Khamul the Easterling

Unique. Nazgul (2nd). May be played as a hazard creature (with one strike) or as a permanent-event. As a creature, may also be played keyed to Brown Lands, Heart of Mirkwood, Gorgoroth, and Southern Mirkwood; may also be played at sites in those regions. If played as a permanent-event, it will remain in play until tapped during the opponent's movement/hazard phase (tapping counts against the hazard limit). When tapped, Khamul the Easterling becomes a short-event and forces opponent to discard one card of his choice for every Nazgul permanent-event in play (including this one).

The special ability's moderately good (though depending on your opponent's hand, this can actually help him), especially since they've probably got a pretty good hand if they're venturing anywhere near where Nazgul can go.

First, though, the creature. 18/8. Wow. That alone makes the card worth playing. A non-modified wizard MUST roll a 12 to defeat it. Otherwise, they're wounded, though they'll probably pass the body check. It automatically wounds Hobbits, and any other characters with prowess less than 6. It's regions of play aren't that great, I admit; 2 of them he can already be played at anyway. But he makes up for it with his power.

But there is one feature of his regions: Rhosgobel, Radagast's home, is right within his range, so for Radagast players there's this new threat (unless you play at Rivendell instead).

There's also the other feature, the permanent-event. It's a typical Nazgul perm-event; it becomes short when tapped, etc. And its effect's just slightly above average. As I said before, it can actually help your opponent, but there are times to use it. Such as if your opponent's heading towards Mount Doom (though then he's probably better as a creature, bear with me on this). He's got The One Ring in play, you both know that he's trying to destroy The One Ring. How do you stop him? Perhaps with this. If you've got several permanent-events in play, there's a good chance you can destroy his Cracks of Doom or Gollum's fate and thereby prevent him from winning, also putting him in a very bad situation for his company. Especially if he has a Wizard in it (heh, heh, heh).

Of course, there is the one problem with this card (other than the extreme difficulty of finding one to trade for if you don't have it). It's worth 6 marshalling points, and its body is only 8. This means if Eowyn gets lucky (and it's always possible, even against 18 prowess), he's likely to fail the check and give her 6 M.P. All I can say to this is, it's worth the risk. And she still needs to get 10 or above to survive, 11 or above to win against the prowess.

So, overall the second best Nazgul (because of The Pale Sword for the Witch-King) for a creature, and around the middle for ability.

Card names and spoilers are copyrighted by Iron Crown Enterprises, Inc., which reserves all rights in its intellectual properties.