Saruman. To those of you who have used him, how good is he? I'm having trouble reconciling his cost with his one turn ability.

He's absolutely worth it, especially early in the game. His stats are great and his ability to take out one enemy or location is very helpful. I usually play him when I am in deep trouble (drawing two enemies at the beginning) or when I want to finish a stage in one turn to avoid a nasty Time effect. When playing Ford of the Isen he's a bit problematic though when you get the attachment that raises your threat each time you draw a card.

He is very cool! Sure you can use him in the deck with Loragorn………

With one player he's great. With two players, he can be worth it. After that, I'm not sure I'd play him. His best uses for me are to remove locations (or enemies) from the staging area with nasty effects (Garden of Poisons from Druaden Forrest for example) or to provide a big attack boost. In other quests, he could be really useful for removing something that is keeping you from winning (like a Dunland enemy card on the last stage). Solid card, worth playing, but nowhere near as good as either Gandalf.

Solid card, worth playing, but nowhere near as good as either Gandalf.

As it should be!

He is very cool! Sure you can use him in the deck with Loragorn………

Statements like this always irk me, for 3 reasons.

First, I despise pigeonhole cards, meaning cards that force me to play other cards. IMO designer deck-building is poor design, but worse than that it's lazy deck-building on the part of players to just take the combo elements and slap them together. A player ends up missing other important interactions with card designs and has to cut efficiency for convenience.

Second, saying "just play Loragorn" is saying "just play Lore." What if I'm playing Leadership and Tactics? Telling players to change the spheres they are bringing to the table really isn't the answer.

Third and most importantly, what if someone else has Loragorn? Only one person can have access to the hero. And please, suggesting the player also bring the 0-cost spirit card that passes him around the table just amplifies the points made in the first two "irks."

To answer the OP, I'd say run 2 copies of Saruman and don't play him if you don't need him. There are a number of threat reduction options out there and more coming all the time. A 12 threat hero who can reduce your threat to the starting level if you confine yourself to the lore sphere is not as good as a 3-hero group that starts your threat in the 21-24 range,

He is very cool! Sure you can use him in the deck with Loragorn………

Statements like this always irk me, for 3 reasons.

First, I despise pigeonhole cards, meaning cards that force me to play other cards. IMO designer deck-building is poor design, but worse than that it's lazy deck-building on the part of players to just take the combo elements and slap them together. A player ends up missing other important interactions with card designs and has to cut efficiency for convenience.

Second, saying "just play Loragorn" is saying "just play Lore." What if I'm playing Leadership and Tactics? Telling players to change the spheres they are bringing to the table really isn't the answer.

Third and most importantly, what if someone else has Loragorn? Only one person can have access to the hero. And please, suggesting the player also bring the 0-cost spirit card that passes him around the table just amplifies the points made in the first two "irks."

To answer the OP, I'd say run 2 copies of Saruman and don't play him if you don't need him. There are a number of threat reduction options out there and more coming all the time. A 12 threat hero who can reduce your threat to the starting level if you confine yourself to the lore sphere is not as good as a 3-hero group that starts your threat in the 21-24 range,

Well, Saruman has a great synergy with Loragorn, so I guess it's ok to suggest that combo?

To add something to the discussion, I'm playing a tactics/spirit deck without any threat reduction except of Gandalf, and I play Saruman quite often. Not always, as some cards in FoI can raise your threat quite heavily. When playing To Catch an Ork I play him always everytime I get him. He's awesome when you want to catch that ork or when you want to finsih the third stage ASAP.

I'd say he is very situational. He is neutral so he may be part of many decks, but I never celebrated when I drew him. He was always in my hand for long time, as at the beggining of the round there wasn't card worth his ability. But when he finally came in play, his stats were very useful.

For me, the best part of Saruman card is that absolutely amazing artwork!