For discussion: based on the ranking so far, what is the most surprising result to you?

I guess I am surprised to see Into Ithilien up at 16. Although I really like that quest, I thought it was despised for its difficulty. I guess it has aged well in the growing card pool.

I played Into Ithilian right at its release, and I never understood the fuss. It seemed like a 4 difficulty to me. Same with Cair Andros. All you needed was a Tactics, leadership deck to quest the battle and seige, and then fight. I got 11 wins straight in Cair Andros before I just stopped, and Into Ithilian wasnt much harder. What difficulties were you guys facing?

Playing one-handed with Leadership/Lore (LeAragorn/Theodred/Denethor) or Spirit/Tactics (Eowyn/Thalin/Gimli). Good combat decks can do well against Into Ithilien, if Celador dies there's never a need for willpower questing. But that also means that decks designed to generate willpower questing will find the quest difficult. Is the proper measure of difficulty how tough a quest is for a purpose-built deck, or how tough it is for a general-purpose deck. I hold with the latter.

Well yeah, but I think most General-all purpose decks were attack/tactics leadership in Heirs. By stating in the rules the battle and siege, I think the quests were designed to be played against using much more attack focused decks.. but yeah who knows

I find it interesting that among quests with 1 or 0 losses, we have representatives from every complete cycle except for Ringmaker, 1 Hobbit box, and 4 of the 5 LotR boxes as well as several PODs. Good quests can be found anywhere.

I'm a little surprised by the poor performance of Ringmaker quests. I thought it was a good cycle, but I guess a lot of people got turned off by the abundance of time counters. Fords of Isen is one of my top 5 quests.

I'm also surprised by the strong performance of Into Ithilien and Siege of Cair Andros. To me, they fall into the personally-despised group of quests that require quest-specific deck building. I thought that was the same complaint against Journey to Rhosgobel, so I'm surprised to see JtR go 0-5 while the battle/siege quests are doing well.

The LotR saga quests are (not surprisingly) doing quite well. However, I rarely see people playing those quests. I think the whole campaign aspect makes them less appealing to pickup and play.

Journey Along the Anduin-Seventh Level:

I like both, but there is no way I'm going to vote something with the Undisturbed Bones shadow effect.

Journey Along the Anduin-Seventh Level:

I like both, but there is no way I'm going to vote something with the Undisturbed Bones shadow effect.

Undisturbed Bones isn't that bad when you compare it to similar Treacheries in other quests:

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Fires-in-the-Deep-SaF

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/A-Knife-in-the-Back-TSF

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Savage-Attack-TSoH

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Dread-and-Despair-TFotW

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Dire-Magnificence-TBoLT

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Covered-Pit-TRoB

Journey Along the Anduin-Seventh Level:

I like both, but there is no way I'm going to vote something with the Undisturbed Bones shadow effect.

Undisturbed Bones isn't that bad when you compare it to similar Treacheries in other quests:

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Fires-in-the-Deep-SaF

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/A-Knife-in-the-Back-TSF

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Savage-Attack-TSoH

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Dread-and-Despair-TFotW

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Dire-Magnificence-TBoLT

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Covered-Pit-TRoB

Journey Along the Anduin-Seventh Level:

I like both, but there is no way I'm going to vote something with the Undisturbed Bones shadow effect.

Undisturbed Bones isn't that bad when you compare it to similar Treacheries in other quests:

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Fires-in-the-Deep-SaF

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/A-Knife-in-the-Back-TSF

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Savage-Attack-TSoH

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Dread-and-Despair-TFotW

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Dire-Magnificence-TBoLT

http://hallofbeorn.com/LotR/Details/Covered-Pit-TRoB

But we're talking shadow effects, not treacheries. An untimely Undisturbed Bones shadow effect means dead ally + dead hero = probably gg.

Although it's slightly less deadly than Sudden Pitfall

And Sudden Pitfall isn't as bad as Sleeping Sentry. I've voted against Road to Rivendell consistently because of that card.

For discussion: based on the ranking so far, what is the most surprising result to you?

I guess I am surprised to see Into Ithilien up at 16. Although I really like that quest, I thought it was despised for its difficulty. I guess it has aged well in the growing card pool.

I played Into Ithilian right at its release, and I never understood the fuss. It seemed like a 4 difficulty to me. Same with Cair Andros. All you needed was a Tactics, leadership deck to quest the battle and seige, and then fight. I got 11 wins straight in Cair Andros before I just stopped, and Into Ithilian wasnt much harder. What difficulties were you guys facing?

Two words: four players.

For discussion: based on the ranking so far, what is the most surprising result to you?

I guess I am surprised to see Into Ithilien up at 16. Although I really like that quest, I thought it was despised for its difficulty. I guess it has aged well in the growing card pool.

I played Into Ithilian right at its release, and I never understood the fuss. It seemed like a 4 difficulty to me. Same with Cair Andros. All you needed was a Tactics, leadership deck to quest the battle and seige, and then fight. I got 11 wins straight in Cair Andros before I just stopped, and Into Ithilian wasnt much harder. What difficulties were you guys facing?

Two words: four players.

There is also Southron Support which is basically Surge 4, and if it happens on the first quest phase it's pretty punishing.

For discussion: based on the ranking so far, what is the most surprising result to you?

I'm a bit surprised we've had as many ties as we have, I would've thought that'd be pretty rare with the number of people voting.

I'm a bit surprised Journey to Rhosgobel and Battle of Lake-Town are doing as badly as they are - I personally think they should be doing that badly, but I didn't think so many people agreed with me.

Does anyone else get the impression that the quests that took a draw ended up with a bit of an advantage? I feel like there's a big block of mediocre quests that just managed to pull out a tie sitting in the middle of all of my favorite quests.

Key:
Quests I really like
Quests I think are okay

1 The Steward's Fear 5 - 0 - 0
2 Helm's Deep 5 - 0 - 0
3 The Ruins of Belegost 4 - 0 - 1

4 Murder at the Prancing Pony 4 - 1 - 0
5 The Battle of the Pelennor Fields 4 - 1 - 0
6 Journey in the Dark 4 - 1 - 0
7 The Treachery of Rhudaur 4 -1 - 0
8 The Battle of Five Armies 4 - 1 - 0
9 Journey Along the Anduin 4 - 1 - 0
10 The Seventh Level 4 - 1 - 0
11 Flight of the Stormcaller 4 - 1 - 0
12 Foundations of Stone 4 - 1 - 0
13 The Massing at Osgiliath 4 - 1 - 0
14 A Storm on Cobas Haven 4 - 1 - 0
15 A Shadow of the Past 3 - 1 - 1
16 Into Ithilien 3 - 1 - 1
17 The Ring Goes South 3 - 1 - 1
18 The Siege of Cair Andros 3 - 1 - 1
19 A Knife in the Dark 3 - 1 - 1
20 Across the Ettenmoors 3 - 2 - 0
21 Breaking of the Fellowship 3 - 2 - 0
22 Conflict at the Carrock 3 - 2 - 0
23 The Wastes of Eriador 3 - 2 - 0
24 Escape from Mount Gram 3 - 2 - 0
25 Escape from Umbar 3 - 2 - 0

Does anybody else feel this way or is it just me?

For discussion: based on the ranking so far, what is the most surprising result to you?

I'm a bit surprised we've had as many ties as we have, I would've thought that'd be pretty rare with the number of people voting.

I'm a bit surprised Journey to Rhosgobel and Battle of Lake-Town are doing as badly as they are - I personally think they should be doing that badly, but I didn't think so many people agreed with me.

There's an average of about 30 votes per matchup. That leaves only 30 possible scores for a match, and there are 43 matches. So it's not surprising that we get several ties, given the the Swiss algorithm is biased to put evenly ranked quests against each other.

Does anyone else get the impression that the quests that took a draw ended up with a bit of an advantage? I feel like there's a big block of mediocre quests that just managed to pull out a tie sitting in the middle of all of my favorite quests.

Key:

Quests I really like

Quests I think are okay

...

Does anybody else feel this way or is it just me?

Give it time, the tournament isn't over yet. But I would hate to see one of my favourite quests, Wastes of Eriador, miss out on the top 16 bracket.

Give it time, the tournament isn't over yet. But I would hate to see one of my favourite quests, Wastes of Eriador, miss out on the top 16 bracket.

That is a quest I want to see done with Minimum Purchase.

Round 7 has begun! http://challonge.com/lotrquest2016

I really like the Swiss format. There are so many tough choices this round!

Throughout the championship so far, I've had considerably more hard choices between two quests that I hate than I have ones between two quests that I really love. I guess that suggests that maybe I'm mostly in agreement with the community on the really bad quests, but we diverge on absolute top favourites? Alternatively I find it easier to judge "I like both of these but this one more" than "I hate both of these and don't want to vote for either."

The Swiss rounds are complete! Thank you all for weighing in, we now have our overall standings. The top 16 have advanced to a single elimination tournament!

Top 16: http://challonge.com/lotrquest2016top16

Cast your votes now!

Helm's Deep vs Breaking of the Fellowship

The fun-level factor is similar in both quests. At the end I'm going with the more innovative mechanic.

Foundations of Stone vs Wastes of Eriador

Not a fan of any of these. In FoS I dislike the part where the quest "reset", and Wastes of Eriador feels like there is no way to make the quest shorter. In the end I hate Wastes of Eriador less.

My votes:

Helm's Deep vs Breaking of the Fellowship

The Battle of the Pelennor Fields vs Journey Along the Anduin (haven't played TBotPF)

Foundations of Stone vs Wastes of Eriador

The Ruins of Belegost vs The Seventh Level (haven't played TRoB)

Journey in the Dark vs Conflict at the Carrock

Murder at the Prancing Pony vs Flight of the Stormcaller (haven't played neither)

The Steward's Fear vs The Treachery of Rhudaur

A Knife in the Dark vs The Battle of Five Armies

I'm sad Into Ithilien and The Siege of Cair Andros didn't make the cut... Also sad about The Battle of Carn Dûm and Return to Mirkwood

Aaand Journey to Rhosgobel got 85th place out of 86! I'm guessing I'm the only person in these forums who enjoy this quest

Helm's Deep vs Breaking of the Fellowship - I'm a sucker for separate staging areas, and breaking of the fellowship does it the best. Helm's Deep is epic, but it can be a real slog, especially 3-4 player, and I find myself totally exhausted after playing it.

The Battle of the Pelennor Fields vs Journey Along the Anduin - I'm glad Anduin made it to the cut, because it is a classic that has stood the test of time. But I almost never play it these days.

Foundations of Stone vs Wastes of Eriador - I normally play 3-4 player, so Foundations of Stone gets the pick here (separate staging areas FTW!). 1 or 2 player I would pick Wastes.

Ruins of Belegost vs Seventh Level - Seventh Level is such a great, simple quest and my favorite of the cycle. Ruins of Belegost is cool, but I've never come close to beating it.

Journey in the Dark vs Conflict at the Carrock - I'm a little surprised Carrock made the cut. Journey in the Dark is amazing though. It captures the sense of doom perfectly. I'm predicting it wins the tournament.

Murder at the Prancing Pony vs Flight of the Stormcaller - Tough choice. Stormcaller is a great quest. But Johnny Goblin-Fingers...

Steward's Fear vs Treachery of Rhudaur - Steward's Fear is fun, but can be quite nasty at 3-4 players with location lock. Treachery is one of my go-to quests for deck testing and has a great tempo.

A Knife in the Dark vs Battle of Five Armies - I might be underrating Battle of the Five Armies because I rarely play any hobbit quests. Meanwhile, Black Riders might be my favorite box in the game for quests.

QUEST MATCHUP SPOTLIGHT!

Foundations of Stone versus Wastes of Eriador!

Since quests cannot speak, we had to track down some appropriate mascots. The quests had this to say for themselves:

Foundations of Stone:

Wastes of Eriador:

I think it's funny that dead marshes ahs by far the worst point difference and is far from being last xD. Also never thought about the long dark as the "worst" quest, as it is ofc forgetable, but not that terrible.

For the best of 16:

Helms' Deep > Breaking of the fellowship - Helm's Deep will win. It completly smashed any opponent during the first 7 rounds with the "closest" matchup being against battle of the pellenor at 63-38. And that is totally fine. The quest is unique, thematic and nails the difficulty without being frustrating or bringing too annoying Encounter Cards.

Murder at the prancing Pony > Flight of the stormcaller - I write this every time, but I still hate flight of the stormcaller.

Battle of the Pellenor fields > Journey along the Anduin - Anduin surely is the best aged quest, but it just isn't on par with todays top quests.

Ruins of Belegost > The 7th Level - Replayability, a dragon and challenge easily take out the slaughter feast.

Journey in the dark > Conflict at the Carrock - Carrock is one of the better mirkwood quests, but time took much of it's difficulty. Journey is still awesome in the theme and can be very dramatic if don't manage to outrun the timer

Wastes of Eriador > Foundations of Stone - I like Wastes for being a very Long quest. You can "rush" through so many quests if your deck/draws are good, it's nice to have a quest that Forces the Long game on you.

Steward's fear > Treachery of Rhudauer - Feat is the better quest in my book as it doesn't have an obvious game plan like rhudauer (turtling).

Knife in the dark > battel of the five armies - This is just because of the theme. I love the Feeling of knife in the dark.

There are a lot of quests here that I haven't played - in particular, the print on demand ones and several of the campaign quests. I played 'Knife in the Dark' so long ago that I don't remember it at all, and haven't played the campaign past the hobbit saga box. This makes for a total of 7/16 quests that I have no opinion on, and given how the votes appear to be going, next round I will likely only recognize 3/8 quests.

This tells me I need to play the campaign and order these print on demand quests, which apparently are quite good. I found the campaign very confining and fiddly initially - hopefully returning to it will leave a more favorable impression.

Steward's fear > Treachery of Rhudauer - Feat is the better quest in my book as it doesn't have an obvious game plan like rhudauer (turtling).

I'm curious what you mean by this comment. In Rhudaur you get 5 turns to get ready and get a clue, then Thaudir is coming for you whether you like it or not. If you didn't get a clue, then get ready for undefended attacks and +3 attack shadow cards. I don't see how turtling is a good strategy for this quest.