I am new to the game, play solo, and have only the core set at this time. I really like the game but so far I have not had much success with the Passage thru Mirkwood Quest using a single sphere of influence deck and heroes. I am looking to begin building a custom deck but really don't know where to begin.

When custom deck building are there any basic guidelines to follow besides the ones in the Rulebook?

How many cards should be in a solo deck?

Can I exclude cards that control other players since I am playing solo?

My more general thoughts on the game:

My biggest challenges are not having enough willpower strength to progress thru the quest and, relatedly, the ever increasing threat level. How do you guys deal with these factors when playing solo?

One last question popped into my mind: should I always play with 3 heroes when playing solo?

Thank you!

hi

the ecounter deck must be kept as it is- if you refer to player cards that control two players- you should exclude them as they are a waste of a card draw

decks have to be MINIMUM 50 cards but can go higher- i reccomend 50 as a good number

the main point to get from this is combos- the main power force behind this game is using card together......i will state a couple of popular examples but there are many others

STEWARD OF GONDOR + ARAGORN- As aragorn can ready paying 1 resource then it is greatly beneficial to have extra resources per turn- putting steward of gondor on aragorn gives him effectlivly 3 resources per turn allowing to ready with ease

PROTECTOR OF LORIEN + big card draw- POL allows you to discard cards to give a willpower boost- note that this is unlimited- you can discard as many cards as you have, so therefore the more cards you have the more potention boost you have

GIMLI+CITADEL PLATE- Gimli gets + attack for each hit point on him, getting citadel plate on him gives him 4 extra hits points, therefore allows you to put more wounds and therefore higher attack levels

BERAVOR + UNEXPECTED COURAGE + PROTECTOR OF LORIEN- same idea as before- big card draw and big willpower boost, with beravors ability you can use her twcie with UC

There are some must-have cards that are out there that will help with threat increase and many other things. when using the respective sphere i would recomend always incuding these cards

GALADRIMS GREETING

UNEXPECTED COURAGE

STEWARD OF GONDOR

FOREST SNARE

NORTHERN TRACKER

PROTECTOR OF LORIEN

you should always play with 3 heros- later packs have a secrecy mechanic that allows for less, but with core 3 is the number

rich

This is obvious, but may be worth mentioning. The starter decks each have only 1 Gandalf in them, presumably so you don't have to worry about customization. But don't forget that you can have up to 3 of each card in your deck, so as you begin deck-building, don't forget to include 3 copies of Gandalf in your solo deck.

ah forgot about old gandalf- another combo- SNEAK ATTACK+GANDALF

As far as having enough willpower goes solo, you have be able to balance between having heroes and allies who can quest really well, and having some heroes and allies to keep them alive. Personally, I've found Spirit to be irreplaceable while playing solo. Eowyn (A lot of people rag on her, but she's undoubtedly the best at questing), a lot of cheap allies that have 1-2 willpower, threat reducing cards, and Unexpected Courage really make it a good sphere to mix in. The natural fit you would think would be with Tactics as it is the combat sphere, and this is true, but Tactics contributes next to nothing as far as questing goes. I've actually found Leadership to mix really well. As a solo player, most of the time you're going to be strapped for resources, and Leadership shines at generating them (Steward of Gondor can get going on the first turn and generates steady resources the whole game). Like Rich pointed out, Aragorn is a very versatile hero, and Celebrian's Stone can make him a Leadership/Spirit hero, which is what I've had success with. On top of that, Faramir is one of the best allies there is, especially when it comes to questing. I know I was a little specific with some of my examples, but this is coming from a similar place you're at right now, until I found the right combination of cards some quests were overwhelming from the first turn.

I would recomend that you forget about the Tactics sphere for now. This is the hardest one playing solo. You should mount a deck using Spirit as base (2 heroes, and a bunch of cards from this sphere), and adding a secondary sphere between Leadership or Lore (1 hero and a few important cards). This should get you better results starting to play solo.

Hope that helps. Greetings.

Thanks to everyone for your help. The blessings of Men and Elves to you all!

My two cents; I play predominantly solo and my primary deck is Lore/Spirit. I start with the heroes, Bilbo, Frodo, and Bifur. This deck starts with an amazingly low threat level (23), has a ton of card draw and also the ability to control my threat level with Galadrims greating and Gandalf. I have been pretty successful with this deck of late. Hope this helps some!

Just realized that you specified "Core game" only. So in that case, you wouldn't yet have the hero Bifur or many of the other cards that I use in the deck. Regardless, low threat is a very good strategy in this game; the other guys on this thread have given some great advice!

DurinIII said:

Actually very good combination of heroes Durin. Bifur is really cool with hobbits. But you must quickly play some allies for quest and fight.

My combo is Glorifindel Bilbo Frodo. I love Glor but looks like many players didn like him too much.....