Mounts and Songs ! 1.0

• Versions
• 2.0
• 1.0

Concept

Horses, songs, sacrifices... What's not to like ?

The goal of the deck is to support a "head on, don't-think-too-much, downhill" type of play : commit many characters to the quest, and yet still be able to deal with foes. A good example of that is Elfhelm's ability to simultaneously quest and attack the staging area. Combined with Battle-fury, he can deal damage 3 times while questing : first he attacks an engaged enemy, then commits to the quest (by spending the required resource), triggers his character action to attack an enemy in the staging area, and, if he has Firefoot, deals excess damage from his last attack to some engaged enemy. Another option would be Late Adventurer, which compensates for one of Elfhelm's weakness, namely his inability to target an enemy just revealed in the staging step.

Another type of "head-on play" involves questing massively without worrying too much about enemies, dealing with any unexpected visitor by discarding Grimbold or having the revealed enemy stuck in the staging area with Fresh Tracks, where it can later be intercepted by Elfhelm. Anchor Watch can be also used to defend with multiple questing heroes equipped with Armored Destrier, triggering Armored Destrier's readying ability.

Deck core

The deck core is Éomer + songs + mounts. Songs have a dual purpose thanks to Éomer : in addition to their intended effect, they buff up stats. This gives rise to some of the best bargains in the game. For 1 resource, Éowyn gets +2 from Windfola. For 2 resources, Éomer can defend twice at 3 , discarding 1 shadow card. With Anchor Watch, he can actually defend 3 times from a ready position, or defend twice from an exhausted position (usually from questing).

The rest of the deck is a Rohan ally build that can do many things from a questing position. Notably, Éomund can quest and still defend if you can target him with Anchor Watch, usually with the express purpose of having him destroyed in order to ready everybody.

The last important part of the deck is ally recycling through Gamling and Gúthwinë. (The latter, played on Elfhelm on top of Firefoot and Song of Battle gives Elfhelm 8 , enough to instakill most enemies in the staging area.) The intended purpose is to recycle Grimbold, or The Riddermark's Finest, while triggering Valiant Sacrifice and Éothain.

How to play

Playing Steward of Gondor and Song of Travel early on Elfhelm is a game-changer, and allows to compensate for the fact that there are mostly cards but only one hero. A good start would be Steward of Gondor + Westfold Horse-breeder + Armored Destrier (if not in the starting hand, then hopefully fetched with Westfold Horse-breeder).

During the game, the division of labor will usually be along these lines : Éowyn quests with Windfola, Elfhelm attacks/quests with Firefoot and Gúthwinë, and Éomer defends on the Armored Destrier (occasionally questing too, with Steed of the Mark allowing him to stay ready on defense).

Card discussion

For card draw, Valiant Sacrifice is a natural fit in a Rohan discard deck. As a bonus, Galadriel also triggers it. Elven-light is nice card draw on the side thanks to Éowyn's Noldoresque ability. For threat reduction, we use Double Back (combo with Rider of Rohan) and Favor of the Valar (neutral, so more affordable than The Galadhrim's Greeting, and Galadriel-friendly too). Faramir is there to shore up the rather thin ally lineup. He doesn't fit the "head on" motto (he hangs back and, rather than questing, boosts questing allies when necessary at the end of the staging step), but he fits somehow, because playing him is mostly no-brain. Steed of the Mark is a nice supporting mount that has the distinction of being unrestricted.

Sideboarding

This isn't a power deck, by any means. It is, however, quite adaptable. The main build is the one I used against The Steward's Fear, but the sideboard contains many cards that counter, for example, Journey Along the Anduin. To be noted, the deck is Hunting Party and Helm! Helm!-friendly. If you ever need a great defender/attacker, you can always sub in Golden Shield or Herugrim and play them on Éowyn.

After the nice theorizing, the testing

The main build is very tweak-friendly. In more profane language : don't expect it to perform extraordinarily well against all quests. With some of the sideboard cards, this deck can crush Journey Along the Anduin solo, and yet be left in the dust by a quest such as Steward's Fear (the main reason for the inclusion of The Riddermark's Finest, actually). Bottom line, it has a fun versatile core to build Rohan decks around.