Dúnedain 1.0

• Versions
• 1.0

Overview

I've decided to share some of the decks me and my friend group play with for particular cycles. This is Deck #1 in a 2-player fellowship, given to a friend of mine, while myself I'm playing the other deck. For more in-depth overhaul regarding structure and thought behind those decks please check out the fellowship description! (e.g. no shared cards in Decks #1, sticking strictly to the theme).

Choice for the main deck of the fellowship was rather obvious here with the Dunedain. This is the time when this archetype was introduced as well as the whole narrative revolves around those rangers. So the thing about this trait is that you want to have at least some enemies engaged most of the time, ideally with low . This gives various bonuses to your Dunedain heroes like Halbarad, provides massive discounts with Heir of Valandil or boosts some allies like Guardian of Arnor and Fornost Bowman. I'm not going to lie, this archetype is both hard to play efficiently and can be quite clunky sometimes. Keeping enemies engaged with you is a heavy burden so Dunedain decks first and foremost should be packed with defensive options. That be either defense boosting, reading effects, feinting attacks or canceling shadows. On the other hand this is a very rewarding and satisfactory playstyle when you almost always dance on the edge of the knife fighting hordes of enemies. Apart from your standard Dunedain engagement shenanigans, this trait offers also a lot more gameplay. Location control, signals, valour, even Aragorn voltron - there are many options to choose from. To offset more combat oriented part of this deck I've decided to include other niche of Dunedain which are side quests. This card type was also introduced in this cycle, so it's seems like a good idea to familiarize player with it now. All in all both of mechanics in this deck set it to be quite slow to start, requiring turtling early on, so be ready to give yourself more time with those scenarios.

Starting Hand

The only must have in your starting hand in this deck is a side quest which will be provided anyway by Thurindir. Apart from that I would say Heir of Valandil or Dúnedain Hunter are worth the mulligan. Dunedain allies can be very pricey so repeatable cost reduction is something you should be aiming for during the mid-game. Dúnedain Hunter however is a perfect card to accelarate your early game. I cannot stress how good this ally is. He is free, great offensive stats with large healthpool and triggers your abilites on turn one (e.g. Halbarad). Sure you have to bring out enemy for him to work but that's what you want to do anyway. What's even better is that you can bring with him usually not too dangerous enemy but with either surge or when revealed effect - and completely ignore it since you put it into play. Even if you get some big enemy at least you kickstarted Dunedain synergy and can chumpblock with him in most dire situation. So probably the worst scenario is when he completely whiffs.

Heroes

Aragorn makes a perfect hero for a combat part of this deck. Firstly, let's look at the stats. 2/3/2/5 make him basically good at everything so he is very flexible. Normally I'm not a fan of such a balanced statline without in-built reading, however Dunedain archetype requires you to be on your toes all the time so all of his attributes are handy. His passive ability is really nice, allowing you to finish of problematic enemies quicker. The second ability is often overlooked but it's also powerful in right situation. You can kill a weak or already damaged enemy with him and bring big enemy that was left in the staging. Then with the rest of your attackers you can kill it without it even attacking. Since other deck in the fellowship has very little combat means, after an enemy sneaks pasts you to them you can bring it back to yourself. Other thing worth mentioning is that access to in Dunedain is very crucial, mainly for Dúnedain Hunter.

Halbarad is a hero I think people glance over too often, espiecially in Dunedain decks. Very balanced statline, however he doesn't exhaust to quest when engaged with an enemy so at least two of his stats aren't wasted. Obviously you want to be engaged with an enemy as quickly as possible anyways. His second ability though can save a game in a multiplayer, espiecially in this fellowship. You want all the enemies on the board to yourself or to put it even better - the other deck doesn't want any enemies. With the ability to grab two of those optionally you can guarantee that the other deck is safe. is a staple in Dunedain decks so his inclusion is even more reasonable. While Amarthiúl can be also a good replacement, he appears in three quests in this cycle as an objective ally.

While the pick for the first two heroes was straightforwad, choice for the third one was trickier. What this deck struggled the most was card draw and to be specific the lack of it. So the third hero must have been . Between two Dunedain choices - Beravor and Thurindir - I've decided to go with the latter. Firstly, he can grab you a side quest from the get go which is really, really important, so you don't have to mulligan for it. Secondly his statline is more focused, meaning you should only quest with him, and the more side quests you do - yours and the encounter deck's - his grows significantly. While Beravor provides raw card draw her stats are more bloated and it requires her exhausting, so without some reading you are losing a hero action. Thurindir also starts with two less which actually might mean a difference between winning and losing in some harder quests. All in all I'm not sure which of those two is objectively better in this or a similiar deck, however Thurindir ties up nicely the sub-archetype of side quests here.

The Deck

Allies in this deck provide various means to keep your enemies engaged, finish them off and play into side quest mechanic. Due to some quests like Deadman's Dike, The Battle of Carn Dum or The Dread Realm I've tried not to include too many repeatable copies of those allies, however three of them excel to much not to include x3. Dúnedain Hunter was covered before. Guardian of Arnor is a great defender for bigger enemies. Sooner or later you will have to deal with boss-level foes and those guys can achieve comically high defense in right circumstances. They are the main reason you ever want to have more than 2 or 3 enemies with you. Sarn Ford Sentry is one of the main card draw mechanics in this deck. While it's a one-off, it can be really powerful when engaged with many enemies. Since card draw is a real struggle in Dunedain archetype I wanted to ensure seeing this ally as often as possible. Another noteworthy ally is Vigilant Dúnadan. This guy requires much more setup to be effective though. Costs 4 in , so you will need to have Heir of Valandil to reduce its cost. Then you have to clear a side quest to trigger his passive ability. Lastly, this side quest should be Keep Watch since with 2 and 3 he is not exactly the sturdiest. However. If you manage to do all that, and maybe throw a Round Shield on him in the meantime, he can defend some weak enemies forever. Think of little swarming enemies like Orc Grunts, Cursed Dead or Reanimated Dead. It's not all that rare you will have 5 or more of those engaged with either by choice or by fate and taking all those attacks undefended or declaring so many defenders can be cumbersone. Vigilant Dúnadan solves this problem nicely and he can even swing after all that for 3 .

Attachments are also important here. Heir of Valandil being the most important covers your financial problems. Real shame though it doesn't provide a resource match for allies like King of Dale. Then you have some weaponry like Warrior Sword and Round Shield but also traps. Forest Snare, Followed and Outmatched go into you play area where you keep your enemies. One great attachment that is often overlooked is Dúnedain Pipe. It can replace other copies of unique cards or maybe those cards that you don't need right now. It's fantastic for quests that interact with your deck or discard pile, like Deadman's Dike, since after using it your decksize stays the same.

We have three events here and all of them are very useful. Feint is a staple needing no introduction. Descendants of Kings can save you from a sticky situation, while Knowledge of the Enemy serves as a one time Heir of Valandil. It gives you resources straight up though, instead reducing cost of only allies, so you can use it to play something like Forest Snare.

Lastly there are side quests, which are a vital part of this deck. The strategy I would typically go for is to grab Gather Information with Thurindir and then get Keep Watch after clearing it. That way you can boost Thurindir some more. Another reason I prefer to play this way is that Gather Information is free and you might want to spend that first resource on something else and it requires 4 quest points to clear instead of 6. It might seem like not that big of a difference however those 2 progrees points might be hard to achieve and you typically want to clear those side quests in one round. If you already got Gather Information or Keep Watch in your starting hand, grab Heir of Valandil with the first one. Keep Watch is what I would say the main goal of this deck. With -1 you can defend much more safely against enemies. Prepare for Battle is there to fix card draw issue however it's not a top priority. Since encounter deck also throws side quests at you, firstly you should get them out of the way instead of attempting this quest card.

Conclusion

That pretty much covers the basics of this deck. Please keep in mind it is designed to play with the other deck in a fellowship and for a particular cycle in a game. This decks is meant to represent most powerful combination of cards in a given archetype, but feel free to leave a comment regarding them, as even after some years of using them I change them slightly after some thought :) Feel free to try them, even with new players as I did!