The Stalwart of Gondor 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

This is a thematic deck built for an ongoing series on my blog, Darkling Door.

Theme: Prince Imrahil's ride to save Faramir

Played Against: The Massing at Osgiliath

“Now they sprang forward, formed, quickened to a gallop, and charged with a great shout. And from the walls an answering shout went up; for foremost on the field rode the swan-knights of Dol Amroth with their Prince and his blue banner at their head. ‘Amroth for Gondor!’ they cried. ‘Amroth to Faramir!'” —The Siege of Gondor, The Return of the King

Strategy

There are three key Attachments that make this deck tick:

1. Horn of Gondor, attached to Prince Imrahil, effectively turns his ability into one free chump block per round
2. Steward of Gondor, attached to Faramir, to help me afford all of those expensive Allies
3. Visionary Leadership, which I typically attach to Imrahil and without which it can be difficult to muster enough

When I was playing this quest, I typically mulliganed for the Horn, but in practice I found that I did better when I had Steward in my opening hand (which makes sense in retrospect, since it provides more resources than the Horn and this deck has plenty of ways to move those resources to the right place).

The goal is to use Imrahil's ability to sneak in a chump blocker every round—preferably one with an ability that triggers when it enters or leaves play (of which there are many in the deck). Faramir's ability can be used to ready up additional chump blockers if needed. This means defense is essentially covered, regardless of how much attack the Enemy has.

There is some concern about shadow effects that punish chump blocking, but in practice I found that those are few and far between, and I can typically afford to take one or two undefended attacks on my Heroes before I start to worry. I always have Warden of Healing around if the going gets tough.

I usually hold back Imrahil to attack and use Allies to generate however much additional is required to kill Enemies. Pippin always quests and Faramir generally does too, at least until there are enough Allies in play to carry the quest phase without him. This deck can't generate much in the early rounds, but by the end of the game I usually have more than enough Allies to cover every phase.

Feint is in the deck just to cancel the Witch-king's threat raising ability, which triggers after he attacks. It's not strictly necessary, but in several games it gave me the breathing room I needed to close out the quest before threatting out. If I were playing this deck in a multiplayer setting or against a different quest, I would consider swapping it for something else (see the sideboard for some ideas).

► For more analysis, check out my blog post on this deck.