Speed Outlands

Questlogs using this decklist
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Fellowships using this decklist
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Derived from
None. Self-made deck here.
Inspiration for
Flash Outlands 19 13 5 2.0
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Ecthelion III 197

Ecthelion III has a newer deck inspired by this one: Flash Outlands

After repeatedly banging my head against Raid on the Grey Havens solo, I finally got around to building a super-powered Outlands deck with my current card pool. I'm sure this hero loadout has been seen before; Denethor and Erestor, combined with Hirluin the Fair's ability to pay for any Outlands allies, allows the player to pump out multiple Outlands allies on the first turn and keep them coming.

The most obvious shortfalling of the deck is its lack of card recursion abilities of any kind; I don't own Men of the West or The White Council, and Will of the West is out of sphere, so there's only one shot through the deck. This means that a very specific opening hand is required, as it's catastrophic if the player draws too many Outlands allies in that 10-card opening hand and can't play them before they're discarded.

The solution? First, make sure that Hirluin gets the Gondor trait first turn. This is ensured by the two copies of Steward of Gondor as well as three copies of In Service of the Steward. (An extra In Service of the Steward can go on Erestor on a later turn.) Steward is preferred, as with it, Hirluin can get 4 resources per round--counting one contribution from Denethor each round. Additional resource-gaining cards such as Wealth of Gondor and Gaining Strength are included not only to provide early resources to play Outlands allies, but also to clog up that 10-card opening hand with free cards to prevent too many Outlands allies from being drawn. We Are Not Idle is also an amazing "clogger card"--it prevents too many Outlands allies from being drawn at once, but it also doesn't take up a deck spot once the deck is going and Hirluin is filled with money to pay whatever comes out of the deck.

The deck will tend to drop off in power toward the late game--once the Outlands allies are on the board, that's really all the player has to work with. But they'll usually come out in full force within an astounding 3 or 4 turns. Heed the Dream fits in perfectly to fetch a specific Outlands ally for a stat that the player is lacking in. Other miscellaneous cards include Ranger Provisions (a sleeper favorite of mine to provide even more resources) and Sword of Númenor (did somebody say more resources???). Protector of Lórien goes on Erestor or Denethor, depending on how many Dúnedain Warnings Denethor has accrued, and is used to dispense with any unnecessary cards such as duplicate copies of Steward of Gondor or In Service of the Steward.

3 comments

Feb 28, 2018 WingfootRanger 2634

Nice! I was also working on one of these decks just to get a feel for what modern aggro Outlands is like now. But the product you have here seems like a solid rendition. I just wonder, what about fitting in some healing? I find it is often nice to have ways to control damage until 2 or more Anfalas Herdsman are in play.

Feb 28, 2018 Ecthelion III 197

Thanks for the feedback! Sadly I don't own Warden of Healing, but Imladris Caregivers would fit in very well with the draw engine. I'd probably sub 3x of them in for 1x In Service of the Steward and 2x Sword of Númenor, or perhaps the 2x Quickbeams.

Mar 01, 2018 mekane 77

This looks like fun, I look forward to trying out some time. Thanks for sharing!