A Shadow of the Past (Thematic) 1.0

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• 1.0

This is my attempt at a deck to take on the first scenario in the saga campaign: A Shadow of the Past. It uses Bond of Friendship to bring Fatty to the party. This means with Frodo, you will have 5 hobbit heroes, so Merry is automatically half way to being able to kill a black rider, Frodo's Intuition will fetch you a whopping 5 cards and exploring Bag End will bag you another 5 cards. Frodo's Intuition also grants you 5 for the round, which is excellent for dealing with hide tests and questing.

You won't find any cards that come from outside the Shire in this deck. That means you will only find hobbits allies. It also means no Staff of Lebethron or Dagger of Westernesse as these are items that the hobbits pick up later in their travels.

The only card that is slightly off theme is Bilbo Baggins as he is technically not in the Shire at this point but I've included 1 copy to ensure that we can get hold of a Hobbit Pipe as soon as possible. If you don't get Bilbo or a pipe in your opening hand, the idea with this deck is to use Raise the Shire to get Bilbo Baggins into play and search the deck for a Hobbit Pipe, then use Gather Information to find the other and get your card draw/threat reduction machine working. Place the Hobbit Pipes on Sam Gamgee and Frodo Baggins and the Spare Pipes on Fatty Bolger and Pippin.

A Fast Hitch should go on Pippin so he can defend multiple attacks with A Burning Brand to prevent any shadow effects going off. With a Hobbit Cloak on him and support from Rosie Cotton or Halfling Determination, he can defend for 5 so can fend off the black riders attack with ease. Gaffer Gamgee is also there to help prevent attacks when you need him. I often look for him with either Raise the Shire or Send for Aid early on to make sure I have some way of engaging black riders before Pippin has all his defences up and running. Another great target for Raise the Shire is Farmer Maggot as you will definitely have an enemy engaged with you and so his direct damage effect will trigger. The other obvious choice would be Rosie Cotton.

I tend to stick the other Hobbit Cloak on Fatty as he can defend for 4, which is all you need to defend a black rider if you complete Keep Watch, but you run the risk of succumbing to shadow effects if you defend with him too much - better to use Mr. Underhill or Gaffer Gamgee if Pippin isn't available to defend for whatever reason.

The overall strategy of the deck for this quest is to utilise side quests to avoid completing stage 1b until you have got your heroes fully established with their attachments. I tend not to put down many allies until stage 3 of the main quest and just make use of Frodo's Intuition and Smoke Rings to boost my heroes to power through stage 2 over two turns.

I'll let you figure out the rest...