Courtesy of CoTR's FB page.

What a cool mechanic with the boon and the return of Gandalf. Really cool.

Quickbeam is way undercosted. Disregarding any ent synergy and assuming you ready him, he's a 2/3/1/2 lore ally for 2 cost. He's pretty much on par with Haldir or Andborn but with 2 cost instead of 4. Even assuming Dain is in play, he has roughly the same stats as Dori and Bifur who cost 3 each. He only has 1 less HP than Gwaihir, who costs 5.

I want to be excited about Ents, but they are definitely starting to feel like Outlands.

That Quickbeam art is absolutely epic.

So stoked for this expansion. Love that Hama card!

That Quickbeam art is absolutely epic.

He's sprinting! It's too funny! Plus the orc flying through the air behind him is just icing on the cake. So fun.

My first thought about Hama was that his artwork really reminded me of Elven Mail. And sure enough - same artist! Guess she likes spears?

The art on all of these is great! But why did they forget to post Ent moot?

Art on Quick Beam is on point. Even looks like he's grinning as that enemy with the spear is probably crapping his pants. Cant wait.

Anyone else have a desire to run the Legolas hero with two blades of gondolin and Arod to give 5 progress tokens on a kill? Not the best restricted attachments to have on him but could make a for a fun build especially if you include some Merry hi-jinks for readying. *creates new topic about Arod, ready for errata!*

Although Arod exhausts, so you can't go too crazy.

I don't know if there are many baseball fans in this group, but every time I looks at that card I think of this guy:

Let's be franks, Quickbeam should have only 2 atk. He would be a better version of wandering ent, but is unique and worse at defending, but still somewhat balanced.

With 3 atk he is simple a monster, too strong. Probable two is going in every deck that has lore and want to kill enemies (sometimes a pure support decks want to avoid enemies). He just became a staple.

I really dig the idea of a quick ent, but like this? He dont need to be strong and quick!

Yeah, I agree. I think it's going to be hard to pass up Quickbeam for any Lore deck, no matter what its focus is. That's a little sad, because that means fewer interesting deck building decisions. At least he's unique!

Art on Quick Beam is on point. Even looks like he's grinning as that enemy with the spear is probably crapping his pants. Cant wait.

Anyone else have a desire to run the Legolas hero with two blades of gondolin and Arod to give 5 progress tokens on a kill? Not the best restricted attachments to have on him but could make a for a fun build especially if you include some Merry hi-jinks for readying. *creates new topic about Arod, ready for errata!*

you need to exhaust Arod for its effect so unless you can ready attachments you are not getting any more than one use out of it each turn. Also unique so limit of one in play. I know that you are just joking as have a few others (treebeard hero needs errata joke was somewhere) with other recent spoilers but I seriously think people are getting a bit too carried away with "these player cards are too powerful!".

How many people ACTUALLY play nightmare and harder quests like Nin-In-Eilph, HoN, AtS Cycle etc? Nightmare is goddamn brutal and we need all the help we can get especially considering they are definitely getting harder, we now have nightmare saga as well and we also have a gradual power creep for all encounter cards and mechanics overall.

Also with all the ent allies, yes they are undercosted and very powerful but they all enter play exhausted (except Quickbeam) and like Trololo said, good luck using Ents against any quest that starts off real hard from the get go. Pretty sure you will get crushed. Even if you run Ever Vigilant to negate the enters play exhausted effect they then cost an additional resource and a leadership one at that and they are only in lore and tactics thus far. Also MANY negative effects target allies and they can be discarded more often and more easily than anything else, sometimes even several at once.

I do agree that the ents are looking pretty **** powerful (not as powerful as dwarves or outlands thus far and I don't really think we'll see that many more Ents either) but with the power creep we will get and how crazy Nightmare Quests are getting I really don't think this will do any damage or give players any sort of unfair advantage. Maybe early quests might suffer in difficulty if you use Ents against them but hey most much older quests are already somewhat outdated and can be easily crushed with the current card pool without the use of Ents. The first and second cycle for example are a bit of a cakewalk now with the current card pool if you use strong decks. To counter this you can either play the nightmare versions of these quests or can limit yourself to thematic or weaker decks or simply don't use cards you think are too good.

All three of these are better options than us simply never receiving powerful cards and therefore not standing a chance against nightmare and harder quests.

There is a powercreep in both player AND encounter cards. Which is bad in one aspect. It makes some of the older cards obsolete. And not only the ones that were obsolete from the beginning (How are you Brok Ironfist?), but others.

Gimli vs. Longbeard Orc Slayer

Legolas vs. Horseback Archer

Secret vigil is insane threat reduction for 1 resource.

But it also makes some older quest (even in nightmare version) obsolete (or too easy). (Shadows of Mirkwood).

And I agree, Ents should be powerfull force. Trolls were just made a mockery of Ents by the Enemy and look how much damage they can do. But its not just Ents.

We will see where this goes.

Hmmm try to play Nightmare quest fot the Against a Shadow cycle and you will see us crazy hard! So if you play standard mode yes this cards overpower but in Nighmare is ok

I did not have a chance to play them sadly, because they are not for sale in my country. But I agree that those new super-powefull player cards are just trying to keep up with the power of new nightmare decks. Or is it the other way? Are encounter decks getting more difficult because of insane power level of player cards?

But yes, I agree that they are needed.

But nevertheless they DO make some of the older cards and decks (player and encounter) obsolete.

When you remember that veteran of Naduhirion was an ok card at the time of Khazad Dum (cheapest ally with 3 attack), now to have 3 attack the cost is zero (dunedain hunter) and for 2 in green, you have quickbeam that can come with a damage (if you choose here) as well, you can realy see the difference with the new cards.

For the sake of what is left of coherence, anyone putting a burning brand on an ent should destroy the ent