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Retailers: March to War with Conquest Demo Decks

Apply Today for One of Our Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kits

“We are the slayers of kings, the destroyers of worlds, bringers of ruination and death in all its forms. These things we do in the name of the Emperor and in the defense of Mankind. Let none stay our wrath.”
    –Captain Cato Sicarius, Ultramarines 2nd Company

U.S. RETAILERS: Apply today to receive a free Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit!

                                         

International retailers should contact their local distributor.

International retailers should contact their local distributor for details.

Since the announcement of Warhammer 40,000: Conquest, player excitement for this new LCG® has grown exponentially. Now, we’re offering retailers throughout the United States and other select regions a new tool to gather armies of fans: our Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit.

This demo kit is designed to introduce the endless war of Warhammer 40,000: Conquest to new players and fans of other customizable card games. This Demo Kit contains four sets of demo decks, allowing your players to take command of Ork or Space Marine armies as they battle to conquer the Traxis sector.

Each Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit contains the following components:

     
• Four sets of demo decks (one Space Marine deck, one Ork deck, and seven planet cards included in each set).
     
• One full-art folder for containing and organizing the information in your kit.
     
• One sheet of information to help you make the best use of your Demo Kit.
     
• One demo guide that provides you with both a clear understanding of the game’s fundamental concepts and a structured approach to your demo games.
     
• One Warhammer 40,000: Conquest rules summary sheet designed for use with the demo decks.
     
• One promotional Warhammer 40,000: Conquest poster.

Note: Our Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit supplies are limited. To increase your chances of receiving one of these kits, apply now!

The Clash of Arms

In every game of Warhammer 40,000: Conquest, two players clash over the planets of the Traxis sector. Planets provide crucial resources and card draw, and winning strategic battles on planets brings players closer to victory. Players must deploy their armies throughout the sector and lead them to war with their warlord. A warlord is the heart of an army, but if he is ever slain in battle, that player loses the game!

The Space Marine and Ork demo decks included in the Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit feature plenty of armies and battle tactics for players to unleash, inviting them to take their first steps along the road to war.

March to War

Don’t pass up this opportunity to establish your local player base for Warhammer 40,000: Conquest. Join the excitement for Warhammer 40,000: Conquest today and support players near you. Our Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit is available to you free while supplies last, so apply now!

Note: International retailers should contact their local distributor for inquiries and orders.

...

Source: Retailers: March to War with Conquest Demo Decks

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Retailers: March to War with Conquest Demo Decks

Apply Today for One of Our Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kits

“We are the slayers of kings, the destroyers of worlds, bringers of ruination and death in all its forms. These things we do in the name of the Emperor and in the defense of Mankind. Let none stay our wrath.”

   –Captain Cato Sicarius, Ultramarines 2nd Company

U.S. RETAILERS: Apply today to receive a free Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit!

   
       
           
       
   

International retailers should contact their local distributor.

International retailers should contact their local distributor for details.

Since the announcement of Warhammer 40,000: Conquest, player excitement for this new LCG® has grown exponentially. Now, we’re offering retailers throughout the United States and other select regions a new tool to gather armies of fans: our Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit.

This demo kit is designed to introduce the endless war of Warhammer 40,000: Conquest to new players and fans of other customizable card games. This Demo Kit contains four sets of demo decks, allowing your players to take command of Ork or Space Marine armies as they battle to conquer the Traxis sector.

Each Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit contains the following components:

   
• Four sets of demo decks (one Space Marine deck, one Ork deck, and seven planet cards included in each set).

   
• One full-art folder for containing and organizing the information in your kit.

   
• One sheet of information to help you make the best use of your Demo Kit.

   
• One demo guide that provides you with both a clear understanding of the game’s fundamental concepts and a structured approach to your demo games.

   
• One Warhammer 40,000: Conquest rules summary sheet designed for use with the demo decks.

   
• One promotional Warhammer 40,000: Conquest poster.

Note: Our Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit supplies are limited. To increase your chances of receiving one of these kits, apply now!

The Clash of Arms

In every game of Warhammer 40,000: Conquest, two players clash over the planets of the Traxis sector. Planets provide crucial resources and card draw, and winning strategic battles on planets brings players closer to victory. Players must deploy their armies throughout the sector and lead them to war with their warlord. A warlord is the heart of an army, but if he is ever slain in battle, that player loses the game!

The Space Marine and Ork demo decks included in the Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit feature plenty of armies and battle tactics for players to unleash, inviting them to take their first steps along the road to war.

March to War

Don’t pass up this opportunity to establish your local player base for Warhammer 40,000: Conquest. Join the excitement for Warhammer 40,000: Conquest today and support players near you. Our Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Demo Kit is available to you free while supplies last, so apply now!

Note: International retailers should contact their local distributor for inquiries and orders.

...

Source: Retailers: March to War with Conquest Demo Decks

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Conquer Westeros

A New A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Pool Is Now Available

“When Aegon the Dragon stepped ashore in Westeros, the kings of Vale and Rock and Reach did not rush to hand him their crowns. If you mean to sit his Iron Throne, you must win it as he did, with steel and dragonfire.”
     –George R.R. Martin, A Storm of Swords

Conquer Westeros! Westeros Draft Starters and Draft Packs for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play are now available via FFG’s in-house manufacturing.

Westeros is a new pool of cards for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play, and it challenges players to forge a new vision for the Seven Kingdoms, even as they seek to win the Iron Throne.

The Westeros draft experience centers around the Westeros draft pool, a collection of 240 randomized cards, which include a healthy representation of cards drawn from the Living Card Game's two most recently completed cycles, Kingsroad and Conquest and Defiance, as well as no fewer than thirty-four preview cards from the upcoming Wardens cycle. Moreover, the Westeros card pool features ten different “draft format only” cards that ensure your draft experiences will be both truly dynamic and unique.

Your trials begin as you build your deck, assembling an army from the pool’s Prized cards, its various Bannermen, its crested characters, and the different plots you’ll wish to hatch from within your Castles. As the draft pool prominently features each of these different themes, the Westeros Draft Starter lays the foundation for your conquest, featuring the beginnings of a solid economic base and a couple of devious plots, the “draft format only” cards, Counting Coppers (Westeros Draft Starter, 10) and Filthy Accusations (Westeros Draft Starter, 11).

Then, your ambitions lead you to battlefields across the Seven Kingdoms, into the shadows of King’s Landing alleyways, and into meetings with foreign dignitaries. Numerous conflicts will divide your attentions and force you to spread your forces, but you must master both your challenges and your foes if you wish to win the Iron Throne – and rule Westeros!

For more about how Westeros Draft Starters and Draft Packs allow players to participate in an alternative and exciting draft play format for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game, visit our A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play description page.

What Do I Need to Play?

Each player participating in a Westeros draft will need to bring two items: a nineteen-card Westeros Draft Starter and one fifty-card Westeros Draft Pack.

Draft Starters:

The Westeros Draft Starter is a fixed collection of rules and nineteen core cards that include a draft-only agenda, Treaty (Westeros Draft Starter, 1), locations like Kingsroad Inn (Westeros Draft Starter, 9) that help you launch your early economy, and five plots to serve as the spine of your plot deck.

 Cards marked “draft format only” are not legal in standard play.

Importantly, the cards in the Westeros Draft Starter vary from those of the Ice & Fire Draft Starter, and the result is that the Westeros draft experience offers more flexibility with your influence and the recruitment of out-of-House characters, locations, and other cards. All of these Draft Starter cards are clearly distinguished from both the larger A Game of Thrones: The Card Game card pool and the cards in the Westeros Draft Packs, meaning you can easily sort them after your games and prepare for your next draft. Best of all, because Westeros Draft Starters are reusable, you only need one, no matter how many Westeros drafts you play!

 All draft cards are clearly identified by a new icon, and starter pack cards are further distinguished from draft cards by color.

Draft Packs:

Westeros Draft Packs are collections of fifty random cards, compiled according to a custom algorithm from a card pool of 240 cards called Westeros.

To learn more about how Westeros Draft Packs are created, visit the A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play description page.

All cards found in Westeros draft products, except for those marked “draft format only,” are legal in standard tournament play as soon as they are tournament legal and released within the standard LCG® format. Accordingly, each card from the Wardens cycle will become legal for tournament play once the LCG Chapter Pack in which it is contained goes on sale at retailers. However, because of variations in production color and card-stock resulting from our in-house manufacturing, players using draft cards in tournaments must sleeve their cards with opaque or art sleeves.

Fight for Your Vision of the Seven Kingdoms

Can you survive the tumultuous challenges of A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play? Assemble your army, plot your schemes, and make your bid for the Iron Throne with the Westeros draft pool for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game!

Pick up your Westeros Draft Starter and Draft Pack today!

Note: A Game of Thrones: The Card Game draft products do not serve as a replacement for the standard A Game of Thrones: The Card Game LCG® model. Instead, A Game of Thrones: The Card Game draft products allow players to enjoy the game through an additional format of play. Orders for products printed via FFG's in-house manufacturing may take 10 – 14 days to ship.

...

Source: Conquer Westeros

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Nightmares in the Dwarrowdelf

Nightmare Decks Are Now Available for the First Three Dwarrowdelf Scenarios

“It may have been only a trick of the wind in the cracks and gullies of the rocky wall, but the sounds were those of shrill cries, and wild howls of laughter. Stones began to fall from the mountain-side, whistling over their heads […]”

    –J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Deep in the Misty Mountains, the Orcs are massing once more. But why are they massing? And who has called them? These are questions that need answering, but the answers lie deep within the heart of the Dwarrowdelf, an underground realm hidden behind treacherous mountain passes and magical doors. As the days grow shorter and the nights grow longer, will you join those heroes bound to explore the Dwarrowdelf and uncover its secrets?

Three new Nightmare Decks are now available for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game!

Nightmare Decks for The Redhorn Gate, Road to Rivendell, and The Watcher in the Water allow you to revisit the first three scenarios from the Dwarrowdelf cycle, but recast this time amid the deadly enemies, locations, and treacheries of the game’s Nightmare Mode.

As with all Nightmare Decks, these expansions each introduce nineteen alternate encounter cards and setup instructions that amplify the trials, tension, and atmosphere of the scenarios they modify.

For more specific details, we turn to developer Matt Newman.

The Redhorn Gate

The encounter cards of The Redhorn Gate Nightmare Deck are focused on increasing the scenario’s atmosphere and theme, while simultaneously providing a new layer of difficulty that should challenge many decks in new ways. Of the nineteen new encounter cards, ten of them have the Snow trait, further enhancing the scenario’s focus on the freezing cold that makes the heroes’ mountain pass a truly perilous journey. These Snow cards are then highlighted by the selection of cards that are removed from the encounter deck during setup, as well as the deadly synergies that are created when you encounter new cards like Caradhras the Cruel (The Redhorn Gate Nightmare Deck, 8) or Icy Cavern (The Redhorn Gate Nightmare Deck, 5).

As a reminder, The Redhorn Gate forces your heroes to navigate a terrible pass through the Misty Mountains, riddled with effects that decrease their Willpower and that punish them for daring to cross its snowy peaks. At its worst, the scenario destroys any character whose Willpower reaches zero. Accordingly, the new encounter cards in this Nightmare Deck push this theme even further, not just reducing your characters’ Willpower, but also making it harder for you to boost their Willpower. Worse yet, the Orcs of the Misty Mountain are more menacing than ever before, and they come prepared to outflank some of the game’s most popular defenders.

Road to Rivendell

If you manage to survive your journey through The Redhorn Gate and its many perils, you’ll face an entirely new set of challenges along the Orc-infested paths to Rivendell. In the Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, the Ambush keyword receives several upgrades, the first of which is an effect that ensures that enemies that ambush the players during still contribute their threat to the staging area until the end of the Quest phase. This mechanic is included on the Road to Rivendell Nightmare Mode setup card (Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, 1):

“Forced: When an enemy with the ambush keyword engages a player during the quest phase, it contributes its threat to the total threat in the staging area until the end of the phase.”

This effect, combined with those of the new locations in this Nightmare Deck, like Treacherous Bluffs (Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, 7), make being ambushed far more deadly than ever before. What’s worse, the ambushing enemies have received a substantial upgrade, as well, and almost every new enemy triggers a potentially lethal ability when it engages a player.

Of course, Road to Rivendell is all about safely escorting Arwen Undómiel to Rivendell, so this Nightmare Deck also introduces cards that target her directly, including a new stage two quest card, Ambush in the Night (Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, 2), that will force players to come to the Elf’s rescue!

The Watcher in the Water

When it came time to develop the Nightmare Deck for the much beloved scenario, The Watcher in the Water, one crucial idea drove all my design: it’s all about The Watcher (The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck, 2). In Nightmare Mode, The Watcher in the Water encounter deck is extremely tight, consistent, and atmospheric, containing only Tentacle enemies and highly thematic locations and treacheries, like Banks of Sirannon (The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck, 5) and Pulled Under (The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck, 7).

Additionally, the Nightmare version of this scenario no longer gives players the choice of whether to fight The Watcher or solve the riddle of the Doors of Durin; in this version, you must do both to win.

Of course, The Watcher has, itself, changed substantially, with a hefty twenty-one hit points and a thematic effect driven by the setup card:

“Forced: When a Tentacle enemy is destroyed, deal 1 damage to The Watcher if it is in play.”

This represents the twenty-one tentacles that the Fellowship saw shooting out of the water to grab Frodo and his companions during their journey into Moria. With each Tentacle the players defeat, The Watcher grows weaker, but it has its own ways of regenerating health and protecting its legion of arms from damage.

One of the most popular strategies that players traditionally employed to defeat this scenario was to include many “scrying” abilities – abilities that allow the players to look at the top card of the encounter deck, such as Henamarth Riversong (Core Set, 60) or Rumour from the Earth (Return to Mirkwood, 124). Such a tactic allows players to easily solve the Doors of Durin’s riddle, or predict many of the abilities that The Watcher’s Tentacle enemies will trigger. However, in Nightmare Mode, players will find this popular strategy hindered by the Hideous Depths (The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck, 6) in which The Watcher resides.

Each of these Nightmare Decks offers horrifying new twists on the scenarios they revisit, and I hope you have fun adapting your strategies to face them. With some courage, clever thinking, and perhaps a bit of luck, perhaps you may find the means to prevail over crushing odds and make your way into Moria…

Alámenë!

Stand Against the Shadow

In the East, the Shadow of Mordor grows ever stronger and darker. The Dark Lord’s armies swell, and his influence can be felt throughout all of Middle-earth. As his power grows, so do the challenges of those scenarios recast in the shadows of Nightmare Mode. This makes the need to undertake these quests and stand against the Shadow all the more urgent… even as the quests themselves become ever deadlier.

Will you be the one to rise to the challenge? Will you stand against the evils of Mordor? Will you join the heroes gathered to explore the Dwarrowdelf and its secrets?

Head to your local retailer today to pick up your copies of The Redhorn Gate Nightmare Deck, Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, and The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck. Or order your copies online through our webstore.

...

Source: Nightmares in the Dwarrowdelf

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Nightmares in the Dwarrowdelf

Nightmare Decks Are Now Available for the First Three Dwarrowdelf Scenarios

“It may have been only a trick of the wind in the cracks and gullies of the rocky wall, but the sounds were those of shrill cries, and wild howls of laughter. Stones began to fall from the mountain-side, whistling over their heads […]”
     –J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Deep in the Misty Mountains, the Orcs are massing once more. But why are they massing? And who has called them? These are questions that need answering, but the answers lie deep within the heart of the Dwarrowdelf, an underground realm hidden behind treacherous mountain passes and magical doors. As the days grow shorter and the nights grow longer, will you join those heroes bound to explore the Dwarrowdelf and uncover its secrets?

Three new Nightmare Decks are now available for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game!

Nightmare Decks for The Redhorn Gate, Road to Rivendell, and The Watcher in the Water allow you to revisit the first three scenarios from the Dwarrowdelf cycle, but recast this time amid the deadly enemies, locations, and treacheries of the game’s Nightmare Mode.

As with all Nightmare Decks, these expansions each introduce nineteen alternate encounter cards and setup instructions that amplify the trials, tension, and atmosphere of the scenarios they modify.

For more specific details, we turn to developer Matt Newman.

The Redhorn Gate

The encounter cards of The Redhorn Gate Nightmare Deck are focused on increasing the scenario’s atmosphere and theme, while simultaneously providing a new layer of difficulty that should challenge many decks in new ways. Of the nineteen new encounter cards, ten of them have the Snow trait, further enhancing the scenario’s focus on the freezing cold that makes the heroes’ mountain pass a truly perilous journey. These Snow cards are then highlighted by the selection of cards that are removed from the encounter deck during setup, as well as the deadly synergies that are created when you encounter new cards like Caradhras the Cruel (The Redhorn Gate Nightmare Deck, 8) or Icy Cavern (The Redhorn Gate Nightmare Deck, 5).

As a reminder, The Redhorn Gate forces your heroes to navigate a terrible pass through the Misty Mountains, riddled with effects that decrease their Willpower and that punish them for daring to cross its snowy peaks. At its worst, the scenario destroys any character whose Willpower reaches zero. Accordingly, the new encounter cards in this Nightmare Deck push this theme even further, not just reducing your characters’ Willpower, but also making it harder for you to boost their Willpower. Worse yet, the Orcs of the Misty Mountain are more menacing than ever before, and they come prepared to outflank some of the game’s most popular defenders.

Road to Rivendell

If you manage to survive your journey through The Redhorn Gate and its many perils, you’ll face an entirely new set of challenges along the Orc-infested paths to Rivendell. In the Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, the Ambush keyword receives several upgrades, the first of which is an effect that ensures that enemies that ambush the players during still contribute their threat to the staging area until the end of the Quest phase. This mechanic is included on the Road to Rivendell Nightmare Mode setup card (Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, 1):

“Forced: When an enemy with the ambush keyword engages a player during the quest phase, it contributes its threat to the total threat in the staging area until the end of the phase.”

This effect, combined with those of the new locations in this Nightmare Deck, like Treacherous Bluffs (Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, 7), make being ambushed far more deadly than ever before. What’s worse, the ambushing enemies have received a substantial upgrade, as well, and almost every new enemy triggers a potentially lethal ability when it engages a player.

Of course, Road to Rivendell is all about safely escorting Arwen Undómiel to Rivendell, so this Nightmare Deck also introduces cards that target her directly, including a new stage two quest card, Ambush in the Night (Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, 2), that will force players to come to the Elf’s rescue!

The Watcher in the Water

When it came time to develop the Nightmare Deck for the much beloved scenario, The Watcher in the Water, one crucial idea drove all my design: it’s all about The Watcher (The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck, 2). In Nightmare Mode, The Watcher in the Water encounter deck is extremely tight, consistent, and atmospheric, containing only Tentacle enemies and highly thematic locations and treacheries, like Banks of Sirannon (The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck, 5) and Pulled Under (The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck, 7).

Additionally, the Nightmare version of this scenario no longer gives players the choice of whether to fight The Watcher or solve the riddle of the Doors of Durin; in this version, you must do both to win.

Of course, The Watcher has, itself, changed substantially, with a hefty twenty-one hit points and a thematic effect driven by the setup card:

“Forced: When a Tentacle enemy is destroyed, deal 1 damage to The Watcher if it is in play.”

This represents the twenty-one tentacles that the Fellowship saw shooting out of the water to grab Frodo and his companions during their journey into Moria. With each Tentacle the players defeat, The Watcher grows weaker, but it has its own ways of regenerating health and protecting its legion of arms from damage.

One of the most popular strategies that players traditionally employed to defeat this scenario was to include many “scrying” abilities – abilities that allow the players to look at the top card of the encounter deck, such as Henamarth Riversong (Core Set, 60) or Rumour from the Earth (Return to Mirkwood, 124). Such a tactic allows players to easily solve the Doors of Durin’s riddle, or predict many of the abilities that The Watcher’s Tentacle enemies will trigger. However, in Nightmare Mode, players will find this popular strategy hindered by the Hideous Depths (The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck, 6) in which The Watcher resides.

Each of these Nightmare Decks offers horrifying new twists on the scenarios they revisit, and I hope you have fun adapting your strategies to face them. With some courage, clever thinking, and perhaps a bit of luck, perhaps you may find the means to prevail over crushing odds and make your way into Moria…

Alámenë!

Stand Against the Shadow

In the East, the Shadow of Mordor grows ever stronger and darker. The Dark Lord’s armies swell, and his influence can be felt throughout all of Middle-earth. As his power grows, so do the challenges of those scenarios recast in the shadows of Nightmare Mode. This makes the need to undertake these quests and stand against the Shadow all the more urgent… even as the quests themselves become ever deadlier.

Will you be the one to rise to the challenge? Will you stand against the evils of Mordor? Will you join the heroes gathered to explore the Dwarrowdelf and its secrets?

Head to your local retailer today to pick up your copies of The Redhorn Gate Nightmare Deck, Road to Rivendell Nightmare Deck, and The Watcher in the Water Nightmare Deck. Or order your copies online through our webstore.

...

Source: Nightmares in the Dwarrowdelf

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Conquer Westeros

A New A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Pool Is Now Available

“When Aegon the Dragon stepped ashore in Westeros, the kings of Vale and Rock and Reach did not rush to hand him their crowns. If you mean to sit his Iron Throne, you must win it as he did, with steel and dragonfire.”

    –George R.R. Martin, A Storm of Swords

Conquer Westeros! Westeros Draft Starters and Draft Packs for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play are now available via FFG’s in-house manufacturing.

Westeros is a new pool of cards for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play, and it challenges players to forge a new vision for the Seven Kingdoms, even as they seek to win the Iron Throne.

The Westeros draft experience centers around the Westeros draft pool, a collection of 240 randomized cards, which include a healthy representation of cards drawn from the Living Card Game's two most recently completed cycles, Kingsroad and Conquest and Defiance, as well as no fewer than thirty-four preview cards from the upcoming Wardens cycle. Moreover, the Westeros card pool features ten different “draft format only” cards that ensure your draft experiences will be both truly dynamic and unique.

Your trials begin as you build your deck, assembling an army from the pool’s Prized cards, its various Bannermen, its crested characters, and the different plots you’ll wish to hatch from within your Castles. As the draft pool prominently features each of these different themes, the Westeros Draft Starter lays the foundation for your conquest, featuring the beginnings of a solid economic base and a couple of devious plots, the “draft format only” cards, Counting Coppers (Westeros Draft Starter, 10) and Filthy Accusations (Westeros Draft Starter, 11).

Then, your ambitions lead you to battlefields across the Seven Kingdoms, into the shadows of King’s Landing alleyways, and into meetings with foreign dignitaries. Numerous conflicts will divide your attentions and force you to spread your forces, but you must master both your challenges and your foes if you wish to win the Iron Throne – and rule Westeros!

For more about how Westeros Draft Starters and Draft Packs allow players to participate in an alternative and exciting draft play format for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game, visit our A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play description page.

What Do I Need to Play?

Each player participating in a Westeros draft will need to bring two items: a nineteen-card Westeros Draft Starter and one fifty-card Westeros Draft Pack.

Draft Starters:

The Westeros Draft Starter is a fixed collection of rules and nineteen core cards that include a draft-only agenda, Treaty (Westeros Draft Starter, 1), locations like Kingsroad Inn (Westeros Draft Starter, 9) that help you launch your early economy, and five plots to serve as the spine of your plot deck.

Cards marked “draft format only” are not legal in standard play.

Importantly, the cards in the Westeros Draft Starter vary from those of the Ice & Fire Draft Starter, and the result is that the Westeros draft experience offers more flexibility with your influence and the recruitment of out-of-House characters, locations, and other cards. All of these Draft Starter cards are clearly distinguished from both the larger A Game of Thrones: The Card Game card pool and the cards in the Westeros Draft Packs, meaning you can easily sort them after your games and prepare for your next draft. Best of all, because Westeros Draft Starters are reusable, you only need one, no matter how many Westeros drafts you play!

All draft cards are clearly identified by a new icon, and starter pack cards are further distinguished from draft cards by color.

Draft Packs:

Westeros Draft Packs are collections of fifty random cards, compiled according to a custom algorithm from a card pool of 240 cards called Westeros.

To learn more about how Westeros Draft Packs are created, visit the A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play description page.

All cards found in Westeros draft products, except for those marked “draft format only,” are legal in standard tournament play as soon as they are tournament legal and released within the standard LCG® format. Accordingly, each card from the Wardens cycle will become legal for tournament play once the LCG Chapter Pack in which it is contained goes on sale at retailers. However, because of variations in production color and card-stock resulting from our in-house manufacturing, players using draft cards in tournaments must sleeve their cards with opaque or art sleeves.

Fight for Your Vision of the Seven Kingdoms

Can you survive the tumultuous challenges of A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Draft Play? Assemble your army, plot your schemes, and make your bid for the Iron Throne with the Westeros draft pool for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game!

Pick up your Westeros Draft Starter and Draft Pack today!

Note: A Game of Thrones: The Card Game draft products do not serve as a replacement for the standard A Game of Thrones: The Card Game LCG® model. Instead, A Game of Thrones: The Card Game draft products allow players to enjoy the game through an additional format of play. Orders for products printed via FFG's in-house manufacturing may take 10 – 14 days to ship.

...

Source: Conquer Westeros

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Palace Intrigues

Preview the Scenarios of The Last Banquet

My dear Baron, I am flattered by your interest in my wares, but the king naturally has the first selection from my goods. He has such a love of exotic goods, and personally ordered me to bring these silks back from India. Take a look at this jeweled, double-edged dagger, but be careful – it’s very sharp. It‘s my present for the king, to demonstrate how highly I regard him. In fact, I intend to give him the dagger during this very banquet… if you take my meaning.
    –The Trader

Ambitious courtiers, greedy citizens, and wily servants compete for power in The Last Banquet. In this large-group game, you and your friends take on the roles of guests at a royal banquet where no guest can be trusted and scandal is served hot. Using the actions allowed, players strive to further their faction’s agenda. Whether your goal is noble or nefarious, you’ll need cleverness and guile to triumph at court.

Our last preview introduced some of the cunning and deceitful palace personalities you and your friends can play in The Last Banquet. Today, we’ll look at two of the six possible scenarios that shape the game.

Rival Assassins

In A League of Traitors the duke and the baron both seek to kill the king and seize the throne for themselves. Before game play begins, fifteen to twenty-five players separate into three roughly equal factions: the duke’s faction, the baron’s, and the king’s. Whichever faction succeeds in their assassination attempt wins the game, but if the king survives three rounds of play, his faction is victorious.

The duke’s faction and the baron’s faction then secretly choose assassins by giving one player either the dagger token or the poison token. The assassin kills the king by sitting next to him at the end of a round and revealing his weapon. If there is an assassin sitting on both sides of him, the king avoids death and another round begins, since neither faction wants to be caught in the act of murder.

Both the trader and the lady’s maid make ideal assassins. Under the pretense of serving the court, the lady’s maid can use her action to directly approach any royalty or nobility. Similarly, the trader can lure a royal or noble character towards him, as if encouraging that character to look at his costly merchandise. Your faction can avoid suspicion by saving your assassin’s action for the last possible moment. That way, no other character can interfere and separate the assassin from their target. 

 

A Royal Rescue

In The Missing Princess, six to ten players work cooperatively to free the princess from the clutches of the traitorous duke who has abducted and imprisoned her. In order to save her, you must defeat the duke’s palace guards, steal their keys, escape from a vicious hound, enter the palace, and find the princess.

When you set up your playing area for this scenario, establish a place for the guard tower, where the guards stand watch and keep the keys, one for the gatehouse, and a place between them for the bastion, where you set the princess character card. Male characters, such as the baron, messenger, and king attempt to defeat the guards by moving next to the guard tower. When the four guard tokens are gone, the keys can be liberated. Female characters attempt to get the keys and move into the gatehouse, where they can search for the princess. If you have found the princess at the beginning of your turn, your group wins.

The duke begins next to the guard tower, and moves through the other players, switching one place at a time. Whenever a player carrying the keys switches places with the duke, that player has essentially been caught and must return the keys to the guard tower. If the duke moves adjacent to a player in the gatehouse, then your rescue attempt has been foiled, the princess remains captive, and the duke triumphs.

Take Your Place at the Royal Table

The king’s murder and princess’s abduction aren’t the only scandals shaking up this court. In The Count’s Estate, clergy and citizens vie to inherit the best of the deceased man’s land and lavish possessions. If you like ghost stories, you might choose to play The White Maiden’s Lament, in which the king’s dead wife haunts the palace and seeks vengeance against the new queen.

Play despicable nobility or trustworthy servants, take on the role of the king or pay him court. The Last Banquet offers a wide variety of roles to play, plots to execute, and knavery to enjoy at your large-group gathering.

Prepare to enter the palace gates. Pre-order The Last Banquet from your local retailer today!

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Source: Palace Intrigues

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X-Wing (TM) Mission Control

Share Missions and Explore the Galaxy with This Free Online Tool

“Stand-by alert. Death Star approaching. Estimated time to firing range, fifteen minutes.”
     –Star Wars: A New Hope

Inspired by the dramatic space battles of the original Star Wars trilogy, X-Wing™ allows players to wage fast-paced, squad-based dogfights between Rebel and Imperial starfighters. Flexible squad-building rules allow tremendous potential for customization; even with just a few ships, you hold a wide range of options with the game’s many pilots and upgrades.

Now, your X-Wing experience becomes even more personalized and customizable with the release of X-Wing Mission Control!

X-Wing Mission Control is a free online resource that allows you to design and share new X-Wing missions.

 Build and share custom X-Wing missions with Mission Control!

Recreate Famous Battles or Imagine Your Own!

Coordinate a daring assault run along the Death Star trench, confront the Rebel fleet outside of Endor, or dodge asteroids in pursuit of the Millennium Falcon. X-Wing Mission Control’s custom editor allows you to easily create any play scenario you can imagine, whether it’s drawn from the Star Wars trilogy or completely unique.

Simply select the size of your play area and define the ships you wish to permit. You can create mission-specific squad-building rules, or you can identify any number of specific ships and upgrades. If you use Mission Control to track your collection, it will even identify any mission components not included in your X-Wing collection.

Furthermore, Mission Control’s custom editor easily allows you to select components from all available X-Wing products. Will you try to break through the Imperial blockade with your GR-75 medium transport? Will you invent a mission to hunt down a powerful Imperial prototype starfighter? Shifting your focus from harrowing dogfights to large, tactical battles is as simple as dragging a ship to the map or removing it.

 A screenshot of Mission Control’s map editor.

With Mission Control’s toolset, you’ll quickly create maps, define terrain elements, and add deployment zones, as well as any helpful mission-specific rules.

Expand Your Galaxy

Once you’ve created a scenario, you can download it to the Mission Control database. Mission Control allows you to publish your missions so that players around the world can download and enjoy them. All of Mission Control’s user-generated missions are free to access, and you can even vote for your favorites.

With its database of published missions, X-Wing Mission Control allows you to enjoy a whole galaxy’s worth of fan-created Star Wars drama!

All Wings Report In

X-Wing has quickly grown to become one of the biggest and best-loved miniatures games around the world. Simultaneously, its growth has been accompanied by that of an enthusiastic and welcoming worldwide community.

Now that X-Wing community gains another tool with which to express itself. Are you a part of the X-Wing community? Share your ideas and your love of the game. Explore X-Wing Mission Control today, and see what this free online tool has to offer you!

Please note: Mobile devices are not supported at this time. Currently, the X-Wing Mission Control beta is only compatible with Safari, Chrome, and Firefox web browsers. We invite all users of the Mission Control open beta to offer feedback or report technical issues by posting on our forums.

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Source: X-Wing (TM) Mission Control

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Sins of Askellon

A Designer Diary for Dark Heresy Second Edition

“Gather tears for the sins of ye fathers, O children of Askellon.”
    –Saint Valerius, Introit to the Apocrypha Askellios

Recently, we released Dark Heresy Second Edition, a new roleplaying game that casts players as Acolytes in the service of an Inquisitor amidst the grim darkness of the far future. In every game, you face the horrors of the Warp-stained Askellon sector, striving to buy humanity more time.

The darkness of the Askellon sector has never been explored before Dark Heresy Second Edition. Today, Andy Hoare, a leading author at Black Library and one of the major authors in Dark Heresy Second Edition, discusses the game’s new setting: the dark and ancient Askellon sector.

Andy Hoare on the Askellon Sector in Dark Heresy Second Edtion

The Askellon sector is an entirely new sector of the Imperium, departing from the Calixis Sector of Dark Heresy, the Koronus Expanse of Rogue Trader, the Jericho Reach of Deathwatch, the Screaming Vortex of Black Crusade and the Spinward Front of Only War. Although this sector is new, it is still subtly linked to the regions of the Imperium that you may have experienced before. Players steeped in the lore of the Calixis Sector and its connected regions may recall scattered mentions of some other locations – the Scelus and Ixaniad Sectors, the “Dread” Madrigal Sector, and an unnamed region bluntly labelled “Access Denied.” This once-forbidden sector is the region in which Dark Heresy Second Edition is set, and the reason for its ominous designation quickly becomes clear to Game Masters and players that dare to enter.

The Askellon sector has been marked “off limits” even by the great Navigator Houses. Ravenous data-phages slowly work their way through Imperial archives, redacting the region from stellar maps. The reason for this is simple—a seemingly endless Warp Storm, called the Pandaemonium, roars through the Askellon sector. This tempest exists on a huge scale that may one day even rival the Maelstrom and the Eye of Terror.

Because of this, the Askellon sector is doomed, but not to a swift, glorious, or merciful death. The region and its people have courted damnation since the very earliest days of human settlement in this sector. Countless legends describe the earliest days of Askellon, but few can be trusted. Some stories claim that the colonists of the first worlds were damned before they arrived; others say the settlers were helplessly fleeing some great calamity or betrayal. These first core worlds clung together through the terrors of the Age of Strife, so that when the Great Crusade finally cast out the shadows of Old Night, Askellon stood as one. Tales from those days exist only as mythical legend and consecrated texts, describing the arrival of the Emperor and the galactic war of rebellion in sacred verses. There are manifold tales of glorious conflict and celebration from those dark times, though apocryphal whispers dare to question these events and Askellon’s role in them. Of course, such accusations are not uttered openly, for the Lords of Askellon are all-powerful within their domains, and a formidable history is not a matter for open discussion.

Askellon is steeped in damnation, forming a microcosm of the larger Imperium’s fate. The institutions of the Askellon sector are crumbling, its ruling classes are beyond corrupt, its worlds are riven with endless war, and all the while, the enemies of Mankind plot its downfall. Uncounted border systems have been lost to the Pandaemonium and other threats over the millennia, and the Imperium may perhaps turn its back on Askellon once and for all. Many of Mankind’s great pillars regard the sector as lost already, so when a high adept of the Adeptus Terra passes away, none replace him. Worst of all, the League of Black Ships has been erratic at best when scouring the sector for psykers. All of Askellon seethes with Warp energies that threaten to draw the questing coils of the Pandaemonium onwards.

Upon these cursed stars falls the inscrutable eye of the Inquisition. Few Inquisitors operate openly in Askellon: to do so would be to court a repeat of the internecine conflict known as the Vaxi Atrocity that burned an entire sub-sector and saw dozens of Inquisitors and their indentured armies clash for no benefit, save that of the dark gods. An uneasy truce holds rival Inquisitors at a distance, but their wars grind on, fought by proxy through their Acolytes, even as they struggle to uncover a fraction of the crimes attributed to the Lords of Askellon. Those sworn to an Inquisitor’s service have their duties to perform, even as the sector crumbles around them.

There are those who would abandon Askellon and its masters to their fate, allowing them to be consumed by the ravening Warp. But others fear that this course of action would allow a daemonic incursion of unprecedented scale. If this invasion occurred, the worlds of an entire sector would be transformed into the domains of Daemons, and the fall of the Imperium brought even closer. Only the bold servants of the Inquisition are willing to lay down their lives to avert this dire fate, even as the Lords of Askellon invent new sins in a sector seething with the darkest heresies known to Mankind.

Enter the Askellon Sector

Thanks, Andy!

The doom of the Askellon sector may be certain, but there are still those of the Inquisition who will fight to the death before they see more of the Imperium slip into eternal night. Take your place among that heroic number as you make your investigations and battle for the fate of the Askellon sector!

Dark Heresy Second Edition is now available online through our webstore and at your local retailer.

...

Source: Sins of Askellon

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Attack on Echo Base

Preview the Struggles of STAR WARS (TM): Empire vs. Rebellion

“General, prepare your troops for a surface attack.”
    –Darth Vader, Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

In June, we announced Star Wars™: Empire vs. Rebellion, a two-player card game of tense strategic battles and clever bluffing that places you in command of the Galactic Empire or the Rebel Alliance during the Galactic Civil War. Each turn, you must influence key events in your favor by using the resources, iconic characters, and overarching strategies at your disposal.

In today’s preview, we’ll take a closer look at a game round, giving an example of a struggle over a memorable event from the classic Star Wars films: the Empire’s attack on Echo Base.

Walkers Incoming

A round of Empire vs. Rebellion begins by revealing the top card of the event deck. In this case, the contested event is Attack on Echo Base. The faction that claims victory in this event expands their power through the galaxy and gains the victory point and influence rewards shown in the upper right-hand corner of the card. The lower left-hand corner shows the event card’s capacity, which limits the number of resource cards, and the objective value, which is the target both Empire and Rebellion strive to reach. The faction that comes closest to the objective value without surpassing it claims victory in the attack on Echo Base, claiming Hoth for the Empire or the Rebellion.

In this example, Phil controls the Rebel Alliance and Sara leads the Galactic Empire. Before they play cards in the struggle, however, they each choose a strategy card. Strategy cards give both players a secret way to affect the struggle, and they are kept secret until the end of the struggle, when both strategies are revealed and take effect.

At this point in the game, Sara has already seen Phil’s Deception strategy. This strategy allows the player who would lose the event to win the event instead. Phil can’t choose this strategy again until he plays each of his remaining strategies, so Sara decides that the Direct Assault strategy is the best choice for this struggle. This strategy increases the resource value on her resource cards by two when determining victory.

Phil, on the other hand, wants to control how Sara plays in a future round. With this in mind, he chooses the Infiltration strategy. This strategy allows Phil to choose Sara’s strategy card in the next round, potentially helping him to lock her into a certain play style. After both players choose a strategy, the struggle phase and the attack on Echo Base begin.

Imperial Troops Enter the Base

On a player’s turn, he has four options. He can bring more resources to bear on the struggle by playing a new card from the top of his deck, he can exhaust a card to trigger its power, he can spend influence to ready a card, or he can pass. After completing one of these options, the turn passes to the other player. The struggle continues until both players pass consecutively.

Sara begins the Empire’s assault on the secret Rebel base by drawing the top card of her resource deck and playing it, revealing a Recon resource card with a resource value of three. The turn then passes to Phil, who also chooses to play the top card of his deck, revealing Chewbacca! Chewbacca is one of the Rebel Alliance’s eight unique character resource cards. He possesses a resource value of six while ready, and by triggering his power, Phil may exhaust up to two of Sara’s resource cards.

On her next turn, Sara takes advantage of her Recon resource card, exhausting it to trigger its power. Sara has the option to look at the top two cards of any resource deck, discarding one of the two cards and replacing the other. Sara decides that she would rather filter her opponent’s cards. Upon looking at the top two card’s of Phil’s resource deck, she finds a Recon resource card with a value of two, and a Military resource card with a value of five. She discards the two resource, leaving the five-value resource. By leaving Phil with a high resource card on top of his deck, she can push him closer to overshooting the event’s objective value.

Phil takes his turn next, playing the top card off of his deck and revealing the Military resource card with a value of five. Together with Chewbacca, this puts Phil’s total resource value at eleven – a total greater than the Attack on Echo Base objective value of nine. If the event ends with Phil’s resource value higher than the objective value, Phil automatically loses the event, leaving Sara and the Galactic Empire in control of Echo Base.

Sara has no ready resource cards, so she chooses to play the top card of her deck, revealing a The Force resource card with a value of two. This brings her revealed resource total to five, or seven with the hidden bonus from the Direct Assault strategy. The turn passes to Phil, and he triggers Chewbacca’s power, which serves the dual purpose of exhausting Sara’s The Force resource and lowering his own resource value to six.

On Sara’s next turn, she decides that filtering her own future cards may be her best chance of winning the event. To that end, she spends an influence to ready her Recon resource card, preparing her to use its power again. Phil wants to prevent Sara from reusing her Recon resource, however, so on his turn, he exhausts his Military resource card to discard her Recon resource card. Sara plays another new card on her turn, revealing a Diplomacy resource card with a resource value of three. Unfortunately, the special text of Attack on Echo Base states that Diplomacy cards’ power can’t be used during this struggle, making the power of Sara’s newest card useless.

At this point, Phil sees that Sara has a total resource value of five, while he has a resource value of six. He doesn’t want to play another card for fear of going over the event’s objective value, so he chooses to pass. Sara, however, knows that her chosen strategy card adds two to her resource value, bringing her to a total of seven. Because Phil passed on his last turn, Sara also passes, and the struggle ends. Both players reveal their strategies, and Sara’s Direct Assault strategy brings her resource value closer to the objective value than Phil’s, bringing victory to the Galactic Empire!

Sara claims the event and the spoils of victory – two victory points and one influence. The first player to seven victory points in Empire vs. Rebellion claims dominion over the galaxy. Although the Galactic Empire was triumphant in the Attack on Echo Base, the Rebel Alliance will make its stand on separate planets and continue the fight for freedom across the galaxy.

The First Transport Is Away

Star Wars: Empire vs. Rebellion is a climatic game expanding the narrative of the ongoing war between the Galactic Empire and the Rebellion. You hold the power to relive moments from the classic movies and change the course of iconic events, but you’ll need every resource at your disposal to claim victory in the Galactic Civil War.

Preorder Empire vs. Rebellion at your local retailer today!

...

Source: Attack on Echo Base

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Sins of Askellon

A Designer Diary for Dark Heresy Second Edition

“Gather tears for the sins of ye fathers, O children of Askellon.”
    –Saint Valerius, Introit to the Apocrypha Askellios

Recently, we released Dark Heresy Second Edition, a new roleplaying game that casts players as Acolytes in the service of an Inquisitor amidst the grim darkness of the far future. In every game, you face the horrors of the Warp-stained Askellon sector, striving to buy humanity more time.

The darkness of the Askellon sector has never been explored before Dark Heresy Second Edition. Today, Andy Hoare, a leading author at Black Library and one of the major authors in Dark Heresy Second Edition, discusses the game’s new setting: the dark and ancient Askellon sector.

Andy Hoare on the Askellon Sector in Dark Heresy Second Edtion

The Askellon sector is an entirely new sector of the Imperium, departing from the Calixis Sector of Dark Heresy, the Koronus Expanse of Rogue Trader, the Jericho Reach of Deathwatch, the Screaming Vortex of Black Crusade and the Spinward Front of Only War. Although this sector is new, it is still subtly linked to the regions of the Imperium that you may have experienced before. Players steeped in the lore of the Calixis Sector and its connected regions may recall scattered mentions of some other locations – the Scelus and Ixaniad Sectors, the “Dread” Mandragora Sector, and an unnamed region bluntly labelled “Access Denied.” This once-forbidden sector is the region in which Dark Heresy Second Edition is set, and the reason for its ominous designation quickly becomes clear to Game Masters and players that dare to enter.

The Askellon sector has been marked “off limits” even by the great Navigator Houses. Ravenous data-phages slowly work their way through Imperial archives, redacting the region from stellar maps. The reason for this is simple—a seemingly endless Warp Storm, called the Pandaemonium, roars through the Askellon sector. This tempest exists on a huge scale that may one day even rival the Maelstrom and the Eye of Terror.

Because of this, the Askellon sector is doomed, but not to a swift, glorious, or merciful death. The region and its people have courted damnation since the very earliest days of human settlement in this sector. Countless legends describe the earliest days of Askellon, but few can be trusted. Some stories claim that the colonists of the first worlds were damned before they arrived; others say the settlers were helplessly fleeing some great calamity or betrayal. These first core worlds clung together through the terrors of the Age of Strife, so that when the Great Crusade finally cast out the shadows of Old Night, Askellon stood as one. Tales from those days exist only as mythical legend and consecrated texts, describing the arrival of the Emperor and the galactic war of rebellion in sacred verses. There are manifold tales of glorious conflict and celebration from those dark times, though apocryphal whispers dare to question these events and Askellon’s role in them. Of course, such accusations are not uttered openly, for the Lords of Askellon are all-powerful within their domains, and a formidable history is not a matter for open discussion.

Askellon is steeped in damnation, forming a microcosm of the larger Imperium’s fate. The institutions of the Askellon sector are crumbling, its ruling classes are beyond corrupt, its worlds are riven with endless war, and all the while, the enemies of Mankind plot its downfall. Uncounted border systems have been lost to the Pandaemonium and other threats over the millennia, and the Imperium may perhaps turn its back on Askellon once and for all. Many of Mankind’s great pillars regard the sector as lost already, so when a high adept of the Adeptus Terra passes away, none replace him. Worst of all, the League of Black Ships has been erratic at best when scouring the sector for psykers. All of Askellon seethes with Warp energies that threaten to draw the questing coils of the Pandaemonium onwards.

Upon these cursed stars falls the inscrutable eye of the Inquisition. Few Inquisitors operate openly in Askellon: to do so would be to court a repeat of the internecine conflict known as the Vaxi Atrocity that burned an entire sub-sector and saw dozens of Inquisitors and their indentured armies clash for no benefit, save that of the dark gods. An uneasy truce holds rival Inquisitors at a distance, but their wars grind on, fought by proxy through their Acolytes, even as they struggle to uncover a fraction of the crimes attributed to the Lords of Askellon. Those sworn to an Inquisitor’s service have their duties to perform, even as the sector crumbles around them.

There are those who would abandon Askellon and its masters to their fate, allowing them to be consumed by the ravening Warp. But others fear that this course of action would allow a daemonic incursion of unprecedented scale. If this invasion occurred, the worlds of an entire sector would be transformed into the domains of Daemons, and the fall of the Imperium brought even closer. Only the bold servants of the Inquisition are willing to lay down their lives to avert this dire fate, even as the Lords of Askellon invent new sins in a sector seething with the darkest heresies known to Mankind.

Enter the Askellon Sector

Thanks, Andy!

The doom of the Askellon sector may be certain, but there are still those of the Inquisition who will fight to the death before they see more of the Imperium slip into eternal night. Take your place among that heroic number as you make your investigations and battle for the fate of the Askellon sector!

Dark Heresy Second Edition is now available online through our webstore and at your local retailer.

...

Source: Sins of Askellon

[RSSFeeder]

Clandestine Cultists and Secret Orders

A Preview of The Sleeper Below Expansion for Call of Cthulhu: The Card Game

“My uncle blamed his old age, Wilcox afterward said, for his slowness in recognising both hieroglyphics and pictorial design. Many of his questions seemed highly out-of-place to his visitor, especially those which tried to connect the latter with strange cults or societies.”

    –H.P. Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu

In Call of Cthulhu: The Card Game, immense and terrifying creatures lie dormant in deathless slumber hundreds of fathoms beneath the surface of the ocean. Other unfathomable creatures, the inhabitants of extra-dimensional worlds just beyond the edges of our own, can reach across time and space to influence the dreams of artists, lunatics, and other visionaries.

While the vast majority of humanity remains blissfully ignorant of these strange creatures, there are a handful who recognize their existence, and the ways in which they respond to this knowledge are as varied as the nature of humanity itself. Many of them go mad, unable to process the ramifications of such terrifying realities. Some recognize the existence of these creatures as threats to humanity and its continued existence, and they work to ensure that these creatures will never fully enter the human realm. Some try to exploit their knowledge for power, offering themselves as servants or seeking the means to control these alien powers that they can’t even fully understand.

Finally, a good number of these individuals elect to congregate with others who share their knowledge and interests. They seek greater strength in numbers and form secret societies or cults. And with the upcoming release of The Sleeper Below deluxe expansion, these Societies will begin to more fully impact the struggles of Call of Cthulhu.

In our previous previews of The Sleeper Below, we’ve looked at the expansion’s new Dormant mechanic and the ways in which its many new characters lend strength and flavor to the Cult of Cthulhu. However, while the majority of The Sleeper Below is dedicated to the slumbering Cthulhu and his cult, the expansion also bolsters each of the game’s other factions. One of the chief ways in which it does so is through the introduction of new Society characters, each of which costs six resources but plays for less if your opponent has won any stories.

Societies in The Sleeper Below

Each of the eight Society characters in The Sleeper Below represents a group of similarly minded individuals who are bent upon secretly advancing their own agenda, whether that agenda be to defend humanity’s interests, seize control of humanity, or summon forth the Great Old Ones.

It makes sense, then, that these Societies are more skillful and capable than nearly every individual character within the game. Each Society comes with six skill and a mix of five struggle icons. They’re all unique, and at six cost, they’re all quite expensive. Of course, high-cost characters come with some inherent benefits, such as the ability to bypass Negotium Perambulans in Tenebris (Dunwich Denizens, 80) and a higher degree of protection from such cost-based events as from Pushed into the Beyond (Touched by the Abyss, 109) and Deep One Assault (Core Set, 56).

Still, games of Call of Cthulhu are often won or lost before players are able to build a single domain up to six resources, so there’s no guarantee you’ll be able to pay any Society character’s full six cost.

However, each Society also comes with a shared effect; the cost to play any Society is reduced by two for each story card in an opponent’s won pile, and they each come with powerful game effects, many of which can quickly turn a game on its head.

In the end, then, each of these Society characters appears to offer a potential late-game swing. The further you find yourself behind, or the closer you get to the end of a close game, the more impactful they become. This is true, but there’s more to these complicated Societies than just a late-game push. Their abilities and subtypes can engender a good variety of mid-game combination plays.

To Preserve Order

While the Ancient Ones and their worshippers seek to sow chaos throughout the world, some Societies, like the US Archaeological Society (The Sleeper Below, 44) seek to thwart the Ancient Ones and preserve order. Or at least a form of order.

Each Society character in The Sleeper Below has two subtypes, the first of which is Society, and the second subtype can tell you a lot about how you might be able to put the character’s talents to good use. For example, the US Archaeological Society’s Explorer subtype allows it to benefit from a wide range of synergies with other Explorers like Roald Ellsworth (Seekers of Knowledge, 4) and Brette Wulffsen (Seekers of Knowledge, 5).

Moreover, even as the US Archaeological Society allows you to search for Lost Civilizations each time you place a success token at a story where it is committed, the Lost Civilization Ultima Thule (Seekers of Knowledge, 26) allows you to commit the US Archaeological Society to stories as early as your first Story phase.

The US Archaeological Society isn’t the only group looking to maintain order in The Sleeper Below. The Criminals of the Hip Sing Tong (The Sleeper Below, 53) intend to make sure no unexpected evils interfere with their profits, The Peel Association (The Sleeper Below, 40) protects mankind by stripping its foes of the ability to use some of its most valuable resources, and H.O.S.T. (The Sleeper Below, 49) continues to promote its own order.

Notably, H.O.S.T. doesn’t gain as much as some of the other Societies from its secondary subtype, Independent, but it certainly doesn’t lack for interactions with other cards. In fact, once it comes into play, H.O.S.T. is one of the Societies most likely to change the nature of a game. Its action reads:

“Action: Return a Lodge character to your hand. Then, draw 1 card. Limit 3 times per turn.”

In combination with other Lodge characters like Nathan Wick (Written and Bound, 13) and Lord Jeffrey Farrington (The Order of the Silver Twilight, 18), H.O.S.T. can even help you recover and snatch victory from the brink of defeat. And it’s Independent subtype? That offers you a bit of protection in the form of 607 Walter Street (Kingsport Dreams, 39), which ensures that even The Plague Stone (Terror in Venice, 32) won’t be able to permanently disrupt the Order’s secret ambitions.

To Sow Chaos

Of course, if the forces of humanity can have their Societies, then so can the Ancient Ones and their followers. All four of the mythos factions gain Society characters whose second subtype is Cultist, and that means that they give each of the mythos factions new tools they can use to extract benefits from all of the other Cultist-themed effects in The Sleeper Below, not to mention the rest of the Call of Cthulhu card pool.

This likely means that players looking to make full use of these new mythos Society characters may explore decks that partner cards from two or more factions. If they do, a maddening array of possible combinations awaits them. For example, aligning the Cult of Cthulhu with the Sons of Carcosa (The Sleeper Below, 42) and other Cultists dedicated to Hastur would dramatically increase the impact of a Harbinger of Insanity (Murmurs of Evil, 27).

Alternatively, were Cthulhu’s Cultists to join forces with those of Shub-Niggurath, the event Even Here She Dwells (Never Night, 80) could provide you a massive burst of early card draw, and The Shepherds (The Sleeper Below, 46) would allow you to resource some of your most powerful characters early on but still retain access to them later in the game.

Finally, the Guardians of the Gate (The Sleeper Below, 55), a Society dedicated to Yog-Sothoth, may posses the most game-changing of all the new Societies’ abilities, but their lack of Combat icons makes them vulnerable in the story phase. Even a lowly Black Dog (Words of Power, 29) could destroy them… That is until the Society coordinates its efforts with the Cult of Cthulhu and gains access to such powerful items as the Horrific Statuette (The Sleeper Below, 20).

And in a well-crafted Cultist deck, the draw limitations imposed upon both players by the Guardians of the Gate might begin to appear truly one-sided once you make use of Unaussprelichen Kulten (The Sleeper Below, 25), Servant to the Elder Things (Lost Rites, 77), and Speak to the Dead (Whispers in the Dark, 20).

Choose Your Cause

While it is primarily dedicated to Cthulhu and his followers, The Sleeper Below lends considerable strength to each of the game’s factions, and the expansion’s eight new Society characters are certain to find their way into a wide array of new decks.

Will you join with other individuals dedicated to the promotion of order? Or will you help call the earth to ruin? The time to decide draws near. The Sleeper Below is coming. Head to your local retailer to pre-order your copy today!

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Source: Clandestine Cultists and Secret Orders

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A Word from the Developers

Updates Will Begin After the Beta Is Available at Retailers

Hello, Force and Destiny Beta testers!

Thank you for joining the beta test for Star Wars®: Force and Destiny™. We’re pleased that so many of you already managed to pick up advanced copies of the Beta Rulebook from Gen Con and contribute to the discussions on our forums.

While these early conversations have already generated a lot of useful feedback, we will not be starting the update process quite yet. Before we start making any large changes or updates, we want to make sure that all testers have a chance to have their voices heard. Because of this, we will be waiting for the copies of the Beta to be available in stores before we start posting updates. Once everyone has had a chance to play the game and share opinions about the book, we can make the most informed decision about what changes to make.

Once the Beta copies are widely available, we expect the beta process will run roughly eight to ten weeks, depending on the level of feedback and number of changes we need to implement. You can discuss changes with other beta testers on our public forum which can be found at www.fantasyflightgames.com/forceanddestinybeta. You can also submit feedback to us directly at forceanddestinybeta@fantasyflightgames.com.

Throughout the beta process, we will be reviewing your feedback and developing updates, which we will post regularly. These updates will include changes to the rules, potential additions we are considering, and direct requests to focus additional testing on certain parts of the book. We plan on posting our first beta update on Tuesday, September 9th, and we will ask you to focus your attention toward some specific areas of the game.

Thanks for your participation! We look forward to hearing feedback and making Force and Destiny the best game it can possibly be.

...

Source: A Word from the Developers

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The End of the World

Announcing a New Roleplaying Game Line of Horror and Survival

“Shoot it in the head – that works in the movies!”

   –A survivor who’s about to be very disappointed

Fantasy Flight Games is proud to announce the upcoming release of The End of the World series, a new roleplaying game line of horror and survival in humanity’s last days!

Four books make up The End of the World roleplaying game series. Each of these four books offers a different apocalyptic genre and experience. The first book in the series, Zombie Apocalypse, challenges you to face hordes of undead that rise and stalk the earth, hungry for the flesh of the living. The series continues with Wrath of the Gods, pitting players against a pantheon of supernatural foes intent of destroying humanity. Ranging from the Mayan apocalypse to Cthulhu, the gods return to exact terrible vengeance in this book. The third installment in the series is Alien Invasion, giving you the opportunity to battle unknown life forms from beyond our galaxy. You may face a species of conquering warriors, or aliens too small to see with the naked eye. Finally, Revolt of the Machines invites you to match wits against artificial intelligence. When our technology develops consciousness, even normal people will need to battle technology in every form. Each of these books offers a complete self-contained experience, although they share the same rules system. No matter which apocalypse you want to explore, you’ll find unending horror and adventure in this roleplaying series.

Better Me than You

In the majority of roleplaying games, you take on the persona of a fictional character – ranging from a elven thief to a half-orc war-mage to a human soldier, and beyond. The End of the World line changes all of this by inviting you to play as yourself amidst the tumult of the world’s ending! You’ll use your own physical, mental, and social attributes to create yourself as an in-game character, allowing you to come as close as you (safely) can to experiencing the apocalypse first-hand. In addition to your chosen attributes, you can represent yourself more accurately by imagining positive and negative features. For example, you may have the Long-distance Runner positive feature, but you may also cope with the Extremely Nearsighted negative feature. Another character may have the Natural Leader positive feature, but this could be tempered by the Wants Revenge negative feature.

Since you’re playing yourself in every game of The End of the World, your starting gear is also limited to what you can find close at hand when you sit down to play the game. You could start with a cell phone, but how long will it stay charged? Who knows how long the cash in your wallet will be accepted as viable currency in light of the world’s ending? You might want a good shotgun to defend yourself, but that could mean venturing out of your friend’s apartment. Kitchen knives might be your only available weapons for defending yourself against hordes of ravenous zombies or conquering aliens.

The Beginning of the End

The world can end in countless ways, and in each of The End of the World books, there are five different scenarios for you to experience. Because these scenarios function like different campaign settings within the same theme, you can enjoy all of these scenarios time and time again. Although each book’s scenarios share the titular theme, there’s plenty of room for variation within the genre. In Zombie Apocalypse, for example, every scenario varies in the origin of the zombies, the government’s response, the timeline of the apocalypse, the ways you can kill the zombies, and countless other details, both large and small. The apocalypse may start with an outbreak of disease, or a sudden earthquake that releases a once-dormant parasite.

Of course, even the panic and terror of the apocalypse can’t last forever. Eventually, you’ll have to cope with the aftermath. Each scenario features a post-apocalypse, illustrating how some semblance of order returns in the shattered aftermath of the apocalypse. No matter how humanity has adapted in order to survive, life in the post-apocalypse is completely different from life before. The post-apocalypse is just as dangerous as the apocalypse itself, presenting entirely different challenges and threats to whatever remains of you and your haggard band of survivors. Aliens may enslave the nations, or Norse gods may return to earth to enact the cataclysmic battles of Ragnarök.

Because of the flexible apocalypse/post-apocalypse scenario structure, your adventures at the end of the world can vary widely in length. Whether you play a single session that ends in gruesome death for every player, or begin a campaign that stretches from apocalypse to post-apocalypse and beyond, every scenario takes you straight to the terror and adventure of the apocalypse.

For more on the The End of the World experience, we turn to the game’s developer, Tim Flanders.

Developer Tim Flanders on the End of the World

For the last several months, I’ve had the pleasure of working on something a little different – a series of roleplaying games called The End of the World, which begins with Zombie Apocalypse. Each game in The End of the World series covers five thematically linked scenarios that bring the world as we know it to a dramatic end. The four books in The End of the World are each dedicated to a beloved apocalypse genre that has inspired countless movies, books, comics, and stories. You can experience these apocalypses with any tone, whether you choose to play a light and humorous version of the end times, or embrace the horror that surrounds the end of life as we know it.

Obviously, the first book, Zombie Apocalypse, covers the much-loved brain-eating undead. One of the great things about starting with this particular form of the apocalypse is the amazing depth of narrative and sheer quantity of media on the subject. The amount of material available for inspiration is nearly endless, and I think the scenarios we’ve included in this book sum up the most exciting elements of the genre. Game Masters will be able to dive headlong into their favourite themes and tropes from zombie horror. In this book, we’ve got everything from shambling, brain-hungry undead to tireless, sprinting rage zombies. There are infections, radiation, parasites, and even voodoo magic!

Of course, the other major theme that runs through the entire game line is that the players get to explore and experience these world-ending events as themselves. This is, hands down, the most exciting part of this game for me. The idea of playing through an apocalyptic (and eventually post-apocalyptic) scenario with my friends, in my home town, definitely adds a pretty unique thrill to the game.

I think people are going to be very excited about this new game line we’re working on, and I can’t wait to hear what kinds of stories your group comes up with as you make your way through The End of the World!

The End Is Nigh

Thanks, Tim!

The day of the dead rising is quickly approaching. It’s up to you to ensure that you survive the apocalypse. For more information on the other books in The End of the World line, visit the description page.

Prepare for hordes of zombies to end the world with the release of Zombie Apocalypse in the fourth quarter of 2014, and look for the rest of the books in The End of the World series to be released at a later date!

...

Source: The End of the World

[RSSFeeder]

The End of the World

Announcing a New Roleplaying Game Line of Horror and Survival

“Shoot it in the head – that works in the movies!”

   –A survivor who’s about to be very disappointed

Fantasy Flight Games is proud to announce the upcoming release of The End of the World series, a new roleplaying game line of horror and survival in humanity’s last days!

Four books make up The End of the World roleplaying game series. Each of these four books offers a different apocalyptic genre and experience. The first book in the series, Zombie Apocalypse, challenges you to face hordes of undead that rise and stalk the earth, hungry for the flesh of the living. The series continues with Wrath of the Gods, pitting players against a pantheon of supernatural foes intent of destroying humanity. Ranging from the Mayan apocalypse to Cthulhu, the gods return to exact terrible vengeance in this book. The third installment in the series is Alien Invasion, giving you the opportunity to battle unknown life forms from beyond our galaxy. You may face a species of conquering warriors, or aliens too small to see with the naked eye. Finally, Revolt of the Machines invites you to match wits against artificial intelligence. When our technology develops consciousness, even normal people will need to battle technology in every form. Each of these books offers a complete self-contained experience, although they share the same rules system. No matter which apocalypse you want to explore, you’ll find unending horror and adventure in this roleplaying series.

Better Me than You

In the majority of roleplaying games, you take on the persona of a fictional character – ranging from a elven thief to a half-orc war-mage to a human soldier, and beyond. The End of the World line changes all of this by inviting you to play as yourself amidst the tumult of the world’s ending! You’ll use your own physical, mental, and social attributes to create yourself as an in-game character, allowing you to come as close as you (safely) can to experiencing the apocalypse first-hand. In addition to your chosen attributes, you can represent yourself more accurately by imagining positive and negative features. For example, you may have the Long-distance Runner positive feature, but you may also cope with the Extremely Nearsighted negative feature. Another character may have the Natural Leader positive feature, but this could be tempered by the Wants Revenge negative feature.

Since you’re playing yourself in every game of The End of the World, your starting gear is also limited to what you can find close at hand when you sit down to play the game. You could start with a cell phone, but how long will it stay charged? Who knows how long the cash in your wallet will be accepted as viable currency in light of the world’s ending? You might want a good shotgun to defend yourself, but that could mean venturing out of your friend’s apartment. Kitchen knives might be your only available weapons for defending yourself against hordes of ravenous zombies or conquering aliens.

The Beginning of the End

The world can end in countless ways, and in each of The End of the World books, there are five different scenarios for you to experience. Because these scenarios function like different campaign settings within the same theme, you can enjoy all of these scenarios time and time again. Although each book’s scenarios share the titular theme, there’s plenty of room for variation within the genre. In Zombie Apocalypse, for example, every scenario varies in the origin of the zombies, the government’s response, the timeline of the apocalypse, the ways you can kill the zombies, and countless other details, both large and small. The apocalypse may start with an outbreak of disease, or a sudden earthquake that releases a once-dormant parasite.

Of course, even the panic and terror of the apocalypse can’t last forever. Eventually, you’ll have to cope with the aftermath. Each scenario features a post-apocalypse, illustrating how some semblance of order returns in the shattered aftermath of the apocalypse. No matter how humanity has adapted in order to survive, life in the post-apocalypse is completely different from life before. The post-apocalypse is just as dangerous as the apocalypse itself, presenting entirely different challenges and threats to whatever remains of you and your haggard band of survivors. Aliens may enslave the nations, or Norse gods may return to earth to enact the cataclysmic battles of Ragnarök.

Because of the flexible apocalypse/post-apocalypse scenario structure, your adventures at the end of the world can vary widely in length. Whether you play a single session that ends in gruesome death for every player, or begin a campaign that stretches from apocalypse to post-apocalypse and beyond, every scenario takes you straight to the terror and adventure of the apocalypse.

For more on the The End of the World experience, we turn to the game’s developer, Tim Flanders.

Developer Tim Flanders on The End of the World

For the last several months, I’ve had the pleasure of working on something a little different – a series of roleplaying games called The End of the World, which begins with Zombie Apocalypse. Each game in The End of the World series covers five thematically linked scenarios that bring the world as we know it to a dramatic end. The four books in The End of the World are each dedicated to a beloved apocalypse genre that has inspired countless movies, books, comics, and stories. You can experience these apocalypses with any tone, whether you choose to play a light and humorous version of the end times, or embrace the horror that surrounds the end of life as we know it.

Obviously, the first book, Zombie Apocalypse, covers the much-loved brain-eating undead. One of the great things about starting with this particular form of the apocalypse is the amazing depth of narrative and sheer quantity of media on the subject. The amount of material available for inspiration is nearly endless, and I think the scenarios we’ve included in this book sum up the most exciting elements of the genre. Game Masters will be able to dive headlong into their favourite themes and tropes from zombie horror. In this book, we’ve got everything from shambling, brain-hungry undead to tireless, sprinting rage zombies. There are infections, radiation, parasites, and even voodoo magic!

Of course, the other major theme that runs through the entire game line is that the players get to explore and experience these world-ending events as themselves. This is, hands down, the most exciting part of this game for me. The idea of playing through an apocalyptic (and eventually post-apocalyptic) scenario with my friends, in my home town, definitely adds a pretty unique thrill to the game.

I think people are going to be very excited about this new game line we’re working on, and I can’t wait to hear what kinds of stories your group comes up with as you make your way through The End of the World!

The End Is Nigh

Thanks, Tim!

The day of the dead rising is quickly approaching. It’s up to you to ensure that you survive the apocalypse. For more information on the other books in The End of the World line, visit the description page.

Prepare for hordes of zombies to end the world with the release of Zombie Apocalypse in the fourth quarter of 2014, and look for the rest of the books in The End of the World series to be released at a later date!

...

Source: The End of the World