Bear Arms 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

I was intrigued by Imrahil13's Bearst deck, where the focus of Radagast was supporting Giant Bears rather than Eagles, and thought it looked like fun. Two Bears didn't seem enough though, so this is where I landed.

The general idea is once a bear is in play, it handle combat on its own as they can ready from Radagast's Staff, and then if necessary can ready using its own ability and be shuffled back in the deck. Rinse and repeat. The Messenger Raven is a fantastic card with Radagast as the ability to bounce in and out of play ensures he is able to quest unexhausted consistently, as well as provide card draw to find the bears and/or supporting cards.

For this deck I went with Gandalf and Éowyn to support the Bear/Raven combo, providing several elements that help it work.

• All heroes can contribute to paying for the bears, if you can get one on top of your deck by drawing or Wizard Pipe. If it's not on top of the deck but you do manage to draw Radagast's Staff or have Word of Command to find it, it can still be played turn 2 with Gandalf paying for the Staff and Eowyn/Radagast paying for the bear.

• Gandalf's ability ensures the Raven's card selection will never fail, ensuring that one resource every turn is equivalent to a card and a ready. This effect combined with Steward on Radagast means you can churn through your deck quite quickly.

• Gandalf enables use of his Staff to protect from shadow effects when defending using the Bears.

• Gandalf enables use of Narya to get even more uses out of Bears in play.

• Eowyns ability allows killing a big enemy turn 1 before the Bears are out, potentially freeing up an action to use Word of Command on either of the heroes.

• Eowyn can Thorongil into Éowyn to make use of the duplicate uniques and provide resources to help pay for the few Spirit cards in the deck.

• Eowyn's high willpower and low threat provide some early game breathing room while you find the pieces you need to set up.

The four main pieces of the deck are a Giant Bear, Radagast's Staff, Gandalf's Staff, and Messenger Raven, so that's what you're looking for in your starting hand. Word of Command can go find one of the pieces you're missing, and don't be afraid to underquest in the first couple of rounds if it means you can ensure the Bears get out sooner rather than later.

It's not the most competitive deck - the focus on Bears means there's not a lot of additional willpower hitting the table later on, so depending on the quest it can stall - but it is a hell of a lot of fun and I have very much enjoyed playing it.