Suicidal Setup 1.0

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Deck inspired by Rajam's "Suicidal Support for Super Bilbo": http://ringsdb.com/decklist/view/637/rajam-suicidal-support-for-super-bilbo-v1-3-1.0

The whole point of this deck is to start the game as the 1st player, spend the entire first planning phase tossing as much cool stuff onto the other decks as possible, and then threat out immediately so that the encounter deck doesn't reveal any extra cards during staging.

The key "suicide" mechanism is Wandering Took + Song of Eärendil. Each time you pass the Took to the other player, you raise his threat by three and lower yours by three. Using Song of Eärendil, you instead raise his threat by two and lower yours by two. He then sends the Took back, raising your threat by three and lowering his by three. The net result of the two transactions is +1 threat for you and -1 threat for him. This action can be repeated indefinitely; essentially, take 50 minus your current threat, lower another player's threat by that amount, and then pack up your cards and leave the table.

Prior to threating out, the goal is to draw and play as much as possible. 44 of the 50 cards cost either 0 or 1 resource, with the exceptions being that critical Wandering Took and the Resourceful. But you're not meant to play the Resourceful yourself; instead, the goal is to pass it to the other player via Message from Elrond, lower his threat down to secrecy levels with your Took/Song, then let him play it for one resource before you finally off yourself.

The rest of the cards are either card draw, (Daeron's Runes, Deep Knowledge), deck thinners (The Seeing-stone, which is used to pull a Deep Knowledge), threat reduction (Elrond's Counsel and The Fall of Gil-Galad, which can be played on Treebeard and his ability activated five times for 13 points of immediate threat reduction), resource acceleration (Love of Tales and Keys of Orthanc, which either help you play an extra card during planning or else go across the table to speed up your partner deck), or cheap attachments to play across the table. (Cards you own that are controlled by another player stick around after your death.)

The sideboard is just stuffed with other 1-cost Lore or Spirit attachments that can be situationally useful based on the quest or the other deck's hero lineup. If you need to make room, the first things to remove would be the Ravens of the Mountain, the Message/Resourceful combo, the Desperate Alliance, (which is only used to pass resources to the other player, or if you can't get to your Song/Took combo), or the Good Harvest (which is really included because it's 0-cost and can sometimes help you pay for one extra card before you go, but which can also be paired with Message from Elrond to speed up another deck's start).

If you can't get to your key suicide combo during your first planning phase, all is not lost. Arwen Undómiel, Círdan the Shipwright, and Treebeard combine to quest for 13 in the first round (if you put four damage tokens on Treebeard to boost his willpower), and then you can engage every enemy in staging and let undefended attacks do you in; the only "cost" to this approach is one extra card revealed from the encounter deck turn one, and a missed chance to dramatically lower the other player's threat before you go.

Or if you want you can even stick around for a round or two just to get more pieces out before you go.

(Side note: while I keep saying "you" and "the other players", this deck is really best piloted by someone who is running a second deck, too, so they don't have to sit out the entire game after that massive first planning phase. Unless you're a big fan of early eliminations and player downtime.)