Return to Middle Earth

 This week Anthony and I played War of the Ring... 2nd edition.  I have a copy of the 1st edition and it turns out there isn't a huge difference between the 2 versions.  

The map and cards have been cleaned up and slightly redesigned and there a few changes to some of the figures.  Rules are pretty much the same in both versions with a few minor tweaks here and there, so most of the mechanics are much as I vaguely remembered them.  As always, I thought I'd maybe played this last year, or even the year before.  Nope... turns out it's been 4 years since we last played!!

The board at the start of the game... lots of lovely red forces poised to overrun Middle Earth.

It's a great game... although there are lots of choices and strategies for both sides, ultimately the 'traditional' plot of sneaking the hobbits to Mount Doom, while fending off the rampaging forces of Mordor is the only real way for the Free Peoples to win.  For the Dark Lord there is a choice of winning a military victory by conquering Middle Earth (technically this is possible for the Free Peoples but it's very unlikely), or hunting down the pesky hobbitses and corrupting them, which is infinitely more satisfying!

The big advantage for Sauron is that they can replenish casualties from the breeding pits of Mordor and Isengard, whereas once the Free Peoples lose a figure it's gone forever.  The Free People nations are also initially very passive and at peace and it takes some political manouvering to get them into action.  It's a lot easier for Sauron to shift to actively being at war

Orcs missing on Gondors borders

This definitely influenced my tactics in our game, where I took on the part of Sauron's forces of law and order, bring peace and stability to Middle Earth.  I held off attacking Gondor, but massed a lot of armies on their doorstep (clearly just on manouvres on a training exercise... nothing to see here....).  Saruman popped up in Orthanc and unleashed his armies into Rohan, quickly overrunning Helms Deep and Edoras.  The Fellowship did a good job of sneaking southwards, taking the traditional route of crossing the Misty Mountains and getting to Lorien where they were able to remove some of the corruption that had been building up.  I'd been very lucky at managing to spot them more often than not... very different to the last time I played the game!

My armies launched attacks from all sides on Lorien. I'd figured that even if I wasn't successful I would have removed a fair number of irreplaceable Elves but actually I was luckier than I'd expected and following a few turns of besieging the Forest,  the Elves they eventually fell.  

Lorien is about to fall...

At this point we'd run out of time.  The Hobbits were half way through the corruption track and I was also half way through the VP track for a military victory, and Gondor was looking very vulnerable.  On the other hand the Ringbearers were close to Gondor where they could potentially remove some corruption and were within striking distance of Mordor so it was still very much in the balance.

In the game 4 years ago Leonard the cat played a decisive role by climbing on the table and trying to eat Elrond, so it felt only right to honour him by casting him as a LotR character.  I toyed with a hobbit or a balrog (2 very different sides of his personality I think... at least when he tries to bite me!) but in the end I couldn't decide so here he is as the entire Fellowship...