Joseph Jobes IV
United States
Emmaus
PA
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Hi everyone, thanks for reading my review of The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game by Fantasy Flight Games. I've told myself that this year I really want to get more involved in the BGG community, and one of the ways I plan on doing that is by writing really detailed reviews for every game and expansion that I own. I figured I would start with LotR because it's a game that I've been very active with recently, and which I really try to keep up on.
So, with that all out of the way, let's get into the review:
Price:
The Core Set of the Lord of the Rings LCG is pretty cheap in my opinion. At the time of writing this review you can get a copy on CoolStuffInc for $25.99. However, this price is a little bit deceiving. The game is a living card game, meaning that new expansions are added every month (assuming no delays in quality).
There are currently 6 monthly expansions, priced at $9.99 a piece, one large expansion (Khazad-Dum) at $19.49, a print on demand expansion priced at $11.99, and plans have been announced to make at least another 6 monthly expansions. Given the success of this project, the amount of lore they can explore in Tolkein's Middle-Earth, and FFG's long history with their other LCGs (Call of Cthulu and A Game of Thrones), it would be silly to think they are going to end any time soon. This is important to note because, in my humble opinion, this game needs the expansions. There are hours of fun in the base box, and lots of options for customization, but you will inevitably want more if you like the game.
Also, sleeves seem to be required. The price on these is going to vary if you buy cheap penny sleeves, moderately priced FFG sleeves, or expensive Dragon Shields. I personally have used penny sleeves for all the cards except the ones I'm currently using in my player deck, and that seems to work fine. Other players have often compared the Dragon Shields and the FFG sleeves, and the consensus seems to be that both are reliable, sturdy products.
So, overall, the price to get into the game is not bad, but there is certainly a (small) monetary commitment if you'd like to keep up with everything The Lord of the Rings has to offer.
Setup Time:/
Assuming you already have your decks built the game will only take about five minutes, if that, to set up. It simply consists of selecting a quest, building the “enemy deck” for that quest by combining the cards that the quest instructs you to, shuffling your deck, and seperating the three different types of tokens included in the game.
If you have not built your deck though, this will take much longer. The Lord of the Rings LCG is a deckbuilding game, not like Dominion, but like Magic: The Gathering. What I mean by this is that you construct a deck of 30 (or 50) cards that you'll be using before you actually start playing. People approach this vastly differently. You can build a deck that tries to win all the different scenarios without changing the cards inside, or build decks specific to each quest, or just experiment with different combos, etc. To me, this customization is part of the fun, but will certainly lead to a lot of time with the game where you're not actually playing it.
Play Time:
You should be able to play the game in about 30-45 minutes, or if playing a multitude of scenarios in a row, 30-45 minutes per scenario.
Components:
In the box you will get:
1 Rulebook
2 “Threat Trackers”
A Pile of Cards of all different types
A Pile of tokens, of three different types
The Threat Trackers are really nifty, but are really just dials which will help you count the amount of “threat” you've accumulated in the game. In The Lord of the Rings, threat is bad, as when you hit 50 you lose. So, you will actually use these little guys in every game you play.
The tokens are decent. The art on them all makes sense. The resource tokens, used to represent the game's equivalent of money, look kind of like a silver coin. The wound tokens, which represent damage to a character or monster's health, look like a nasty cut or streak of blood. The progress tokens, which represent your characters progress exploring through different parts of the quest, have footprints on them, going through what appears, to me, to be a dirt path in the woods.
The cards are the real meat and potatoes of the components. You get tons of cards in this game. Quest cards, which give you the objectives you need to complete in each scenario in order to progress to the next part, or win the game. The Encounter cards, which have the Eye of Sauron on the back of them, and include all of the hazards that your characters will face as they travel through Middle-Earth. These range from monsters, who attack you, depending on how threatening you are, locations, which are perils that will constantly work against you unless you explore them(the downside to exploring them is that when you are exploring a location any progress you make goes there, instead of towards winning the game), and treachery cards – bad events which may deal damage or hurt your characters in some other way.
There are also the heroes, of which you'll choose three before you start the game. The heroes all belong to a particular sphere, of which there are 4 – Lore, Spirit, Leadership, and Tactics. These match the player cards, which have allies and events that will help you throughout the game. Pretty much, if you use tactics heroes, you can have tactics cards in your deck. If you use spirit heroes, spirit cards in your deck, etc.
These cards are not the best quality, and I was actually a little disappointed with FFG. As I've stated earlier, sleeving the cards is an absolute must. I didn't sleeve the cards I wasn't regularly using at first and they all have a noticeable warp on them now from sitting in the box. However, the art on the cards is fantastic, really fits the theme of the game. I can't think of a card that I have found ugly.
Overall, the components are certainly good, but not up to the standard that I've come to expect from Fantasy Flight.
Theme:
This game is just dripping with theme. You control heroes questing through Middle-Earth, and in your encounters you'll come across all the heroes, enemies, and locations that you've loved (or loved to hate) in the books or movies. The game also expands upon this, adding a lot of characters that I personally haven't heard of. I will warn you, it seems required to have some familiarity or interest in Tolkein's story to play the game. While it's certainly not a hard set rule people that I've shown the game to who don't like Lord of the Rings have no interest in it.
But, if you do, this game is just fantastic.
Rules:
If you can't guess at this point, giving an overview of the rules in this game is a complicated task. There is a very good, five part “how to play” series uploaded in the video section which will give you any details you are looking for. I'm going to attempt to give a good overview of the game here, but I want this to be a review, not a how to play:
To start the game you must select a “quest”, I sometimes refer to them as scenarios, that you want to play. There are three included in the Core set, Passage Through Mirkwood, Journey Down the Anduin, and Escape from Dul Guldor. They all have corresponding quest cards as well, labeled 1,2, and 3 with an A side on the front ,and a B side on the back. Stack these in order, 1 A on top, and then mix the encounter decks that the quest is made up of together (it will tell you what these are in the rulebook). Stack the encounter deck up, face down, next to the quest cards. Follow any set up instructions on the 1A side (which will normally consist of getting some monsters out of the encounter deck) of the quest then flip it over. On this side it will tell you how many progress tokens you need to go the next part.
Next, select the three heroes you are going to be using. Heroes have on them: a starting threat value, willpower, attack, defense, hitpoints, and a unique ability of some sorts, which personalizes them more than just “Legolas – good attacker”. Add up the starting threat of all three of your heroes, and grab your player deck. In the Core Set, there are 4 premade decks, which are ready to go. If you want the green deck, pick the green heroes, just match color to color. You draw 6 cards, decide if you want to mulligan or not, and begin the game.
The game is broken up into 7 phases:
Phase 1 – Untap heroes, Draw 1 card, and place one resource token on each of your heroes. Resources are dollars. Every card in your deck costs a certain amount of dollars. Green cards can only be bough with green dollars, red cards with red dollars, and so on. This is why you must match your player cards and your heroes, or else you will not even be able to play any of the cards in your deck.
Phase 2 – Pay for and play any ally or attachment cards in your hands. Allies are cards which will stick around and help you quest, attack, or block as long as they are alive. Most have a unique ability, like heroes, which you may be able to use a few times, or just when it comes in or leaves, depending on what it says on the card. Attachments are things like weapons and artifacts, which boost your characters stats.
Phase 3 – Commit characters to the quest. To “commit” in this game means to exhaust, or tap, like in Magic: The Gathering, or tools in Stone Age. If a character is committed to something, that's what they're doing for the turn, they can't do anything else. They will refresh each turn, so you can reuse them.
When a character commits to the quest, he uses his willpower. You're going to combine the total of all willpower on characters committed, and compare it to the “threat” of enemies and locations in the staging area. This number is on there cards in the same place that willpower is located on your heroes. After you've committed, flip 1 card over per player from the encounter deck, resolving any effects on it, and adding it to the staging area. If you're willpower is higher than the threat, you gain that many progress tokens. For example, I have 5 willpower, my enemies and locations in the staging area have 3 threat, I get 2 progress tokens on the current quest. If they had 5 threat, and I had 3 willpower, I would go up 2 threat.
Phase 4 – You can “travel” to one location by moving it on top of the quest card, and doing any “travel” requirements listed on the card. This card no longer contributes it's threat, but all progress tokens must go on it until it reaches the number listed on the card, and not on the quest.
Phase 5 – You may first optionally engage one enemy. It will attack you, then you can attack it. If it does not die, it stays engaged with you. The enemy no longer contributes it's threat, while fighting. Then, the first player looks at his threat, and any enemies left in the staging area. If his threat is higher than an enemy, that enemy fights him. If there are multiple enemies falling under this criteria, he takes the one with the highest threat. Then the second player, back to the first, the second, etc until both players can make a check without having to engage any enemy.
Phase 6 – Enemies attacking the first player attack. You must exhaust a character to defend the attack. If a monster has 2 attack, and you exhaust a hero with 2 defense, there is no damage. If he had 4 attack and you have 2 defense, that hero takes 2 damage. If a character has equal, or more, damage than hit points he/she dies. If playing the advanced version the monster is dealt one card from the encounter deck face down before it attack, this is called a shadow card. Flip it over after declaring a blocker. If there is a shadow effect on the card, apply it then discard it (for example it might say “Shadow: attacking enemy gets +1 attack this turn”). If there is no shadow effect ,just discard it. Lastly, you may declare an attack undefended, but then you must put all the damage on one hero. Try not to do it, a lot of the shadow cards get worse if the attack is undefended (example: “Shadow: Attacking enemy gets +1 attack this turn. If this attack is undefended, +3 attack instead). Resolve all attacks against the first player, then clockwise from him/her.
Next, you can attack a monster by exhausting a character. While only one character can defend against an attack, any number of characters can attack a monster by being tapped/exhausted. You simply add up all the attack you have (maybe I have one card with 3 attack, and another with 2) against the enemies defense (let's say he has 2) and do any damage left over. So, in this example, I have 5 attack, he has 2 defense, I do 3 damage.
Phase 7 – Put your threat up one, pass the first player marker to the next player.
Whew! That was exhausting. Read the rulebook for this game, watch a video on how to play, and keep the quick reference chart open during your first game. It seems like a lot at first, but the game is actually not that complex, I promise. It just takes a few rounds, then you'll be a rules master.
Mechanics:
The game is cooperative, completely.
It has a lot of customization options.
It requires you to make a lot of tough choices on resource/action allocation (what cards to buy, what your heroes should do each round).
Basic Strategy:
I could go on and on about basic strategy for this game, but I'll keep it short and sweet (relatively). Try all of the premade decks against the first quest, Passage Through Mirkwood, before messing around with anything else. This will give you a feel for all the different heroes, sphere, and cards. The easiest to win with, in my opinion, are Leadership and Spirit. Lore is difficult but doable, Tactics will feel impossible, depending on your draws.
After that, you can delve into game strategy. I have a thread in the General section of the forum entitled “Strategy Guide” where I am constantly keeping a list of my posts of articles on deckbuilding and other strategy tips, and my videos, which break down all the heroes and cards and explain some deckbuilding strategies as specific to each sphere and card.
If you're playing two player, work together! Communication is key in this game. While you're not allowed to tell each other explicitly what is in your hand, you can certainly form general strategies and you'll need to – this game is tough to beat!
Favorite Things::
1.) The Quests – there are so many, and once you add some expansions, your options really (for lack of a better word) expand! Each quest has it's own special mechanics and victory goals, and that is really a cool thing for me. For those of you who care my favorite quests as of right now are Journey Down the Anduin, from the main box, and the Adventure Pack Journey to Rhosgobel.
2.) The TON of customization – I have built more decks for this game then I can even think of, and there are still some combos and heroes that I want to try out and explore more. Once you pick up the entire Shadows of Mirkwood cycle (the first six adventure packs) you have so many more options, but you don't really need them to start.
3.) The “Action Allocation” aspect – Every game I get a turn where I am so torn on what to do or how to proceed, in a good way. It normally comes down to something along the lines of, I can just use my heroes as I normally would and possibly lose an ally or something, or try to pull of something neat and hope I don't flip over any really bad cards in the questing.
4.) The Cooperativeness – I love co-op games, but I always get bored with them eventually because my group becomes too good, we know what to expect. This game shakes that up so much with all the different scenarios, and you are really forced to work together as closely as possible in order to succeed.
Least Favorite Things:
1.) The Card Quality – I am just pretty upset still that my cards bent after being in the box for less than a month, sitting in a spot where they weren't bumped into other things. I have other games with cards that sit around for a while, like Cosmic Encounter (to compare another FFG game) and the cards are still in perfect condition. The fact that this game NEEDS sleeves kind of hurts a bit financially.
2.) Getting Into It – This is a Hell of a game to start playing. There's so many different things going on, so many phases, abilities, decks, different card types, errata for cards, expansions, strategies, articles, videos, etc etc that it can be very overwhelming if you don't have someone to walk you through it.
The “Eh”:
1.) Starter Decks – They just aren't that great. Really, it should tell you in the instructions to not bother doing anything but the first quest with them. While it's possible to beat the other two, it is incredibly frustrating. For me, this wasn't a big deal. I was incredibly eager to jump into the deckbuilding aspect of the game. However, others have complained about it, so take it for what it is.
2.) Difficulty Level – Not how hard the game is, just how they label the difficulties on each scenario. It's kind of deceptive. For example, Journey Down the Anduin is a DL 4 and so is the first Adventure Pack, The Hunt for Gollum. However, I find ThfG pretty easy in comparison to JdtA. Again, not a big deal, just something to note.
Replay Value:
HUGE. I feel as if I don't have to go into much detail here because I've grazed over all of it in my previous sections, but I'll repeat the important parts for anyone who missed them.
Infinite Customization in player decks. You can constantly rebuild your deck trying out new spheres, sphere combinations, heroes, hero combinations, allies, events, attachments, strategies, abusing different synergies between keywords, etc.
Even in just the base game the three quests are very fun and I've replayed them all more than once. Once you add in the expansions this game just gets giant. I haven't even played Return to Mirkwood or the big expansion, Khazad-Dum, yet and I believe the next cycle of quests starts coming out this month, or early March.
Conclusion:
Well, I've rambled on long enough at this point, huh? Although the game is mildly hard to get into, and you may have a problem with bending cards, it is well worth the effort. The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game is currently in my top 3 games, and depending on the day is #1. I played it more than any other game last month, and that doesn't include the amount of time I spent making videos, writing articles, reading cards, testing decks, etc.
You will like this game if:
You enjoy a Fantasy theme, or more specifically Middle-Earth
You like customization
You enjoy cooperative games
You enjoy solo games
You don't mind putting time into a game outside of playing it
You enjoy the LCG format
You like experimentation with different strategies
You like to make hard choices on what to do in your turn
You don't mind losing
You will not like this game if:
You don't like cooperative games
You don't like losing
You want a game that isn't a large time commitment outside of the gameplay itself
You don't like fantasy or Tolkein
You don't like a mild level of randomness or “luck”
I'm going to award this game a 9 out of 10. Thank you for reading, any comments/questions/criticisms are always appreciated.
-Joey
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Judy Krauss
United States
Pittsburgh
Pennsylvania
but I'm not the only one
My hands are small, I know, but they're not yours, they are my own
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Very nice and helpful review. I've been debating with myself about getting this game, because I like solo games and LotR, but don't much care for the deck-building games I have tried (like Thunderstone: Dragonspire. But it seems that with this game, it is more like choosing an adventuring group and equipment before playing.
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Joseph Jobes IV
United States
Emmaus
PA
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Jude wrote: Very nice and helpful review. I've been debating with myself about getting this game, because I like solo games and LotR, but don't much care for the deck-building games I have tried (like Thunderstone: Dragonspire. But it seems that with this game, it is more like choosing an adventuring group and equipment before playing.
Yeah, this game certainly isn't "deckbuilding" as the board gaming world has defined it. It is similar to any other CCG in which you own a pool of cards that you could use, but before playing you have to choose a certain number that you will actually have access to. There is no deckbuilding mechanic in the game play.
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Marc Anthony
United States
Berkeley
California
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Great review, very helpful
I've been considering this game for a while now and it sounds like I should look more into it
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Jonathan Young
United Kingdom
Farnham
Surrey
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Very good review Joseph, well done. To give another perspective, I'm really not a Tolkien fan at all, although I don't hate it. I would much prefer a different theme and have been quite interested in the Star Wars LCG that's on its way (but would really prefer a Cthulhu themed one - CoC unfortunately is not solo-able).
However, I absolutely love this game, theme or no theme.The mechanics of it, although slightly tricky at first, are incredibly clever. The game seems very well balanced and is always just on the right side of incredibly challenging (with the possible exception of Dol Gudur, which I can't solo - yet).
This is also the first game that I've ever been so interested in that I intend buying all the expansions for. I have them all so far, and don't see that stopping.
Ultimately then I think that LOTR LCG succeeds because it's an incredibly well designed game, and one that's well supported by FFG. The theme really doesn't matter if you're not a fan, although it could only be a bonus if you are..
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Colin Houghton
United Kingdom
London
London
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Thanks for that Ace review, Joseph.
Agree with almost everyhting you say, however, when I play solo, with two decks, it takes about 90 minutes to finish (ie win) but a lot less if I lose!.
One scenario; the Hills of Emyn Muil, tends to drag on and outstay its welcome, but the others are all good.
I've also found some of the user scenarios posted on here to be very good.
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David Grim
United States
California
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warth0g wrote: I would much prefer a different theme and have been quite interested in the Star Wars LCG that's on its way (but would really prefer a Cthulhu themed one - CoC unfortunately is not solo-able).
Sounds like Mythos is it. It's long since been discontinued, but it's playable solitaire.
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Ryan S.
United States
Idaho
"Come, Let the Quest begin..."
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I have avoided this for a long time because I have read quite a few complaints. However, your review has caused my interest-o-meter to shoot up.
I'll have to do some more looking. Thanks!
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Joseph Jobes IV
United States
Emmaus
PA
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Ryanmobile wrote: I have avoided this for a long time because I have read quite a few complaints. However, your review has caused my interest-o-meter to shoot up.
I'll have to do some more looking. Thanks!
I've found it's a game that can really divide gamers. I know some that love it and some that hate it or find it incredibly dry. If you can try before you buy, I definitely would. But, worst case, you can probably resell the coreset fairly quickly if you don't enjoy it.
Glad the review was helpful though!
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