I've contemplated how to make Dori a worthwhile hero, which would be an easier task in a world with Beregond in it. With Beregond as a comparison, the answer becomes -- in a dwarf deck with Dain, making him a 2/3/2/5 hero. That's Aragorn without the toys or special ability, but for two less threat.
Still, that's more valuable in general, he's still worse than Beregond at what Beregond does best -- defense. Dori's special ability has to do with defense, so what circumstances could possibly justify putting Dori on a team for defense instead of Beregond?
The problem has to do with actions, of course. Dori + hero can get to 4 defense instantly with a huge number of heroes, and can even get up to 5 defense (better than Beregond) with a number of other heroes. So Dori can easily produce Beregondish defense, it just requires Dori's action *plus* the other hero's actions. And while you can buff the defense of Dori and his target separately, you can buff Beregond to 6 for free with a single Gondorian Shield.
So it's a hopeless quest to make Dori better than Beregond -- no shame in that, he's one of the most efficient heroes in the game. But Dori's buffing ability can be strong *if you can get the other hero's action back*. I'm sure at this point you're thinking about Armored Destrier -- for two leadership resources, you can get the hero's action back, plus discard a shadow if there's any other enemies to defend against. Brilliant -- and not out when I was trying to make Dori shine.
So lacking the destrier, my focus was on two different leadership cards -- Heir of Mardil and The Day's Rising. Stick both of those 1-cost leadership cards on your designated defender, and with Dori's help he can defend, get a resource, and ready!
Now what sort of decks would benefit most from Dori's flexibility to buff a defense or defend at need on his own? Swarm decks -- chump blocking is the enemy of building up an army of allies. Dori can take a hit and can help practically every other hero take a hit, they can do that early while the army multiplies and becomes strong.
What sort of heroes work best for a designated defender? If you want the Heir of Mardil/Day's Rising combo to fire, you need sentinel (Day's Rising), and Noble (Heir of Mardil). There's a number of ways to get sentinel, but no ways outside the saga to become a noble, and just three heroes that are already both sentinel and noble:
1) Leadership Aragorn
2) Spirit Theoden
3) Tactics Theoden
Sadly, there's not a Lore candidate, since The Burning Brand is really, really good to have around if you want to make Day's Rising fire consistently. Since both of the combo cards are leadership, Aragorn stands out as the best candidate. And what are the two best swarms to pair up?
Dwaves and Outlands. So I had my lineup:
Aragorn/Dain/Hirluin (Outlands)
Thorin/Ori/Dori (Dwarves)
Powerful lineup, if high threat. Completely lacking in cancellation, but can crank up the power quickly, and with leadership available on both sides can get the two card combo together fairly quickly as well. The Dwarf deck can get to five dwarves on turn one with the help of We Are Not Idle. But there's two problems:
1) Thorin is noble, and with Dain ready he quests for four and attacks for four. Heir of Mardil really should go on *him*, even if you have to put Steward of Gondor on him to trigger it.
2) I really want Dori to be with his brothers. If I wanted maximum efficiency, I wouldn't put together Dori decks in the first place.
So I revised the Dori deck to Ori/Nori/Dori, not as awesome or quick as the Thorin version, but lower threat, provides some cancellation, and allows Ring of Barahir to get on Aragorn quickly, to make him an eligible Burning Brand candidate.
This combination also has a good reason to put Steward of Gondor on somebody besides Aragorn who isn't noble (Hirluin), at least if there are off-sphere Outlands and Aragorn doesn't have the toys to pay for them yet.
I then proceeded to create fellowships of just about every archetype I could think of, but always including Dori, Heir of Mardil, and The Day's Rising. Haven't played with all of them yet, and some of them (all of them?) really should have Armored Destrier added to them now. But this was the first I made, so it will be the first I publish. Still, there's a certain irony in sacrificing Dori's 2/3/2/5 action in hopes of getting Aragorn's 2/3/2/5 action back.
Does it make Dori shine? Probably not so much. Both swarms are diluted with attachments intended to making Aragorn a superhero, which leaves less room for other cards. If I weren't including 2 copies of The Day's Rising, I could include In Service of the Steward and Sword of Morthond, and put them both on Gimli to make the Best Outlands Ally Ever. But I think it's a setup where Dori isn't useless, because it becomes very rare that you have to chump with an ally.
Here's the first Dori fellowship, "Dori, Outlands, and the Dwaves":
http://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/105/dori-outlands-and-the-dwarves