I've beaten this quest solo, but we are having severe problems with it in 3- and 4-player. A good option seems to be that we quest moderately in the first stage so we do not progress until we have massed an army of allies, but by the time we decide to progress, Gondor almost always threats out (he runs straight combat, and his starting threat is always 32-34). Dwarves and Spirit/Tactics Rohan can usually hold its own, but we can't seem to both manage threat and survive combat. Which is weird, because I've taken on the four trolls solo and won with a Lore/Spirit deck (although granted, Loragorn and Spirfindel played a part in that).

Can you share any good strategies? We're currently playing through the quests in release order and struggling with this scenario. Maybe we're just unlucky, or one more player needs to go for healing or threat reduction.

Go slowly, build up an army of Allies. Grab the bee keeper are probably the best strategies. Also I found a tactics eagle deck to work well against the trolls.

In addition to aggressive threat reduction, Denethor/Unexpected Courage and Henamarth Riversong have been key for me beating this scenario consistently in straight solo, solo 2-handed, and 2-player games by scrying the encounter deck and reducing the risk of "overquesting" on stage 1.

That having been said, I have never played this game with 3+ players, and I can see why the deck scrying wouldn't work so well in 3-4 player mode to prevent "overquesting." I can see how it might be very difficult to raise the army you need, and to recruit Grimbeorn the Old, before advancing to stage 2.

Sorry, I've got nothing helpful at the moment, aside from suggesting that one player play a mono-Tactics decks with Feint x3 and Thicket of Spears x3, and with as many really cheap allies as possible. You need to get allies on the field fast, so forget about high cost/high-strength allies, and get as many 1 and 2 cost chump-blockers into play as fast as you can. The other players should also focus on getting 1 and 2 cost allies into play a.s.a.p. And of course, get Steward of Gondor on the player with the most Leadership resources as quickly as you can, so that you can get Grimbeorn onside when he comes out of the deck (or is put into play by… the Bee Pasture location, is it? Can't remember, it's been a while since I played this one).

Good luck!

I usally play with my girlfriend, she has a Spirit/Tactics deck (2:1) and I have a Tactics/Lore deck (2:1) - we are using only the cards from core and Heirs of Numenor expansion, plus Hunt for Gollum and obviously Carrock itself. Our heroes are Eowyn, Frodo, Legolas for her & Boromir (Leadership), Theodred, Denethor for me. We try to exploit the Gondor type a bit, with some Silvan support for healing and threat management. Traps are useful, but not as much as I expected; Grimbeorn is usually very easy to activate; songs from the Shadows of Mirkwood are useful, IMO.

I'd have to agree that Denethor or any other scrying strategy help in the first stage, and having lots of allies is fundamental. What we always forget is to put some Creature type allies, to counter the "A Frightened Beast" treachery - that has been the n° 1 reason we end up defeated in this particular scenario. Trolls were never a big issue, once you have Grimbeorn, or you sneak Gandalf into play, or you can return the most anoying of them to the staging area (Louis, I'd say - again, becaus of threat).

We plan on tackling each new scenario gradually adding the cards that come with it, so deckbuilding is a bit limited by this "rule" of ours... HoN is the exception, but that's because we received the set as a gift and we really liked some of the cards and the Gondor type seems pretty strong for these adventures.