Gandalf and Elrond: Revisit 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

This is an update on a deck I made when Gandalf was released in early 2015. The idea is one that has been developed by many other deckbuilders but after looking on cardgamedb and Ringsdb I didnt find a deck identical to mine so I figured I might as well post it here and start tweaking it. The idea was to combo Gandalf with Elrond + Vilya. This has been done to death but I also wanted to abuse the fact that the top of the deck is always known to us. I didnt see many people using the interaction between Expert Treasure-hunter and Hidden Cache. What ends up happening with the tools that came with gandalf is that it is very easy to manipulate your hand and top of the deck so that you place an expensive ally on top then use Elrond + Vilya, after that is done you do not want an expensive ally on top so you put something playable or leave a hidden cash on top. Quest Successfully with Expert Treasure-hunter and you can name a card to draw it or if it is Hidden Cache you can "name the wrong card type" and then get some much needed resources. Back when I built this Narya, Treebeard, Shadowfax, Denethor, Sword-thain and many other expensive high quality allies were not released. Shadowfax is too expensive for this deck but Narya is a great way for this deck to start catching up in action number since it starts with one less hero.

My thoughts before going into testing:

Sword-thain and Resourceful can both be cheated into play with Elrond + Vilya to generate resources that are badly needed. Sword-thain gives you an additional hero to take nasty hero specific treachery effects and surprise undefended damage. But Resourceful puts the money where it matters on heros that can spend it on any sphere.

This deck has always been one that requires support in the first 2 turns before it starts churning in 1-2 huge allies a turn. If it survives that it takes over the quest and your turns take up a ton of time. This was all fine and dandy while the deck was handling most quests with ease. I stopped playing it entirely when the fog of the barrowdowns fellowship quest event came out. I brought this deck out to play with my group of 4 hardcore LOTR players. That quest has a mechanic that seperates you (which is fine and dandy) but it also discards every ally you have except one or something like that. This deck rolls over to any quest effect that is not a treachery and removes ally's en masse without regard to the allies health. There are enough quests (including one in the core set) that do this to make this deck very vulnerable. It would be nice to make the deck more robust when attacked directly like that.

Denethor and Glorfindel are realistic options for a third hero. The former solves your early resource deficit and survivability while the latter gives you access to much needed cancel and threat reduction. I think adding one of them is essential if you plan on taking this deck in a solo direction.

I would love any feedback and deck ideas building upon this as a base.