Dear Folco, lead us to Strider 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

Hey everyone !

I always wanted to play a Strider deck. The idea to have a small team doing extraordinary things always appealed me. You get the max out of Strider with 3 allies and 2 heroes on the table. So I tried to figure out the best team with such composition.

Heroes selection (and their attachement)

Éowyn takes Strider and the Golden Shield. When she is fully equiped, we have a hero who quest at 6 without exhausting and who is ready to defend at 7 afterward.

Sam Gamgee takes Steward of Gondor and Gondorian Fire. Since we begin quite low in threat. Sam usually quest at 3 and attack at a massive score in the same turn.

(What ? 2 heroes ? But with Folco Boffin, that makes 3 heroes ! Yes, but he is only a mean to get the card I want, It will be explained later)

Allies selection

Gandalf Hobbit is certainly a strong card. He quest at 4 without exhausting and is ready to attack at 4 or defend at 4 afterwards.

Treebeard is also one of the strongest ally available. He can quest decently at 2 and he is quite formidable in combat (4 / 3 / 5 hit points). Morover, he build-in untap mechanism.

Rosie Cotton is the only character in my selection who does not have an untap/not exhaust mechanism. She is to be considered as a sort of attachment for Sam Gamgee that provides him some versatility with a +2 in the stat of our choice depending on the situation.

Too few cards

These are the 7 cards I need to have a solid deck in both questing and combat. Even with 3 copies of each, that makes only 21 cards in the deck, which is not enough !

I will thus have to add unwanted cards. So to retrieve the cards I really want, I need draw cards. But the best drawing cards are

Here comes Folco Boffin

Folco Boffin allows me to add all the draw cards I want : Heed the Dream, Daeron's Runes, Deep Knowledge. And since I have Gandalf, I can even include Word of Command.

Another little advantage of the inclusion of Folco Boffin is the virtual decrease my starting threat by 2: he adds only 5 but I will decrease my threat by 7 when I will discard him. I usually discard him when Éowyn is in place.

Other inclusion

Secrecy

Since, there is a good chance we can play secrecy cards, I included Timely Aid to get Treebeard or Gandalf and Resourceful.

Out of secrecy / High threat

Sam Gamgee will not ready himself if we are too high in threat. Fast Hitch was included for that purpose.

Vanish from Sight allow you to play secrecy cards without paying the full cost.

cards

In order to be able to play after Folco Boffin is gone, I included Song of Wisdom

Gandalf Stuff

I included Shadowfax and Gandalf's Staff to complete the deck. These inclusion are nice but really not necessary.

Gather Information This is a super useful card when you have to get a piece of the combo.

Starting hand You are looking for Strider and Golden Shield in your starting hand. If you do not have the equipment of Sam, you will be able to handle yourself with one of the ally of the deck. Priority amongst the allies is Gandalf.

Testing

This deck successfully achieved Journey Along the Anduin (my crash-test Scenario) and Intruders in Chetwood. More test is still ongoing.

End note

If you have tested and enjoyed (or not) this deck, please leave a comment !

Thanks