I recently tried my hand at building a Dale deck for the first time (yes, my cardpool was somewhat behind the times), and came away intrigued but unsatisfied.

The main point of tension in the deck (aside from having no reliable early way to defend/kill) was King of Dale. This card wants me to load up a single hero with as many attachments as possible to get reliable cost reduction on Dale allies, which is needed as this was my only resource acceleration other than Traffic From Dale. However, Dale allies generally need attachments to pull their weight, and I always needed more cards because I need to draw both allies and attachments for the deck to work well. This meant that most of the time I needed to place the attachments I drew onto my allies to draw new cards, and not onto my King of Dale hero - leaving the cost reduction when playing allies at 1.

How do people get around this tension? I tried two hero line-ups - Brand/Bard/Faramir and Brand/Bard/Grimbeorn (to resolve initial struggles with combat until allies are set up). Both had this problem, though the inclusion of tactics made the deck probably a bit slower. Both decks beat Into Ithilien, however, so its not like they were bad - I just feel that I'm missing something in the construction. Suggestions?

First of all: I'd stick to two spheres with my choice of heroes. (I know, there are (lots of) decks to find which do use more than 2 colours, but anyways... )

Explanation: I think there are basically two typical setups for a Dale deck. The first one centers on Guardian of Esgaroth and equiping him with lots of attachments. These are usually from Spirit and Leadership, like Wild Stallion, Hauberk of Mail and Vailiant Determination. With playing this theme you would only need two colours. The second one basically comes from all those cards in The Wilds of Rhovanion. These includes cards from all four spheres. But the "important ones" are (more or less) within Spirit and Leadership. (e.g. a Long Lake Trader can move your attachments to the right place, but this is something mid- to endgame-ish thing)

My solution to "wanting to reduce the cost to play allies" were cheap attachments which might come in handy later in the game. I'd suggest to use Spare Hood and Cloak to attach it to the hero who has King of Dale. That reduces the costs of each ally by 2. This way you should be able to play at least one ally per round. Which sounds good to me.

A thought on "wanting to increase the card draw": play an attachment on a Dale without any attachments, so you can draw a card. Then transfer your attachment to another character to maximize the use of the allies. In general, with my second named typical Dale deck, any ally just needs one attachment to be boosted, so card draw should not be a problem.

If you want to have a better start at combat, I'd still stick to a 3rd Spirit or Leadership hero. Depending on your card balance and preferences I suggest to take a look at Amarthiul (Leadership) and Beregond (Spirit). If you do not have access to them other options can be Erkenbrand (Leadsership) or Dain Ironfoot (Spirit) or Denethor (Leadership).

I play Spirit Dain as my third hero. Defender turn 1. King of Dale I mulligan for. When I get it, I’ll put maybe a second, maybe sometimes a third attachment on him. Using King of Dale means no resource match, so even no other attachments allows out of sphere Warrior of Dale discounted 1.

The big turns come from Traffic from Dale for me.

Also 2 spirit heroes means King of Dale or Unexpected courage or long lake fisherman can be played turn one. Fish for King if your mulligan didn’t get it

I found that cost reduction of 1 was usually plenty and found it better to use the attachments to draw more cards instead. By itself, King of Dale gives you: one additional willpower, a saving of one resource per turn and resource smoothing for allies. Altogether I think that's great deal, especially if you're going for the quad-sphere build.

I think you want to be playing lots of 0 or 1 cost attachments. That way, you can usually afford one ally and one attachment per turn, sometimes more.

I would reccomend to try a second spirit hero. Beregond, Dain or Frodo. All of them grant you a second spirit hero to pay for king of dale in turn 1 and ensure you can survive in defense in early game.

Secondly I would include 0 costs attachments. Spare hood and cloak and Cram. Also the new tactic bow works well as you can pay item of all spheres. You do not really need more than a cost reduction of 2 to get the engine working, so king of sale plus a second 0 or 1 cost item attachment of any sphere. Not really hard to pull out in turn 1 or 2. Then you can play for free or 1 resource all dale allies, including off sphere thanks to king of dale text.

Fisherman ally is great to help you fish king of dale. I found traffic from dale often overkill and rarely I play it more than in 2 copies, often 1 or none.

Hope this help

44 minutes ago, Halberto said:

k ing of sale

great

I think one you have two attachments on your King of Dale hero, you're good to go and can start kitting out your allies. You won't really need an ally cost reduction greater than two in a Dale deck.

I have managed to build a deck that I'm pretty happy with: https://www.ringsdb.com/decklist/view/13686/daleexcels-1.0

It uses Galadriel as the third hero, and I've found her card draw essential to getting set up quickly. If I get the opportunity, I'll play a second attachment on the King of Dale hero, but I actually haven't found that this is necessary - frequently additional card draw from placing attachments on characters without them is more important.

While the deck is still pretty squishy in the first 1-2 rounds, it sets up surprisingly quickly and I haven't found that a stronger defensive hero is necessary.

Thanks for all the comments and advice!

I'm glad you found your third hero (heroine?). I went for Lanwyn, as her Dale trait helped get a bit more card flow initially. I hadn't played her before, and it was an education to see her anti-surge credentials! Akin to Flrbb's comments, a cheap attachment like Cram is quite good - one-shot, but it then creates a gap to play another attachment with card draw. Also works as Lanwyn can quest, then attack if needed.

And I agree with Wandalf - two attachments on your King of Dale is usually fine!

Pretty much agree with everyone else on tactics. Shift attachments around with Long Lake Trader so you can get both the draw and get them on the characters that need them. Also the first Dale deck I built worked pretty well and had a left-field third hero- Eleanor!

I included a Gondorian shield for her, but found another attachment that is perfect for her- Ancestral Armor (and obviously with both she’s an absolute tank).

Otherwise I’ve had success with both Lanwyn and SBeregond.

As far as specific tactics, one I like is to put a Spare Hood and Cloak on a North Realm Lookout so it quests without exhausting. After the quest phase, use it to ready Brand so he can attack. The next round, Brand has the attachment as a cost reducer for King of Dale, which can then be shifted back to the NRL by LLT so you can do it all again.

On 12/20/2019 at 1:12 AM, Schrodinger's Hat said:

Pretty much agree with everyone else on tactics. Shift attachments around with Long Lake Trader so you can get both the draw and get them on the characters that need them. Also the first Dale deck I built worked pretty well and had a left-field third hero- Eleanor!

I included a Gondorian shield for her, but found another attachment that is perfect for her- Ancestral Armor (and obviously with both she’s an absolute tank).

I love Eleanor, but have never boosted her with Ancestral Armor - great idea! It solves not only her defense but also her low hitpoints. How did you reliably ready her for defense after potentially using her ability? Just Unexpected Courage?

Unfortunately I play only either solo or with my wife, and Eleanor isn't quite as good at low player counts.

57 minutes ago, Calyx said:

I love Eleanor, but have never boosted her with Ancestral Armor - great idea! It solves not only her defense but also her low hitpoints. How did you reliably ready her for defense after potentially using her ability? Just Unexpected Courage?

In a Dale Deck you can count on the usual Spare Hood and Cloak shenanigans with the North Realm Lookout and the Long Lake Trader.