I'll take the mantle of movie-hater. One of the best things about this game is that it's based on the books, not the movies. The movies were okay, but I think each one has gotten progressively farther from the intentions of the author. The Hobbit was enough to finally push me too far. I won't be seeing any more of Peter Jackson's adaptations. They really have become his stories.

Anyway, to get back to the topic... I'm excited about this AP. The Theoden and Rohan synergies are intriguing and we haven't even technically gotten into Rohan territory yet! Discarding a card for beneficial effect is a very interesting idea and will provide some great new options for deckbuilding, especially against certain scenarios.

I'll take the mantle of movie-hater. One of the best things about this game is that it's based on the books, not the movies. The movies were okay, but I think each one has gotten progressively farther from the intentions of the author. The Hobbit was enough to finally push me too far. I won't be seeing any more of Peter Jackson's adaptations. They really have become his stories.

I would always agree that An Unexpected Journey was by far the closest to the book, of all the Middle-earth movies so far.

I think the Fellowship might be the best movie of them all but it really just skips most of the Book 1, my favourite. The Hobbit so far hasn't skipped much, and it made little changes, save bringing stuff from the other canon that is perfectly logical. But yes, this is very off topic.

Lets not forget, though, that the movies are an adaptation, not a direct line-for-line scene-for-scene filming of the book. Personally i'm quite glad they left out the constant inappropriate singing, and that there was no sign of Tom Bombadil, etc.

One important thing the movies did, though, was make a lot of people who'd never read the books (such as myself) want to read them.

Lets not forget, though, that the movies are an adaptation, not a direct line-for-line scene-for-scene filming of the book. Personally i'm quite glad they left out the constant inappropriate singing, and that there was no sign of Tom Bombadil, etc.

yes to leaving out the all the singing!(Not that thought it was inappropriate?)

Just imagine how long the movie would have been to have included ALL the singing? perhaps another trilogy..

I tried a gondor deck of Boromir tactics, Denethor and Imrahil and never made it out of the 2nd round twice. Decks that start with a high threat are going to be hit pretty hard early.

I then tried a new deck i have been tinkering with Frodo, Merry, and Dunhere, i never thought it would have a chance , but it won 3 out of 4 times. Dunhere with either two daggers or spears makes short work of almost all the enemies in the staging area before they engage.

Really happy to dust off Dunhere, he's back.

If someone would please spoil who the traitor is I would appreciate it. The suspense is killing me and I'm not so involved in the story that I feel I need to wait to get the adventure pack in person. PLEASE GIVE SPOILER WARNINGS so those who don't want spoilers get plenty of warning. It would probably be best to make a separate thread with spoiler in the title. Thank you!

I tried a gondor deck of Boromir tactics, Denethor and Imrahil and never made it out of the 2nd round twice. Decks that start with a high threat are going to be hit pretty hard early.

I then tried a new deck i have been tinkering with Frodo, Merry, and Dunhere, i never thought it would have a chance , but it won 3 out of 4 times. Dunhere with either two daggers or spears makes short work of almost all the enemies in the staging area before they engage.

Really happy to dust off Dunhere, he's back.

Het Tracker you as usual try some new things? Yes Dunhere with all those new equipment will be very cool. But what you can tell about encounter deck?

SOME QUEST SPOILERS BELOW

All questing is done with Willpower no Battle or Siege.

There will be 5 threat already in staging are at start of the game.

You need to defeat a captain to advance to the next quest card and to eventually win the game. There are 3 captains.

1. Murzag already spoiled

2.This is the traitor so i Will spell his name backwards just in case someone does not want to know: noracla

engagement cost 10, threat 3, attack 4, def 3, HP 5

Forced: when he attacks place 1 token on To The Tower

forced: if he is dealt a shadow card without effect he attacks again deal another shadow card

3. Nazgul already spoiled

Transition to the 3rd quest card will reveal an encounter card.

Some cards attempt to place progress tokens on the To the Tower objective which is placed in the staging area at set up.

If 10 tokens are placed on this card you lose. Cards can also gain a boost by the number of progress on the cards.

White Bridge location (added at 3rd quest card) will get threat and quest point increase due to this progress on the objective

Most treachery cards place progress. The only one that deals damage to characters is Masters Malice.

There are plenty of attack boosting shadow effects. Some return enemy to staging area, and one will have enemy attack next player, which in solo is usually not good.

Overall there are 17 enemy, 6 location, and 14 treachery in encounter deck.

Doomed keyword is pretty common, and a few surge cards, which are not so bad.

I think the scenario will need a specific type of deck and it will probably not be easy. It's a tough quest, but doable with the card pool we have.

Got the quest in today and tried it 3 times losing each time. It definitely is a challenging scenario but I think a powerhouse deck would be able to handle it even though i was unsuccessful each time with my more thematic offerings. First time I used a Gondor deck with Boromir (leadership), Beregond, and Sam and just got trounced. The next two times I used a deck of Bard, Glorfindel (spirit), and Dunhere which was designed to slaughter enemies in the staging area. The first time i used it, i got quite far...to the last stage with 2 points of damage to the nazugl, but succumed to too many enemies and not enough defense. Second time only made it to stage 2 before my lack of defense ended my game. (side note: the deck i used itself was a lot of fun and would probably be very succesful vs a normal scenario)

As for the scenario itself, most of the enemies are strong, there are some brutual treacheries, and nearly every shadow effect increases the enemy's damage output so be prepared with a burning brand or some extra points of DEF.

As for the narrative, it has a decent enough if not unsurprising conclusion and hints ever so vaguely at the setting of the next cycle (even though we already know what it is). What I was surprised is that there was a whole extra sheet of narrative including some prequel material aka story set before the events of the HoN box which was really cool and detailed.

Hope everyone enjoys the quest

That sounds pretty cool Pharmboys. I'll be getting this pack in about a month but what does it say more or less about the next cycle? Or is it a spoiler?

Not much at all, sorry to lead you on.MILD SPOILER WARNING More or less says that the group of heroes head towards the gap of Rohan after celebrating in Mina's Tirith

Team Covenant have a new video up on Youtube with Caleb and Matt Newman talking about the Morgul Vale player cards, go check it out!