Forked Thread: A Brief History of Tolkien RPGs - Middle Earth 4E

Olgar Shiverstone · Dec 3, 2008

Forked from: A Brief History of Tolkien RPGs

crash_beedo said:
Funny that 4E could be an ideal Tolkien system - you could play a Martial-only campaign, either introducing new classes for things like Istari (wizards) with toned down spells, or relegate magic to ritual casting. Herbalism, which plays a part via Athelas (and MERP went crazy with the herbalism), could be handled similar to Alchemy or Rituals, too.

Assume for a moment if you will that you've decided to run a fantasy RPG campaign set in Middle Earth (age of your choosing) using the 4E rules set. Accept for the moment that though 4E may not be a perfect match to Middle Earth, your gaming group is familiar with it, so you want to run it with as few changes to the base mechanics as possible.

1. How do you set up your campaign to get a Middle Earth feel? For example, what goes in the character creation document and campaign guide?

2. What rules changes do you make for your campaign?

Discuss.

Aside -- I really miss the Middle Earth 3E pages that EN World used to host, as I had my own version of Middle Earth 3E on there.

Grimstaff · Dec 3, 2008

On the contrary, I feel 4E is a perfect match for a LotR game.

1. Classes Allowed: Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, Warlord.

2. Ritual magic (Arcane and Divine, barring Raise Dead) only

3. Races Allowed: Human, Half-elf (as Dunedain), Elf (Sindar), Eladrin (Noldor), Dwarf, Halfling (retro-flavoured back to Hobbit of course).

4. Magic Items - very rare (roughly 1-3 per PC per Tier) - PCs receive the recommended +1 to hit, dmg, and AC per 5 levels as recommended in the rules for low magic campaigns.

5. Possible Arcane class abilities allowed through Multi-classing only. No Divine allowed.

RandomCitizenX · Dec 3, 2008

Grimstaff said:
On the contrary, I feel 4E is a perfect match for a LotR game.

1. Classes Allowed: Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, Warlord.

2. Ritual magic (Arcane and Divine, barring Raise Dead) only

3. Races Allowed: Human, Half-elf (as Dunedain), Elf (Sindar), Eladrin (Noldor), Dwarf, Halfling (retro-flavoured back to Hobbit of course).

4. Magic Items - very rare (roughly 1-3 per PC per Tier) - PCs receive the recommended +1 to hit, dmg, and AC per 5 levels as recommended in the rules for low magic campaigns.

5. Possible Arcane class abilities allowed through Multi-classing only. No Divine allowed.

Just change the races allowed to only Human and limit PC magic just a touch more and this would be pretty close to how I would set up a Hyborian Age game of 4E

Gort · Dec 3, 2008

I think you'd have to house rule your races and abandon balance for them. Elves are just humans++, and Dunedain are humans+. They should be better than humans by their very nature.

Oh, and I think you'd have to vet the list of rituals significantly. Things like Teleport don't belong.

Ydars · Dec 3, 2008

One thing I would put in my player's guide would be the fact that characters have to be heroic in the highest sense of the word. I just feel that a Middle-earth setting is closely tied to the fact that there are few or no moral ambiguities. it wouldn't tolerate the usual freebooters who abound in D&D games; not if you want it to taste like LoTR anyway.

I would also re-model my experience system so that instead of gaining experience for monster kills it was purely given for attaining story goals. Indeed I would even consider deducting experience for monsters slain, since LoTR is not really about slaying monsters in the way that 4E RAW is.

I would allow items of ancient power, since there are many heirlooms of the Dunedain in Arthedain and other places, especially troll hoards but I would avoid reducing them to purely mechanical bonus items. I would probably make them all legacy type items that grow with the PCs and would have a rich back-story themselves

e.g. Durcrist; darkness-cleaver. Forged in Gondolin during the wars with Morgoth's minions, this blade has special virtue against spiders and their ilk and grows warm when they are near. It survived the wreck of Beleriand and washed up on the shores of Mithlond (Grey havens) where it was taken by the wandering companies of Elves to Imadris (Rivendell) and there gems of light were set into the pommel to honor the memory of the Lords of Gondolin. It was given to the Sylvian Elves of Thanduril who used the sword to hunt spiders in Mirkwood but passed out of all knowledge in the TA 2941; the year the Necromancer was driven from Dol Guldur (and the Ring was found by Bilbo).