Doom of Isengard 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

"But unless you have more skill even than Saruman, who has studied here long, you will find naught..." --Denethor, The Fellowship of the Ring

This starter pack contains everything you need to play a Doomed-themed deck for the Lord of the Rings: The Card Game.

Playing the Isengard Starter Deck

Saruman the White has studied the many arts of the Enemy for a long time. Ensconced in his tower, Orthanc, his mind is slowly twisted by the evil nature of his subjects. The Doomed keyword represents the danger of studying the Enemy too deeply, and of the risk inherent within great power.

Doomed raises the risk for an entire fellowship, but it provides significant benefits, either to yourself or to fellow players as well. Cards like Herald of Anórien and Steward of Orthanc have optional but tempting effects. And, of course, each instance of Doomed increases the power Saruman wields, enabling him to act again and again each round.

Ever-ready to heed the will of Saruman, cronies like Isengard Messenger and Soldier of Isengard instead react when Doomed is triggered by other effects, as Saruman's plans set other forces into motion.

Saruman's arrogance and pride grow ever-stronger, and it is difficult to keep him in check. Frodo Baggins should be paired with the Keys of Orthanc to ensure that he will always be able to mitigate some of the danger posed by the wizard. Saruman's Staff will also help in that regard--and keep any fellow players happy!

New Rules

Player cards with Doomed X: If a player card with the Doomed X keyword is played or put into play, each player must raise his threat level by the specified value.

Player Side Quests: [there's a lot of text for these, pretend I wrote it all out]

In this hypothetical revision, Soldier of Isengard and Orthanc Guard have both received errata to give them the Warrior trait.

This deck was inspired by a recent discussion I had over on Reddit, about what themes or traits would be suitable for a hypothetical second round of starter decks. I suggested a Doomed deck, and decided to give actually designing one that would be at least half-decent a go. The text above lays out some thoughts on how to play the deck (I tried to model it after the text that accompanies the extant starter decks), and here I want to lay out some of the design principles I had in mind as I was building and playtesting it.

First, I wanted it to be as similar to the official starter decks as possible. That meant no more than 50 cards in the deck (as my personal decks tend to run closer to 55), at least one copy of Core Gandalf, and between 31 and 34 different cards in total. I also included 1 extra hero and a small selection of thematic cards that could be swapped in as desired (for example, running Ally Saruman if Hero Saruman were replaced by Aragorn). The sideboard is so large in order to simulate the 3x copies of each card that would come with an actual starter deck. There are 34 different cards in total.

Second, I wanted to include only cards from non-Revised products--plus Core. This placed a severe limitation on my options, not in the Doomed cards themselves, but in the other cards I could use to make the deck actually playable. In the end, the realities of the game meant that I needed to include at least one armor card from Ered Mithrin, but I consider only conceding one card to be a win. The deck contains at least one card from each non-Revised cycle.

Third, I wanted the deck to be a useful purchase for many different players, regardless of playstyle. Therefore, when choosing which cards to add, my consideration was not only 'does this fit thematically' but also 'will this be useful in decks besides this one'. Those questions influenced the inclusion of cards like Warden of Healing, A Burning Brand, and Fast Hitch. They help make this deck function, and their presence may make the deck worth buying to any hypothetical buyers who want more options but aren't thrilled with the idea of Doomed.

So, yeah, that was my design philosophy. I'm open to comments and suggestions, but I'm pretty happy with the decklist itself and the cards I've chosen. While it could play better, it's not an entirely awful experience to pilot, so I hope anybody who takes it for a spin enjoys the experience!