The Hobbit: Over Hill and Under Hill – Saga Expansion
This is the story of how a Baggins had an adventure, and found himself doing and saying things altogether unexpected.
–J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit
The Hobbit: Over Hill and Under Hill is the first Saga Expansion for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game and gives players the chance to participate directly in the thrilling narrative laid out by J.R.R. Tolkien in his beloved classic. Its characters, enemies, and scenarios are drawn directly from the first half of the novel. The three new scenarios in The Hobbit: Over Hill and Under Hill can be played one at a time, or they can be linked to form a campaign that allows players to relive Bilbo's dramatic story arc!
The Hobbit: Over Hill and Under Hill also introduces five famous heroes, three copies of each player card, and an exciting new card type–treasures!
This is not a stand-alone deck. A copy of The Lord of the Rings: The Core Set is required to play.
User Reviews (2)
Add a Review for "The Hobbit: Over Hill and Under Hill – Saga Expansion"
You must be logged in to add a review.
“Do we really have to go through?” groaned the hobbit. “Yes, you do!” said the wizard, “if you want to get to the other side. You must either go through or give up your quest. There are no safe paths in this part of the world.” – The Hobbit
One of the most beloved children’s stories of all time comes vividly to life in this Lord of the Rings: The Living Card Game expansion.
This is an expansion to the insanely popular LOTR game (as seen by it’s continued presence on the top 10 Hearted list here on BG!) so I won’t get into game play details except for the handful of new features introduced with this set.
First and foremost, what continually stands out with each of these sets is the brilliant art work. We’ve been treated to wonderful Lord of the Rings art through the years by perennial favorites John Howe, Alan Lee and the Hildebrandts. This game has, however, afforded us all new and vivid depictions of our favorite characters and moments from the Tolkien’verse by extremely talented artists. Fantasy Flight Games really brings the A game in this department. My favorite cards from this set are: Glamdring, Wild Wargs*, Bofur and Beorn.
One of the unique elements presented in this expansion is that everyone gets a chance to control Bilbo. He’s a hero and gets passed along with the first player token, collecting his own “Bilbo resources” at the start of each turn. You can use him to quest, defend and attack, but don’t let him take the eternal sleep… that spells game over! As far as gameplay goes, the gloves come off and the quests are difficult! Starting with the trolls Bill, Bert and Tom bringing the pain and having your characters “sacked” so they’re basically unusable as you try to take down the three hungry trolls. Then in the second quest Stone giants are not only powerful in their own right, but Treachery cards basically toss down devastating boulders that wipe out your allies while you try and make it to Moria and finally the last quest where you lose Bilbo to Gollum’s riddle game (of which the mechanic makes you discard cards from your deck to solve riddles, so pray you find that Stargazer in your opening hand!) while trying to make your way through Moria and out into the forest. Wargs and Goblins are relentless and you feel like you literally are walking through the wasps nest of a goblin stronghold! Between flipping over two encounter cards per player every turn, dealing with riddles that discard your deck and treachery cards that add even more wolfs and goblins to the staging area… as of this posting I’ve yet to tackle this quest with my play group!
Another of the unique elements making their debut in the game is the “Treasure” card type, featuring the three magical blades featured in the Hobbit, Glamdring, Orcrist and Sting. These swords are seeded in the encounter deck of the first quest. Once they are recovered, you can put them in your deck for the remaining Hobbit quests and they prove most helpful and powerful!
Out of the light side cards, the Dwarves (obviously) shine in this set and combined with the Khazad Dum expansions really open up a plethora of Dwarf deck strategies and combos. Erebor will be fully armed and ready to deal with any threat thrown it’s way at this point!
With the Peter Jackson Hobbit film set to hit theaters in December, this expansion is well timed and definitely gets you into an adventurous mood! It’s one of the better expansions FFG has put out for this game and if the subsequent Hobbit expansions are as good, I don’t know that I want to come “back again”!
* I love the art of the card… I hate the card! The wargs are relentless, they always seem to be engaged with you and they always seem to be getting boosted in attack! ARG! 😉
This game tells the story of the first part of the hobbit. It has three new scenarios and takes you up until the time where Bilbo finds the rings. You need the base game to play because you need the spirit, loyalty, and other hero cards. And some of the other card sets are used to make up the threat decks.
I am not going to talk about way the game works – it has the same play as the base game. I felt like this expansion was like the base game with the training wheels removed. (In other words we lost a lot!)
The way you know you are having a good time with a game, to me, is when you lose and then you think…hum let’s try again and tweek our decks just a bit to see if this helps.
This expansion add some fun cards. First off there is Bilbo. He has his own set of cards with a pipe icon on it. In the first scenario it is important to keep him alive. If he dies he loses the scenario. He has a resource pool which allows you to use him to assist in difficult tasks.
Then there are new “sack” cards. At certain times in the game you will be required to select from the sack deck. The sack when attached to a character makes them useless. The card will say attach to the hero with the most resources or attachments.
There are treasure cards that you get to keep and use in other scenarios.
And the trolls Bert, William, and Tom will make you wish for a “sunrise” card. After Bert engages a player – well someone is going into the sack.
I have not played the last scenario yet, having not survived the trolls, but there is a new mechanic for doing the riddles. The first player names a sphere and costs, shuffles his deck and discards the top two cards, for each of these cards that matches both items, you can place one progress token on the stage.
If you enjoyed playing the base game or other expansions, I think you should enjoy this expansion set. I thought this expansion was very difficult, so if you haven’t played any of the base scenarios, I think you should try them out prior to taking on these. I totally enjoyed seeing items from the book, and I did think the game had a good story telling feel. The second part of the hobbit is told in another expansion module.
Until then – I will keep trying to pass by the trolls. Maybe if I just add these two cards….