Happy holidays all! I hope everyone gets to celebrate the end of this year with some more games and I wish you the best for 2026.
I know it has been a while since the last update, but we have finally gotten some progress going on the book again, and we are hopeful to release it around the time of the blog’s anniversary. Things could still happen to delay this, but we are getting closer to a finished product. So I would ask a little more patience before you get the book. Supporters on Patreon will be getting free shipping on all books, and a PDF version will be made available to everyone who wants a digital version of the book or to print for themselves.
In the meantime, I would like to reflect a little on 2025, which was a slightly slower year for Vision of the Palantir due to various reasons. We did achieve some major milestones this year. The first of which was the completion of the LOTR campaign with a huge help from Morten Dall for writing those articles. It has long been a dream of mine to have the entire campaign up on the blog, but I have had to rely on other writers to do those articles for me whilst I was working on other topics.
Those topics include the Nightmare Dream-chaser cycle, which will be completed soon. Only NM City of Corsairs will need to be finished, and then I can go back to Nightmare scenarios I missed. This will start with the NM Ringmaker cycle, though all NM Saga scenarios also still need to be done. I plan to have NM Ringmaker done this time next year, and will be accepting help on any of the NM scenarios if someone wants to help out.
We also continued our Quest of the Week series along several cycles this year. A big thank-you to Autumn for continuing to prepare the form each week and to do the write-up for the weekly quests. We’ve seen a big influx in players now that we have gone back to the Dwarrowdelf cycle, and we hope you are all enjoying this weekly format. It has produced a ton of articles on the blog as well, but I hope that there was enough content aside from that for people not participating in the QOTW.
Another big milestone for this year was that the total number of visitors to the blog has surpassed 2 million! This is not a statistic I actively track, but at the bottom of each page of the site is a small tracker that has quietly gone past the 2.000.000 within 8 years of blogging. This is a fantastic achievement for such a niche game, and a motivator for me that there are still people interested in what I have to say about this game.
I do recognise that I have not had as much time for the blog as in previous years. This is due to a variety of reasons, such as lack of inspiration for amazing articles, but also that I don’t have as much motivation for the Nightmare scenarios anymore. The art on them is still amazing, and I do like the different strategies that the developers made in such a small expansion to the quest. But it is hard to get into, and the audience is also a lot smaller than for other articles. I have also been busy with other things. Some of them are blog-related, especially things like the cover-art for the book and keeping up with the community. But I have also been sliding into the nostalgia-flavoured hole of the Pokemon TCG now that I have a local group for trading and playing the game. Those of you who follow me on Reddit may have seen some videos of non-LOTR themed binders.
But the biggest reason as to why there has been a lack in content on the blog is that I have been putting in more time for myself. I have started to work part-time, reducing to 80% of my regular workload in March. I now have time to do things without as much stress, and have more time to dedicate to sports, family, and other hobbies. Distractions like videogames (mostly Silksong) now have more space dedicated to them. I do use the time for the blog as well, but in a more controlled manner, with plenty of breaks and no deadlines to myself. It has greatly lowered stress for me and I have found time to do things I like. This has culminated in the start of a relationship this past month, which will further add to the distractions in the new year, but the blog will not be forgotten. She is also a boardgaming nerd, so hopefully I can get some more 2-player games in for 2026.
Goals for 2026
As for 2026, I hope to achieve a couple of milestones, whilst not pressuring myself too much on reaching them.
The first will be the release of the book. It will be a year behind schedule, but at least the community will appreciate a new book to learn deckbuilding from and have plenty of example decks to get inspiration from. As I mentioned, I hope to release it soon, but am depending on the lay-out specialist to prepare all pages. I will have a dedicated article to the release of the book coming out with details on where to buy the book for yourself.
Second milestone will be the completion of the Nightmare Ringmaker cycle. I am not looking forward to this cycle, but I do have all the cards, so it is a good excuse for them to hit the table. Completing this cycle will mean that all cycles have their Nightmare versions covered, leaving only the 6 Hobbit scenarios and 12 LOTR scenarios to be covered. That will be enough for 2027. I average a month per article on these, so hopefully that will remain true throughout the year.
Other than that, I will take things as they come. The QOTW will likely continue, and perhaps even revisit some scenarios if we run out. It has been going on for a year and a half at this point, and we are going to run out of quests at some point. I will also accept any newcomers to the blog who want to do the write-up for some scenarios for the game. This is mostly targeted at the AleP-scenarios, which I have largely ignored up to this point. I want to make sure that at least all the official content has been covered by the blog before we get into fan-made stuff, but if people want to help out and get a headstart on some AleP scenarios, let me know!
As for me playing the game, I will hopefully finding more time between D&D sessions and other distractions to play some more on DragnCards during the weekly LCG Server event. The local group of Dutch and Flemish players is also growing, so I hope to get more physical games in during 2026. I have hosted a few in the past, and have had a great time with them. I will not be joining the European players for Lure of Middle Earth this year due to different priorities that weekend, but I do hope to make it to Con of the Rings in 2026. It has been a few years and provided that the US doesn’t implode, I will be making the trip again to play with the North American part of the community again.
With that, I feel that I have come to the end of this update article for you this year. Have a great conclusion to 2025 and I hope to see you all in 2026 with more articles, a new book, and fun content for all!
Vision Of The Palantir 