Na'asiyah with Firefoot 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

After several attempts, here is my most promising take on a deck centred round Na'asiyah so far. Thanks a lot to @philkav for the inspiration.

When it comes to Na'asiyah, there are a few things to keep in mind:

• She has a relatively low starting threat, which might allow combining her with Éowyn, Merry, Glorfindel or similar heroes and aim for secrecy including Resourceful. In this deck, however, I merely use the additional time and establish my board position until the big enemies engage me.

• She cannot pay resources for allies. Period. So you either add more heroes from her sphere, or consider Dúnedain Hunter (which I did, but which always felt awkard, even in a Dunedain-shell with Halbarad and Amarthiúl), or use allies from other spheres and simply put her resources to better use.

• She obviously becomes better if you find a way to give her additional resources. I tried doing this with Arwen Undómiel and Elf-friend, but this also looked better on paper than in practice. So Steward is the obvious choice number one. Denethor is then a good way to give her that card on turn 1 without having to include a second Leadership-hero.

• If you spend her resources on her own ability, the effect only lasts for one attack, not the entire phase or turn. In this way she feels like a Boromir-light, but the upside is that you don't need to draw a dozen cards in the right order to get her started. To get the most out of a single attack, Firefoot becomes the perfect solution, with the additional bonus that the extra-damage passes the enemy's shield (just think of Eastern Crows + Hill Troll or Corsair + Ship...).

Taking all these things into consideration, I tried building a deck based on three heroes, each serving a clear purpose, but which still open way to tactical variations if necessary.

• Na'asiyah's primary role is that of the attacker. With her own ability, Firefoot and additional boost, she can take out multiple enemies if necessary or just kill a big guy. But she can also function as an emergency-blocker, especially early in the game, and with Unexpected Courage she can even do both.

• Denethor's most important job is to pay for Steward as early a possible and pass extra resources to her. Additionally, he becomes our main defender with Dunedain Warnings and Armored Destrier.

• In contrast to Philkav, I picked Eowyn as a spirit hero. Spirit is important for having access to the Horse-Breeder, but also, more traditionally, for cancelling nasty treacheries and shadow effects and to provide quest power. And as far as questing is concerned, nobody beats Eowyn.

The rest of the deck is pretty straightforward. You have your good ol' Gandalf+Sneak Attack combo, some chump blockers who do useful stuff, a bit of healing, a bit of carddraw (Elven-light is easily recyclable with Eowyn) and some combat tricks. Especially Quick Strike is a lot of fun with Na'asiyah, as she can kill 2 enemies before they even have a chance to reveal their shadow cards.

Edit:

Some minor changes to the decklist: +2 Gondorian Shield, -1 Destrier, -1 Warning

Playtesting (successes):

• Journey along the Anduin (solo)
• Foundations of Stone (with Caldara as partner-deck)
• Journey across Belegaer (with Caldara as partner-deck)
• Fate of Numenor (with Caldara as partner-deck)
• Storm on Cobas Haven (solo)