[minion; vs minion] The Red Hills

[Zarathustra]

This is the deck I used to win 2004 World Championships:

The Red Hills vs. Minion:

Start:

Bolg
Buthrakaur *
Gorbag
Mauhur
Radbug
Shagrat *
Ugluk *
Ufthak
Ulkaur the Tongueless
Umagaur
2 Orders from the Great Demon

Deck:

3 The Balrog

Ancient Secrets
2 Awaiting the Call
3 Dark Tryst
2 Great Shadow
3 Hold Rebuilt and Repaired
3 I’ll Report You
3 Orc Quarrels
Weigh All Things to a Nicety
2 We Have Come to Kill
Blasting Fire
A Few Recruits
Orcs of Moria
Great Bats
Stinker
3 Maker’s Map
2 Tempest of Fire

2 An Unexpected Outpost
2 Heedless Revelry
Redoubled Force
Revealed to All Watchers
River
Rolled Down to the Sea
2 Unabated in Malice
3 Webs of Fear and Treachery


Lord of the Carrock
Adunaphel
Baduila
Daelomin at Home
Gandalf the White Rider
Itangast Ahunt
Lady of the Golden Wood
Mouth of Sauron
Smaug Ahunt
Smaug at Home

2 Cave-Drake
Cave Worm
Ice-Drake
2 Sellswords Between Charters
Wandering Eldar

Sideboard:

3 Hill-Troll
2 Orc-Tracker
3 Troll-Lout
Blasting Fire
Gifts as Given of Old
Sudden Call
Tempest of Fire
Threats
Angband Revisited
Darkness Wielded
Ancient Black Axe

Alone and Unadvised
Khamul the Easterling
Lost in Free-Domains
Lure of Power
Lure of the Senses
Lure of Expedience
Nameless Thing
River
Seized By Terror
The Balance of Things
The Roving Eye
The Way is Shut
Veils Flung Away
Troll-Purse
----------------------------------------------------

This is yet another of my "trick" decks, so called because they take extreme advantage of some little-used card. In this case, the card is the Minion Worthy Hills site, which, interestingly enough, never taps. At first, I thought they only thing that could be gotten out of this was unlimited Secrets of their Forging + 2 big, impossible-to-influence factions. However, if you rebuild the site into a [S], you can play three copies each of Maker's Map (2 MPs) and Tempest of Fire (3 MPs) for a total of 15 miscellaneous MPs out of one site. You can also pull a techno item or two, since they're playable at [S]s, as well as some Great Bats and A Few Recruits. In the meantime, Big Red amasses a large contingent of fellas from the sideboard (Bolg as well, usually), and brings in the Orcs of Moria and Stinker. If you have time, head over to the Under-Leas with a Darkness Wielded as protection for the Ancient Black Cheeze. Interestingly enough, you can have both Shagrat and Ugluk Await the Call at the Worthy Hills, and even if you put an I'll Report You on him, he can still controll Ugluk. Another nice thing is that Awaiting the Call does not reduce the character's mind for the purposes of Heedless, and that Webs of Fear and Treachery actually cancels both Foolish Words and I'll Report You, while hosing most minion influence schemes (since they don't have wizards with 10 DI...). Unfortunately, you'll need to buy 3 boxes of Balrog cards to get all three Tempests of Fire, so it's a rather pricey deck to play IRL. C'est la vie....

MP breakdown:

Character: 16 usually,
Ally: 1-3 (depending on whether My Precious springs out before Stinker),
Item: 1-2-6 (depending on 2nd Blasting Fire and Axe),
Faction: 1-4 (depending on luck with Orcs of Moria),
Misc: 15

== 34-44

Burn, baby, burn...

[Jambo]

I must admit, whilst I'm amazingly intrigued by your Return of the Faithless Stewards deck, this Red Hills deck is still the deck I'm most impressed with. The reason being that unless one can hit this deck on the first turn out of Moria, it is otherwise almost impossible to touch - maybe with the exception of 3 Heedless Revelry.

I remember back when I had the misfortune to be up against it on GCCG, and I was using dwarves up in Dragon country. I was acquiring no less than around 4 MPs per turn and yet still couldn't keep pace with the speed of this deck. Essentially, as i remember it, the deck exhausted on the 4th turn and then by that stage you effectively only had hazards left in the deck. That's the one great thing about this deck - so many of the resources get played on the table...

It's still unbeaten isn't it, although am I right in saying that Brian Min's FW Gandalf tied with it in the Worlds? - a feat that will probably take a while and a very special deck to repeat, if it's even possible.

[Zarathustra]

It is indeed still undefeated, though it does have the slight mar of a tie on its record now. However, I don't feel too bad about that, since Brian knew ahead of time that I was playing a Seek Without Success hazard strategy, which helped him avoid being roadblocked greatly. Also, I built his deck (at least the resource portion), so it's more like I tied myself, which, when you think about it, makes sense. I'd hate to kick my own ass all the time...

IMHO, this deck needs to be nerfed. A Modest Proposal, anyone?...

[Qapla]

Hi Mark,

Thank you for demonstrating this Red Hills deck to me during the dutch nationals weekend. I constructed my own version of it for a tournament in Belgium and it got me my first golden hobbit!.

Michel

[Zarathustra]

Hahah!

Nice!

Glad to be of service.

MRA

[Sauron]

In all fairness Mark, you knew what was coming too, you could easily anticipate alot of the sites I was going too.

[Lord Leuber]

However, what happens if you don't draw that Hold Rebuild and Repaired for four turns and are staring at Tempests of Fire and Great Bats, what then?

(yes, that happened to me, however in all fairness I still won 6-0 because I managed to slow my opponent down greatly with Heedless Webs, but I called in turn 8 or something.)

[Zarathustra]

Then you cry to your mommy that it isn't fair.

Also, send some scrubs around to draw cards -- Himring is the only minion site that allows you to draw 3 cards.

No deck is immune to a really really really bad draw. They should all have a way to speed up their draw, however.

As an interesting sidenote to this discussion: I've exhausted the Red Hills deck against a hero in 2 turns before. Silly fellow played 3 A Short Rest in one turn!

[Zarathustra]

Since I will never play this deck again at a tournament, I feel that I ought to tell all the secret counters to it.

(1) The Witch-King (or Awaken the Earth's Fire): tap him to turn the site into a .  No Tempests or Great Bats will be playable.

(2) Spells of the Barrow-Wights: take characters prisoner.  They will be worth negative MPs and lose any stuff they carry (e.g. maps, bats, tech).

(3) Minions Stir: make the Tempest attacks brutal.

(4) Heedless: lots of it.

(5) Doubled Vigilance: annoying, especially with Minions Stir.

(6) Turn the site into a wizard:H: and protect it (see my Mystic Hills deck).

(7) Drop a Vile Fumes on the site to return it to status.

(8) Malady.

(9) See my Dwar cvcc deck.

(10) Orc Rain with Umagaur the Pale (hazard).

[Sauron]

Wish more people had thought about counters to the deck instead of trying to nerf it to all hell.

[Bandobras Took]

Since I will never play this deck again at a tournament, I feel that I ought to tell all the secret counters to it.

(1) The Witch-King (or Awaken the Earth's Fire): tap him to turn the site into a .  No Tempests or Great Bats will be playable.

That was one of the bases for the hazard portion I built against it.

Did you find a way around buffed-out Wisps tapping your characters?

[Sly Southerner]

Wish more people had thought about counters to the deck instead of trying to nerf it to all hell.

AFAIK, noone has tried to nerf this or any other deck. The Balrog rule is designed to have a smallish effect on the Balrog avatar in general. Nerfing this deck would be done by making Worthy Hills tap, but that has not been suggested (and I am certainly not doing so).