So I'm looking for an excellent deck to beat Journey to the Cross-roads on "easy" mode (yes, that's in quotations because this quest is anything but easy). FFG is simply notorious for giving incorrect difficulty ratings for the LOTR quests, and there's a blog somewhere on here devoted just to bashing them for their irrational difficulty levels. But in any event, I tried Journey to the Cross-roads 3 times with Seastan's "The One Deck"...totally failed. Pretty bad deck to use for this quest. Then I tried this one 3 times, all failed: https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/9182/chad-s-campaign-journey-to-the-crossroads-1.0 Again, pretty bad, although better than "The One Deck." I got a bit farther than using The One Deck, but the fun lasts until rounds 5 to 7 and then things go straight to s**t.

I read so many horror stories from people how this quest is ridiculously brutal, poorly designed, badly scaled, etc...and I definitely agree with them. When I play this game, if I can't beat a scenario on easy mode in 3 attempts, things start to get very ugly, and I mean ugly . Stuff breaks, people get hit, you name it. And just when I think there's a quest that can't get any harder, it does ! This is one quest that's slowly getting me to want to sell my entire collection (and I have everything for it so far). So...

What deck is the best to beat this quest on easy mode? I really feel like you need to cheat somehow because Caleb Grace cheated the players with improper scaling (and by the way, having only four gold-ringed cards being removed when playing on "easy" mode is improperly scaled in itself...there should definitely be more cards you need to remove)

A good hero here is Haldir. With him you can avoid many nasty engagement effects. It is just not easy to place Haldir in a deck that can handle questing required against this quest, and at the same time have enough support to make Haldir efficient.

The self-proclaimed One Deck is strong but not nearly a silver bullet, there are many decks of similar power, some do better against some quests, worse elsewhere, obviously. Vilya decks are always strong, but having Beregond there is certainly useful against the quests like this one (hence the other thread).

I know the One Deck is pretty bad against this quest, so that's out. Chad's deck is better, but still doesn't nail it. There's just too many cards to handle, too much thinking involved, too many choices...a real brain-burner. Any deck that loads your hand up with cards and presents you with many choices is bad. You think it would be good because of all the freedom you can have, but it's overall bad. Too much time is wasted. I'll try the Beregond deck. If that doesn't do it on easy mode, this whole collection is getting sold, and Nate French and Caleb Grace should be ashamed of themselves.

Jeez. It's one quest out of what, just over a hundred now? That's no reason to sell your entire collection.

The One Deck is comparatively bad, but I wouldn't expect it to be absolutely bad. Seastan took three tries to beat it -- but that was the nightmare version of the quest, not easy version. He gave strategy tips in the comments:

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One of the challenges of doing Cross-roads solo is that if you ever reveal an enemy during the staging step, you may be forced to let an enemy go to the Black Gate simply because you can't optionally engage two enemies - even if your more than capable of dealing with both of them. One way to mitigate this, that took me some time to learn, is to ramp up your threat by not questing the first couple rounds. Two-handed play is also helpful since it gives you two optional engagements each round, and the added pressure of the extra enemy each round is spread across more decks.

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Have you considering having a go two-handed? You might also consider using Seastan's Grace of the Valar variant, which guarantees (eventual) victory. I find it more satisfying than repeatedly bashing my head against a wall.

But I am afraid there are much harder quests than this one. I have not played them all but I have played each saga quest maybe a hundred times (or most of them at least) and I would not think of this as the hardest by a long shot. I like it though, I think it is an exciting one though it may be treacherous, but not always annoying like Helm’s Deep, for instance.

I think two handed is not what concerns mr. gpd. But I think it is more fun two handed, as most quests are (2 player anyway), because you can try different things.

Good luck!

You guys are taking the bait. This guy is not here asking for help. Don’t reply.

There is no bait. GrandSpleen is just a detractor, which is bait in itself. lleimmoen has been a great help so far in another thread giving me advice with a Beregond deck.

8 hours ago, gpd924 said:

this whole collection is getting sold, and Nate French and Caleb Grace should be ashamed of themselves.

Why? It's one quest, and not everyone hates it. The developers and designers did their job well in making a game that many people enjoy (And makes money, the reason FFG commissioned it too many people forget this). If you want to sell your collection over it, who am I to tell you otherwise! That's your business, but give me one good reason those gentlemen should be ashamed of themselves for making a product you don't enjoy.

And please don't continue to talk on this forum like you did to Grandspleen, a very helpful member of the community.

Then please tell him to not tell others to reply. That's censorship and will not be tolerated. Falsely accusing someone of "baiting" is also ridiculous.

Thank you for those who helped!

I’m on the same scenario now as well. I can’t say I have anything consistent yet but I have notched a few wins with a ranger trap deck. Ambush has been a surprising tool. And yeah I try to let the Oliphaunts go to the black gate although sometimes I have to engage one anyway. At the moment it’s the treacheries that send additional enemies under the gate that cause me the most problems.

1 hour ago, Vermithrax said:

I’m on the same scenario now as well. I can’t say I have anything consistent yet but I have notched a few wins with a ranger trap deck. Ambush has been a surprising tool. And yeah I try to let the Oliphaunts go to the black gate although sometimes I have to engage one anyway. At the moment it’s the treacheries that send additional enemies under the gate that cause me the most problems.

Yes, those treacheries are bad. You said that you beat this scenario with a ranger trap deck? If so, can you post it?

9 hours ago, GrandSpleen said:

You guys are taking the bait. This guy is not here asking for help. Don’t reply.

No. He is doing nothing wrong as far as I see it.

On 4/10/2019 at 8:28 AM, gpd924 said:

I read so many horror stories from people how this quest is ridiculously brutal, poorly designed, badly scaled, etc...and I definitely agree with them. When I play this game, if I can't beat a scenario on easy mode in 3 attempts, things start to get very ugly, and I mean ugly . Stuff breaks, people get hit, you name it. And just when I think there's a quest that can't get any harder, it does ! This is one quest that's slowly getting me to want to sell my entire collection (and I have everything for it so far). So...

What is giving you the more problems for now? Not being able to engage enough Harad enemies so that then they go under the Black Gate? Defending or killing them once you have them engaged? Which option are you choosing from the Campaign Mode (resources or Brace of Coneys)? Bringing down the Mumak?

As I said before, especially if you are going to try two-handed, pick Haldir as a hero. You need a Tactics hero with him in the deck, perhaps Eowyn or the new Bilbo if you have him already, to start rather low on threat, and to be able to equip him with the Bow of the Galadhrim, early. Pack three of those and some other weapons to make sure he strikes with 7 early. That way he will take down most of the enemies without the need of engaging them.

9 hours ago, Alonewolf87 said:

What is giving you the more problems for now? Not being able to engage enough Harad enemies so that then they go under the Black Gate? Defending or killing them once you have them engaged? Which option are you choosing from the Campaign Mode (resources or Brace of Coneys)? Bringing down the Mumak?

I actually forgot about the easy start for the campaign mode. That really makes things easier at the start if you choose the resources. But he is not playing campaign mode, is he?

1 hour ago, lleimmoen said:

But he is not playing campaign mode, is he?

Yeah, that's unclear (at least for me, maybe I missed something) actually

Maybe you haven’t, haha. I just assumed when we are talking about a single quest that it would not be campaign. The only punishment in the campaign comes later when the enemies from the Black Gate join in on the Pellenor Fields, right? But starting with extra resources really makes things much easier for the quest itself.

Here's the one i've been working on. I'm not claiming its the best since sliced bread but its showing promise. I included my play notes on rings db so as not to clutter this space.

https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/11791/landofshadow-crossroads-1.0

I think Dale's Haldir concept would work well and Dunhere Seems a good hero to try.

I like the traps. What I don’t like about them is that when I make a deck I want to take through many (not nearly all now, of course) quests. And some, like in Black Riders, totally mitigate the power of a trap deck. Ithilien Pit is probably the best trap against the Haradrim in Cross-roads. And I find it is often an overlooked card tha I have used to very effect.

I think traps are situational. I'm playing progression mode so I only recently acquired Damrod who put traps back into consideration for me.

I completely overlooked Ithilien Pit when I did my trap sweep. You made me look at it again. Unless i'm missing something its a better version of Ambush. If so - you just improved my deck! That one resource cost savings is huge. Reminds me of swapping an uncommon for a rare in a CCG.

This exemplifies what I love about this game. I'm glad I went into the Crossroads with my self-imposed thematic constraint. Otherwise I might never have built this deck. I would have probably went in with something stronger. Instead i got to do what I really enjoy - building a new deck. Thanks again for the tip!

Yeah, the Pit is great in low threat decks, or against high threat enemies quests. Let me know how you fare with the deck, against different quests (especially inteested in LotR saga) and if you update it somehow.

With Ithilien Pit you won't get Sam's 2 attack from readying before Ambush.

I think we know the rules. At least the basic ones like that.

It would be a shame if they made one trap just outright better than the other. So I certainly get that Ambush is better than the Pit in certain cases. And vice versa.