The Blue Wizards are here! With the Strange Eons program, and GeckoTH's awesome templates, I've made the two blue wizards, Morinehtar and Rómestámo (A.K.A. Alatar and Pallando). Since there isn't much information about them, I went off the meaning of their names to make them. Morinehtar means "Darkness-Slayer", so I made him a tactics hero, and Rómestámo means "East-helper", so I made him a spirit hero. I think I made them too powerful, but what do you guys think?

Also, I had some trouble with Strange Eons, since it wouldn't let me go back in to edit them after I created them. I meant for their threat to be 12, but I couldn't change it. And I spelled Rómestámo's name wrong on his own card, sorry!

http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/3391/morinehtarfrontface.jpg

http://img818.imageshack.us/img818/6659/rmestmofrontface.jpg

Note: You may want to open them in a new tab so it doesn't kick you out of this page

Note 2: I claim none of the artwork as my own, and I didn't find the artists' names.

Well you should make them an ally cards like Gandalf is! Gandalf is too powerfull for a hero and so are these two allso. I think that you should consider both versions of Gandalf and Radagast and make these in the same consept! One time wonder like original Gandalf, Hard to keep, like second Gandalf or very spesific like Radagast is (not too powerfull)

I would very much like to see these two Wizards so I hope that you will make ally versions of the them!

Let me see:

Original Gandalf
cost: 5
quest: 4
battle: 4
defence: 4
Hit points: 4
Discard Gandalf at the End of the round
when enters the play: 1: draw 3, 2: deal 4 damage, 3: reduce threath by 5

Second Gandalf
cost: 5
quest: 4
battle: 4
defence: 4
Hit points: 4
Does not exhaust to quest
discard Gandalf or raise your threat by 2 at the end of refress phase

Radagast
cost: 5
quest: 2
battle: 1
defence: 1
Hit points: 3
Collect resource, use them to pay only for creatures
heal creatures by using own resourse tokens

Morinehtar (Alatar)
cost: 5
quest: 2
battle: 3
defence: 2
Hit points: 4
ranged: responce: threat and wound +3str
Increase your threat by 1 during the refress phase or discard

Alatar alternate
cost: 5
quest: 2
battle: 3
defence: 2
Hit points: 3
ranged: responce: threat and wound to discard target threachery card
Increase your threat by 2 during the refress phase or discard

Alatar alternate 2
cost: 5
quest: 1
battle: 2
defence: 1
Hit points: 3
ranged: responce: increase threat to attack a target enemy in the staging area

Romestamo (Pallando)
cost: 5
quest: 2
battle: 2
defence: 3
Hit points: 3
responce: ingrease threat to 1: deal 2 damage to attacking enemy. 2: Take damage from attack
Increase your threat by 1 during the refress phase or discad

Pallando alternate
cost: 5
quest: 2
battle: 2
defence: 3
Hit points: 3
responce: ingrease threat to 1: draw a card. Your hand size in ingreased by 1.
Increase your threat by 2 during the refress phase or discard

Pallando alternate 2
cost: 5
quest: 2
battle: 1
defence: 1
Hit points: 3
responce: Your hand size in ingreased by 1. Action: exhaust and add a threat to see the top card of the encounter deck. you may move that card to the bottom of the deck.

These has to be be playtesteted but they are more in balance with original wizards that has been released so far!

I totally agree with you. I didn't really make these as final versions, just kind of as ideas. The reason I made them powerful is because they are Istari, and I definitely don't like the Radagast they came out with. To me, he's useless, and definitely not worth 5 resources.
I've figured out the issue with Strange Eons, so now I can edit stuff all I want. I think the ally thing is a good idea. I wanted to make them heroes in the first place because I'm making a series of quests where you travel to the east and find Ithryn Luin to help you against Sauron. Do you think they could be heroes if I toned them down a little bit?

Also, where's the best place to find art to put on the cards? I need to find pictures of Easterlings to put on the cards that are going to be in the quests.

One more, or actually two :-)

Saruman the White
cost: 6
will: 5
attack: 5
defence: 5
hitpoints: 5
Sage, Istari
Palantir; Action: Exhaust Saruman to peek top 3 cards of the encounter deck. You may rearrange the cards when you put them back to the top of the encounter deck.
Forced: if you can not cansel revealed treachery card the Saruman joins the Dark side of the force. Put Saruman the many colored to the stagin area and trasfer all cards and tokens from the Saruman the white to the Saruman manycolored. Remove Saruman the White from the game.
Forced: if any effect puts a ring item to the game. Increase the treath level by 5.

Saruman Manycolored
engament cost: 42
treath str: 5
attack: 5
defence: 5
hitpoints: 5
Sage, Istari
Forced: Saruman engages the player who owns a ring item.

legolas18 said:

I understand your idea. The only way of making them as an heroes is to use them like Bilbo is used in the Hobbit saga expansion. And even then it would be very difficult to balance them. (they shoud not produce resource tokens or they would not be additional heroes like Bilbo was) It allso means that they could not be used in any other scenario. Only in those where you exspesially allow them aka those Hobbit saga expansion scenarios for Bilbo.

If they are ally cards it would be easier to use them allso in many other scenarios allso! But ofcource it is your call. I IMHO like more ally variant, because they are more easily balanced because we have the Gandalf example of how making a balanced but a powerfull card! Those two wizards got corrupted like Radagast and Saruman did, so threat cost based actions are guite good idea! Just have to make that threat cost big enough! Only Gandalf remained true in the original quest of bringing the pease and harmony to the Middle Earth. Radagast was corrupted by narure, so he was/is only usefull when dealing with nature (so the creature only usefulnes is actually very good point by FFG!) He was somewhat completely unusefull in any other way! Same should be considered with Alatar and Pallando and allso the Saruman! They sould be only good in one very specifick task and somewhat completely unusefull in any other (to some extent) if you want to follow the spirit of the Lord of the Rings but maybe these are earlier incarnations of those "fallen" wizards and they are not yeat so corrupted that they can be more usefull in general, like Gandalf is/was.

In ICE the Pallando was corrupted by knowledge, and mystics (spells, artifatc, rituals, foreseeing). Alatar by the force of hunt (killing animals, beast, enemies of dark). Saruman was corrupted by knowlege of the ring and palantir (greed and fear and lust for power). Radagast was corrubted by the nature (consentration only to the wildlife: animals and plants).

Well I see your point, but that was only Tolkien's first idea of them. Later in his life he changed his opinion on them and instead said that without them, the enemies in the east and south would have so greatly outnumbered the people of the west that they wouldn't have stood a chance. So that's why I made them good, because I'm going off his last revision of them.

"Their task was to circumvent Sauron: to bring help to the few tribes of Men that had rebelled from Melkor-worship, to stir up rebellion … and after his first fall to search out his hiding (in which they failed) and to cause [?dissension and disarray] among the dark East … They must have had very great influence on the history of the Second Age and Third Age in weakening and disarraying the forces of East … who would both in the Second Age and Third Age otherwise have … outnumbered the West." - J.R.R. Tolkien.

Interesting! I have to read my HOME more carefully… How did I miss that…

definitely make them allies!!! it is more fitting to the overall theme and the previous Istari…

but cool cards anyway! a tad overpowered

ps: I really would have loved Tolkien to write a book of "Eastern-Earth"… I was always kind of fascinated with the Istari, esp. Pallando and Alatar, of whom we know little if nothing… also, I would have loved to read more about Radagast… it's a shame in my opinion, what they have done to poor Radagast in the movie… he's is like a crazy mushroom-eating clown!!! COME ON! A RABBIT SLEIGH!!!!!! REALLY?!?!? To many mainstream-money-grabbing-movies these days anyway… but The Hobbit… all in all it was all "too funny"… I know that it's a child's book, but the movie… I hope the second one gets more "earnest" btw… sorry for the off-topic stuff…

No it's fine, I definitely agree with you. The Hobbit, although it was pretty well made, could have been SO much better. If you're splitting a 300 page book into a trilogy, then I think you could fit every single detail in there, and not have to change a thing at all. The CG orcs bugged me so bad that I almost cried. And maybe they should try to read the book. Azog is only mentioned once, the entire book.

Anyway, back to the wizards topic, I would have loved to see more information on what happened to them as well. The reason I made them powerful is because… Well, because they're Istari. And Radagast, though he may have not been the most powerful of them, deserved much more than the card he got. Here's Gandalf, sitting happily at 4 everything stats, and then Radagast comes with… Nothing. But yes, I'll make them into nuetral allies instead of the heroes, and then we'll see if they're any better than the current versions.

Also, off-topic, what does everyone think about the new scenario announced?

I don't think that Radagast is a weak card! The only non hero character that produces resource tokens can not be bad… One of my best deck still uses him as a resource source with desent quest power. Ofcource the cost is guite high, so it takes time until he pays himself back, but I would say 3 round is enough for that. After that everything you get is a profit ;-)

That's the good part of him, the resources. But still, given his cost, and that the only creatures in the game are eagles, I don't use him that much. I'd rather just go with a mono- tactics deck and then a second support deck to go along with it. But then again, I'm not a pro at this game, such as Rich or the author of Beorn's hall and Tales from the Cards. And I don't have a lot of experience with him. What ways do you best incorporate him in a deck?

He is in Tactic leadership draw a whole deck in your hand type of deck. So there are a lot of fighting characters and a lot of card drawing cards and some of those cards draw eagles out of the deck, so I benefit from card draving, resources to eagles and wery high persentage of getting all I need in hand… Actually it is now multisphere deck, but based on tactic and leadership heroes. The resource production is based on Horn, Radagast and that Tactick dwarf who likes to weat a lot of armour…

Now a days that deck contains some counter spell, good fighters and allmost all possible cards that can draw more cards from all possible spheres…

Any news about the new Wizards? I have been anciously following the development in this article! This is an interesting consept.

Sorry! I haven't made the allies yet, I was attempting to make a scenario where you go into the east to find them, and I've discovered that making a scenario is a lot harder than it looks. With all the making sure that you have enough of each type of card in the encounter deck, making sure that nothing is confusing, making sure that there aren't too many surges or shadow effects, I've been overwhelmed. But they are coming! I'm still trying to think of abilities that can go on the Wizards, but that don't make them too powerful. I don't want them to go very fast like Gandalf, I want them to be allies that can actually be used without having to worry about the right time to use them, but then again if I leave them in too long, they become too powerful. (sigh).

Here is a rough draft of Morinehtar. I don't mean for this to be final, just an idea of what I'm thinking he should look like. Suggestions are welcomed.

Well the game developing is allways like that! Now you know how FFG stuff feels like when players are asking for more information about the next release ;-)

Nice to hear where you are at this moment. The new Morinehtar will run out of his hit points very fast, but I don't know the rest of the cards in your scenario, so I cant say if it is a bad thing or not. But he seems to be very vulnerable to the damage at this version.

I am not and can not expect any news regularly from a hobby like this, but If you can give a hint or two from time to time even if you are not going to release anything soon, it would be nice.

I am not sure, how you manage your project, but I have allways been interesting in providing opinions and maybe some development support, but as allways it is your project and you can and have to work it out just like you yourself would have liked to do it. Too many peoples gives so many options that you can not compromise everything and every people has an opinion on his own that is different to some-one elses opinion! So it is allways better to make desisions by your self, but sometimes it can be usefull to listen other opinions and maybe tweak your ownbased on that (and sometimes not to tweak).

This is interesting project because it handles an area that has not been covered too many times in LOTR based games. Nice to see how it develops! And I hope that you can finnish it one day! Not all projects come to the end.

I would definitely like opinions on this one, as the scenario will be a little hard to figure out. The reason I made him so vulnerable to damage is because I don't want him to stay in play for too long, or he'll become overpowered. But the damage can be easily solved by a Warden of Healing paired with Elrond.

So here are some of the cards that I'm planning to put in the encounter deck if everything turns out alright. I'm sorry about the white backgrounds, I couldn't find art that I liked that fitted the description of the card. So for now, we'll have to use our imagination about how the picture looks on the card. This quest (I'm planning to make a chain of three quests) focuses on your party journeying to the east in hunt for the Blue Wizards. But the Easterlings are very numerous, and they plan to stop you before you get very far. I really wanted the players to feel the pressure of the enemies and to feel overwhelmed, so there's going to be a lot of Easterlings.

Sorry that the images are so big, I couldn't figure out how to shrink them.

Interesting!

Ok now some comments:

Wild orc is deadly, if you don't have a feint or cheap first turn soaker. Maybe too deadly if it appears in first two turns (very low engagement cost)) I would make it a little bit bigger, so it would not hit you during the first turn… But nice little enemy indeed :-)

Easterling chieftain: Would it be better if the bonus would go to the easterling enemies only? (a matter of taste) The real problem may be that when this one come to the staging area it will be engaged during the same turn it was released (there is not any rule in the card that would keep it in the staging area) so the +1 effect would never come in use, so it is somewhat empty card at this incarnation. Maybe: "You can not engage Easterling chieftain, if there are other easterling minions in the game…"

Endles plain: this is pure pain… Very dangerous location, but maybe suited to location manipulation and heavy tactic decks. Have to play with it with spesific deck until I can say more, but dangerous location indeed!

Easterling Ambush: A nice card that keeps those easterlings coming. Does not need any tweaking from my point of view…

You seems to focus on minion horde that just keep on coming from the very moment it is released from the enounter deck. These cards support that theme guite well. It allso means that bad start (no allies) will end the game very quicly. A player need a big party of allies to fight these. If he don't get them he will be overwhelmed very quicly. It is a good and a bad thing at the same time. A dwarf ally heavy deck can manage this, but not so many other deck type at this moment. Interesting to see how those new Gondor cards will do against this. Not a easy encounter deck type to balance.

(edit) see the post below

Thanks for the comments!

Wild Orc: I made this guy so hard because he's supposed to be a rampaging orc, and he wouldn't really care what your threat was before he started attacking. But I might make him less harsh on the engagement cost after playing with him in the scenario a few times… Maybe a 27 or something.

Easterling Chieftain: The main reason for this guy's forced ability has to do with his shadow effect. If you happen to draw him regularly, then he won't be too much of a problem other than his high stats, but if you draw him as a shadow card, then all the enemies get +1 attack, which could prove deadly. But yes, I meant for his ability to be for only Easterling enemies, so I'll change that.

Endless Plains: I agree that this one is very difficult. I will fear it every time it pops up. But if you're on an open plain, then your enemies are going to have a big advantage to you because they can see you and attack you better. Still, I think after a few times of playing with it, I'll decide whether it needs something to compensate for it's bad effects, such as more victory points, or maybe a reponse like "After Endless Plains leaves play, all players may draw one card" or something like that.

The point of this quest isn't really to be able to fight all the enemies. You pretty much get ambushed, and so you have two options: Run away, or try to fight them. So I've included a pretty cool effect, where on the second stage of the quest the enemies are gathering together, planning to attack. But in that same time, you have the option of running away. The locations that you explore during stage two go into your victory display instead of the discard pile, even if they don't have any victory points. And then on the last stage, all the enemies attack. But, if you have 5 (not a decided number yet) locations in your victory display, then you've succesfully run away from the enemy without having to fight them. If you don't, then you'll have to fight all the enemies until their are none left in play. The second is harder, but there's a reward at the end of some treasure cards if you go this way…

I'll try to post more cards later. And maybe you'll see some player cards in there as well to help deal with the so numerous enemies….

Ok. That sounds interesting. So you can manage as long as you can keep alive and explore those locations. Hmmm… Not bad at all! Allso now I got that Easterling chilftain better. The shadow effet is actually good! Have to read these more properly.

Remainds me about a little bit of one of those Hobbit scenarios, but a with a twist. Good job!