Con of the Rings 2023: Experiences and Memories

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After having missed the previous 3 editions of Con of the Rings, I have finally made the trip to the GameZenter again for a weekend of LOTR LCG and meeting up with community members I hadn’t seen in 4 years. In this article, I share everything that my jetlagged brain can remember of the weekend, so it might help others in the future to decide whether or not this convention is something you would be interested in attending next year.

Preparation

Before the trip started, a lot of things had to be arranged. Bags had to be packed, plants had to be watered, and I needed to be sure not to forget anything. I did write an article on convention preparation earlier in September, which is worth a read to see how you can best prepare for conventions like this. The decks for this year were prepared during the summer, which gave me enough time to test them and make any adjustments. When the news came out that the Siege of Erebor quest was also being introduced at the convention, I had to make some adjustments to ensure I could bring a deck suited for that specific quest. In all, I packed the following decks (RingsDB links included to the digital decks I based the physical ones on; some may have changed):

Aside from decks, I also packed 4 custom-made scenarios, using the POD kits in order to make 2 Mirkwood encounter decks and 2 Moria-themed ones. In the deckbox, I also managed to fit a token box, 1 playmat, 4 miniatures in case I needed them for a map, a threat tracker, and some spare sleeves. A binder with hero cards had to be packed in my luggage as well, along with a sideboard in case I needed to make adjustments to the deck then and there.

Since shipping to the US is expensive, I decided to bring a bunch of stuff with me that needed to be shipped within it anyway. This includes many of the Field Guides I had left over. Some were reserved for the raffle at the convention, while others were to be handed to community members there. This finally cleaned out my cabinet of all the books, though it did add a lot of weight to my suitcase.

A lot of the cards had to go into my hand luggage since it is notorious for being filtered out during security screening at the airport. I also want to keep an eye on the cards during my trans-Atlantic flight, as losing the cards would be horrible. This adds a lot of weight to carry around, especially if you’re bringing so many decks like me. Add to this the liquids and other essentials for the trip, and my luggage was quite full. Luckily, I could put the books and snacks for the convention in my check-in luggage.

Snacks from the homeland!

Since I have moved further from the airport since my last convention, I had an additional 2-hour drive on the schedule. With my flight departing at 10, I really didn’t want to have to get up at night, so on the Tuesday before the convention, I packed my things and drove to family who still lives near the airport. From there, it is a 20-minute bus drive, meaning I can also leave my car behind for free.

Wednesday September 27th – Arrival MSP

The day started quite early, with a fast breakfast and packing lunch in case I got hungry on the plane. It’s always a good idea to bring some extra food with you, especially when traversing time zones. The bus that was to take me to the airport was on time, but halfway through the trip, it refused to go any further. So I had to catch the next bus, but I was still on time. This is where my over-preparedness comes in handy. In the end, it didn’t matter too much since the flight was delayed by 30 minutes. This gave me time to pass security (cards in your carry-on are always picked out and inspected) and to get my hands on some dollars.

After waiting an additional half-hour, I was able to board. I was thankful that I had booked a seat with additional leg space; otherwise, the 8h45m flight would have turned me into a pretzel from having to stick up my legs constantly. The space was still not royal, but a fair bit more comfortable than in the back of the plane. Sadly, I did have a baby seated in front of me, but luckily, they were pretty quiet during the flight.

The flight went by quickly, making up for lost time, so I arrived at the airport around noon. There, I was met by ThePurpleWizard, who was kind enough to pick me up and drive me to the hotel. Dropping off my bags there, we went for lunch/dinner at a local salad bar. While a bit expensive, I feared that I would have more than enough fried food during the week, so some green stuff wouldn’t hurt. By this time, I did start to feel tired already, as the sun was already setting over Europe at that point.

Healthiest thing I’ve eaten all week

But not in the US, so we got back to the hotel and played our first game of the convention. A 2 player Voyage Across Belegaer was a nice warmup to the weekend. I had my CotW Silvans deck pump out nearly all the allies by the end of the game, which is a sign that the deck did well, despite having to sail as well as quest. Host of the Galadhrim hit 8 allies, so that made for an easier round.

While I was getting more and more tired, I agreed to one last outing for the day to a soda shop a few minutes away. This was something that I was not all that used to (for soda, at least, lord knows, we have enough beer stores in Europe…). Seeing all the random bottles of different flavored liquid sugar made my head spin, but with PurpleWizard’s guidance, I managed to select a few bottles to try out. By this time, it was well past midnight to my body, and it had been a pretty long day. So I went back to the hotel, packed my bags for some gaming the next day, and went to bed.

Thursday September 28th – Pre-con Day

As expected, I was awake quite early. 1:20 AM, which would have been a decent time to get up back home, but sadly not in the US. Luckily, I am quite good at sleeping in, so I managed to half-sleep until 6 AM. I had a quick breakfast in the room and then wasted some more time before it got light outside. I had seen a Walmart the previous day, so I decided to walk there for some grocery shopping. After being hit with the realization that the area really isn’t that walkable, I managed to find my way to the store. It’s always amazing how much stuff can be bought there, but luckily, their game selection was minimal, so I didn’t have to buy much. Some food and gifts for people at home were purchased, and I took a (in my opinion) much better route to the hotel, though it involved some “creative traversal” of the landscape.

Next year we gotta do some pool activities

After having unpacked and eaten some more, I went to the pool. The hotel has quite a nice spa with a sauna and swimming pool, which I always appreciate. As a bonus, there was nobody there so I could swim my laps in peace. Sadly, the pool isn’t too long or deep so I couldn’t do the regular swimming activities, but it was a nice way to get exercise and spend time before everyone arrived at the hotel.

After having left my swimming trunks out to dry in the room, I went down to the lobby, where people started to trickle in. I had a few games there, including a victory against Journey Along the Anduin and Battle for the Beacon. After those wins, I decided I wanted to take Sauron’s place for a while and took out the four custom encounter decks. I found 3 willing victims for both Moria quests, and we had a lot of fun with it. During the second run, I even managed to kill two heroes in one round after having discarded their shadow cancellation, which lucked into a bad shadow combo that killed the main defender on the table. This made the victory a lot more hard-won, but it was great setting up a challenging encounter for them. This also makes me realize how busted some cards are, like Firyal or Grimbeorn.

While there was an off-site party on Thursday evening, I didn’t attend. I was already starting to feel tired (it was after 1 AM at this point, according to my bio-rhythm), and I didn’t want to sit there like a zombie waiting to go back to the room. So I grabbed a quick bite to eat, hung around the lobby a bit more, and went to bed at around 10 PM. It really sucks that jetlag is preventing me from enjoying the entire day, but it should go better from here on out.

Friday September 29th – Con day 1

I am now starting to wake up a bit later, though the storm outside didn’t help things. Woke up at 5 AM with thunder and rain striking the windows. Still, I managed to catch some additional zzzs and went for breakfast on time. The nice thing about booking the hotel with the convention discount is that breakfast is included. And while it is not a diverse buffet, it’s enough for me to get some decent food in me before starting the day. You also get the chance to sit down with people that arrived overnight, which was nice. You also can feel the excitement in the room that the con was about to begin.

All this product just waiting to be bought. Good thing I had everything already

At 10, we drove to the GameZenter. It’s within walking distance, but with the rain coming down, I prefer being driven. It had been 4 years since last I was at the Zenter, so some things had changed. I was amazed by the amount of stock they had in terms of Nightmare packs and PODs. They even assembled old demonstration Deluxes and sold those. It was great for people who were missing packs, though prices were marked up pretty high. I managed to help out a few European players to get some packs for them. I couldn’t help everyone, but perhaps others managed to get stuff via other attendees.

With that, the con had officially started! I picked up the nice swag and t-shirt that came with the ticket and picked up the COTR swag soon after that. The book wasn’t a surprise for me, as I had helped to get it developed, but it was nice to hold the finished product. I also got a ton of other stuff, ranging from alt arts to stickers and tokens. More on that later in the article. The first “official” game at the convention was with Chad, Chris, and Jon against NM Watcher in the Water. It really didn’t stand a chance against our decks, and we even beat an enhanced version of The Watcher and the Doors of Durin. During the game, I was immediately called to the raffle, where there were plenty of choices ranging from alt art cards to swag from previous years and even some rare Vengeance of Mordor cycle APs! Sadly, I had most of the items already, so I went with the Against the Shadow T-shirt that I wasn’t able to get last year.

Glad to have seen the Field Guides being used as trackers during games!

Other games at the convention were wins against The Long Dark and Redhorn Gate (though I was killed) and a nasty loss against Foundations of Stone (note to self: don’t play Grey Wanderer against that quest). I also won in the very first raffle of the con and managed to get another t-shirt. It’s strange how you can scan the prize pool and realize you own more than half of it already. It was also nice to see some of my books among the prizes.

After the games, I had to go back to the hotel and freshen up a little. I was invited to spend the evening at Caleb’s house to play games with fellow content creators and employees at FFG. It was great getting some other games on the table and getting some food down at the same time. I also got to play Kluster, a weird magnet game that I brought. There was also a bean game and something about creatures evolving, but it was getting late, and while the jetlag was getting less, it was still noticeable later in the evening. So, I got the first ride back to the hotel under a sky illuminated by more lightning and went to bed right after. I think the sleep schedule is pretty well adjusted by now.

Saturday September 30th – Con day 2

Another day of the con dawned early, but not as early as before anymore. I spent some time in the room packing my bag for the day, leaving behind any swag I received the day before. Breakfast was similar to the previous day, and I still find it weird to have a warm breakfast without bread or cereal anywhere in sight. The weather had improved a lot, and it even was pretty warm out in the sun. So I went for a morning walk to get some final groceries and other items for people back home. Back at the hotel, I swapped the bag for my gaming stuff and headed to the GameZenter along with everyone else at 10.

This was the day of the Siege of Erebor stand-alone scenario, but my only attempt didn’t go so well, as we lost a player pretty early on due to threat. When we saw no way out, we had to call it after 5 rounds, but I did hear a lot of other people were successful in beating it. My group instead went for a 4P game against Shadow and Flame, the only Dwarrowdelf quest on the schedule. It was a win, though I lost 2/4 heroes due to some stupid shadow effects. The other players managed to get through until the end, and Durin’s Bane was cast into the abyss.

While I was setting up for another game of Siege of Erebor, I was asked to fill in a seat at the Bear Draft that was happening. I had just missed registration, but I could luckily get in on an open seat. Drafting is a really cool format where you have no idea which heroes and player cards you are going to get. You can also see what the other players are trying to make and hope to support them by giving them matching player cards. I ended up going with a mono-Spirit Caldara deck, as I had her, along with Thengel and Arwen among my starting heroes. The deck only had to be made up of a minimum of 30 cards, but I added a few extra because card draw was no issue. This made the deckbuilding pretty easy, as I just focused on willpower with a hint of location control. The other players had an Outlands deck, a Gondor/attachment deck, and a Silvan/Vilya deck. We were tasked with defeating a pre-made Mines of Moria quest made by Beorn. It was nice not knowing what the encounter deck had in store, but it tried to location-lock us. We managed to beat it in the end by questing out of there. Beorn even has the deck featured in the article on the Bear Draft on his blog!

The deck after having drafted

Having had a taste for the custom scenarios again, I piloted a Woodland Realm game against two other players. I hit them with spiders that exhausted their characters; all the while, their threat was increased in small fragments here and there. In the end, they lost due to their greed, which revealed an additional encounter card that threated out the player with The One Ring. They got super close, though, so the quest was pretty successful for me. After that, we went for a 4 player attempt at Battle of the Beacon but ended up losing.

With all of that excitement and managing decks behind me, I was feeling quite tired. Apparently, the jetlag isn’t completely gone yet, and these events are just very energy-draining. So, I went back to the hotel at 6:30 PM to drop off my stuff before going to the off-site party. But I never got there, as I felt too tired for more socializing. Tomorrow was also going to be a tough day, so I started to pack my things early and then went to bed.

Sunday October 1st – Con day 3 / Departure MSP

Well, I’m in the rhythm for this time zone; it’s time to head home, I guess. Woke up at 7 AM and had a quick breakfast. It’s the same stuff as yesterday, so I’m glad I’m going back to other food soon. I took some time to pack everything for the Con, and everything else went into my main luggage. That also had to come with me to the GameZenter today. Luckily, the walk was very short, and the weather was nice enough to stand outside the Zenter for a while.

The first game of the day was a 4 player fight against Muster of the Rohirrim. The nice thing about this game was that all four players brought Eagle decks. The fellowship was set up beforehand by PurpleWizard, who joined alongside Mr. And Mrs. Salted Pork. The game went well, and we had some pretty big flocks of Eagles of the Misty Mountains by the end of the game. It was really cool to see the four decks working together, as this kind of experience can only really be had at conventions.

Look at all those chickens

After that first victory of the day, I walked around a bit and was approached by one of the younger attendees of the convention. This little girl wanted to do a quest with me, and that’s something you just cannot refuse. She was very chatty during our game against Foundations of Stone. It was nice having a relatively faster game with 2-players than having a long, 4-player game. I played my Perilous Voyage Gondor deck, which did pretty well, even though Denethor had to be shuffled into the deck at one point.

With that quest over, I had a quick bite to eat and looked around for my final game of the Con. I managed to get that going with Thaurdir, who did the design for the Field Guide and his parents. We did a 4 player run against Fire on the Eastemnet and were victorious. It was my first attempt at that quest, and I played my mono-Spirit Caldara deck. Sulien did a lot of heavy lifting, as she was readied by Narya to lower the threat of all locations in the staging area by 2. That helped relieve the location lock a lot.

With the games finished, I did a final run through the GameZenter store. Not only to pick up some more NM/POD packs that people were missing in Europe, but I also had to spend my final dollars before heading back to my own country, where they are close to useless. I managed to snag a chest-mimic token bank and some additional golden tokens for it to hold. There was also a special 24-sided die with Nordic Runes on it that I couldn’t leave behind. Having repacked my bag for the flight home, I managed to find a ride back to the airport with Doc_H at about 5 PM.
I still have nightmares about the queue for security after ConOTR 2019, where the line stretched throughout the terminal. So I wanted to be there on time, even though my flight left at 8. Me and Doc_H managed to get through security with ease and went for a quick bite at the Chilli’s in the food court. Having finally had a healthy meal for the first time in 4 days (fruit salad doesn’t count), I said goodbye to the final con attendees and to Minneapolis itself. Plane boarding went fine, but unfortunately, my seat was close to the lavatory. There was also no open seat next to me, nor did I have as much space for my long legs as on the way to the Con. But I buckled up and lifted off from MSP back to the Netherlands.

Monday October 2nd – Home again

As expected, I didn’t get any sleep. I never do on board an airplane, but I had hoped that this time was the exception to that rule. The lights in the cabin were far too bright, and there was too little space to get comfortable in without people bumping into you constantly. There had also been a bit of turbulence during the flight, causing a slight delay. All in all, I picked up my bag at 11:45 AM and took a short bus ride to my grandparents’ house to catch some sleep. I really needed it too, as I was exhausted from a long day and the flight. After dinner, I took my car and went south towards home, but I had to stop halfway because I couldn’t muster the attention to drive safely on the road. Luckily, my mother lives about halfway between the airport and my house, so I could crash there for the night. I was starting to get a bit of a cold, which didn’t make sleeping any easier, but after all that flying, you’ll sleep in any bed, no matter your medical condition. Being so tired after a week like this is a sign of a very productive convention!

Tips for next time

There is always a way to improve your experiences during conventions like this, so I have this list of things I would probably change for next year. You can use this as a reference when packing for your next convention as well!

  • The hotel is great; there is no need to change anything about that, though have plans for your own breakfast if you like variety. It’s very close to the GameZenter, so you can even get some items you forgot in your room and be back in 15 minutes.
  • GameZenter food has really fallen off since I was last there; it’s not recommended. Search for alternatives at the hotel, meal-prep beforehand, or go to the mall nearby for some better meals.
  •  Officially, the convention starts on Friday, but Thursday is already quite busy with people arriving and playing games. If you are coming from several time zones away, Wednesday is also a good day to come in, as it is pretty quiet still, so you can adjust to the environment.
  • Don’t bring so many decks. I packed an extra few at the last minute, but I really shouldn’t have. Remember that you will likely get some alt art decks at the convention, so that offers some more variety.
  • Bring additional sleeves! Especially if you are someone who sleeves their encounter cards. People might bring player cards that get shuffled into the deck, so you can use the spare sleeves for that. Additional player card sleeves can be used for alt arts or if you need to expand your deck with something.
  • The weekend isn’t all about LOTR LCG. You might want to bring some other games for offsite parties or at the hotel.
  • Invest in some comfortable seats on the journey to and from the convention. Yes, it might increase the cost of the trip, but it is worth a lot. I might also switch flights next time to the earlier KLM flight instead of flying Delta.

The Haul

Conventions are THE place to get your hands on stuff for the game, either fan-made or official. In past years, I have used the occasion to get a hold of more Nightmare packs and official items like alt arts and playmats. The haul for this year also did not disappoint, with various items finding their way home with me, filling up the space in my suitcase left behind by the food I brought. I will only list the somewhat game-related items since I also use this trip to stock up on US foods that are difficult to get at home.

  • Con of the Rings 2023 Dwarrowdelf T-shirt – Bought with the ticket
  • Con of the Rings 2022 Against the Shadow T-shirt – Raffle prize!
  • Con of the Rings 2023 Swag Alt art cards and challenge decks – Received with ticket
  • Con of the Rings 2023 laser cut tokens – Compatible with COTR mats and VOTP book!
  • MtG Playmat: Tom Bombadil- As thanks for the support with COTR Swag 2023
  • Cardboard of the Rings 2023 Swag Saga Campaign book – Received for being a Patreon supporter
  • Cardboard of the Rings Hacky Sack – Patreon reward
  • Original “Apple to the face” drawing from Chad, as featured in the book
  • The Siege of Erebor Print on Demand quest – Received for attending.
  • Beorn’s Sticker set
  • First Player Tomato – Resin cast tomato from Beorn’s garden
  • Alt art cards
    • Spirit Dain Ironfoot
    • 2x Tactics Brand son of Bain – includes reworked version
    • LEGO Fellowship, Gandalf hero, and Cave Troll
    • Splice’s alt art set – Both versions of Theoden and Snowmane
    • Beorn’s alt art set – Yet another Loyal Hound to add to the “Good Boi” deck
  • Alt art Decks
  • Acrylic first player token – A gift from Caleb, was featured at GenCon this year
  • Laser cut Murder at the Prancing Pony accusation board – Really cool gift by FunkyMonkeyMonk and his wife.
  • Mimic chest with golden coins – Bought at GZ because I needed a token box
  • Futhark Rune die – Bought at GZ because it seemed fitting to own.
  • A lot of food that I bought and brought back with me…

Thanks again to everyone who made this a memorable trip for me. I really wish there were more occasions for the community to meet up like this, though my wallet probably doesn’t agree with that statement. I will continue to attend the Dutch national meetup every 2 months (when I can) and have already registered for Lure of Middle Earth in February next year. I hope to meet people of the European side of the community there again as well!

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