The Lonely Mountain is a gimmicky quest, but I’ve never had a big problem with it. In the context Nightmare I may actually prefer it to the other two quests from the box since the Nightmare decks for Flies and Spiders and Battle of Five Armies have a tendency to accentuate the potential to randomly screw you over, whereas Lonely Mountain at least remains pretty consistent.
The Nightmare deck for The Lonely Mountain doesn’t really change the quest that much. Nothing messes with the basic structure of quest-burgle-survive dragon-quest. The Erebor Bats mean you can’t neglect combat requirements quite as much as in the standard version and they cut down your hand which you need for burgling. But that’s the only thing which really runs counter to the simple and effective strategies for beating the quest. Maybe there could be some issues with threat (both in the staging area and on the players’ threat dials) but the quest is still straightforward enough that fitting in solutions to this sort of thing really isn’t a problem.
How then do I go about building a deck for this quest? Well, high willpower is important (high willpower characters preferably rather than building up willpower from lots of characters), as is good card draw. Location control seems a good idea to clear some of the locations in the staging area rather than travel to them – also getting their threat out of the way faster, for which Secret Paths is another obvious choice. Since I highlighted potential issues with the Erebor Bats I do want to make sure I have some decent attack power available. Means of surviving hits from Smaug and of course I need to be able to discard his shadow cards to avoid the burgle chaingun dragon.
Will set on gold
Heroes:
Gloin
Eowyn
Glorfindel (Sp)
Allies (16):
Gandalf (OHaUH) x3
Faramir x3
Erestor x3
Northern Tracker x3
Rider of the Mark x3
Arwen Undomiel x1
Attachments (16):
Light of Valinor x3
Citadel Plate x3
Narvi’s Belt x3
King Under the Mountain x3
Celebrian’s Stone x2
Boots from Erebor x2
Events (18):
A Test of Will x3
Elrond’s Counsel x3
The Galadhrim’s Greeting x3
Dwarven Tomb x3
We Are Not Idle x3
A Good Harvest x3
Thoughts: Eowyn and Glorfindel were obvious choices since I want high willpower and location control. Gloin potentially has some rather interesting synergy with Dragon-spell, which I didn’t get to actually pull off in standard mode but maybe it’ll come up in Nightmare, and once powered up he also works as a means of taking hits from the dragon. Oh, and he allows me to use King Under the Mountain for card draw.
Gandalf is another good willpower ally, Erestor is more card draw, Faramir is a fantastic willpower boost, Northern Tracker is location control and Rider of the Mark is my means of discarding Smaug’s shadow cards. Celebrian’s Stone is another good willpower increase.
Citadel Plate and Boots from Erebor boost Gloin’s hit points so he can take stronger hits, while Narvi’s Belt lets him pay for the Citadel Plate or for Spirit cards, as does A Good Harvest.
The threat reduction events are potentially significant to compensate for keeping Gandalf in play. Dwarven Tomb will allow me to retrieve cards I’ve discarded for Burgle tests and still play them, or conversely retrieve events I’ve played to discard them for Burgle tests.
Drawing out the dragon’s treasure
Heroes:
Elrond
Beravor
Frodo Baggins
Allies (20):
Imladris Stargazer x3
Rider of the Mark x3
Vassal of the Windlord x3
Gleowine x3
Dori x3
Warden of Healing x3
Gildor Inglorion x1
Haldir of Lorien x1
Attachments (9):
Asfaloth x3
Unexpected Courage x3
Vilya x3
Events (21):
A Test of Will x3
Elrond’s Counsel x3
The Galadhrim’s Greeting x3
Dwarven Tomb x3
Daeron’s Runes x3
Deep Knowledge x3
Secret Paths x3
Thoughts: Beravor was a definite for card draw. Frodo can take hits from Smaug and of course I need Spirit access on both sides for Riders of the Mark to work repeatably. Elrond can also have Spirit access with Vilya, has high willpower, and allows me access to a little Tactics attack power without needing to include an actual Tactics hero. Since I’m expecting to make use of Frodo’s ability threat reduction is important again.
This deck doesn’t really put a lot towards the questing, but of course it provides Asfaloth and Secret Paths to deal with locations. It does well on the card draw front though of course – in addition to Beravor we have Gleowine and Deep Knowledge which can help on both sides of the table and Daeron’s Runes just for here.
Imladris Stargazer obviously works with Vilya, but I can also use it while Burgling, to check if any of the cards I’m about to draw through various means will help me pass the test.
Dori is a backup plan for Smaug, healing is obviously essential for Gloin to work properly, everything else is pretty standard.
RingsDB:
http://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/4186/the-line-unbroken-nm-the-lonely-mountain
http://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/7697/the-line-unbroken-nm-the-lonely-mountain-deck-1-1.0
http://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/7698/the-line-unbroken-nm-the-lonely-mountain-deck-2-1.0
Youtube: https://youtu.be/0YhlHKOZORA
Warden of Arnor 