Forgotten Realms Just Like Lord of the Rings?

[Edena_of_Neith]

There is no Morgoth in the Forgotten Realms. You need to put Morgoth (and Sauron) in, and take Ao out. And assume the other Dieties are refusing to interfere in the events of Faerun, for some reason.
Then, perhaps, Queen Amlaruil is the equivalent of Fingolfin, Piergion the Lord of Waterdeep is Haldor the Tall, the Thavians are the treasonous Swarthy Men, and the people of the Lord's Alliance, Cormyr, Sembia, and Thesk are the Edain.

In the southernmost mountains of the Great Glacier, backed by the eternal cold of the north, sits the Dark Lord on his Dark Throne, and to him have come all the armies of humanoids, drow and illithid cities, beholders by the thousands of hives, dragons, dark elementals, and evil spirits of horror (not to mention, a lot of undead under Sauron's control.)

The Seven Sisters are the Seven Sons of a certain Noldorian Lord. The Simbul is foremost among them in power, but Alustriel is the wisest and most poetic (like Maglor.)

Well ok, perhaps that might not do. But hey, you did ask ...

 

[MadMaxim]

As for those hammering Elminster for not being all "Gandalf-like", I'd say there's a very good reason. Firstly, he's human. Furthermore, he has been both a thief, a warrior (actually hating magic, I believe), a priest of Mystra and finally found out that perhaps that arcane magic wasn't such a bad thing after all and became a mighty mage (becoming Mystra's lover probably didn't make learning arcane magic worse). Gandalf is still a complicated man and not just the old geezer who sends aspiring champions on world-saving quests.

As for the reason that he doesn't just blow away Szass Tam, Manshoon and the entire Underdark, it's stated on page 84 in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting. The powerful guys and girls are keeping each other in check and only a fool would try to eliminate each one individually without them doing the same to the good guys and girls.

 

[Banshee16]

That was based on the books, or more specifically, the Silmarillion. In the books all elves are immortal; they can only die by violence (either accidental or intentional). The spell-like abilities seem only to be seen in older, more powerful elves such as Elrond and Galadriel, but elves are referred to as being able to perceive things Men cannot. And they definitely are not any less strong or hardy than Men.

And just to throw another spanner in the works, if you wanted to base FR halflings on LOTR hobbits, you could just use human ability scores, because hobbits are a sub-race of humans.

Though the younger elves like Legolas may not have worked any great magic, I'd think that maybe they had Detect Magic and Detect Evil as spell-like abilities...

Banshee