Middle-Earth Arcade: Space Invaders 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

Space Invaders was released in 1978, which makes this year the 40th anniversary! What better way to celebrate than to create a Space Invaders-themed deck?

In Space Invaders you must shoot down the aliens before they land and spell DOOM for your entire planet. OK, now you see where I'm going with this.

Those aliens stay high up in the sky (staging area), and their slow descent toward you is an ever-present threat, like, say, the number 50 on your threat dial. This deck symbolizes that conflict by keeping enemies in the staging area, using Doomed to make the whole table feel the threat, and shooting enemies down before they reach you.

Mechanically, keep enemies in the staging area with Noiseless Movement, Advance Warning, and recurring those cards with Scroll of Isildur. Erebor Hammersmith then helps you recur the scroll. Take No Notice is also helpful. Note that with a Fellowship Frodo or a Baggins sphere Bilbo hero under your control, this card is free to play.

Not a pure solo deck, but for some fun I actually tried it in pure solo. I was able to defeat Flies and Spiders (2nd try, no enemies engaged) and The Seventh Level. Flies and Spiders was tricky because you need to raise your threat to use Bilbo's Ring, so you can hit 50 very quickly. In two-handed play, I defeated The Drowned Ruins (on the last possible turn: aliens almost landed) and Journey Down the Anduin. I then tried Battle of Carn Dum and threated out on round 2. Yippee!

Some notes about piloting: Gríma will always quest. Faramir typically quests in the early game, but attacks once he has Great Yew Bow. Haldir of Lórien can quest or attack early on; you won't really be able to kill anything until you've got one or two Ranger Spears on him, but you can chip away at things.

Ithilien Pit allows heroes from other decks to join in the shooting fun. Ranger Spikes is another way to keep an enemy in staging without having to waste an event.

Scroll of Isildur puts cards on the bottom of your deck. Even with as much draw as this deck has, I never drew down to the bottom of it. I recommend holding Heed the Dream back until you've got 1 or 2 useful events on the bottom of your deck, then Heed the Dream can shuffle it for you.

If you have the table support, you can drop Take No Notice and sub in Arrows from the Trees. Warden of Healing can also be dropped if the quest does not include much direct damage. Take No Notice is nice, but less useful later in the game.

Keys of Orthanc is of course a very important card to see early on. When you play a 1-cost card and use Grima, you essentially gain a resource (play card for 0, gain a resource from the Keys). Playing a 2-cost card in this way means you break even.

This deck is well-paired with high willpower decks. And best in a 2-player game, where Noiseless Movement might be enough and you don't have to recur Advance Warning every turn (you won't be able to pull that off). If you have other heroes hanging around ready for combat, great, but if the deck is doing its job, you won't need defenders.

For a novel experience, play this deck. Best against quests without forced engagement through quest card or treachery effects. Tell you buddy in advance what you're planning because... well, you're polite.