Halbarad the G.O.A.T. (MD - Dúnedain Alternative) 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

This deck is part of Mormegil’s Deckbox, an effort to create an extensive catalogue of decks for the different archetypes, themes and playing styles available to players. Click here to check out the whole project.

Preferred Player Count: 2-4

Rating: .5

Premise

This is a quite fun deck utilizing Halbarad as your only hero to take two enemies per round with his double engagement ability and then never defends any of them, not killing them either and stacking them at your side permanently. How? You start by gaining the spirit resource icon through Song of Travel (which is fetched through The Grey Wanderer) and then afterwards playing either Out of Sight or Desperate Alliance to not have to defend any enemies (since - if you give Halbarad away during the combat phase - you can just choose to take enemy attacks undefended and they fizzle).

You then use Sarn Ford Sentry/äGandalf alongside Sneak Attack and Knowledge of the Enemy to sustain the combo, cycling your key attack prevention events with Dwarven Tomb (and later on with Will of the West if need be). Most cards fall firmly into the category of enabling the combo, however you then also have a few payoff cards to control other aspects of the game as well, such as Northern Tracker, Warden of Annúminas and A Test of Will.

How To Play

In my opening hand I like to have at least one way to prevent enemy attack (so either Desperate Alliance or Out of Sight) but even more importantly I prioritize seeing draw. Running out of combo-pieces due to lack of draw and therefore out of steam is usually how you lose the game, especially since (if you die), all engaged enemies return to the staging enemy, most likely losing the game for all other players. So seeing Deep Knowledge, Gandalf/Sneak Attack or Sarn Ford Sentry early on is also very useful. Pillars of the Kings is not needed most of the time, but if you have no other options, it can be a very useful hail-mary type panic-button to see more combo-pieces.

Considerations

Celduin Traveler and Misty Mountain Journeyman are decent includes if you want to contribute to questing early on already, however I usually found that usually not be a problem (since you are dealing with quite a lot of enemy pressure, the rest of your playgroup should have some resources free to quest). Fornost Bowman is great for quests where you need to kill something (e.g. for the quest to advance). Campfire Tales is a striaght include in 4-player-games for me, with me often already opting to take it in 3-player-games. Hasty Stroke is very clutch for quests with shadow effects punishing you even if the attack doesn't matter (e.g. shadow effects discarding cards from hand or raising your threat by a lot). Increases in attack or attacks made is not a problem, but there are a select few other nasty effects that I like to have a silver bullet in the sideboard for.

Enjoy!!!