to its Master / Wraith-world

[neopium]

Hi everyone,

Did anyone ever managed to build a deck that made Return to its Master or Wraith-world really work?

I have seen here a few example of deck using those cards, but forcing the Ring-bearer to wear the one ring seems pretty hard. Resistance becomes unbearable seems the best way to go, but still, very hard to ensure the ring bearer is exhausted...

Any ideas ?

[sgtdraino]

I haven't seen much regarding Wraith-world, but I did see a deck once that made good use of Return To Its Master and Resistance Becomes Unbearable, by combining it with Gollum, Dark as Darkness, and the various ways of playing Gollum over and over.

[neopium]

That's what I was thinking about...

Currently I am working on this:

1x Gollum, Dark as Darkness
3x Morgul Brute
4x The Witch-king, Lord of the Nazgul
1x Ulaire Enquea, Lieutenant of Morgul
2x Ulaire Enquea, Ringwraith in Twilight
2x Ulaire Nelya, Ringwraith in Twilight
1x Ulaire Toldea, Messenger of Morgul
3x Fell Beast
3x Captured by the Ring
2x Morgul Gates
4x Resistance Becomes Unbearable
1x Return to Its Master
4x Wraith-world
2x His Terrible Servants
2x Stronghold of Minas Morgul

I started with more copies of Return to Its Master but with The Witch-king, Lord of the Nazgul, you can't play it, so I thought on concentrating more on a Wraith-World bomb.

Return To Its Master is then just a bonus...

[neopium]

In fact, I had an even more pervert idea: combine a shadow like this with an adapted Durin's Secret Society of Dear Friends fellowship.

The main issue I find with Durin's Secret Society of Dear Friends is that you usually cannot play the shadow side (you know what I am talking about). So it can get pretty boring for both you and your opponent.

The idea would be to adapt Kralik's version to combine Preparations and Rest by Blind Night in order to prepare a corruption bomb.

I would not focus on triple moving, but more on the preparation of the bomb. I chose Kralik's version over yours because I can heal in the regroup phase and stack more shadow cards on Preparations (hopefully 7 cards). As you always have an empty draw deck, you are sure of what you get.

Problem is: it's a one-shot with 7 cards only (Preparations and the 7 other cards). You can of course reproduce it once or maybe twice (I did not do the math), but next turn, you end-up with an empty hand for fellowship... So your opponent has time to heal/remove burdens, etc.

Well, if I find a way to combine both, I will try it. Otherwise, I will just pair it with an "ordinary" fellowship

[sgtdraino]

I started with more copies of Return to Its Master but with The Witch-king, Lord of the Nazgul, you can't play it,

So, use a different Witch-king!

so I thought on concentrating more on a Wraith-World bomb.

I dunno, only 3 burdens per card. Is that the 7-card combo you were talking about?

Return To Its Master is then just a bonus...

My buddy Shonuf often includes at least one Return To Its Master in his Nazgul decks, just for the potential ugly surprise. Got so bad that I get so I NEVER put the ring on when Nazgul are around, unless there is absolutely no other choice.

The idea would be to adapt Kralik's version to combine Preparations and Rest by Blind Night in order to prepare a corruption bomb.

I would not focus on triple moving, but more on the preparation of the bomb. I chose Kralik's version over yours because I can heal in the regroup phase and stack more shadow cards on Preparations (hopefully 7 cards). As you always have an empty draw deck, you are sure of what you get.

Not bad. Maybe go for a mostly-dwarf set up, so you can get as many exertions as possible to put stuff on Preparations.

Problem is: it's a one-shot with 7 cards only (Preparations and the 7 other cards). You can of course reproduce it once or maybe twice (I did not do the math), but next turn, you end-up with an empty hand for fellowship... So your opponent has time to heal/remove burdens, etc.

Yeah, you really need a combo that is a guaranteed kill the first time you use it. In this case, either option could be hit-or-miss depending on what ringbearer you're facing.

Well, if I find a way to combine both, I will try it. Otherwise, I will just pair it with an "ordinary" fellowship

Interested to see what you come up with!

[neopium]

Interested to see what you come up with!

Not sure I will come up with anything.

I was looking for the killer combo cards. Killing the Ring-bearer depends on too many factors (unless you go the archery bomb, but it requires you to control many sites before getting the combo out), so corrupting looked easier. There are not that many cards that potentially add tons of burdens in a raw. There are Uruk Spy, LttG and Wraith-world.

LttG and Uruk spy requires way much setup (you need to put a lot of shadow cards in the draw deck, and Rest by Blind Night shuffles them, so you are not sure to get what you want), so I am left with Wraith-world (and Return To Its Master as it follows the same mechanism), but I'm not sure I can make it work...

Thus my post, in case I missed some magic combination that make it more efficient...

[neopium]

So, use a different Witch-king!

He helps you exhaust the Ring-bearer, especially with AtAR (you have to deal 5 wounds!

I dunno, only 3 burdens per card. Is that the 7-card combo you were talking about?

7 is the constraint. With Gollum DaD + 4x Resistance Becomes Unbearable, you can get any Ring-bearer to wear the one ring (Frodo + AtAR is 6 vitality).

But you have to exert a twilight Nazgul 4 times (or heal him in the meantime) and that requires two cards.

Then you have 4x Wraith-world to add 12 burdens...

But you need 11 cards... so it does not work :-)

[Zurcamos]

Not bad. Maybe go for a mostly-dwarf set up, so you can get as many exertions as possible to put stuff on Preparations.

I think that's what Kralik started out with.  Ever since people have been talking about the Dear Friends deck again, I've been trying to come up with a unique idea (to do in paper), but it's no easy task!  In addition, I've always wanted to change the shadow.

Love the idea, neopium.  Is there another combo or culture that could be "better," with just seven cards?

[Galdor420]

Perhaps combining Return to Its Master and Nazgul with Under the Watching Eye and Orc Bowmen? Or maybe a Plotting (7R67) bomb with Hate? That requires alot of cards though (Gollum, plotting, a Nazgul, a Sauron Orc and Hate)

[sgtdraino]

If you're doing the deck cycling thing, perhaps some sort of variant using Lost To The Goblins?

[neopium]

For Lost to the Goblins to work, you need:
- Gollum, DaD to exert the ring-bearer
- 4x LttG
- 3x minions (Goblin sneak is great as you put 3 other minions behind your draw deck)

So that's a total of 8 cards (9 with the Preparations you shuffled in your draw deck), which is close, but then, you have only 3 cards left in your draw deck and can only use 1 LttG before decking out...

You have to find a way to put more shadow cards from the discard pile to the draw deck during your shadow phase... not easy

[neopium]

I can't find a way to play my bomb in Durin's Secret Society of Dear Friends.

But here is a replay link with the shadow mentioned above... That was efficient!

http://www.gempukku.com/gemp-lotr/game.html?replayId=neopium$qyry9vhjf9gn97ps

Sure, I was a bit lucky with the draw and my opponent did some mistakes (by putting the ring). Even though, with Resistances becomes Unbearable, I could have win. Too bad I missed 2 twilight tokens for the corruption

[sgtdraino]

I think that was the wrong link. All that one says, is that the game was canceled.

[neopium]

Oops

The correct link is this one:
http://www.gempukku.com/gemp-lotr/game.html?replayId=neopium$w2ef33d0tf4l2hxj

I played since a few other games and the shadow did not work as well (I lost all 3 of them).
I found myself with a clogged hand and no Gollum nor CbtR... I guess I have too few minions and I often have cards I cannot play in hand...

[neopium]

Here is an updated shadow with more copies of Gollum, DaD and CbtR:

3x Gollum, Dark as Darkness
3x Morgul Brute
4x The Witch-king, Lord of the Nazgul
1x Ulaire Enquea, Lieutenant of Morgul
2x Ulaire Enquea, Ringwraith in Twilight
3x Ulaire Nelya, Ringwraith in Twilight
2x Fell Beast
4x Captured by the Ring
4x Resistance Becomes Unbearable
1x Return to Its Master
4x Wraith-world
2x His Terrible Servants
2x Stronghold of Minas Morgul

Comments are welcome