Boy, was I wrong!
It didn’t help that they each became Weary during the skirmish, one failed a Fear test, and with the High Elf consistently getting poor rolls, things began to look bleak for the heroes!
They finished off one of the Hounds relatively quickly, but the last two proved quite resilient and challenging. By the time they dropped the second, one of the heroes (Me'lereal) was getting knocked unconscious on a regular basis, continually being revived by the singing High Elf (Ardorwyn). For a portion of the fight both Me'lereal and Ardorwyn sang as brave Falandor wielded his mighty sword against the powerful canines. They tried to keep one emergency point in the Fellowship Pool, but eventually even that last point was used for a necessary Protection test.
Finally it came down to a single Hound against the three, though all three PCs were barely standing. If Falandor were to fall, it could easily mean the end for all of them! The last beast was struck, taking it to 0 Endurance! But – as I’d just learned – that meant it still got to make one last attack (as the heroes had the initiative) before it fell! Falandor was only conscious due to multiple successful uses of Rally Comrades by Ardorwyn, and he barely had any Endurance left. His player announced that he would likely be dead if the beast’s final attack wounded him!
I rolled for the dying Hound, and got a Tengwar. It was a Called Shot (I believe the third one that night!), and thus forced a Protection test, and we all knew Falandor couldn’t spend Hope on it. His player decided to roll the dice one at a time. He rolled the first Success Die and got a 1 (being Weary, it counted for nothing). The next one he got a six on, but now it all came down to one last roll with the Feat Die, and he needed to roll well!
After a quick spoken prayer, he slung his final die, and it came up….a Gandalf! Everyone cheered!
The last Hound of Sauron then fell, and the champions were victorious!
The next day my son (Falandor’s player) pointed out that – though he had said in the heat of battle that he would die if he got hit – he actually wouldn’t have perished (as he wasn’t Wounded yet). Technically, he would have only been Dying. That still didn’t detract from how epic the moment was at the table, and it will be a tale told round the campfires for the heroes for quite some time, I imagine!
