LotR 213 - The Lost Road (1)

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I had intended on digging into The Battle of Laketown today, but I found that I had misplaced my Elrond/Vilya deck. I wasn't necessarily going to use it for the quest, but it bothered me a lot, and I had to stop everything else I was doing to find it. As it turned out, I had more or less torn down that deck, and stashed Elrond, Vilya, and a few other cards in with my duplicates and alt-art cards. By the time I figured all this out, I had decided to start the Ninjadorg scenarios instead.

Starting with The Lost Road, the first of a sequence of 6 quests, requires building a single hero, single sphere deck, preferably limited to Core cards, which I've done with the deck I built for the first scenario: Ninkadorg - The Lost Road.

After mulligan, initial hand from a small, Leadership deck:

  1. Snowbourn Scout
  2. Faramir
  3. Son of Arnor
  4. Steward of Gondor
  5. Faramir
  6. Gandalf

Not too bad, would like to have had Celebrian's Stone as well, but with Steward I'll be able to play it quickly.

With a single hero, starting threat is 12, so I can let some things build in the staging area for a round or two.

There is no initial staging set up, which is good.

Round 1

  1. Resource: 1, draw Gandalf.
  2. Planning: none.
  3. Quest: none, draw Dol Guldur Orcs for no effect, there is no one committed to the quest. Threat 14.
  4. Travel: none.
  5. Encounter: Dol Guldur Orcs.
  6. Combat: Aragorn will defend this one, shadow The Necromancer's Reach for no effect. Nice to get rid of one of those early in the game. No damage on Aragorn.
  7. Refresh: Threat 15.

Round 2

  1. Resource: 2, draw For Gondor!
  2. Planning: Play Steward of Gondor.
  3. Quest: none, draw Enchanted Stream, Threat 17.
  4. Travel: none, can't draw with Enchanted Stream active.
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: Aragorn defends again, shadow Dol Guldur Beastmaster for no effect.
  7. Refresh: Threat 18.

Round 3

  1. Resource: 5, draw Snowbourn Scout.
  2. Planning: Play Snowborn Scout x2 clearing Enchanted Stream.
  3. Quest: Aragorn, pays 1 to ready, draw Necromancer's Pass Threat 19.
  4. Travel: going to risk losing good cards, and travel to Necromancer's Pass: discard For Gondor! and Faramir. No big deal, semi-lucky
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: Snowbourn Scout defends, shadow Forest Spider, and I have to discard Steward of Gondor. That stings! Aragorn kills Dol Guldur Orcs.
  7. Refresh: Threat 20.

Round 4

  1. Resource: 4, draw Steward of Gondor, excellent.
  2. Planning: Play Faramir. Expensive, but hopefully I can get a couple more rounds from Steward and build up my cash again.
  3. Quest: Faramir, draw Forest Gate net 0 on Threat.
  4. Travel: none.
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: none.
  7. Refresh: Threat 21.

Round 5

  1. Resource: 3, draw Sneak Attack.
  2. Planning: none.
  3. Quest: Aragorn, Faramir for 4, draw Chieftain Ufthak. I'm going to Sneak Attack Gandalf in right here committed to the quest, and drawing 3 card: Valiant Sacrifice, Sneak Attack, and Steward of Gondor. This clears Necromancer's Pass.
  4. Travel: Forest Gate, which is probably not the greatest move, but we'll see how it plays out.
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: none.
  7. Refresh: Threat 22.

Round 6

  1. Resource: 4, draw Ever Vigilant.
  2. Planning: none.
  3. Quest: Faramir, Aragorn, and I have forgotten that I only stage on odd turns, so I'm not going to draw any cards this time, and quest with Aragorn, Faramir to clear Forest Gate and draw Gandalf and Guard of the Citadel. Where are the Celebrian Stones!
  4. Travel: none.
  5. Encounter: none.
  6. Combat: none.
  7. Refresh: Threat 23.

Round 7

  1. Resource: 7, draw Sneak Attack.
  2. Planning: none.
  3. Quest: Aragorn & pay to ready, Faramir, draw Dol Guldur Beastmaster. Sneak Attack Gandalf committed to the quest to put 4 damage on Dol Guldur Beastmaster and clear Stage 1.
  4. Travel: none.
  5. Encounter: Dol Guldur Beastmaster.
  6. Combat: Snowbourn Scout defends, shadow The Necromancer's Reach, excellent! Play Valiant Sacrifice to draw Valiant Sacrifice and Ever Vigilant. Legolas swings for 3, killing the beastmaster, and clearing Stage 2.
  7. Refresh: Threat 24.

Round 8

  1. Resource: 8, draw Ever Vigilant. This is going to win the game right here. (Turns out I don't need it.)
  2. Planning: Play Gandalf, 4 hits on Dol Guldur Orcs.
  3. Quest: Faramir, Gandalf, Aragorn for 8, draw Forest Gate, and that clears Stage 3 for a win.

AAR

Once in a while it feels nice to absolutely pummel a scenario. I could have beaten this one faster, too, had I not forgotten that staging only occurs on odd rounds. I only remembered to not staging on Round 6. It might be worth playing this again to see how fast I can beat it playing it correctly.

Then again, the Encounter deck definitely softballed me. Slow pitch too. Super easy draw given there are a some moderately nasty cards given restriction to core cards.

Deck: Ninjadorg - The Lost Road

Hero (2)

Ally (15)

Attachment (6)

Event (12)

2 Heroes, 33 Cards Cards up to Core Set

Decklist built and published on RingsDB.

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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.