I’ve seen actual boxed versions at his house, so I doubt it.
My copy of LoTR: LCG showed up (yay) and I am sitting down to play the first scenario, A Passage Through Mirkwood. I am a bit confused though since I noticed there are 2 stage “3” cards. I checked the rules and the FFG erata and I don’t see anything about how this works. Do I use both (if so is there a specific order)? One or the other? It’s called “A Chosen Path”, so it would seem to me that when you get there you pick one and go with it. Still some clarification would be nice. Thanks for any light my fellow QT3ers might be able to shed on this situation.
The stage 2 card should tell you what to do with the stage three cards. (I’m at the office so I don’t have them in front of me.)
I believe you are supposed to shuffle them and then randomly choose just one or the other.
‘prank’, before playing the LotR:LCG, you might want to check out Rodney Smith’s Learn to Play (by Watching it Played) for it. They’re all listed here. He runs through a full solo play of the game and it’s pretty helpful stuff.
Vesper
4206
Anyone played the Mage Knight boardgame? It’s getting a lot of good buzz over at BGG as a good Talisman-esque game. A bit on the complicated side, though.
Thanks for the link, and thanks for the rules clarification guys. very helpful!
I haven’t played it, but am currently leaning against getting it, based on accounts of people I know. Apparently it’s brain-bustingly deterministic, requiring a ton of calculation/analysis from turn to turn. The things that keep me interested are that Vlaada was at least partly inspired by Magic Realm, and that it’s bound to be the heaviest fantasy adventure game to date.
Lorini
4209
We just finished about 2/3rds of a game (my son had friends come over so we had to stop) and I didn’t find it to be especially prone to calculation. I play a lot of heavier strategy games though, so what others might call a lot of calculation wouldn’t bother me.
We enjoyed it. The rules are somewhat of a slog but we made it through. They are far easier to understand than Arkham or Descent. It took us almost three hours to get through 2/3rds of the game but a lot of that was rule look up. The rules make assumptions though, which I don’t like. For example if you don’t defeat a monster, the rules don’t say that the monster stays on the spot. I’m assuming that the monster does stay on the spot, but it would have been nice had they actually said so. The graphics are nice, the set up and take down are a little long, especially the first time when you have to separate everything.
We hope to play a full game sometime next week and I’ll add to this if the experience is especially different.
I played through two solo games of Fortune and Glory. That game is great Ameritrash. It just drips theme.
The first game I won in about 2 turns, the second I lost in about 7.
I enjoy Fortune and Glory but make sure you play it with at most 3 other people who want to like the experience. I’ve had some great games with people who helped build a narrative and enjoyed the adventure but my last game ended as a disaster when I allowed two unknown guys to join in for a total of 6 players. After 20 minutes they pulled out an ipad and started playing a game with each other, when asked one just shrugged his shoulders and said ‘it’s boring’. He was the guy at the start who flat out stated that if it was anything like pandemic where other people would tell him what to do, he wouldn’t play. Should have known he isn’t a coop player from that.
I’ll admit that there was a lot of (non-game) downtime and that the rules and choices are simplistic, but it’s not like the game doesn’t scream ‘Ameritrash!’ at the top of its lungs.
tiohn
4212
The Magic Realm inspiration piqued my interest, but are you saying that it’s actually heavier than Magic Realm, or that Magic Realm is not a fantasy adventure game?
I’ve been kicking myself for selling my copy of Magic Realm years ago, and have pondered getting a used copy from someone on BGG. It looks like I can get a nice, lightly used copy for about what Mage Knight costs, but I’m torn between the two at the moment.
Lorini
4213
Mage Knight doesn’t have much in common with Magic Realm at least as far as the ruleset goes. Magic Realm’s rules are ridiculous for what he was trying to accomplish. They do share a similar style of playing, but MK is far more accessible.
Sorry, instead of “to date” I should have saide “since the beginning of this latest boardgame renaissance.” I doubt any fantasy adventure game will ever be as heavy as Magic Realm.
Mage Knight only has four characters, but they explore a modular map over a day/night cycle, recruit indigenous forces, conquer monsters, and gain treasure. These elements, coupled with the fact that Vlaada has said that Magic Realm was one of the inspirations for the game (I can’t find now where I read that), lead me to believe that MR is in there to some degree.
A big thanks to Bilbo, Legolas, Gimli, and Radagast for helping me secure my first win in LoTR:LCG.
Played this today too and had a blast winning the 2nd core set scenario not once, but twice. Which baffled the hell out of me because I couldn’t beat it yesterday AT ALL, even without using shadow cards. So, what made the difference? Apparently using single sphere decks. I was under the impression that 2 player multi sphere decks was the way to go and that single sphere was much weaker, especially when you’re not using the other spheres (green’s healing for example).
We EASILY beat the 2nd scenario using the red and blue spheres…red concentrated on combat while blue concentrated on questing and support. Piece of cake. :D
Will be buying 6 adventure packs + the Khazud Dum mini expansion very soon depending on when it gets released. Hopefully, they don’t push it back to January.
Once I have all those expansions the game should REALLY open up in terms of deck building and all the different scenarios you can play. :)
I guess playing it solo helps, then, as I have 0 down-time. It’s all crazy all the time, and that’s almost totally a good thing.
Speaking of Mage Knight, I found a copy of it at my FLGS this afternoon, bought it, and managed to rope a friend into a game.
Setup and initial walkthrough of the rules took an hour and a half or so. Actual game took another hour and a half. Lots of missteps and time spent looking stuff up. Really fun game after all that, though. Lots of choices made every turn, and yeah, I can definitely see the comparison to Magic Realm- mostly deterministic combat, general exploration, kind of sandbox-y feel. I’m really looking forward to the playing the Full game.
Yeah Neph, I played LoTR all day today too and loved it! Easily the best single player game I have ever played glances balefully at Elder Sign and Death Angel. Given how much fun this game is SP I can’t wait to try it with some friends, which is appearently even better.
I have two of the APs and decided to order 3 more based on how much fun this is even in a bare bones form. I’m sure I will end up picking up the last Mirkwood AP and the Kazud Dum pack too. While LCG is pretty pricey as a concept (15 bucks for 60 cards…sheesh), it’s great to finally find a game I can play solo and enjoy.
It’s interesting the different experiences with spheres we are having. I tried playing single sphere decks a bit and was getting creamed. With only one sphere you just seem to have too many weaknesses in SP. So far I have had great luck with a Lore/Tactics and a Lore/Leadership deck. (Bilbo + Steward of Gondor is just devastating). Gonna try a Tactics/Spirit deck soon and see if that get’s me anywhere. Though to be fair the Songs really help with resource management multi-sphere.
I can’t wait for the other APs to arrive, so I have even more deck buildin’ options. I haven’t built a deck since 1994 when I used to play Magic, and I forgot how much fun it is! :)
Re Lotr: I think for solo play using a single sphere can be difficult, especially if that single sphere is tactics. I tried that once and I was beaten to death by location cards. Locations killed me! I guess for multi-player, single sphere is less of an issue because you still get at least two of them.
