QOTW Recap: Into Ithilien

Many great trees grew there, planted long ago, falling into untended age amid a riot of careless descendants; and groves and thickets there were of tamarisk and pungent terebinth, of olive and of bay; and there were junipers and myrtles; and thymes that grew in bushes, or with their woody creeping stems mantled in deep tapestries the hidden stones; sages of many kinds putting forth blue flowers, or red, or pale green; and marjorams and the new-sprouting parselys, and many herbs of forms and scents beyond the garden-lore of Sam. The grots and rocky walls were already starred with saxifrages and stonecrops. Primeroles and anemones were awake in the filber-brakes; and asphodel and many lily-flowers nodded their half-opened heads in the grass: deep green grass beside the pools, where falling streams halted in cool hollows on their journey down to Anduin.

— “Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbits“, The Two Towers

Cycle: Against the Shadow [Heirs of Númenor deluxe box]

Here we make our way into the wilderness of Ithilien in order to deliver Lord Alcaron’s message to Faramir. Lucky for us, the aged forest is full of Men of Harad and at least one mûmak (mûmakil in Nightmare). A few had the chance to blitz through the scenario without encountering the tusked goliaths, while others were able to recruit Celador and his entire cadre of Rangers.

Into Ithilien’s Stats

• Groups registered: 8
• Total attempts: 31
• Most attempts: 8
• Average attempts per entry: 3.9
• Official difficulty: 4/10
• Community-rated difficulty: 7.7/10

• Total number of wins: 10
• Average win-rate: 37.8%

• Average opinion on the quest: 3.3

This quest sits at about average for the cycle. Clearing stage 1 with Celador alive is a feat, but that reprieve comes with potentially stacking the staging area with enemies. The amount of treacheries that can stymie you can swing this quest wildly and leave a sour taste in a lot of folks’ mouths.

It seems like this is retreading familiar ground for many folks.

Achievements

The achievements for Into Ithilien are challenging, without being impossible. With a little bit of luck, patience, and skill they can both be done in either mode.

Ranger Recruits

Complete the scenario with all three Ranger objectives in play.

Race Across Ithilien

Complete the scenario by bypassing stage 2, and before stage 4B gains siege.

Ranger Recruits requires that you reveal all three Rangers into the staging area, gain control of them, and complete the scenario with all of them alive. While their shadow effect is a big help in clearing the many enemies that can swarm you in this quest, it’s still discarded at the end of combat where you’ll either have to fish it out or hope it comes around again later.

Race Across Ithilien asks you to get through the first two stages (1 and 3) while also keeping your threat at 36 or below. A difficult feat for most as you’d need a healthy amount of willpower and/or progress-placement to get past 24 quest points in two stages.

Encounter Card Opinions

The Favorite

There was one clear winner for the favorite encounter card in this quest: Ithilien Guardian!

Very few objective-ally cards have a shadow effect, but the ones that do are either Eagles or Rangers! No wonder people love it when this one shows up. On top of needing him for one of the achievements, he’s very handy for his 2 willpower and archery soak.

The Non-favorite

Blocking Wargs took the top spot for least favorite card in Into Ithilien.

Blocking Wargs is famous for chaining itself, easily wiping out a questing party and leading to quick scoops. With 4 in normal and 3 in nightmare it’s a card that should be a primary target for cancellation.

It’s shadow effect can knock out low-health defenders if you’re not prepared for it. Defenders of Rammas are made of pudding under all that armor; a Wargs’ favorite treat!

Things worth sharing from the games

My low-mencae side-quest deck is perfectly adapted for this quest. I have a few turns with normal questing guaranteed, then i have a ggod board and scry for the encounter deck in order to remove the horrible cards (risk some light is bonkers in solo)

Getting an Ithilien Guardian, which surged into blocking wargs, which surged into ANOTHER blocking wargs, instantly killing the just revealed guardian. Classic encounter deck behaviour – I love it.

An early Warden of Healing on my winning playthrough (2nd) allowed me to keep Celador alive and to survive a round when two copies of Ithilien Overlook came out. Once I managed to skip stage 2, it was a matter of power-questing through stage 3 as quickly as possible to give myself a chance to finish stage 4 before threating out. I was forced to hold off 6 enemies, which maxed out my defenses (multiple Defenders of Rammas, Winged Guardian, Boromir w/Gondorian Shield, Feint), but left the staging area clear for a frantic siege-questing push on the next turn to win (with threat at 48 and 40)!

0 wins, 3 losses for the Gondor Cycle Progression deck. Too slow for this quest and too much threat.

2 wins for the Dwarf Cycle Progression deck. As usual, Dain was the MVP as his ability thrived here for battle and regular questing. Lost Celador towards the end, but with Ori’s draw and Nori’s threat reduction, siege on Stage 4 never triggered.

1 win, 1 loss for the Outlands Progression deck. Slow start but as with most Outlands builds, the engine was humming mid game. Low starting threat and Elrond’s Counsels avoided siege questing on Stage 4.

Never had to slay a Mumak in any of my games, though. Overall, I enjoyed the quest but can see why it may have a bad reputation. Probably not one I’m rushing to replay but it was still fun and worth playing.

Eomer is a beast questing with Firefoot and if you put Silvermane on him you can sweep up the engaged enemies. Works great also with battle fury! Kill and quest. However, Rohan dynamics are not great for Celador, poor lad

The good thing about this quest is it dumps you out on the first round so its an easy restart!

With Tactics Beregond and Gimli it was easy to take down enemies every round. Elrond and a pair of Wardens kept everything topped off. In the very last round during staging I had ~29 defense committed to the siege quest with an empty staging area, thanks to a few Defenders of Rammas, Beregond, and a handful of other very helpful characters. The first card I revealed was Lost Companion, which sacrificed ~4 defense. The second card (for the second player) was Blocking Wargs, wiping out another 2 defense. This surged into another Blocking Wargs, knocking out another 4 defense committed to the siege quest, giving me very sweaty palms. The final card, thanks to the surge, was Ithilien Overlook, giving me the 14 progress I needed to knock out the quest in one step! What a rush!

At least the quests only get better this cycle

Decklists Used

https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/657131

Core Aragorn, Beorn, Sp Glorfindel – perfect for blitzing through the first quest card and taking down big enemies off the bat.

“My Brother, My Captain, My King” (Boromir, Aragorn, Mablung, https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/566880) and “Date Night Dragon Hunt” (Faramir, Eowyn, Damrod, https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/533741)

A modified Eomer Lothiriel Thengel deck optimized for battle questing

Shellin’s Progression decks 2handed: https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/6255/21-into-ithilien-progression-series

Fatty/Splorfindel/Elrond (https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/669808)
Gimli/Boromir/TBeregond (https://ringsdb.com/deck/view/669807)

Discard Duo: Noldor trio from hand and Dwarf trio from deck

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If you haven’t yet voted on the difficulty of the quest over at the LOTR LCG Quest Companion, feel free to do so here: https://lotr-lcg-quest-companion.gamersdungeon.net/#heirs-of-numenor-quest-into-ithilien

For the next quest in the cycle, you can submit your playthrough of The Siege of Cair Andros using the form here: https://forms.gle/D5PkyaJpipPqFj3E9.

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/pzKpyhTHx

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And for achievements for The Siege of Cair Andros, this is what we have:

Be Done Before Lunch

Clear all three Battleground locations on stage 1.

Rooted in Place

Complete the scenario without traveling to a location.