Racing Against the ShadowThe Game's Developers Address the Optional Tournament Rules
To all of our The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game players,
Mae govannen!
Since the recent release of the official rules for the optional Race Against the Shadow tournament format for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game, there has been some discussion about the direction of everyone’s favorite cooperative Living Card Game® (LCG). We on the design team want to take a moment to touch base with our community and reassure you that we are not altering our approach to the design or development of the game.
At its heart, The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game is a cooperative or solo game where friends come together to battle the forces of evil in Middle-earth, just like our heroes did in the books. That is our guide for the design and development of each new set, and we plan to continue providing new scenarios for you and your friends to play together for many years to come.
The tournament rules were released as an optional format for players who enjoy competition. We know that some of our players come from competitive card game backgrounds, and we recognized the desire among those players to prove their deck-building and card-gaming skills in a player-versus-player format. The tournament rules were created to give those players the opportunity to do just that. We tested the system internally and found it to be an extremely enjoyable alternate form of play. We encourage any interested players to try it out. And for players who aren’t interested, we want to assure you that we will continue to focus on the cooperative and solo nature of the game with our regular releases.
The Purpose of the FAQ
As a final note, we realize that the release of our tournament rules in conjunction with our updated FAQ has caused some players to conclude that the new errata and rules clarifications were intended to establish the path the game would follow in Organized Play. We want to assure players that is not the case. 
Each item in the FAQ was implemented in order to preserve the consistency, health, and balance of the cooperative and solo play game experiences within the context of the current card pool, as well as unannounced projects currently in development.
Speaking of unannounced projects, there are some really exciting things in store for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game, and we look forward to sharing them with all of you when the time is right. Until then, we hope you continue to enjoy all your travels in Middle-earth!
Sincerely,
Caleb Grace
Matthew Newman
Nate French
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Source:
Racing Against the Shadow
