A couple of questions from a new player

By Friar M, in Rules questions & answers

Posted at

I have a couple of questions after starting to play this rather good game.

- with the Necromancer's Pass location do I need to have two cards in my hand to discard to travel? If I have one or none I can't travel correct?

- with Thalin questing and Eastern Crows revealed from the encounter deck I assume that 'Surge' triggers before Thalin's rule?

- In the Journey down the Anduin quest a few times I have managed to put a Forest Snare on the Troll which preventS moving on from stage 1 and when I have built up enough quest tokens to clear both stage 1 and stage 2 at the same time I kill the troll thus bypassing stage 2 completely. Is this correct? It seems a rather easy way to win the quest.

Thanks

Posted at

Hi Friar M,

Welcome to the boards and this great game!

With regards to your questions, the second one (regarding Thalin) is answered in this FAQ document: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/lotr-lcg/support/LotR-FAQ-Printer-Friendly.pdf

Answer to your first question (Core Rulebook p. 23):

Travel Effects

Some location cards have travel effects, which are
denoted by a bold “Travel:” trigger on a card. Travel
effects are costs or restrictions that some or all players
must pay or meet in order to travel to that location. If
the players cannot fulfill the requirement of a location’s
travel effect, the players cannot travel to that location.

Also see FAQ pp. 4-5:

(1.10) Limitations on Actions
Actions are only limited by whether or not a player can
pay the cost of the action, or by built in limitations on
the card itself, such as “limit once per round.”

Example: Protector of Lorien (CORE 70) reads,
“Action: Discard a card from your hand to....” This
action may be triggered three times per phase, as long
as the card’s controller has cards in hand to discard.

So you are correct -- if the first player has one or no cards to discard, you can't travel to Necromancer's Pass.

Answer to your second question (FAQ p. 2):

Thalin

When an enemy card is revealed from the encounter
deck, Thalin’s ability resolves before any keyword or
“When Revealed” card effects on the encounter card.

So the Eastern Crows would not Surge before Thalin's effect triggers. :-)

Answer to your third question (p. 22 Core Rulebook):

Quest Advancement

Players immediately advance to the next stage of a
quest as soon as they place a number of progress tokens
equal to or greater than the number of quest points
the current quest card has. Additional progress tokens
earned against the quest do not carry over to the next
stage. All progress tokens on the quest are returned to
the token bank when players advance to the next stage.
Players follow any instructions on the newly revealed
quest card as it is revealed.

Also, FAQ p.10 states:

Q: If players have placed progress tokens on a quest
equal to its quest points, but a game effect prevents
them from advancing, can they continue to place
progress tokens on the quest?
A: Yes. There is no upper limit to how many progress
tokens may be placed on a quest.
So your interpretation regarding your third question is incorrect -- you can't bypass stage 2 completely.
I'm still fairly new to the game, and it's easy to get tripped up in little details (or to miss things in the rules and FAQ)… so feel free to post further questions.

Other useful sources that may contain answers to future questions you may have:

http://www.cardgamedb.com/forums/index.php?/topic/1702-official-nate-rule-clarifications/

http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/92338-unofficial-faq-compilation-of-answer-from-around-the-web/

Posted at

About the quest advancement, any excess progress tokens on the quest are discarded when you flip to the next quest card. That may be where you were getting hung up in 'bypassing' the 2nd stage of Journey Down the Anduin (you can't bypass it).

Posted at

Thanks for the answers guys!

Looks like I need to read the rulebook a little more carefully. I just read the questing resolution section and assumed that quest tokens carried onto the next quest card like they carry over from the active location.

Looks like I'll have to take a look at the FAQ too.

Posted at

You're welcome.

And for what it's worth, I think it would have been logical and more learner-friendly if the Quest Advancement section of the rulebook directly followed the Quest Resolution section.

But oh well...