The Free Kingdoms

They're the faction that gets a banner at the bottom of my Temple of Lore forum signature, so the FreeKs should really be the natural choice for deck to take to Manchester. Yet I'm feeling distinctly ambivalent toward them.

Take my LOGAN EBONWOULFE deck, for example. It's half and half trying for melee and ranged strike kills, which while adaptable does lessen its focus toward both objectives. Barrett and Graham are pulling Logan in two different directions, and it's to his credit that he does as well as he does with the tools I've given him. 'Optimised'. That's the word I'm looking for. He could be optimised better, but I like to have options available when playing, y'know?

Anyway,probably not tournament-worthy.

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NIOBE throws forward all those big, nasty high-level characters that the FreeKs have access to. Yes, I mean Barrett. She's also a front-line cleric, which I have a fondness for. Again though, this leads to the deck being slightly schizophrenic, torn between rushing Niobe to the front and also keeping the ranks stable enough to bring characters in in rank 4. One collapse early on and it's all over, and the deck often helps defeat itself.

It's also nerve-racking having Niobe spend as soon as possible each turn and hoping that her boosted AC is enough to survive my opponent's worst while the lesser FreeKs try to do some damage back.

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CAPTAIN ALERA has the pirate trait, and plays very similarly to that old favourite, Kara Wadreth. There're no mixed messages here; just like Brymin, Alera runs up front to smash people down personally. It's very fun, and works better with her than the Deverenians, if only because the FreeK support characters (Aida, Dreiga, Corten Lye, Kiras Yscar, etc.) are so much better than their evil red opposite numbers.

She wins big or she loses big, but either way games don't drag on too long. With a little fine-tuning, she may be up for the challenge...