ARDA Expanded World - The CORE 18

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Frodo
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Joined: Tue Apr 18, 2006 5:09 am
Location: NYC, NY

Eric, I think both your ARDA set and my ARDA set may have too many new cards for people who DO want to try making their own “Expanded World” rules but don’t want to make all 50+ new cards and aren’t sure which cards are the most necessary/fun ones for ARDA. It can also be the new cards we feel most certain about; thus, our own versions will become like ARDA playtesting stations.

Therefore, I have an idea to market an ARDA Game called “ARDA: Expanded World: THE CORE 18” which is simply the Expanded World rules with a pdf of 18 new cards that we consider absolutely important to the ARDA game. Why 18? I don’t know; it just popped into my head! We can change that number of course; ARDA 21 sounds nice too. This is in addition to the Wizards.

Here is my tentative try at this list:
CHARACTERS
Merry
Frodo
Eowyn
Pippin (*not sure)
Old Road
Here is a Snake
Hidden Knife
=7 so far

Keep 'um coming!

--Frodo
domse
Ex Council Member
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obviously, its 18 because that makes 2 3x3 printsheets!
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Nerdmeetsyou
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Joined: Mon Mar 12, 2007 6:30 pm

New Elf lord, so you could play it up to 8 player!
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Thorsten the Traveller
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Location: Tilburg, Netherlands

I think it would be best to make a selection number on a rational basis, as Domse says, in a PDF print sheet fit 18 cardboxes. In my experience it’s best to keep unique and non-uniques separated, for printing reasons, it annoys people if they have to print unique 3x because they want non-uniques 3x. That means 36 would be a good number. And truly, it’s not that much. In fact, to stay under 18 uniques will be very difficult:
10 wizards (5 normal +5 fallen)
3-6 lords (fallen, or also new abilities for regular lords?)

Then:
3 elven rings
1 saw further

This is all undisputed, so that’s 17 or 20.

Next, 1 wizard specific faction wouldn’t be bad I suppose, I would go for it since we are over the 18 uniques anyway because of the 16 avatar cards. So perhaps the Arda 50 is more in order. On the other hand, the lords then are at a disadvantage. Same goes for lore cards and/or wizard specific factions. I’d really hate to miss those special cards :cry:

Then, my A selection would be:
Characters: Frodo, Sam, Robin, Eowyn, Pippin
Items: Jewel Beleriand, Palantir Osgiliath
Factions: Hobbits, Eagles, Dunlendings, Wood-elves, Easterlings (1 for each wizard, but with lords might need to expand that or make the factions less avatar specific)
Events: here is a snake, here there yonder, Scroll, use palantir, dragon-lore, healing of nimrodel, rescue prisoners, old road, Shifter of Hues? (depending on radagast’s new abilities)
Hazards: two or three tribes, bane o ithil, Balrog of Moria, in great wrath

This would leave us at 16 non-uniques and 26 uniques (29 if 6 lord avatars). So room for about 2 more non-uniques and 3 uniques in the Arda 50.

Some options for the B selection would be:
No Strangers, Wit, Pledge of conduct, dreams of lore, Face out of Sight, Sentinels, hidden knife, tales of the hunt, lost in wilderness/fd, the ring’s betrayal
Farmer maggot, petty-dwarves, Gems of Arda, Sapling, Ring of Lore, Red Book, Faramir, Fallen Boromir, Arinmir, Bergil, Gimli

Not that Gimli is that great, but I like all new fellowship versions, for thematic reasons. Personally I find Merry a bit pale, since you will only use his ability once per game and that’s it, same goes for Frodo but of course The One Ring needs to see play. On the other hand it’s obvious these guys need something to make them more attractive in Arda, otherwise we’ll always end up with the buff companies, which people go for anyway. That’s why I’d prefer Robin, since he can get and play To Fealty and untap Sam who is a bit stronger and can get No Waiting. Besides, to play To Fealty on Robin after any hero faction is just so cool, he can even swear allegiance to some hillmen, how gullible he is 8)

Here is a snake, Face out of sight and Hidden knife now basically have the same objective: go to opponent to wound him. Hence the overlap, hence I would go first with Here is a snake, then with Face out of sight since it gives little people the chance to do something. As before, the problem is everybody just goes for the big boys, and in game terms it is indeed better to start with only your wizard and 2 or 3 big guys, than a load of small fellows…maybe we even need to make a rule that states that from your initial 2 big guys you may only choose 1.

@Boder, since there are 3 lords and 5 wizards, you could already play a game with 8 players, theoretically, though how you would manage in time/space I don't know, you'd need 3 simultaneous turns I suppose. :wink:
Stone-age did not end because man ran out of rocks.
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