To Ride the Winds 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

Both Eagles and Rohan like to leave play, so why not combine them together with The Last Alliance to take maximum advantage of cross-trait synergies?

Ways to discard Rohan and Eagle allies:

• Morwen Steelsheen
• Allies that discard themselves: Westfold Horse-Breaker, Escort from Edoras, The Riddermark's Finest, Vassal of the Windlord, Winged Guardian
• Chump block.

Benefits of discarding Rohan (or cheap Eagle) allies:

• Trigger leaves play abilities.
• Replace the ally using Thengel's ability.
• Possibly ready Gwaihir, use Morwen Steelsheen, draw a card with Horn of the Mark, or power up Eagles of the Misty Mountains.

You can cycle an ally once a turn with Gamling, as well.

For card draw, we have lots of pullers: The Eagles Are Coming!, Mustering the Rohirrim (good to fish out Morwen or Gamling), Westfold Horse-breeder, and of course Thengel. Another option could be Need Brooks No Delay, but tactics resources are scarce and it costs 2 unless you use TLA on it.

Threat can be a problem since you start at 36. I've chosen to use Favor of the Valar (neutral is nice), but the presence of Landroval also opens up a rare case for using The Fall of Gil-Galad -- pop it on Gwaihir, chump, and drop 13 threat! Other standard options would be Secret Vigil or The Galadhrim's Greeting, but for this deck I want to maximize space for allies so went with these big-hitters. You could probably drop a Steed of the Mark and 1 Mustering the Rohirrim to make room for more threat reduction if needed.

The fun part of the deck is deciding when and how to use The Last Alliance each turn. Use it on Gwaihir? On Theoden? On The Eagles Are Coming! or Mustering the Rohirrim? On Eagles of the Misty Mountains? On the Horn? On Eomund? Lots of great options.

The other fun part is deciding who should leave play when and how in order to maximize the ally discount from The Last Alliance.

An example starting turn:

• Play Westfold Horse-breeder for 0 or Westfold Horse-Breaker for 1 (thanks to Theoden).
• Play Vassal of the Windlord or Wilyador for 0 (thanks to TLA).
• Have resources left for A Test of Will, Snowmane, Steed of the Mark...
• Quest for at least 8.
• Dump a Rohan ally to play Morwen Steelsheen or to ready a hero if the Westfold Horse-Breaker, at this point can use TLA to ready Gwaihir. Get another Rohan ally with Thengel.
• OR chump block with the cheap Eagle and ready Gwaihir. If Vassal of the Windlord is replaced with Winged Guardian, then after the Guardian defends it can be allowed to discard itself to trigger Thengel.