When you explore the Bridge and triggers his response, which keywords loses the Balrog?

1. Indestructible.

2. Cannot be optionally engaged.

3. The Balrog and shadow cards dealt to The Balrog are immune to player card effects.

4. While in the staging are, The Balrog is considered to be engaged with the first player....

Which numbers do you think?

We had clarification about this recently. The only "keyword" on this card is "Indestructible," while the rest is considered "game text" and is not removed by the bridge's effect.

In HallofBeorn it reads 1., 2. and 3. as a keywords.

Isnt?

And immune have always been keyword.

Those aren't keywords, simply because they are not defined as "keywords" in rules inserts. "Immune to player card effects" is not described as a "keyword" when it is described in rules inserts, so it is just "game text" and will not be affected by the bridge. I posted a bit below about the official ruling about this.

HallofBeorn may list them as such, but it is maintained by a player, not FGG, and may have some discrepancies from official wording. Beorn from that site gave us his thoughts about keywords recently, in a thread here .

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A BGG thread here has text from an official ruling. Here's the text from the BGG thread:

"...what it means for the Balrog to “lose all keywords.” The only keyword the Balrog has is Indestructible, so that’s all he loses after the Response on the Bridge is triggered. Phrases like “Immune to player card effects” and “cannot have attachments” are game text - not keywords. It’s actually easy to identify keywords because they’re always called out in the rules as being keywords. I believe the confusion here is because I made it plural on the Balrog. That was me trying to leave future design space open for future nightmare mode."

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That kind of confirms that there will be nightmare saga.....

Super unpleased by this information. Nightmare up everything else by all means but Saga is different...

There already is nightmare for Hobbit saga

That kind of confirms that there will be nightmare saga.....

Super unpleased by this information. Nightmare up everything else by all means but Saga is different...

Why not? I will love Frodo story Nightmare!!! If you dont like just not purchase no prob….

That kind of confirms that there will be nightmare saga.....

Super unpleased by this information. Nightmare up everything else by all means but Saga is different...

Why not? I will love Frodo story Nightmare!!! If you dont like just not purchase no prob….

I dont know it just seems really wrong.... its such a long campaign and so far a lot of it is quite hard already. None of the quests are easy like Emyn Muil, a lot of the first cycle in Mirkwood, Encounter at Amon Din etc and are all fairly difficult.

Plus if you run super thematic decks it is obviously a lot harder as well so the difficulty can easily be ramped up that way.

Another way is pick up more burdens than you usually would or perhaps not use boons, this would make it far far harder.

I think that the Campaign is only going to get harder anyway and we will eventually be almost relying on Boons we've saved up to make certain quests doable. I can't see the battle that takes place at The Black Gate, the fight against Shelob or the Siege of Minas Tirith being easy at all, pretty sure they're gonna be balls to the wall hard.

The hobbit nightmare quests were done so very badly and cop a lot of hate on the forums. Nightmare for the LOTR campaign might be just as much of a failure.

Also the saga quests are absolutely amazing and so well done thematically. What are they going to add that they haven't already? If they add enemies and locations that the fellowship didn't actually fight or explore I think that will be really dumb as its meant to be as close to the story as possible but with a different group of heroes. Unless they just do versions of existing cards with nastier effects and different art not sure how else they could handle this without changing it from Saga mode to some crappy not at all thematic or correct Saga mode.

Yeah I don't know I feel like its sacred and shouldn't be touched by nightmare (especially after what happened to the Hobbit boxes)

Besides we now have nightmare HoN, will probably have nightmare AtS and VOI before long and still have nightmare Ring Maker Cycle and Lost Realm which will also eventually be made. Definitely no lack of nightmare quests in sight, plus we will probably get more POD scenarios that are quite difficult.

Oh and Glaurung you know thats nonsense, if its released I'm gonna buy it whether I like it or not. We went over this in relation to Nightmare On the Doorstep. Both of us think it will suck but both want it.

Yes you have a point I agree here. But… I love nightmare!!! Anyway will see. Just with more and more players cards in thr end of the day saga can became very easy so we wikl need nightmare. Will see.

By the rulebook Victory is also a Keyword..

So if you use the The Great Bridge response, you will lose all 50 victory points, because you remove Indestructible and Victory points keywords?

That is nasty but good at the same time.... You can kill The Balrog but lose by doing it

The victory points are not keywords.

From FAQ 1.7:

Q: How many keywords does The Balrog (RD 44) have?

A: One. Indestructible is the only keyword on The Balrog.

The victory points are not keywords.

From FAQ 1.7:

Q: How many keywords does The Balrog (RD 44) have?

A: One. Indestructible is the only keyword on The Balrog.

That contradicts what is written on pag. 24 from CoreSet...

It's just an oversight. You get 50 victory points for defeating the Balrog.

If you are really bothered by this, shoot Caleb and e-mail, otherwise let the guy get on with more important stuff.

Hey .. some questions about the Balrog's ability: "Only the first player can declare attacks against The Balrog."

Can i participate with one or more ranged characters in an attack against The Balrog declared by the first player? Participating is not declaring an attack, right?

How could it be possible for other players besides the first player to declare attacks against The Balrog without this ability? Only some eventcards like "Hands upon the Bow" or Dunhere comes into my mind.

Hey .. some questions about the Balrog's ability: "Only the first player can declare attacks against The Balrog."

Can i participate with one or more ranged characters in an attack against The Balrog declared by the first player? Participating is not declaring an attack, right?

How could it be possible for other players besides the first player to declare attacks against The Balrog without this ability? Only some eventcards like "Hands upon the Bow" or Dunhere comes into my mind.

Declaring is not participating. Only the first player may declare an attack during the normal combat phase, or using a card ability granting an attack declaration; but then other players may commit ranged characters to the attack. It is not possible for other players to attack the Balrog otherwise.

Declaring is not participating. Only the first player may declare an attack during the normal combat phase, or using a card ability granting an attack declaration; but then other players may commit ranged characters to the attack. It is not possible for other players to attack the Balrog otherwise.

Thanks for the reply. The german translation of the paragraph ranged reads a little bit different then the english original. There we got the intention that participating in an attack is the same as declaring a ranged attack, but it is simply declaring a ranged character as attacker.

is there a possbile szenario in which other player could attack The Balrog without cardeffects if The Balrog has not this limitation of declaring attacks only by the first player? I only see Dunhere riding into the staging area...

To your first point, Ranged characters can declare a ranged attack on their own. On your combat phase, you may use Ranged to declare an attack against an enemy engaged with another player. This is different than participating in an attack declared by another player. The Balrog prevents this, though. If the first player is unable or unwilling to declare his own attack (e.g. has no characters ready to declare an attack with), your Ranged characters cannot take the initiative and declare it themselves.

Edit: I should clarify that by "different than", I mean for the purposes of the Balrog's restriction. A Ranged character declaring and resolving a ranged attack is still considered to have participated in that attack for the purposes of Response and Forced triggers, like Legolas' ability. Hope this isn't getting too confusing!

For your second point: If it did not have the restriction that only the first player may declare attacks, then yes: even though it is only engaged with player 1, players 2-4 may declare and resolve their own ranged attacks against the Balrog. An enemy that is in the staging area but still "considered to be engaged" with a player is an eligible target following normal combat phase rules. The staging area restriction primarily serves to maintain that enemy adding threat, but otherwise treat it as engaged for other purposes.

I'm not sure if you can use Ranged against the Balrog at all actually. Because The Balrog doesn't say "only the first player can declare attacks" it says "only the first player can declare attack ers ". The wording is a bit ambiguous in a rules sense since 'declare' is generally used just to refer to initially declaring the attack, but linguistically, if the first player declares an attack and you say your Ranged character will participate, you are declaring that character to be one of the attackers.

I'd never noticed that about the Balrog. Good spot. That is an unusual restriction. As written, it does sound like any character that doesn't belong to the first player can't be part of any attack against the Balrog. Things are somewhat ambiguous:

A character with the ranged keyword can be declared

by its controller as an attacker against enemies that are

engaged with other players. A character can declare

ranged attacks against these targets while its owner is

declaring attacks, or it can participate in attacks that are

declared by other players. In either case, the character

must exhaust and meet any other requirements

necessary to make the attack.

It isn't made explicit in this, but it feels like the ranged character that is participating in the attack is also declaring an attack. But the FAQ entry for Brand son of Bain tells us

Declaring an attack and participating in an

attack are both subsets of attacking

suggesting that a ranged character participating in another hero's attack is not declaring an attack.

No other part of the FAQ or the rules seems to be relevant.

I'm not sure if you can use Ranged against the Balrog at all actually. Because The Balrog doesn't say "only the first player can declare attacks" it says "only the first player can declare attack ers ". The wording is a bit ambiguous in a rules sense since 'declare' is generally used just to refer to initially declaring the attack, but linguistically, if the first player declares an attack and you say your Ranged character will participate, you are declaring that character to be one of the attackers.

Dang, good catch. You might be right.

I'm not sure if you can use Ranged against the Balrog at all actually. Because The Balrog doesn't say "only the first player can declare attacks" it says "only the first player can declare attack ers ". The wording is a bit ambiguous in a rules sense since 'declare' is generally used just to refer to initially declaring the attack, but linguistically, if the first player declares an attack and you say your Ranged character will participate, you are declaring that character to be one of the attackers.

Dang, good catch. You might be right.

Yup, it is definitely ambiguous. I tried finding something in the FAQ and rules that would tell me what the correct interpretation is, but there's nothing in either of those sources that confirms it for me (at least not that I could find).

I think I found clarification:

Q: Can characters with the ranged keyword participate in an attack declared through the card Quick Strike (CORE 35)?

A: No. There is no opportunity for other characters to join a Quick Strike attack. One character is exhausted to pay for the cost of Quick Strike, and the effect is that the exhausted character is immediately declared as an attacker against the target enemy. The card’s resolution does not allow for a standard declaration step in which other characters can declare.

The bold portion of the answer seems to indicate that Ranged characters that participate in attacks are also being declared as attackers which is prohibited in the instance of Quick Strike.

What do you all think?

I think we should flip a coin. Heads, you can attack with ranged characters, tails you can't. Or you can ask the devs, but there's not really a difference.

*Not meant to be mean, just teasing

I think we should flip a coin. Heads, you can attack with ranged characters, tails you can't. Or you can ask the devs, but there's not really a difference.

*Not meant to be mean, just teasing

Ever wonder if every time they get a rules question, Caleb and Matt just glance in their perfectly lucid 100-page full-resolution internal version of the rules, laugh at our ignorance, and send us an oracular answer, knowing that those full rules will never be made publicly available? Otherwise, what would keep forum chatter going during shipping delays?