LotR 107 - The Long Dark (1)

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Deeds of Dwarves takes on The Long Dark. These first plays are always extra exciting as I do not read the quests or look at the encounter deck before playing. So I have absolutely no idea what I'm getting myself into.

Initial hand:

  1. Forest Snare
  2. Bifur
  3. Narvi's Belt
  4. Dwarven Tomb
  5. Forest Snare
  6. Dwalin

Not a great initial hand, but since I have Narvi's Belt, I think it's worth a go. If I get a little bit lucky on the first couple of turns, it should be all right. We'll see!

Encounter set up: discard Foul Air to reveal The Mountain's Root for Threat X, which will be 2 in this case. This is decent, could be hugely worse I suspect.

Round 1

  1. Resource: 3, draw Miner of the Iron Hills, not so useful, really need some Leadership mojo here.
  2. Planning: play Narvi's Belt on Thorin.
  3. Quest: Ori for 3 Will, draw Burning Low for net 0 on the quest. That's fine.
  4. Travel: The Mountain's Roots.
  5. Encounter: None.
  6. Combat: None.
  7. Refresh: Threat 32.

Round 2

  1. Resource: 4, draw Untroubled by Darkness.
  2. Planning: play Miner of the Iron Hills.
  3. Quest: Ori and Miner for 4 Will, draw Goblin Follower. The Mountain's Roots is cleared, net +3 Progress.
  4. Travel: none
  5. Encounter: Goblin Follower is engaged.
  6. Combat: Thorin will take this as undefended, and let's hope no Shadow here…draw ROck Adder! Discard Miner of the Iron Hills. Bummer, but could have been a lot worse. Thorin and Dain kill Goblin Follower.
  7. Refresh: Threat 33.

Round 3

  1. Resource: 5, draw Gandalf.
  2. Planning: none.
  3. Quest: Ori, draw Gathering Ground, no effect as no locations in Staging Area. Net +3 Progress to quest.
  4. Travel: none.
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: none.
  7. Refresh: Threat 34.

This is pretty cool, but I do need to get some allies out there to get the Dwarf Swarm started. This just isn't cutting it! A weakness of the deck is the number of Lore/Spirit when those cards come up early. Super strong when they come up later.

Round 4

  1. Resource: 8, draw Parting Gifts. Bummer.
  2. Planning: none, save for 1 more round.
  3. Quest: Ori, draw Zigil Mineshaft. Play Cave Torch and draw Silent Caverns. Raise Threat to 36, clear Zigil, net +3 Progress.
  4. Travel: none.
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: none.
  7. Refresh: Threat 37.

Things could get very hairy, very quickly, I don't have any allies out.

Round 5

  1. Resource: 11, draw Sneak Attack.
  2. Planning: Going to have a pay a lot to get some allies out. There is no help for it. Playing Dwalin and Bifur, but not going to use Bifur's draw. I hope I don't lose either of these this round.
  3. Quest: Ori and Dwalin for 5 Will, draw The Mountain's Roots for Threat 2, net +3 Progress with 12/13 on the quest. This scenario is taking it very easy on me.
  4. Travel: The Mountain's Roots.
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: none.
  7. Refresh: Threat 38.

Round 6

  1. Resource: 9, draw Gandalf and King Under the Mountain.
  2. Planning: Play King Under the Mountain on Dain. Exhaust to draw Kili and Erebor RK, keep Kili and play using Narvi's Belt to get Fili on the table. Now we're doing well, can soak up some attacks.
  3. Quest: Ori, Fili, and Kili for 7 Will, draw Burning Low for no effect! The Mountain's Roots and the quest are cleared, on to card 2B: Locate test, discard Parting Gifts draw Dwarven Forge for a PASS.
  4. Travel: none.
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: none.
  7. Refresh: Threat 39.

Round 7

  1. Resource: 8, draw Henamarth Riversong and Forest Snare.
  2. Planning: play Henamarth and Scry Foul Air. Woooo that's going to be a tough one…
  3. Quest: All but Dain for 9 + 6 (Dain) for 15, play Untroubled by Darkness for +6 for 21, draw Foul Air and start discarding for Locate Test: Forest Snare draw Goblin Warlord, Forest Snare again and draw Cave Spider, Dwarven Tomb draw Abandoned Mine for PASS. And that's a win.

This quest is rated a 7, but somehow I managed to slip right through the cracks. I could see how with more players, this thing could be really, really tough once things started backing up.

I'm due to lose something really badly.

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What to play next?

Deciding what to play next is always a tough call when faced with a closet full of games, all of which were purchased with intent to play. Here's one I'm dealing with the decision.

  • Something New: this means both something new to me and a game which has been published recently, within the last two or three years.
  • Something Classic: I've acquired a number of games properly considered "classic" which haven't yet been played. The current example would be PanzerGruppe Guderian.
  • Something Again: mastery requires constant practice, which means playing games many, many times to allow nuance to appear.
  • Something Vietnam: as I'm on a Vietnam binge. I don't have all the Vietnam games ever published, but I can say that I have a lot of them, and probably more than most people.
  • Something Obscure: as it's fun to poke around in the dustier corners of game design.
  • Something Different: break away from the same old publishers and try a game from one of the new kids on the block. Or, conversely, dip into legacy with a classic tried and true.
  • Something Light: once in a while it's nice to actually finish a game all the way through in one sitting, in an hour or two.
  • Something Heavy: if possible, it's nice to set up something big and complicated which can be left out for days or weeks or even months, for a leisurely stroll through a very large or long game.

There are surely many more ways to choose, but the above method keeps me busy enough, helps me get both breadth and depth into my play, and provides me with a sense of progress.

The odd man out

When there is an odd man out:

  • Have a solo game ready to play.
  • Keep score or advise on a game in progress.
  • Referee a game in progress.