Kris Hall: War of the Ring Collector’s Edition: A Modest Proposal

The news that Nexus Games is creating a Collector’s Edition of War of the Ring is good news for fans of that game. War of the Ring is probably the most highly-regarded game to simulate the struggle for Tolkien’s Middle Earth at a strategic level (and there have been a surprisingly large number of these). The War of the Ring: Battles of the Third Age expansion, for which I was a playtester, added welcome additional elements to the basic strategic game as well as simulating the campaigns for Rohan and Gondor at an operational level. The latest indication from Nexus Games is that the Collector’s Edition will contain the strategic elements of the expansion as well.

But like most games, War of the Ring wasn’t perfect. There were a number of issues with the physical production of the game that the Collector’s Edition promises to fix. Among these are:

1. It was sometimes hard to tell many of the pieces apart because some of the figures looked so much alike (especially those belonging to the Free Peoples). The Collector’s Edition will have hand-painted pieces and the colors will help differentiate them.

2. It wasn’t always possible to fit the larger armies into their spaces on the smaller regions of the gameboard. The Collector’s Edition will have a larger gameboard so this will presumably be less of an issue.

3. Some people thought that the rulebook could have been written better. (I didn’t have a problem with it.) The rules will be re-written to deal with many of the frequently-asked questions that have appeared over the years.

4. The cards in the game were small and hard to read. To me, this is the biggest problem with the physical production of the game. Every time I pull out the game, I end up squinting at the small print and wondering when a new and larger deck of cards will be available. Apparently, my prayers have been answered; the larger deck will be available with the Collector’s Edition.

Exactly how much the game favors the Shadow is a matter for debate. Some think that the imbalance is minor and doesn’t need to be addressed. Others think the imbalance is so great that it affects enjoyment of the game and should be addressed by the designers. I am in this latter camp; I can’t remember the last time I saw a Free Peoples’ victory. One indication that others feel this way is the amount of discussion and the number of variants available on BoardGameGeek that address this problem.

(It takes six mini-screens on BoardGameGeek just to list the variants proposed for War of the Ring. Not all of these deal with game-balance issues, of course, but many do. Mr. Weasely has invented five variants by himself that deal with game balance: The Wizardry Variant, the Dale-Erebor Variant, the Will of the West variant, the Out-of-Turn Fellowship Phase Variant, and the Stalwart Companions variant. The first four, at least, look simple and ingenious. If you are finding that the Shadow wins all of your games, you might try using one of these.)

The game seems to favor the Shadow Player for two reasons. First, the Shadow can use the Witch-King’s card-drawing ability to run through the Character deck and throw cards at Fellowship that cause damage and delay. This makes a Free Peoples’ Ring victory difficult and infrequent. Second, the Shadow player can quickly go a long way toward a military victory by assaulting the cluster of Northern strongholds that is usually called the DEW line (for Dale, Erebor, and the Woodland Realm). In my opinion, these two strategies can make it almost impossible for the Free Peoples to win against an experienced Shadow player.

I propose that the designers address the game balance issue in the Collector’s Edition in the following way: either create a few optional cards for the game that deal with these issues, or include blank cards with the game so that players can invent their own solutions to the game balance problem, however they perceive it.

What kind of optional cards am I talking about? Just three to five cards for each of the four decks. The FP character deck would include new cards that deflect damage or heal corruption for the Fellowship. The FP strategy deck would contain cards that help the Free Peoples reinforce the DEW line or make an assault on it more costly. The Shadow character deck would contain cards that do not deal with the hunt for the Ring. The Shadow strategy deck might contain cards that help the Shadow armies in general, or give the Shadow rewards for pursuing non-DEW line strategies.

Here are some possible cards to illustrate what I mean:

Of course, including blank cards with the Collector’s Edition might be the more interesting solution because the collective imaginations of the WOTR community would instantly start working on variant cards. WOTR fans could spend years devising and revising sets of variant cards in the hope of coming up with the most perfectly balanced game. I anticipate lots of debates on the Geek about the merits of one set of homemade variant cards versus another.

Of course, the major advantage of an official set of additional game-balancing cards over home-grown cards is that the official cards would be useful in tournaments.

To me, it is less important how the designers address the game balance issue than the decision to address it at all. War of the Ring is a particularly ingenious design and has a legion of loyal fans. Let’s hope the designers use the Collector’s Edition opportunity to make the game fulfill its potential in all aspects of its design.

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