I guess my mastery of nuances is also baffling :-D.
I meant it as a praise (first time was your 'state of the meta' statement). Nothing I heard wasn't to my taste, it's quite the opposite.
It's the game that isn't really sticking with me. LOR is a fantastically well done game, I absolutely don't question the choices made (well ... some, but that's marginal), and I am in awe of how well you guys do what you do. But I'm afraid it's not what I enjoy.
I think design space is too small // granularity too large. Gameplay is too much synergistic, self-centered, and the balance between ingame decisions versus pre-game decisions is too much skewed toward pre-game decisions. Basically, too much MTG-like. End result is interactions with the opponent matter ... not that much. And the game becomes repetitive too fast.
I prefer 'muddy' games where your plan (eg deck) doesn't 'simply work', neither does your opponent's, and the largest part of the game is how e...