Messenger Raven

Ally. Cost: 1. 1   0   0   1  

Creature.

Cannot attack, defend, of have attachments. Refresh Action: Return Messenger Raven to it's owner's hand and name a card type. Choose a player to look at the top card of his deck. If that card is the named type, add it to its owner's hand. If it is not, discard it.

Derek D. Edgell

The Fate of Wilderland #146. Leadership.

Messenger Raven
Reviews

I'm a little surprised that no one has commented on this card yet as of 12/2/2023. It has a pretty solid 1-for-1 cost on Willpower to start, which certainly isn't amazing but makes me want to read on to the game text. It cannot chump block, which is a downside for sure. It's the ability that makes the card, though it's very niche. The kind of deck that wants Messenger Raven is one that's running scry effects like Imladris Stargazer, Gildor Inglorion, or Wizard Pipe. Hero Gandalf is moderately popular and since Vilya is one of the strongest cards in the game and pairs so well with scrying, there should be quite a few players running this kind of deck. On the other hand, Vilya always comes with Elrond so must be played alongside for the Messenger Raven (but is likely already added for Steward of Gondor and the raven is thus automatically available). In such a deck, the raven becomes essentially the ability of Gildor Inglorion (spend a buck to draw a card) and makes for a lovely resource dump for extra money.

DunYoss 52
its only good for radagast, else the https://ringsdb.com/find?q=treasure is usually better — doomguard 2121
The.... What? Your link isn't a link. And you didn't include a card name. — Ensign53 7
I assume doomguard is referring to Expert Treasure-hunter, which is a 0-cost Lore attachment that essentially has the same effect. — kjeld 659
Note that in a deck with Elrond you do not need to include Leadership heroes to play the Messenger Raven due to Elrond's ability to pay for allies of each sphere. But yeah in a deck that does lot of scrying Expert Treasure-hunter is better. — Alonewolf87 2355
Wait I thought Elrond could simply pay for other spheres allies but didn't count as having the needed resource icon to play them from your hand — Diamondore12 26