A Knife in the Dark - Specialist Deck Series 1.0

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• 1.0

The Specialist Deck Series returns to the Black Riders expansion with A Knife in the Dark.

For an overview of the series and the first deck list see here: https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/18970

The previous deck for Fog on the Barrow-downs is here: https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/19338

Once again we are facing the Nazgul, but this time the goal is to minimise the chaos when we take them on at Weathertop. More directly, this means never shuffling Nazgul into the encounter deck. As a solo deck, this is of even greater importance.

For the most part, this just means taking the bad effects as they come instead of opting for the Nazgul, but there are two encounter cards worth noting. The first is Unwanted Attention, which means that we should always be questing with at least two heroes.

The more obvious and pressing matter is Bill Ferny, who starts the game in the staging area. I imagine a lot of decks that are built with this quest in mind have Bill firmly in their crosshairs, and this one is no exception. Our chosen strategy will be to take the threat raise from Bill every turn until we can engage and kill him. At that point, we will use our first hero, Aragorn to reduce our threat back to the starting level and continue as if he was never there.

I've never used this strategy in the quest before but I'm excited to do it because it's super thematic. But to make the most of Aragorn's ability we'll need two other low threat heroes. We'll start with Merry - not only does he have a nice low threat, but after we reset with Aragorn, he'll help us stay low for the rest of the game. Early on we need the and we want our threat to rise anyway so we can just quest with him. Later, we probably have enough so we can hold him back to use his ability. Or he might have a Fast Hitch so he can do both.

Next we want a hero. As I've mentioned before, there are not a lot of options for this sphere on the lower end of threat. Given that I want to try a variety of different heroes over the saga and I want someone who can quest at least decently, I opted for Balin. He does a lot of things we like - low-ish threat, okay , is good enough to survive an attack from a Rider of Mordor and his shadow cancellation can come in handy in a pinch too. Most importantly, he gives us access to the sphere, which we will want for things like Sword that was Broken.

So we have general plan. It would be nice to make the most of Aragorn's ability, so we'll add in some doomed cards to maximise our threat raises and benefit from it. We also want to get the maximum benefit from The Prancing Pony's effect so a few expensive allies will go in as well. With low threat and an army of allies we'll quest to the end with ease and engage and beat the Nazgul at our leisure.

In testing, the deck won two out of three games. The loss was down to having both Rider of Mordors in play by turn 2, which heavily punishes our chosen strategy. Even with four allies in play by turn 2, including Jubayr and Treebeard, I couldn't get over this hurdle (that penalty is nasty). Anything short of this should be no problem to handle and both the other games were won convincingly, even when I didn't see any early card draw.

The cards in detail:

Arwen Undómiel - There are more than just Nazgul enemies in this quest so we'll be fighting a fair amount and she improves our options for combat tremendously, on top of her good questing.

Faramir - Particularly in Stage 2 of this quest we'll be trying to leave Nazgul in the staging area so Faramir will help us to continue questing past them. As an added bonus, he helps protect our weaker allies from the Power in Their Terror treachery.

Firyal - Her ability is great whatever the quest. Especially here, where some encounter cards are much worse than others.

Gandalf - Useful as ever, and we're playing so Sneak Attack will be involved.

Henamarth Riversong - An amazing solo card. Nothing makes the game easier than knowing what's coming from the encounter deck.

Jubayr - One of the strongest defensive allies. With healing or Arwen's defense boost he can defend against Riders almost indefinitely.

Quickbeam - One of the best allies, we're interested in both his and and at a great cost.

Ranger of Cardolan - These guys are amazing value with a Dunedain hero, especially for emergency defending. As an added bonus, we can effectively use them twice for one resource by playing A Very Good Tale in the refresh phase.

Rosie Cotton - We have two Hobbit heroes (including Frodo) so Rosie is very valuable. She'll help us quest and later, take down the Nazgul.

Sam Gamgee - Given we have Frodo with us he is an amazingly cheap ally for his stats. We even have doomed cards to trigger his ability somewhat easily if we want.

Steward of Orthanc - Plays into our doomed plan perfectly and not a bad quester to boot. We'll want to trigger him often early game to get the most benefit. Bumping Deep Knowledge up to Doomed 3, Draw 3 is very satisfying. Hopefully we won't need to do it as much later on as we'll have the cards we need.

Treebeard - Simply one of the best allies for combat. He's a great asset for fighting the Nazgul, especially when he has a few resources available.

Warden of Healing - We might be doing quite a bit of fighting this time and we don't have enough to mitigate all the damage. Aragorn and Balin are pretty sturdy, meaning we might even risk an undefended attack. Healing them up to be able to defend again will be very handy.

A Burning Brand - Aragorn makes a decent defender with this attachment, especially with Arwen in play.

Fast Hitch - Basically a mandatory choice for decks with hobbits. Rosie is probably the strongest target, but Merry and Frodo can really benefit as well.

Steed of the North - Cheap readying for Aragorn which means we can usually quest with him every turn and he will be ready for combat if needed. There's no competition for the restricted slot either.

Steward of Gondor - This will let us play all the cards we will hopefully be drawing. Usually best on Aragorn as he will be dual sphere at some point. He can pay for things and we can save Balin's resources for his ability.

Sword that was Broken - A hugely powerful card that should pretty much always be brought along with Aragorn. In this quest we can end up with a surprisingly large amount of in the staging area so we need all the help we can get. Also does a good job of combating the negative effects of Rider of Mordor and Power in Their Terror.

Unexpected Courage - Good on any of our heroes and we don't have enough Fast Hitches for all the hobbits anyway. Aragorn is likely to want one of these so he can use all of his stats each turn.

A Test of Will - There are a few things we'd like to cancel in the encounter deck, particularly Piercing Cry and Unwanted Attention. The When Revealed on Squint-eyed Southerner is not a bad choice either.

A Very Good Tale - There are a number of high value allies we wouldn't mind grabbing with this. We get extra value by using Ranger of Cardolan or Gandalf in the refresh phase before they leave play.

Daeron's Runes - Excellent card draw as ever. We can get even more value by playing while Steward of Orthanc is in play.

Deep Knowledge - Basically free card draw, but it really is free if we can use Aragorn afterwards to reset our threat. We want the card draw as much as any deck.

Legacy of Númenor - It can take a little while for our deck to get going with resources, one of the difficulties with playing tri-sphere. Legacy gives an amazing boost in the early game and it also brings us that much closer to engaging Bill Ferny. Thanks to Frodo we even get one more resource than usual.

Sneak Attack - Strong as ever. Obviously the ideal partner is Gandalf, but most of our high cost allies can make great use of it.

I once again chose Land of Shadow Frodo Baggins for this quest. There are plenty of effects (including the Nazgul) which punish the ring being exhausted, so having the ability to use the Ring after staging is a big bonus. The extra early game is nice too.

I never seem to get use out of The Road Darkens version (and he's useless against Immune enemies like The Witch King anyway). As above, I'd rather not be using the Ring before staging, so Mountain of Fire Frodo is out. The Black Riders version would be my second choice, but it can be a risk. On the other hand, it's a pretty good answer to the double Nazgul opening.