Nurn Hobbits 1.0

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• 1.0

Nurn. This quest has been my bane since it was released. I thought I had a deck that took some of the bite out of it, but after posting the video a game altering mistake was noticed in my build. So I took the video down and went back to the drawing board.

Mike G suggested Hobbits. Hobbits versus Nurn? Surely he must be joking. (Stop calling me Shirley).

I love Hobbits, so I decided to give it a go. My first few attempts ended in horrible loses. So I tweaked, I cut, I prioritized, and I learned. And then, I won.

As I played and made changes to the deck I got a feel for how these brave little halflings could endure the horror of Nurn. In the video I show a couple of the loses and then a game that went to stage 2 (but do I win?) https://youtu.be/OEEV8qSBTVI

When you play The Fortress of Nurn you MUST have cards you need in your 10 cards available to you at the start of the game. Any card you draw that is a dead card, or 'useful later' is another arrow to the chest. You have to get as much value from those first 10 cards as you can, and since you cannot pick those cards, you must have a deck that will propel you forward and hit the ground running.

Bond of Friendship is the contract that came with this quest and it is really good here. The extra hero against Nurn is very useful and A Bond of Hobbits with Merry and Pippin is a good thing.

What you are looking for in your opening hand is a way to boost Frodo Baggins's and drop your threat. The trick of this deck against Nurn is you must defend with Frodo, but not raise your threat too much too fast. So, if your opening hand has Arwen Undómiel or Rosie Cotton and The Shirefolk, that is a really good hand. Keep your threat as low as possible, Gandalf should ALWAYS drop your threat except perhaps very late game when you figure you won't be threating out. If your threat gets too high, your Hobbit Cloak and Sam Gamgee's ability stop working.

Bond of Friendship limits you to 2x any card, which is a good thing. If you want your first 10 cards to all be useful, you don't want to draw duplicates of Uniques. Also, the No Quarter castle side quest could make you lose a card in play or in hand if you discard a copy from underneath it.

This deck has answers to a lot of the nastiness Nurn throws at you:

Elfhelm cancels the effect of the Power of Mordor card Under the Watchful Eye, which makes you raise your threat when you draw a card.

Gandalf, The Galadhrim's Greeting, and The Shirefolk and Double Back cancel the Doomed 5 Power of Mordor Card. And, sort of cancel the 'your threat elimination level is -5' from the Tower of Barad-dur.

Halfling Bounder is great because if you get a sidequest in the VD he can cancel Ulcar's Rage and The Dark Lord's Reach while in the first stage, and still be of value while in the 2nd. A Test of Will is useless once you progress,

Thalion and Vigilant Dúnadan take advantage of the sidequests in the VD.

Many of the allies have more than 1 hitpoint so you can weather the Castle side quests that damages everyone. Honour Guard is also very useful for that.

If you draw a SQ in your first 10 cards you should go to it, get the benefit from clearing it and prolong going to a Castle SQ.

Finally, Frodo should be able to defend for 6. Rosie plus Hobbit cloak against the trolls and Kamul the Easterling means it is 6 vs 6, and that is a good thing.

If you have Rosie in play and draw Fast Hitch, put it on her so she boosts a questing hobbit and Frodo (or Merry).

Don't forget Merry's 2nd ability to ready someone, getting 2 attacks from Treebeard is very nice.

Finally, it will take some luck to win. You must have a great (not good) opening hand. Every hand will be decent, but a winning game will have a stellar hand. Also, you have to get lucky on the randomness of the quest, and that is true for any deck you bring against this quest.

Good luck and I hope you enjoy!