I got the ‘The Steward’s Fear’, the first adventure pack in the ‘Against the Shadow’ cycle. This concentrates more on the city of Minas Tirith and the armies of Gondor.

The reviews say this pack has a very good scenario, all about conspiracies and mysteries to be solved. It also has some nice new cards for my decks.

A standout card for me is the Gondorian Shield, which would be great to give to Elrohir in my Elf deck.

Elrohir’s job is blocking over and over again, and the Gondorian Shield gives a hero +2 defence. This will make him almost invulnerable!

Also in the pack is a new hero, Hirluin the Fair. He supports the new character type of ‘Outlands’ which was introduced in the big Numenor box.

(In the books, the Outlanders were minor princes and chieftains who came to the defence of Minas Tirith in the big battle at the end. Hirluin was one of those chieftains.)

Another good ally in this pack is the Ethir Swordsman. He boosts his own questing willpower and the willpower of other Outlands characters. What is cool is he will boost other copies of himself and they will boost him back.

If you have one Swordsman in play, his willpower is 2 (1+1). If you have two in play, their combined willpower is 6 (1+2+1+2). If you manage to get all three in play, then their combined willpower is 12!

There are three adventures in the big Heirs of Numenor box set, but when I come to play the adventures in this cycle, I think I will try this The Steward’s Fear adventure before those in the box. Those three box adventures are supposed to be very tough.

Take a look at this enemy from one of the difficult box scenarios, the Mumak war elephant. I can see why this box has a reputation for being difficult. The Mumak has 12 hit points and an attack of 7!

You can’t do more than 3 points of damage to it in a turn, so it will be around for at least four turns, stomping with 7 attack each time.

It also has a ‘no attachments’ rule which means you can’t just trap it in a Forest Snare. I guess you could Feint and dodge its attack for a turn, maybe?

I will definitely come back to the Numenor adventures much later 🙂