Starting Fellowship
From the Comprehensive Rules 4.0:
Your fellowship begins with a character bearing The One Ring. This can be any character with the ringed resistance icon, or any version of Frodo. That character gains the keywords Ring-bearer and Ring-bound, if he does not already have them.
Place your Ring-bearer face up on the table. Place The One Ring under your Ring-bearer (so the title is showing) and place on him the burdens that you bid.
You may then play other companions (not allies, possessions, artifacts, or conditions) one at a time from your draw deck, as long as the total twilight cost of these companions is 4 or less. The twilight cost of your Ring-bearer is not included in this total.
Don’t place any tokens into the twilight pool for the cards in your starting fellowship.
One companion you play may effect the play of a later companion you play.
Some versions of Éomer cost 3, but read, “While you can spot a 
Man, Éomer’s twilight cost is –1.” If you play another Man who costs 2 first, you can spot him to play Éomer, as the total cost of your starting companions will be 4 instead of 5. You may use “When you play” game text on a starting companion.
In the Starter Rules, players select their starting fellowships based upon which deck they have.
See also active.
| Setting Up the Game | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Deck Building | Kinds of Cards | Uniqueness | Rule of 4 | Rule of 9 | Starting Fellowship | Bidding | Mulligan | X-List | R-List | Errata |