One go at emyn muil with trisphere. Easy win.

It was fun and i can see where its epic-journey reputation comes from and i did indeed enjoy it, though i do imagine its hard to lose with a constructed deck containing good willpower and location management.

That said, the game needs scenarios like this where you can enjoy the game and expect to win. Some scenarios can be so hard at first that after repeated losses, it may be nice to rake a break, throw your deck against emyn muil for some light heartedness then come back to the difficulty.

So i enjoyed it, not much challenge, will play a few times more before going onto Dead Marshes.

I can see this being a go-to scenario for light heartedness and easy-win.

Fun though and lovely location art

Ok ok i officially withdraw my previous comments. Today i played another emyn muil and it kicked my arse!

I drew two lots if dol guldur orcs, so that was two lots of 2 damage to questing heroes followed by a necromancers reach doing another 1 damage to all heroes who were questing at the time, so gimli and theodred both had 3 wounds and eowyn 1. Then i pulled a treachery card that did two damage to each hero (cant remember the card) so all three died same turn.

I didnt have any cards to counter and had hit location-lock at almost turn 1 hence trying to quest with so many heroes. It just butchered me with treachery.

So depending on card draw, nit as easy as first appears. Few more games at this scenario are in order now I feel

Three goes at emyn muil today.

Go one it hammered me again. Man those treacheries can be rough.

Go two, everything was going well, looked a good win... then rockslide killed eowyn and theodred in one go. After that Gimli couldnt handle it on his own and it was location lock and threat bust to another loss.

Go three, i won easy. A no problem jaunt to victory.

Does seem the treacheries in this scenario can be game breakers.

I agree. It's one reason I don't hate on the quest like everyone else. I recommend working in some sky effect (looking at top of encounter deck) Riversong helps save you from landslide. I also like ears to the ground or whatever or Denethor.

Good idea. My trisphere doesnt have lore, but i dont think i need the full might of tactics, so may swap tactics for lore (denethor) and upgrade theodred to aragorn or gloin to still have combat ability.

Hmm ill have a think on that thanks

So Emyn Muil beat me again. I was going amazing then those treacheries nuked me. Its always the treacheries. Theres not enough treachery cancellation in my spirit deck to handle the amount, so skrying has to be the best repeatable solution. Henamarth being only 1 card is unreliable so it has to be denethor/lore.

So what to drop?

Eowyn/Spirit is a must to keep.

Leadership is good for Faramir, steward/gondor, celebrians etc.

Tactics is only good for the few fights.

So ill probably drop tactics. In doing so, i need a hard hitter for combat, so probably swap theodred for Aragorn and bolster Aragorn with a few additional Leadership allies.

Didnt want to design a deck specially for this scenario but i think ive lost enough that a deck design is needed before i move on.

Slightly wondering if to keep tactics and get the leadership cards via a leadership-song card, but first I think ill try the aragorn route.

Aragorn was my favorite when I started out. Don't remember using many tactics cards, aside from my first few tries, not until the dwarfs and super heroes cycle... often ran Aragorn, T heodred , Eowyn together; using S ignal's, Unexpected Courage, Celebrían's Stone etc to boost Aragorn... Theodred to help with resources early on... Steward & Celebrian's on Aragorn to pay for expensive spirit Allies...

Aragorn/Eowyn/Denethor is a great combo. I used to play it all the time back in the core set days.

Do you have the sword that was broken yet? I don't remember the sets. If you do, use it. They don't have "broken" in the name for nothing.

Do you have the sword that was broken yet? I don't remember the sets. If you do, use it. They don't have "broken" in the name for nothing.

Sword That Was Broken doesn't turn up until Watcher in the Water. Same pack as Loragorn.

I do have the AP for the sword but as i am playing in release order its not made its way into my card pool yet, its in my upcomin-section

So went Aragirn, Denethor, Eowyn and made a deck to go with them.

Played and won three Emyn Muils in a row

Skrying certainly wins this.

Even when i got location lock, i was able to pull it back with this deck at one point (Thank you sudden appearance of Northern Tracker).

So next game will be my first at Dead Marshes. Going to keep the same deck, see how it plays and where its downsides are (considering the core encounter decks used, i am thinking i will be lacking combat, but lets play and see).

After playing, then I will deck design fir this one.

If you're fortunate enough to get two or more Northern Trackers in play at the same time (plus do timely drops with Snowbourn Scouts, even with Sneak Attack if necessary), you can clear the location locks in Emyn Muil fairly quickly (if you aren't first eliminated by threat gain).

So five goes at Dead Marshes today with the same deck as enyn muil. 4 wins 1 loss.

The loss was due to getting tied up with a hill troll too much to a threat bust. I did have it sorted by having an extra defense on denethor meaning he could defend the troll and take 2 damage without dying, then be healed by a nimrodel, great even though i could only scratch 1 or 2 damage on it per turn.. then the giant marsh worm joined the troll and it all went bad.

The other 4 games, the wins, were good. Aragorn being able to quest and hide test is good. Getting unexpected courage onto eowyn works great for that too!

While they were consistent wins they didnt feel easy as the choice on quest/hide was difficult at times and even scrying could only help so much. So still challenging.

Next i am on to Return to Mirkwood. Ive had a peek and woah it looks hard.

Im going to try same deck at first, expect to lose as i dont think i have near enough combat for those attercops.

After a few losses I think i will deck design with Gimli. Maybe use songs to go quad-sphere.

If you try to fight the attercops or any of the big enemies you will almost always lose the quest. In solo, most of the time your only hope is to just rush through and quest as fast as you can before your threat runs out, while holding of any enemies with fient or chump blockers ect. Will be very interesting to hear your experiences!

If you try to fight the attercops or any of the big enemies you will almost always lose the quest. In solo, most of the time your only hope is to just rush through and quest as fast as you can before your threat runs out, while holding of any enemies with fient or chump blockers ect. Will be very interesting to hear your experiences!

I noticed that as a solo player the attercop will instantly engage me, as well as undefended damage going onto Gollum, so I was thinking to get Gimli citadel plate and dwarvern axe and go nuclear on them. That said, my current deck doesnt have Gimli and ill play it a few times with that first to see how the encounter plays and beats me.

If you try to fight the attercops or any of the big enemies you will almost always lose the quest. In solo, most of the time your only hope is to just rush through and quest as fast as you can before your threat runs out, while holding of any enemies with fient or chump blockers ect. Will be very interesting to hear your experiences!

I don't think this is possible. Stage 4 says: "Players cannot defeat this stage if there are any enemies in play."

My solo victories vs. RtM (progression style) were all with Aragorn, Eowyn and Thalin. Good luck, it's a pretty brutal ride!

Denethor-ing the Attercops to the bottom of the deck may also be a good method. Have to see what happens when I play it

Hmm

8 Goes at this today, all losses.

Every single loss was due to threat bust. As a solo player raising by 4 every turn is destroying, especially with treacheries raising 8 threat.

With such fast threat raise, even having 2 galadrims greetings, 3 gandalfs and 2 sneak attacks doesnt card draw enough to reduce threat enough, especially as cards cant be played at all in stage 3. Too much threat raise.

Lots of reliance on luck with card draw.

One game I lost on last stage when busting threat.

One game I thought i had it in the bag. Last quest phase was complete but still Attercop in play. My threat was 48 or 49 so needed to win this round. Dropped in Gandalf, did his damage to the Attercop and him and buffed Aragorn were going to be enough to kill it and win the game yay, i even had a chump blocker ready. All good..... then the shadow card raised threat and bust 50 aarrgh!

So not beat it yet.

High fast questing with threat reduction seems the key, but my deck already has that. So im thinking card draw to get through the deck, which means Berevor (hate to loose scrying) and due to starting threat swap Aragorn for Theodred (risky as Aragorns ready skill is useful here). Might try that.

Also might ditch leadership and ho eowyn berevor denethor. The lore scout that ignores enemy defense would be good against enemies and denethor scrying, berevor card draw and eowyn questing. Maybe a song to be able to include celebrians stone, steward/gondor and sneak attack. Not sure yet.

Might go a few more with the deck as-is considering ive gad two nearly wins.

Man that threat increase is tough as solo.

EDIT:

Another three games

First TWO both wins yay.

Basically the deck ran ok, not exceptional but good enough... but the encounter deck was so kind and so the scenarios just ran well (Gollums bite still nasty)

Third game was another threat bust.

I imagine the later heros who reset threat to zero are handy.

I think I might have won the third game too if I had been allowed to play Gandalf in stage 3 so he could threat reduce and quest high but sadly not allowed to play cards and thus threat bust with 5/7 progress on stage 3

Though fragile, Bilbo Baggins would be your most reliable card draw in the Core/Mirkood hero card pool… assuming you can protect or buff him up well enough. It's been a long time since I played this one, don't remember what Treacheries are in the deck.

But hey, you managed to squeeze out a few wins with a deck of your own construction… something to be proud of!

Though fragile, Bilbo Baggins would be your most reliable card draw in the Core/Mirkood hero card pool… assuming you can protect or buff him up well enough. It's been a long time since I played this one, don't remember what Treacheries are in the deck.

But hey, you managed to squeeze out a few wins with a deck of your own construction… something to be proud of!

Thank you

And ooh yes Bilbo, I havent used him so didnt think of him, thank you good idea I might give that a try

So are are you going to move on to Massing at Osgiliath since thats what was released next? Or are you going to save that toughy for later and travel to Khazad-Dum and the dwarrowdelf cycle?

Righto, firstly, khamal good question, i was going into Khazad Dum but now I am considering the POD so not sure very good question as I hadnt realised the POD was chronologically next.

Secondly, today spent lots of enjoyable time sleeving cards (yes i am now 40 this week so now own my huge £300+ collection present) which was great to see fleeting glimpses of awesome futre cards, both bad and good.

Then I played 1 game on my new 2-playet(awesome) printed plsymat from inkedplaymats and the playmat is stunning and the game was great.

Another win against Return to Mirkwood with my Leadership/lore/spirit deck. Went fairly clockwork

So I was going to post about gearing up for Kazad dum and leaving the whole first cycle behind, but now I am considering the first POD osgiliath scenario, so not sure wjich to go at next, exciting times!!!!

Whatever you do will be interesting to read And yes Osgiliath was released in between Dead Marshes and Return to Mirkwood officially. If you were to play it now, with your current cardpool, it would be very very tough...but possibly beatable. Still though, people did beat it at that time so its not out of the question. However, you could wait a while too. Your choice.

Thats crazy you sleeved your whole collection! That would take a long timehaha