Month in Review: May 2023

Last month I had nothing major to share, so there was no review for April. But May has been busy, so strap in for a slightly longer-than-usual recap article. This is all related to the loot, of course, which finally entered the final stages this month and should already be on its way to many of you. But this month also saw the release of quite a few articles on the blog, so it’d be nice to discuss the plans going forward.

May

From FFG, there was no news. We are still waiting for the repackaged Dream-chaser cycle, which will finally blow some life back into the game, as the most recent release was the Fellowship of the Ring box back in October. If you’re going so long between releases, I start to understand why people are trying to get their hands on out-of-print packs. We did get a teaser for the next AleP cycle, but apart from two heroes being name-dropped in the article, there is nothing major in the article. I did get to playtest the first scenario, and that has me pretty excited for what the cycle is going to bring. The only other thing worth mentioning for this month was that the Con of the Rings tickets have gone on sale as well as their custom t-shirts for this year’s cycles. I have gotten my tickets already, and I hope to attend again for the first time in 4 years finally. There are still tickets available, so check here to get yours, and hopefully, I will see you at the convention.

Scenario analyses

We are one step further in our Saga analyses with the completion of the Shelob’s Lair article. This rounds out the Land of Shadow box and also marks the end for all the Nightmare campaigns (if I ever get to writing articles on those quests). Mortendall has been delivering amazing work for that quest and will continue with the next saga box next month so that we can hopefully have The Passing of the Grey Company in early July!

I have also been busy with the custom scenario quests, maintaining my rate of 1 article per month. These quests are a bit different from what we are used to, but with the release of Mines of Moria this month, there is just one more set left to write about. Unfortunately, it is the one with the Balrog, so that might take up most of my time in June.

Nightmare analyses

No updates on Nightmare quests so far, but I haven’t heard anyone complain about it, so I don’t mind as much. Just know that once I do manage to finish the last of the custom scenario quests, I will get back to the grind on the Nightmare quests, hopefully completing the Angmar Awakened cycle around the time Summer ends. That then leaves 2 cycles and all the Sagas before I have also run out of Nightmare stuff to write about. The blog is really starting to be a complete set of analyses now that series are rounding out, and there are fewer and fewer scenarios to write about.

Traits and Staples

While I was hoping to release the next Staples article, I had to delay it by a week in order to get all the books released on time. So the attack buff article will be coming out in early June. That just leaves the defence article, which will be started soon after. If there are any other articles in the series that you would like me to write about, let me know. I could imagine there being an interest in some of the best Ranged/Sentinel cards in the game, but I’ll have to see if that is worth writing about.

Additional articles

With the release of the loot this month, it was time for me also to release the detailed design article about the process that went into the loot this past year. It has been a lot of effort to complete the book finally, but I am very pleased with the results. Most people skipped ahead to the contact form to get their hands on a PDF copy of the book so they could print it for themselves. I don’t fault them for it but know that I do appreciate a donation to the blog in return. A lot of time and effort went into this.
As for June, I do not have any additional articles lined up. But inspiration might strike at the right moment, so perhaps we will get more articles in the coming month. If you have a suggestion for a topic, feel free to let me know.

The Future

Now that the books have been produced and sent out to everyone, I will have more time to work on the blog and the articles. It’s always fun to make items for the community, but it takes quite a lot of time. Not only to design and produce the items but also to ship them and make sure everyone got their hands on the books. I have also been busy answering hundreds of emails asking if I had any spares left to sell. I do not. I do have a PDF version of the book that I have been sending to people in exchange for a donation to the blog. I’m glad to see around 40% of the people actually making donations after having received the PDF. I’m really grateful for that since it means that I do not have to spend my own money on shipping all the books around the world.

With that chapter of the blog’s life now behind me, I have been thinking a bit further ahead. I do want to do another run of the playthrough logs as I did in January 2022. Just opening up registration to everyone and updating the book a little. I do not want to promise any date for that yet, but perhaps once I have recovered mentally from shipping this batch of books. I have also come up with another idea for an item that would help players of this game, but that idea will cost a minimum of $6k, which is not what I am earning with the blog for another 5 years. That idea might have to be put on ice while I wait for a better idea. I could prototype this and see if it would work at all, but with each item ending up costing around $35 per player, it would be quite more expensive, considering so many people have joined the Patreon site.

June will be a relatively quiet month for me personally, without much to do outside of work. I do have to fill in for a colleague, but I won’t go on holiday or have major things happen to me that prevent me from working on the blog in the evenings or on the weekends. I did pick up Tears of the Kingdom, though, and that Korok Space Program is taking up some free time that I have… But next month should be fairly average beyond that. I hope that all the books will arrive next month as well so that I do not have to use any of my extras. This will allow me to use those extras for giveaways or save them for the Con of the Rings raffle in September.

~Aa’menealla nauva calen ar-malta~