We have always seen Early Access as an ongoing conversation with you, the players. Since August, we’ve carried on that conversation in a variety of ways—here on Steam, on Twitch, at shows and conventions—about card balance, visual presentation, user interface, and more, and we’ve taken your responses to heart.
One topic has come up again and again since launch. It’s something we’ve spent a great deal of time discussing internally: Economy.
We’ve been carefully considering the feedback from users regarding how the game is sold and purchased. After discussing various possibilities, today we’re ready to announce a few major changes in direction.
First off: The Palantír is going away. The Palantír was intended as a reward system—sort of a grab-bag for high level players who earned an extra reward for playing and engaging with the game.
In practice, however, the Palantír felt out of place and confusing. Put simply, it came across too much like a lootbox. We looked at ways to mitigate that, but we’re still not satisfied with the way it’s been implemented, and so, in one week, we’ll be removing it from the game.
As a result: We advise you to spend your remaining Palantír Views as soon as possible. You’ll retain all the Valor, cosmetics, and cards you already have or will get from the Palantír, but after October 23, the Palantír feature will be removed from the game.
That’s a big change, but not the only one we have in mind. We have something else in the works.
We want to bring the game’s economy more in-line with the tabletop LCG model. As a result, we will be changing how the game is sold when we come out of Full Release. We’re taking steps now to prepare for that changeover.
When The Lord of the Rings: Living Card Game enters Full Release, we plan to change the game from a Free-To-Play title to a more conventional game release. The content currently available during Early Access will become the basis for the “Core Set.” Following that, future Expansion Packs will give players new Hero Packs and quests as part of a single bundled expansion. We will detail the specifics of the new Core Set and Expansion Packs in a future news update.
From a practical standpoint, this changeover won’t mean much for Early Access users. During Early Access, new users will still be able to unlock access to the game through the Founder’s Packs, which will remain largely the same.
However, there is a practical change that we want to alert you to now. At the same time we remove the Palantír, we will be giving everyone all of the currently available Hero Packs, with two copies of each player card included in those packs. We’re unlocking them for everyone who has purchased any level of Founder’s Pack either previously, or new players leading up to Full Release. That means that if you have access to the game, you’re getting every Hero Pack next Tuesday, October 23.
If you’ve already purchased or unlocked any of the Hero Packs, we’ll be gifting you 4000 Valor Points for each pack you’ve unlocked. This process will be similar to the Quest Unlock from back in early September—we’ll simply add the Valor to players’ accounts.
So, what can you spend that Valor on? Valor cards will still be unlockable through Valor Points. We want Valor Points to serve more like Experience Points in an RPG. Instead of using those points to level up, however, you’ll use them to unlock new Valor Cards.
As part of our ongoing expansion plan, we will have new Valor Card releases coming several times a year. In fact, we’re happy to announce that an all-new set of Valor Cards will be coming next month.
That’s not all: The first of our new free Encounters, a brand new, ultra-hard stand-alone Quest, will be released for all users for free next month as well. We’ve previewed some of the things to come in this first Encounter, titled The King of Carrion, on stream at twitch.tv/ffigames. Head there for a first look.
That’s a fair bit of news, so let’s recap:
-The Palantír is going away on Tuesday, October 23. Use your Palantír Views now!
-All Hero Packs will be unlocked for everyone in Early Access on Tuesday, October 23. Players who already unlocked or purchased those Hero Packs will receive 4000 Valor for each pack they unlocked.
-The next round of all-new Valor Cards are arriving in November.
-The first Encounter, The King of Carrion, is arriving in November, free for all players.
Thank you to everyone who has joined us on this ongoing journey to full release.
The FFI Team