LOTR04132

Ranger's Sword, Blade of Aragorn (4U132)

{{description>Full card information and wiki for Ranger's Sword, Blade of Aragorn (4U132) from LotR TCG}} <WRAP dbshell><WRAP 990px center>

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<WRAP 500px db rightalign>[[lotr04132|Template:cards:lotr04132.jpg]]</WRAP> <WRAP 480px db2 leftalign> | Set:| The Two Towers| | Kind:| Free People| | Culture:| Gondor| | Twilight:| 1| | Card Type:| Possession &#149; Hand Weapon| | Strength:| +2| | Game Text:| Bearer must be Aragorn. While skirmishing an Uruk-hai, Aragorn is strength +2.| | Lore:| //"'I am not weaponless.'"//| | Rarity:| U| </WRAP>

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General Strategy

The most popular sword for Aragorn in Towers Block and Towers Standard, !Blade of Aragorn enables Aragorn to have an impressive strength of 12 when fighting most Uruk-Hai - as much as Treebeard. Since most weapons give +2 strength, there is no strength trade-off when using !Blade of Aragorn against other minions. It is often borne along with Aragorn's Bow to make Aragorn highly efficient when facing both the high-vitality Uruk-Hai and low-vitality Dunland, two of the most commonly played shadow sides in Towers. It may also be used with The Last Alliance of Elves and Men or Stone Trolls to allow Aragorn to boast an impressive 15 strength against Uruk-Hai (more than any [Isengard] minion but Uruk Vanguard) with just 2 cards.

Although it lacks the damage bonus of the Ranger's Sword released in The Fellowship of the Ring, the Ring-Bound rangers of The Two Towers fill most needs for hard-hitting Gondor companions which could previously only be filled by Aragorn or Boromir. With Sword of Gondor, Faramir, Captain of Gondor reaches 11 strength while the non-unique Ranger of Ithilien usually has Aragorn's previous best of 10 strength, both with damage + 1 on most (if not all) sites. This availability - along with the prevalence of Uruk-Hai in Towers formats - causes the consistency of Ranger's Sword to be ironically situational.

While the potential strength of !Blade of Aragorn is impressive, it should not be taken for granted. Dunland, Wargs, Mounted Southrons, and Nazgul are other hard-hitting shadow sides which still see play in Towers, and Aragorn will often need backup skirmish strength from events or conditions to consistently win skirmishes from game to game. Though the sword is potent against most Uruk-Hai, the game text of Troop of Uruk-Hai will drop Aragorn's strength back down to 8 unless there are other skirmish pumps available to him. Further, free events such as Ferocity or Vengeance are used often and can kill an unsuspecting Aragorn.

Because it is only better than other [Gondor] weapons against Uruk-Hai, its popularity waned with theirs - very few [Isengard] cards were released after Ents of Fangorn while most other cultures continued to get powerful cards, and the [Uruk-Hai] culture is not seen very often compared to other shadow sides. Other, consistently useful weapons such as The Return of the King's incredibly popular Anduril, Flame of the West (along with the less-used Anduril, King's Blade) rose to prominence instead, making !Blade of Aragorn essentially a Towers-only weapon.

Strong Versus...

 * Uruk-Hai

Weak Versus...

 * Troop of Uruk-Hai, completely negating the +4 strength from !Blade of Aragorn
 * Formats in which Uruk-Hai are rarely seen (compared to other weapons available to Aragorn)

Example Decks

 * Decklists or links to decks that use this card.

Rules and Clarifications

 * Clarify existing rules if needed.
 * Link to rules discussions on TLHH.

Other Versions of Ranger's Sword

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