Council of Elrond

Ranger Ally

Unique. Manifestation of Bairanax. Playable by a Diplomat Ringwraith at Ovir Hollow. 5 Mind. If your Ringwraith is the only character in his company, he may move using region movement to a maximum of 3 regions regardless of resource effects in play. Discard a hazard creature from your hand or this card during the organization phase. Cancel all attacks by Bairanax against your Ringwraith's company.

i'd say animal/ wolves hazard creatures, since he seem to mainly eat bears

btw, prowess/ body???

and how will it interact with parsimony and from the pits of angband?
too powerfull if you can take it to hand from discard.

other than that i like it

Oh, prowess/body 7/7.

Any hazard creature will do in a pinch, I think; that's why it takes a diplomat to get him to do it.

It might be too powerful, though we'd have to see; is getting a Dragon Faction with Parsimony/Pits of Angband too powerful?

And a list of Diplomat Ringwraiths:

Adunaphel
Indur
Khamul
Ren
The Witch-King

I'm going to edit it to say "If your RW is the only character in his company."

Bandobras Took wrote:Oh, prowess/body 7/7.

Any hazard creature will do in a pinch, I think; that's why it takes a diplomat to get him to do it.

It might be too powerful, though we'd have to see; is getting a Dragon Faction with Parsimony/Pits of Angband too powerful?

nope, because dragon factions are hard to influence, allies are so easy to play.

Marshalling points of this version?

That is a key difference, I suppose. MPs would be the same, but having to discard a creature from your hand can be harsh, especially since, as it's currently worded, this applies on both your turn and your opponent's turn.

Nice! Is RW supposed to ride Bairanax then? Not sure he would suffer that. Maybe only playable if you buy him with Gifts, or trick him with some Words of Menace?
What if Bairanax is at Grey Havens (cool!), can you still play Bairanax Ahunt/at Home? Then he really gains some free air-miles. The manifestation rule must be bent here maybe?
Why the high mind (Balrog/Tom only has 4), he can't be influenced by opponent, but will find it very difficult to Stay at his RW's Appetite.

Discarding cards can also be to your advantage, more so if it's any creature, and especially in your own turn, since you don't need hazards in your own turn obviously...

That's why it's only Diplomat Ringwraiths; non-diplomats can't persuade the Dragon to suffer it. Different Manifestations of the same Unique Dragon may be in play according to the Dragons rules. What you can't have is two copies of Bairanax Roused in play.

Discarding cards can be an advantage, but if at any point you find yourself without a creature hazard in hand to discard, Bairanax goes away. This means you can't always play a vital creature if you want to keep your ally. It also means you have to shift the balance of your hazard portion towards creatures, leaving less room for events. I think the drawback is sufficient, but I could be mistaken; I've often been so before.

I don't think you understood what I was implying Ben, since the normal manifestations of the dragons all remain in the same area, it is not that strange if multiple manifestations are in play. Bairanax may be Hunting through Anduin Vales and still be at home at Ovir Hollow, we assume he just returns there in a sec. But if the ally manifestation can go anywhere, it does become strange, at least I see it that way. If Bairanax ally is at Edhellond, can he still be at Ovir Hollow too?

The fact that only a diplomat RW can play the guy is no real obstacle to play him, only an obstacle on deck construction. Personally I feel it would take a bit more effort to convince a dragon, even if he's one of the smaller ones. The faction (worth only 3 mp) even takes alot more effort, and it's basically the same guy.

The creature discard is nice, and it does carry risk, but I'm saying that a clever player might use it to draw an extra card each turn, and if you play nazgul/dragon dump there's always some perm opponent has in play that you would like to get rid of....

The best allies, Tom Bombadil, The Balrog and Shelob all have limitations. I see no point in making this dragon into an ally at all, but you would have to give it serious drawbacks in case you do.

Like a chance of being discarded on any given turn?

I will not go into further discussion about how an ally version would be good. The dragons are factions when played as a resource, the balrog, shelob and stinker are allies and that works fine. The dragons even attack opponents nearby, so they serve as a good defence in dragon country.

Leon wrote:the balrog, shelob and stinker are allies and that works fine.

I take exception to that statement simply because of the Balrog's Propensity for killing its controlling character, the auto-attack to get Last Child (not to mention returning to hand), and My Precious.

Do you think that having to discard any putative ally if you can't discard a creature from your hand during each organization phase is not enough of a drawback?