Seven Heroes, True Solo 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

One Deck, Seven Heroes
Two-handed solo play is great, but sometimes you don't feel like piloting two decks. Do you ever wish you could get the true solo experience, but still control 6 or 7 heroes? Wish no further! This deck allows you to control up to 7 heroes while playing true solo:

• [Bond of Friendship](/card/22147) allows you to start with four.
• [Sword-thain](/card/10149) will bring you to five.
• Once you've completed three side quests, [Thalion](/card/19065) will take you to six.
• The extra starting hero in the saga quests will get you to seven.

Gimmick or Good Deck?
I built this deck on a lark, but it's actually pretty strong. Sure, Sword-thain is a gimmick, and the deck would be better without it, but Thalion pulls his weight. The side quests are all helpful, and since you start with 9 willpower (leaving Denethor back as a defender), they're not difficult to complete. Most of the cards in the deck cost just 1 or 2 resources, so it's not hard to build up your board state. The deck is fairly easy to pilot, and it's fun controlling so many heroes!

Win Rate
I tested the deck against A Shadow of the Past, the first quest in The Black Riders. It won three times in a row.

Mulligan: It's usually best to mulligan for Gondorian Shield to put on Denethor, your dedicated defender. But since there are only two copies (a restriction of the contract), the odds of a successful mulligan are lower than usual. So it would be worth keeping a hand with, say, Light of Valinor and Dúnedain Warning. Gléowine and Prepare for Battle are also useful to have in play early, since you'll be generating a lot of resources with all those heroes.

Early Game: Don't be afraid of using Éowyn's ability right away. In A Shadow of the Past, for example, you can quest with Eowyn first round, engage the Black Rider, defend with Denethor (ideally with Gondorian Shield), ready Eowyn, and take out the rider first round. Then you'll have a little breathing room to build up your board state. Use Frodo's ring to avoid drawing a Black Rider whenever possible.

Defense: With Gondorian Shield and a Dúnedain Warning or two, Denethor's defense can go as high as 7. Staff of Lebethron will let him discard a shadow card, though only against enemies with high engagement costs, so it's not always reliable. The Warden of Healing can restore him if he still takes damage. The cheaper allies can be used as chump blockers, too.

Threat: Your threat effectively starts at 31 thanks to Eowyn's ability. Not bad at all for four powerful heroes. Once your threat gets too high, you can use Aragorn's ability to reset it to 34.

Sideboard: As I mentioned, Sword-thain is a gimmick, so if you're content with just 5-6 heroes, swap it out for a 2nd copy of Treebeard and maybe 1 copy of Wilyador (mid to late game you'll have plenty of resources to keep Wilyador in play). Staff of Lebethron won't always be useful, so you could trade it out for 2x Dúnedain Watcher. It could also be worth trading out Keep Watch for an Elven Spear or another weapon for Glorfindel to go with his Rivendell Blade.