Ive played twice now with a friend of mine. Ive played the shadow both times and won both times via victory points.

We are not playing with the expansion but the second game was very close. Came down to the last combat die roll to see if I could take Edoras.

If he had gotten another turn Im sure he would have won.

Is there a usual path to victory for the shadow that is rather predictable because I won by taking the exact same victory points in both games but not in the same order.

The next time Im supposed to play the FP so I was wondering if there might be a way to buy some more time

Im thinking that if the Gondor nation were to actually come to the aid of Rohan or the Elves it might make winning difficult for the shadow. I mean Gondor seems to be a bit of a lost cause but Helms Deep, Edoras and Lorien seem to be a bit more difficult to take an hold.

Would it be better for the FP to focus on saving one of those 3 to buy some turns rather than defending Gondor.

My strategy as the FPP is to move the fellowship at least twice per turn. All my other dice go to defending or distracting the SP. If you can keep the Fellowship in a FP stronghold until you have enough moves (10 going through moria) to declare it in Mordor than you have a really good shot at wininning. This seems difficult but as long as you dont move the fellowship with to many eyes in the hunt box you should be able to do it. I always move it once per turn with 3 eyes in, and twice per turn if there are two or less. Or if the shadow player is really rolling crappy for the hunt then just keep moving it. You really need to get the expansion, it makes it a little easier to destroy the ring. And adds some cool characters, cards and new strategic ways to play.

There are some discussions on strategies for both side over at the Geek, you might want to look at these:

WotR-Strategy
Shadow Strategy
Free People Strategy

Hmm thats odd because I have never seen someone win as the shadow team. The fellowship nearly always gets into mordor with me. You can generally mobilize enough troops to slow down the shadow team enough to get the ring in.

jobroskie said:

Sounds very odd. It generally takes the FSP 6-7 turns with good to normal action die rolls to reach Mordor and that's assuming they don't get revealed very often (or get turn-stalled). My last two games have ended on turns 9 and 10 respectively, in Shadow Military wins. And we don't even play balls-to-the-walls style, like doing the DEW, which can win the game for the SP in 7 turns fairly regularly, if executed as per magic geek's plan. Hard part about mobilizing FP troops is getting the right cards to muster to those places the SP is attacking, since you can only otherwise muster once a nation is at war, which takes 3 Action die for all but Gondor. SP attacking of course reduces that requirement by 1 for each attack, but a good SP shouldn't attack until he's ready to complete the conquest ASAP, as just moving his armies into position doesn't activate the FP nations (unless he's forced to enter the nation borders).

jobroskie said:

I've played a total of 9 games with the same person. So far, the SP has won 6 times and the FP only 3 times. The first two FP wins were very close. In fact, the second win came down to the wire. The SP had scored 11 victory points the same turn the ring was destroyed.

It was only on our most recent game that the FP won handily. By turn 5, the fellowship declared in Marannon. On turn 7 the ring was destroyed and the SP only had 6 VP. Basically, the FP ran the ring non stop. Two moves on turn one. Three moves on turns two and three each. And another two moves on turn four. Only two successful hunts and no reveals. Turn two was definitely key. There were no eyes in the hunt and this was on 9 dice rolled. The fellowship used a character, will-of-the-west, and a ring to move three times without any hunt roll. It wasn't until the third move on turn three that there was finally a successful hunt.

Tsugo said:

No eyes in the hunt? Yearg. Generally speaking, the SP has to divert one eye to the box during that allocation step each turn, or they will lose in the manner you're reporting if no eyes get rolled (unless they have a backup plan, like that lidless eye card that lets you put eyes in, or an unused elven ring to get an eye result).

As I understand it, the SP has an advantage in the base game, though how large it is is unclear.

Sinis said:

Yeah. When we play, the SP typically puts one eye in the pool, and a second eye is usually rolled. I can't remember if he forgot to place a die or was hoping for more of the other actions, but that turn was painful.

Currently we are only playing the base game. I don't want to get the expansion because I am hoping to get a copy of the CE which has it. If I'm unable to snag one, then I will pick up the expansion.

Tsugo said:

I'm sitting on my friend's copy while deciding to buy the game (I would normally in a heartbeat, but I'm having trouble finding time/people to play against, the person I'm borrowing it from doesn't seem to care too much for it). I've played it before, but only recently redeveloped an interest. I was unaware of the expansion until recently, and am fuzzy on what's in it.

Some of the strategy articles in the second post seem to imply that the SP has very good odds of winning under normal circumstances, and given certain strategies, an unbelievably high win chance. I haven't played enough games with or without those strategies to say if their claims are true, but the mathematics seems to be on their side.

to the original poster.

welcome to the forums i recently picked up the game myself and im having a lot of fun with it

I have a question about Ent cards.

All those cards (and some SP cards) say that after each success on 4+ SP takes a casualty. Does it mean that SP must take whole Elite Unit as one casualty or is it "1 casualty = 1hit" like in the battles?

I know that this may sound stupid but we had a huge quarrel during last game.

Oldster said:

Always applied this myself:

"Q. The Shadow Battle Effects “Onslaught” and “Relentless
Assault” use the word “eliminate.” Does this mean that you
must eliminate an entire Elite unit as “one unit”?

A. No, the word “eliminate” should be used synonymous with
“hit.” If you remove an Elite unit when using the effect
“Relentless Assault,” it would equal two units and give a
modifier of +2, and if you remove an Elite unit when using the
effect “Onslaught,” it would give you two extra attacks after the
combat and two removed Elites would equal four extra attacks."

From the FAQ.

Tsugo said:

Two eyes in the pool + a nazgul at their location slows them down quite a bit. The shadow players pieces come back again and again whereas the free people are gone when they are gone. If the fellowship doesn't move the shadow has as many turns as they want.

That and of course get the extra dice from the witch king and sauron.

mtagge said:

Yeah, I was trying having a nazgul follow them around (with what's starting on the board + witch king, you have one to spare), but it sucks when they get revealed and you have use a character action die to chase them. I know it's more efficient (that character action is roughly the equivalent of an eye every turn until they get revealed again), but it can be annoying.