Solo Reducing Party (beat Carn dum and Helm's Deep solo) 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

Hi there, here is a powerful ally swarm deck featuring reducing heroes Grima and Hirgon (and Eowyn because she is just always good). It beat Escape from Umbar, Helm's Deep and Carn Dum (all solo) among other quests and is meant to be played in true solo.

Hero lineup

For a while Hirgon decks have been flying around the meta. But while I like to play the classical Hirgon-Theoden-Eowyn deck, I always thought that card draw was the achilles-heel of the deck since the Tactics' access to card draw is mostly limitred and conditional (e.g. Foe-hammer). Lore meanwhile has access to cheap and unconditional card draw very easily (e.g. Daeron's Runes, Deep Knowledge) which speeds up any deck and makes it more consistent. That is why I decided to add a lore hero and who better than Grima. Not only does he give us access to the lore sphere at a relatively low threat cost, he is also able to speed up the ally swarm with his cost-reducing ability and is able to generate resources with the very poewrful Keys of Orthanc. His threat acceleration is not that much of a problem since you start at only 24 threat and don't have other players to complain about doomed. If you want to play the deck in multiplayer though, I would add Pippin instead of Grima and add Peace, and Thought instead of the keys. Eowyn is just a stellar quester which the deck desperately needs and provides us with low starting threat, a potentially game-saving ability and a Tactics resource every round. Hirgon of course is a lso very good and insures a cheap and efficient ally swarm.

Strategy

The deck is very much straight-forward to play. There is no "one card" you need to mulligan for but great cards to have in your starting hand are Henamarth Riversong (in my opinion one of the if not the best card in the game in solo) or Elf-stone along with a great ally like Legolas or Boromir. Otherwise, you nearly never get any "bad" starting hands since the deck mostly consists of many great Tactics allies and you are able to get them out quickly with your reducing heroes.

Boromir is an ally who I found to be fantastic in the deck. Your low starting threat will normally ensure his ability is active during the first few turns and later he becomes a combat readying machine with Raiment of War.

Which brings us to Raiment of War in general, an attachment I found incredibly useful. It turns already great defending allies like Boromir, the Defender of Rammas or Déorwine into defending powerhouses which you need to build up a board. If you lose an ally a turn, your swarm will be limited but with defending towers like said allies you board can increase in size and strength.

That's basically it strategywise. As I said, the deck is not very difficult and the combos are very basic. Anyone should be able to play this deck to great effect.

Sideboard

As already mentioned, Pippin and Peace, and Thought are replacements for when you are playing multiplayer. The Tactics allies would all fit into the deck as well, but I think the allies already in the deck are generally more effective. If you want to add some of them anyways (to say it in the fantastic words of Shia LaBeouf) JUST DO IT. The allies with two are there when you experience your questing power is not sufficient.

Overall, a fun and easy deck to play that can tackle extremely difficult quests, especially in solo.

ENJOY!!