Puzzle Strike and LotR CCG

Played 4 games of the LotR LCG this past weekend. While I am not totally won over, I have seen and liked enough to see what the next few expansions bring. Game play is pretty easy to grasp - as usual, the FFG rulebook length makes it look longer than it needs to be.

Theme is good; it takes place between the Hobbit and the trilogy ( same as Middle Earth Quest ). However, unlike MEQ you get a lot of the canon characters, instead of the made up characters of MEQ.

We played each of the first two scenarios twice, winning three out of four. Our last game was only two player, and while the game scales pretty well, it is easier with more people. With less than 3, I think you have to get more into deck building, mixing and matching the 4 different skill sets.

You don't need a second base set to play four player; you just need to track the Threat Level for the other two players since the base only has 2 scorers for this. However, if you want to get into deck building, a second one may be the way to go. If you buy online, it's $26.00 per set, so at $52.00 its not that bad.

That said, the LCG concept can be more expensive than it appears if you keep buying a $15 expansion every month. Since this is a co-op ( for now, I could see ways to make it more PvP ), the lack of a competitive angle makes it less of a CCG candidate anyway.

It has made me go back and dig out a large set of Middle Earth CCG cards I traded for a while back to see how it compares; the ME CCG has a very good reputation.

I played Puzzle Strike this weekend also. Similar to Dominion, but a bit more streamlined, and seemingly less prone to drag on for a long time. My friend had made a PnP version and glued everything on poker chips - this totally beat the shit out of cards. I was hesitant due to a total lack of interest of any Japanese/manga/anime themes, but here it is so thin that you don't notice it, so no big issue. I liked it for a quick filler, but not sure I'd buy a copy. If I could find someone to assemble a PnP...I'll wait til he needs cash....

Thanks for the run down on the LotR LCG Marty. I'm thinking about picking up the Core Set for something to play with my wife in the evenings when there's nothing good on TV, and I like that this would be cooperative rather than competitive. I get bored with simpler games (e.g., Lost Cities, Caesar & Cleopatra, etc.) pretty quickly and this looks like it should have enough 'meat' on it to keep my interest although I'm not in the mood to get swallowed up by the collectible card game sinkhole again (I've already done that three times in the past: X-Files, Mythos, and Legend of the 5 Rings). The LCG aspect of the expansions makes me think I can get away with just the Core Set and the occasional Adventure Pack to change things up.

I am totally digging PUZZLE STRIKE. The online game now has rules enforcement , which makes that a lot easier to play. I went online and played a coupe of games. Got rocked, but started to feel things gelling. I also played with my kids, which they like more for the tactile sense than the game itself. The biggest downside to the game is the lingo learning curve. There's only so much room to print on those chips, so you need to learn the difference between trash and discard, what "on the top of your bag" is, crash and counter-crash, &c. Can someone go into detail on the DOMINION v. PUZZLE STRIKE comparison? I have never played the former. From what I understand, that separates the deck-building from the game a little more, no? In PS, "deck-building" is a part of your turn, other parts involve actually doing stuff.

Here's a F:AT link to PUZZLE STRIKE .

Re: Puzzle Strike vs. Dominion.

Caveat: I only have really played the base set of Dominion, plus Intruige. Plus one play of Seaside. The main difference is that there is only one real decision any given turn of Dominion, and that's what to buy. The hands essentially play themselves; everything is focused on building up as many buys and as much money as possible. The rest is gravy. Bland gravy. So to address your post: "From what I understand, [Dominion] separates the deck-building from the game a little more, no?" ... it's the opposite. There is precious little difference in Dominion between deckbuilding and playing the game. (If I understand you correctly.)

In PS, the decisions are harder. Yes, "what to buy" is still really important. But the game state is more complex due to the gem pile and the various things that can affect it. At any given moment you have to be really aware of the tempo of the game and how close your right-hand opponent is to crashing. (And how likely your left-hand opponent is to counter-crashing.)

In Dominion, the thing that makes you win (victory cards) are things that make your deck suck. They generally don't do anything worthwhile. Some expansion set VPs have minor effects but they are always worse than the cards that just do something with no VPs. So it creates a very typical Eurogame decision of when to transition from building your engine, to using the engine to accumulate VPs. It's more fun in Dominion than in (say) PR but it's still overly familiar. In Puzzle Strike, the things that make you win are the things that make your deck great. Which I like because the reward for being awesome should be awesomeness, not clogging your deck with dumb and boring cards that are nonetheless required to win.

One interesting difference is the approach to a catchup mechanism: In Dominion the leader will start to transition to VP-buys, which makes his deck less efficient, which allows everyone to start to catch up. In PS, the leader crashes gems and sends them to you, which makes your pile bigger, which gives you more draws, which lets you do more fun things. I think PS is a lot more fun.

The character chips in PS ensure that everyone has to play differently. In Dominion all positions are identical.