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Can You Survive Nightmare Mode?

The First Three The Lord of the Rings Nightmare Decks Are Now Available

“He had picked his way stealthily for some distance, when he noticed a place of dense black shadow ahead of him, black even for that forest, like a patch of midnight that had never been cleared away.”

    –J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit

The first three Nightmare Decks for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game are now available via Print on Demand!

Pick up your Nightmare Decks today to revisit the three Core Set scenarios cast in the shadows of the game’s challenging new Nightmare Mode. Featuring deadlier enemies, darker locations, and more terrifying surprises, each of these Nightmare Decks introduces twenty alternate encounter cards and rules for using them to reshape the encounter deck for one of the three Core Set scenarios. The result? A nightmarish journey back to the heart of Mirkwood that will have you on the edge of your seat!

Return to the Path Not Taken

These Nightmare Decks and their alternative encounter cards are designed to offer surprising new play experiences as you return to the challenges of your favorite Core Set scenarios. Of course, they introduce deadly new challenges, but they also play up new themes and unexpected twists that provide the scenarios a new feel, not just a greater level of difficulty.

As developer Matt Newman noted in his Second Breakfast article on Nightmare Decks, “Nightmare Mode gives us the chance to evolve older scenarios. Not only can we make them tougher, but we can make them more thematic and introduce new challenges that respond to popular player strategies.”

Scenarios keep their basic shapes and essential identities in Nightmare Mode, but there’s no guarantee they’ll play the same as they did before. If you thought you could breathe easy after you defeated the Hill Troll (Core Set, 82) in Journey Along the Anduin, think again. Your favorite tricks may no longer work. The scenario’s most challenging enemies may hound you again and again, they may ply new tactics, and they may engage you before you’ve had a chance to prepare. You may find yourself caught in the webs of Ungoliant’s Brood, battered by trolls, or trapped in a Nazgûl’s gaze, and you will need to adopt new strategies.

Not only will the new encounter cards in these three Core Set Nightmare Decks force you to look at the scenarios’ challenges in an all-new (dimmer) light, they’ll startle you with their new thematic cores:

   
• The spiders and flies that gnaw at you throughout Passage Through Mirkwood will really wear you down. Its Nightmare Deck strengthen’s the scenario’s exhaustion effects and pairs them with new enemies that grow in strength as your characters are exhausted.

   
• You’ll want to get to your boat and paddle down the Anduin as quickly as possible in Journey Along the Anduin. Its Nightmare Deck thrusts you neck-deep into treacherous waters and unavoidable, heated combat.

   
• Tortured prisoners and the deadly catacombs of Dol Guldur lie at the heart of the Nightmare Deck for Escape from Dol Guldur. The terror that begins with an increase in the number of captives continues as you explore Dol Guldur. You’ll face encounters so haunting, you’ll hear the phantom cries of anguished victims, echoing through tunnels lit by flickering torches.

What Is Print on Demand?

Print on Demand is an exciting new process that allows Fantasy Flight Games to produce professionally finished cards on a made-to-order basis, which opens up new opportunities for expanding existing games. Not to be confused with Print and Play, the Print on Demand process results in small print runs of professionally manufactured products.

Due to variations in printing, cards from these Print on Demand scenarios may differ subtly in appearance and texture from Core Set cards, and players are thus encouraged to utilize opaque sleeves or art sleeves when playing in Nightmare Mode.

If you’re a retailer interested in carrying our Print on Demand products, visit our Professional Zone website to learn more.

Darker Times Ahead

When you play in Nightmare Mode, you’ll find the Dark Lord’s shadow spreads farther across Middle-earth than ever before. His power haunts the land and drives your enemies toward greater rages.

Can you survive the increased challenges and the new twists and turns that these three Nightmare Decks add to the Core Set scenarios? Order your Nightmare Decks today to find out!

   
• Passage Through Mirkwood Nightmare Deck

   
• Journey Along the Anduin Nightmare Deck

   
• Escape from Dol Guldur Nightmare Deck

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Source: Can You Survive Nightmare Mode? (http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4281)