Argalad

Some thoughts: Is he from Mirkwood? Artwork looks like it's Mirkwood... If that's the case, is he a prelude to finally having Thranduil as a hero? I feel like he's the only relevant character in the saga not having yet it's own hero version... As far as Argalad is concerned, I don't seem to figure him out yet. His ability would have been amazing in the early days, but nowadays, hoping for one meager point of damage in the best scenario (plus threat reduction, of course) seems a bit disappointing... I suppose he's very versatile, being ranged and Lore, but wouldn't he need quite a bit if deck building around? I mean, you surely want to equip some weapons and means of readying him, which are typically found outside of lore. Maybe he's a good complement to Haldir? We'll see, I'm eager to discover what the genius of deck building out there make of him.

I think he is designed for ranger/trap decks. It's a pitty that he dooesn't have the ranger trait, though. 

I completely agree, his ability is not competetive nowadays. Hoewever, I can imagine to play him in trap/ranger decks for single-player, where there is also engagement value incrasing. Knocking out an enemy's threat, not having to engange him +wound him seems nice. The lack of weapons for lore surely is an issue here, too.

 

In multiplayer I don't see him, as you then can't rely on all those engagement modifiers to work 

Yeah, like with Lore Faramir, his own threat is an issue against what he's trying to accomplish. Plus, in this case, we've got anti synergy with Pippin, since it reads "enemy's threat", not "printed threat". Besides some traps, as you said, I can't see where would I put him instead of Haldir. Maybe craft a deck using him and Dunhere in order to keep your threat low and attack the staging area forever? But this kind of decks usually used turtling and in the modern days it's not a viable strategy.

What anti synergy with Pippin? Neither Pippin cares about enemies' threat values. Lore Pippin only cares about enemy engagement costs and your threat, and Spirit Pippin doesn't care about anything at all.

I also can't see the anti Synergy with Pippin...however, Pippins "+1" doesn't have that impact at all.

 

Again Agree on th Dunhere/Argalad synergy...nice, but hard to get it working

One damage certainly isn't exciting, but his power effectively lets him commit to the quest after the staging step, when you know how much threat there is. Post-staging ways to modify quest success are always nice.

I can see him replacing Mirlonde in some Silvan decks, but he seems generally inferior to Haldir.

I also can't see the anti Synergy with Pippin...however, Pippins "+1" doesn't have that impact at all.
 
Again Agree on th Dunhere/Argalad synergy...nice, but hard to get it working

Yeah, sorry, I don't know what I was thinking about Pippin... There's in fact synergy, since Pippin allows you to have enemies for more rounds engaged with you.

I played him in my ranger-theme deck. His ability his really nice. If he had the ranger trait he would be really good (beeing able to trigger e.g. Quick ears, Ranger Bow, etc). Not sure if I will keep him in this ranger-style-deck. But his synergy with Ranger Bow is good.

Another aspect that would make him much better is (besides of course a higher attack, but iI guess this would make him too strong) is having stats 9/1/2/2/4 instead of 9/2/2/1/4

Good point, his will of 2 is a bit wasted, though I suspect I would like one less threat or one more hit point rather than an extra defense. And you are right about him wanting the Ranger trait.

 

I played a 3-player game with him present about a week ago, and I found that we left enemies in the middle, that we might normally have optionally engaged. There was a case of "if don't engage him, Argalad will kill him in 2-3 turns". He combined especially well with Haldir, who can attack into the staging area. Argalad would scratch them once or twice then Haldir would kill them, without them ever making an attack.

 

Not top-tier, but I think a credible second-tier hero.