War of the Ring: Second Edition rules refresher

Read the refresher

What you are trying to do is simple to state: the Free Peoples want to destroy the Ring in the Crack of Doom, or conquer enough Shadow strongholds, while the Shadow wants to corrupt the Ring bearers or overrun the cities and strongholds of the West.

A few setup points worth checking. The Ring bearers figure starts in Rivendell, and both the Fellowship Progress counter and the Corruption counter start on step zero, with the Progress counter hidden side up. All Companion cards go in the Guide box with Gandalf the Grey on top, since he is the starting Guide. Set aside the cards and figures for Aragorn Heir to Isildur, Gandalf the White, Gollum, and all three Shadow Minions. The Free Peoples take the three Elven Rings, ring side up. The Shadow gets seven action dice, the Free Peoples four. On the Political Track, every Free Peoples nation starts passive except the Elves. The Elves and all the Shadow nations start active. Rohan, the North, the Elves and the Dwarves go in the top box, Gondor and the Southrons and Easterlings in the second box, Sauron and Isengard in the third box, immediately above At War. Only the beige standard Hunt tiles go into the cup. The blue and red special tiles wait for Event cards to bring them in.

Now the turn, which has six phases. First, recover your used action dice, adding or removing any dice gained or lost, and each player draws two cards, one from each of his two decks. Second, the Fellowship phase: the Free Peoples player may declare the Fellowship's position, which activates the nation if it is declared in one of its cities or strongholds and lets the Ring bearers heal one Corruption in a friendly city or stronghold. He may also change the Guide, though the Guide must always be a remaining Companion of the highest level. Third, Hunt allocation: the Shadow places dice in the Hunt Box. Fourth, the action roll. Everything except the Hunt Box dice is rolled, and every Eye result goes straight into the Hunt Box.

Fifth, action resolution. Starting with the Free Peoples, players alternate, each taking one action by spending one die result. You may skip an action and discard a die for nothing, and if you have fewer unused dice than your opponent you may pass instead. When one player runs out, the other takes all his remaining actions in a row. As a reminder of the results: Character moves an army containing a leader or attacks with it, or plays a Character card, and for the Free Peoples also moves the Fellowship, hides it, separates Companions, or moves Companions on the map. Army moves up to two different armies, attacks with one army, or plays an Army card. Muster advances one friendly nation one step on the Political Track, plays a Muster card, or for a nation at war recruits either one elite, or two regulars, or two leaders, or one regular and one leader, each figure in a different friendly free settlement. Event draws a card from either deck or plays any card. The Free Peoples Will of the West becomes any other result, or brings in Gandalf the White or Aragorn. Sixth, the Victory Check.

Battles run in rounds. Both players may secretly choose one Event card as a Combat card, then reveal. Each rolls dice equal to combat strength, maximum five, hitting on five or six. Then each rerolls failed dice up to his leadership, maximum five. Casualties come off, with the attacker deciding first: each hit removes a regular or downgrades an elite to a regular, and two hits may instead remove one elite. Then the attacker may cease the attack, and if he does not, the defender may retreat. Attacking into a city or fortification, the attacker hits only on a six in the first round. Against a stronghold, the defender chooses each round to fight in the field or retreat into a siege. A siege battle lasts one round only, unless the attacker reduces one of his elites to a regular to buy another round, and in a siege the attacker hits only on a six.

Here are the things people often forget. The Shadow must place at least one die in the Hunt Box if the Free Peoples retrieved at least one die from it during the recovery phase, and he may never place more dice than the number of Companions still in the Fellowship, though he may always place at least one even if none remain. Every Free Peoples die sitting in the Hunt Box from an earlier Fellowship move this turn adds one to each Hunt die result, and a roll of one is always a failure regardless of modifiers. Once the Fellowship has been revealed, it cannot be moved with a Character die until it is hidden again, and using a Character die to hide it does not also move it. Units and leaders of a nation not yet at war cannot attack, cannot be recruited with a Muster die, and can move outside their own national borders but can never move across the borders of other nations, including friendly ones; the exception is that they are allowed to cross another nation's border when retreating from a battle, and if they do, the next time they move they must move out of that nation, unless they became at war in the meantime. Finally, each player may use only one Elven Ring per turn, using it changes one unused die result and does not count as your action, the Free Peoples may not change a die into Will of the West, and the Shadow may change a die into an Eye, which goes immediately to the Hunt Box.

On the final approach, if the Fellowship is in Minas Morgul or Morannon during a Fellowship phase, the Free Peoples may enter Mordor. Rebuild the Hunt Pool with the previously drawn Eye tiles and any special tiles, and from then on Companions can never be separated. On the Mordor Track you do not roll Hunt dice at all: you draw a tile automatically and apply it, and the Fellowship advances one step unless the tile shows a Stop icon. If the Free Peoples never attempt to move or hide the Fellowship during a turn on the Mordor Track, the Ring bearers take one Corruption automatically.

The game ends the moment either Ring based condition occurs. If Corruption reaches twelve, the Shadow wins. If the Ring bearers reach the Crack of Doom, the fifth step past entering, with fewer than twelve Corruption, the Free Peoples win. The two military conditions are checked only in the Victory Check phase: the Shadow wins if he controls Free Peoples settlements worth ten or more victory points, and the Free Peoples win if they control Shadow settlements worth four or more. A captured city is worth one point and a captured stronghold two, marked with a control marker, and if the original owner recaptures it the marker and the points are lost. If more than one condition is met on the same turn, the lower numbered condition takes precedence, in the order listed: Corruption, then destroying the Ring, then the Shadow conquest, then the Free Peoples conquest.

A turn, played out

You are the Shadow, midway through action resolution, and it is your action. You have an Army result showing. Sauron is at war, so its armies may attack. Your Sauron army stands next to a Gondor city: 4 regulars, 2 elites and 1 leader, combat strength 6, leadership 2. Inside the city, Gondor has 2 regulars, 1 elite and 1 leader, strength 3, leadership 1. You spend the Army die to attack with this one army. Neither of you commits a Combat card. Your strength is 6, but the cap is 5, so you roll 5 dice: 6, 6, 5, 3 and 1. You are attacking into a city, so this first round only sixes hit, and that 5 is wasted. Two hits. Leadership 2 lets you reroll 2 failed dice. You pick up the 5 and the 3 and roll a 6 and a 4. Three hits. Gondor rolls 3 dice, hitting normally on 5 or 6: 5, 2 and 1. One hit. Its leadership rerolls one failure, and that comes up 6. Two hits on you. You decide first, and remove 2 regulars rather than downgrade an elite. Gondor spends 2 of your hits removing its elite and the third on a regular, leaving 1 regular and the leader. You do not cease the attack. Gondor could retreat, but chooses to hold. In round 2, the sixes only penalty is gone. Your combat strength is now 4, so you roll 4 dice, and every 5 or 6 hits.