Cubicle 7 No Longer Producing The One Ring and Adventures in Middle Earth

Cubicle 7 has announced that it will cease publishing Tolkien-related games, including The One Ring and Adventures in Middle Earth, in early 2020. The One Ring 2E is cancelled.

‘I am with you at present,’ said Gandalf, ‘but soon I shall not be. I am not coming to the Shire.’

UNEXPECTED TOR2 UPDATE – Cubicle 7

www.cubicle7games.com

We have some very unfortunate and unexpected news to share. Contractual differences arose recently which we have been unable to resolve, and so we have decided to end our licensing agreement with Sophisticated Games. It is with regret that we have made this very tough decision to withdraw.

This means we will cease publishing The One Ring and Adventures in Middle-earth™ in the first half of 2020. Unfortunately, this doesn’t give us enough time to release the much-anticipated The One Ring – The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Game second edition. As many of you know, our first edition of The One Ring is eight years old, and we had high hopes of a full product line to support our second edition. Our team have worked incredibly hard on this new edition; with many of the announced titles already written and edited, so being very close to completion makes this decision even harder.

We fully appreciate how invested so many of you are, both in regards to stock and your love of the game. Especially those who have followed our journey from first edition, or have customers who have pre-ordered the second edition or Rohan Region Guide. We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused.

We will continue selling our existing stock over the next few months. We will be offering some discounts on our website for consumers as part of our Black Friday sale this week. We will not be reprinting any of these titles, so if you wish to stock up, we would suggest you contact your preferred distributor soon.

 

[JeffB]

OH FYI for all- Great series of articles here re: RPGing in ME (this came out prior to AIME, I believe). There are 4 or 5 of them. Links to following articles are at bottom of each page

Playing D&D in ME-

 

[darjr]

MERP being like GURPS books? Yea I see that. I have some too, and want more.

TOR is a pure gem. Evocative and compelling and brings to life Middle Earth. The magic in it alone is subtle yet powerful and feels just like it should.

As a game I feel MERP was a poor way to play in Middle Earth. It never quite felt right.

We’ll never get MERP back and that’s OK. But it does look like TOR will live on.

 

[GreyLord]

I liked MERP, it seemed to get one thing down that many others didn't. Combat was deadly.

Even more deadly than 5e.

When you have Dragons being equivalent of level 150, and Wizards like Saruman being similar...a maximum of level 10 isn't all that great.

You can extrapolate, but it still is a long ways to dealing with many of the more powerful creatures.

Orcs and others are pretty reasonable threats, and in a way far more deadly than what you see in 5e or derivatives. One orc can lay your 3rd or even 5th level character to rest...if played right by the GM.

Magic may be somewhat abundant, but spells are still harder to gain and cast than in 5e (or any version of D&D for that matter).

That doesn't make MERP better than AiME or TOR, just a different flavor for a different feel for the books.

I think it depends on how you view the books and how you view combat. Combat is far easier to survive at low level in the new games, while it was something to avoid at all costs in may ways in the MERPS at low level.

Travel and lands may be better replicated by TOR, while ideas of the rest and recuperation seem to be imitated by it as well in better form.

I think it really boils down to preference. I'd probably prefer MERPS, but that may be simply from not having a good GM run TOR or AiME.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

What sets ME apart, IMO, is that the tone of the adventures, things like hope and despair, weakness and shadow, bolstering eachother's hope and falling to shadow in solitude, these are part of what the setting is. I'd be reluctant to play in any era or region of ME without those dynamics in play.

I also don't want to meet with Aragorn, or whatever, when I play in ME, and I absolutely feel free to mess with canon in any setting, even ME. But there are tonal things that if I didn't want to use, I'd just play in a homebrew.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Well, whatever we think of past game systems for Middle-Earth, and I count TOR and AiME in the past, whatever we see as the next game will probably come out around the time the Amazon Prime Middle-Earth series debuts. And since that is set in the 2nd Age, I expect the game, or at least the first supplement, to be the same. Still no real mages, but a lot more magic and magic items floating around in that time period.

 

[PabloM]

Won't somebody please think of CODA system?

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

Won't somebody please think of CODA system?

I think we'd all rather not...

 

[Crusadius]

To be clear, it is not the quality of MERP that is questioned here; I’m only refuting the un-debatable fact that it will remain the champion of all Middle Earth rpg to date.

Ahem. For 15 years MERP was the Number One Lord of the Rings roleplaying game*. TOR has a few years to go before it knocks MERP from that perch....


Ah but I joke. TOR is definitely the better system. I would play TOR over MERP any day. But at the time of MERP, I preferred it over the granddaddy of them all: AD&D.
* It was the only LotR RPG

 

[Ravenbrook]

But the MERP maps!!! They are indeed PRECIOUS!!!

 

[teitan]

Having finally cracked open my AIME Player’s Guide I must collapse to my knees and cry NOOOOOOOOOO! And then buy the humble bundle until I can get the rest of what’s published.