Care for a round of Gwent Lord of the Rings: The Living Card Game?
Some time back, I started playing Lord of the Rings: The Living Card Game (or LOTR:LCG in short). It’s a Lord of the Rings themed deckbuilder, where you have a nice mix between adventuring and combat.
The makers of the game (fantasyflightgames) have done a great job to give the characters recognizable properties, and some of the scenarios are very thematic. It’s actually one of the best games I’ve ever played, and the replayability is very high: you can choose from various difficulty levels, and the deckbuilding part allows you to try out a lot of different tactics.
But it’s not easy to get started. The rules are clear enough, but it’s easy to misinterpret some things, and make the game either too easy or too hard.
So I have some recommendations to get you started:
Point 1: Research online
You can start with the fantasyflightgames website: here you can find an online rules reference, and a FAQ.
Next to that, the Tales from the Cards site has a section with “5 things I wish I would’ve known when I started playing LOTR:LCG”. I found this very helpful.
And finally, if some text on a card is not clear, you can just google it. You’ll typically find lots of information on Boardgamegeek or Reddit.
Point 2: buy more cards
To start, you need the core set. But that won’t get you far.
If you want to build more powerful decks, you need to get extra cards. You can buy all kinds of expansion packs. These packs typically have extra cards to improve your decks, as well as new scenarios to play.
If found the buying guide of Tales from the Cards extremely helpful.
Point 3: Organize your cards
The various expansion boxes you buy are nice, but they’re not handy to keep your cards organized. You’ll quickly see that you need to keep all your player cards together (per type), so that you can quickly build new decks.
And you’ll start collecting a lot of scenario cards. These cards also need a bit of structure if you quickly want to set up a new game.
I’ve used the dividers from Designed By Ryno to organize my cards in a large cardboard box.
Playtime!
And with these few hints to get you started, it’s time to play now. Enjoy!
More games
If you care more for a round of Gwent, be sure to check how you can make your physical Gwent deck. Or maybe you want to stick with Lord of the Rings? Then I can recommend The War of the Ring.
Geek stuff 