PLayed another game and got squashed by Bilbo not readying people fast enough with the big spiders coming out of the deck.

Moving onto The Lonely Mountain for my next game will play first with my current deck before deciding if any tweaking/changing is needed.

2 hours ago, alexbobspoons said:

PLayed another game and got squashed by Bilbo not readying people fast enough with the big spiders coming out of the deck.

Moving onto The Lonely Mountain for my next game will play first with my current deck before deciding if any tweaking/changing is needed.

Looking at your last post in this thread which was months ago, you seem to have a problem with that quest 😂

4 hours ago, Thaeggan said:

Looking at your last post in this thread which was months ago, you seem to have a problem with that quest 😂

No, just havent played in months.

I did beat the quest and was just still playing it a few times before moving on and I felt the next enjoyment would be in a new quest

So another game and this time the new quest (Lonely Mountain I think)

Got to stage 3 before busting threat.

Was quite fun. Tricky one. I struggled to quest a lot as targets were very high in staging. Didnt do much combat but didnt really need it, defending was irrelevant due to Smaugs big attack levels when he had a pop at me.

I also struggled for resources. Was dual sphere with Tactics and Spirit. Glorfindel was good, Gimli was okay and Legolas useless. Need to swap Legolas for a better quester.

Not sure how I would fare against damaging Smaug but next game will simply need much more questing somehow. Might bring in Eowyn to pair with Glorfindel. More revealed-cancellation would have been good too!!

Fun tricky quest so far.

Had a think.

Definitely thinking:

More questing

More cancellation

More resources

More chump-blocking (or threat reduction to let Bilbo block)

Combat not seeming that important overall, though do need a bit

New deck and two losing games.

Swapped out Legolas for Aragorn.

Celebrians, Steward, sneak etc

Game 1: Worked well until Smaug did a chain surge attack and essentially killed everyone. Bang.

Game 2: Went downhill early as some surges tied up people and I lost Aragorn. Sadly then I just seemed to draw leadership cards and couldnt play them, so I had a useless hand and very little in play, which lead to location-lock which then lead to threat busting.

Not seeing tactics doing much yet other than chump blocking. Thinking of swapping tactics out for a second Leadership or Spirit hero. Then swapping its cards in the deck for various chump blockers of the other spheres. Will have a think on this one.

All I'm going to say is... Dawn Take You All.

Redesigned deck removing tactics. Added Eowyn and more of both spirit and leadership cards.

Beat it yay!!

Kinda difficult. Surged through questing, Faramir invaluable, celebrians, eowyn, glorfindel+valior etc. Galdalf was around a lot as I drew all 3 and sneaked him twice too.

Smashed the 21 progress target with really high questing.

Ive never been sure if this applies as the card number is 20 so not quite sure if you have to cap at 20 and then get at least 1 damage on Smaug, so I played another turn to try that. Quested low to save people for combat. Smaugs burgle-surge meant he ended up doing 6 consecutive attacks kiling each time, including Eowyn (undefended) and Gandalf. I only had enough people left to get 1 damage on him but it was enough. Phew.

Will replay a few times with this winning deck now, without the pressure lol.

I wonder if the 21 quest points is clarified in the faq??

You can exceed the total progress on a quest card, so you could have twenty-one or more progress on stage three and win with no damage on Smaug.

Played again with this deck, smashed it with questing.

High questing and lots of allies seems to do very well on this quest if you ignore hitting the dragon

I remember Escort From Edoras (x3) playing a key role in my victories.

On 1/3/2019 at 9:40 PM, TwiceBorn said:

I remember Escort From Edoras (x3) playing a key role in my victories.

I did have 1 or 2 of that card in my winning deck yes

I think my key cards were Valinor for Glorfindel, unexpected courage, celebrians stone, steward of gondor, sneak attack, gandalf, burglar bagins, elronds council (I think that's its name, reduces threat), plenty of willpower chump blockers (with Faramir supercharging them in one of the victories).

There's a female ally neutral card whose name I forget but great card. Costs 2 but gives 1 back to a noble hero so really only costs 1. So perfectly cheap chump blocker but also has 1 wp so nice to add questing until chump needed, good card.

As a leadership/spirit deck, getting steward of gondor on Aragorn giving lots of resource to him plus a spirit icon, then 2 spirit heroes, meant resources were never a problem for either sphere. Obviously dependant on getting steward out of the deck but both games that happened. I think I put a full 3 copies in.

You mean Envoy of Pelargir.

11 hours ago, Wandalf the Gizzard said:

You mean Envoy of Pelargir.

That's the girl, she's a star

So today I started playing again.

Played Battle of Five Armies for the first time and used the previous deck to get a feel for it. Got hammered! That deck is no way suitable.

I see the key in prioritising the quest stages for their negative effects, but couldnt get progress to stay on before it got knocked off..

Need a deck with good defense, attack and questing, which the current one isnt really, too many attachments that didnt help me, not enough allies.

Need to go away and think about a deck design then give it another go!!

Designed a new deck. Bit like an army.

Glorfindel (spirit) Aragorn (Leadership) and Gimli. Lots of allies, combat effects and mitigation cards.

Played a game and lost.

Was a struggle, didnt manage to get anywhere near as many allies out as I expected, this hurt me and I lost aragorn early which meant I kept drawing leadership cards without a use. Had plenty of resources but couldnt play much. Managed to get 1 progress on each of the three stages but by that time I was starting to become overwhelmed by Bolg Bodyguards with 3 engaged, so I couldnt hold out long enough. Technically I burst threat but only because of a few rounds of Bilbo defending with the ring.

Cant think of anything YET I would change with this deck, think it was a bad draw/play. Need a game or few more before I can feel if the deck needs changing.

So I beat the quest.

Mixed feelings on it.

I really enjoy how it does feel like a battle, so much going on, such a panic to get things set up so quickly, very thematic.

But..

I also feel as a game it has too much emphasis on getting things set up too fast. At the start there is a scrabble to get questing progress on all three stages to avoid the bad effects, while also encounter cards are removing the progress AND also have additional bad effects if any stage has zero progress on it. So this starting point is MANIC. But, once you have yourself set up with a couple of progress on each stage then the negative effects fall from loads to pretty much zero and you can just bash away at the remaining part of the quest steadily.

The goblin surge remains a hard thing to beat. The big bad guy went down in one hit from a powered up gimli with glorfindel.

Think I will move on from this, the quest is fun but the starting panic is too stressful to make the whole quest completely enjoyable.

Thread seeming quite these days

Anyways..

Had another go, horrible starting hand after mulligan but I pulled it back some. Had the three intermediate stages with 9-7-1 progress upon the end, so not quite managed the last stage. I bust threat at 50 bt Aragorn and Glorfindel had died that turn anyway as I knew I couldnt win so did a blaze of glory finish. Bilbo and Gimil had one health remaining each.

I still dislike the pressure on starting with this quest. If you dont get a good enough start (starting hand) then the game punishes you so hard that it seems too hard to pull back from. True that deck design could try to get cards out fast, but I am not too good at that part of a deck design.