One key element of strategy in THe Lord of the Rings Trading Card Game is surprise. If your opponent can guess your every move, he can plan ahead and attempt to thwart you at every phase of the game. A good opponent will always check out the twilight pool left after the shadow phase and calculate what you can do with it. A drawback of the Raider culture is that most of the events have a cost and there are few enough events that a good player can remember them AND their cost and calculate why twilight has been left in the pool.

Minions with the key word Ambush add twilight to the pool but there is no surprise in this addition. As soon as they are played, it's apparent that twilight will be added unless the minion is killed before assignment begins. Flanking Attack allows you to add twilight without letting your opponent know it is coming. Furthermore, its text allows you to add that twilight in either maneuver or skirmish phases. If your opponent does not have archery and has not demonstrated a tendency to wound minions in maneuver, you may want until skirmish to add the twilight. We all know how dangerous one of the “remove 3 to wound a companion” minions can be with Whirling Strike. One of the problems of that combo is that your opponent checks the twilight pool and never assigns a battle to a vulnerable companion when there are 6 twilight in the pool.

But with Flanking Attack you can add the twilight AFTER the first 3 had been removed. Surprise! Exert a Desert Soldier, play Whirling Strike and here's an unanticipated wound! One that may even be a killer. Have you set up just the right number of burdens and now you are looking to play Desert Lord and Rabid Fire - but your opponent is playing a twilight choke deck and refuses to give you 11 twilight? Use Flanking Attack during the maneuver phase and you only need 8 twilight.

by Cynthia Hart

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