I play the Lord of the Rings SBG when it first came out and got the Two Towers set and ROTK set (but lost the rulebook) and the last major book I read was the one that came with the Balin's Tomb set with the plastic fellowship, cave troll, and 24 Moria goblins.

So, can you guys give me a rundown on what I missed and what rules are different now? I'm sure the game is different but how different exactly?

I just play with my myself, my brother, and a friend once in a while. Nothing competitive. I heard about the warband rules with only 12 figures and am not really interested in that. I also really dislike the new Hobbit films and have ni interest in collecting any of those figures or playing any of those scenarios.

Cheers!

The core of the rules are the same really, however, they did do some expanding on the existing systems. Most of it was done for balancing reasons I think. Heroes got four new heroic actions to work with. Magic got altered in the duration and force of its effects. Monsters got some special attack options that allow them to not get stopped up all game by charging in one guy. They can either throw people, do a mini heroic combat, or wound verse targets strength rather than defense. Hand-weapons got typed so that they can have different effects depending on what you've got. But all models count as having at least an undefined hand-weapon on them anyway. Pikes can no longer support through spears. Pikes can be taken with crossbows. The rules for the one ring changed to make the wearer no longer intangible and unchangeable. Elven blades got an extra effect that lets them win ties on a 3 or better. I think that is the majority of what changed.

As you can see it reads more like a video-game patch notes then a major overhaul and most of the stuff was done, like I said before, to sort out the complaints people had with the rules from before, speed up the game, add more variety to combat, make monsters viable, nerf magic, and so forth. You could play with the new rules and not use the warbands limitations I suppose. If you like the game you're playing already, though, there is no really need to change things up in my opinion. Hope that helps.

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