Ok, so when I first saw them, I was a bit shocked. I guess they all look fine except for Sam who looks hilarious, and then I was shocked at the spheres they chose for each of them. Sam in Leadership? that's, well, an interesting choice. Since Caleb said he based the hobbits off of the lotr as a whole and not only from the beggining of fotr (Sam as mayor of the shire, Merry stabbing the Witch King, etc) I guess these will be the only versions of these heroes that we're going to see. If that's the case, I guess I'm fine with that.

A second Pippin.....already??

And what's even more strange: the hobbit deck that this article proposes (Frodo, Merry, Sam and Pippin) has absolutely NO Spirit in it! What!? How are you supposed to play Smoke-rings and whatnot?

Sam looks like he sharted in battle.

@ Gizlivadi: With A Song of Travel, which is quite fitting, considering its artwork and lore

@ Gizlivadi: With A Song of Travel, which is quite fitting, considering its artwork and lore

Which is... not included in this pack? They could have as well not included Pippin since we already got a decent (and spirit) version of him in the last AP. And also, I'm concerned about how a four sphere hobbit deck would work, IF it would work. Call me a skeptic, but that seems strange and off-putting.

A song of travel is in the hills of emyn muil. http://www.cardgamedb.com/index.php/lotr/lord-of-the-rings-card-spoiler/_/shadows-of-mirkwood/the-hills-of-emyn-muil/song-of-travel-thoem

Dude, again, I'm not saying it's not possible. I'm saying it's impractical. Extremely impractical. A four sphere deck (five, including ring-bearer sphere) which depends on songs which are extremely hard to get if you're a new player feels like a very odd choice from a design standpoint.

ok....first things first- i challenge anyone to say that merry doesnt look like his film version- he is the DOUBLE of dominic monaghan

so with that out of the way, onto the cards.

SAM. - i dont mind the art. its not amazing, but i dont see it as stupid either. Calebs idea of leadership is something that i wouldnt go to personally, sams leadership traits certainly do not overpower his spirit as a character, but thats ok, it makes sense in a way

MERRY - tactics was thought up from the start so im not surprised there. ive already mentioned the art

PIPPIN - i disagree with the sphere choice here. i do not consider the case good enough to put pip as lore. a similar case could be made for merry who led the 4 hobbits through the old forest- he was afterall a brandybuck who knew more about that area even than frodo. personally i would have made him spirit (which we already have hence i would have left him out)

love the art though, and despite thinking he looked like astin from the banner spoiler its much better up close

now, i am dissapointed not to see fredegar bolger. i was sure we would see him. surely he will be an ally. personally like someone said above, i would rather have seen no pippin and used his old version (already calling it old, and i havnt even got him!!) and seen fatty

all that seems like im dissapointed with the cards....so to balance it out here's what i like

calebs idea of the hobbits getting stronger as they perform heroic acts is very thematic and something i hadnt really considered and as i have said before its great that the designers are considering theme and lore first

im really trying to think of more good things to say here, but for the time being i am going to reserve my main judgement until i have the pack as i really want this to be the best expansion yet as it is based on my favourite piece of tolkiens writings...which i am sure it will be

^{Well there is going to be a fourth hobbit hero in the expansion which was not spoiled yet. We can assume that hero will be Spirit (and Rich, he could be Fredegar).}

^{I also was initially not too impressed with the Sam card art, but after looking at the higher res image, it doesn't look that bad. It looks like he's staring into the eyes of Shelob, almost consumed with fear, but not quite...}

^{I second what Rich said about the sphere assignments. Everything can be made a case for except Pippin as Lore. They probably put themselves into a bind when committed to releasing a Spirit Pippin in AtS. I think Merry could make a better case for being Lore with the library he put together and his trips to Rivendell. Caleb could have said something about Pippin spending a lot of time in the libraries in Gondor after the War of the Ring.}

^{Well there is going to be a fourth hobbit hero in the expansion which was not spoiled yet. We can assume that hero will be Spirit (and Rich, he could be Fredegar).}

good- i forgot about that, i assume they didnt mean the 4th hero was the frodo card?

rich

ps - i just looked at the artisit for the cards and what is strange is that they were all done by the same artist. i wonder why he stayed clear of the film versions for sam and pippin but relied so heavily on merry? strange....

ok....first things first- i challenge anyone to say that merry doesnt look like his film version- he is the DOUBLE of dominic monaghan

so with that out of the way, onto the cards.

SAM. - i dont mind the art. its not amazing, but i dont see it as stupid either. Calebs idea of leadership is something that i wouldnt go to personally, sams leadership traits certainly do not overpower his spirit as a character, but thats ok, it makes sense in a way

MERRY - tactics was thought up from the start so im not surprised there. ive already mentioned the art

PIPPIN - i disagree with the sphere choice here. i do not consider the case good enough to put pip as lore. a similar case could be made for merry who led the 4 hobbits through the old forest- he was afterall a brandybuck who knew more about that area even than frodo. personally i would have made him spirit (which we already have hence i would have left him out)

love the art though, and despite thinking he looked like astin from the banner spoiler its much better up close

now, i am dissapointed not to see fredegar bolger. i was sure we would see him. surely he will be an ally. personally like someone said above, i would rather have seen no pippin and used his old version (already calling it old, and i havnt even got him!!) and seen fatty

all that seems like im dissapointed with the cards....so to balance it out here's what i like

calebs idea of the hobbits getting stronger as they perform heroic acts is very thematic and something i hadnt really considered and as i have said before its great that the designers are considering theme and lore first

im really trying to think of more good things to say here, but for the time being i am going to reserve my main judgement until i have the pack as i really want this to be the best expansion yet as it is based on my favourite piece of tolkiens writings

Yes looks like in Decipher previous game again. Very cool Sam without any problem deal with Witch-King. Hate it!

Stupid, nasty hobbitses. I like more idea of hobbits just a sneak hide and run. Now we will see Merry Fighter like a Aragorn.

Also a bit dissapointed.....

I also think the card abilities are pretty spot on.

Yes, in that sense, a 4 attack Merry seems pretty ridiculous. One thing that I guess tempers the Hobbits' abilities is the fact that they are in so many different spheres. If you have too many Hobbits, resource generation will be tough in the beginning. Another observation is that there will be no Hobbit monosphere decks ran in the Black Riders.

^{Well there is going to be a fourth hobbit hero in the expansion which was not spoiled yet. We can assume that hero will be Spirit (and Rich, he could be Fredegar).}

good- i forgot about that, i assume they didnt mean the 4th hero was the frodo card?

rich

ps - i just looked at the artisit for the cards and what is strange is that they were all done by the same artist. i wonder why he stayed clear of the film versions for sam and pippin but relied so heavily on merry? strange....

That's how I understood it. There will be four hobbit heroes in addition to the Frodo hero card.

by the way art is good as always........

I'm kinda sick of Villeneuve/Dainche art for my part. Especially on Hobbits. The card abilities however seem all nice. I guess this can be a functional deck but as I said before it will be tough with resource management.

wow, quite surprised at the negativity around the cards considering how much i love all of them.

the art is pretty good with clearly Pippin> Sam> Merry IMO

i really dont mind the sphere choices at all, we cant nitpick all day about the merrits of any one hobbit in any one sphere but they cant all be spirit or lore so i thought Caleb did a very fine job fitting the characters into spheres while still maintaining the essence of the game (4 heroes 4 spheres per saga expansion)

the powers are really great and i cannot wait to build a hobbit deck with these guys along with the other toys they'll get in the box. anyone who has already tried to build a hobbit deck with the current cards surely already realizes how underpowered they are at the time so i dont mind Merry's potential 3 or 4 attack if it means i dont have to rely on the hobbit gandalf each turn to kill anything

i also love how well they synergize with each other as was already stated in the article, Pippin's ability is so unique and cool that it already makes his current incarnation seem obsolete (also whats up with Pippin just having the two best art depictions by far?! they must really love him)

Again Pippin alias the most stupid character in LOTR?

Edit: Sam's face looks insane! ... maybe he saw Frodo naked?

I like that the Hobbits were made with the entire saga in mind (especially as Sam's art suggests, because I think he's threatening Gollum in Mordor), so that they have room to grow and improve. When paired with the boons, these hobbits can become a strong deck archetype. But I wonder what the game designers will do about the breaking of the fellowship. These hobbits were clearly meant to be played with other hobbits, but one of the strengths of the hobbits was how they inspired/worked with other races. Will we get a Rohan Merry and a Gondor Pippin, or Ent boosting versions of those characters? With lots of great heroes still to come in the saga expansions (Eomer!), I'm curious as to how the designers will approach it, and if we'll get more hobbit versions to the exclusion of other heroes.

One thing I was hoping was lower starting threat values so the secrecy decks could make a bit of comeback. 6 isn't bad, but a whopping 8 for Sam.

One thing I was hoping was lower starting threat values so the secrecy decks could make a bit of comeback. 6 isn't bad, but a whopping 8 for Sam.

i think that, given the fact sauron was only interested in frodo and didnt even consider hobbits to be a threat at all, all hobbits apart from frodo (and bilbo) should have a threat of 6. sam perhaps can be given a higher threat if you are looking at the entire lotr, as he was a ring bearer for a short time

rich

I actually like the Sam card very much. I think he too is very similar to the movie version. Which is cool by me. Haven't read the books yet you know and that's maybe the reason I think he actually fits in the leadership sphere. Not that he is a leader like Aragon, but he does take a lot or responsibility, specially when Frodo gets stung by Sheelop and gets the ring before the orcs. This might not happen in that way in the book and if not I fully understand the hesitation about him not being spirit instead I'm just happy to get him as he is my favorite in the whole tale.

I actually like the Sam card very much. I think he too is very similar to the movie version. Which is cool by me. Haven't read the books yet you know and that's maybe the reason I think he actually fits in the leadership sphere. Not that he is a leader like Aragon, but he does take a lot or responsibility, specially when Frodo gets stung by Sheelop and gets the ring before the orcs. This might not happen in that way in the book and if not I fully understand the hesitation about him not being spirit instead I'm just happy to get him as he is my favorite in the whole tale.

no that is a good point. i guess it depends on how you see the words leadership, spirit etc. its interesting to see whether cards literally represent that phrases as described in the rulebook at the beginning

if you look at what it says under leadership then sam certainly does portray the initiative and inspiration to frodo.

if you look at what it says under spirit then it also looks like sam!

so i guess the designers have the choice of either there. to make things more complicated he could have been lore for his knowledge of the garden and even poems, and tactics for showing shelob where to go

i think sam is the toughest of all, thats why im not particularly dissapointed either way

I noticed Sam's response adds +1 willpower as well. Any thoughts on when that +1 willpower will come in handy?