I'm new to playing the SBG, I have one question, is the SBG like Warhammer where you have to have the most recent rulebook to play(well at least in GW)? Are there significant changes in the book with the Ring on the front from the Return of the King book?

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Cartmic's Blog: http://cartmic.blogspot.com

No warhammer has nothing to do with Lotr so forget about it:P

The return of the king yourneybook has no rules in it, the full rules for playing Sbg are in the Sbg rulebook. the return of the king only has profiles of models wich were brought out with the return of the king book and the 2 towers sourcebook has other profiles. Yourneybooks only have scenario's and modelling advice.

Some profiles are updated after some time and then the most recent book makes sence. But with buying the LOme book and the rulebook you can have rules of the models cause the most profiles are on the GW site.

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"There are only 4 things you need in life: Lasagna, beer, a girlfriend and of course a gondor army."

I know the system is completely different, I guess my question was meant to be a more general GW marketing question, seeing a new Fantasy and 40k book come out ever 4 or 5 years.



Ah right, thanks for clearing that up. So what did the rule books look like before the One Ring rulebook came out? As in I remember seeing various box sets come out with the films until the mines of moria was released back in 2005/6?

This is what I'm talking about: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Warhammer-LOTR-Re ... 2269wt_721

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Cartmic's Blog: http://cartmic.blogspot.com

Those old rules are very similar, but some subtle yet important changes have been made. Best to either get the small rulebook with the Mines of Moria set, or get the big blue "One Ring" book. The MoM and One Ring books are identical as far as rules go. The One Ring book has a lot more profiles though. Depending on the army you want to build, you might need it.

As for marketing, the SBG system has been on a downward spiral of GW attention for a while, but with the possibility of the Hobbit movies coming in the next couple of years I'd expect either a new game, or a re-release/rewrite.

If you just play with friends and can get the Return of the King rulebook really cheaply, you don't have to upgrade if you don't want to. After all, we all played several years with those rules and had great fun doing so. For the tournaments and playing against people who do use the new rules is of course a completely different matter.

There are some differences, on top of my head I'd say that the hand-weapons-for-all rules and the new courage rules are the ones that have had most influence on how I play the game. The old rulebooks were significantly thinner, having profiles for only those troops that had been released so far, and less hobby material.

2001 we got the first set of rules, which were upgraded twice during the following two years. The current rules came out 2005 and instead of a new update we got the War of the Ring game 2008. I guess the game is still too young that we can really say anything about how often it will get a major upgrade.

-- Pasi

Thanks for all your help. As I'll playing with friends I'll probably go with the Return of the King rulebook as I found it somewhere really cheaply. All I want to do is have a bit of fun so this will probably be my best buy considering my current budget, also I have no plans with playing at GW or in tournaments so i'll mix my cheapo old Grenadier Fantasy Warriors converted plastic Dwarves and Orcs with the GW figures I have.

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Cartmic's Blog: http://cartmic.blogspot.com

To be honest with you, I actually prefer the old Return of the King rulebook's rules, and still like to enfore the old courage rules and hand weapon rules. I would recommend it to anyone who isn't particularly interested in tornaments.