Back in the first half of the year 2013, user Leptokurt created a series of Challenges all revolving around the use of decks made of one sphere to beat scenarios with slights twits. I personally enjoyed that, and thought now would be a good opportunity to make a new challenge as we wait in anticipation for the Voice of Isengard expansion and also because the Against the Shadow cycle gave us many more tools to make these decks more viable.

This challenge will be based on the scenario the Druadan Forest. Picked this because its a newer scenario with medium difficulty IMO. The players will play the scenario 3 times with each monosphere deck.

The players will build a mono sphere deck for each of the 4 primary spheres. The deck may only contain cards of that specific sphere or neutral cards (aka no song splashing). As an additional challenge, when selecting heroes for each deck, none of the 3 heroes may share the same trait. 2 exceptions exists: the warrior trait may be shared as there is no thematic cohesion to it currently and there are simply too many tactics heroes that carry it to have different kinds of decks. The same also goes for the noble trait for it would be too difficult to build a leadership deck without it

Players will record their score for each game and whichever has the least amount of points combined for all 12 attempts is the winner. For each loss, the player will count that as a score of 200. Additionally, you may receive -30 to your total score for each hero below that you use (aka a max benefit of -120 if you use all 4 heroes in your decks): Lore: Bombur. Spirit: Pippin. Tactics: Elladan. Leadership: Elrohir.

For example: I play my 3 matches with a lore deck of Mirlonde, Bombur, and Denethor.

match 1: victory 98 points

match 2: loss 200 points
match 3: victory 124 points

Bonus for using Bombur: (-30 points)

Running total thus far: 392

Also, tell us anecdotes of your attempts is always encouraged and adds a good bit of fun to the proceedings.

The challenge will go until: January 27th (or if i quit paying attention to this topic before then)

Cool idea. Hope I'll have time to compete.

Two questions:

1) Regarding "none of the 3 heroes may share the same trait". 9 of 12 of the released Tactics Heroes have the warrior trait. (Only Merry, Brand & Elladan don't)... Do you intend that the tactics mono sphere includes 2 of these 3 non warriors or can we ignore, either the warrior trait or traits that don't have any in game bonuses from cards etc.

2) Are we restricted to just the released player cards or can we include proxied cards from the yet to be released Voice of Isengard cycle?

Thanks

Thanks for bringing these back! I enjoyed the challenges when leptokurt did them, and this looks like fun too. I'll have to find some time to play

Mono-sphere is restrictive enough in solo, I would drop the trait limitation.

Cool idea. Hope I'll have time to compete.

Two questions:

1) Regarding "none of the 3 heroes may share the same trait". 9 of 12 of the released Tactics Heroes have the warrior trait. (Only Merry, Brand & Elladan don't)... Do you intend that the tactics mono sphere includes 2 of these 3 non warriors or can we ignore, either the warrior trait or traits that don't have any in game bonuses from cards etc.

2) Are we restricted to just the released player cards or can we include proxied cards from the yet to be released Voice of Isengard cycle?

Thanks

Good catch to the warrior trait, its so underdeveloped I completely forgot about it. Changed the rules to allow it.

Restricted to currently released player cards aka no VoI or Ring Maker cycle spoilers

Mono-sphere is restrictive enough in solo, I would drop the trait limitation.

I would prefer to keep it for this instance I think

Thanks for setting this up, Pharmboys! My time is very restricted, but I will try to offer a result for this challenge, especially as Druadan Forest is one of my favourite scenarios from the AtS cycle.

I would also ignore the Noble trait. It is quite restrictive for Leadership.

Only 3 leadership heroes have NOT noble trait: Dain Ironfoot, Balin and Sam Gamgee.

There is also Hirluin, but he is useless for pure monosphere.

Only 3 leadership heroes have NOT noble trait: Dain Ironfoot, Balin and Sam Gamgee.

There is also Hirluin, but he is useless for pure monosphere.

Balls...good point *changes rules*

I already finished my three games with the spirit sphere. It was quite frustrating at the beginning, but after trying several decks I finally found one that was up to meet the challenge. The quest is, like I said, easily one of my favourite so far. It's a hard nut to crack for spirit, as this sphere lacks both HP to take all the ranged damage and the ability to heal your fellowship. That's one reason why Nori ended up dead twice (the other being that I forgot to add the White Tower Watchmen).

Heroes:

Nori (Dwarf), Pippin (Hobbit), Glorfindel (Noble. Warrior. Noldor)

Results:

game 1: win, score 132

game 2: win, score 146

game 3: win, score 82

bonus: 30 points

total: 330 points

Not the best results, I suppose, but the last game was a blast. In all three games I excessively used the Nori/Bofur combo which I played for the first time. It is awesome! That plus an early Resourceful was the key to winning. I tried to gather enough resources to counter all the prowl effects. And kept praying that I wouldn't get any ranged enemies early in the game.

One question: how are we supposed to count losses? The rulebook only explains how to score victories...

While not specifically stated, the rule book says "when a player is eliminated, his threat is considered to be 50 and all his heroes are considered dead"

So using your hero compilation I would say if you lost a match on say turn 8, then your score would be threat (50), threat cost of each hero (20 total), and then number of rounds x10 (80) = 150

Not the best results, I suppose, but the last game was a blast. In all three games I excessively used the Nori/Bofur combo which I played for the first time. It is awesome!

Do you mean triggering Nori's threat reduction after putting Bofur into play in the quest phase? Nori was errata'd so this doesn't work...

Not the best results, I suppose, but the last game was a blast. In all three games I excessively used the Nori/Bofur combo which I played for the first time. It is awesome!

Do you mean triggering Nori's threat reduction after putting Bofur into play in the quest phase? Nori was errata'd so this doesn't work...

You're right. Haven't played Nori for ages and didn't realized that they rendered him useless. At least for a spirit mono deck.

Ok, so my results are apparently invalid, I'm trying to figure out a new deck

While not specifically stated, the rule book says "when a player is eliminated, his threat is considered to be 50 and all his heroes are considered dead"

So using your hero compilation I would say if you lost a match on say turn 8, then your score would be threat (50), threat cost of each hero (20 total), and then number of rounds x10 (80) = 150

Hmmh, that's ok, but I think loosing a game should get you a harder punishment. Say I loose the game after turn 3, my result would be 20 + 50 + 20 = 90. Which is not too bad, and even better than actually winning the game.

Not the best results, I suppose, but the last game was a blast. In all three games I excessively used the Nori/Bofur combo which I played for the first time. It is awesome!

Do you mean triggering Nori's threat reduction after putting Bofur into play in the quest phase? Nori was errata'd so this doesn't work...

You're right. Haven't played Nori for ages and didn't realized that they rendered him useless. At least for a spirit mono deck.

Ok, so my results are apparently invalid, I'm trying to figure out a new deck

While not specifically stated, the rule book says "when a player is eliminated, his threat is considered to be 50 and all his heroes are considered dead"

So using your hero compilation I would say if you lost a match on say turn 8, then your score would be threat (50), threat cost of each hero (20 total), and then number of rounds x10 (80) = 150

Hmmh, that's ok, but I think loosing a game should get you a harder punishment. Say I loose the game after turn 3, my result would be 20 + 50 + 20 = 90. Which is not too bad, and even better than actually winning the game.

crappp. i should have kept it simple with just a point for a victory like you used to do. i'll edit the rules so that a loss gives you a score of 200 since theres no way solo victories would reach that high and is penalizing as well

Ok, new results for spirit are up. I replaced Nori with Eleanor, sent all dwarves home and replaced them by neutral Gondor allies. No one died thanks to Light the Beacons and Blood of Numenor, but the first tow attempts were close. Had to overcome loads of threat in my fist game, and met a Druadan Elite on turn 1 in game 2. The strategy was to put Blood of Numenor on Eleanor, making her an excellent defender. The deck has a serious lack of ATT points which is why it took me forever to take out the harder enemies. Once the hobbit Gandalf was in play, he could take care about that. Resourceful and Shadow of the Past both are key to get your party through early and midgame. Once I had 6+ resources in my pool most of the encounter cards lost their lifethreatening power, as I could easily pay prowl effects. I decided to play this scenario very carefully, tying to minimze the risks. There only a small place for errors, as my fellowship cannot take a lot of damage. That's why I tried to hold back enough allies to be able to kill a Druadan Elite in one single turn. The results are thus not that spectactular, but at least I won all three games.

Here are the results:

Heroes: Eleanor (Noble. Gondor), Pippin (Hobbit), Glorfindel (Noble. Warrior. Noldor)

Results:

game 1: win, score 159

game 2: win, score 155

game 3: win score: 116

bonus: 30 points

total: 400 points

Aaaaaaaaaand.... here we go with tactics:

Tactics seems to have a solid base against this scenario. Enough HP to deal with ranged azttacks, some cannonfodder, strong allies and useful events. Theodren is a must IMO, as is Thalin. I used him and the Gondorian Spearman-Spear of the Citadel combo to deal with most of the enemies. Once I had an ally to block potential attacks, I sent everything with a point of WP to the quest. It's quite satisfying to see a mono tactics deck that can take it up with four early locations in a row, as happened in game 3. After clearing these locations I had enough support (Eagles of the Misty Mountains, Bofur) to make decent progress each turn.

Game 1 was tougher, as I got also lotsa locations at the beginning, but not that much WP support. One Gandalf in midgame broke the spell eventually and afterwards it wasn't too difficult to complete the last stage (got White Tower Watchman in both winning games).

Game 2 was a devastating loss. Got three enemies in a row during turns 4-6. One Druadan Elite and two Druadan Hunters sealed the fate of my strong looking fellowship. I don't think there was any way to avoid that loss. 'twas a typical case of bad luck.

Heroes: Thalin (Warrior. Dwarf. Angry), Elladan (Noble. Noldor. Ranger.Twinless), Theoden (Rohan. Noble. Warrior. Badass)

Results:

game 1: win, score:219 (!!!)

game 2: loss, score: 200 (?)

game 3: win, score: 133

bonus: 30

total: 522 points

P.S. : The scoring system still seems to need a bit of tweaking...

ugh screw the scoring at this point, this is all just for fun and something to try anyway. Thanks for the great recaps tho!

my lore attempt:

I figured Lore would be the easiest of the 4 spheres with all it's healing, and while the archery truly posed no threat (no pun intended), I still struggled in other areas. Particularly willpower which while is a known weakness of lore, came to the forefront of my playing experiences particular against some tricky locations like overgrown trail, secluded glade, and ancestral clearing. I often relied on my heroes for the will power necessary to progress but untimely cards like stars in the sky really set me back. While I was able to win all 3 of my attempts, this lack of willpower resulted in particularly long games...not ideal in a scoring competition (although at this point I'm so over the scoring). The surprise of my deck was definitely Bombur, I named him as a bonus hero inclusion since he essentially has a dead ability within the rules but his 5 hit points alone was able to soak up damage like a boss. Equipped with self-preservation, some boots from erebor, and bonus healing from Elrond's effect, the portly dwarf took arrows to the face all day and didnt care. It was really enjoyable using a hero out of context but still finding a way to play to their strengths.

Heroes: Mirlonde (Silvan, FFG-created, Underated) Bombur (Dwarf, Ham-Lover, Barrel Scene) Elrond (Noldor, Noble, Hugo Weaving)

Results:

game 1: win 138

game 2: win 147

game 3: win 171

bonus: -30

total: 426

@Pharmboys, nice traits you have on your heroes ;-)

Thanks for the effort of elaborating this challenge guys. As a casual player, this is quite challenging, I did not manage to build a Lore deck to beat this deck mono-sphere, but with my tactics deck I had mediocre succes (so far the weakest score it seems):

Game 1: 180

Game 2:166

Game 3: 200 (Loss due to Threat: 50)

Total: 546

Heroes: Theoden, Thalin, Beregond

The first two games were actually quite simple, it just took forever to pile up the progress tokens. Thanks to Defender of Rammas, Winged Guardian and Gondorian Shield on Beregond I finished stage 3 in the first turn. Since the enemies have very low hit-points Spear of the Citadel + Thalin + Gondorian Spearman worked like a charm.

The third game, I lost due to drawing three Secluded Glades in a row in the first 5 turns. That was just too much for the low Willpower in the beginning stages of this deck.

I know many players here don't like Theoden (mainly because he's not so thematic?) but in this deck he worked very well. I really like how he goes nuts with Thalin as a combo...from a pure gameplay perspective, of course.

Finished up leadership:

Despite the one loss i had this deck, i was actually surprised by how well it did. No healing was obviously a problem as in each game all of my characters were near death, but the will power boosts from faramir and visionary leadership did wonders in regards to questing quickly and dealing with enemies in stage 3. Even on my loss i made it to stage 3 but just became overcome with enemies and was unable to pull through for the win. I felt the uselessness of Elrohir this time unlike bombur in my lore attempt, outside of his average 2 will power he really contributed nothing else to the games, most times it was completely up to Boromir and whatever allies i could muster to do all the heavy lifting

Heroes: Boromir (Gondor, Warrior, Noble, Ned Stark) Sam (Hobbit, Po-ta-toes, Rudy) Elrohir (Noldor, Noble, Ranger)

game 1: win 112

game 2: win 153

game 3 loss 200

bonus: -30

Total: 435

Running total thru 2 spheres: 861

@Pharmboys, nice traits you have on your heroes ;-)

Thanks for the effort of elaborating this challenge guys. As a casual player, this is quite challenging, I did not manage to build a Lore deck to beat this deck mono-sphere, but with my tactics deck I had mediocre succes (so far the weakest score it seems):

Game 1: 180

Game 2:166

Game 3: 200 (Loss due to Threat: 50)

Total: 546

Heroes: Theoden, Thalin, Beregond

The first two games were actually quite simple, it just took forever to pile up the progress tokens. Thanks to Defender of Rammas, Winged Guardian and Gondorian Shield on Beregond I finished stage 3 in the first turn. Since the enemies have very low hit-points Spear of the Citadel + Thalin + Gondorian Spearman worked like a charm.

The third game, I lost due to drawing three Secluded Glades in a row in the first 5 turns. That was just too much for the low Willpower in the beginning stages of this deck.

I know many players here don't like Theoden (mainly because he's not so thematic?) but in this deck he worked very well. I really like how he goes nuts with Thalin as a combo...from a pure gameplay perspective, of course.

thanks for the contribution!

In your defense, I think Tactics will be the hardest sphere to complete this with. Theoden is going to be a must have in each attempt I'm sure. I'll probably save it for last ha

Mono Leadership:

Sam Gamgee (Hobbit), Balin (Dwarf), Boromir (Gondor, Warrior, Noble).

Game 1: 200 (Loss) - 11th round, Heroes died out during the final Quest... so close. Had a Druadan Hunter enter the staging area for each of the first three rounds... killing an ally each time & peppering my heroes with archery damage... in the end the lack of allies in play + the archery damage left too much for the Heroes to do. Ironically I had two copies of Denethor Ally & sneak attack in my hand & something else I couldn't use at the end (All my Heroes had taken wounds by then)... if only it had been ANY other ally I might have just made it... should have considered the amount of archery damage before adding ally Denethor to my deck... it seemed so Fatherly for him to hang out with his two sons.

Game 2: 200 (Loss) - 6th round Heroes died... well ok only two Heroes would have died in the sixth round...I quit... had a crazy amounts of high threat locations and so I risked questing with everyone (fail)... a Druadan Thief surged into two enemies... which, unfortunately was too much for my arrow cushioned Heroes...

Game 3: 153 (win) ..Phew!

So HATE PROWL!! ...Equally not fond of treacheries effecting Heroes that no longer have no resources due to prowl!

I think that I should have been able to win two of the three...but oh well ... next stop Lore... think i'm need of some healing

Edit... forgot about "While Dru-buri-Dru is in the victory display, characters get +1 [Willpower] and +1 [Defense]." *wonders if that would have made a difference to game 1*

Mono Lore

Heroes: Mirlonde (Silvan), Elrond (Noldor. Noble ) & Aragorn (Dunedain. Ranger)

Game 1: 151 (slow start cruised though)

Game 2: 156

Game 3: 132 (faster game... though no healing for except for Silvan's via Silvan tracker. Certainly made life interesting. Sacrificed Mirlonde to finish off Dru-buri-Dru more quickly... only to have a shadow card return him to the staging area)

next stop mono Tactics...

Mono Tactics:

Theoden, (Rohan.Noble. Warrior), Brand son of Bain (Dale), Merry (Hobbit)

Game 1: lost (200)... over run by locations

Game 2: lost (200)... over run by everything.

Game 3: won (151)... think I got quite lucky

(Game 4: won (154)... Gandalf (Hobbit version) arrived just in time to save the day, his questing being enough to complete 2nd and 3rd quests and being a big help persuading Dru-Buri-Dru in between. Towards the end though, the other Heroes & Allies were getting quite nervous about the additional threat he was generating... so it was a good thing that we powered though the final quest without needing to have any embarrassing conversations... concerning a certain wizard being asked to leave the party)

Pity this game wasn't one of the three... maybe i should of had a practice round. (Probably would have won if I had)

Just Spirit to go...

Next stop: Leadership!

I considered this to be one of the easier challenges, and I didn#t get disappointed. Leadership helps you to create more resources than your enemies can prowl from you. Additionally, Gondor and dwarfs have cool synergies that boost both your WP and ATT. There's also enough HP on your allies to takes some ranged damage. All and in all I did't face any serious problems, even these Gardens of Poison could only slow my fellowship down, but not break them.

Heroes:

Sam Gamgee (Hobbit. Best Friend.), Dain Ironfoot (Dwarf. Unnoble King.), Boromir (Gondor. Warrior. Noble. Cool.)

Results:

game 1: win, score 130

game 2: win, score 121

game 3: win, score 131

total: 382 points

My best result so far, unsurprisingly. In my first game I had an early Denethor plus Visionary Leadership to boost my questing progress. I managed to avoid any damage on my heroes until the end of the game, and Bill (in German: Lutz) the Pony saved the day by blocking two 4 ATT enemies. I even got a third copy of Bill that made it out of the forest.

The second game started with a Stewrad of Gondor in my starting hand, and I never got an encounter that I didn't want to see.

In my third game I encountered 3 Ancestral Clearings in a row (sometimes I ask myself why I'm even shuffeling...) and while I was clearing the clearings I could build up a strong fellowship with Faramir and some of his Gondorian pals. A midgame copy of Visionary Leadership sealed the deal.