(Psi)SeveredHead
Adventurer
While I could picture an interest in gaming, I don't think any of the well-known games (eg D&D and Pathfinder) could replicate the setting.
It takes a seriously hard core fan to actually want to play in the setting. As the sole conflict in the setting was dealt with in the books, the DM needs to learn the setting inside out - the power players, the languages, the characters, etc - and then needs to get 4 or 5 players as interested in the same thing. It's also not a sword & sorcery setting, which D&D and PF rely on - only Noldor and "outsiders" get to cast spells, healing takes forever, etc. So when potential gamers show up at a Middle-earth game, they'll likely be disappointed.
At least one issue could be resolved with a published game system rather than "homebrew", and I suspect it's been done before, but not in a system that people are familiar with.
It's possible another system could handle the game just fine - there was a thread about that the other day - but those are systems the majority of gamers haven't heard of, much less new gamers.
The "dream" scenario would be if WotC got the license for the films, so there'd be no IP conflict between film maker and game maker, but that'll never happen. Furthermore, WotC would have to develop a new system for the setting, which is ... well, just look at what happened to TSR, then picture it getting worse.
It takes a seriously hard core fan to actually want to play in the setting. As the sole conflict in the setting was dealt with in the books, the DM needs to learn the setting inside out - the power players, the languages, the characters, etc - and then needs to get 4 or 5 players as interested in the same thing. It's also not a sword & sorcery setting, which D&D and PF rely on - only Noldor and "outsiders" get to cast spells, healing takes forever, etc. So when potential gamers show up at a Middle-earth game, they'll likely be disappointed.
At least one issue could be resolved with a published game system rather than "homebrew", and I suspect it's been done before, but not in a system that people are familiar with.
It's possible another system could handle the game just fine - there was a thread about that the other day - but those are systems the majority of gamers haven't heard of, much less new gamers.
The "dream" scenario would be if WotC got the license for the films, so there'd be no IP conflict between film maker and game maker, but that'll never happen. Furthermore, WotC would have to develop a new system for the setting, which is ... well, just look at what happened to TSR, then picture it getting worse.
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