Special House Rules

[Gartax]

Hi there, me and my friends have devellope a special format base on the expended one, but more friendly. I wish to get some feedback from you and if you have some advice it will be appreciated.

The Goal:
Our goal was to design a format that allows us to play as many cards as possible and built as many competitive deck as possible. We wish to have as few "Master" (like mountain troll swarm) deck as possible in order to enjoy the diversity in its fullest.

In the light of our goal wich card should we ban or put on a watch list?

We also have a special rule:
Site path: When building your site path, you can choose between 2 sites pools. Standard site pool and Movie Block site pool.

If you choose the Movie Block site pool, you can choose site from any sets. The sites keep their site numbers. So you cannot have more than one site 1, one site 2 etc. Also they kept their twilight cost number, but loose the region penalty. Finally, the site number 4 have a twilight cost penalty of +3 and the site 7 have a twilight cost of +2. Also note that the TT Cavern Entrance has the same text as the Standard one.


So here are our X-list

1C9 Dwarven Axe
1R45 Galadriel, Lady of Light
1R80 Ottar, Man of Laketown
1U108 No Stranger to the Shadows
1C311 Sam, Son of Hamfast
1R139 Savagery to Match Their Numbers
1R195 Relics of Moria
1U234 Úlairë Nertëa, Messenger of Dol Guldur
1C248 Forces of Mordor
1C138 Saruman's Snows
1R308 Power according to his stature
1U316 A Talent for Not Being Seen
2P121 Gimli, Dwarf of the Mountain-race
2C14 Till Durin Wakes again
2C30 Deep in thought
2R75 Bill Ferny
3R38 Aragorn, Heir to the White City
3R42 Horn of Boromir  
3R67 The Palantír of Orthanc
3R68 Saruman, Keeper of Isengard
3R113 Shire countryside
3U106 Bill the Pony
3C108 Frying Pan
4R73 Legolas, Dauntless Hunter
4U276 Fortress Never Fallen
4R304 Get On and Get Away
7C23 Into The West
7U49 Steadfast Champion
8C1 Aggression
10U2 Memories of Darkness
10R104 Birthday Present

10R11 Galadriel, Lady Redeemed
10C91 Mordor Fiend
11C31 Final Account
11R100 Strange Looking men
11U114 Demoralize
11C132 Orkish Smith
13U188 Courtyard Parapet
15R55 Aragorn Torongil
15R72 Bill Ferny
15R64 Madril Defender of Osgiliath
15R86 Mumak Commander
15R112 Mountain Troll
15R154 Second Breakfast
17S7 Elven Guardian
17U10 Namarie
17U14 Weapons of Lothlorien
17R24 Shadowfax, Greatest of the Mearas
17R36 Throne of Minas tirith
17U58 Soldier Cache
17R89 Relentless Warg
18R11 Galadriel's Sylver Ewer
18R17 Gil-Galad, High-king of the Noldor
18R29 Deceit
18R32 Not Easily Avoided
18R38 Aragorn, heir to the throne
18R50 Faitfull stone
18R85 Gothmog, Morgul leader
18R96 Ekerbrand's horn
18R100 Gamling's Horn
18U110 Prized Lagan


Self-Made Errata


1R90 Aragorn's bow

At the start of the Archery phase instead of Archery:

15R56 Aragorn's Bow, Ranger's Longbow

At the start of the Archery phase instead of Archery:


15U102 Black land Overlord
Remove 2 threats

15R172 Ugluk, Ugly Fellow
He does not exert at the start of the skirmish.

Thanks

[NappyKorn]

Woot, like having the original x-list and errata wasn't enough now we have this HUGE list to worry about, LOL. All I can say is I can't remember errata and x-lists that decipher published when making a deck so I would have to aviod this format if it comes to pass.

NK

[Gartax]

Actualy the list contain all the original X-list plus a some more, the new add on are in bold in my ruling document, but it did not copy paste well!

The card that we have had are the following

1C9 Dwarven Axe
1R308 Power according to his stature
2C14 Till Durin Wakes again
2C30 Deep in thought
7C23 Into The West
10R104 Birthday Present
15R55 Aragorn Torongil
15R72 Bill Ferny
15R86 Mumak Commander
15R112 Mountain Troll
15R154 Second Breakfast
17S7 Elven Guardian
17U10 Namarie
17U14 Weapons of Lothlorien
17R24 Shadowfax, Greatest of the Mearas
17R36 Throne of Minas tirith
17U58 Soldier Cache
17R89 Relentless Warg
18R11 Galadriel's Sylver Ewer
18R17 Gil-Galad, High-king of the Noldor
18R29 Deceit
18R32 Not Easily Avoided
18R38 Aragorn, heir to the throne
18R50 Faitfull stone
18R85 Gothmog, Morgul leader
18R96 Ekerbrand's horn
18R100 Gamling's Horn
18U110 Prized Lagan

[macheteman]

i also would never use this format. deep in thought? really? saruman's snows? its like you took all the cards you didn't like playing against and banned them. i mean really, banning saruman's snows and deep in thought are not helping reach your goal of playing "as many cards as possible."

let me clarify by saying that if you and your friends enjoy the game more by using this "format" then that is great and good for LOTR TCG. however i doubt that many (if any) forum members would enjoy playing by these rules.

[Ringbearer]

I wouldnt. For above reasons. It looks like a list saying: we lose a lot tot his card, so we ban it.

[Gartax]

saruman snows was already ban by decipher we just did not ask ourself if we kept it or not

deep in thought with follower is just plain stupid (tranfert palendo had 2 pool transfert alatar had 2 pool and so on, play deep in thought discard all shadow condition)

AS for loosing to those card that we ban, we just ban the card that we judge was vastly overpower compare to previous card already made.

You had to keep in mind that we wish to play all the old shadow culture and the older freep strategies. That way we could keep the game entertainning and fresh. Not always playing the same cards again and again.

Exemple: Aragorn THorongil, in a standar format that card is strong, nothing more. In my format, where you wish to see diversity, Aragorn Thorongil will see 90-95% of game play compare to the other Aragorn.

Just as a side note, I am note trying to convert anyone into playing this format, I was just asking for feedback and or advice as to how to improve it.

[Thranduil]

I think it's great that there are still people working on making the game better for them and their player groups. If you don't agree, that's fine—don't use their ideas. I do think that being automatically and unnecessarily negative about it is not helping anyone.

@Gartax: Maybe you could post a few of the more powerful decks you and your friends have been playing to give us more a sense of what this format looks like?

Thran

[NappyKorn]

Yeah don't get me wrong guys, it is a great idea people are still finding new and creative ways to keep the game fresh. Asw I said though my memory is crap as I didn't even notice he has the original x-list included in his. I have a hard time remebering those cards and the errata that decipher added so just my mind can't add more to this. I'd be willing to give anything a try, but don't be surprised if I drop a card in this format that is 'banned' from time to time.

NK

[Gartax]

I will post some of the deck I can remember being powerfull, it will be hard because we play about 20 deck each...

Probably this evening!

[Doom]

The Goal:
Our goal was to design a format that allows us to play as many cards as possible and built as many competitive deck as possible. We wish to have as few "Master" (like mountain troll swarm) deck as possible in order to enjoy the diversity in its fullest.

Honestly, as previously said, you really aren't helping to "play as many cards as possible". Dwarven Axe? Faithful Stone? (Card already has errata that lets the shadow player prevent this by removing (2).
I think a better "format" would just be to play expanded, and have a mutual rule with your friends to not use any utterly broken decks (fruit loops, horn).

[leokula]

I love to see Dwarven Axe here, that's probably one of the most abused LOTR cards.

[Doom]

honestly, if dwarven axe is that broken, then probably half of the cards in LOTR TCG should be on the x-list.

[macheteman]

dwarven axe is somewhat NPE. but it should NEVER be banned. its the dwarven bread and butter.

[Doom]

Exactly ^^

[leokula]

It's not broken, it's just been abused. Mind you nobody in the game has free possessions that give them +2 and an ability. That card only exists because it was designed in a set where dwarves were so weak that it was balanced. Just compare it to the other axes released after reflections.

I'm not saying I don't play it, but it's cool to see someone not playing it because it's clearly unfair.

[Doom]

I guess I can see where you're coming from. But part of dwarven culture IS the massive possessions. And IMO, that's just part of the game. No other culture has an equivalent to elven bow, and gondor's IB ranger deck is way more broken than dwarven axe.
To be honest, I still don't quite know how dwarven axe would be abused enough to put it on the x-list. Could you give an example?

[Gartax]

We put Dwarven axes because it gave us a way to enforce friendly rule.

Dwarven axe is not broken it is just NPE.  and since we want to play more friendly while having some sort of chalenge, we just decide to X it.

The card we choice to had, we judge taht is was either NPE or too powerfull.

Faithfull stone with some token adding threat is just NPE.  Imagine you have 3 faitfull stone on the table, the shadow play 3 minions and you have 3 tokens on each of them. So the shadow player will have to keep 6 pool in order to fight.

In a highly competitive environnent, That card would have been OK. But we wish to play as many strategie as possible and not many shadow have pratical discard condition. That gave us more option.

[Gartax]

I may have started this the wrong way.

According to your oppinion and your understanding of my goal, wich card should we (my playgroup and me) remove from our X-list and wich should we Banned.

Also none of you talked about the site path idea. What you guys think about it?

Thanks you all for your opinion, even thought I may not agree with you your opinions are appreciated.

[leokula]

I guess I can see where you're coming from. But part of dwarven culture IS the massive possessions. And IMO, that's just part of the game. No other culture has an equivalent to elven bow, and gondor's IB ranger deck is way more broken than dwarven axe.
To be honest, I still don't quite know how dwarven axe would be abused enough to put it on the x-list. Could you give an example?

You see... the thing with abusing, IMO, is when you use a card in a different way than the way it was design to be used. Follow the game's history with me for a bit.

Dwarven Axe is a free +2 possession with a powerful ability. It was designed when dwarves were mostly Gimli and he had a better unique axe for himself, so it was not widely used. It didn't really matter if it was free or not, you were not playing multiples. You'd be better playing Legolas, Aragorn, Boromir or Arwen, instead of the other dwarves.

In two towers, came Rohan: THE possession culture. Even bearing that status, it didn't have free possessions in the power level of dwarven axe.

Reflections came and along came Durin III and all those dwarven companions, allowing you to play a decent stand alone dwarven fellowship.

Right here is where dwarven axe became an abused card, because you could now play multiples of it, win skirmishes very easily and discard multiple cards from ur opponents deck. All of this wasn't allowed when it was first released.

See how the card changed completely due to its context? Dwarves weren't DESIGNED to be choke and strong LOL thing is they could now use all the dwarven cards that were useless, and they weren't powerful in the past with only one dwarf out... now they became powerful with a bunch of strong dwarves out... see?

[Doom]

So dwarven axe has become more powerful over time. But still not as powerful as IB.
That doesn't mean that DA is broken-otherwise pretty much half the cards in the game would have to be banned. Instead, players developed new strategies for dwarves, and now dwarven axe has an actual use. Great! That's how the game stays alive.

Gartax, I think you should just follow the game's x-list and agree with your friends not to play known broken combos. If you "we wish to play as many strategie as possible," you certainly aren't helping by banning so many cards.

[TheJord]

Looking through the list, there is a lot of cards I would not ban.

However, if this means you and your group will continue to play the game, great!