So I was wonderings players thoughts on if we will se a Balrog fight in Kazhad-Dum or no. If so what do you think it will be like? I possibly thing a direct damage type theme.

as long as its EPIC im ok with it. i hope to and i assume u will see a balrog but u cant kill him and u have to escape him

I certainly hope we see the Balrog in the basic box. I'm also hoping for the Watcher in the Water, though I'd bet that will be in one of the APs.

The french board mentionned there will be something "bigger and older"

There has to be a balrog. That'd be like having an expansion box on Fangorn and not having an Ent.

I believe I read somewhere that the Heroes will enter Moria from the East and exit three scenarios later to the West. This suggests no Watcher in the base set. Escaping the Balrog should be the third quest, can't imagine anything else.

Yeah, there has to be a Balrog. I'm sure we'll see some cave trolls as well...maybe a kraken?

Definitely a Balrog coming.

Khazad-Dum and Balrog go together like peanut butter and sandwiches!

But seriously, the Balrog absolutely will be in the expansion. Not sure whether in the core expansion but the cycle won't end without that evil spirit of Udun rearing his flaming face. Their isn't even a relevance to Khazad-Dum without him.

On the expansion page it says that we look for Balin. Well, he lead a colony there and hans't been heard from since. The reason he even went there is because Khazad-Dum has been empty of Dwarves since the Balrog ran them out.

So, an emphatic YES to Balrog in the expansion!

I hope we'll see the Goblin King too in the near future

Frayed said:

Agreed, and I think the idea of the watcher in the water is also cool, be interesting to see if that is in there as well. Still to not have the Balrog would not be a pleasant surprise.

I think it will be interesting to see how it works, as thematically, there should be no way to fight this card. I am thinking it is going to be some kind of card that sits in the staging area and we have to "run" away from, slowly collecting tokens or something, when a amount is reached, we all die. Sort of like Wilyador but for the staging area.

Also be cool to see "shall not pass" used in some way

it would be interesting to see a "sleep" mechanic... the balorg doesn't resurface until XYXYX (threat, or whatever stage of quest) but THEN, the heroes have to flee back and run from him...

imagine they fight the balrog - and win - storywise impossible, see the movies... etc...

Balrog can allso be a Treachery cards, but most propably it will be minion...

has to be a Balrog

shouldn't attack/engage/be too much of a problem, via some as-yet-unseen mechanic until a certain point in the quest/level of threat is reached.

Shouldn't be killable - unless you're Glorfindel or Gandalf - just run-away-from-able

The threat could go up even higher then 50 as well... that is something that they have hinted at as well. So maybe we could do this to like 100 threat against the balrog?

Vyron said:

Scenario: Don't Wake Daddy!

Satisfying Condition: Heroes take turn running up to the sleeping Balrog and poking him. With each poke, add 1 card to the staging area. When players draw the "Cranky Grandpa" condition, the Balrog wakes up and yells at them to get off his lawn.

erikwm said:

Are you thinking of the new "secrecy" keyword?

I bet that the Balrog, in the third scenario of Kahzad Dum, will be in the stage area from the beginning of the search gainining some tokens if the threat will raise more than one each turn played. After getting a certain number of token it will be unleshead.

This can be in conjuction to a threat level more than 50 too....

Mighty Jim said:

i agree, but even gandalf as an ally wouldnt be powerful enough, perhaps with some attchment that buffs him up big time

Well me and my friends squished the Witch King quite brutally... And that's lorewise quite impossible too. Granted he can 'regenerate' but still. I think the Balrog should be made immensely powerful but not auto-unkillable.

Headnig to work this morning after having an awesome night playing this game with friends...

Got thinking about the upcoming Khazad Dum expansion and prospects of the Balrog...thought I would do a post on the concept and what kind of mechanics should be employed only to realise post search that this concept had already been thoroughly discussed and that all of my ideas had already been covered - LMAO.

I must be getting old and slow!

Definately like the 'escape the Balrog' concept, rather than some kind of lore-tampering confrontation, unless of course that confrontation resulted in you managing to fend him off long enough to escape (I can see him gobbling up Silverlode Archers and Snowbourne Scouts left right and centre...om nom nom nom nom). I don't think there should be any element of being able to 'defeat' the Balrog.

Definately don't think there should be a way to defeat him in any form or fashion.

I think the epic punch-ups will come from the huge goblin and orc tribes located in Moria - there would be some bad-ass orc tribal leaders to face down!

Klaen said:

yeah was just re-reading the battle scene in the chamber of mazarbul, where aragorn cleaves the orc's head in two! nice!