The Lord of the Rings™ TCG Help Clinic
Part 6 – Start of Turn and the Fellowship Phase
by Mark Tuttle (elrond@decipher.com)
Starting the Game
In this Help Clinic article, we'll give you the information you need to
start playing a game of The Lord of the Rings TCG and cover the options
available to the Free Peoples player during the fellowship phase.
As with any of the other phases in the game, there are a multitude of strategic
choices that you can make that will result in very different outcomes. The
first of these, obviously, begin with constructing your deck.
Rules Summary:
In The Lord of the Rings TCG you and your opponent are each playing
a fellowship that is moving up the same adventure path. Thus, every
players deck will consist of these elements:
The One Ring – You currently have two choices here, "The Ruling
Ring" or "Isildur's Bane". For details on which you should use, consult
the Help Clinic article on Archery.
Frodo – Again, you currently have a few choices as to which version
of the Ring-bearer you will use.
Adventure Deck – This will consist of nine site cards, numbered
1 through 9. You will want to pick sites that either specifically benefit
your fellowship or sites that will hurt your opponent. See the Help Clinic
article on Movement for details on how sites work.
The preceding eleven cards do NOT count toward your deck total. These
are "freebies" that you bring to the table. You must also bring a draw deck
that must consist of at least the following:
30 Free Peoples cards – as identified by the round icon in the
upper left corner of the card
30 Shadow cards – as identified by the diamond icon in the upper
left corner of the card
Note that there is no upper limit, meaning you can have as many cards
as you like. However, your deck must always be at least 60 cards and must
have an equal amount of Free Peoples and Shadow cards. In The Lord of
the Rings TCG you are limited to no more than four of any card in your
deck. When dealing with characters the four card limit counts for card titles,
not sub-titles. So you could have four copies of Boromir in your deck, two
of which are "Boromir Son of Denethor" and two of "Boromir Lord of Gondor".
You are not allowed to have four copies of each.
You'll also need tokens for wounds, different tokens for burdens and one
token representing your fellowship's place on the adventure path. The
Lord of the Rings Trading Card Game Deluxe Starters contain all of the
above, including tokens and a pre-constructed deck so you can get started
playing right away.
Bidding and the Starting Fellowship
The first thing you'll do in the game is bid for your position in the play
circle. We covered bidding in the Help Clinic article on assignments, so
we won't do so again here. Once that is complete, the first player will
play his starting fellowship.
The starting fellowship represents Frodo and additional companions (or
even just one) to help him along the way. For your starting fellowship,
you're allowed to spend four Twilight on this starting fellowship. Frodo
is free, so you have most any other companion to choose from. There are,
however, a few limitations:
- These four points may be spent on companions only. You may not use them
to bring allies into play.
- These points may not be used for possessions, such as weapons or staffs.
- If a card contains text that requires something to be in play as a condition
to play the card, you must be able to meet that requirement. For example,
"Lorien Elf" says "To play, spot an Elf". "Spot" means that you should
be able to see a card that is active. If you do not yet have an elf in
play and active, you cannot yet play this card. Thus, "Lorien Elf" could
not be played as your first starting companion. You must play another
Elf companion first. Play "Arwen" or "Legolas", then you can spot an elf
and play the "Lorien Elf".
- Your starting fellowship counts as part of your Free Peoples half of
your draw deck. "Frodo" and The One Ring do not. (Note that that your
starting "Frodo" DOES count toward the "four cards per deck limit" so
your draw deck could contain no more than three additional copies of any
"Frodo").
When you play a companion in your starting fellowship, their text is active
immediately. So if you should play "Pippin, Hobbit of Some Intelligence",
his text reads "When you play Pippin, remove a wound or burden from a companion."
By playing him, you could immediately remove a burden from your Ring-bearer
that you placed there as your opening bid.
However, card text that lowers the cost of companions that have "Fellowship:"
timing keywords may NOT be played at this time, since your starting fellowship
is chosen before you begin the game. For example, "Pippin, Mr. Took" could
not allow you to use his text to play "Aragorn" as part of your starting
fellowship for only two twilight. One more note on "Pippin, Mr. Took", while
we're discussing it. " Pippin's" special ability text, as with all special
abilities, are individual actions that are initiated, costs are paid, and
the action resolves to some effect. When you initiate this action, the action
ends with the playing of "Aragorn". Note that you may NOT combine "Pippin
Mr. Took's" text with the gametext of site one, "The Prancing Pony". Both
texts are special abilities and are separate actions.
Aside from what we've just discussed, there is no limit to how you spend
your four Twilight for your starting fellowship. You could, for example
spend all four points on "Gandalf" or "Aragorn". Or you could spend two
points on "Legolas" and two points on "Arwen". Or for real fun, play "Merry",
"Pippin", and "Sam". It's entirely up to you.
Two additional points: You do not have to spend all four points if you
wish. There is really little reason not to, but it's your choice. Lastly,
you're choosing these companions based on their Twilight cost, but you do
not pay that cost into the Twilight Pool. This is free to you.
Rules Summary:
The Rule of 9 states: You may not have more than nine total companions in
play and in your dead pile at any time. Each copy of a non-unique companion
in play or in your dead pile counts as a separate companion.
This rule is important to be aware of as you decide who your starting
fellowship will be, and more so when you begin playing (and subsequently
losing) companions through the course of the game. There were nine members
of the Fellowship, and that's all you're allowed in this game.
Let's Get Started
The first phase is the start of turn. The back page of the Mines
of Moria rulebook clarifies this segment, and defines what happens at this
point, before officially entering into the fellowship phase. Note that these
actions MUST happen in this order.
- Reset the Twilight Pool - The twilight pool is emptied at this point,
if there are any twilight tokens in it from a previous turn.
- All "start of turn" actions are performed, such as sanctuary healing.
Rules Summary:
At the start of your turn, when your fellowship is at a sanctuary, you may
heal up to five wounds from your companions (not allies).
These five wounds (note: NOT burdens) may be removed from your companions
in any combination you wish. You could take 2 wounds off of Aragorn, 2 off
of Gandalf and 1 off of Arwen for example, or any other combination thereof.
This is a rule-based action. You do not need to use any cards such as "Athelas"
to initiate this healing. When your fellowship starts their turn at the
sanctuary sites, they get to heal. Moving through a sanctuary site does
not permit you to use the sanctuary healing. You must have stopped at the
sanctuary site on your previous turn.
Note too, that sanctuary healing is a "start of turn" action. This is
important mainly due to one card, "Blade Tip". That card specifies that
the wound occurs at the start of the fellowship phase. On an exhausted companion
starting the fellowship phase at a sanctuary, the sanctuary healing happens
first, then the wounding from "Blade Tip" when the fellowship phase begins.
A note about the Twilight Pool. I'm frequently asked "how many tokens
do I start the game with in the twilight pool?" The answer is none. Twilight
tokens are added into the pool based on the actions that the Free Peoples
player performs during the fellowship phase. We'll discuss that next.
The Fellowship Phase
The fellowship phase is where the Free
Peoples player gets to do all sorts of things. Cards come into play, special
ability actions are used, etc. If you're the Free Peoples player it is "your
turn" until your fellowship stops moving.
Rules Summary:
There are several options available to you during this phase, and you may
do these in any order:
- Play Free Peoples companions, allies, possessions, conditions, and artifacts
from your hand or from cards like "Gandalf's Cart". You may perform as
many of these actions as many times as you like. Each time you play a
card with a Twilight cost, you pay that cost into the Twilight pool.
- You may discard a copy of a unique companion or ally from hand to heal
a wound from that companion with the same title that is in play and active.
There are some things you need to be aware of about these options. First,
when you have twilight costs, you are adding into the twilight pool, which
is an area in the center of the table between the players. This is a resource
that the Free Peoples player adds to, and the Shadow player takes out of
to play his cards. The balance here is that the more the Free Peoples player
does, the more resources the Shadow player has. Think of it this way. The
more companions that are put into play, the more companions that are crashing
through the woods, the more tokens are put into the pool and the more minions
that are going to attack them. A smaller, less active fellowship attracts
less attention, thus giving the Shadow player fewer resources to work with.
This is perhaps the most interesting mechanic in The Lord of the Rings
TCG and the most strategic element of TCGs in a long time.
Second, a frequent question concerns the "discard to heal" mechanic. First,
you cannot use this for minions, only companions and allies, so this option
is only available to the Free Peoples player. Also, since you are discarding
this copy from hand and not playing it, you do not have to put tokens into
the twilight pool.
You Got To Have Friends
Rules Summary:
You may not have more than nine companions between your fellowship and your
dead pile. The dead pile is where killed Free Peoples characters
(companions and allies) are placed. If a unique companion or ally is in
your dead pile, you may not play any version of that character again. Another
version of that character has the same card title, although it may have
a different subtitle. Place all your killed Shadow characters (minions)
in your discard pile. You may play any minion again (even a unique minion)
if you have an additional copy, since you don't place minions in your dead
pile.
Allies are characters that aid the fellowship in their quest. Many do
this through far-reaching special ability text. All can participate in archery
and skirmish actions when the fellowship is at their home site. There are
detailed examples of this in the Help Clinic article on archery. Allies
play to your support area. The support area is a row directly below
your current fellowship. You may play allies to your support area even when
the fellowship is not at the home site for that ally. Allies are not companions
and are never considered part of the fellowship, even when they are participating
in archery and skirmish actions.
Possessions and Artifacts
During the fellowship phase, you may also equip your companions and allies
with weapons, armor, and other enhancing possessions. These cards have twilight
costs just like your characters, and they play either to the support area
or to specific characters. When these cards are played to your characters,
they have attribute modifiers that raise a character's strength or vitality.
Many also add keywords such as archer, damage +1, etc.
Possessions and artifacts have classes such as armor, cloak, hand weapon,
staff, and ranged weapon. A character can bear no more than one of these
types of possession. Cards such as "Athelas", have no class listed, so you
may put multiples of these on a character. There are some exceptions to
this rule such as "Flaming Brand" but they are specifically listed in the
card text.
Possessions may be transferred between companions and allies (Note that
a transfer between an ally and a companion requires the fellowship to be
at the Home Site of that ally.). You put tokens into the twilight pool for
the twilight cost of the possession when you transfer it. The receiving
character must be able to possess that item. Also, you may never voluntarily
discard a possession in favor of a new one.
Conditions
Another option for the fellowship phase is playing conditions. Most of these
play to your support area but many (such as Tales, which are conditions
that have the keyword "Tale") can play to your characters. Conditions may
not be transferred as possessions.
Rule Summary:
A new rule has been added called "The Rule of 4". This rule states the following:
You may not draw (or take into hand) more than 4 cards during your
fellowship phase.
This applies to cards taken into hands by any means. However, please note
that this limit is only imposed during your fellowship phase. Cards that
are drawn as your opening hand, and by cards like Gandalf the Grey Pilgrim
(which occurs at the start of turn, prior to the fellowship phase), etc.
are not covered by this rule.
Move It Out
Once the fellowship phase is done, the twilight pool will probably have
a handful of tokens in it. You're about to move into the next site and add
more tokens to the pool. For more details on movement, please see our Help
Clinic article on movement.
Conclusion
So, that's how you start the game, and get through the first phase. Because
of the amount of information, we didn't get into a lot of strategy here.
Don't let that fool you though. From the bidding to movement, your choices
will set the tone for the rest of the game. As always, if something isn't
clear to you, please write me at elrond@decipher.com.
April 26, 2002
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