Cairn Dum is most challenging in 2 player mode, from what I have seen. I am normally a solo player, but I wanted to lend a hand to players like PsycoRocka who want to beat the quest 2 handed without resorting to "overpowered" cards, like Gandalf.

I have not yet built anything consistently successful, but I am getting very close. I decided to share my progress and maybe get some help. The breakthrough I have made is discovering a seriously strong combo that I believe will eventually prove to be the quest's undoing.

Here is the combo: ally Hama, Gamling, ally Arwen. The idea is that you need high defense and action advantage to deal with the many surprise attacks that can come. Hama can use his ability to ready immediately after exhausting to defend his first enemy attack. Thus he will have 6 defense even against the first attack. With Arwen giving him sentinel and +1 he can defend to attacks per round with 6 defense. Obviosly you have to then discard him, but with Gamling you can rinse and repeat every round. It is an easy combo to set up and it works amazingly well.

So, in 2 handed I would start with a mono Blu deck to use Shadows give way. My heroes would almost certainly be Theoden and Idrean. The third hero is debatable. With Theoden you can play Gamling and Hama more cheaply, and with Gamling you can use Riddermark's Finest and Ride to Ruin to clear those nasty locations in the scenario while readying Idrean. Almost all the locations have 3 quest points so Ride to ruin or Riddermark's Finest + Warden of Arnor on Idrean works astonishingly well.

The problem with the mono lue deck is that it needs a TON of resources to work well. The second deck basically must be purple and must play Steward of Gondor on Theoden. In my various experiments I have had most success with Amarthiul and/or Leadership Faramir. Hama is a beast, but even he needs backup. I have found that Derndingle warriors are nearly unstoppable with some healing. I am thinking maybe Faramir/Amarthiul/Lore Aragorn.

The concept is definitely solid. Often Hama uses sentinel to keep enemies engaged with the dunedain to fuel their mechanics. The problem I run into is lack of attack power and range so the high defense enemies can be a challenge to knock out.

I don't have a real deck list to share because I am always in flux, but I would still appreciate feedback if you have some. Thanks.

With two players I think I'd prefer to set up a strong sentinel defender with action advantage and burning brand. It's mainly due to how often the shadow effects have ruined an otherwise strong attempt.

"+1 attack for each ally", "Flip Thaurdir after this attack", "Discard the top three cards of your deck (that will definitely by followed by a treachery later that makes you pay more for copies of those cards or discards copies that are in play)"

If you can stop these then it makes the quest MUCH more doable.

I agree that the scenario has brutal treacheries. However, with 3 copies of Shadows give way + Dwarven tomb and Will of the West I have found that as long as the second deck includesign enough card draw shadow cards are not a problem. The only time I can remember getting a loss because of a shadow card was when I had a lot of allies and the shadownload effect added attack power equal to allies. I mostly lose, as I said, to lack of attack power and range.

For me the hardest part of the quest is surviving Thaurdir flippin all over the place when Orc Grunts keep reducing his number of shadow cards below 3. So the earlier you can get a defender with Burning Brand up, the better I think. But it needs to be somebody who can survive a 6 attack.

Taken from the other topic I would include 3X Lore song, 3X Good Harvest, 3X Burning Brand and 3X Shadows give way in each deck just to be sure?

Alternatively, using two trap decks would probably break the quest pretty easily.

One solution is definitely A Burning Brand/Sentinel/action advantage. When my friend and I beat it, Elrond had A Burning Brand, Cloak of Lorien (I think), Arwen (ally), Unexpected Courages, and Lembas.