Daily Challenge - Play Deadmen's Dike using a Gondor Deck
I had never played Deadmen's Dike before, so I figured I would give this daily challenge a shot. Gondor swarm is nothing particularly new, and this particular variety is a lot less potent than some of the others that I have seen on the site. I knew I wanted access to Spirit for Will of the West, and then Boromir + Visionary Leadership to make the most out of the Gondor allies that I manage to get out onto the table. So my hero lineup of Boromir, Beregond, and Denethor got set into place pretty early in my planning process.
Having to manage a bunch of enemies right off the bat, and having to quest did prove to be a bit of a challenge. I lost a few games to location lock because Visionary Leadership never showed up and I didn't have a reliable way to dig for it. Combat was much less of a problem, with Beregond (and eventually Denethor) getting an Armored Destrier and Gondorian Shield with the help of the fantastic new Reforged. There shouldn't be too many issues getting some copies into the discard pile with all of the mechanics from the quest, the same goes for the Gondorian Fire which will eventually go onto Boromir to provide enough attack to take out Thaurdir.
I usually had a surplus of resources on Beregond, so Reforged and Stand and Fight both can be helpful to get some more attachments/allies onto the board, as well as getting them out of the discard pile to prevent some nastier shadows/treacheries. Thanks to Will of the West, it isn't awful to stay on Stage 1 for a little while and get the board state under control, especially since Beregond keeps threat in check pretty well.