QOTW: Journey in the Dark Results

You would think that after four different quests in this game that feature the same boss enemy–the Balrog–I would get tired of it. But this quest is, in my opinion, one of the best that this entire card game has to offer. We’ve spent the week finding our way in the darkness, fighting back swarms of goblins and trolls, and getting burned by the fires of the Balrog. The discussion around this quest in the Discord was particularly fun to take part in, as players discussed their run ins with the Balrog, their triumphs, and their fallen heroes. Let’s talk about the results:

Journey in the Dark Stats

Groups registered: 15
Total attempts: 33
Most attempts: 12
Average attempts per entry: 2.2

Total number of wins: 15
Win-rate: 45%

Average opinion on the quest: 4.5

Campaign Mode

For this quest, if you end the scenario with the Balrog still in play, you earn all four possible burdens. Otherwise, you choose one treachery burden and one objective burden.

Number of groups that ended with the Balrog in play: 1
Number of groups that defeated the Balrog: 9
Number of groups that got out before the Balrog showed up: 5

Achievements

Here are the two achievements we were shooting for this week. One if awarded for outrunning the Balrog. The other is a small act of revenge.

Fly, You Fools!

Complete the scenario with at least 1 damage token on Doom, Doom, Doom.

Fool of a Took!

Defeat the Balrog by discarding Pippin when resolving the response effect on The Great Bridge.

Encounter card Opinions

There were a lot of favorite encounter cards in this quest, which I think is a sign of a well-designed quest. The number one favorite, though, was The Great Bridge. People enjoyed how thematic it is to recreate the iconic moment of Gandalf standing firm on the bridge against the Balrog.

Before I talk about the least favorite encounter card, I want to mention all the cards that got votes for favorite encounter card and least favorite encounter card:

The Balrog
Fool of a Took
Mines of Moria

There was a three-way tie for least favorite encounter card between Shadow of Fear, Fool of a Took, and We Cannot Get Out. Shadow of Fear blanks the text boxes of all characters in play, has doomed 1, and surges. It also has a shadow effect that forces the defender to not count their defense. Ouch! Fool of a Took has doomed 1 and either removes 1 damage from Doom Doom Doom or makes the Balrog make an immediate attack. If you want to try to get out before the Balrog shows up, you’ll probably need to cancel this one. Finally, We Cannot Get Out is very similar to the classic Necromancer’s Reach, but gives you a little more flexibility in where the damage is assigned. Still nasty!

Cool moments that happened during the games

I took stage 1 slow and only had 1 damage remaining on Doom Doom Doom! when I advanced. I then spend 5 rounds at stage 3 so I could get enough damage on the Balrog to defeat it. I ended up sacrificing a Sword-Thain Ceorl to the Balrog to keep my fellowship together. Honor Guard + Ioreth were the real MVPs of this chapter, allowing Beregond and Denethor to repeatedly defend Balrog attacks.

I’ve always defeated the Balrog but I wanted to try rushing it. I had 2 tokens on Doom, Doom, Doom when I completed the final stage.

Gandalf sending the Balrog back into the shadows from whence it came.

I had everything planned out and prepared for the Balrog to show up: Rowan had 8 defense, 5 hit points, healing, and readying. I had a ton of attack on the table. I had Sword-Thain on Haleth ready to make the sacrifice… and then I won before the Balrog showed up.

When the Balrog showed up I did 50 damage to it that same round, then the following round cleared the Bridge and discard a sword-thained ally to defeat him without any hero death.

I drew “They are Coming!” so many times, and each time I revealed at least one “Great Cave-Troll”. Twice I drew two in a row. I killed so many Great Cave-Trolls I’m going to hide out from the UN for a little while.

The Orc Chieftain ate my Beregond.

Because I didn’t think I’d be set up to face the Balrog, I resolutely avoided anything that would take a damage off doom, doom, doom (thanks Black Riders Frodo for making Tooks less foolish). Thus, when I revealed quest 3A, I ended up with two Moria Orcs and one Moria Archer all jumping out at the same time to really make the end tense. Also key to this run was an early Elrond to get rid of grievous wound, as my deck is built upon repeatedly damaging and readying Treebeard.

I used Guarded cards to bring in enemies to speed up Stage 2. I also wanted to use Dunedain Hunters for this purpose (their attack is pretty nice to have for the Balrog too), but both the ones I played whiffed!

A Test of Will is a great card, but when I take a mulligan I really don’t want to draw three of them…

Didn’t manage to get the party through Maria without alarming the balrog, so Gandalf brought him to his knees and Aragorn (with his inner gondorian fire) and tacteam took him out in the second to last round. In the next quest phase we could hear Fool of a took in the air.

Tactics Glorfindel dealt 26 damage to the Balrog in one strike, then sacrificed himself to The Great Bridge to destroy it. Unseen Strike is good tech against the Balrog.

Decklists used

Beregond, Gandalf, Legolas & Denethor, Eowyn, Galdriel, Thurindir https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/18922/birdmanssagafellowship-qotw

Hobbit Secrecy Fellowship (A Weary Pilgrim)

https://ringsdb.com/questlog/view/53443/journeyinthedark-2players-2024-10-31

https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/551563

Woodmen + Burglar’s Turn: https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/20726

QotW Does the Sagas! https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/20652

Mono Spirit Miner/Stargazer with Eowyn, Beregon and Idraen alongside a pretty standard Dale deck with Brand, Bard and Galadriel

A deck with custom Merry and Pippin heroes to work well with hero Treebeard

Mildly Thematic Fellowship https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/20878/qotw-journeyinthedark-mildlythematic

Dúnhere keeps the orcs at bay: https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/557179

Radagast, Grimbeorn, Tacragorn & all the creatures + Gandalf, Sam and the fool of a took (spirit)

Elrond, Galadriel, Sam https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/557246 Glorfindel, Idraen, Arwen https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/550914

This week our Fellowship will be broken. Stay true to one another and protect the Ring-bearer at all costs so that he can escape. Once you have completed your playthroughs of the quest, please fill in this form: https://forms.gle/162zgSZM7EbqcfDP9

If you are using the quick start for campaign mode, either because you didn’t get a chance to play the first four quests and still want to play campaign mode, or because you want to use the community’s shared campaign pool, this is what your campaign pool looks like going into Breaking of the Fellowship:

Boons: Mr. Underhill, Old Bogey-stories, Ho! Tom Bombadil!, Each player may choose one of the permanent boons from A Knife in the Dark, Sting, Mithril Shirt, Glamdring, Anduril
Burdens: The Ring Draws Them, Panicked, Pursued by the Enemy, Overcome by Grief

And for achievements for this quest, this is what we have: