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2
Tales from the Prancing Pony 1: That's the Spirit
Jul 12 2012 05:00 AM |
sirprim
in Lord of the Rings
Prancing Pony musings sirprim Spirit
Tales from the Prancing Pony is my article section where I will connect some loose ends, ramble here and there or basically just talk about whatever crosses my mind and I am in the mood to write down (And the powers behind cardgameDB don't feel like censoring 
). So take a seat and relax, there might be Hobbits dancing on your table, who knows.Alright, time for the first detour.
So basically since the beginning of this game up to this very day the article is published, Spirit has been perceived as the most powerful sphere out there and many fellowships don't leave their homes without a little or a lot support from the blue cardpool. Now that's a good and a bad thing. Its good to have some powerful cards in your deck and Spirit offers some interesting choices, but there seem to be many people that find spirit essential to winning most quests, which is bad from a design and gameplay standpoint.
I am not here today to challenge this view (yet
), but I hope that my future articles can reveal some strength from other spheres, so that spirit can let go of its essential status in order to get a better 
. Today I'd rather like to shed light on the reasons behind spirits popularity. With my previous two articles in mind, we can now look at how well each sphere does at hard-countering certain encounter cards and try to rank them:hard-countering locations
between Northern Tracker (Core), The Riddermark's Finest (THoEM), Ride to Ruin (THoEM) and ridiculous amounts of willpower (Eowyn (Core), Escort from Edoras (AJtR) or Arwen Undomiel (TWitW) just to name a few) this ranking is obvious and unchallenged.
2nd place: Lore
Lore got strong willpower boosts (Protector of Lorien (Core), Longbeard Map-Maker (CatC), Rivendell Minstrel (THFG)) and good direct progress (Asfaloth (FoS)) leading up to a fine 2nd place.
3rd place: Leadership
Only little direct progress (Snowbourn Scout (Core)), but good willpower boosts (Faramir (Core), Celebrian's Stone (Core)) justify a 3rd place for leadership.
4th place: Tactics
Someone has to get the last place... you have to pay 10+ threat or 4+ resources for a 2WP character and that's as high as it gets. Additionally no location effects whatsoever. Locations make tactics a sad panda. I remember when I first got the Core Set and played the tactics starter deck vs Passage Through Mirkwood, I got location-locked and lost. I bet many people had the same experience, raise your hand if you do
hard-countering enemies
Defense (Winged Guardian (THfG), Feint (Core)), offense (basically any character *g*) or direct damage (Hail of Stones (RtR), Thalin (Core) etc.). Tactics got it all and plenty.
2nd place: Leadership
second spot goes to leadership for their reasonable defense (Snowbourn Scout (Core), Dain Ironfoot (RtM), Dunedain Warning (CatC)), good offensive boosts (For Gondor! (Core)) and some direct damage (Sneak Attack (Core) + Gandalf (Core), Fresh Tracks (TLD))
3rd place: Lore
strong defense (Denethor (Core), A Burning Brand (CatC), Silvan Tracker (TDM)), little offense (Mirkwood Runner (RtM), Glorfindel (Core)) and a touch of direct damage (Infighting (AJtR)) lead Lore to the 3rd place.
4th place: Spirit
They basically got Dunhere (Core) and thats pretty much it. Trying to kill things with Spirit-only is a chore.
hard-countering treacheries
and we all know why
. Shall I repeat it? Ok. *drumroll*. Dear readers, especially for you, here it is, the magnificent, the long awaited... Allow me to reveal ...*eek*
Looks like I got cancelled
2nd place: Lore
Miner of the Iron Hills (Core) is securing the 2nd spot for Lore.
3rd place (tied): Leadership and Tactics
There is simply nothing there *g*
So by reviewing these rankings the reasons for spirits relevance becomes crystal clear:
1. Hard-countering is the most common and obvious strategy of dealing with encounter cards
2. Spirit is the sole leader in two out of three of those categories
3. Voila, you have a powerhouse
Or to reiterate in different words: You pick Spirit and not only got you 2 out of 3 bases covered already, you also got the respective strongest cards in both of these fields (locations and treacheries). You cannot ask for more from a single sphere.
This also shows why I believe it is more beneficial to ask what you can do to the encounter card types rather then how to quest, attack or defend. Imagine you take the latter viewpoint (#2 in my previous article) and then try to come up with a similar kind of ranking. Now suddenly tactics would "win" 2 out of 3 categories (attacking and defending), which should indicate that tactics is a powerful sphere, but unfortunately tactics is not up there yet with the others (I believe many forum posts have expressed this observation and I honestly feel sad for tactics - oh the possibilities...). Don't get me wrong, tactics has powerful cards, but so far they are basically all only able to deal with one third of the encounter deck and can only so slightly contribute in other areas.
Alright, there you have it. I honestly don't know how many people were wondering about the reason for spirits popularity, but I do know that plenty of people view spirit as being a step ahead of the others. Will I ever move away from the obvious stuff? Only one way to find out
So long,
Sebastian
P.S.: How essential is Spirit in your decks? Do you dare leave home without? Are you a brave mono-tactics masochist?
- Hastur360, Reager and Aequitas like this
6 Comments
and Unexpected Courage (Core) that is so important for the combat phase. These supports the fact that spirit is the strongest sphere because even being in the last spot of the countering enemies ranking (which I consider to be the most important one out of the 3) it still has its tricks and isn't completely useless as the last spot spheres are in the other 2 rankings.
On a side note: I did get location locked down with the tactics only deck like you mention for the first games where you use the mono-sphered decks just to try out the game, but on the second game I managed to win, much more harder was with the spirit only deck where it was too hard to kill enemies, had to play like 5 times to beat passage through mirkwood. At least with the tactics you had legolas and attachment for placing quest tokens. This obviously doesn't matter though on the ranking since it is just a particular way of playing the passage through mirkwood quest only at the beginning to learn the game.
Thank you for your kind words. To me the CoOp aspect is a nice "refreshment" as it can be very "relaxing" to play together instead of head on while still having a very tough challenge ahead.
And if my writing makes the game sound awesome, that is solely due to the game being awesome
You are right, the new Glorfindel certainly helps Spirit with combat. But I don't see Unexpected Courage as a combat card for Spirit. When you use UC for "combat" it usually gets attached to the likes of Gimli or Aragorn.
But I agree in total, Spirit certainly can fight better than tactics can quest.
Sweet to hear. Preach on brother!