Unique. If his company moves to a new site during the movement/hazard phase, he may draw 1 additional card for each wilderness in his company's site path. +1 to all his corruption checks.
Home site: Rhosgobel
Pretty nice Wizard. It has to come third to me, because Saruman and Alatar simply are better in my opinion (I've come around to Gandalf being fourth because I realized Saruman can do his ability better with Wizard's Test).
I prefer this over Pallando because this lets you draw extra cards, while he merely increases your hand size. Though it's like having one extra card every turn with Pallando, since Wilderness is so common you can easily get more than 1 per turn.
One strategy with him is an extreme "wandering wizard" strategy. You can, for instance, travel back and forth between two sites in Hollin and Old Pukel-Land, getting FOUR extra cards per turn. Or even better, use Shadowfax to move 8 regions, and keep going between Cardolan and Anfalas looping through Rhudaur, for EIGHT extra cards per turn. Look at the map, you'll see what I'm talking about. That's like drawing an entire extra hand. And it only needs him and a rare to do (plus the regions between and Edoras or Dunharrow to play Shadowfax at). A great boost to your strategy.
The corruption checks modifier is also extremely nice, it's only in Gandalf besides Radagast and his skills aren't as good. The Rhosgobel home site is pretty good for this strategy, too, since it's right in Mirkwood (there's a four wilderness block between Western Mirkwood and Northern Rhovanion). But the problem is it's Southern Mirkwood, a Dark-Domain, so he could be attacked by Nazgul the moment he leaves (thus, it's often better to just play him at Rivendell, right in the heart of the bigger wilderness block).
But as a regular wizard, his abilities aren't as good, since he may often encounter almost no Wildernesses. Also, this card has NO bad parts, other than the lack of Sage skill (which is common enough so it can easily be gotten). Overall, a great card, the third best Wizard.
| Rater | Rating |
|---|---|
| Gandalf | 8.0 |
| Lobelia | 5.0 |
| Morgoth | 8.5 |
| Faramir | 9.0 |
| Shadowfax | 6.0 |
| Beren | 9.5 |
| Isildur | 5.0 |
| Turin | 8.5 |
| Radagast | 10.0 |
| Average | 7.72 |
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