In 2509 Celebrían wife of Elrond was journeying to Lórien when she was waylaid in the Redhorn Pass, and her escort being scattered by the sudden assault of the Orcs, she was seized and carried off. She was pursued and rescued by Elladan and Elrohir, but not before she had suffered torment and had received a poisoned wound. She was brought back to Imladris, and though healed in body by Elrond, lost all delight in Middle-earth, and the next year went to the Havens and passed over Sea.
–The Lord of the Rings, Appendix A
I don’t know for a fact that Redhorn Gate and Road to Rivendell were inspired by the story of Celebrían, but those two Adventure Packs certainly seem to be. We are escorting a member of Elrond’s household between Rivendell and Lórien (though in the opposite direction than Celebrían was traveling), and are waylaid by a sudden assault of orcs and (if you are playing on Nightmare Mode) we are scattered and the orcs temporarily capture her. Plus, these are the two APs when Elladan and Elrohir were introduced to the game! It is because of this really fascinating underlying narrative that I really wish these two quests were better. Especially Road to Rivendell.
Road to Rivendell Stats
- Groups registered: 15
- Total attempts: 35
- Most attempts: 4
- Average attempts per entry: 2.3
- Total number of wins: 19
- Win-rate: 54%
- Average opinion on the quest: 1.9
Achievements
Here are the achievements we had for this quest:
Just a Fool’s Hope
Complete the scenario where at least 1 character is discarded when resolving the shadow effect on Sleeping Sentry.
Easy Targets
Forced: When making an engagement check against an enemy due to the ambush keyword, reduce the engagement cost of that enemy by 1 for each character you control.
Encounter Card Opinions
The winner of the most votes for favorite encounter card was our friend the Wild Bear. This is one of 5 enemies in the game that has a zero printed threat and doesn’t have an ability that raises its threat in any way. Two of the other four of those are corsair enemies which never really go to the staging area because of how the corsair deck works, so this bear is truly unique. Despite the intimidating art and 5 health, this bear isn’t much of a threat. But why should he be? He’s not a mutated bear of Sauron. He’s not undead. He’s just a wild bear minding its own business. And I love him for that.
The only card to be nominated for favorite and least-favorite this week was Pathless Country. It’s not too dangerous of a location, but that shadow effect can really ruin your day (or lose you the game) if you’re not ready for it.
And of course the overall least-favorite card this quest is none other than Sleeping Sentry. One of the worst designed cards in the entire game, leading to some of the worst play experiences. What else needs to be said?
Things worth sharing from the games
Some real bullshit treacheries and shadows mar an otherwise fun quest. I still gave it a 3, but if I had lost, I probably would’ve given it a 1.
This quest could be so good if not for sheer quantity of cancel-or-lose stuff. My first attempt had me in full control of the board, just to instantly lose because I pulled 5 enemies for the nightmare version of 2A and two of them had Pathless Country as shadows. It’s one thing to require cancellation, but it’s another to have 7 or 8 different cards in the deck that you need it for. Shoutout to the Con of the Rings team for putting in some alternate cards you can swap in for Sleeping Sentry/Orc Ambush. I didn’t use them this time, but when I revisit this quest in the future I don’t think I’ll ever play it any other way.
After trying to get a victory display deck to work, I found a Haldir Grey Wanderer and shot all the enemies that couldn’t engage me since my threat was so low, even while using the Easy Targets achievement.
I had one game that I went from almost scooping to holding on by the slimmest of margins (only to realize later that I made a critical cancellation of Sleeping Sentry’s shadow effect with Crebain in the staging area – yay, asterisk!). Nevertheless, there were some great moments: – Survived a round 1 Sleeping Sentry by dropping in Greenwood Archer to ready Thranduil. – Used Rumil to kill a Goblin Spearman and to combine w/Greenwood Archer to snipe a Goblin Archer from staging. – Dropped in a Greenwood Defender w/Thranduil to survive four engaged enemies – Used Woodland Sentry to discard Black Uruks before they attacked
Switched up my progression deck to experience the Elladan-Elrohir tandem for the first time (along with Eowyn to handle questing by herself). With Arwen’s resource every round (if it didn’t need to go to Eowyn to ensure a resource for Test of Will or Hasty Stroke), I knew I’d be able to reliably ready Elrohir to defend multiple attacks. This came in handy for Ambush. Cancelled the nasty treacheries and shadows, or used Feint to prevent attacks as a pseudo shadow cancellation, so had a fairly smooth experience. Some early direct damage made things dicey with no healing in the deck.
In all three games, an enemy was never able to successfully engage my blazin’ hobbits. In one game the NM Orc with 5 Engagement Check did engage, but Spirit Pippin pushed him right back and then I skirted my threat below 5 next round. Interesting, my one loss occurred when I optionally engaged the Crebain (to be able to cancel When Revealeds next turn) and it’s lone shadow effect… the only attack of all three playthroughts to happen… was a board-wiping Sleeping Sentry. Never change, Road to Rivendell, never change…
My first time trying Nightmare was going swimmingly until a late Orc Ambush that brought out 4 enemies (seriously why does that card surge?). I only needed to engage two, defend them then quest out next turn. Of course one of the shadows was Sleeping Sentry and 80% of my board state including all my heroes were exhausted. What a terrible shadow.
Playing two-handed resulted in significantly more Orc Ambush, Sleeping Sentry, and Followed By Night. Tried keeping up with cancellations, but got caught three times resulting in losses. The fourth game I managed to Forest Snare all of the Mountain Wargs, which really helped negate some of the nasty shadows and avoid their annoying ability to go back to staging.
I didn’t cancel a single treachery. Undisturbed Bones killed two of my allies, but I was saving my Test of Will for something worse, which never came. When Arwen was captured under Goblin Gate, I simply used Distant Stars to get her back, which was neat. At the end, A Perilous Voyage had flipped, all my heroes had Unexpected Courage, Aragorn had Anduril, Gandalf had Shadowfax, and Aragorn also had The Renewer, so I ensured nobody was exhausted when staging and nobody was exhausted when flipping any shadows I couldn’t discard with Gandalf’s Staff. All to never even see Sleeping Sentry.
Love the quest, hate Sleeping Sentry! Also Merry gets killed a lot (in all three of my games!)
Secrecy decks make this quest incredibly easy. Paired with the Quest Stages which don’t really have any effects other than revealing a card, it makes for a fairly boring quest. Bump Haldir up to 6 attack and is able to clear all enemies in staging easily, Frodo (Leadership) to then maintain Secrecy and just quest for an easy win.
I was using the Cotton family (Lily and Tom) to bounce a Hobbit Archer into play to take out the Goblin Archers and any other big bads that showed up. She, along with Sneak Attack, also let me bounce Bilbo to get a bunch of pipes out quickly!
Decklists used
Ents
To Hunt a Balrog https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/637826
Bond of Friendship Hobbits with Tom Cotton
S. Theoden/Erkenbrand/Thurindir for all attempts. My first three attempts used a Beorning deck for the second player, but the final successful attempt switched to Lo. Fatty/S. Frodo/Folco victory display shenanigans.
Chad’s Haldir Grey Wanderer: https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/19287/haldirdreadsnaught-1.0
Silvans & Secrecy Fellowship (Celeborn, Galadriel, Thranduil & Rossiel, Glorfindel (Sp), Mirlonde) – https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/642461 & https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/642459
Thalin, Dunhere, Sp Pippin + Glorfindel, Sp Merry, Galadriel (https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/19707)
Progression: Elladan, Elrohir, Eowyn (https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/642491)
Pipe-Hobbits (MotK Bilbo) & Pipe Hobbits Fellowship (Frodo-Merry-Pippin)
The Riddermark’s Finest Finest Hour https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/62554/theriddermarksfinestfinesthour-1.0
Cycle Progression Fellowship: Elladan/Elrohir/Eowyn and Aragorn/Elrond/Glorfindel (https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/23590)
https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/61756/thegreyvoyage-1.0
Elrond, Radagast and Spirit Merry
https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/62771/secrecy-1.0
LFrodo/Sam/Idraen & Amarthiul/Thurindir/Tom Cotton
At time of writing I’m a little behind on publishing this article, so we have actually moved on to The Long Dark. Once you have finished with your playthroughs for that one, please fill in this form: https://forms.gle/CpH3Jo5pwHjKytqV7
If you want to share in the discussion of this quest live, join the Cardboard of the Rings discord and look for the Quest of the Week channel: https://discord.gg/5tkTeSCdxc
And for achievements for this quest, this is what we have:
The Short Dark
Complete the scenario in less than 3 rounds.
Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop
When making a locate test, continue to discard cards from your hand until you either discard an encounter card with PASS printed in the bottom right hand corner or you run out of cards in your hand.
Vision Of The Palantir 