June Monthly SBB Tournament Report

The following are the notes I took during the event - this has not been edited, but could be entertaining regardless. #likecommentandsubscribe

Round 1: Fallen Angel over Geppetto and Share Bear, find tons of strong Frogs and Summons early, poly + Kiss into Womabats, but never find an XP spell or other scaling things. Poly into an Ashwood on 5.1, and go trees mostly successfully, Pan’s Shadow goes Puff PUff and gets 4th, Muerte finds a Good Boy and rules the lobby, outstatting me twice and leaving me in 3rd. Treasures were Fancy Pants, Fool’s Gold, Helm, Staff, (from two Nian triples), ending on Spear and SoFI for the last fight.


(Forgot to screenshot)


Round 2: My computer fritzes and I start the game in Round 2 with a random hero. Luckily its Charon. And I get a bunch of Wizard’s Familiars, including Kidnapping a golden one, so I’m able to stabilize at a high life total. I don’t find any spell treasures or Monster Books, but I’m strong enough to win a Wish fight at 5.0, and build into pumpkin/doombreath. Unfortunately Merlin is my finals opponent, and out-techs me with lucky Lightning Dragon hits on my Gold Pumpkin every time (or attacking it normally the one round I sneak it into slot 4), and a Soltek to protect his huge spellweavers from my Doombreaths. Our first fight I lose a 50/50, and 3 rounds later I finish in 2nd.



Round 3: The Fates over Cursed King. My first shop is Mim, Tiny, Bossy, Shrink Spell. I go with Bossy, and end up locking the shop every round until 3.2 even though I buy the 3rd bossy on 2.2. Bossy gives me Faire Tale, and I triple up a Mim as well, which (along with 2x Black Cat and some random dwarves like Doubly and Amy) gives me enough strength to win a Wish fight and get to L6 3 xp ahead. I also
poly into an Ashwood, so I go directly to Trees (with a slight detour to grab a Tweedle for immediate strength), Knighting that Ash and eventually finding enough pieces to beat Mirri, even though my treasures up to the last fight are Fairy Tale, Ring of Meteors (because I might have gone Dwarves), and Ring of Regeneration (which made me feel better, but I finished at life total > rounds, so it didn’t actually do anything). On the last fight I replaced one with Ivory Owl, and got 1st.



Round 4: Horde Dragon, Morgan, Pan’s Shadow, Charon.I take Morgan, since I’m doing well, and don’t need a high roll, just more 2nd and 3rd. I go into a standard double Mim, cat, peep start with a spell weaver, and I hit exactly 20 hp during level 4, grabbing Deck. At level 5 I find a The End to go back above 20, and add an Aeon to my board of double Fancy Pants Lady of the Lake. At level 6 it looks like I’m going Trees, with an early Ashwood, but Morgan gives me a 9th Book, and a Genes Wish knighthoods my Monster Book, so I pivot back into Mages. In the final 2, I lose a fight to an non-upgraded pumpkin, and it puts me at 3, giving me Mimic, which is enough to win the last one. 1st place again

(forgot to screenshot)

Round 5: Gep, Grann, Drac, Piper. I take Piper, again not needing to high roll. After a normal piper start, I’m taking some damage throughout the midgame while I grow a spell weaver and pick up a couple Sporkos and gold up a Poly. On 5.0 I slay into a Bearstein, but I’m on 9 health. I’m able to pick up some strong summons (2 Bears, Golden and Normal Flies), but just before 6.0 I run into double Lightning Dragon Slay w/ Drac’s Saber _and_ a piggomorph. So, I’m going to lose, clearly, but then the fight RNG is very bad, with Bearstein dying first, so I don’t even get a big Time Flies, and Piggo/Dragon hitting both Sporkos as well, so I don’t even have a ranged support to try and fight though the pile of medium stats (I have Eye of Ares and Ring of Rage). I manage to trade with some things, but the dragons grow _just_ enough from slay and saber to triple trade with my now ~10 atk bears, and I die in 5th place.



Round 6: Jack, Granny, Morgan, PM. Going with Morgan again to lock up Day 2 with 6 points needed. I have a Wizards Apprentice start, do normal early game things while accumulating two pollywogs for later golden 6-drop equity. I grab Sporkos and scam pieces, and eventually get Lance to proc, polly to slay, and take a bunch of damage from I don’t remember, but many golden supports and end up getting a gold Grumblegore, a L5, and a L6 treasure all as I hit level 6. I grab a Staff and an Owl to go with my SoFI, and start collecting pumpkins. Unfortunately I die shortly thereafter to Skip on dragon slay, where I miss the 33%er to have the second Jorm attack my Apple Tree after I hit the first one with Medusa, and my second pumpkin (the first obviously died to Dragon) doesn’t give me the scam I need to get through it. 5th place again.



Round 7: Just need 7th place. Fates, Horse, Evella, PM. Clearly we take the mistress of 2nd place, and go with Evella. I get a normal evella start with a cat and some level 3 evil ranged, pick up a Sporko on L4, and some casual XP. I eventually get lucky with a Poly and get an early Herc into Embiggening stone, wich is enough, in conjunction with a Dragon Slay Loki to clean out the lobby. I find a Soltek once we’re top 2, and that stuffs both Dragon attacks, letting my Doombreath kill both his Babbas, and leaving my trees to clean up easily for the win!



Day 2




Round 1: Fallen Angel over Geppetto and Mad Catter. Starting with an Egg over neutral dwarves against Piper. Safe. All good start, with a Frog and selling Egg for Stag ^ Romeo on 3.0. Lock for Wish on 3.2, but didn’t win. I don’t find a comp for a long time, and especially don’t find any treasures. I have kinda sorta some tree stuff going on when I hit 6, and find Pumpkin and Echowood (taking the first, but not the second), but no Ash and end up with a kinda bad scam board, and lose or win some close games before being crushed by double gold Bearstein from Piper (who won the lobby shortly thereafter). 4th place finish to start the day



Round 2: Gep, Evella, Pants, Skip. Taking Evella. Apparently I was in position to just play mono-Geppetto if I wanted. Beautiful start with Black Cat, lock Minotaur and roll. Which turned into buy 2nd cat and roll into Mim + Cutpurse. Just an ideal opening for Evella, and good enough to crack Apoc’s Egg T2. I add a spellweaver at 3.0, and then lose two in a row to the weaver getting attacked first among my back row. Then I pick up some additional ranged backline, and do some dragon stuff, but keep losing by inches until I eventually die in 7th with a newly acquired Radiant Prism (over Mirror Mirror and Excalibur, with a board + shop that did nothing with Mirror and 2x Time Flies in hand to go with Prism)








Round 3: Fates, Evella, Morgan, CT. Going with Fates - we aren’t quite at the point of needed 1st or bust. I get offered Minotarur, Cutpurse, Prince, Shugar and Spice round 1, so I’m on Cutpurse. Who then gets some slays, but again I lose literally every round through 4.0 and just die in 8th place.







Round 4: Bye & Drop so my wife could go play D&D - finish similar to my November performance, were I also made Day 2 and was out of it after 3 rounds.

SBB Pick Order for Level 2

 This is the comprehensive default pick order for 2-cost characters, assuming you are Grandmother. Other heroes might (will) adjust pick order, as detailed in their respective guides.

This list is based on the strategic goal of having the strongest board on 2.2, and in Level 3. Tactical considerations of not losing Round 1, or how good a particular shop is to lock, may dictate the actual decisions.

This list is a work in progress, and is subject to editing in the future.

Round 1 Happy Little Tree

Frog Prince

Cinder Ella

Mad Mim

Sherwood Shureshot

(Wizard's Familiar with a castable (or, on round 1, lockable) spell in shop)

Baby Dragon

Black Cat

(Minotaur if you have Black Cat)

Round 2 Happy Little Tree

Rainbow Unicorn

Wizard's Familiar

Lonely Prince

Golden Chicken

Free Roll before buying anything

Blind Mouse

Pollywoggle

Labrinth Minotaur

Humpty Dumpty

B-a-a-a-d Billy Gruff

Tiny

Baby Root

Bossy

Crafty

Kitty Cutpurse

Tier Lists for AGOT 2.0 Factions

Loyal cards:

Targarian - Dracarys, Danny, Plaza, Viserion, and a completely unique direction with Drogo

Greyjoy - Balon, Rise of the Kraken, plus good support in We Do Not Sow and the Warship

Baratheon - Red Keep, Consolidate Power, Bob, and Stannis, unique and strong

Stark - Winter is Coming. Grey Wind and Rob are incredible apart and together. Catlyn and Ice are also good.

Lannister - Tywin. Maester based draw. Supported by strong locations, and Cerci

Tyrell - Highgarden is amazing. The rest of the Loyals are passable, but expensive.

Martell - Gaston Grey. Aero Hotah. That's about it. It can be enough sometimes.

Night's Watch - Sam and his Ravens. A Meager Contribution and Take the Black. These could be strong, but the meta lacks non-uniques to exploit.

Non-Loyal cards:

Lannister - Tyrion, Jamie, Treachery, The Hound, Things I Do For Love. This is why Banner to the Lion is one of the most played agendas.

Baratheon - Melisandre and her kit (including the incredible Seen In Flames). Maester Cressen.

Greyjoy - 2 moderate cost stealth bodies, free setup warship, Lordsport Shipwright and other good curve filler. Risen from the Sea. This is a good solid kit to add.

Martel - Sunspear, Confinement, and Araine are all very strong. The cheap guys are better than average, which helps.

Tyrell - Margary is the big draw here. You also get 2 moderate cost Renown, and plenty of Intrigue icons.

Night's Watch - You can defend the Wall, or just splash for Maester Amon, Ghost, and some efficient Rangers.

Stark - Arya. Bran. The rest of the non-loyals aren't any better than what you could run in another faction.

Targarian - I guess you get some efficient uniques? Useful at the start of the game, when you might just want more 2-3 cost guys, but there is nothing here that pulls you to Targ.

One Deck to Rule Them All

After a bunch of playthroughs, I've settled on a version of my "Three Rings" deck that has been able to beat all* scenarios and all nightmare scenarios released to date, with a >33% win rate (usually 100%, but some of the harder quests have encounter and/or player draws that lose). Note that I stopped working on this just before the Grey Havens and the 3rd ring came out

*escape from dol gondur is excluded from this claim. I did manage to beat it once, but I'll need to play through it some more, and see if there is a slight modification that can improve my chances. Regardless, I'd have to play with the rule of "select which hero is the prisoner" rather than have it be random.

Decklist (with notes) - 51 cards.

The deck is 51 cards to allow one card to be removed before each scenario. In some cases, one of the Unique allies might not be usable. In many cases, there are no Condition attachments, so Power of Orthanc isn't needed. In other cases Nenya (Battle/Siege heavy quests), Flame of Anor (location heavy quests), or a Dareon's Runes (against Dunland enemies) might be removable.

This deck can be constructed from 2 core sets, and 1 of each expansion. Note that all unique cards (other than Vilya) are only 1x, just for fun.

Heroes (36 starting threat):
Gandalf
Elrond
Galadriel

Attachments (13):

For Gandalf:
Wizard Pipe
Gandalf's Staff

For Elrond:
3x Vilya
The Light of Valinor

For Galadriel:
Nenya

For Gandalf/Elrond, depending on need:
2x Unexpected Courage
2x Expert Treasure Hunter
A Burning Brand
Ring of Barahir

Events (18):
3x Elrond's Counsel
3x Hidden Cache
3x Daeron's Runes
2x Dwarven Tomb
2x Flame of Anor
A Test of Will
Hasty Stroke
Stand and Fight
Power of Orthanc
Will of the West

Allies (20):

Cheap:
3x Zigil Miner
2x Warden of Healing
2x Vassal of the Windlord
Henamarth Riversong
Arwen
Bilbo Baggins
The Riddermark's Finest

Expensive:
3x Northern Tracker
Faramir
Boromir
Treebeard
Gawahir
Gildor Inglorion
Beoren


If you don't have a second core set, you would have to replace one copy of the following three cards:
Northern Tracker, Unexpected Courage, and Dwarven Tomb

You can also replace the Northern Tracker and Dwarven Tomb with Elfhelm and an Asfaloth. I would make these replacements because Dwarven Tomb normally gets back and Elrond's Counsel for threat control, which Elfhelm can help with, while keeping the same number of 2 atk / 2 def / 3 hp characters. Asfaloth keeps the number of location control cards the same (needed for Journey to Rhosgobel to clear Rhosgobel before stage 2, as well as other location heavy scenarios / encounter draws).

Once the next set comes out, you can use one Shadowfax instead of the Unexpected Courage. Grim Resolve is another possible replacement.

The Hills of Emun Muil (2 player, Round 2, One Core Set)

The Hills are almost impossible to beat in Round 1, due to the need to actually see 20 VP worth of locations, and be able to put 18 progress on them. The most card efficient way to do this is to reveal 2x The Outer Ridge and 2x The East Wall of Rohan, for a total of 20 VP alongside Amon  Hen and Amon Lhaw. We'll be using Legolas again to blow up some Eastern Crows to help clear out locations.

Setup:
Add Amon Hen and Amon Lhaw to the staging area

Deck 1:
Legolas
Dunhere
Eleanor

Hand:
Blade of Gondolin
Northern Tracker
Stand and Fight
Stand and Fight
Strength Of Will
?

Deck 2:
Eowyn
Gloin
Theodred

Hand:
Steward of Gondor
Unexpected Courage
Northern Tracker
Sneak Attack
Snowbourn Scout
Snowbourn Scout


Round 1 Planning:
Draw ? and Sneak Attack
Attach Blade of Gondolin to Legolas
Attach Steward of Gondor to Eowyn, and exhaust it.
Attach Unexpected Courage to Legolas

Round 1 Quest:
Commit Dunhere, Eleanor, Eowyn (Deck 1 discards), Gloin, Theodred (resource to Eowyn) (10 Willpower)
Reveal 2x Eastern Crows, surging into 2x The Outer Ridge (10 total Threat)

Round 1 Travel
Travel to Amon Hen

Round 1 Engagement:
Both Crows engage, one on each deck

Round 1 Combat:
Both attacks go undefended (no shadow effects). Dunhere and Gloin each take 1 damage. Gloin gains a resource.

Legolas kills both crows, clearing Amon Hen, and adding the needed progress to the quest.

Round 1 Refresh:
Raise Threat to X and Y

Round 2 Resource/Planning:
Draw ? and ?
Exhaust Steward of Gondor (5 resources total)
Play Northern Tracker
Deck 1 Play Northern Tracker

Round 2 Quest:
Quest with 2x Northern Tracker (clearing 2x The Outer Ridge, Amon Lhaw at 2/5 progress), Gloin, Theodred (resource to self), Eowyn (Both decks discard), and Dunhere. (12 total Willpower)
Reveal 2x Eastern Crows, surging into 2x The East Wall of Rohan (12 total Threat)

Round 2 Travel:
Travel to Amon Lhaw, exhaust Eleanor to play Strength of Will (4/5 progress).

Round 2 Engagement:
Optionally engage 1 crow, and the second also engages Deck 2.

Round 2 Combat:
Sneak Attack x2 puts Snowbourn Scout x2 into play, clearing one Wall
Each scout blocks a crows, and dies due to a shadow effect boosting attack
Deck 1 plays 2x Stand and Fight to put the scouts back into play (clearing the other Wall)
Legolas attacks and kills a crow, putting the last 2 progress needed on Amon Lhaw

The Dead Marshes (Solo, Round 1)

The Dead Marshes fall, beaten in Round 1 by a single Core set (as released):

Heroes (30 Threat)
Legolas
Glorfindel
Gloin

Hand:
Blade of Gondolin
Protector of Lorien
Sneak Attack
Gandalf
Sneak Attack
?
Draw: ?

Setup: reveal Evil Storm (no effect)

Planning:
Play Blade of Gondolin on Legolas
Play Protector of Lorien on Glorfindel

Quest:
Play Sneak Attack to bring in Gandalf. Draw 3 cards, which are discarded to Protector of Lorien.
Commit Gandalf, Gloin, and Glorfindel to the quest (12 Willpower)

Reveal Eastern Crows, which surges into Despair (no effect).
Discard a 4th card to Protector of Lorien, since this takes place before the errata.
Place 12 progress on stage 1, completing it.

Escape test:
Exhaust no-one, fail the test, add 2 resources to Gollum

Engagement:
Wolf Rider engages

Combat:
Take Eastern Crows attack undefended. Gloin takes 1 damage (and gains 1 resource)
Sneak Attack to bring out Gandalf again, reducing Threat by 5.
Legolas dispatches the crows, adding three progress to Stage 2, and completing the quest.

Exhaust Gandalf for the final Escape test, discarding 2 cards that do not beat Gandalf's Willpower.

Final Score: 25 (Threat) + 1 (damage) + 0 (rounds) - 0 (VP) = 26!

How to beat Journey Down the Anduin in Round 1

The best solution I've come up with to this challenge is three players, and using a third Sneak Attack. For a single core set, it is relatively trivial to beat it solo in 2 rounds, using the same hero lineup and technique as Passage Through Mirkwood.

3 players, 2 core sets, 1 round:

Deck 1:
Legolas
Gimli
Thalin

Hand:
2x Blade of Gondolin
Horn of Gondor
2x Quick Strike
Blade Mastery

Draw: Veteran Axehand

Deck 2:
Aragorn
Theodred
Gloin

Hand:
3x Sneak Attack
2x Son of Anor
Gandalf

Draw: Steward of Gondor

Deck 3:
Eowyn
Dunhere
Eleanor

Hand:
Unexpected Courage
Stand and Fight
(other cards are irrelevant)

Staging: Reveal Hill Troll, Despair x2.

Planning:
Play Steward of Gondor on Eowyn & exhaust it
Play 2x Blade of Gondolin on Legolas
Play Horn of Gondor on Gimli
Play Unexpected Courage on Legolas (3 Spirit resources left on Eowyn)
Use Sneak Attack to put Gandalf into play, dealing 4 damage to the Hill Troll (5/9 HP remaining)
End of phase, return Gandalf to hand, Gimli gains a resource.

Quest:
Discard Son of Anor, Veteran Axehand, and an irrelevant card to boost Eowyn.
Use Stand and Fight to put Son of Anor into play, engaging the Hill Troll.

Commit Gimli, Thalin, Aragorn, Theoden (resource to Gimli), Gloin, Eowyn, and Dunhere to the quest (16 willpower), along with the Son of Anor.

Reveal 2x The Necromancer's Reach (Gimli gains a resource when the Son of Anor dies (total of 3), Gloin gains 2 resources, 14 total damage on heroes)
Reveal Goblin Sniper

Play 2x Sneak Attack to put Gandalf (deal 4 damage to Hill Troll, 1/9 HP remaining) and Son of Anor (engage Goblin Sniper) into play.

Play Blade Mastery to give Legolas +1 Attack
Play Quick Strike and have Legolas ranged attack the Hill Troll, defeating it and adding 4 progress to the quest.
Ready with Unexpected Courage
Play Quick Strike and have Legolas ranged attack the Goblin Sniper, defeating it and completing Stage 1.

Resolve the quest, adding 16 progress and completing stage 2.

Reveal 6 locations for the Forced effect on Stage 3, completing the quest!