Just started a new Saga Campaign this week and just beat Helms Deep on about the tenth attempt. It was an insanely hard slog starting on Stage 2A and using the decks I was using which are a little slow to start off but powerful once they get going.
During the game I won I pulled off several nice tricks to slightly neuter the encounter decks effectiveness and abilities.
First up, StwB on Fellowship Aragorn is just so **** good, always gives the first players characters +1 willpower and it is nice seeing the willpower boost jump between players rather than just staying with one player. Leader of Men is also amazing on Fellowship Aragorn and although in Helm's Deep you are not going to quest successfully anywhere near as much as other quests when you do that extra resource can allow him to ready a hero (for 2 so with this resource and the one you gain each turn) which allows you to overcommit with heroes that are usually used for defense or attack. At various points towards the end of the game I had Aragorn on 4 or 5 resources and could ready up to two heroes in one turn (to clear extra enemies, to generate as much willpower as possible by overcommitting, to safely defend against all enemies while still spending Elrohir's leadership resources) and then quickly ramp back up to 2+ resources thanks to Arwen hero and Leader of Men the following turn if need be.
Ok so onto some more tricky interactions.
First off side quests are amazing for this quest so long as you have great threat management and reduction. Yes you may eat a ton of threat by questing with a side quest as the active location but you will avoid any progress being put on the quest card (except for encounter effects obviously). I took about 6 extra threat just from doing this but was able to completely negate this with multiple copies of Greeting and core Gandalf.
Once you have your decks running better and can actually stand against the encounter decks threat, side quests like gather information and send for aid allow you to actually place progress for all that **** willpower you committed and get something back from it (in this quest heaps more willpower than threat while questing is just a waste because you don't place any progress or do anything else with the bonus willpower.... it just stops the encounter deck placing progress) which allows you to simultaneously get the most from all the extra willpower you committed while also stopping the encounter deck placing progress. It is a little bit cheap but honestly this is one of the hardest quests out there and hits like a freight train so I think it is ok that side quests act in this way during this quest. The quest also generates a crazy amount of threat in the staging area and many other affects reveal extra cards or place progress directly onto the main quest stages so even when questing on side quests you can EASILY lose from threating out and you still have to face the hordes of enemies that appear alongside the high threat locations and super nasty treacheries.
The other awesome interaction/trick is to do with Asfaloth and Legolas. Most of the locations in this quest have some truly awful effects once they are explored or thematically, overrun/destroyed! They have low quest points however.... (I think 4 is the most?) and the majority of the nasty when explored effects are only awful if they take place at certain points of the round... Lets look at some examples and how you can use Asfaloth or Legolas to overcome them:
First off is the nastiest offender Helm's Gate.
This 5 threat location forces the first player to reveal another encounter card at the end of staging if ANY player is not engaged with an enemy...... if you run a combat deck and questing deck there will be plenty of situations where only one player/deck is engaged with an enemy... this results in many additional cards during the quest phase and because you HAVE to face this location on stage 3 you are almost guaranteed to see it at some point. Here is the trick with this card.... travel phase is after the quest phase... so as long as you can clear this location as soon as you travel there or before the next quest phase its effect does nothing. Similarly so long as you explore it after engaged enemies make their attacks the minus engagement and bonus to attack does nothing either! Legolas and Asfaloth are key here because they can place progress at a point in the round that is after engaged enemies have made attacks. During player attacks you can either combo Asfaloth and Legolas to place 4 progress or can ready Legolas with Aragorn and place all 4 progress with him to clear this location and avoid literally every bad thing about it.... this is quite powerful and not only does this avoid the nasty effects and stop extra encounter cards being revealed during staging but it also clears the active location allowing you to travel somewhere else and reduce staging threat.
Next is Postern Door. Once explored it stops players making attacks for the round, this is AWFUL in a quest where there is literally a non stop tide of enemies that have high stats and nasty extra effects. Not being able to destroy and clear a single enemy during any round can potentially be catastrophic and may mean the following turn you are overwhelmed and lose.
So once again simply clear it with Legolas after you finish with player attacks (just make sure he makes the final attack!!!) and the nasty effect once again is completely avoided and you are free to travel elsewhere!!
Lastly is Deeping Wall. Ok this one doesn't work anywhere near as well but if you are desperate to reduce staging threat or to travel to a new location you can clear Deeping Wall with Legolas and Asfaloth. You do not avoid the nasty effect however and will still raise threat by 4. The only real benefit to doing this later in the turn is to do it after engagement so that you can raise threat but not have to engage certain enemies till the following turn. I admittedly only let one of these be explored but with enough threat reduction or low enough starting threat it can be well worth to clear a few copies of this location to reduce staging area threat and to allow further travel to other locations.
Deeping Culvert doesn't really work because when explored it brings two enemies into play so I don't see any real benefit from clearing this with Asfaloth and Legolas outside of the quest phase...
Just a few more minor notes that are far more obvious but still helpful when playing Helms Deep.
-Ranger spikes are goddamn god like in this quest considering every little bit of willpower and every bit of threat you can remove from staging helps a lot. They are especially nice on the Dunlanding that places progress on the active location or the Dunlending that makes an immediate attack. There is also just one card that boosts enemy threat which is those stupid ladders so usually a ranger spikes on a 2 threat enemy elimimates its threat for the rest of the game. The only issue with the spikes is that you still need to kill any enemies with ranger spikes attached on stage 5. THis is relatively easy though because there is no quest phase and you can optionally engage them at your own timing or leisure.
-Test of Will is pretty critical for this quest because some of the treacheries can just shut you down completely especially if you are running certain decks (Devilry and night without end are both horrendous). Devilry for example decimates Elladan/Elrohir decks.... especially if you are banking on Elrohir defending against like 4+ enemies and all of a sudden hes only capable of defending against one.....