You have followed Gollum's trail for days, and are now closing in fast pursuit. In a last ditch effort to escape you, the creature has fled to The Dead Marshes.
Setup: Search the encounter deck for Gollum, and add it to the staging area. Shuffle the encounter deck, then reveal 1 card per player from the encounter deck and add it to the staging area.
'Yes, yes,' said Gollum. 'All dead, all rotten. Elves and Men and Orcs. The Dead Marshes. There was a great battle long ago, yes, so they told him when Smeagol was young, when I was young before teh Precious came. It was a great battle. Tall Men with long swords, and terrible Elves and Orcses shrieking. They fought on th eplain for days and months at the Black Gates. But the Marshes have grown since then, swallowed up the graves; always creeping, creeping.'
–The Two Towers.
After a tiring pursuit through the treacherous marshland, you have cornered Gollum, and move in for the capture.
Forced: After this stage is defeated, the first player chooses a player. That player must pass an Escape test, dealing 1 card from the encounter deck for each resource token on Gollum, to capture him. If Gollum is not captured at this time, reset the quest deck to stage 1B.
If this final Escape test is passed, the players have captured Gollum and won the game.
If Gollum ever has 8 or more resource tokens on him, shuffle him back into the encounter deck.
Forced: At the end of the quest phase, the party must make an escape test, dealing 1 card per player from the encounter deck. If this test is failed, place 2 resource tokens on Gollum.
When Revealed: Place 2 resource tokens on Gollum. Any player may exhaust a 
hero to reduce this effect to 1 resource token.
Escape: 4
Presently it grew altogether dark; the air itself seemed black and heavy to breathe. When lights appeared Sam rubbed his eyes: he thought his head was going queer. He first saw one with the corner of his left eye, a wisp of pale sheen that faded away...
–The Two Towers
When Revealed: The first player makes an escape test counting 
instead of 
, dealing 2 cards from the encounter deck. If this test is failed, place 1 resource token on Gollum and raise each player's threat by 1.
Escape: 3
When Revealed: Each player must make an escape test, dealing 2 cards from the encounter deck for each test. Each player that fails this test places 1 resource token on Gollum, and raises his threat by 1.
Escape: 5
3
2
6
Forced: Remove 2 damage from Giant Marsh Worm at the end of each round.
Escape: 2
"No birds here. There are snakeses, wormses, things in the pools. Lot of things, lots of nasty things."
–Gollum, The Two Towers
While The Heart of the Marshes is the active location, all cards dealt from the encounter deck for escape tests get +1 Escape. (Cards receive this bonus even if they do not have a printed escape value.)
Escape: 1
