I'd be interested in hearing some hero line-ups that feature her.

I'm running through the list of possibilities, and trying out some options, but have not landed on anything that really clicks for me.

Any thoughts?

My suggestion (totally untested) would be Idraen with Glorfindel and Loragorn. Lots of location control of course (including the new Warden of Arnor and greyflood wanderer), rumour from the earth + wingfoot for Aragorn, alongside LoV on Glorfindel and location exploring stuff gives a lot of action advantage. For the rest, standard Lore and Spirit stuff, with emphasis on Rangers and traps to control enemies as well as locations. Seems pretty plausible in theory.

I thought of the same three heroes, only for purposes of lower starting threat and more access to card draw I switched loragorn for Beravor. And because I like to play solo two-handed I thought Elladan, Legolas and Elrohir would be a good team to go with it, especially with the new elf mail card.

Yeah, my first deck with her was with, Beravor and Spirit Glorfindel, and then was thinking Aragorn lore. Seems like we all thought similarly on that. It was mediocre for solo play.

But after that, i'm kind of stumped on where she fits in. Would love to hear some other players thoughts. At this point I don't think she is the type of hero that fits into a lot of different types of decks, but we'll see as more player cards are revealed.

I just feel like 3 attack strength starts to depart from the theme of the Spirit sphere a little bit. With 2 attack strength, if she readies when a location is explored, then she could add to the attack strength of another Spirit hero, and that would help Spirit at least be able to deliver some 3-4 attack strength blows against enemies. I think that her being able to quest and then provide a sort of "attack support" would have been good enough. 3 attack strength just feels a little bit much for Spirit, and I feel departs slightly from the theme of the sphere.

Ok, so you were talking about balance between the spheres. Overall, I tend to feel like Spirit is the strongest sphere already, and giving it access to more characters that improve their combat abilities is only making the gap wider. In that sense, I totally agree with you.

If you put her in any other sphere she'd feel more balanced that way, but the trigger for her readying ability would feel out of place. Also, if her attack is lowered, she wouldn't have any "good" stats and her ability to ready would become weaker.

Overall, I feel that she is fine the way she is. I don't particularly like that she gives the Spirit sphere more of an advantage, but I can deal with it. Since it's a cooperative game, it's not like making one sphere noticeably stronger than the rest will make the game less playable. It just makes you want to use Spirit more.

I think if they build on the Ranger and/or Scout and/or Dunedain traits a little more, she could probably fit better into decks designed for one or more of those traits. So Faramir, Aragorn, Beravor, or the twins would work. Right now, though, I think you're right that she doesn't have any particular synergy with other heroes.

@Tracker: Then maybe you could try mono-Spirit, I think she can work great with Caldara and Glorfindel. Add in some location exploring stuff that you probably had in the original deck, and there you go.

I'd be interested in hearing some hero line-ups that feature her.

I'm running through the list of possibilities, and trying out some options, but have not landed on anything that really clicks for me.

Any thoughts?

in my head, i'm thinking eomer, imrahil, and her.

horn of gondor, steward of gondor, and errand riders to smooth resources.

popping allies to clear locations (hello, riddermark's finest) to ready imrahil, pump up eomer, and ready our newest hero.

we'll see how it goes...

I'd be interested in hearing some hero line-ups that feature her.

I'm running through the list of possibilities, and trying out some options, but have not landed on anything that really clicks for me.

Any thoughts?

in my head, i'm thinking eomer, imrahil, and her.

horn of gondor, steward of gondor, and errand riders to smooth resources.

popping allies to clear locations (hello, riddermark's finest) to ready imrahil, pump up eomer, and ready our newest hero.

we'll see how it goes...

That's a high starting threat!

I'd be interested in hearing some hero line-ups that feature her.

I'm running through the list of possibilities, and trying out some options, but have not landed on anything that really clicks for me.

Any thoughts?

in my head, i'm thinking eomer, imrahil, and her.

horn of gondor, steward of gondor, and errand riders to smooth resources.

popping allies to clear locations (hello, riddermark's finest) to ready imrahil, pump up eomer, and ready our newest hero.

we'll see how it goes...

That's a high starting threat!

so?

Why isn't she limited? Why Imrahil is limited once per round while she not? It would be more consequent she would be limited like Imrahil.

Why isn't she limited? Why Imrahil is limited once per round while she not? It would be more consequent she would be limited like Imrahil.

b/c typically you only clear 1 location per turn, you can lose/pop allies at will.

Why isn't she limited? Why Imrahil is limited once per round while she not? It would be more consequent she would be limited like Imrahil.

b/c typically you only clear 1 location per turn, you can lose/pop allies at will.

I'd be interested in hearing some hero line-ups that feature her.

I'm running through the list of possibilities, and trying out some options, but have not landed on anything that really clicks for me.

Any thoughts?

in my head, i'm thinking eomer, imrahil, and her.

horn of gondor, steward of gondor, and errand riders to smooth resources.

popping allies to clear locations (hello, riddermark's finest) to ready imrahil, pump up eomer, and ready our newest hero.

we'll see how it goes...

That's a high starting threat!

so?

I always struggle with Tri-Sphere decks and would undoubtedly need another mono-lore deck for support. I am getting into mono-decks again lately (mainly for eagles) but i would say that Idraen would be good in mono-spirit. Idraen, Eowyn, Eleanor, maybe alongside a tactics deck or whatever is needed for the given quest. That is a solid three I think...and who says women are underrepresented. They are three solid heroes.

Ran Idraen with (S) Glorfindel and Denethor a couple times tonight, but I never got all the gears moving solo. I think complimented with a combat deck this could eat up locations and grant some nice action advantage (especially if Glorfindel and Idraen can get some Ranged action).

I included Northern Tracker, Lorien Guide, Greyflood Wanderer, Asfaloth, even Strength of Will (which actually couples nicely with Glorfindel+Light of Valinor). Ravenhill Scout didn't get his chance to shine: I picture him shooting some progress over at the right time to knock out a location and ready Idraen as needed.

Three Trials didn't get me enough time to setup and I quested through Into Fangorn too quickly to really see the deck working as intended. I'll try it in a multiplayer setting and hopefully it'll take off.

The real treat, though, has been seeing my Silvan deck come together! But I guess that's for another thread.

Can we get a review of The Three Trials? I'm picking up my pack tomorrow.

More info! What about the quest? the enemies, locations, etc. What is it compared to other quests like this?

CardboardoftheRings has a brief review over on their facebook page

anyone have a preview/summary for those of us who dont use fb? ...(yes, we exist!! )

SPOILER ALERT, YOU'VE BEEN WARNED
Brief review - The Three Trials

My quest rating, after two games: 9/10
The quest reminds me mainly of the Steward's Fear, with the bosses and quest cards interacting in similar ways as how the plot cards and villains used to work. Various combinations can ensue, which increases the replayability. The shadow and treacheries are fairly tame. The new Dunedain hero excels in this quest; bring Northern tracker, Asfaloth and Warden of Arnor for some on demand readying. We used generic decks for our first game and got beaten (but still almost won). On the second game we slightly tweaked our decks for the quest and won. Fun and includes lots of decision space on how to proceed from one trial to the next.

My player card rating: 9/10
A very solid pack of cards, especially for secrecy decks. The new hero is a blast, think Aragorn-like stats and readying ability with Asfaloth/Glorfindel's or Legolas' help. She particularly excels in multiplayer games; in solo, not enough locations come out to warrant her inclusion in my opinion.

Look forward to the next podcast episode for some more discussion on the expansion pack, and the opinions of the rest of the crew.

- É

I'll give a few detailed spoilers here, so look away if you don't want to be spoiled!

- There are three unique Guardian enemies, three unique Barrow locations, and three unique Key objectives. Each Key objective is associated with a particular Guardian.

- There are three different stage 2 cards (stage 1 is basically a setup). Each one represents a different type of trial (perseverance, strength, and intuition) and you get to choose which trial you want to face and in what order. Once you pick a trial, you randomly select a Barrow location and objective/guardian. Each trial works a bit differently.

- It is similar to Steward's Fear in terms of replay value in having the combinations of different locations, trials, and guardians, but plays out very differently.

I give it two thumbs up. Between the random nature of the encounters and their varied effects (lots of attacking, threat raising, location lock, searching through the encounter deck, etc) and the fact that you're fighting a Guardian from round 1, it is very intense and rewarding. I've only played it solo, and so the last stage is very difficult, but I can't wait to see it multiplayer.

Getting back to Idraen for a moment I'm coming around to her being 3 attack. Consider a secrecy deck with her and (who else?) Spirit Glorifindel. Starting threat 16 and can crack back for 6 damage right out of the gate. Attacking for 6 is pretty much the magic number right now because there are so many enemies with 4/2, 3/3, 2/4 defense/hit points. It's important as a solo player to be able to remove these engaged threats right away so they don't trigger.

Starting to brew now.

A Watchful Peace is a decent mini-combo with Warden of Armor. I'm going through my binders and looking at some cards from a new angle - which is really good.

A Watchful Peace is just plain good for any deck that sucks at combat and is good at questing. Doesn't necessarily need to "combo" with anything.

Hmm, not so sure about that, when dealing shadow cards you're always going to lose the locations.

Yes, but if you can use it when there is no enemy for that round, you can keep cycling that location over and over. You can also use several "tricks" to prevent enemies from engaging, especially in the Spirit and Lore spheres.

Hmm yes I think you're right. It's not gonna work in all scenarios but most of them probably.

Also still no ffgapp link to The Three Trials!... I want to see the cards!