Is this game too difficult?

[Legatron]

Granted the game is pretty new, but it seems like the mechanics make it too hard. And that is playing on the easiest difficulty too.

I feel like it is too resource intensive and restrictive. The are no movement options like there are in Pandemic, so everything feel like it's so far away. Plus the nature of the objectives are so specific that it makes spreading out around the board difficult. Especially late in the game when enemy troops get placed throughout the board, players may have left that area long ago, and there are not real options for getting back.

I also feel like everything is too resource heavy. A lot of actions take some sort of payment to use, and those resources come to you slow and get spent really fast. A lot of the game is the inability to do what you need because it's so hard to get the tools to do so. That is just regarding actions too, much less objective fulfillment and secret paths (sometimes mandatory).

Does anyone else feel like this game needs to be revised for these reasons, or do you disagree?

[Starwarrior1128]

I agree that this game is too difficult. I've played Pandemic many times and I also played the Cthulhu themed version of Pandemic and it was great (we had to stop the spread of madness instead of diseases). I read the rules and watched a playthrough and every time I tried playing this game on BGA we lost very quick, I even tried playing it solo so that I had the upmost command and control over the characters and I couldn't stop the hope counter from flying towards victory for the evil side before I was able to accomplish the very first mission.

[crazy114]

I played two single player games and felt okay. Although I didn't win either, it's probably because my methods were wrong. In the first game, I only focused on fighting to kill the nazgol and forgot my goal, which resulted in not enough cards in the end. The second Frodo entered Mordor, but Merry also followed in, and Mordor had no army to establish a haven, making it impossible to respond to the search. If Merry had attracted attention outside and the army inside had built a haven, I should have won. Of course, it could also be my luck. If it's three or four players playing, there should be more characters and it should be easier to win, as long as everyone doesn't quit halfway.

[HalfelvenHobbit]

I've played a few games on easy at this point and I would agree it feels too hard. We've been absolutely destroyed every time, incredibly quickly. It's way too hard to get the resources you need to do things like conquer havens and use secret paths. It feels like everything is so restrictive that you have to burn more resources than are available to do all your actions. So many turns end up wasted because you just can't do anything because of the cards you've drawn.
I think it's a good game, but I would agree it needs a revision to make it a little more achievable.

UPDATE: I played it again in 4 player Hotseat mode, played as efficiently as I possibly could to get all of the cards needed to the players that needed them, and still lost 1 turn before destroying the ring because the player deck ran out. And in that time, the Eagles event card never showed up even though I went through the entire deck. That card would have changed the game by allowing Arwen to fly to frodo and fellowship for free to get the last ring card instead of having to waste turns getting to the right regions for fellowship actions.

I may be lowering my rating on this game based on how impossible easy mode is. I understand the game being intentionally difficult, but honestly at this point it feels kind of ridiculous.

[Adonnenniel]

While I agree that Fate of the Fellowship is quite difficult, it is possible to win. Another player and I lost the first two times. The first time because we focused too much on completing the objectives, and the second time because we focused too much on fighting the Shadow Troops. However, for the third game, we tried to balance both the completion of the objectives and the extermination of the Shadow Troops, while also stocking up on tokens by preparing. We did end up winning the third game, so the strategy seems to take concentration and balance. This game mostly takes a lot of time and patience. However, it is quite enjoyable. (An interesting thing to notice is how the details of the game correspond to the details of the books, not perfectly, but enough to add a level of fascination to the game.)

[NoReplication]

This game doesn't allow for many mistakes is what I'll say.

That being said I enjoyed it and got my first win with you just now !

[Calmon70]

I played the game 5 times solo (all standard) and while I abandoned the first 3 games I won the last 2 and had a lot of fun. I really like the playstyles of different chars. When I have Eowyn for example I managed to kill most of the Natzgul (especially good with the "Eagles" Event card) and when I had Boromir in different game I conquered all but 1 shadow fortress. Different stuff seems to work even I usually end up with 1 stack of doom.

Game is pretty good but the game itself is a demo for sure. You can't increase difficult settings and the fix objectives makes it too repetitive soon.

[cybrweez]

Played 3 games, with another player, both pandemic (also pandemic star wars) players. This is definitely harder, which is good for co-op, I like the more challenging aspect. But intro should be easier than it is. I feel the demand on valor is too high, b/c you need 3 for objective and 3 for any shadowhold you want to conquer to up hope. Seems to be too reliant on getting lucky, which we haven't in 2 player game, with 3 or 4 would be even harder (cards spread out more?). Though I imagine more players does make containing shadow troops easier, since you can keep them spread out. I wonder if I'm missing a rule or something...

[Remkar]

I've played a lot of Pandemic and Spirit Island, and I just finished my first solo game of this.

I lost, but I didn't look at the map around Mordor closely until the last handful of turns, and I didn't realize how much movement I'd need to bring Frodo/Sam from the North (I had them in Dale in the mid game for safety plus preparation moves since none of my other characters were up there while I worked through the 3 other goals).

I still finished all goals except destroying the ring, and I managed to get Frodo/Sam to Mt Doom, but I only had 4 rings to spend, so even though my hope was mid-level, I couldn't complete the final quest (and there were no more rings in the deck, so I eventually lost when the deck ran out).

Knowing that now, I think I'll be ok as long as I keep Frodo/Sam more to the South so Gandalf doesn't have to ride up North and haul them back down to where they should have been.

I try to play another couple games this week, though, and see what I think about the difficulty now that I have a better feel for the rules and the map.

[COMaestro]

Just finished my first game with one other player, and we managed a victory. Barely, because the last roll for destroying the Ring was lose 4 Hope which was just enough to hit the bottom of the track, but I had one Friendship card left in hand to negate one of them.

I think a lot is going to be based on if you use the pre-selected characters or go random. Since we did pre-selected, I had Frodo & Sam and Legolas, while the other player had Merry & Pippin and Eowyn. Having Legolas, I was able to generate 1 Stealth a turn, which meant Frodo could move 1 space freely, and also helped greatly once he got to Mordor. We had the first objective for Rivendell accomplished after a couple turns. Meanwhile, Legolas started bringing the two Elven armies south and Eowyn moved towards Isengard, Mustering troops on the way.

Legolas sniped some Orcs to weaken Isengard and brought the Elven armies in after Eowyn got there with her armies and it fell pretty quickly, accomplishing the second objective. Legolas proceeded to Minas Tirith with all the surviving armies to prep for the third objective while Eowyn stayed behind to Muster more forces and protect Helm's Deep. Meanwhile Frodo was moving down into Gondor and then moving East towards Mordor.

After threatening Sauron at North Ithilien to accomplish the third objective, it opened the path for Frodo & Sam to sneak into Mordor. Some moving let us meet up to trade a Ring and Stealth card, and a lucky event let us trade a necessary Stealth token.

Other than Isengard, we never conquered a shadow fortress, we never lost a Haven as the troops just never seemed to move that way, or were killed before they could reach one. I won't say it was easy, by any stretch of the imagination, but it certainly wasn't impossible and didn't feel too difficult. But it is a game, we felt, that would be much better to play IRL than virtually. At least async, anyway. Maybe real-time would be better, but that can be hard to organize.