Gifts From the Galadhrim 1.0

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• 1.0

"For the Lord of the Galadhrim is accounted the wisest of the Elves of Middle-earth, and a giver of gifts beyond the power of kings." - Fellowship of the Ring

This deck, and all the variants of it, are now my most-played deck. This particular decklist is the most generic version of it, with a focus on lots of early questing. So I decided to publish it, and use this version as a reference point.

Gifts of the Galadhrim

The main focus of the Gift deck is:

• Erestor and Círdan the Shipwright draw five cards each turn, then discard one of those five. On the first turn, that gives eleven cards to choose from. (This has been done many times, in many decks.)
• Denethor is the third hero (which I think is my own original combo), and he has two extra resources...
• ... which is exactly enough to play Galadriel, and search the next five cards for an attachment.
• And with three copies of Daeron's Runes and three copies of We Are Not Idle just for card draw...

I find the deck can often see almost twenty of its cards on the first turn. The point is to swap in about 6 to 10 attachments that the other players need most urgently, and spit them out as fast as possible. Three copies of Vilya? Gandalf's Staff? Sword that was Broken? Whatever is most crucial to your combo, put it in here and get the best possible chance to find it turn 1.

Then, I usually quest for 9 in the first turn, with a Galadriel in play. Then I have one hero still untapped, who blocks for 3. There are other decks that do better on the first turn, but the point is to get the other players growing fast. Eventually they take over the heavy lifting - sooner rather than later, with the right combo from here! - and this deck falls behind, having done its job already. It still quests decently throughout, but achieves little more than that.

Erestor Madness

Because Erestor, I run a lot of zero-cost cards in here. Because Galadriel, some of them are attachments, and I don't want to run fewer total attachments than shown here. I'd rather pull a free 2-cost attachment of course, or even a 3-cost, but I keep a few 0-costs so that at least I can always pull something.

Everyone loves Unexpected Courage, but since I can't always afford them all, there's Cram and Lembas to keep us going until we're fully set up. Explorer's Almanac is rarely useful, but every now and then there are too many locations; this is especially nice in this Dunedain Pathfinder edition of the deck. Elven-light lets me draw a bit faster once I have more resources coming in, and Glorfindel can sit around in the discards until I can afford him.

I try not to run multiple copies of unique cards, except of course Galadriel who discards herself and appears again. The main exception is that I often run two copies of Steward of Gondor, but rarely three. Finding it in the first or second turn tends to be good enough, and the third copy just does not add enough chance of improvement.

A Bit of Selfishness

Every deck has to contribute something, and despite all the things this deck gives away, it still has to pull its own weight. So the things it wants for itself are:

• Silver Harp. One of them urgently, the second one not so much.
• Magic Ring. On Denethor it makes a strong blocker with his own healing, or on Círdan the Shipwright it feeds the blue resources that the deck needs lots of. But sometimes I give away the first Magic Ring, and then get one from someone else later.
• Narya, which is not actually selfish, since it usually boosts the other decks...
• ... and Light of Valinor, so that Círdan the Shipwright can still quest.
• To the Sea, to the Sea! for playing a handful of expensive Noldor allies, mostly to help manage the card flow. Prioritize, though... often if resources are tight, something else will be more urgent than this, and I just have to watch it fall into the discards.
• Will of the West, PLEASE! In this version, the rest of the fellowship was running one or two of them. However... sometimes the right answer is, we already got all the attachments we needed. Playing out the rest of the game with an empty deck and only half your allies is boring, but still might be the best strategy if another deck is more critical.

In general I want Steward of Gondor, Heir of Mardil, and Livery of the Tower all on the same hero. Occasionally that hero is Denethor. More often, it's someone else... who now has the Gondor trait and can take Denethor's resources. Which he gains more of, with Captain's Wisdom.

Sideboard

Yes, the sideboard for this deck is EXTENSIVE. I've played everything from Friend of Friends to Strider in here. A few fellowships have played this deck with Song of Battle and some tactics attachements, but mostly I stick to these three spheres. This version came from a fellowship that just needed Courage, but wasn't questing enough, so instead I'm running:

• 3x Dunedain Pathfinder
• 2x Silvan Refugee
• 1x Quickbeam
• 1x Faramir, who rarely ever got into play
• 2x Children of the Sea, which also works GREAT with Galadriel
• 1x Double Back

That's the list of things that aren't "usually" in here, my first candidates for replacing with the attachments we need. I often run 3x Legacy of Númenor, play the first one I find and ignore the rest, because one quick boost early is enough. I often run more A Test of Will and more Will of the West, but I find that having the card AND the resource AND the opportunity to play it at the right time is rare.

Other than that... run whatever you need! Several of the cards I've run most often are listed in the sideboard here.