So in the Core rules they tell you how to chain the Quest and in what Order to do them in. Has anyone expanded upon that with the new releases?

Is it possible? Thematic? Fun? Tedious? Laborious?

I think if players try to go through more than three in a row in the Nightmare option, they'd have trouble finishing before the threat reaches 50 since the player decks don't reset either while playing that way.

But you could probably swap out a quest for another quest with a similar difficulty rank and stick to three quest scenarios total. Like Passage Through Mirkwood, then Hunt for Gollum (in place of Journey), then Escape from Dol Guldur. I don't think dropping Passage and trying two 4s and a 7 or a 4 and two 7s would lead to much success.

Doing the Expert level option where you can reset threat and decks could probably be expanded beyond three total quest scenarios. A deck that's good enough to beat the first three core scenarios is probably good enough to take on Hunt and Carrock.

I don't have a copy of Rhosgobel yet so can't comment on the difficulty of that one.

I actually play all the Quests as a campaign now, and it's really good fun. I play them in this order, based on how I perceive their difficulty in solo play (difficulty level as defined by me, myself and I in brackets):

Mirkwood (1), Gollum (3), Carrock (4), Anduin (5), Dol Guldur (8).

Once I get Rhosgobel and Osgiliath and the rest I'll play those as single games a few times before assigning a difficulty level and slotting them in.

Then I score my campaign as follows: a win is scored as per FFG's system, a loss is 80 points. I add up the scores of all the games in the campaign and divide them by the sum of the difficulty levels of all quests I beat = 1. So if I lose all five of the quests I currently have, the score would be (5*80)/1 = 400, if I win every game with a score of 20, the overall score would be (5*20)/(1+3+4+5+8+1) = 100/22 = 4.5.

After a campaign I build a new deck, and I'm now actually trying out every combination of major and minor sphere this way.

Obviously this way of campaigning ignores the story arc, although they're all adventures in or around Mirkwood so still lots of flavour. I just really like the building up towards the tougher scenarios that this order of quests gives me. Dol Guldur is normally a 5-minute 80-points game but well...that's Dol Guldur for ya.

You put Carrock as a four???

Honestly, I'm not sure that I can really conceive of beating that scenario solo. (Maybe if I had multiple core sets and got really lucky with drawing Sneak Attacks and Gandalf....)

gatharion said:

3/5 for me so far, solo with one core set and the 2 adventure packs.

Won it with a crazy four-sphere deck (Legolas/Frodo/Beravor/Song of Kings) which had to battle all Trolls at once as threat was in the low 40s, but also with a Spirit/Leadership deck which kept threat low and picked off the Trolls one by one. None of the wins I can recall had Gandalf all over it; he did come out once or twice but didn't decide the outcome all by himself.

So far it's given me a lot less trouble than Anduin, mainly because you can almost decide when to go into battle on your own terms rather than having a Troll flung in your face when you're barely out of the blocks.

Although 5 games obviously isn't a huge sample size, so maybe the losing streak starts here...

I have a Leadership/Lore deck that I tool around with during each AP and for Carrock I have won 2/3 attempts with scores of 30 and 33.

I also have a Tactics/Spirit Deck that lost three times in a row so I am going to go back and rethink my strategy. I don't have any heroes in this deck with a defense greater than one so every time a Muck Adder comes up I end up losing someone if I have no allies to block. I am going to try simply substituting Gimli for Legolas to see what happens.

I personally like the idea of moving through a series of adventures with the same heroes. I've done two in a row, and plan on doing more. I think I'd alter a bit of the cards though because things change based on where you go, different allies etc. At the first local meetup I'll suggest it and see how far we can get.

Actually, with a Lore/Leadership deck, Nightmare is doable since you can both lower your threat considerably and recycle your discard pile. The biggest headache is wounds, but so long as you put in a couple of Fortune or Fate cards, that can be managed as well should a hero or two die. I haven't done much yet with adding the new expansion scenarios into a campaign yet, but I like the order listed by ClydeCloggie and I'll have to give that a try. The entire Shadows of Mirkwood expansion should make for a very fun campaign game as well once all 6 of the adventure packs have been released.

1. lets see, if FFG surprises us with a "shadows of mirkwood" nightmare mode, where your threat may rise up to 100, but you have to finish all 6 quests back to back

2. also FFG mentioned that they might take into consideration changing the threat threshold for different scenarios - which we might be seeing in the Deluxe Pack

3. @ ichirou - you mean SPIRIT sphere - Lore is green and Leadership violet... SPIRIT (blue) reduces threat and fortune or fate is a spirit card...

My girlfriend and I have done Nightmare mode quite a few times. We played the three Core Set scenarios and mixed in Gollum when it was new (with the order being Mirkwood - Anduin - Gollum - Dol Guldur). Those have actually been the most fun games we had so far. Not only do you worry about beating the scenario, but you start worrying about which cards you use and which you want to save for the next one.

For two players, it is possible to go through the three Core Set scenarios with decks consisting of only a single Core Set, and we once managed four scenarios with Gollum thrown in. Theodred was dead, and we ended the game on threat levels of 48 and 49. It's really challenging and a lot of fun! I'm looking forward to trying the whole Shadows of Mirkwood cycle, though it will probably be very hard without several Core Sets...

My goal is to build a deck (evolving it with the cards from the expansions to be clear) that can beat the full Shadows of Mirkwood quest in order once it is released.

So far, I just play each one in order, but I'd love for their to be better rules to chain them. Some ideas I may look at...unique heroes and allies that die must be removed from the campaign (likely requiring a sideboard to replace them), outcome of one impacts the start of the next or something like, if you lose once then you play Dol Gulder. If you win Dol Gulder you are back in the normal campaign. I'm hoping that with the final adventure pack that FFG releases a campaign mode for Shadows of Mirkwood.

As for Conflict at the Carrock, once you learn the pace it's not that bad of a quest solo - really fun. I've probably played it solo a dozen times and won eight or so with my primary deck (Leadership - Spirit heroes with a splash of Lore). I'm sure it is an advantage that I usually have plenty of Leadership resources to recruit Grimbeorn.

The key is to manage the questing in the first stage, keeping your threat decent while building up allies in play and events in hand for the trolls. Eowyn and Faramir are great for this as they give you the flexibility to go in with a certain will and bump it up if needed. When you are built up, keep your threat low enough to bring the trolls down one or two at a time...or just have Grimbeorn, some healing and buffs along with stud allies and take them at once. Also, have some questing in place so that as soon as the Carrock becomes active you can explore it. Aragorn and Imrahil are great for this as they can quest and get back in for the fighting. Getting the +1/+1 AT/Def out of play is helpful. Have Grimbeorn soak up damage from multiple trolls but try to keep him alive to hammer them back - and figure out which order to take out the trolls based on their abilities

Also, hope the Hill Trolls come early (even if as Shadow Effects), you don't want them to appear when you're in stage 2 and taking on four unique Trolls already.