|
Lord of the Rings The Boardgame Posters
Photos Art
Search for Posters Art Prints, photos and get
results from all the many categories from Amazon including
books, videos, dvds, toys, video games, and more.
|
|
|
Posters Art
Prints Photos collectables |
|
|
|
|
|
|
If for some reason you can't find what the
poster or art print your looking for try using the search boxes
below
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
Rating:  -
If you are a Lord of the Rings purest who objected to the movies this game is for you.
This game faithfully follows the books forcing you to team up to face the Dark Lord and destroy the ring.
A VERY hard game to beat, so hard that a special sheet is included to fill out if you win (our group has only managed to do it once)
As you face the dangers of your trek the ring slowly corrupts you and Sauron gets closer and closer most likely not all the hobbits who leave the Shire will make it to Moria alive.
It is hard to review this game since I purchased the Expansions with it at the same time so I haven't played it without them. The Expansions add so much to the game they should be purchased at once, however even without them this game stands up on its own quite well and the artwork is superb!
Worth your time and money but don't lose your temper when it takes you months to win.
Rating:  -
In LotR, the board game, Kniza has done a masterful job of creating a form of team-solitaire. The many players compete not against each other, but against the game itself. Luck, familiarity, planning, and team communication are all important.
The game is difficult: while "winning" is defined in the game, it's far more common to come close but sputter out most of the way to the finish line. (At this point, you record how far you made it on the provided roster and try again!)
There are a couple problems with the game: First, while the rules are simple, the rulebook is easy to misread in a few places. If it seems like the game is too easy or too hard, you've probably misread one of the rules. The other problem is that one player who knows the game much better than the rest can get frustrated. There's nothing to stop an expert at the game from bossing around neophyte teammates. If the neophytes want to win, they'd do well to heed the expert's advice, even. The 'Sauron' expansion set fixes this problem.
On the whole, this is a good game. The production values are excellent, with beautiful art and pleasing props. The rules are simple enough to teach a youngster, yet the game is challenging enough to intrigue an adult. A good addition to any game-player's library.
Rating: -
I almost didn't give it 5 stars. Why didn't I? Bitterness. Yes, I'm bitter because my wife and I have attempted the two player game as Frodo and Sam FIVE times and have NOT yet won once!! (I'm AM grinning as I write this, in case you're wondering...)
It's okay. I'll get over it. It may be tough for two players... but it's still fun to lose the game WITH my wife, rather that try to compete against her. We HAVE, however, successfully destroyed the One Ring in three, four, and five player games. It's really a neat experience to play a game in which a group has to cooperate with each other in order to win TOGETHER rather than compete in order to... well... destroy everyone else.
This game combines many elements of group strategy with some elements of luck (i.e. mostly in wondering which tile you're about to turn over). It really seems to capture a bit of the feeling that Sam and Frodo must have felt as they struggled to Mordor. (My wife and I felt it today as the game pummeled us relentlessly... talk about bad luck in this case. Whew.)
Grab a group of four or five friends - a larger group is better since each player/Hobbit has a special "ability" to add to the group/Fellowship. Be patient, plan carefully, talk about strategies, and just have a great time.
Rating: -
There are plenty of good games out there, and some cooperative ones, but good cooperative games that don't take forever to play are hard to come by. This is one.
I've seen complaints that the rules are hard to understand. I'd like to clarify that a little. If you just open up the rules and read them by themselves, they ARE hard to understand. That's okay. Just follow the setup instructions at the front of the rulebook first. THEN read the rules, looking often at the board & other components, and it all starts to make sense; in fact, virtually everything about the game is very cleverly designed. The only question that I haven't yet found an answer to is when, exactly, the event tiles are supposed to be reshuffled (I think after each location is complete is probably the best time, but it could be that you're supposed to wait until they run out; I'm just not sure).
The basic ideas aren't that difficult. On your turn, you turn up tiles until you get a good one (suffering the consequences of the bad along the way) and then you either play one or two cards to advance the group, or you recover by drawing two cards or healing yourself one space on the Corruption track (as the game progresses, the Hobbits and Sauron advance toward each other on this track, and if a Hobbit and Sauron meet, the Hobbit dies). There are four location boards: Moria, Helm's Deep, Shelob's Lair, and Mordor, each with several tracks; on each board, one of the tracks is the "main" track, and you advance to the next when it is complete - or when time runs out, with nasty consequences ranging from the moderately bad "Fly, you fools" in Moria to "The Ring is MINE!" in Mordor, ending the game as Sauron recovers the Ring. That said, there are great benefits to advancing the secondary tracks as well; if you concentrate solely on the main one, you'll never make it TO Mordor, let alone through it.
At every turn, there are meaningful decisions to be made. Adding to the tension, you never know how much time you have to achieve important results (such as obtaining Eowyn's help before the Lord of the Nazgul arrives - which, by the way, is very hard to do - or getting the Riders of Rohan to reinforce Helm's Deep before it is too late). You can go from being in good condition to in deep trouble in a heartbeat with a few bad tile draws, and that goes double in Mordor. You also need to actively cooperate with the other Hobbits, or you may find yourself half way to Mordor and all your friends have expired, leaving you too weak to get to Mount Doom and dunk the ring. Particularly, make sure you DON'T take all of one type of life token, because anyone who is missing a certain type at the end of a location board moves toward Sauron on the Corruption track. There are also many opportunities for a player to make a sacrifice to prevent something bad from happening to the entire group.
The game has three built-in difficulty levels (you just start Sauron in a different space on the Corruption track, to give you more or less leeway), and the difficulty also varies depending on the number of players. I suspect three, four, and five are probably not dramatically different in difficulty, but I got the distinct impression that the game is much more difficult with only two. There is also a competitive variant, but a lot of cooperation is still required.
Although the box says the game is intended for players 12 and up, I think that with a well-behaved player to lead (in other words, one who won't just order the others around but will actively involve them in the decision making; you might want to play with all cards face up instead of hidden as the rules say), younger children could easily play and have fun, IF they are prepared to cooperate. I played tonight with my (very smart) four year old daughter, and although she certainly didn't understand everything that was going on, she had the basic ideas down and volunteered to take just about every hit imaginable to help. She also LOVED rolling the die (which is a punishment of sorts - you roll to see just what bad thing befalls you in many situations; you may take one to three points of damage, advance Sauron one space, discard two cards, or nothing), so it was fortunate she drew Sam, as each Hobbit has a special ability and Sam's is that he never suffers more than one point of damage from a die roll. We ended up one space from Mount Doom when Sauron seized the ring, and we had a great time. As an added bonus, she asked a ton of questions about the background, from why we were trying to destroy the ring to why Sauron was so powerful (I've rated it up for educational because it has sparked my daughter's interest in the books; I'm pretty sure that as soon as she's able, she'll want to read them).
I highly recommend the game. It's not only a very good game, but the theme ties in very well. It's not just a random game with a theme pasted on - there was a lot of thought given to the events, like the final event in Moria called "Fly, you fools!" where one player can take a big hit (three points of damage) or everyone can roll the die and suffer the consequences. It's pretty much a no-brainer to decide that SOMEBODY should take the three hits (except with only two players, where it is arguable), but who will volunteer? That's just one of the ways the game makes the players put the overall quest above themselves - even if your Hobbit dies, you still win with everybody else if the ring is destroyed.
Rating: -
"Fatty" is from the book, I suppose he is not mentioned in the movie but the game is obviously based on the book, and rightfully so.
|
