“In short: the game is not dead. It is alive and well, and the party shall go on a while longer.” – /
ALEP, https://alongextendedparty.com/2020/11/23/for-if-we-fall-who-shall-stand

Following the release of The Fortress of Nurn an uncertain future awaited the game. The game was in hiatus, it would be over a year until the Revised Core Set would be announced, and many players were left wondering what would be next.

Children of Eorl was the first deluxe box released by A Long Extended Party, a group of fans working together to continue releasing new content for players. CoE follows the model of official FFG content. It contains 3 scenarios (Ambush at Erelas, Battle for the Beacon, and the Horse Lord’s Ire) that begin the Oaths of the Rohirrim cycle, as well as new player cards for players to add to their decks.

Oaths of the Rohirrim centers on the people of Rohan who, despite their prominence in the books, weren’t ever fully fleshed out in the official FFG releases. There is perhaps no better example of this gap than when FFG released the Riders of Rohan starter deck with the Revised Content 2 of the 3 heroes were actually Gondor traited! The player cards in CoE, particularly Thengel, greatly boost the Rohan trait, while Oaths offers a full cycle set in Rohan as players delve into the nation’s messy politics.

It should be said that these quests are designed with more experienced players in mind and maybe a challenge for a new player with just a core set. For newer players, the Dark of Mirkwood Scenario Pack or one of the re-released official cycles with the added campaign cards is probably a better point of entry. However, for those looking to extend the game and take on a new challenge, this cycle not only presents a variety of interesting challenges for players to take on but also tells a fantastic story as well.

Ambush at Erelas

Found in: Children of Eorl deluxe, Scenario 1
Official difficulty: 5
Community difficulty: 5
Encounter sets: Ambush at Erelas, Rohan Weather, Rohan Encampment
Quest cards: 2
Play if: You want to start the Oaths of the Rohirrim cycle from the beginning, you want a combat focused quest with unique enemies, you like extended boss fights.
What’s different about this quest?: Looter Keyword, Boss Battle
Solo or multiplayer?: Both present their challenges. In solo, you have to handle the Ringleader boss yourself without sentinel/ranged support from other players. However, at higher player counts, the treacheries can take their toll, and quest objectives do scale with the player count.
Can I run side-quests in this scenario?: Yes! Players do not need to place progress on the quest in order to advance the quest and instead progress can be used to manage the loot piles of enemies and the Plundered Goods objective card. This is much more important in the second stage of the quest, so the first stage is a great opportunity to run a side quest or two.
What to look out for: Tough boss enemy that needs to be attacked with significant strength each round (ideally 8+), looter keyword that takes cards from a player’s hand, card effects that punish certain kinds of decks (ally swarm, cost, and sphere variety).

The Quest

Looter Keyword

This quest introduces new rules for the Looter keyword as well as Loot Piles, which are explained on the overview cards as well as the Plundered Goods objective card. When an enemy is engaged, it will add a card from the player’s hand as well as 0-3 cards from the top of the player’s deck, depending on the value listed next to the looter keyword on the enemy card. These cards are placed next to the enemy and constitute that enemy’s “loot pile.” These cards will often add negative effects to that enemy based on their cost and value (the actual text of the card is ignored). Once an enemy is defeated, one card from the loot pile will be added to Plundered Goods, which will increase the threat value in the staging area. One card will be returned to the player’s hand, and the rest will be discarded.

How well the players are able to manage this mechanic determines how successful they are in this quest. Because the first card in each loot pile will be pulled from the player’s hands, decks that are used to playing with empty hands are going to be at an advantage. Similarly, being able to play cards from the discard pile will also be very helpful. In both cases, Noldor is a great archetype for this quest because a Noldor player will often discard down to an empty hand, robbing the enemies of potential loot, and can later play cards lost to loot piles out of their discard pile. Alternatively, players will greatly benefit if they can kill enemies in the staging area before they engage a player and collect loot. All enemies (except the Ringleader) are susceptible to Gandalf. Leadership Eomer can kill the Sneaky Thief without any boosts in Round 1.

It’s also important to pay attention to what kinds of cards will give boosts to enemies. In general, less variety in sphere, card type, and cost will help limit the boosts enemies receive. Of these, the most important thing to pay attention to is card cost because of the Brigand Ringleader. Defeating him is the primary challenge of the quest, and it is easy for this fight to stall, given the limited amount of damage he can take and his healing abilities.

Setup

The scenario first instructs the player to set aside the Brigand Ringleader, a unique enemy that returns as a boss fight in the second stage of the quest. Plundered Goods is added to the staging area. This is an objective card that interacts with the “Looter” keyword introduced by this scenario and contains important instructions on what to do with the loot piles an enemy has collected when that enemy is defeated. This objective will also gradually add threat to the staging area as it collects loot cards.

Finally, each player is instructed to add a different enemy to the staging area. There are 4 enemies to choose from: Sneaky Thief, Vengeful Bowman, Grasping Slaver, and Pillaging Swordsman.

My first pick is always the Sneaky Thief. His stats are manageable, and it’s always great to pull a card with surge out of the deck. If you can handle the archery and/or kill him quickly, the Bowman has the most manageable stats. If you have a hero with decent defense, then the Slaver is a good option, but he can be punishing if you chump block him with an ally or run ally swarm decks. The Slaver does have the highest threat at 34 so many decks will have a couple of turns to prepare for him if needed. Finally, the Swordsman is manageable with low-cost cards in his loot pile, but since his attack is boosted based on the highest-cost card in his loot pile, he can be a potentially devastating attacker for unlucky players running high-cost cards. At least the Swordsman doesn’t punish chump blocks like the Slaver. Players will likely see all the enemies eventually, so make your choice. It’s time to begin the quest!

Quest Card 1: Drive them Away – No Quest Points

The first thing to notice about this quest stage is that it can not be completed by normal questing. Instead, the quest will advance once players have killed a certain number of enemies (1 + 2 per player). Progress can still be placed on this stage, and during the encounter phase, players can remove 5 progress from the quest to remove a card from a loot pile in play. This ability is not as important at this stage (and progress doesn’t carry over to stage 2), so if players would like to run a side quest, this is a great time to do it. This ability can be helpful, though, to manage the threat of Plundered Goods, especially at higher player counts.

Unless the player is playing the Dunedain archetype or similarly working to keep enemies around, they will often progress through this stage naturally. In the meantime, take the opportunity to build up your board state to prepare for the next round. Ideally, when advancing, players need to be ready to defend a 6-strength attack and then respond by attacking for 8 themselves. If you are struggling to withstand the attacks in the first stage, then the situation will not improve as you advance. Go side questing, get your board state ready, and in the natural course of combat, you should be moving on within a few rounds.

Quest Card 2: Ambush! – No Quest Points

Quest 2A instructs players to end the current phase. Often, this will be the combat phase since the previous quest is advanced by destroying enemies, but not always. In unique situations, this can be used to the player’s advantage. For instance, if Leadership Eomer is able to kill an enemy in staging to advance the quest and skip the rest of the quest phase. More often, though, this will simply stop some players from attacking in higher player counts. However, this isn’t all bad, given the final instruction is for each player not engaged with an enemy to search the encounter deck and discard pile to engage an enemy (which, of course, triggers its looter keyword). So if the combat phase ended prematurely and you did not get to attack, a small advantage could be that you would not need to add a new one. Also, take advantage of the fact that you get to choose your foe, so pick an enemy your deck can handle. As I said before, removing the Sneaky Thief and its Surge ability is typically my first choice, but depending on your deck, you may find another to be a better option. However, what will define this stage and really the whole quest is that the Brigand Ringleader finally makes his appearance and gets added to the staging area. He does not engage yet, but given his 0 engagement cost he will shortly.

Once flipped to 2B, this stage is very similar to 1B in that no progress is needed to advance the quest, and instead, progress can be used to remove a card from a loot pile. It is important to note that this action is now a Planning Action rather than an Encounter Action and that it also adds a huge benefit in that cards removed from an enemy loot pile can now be played at no cost rather than simply discarded. This action is very important at this stage, though, as players will likely need to use it to manage the Ringleader’s loot pile and limit his healing ability.

One final change to note is that enemies make engagement checks immediately upon entering play rather than waiting for the encounter step. While not using the keyword itself, this is clearly harkening back to the Ambush keyword in quests such as Road to Rivendell – which is appropriate given the name of the quest stage. The first player and those with high threat will want to watch for this as it could send several enemies to the same player at higher player counts.

Once the Ringleader is defeated the quest is over and the players win, but this task is easier said than done!

The Encounter Deck

No cards are removed for ‘Easy’ mode, but players are welcome to play it in Easy by giving their heroes an extra resource.
Shadow effects are on 60% of the cards, so cancellation is helpful, but most are not overly punishing if cancellation isn’t an option.
Surge is not a concern as it is only on 4 cards: the 3 Sneaky Thief cards and the Stockpile Barricade side quest. Most treacheries will surge, though, if they would have no effect.
Average threat is 1.65, but can vary due to the fairly high number of treacheries and side quests. Most enemies and locations are threat 2 or 3.
Archery is present thanks to the Vengeful Bowman, who will have an archery value equal to the number of different card types in his loot pile. There are only 2 copies in the encounter deck though.
The Abandoned Mill (2 copies in the deck) has Doomed 1 and is also immune to player card effects. This is the only location that is immune to player card effects, so clearing location cards while still in staging is an option.
In addition to the Abandoned Mill, the Brigand Ringleader is also immune to player card effects.

Enemies

Brigand Ringleader:If there is one thing players will remember about this scenario, it is the fight against the Brigand Ringleader. He comes in with high stats (6 attack, 3 defense, 10 health), is immune to player card effects, and can only take a maximum of 5 damage each round. Not too bad, you might think; it’ll just take two rounds to kill him … and that’s where the Forced ability comes in.
At the end of each round, the Brigand Ringleader adds the top card of the engaged player to his loot pile and heals damage equal to the number of different card costs in his loot pile. This means that each round, he is going to heal at least 1, meaning in the best-case scenario, it will take 3 rounds to defeat him. In the worst case, the players can find the fight grinding to a standstill as the Ringleader heals 3 or 4 of the maximum 5 damage they can do.
As mentioned before, if players want to build their decks to the quest (a necessity sometimes in this cycle), then reducing the variety in card costs will be helpful. You will be able to remove some cards from the Ringleader’s loot pile with the Quest action, but not having to rely on this (especially at low player counts where quest points may be harder to come by) is helpful. Still, the Ringleader makes a great, if not essential, target for the quest action at this stage. If the Ringleader is able to heal more than 1 or 2 a round, then this fight could take a long time.
If playing multiplayer, having ranged or sentinel support for the player engaged with the Ringleader is helpful. You will want to do the maximum 5 damage to the Ringleader every round, which means one player will be tasked with blocking a 6-damage attack and then dealing 8 damage in return. He can be chump-blocked with an ally (though some shadows will punish this), but over time, this could whittle away at the player’s ability to deal damage in return, which is vita
It should also be noted that his engagement value is 0, which means he is always going to be engaging players, and Hobbits especially are going to struggle to fight him as many of their abilities (Hobbit Cloak, Gaffer Gamgee, Leadership Sam‘s readying ability, etc.) won’t work.
Once you begin a round with at least 5 damage on the Ringleader, make one final push to destroy him and win the scenario!
Sneaky Thief: The Sneaky Thief has very manageable stats with only 3 attack, 1 defense, and 2 health. However, his ability will cancel any damage dealt to him if he has cards in his loot pile. Often, this could mean he sticks around for at least two rounds if only damaged in a traditional attack, as his loot pile will absorb the first blow. With a looter value of 0 the Thief will steal a card from the player’s hand, but not from the top of the deck. If playing with an empty hand (a good strategy in this quest if players can pull it off), then the Thief will have nothing to steal and can’t cancel damage. Direct damage is also helpful as it can remove his loot pile and make him vulnerable to a traditional attack. Finally, with only 2 health, he is a great target for direct damage to kill him before he engages. If playing leadership Eomer, you can kill him in the very first quest phase without needing to boost his attack.
Generally, the Sneaky Thief is the most manageable of the Brigands. The major downside of the card is that it is one of the very few in this quest with Surge. So, when given a chance to choose an enemy and put it into play, it makes a great candidate if for no other reason than to take the Surge out of play.
Vengeful Bowman: The Vengeful Bowman, while tougher than the Sneaky Thief, also has a manageable state line with 3 Attack, 2 Defense, and 3 Health. It comes as no surprise, however, that his main ability is to do archery damage. The Bowman has Archery X, where x is the number of different card types in his loot pile (ally, attachment, event). Often, this will give him archery 2, but particular decks such as 3 hunters or ally swarm may get lucky to have only archery 1. This ability is not threatening enough to build your deck around (you aren’t in the Druadan Forest), but it can be dangerous, particularly if players are already at low health due to treacheries like Exhausting Winds. With 3 health and 2 defense he can be dispatched fairly easily to remove the threat.
Pillaging Swordsman: At first glance, the Pillaging Swordsman seems fairly non-threatening, with only 2 attacks. His ability, however, allows him to add the cost of the highest cost card in his loot pile to his attack. Often, this will boost him to a 4 or 5 attack (assuming a 2 or 3 cost card), but if players run high-cost cards (such as Gandalf) and get unlucky resolving the Swordsman’s looter keyword, he can become very dangerous. Players may want to keep this in mind as they consider what deck to bring to this quest. High-cost cards (4 or 5) can not only make the Pillaging Swordsman dangerous but often add to the Ringleader’s healing ability as well since they add more variety in card cost. If Beregond is at the table, this may be less of a concern, but for other players, there is the benefit that he doesn’t naturally punish chump blocking (though shadows might).
Grasping Slaver: The Grasping Slaver has the toughest printed stat-line at 4 attack, 3 defense, and 4 health. The Slaver’s main ability is to punish chump blockers. He does 1 direct damage to the defending player for each ally in his loot pile, and if he kills an ally with his attack, then he adds that ally to his loot pile. Because of this, it is helpful to have a hero available to block, which should be manageable for any decent defender, given his attack of 4. There are only 3 cards in the deck (the Crossroads location) that boost attack value, so there is a relatively low risk of a significantly boosted attack killing a hero. At 3 defense and 4 health the Slaver is the strongest Brigand outside of the Ringleader himself.

Locations

Old Farmhouse – The two locations in the Rohan Encampment set (Old Farmhouse and Abandoned Mill) have abilities that, when the location is explored, bring another card into the staging area. In the case of the Old Farmhouse, once it is explored, either as the active location or in the staging area, the player is instructed to discard cards from the encounter deck until another location is discarded, and then that location is added to the staging area. Because of this, there is little for the players to gain by exploring this location and potentially much to lose, as the other locations are debatably worse than the Farmhouse since they will pull enemies from the encounter deck. If given multiple options of locations to explore this should be at the bottom of the list.
Abandoned Mill – The Abandoned Mill is similar to the Farmhouse, but when explored, it adds an enemy to the staging area rather than a location. The Mill also has Doomed 1. It only has 1 quest point but is immune to player card effects, so it will still need to be explored the traditional way by traveling to it. Because of its 4 threat, players will want to remove it from the staging area as soon as they can, but need to be ready for the extra enemy it will bring when explored.
Crossroads – The Crossroads will pull an enemy from the encounter deck and have it engage the first player (which will trigger the Looter keyword). This is similar to the Abandoned Mill, but with the Crossroads, it is a Travel condition rather than a Forced effect when explored, so if the players can remove it in the staging area with cards like Northern Tracker, Rhovanian Outrider, or Asfaloth, they won’t have to engage the extra enemy. If players can tolerate the threat in staging, they can also wait to travel here if the current first player is already overwhelmed with enemies.
Erelas Stables – The Erelas Stables has a Travel condition that has the players return an enemy engaged to the staging area. While preferable to adding a new enemy to staging, the challenge here is that this will allow the enemy to loot once again when it is likely re-engaged. The impact of this will depend on the enemy. For instance, if a Sneaky Thief is engaged and has a loot pile, then adding more cards to it will have no effect. The Bowman similarly would likely have little to gain and could make another good candidate. If players were planning to chump block the Swordsman anyway, adding to his attack with more loot also wouldn’t make a difference. What players want to avoid at all costs is returning the Ringleader to the Staging Area.
Erelas Gates – The Erelas Gates has the Travel condition that each player must choose an enemy and add the top card of their deck to that enemy’s loot pile. As with the stables, players will want to choose an enemy where this will have a manageable effect and avoid the Ringleader. As stated above, this choice will likely depend on the situation.

Treacheries

Exhausting Winds – Harkening back to Weather treacheries in previous quests like The Weather Hills or Redhorn Gate, Exhausting Winds and Cold from the Mountains seek to control ally swarm decks with expansive board states (looking at you, Gondor and Dwarves). Exhausting Winds does one damage to each character but does give some reprieve to decks with lots of cheap allies by exhausting allies with only one hit point remaining instead of destroying them. This is challenging enough in a quest with many tough enemies like this one, but at least if the player can survive until the refresh phase they can return to normal the next round without having their board completely wiped. This treachery can be very damaging but, thankfully, holds back a little bit so as not to rise to the “cancel or die” level of other treacheries in earlier cycles.
Cold from the Mountains – This treachery more directly targets ally swarm decks than Exhausting Winds. Any player with more than 2 allies discards 1. If that player has more than 5, they discard 2. It’s not the best, but the conditional nature of this effect offers a rare moment of kindness in an often unforgiving game. For some decks, like those running the Three Hunters contract, that runs low on allies anyway, this effect will do nothing and does not even surge if it whiffs!
Tired and Hungry – Tired and Hungry attaches to a ready hero as a condition that will exhaust that hero any time a location is explored. It would be most helpful to attach this to a hero who will often quest, leaving it exhausted anyway when a location is explored. However, since Tired and Hungry needs to be attached to a ready hero (meaning your questing heroes are likely already exhausted), this strategy is often unhelpful. There are some benefits here, though: Tired and Hungry can be attached to any hero and is not restricted to a particular player (like Song of Sleep), it doesn’t have restrictions against readying that hero, and it won’t even trigger each round if you are not exploring locations. Having condition removal helps, but if not available, this card is more manageable than many other condition treacheries.
Looted Weapons – Looted Weapons attaches to the enemy in play with the highest engagement and adds 1 threat and 1 attack per attachment in its loot pile. Furthermore, to help make sure there are lots of attachments in its loot pile, each player has to add an item attachment they control to that enemy’s loot pile when “Looted Weapons” is revealed. The Grasping Slaver and Pillaging Swordsman are the most likely targets for Looted Weapons as they have the highest engagement costs. Both of these enemies also already have high attack (4 for the Slaver and likely 4 or higher for the Swordsman), so this could make them very dangerous, especially at high player counts where more attachments are being added by the revealed effect. This will likely force the defending player to chump block if they weren’t planning to already, which can also trigger Grasping Slaver’s ability. Eliminating the enemy targeted by this treachery will likely become a high priority.
Depending on the player’s deck, perhaps the greater danger than the added damage is the lost item. If a player is relying on a key item, such as a shield on a defending hero or a staff on a wizard, to run their deck, then having it taken could leave them vulnerable. Thankfully, this is limited to item attachments, so it will not take titles like Steward of Gondor or rings like Vilya or Nenya, which could greatly hinder decks relying on those cards. It’s likely attachment-heavy decks like those running the Three Hunters contract will be able to spare an attachment (even if they don’t like it), but it is good to keep this card in mind so your strategy isn’t entirely based on a character defending with a shield that may go away. In general, this quest leans more towards punishing ally swarm decks that love to chump block, but this card in particular challenges other players who rely instead on well-armored heroes to carry the load.
The best thing about this card though is that the Brigand Ringleader will more than likely not be the target because of his 0 engagement cost.
Chaos in the Hills – Chaos in the Hills returns the enemy with the highest engagement cost to the staging area, which allows them to loot once again when they likely re-engage the player in the encounter phase. Like with Looted Weapons, the Ringleader’s 0 engagement cost is very helpful here as, more than likely, he will not be the target. In fact, because of both of these abilities, it would be smart to make sure players as a group are engaged with another enemy in addition to the Ringleader to ensure these treacheries have a target. Beyond that, this card is an annoyance, but it is far from the worst thing this quest will throw at you.

Side Quests

There are two encounter side quests included in this quest, and both are ones the player will want to clear as quickly as possible. Luckily, since players don’t need to place progress on the main quest, these side quests can often quickly be targeted and removed.

Exposed to the Elements – Exposed to the Elements forces players to reveal an additional treachery card each staging phase. This is quite thematic since the majority of the treachery cards are weather-related. The negative effects of these treacheries can really add up, so players will want to try to remove this quest as soon as possible. At least this card doesn’t have surge to add two encounter cards to staging this round!

Stockpile Barricade – Stockpile Barricade adds 1 Defense for each attachment in an enemy’s loot pile. You may get lucky and have an enemy not grab an attachment when resolving the looting keyword, but in that case, this quest forces that enemy to make an extra attack. This card doesn’t present as immediate a threat as Exposed to the Elements, but in a combat-heavy quest like this one, any boost to the enemies can be a challenge. If this is in effect when Looted Weapons is revealed, it can make for a very strong enemy! In the first stage of the quest, this is manageable, but in stage 2, players will want to remove this quickly. You want to be doing maximum damage on the Ringleader, and the boosted defense makes that very difficult.

Tips and Tricks

Because the Looter keyword always pulls a card from the players’ hands, it is helpful to have an empty hand so enemies have nothing to loot. Noldor is well-suited here, but even non-Noldor decks may want to include a card such as Protector of Lorien to help discard extra cards in their hands (as well as give their heroes a boost).

This quest punishes many different kinds of decks, so it is impossible to build a deck suited to all of them, but with the Ringleader taking center stage, preparing for his ability should be the first thing to consider in deck building. Having less variety in card cost gives the Ringleader less ability to heal and can make the second stage much easier.

If playing a trap deck, Live Bait (an ALEP-designed card released in this cycle) helpfully blanks the text box on an enemy for a round, which would prevent that enemy from looting upon engagement.

It won’t help with the Ringleader, but killing enemies in staging through direct damage or heroes like Leadership Eomer is very helpful as it stops the enemies from looting. This may be a challenge with the low threat of the Sneaky Thief and Vengeful Bowman, but in early rounds or with decks that can manage threat, it is possible to keep the Pillaging Swordsman or Grasping Slaver in the staging area for attacks. The Sneaky Thief has only 2 health, so it is vulnerable to many forms of direct damage, and all non-unique enemies have 4 or less health, so they could be hit by a Sneak Attack Gandalf.

Since the cycle is set in Rohan, if players want to play thematically with a Rohan deck, the player cards released in this pack greatly elevate this archetype. Thengel, in particular, is nearly a must-include for Rohan, and Herubrand is great when paired with leadership Eomer, especially in Three Hunters. Need Brooks No Delay is similarly an auto-include in Rohan decks with Tactics access.

Playthroughs

One Stop Co-Op Shop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOfEZlqhm48
Cardboard of the Rings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIo1cMDw1GM
LOTR LCG Solo Progression Series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH9K9OP9Qbg

A big shout-out to Kyle Butler for kicking off the first AleP cycle on the blog! We will be working to bring you more articles in the new year, covering the entire cycle in release order. We hope this helps to introduce more players to the amazing stuff that the AleP team has been working on. In the meantime, I myself will be working on the Nightmare stuff that still has to be covered, so that will help to change things up content-wise. Best wishes for 2024, everyone!