This week, we tried out the Sauron expansion to the Lord of the Rings board game. Rather than all co-operating against the game, here one player acts as Sauron and does his best to impede the progress of the Fellowship. Mark G got drawn randomly to be Sauron and very effective he was too. Frodo, Sam and Pippin all fell in Helm's Deep as we got overtaken by events, leaving Merry as the only hobbit to reach Shelob's Lair. He lasted less than a turn for a humiliating defeat with the ring falling into Sauron's clutches.

The original game was challenging enough but this version seems extremely hard for the hobbits. It didn't help that we kept drawing multiple evil events each turn but, even so, Sauron seemed to be able to advance towards us pretty regularly. I enjoyed it but I'm not sure that it isn't weighted a bit too much in favour of the Sauron player.