Fantasy Flight Games

Gather Strength

Published 19 July 2016 | The Lord of the Rings LCG

Gather Strength

A Preview of The Flame of the West Saga Expansion

"They met the Prince Imrahil, and he called to them: 'Whither now, Mithrandir? The Rohirrim are fighting on the fields of Gondor! We must gather all the strength that we can find.'"
–J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King

How do you prepare yourselves for an adventure that's as epic as The Battle of the Pelennor Fields scenario? You gather all the strength that you can find.

In our last preview of The Flame of the West Saga Expansion for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game, developer Caleb Grace revealed how The Battle of the Pelennor Fields recreates one of the largest and most memorable battles ever put to page. He looked at its different stages and movements—as well as the ways they add greater significance to your adventures in earlier scenarios, both in The Flame of the West and in The Land of Shadow. Aragorn's arrival may be hastened or delayed. You may see Mordor's forces reinforced by the Haradrim and Oliphaunts that survived Faramir's ambush. And, of course, you'll come face-to-face with a punishing new version of The Witch-king (The Flame of the West, 79).

So as you aim to rally the Free Peoples against such overwhelming forces, we are happy to reveal a few of the player cards you'll find in the expansion!

Withstand the Siege

The siege of Minas Tirith is central to the drama of The Battle of The Pelennor Fields, and there's a siege mentality running through many of the player cards from The Flame of the West. In fact, it's so prevalent that the Tactics and Spirit spheres are given special weight, reflecting the need not only for strength of arms, but also the very resolve to stand and hold the walls.

Fans of the Tactics sphere will find a new Rohan ally along with the event Sterner Than Steel (The Flame of the West, 8) and the attachment Golden Shield (The Flame of the West, 10), both of which introduce powerful combat-focused Response abilities. Sterner Than Steel allows you to exhaust a Weapon or Armor card attached to your defending character to cancel a shadow effect just triggered. Along with the new Willpower provided by the Tactics Éowyn (The Flame of the West, 2) included in the expansion, this card goes a long way toward strengthening the mono-Tactics decks that may have previously strugged with questing and unfortunate shadow reveals.

At the same time, you can also generate some truly monumental Defense Strength from your Rohan heroes by exhausting Golden Shield. Combined with Sterner Than Steel, it's enough to grant you the courage you need to block The Witch-king with Tactics Théoden (The Morgul Vale, 134) or Éowyn. Since you can cancel a deadly shadow effect, you know you'll suffer no more than one damage on either hero.

Meanwhile, Spirit players gain a couple of Gondor-themed cards in the form of Livery of the Tower (The Flame of the West, 11) and Desperate Defense (The Flame of the West, 9). A suit of Armor that's always as good as you need it to be—provided you have the resources—the Livery of the Tower is an excellent option for any Gondor character looking to fill a Restricted attachment slot. While it doesn't grant the extra Defense Strength or Hit Points that many other suits of Armor may grant, its potent Response ability can save the life of a hero like Boromir (The Dead Marshes, 95) not only while he's defending, but also while he's being stabbed in the back by treachery effects or being pelted by Archery damage. Just think—what if Boromir had been wearing Livery of the Tower when he encountered Saruman's Uruk-hai? It's likely he'd be leading the defense of Minas Tirith.

On the other hand, since extra Defense Strength goes a long way toward reducing the amount of resources you need to sink into your Livery's Response effect, you may wish to add a few copies of Desperate Defense to both increase your Sentinel character's chances of shrugging off all damage, but also to ready that character—either to defend again or to launch a counterattack.

Three and a Half Heroes

While events and attachments of The Flame of the West are grand, they're no substitute for the heroes and allies who ride forth to meet the Dark Lord's minions on the field of battle. We met two of these heroes in our announcement of the Saga Expansion, Aragorn (The Flame of the West, 1) and Éowyn, but we can still look forward to meeting another one and a half of the expansion's heroes.

About that one-half hero? That's just a bit of fancy accounting for the unique ability of the new Prince Imrahil ally (The Flame of the West, 5). Just as he and his forces rescued the fallen Faramir, bringing him back to Minas Tirith to be healed, so can Prince Imrahil rescue your fellowship should it ever lose a hero.

There's no good that ever comes from losing a hero—unless, perhaps, it's the intentional discard of Caldara (The Blood of Gondor, 107)—but Prince Imrahil's ability is the best way you'll find of mitigating the loss. Not only will you continue to generate three heroes' worth of resources, but you'll continue to have three heroes to target with attachments like the Livery of the Tower and Unexpected Courage (Core Set, 57). And, of course, Prince Imrahil can also help you balance your three-pronged efforts to quest, defend, and attack.

The thing to remember with Prince Imrahil, though, is that he's meant to be your back-up plan. If your primary plan is successful enough, you'll never need to use Prince Imrahil's ability. And that would be okay, especially if one of your heroes is as resolute and helpful a defender as the expansion's new Spirit version of Beregond (The Flame of the West, 3).

Just as he does with his Tactics version (Heirs of Númenor, 1), Beregond arrives as a Sentinel character with zero Willpower, one Attack Strength, four Defense Strength, and four Hit Points. However, that's where the similarities end. His new Spirit hero ability is drastically different than his Tactics ability, even though they're naturally both focused on defending. Spirit Beregond trades in his two-resource discount on Weapons and Armor in favor of a new Response ability that plays into the Spirit sphere's traditional strengths in threat reduction:

"Response: After Beregond defends an attack and takes no damage, reduce the defending player's threat by 1. (Limit once per round."

Notably, since Beregond's Sentinel allows him to defend attacks directed toward your teammates, he can help reduce their threats, as well as your own. And that's an important thing to remember while the forces of Mordor are racing at you in waves and there's no telling when Aragorn or the Rohirrim might arrive. In such moments, it's not just vital that you keep your shield held high; you must also keep yourself steeled against the insidious seeds of despair.

The White City Must Not Fall

For generations, Minas Tirith and Gondor have stood as the first line of defense against the evils of Mordor. They must not fall.

Can you stand fast against the Dark Lord's armies? Can you help win The Battle of the Pelennor Fields? You'll soon have your chance to find out! The Flame of the West Saga Expansion is on its way to retailers, and now is the time to gather your strength. Pre-order your copy, and steel yourself for one of the most epic battles in all of card gaming!

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The Battle of the Pelennor Fields

Published 29 June 2016 | The Lord of the Rings LCG

The Battle of the Pelennor Fields

A Preview of The Flame of the West Saga Expansion

“See my friends, when I had mastered the Stone, I learned many things. A grave peril I saw coming unlooked-for upon Gondor from the South that will draw off great strength from the defense of Minas Tirith. If it is not countered swiftly, I deem that the City will be lost ere ten days be gone.”
–Aragorn, The Return of the King

Greetings, fans of The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game!

Whether you have played your The Lord of the Rings campaign from The Black Riders through The Land of Shadow and are eager to continue with the next chapter, or whether you have just picked up your first Core Set and love how the game encapsulates all the fantasy and drama of Middle-earth, there's much for you to be excited about in The Flame of the West Saga Expansion.

After all, most of us who come to The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game are already fans of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and The Flame of the West, as a Saga Expansion, offers us the chance to participate as fully in the action as we could without finding our names written in the books. We get to join Aragorn and The Grey Company for three thrilling adventures drawn straight from the first half of The Return of the King.

Of course, there are new heroes and player cards, too, and fans were excited about the opportunity to make use of the new Tactics Éowyn (The Flame of the West, 2). But if we're being honest with ourselves, the majority of the cards are for the scenarios, and the majority of the Saga Expansion's purpose lies in recreating the events of The Return of the King. So how does the expansion do this? To get a better idea, we turn to developer Caleb Grace for a preview of the expansion's take on one of the greatest battles in all of fantasy.

Developer Caleb Grace on The Battle of the Pelennor Fields

When The Flame of the West Saga Expansion makes its way to retailers, you will have the opportunity to play a personal role in what is possibly the most exciting battle in fantasy fiction: The Battle of the Pelennor Fields. While it is not the end of The Lord of the Rings, it is the culmination of several story arcs and the highpoint of action in the series. Tolkien spends several chapters arranging the pieces and setting up the story so that when The Witch-king (The Flame of the West, 79) finally lays siege to the city, you know it’s going to be epic.

And that is exactly what we wanted to accomplish when we set out to design The Battle of the Pelennor Fields scenario. We wanted to make this quest the most epic scenario in the game. And we also wanted it to serve as the culmination of several other scenarios in Campaign Mode.

The Battle of the Pelennor Fields scenario actually encompasses both the siege of Minas Tirith and the battle upon the titular fields. The adventure is five stages long, with each stage representing a major event connected to the battle:

The Garrison of Gondor . Stage 1 represents the arrival of the Outland armies come to defend Minas Tirith. Side 1A takes care of all the Setup and side 1B gives players one round to prepare for the coming storm.

Retreat from Osgiliath . Stage 2 represents the fall of Osgiliath and the outer defenses. Side 2A has each player add an ally to the staging area and side 2B gives you the opportunity to rescue those allies or watch them be overrun by the pursuing armies of Mordor.

The White City Besieged . Stage 3 is the heart of the scenario. It represents the actual siege of Minas Tirith and requires the players to defend the city from endless waves of enemies led by The Witch-king. The city is represented by the Minas Tirith objective and if its "city strength" is reduced to zero the players lose the game. This stage has the Assault keyword, which prevents players from placing progress on the quest by any means other than by destroying enemies. It also prevents players from raising their threat when they quest unsuccessfully, instead players must assign damage to Minas Tirith equal to the difference between the Threat Strength in the staging area and the total Willpower committed to the quest.

Rohan has Come! Stage 4 brings the players a welcome reprieve. If they can survive the siege and advance to stage 4A, The Witch-king retreats and each player gets to put an ally into play for free. This represents the arrival of the Rohirrim, and stage 4B represents the cavalry charge over the besiegers. Instead of making progress on the quest, players assign progress and damage to enemies in play, but only for one round. Then the battle advances to the final stage.

Fighting in the Fields . Stage 5 is the actual battle on the Pelennor Fields. The siege is broken, but the battle rages on. The Witch-king reappears to turn hope into death, making two attacks each round. The players must make twenty progress and defeat the Morgul Lord once and for all in order to finally win the scenario. The Minas Tirith objective remains in play throughout this stage, so the players will continue to feel a sense of urgency as they watch its city strength draw closer to zero each round.

If that wasn’t enough, the scenario gets even bigger in Campaign Mode, tying in the results of several other scenarios! First of all, when your group sets up The Battle of the Pelennor Fields in Campaign Mode, the first player is required to set Aragorn (The Flame of the West, 1) aside, out of play. That’s because in the story, the siege of Minas Tirith begins while the Heir of Isildur is on his way to Pelargir. So instead of taking control of Aragorn at the beginning of the scenario, the first player adds The Corsair Fleet objective (The Flame of the West, 72) to the staging area and places a number of resource tokens on it. This number is determined by how many rounds it took the players to defeat the Corsairs in the previous scenario: The Siege of Gondor.

In that scenario, Aragorn leads The Grey Company to Pelargir where they battle the Corsairs of Umbar. At the end of that battle, Aragorn and his companions capture the Black Fleet and use the Corsair ships to sail up Anduin to Minas Tirith. Then, when you play The Battle of the Pelennor Fields in Campaign Mode, you, your friends, and all the heroes at Minas Tirith must endure the waves of Mordor's armies as they wait for Aragorn to travel up the river in his captured ships. And when the last resource token is finally removed from The Corsair Fleet, you can once again take control of Aragorn.

Just as in the books, the arrival of Isildur’s Heir can turn the tide of the battle. But that’s not the only thing that can tip the scales: The Witch-king also held forces in reserve. When the players advance to stage 5A in campaign mode, the campaign card instructs the players to add each Harad enemy recorded in the campaign log to the staging area. These are the same Harad enemies that the players were unable to defeat in Journey to the Cross-roads from The Land of Shadow. Because they were able to advance to The Black Gate (The Land of Shadow, 27) in that scenario, they can return now to attack you and your heroes at stage 5 of The Battle of the Pelennor Fields!

Every Decision Matters

Beyond the fact that they take you as close to the Nine Walkers and their stories as you can get with any game, the Saga Expansions for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game are remarkable for the ways they ensure that every decision you make has lasting consequences.

Through the first four Saga Expansions, these consequences have come primarily in the form of boons and burdens, as well as the inability to play with any characters that appear on your list of fallen heroes. Now, however, as we look forward to The Flame of the West, we see new weight and new dimensions to your decisions. Will Aragorn show up in time to aid the defense of Minas Tirith? Will the White City's defenders fall to the Haradrim who managed to survive Faramir's ambush?

You'll have your chance to make your decisions and to live with the outcomes when The Flame of the West arrives at retailers. This first Saga Expansion from The Return of the King is on its way, so be sure to pre-order your copy today!

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The Flame of the West

Published 26 April 2016 | The Lord of the Rings LCG

The Flame of the West

Continue Your Journey to Mordor with This Saga Expansion for The Lord of the Rings

"Time is short. See! The beacons of Gondor are alight, calling for aid. War is kindled. See, there is the fire on Amon Dîn, and flame on Eilenach; and there they go speeding west."
–Gandalf, The Return of the King

Fantasy Flight Games is proud to announce the upcoming release of The Flame of the West, the fifth The Lord of the Rings Saga Expansion for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game!

Brave the Paths of the Dead, battle the Corsairs at Pelargir, and stand fast against the Witch-King and the armies of Mordor during the Battle of the Pelennor Fields! Drawn directly from the key events of the first half of The Return of the King, The Flame of the West returns our attention to Aragorn, the Grey Company, and the plight of Gondor, even while the fates of Frodo Baggins and the One Ring remain uncertain.

With its 165 new cards, The Flame of the West introduces three new scenarios with a decidedly epic bent. War is kindled, and your actions will determine whether or not Gondor stands. Fortunately, you will not ride alone. The Flame of the West introduces a new version of Aragorn (The Flame of the West, 1) to lead you, as well as two new heroes, two boons, and thirty player cards (three copies each of ten different cards) divided between the four spheres of influence.

Whether you dive into The Flame of the West with only the Core Set, or you play through it as the fifth movement in your The Lord of the Rings campaign, you'll be thrilled and challenged as you race across Gondor to defend the city of Minas Tirith in its moment of greatest peril!

Ride Against the Shadow

With their different scenarios, all the various expansions to The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game introduce new stories and challenges. Many of these scenarios go even further, introducing new rules that lend them subtle—but meaningful—twists that defy expectations and keep your gaming experiences fresh with each new journey into Middle Earth.

The Flame of the West is no exception to this model. In fact, while its three new scenarios recall some of the most memorable action from the first half of The Return of the King, they continue to lend additional vigor to the game and your enjoyment of it. More specifically, while all three share the grandiose and desperate tones befitting their source material, each plays in an entirely different fashion.

The Passing of the Grey Company

In the novels, The Passing of the Grey Company is a chapter marked prominently by the heavy dread that fell over the Grey Company as they approached the shadows of black Dwimorberg, the Haunted Mountain, and the Dark Door that led into the Paths of the Dead.

In The Flame of the West, The Passing of the Grey Company gives us the Paths of the Dead, its darkened network of caverns, and the Undead spirits that inhabited them. Despite the terror these spirits prompted in the members of the Grey Company, they never assailed them. Still, were it not for Aragorn, the Company may have panicked and failed to complete its passage. Accordingly, these spirits come with the Phantom keyword, which assigns any damage they would deal as threat increase, rather than as wounds to your heroes or allies.

Additionally, to more fully represent the terror the Company experienced while traveling through the Paths of the Dead, The Passing of the Grey Company introduces Overcome by Fear (The Flame of the West, 16). Working hand-in-hand with the scenario's Phantom Undead to add urgency and a measure of fear to your passage, this objective attaches to your threat dial during setup and raises your threat an extra point each round until you spend one of Aragorn's resources to remove it.

The Siege of Gondor

While The Siege of Gondor draws its inspiration directly from the novels, it carries players through a series of events that never played out on the foreground of The Return of the King. After Aragorn and the Grey Company traversed the Paths of the Dead, they seized the fleet of ships that had belonged to the Haradrim and Corsairs of Umbar, and they sailed the fleet to Minas Tirith and the Battle of the Pelennor Fields

In The Siege of Gondor, these events are brought to the fore, as you and your friends join Aragorn and the Grey Company to battle the Corsairs and seize their ships. Moreover, time is of the essence, and The Siege of Gondor introduces a unique, double-sided objective, The Corsair Fleet (The Flame of the West, 71), which helps tie your progress through this quest directly into your efforts in the expansion's final quest.

The Battle of the Pelennor Fields

The Battle of the Pelennor Fields goes above and beyond nearly every scenario in The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game in its efforts to serve as the capstone for multiple quests and scenarios. In the novels, the Free Peoples only barely won the Battle of the Pelennor Fields because the Men of Gondor stood fast long enough to receive reinforcements from the Rohirrim and then the aid of Aragorn and the Grey Company.

Accordingly, The Battle of the Pelennor Fields is a uniquely sophisticated scenario that related directly to the results of other scenarios in both standard play and Campaign Mode. In The Battle of the Pelennor Fields, your victory in hinges upon the results of your previous quests, and you'll want to ensure that Aragorn arrives as early as possible. However, in Campaign Mode, Aragorn's arrival in The Battle of the Pelennor Fields is timed according to the number of tokens on The Corsair Fleet , and the number of enemies he'll face at the battle's peak is tied to the results of your progress through the scenarios of The Land of Shadow.

Stand with the Men of Gondor

As much of the action in The Flame of the West and the first half of The Return of the King culminates in the Battle of the Pelennor Fields, it is only appropriate that the expansion's new heroes and player cards represent the strength of the alliance between the Men of Gondor, the Riders of Rohan, and the Elves and Dúnedain of the Grey Company. Nearly all the new player cards bear either the Gondor, Rohan, or Dúnedain traits, and those that don't are designed to fit in any deck that must survive a brutal combat waged at a feverish pitch.

Moreover, as the player cards, like the scenarios, are inspired by the first half of The Return of the King, you'll find new boons that allow you to swear your fealty to either Gondor or Rohan, and you'll find a new Tactics version of Éowyn (The Flame of the West, 2).

The woman who slew the Witch-king, Éowyn still comes with the same four Willpower as her Core Set version, but she gains an uncanny ability—once per game—to do things it was said that no man could do. She can ready herself and gain a nine-point bonus to her Attack Strength, raising it to ten, which is enough to take down even the mightiest of foes.

The Beacons Are Alight

The beacons of Gondor are alight. War is kindled, and The Flame of the West is bringing all the desperate action of the first half of The Return of the King straight to your table. Look for this Saga Expansion for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game to arrive at retailers in the third quarter of 2016!

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