Marching into Mordor
Volume 2, April 6, 2005
The Orc Culture
The Orcs of Middle-earth are bloodthirsty, ruthless, and ugly. Despite their incredible ability to lose beauty contests in a moment’s notice, they still find themselves as the Shadow culture of choice for many The Lord Of The Rings Online TCG players. But what is it that draws players to this relatively new Shadow culture? Is it their corruption potential? Perhaps it’s the wounding capabilities. Or maybe the Orcs are just much more charismatic than their appearances would suggest them to be.
Whatever the case, the Orc culture has seen some great popularity since its inception in War of the Ring Block, having taken three of the top eight spots in the latest (March 2005) PSQ, with each Shadow side having a different strategy – an amazing feat for a culture that’s only been around for two sets.
To get a better understanding of the basics of this culture, let’s take a look at what the Orcs have going for them:
STRENGTHS
WEAKNESSES
 Corruption definitely seems to be the most popular use for the Orc culture these days. It all started with the Bound to its Fate / Isengard Underling / Goblin Hordes combination. A player could use Bound to its Fate to add a burden, Isengard Underling to retrieve Bound to its Fate, and then Goblin Hordes to retrieve the Underling on the next move. Four Hordes meant pulling four Underlings into hand, which meant pulling four Bound – this would commonly result in four burdens at any given site. Mocking Goblins and Porter Trolls just add to the corruption mix, making sure those little black tokens pile up on the opposing Ring-bearer nice and fast. As if that wasn’t enough, Retribution was released in Black Rider, giving the Orcs a whole new way of adding burdens (Trolls with weapons suddenly became corruption machines).
If going for a straight-up corruption victory isn’t your style, then you can always just add a few burdens to utilize resistance-triggered cards such as Entrapping Orc and Hill Orc. There are a variety of minions that make use of burdens on the Ring-bearer (rather than adding burdens themselves), so keep an eye out for them when building this type of Orc deck.
In addition to corruption, the Orcs also seem to have a knack for exerting companions. Cards such as Great Cost, Orc Hammer, and Mordor Scimitar all cause exertions on companions, but there aren’t really enough cards available to construct a dedicated wounding deck. More often than not, the exerting ability of Orcs finds its way into other decks (such as Mordor Scimitars being included in a corruption deck that uses Retribution).
 The powerful Trolls (Porter Troll, Beastly Olog-hai, and Cave Troll of Moria, Savage Menace) included in this culture are another strength that won’t make an entire deck by themselves, but are certainly worthy of mentioning. Porter Trolls regularly find themselves in corruption decks, while all three Trolls show up in random Orc builds throughout the universe – these minions are just too good to pass up sometimes, even if they don’t fit a deck’s theme particularly well.
 A newer strategy for Orcs is based around the Lurker keyword. It's true that there aren't many cards to make use of this deck theme thusfar (though the Cave Troll's Hammer, Unwieldy Cudgel and Rallying Orc shouldn't be overlooked), but the idea does show reasonable potential. Watch out for Lurker-based decks to improve in future sets, and until then, be wary of Fred "UlaireEnquea" Coughlin's Rallying Orc / Demoralized Lurker Swarm, which placed sixth at the March 2005 PSQ.
Swarm decks, generally speaking, tend to need three things to function well: twilight generation/pool manipulation (in order to afford the cost of a large army), wound prevention (to make sure those soldiers stay on the battlefield), and hand extension (to have a legion of minions at your disposal). The Orc culture definitely has hand extension in the form of Goblin Hordes – starting your Shadow phase with a twelve-card hand (once you have four Hordes in play) is never a bad thing for a swarm deck. There’s also some twilight generation in Scurrying Goblin and Demoralized. What the Orcs lack, however, is wound prevention – you can get a whole slew of Goblins out, but it won’t matter if half of them die in the archery phase. It helps that many of the Orcs have two (or greater) vitality, but that still won't save the smaller ones from directed wounding.
The inability to prevent wounds isn’t the only downfall of the Orc culture, however. Most Orc decks, regardless of how varied they are from one another, tend to be extremely combo-intensive. The Bound to its Fate corruption deck outlined above requires a combination of three cards to work at maximum efficiency, while swarms will have a similar problem – being that the only solid hand extension available is Goblin Hordes, a large part of the swarm relies on having set up a good Shadow hand (one full of minions) in advance. If your Orc deck wants to make good use of Demoralized, then it also needs to find cards that cause exertions. Basically, very few cards in the Orc culture will have much effect by themselves – almost everything the Orcs can do requires two or more cards at any given time. Heck, even two of the three Trolls have spotting requirements.
As a Free Peoples player, how do you take advantage of this? Double-move, especially early on. Shadows that rely heavily on combinations need to draw the right cards before they can be terribly effective, and doubling early means that you're still in that safety zone before they're prepared to hit you hard. Give yourself a sizeable lead so that you can afford to single-move in the late-game if you must, but remember - if they're still having trouble setting up, continue doubling down that site path. It's entirely possible to reach site nine against combo decks before they've drawn the cards they need.
 Condition Removal is something that can be very important for a Shadow culture, and although Orcs have two cards capable of performing this feat, neither of them is particularly reliable. Dread and Despair gives the Free Peoples player a choice that will allow them to keep their targeted condition in play, while Storming the Ramparts lets your opponent choose which of their conditions is discarded. Neither is particularly helpful if there is a condition in play that you absolutely must get rid of. In a world where Watch and Wait can destroy your chances of corruption and Sudden Fury makes Hobbits nigh-impossible to kill, condition removal is a must.
Lastly, being a new culture means that the Orcs don’t have access to as many cards as they’d like. Newer cultures tend to take some time to develop into true powerhouses, and although the Orcs do show promise, their limited card pool restricts their options and holds them back at times.
Every culture has drawbacks, but none of the ones associated with the Orc culture are particularly nasty. The Orcs will only improve with future expansions, giving them the potential to one day be the most popular Shadow culture out there.
THE SPLASH FACTOR
Orcs don't have a whole lot of potential to be splashed into decks of other cultures, but they do have one minion that could really help improve any Shadow wounding deck. Although most would agree that Ulaire Enquea, Lieutenant of Morgul was a primary choice for crowd control in any deck, the fact of the matter is, he's been lost to rotation. Stepping up to take his place in wounding decks is the Pitiless Orc - this three-cost minion can put as many as five wounds on a Fellowship just by being played, so keep him in mind when building your Shadow archery decks.
 THE ADVENTURE DECK
As with many cultures these days, the Orcs can gain exclusive benefits from certain sites. Although the Watch-tower of Cirith Ungol can help you out a bit, it's too random for my tastes - for all you know, you're discarding cards your opponent would rather be without, hence helping them cycle. Shores of Nen Hithoel, however, is an excellent addition to any Orc deck. Everyone's had those games where neither player's Shadow side was being particularly effective, and whoever's fellowship had the lead and the move limit to get to site nine first was guaranteed victory. The Shores gives you one last chance to stop your opponent in their tracks, regardless of what their move limit is.
So now that you know all there is to know about the Orc culture and you're ready to build a deck around it, what's the first thing on your shopping list? I'll answer that question for you:
GOBLIN HORDES
It doesn’t matter if you’re playing corruption and need it to pull back your Isengard Underling, or if you just want that one extra soldier to round out your swarm, Goblin Hordes is the Orc card to have. There isn’t an Orc player alive that wouldn’t want four copies of this gem – the ability to snag any Orc-culture minion (that includes Trolls) you want from your discard pile is too good to pass up, regardless of what type of deck you’re playing.
To wrap up this volume of Marching into Mordor, I've provided links to several Orc decks that have placed highly in online events. Enjoy!
-Zach "Rubber Chicken" Shephard
|
