And the wheels finally come flying off the wagon (oh wait, wrong cycle...)
I was never really able to get a foothold in the quest; I basically had to have Silver Circlet, and then get the Harad allies into play as soon as possible. 0 and 1 tokens were quick washouts, so I jumped to 4 tokens and actually got off to a decent start, but then an ill-timed treachery left me with too many Haradrim Archers, and too much Archery to soak. Attempts with 8, 10 and 14 tokens all stalled out before I could even beat stage 1. The problem with the tokens is that I don't really want to be drawing all my Harad allies - I want Timely Aid etc, with the allies near the top of my deck! Spending tokens to draw them all just meant I needed a load more tokens in extra resources to get them into play as early as possible (notwithstanding the generation from the contract)
It was a case of needing the right cards to come out, and the encounter deck being kind enough whilst I set up. Eventually things went my way on token 20, getting Silver Circlet, two Harad allies out immediately with Timely Aids, and that gave me the platform to build on to deal with the quest. Firyal's direct damage was particularly handy to soften up enemies in the staging area.
I think my deck wasn't brilliantly suited for this quest, but it is probably capable of beating it with fewer; it just depends how the cards fall out. Strider would have been a game-changer here; making it much more consistent. Any game where I was stuck with just Khaliel questing for 2 was almost an instant write-off.
Still, beating 2/3 quests with no Valar is a decent effort, and I'll try and bounce back next month - I've been working on a cunning plan for Escape from Dol Guldor!
Black Serpent: 20 tokens.