First Year Anniversary

Exactly one year ago to this day, the first article appeared on the young Vision of the Palantir blog. Since then, the blog has grown to bea hub for several content creators, sharing their content with the community. In this article I want to reflect a little on the past year, and get some thank-yous out of the way.

At the start of the blog, I wanted to make an in-depth article about each scenario in the game to serve as a reference for players struggling with that specific scenario. Since then, the blog has grown as one of the spokes of the great community hub. Several series got added, and with over 140 articles posted in a year, you can safely say that We Are Not Idle (Ok, ok, you had to give me just one of these, I’ll stop, honestly). The blog has had over 13.500 visitors in the past year, from more countries than I care to count. I couldn’t have thought this thing would take off as quickly as it did, which is largely due to the tremendous amount of support I received from the community.

The blog has also helped me to personally grow in many aspects. Not only the simple things like “get even better at writing in English”, but also mental things. Besides learning web-design, how to work with sites like Patreon, and how to share your work in the most efficient way possible, it has also taught me more about connecting to different users around the world. No where else can it be seen better than with my co-authors who have reached out to me and made this blog the one it is today. Those of you who know me personally (or have ever met me for like one minute) know that I am not the strongest social creature on this planet. This blog has helped me to form an identity in the community, which helped me a lot. Hearing my name said out loud during podcasts, or seeing my name between other pillars of this community means a lot to me. This all came together during the first meetup at Con of the Rings, which was amazing.

I hope to keep this thing going during the next year, though there will be droughts in content during Q2 and Q3 as I will be graduating at that time. This will probably take a lot from my free time, but I am sure that I can rely on this great community to be patient for a while between releases. After all, we waited for months between packs, so this should be easy. Anyways, since a simple thank you is not enough, I will dedicate the rest of this article to thanking those of you that have made this adventure possible. To those that don’t read further, I hope that you’ll be back for new content whenever I get my ass into gear and behind a keyboard. Thank you for taking the time to read this at least, and hope to see you again.

Thanks

I couldn’t have done this thing by myself to this degree though, so there is a list of people I want to thank for helping the blog. These people have supported the blog by providing articles on topics that I personally have found difficult, or at least would have waited with until later. There are some scenarios with which I am better acquainted, so having others pick up the parts where I wouldn’t trust my own article has been very helpful. But instead of thanking you guys as a group, let me take some time to thank you individually (going in alphabetical order, I have no favourite child):

• Brinxian: You were one of the first co-authors on the blog and have helped the community a lot by taking care of the Lord of the Rings Saga scenarios, even including the campaign modes. I wouldn’t have gotten to these scenarios anytime soon, so I am very grateful for your help with these. I know that life is preventing you from gaming as much as you like, but I at least want to thank you for doing the campaign up to this point, and hope to see it finished someday when you find the time. Besides the campaign, you also did the majority of the Voice of Isengard Deluxe box, including the tricky To Catch an Orc scenario. I think I would still be stuck there if you didn’t volunteer for that quest! It was great meeting you in person at the Con of the Rings event, and hope to see you again at a convention in the future!
• Dave Walsh (from Card Talk): Keeping to the Saga’s, you started the Hobbit Saga scenarios, another set of expansions I wouldn’t have gotten into for a while. So I want to thank you for starting that journey. I know that you are busy with your other contributions to the community as well, and I’m happy to have provided you guys with content like you have done for this blog. I had a great time recording the episode and might come back with a card you guys like better.
• josephforster86 (from LOTR Deck Test): You were the first co-author of this blog, and have helped me a lot to get past some scenarios I didn’t really have experience with in the early days. You are a great pillar of this community and I enjoy seeing decks being tested against multiple scenarios and seeing them get valuable feedback. Thanks again for the help you gave in the early days, and you are always welcome to come back for a guest article if you want.
• Matt Duckworth: You are one of the newer members of the team and have hopefully found your place in this community. I enjoy reading your articles and want to thank you for taking some of the more difficult ones out of my hands. You don’t shy away from a challenge, going ahead of schedule to Race Across Harad, which is no small scenario for sure. I hope we get to see some more articles from you in the future, though life can prevent you from spending more time on the game than you’d like.
• mortendall88: You were also new to the community if I recall correctly and have hopefully enjoyed writing for the blog. It was great having you join the group when the blog was at the Ringmaker cycle. You did the Dunland Trap and took over the Three Trials, allowing me to meet the deadline I set in my head. On top of this, you are also a fan of the difficult scenarios it seems, as you accepted the Carn Dum article without hesitation. I am very grateful for that, as it allowed me to carry on with the Dream-chaser cycle. It was great meeting you in person, and hope to play some more games with you in the future.
• Noah Baker: Despite not having a lot of article on the blog, I know that many people enjoyed your Harad cycle article. I hope you find the time to do this for the other cycles as well, or to hear from you in the future again. If not, I still want to thank you for stepping up and doing the article.
• RedSpiderr (from The Road): You came forward to do a guest article for the blog on one of the saga PODs. These were skipped in the initial Saga overviews, so I am very happy to complete them in the future. I know that you got a son during the writing, so I hope you enjoy spending time with him. If eventually you get your gaming life back, I’d love to see the article finished at some point. Until then, I enjoy reading your campaign playthroughs. I never attempted a campaign before, so I am humbled by those that go through with them. Also you narrative articles are a treat to read, almost worthy to bundle into a book once you finished. Carry on, and I hope you win your campaign soon!
• Silblade222: While you are the newest member of the group, you immediately took the top spot with the longest article on the blog. I have gotten great responses to your in-depth player card analyses and hope to see you continue the series at Vision of the Palantir as well. I am glad to have given you a place for you to show your work, the analyses are great and will be appreciated by many new players in the future.
• thepurplwizard: You also joined very recently and have not yet had your own publication, but that is ok. You showed some great enthusiasm when you wanted to write things for the blog and you were happy to take on Fog on the Barrow Downs. I hope to see the article published soon and to see more articles from you if time permits.

Well, that should about cover all those that actually wrote (or are writing) stuff on the blog, but I have not yet finished. This community is greater than just me and the co-authors, so I also want to thank my Patreon supporters with their monthly contribution. You guys help me to keep this blog financially stable and to set aside some money for the loot I have in mind for this year. I hope you guys enjoyed last year’s loot, and I will have some more Patreon exclusive things going in the near future. I couldn’t have though a year ago that people would actually spend money on me rambling about the game, so I am very thankful. I know I don’t spend a lot of time on Patreon itself, but I will have some projects there maybe as early as next month.

And lastly, you the reader are also to be thanked. You are a part of the greatest community of gamers I have come across and hope you have found the content on this blog useful in your adventures (or you have randomly come to this site and clicked on this article, in which case, welcome, excuse the nerds here). I have received great support through useful or positive comments, plenty of poll entries, and over 50.000 views within a year. I hope you stick with us for another year around the sun, and that your games may end up victorious. Here is to another year with this great community!