Fellowship 2020 - Three Hunters 1.0

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• 1.0

I was fortunate to get a copy of the materials from the Fellowship 2020 kit, and I had been wanting to make a Three Hunters deck for a while. So I decided to try Three Hunters, restricting myself to the heroes in the Fellowship 2020 kit. :) There are a surprising number of valid permutations with just those 5 heroes, but I had been leaning toward Gandalf + Spirit + Tactics because I liked Silver Circlet to get enough willpower, and Tactics for Golden Belt and the very efficient War Axe. I've always been intrigued by Tactics Beregond, but had trouble finding a good way to use him. I recall reading about the resource advantage of Narya decks (https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/8682/the-one-deck-1.0) and wondering if a Three Hunters deck (and Tactics Beregond) could compete.

This deck went through several iterations. I wanted to include The One Ring because it's a restricted attachment and helps flip Forth, The Three Hunters!. Since Gandalf has such great all-around stats, I figured he would wield it, and get great attacks with Strength and Courage. Maybe that's still a good way to go, but instead I settled on giving the ring to Beregond. That way, he can be healed with Well Preserved and take ridiculous amounts of damage, basically never blocking. It's super fun!

Before Three Hunters flips, it costs 1 to play Citadel Plate on Beregond. This pumps his HP to 8. Once you have a Wizard Pipe, you can put Well Preserved on top of your deck, and use Gandalf to play it on Beregond. You start with Well Preserved in hand because of The One Ring's setup effect. That puts him to 9 HP. Once you get a 2nd Citadel Plate, he's at 13 HP, healing all of it each turn for 1 threat. You can solve a lot of your problems if you can take 12 HP of unblocked damage each turn! Raven-winged Helm is always free on Beregond, and is another HP. Once you flip Three Hunters, you can heal one more, so you can reliably take 14 points of unblocked damage every round, plus another 2 points of archery damage on Gandalf and Arwen, and heal it away. Removing the need to block attacks, even really big attacks, gives this deck a lot of options. Of course, once Beregond gets a Golden Belt and possibly a 3rd set of platemail, he maxes at out 19 HP (4+4+4+4 + 1 well preserved + 1 helm + 1 three hunters healing). I previously had Ring of Barahir and Spare Pipe for a few more HP, but the platemail is enough.

Gandalf's Staff and Wizard Pipe do a lot of work! There are several cards that can only be played off the top of the deck. Most important is Well Preserved, but there's also Silver Circlet on Gandalf, War Axe on Gandalf, Celebrían's Stone on Arwen, Firefoot on Gandalf, and both Expert Treasure-hunter cards. Before you get Wizard Pipe, you might have some cards stuck in your hand, but with 3 copies, you'll have decent chances of getting it soon. The pipe and the staff are the primary mulligan targets.

Gandalf's Staff is obviously good, and can do lots of important things. Resource smoothing, card draw, and then late game, shadow mitigation. For card draw, you can do things like draw a card in your Resource phase (after drawing your card for the turn), just to see if you'll reveal an event like Daeron's Runes or Elrond's Counsel, which you'll be able to play for free. This is pretty standard Gandalf hero strategy, but it continues to be fun, and offers interesting choices.

Other than the cards to power up Beregond, Arwen does a huge amount of questing. With Silver Circlet and Celebrían's Stone, she quests for 9 once Three Hunters is flipped. Gandalf also gets a Silver Circlet, along with his staff, and a War Axe, allowing him to quest for 8. With Strider, that's another 2. Most solo quests are manageable with reliable questing for 19 by mid-game.

For additional willpower, I considered Power of Command and The Red Arrow, but so far I haven't had problems maxxing out at ~21 willpower (or 25 if Beregond joins in at the very end).

The first Golden Belt can either go on Gandalf or Beregond, depending on the situation. Typically Gandalf, so he can increase his questing by one more, and get Firefoot, bringing his total attack to 8 with a War Axe. It's not quite as high as I'd like, but usually it's enough to deal with most enemies, especially with a clever use of Firefoot to splash damage. Flame of Anor can give a little extra boost, just in case. Also, Beregond, once he has a Golden Belt, can also get the second War Axe and add another 5 attack. The fact that 13 is reasonably the maximum attack from the deck isn't great, and I've considered adding in cards like Fair and Perilous for Arwen to completely destroy something, but so far, especially with Firefoot, it's possible to manage most enemies. I considered adding Light of Valinor for Arwen, but without Fair and Perilous in the deck, she really doesn't do much during combat phase.

For card draw, I considered more cards like Drinking Song, Open the Armory, and Foe-hammer, but there seems to be the right balance as-is with Gandalf's staff, Gandalf's ability + 18 events, Daeron's Runes, Word of Command, 2x Silver Harp (of which I only equip one on Arwen), and 2x Expert Treasure-hunter (which always works thanks to Gandalf).

For location control, I considered adding Asfaloth and/or Arod, but in solo, given the willpower this deck can provide, it seems OK as-is.

For resource generation, The Three Hunters before it's flipped, Arwen Undómiel's ability, Beregond's ability, and Gandalf's Staff seem to let things run pretty smoothly. I considered adding Steward of Gondor, but that's in every deck, and I don't think I really need it. It might still be worth adding...

This deck was designed to be played solo, but for multiplayer, I'd probably want to add Vigilant Guard, so I could soak up damage for the whole table.

One other challenge for the deck is threat, since you're typically increasing by 2 each turn (one extra due to Well Preserved), you start at 33, and you lose at 45. Thus, I have 3x Elrond's Counsel and 2x The Galadhrim's Greeting, plus a Will of the West, since you often manage to go through your deck and it's fun to play all those events again. I considered Thorongil for Beregond, which could save more threat in the long run, and give him Spirit so he could get the third Silver Circlet in case a quest really needed more willpower, but I think the instant benefit of 6 threat reduction is better than what you'll get most of the time, and often don't block with Beregond at all (especially if I need him for a big attack), and I can play the Greeting twice via Will of the West for a total of 12 threat reduction from that one card, and I doubt Thorongil will often get that high. Oh, and Greeting is an event, so I can play it off the top of my deck with Gandalf outside of the planning phase for extra card draw. And finally, if I ever take the deck to a multiplayer event, it's nice to be able to save other people threat too.

Thoughts and feedback welcome!