tripecac said:

While I exclusively play 1-deck play (I make enough mistakes while playing 1 handed, it is going to be impossible for me to follow every rules while playing 2 handed), the quests after Rhosgobel will get more aimed for 2 or more players.

You will miss half the mechanics in Return to Mirkwood while playing solo (many effects and decisions regarding who guards Gollum), a major mechanic in Foundation of Stone (splitting and reuniting staging area), and few mechanics in Shadow and Flame / Battle for Laketown (Balrog and Smaug attacking multiple players).

You will be missing out on Sentinel keyword (ranged is somewhat relevent in solo too with Hands Upon Bow) and other card effects (Song of Earendil, the one where you get to draw card and lower threat by playing attachment to other player…. I can't remember the name because I haven't seen it since sleeving it).

And of course, As you pointed out, playing 2 handed gives you many gameplay depth.

It sounds like double-handing (trying to avoid the term double-fisting) is the way to go…. however, playing single-handed has it's merit too because I only play single-handed but still enjoy this game very much.

To help to bring this back on topic:

I agree that mosts quests of the Dwarrodwelf cycle have been designer with 2 players in mind. Like Ellareth said, RtM is a good example for this. Shadow and Flame too might be more interesting if you have to defend two decks. Secrecy decks are more powerful when playing multiplayer.

So yes, there are some reasons to play twohanded. I did this when playing against RtM and Escape from Dol Guldur, as both adventures were not very enjoyable for solo playing. It's doable, but requires more time and a big(ger) table. It's also harder IMO as you have to additionally think over how you can make these two decks work together (synergies). And you're more likely to make mistakes, as has been mentioned. I sometimes even forgot to draw cards or to switch objectives etc. The main issue for me against playing tow handed is that it requires a lot of time and that it is sometimes a bit stressful.

The good thing is that with all these deckbuilders in the internet you can take easily build two decks that you want to play together. Perhaps that is what you should do, then you should try this, playing against an easier scenario. Rich got hooked after playing two handed. I still prefer to play solo. ANd I'm having fun, which I guess is the most important thing. And as long as you have fun you can do whatever you want.

tripecac said:

Just came across this post. As the writer of one of those blogs (Tales from the Cards), I thought I'd chime in here (and thanks for reading and the kind words by the way).

1) You are not wrong. Writing for TftC requires a lot of free time, and your 10-15 hours estimate is probably pretty accurate. The fact that I recently came into a lot of free time is what allowed me to start up the blog in the first place. Soon I won't have quite as much time available, and I've made plans for how I will deal with that situation. I empathize with your situation of momentum greatly. When the game first came out, I was obsessed and played at least one game when I got home from work about 3-4 times a week. At that point, I spent most of my available free time playing and didn't really engage with the community that much. Then there was a space of about 4-5 months where I was extraordinarily busy and had no time to play or keep up with things. This was a "dark period" or "extended break", whatever you want to call it. I always had the memory of how much I loved the game though, but it was really hard to get back into the game, because of the same analysis paralysis that it seems like you are going through. The hardest part was playing that very first game back. After that, I got sucked right back in, spending endless hours playing the game and writing about it. My biggest advice to you would be to not overthink it too much. Don't worry about being perfect on each scenario. Beat it once or twice and move onto a new one and keep that momentum going and get experience. Once you start feeling comfortable you can always go back and play earlier scenarios to your heart's content, but the biggest thing right now is to get enjoyment out of the game. If anything, it shouldn't feel like a task, the more you have fun, the more you'll build up natural momentum.

2) Again, you're correct. I have multiple different decks I play with and work on at the same time. I generally create and store them on Card Game DB for ease. My cards are all stored in a card binder, organized by sphere and type. This makes it a fairly quick process to break down decks and build new ones. I quickly sort them into spheres and type and put them back in the binder. Then I follow my deck lists and quickly pull the cards I need out of my binder. I guess you do build up a bit of nimble fingers after awhile. All my quests are sorted by encounter card set in a card storage box, and it is super quick to find them and combine them as well. I've spent a bit of money and time to organize things this way, but it saves me quite a bit of set-up time in the long run.

3) I'm definitely not looking for perfection or the "one deck to rule them all". In my opinion, looking for perfection is sometimes the enemy of learning, in that it makes you too paralyzed by the thought of making mistakes to have fun and to experiment. I have a bit of deck ADD, in that I'll play certain decks for awhile, but then will get bored and try something new.I have specific decks built for certain quests, and others that tend to do well against a wide variety. The biggest thing that guides my deck-building is experimentation, usually starting with "I wonder what would happen if I built a deck around…"

Finally, I'm a big proponent of 2-handed solo. I don't view it as cheating at all, because the table talk rules don't make much sense to me. We can say "grey wizard" but not Gandalf? We can say "a certain readying attachment from the Spirit sphere" but not "Unexpected Courage"? Doesn't add much to the experience in my book, but that's just my opinion. On the other hand, playing 2-handed lets you experience so much that you don't get 1-handed, and you get great experience with different types of decks and building synergies. Before my "break", I played exclusively 1-handed solo, but afterwards I almost always play 2-handed (I do still try out quests 1-handed as well though to see how they play). Don't get intimidated by the seeming complexity of playing 2-handed. Borrow someone else's decks and try it out first, or pick a simple set-up like Lore/Spirit questing deck and Leadership/Tactics combat deck and try things out from there. For the record, almost all of the decks I post on Tales from the Cards are designed for 2-handed play, meaning that they synergize with another deck, although they can be used solo as well a lot of times.

This has been a fairly long-winded post, but my main advice is what I said earlier: focus on the fun and try out as many different things as possible (1-handed, 2-handed, different scenarios, different deck types). Momentum requires movement. Don't worry about doing things perfectly or comparing yourself to others. Your primary goal is to enjoy yourself.

Thanks for the thoughtful replies!

I think my next step will be to give 2-handed a shot. I've got 2 core sets, which lets both decks use 3 Gandalfs, but I only have 3 Radagasts, although I don't know if there are many times when both decks need 3 Radagasts. As for the non-neutral cards, I'm hoping that complementary 2-sphere decks (e.g., Leadership/Lore and Tactics/Spirit) will work out okay.

I suppose one thing that makes 2-handed solo feel less like "cheating" is the fact that unless we buy 2 of every expansion and quest pack, we're pretty much forced to use "opposite spheres" in each deck, since we can't usually include more than 3 of any card across both decks. This means we can't have both decks with really good Spirit cards… Or two extremely dwarf-heavy decks. We can't test the extremes as easily as 2 players who have each bought their own copies of all the packs.

Of course, if there's a way to play 2 handed in OCTGN, VASSAL, or LackeyCCG, we're not limited in which cards we use. However, I've never seen a video of anyone playing 2-handed in those programs. I'd love to see how it's done!

As for the blog, this suggestion might ruffle some feathers, but perhaps Tales from the Cards and Hall of Beorn can merge at some point? Having 2 insightful blogs is awesome (and I am incredibly impressed at the quality of writing!), but as real life gets busier, it might help you avoid "blog fade" to take turns writing articles. You would be motivating each other (cooperatively rather than pseudo-competitively) as well. I think most of us are just amazed at the number of high-quality articles you are cranking out, and wondering how in the world you can sustain it. Perhaps the competitive element is helping with the motivation, but at some point, there's the real risk of burn out. Look at Fellowship of the Cards. I hope you're able to keep writing about LotR LCG for the long haul, and if that means slowing down a bit or taking turns, then I'm all for it! I'd rather have a Gandalf that pops in and out sporadically from beginning to end than a Boromir who super-novas in the first book!

Anyway, keep up the good writing! I'd love to see a supplementary video series as well!

tripecac said:

The Progression Series isn't enough for you?! Haha.

In all seriousness, I'm glad it sounds like you've gotten your momentum back - I, too, go through fits and spurts of playing. While I always buy all of the quests, there are a bunch I've never even played - or only played once!

One reason I enjoy the Progression Series so much is actually b/c I'm playing a lot of the quests for the first time - it's helped my "momentum," if you will.

Mitch and I are looking for new subjects to tackle in the series, so if you - or anyone! - has any suggestions, we''ll gladly consider them!

I love the progression series, and have a huge appetite for more. The more high-quality videos, the better! It's great to see different play styles, card layouts, and how they get around the OCTGN/LackeyCCG/VASSAL interface. For those of us who have only played solo, this is our own chance to observe other people playing, so we eat it up!

One possible topic for the progression series would be a comparison of the different interfaces. Or, if you only want to focus on OCTGN, a brief tutorial on how to setup OCTGN for Lotr LCG, and then how to make the most of the OCTGN interface. For example, it took me a few games in OCTGN to figure out how to draw the arrows from enemies to character cards. That's a very useful way of keeping track of who is defending which cards. This sort of "techical" video might be tedious to make, but it would definitely help people get started with virtual play and more easily keep track of what's going on in the videos (e.g., where is the threat counter, why are the quest cards laid out, how do you flip a coin, etc.)

A much more fun video would be seeing the Mirkwood cycle tackled in nightmare mode (using any cards from Mirkwood cycle). Of course, that might have to wait until the new nightmare cards are released. It would certainly increase our "attachment" to the decks being used (since we'd become more familiar with them after seeing them played a few times) and would let us see how the meta-game is played. Might take a few attempts, however.

tripecac said:

Hehe, I love this analogy.

Okay, on the topic of momentum, I have a long-overdue update.

Over the past 6 years, I have been playing LotR LCG off and on, almost exclusively on OCTGN (though I continue to collect the cards).

Most of my progress was made during overseas trips (in 2014 and 2018) when I was limited to a laptop which couldn't play "real" video games . During those trips I played LotR LCG on OCTGN, gradually progressing through the Mirkwood cycle. Whenever I returned from those trips, however, I would go back to playing other games, and didn't really pick up LotR LCG again until my next overseas trip. So, I often restarted with Passage through Mirkwood.

However, in 2019 something changed. I've been listening to new podcasts about LotR LCG, which keep me inspired. And BGG is a great source of "reminders" about the game. So, for whatever reason, a few months ago I started playing LotR LCG again, on weekend mornings. My goal was one quest per week.

And guess what... I've stuck with it! Playing once a week is frequent enough to keep the rules fresh in my head (which reduces overhead), but not frequent enough to feel like a "chore" or cause burnout. It's a comfortable frequency.

Right now I'm in the Dwarrowdelf cycle. Yesterday I finished The Long Dark. This is now the farthest I've ever gotten in LotR LCG!!! After all these years, I am finally progressing into new content. So, playing once a week has helped maintain momentum .

However, there is another factor: I have created my first "good" deck (or rather, a pair of decks, since I play 2-handed): Dwarves! Dain helps glue this deck together, and so far, several missions into the Khazad Dum/Dwarrowdelf quests, I haven't needed to rebuild my decks ! This also reduces the overhead of playing LotR, and gets rid of the most stressful part of the game for me, which is deck building (since I hate the process of removing cool cards from decks, and so many cards seem cool to me!).

So, those 2 things have helped me maintain momentum for the longest period of time so far:

1) playing once a week, and

2) playing a "good" deck (which doesn't need to be tweaked between scenarios)

Hopefully this update will help other people in similar situations find ways to establish their momentum too!

It feels great to be finally making progress in this game!

Excellent! I myself haven't played in like 4 months, although of course I continue to collect. Still, even if not playing, I always think about the game, new lineups and builds and interactions to build upon, as well as listening to the podcasts and participating in the online discussion. I have to get back to actual questing though, and for that the idea of ready-to-play, all-rounded solo decks for a variety of quests in standard mode has been invaluable. I too dislike to disassemble decks I actually enjoy, taking out cards for others, etc., so my ever-growing slew of prebuilt solo decks has been one of my biggest treasures (though granted, it is more expensive to keep than a normal collection). Still, the online community has helped tons in maintaining momentum for me. As I've said elsewhere, without the community, discord, podcasts, blogs, forums, etc, I wouldn't enjoy this game half as much as I do. I've played and still play other card games, and this is by far the best community I've seen. I'll have to try the quest a week idea. It's very reasonable, and will keep my skills from getting rusty. Thanks for sharing!

1 hour ago, tripecac said:

Okay, on the topic of momentum, I have a long-overdue update.

Long-overdue? You surely are no wizard

Anyway great to hear you're back having fun with the game

Happy to hear you are back! It is a great game.

I understand very much the “having a good deck” point. It is something that we have discussed recently due to the upcomming erratas. With the modern card pool, I am sure you can make a different deck for each scenario and be able to beat it. But most people do not have the time or the will to play the game that way, this is a style of play that should be exclusive to nightmare mode. Having good decks that do not have to be tweaked between escenarios is important.

@tripecac Thanks for the inspiration. I've been in the same boat, which is funny because at the same time I've been on FFG's website like a hawk this year, buying up sets I've always wanted as they became available.

I've got an annual camping trip next week and the game always comes with me, and after that week I will be joining you in the (minimum) once a week play. Been sitting on too much content not to and the more I think about it the more excited I get!

I've also been listening to Card Talk (one of the newer LotR LCG podcasts) which has been great because each episode is short, focused, and entertaining. It's probably the "easiest to digest" LotR LCG podcast out there, and when it comes to this game, anything easy is good! Plus, the show has a relaxed, humble, humorous feel to it. It's like listening to two buddies talking about the game. Highly recommended!

I managed to get through the final 2 Dwarrowdelf quests! Shadow and Flame required some deck building, but I stuck with it and managed to beat it. So now I am finally, for the first time ever, done with Moria!

Next weekend I plan to tackle Massing at Osgiliath, and then the Hobbit Saga. That will be interesting!

How are you guys doing?

I've beaten Assault on Osgiliath a few times, but most of those felt a bit cheap due to that one swingy treachery, so I'm planning on playing it a few more times until I decide to move on and take my technical win (one on turn 1 due to the treachery, one several turns in after I had taken control of a location or two due to the treachery) or I get a satisfactory win. I'm pretty sure my current decks can beat it, but I have a mono-tactics replacement for my mono-spirit deck if need be.

Once I'm done with the Heirs of Numenor, I actually plan on taking a break in order to paint my miniatures for Journeys in Middle Earth, then it's on to the Angmar Awakens cycle (I already played Ringmaker).

Just a quick update...

I have stuck with the once-a-week routine, and it's been working out great! The Hobbit Saga has been a real pain to get through, though. I am finding its quests much more difficult and frustrating than the Dwarrowdelf ones. That said, it's neat having Bilbo floating around on the edges.

Despite, or perhaps because of, the frustrating scenarios of the Hobbit Saga, I'm very glad I've been forcing myself to stick with the once-a-week schedule. If I hadn't created that "rule" for myself, I suspect I would have skipped a weekend or two or three or... and wouldn't have made as much progress as I have.

So, although "momentum" requires effort, it does have the benefit of ensuring an overall sense of progress through the game, and plus, even the hardest, nastiest quests have their fun moments. I love it when my Dwarf swarm is finally kicking butt... and I love that sense of relief when I finally beat a quest I've lost repeatedly. Those infrequent, "hard-earned" moments are very satisfying, and they wouldn't happen if I didn't "force" myself to maintain momentum.

It's a truly great game. A very hard one (for those of us who don't enjoy deck building) but also one that is very thought-provoking and emotionally/intellectually rewarding... when we finally win.

TLDR: There is no winning without losing. And there is no losing without playing. So play.

I have not had the willpower to commit to once a week like you have so I am still a little envious, but I am also happy to report that I've found another motivator that has gotten the game back to almost regular play.

I introduced a local friend to the game on a board-game night when there would be only the two of us. He had been wanting to try it anyways and the timing worked out. I took my two Gondor decks (see my post in deck construction if you're curious) and we not only did passage through Mirkwood but we Journeyed down the Anduin in one night. My friend absolutely loved the game, and he went out and found someone selling their collection so he got a small jump start on sets. A combination of Core, maybe early stuff and one or two sets from the latest stuff too.

Suffice to say another board game night came up where it would be only the two of us, so we boldly took Gondor into the heart of Dol Guldor so that we could Escape from it. We got absolutely destroyed by the quest in both attempts but I don't know if I've ever had more fun playing this game.

I still enjoy the game solo and two-handed but it has been so refreshing to find someone locally to play the game with and it has helped it get to the table more. If you have friends with any interest in Lord of the Rings I heartily recommend nudging them on the game!

So, I finished the Hobbit saga, and finally managed to beat Lake-Town.

I'm now tackling the first quest in Heirs of Numenor: Peril in Pelargir .

Twice I tried it, and twice I got completely crushed within the first 3 or 4 turns. My decks (I play 2-handed) are not even close to making headway. Starting with 2 enemies in the staging area, and then drawing up to 2 more at the beginning of the quest phase, and then up to 2 more during staging... Both times I ended up having to fight 4 or 5 enemies on turn 1. So I couldn't really quest, and either ended up threating out or getting too many heroes killed to make it worth continuing.

Peril in Pelargir feels so imbalanced (and "unfair") that, to be honest, it's very tempting to "take a break" for a few weeks/months/years and focus on other games. I can now see why so many people said that the Heirs of Numenor quests are painful and discouraging.

Lake-town was hard. The Hobbit quests were confusing. But Peril at Pelargir is just plain depressing.

Is this how you felt when you first tried it? Did it throw your momentum off for a while?

And, if you persevered, what helped you get through? Did you overhaul your deck(s)? Shift to/from 1-handed? Play Easy Mode? Cheat? Or did you give up on the idea of beating each quest, allowing yourself to "fail forward" after X attempts, with no real consequences other than a bruised/battered ego (and perhaps some bent cards)?

When first acquiring the quests I was playing two decks -- Theodred/LeAragorn/LoDenethor and SpEowyn/TaGimli/Thalin. Those of course are the hero lineups from Beorn's Path, but as I acquiring more cards I kept tweaking the contents. My procedure was as follows:

1) Play each deck a maximum of three times against the quest. If either wins, go on to the next quest.

2) Play both decks together against the quest a maximum of three times. If I win, go on to the next quest.

3) Repeat #1 in semi-easy mode (extra resource for each hero at start).

4) Repeat #2 in semi-easy mode.

5) Repeat #1 in easy mode.

6) Repeat #2 in easy mode.

I followed this procedure for all regular quests through Temple of the Decieved and all saga quests through Shelob's Lair (plus the two saga PoD quests), at which point these two decks were displaced to play assorted Dori fellowships. Only Morgul Vale reached the 27th try. I'm not sure where Peril in Pelargir fell, I think the SpEowyn/TaGimli/Thalin deck took it down--a maxed-out Gimli with Unexpected Courage can solve a lot of battle questing issues. I only completely remade the deck for one quest in that span (Hobbit's riddle quest), but I added sideboard cards for assorted quests.

Were I to play again progression style with a particular deck, I think I would rely on the Grace of the Valar variant we use in the solo league. With enough help from the Valar you can win any quest, and you don't lose the cards out of the deck like you do with easy mode. With that said, there's absolutely no shame in taking a tough quest down in easy mode, especially for a progression player. And sometimes a particular deck just is a bad fight for a particular quest. At least there's one stage where SpEown was useful; in some of the other quests in the cycle she was dead weight.

Peril in Pelargir requires you to really tech against it with a very specific deck to be successful. A good deal of the most efficient "normal" decks would perform poorly.

On 11/22/2019 at 9:12 PM, tripecac said:

So, I finished the Hobbit saga, and finally managed to beat Lake-Town.

I'm now tackling the first quest in Heirs of Numenor: Peril in Pelargir .

Twice I tried it, and twice I got completely crushed within the first 3 or 4 turns. My decks (I play 2-handed) are not even close to making headway. Starting with 2 enemies in the staging area, and then drawing up to 2 more at the beginning of the quest phase, and then up to 2 more during staging... Both times I ended up having to fight 4 or 5 enemies on turn 1. So I couldn't really quest, and either ended up threating out or getting too many heroes killed to make it worth continuing.

Peril in Pelargir feels so imbalanced (and "unfair") that, to be honest, it's very tempting to "take a break" for a few weeks/months/years and focus on other games. I can now see why so many people said that the Heirs of Numenor quests are painful and discouraging.

Lake-town was hard. The Hobbit quests were confusing. But Peril at Pelargir is just plain depressing.

Is this how you felt when you first tried it? Did it throw your momentum off for a while?

And, if you persevered, what helped you get through? Did you overhaul your deck(s)? Shift to/from 1-handed? Play Easy Mode? Cheat? Or did you give up on the idea of beating each quest, allowing yourself to "fail forward" after X attempts, with no real consequences other than a bruised/battered ego (and perhaps some bent cards)?

I think all of the cycles start getting harder after Khazad Dum and the only way around it is to up your decks. Forget playing progression or anything else that limits you, at least for a while.

Your Dwarf deck should be able to handle Peril at Pelargir, but another one to consider is a Gondor leadership deck, as you get plenty of low cost allies that you can use. Maybe something like this:

Theodred

Leadership Boromir

Leadership Denethor

Steward of Gondor x 3

Gandalf x 3

Sneak Attack x 3

Errand rider x 3

Squire of the Citadel x 3

Faramir x 3

Visionary Leadership x 3

Pelargir Ship Captain x 3

Strength of Arms x 3

Guard of the Citadel x 3

For Gondor x 3

Grim Resolve x 3

Envoy of Pelargir x 3

White Tower Watchman x 3

If you've got later packs you can add in:

Ingold x 3

Veteran of Osgiliath x 3

Herald of Anorien x 3

You can tinker around with this but hopefully you get the gist - you have plenty of resources, and use lots of allies, plus boosts using the Gondor keyword pack a real punch. There are one or two quests in HoN that force a change but worry about them when you get to them!

A quick update...

Peril in Pelargir ended up completely killing all of my momentum, to the point where I haven't played any LotR LCG in 2020 .

Wandalf's words express the key reason:

On 11/24/2019 at 3:32 PM, Wandalf the Gizzard said:

Peril in Pelargir requires you to really tech against it with a very specific deck to be successful. A good deal of the most efficient "normal" decks would perform poorly.

At the end of 2019 I tried repeatedly to beat Peril in Pelargir. My Dwarf decks kept failing to get beyond the first few turns. I was nowhere close to winning. It was painful. All the advice (here and elsewhere) said to try different archetypes... but since I didn't have anything other than my Dwarf decks, and since I didn't want to go through the hassle of building brand new decks from the hundreds of unfamiliar cards which have come out , I decided to set the game aside and focus on Gloomhaven instead.

So, 2020 has been the year of Gloomhaven. It's been great. I play about as many hours per month as I did for LotR LCG, but I find it a lot less less stressful.

I still think about LotR LCG very often, and keep up with podcasts and forums for it. I still collect the packs as they get released, despite playing 100% virtually (on OCTGN). I'm still "into" it, despite not playing it. I look forward to tackling Pelargir's peril again, but will only do so once I've got a firm plan on how to get around the deck construction issue.

Finding a collection of "official" decks would be the best situation, especially if there were also carefully designed pairs of decks (since I prefer to play 2 handed). I'd love to be simply selecting decks rather than cards. Trying some community-constructed archetypal decks would be the next best thing, but I would prefer if FFG itself could create (or annoint) "official" decks so that skipping the deck construction process didn't feel like cheating.

I think your deckbuilding time and decision paralysis could be reduced a lot by selecting ones you like from ringsdb. These decks are published by other players (some of them are incredible deckbuilders). You can download the octgn deck straight from ringsdb.

You can specifically look up "fellowships" lists of decks designed to work together.
In this link I set up a query for 2-handed fellowships using only cards up to Heirs Of Numenor ( https://ringsdb.com/fellowships/find?nb_decks=2&numcores=1&numplaysets=1&author=&name=&sort=popularity&packs[]=1&packs[]=8&packs[]=15&packs[]=2&packs[]=3&packs[]=4&packs[]=5&packs[]=6&packs[]=7&packs[]=9&packs[]=10&packs[]=11&packs[]=12&packs[]=13&packs[]=14&packs[]=37&packs[]=38 ).

These 2 stuck out to me since they specifically mention Peril in Pelargir:

https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/9281/heirsofnumenorprogression1csfellowshipbyczyn

https://ringsdb.com/fellowship/view/7598/ats1perilinpelargir2-handedsoloprogression

Hey, I second that piece of advice.

I regularly pull decks off rings DB. They have done all the hard work so that you can quest more.

I find deckbuilding fun but.. takes me ages too. i often loose focus and end up with a deck opposite to what I wanted. With rings db you can put in cards you want to focus on and then find a deck using them.