V1: The One Ring (alpha playtests)

[Kralik]

It seems to me it would be better to narrow it down to a few -- then I could always add them to GCCG.

[Thranduil]

Kralik, it would be amazing if you could add even 1 of them (maybe one at a time?) onto GCGG.

I like the 4 options. I'm happy to run with so many because it's the first card we've designed and we're not sure how it might work in future. But ideally I think, for other cards, we probably want no more than 2 versions in alpha playtests.

Thranduil

[Kralik]

I'm not sure if you want to wait this long, but I was planning on releasing an update for next weekend.

[Kralik]

Right. I saw these, and suggested LESS options.

[Tbiesty]

Right. I saw these, and suggested LESS options.

Sorry, I should have been more specific with my question.

Once we have it narrowed down, will something like full size card templates be acceptable for GCCG? Or would you worry they "look too much like a existing Decipher card template"?

[Kralik]

Well, GCCG natively makes virtual cards based on the game text whenever you are missing the image.

[Tbiesty]

Ah, so it does.  Yep, I just tried it on my computer.  Looks good enough to me.

Here are the "playtesting slips" for the "alpha" playtesting.

Click here to download the playtesting card inserts for The One Ring, The Ruling Ring (V).

[Tbiesty]

I call dibs on this one:   

The One Ring, The Ruling Ring (V)
Strength: +1
Vitality: -1
Resistance: +1
Game Text: Response: If bearer is about to take a wound, bearer wears The One Ring until the regroup phase. While wearing The One Ring, each time bearer is about to take a wound, add a burden instead.

designed by Tbiesty.

I'll do my best at playtesting, even though it will most often be me against myself

I will build several different decks with several different ring-bearers and test it against the most common shadows (Corsairs, Moria Swarm, Sauron Wound...).

Be sure to try out what happens if you have an exhausted Sam ready to take the ring when Frodo dies...

[Witchkingx5]

Started playtesting with the discarding Ring...

My first impression was, that it's a very good option against Hand Clog, even though I don't think Hand Clog really was a Tier 1 or Tier 2 Deck, more a niche one. I found that I can expand my Deck a bit as the Ring provides nice cycling. Will be playing against discard tonight.

[Tbiesty]

I tried out the "add a burden if you don't double-move" ring.

Here are the things that stuck out to me the most when using it.

1)  The first thing I noticed, was that I often forgot about the ring's "penalty" until some point during the next turn.  It's different than something like Thin and Stretched, because it's not your opponents card (it's The One Ring, which is always there), so they will likely forget it too.  Maybe that is just part of it being something new and different.

2)  Even when playing with Frodo against a deck that did not add any burdens, the Ring-bearer ended up with 3-5 burdens at the end. If you pack good burden removal, it's probably not so bad.  But if using an Alternate Ring-bearer or facing a corruption deck, there's not much breathing room.

3)  Lastly, it does suffer from a bit of a "when things are going well, it's fine; but when things are not going well, they get much worse" effect.  If you are having an easy game and your Free Peoples side is doing fine (i.e. you are double-moving a lot), there is no downside.  But if you are facing a tough game and your Free Peoples side is struggling (i.e. you are single-moving a lot), this ring just makes it worse.  A ring that penalizes me for having a close, down-to-the-wire game, would be something I'd avoid using if I know it's going to be a competitive game.

[Witchkingx5]

1)  The first thing I noticed, was that I often forgot about the ring's "penalty" until some point during the next turn.  It's different than something like Thin and Stretched, because it's not your opponents card (it's The One Ring, which is always there), so they will likely forget it too.  Maybe that is just part of it being something new and different.

As soon as you play a couple of games with it, you'll be fine.

2)  Even when playing with Frodo against a deck that did not add any burdens, the Ring-bearer ended up with 3-5 burdens at the end. If you pack good burden removal, it's probably not so bad.  But if using an Alternate Ring-bearer or facing a corruption deck, there's not much breathing room.

Well, this might be a sign  that it isn't worth the effort of playing that Ring, as you have to add cards to your Deck that make it playable. It would be more a niche card like The Snow Ring.

3)  Lastly, it does suffer from a bit of a "when things are going well, it's fine; but when things are not going well, they get much worse" effect.  If you are having an easy game and your Free Peoples side is doing fine (i.e. you are double-moving a lot), there is no downside.  But if you are facing a tough game and your Free Peoples side is struggling (i.e. you are single-moving a lot), this ring just makes it worse.  A ring that penalizes me for having a close, down-to-the-wire game, would be something I'd avoid using if I know it's going to be a competitive game.

That doesn't sound good at all... I usually try to afford any "win-more" cards in my Deck, as if you're ahead, you don't really need more to do, as you're ahead and fine, right? and when you're behind and would need help, you can't really use the card, or at worst, it hinders you.

PLaytested it against discard, and decked out at 5. Yeah... that isn't too good, but fortunately, I still managed to win with my good old Twilight Nazzies Deck (LotN on Fell Beast is winning games for me ever since.) Then, I'm actually pretty happy how my Ring is performing, he's good, that's true, but not OP. I once had a pretty bad reconcicle at Site 3, but by discarding al the useless stuff, I won.

And I faced a problem with the Ring: Youcan use the ""Response:" action as often as you like, right? So you can basically ditch any number of cards from your hand to put the Ring.

Eventually, the RIng seems to have two Sides. One is having to discard cards, even good cards you'd actually prefer to keep in your hand and ther other is nearly free cycling, which I found a bit scary. What do you think?

[hyvee_doughboy]

Regarding the burden ring, I think it's OK that bit wont fit in a lot of decks...it will fit in a lot of others. I don't think our goal needs to be to have cards that fit into every deck ( or even most decks for that matter).  IMHO, any card that fits in every/most decks are usually a sign of a card that is too powerful, making previous cards obsolete.  I agree that after a few games it'll probably come easier.

Regarding the discard ring, I think modifying the text a little bit to say "Response: If The One Ring is not on...." to prevent the infinite discard. Seems a little more reasonable.

[hrcho]

After several games using this ring:

The One Ring, The Ruling Ring (V)
Strength: +1
Vitality: -1
Resistance: +1
Game Text: Response: If bearer is about to take a wound, bearer wears The One Ring until the regroup phase. While wearing The One Ring, each time bearer is about to take a wound, add a burden instead.

I've come to the conclusion that this ring is quite powerful. Much like The Ring of Rings and I'm not that sure we should be making such a ring with Sam, SoH around. The Ring of Rings is mainly played in Standard and Expanded and as far as I know there are no burden removals there as effective and universal as Sam, SoH. This ring maybe even works better with ARBs than with Frodo because I think SAWTC is a better option for Frodo with almost the same effect. It's even good on Boromir, BoC (especially if you play Narsil on him) because you can always choose to wound him twice and take burdens instead of wounds as necessary.

I'll test it some more, but so far, my advice is not to create this ring.

Note that I have tested it only within Movie Block and lower. I am not that familiar with post-MD cards and I'm still not that convinced I want to be.

[Tbiesty]

Note that I have tested it only within Movie Block and lower. I am not that familiar with post-MD cards and I'm still not that convinced I want to be.

I'd venture to say that Movie block and lower is our focus.  So if the ring is a bad fit for Movie block, that's not a good sign.

[Tbiesty]

I'm starting to lean towards preferring the "Discarding Ring" at this point, so I'll do some more playtesting with it.  But so far, my impression that the discarding of a single is to small a price to pay for the flexibility.  Perhaps discard 3 cards, so it is on par with other special abilities (Arwen, Elven Rider, etc.) and a smaller possibility you can meet the requirements.

The One Ring, The Ruling Ring (V)
Strength: +1
While wearing The One Ring, each time the Ring-bearer is about to take a wound, add a burden instead.
Response: If bearer is about to take a wound and not wearing The One Ring, discard 3 cards from hand to wear The One Ring until the regroup phase.

I'll try out how this works.