QOTW: The Horse Lord’s Ire

Before long there came the sound of hoofs, at first hardly more than a tremor of the ground perceptible only to Aragorn as he lay upon the grass, then growing steadily louder and clearer to a quick beat.

‘There is more than one horse coming,’ said Aragon.

‘Certainly,’ said Gandalf. ‘We are too great a burden for one.’

‘There are three,’ said Legolas, gazing out over the plain. ‘See how they run! There is Hasufel, and there is my friend Arod beside him! But there is another that strides ahead: a very great horse. I have not seen his like before.’

‘Nor will you again,’ said Gandalf. ‘That is Shadowfax. He is the chief of the Mearas, lords of horses, and not even Théoden, King of Rohan, has ever looked on a better. Does he not shine like silver, and run as smoothly as a swift stream? He has come for me: the horse of the White Rider. We are going to battle together.’
–The Two Towers

The Horse Lord’s Ire Stats

Groups registered: 11
Total attempts: 37
Most attempts: 10
Average attempts per entry: 3.4

Total number of wins: 13
Win-rate: 35%

Average opinion on the quest: 3.3

Achievements

Here are the achievements we had for this quest:

The Horse Lord’s Dire

Win the quest without any player reducing their threat.

All the Pretty Horses

Mount objectives cannot be used to satisfy the Travel requirements of Vast locations, nor do they count toward the number of mounts the players control for purposes of Vast locations’ Response triggers.

Encounter Card Opinions

The winner for favorite encounter card was Flinthoof. These mount objectives are all obviously useful for being able to travel to Vast locations, but this one also has the benefit of being able to sometimes kill enemies before they get to attack (especially if you combine it with some other direct-damage effects). This quest features a lot of nasty effects when enemies attack and a lot of nasty shadow effects, so that can be really valuable. Flinthoof can also help you defeat the pesky Orc Battalion.

Speaking of the Orc Battalion, it was the only card to be nominated for both favorite and least-favorite card this week. In order to deal with this nasty enemy, you either need at least three good attackers that have more than 1 health (sorry Silvans!) or lots of direct damage. The direct damage route has the benefit too of getting around the need to damage your allies. This quest gives us Flinthoof to help deal with this guy, but this enemy is in an encounter set that is re-used in later quests, so make sure you have a plan for future quests.

The most hated encounter card for our players this week was Bridle-biter. The only good thing about this enemy is that usually it doesn’t contribute to threat totals during the quest phase because it immediately engages. Other than that, it is super annoying. Even though they aren’t that strong, you may consider using things like Forest Snare on them just so you can keep them out of the encounter deck.

Things worth sharing from the games

I’d rather a Recreant Rider show up in my living room than have to look at another Bridle-Biter.

Big boy Spirit Dain was discarded from play in the penultimate round (with no damage on him) because of a stupid little Bridle-biter being boosted by Saddle-slasher’s shadow card. There goes my tower of attachments.

This was a nail biter. I had a pretty poor starting hand and stalled out on stage one of the quest for a while. I was able to get a board state going, only to reveal The Green Sea, which slowed things down again. I finally got through stage 1 with threat on the mid 40s. Thankfully, Morwen Steelsheen made an appearance and let me keep my threat stable at around 45. Even with her, I was at 49 threat going into the final round. A well timed Muster of Rohan let me get the right allies in play to secure the victory.

My Ent deck with Leadership Faramir and Mablung heroes loved all the engagements outside the encounter phase. The Ents were also well equipped to handle Orc Battalion. I ended up chumping (hero) Bifur at stage three so I wouldn’t lose a more valuable character. Fair and Perilous on an AtEoAT Glorfindel helped me take out Thuk in one shot at stage three.

It was a random, happy accident, but advancing from stage 1 to 2 from Stolen Steeds’ effect was extremely helpful. Was able to kill Thruk the round he entered play and not have to deal with more than one instance of Felarof’s double shadows. Also, while the quest discourages early turtling due to the threat raises, the Stolen Steeds effect doesn’t bypass the active location, so you can run some side quests and catch a breather once those first two mounts are rescued without auto-advancing.

I took a Perilous Voyage deck through and just prayed I didn’t get hit by too many threat increases. With my threat at 45 (after flipping) and on stage 3, I very luckily discarded one shadow with Felarof and another with Gandalf’s Staff that were both threat-raising. Also I used Word of Persuasion on an Orcish Horse-Butcher, so that relieved a lot of pressure for that last fight. I also forgot Vast had a Response portion, but remembered the travel cost.

I played the first 7 or so tries wrong and lost because I raised my threat all the time from the objective when I had no Objectives. In almost all games I ended up with 3+ engaged enemies turn 1 and had to scoop around turn 2. In my final run Ally Boromir supported with a Warden of Healing held out against Thruk long enough to get the first kill and then got discarded by a saddle-slasher shadow effect. I really like the quest from a theme and design point, but playing it feels like hell to me every time. Won’t play it again soon.

Ah, the inconsistency of A Perilous Voyage. My first game where I didn’t draw Golden Shield or Herugrim (I always drew both!). Upon activating Side B, I searched for a Golden Shield so I could defend and not chumpblock, but then I was lacking attack. In quest stage 3, I was at 49 threat and missing 10 attack power… but a chump block made Thengel pull out Éomund (exhausted) and… Horn of the Mark draws Morwen! I attack, sacrifice Éomund, attack again, and I save myself at the last second! Yes!

Decklists used

Leadership Boromir, Ingold, Tactics Imrahil

Rohan Discard: Éowyn, Thengel, Théoden (https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/648023)

Quendi and Naugrim: https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/60584/quendiandnaugrim-1.0 And Caldara’s Fellowship: https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/64000/caldarasfellowship-1.0 Only just now realised I forgot to give the latter an inventive name. Whoops.

https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/647573

Ents + Location Control https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/45940/rousingtheents-1.0 https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/58862/hopefromthelasthomelyhouse-1.0

Grimbeorn, Coreagorn, Arwen / Theoden, Erkenbrand, Thurindir

Rohan Hunters: Éomer, Fastred, Herubrand (https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/648684)

Autumn’s 3 Hunters for Wainriders https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/632108

https://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/61756/thegreyvoyage-1.0

BoF with an effective starting threat of 22 (Eowyn, Glorf, Sam, Smeagol

A Perilous Ride – https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/649507

This week we are playing my personal favorite quest in this cycle, The Aldburg Plot. It has mystery and intrigue, and is one of our only looks at a Rohan town other than Edoras. Once you have finished with your playthroughs, please fill in this form https://forms.gle/uF8e4rDcnUsvxxHm9.

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: