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I love it when opening a game box feels like a special moment. It’s always fun to pop the lid on a new resident of the collection, but some feel like they are revealing a secret. And this tall box not only does that but leaves you with no doubts about it!
From the deck of cards and the decorated boxes hiding all the Chapters to the small ribbons assisting with the lift, this small game brings a big air of deference to the table. And its delicate and reverential homage to Tolkien’s original Lord of the Rings (sorry Percy J!), is evident throughout.
And what surprised me even more upon hearing about this game was that it is a co-operative trick taking game. Like the Crew and a few others, you need to work together to tame those tricks in order to win personal objectives and succeed in winning each chapter’s goal. You still have your own hands of cards. But, like the fellowship itself, you cannot do this alone! (Well actually you can as there is a solo mode but shhhhh…..I can’t have my dramatic moment ruined by facts! Haha)
But I am not here to waffle on about the wonders of the game generally – that will be the privilege of the main reviewer. No, I am here to tell you a little bit about how we feel the 2 player mode works because there are a few tweaks to the multiplayer game to make it sing at lower player counts. And, spoiler alert, it works really well!
Speaking of which, the campaign element of this game does make spoilers a real risk. With each new chapter comes new characters, powers, and challenges. So, again, I am not going to go into too many specifics. But I can give you a hint as to what you might expect early on. Then you can let your imagination run wild until you crack open the boxes yourself!
Frodo and his dummy friend
Fear not, for I am not speaking out of turn about anyone in the Fellowship or even Shire-adjacent.
Rather than just dealing all the cards between the players as you would in a 3 or 4 player game, the two plyer mode introduces a dummy to simulate a third player. This player has a character assigned to it, and its hand becomes a pyramid of face up and face own cards (3,4,5) which get used as they are fully revealed from behind other cards.
If you have played 7 Wonders Duel or Truffle Shuffle, you’ll be familiar with the way cards are partially covered and then get revealed in a trick taking game. And for us we felt this was a brilliant way to introduce greater unpredictability in how the characters and cards manage the objectives in play.
I should note that whichever player takes on the role of Frodo (i.e. the player who was dealt the #1 Ring card (the One Ring, get it?!)) is the one responsible for managing the dummy during the game. If neither player has the #1 Ring card in their hand, then in a twist, the Dummy must have it in the pyramid. If that happens, it becomes Frodo. Cards are then taken from those fully revealed (note that any face down cards which get unlocked at the end of a trick are flipped over) in the pyramid to use in tricks as usual. Everything else (unless specifically modified by the rule book) plays as per the multiplayer game.
Final Thoughts
If you know your Lord of the Rings, then you’ll know all the characters that show up as the game progresses. Some weren’t prominent in the films, so a little background geeking out will definitely enhance the thematic side of the game. Same with their challenges – LOTR aficionados will appreciate the links between the requirements and who has to achieve them.
The main mechanic of trick taking isn’t pulled about too much – it’s a pretty entry level version of following suit throughout a large chunk of the game, although gold rings do have their own rules (they can generally only come into play once a player has gone “off suit”) and the #1 Ring card can be a trump in an otherwise trumpless game! So it’s a great choice for those new to trick taking or even co-operative gaming. Having said that, in similarity with co-operative trick takers like The Crew, as more characters and challenges are added, the tactics needed to win the right tricks and the right time by the right folks to smash those objectives and chapter goals become a lot more demanding. Best to think of the first chapter as warming you up for later!
And revealing which characters and what elements are going to be available in each Chapter is a really fun part of this campaign. At 2P, just having Dummy present adds in more challenges and randomness into each chapter. So it’s helpful to pick those whose powers and personal objectives work well together. Seeing some of the Dummy’s cards in 2P mode feels a little like legitimised cheating (and I am always up for that!) because it can help each player work out what they might need to do individually to help Dummy achieve its objectives in a way you wouldn’t be able to if it was a human player. But even then it’s not always straightforward. Your communication is intended to be limited, and so what you are thinking and predicting could be different to what your teammate has in mind for Dummy!
Having only played at 2P so far, I can’t speak to the added considerations/impacts that a third or fourth human player might bring. But, although we are each fiercely competitive gamers at heart, we have really enjoyed working gently together through the 18 chapters as a duo plus Dummy. And being just a twosome has eliminated the difficulty of getting the same group of players back to the table regularly. Like a lovely walk around the Shire, this game has introduced us to characters and snippets of the story as we have progressed. And, just like the Fellowship, we have enjoyed figuring out how best to progress towards our goals along the way. Luckily for us, even though we have now completed the campaign, we can now go back to it and either start again or play the eternal game. And as my husband is a mad LOTR fan, he is raring to go again already! Time to fuel up with a second breakfast me thinks!
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Published 11th Feb 2025.
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