maybe they could have just done a general rule for secrecy, instead of doing specific ones for each card. eg… if you are running a secrecy deck then every single card is 1 or 2 cheaper.

they could have said something like… every 4 cost card in your deck becomes 2, every 3 or 2  cost card becomes 1, and every 1 card is free

i dont think they've abandoned it though. it kind of worked well in khazad-dum because it fit the story. but it wont work so well in the next one.

it would have worked quite well for shadows of mirkwood as well though, treking through the forest and across the hills. its a shame they didn't include them from the very start

looking at the newest pack spoiler i would say it works very well….all that assassin style creeping around.

rich

Cunir said:

I disagree, I think that having it be a rule on some cards and not others is much better (and easier) for them from a balancing perspective. It also means you could make two identical cards (in theory) and they only difference is one of them has secrecy. So it allows them to do more card variations.

In practice I would expect a card with secrecy as a keyword to cost 1 more than a card that didn't have the word. That way if you get it before your threat is too high you get to be cheaper, but if you fail you have the penalty of an extra resource cost. If (As in my simplified example above) the cost was the same then you'd never use the card without the secrecy keyword.

Yes for the above. I think the mechanic is ok, the card pool is poor. But I am in the group that likes the idea and I hope (and expect) to see more secrecy cards in the future.

PS: Some of the secrecy cards have great design and they are highly playable even without the discout (though I would never put them in a deck with no chance of reaching secrecy). Timely Aid, Risk Some Light, or O Elbereth, Gilthoniel! come to mind.

I have allso suggested to FFG that they will make collective expasion rules PDF for all of their scenarios. They have not released anything yet, but I am still hopefull, because it would make it much easier to find some of those obscure rules, at least in the long run!