by Shelfwear
Hello fellow LotR LCG fans!After having finished my first custom scenario (Shadows over Emyn Muil) I started to develop my second scenario: "Web of Isengard" (WoI). And here it is:
1) I wanted a scenario that is challenging, I'd rate the difficulty of this as 7.
2) I wanted to take one of the less popular official scenarios and make it more interesting: This time I took on "Road to Rivendell"
3) I wanted to create a scenario with a different flavor, that means to go beyond the usual Orc & Troll enemies.
4) As you might already know I'm a big fan of Angus McBride. Like my other scenario "Shadows over Emyn Muil" all custom cards in this scenario use art by Angus Mcbride (expect one quest card).
A very big thanks goes to GeckoTH for his templates! Without his effort this wouldn't be possible.
[user=GeckoTH][/user]
Web of Isengard is not so much about big fights. It's a deadly cat-and-mouse game between your heroes and the agents from Isengard. You've come across an evidence of their activities and try to gather more information about their network in southern Eriador/northern Dunland by catching their minions or exploring special locations. Whereas they try to stop you with rumors, thefts and assassination before you can deliver the evidences to a Dunedain ranger. Even though the name of Saruman is not mentioned explicitly anywhere in this scenario (he is shown in the artwork of the treachery card "Voice of Orthanc" though) you know of course that's his web you have started to unravel (the heroes only can guess who is behind all of this but Saruman's true intentions remain hidden until the war of the ring).
Quest spoilers
[o]The quest starts rather straight forward and seems not a big challenge in quest stage 1 but if the players need more than 2 turns for this stage they will regret it at the end. The faster you get pass stage 1 the more mistakes you can afford later. In stage 1 you will receive the objective card and have to chose wisely which hero to attach it to. He/she should have high defense and many hit points because he/she will get some heavy beating during the quest.
Time is running up and threat becomes an issue in stage 4. So players who think they can stall the game and build up their forces will face the consequences.
Even though time is of the essence, stage 2 is the where you are required to spend a couple of turns looking for information (=resource tokens for the objective card) in order to get to stage 3. Here you also make the choice of A) gathering the minimal required amount of information and rush to stage 3-A which is long and might slow you down so much, causing you to lose the scenario in stage 4, or B) spend more time in stage 2 and gather more information but get to stage 3-B which is short and easy to accomplish. The choice is yours but the more successful you are in stage 2 and 3, the less the chances are you get kicked out of the game in quest stage 4.
Upon entering quest stage 4 the threat of all players is raised by 15 minus the amount of resource tokens on the objective card (=information you gathered so far).
Throughout the game the hero with the objective card will be target of enemies and treacheris. "Voice of Orthanc" and "Hired Assassin" are especially nasty and you'll need to protect the hero with the objctive card by buffing him up and/or healing. Additionally you have to protect the objective card from being stripped from you by some enemies that make you discard attachments. Once you have played the scenario you'll get a feel for what to risk and which of the two quest stages #3 to take. Most of the objective resource tokens can only be gained by "paying its price" be it resources, card discards or threat increase.
[/o]
This scenario uses the custom scenario cards shown below plus the encounter cards from "Road to Rivendell". Shuffle the custom WoI cards together with the Road to Rivendell encounter cards (PS: for all of you who hate "Sleeping Sentry" - you can take it out if you like. It is not neccessary for this quest to function, but it's shadow effect still usually leads to auto-loss).
You need the following amount of copies of each card, note that there are two different quest stage 3 cards (you can also see the required amount copies on the bottom of the cards next to the one ring symbol):
Quest Card #1 x1
Quest Card #2 x1
Quest Card #3-1 x1
Quest Card #3-2 x1
Quest Card #4 x1
Secret Ledger x1
Orc Pillagers x4
Hired Assassin x3
Isengard Spies x2
Messenger from Isengard x2
Brigands from Eriador x4
Dunlending Chieftain x1
Dunlending Warriors x4
Dunlending Outrider x2
Dunlending Fort x1
Trading Post x3
Smuggler's Landing x2
Voice of Orthanc x3
Spreading Rumors x2
Thievery in the Night x2
The WoI card set consists of 41 cards in total.
You can download a card pdf-sheet for print out here (pending upload to BGG).
A note on scaling: This scenario plays best with 2 players (and it has been playtested mostly with 2 player) and the quest card 2 is coded accordingly. If you want to play it solo or with 3/4 players you need to adjust a detail. The required Secret Ledger resource tokens to pass from stage 2 to stage "Out in the Open" and "Through the Mist" are as follows:
No of Players: 1 - You need 3 and 5 tokens
No of Players: 2 - You need 5 and 8 tokens (this is what's printed on the quest card 2 below)
No of Players: 3 - You need 7 and 11 tokens
No of Players: 4 - You need 9 and 14 tokens
(I havent included these variables on the quest card because it cluttered the card and made it look very complicated)
Have fun and tell me what you think of "Web of Isengard"!
Cheers
