Quest 45: The Dread Realm

Victory on the First Attempt! 


The Deck

Once again, I decided to test Seastan's Boromir against one of the more difficult Angmar Awakened cycle quests. This was actually done between attempts 3 & 4 of The Battle of Carn Dum, with the goal being to not fail against that quest so many times in a row I become demoralized. I actually ended up pulling a victory here, which even further helped with moral.

Seastan's Boromir

Heroes
Boromir (The Dead Marshes)
Galadriel (Celebrimbor's Secret)
Glorfindel (Foundations of Stone)

Allies
Arwen Undomiel (Watcher in the Water) x1
Bofur (The Redhorn Gate) x1
Galadriel's Handmaiden x3

Warden of Healing x1
Gandalf (Core) x3

Attachments
Gondorian Fire x3
Gondorian Shield x3
Ancient Mathom x3
Blood of Numenor x3
Light of Valinor x3
Mirror of Galadriel x3
Unexpected Courage x1
Asfaloth x1
Steward of Gondor x3
Nenya x3

Events
A Test of Will x2
Dwarven Tomb x2
Elrond's Counsel x3
Hasty Stroke x2
Daeron's Runes x2
A Good Harvest x3

Sets Used
Core
A Journey to Rhosgobel
The Dead Marshes
The Redhorn Gate
The Watcher in the Water
The Long Dark
Foundations of Stone
Heirs of Numenor
The Steward's Fear
Assault on Osgiliath
Celebrimbor's Secret

RingsDB Link


Fantastic deck with every card playing its role. Horn's Cry might have been welcome for this quest. Not to prevent damage to Boromir, but to allow a round of attacks to possibly go undefended and thus save the threat increase Boromir would give at that point. And, along those lines, Favor of the Valar would also be a welcome sight. As always, the tricks is figuring out what to swap out.



The Journey

Set Up
No Steward in my opening hand, but I do have: Gondorian Fire, Nenya, Asfaloth, Elrond's Counsel, Mirror Galadriel x2. I like a lot of what I see and figure the Mirror will (hopefully) let me fish out the remaining pieces. It will be tricky to get A Good Harvest & Steward in my hand at the same time, but this is just a first attempt and I am pretty open to risk on these.

Round 1
I start equipping Boromir with some Gondorian fire and Galadriel with Nenya. The Mirror is kept in hand. I want Galadriel to save her resources to pay for Asfaloth during round 2. No worries about the single Reanimated enemy in play, who is quickly dispatched by Boromir.

Round 2 

I buy some more time with Elrond's Counsel and get Asfaloth & the Mirror down. No Steward & A Good Harvest waiting at the top of my deck, but there is a Gondorian Shield. The second Mirror is randomly discarded (yes!) and the shield goes onto Boromir. Now the threat of those reanimated enemies are basically removed. A good amount of progress makes its way onto Stage 1.

Round 3
Steward of Gondor is drawn into hand! I want to wait to use the Mirror until I have more cards to optionally discard. Asfaloth clears a location in the staging area and more progress goes on the quest.

Round 4
And the draw is...A Good Harvest. Well, there we go. Slap that Steward onto Boromir and throw down a Gandalf to use for card draw. Boromir gets his second copy of Gondorian Fire. A few enemies are Reanimated and taken out by Boromir, clearing up the board but taking my threat to 30. Could have used Gandalf for the threat reduction, but I want to get Boromir voltroned-up ASAP.

Round 5
I use A Test of Will on Death and Calamity, wanting one less curse out and to mitigate the amount of times I am readying Boromir. Galadriel drops my threat a bit and I pick up a Handmaiden. This is great, since every point of threat will count from this point on. As it is, there are a handful of Reanimated enemies to deal with as well as Daechanar. Boromir takes a few damage from Daechanar and he (with a little help from Glorfindel) cleans up most of the board.

Round 6
After getting the Handmaiden into play (reducing me to 35 threat), I use the Mirror to dig up a Blood of Gondor for Boromir. With Blood & Fire both activated, Boromir is able to defend without taking a beating and able to clean up the handful of enemies who have made their way onto the board. Threat is now up to 39.
 
Round 7
The Mirror digs up an Unexpected Courage, which is going to save me at least one Boromir threat increase per round. Really valuable right now. This + only a few enemies allows me to keep the increase minimal and I end the round at 42 threat. The last curse has been discarded and, barring an unfortunate staging next round, I can take out Daechanar.

Round 8
Restless Evil comes down and I reanimate another card. Still, Boromir is able to pump up enough to destroy Daechanar! A little bit of strong questing and we should be good to go.
 
Round 9
I am able to get another Handmaiden in play, then go all in and reveal...Cursed Dead! Dude! These guys always come out when I think victory is just in site. Still, I get Altar of Midwinter out out of the way. I spend my actions defending the plethora of enemies attacking me, but opt not to take them out. I end the round at 45 threat and am happy there. Doomed is a keyword in this quest and would hate to throw the game down the drain just to have a clear board.

Round 10
I quest hard, nothing crazy comes off of the deck, and victory is mine!


Final Scoring
9 Completed Rounds x10: 90
Ending Threat: 45
Total Damage on Heroes: 3 (Boromir: 2, Glorfindel: 1)
Threat of Defeated Heroes: 0
Victory Display: -15 (Daechanar: 10, Altar of Midwinter: 5)
Total Score: 84


The Recap

Once again, this is a "beatable" kind of tough and one that I appreciate. The encounter deck puts on a heavy amount of pressure via the Reanimation mechanic. For every small enemy it spawns out, you need to commit 2+ actions to deal with it. This makes the game a race for action advantage. Now, Boromir handily takes care of that. In fact, my playthrough became more of a race against the threat dial than the encounter deck.The Reanimation mechanic was also a great way to use your own deck against you (stop hitting yourself) and makes adding that 1x of a card a risky move. Even more than The Battle of Carn Dum, here is a difficult test I would enjoy bringing more strong decks up against in the future.