War of the Ring (SPI game)

Description

War of the Ring was the first officially licensed game to try and represent the whole sweep of conflicts from the Lord of the Rings, starting when the Fellowship leaves Rivendell and ending at the final clash before the Black Gates of Mordor. Designed for two players, one commands the Free Peoples of Middle-earth while the other controls Sauron’s dark forces. A three-player variant exists where a third player takes on the role of Saruman. The simpler Character game focuses on the Fellowship’s quest to destroy the One Ring.

Character game

One side controls the Fellowship; the other commands the nine Nazgûl, Saruman, the Mouth of Sauron, and, if he gets the Ring, Gollum. The Fellowship wins by getting the Ring to Mount Doom. The Dark Forces win if they find the Ring, take it from the Fellowship, and bring it to Barad-dûr. The Dark Power can also achieve a military victory by moving Nazgûl to key Fellowship-held fortresses and rolling dice to see if they capture them.

Campaign game

The more involved Campaign Game adds army units for both sides and additional characters tied to the military campaigns. Combat between armies uses an odds-ratio system. Victory conditions include the Ring-based goal from the Character game or capturing a set list of objectives with armies. Characters have ratings for individual combat, magic, army leadership, endurance, and resistance to the Ring’s temptation.

This last rating affects how hard it is for them to take the Ring off once they put it on; wearing it gives benefits, but staying in it too many turns turns them into a “semi-Ringwraith” under the Dark Power’s control. To reflect Sauron’s need to balance hunting the Ring with commanding his armies, the Dark Power player gets a variable number of “Shadow Points” each turn to spend on actions. One key action is searching for the Fellowship. While the hex locations of Fellowship members are known, their identities are hidden—counters are placed face-down.

Sauron must use Nazgûl or orcs to search, identify characters, and spot them for combat or capture. A small deck of cards determines which map areas can be searched and what forces can be used.

Publication history

In 1976, the Tolkien Estate gave SPI permission to create wargames set in Middle-earth. The following year, SPI released three such games: Sauron, Gondor: The Siege of Minas Tirith, and War of the Ring. Richard Berg designed War of the Ring, with Redmond A. Simonsen handling the graphics and Tim Kirk providing the cover art. These three titles were also sold together as a boxed set called Games of Middle Earth.

That collection became a major success for SPI, reaching the top spot on the company’s bestseller list four months before its release, based entirely on advance orders. War of the Ring itself came out in November 1977, and Games of Middle Earth stayed SPI’s top-selling product for nearly two years. According to Shannon Appelcline, War of the Ring stands out as the most significant among SPI’s early fantasy and science-fiction games.

Reception

The British wargaming magazine Perfidious Albion featured a discussion of the game in its 24th issue, with Charles Vasey and Geoffrey Barnard offering contrasting views. Barnard felt the game failed as a game, calling it overly mechanical with little happening, though he allowed it might work as a book simulation. Vasey noted the rules were incomplete but contained original ideas, finding the card-based searches odd and the army combat system flawed, while individual combat results were too predictable.

Barnard advised that book fans might enjoy the game's color, but others should play or study it carefully before buying. Vasey, however, liked it, praising its book-like feel and nail-biting choices, and mentioned that fans could enjoy quirky events like a Balrog in Shelob's Lair cursing clerks. In The Space Gamer No. 16, Tony Zamparutti approved, calling it fun and a fair recreation of Lord of the Rings events. Neil Randall, writing in Moves Issue 40, was initially impressed by the wealth of details, research, beautiful graphics, fast play, and uncertain outcomes.

But he strongly criticized the Search System, where the Sauron player uses the One Eye to find the Fellowship. Randall argued the system failed tactically and strategically, noting that Sauron could simply stack all Nazgul on Mount Doom, wait for Frodo, search successfully, and kill him. This, he believed, strayed so far from Tolkien's vision that it made the game unplayable for a fan. His sole suggestion to salvage what he otherwise considered an excellent game was to replace the Search System with a hidden movement system.