The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game – Across the Ettenmoors

A moderately difficult scenario. Challenging, but not making you gnash your teeth. The difficulty level seems spot on. Another positive is a variability. Side quests (from the encounter deck) play a prominent role.

One of my favorite adventure packs. The quest is a fantastic thematic experience of running from safe place to safe place, attempting to avoid large, punishing enemies, and being pummeled by harsh weather. It really feels like a rough trek across the moors, and while tense, it's very beatable. The cards themselves are a mixed bag - some great allies and Spirit cards, but niche or weak Hero and other events.

I like that it was a long scenario (at least in my experience), thematic as hell and tough enemies. Even though other players found it to be an easy scenario, that wasn't my case - the right combination of set up, tough treacheries and specific enemies can make you sweat right from the start. One of my favourite scenarios so far.

LoTR is criticized for scenarios having a short shelf life. So it's nice that, in [i]Ettenmoors[/i], there's some variability in the starting side quest and safe location. The quest itself is a combat exercise with heavy hitters in the form of trolls, giants, and closeted secrets from a misspent youth. Keep an umbrella handy, since the grating Weather treacheries are ported over from the Lost Realm set. Those suck. On the positive side, we appreciated being able to complete two consecutive quests on Standard difficulty mode. That hasn't happened in ages, even though our complementary generalist decks are more than decent.