"Heal thyself" the old adage goes. Alternatively, you can go to someone's house and have him heal you.
Hall of Fire # Resource # Short-event
Playable on a Haven. Any company at this Haven immediately following its
movement/hazard phase may choose for one of its characters to untap or heal
(from wounded to tapped). Discard Hall of Fire when the site card is returned
to the location deck.
Planning to put this card in your deck can be rather odd. As one rater said, "It's like planning to get wounded." There are some reasons to put this card in your deck, though.
In normal use, you have to get lucky with this card. If you head to, say, Carn Dum and on your way someone gets wounded, you'll want to draw this card on your way back to the haven. If you draw it too early you may not know how dangerous your opponent's deck is or you may not anticipate getting wounded. Surely you can think of a better card, like an attack canceler, to hold in your hand for a while. If you draw it too late, like after you've arrived at the haven, the card is pretty worthless unless you are planning to send someone to go GET wounded. This can be slightly viable, using Escape as an attack canceler, and then heading to a haven with Hall of Fire.
By the way, why would you want Hall of Fire, anyway? It's a card that can speed you up. If one of your main characters has been wounded, you can head to a haven to heal, play Hall of Fire, and have him untapped next turn for more action, perhaps saving a turn. It can also be useful if you plan to tap a character during the site phase at a haven for some reason. For instance, you can tap Saruman during your organization phase to bring some resources to your discard pile, move to a haven, play Hall of Fire, and untap him so he can bring one of the spells to your hand. Similarly, you can have a character tap during the hazard phase and then untap to play something like Earth of Galadriel's Orchard. Or perhaps your wizard taps on the way to Lorien, you can untap him and influence someone away. The unfortunate thing is, it happens right after the company's movement phase, so you can't Bridge, heal, and head somewhere else.
There is one way to play this card which makes it worthwhile to include in your deck even if you don't want to hold a card in your hand for very long. If you leave a character in a haven and focus your deck around that haven, Hall of Fire can be a very dependable card. For instance, if you have Ioreth get Tom Bombadil early and then keep them both at Rivendell to play Marvels Told, they can also make sure the Hall of Fire is nice and cozy. Any time you have a wounded character, drop by and Tom and Ioreth, adept healers they are, can take care of all your needs. If you want something a little more active, how about Cirdan staying in Grey Havens with a Palantir, canceling any sea based attacks. You somehow get wounded, pay a visit to the old shipwright. And to help to keep the character at the haven in play (especially if a Palantir is involved) you can have an Elf-song Echoing of All Joy.
So if you don't want to deal with a card like Healing Herbs, Hall of Fire can be a useful card to keep you from being out of action for too long.
| Ratings for Hall of Fire: | |
|---|---|
| Isildur: | 4.0 |
| Bandobras: | 7.9 |
| Farmer Maggot: | 7.5 |
| Legolas: | 7.0 |
| Strider: | 4.0 |
| Fingolfin: | 7.5 |
| Beorn: | 7.4 |
| Cirdan: | 6.0 |
| Frodo: | 6.0 |
| Samwise: | 5.9 |
| Average: | 6.3 |
Card names and text copyright 1996 by Iron Crown Enterprises, all rights reserved. This document copyright 1997 by Trevor Stone. Permission given to duplicate so long as no profit is made and the copyright notice is kept in tact, blah, blah, blah.