Designers:  Roberto Di Meglio, Marco Maggi, Francesco Nepitello

War of the Ring is a two player game (though there are some gibberish rules for 3 or 4 players) that depicts the epics story that is The Lord of the Rings.  One player takes the side of the free people’s of middle-earth on a quest to defend the realm while the fellowship of the ring attempts to carry the one ring of power to Mount Doom while the other player takes on the evil forces of Sauron trying to crush the people of middle-earth and re-claim the ring of power.  In a nutshell you are effectively re-writing the history of the Lord of the Rings story in the form of an epic board game with every finite detail from the books and movies imaginable built into the mechanics.

To say that War of the Ring is anything but one of the most thematic games ever made would be a major understatement.  It IS the story of the Lord of the Rings and every mechanic, every card, every action and every nuance of the game reeks of the middle-earth theme.  I have played many Lord of the Rings board games, card games and miniatures games but none come even close to capturing the story with as much gusto and detail as War of the Rings.  War of the Rings however isn’t just an amazing re-telling of the story in board game form, it’s actually mechanically one of the most intuitive two player board games I have ever played.  The game is epic in scale, which means that you can expect a game to last at least 4 hours. There is no question that to tell a story like that of Middle-Earths great conflict depicted in the Lord of the Rings books and movies, nothing short of epic board game would do it justice and as such it’s one of the very few long games I think is worth every moment of time spent playing it.

There are many clever way’s the story is depicted mechanically in the game, most notably the all-important story of the fellowship of the ring.  From movement of the fellowship itself, with the evil forces always at their heels, the corruption of the ring and how each character and villain is represented with his own card and figure, all making plays as the fellowship moves towards Mount Doom.  You have a clear sense of the journey, an important part of the story.  These characters are used to support the fellowship itself in various ways but can leave the fellowship for various tasks like rallying the people of middle-earth or even directly leading critical battles on the game board.  Suffice to say that these mechanics, the characters, they all do what you hope they could in this game, giving the characters of the Lord of the Rings story as much relevance in the great war as they do in the books.

Then there are the amazing event cards, each depicting scenes and story elements of the books and movies, tied to the mechanical advantages they yield to each player, ones that feel thematically correct, each more epic than the last.  These cards not only help to tell the tale but there use is critical to each side winning the game as they depict important events in the story, they also bestow powerful advantages.  Often despite the great war happening on the army filled map of middle-earth that is the game board these cards turn battles with a single play and sway the flow of power.

Finally there is the amazing use of specialty dice, the precious resource that determines what sorts of actions will be available to you from round to round.  While sometimes unwieldy, the dice themselves shift the focus of the game and allow for maneuvers, tactical and strategic decisions that give each game despite being setup identically each time a completely unique feel.  Each play of the game ends up being definitively a different version of the story as a result.  It’s often like watching the movies but with alternative story arches that pull you towards unique side story’s you would not expect, but still fit like a puzzle piece into the story and the game as a whole.  It’s amazing how in each game I have played different area’s become the focal parts of the story.

You also have events being tracked via the very important political tracker, which is a critical element to the game making things much more difficult for the free peoples player.  In essence most of the nations in the game are reluctant to join the war and this political track represents this element of the story in the game.  This basically means that despite the evil player being able to quickly push his forces to war and start raising armies, as the free people’s player you must first rally all the nations to the cause before you can take advantage of the weight of their armies.  This is difficult and forces the free peoples player to make hard choices between using his companion characters to protect the ring, or to send them out to rally the nations to war (yes just like in the books!).  Yet another wonderful mechanic that puts the players to making endless streams of important decisions while always thematically bringing out the Lord of the Rings story.

The question of balance (equal chance of winning) is often discussed in this game and I will grant the nay sayer’s that the Free People of Middle Earth side is a bit tougher to win with, at least in the sense that the war itself is obviously rigged. The free people have a limited amount of time to succeed in getting the ring to Mount Doom before they are crushed by the forces of evil militarily.  The evil forces outnumber you greatly and have an unlimited re-supply of combat units that floods the board turn after turn.   It so happens now and again that the evil player blunders by mismanaging his resources opening the window to make a rare military victory but in most games the free people must get the ring to Mount Doom and they must do so under the overwhelming forces of evil.  It’s tough, perhaps tougher to win for the free people but the more you learn about the nuances of the game the less impact this slight imbalance has on game play.  Two veteran players of the game stand a pretty equal chance of winning in my opinion, the divergence comes largely from inexperienced players as the actions of the player controlling the evil forces of Sauron has more room to make errors than the free peoples player.

I think the main difference between playing the two sides is that one player, the free peoples player dictates the direction of the game for both players.  Another words  if the free peoples player focuses on moving the fellowship, his opponent must respond, if the free peoples player gets aggressive with cards, the opponent must respond, if the free peoples player gets aggressive in the war, again, his opponent must respond.  In a way whenever the forces of Sauron lead the action by pushing a strategy not opposing the one the free people’s player is deploying, they are at a disadvantage as any action that isn’t a direct response to the tactics of the Free People player will typically result in him having a very easy time of executing it successfully.  As such one side is more responsive while the other directs the action.

A good example is moving the ring.  The Sauron forces player must dedicate his action dice to the hunt, if he does not, the result can be that the Fellowship moves very quickly to Mount Doom unharmed.  If he does however commit action dice to the hunt, he gets fewer actions which in turn buys the people of middle-earth time to rally their forces as the free peoples player can simply choose not to move the fellowship if it’s too dangerous without affecting his action dice resources.  As such, the evil forces must be wary of what the good people of middle-earth are trying to accomplish and making smart decisions when to try to block a strategy and when to recognize it as a rouse to buy time.

The strategic elements and choices players in the course of the game make create an amazing array of cause and effect, it’s almost a game that combines bluffing and miss direction at times, where you make sacrifices to get your opponents attention in one place as you sneak it an action that will help you win in the long term.  The subtlety and nuances of this game take time to pick, it’s very likely that if you play against someone who has played before you may play several games before you can beat him.  It’s worth the trip however, as the game rewards you over and over with amazing story’s of that time when you played War of the Rings.

If it’s not only clear that this game gets my highest recommendation, than let me re-affirm it, if you love the Lord of the Rings as much as I do, this game belongs in your collection.  There are no better games on the market that depict the Lord of the Rings story, in fact, this one is so far ahead of the pact you will find that once you play this, all other Lord of the Rings games seem very flat by comparison.

One game to rule them all, War of The Rings.