Hi guys!

The final adventure pack of Dwarrowdelf cycle is complete, you can check it here:

https://visionofthepalantir.com/2020/08/08/player-card-review-shadow-and-flame/

I hope you enjoy the article. Leave the comments and your own observations and experiences with cards of this pack. I think there is a lot to discuss here.:)

Thank you for your support!

Silblade

My takes:

Elrond is a fantastic hero, as you say. The interaction with Light of Valinor is great, though early Vilya decks commonly paired him with SpGlorfindel (to offset Elrond's threat), so Elrond never got it. I love Light of Valinor on Elrond, though more to setup questing/defense than questing/Vilya. My favorite time to Vilya is planning, if I wait until after I've committed to the quest (to take advantage of LoV), and I'm running an ally-heavy Vilya deck, it's too late for the new ally to also quest. In the absence of other readying, you can wait until the combat phase, exercising Vilya if not needed for defense, but that obviously reduces the return on having Vilya in play.

I don't believe that Elrond has a large kit associated with him in a deck. Does Steward of Gondor work well on Elrond? Sure, but it's a leadership staple whether Elrond happens to be in the deck or not. Elrond is an attractive target *if* you're running leadership already, but there's no requirement to run Elrond with leadership. Do Wardens of Healing work better with Elrond? Sure, they're amazing, but Wardens are a lore staple *anyway*, and by making healers more efficient you need less healing cards to provide the same amount of healing. The only card that gets added to a deck because Elrond is one of the heroes is Vilya.

Vilya, on the other hand, can have a dramatic effect on deck construction -- but only if it's a Vilya deck. Vilya might be worth a 1x (at least) in any Elrond deck, but if Elrond is used as a resource smoother for a multi-sphere archtype, the focus is on the archtype and Vilya is just a bonus if it shows up. I've seen Elrond used for lore splash in Outlands, Harad, Silvan and even Dale, and in those decks Elrond's ability to help put off-sphere allies into play is really more crucial than the chance of getting opportunistic free stuff.

But a Vilya deck is more focused. 3x copies of Vilya, 3x Imladris Stargazer if Gandalf is not a hero, Master of the Forge and/or search cards to find Vilya in the deck -- the focus is entirely on getting Vilya ASAP, and having Vilya put valuable targets into play consistently. Such decks are loaded with single copies of high-cost unique allies. It's the most powerful archtype in the game, but it's not the only place Elrond can find a home.

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We Are Not Idle -- I was and am a huge critic of the WANI nerf, but I think you go to far in condemning it utterly in its new form. It retains an important feature that saw it used even in decks with no dwarves at all -- it is free and it draws a card. By including 3x WANI you can effectively shrink the size of a 50-card deck to 47 cards, and make it more consistent. I don't do this myself, I usually play 51-card decks outside the league anyways, but I know from deck analysis that a reasonable number of people *do* do it. The bottom line is that even when WANI's effect is useless, it still doesn't hurt your deck (barring card-draw hate in the quest itself), and that's not true of *most* weak cards in the game.

And in a dwarf deck, the likelihood is that it won't be useless, especially if you're using staple enabling hero Dain. Dain's ability only works when he's ready, so if he's used to enhance attack (or isn't needed for combat) Dain is *always* ready in the last action window before refresh, which turns WANI into "replace this, and get a free resource". That's not huge, but it's not nothing and makes WANI a defensible inclusion in any LeDain deck.

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Hardy Leadership is more iffy. I'd kill for a card like this to shore up my Silvans, but dwarves are *already* pretty hardy. There are dozens of dwarf allies in the game, but only two of them (Zigil Miner and the 1-cost Erebor Record Keeper) have just a single hit point. Few of those dwarf allies have the defensive chops to justify repeat defense, while Hardy Leadership isn't a terribly efficient way to boost heroes like Gloin and TaGimli. Hardy Leadership can provide a lot of archery buffer for a swarm deck, but I think it's really more of a sideboard for dwarf decks than a requirement.

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Hands Upon the Bow is a potent event with the right attacker, though it's a shame that it doesn't specify it's a ranged attack. What I love most about this card is that it's not a Combat Action, just an action. So not only can Legolas snipe that obnoxious enemy in staging, *he can do it after it is revealed and before staging resolves*. Now that's powerful, and something Dunhere and Haldir can only look on with envy.

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A Elbereth Gilthoniel (the name is officially errataed, I believe) -- you touch on the weakness of this card when you point out that using it can boost you out of secrecy, but that points out the general weakness of all the Dwarrowdelf secrecy cards -- secrecy decks tend not to stay in secrecy long, even *without* using this card. So while this card is extremely powerful for 0 cost, at 4 cost it's ridiculously overpriced, and secrecy decks need to use secrecy decks that aren't dead cards once you hit 21 threat.

There is a nifty combo with this card and the Dreamchaser card Vanish from Sight (requires two or less heroes). The latter card lets you treat your threat your threat at 20 if you over 20, and since AEG *sets* your threat instead of raises it, you can have 40+ threat, engage a 20-something enemy, bottom deck it with AEG, and lower your threat!

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Risk Some Light doesn't have the threat raising that AEG does, but shares the same general defect -- it's a dead useful card at 0-cost, but seriously overpriced at 3-cost. For that reason I can't rate it high, and its effect just isn't strong enough to prioritize it at game start like Resourceful and Timely Aid.

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Miruvor is an interesting little card, in strong draw decks it can serve as repeatable readying (like an Erestor deck, for example). You can also create an actual infinite loop in a Dale deck with LeBrand and a spirit Dale hero (like SpBard). It works like this -- Miruvor #1 is attached to Bard, and is his only attachment. Miruvor #2 is in hand. You use an action to discard Miruvor for a resource and for top-decking it. Then you spend that resource to put Miruvor #2 on Bard, trigger Brand's response, and draw Miruvor #1. You're now in your start condition and can repeat until you are bored to death.

Is there any way to exploit that particular infinite loop? There is an edge case where it might be possible. It goes like this -- a Dunland Tribesman is in staging. Tactics Bilbo is one of the heroes. You repeat the Miruvor loop to create an arbitrarily high threat on the Tribesman (he gets +1 threat every time a card is drawn). Then after Bilbo commits to the quest and steals his arbitrarily high threat for the willpower, get the Tribesman's threat out of staging (Hands Upon the Bow, Saruman ally, even Radagast's Cunning). Bilbo's willpower is a fixed lasting effect, so you can blow the stage away. Shame it only works against a handful of Ringmaker quests.

Anyway, it's a neat little utility card, though I don't often see it make the cut.

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Master of Forge is a fantastic search card for lore decks that absolutely, positively need to find attachments ASAP. Vilya is a good example, but there are a lot of decks with critical mulligan-for attachments. Still, I don't buy a sixth star on this ally, whose value is directly proportional to the importance of attachments in the deck. It's not a lore staple, like Daeron's Runes or Warden of Healing; there's too many decks where fishing for attachments isn't worth spending two lore resources on an otherwise worthless ally.

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Peace and Thought is very hero-dependent, but the value of an exhausted hero is widely variable compared to cards. For heroes with a passive effect and terrible stats (like LoBilbo), his action is utterly disposable, while for heroes with readying cards (or in TaBoromir's case, in-built readying) it can also be dispensed with. There's also heroes like Caldara and Folco Boffin who you can plan on going away, using their last ready to help grab you cards is just icing on the cake. Probably the best fit is with a swarm deck, as the ally count increases the hero actions become less important, but you might run short of new allies to put in play. It's a good card in the right deck, and shouldn't even be considered for the wrong deck -- that makes it a good but narrow card.

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Vilya is the top card in the deck -- it enables the most powerful archtype in the game. AEG is the goat card, outside of a nice combo with a two-hero secrecy in Dreamchaser it's yet another secrecy card that's too expensive to use once you lose secrecy. I agree with Lore as the most enriched sphere, partially because Vilya *requires* a particular Lore hero to be in play -- even though it's a neutral card, it doesn't really enhance the neutral cardpool.

I agree with Dale that you've undervalued WANI. I won't repeat his comment but I wanted to point out this inaccuracy from the article:

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If more players control Dwarves, then the situation is even more favourable, because this event can exhaust Dwarf of any player.

This is unfortunately not the case. Exhausting the Dwarves (Heroes) is a cost and under the rules for costs you can only exhaust your own cards:

Quote

When a player is paying a cost, the payment must be made with cards and/or game elements that player controls

Obviously the pack is a must have due to Elrond and Vilya. The other good cards (Hands upon the Bow and Master of the Forge are my favourites) are just gravy.

21 hours ago, rees263 said:

I agree with Dale that you've undervalued WANI. I won't repeat his comment but I wanted to point out this inaccuracy from the article:

This is unfortunately not the case. Exhausting the Dwarves (Heroes) is a cost and under the rules for costs you can only exhaust your own cards:

Obviously the pack is a must have due to Elrond and Vilya. The other good cards (Hands upon the Bow and Master of the Forge are my favourites) are just gravy.

Thanks for clarification, I'll update it in the article.:)

@dalestephenson Elrond is the type of hero, who greatly cooperates with cards, which I have showed: Steward of Gondor, Warden of Healing, Light of Valinor, Unexpected Courage, A Burning Brand ... all of these cards develop him and offer you interesting options. Nevertheless, I admit he can work well on its own, while Vilya needs a good support. I wouldn't actually run Vilya without Imladris Stargazer and Master of the Forge . The best thing is to obtain Vilya in opening hand, no doubt.
Interesting idea. It doesn't come to my mind that We Are Not Idle could be used only for its draw-card effect. I aimed on its main ability, which is, unfortunately, very weak in errata version. I understand your outrage.:)
Yeah, Silvans would need such a Hardy Leadership more than Dwarves.
A Elbereth! Githonial! has effect, which doesn't correspond with Secrecy mechanic at all. While I understand Secrecy decks try to "avoid" battle as much as possible / choose the battle you just want, AEG aims for enemies with lower Engagement cost… lower than 20. The choice of such enemies isn't wide and using on them would be waste, I think. Why to banish weak enemy, when you could banish strong enemy...BUT for the cost of increasing threat to the level of enemy's engagement cost.
As the fan of scrying mechanic in LOTR LCG, I highly value Risk Some LIght , even with its full cost.
Wow, interesting use of Miruvor .:)

I agree that Elrond works well with Steward, Warden, LoV, UC, and Burning Brand, he's a great target for all of them. But Steward, Warden and UC are staple cards that get included *anyway*, none of them are cards that you wouldn't include if you weren't running Elrond. That's less true of LoV and Burning Brand, but Burning Brand is a no-brainer for any lore defender, and LoV is worth including for any combat-capable Noldor hero -- it's the interaction with combat, not Vilya, that makes LoV attractive for Elrond.

I agree that threat-raising Secrecy cards run opposite to the conception of staying in secrecy -- but until SpMerry or Strider/Grey Wanderer decks, it's not reasonable to expect a secrecy deck to *stay* in secrecy. So the best secrecy cards are those that give you a big permanent leg up at game start (like Resourceful and Timely Aid), before you lose your discount. That's why I see AEG as a much better secrecy card than cards like Out of Sight and Dunedain Wanderer -- it can have a big impact, and it can have a big impact early. If you see just as a card that removes sub-20-threat enemies for free while you're in secrecy, I agree it's weak -- there's not a lot of non-unique enemies in that range, and the ones there tend to be weak (though it would come in handy against those tentacles in Watcher in the Water). But if you instead consider that secrecy is a very temporary condition you're going to lose *anyways* soon, then taking a big threat raise to get rid of a big hitter isn't really a problem. Bottom-decking the Hill Troll in Journey or the Nazgul in Dol Guldur isn't a failure if it vaults you WAY out of secrecy -- it's a huge success that can help you win the game. It's definitely a sideboard card, and like the other Dwarrowdelf secrecy cards it's way too costly when not in secrecy -- which even for secrecy decks is *most* of the game for the next few cycles. But I think the true target of AEG is not low-engagement enemies but powerful ones, and the threat raise ensures you can do that only once for free. It would be a ridiculously powerful card without the threat raise.

@dalestephenson Weeeell, to be honest, I'm not with you as for the usefulness of Dúnedain Wanderer in Secrecy decks. I would rank him among mentioned Secrecy cards Timely Aid and Resourceful , because he is the type of ally, who can do a lot for a negligible amount of resources (considering his Secrecy cost). For 2 cost, he is excellent ally in early phase of the game: 2-2-2-2 + Sentinel + Ranged , these are above-standards stats. In mid and late game, it's not so amazing, mainly because you probably "lose" the threshold 20 threat, within Dúnedain Wanderer worths it.

It's interesting point of usage of AEG - to actually use AEG as one-time solution, regardless your threat. True - if you face some strong enemy and you "bleed" seriously, then jumping onto threat of your enemy worths it for increasing own threat. Loragorn then enables you to repeat AEG again, if you get into the trouble second time. However, increasing threat brings also some issues, mainly due to possiblity of uncontrolled engaging of many enemies. Thus, I wouldn't use it in situations, where you are "swarmed" by enemies.

Still, personally AEG haven't a free spot in my decks, even within the Secrecy decks - I very often combine Secrecy decks from Leadership and Lore sphere, as many Secrecy cards (from Dwarrowdelf cycle) come from these spheres, and actually nothing from Spirit sphere forces me to include Spirit cards into Secrecy decks.

From a progression point of view, three-hero secrecy decks can only be constructed with SpGlorfindel until Black Riders come out, and longer-term the stay-in-secrecy decks all use spirit for repeatable threat reduction. So sphere is less of a barrier than utility (at least until the 20-threat Black Riders deck hits, which doesn't use spirit -- but with only one turn in secrecy, those often have no secrecy cards).

I agree that Dunedain Wanderer is good value at 2 -- but he's not *game-changing* at 2, while Resourceful and Timely Aid *are*, and cost 1 in secrecy. A secrecy deck will mulligan for Resourceful or Timely Aid, but never for Dunedagin Wanderer. 2/2/2/2 is useful, but not amazing, you can get dedicated 2-wp questers for 2 and dedicated attackers for 2, while 2/2 is too weak for the defense to be much good (also reducing the value of his sentinel).

The fundamental secrecy issue until at least SpMerry is that you don't lose secrecy in "mid-game". You lose it *quickly* unless you're crippling yourself by running only two heroes. That's why secrecy in Dwarrowdelf isn't strong at all.

AEG is a sideboard card to me, I'd never run it against all quests for a secrecy deck. But it's a large impact sideboard card, and those are worth remembering for the situations where they are useful.