In Defence Of... Lord Of The Rings: Nazgul

Lord of the Rings: Nazgul, published by Wizkids (no comment), is a game which attracted a startling level of opprobrium for such a high-profile release under a beloved license. This game is not intended to be a review in the traditional sense, and I will only cover the game's structure itself in the briefest of ways. Instead, this article will address the major areas of complaint... and suggest why the game might be worth your time after all...

The game itself

Picture by the author

Lord of the Rings: Nazgul (henceforth LotR:N) is a "semi-cooperative" game wherein each player
takes the persona of a Ringwraith, simultaneously striving to frustrate do-gooding heroes while competing for the favour of the great lord Sauron.

This is not a simple game, but I shall try to be brief. Player Nazgul must bring themselves and their armies to the battlegrounds of each of three threads of the Lord of the Rings saga, trying to eliminate the armies and heroes of the "good guys" at a variety of Middle Earth locations. Each round also presents a number of smaller mission cards, providing optional battlegrounds which may or may not be worth the focus of the players.

Players then enter a blind auction, highly reminiscent of the auction system of the old MB Gamemaster game Shogun (now known as Ikusa, I believe). Players use the "favour" they have accumulated in a variety of ways; these may be non-competitive (e.g. buying new army units), "winner-takes-all" (e.g. the bid to decide turn order), or auctions where there are consolation prizes for those who do not bid the most (e.g. bidding for Cards of Power).

With their forces and other assets arrayed, players then deploy to the various battle areas and mission cards available this turn, and do battle. Combat is a bit too complex to detail here, but in brief, the Ringwraiths and their armies will face blue cubes (representing generic Free Peoples armies) and white cubes representing "heroes". Players must deploy a Hero card they will face for each white cube present. Each player will have at least one Hero card drawn from the deck which he/she may play to the battle they are attending... alternatively, if players do not fulfil the Hero requirement from their own hands, the gaps are filled by Heroes drawn blind from the deck. Nazgul may then deploy a number of their own armies to the battle, filling a cup with cubes for all units present on both sides. Players then blinding take cubes from the cup, such cubes and their allegiances determining units lost in the battle. Winning provides favour, victory points, and removes Heroes defeated from the game. As the game progresses, the Nazgul may gain and lose power (personally, by advancing or reversing their Clix dial, and by the armies under their control).

There's plenty more to the rules, including an advancing One Ring track which will cause the players to effectively "run out of time" (due to certain hobbits depositing a certain item of jewellery in a certain volcanic mountain) and thus all lose the game. If all stages are completed before this occurs, the winner is whomever has acquired the most victory points by winning battles, defeating Heroes, and completing quests.

The problems

Now that you have some idea of the game, let's address some of the most-raised complaints.

The semi-cooperative aspect doesn't work

One complaint raised is that the semi-coop aspect (working together to beat the game, while trying to undercut each other for favour and victory points) doesn't make thematic sense; i.e. that the Ringwraiths of the stories don't have sufficient individuality, or otherwise would not compete on a personal level. I'm not sure I accept that argument myself; the Nazgul have personal histories, and there are plenty of examples of Sauron's forces working for personal gain. Sauron himself started out as the conniving servant of a greater power, as I vaguely recall. Ultimately, this comes down to a subjective take on the underlying material; you may disagree, but I see no reason why Nazgul wouldn't compete to become first among the Dark Lord's servants.

Our plucky Ringwraiths. Picture by the author.

The other argument under this heading is that the semi-cooperative aspect doesn't work mechanically. While there are competitive games which include an "everybody loses" clause which may kick in if players slow one another down too much (Chaos in the Old World springs to mind), such games generally make such an outcome a fairly remote possibility. LotR:N has a higher requirement for cooperation; big battles will not be won without players working together. This problem comes down to a difference in gaming group; if your group is likely to "get" that this is a game of working together while conniving against each other, rather than a game of constant competition, you'll probably be fine.

If, on the other hand, your group is likely to be too aggressive, the game provides an alternative right there in the manual; the fully cooperative mode. As a pure cooperative mode, this thus allows solo play (with handling of multiple characters). I confess that this is my preferred way of playing. In any case, one cannot complain too much that the semi-coop mode is flawed since a fix is on the back of the manual.

The artwork is terrible

Well... yes. The board itself utilises a number of circles to keep track of the starting and current

Even less pretty than it appears in this photograph. Picture by the author.

disposition of the forces of "good", overlaid on a map. Quite frankly, to borrow the vernacular of our American cousins, this board looks like ass. A nicely detailed map, with simple indicators of starting forces and the direction of travel to each zone (and maybe colour-coding of each of the three overall regions of conflict) would almost certainly be preferential. The circles really add nothing of value, and just makes the whole thing look awful. It smacks of a nice idea which should have been discarded on testing.

Cards themselves are illustrated with screenshots from the films. If you really, really like looking at the films, that may be fine for you. I think most would agree that some proper artwork would have been preferable. The Clix figures don't help either; while I accept there's only so much you can do to produce five figures shrouded in black robes, they're still pretty disappointing.

So... no defence for this section. The artwork is terrible. I can only ask that you persevere.

The cube-pulling mechanism is weak

I'm not sure I understand this criticism. The game features a "push-your-luck" mechanism involving both how many armies you put in the cup, and how many you pull from it. Pulling blind from the cup has a reasonable amount of tension. Sure, perhaps replacing cubes with dice would provide more excitement (a la 1812: The Invasion of Canada and its cousins), but you'd need a hell of a lot of dice for big battles. That would be fun; but the cube-pulling mechanism is at least unusual. Honestly it's hard to feel strongly on this point. I call it a draw.

The game is just ludicrously overpriced

Yes. Yes it is. The RRP for this game is, I believe, £70 (or it was at time of release). Having five Clix figures is going to inflate prices, but by comparison, the mighty Mage Knight contains four Clix (albeit of the same sculpt), plus four excellent hand-painted figures, plus a range of components which are clearly superior to those of LotR:N, all for an RRP £20 less. There is no excuse for this price point, particularly considering the terrible artwork. So many games with broadly similar component requirements, yet superior actual components, exist with considerably lower price points (Cyclades, Wallenstein, etc.).

However, the market has realised how insane this RRP is. I myself bought my copy, new in shrink, for the princely sum of £17.50. That's less than some card games. And yes, it has certainly provided a decent return on investment at that price. Even given the defensive arguments in this article, a person would be crazy to purchase this at full price; but a bit of shopping around could make this a totally valid purchase.

So why should you play this game?

The above comments are intended to mitigate some of the criticisms of the game. In themselves, they do not provide compelling reasons to play this game (unless you are a Lord of the Rings completionist). But there is one very good reason to play this game:

This game is not a cube-pusher. It is a reverse-deckbuilder.

Those dreadful "heroes". Choose your battles wisely.
Picture by the author.

While this game includes a number of mechanisms (blind auction, push-your-luck on cube deployment, etc.), most of the real strategy revolves around the Hero deck. The heroes are the real threat in any battle, and before the battle, players must decide whether to place the Hero card(s) they have into the battle, or to draw from the deck. If the hero they hold is strong, they may wish to avoid it and chance the draw; on the other hand, if there isn't much to the rest of the hero army and the player is feeling strong, they may deliberately play the Hero in the hope of defeating them.

Why run the risk? Because any heroes that are not defeated are shuffled back into the deck, while those that are defeated leave the game. As time goes on, the Nazgul become stronger (on average), but so too do the armies of the enemy. If you do nothing but take easy options, you run a serious risk of thinning out the deck such that only strong heroes remain, producing an impassable blockade on your progress. Choosing when to fight the tough heroes, and thus thin the deck in favour of weaker enemies, is key. Ultimately, that Hero deck is the real enemy, and working out how to thin it is the real strategy of the game. This isn't the cube-based wargame-lite it seems to be; it's a reverse-deckbuilder.

There are other games that involve playing against enemy decks; for instance, the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game has decks for each location faced, but these are small and work in a rather different way. Thunderstone Advance uses an enemy deck, but enemies largely leave and are dealt with one-by-one in a unidirectional fashion. I cannot think of any other game which utilises a large, constantly-reshuffled deck, thinned over numerous rounds, as the AI enemy. LotR:N offers an unusual mechanism in a much-loved setting. I wouldn't describe it as an overlooked classic, but if you have any interest in deck-based games, want to play something a bit different, enjoy the theme, and can find it at a reasonable price point, you really should consider this game (though I recommend starting with the fully-coop variant, even if you are planning on using the semi-coop variant in the long run).

And finally...

This is the first of a two-part article set. In the second, I will outline a variant I have been using which adds both excitement and strategic variation to the cube-oriented mechanisms. Watch this space...