For all the players out there that play solo single-handed: How many times will you usually play through a scenario before you finally beat it?

Related: How many times will you play with the same deck before making changes?

Thanks!

- Erik

3 or 4. By then I have a feel for what’s needed to win. A change in my deck? A whole new deck? Or switch to 2 handed. Most plays to beat a scenario is 14. By then I had switched to 2 handed and sleazy mode

10 hours ago, errrik012 said:

For all the players out there that play solo single-handed: How many times will you usually play through a scenario before you finally beat it?

Related: How many times will you play with the same deck before making changes?

Thanks!

- Erik

I usually beat a scenario on the first or second try, but this is not indicative of most players. I'm one of the few that peruse the encounter cards before starting a quest so I know what I'm in for, and also one of the few that builds decks with the scenario I'm going to play in mind. I have the luxury of time to build a new deck between every quest.

As for adjusting my deck? Almost after every playthrough (obviously not counting building an entirely new deck, which I often do).

When I try new nightmare I pick my vilya deck and I win it right away about 75% of the time (it is an hardest scenario but the discover is not as important as a new scenario). When I try a new scenario I usually pick one of my fun (and not that strong so) solo deck, like one hero deck Sam or my deck built only with 1 core set cards and probably have an average of 2 or 2.5 tries before winning one.

I do not tweak my deck in order to win a scenario. But sometime I just saw that the difficulty of a scenario is bigger than a thought so I pick a better deck (like with fire in the night, I go to a quite good silvan deck since the scenario is as difficult as many nightmare ^^).

On 3/12/2019 at 9:36 AM, Ywingscum said:

3 or 4. By then I have a feel for what’s needed to win. A change in my deck? A whole new deck? Or switch to 2 handed. Most plays to beat a scenario is 14. By then I had switched to 2 handed and sleazy mode

How did you beat Escape from Dol Guldur?

I'm only up to Journey to Rhosgobel (just finished that one, loved it). I can usually win in two or three tries by forming a deck specifically to beat it. Except for the Dol Guldur one, I still haven't won that one, not even in easy mode. As long as a scenario doesn't require me to put multiple enemies in the staging area before the game even starts, or puts multiple enemies out per turn, I'm cool with it.

Switch to two-handed for Dol Goldur.

Yup I switched to 2 handed. And if that’s the one we’re you have a captured hero, I chose the hero to be captured I think

I've come to the conclusion that it's pretty much impossible to defeat Escape from Dol Guldur solo one handed using cards from the Core Set (or even the entire first cycle) - UNLESS you just happen to get really, really lucky with the card draw. Meaning the draw from both the player deck and especially the encounter deck.

I keep coming back to it, but it seems like a waste of time. I don't consider getting lucky to be a good strategy. There are numerous guys who have said they've defeated it one handed. Who knows how many tries though.

@Vince_76 Conclusion false!

It is impossible to beat consistently in solo with one core set without lucky draws.

At least for me, and several other community members. (ye powers of strategy and skill, I hath summoned thee! )

10 hours ago, Wandalf the Gizzard said:

@Vince_76 Conclusion false!

It is impossible to beat consistently in solo with one core set without lucky draws.

At least for me, and several other community members. (ye powers of strategy and skill, I hath summoned thee! )

What deck do you use for it then?

I've seen people on the net claim to beat it 50% of the time solo, I just don't buy it.

Do you pick the prisoner? Give yourself unlimited mulligans on both the card deck AND the encounter deck (as I saw a guy on YouTube doing)?

The deck I used for this specific challenge is a variation on this deck: https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/5701/escape-from-dol-guldur-solo-1.0

When you use cards from only one core set, that 30% win rate drops dramatically closer to ten/fifteen.

A 50% win rate is ludicrous, even with a full card pool and if you choose the prisoner. Well, okay, maybe it's possible for some like Rouxxor or Seastan, but I'd be gobsmacked if even they could pull it off. Basically, you have good reason to not buy it.

I did pick the prisoner, but divided my win percentage by three to account for probability, so my written percentage is still statistically correct.

And no, unlimited mulligans are a travesty.

Thanks, I will try that deck at some point. I use the exact same heroes and attachments, but you pared down the variety of allies and added in some events (compared to mine). I also appreciated the strategic notes.

I don't really have a problem with picking the prisoner, because if you don't it's just a waste of time completely.

I've seen guys on YouTube playing this, and if they get a draw they don't like they just say "That counts as a loss" and move on to the next one.

32 minutes ago, Vince79 said:

I've seen guys on YouTube playing this, and if they get a draw they don't like they just say "That counts as a loss" and move on to the next one. 

I do essentially this, but with which hero is prisoner. Some of those bad draws that "count as losses" might end up being a win.

53 minutes ago, Wandalf the Gizzard said:

I do essentially this, but with which hero is prisoner. Some of those bad draws that "count as losses" might end up being a win.

Yeah, maybe like one in a thousand. Again, waste of time. Hoping to get lucky one out of a thousand games is not good strategy

11 hours ago, Wandalf the Gizzard said:

The deck I used for this specific challenge is a variation on this deck: https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/5701/escape-from-dol-guldur-solo-1.0

Well, I must admit I feel a little foolish. I used your deck and defeated Escape from Dol Guldur on the second try. Fairly easily, in fact, although I did get a lucky draw with two Steward of Gondors available almost immediately. Then I had enough Gandalfs and Sneak Attacks to take out the Nazgul before it even left the staging area.

So you have my thanks, this scenario was a dark cloud hanging over my head. I didn't think this kind of victory was possible.

These aren't the droids you're looking for. Move along. Move along.

Haha! Well, I'm glad to hear you've beaten Escape from it! Escape from Dol Guldur solo with just one core is no small accomplishment.

13 hours ago, Vince79 said:

Well, I must admit I feel a little foolish. I used your deck and defeated Escape from Dol Guldur on the second try. Fairly easily, in fact, although I did get a lucky draw with two Steward of Gondors available almost immediately. Then I had enough Gandalfs and Sneak Attacks to take out the Nazgul before it even left the staging area.

You realize Steward of Gondor is unique, correct?

7 hours ago, dalestephenson said:

You realize Steward of Gondor is unique, correct?

Nope, I guess I missed that rule somehow. I guess I inadvertently cheated then. Well, you learn something every day. Thanks for the tip.

It's hard to say if not using it would have made any difference in the outcome or not. I had a lot of money on the board, lol. Oh well, back to the drawing board.

I was trying to consider the difference between Wallard's deck and the one I was using. Seems like the main difference is he paired down the allies, keeping the ones with the most value. Having less allies allowed more event cards to come up when I needed them, or so it seemed.

Just to update, it took me three more times, but I got another win over Escape from Dol Guldur, a clean win this time. So I've played it five times with Wallard's deck, and if you include the win I had when "cheating", that's a tainted 40%. So not too far from the 30% Wallard claimed (I'm using the multiple core sets version).

So thanks again to Wallard for the deck, and to dale for setting me straight on the rules.

What I tend to do is play 3 games on Standard Mode. If I lose all 3, then I switch to Easy mode. If I lose all 3 with that, then the deck is entirely useless and move onto a different deck.

Now, Journey to the Cross-roads is one quest that's game-breaking for me, and I'll be selling my entire collection off because of this. I feel like I can't continue playing through the game unless I beat a quest. I just can't skip it and move onto the next quest. So when I can't beat a quest, I stop playing the game entirely and need to sell it off. That's just how I operate, and this goes for any game I play. There aren't even that many decks on RingsDB listed for this particular quest, which is extremely odd. You would think that such an insanely difficult quest would have many decks to try...guess not. Journey to the Cross-roads has officially been renamed to Journey to the Dumpster.

On 3/13/2019 at 7:08 AM, Rouxxor said:

When I try new nightmare I pick my vilya deck and I win it right away about 75% of the time (it is an hardest scenario but the discover is not as important as a new scenario).

The Vilya/Stargazer combo is so strong it makes me worry that it's going to be hit next with the nerf bat.

24 minutes ago, urloony said:

The Vilya/Stargazer combo is so strong it makes me worry that it's going to be hit next with the nerf bat.

I think the statute of limitations has expired for nerfing that combo. They can't do it.

20 hours ago, gpd924 said:

I think the statute of limitations has expired for nerfing that combo. They can't do it.

I don't know, It took them six years to nerf Boromir.

2 hours ago, urloony said:

I don't know, It took them six years to nerf Boromir.

Yeah, taking years to errata a card is ridiculous. I don't follow that Boromir errata at all.