Finally some awesome news!

Looks like an epic scenario especially considering the Nazgul "boss" whom looks like he is pretty hard to kill

I'm also really excited at the reveal of one of my favorite characters, Theodan!!!

His stats and ability are just fantastic too, granted starting 12 threat is whatever but giving that universal boost to all tactics characters is clutch. Especially with that "steed of the mark" card. I already have visions of Theodan and Tactics Boromir just ripping through encounter decks with it…although one would have to include spirit which would actually work well to help lower the treat from boromir and their combined starting threat.

What other good combo's do you guys envision for him?

works well dwaves actually… thalin and tactics bofur

He looks great. Bear in mind he only boosts heroes though. Well suited to a mono sphere deck I think, which would work well in multiplayer with a spirit deck

First off, I am almost as excited about the Steed as I am about Théoden. Just the other day I remembered when Asfaloth came out, they mentioned he is the first mount, and then… there was a long break. Now I am thinking if there shall be a card that searches for Mounts?

I too first thought of Boromir when seeing Théoden, the two "tragic" heroes can really be powerful I feel. It also makes sense we are probably not going to see an overall Rohan boost (like Dain's) since there is Mutual Accord which makes Gondor Rohan (and vice versa). On the other hand, there is an overall Gondor boost already, though much less global and/or potent than for the Dwarves. I see this paragraph is not much good but I am excited about Rohan and Gondor synergies. Gondor seems to be the trait that binds things together quite a bit, Gondor and Outlands (given - Hunter of Lamedon, for now), Gondor and Dúnedain (Blood of Gondor, for now), Gondor and Rohan (Mutual Accord or the previewed Steed).

What I think shall be toughest in making a mono-sphere Tactics deck (for solo) is threat reduction now. With Théoden, Willpower can be managed but since there are now low-threat Tactics heroes, this may be an issue…

Theoden looks awesome. I've been waiting for a Theoden card. I'm a little bummed that he doesn't seem to synergize with other Rohan cards as well as I'd like, but with some tweaking, I'm sure it could work. You could have Theodred, Dunhere, and Eowyn in one deck and Theoden, Hama, and some other guy in the second deck. I'm liking the idea of Thalin for the third Tactics member. It could be pretty cool.

Does Theoden boosth is own willpower up to 3?

Yes, he affects himself. In the article it says he quests for three because of his ability. =D

Good hero. Sounds much more balanced now. He give a good boost but only to heroes not to every one……. And threat cost 12 for cool hero is ok.

Looks like they start to do more careful job. Hope we will not see some game braker like Dian anymore.

P.S. Nazgul is cool!!!!

Glaurung said:

Agree 100%

Glaurung said:

Yeah, the Nazgul looks nasty. Tough stats, takes at least 5 turns to kill, and engagement threshold is only at 1. Obviously, there will be something in the deck itself (on the quest or location cards) that will help deal with him, or he is simply too nasty. And destroys what little attempt at Secrecy you could hope for. But I like that they are making him super-hard to deal with. Just waiting to see what twists the deck will throw at us for handling him!

I was underwhelmed at Theoden at first. He just feels pretty limited. With those stats, that seems odd to say, I know. I don't mind the 12 threat to start with, and his great stats reflect the steep cost… no complaints there. I would just rather have a hero I can be more versatile with… he is pretty much guaranteed to be assigned to an all-Tactics hero lineup. But it's really a small complaint… not every hero can fit every deck.

A couple ideas of heroes to pair with him… (don't have access to my cards right now, so just pulling some out of my head):

Theoden - Gimli - Brand (33 threat): For sheer bang for your buck in terms of Theoden's boost ability. 3 Tactics heroes that could quest for 3 willpower a piece… dang. Not much synergy between them beyond that, although would be a decent multiplayer lineup (epecially if you could get sentinel on Gimli), particularly if you could get another player to do some serious threat reduction for you (that is going to be a theme for any deck with Theoden, I imagine).

Theoden - Boromir - Glorfindel (spirit) (28 threat) - Now THIS lineup I would be interested in trying myself! The obvious detraction is that in adding a non-tactic hero, you lessen Theoden's effect. But a constant boost to himself and Bormir is still pretty **** good, and Glorfindel adds in that synergy piece of bringing in the threat-reduction blue cards, as well as the readying cards (UC, new mount… not that impressed with mount) that will free Boromir and Theoden to just be three-hormed beasts- quest, defend, or attack! Oh, and Glorfindel is alright at questing and defending as well…. lol. And his lower starting threat really helps offset the higher cost of the other two.

Theoden - Thalin - Dain (33 threat) - I thought first pairing him with Thalin would help keep the starting threat down a little, but dropping Dain in with them kinda killed that idea. I only threw this one together for the thought of finally making it worth questing Thalin every turn regardless. With both Theoden and Dain's boosts in effect, Thalin quests for 3 (and wounds all the revealed enemies). Having Dain in there allows for SoG, that will help pay for all the spendy red and purple cards this deck would surely have in it… would still have to do some fancy footwork to deal with the higher threat, of course, but with Dain in, the "Sneak Attack+Gandalf" combo becomes an automatic… And of course, there's all the nice dwarven cards to play off the two heroes…

Captain Poe said:

Yes he does, this is also interesting because they obviously took it into account when deciding his threat cost of 12. His stats only sum up to 11 unless you add that extra 1 willpower, in which case his threat equals his stats.

Wow this guy looks very epic, i like Glaurung i agree that although his very good effect it´s not broken or ultra-powerful like Dain. I really like him and the new steed is a very amazing card. The Borormir, Theoden and Glorfindel combo that benhanses mentioned looks very epic and i´m really eager to try it out. By the way it seems that the last adventure in a cycle is introducing a big boss fight against a very strong enemy. This Nazgul looks very deadly (but we already battled a blood-thirsty balrog and a multi-attacking dragon so how worse could it be?) Okay joking aside i think this is going to introduce some effects that will make the Nazgul a very annoying (in a good way) enemy.

Tactics willpower boost…I'm crying…I love you Theoden…

I like Theoden but I wish his ability was more directed to Rohan than to the tactics sphere. Maybe because i feel that boosting traits should be done by those who are at the top of their herarchy:

- Dain (could have been THorin) after the Hobbit becomes the King of Dúrin's folk; so his ability (despite been too strong) isn't bad planned;

- Boromir (could have been Aragorn) was the Gondor great hope at the begining of the Lord of the Rings; so the Leadership Boromir ability is in one of the right Tolkien characters;

- to Rohan, who is left to give this kind of boosting?

As to the Steed of the Mark and the other Mount card, Asfaloth:

Whitout any other cards to give the traits or the sphere and the Against the Shadow cycle cards:

- we have only 3 heroes that can play the Steed on themselves (Dunhere, Eowyn and Eleanor);

- we have only 2 heroes that can play Asfaloth on themselves (Elrond and Lore Glorfindel);

Can be played yet on the following, but needs a spirit hero on the team or Song of Travel (for Steed) or Song of Wisdom (for Asfaloth) or Narvi's Belt:

- Steed of the Mark can only be played on 7 other heroes (Beregond, both Boromir, Denethor, Prince Imrahil, Háma and Theodred);

- Asfaloth can only be played on 4 other heroes (Legolas, Elladan, Elrohir and Spirit Glorfindel);

The Steed ability is the same as the Core Aragorn's one.

But given the heroes where he can be played we have some of those heroes:

that are only designed to, on normal quests, do one thing (Eowyn - quest, Háma - attack, Beregond - defend). the last two are usually not worthy of having on quest because they have low (1) or no willpower and are not the prime candidates to give willpower boosts.

can do more than one thing. On these:

- Denethor usually uses his ability before questing, so doesn't have much benefict from the Steed ability;

- Theodred gives an simultaneous effect with the one from the Steed, so basically he would be questing and readying himself for 0 (it is better the UC);

- Tactics Boromir already have that ability with a different cost (threat rise)

- Leadership Boromir needs to have at least one resource to have his ability, so we could have a bit of problem with resources;

- Eleanor usefull but resource needed;

As to Asfaloth:

his ability is unique on heroes and has a boost if it rider is Glorfindel.

I love that they explore the traits… And that it integrates well with the other existing cards. But Steed of the Mark seems way too powerfull, in comparison to Asfaloth…

A bit like Dain in comparison with Leadership Boromir…

The Steed of the mark does not exhaust when it uses its ability. Could this allow the ability to be triggered multiple times and the questing power of the attached hero to count more than once?

benhanses said:

Not technically true.

I think the way Dwarrowdelf Axe is worded, that it would do another damage to the Nazgul, if it was being used in the attack. Toss in a sneak attack Gandalf strike and that's three potential damage right there.

Plus there are cards that can put enemies into the staging area, which then opens him up to several other forms of additional attacks or direct damage.

It wouldn't be all that hard to drop the Nazgul in a single turn. Provided you were prepared for such a thing.

CJMatos said:

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding you but there is a way to attach the new mount to other heroes…

Nor Am I A Stranger (Conflict at the Carrock): "Attach to a character. Attached character gains the Rohan trait."

Steward of Gondor (Core Set: "Attach to a hero. Attached hero gains the Gondor trait. Action: Exaust Steward of Gondor to add 2 resources to attached hero's resource pool."

Maybe you meant short of using either of these two cards, there are only 3 heroes?

Style75 said:

Style75 said:

No. A character can only commit to a quest once per round. This was firmly established with the core set Aragorn who has that exact same ability.

Likewise a character can only be used once to defend from a single attack and only used once when attacking a single enemy (until the next round of course).

Style75 said:

I don't believe this would be possible. Even if the hero readied, it's still commited to the quest, so you'd not be able to commit and already commited character.

Thinking a great combo would actually be Theodan, Gimili, and Thalin then have a second deck with Dain…maybe even the famous/infamous Thorin and Co. deck to have tactics heroes that could all contribute 3 will power.

That said, its not really worth using Theodan in a solo tactics deck just for the sake of getting the most out of his ability because since most tactics heroes only have a 1 or 2 quest power its the same difference as including another hero from a different sphere whom already has a willpower of 2 or 3 while giving acess to a lot of other types of cards.

Also while his effect will always be useful becasue it boosts himself, he really should be with at least 1 other hero who can take advantage of it otherwise unless u have a readying card (which are numerous these days) its better to have another character who can contribute 3 WP and have another effect or Legolas/Hama who can have 3 atk and another effect.

kind of just rambling but i'm still really excited by theodan. art is great too

still surprised he wasnt leadership

CJMatos said:

You are forgetting about Battle and Siege keywords. That steed will be a staple for questing Beregond on a Siege quest.

For solo, Théoden, Boromir (Tactics), Glorfindel (Spirit) seems best to me. But then again, Glorfindel makes any deck look good, basically, right now (except Dwarves perhaps). Questing for 8 and having enormous fighting prowess, that is some potential at the start of the game. And all that with Théoden certainly a better Dain in terms of balanced design, bravo ffg!

I do have second thoughts about the Steed, however, it does pale in comparison to Unexpected Courage (same sphere). Should have been cost 0 to rival that (and hardly still). Still hoping for Mount synergies however, that could sway things around.

As for the Nazgul, Gondorian Spearman is a great card to have, if I read the card well. How about the Scroll and Leader? Can anyone read (or guess) the whole thing? Will the Leader boost willpower to all Gondor characters?

Not sure if I like that new hero. However, the artwork is fantastic and probably one of the best we saw so far. I like the idea of making mono tactics decks workable, but solo players will still have to deal with the high threat cost and the fact that the only tactics hero who can be used more than once is Boromir. There aren't too many Rohan cards in the tactics sphere either.

Ok, one big plus is that you can use Theodenas a quester regardless of the keyword. This is one thing I really like about the keywords, as characters like Beravor or Imrahil become much more useful, as all of their good stats come into play instead of only one.

Thanks for clarifying how you can't multi-commit to a quest with one character.

I still think, however, that the lack of exhaustion on this horse's ability is very significant. I'm making a prediction: there will be a card coming that will only work if you are able to exhaust a mount attachment similar to how we are seeing cards that exhaust weapon attachments. This would explain why the Steed is cost 1 instead of cost 0 and make it a bit more useful compared to unexpected courage.