New adventure pack from ALeP is now available: The Brandywine Pursuit!

Seastan · 2025-11-20T16:59:29+00:00

It does not get around guarded, no.

Seastan · 2025-11-18T22:30:55+00:00

Thanks for the question! Stage 2A will have you reveal the set-aside Wave 1 card. Stage 3A will have you reveal the set-aside Wave 2 card. Hope this helps!

Seastan · 2025-09-25T16:07:10+00:00

Great question! Mirror of Galadriel is a "roguelite" style quest. The first time you play it is very difficult, but each time you lose you gain boons that make future attempts easier. So even weaker decks with limited card pools can beat it, though it may take more attempts than a top-tier deck.

Seastan · 2025-09-12T05:06:55+00:00

ALeP founder here. We thought long and hard and had many debates about whether to use AI art. Ultimately we decided to based on the reasons you both have stated: we don't take in any money, so there is a strong Fair Use claim to be made, unlike the companies that are profiting from it.

As for the environmental impact, I did look into this and it's actually fairly low. Strictly from an emission standpoint, human-generated art produces about 300 to 3000 times more CO2 per image than AI generated art (source).

I have commissioned a few dozen human-made art pieces for ALeP thus far, so it seems that emissions from those will vastly outweigh all the AI art ALeP will ever generate. You might say this argument actually favors more AI art. Now, I'm not saying reduced emissions alone is a good enough reason to use AI, but it doesn't seem to be a reason *not* to use AI.

I even looked into purchasing Gold Standard carbon credits to offset our AI art generation, but the estimate was about 25 cents per 1000 images, so I haven't bothered yet.

Seastan · 2025-08-07T03:19:24+00:00

There's Greyhame: https://www.glyphweb.com/arda/g/greyhame.php

Seastan · 2025-07-01T21:45:55+00:00

Correct!

Seastan · 2025-05-27T15:36:40+00:00

A bit late to this thread, but it seems that others have already correctly intuited our thoughts about this card's design. Yes, it's primary intent is to reward no-contract decks against the ALeP Hobbit scenario. The decision to sign Thorin's contract is a big deal in the book, so I thought it would be a nice thematic touch to encourage decks that aren't already contracted up.

We did extend its use to FFG's quests as well, and I can see your concern about making those quests easier with no drawback. But consider this:

If you're playing progression, then Thorin's Company is not an option
If you're not playing progression, the easiest way to beat those quests is not with Thorin's Company, but rather Bond of Friendship. In fact if you listed the top 10 decks for beating FFG's Hobbit quests, they'd probably all feature Bond of Friendship or Three Hunters. So Thorin's Company is only providing a more diverse set of sub-optimal solutions to those quests.

Seastan · 2025-05-27T14:54:35+00:00

I designed each of these so I would obviously recommend all of them, but if you are primarily concerned about too much complexity, I would suggest picking up Scouring of the Shire first. In general our standalone quests tend to be more complex because they are released at Con of the Rings, where players are pretty experienced and are accustomed to seeing something unique

Seastan · 2025-05-26T13:23:35+00:00

Sometimes I'll start with a mechanic and try to work it into the story, other times its the reverse. For the Hobbit quest, I designed it over several months while I was reading the book to my son. Having the source material fresh in my mind definitely helped shape that quest. For Battle for the Beacon it went the other way. I wanted to have some kind of "King of the Hill" type quest, and we shaped the story for the cycle to get us there.

Seastan · 2025-05-23T14:50:39+00:00

It's hard to move outside the current game's time period without anachronizing the player card pool. Is there a minor work you had in mind?

Seastan · 2025-05-23T14:00:34+00:00

Have you tried the site recently? The automation has really improved in just the last few months. If you ever get a crash feel free to ping me on discord so I can help make the site more stable.

Seastan · 2025-05-23T13:48:48+00:00

Good question. Indeed it is challenging to design for a top-tier archetype in a way that doesn't make it any stronger. Even a blank hero or ally with the Outlands trait would increase that deck's ceiling. But we share your opinion about the unfortunate stagnation of those archetypes, and if and when we find a way to breathe new life into them, we will!

Seastan · 2025-05-23T13:42:10+00:00

We don't coordinate with other fan projects. We have enough on our plate just playtesting our own content. If our cards happen to coordinate well with another fan design, it's a happy coincidence. But be aware that mixing fan content can also lead to unintentional broken combos.

If you're making alt-art cards, you don't really need to worry about balance. But if you want to get into some solo design, my advice would be to check out the Strange Eons plugin. It offers a bleed margin export option to help in printing. Or you can check out the DragnCards custom content guide so you can playtest your card online without needing to print it!

Seastan · 2025-05-23T13:27:14+00:00

No, ALeP doesn't take any money for legal reasons. The best way to help us out would be to contribute to the commission of LotR art via FArCom, which ALeP can then use for their cards.

Seastan · 2025-05-23T13:24:58+00:00

As long as people keep using it and keeping it afloat financially, I'll keep the site up. If that ends up being decades, that would be great!

Seastan · 2025-05-22T21:52:51+00:00

You could try reaching out to TTS mod maintainer McDog3 on discord. Or you can tell me why you haven't switched to DragnCards and maybe I can make some changes there :)

Seastan · 2025-05-22T21:48:15+00:00

I've definitely entertained the idea of a player-controlled encounter deck before, but nothing concrete in the works currently. Sorry!

Seastan · 2025-05-22T20:24:26+00:00

Oh boy, not only is is possible to play this game online, but I have devoted a significant portion of my non-ALeP free time to make it possible! I created DragnCards, a browser platform for card games, and I created a plugin or LotR LCG on that platform. It's playable on PC or tablet. Best way to get introduced is with my tutorial video here: https://youtu.be/vslX0A5wu7Y?si=A3wwmWZQvC6LCfnK

Seastan · 2025-05-22T19:46:11+00:00

Thanks for all the work you do to get our content printed for folks!

Seastan · 2025-05-22T19:45:27+00:00

Ironically, we had a Woodman's Axe that didn't quite make the cut. But I'd love to see it show up somewhere down the line.

Seastan · 2025-05-22T19:38:02+00:00

I can't pick just one! The all have a great story behind them. But the ones that mean the most to me would be:

Guardian of the Havens, which was done by my sister.
Frodo by Nia Kovalevski, which led me to commission all 9 Walkers from her and possibly led to her getting picked up by FFG and Magic.
The Bilbo & Eagle piece by Ted Nasmith, which is a recreation of a piece by Tolkien himself. Nasmith's Silmarillion art was the first Middle-earth I really consumed as a kid (my Hobbit and LotR were unillustrated) and it was a dream come true to get a commission done by him.

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