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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7967554" data-attributes="member: 42582">We played our first quarantine session today, using Zoom video and chat. For most of us - including me - it was our first RPGing since late February (ie 8 weeks!). So I enjoyed it a lot!We played our second session of a Middle Earth/LotR game, using Cortex+ Heroic, which is an adaptation of Marvel Heroic RP. Cortex+ uses big dice pools with dice of different sizes, and resolution depends partly on the pips showing and partly on the dice size regardless of pips, so we used <a href="https://rolladie.net/" target="_blank">Roll a Die</a> (sharing screens via Zoom), which shows the individual dice results (which we need) as well as the total (which isn't relevant for this system). Some rolls were also done the old-fashioned way, with purely verbal reports of the outcomes.There are four PCs - Gandalf; Nehar, a Dunadan ranger of the north; Mirenlea, a Noldor Elf from Rivendell; and Dwalin, a Dwarven traveller. The session began with them IN PURSUIT OF THE ORCs (a scene distinction, which the players had to wear down in order to catch the Orcs) who were (as a result of the events of the first session) carrying the Palantir of Amon Sul from the north of Eriador where it had been recently discovered, somewhere to the south in the vicinity of Eregion. As they travelled south with the Misty Mountains to their left, ALL THINGS WERE SILENT, WITH A SENSE OF WATCHFULNESS AND FEAR.There were two antagonists - the Orcs, and also a mysterious presence whom the players (and perhaps the PCs) became increasingly certain was Saruman.Nehar and Mirenlea tried to help the company bear down on the Orcs. But the Orcs were leaving foul marks of their passing (like the damage to the statue of the king that Frodo saw at the cross-roads in Ithilien). Dwalin found himself dismayed at what he saw (significant emotional stress) and threw away his axe in despaire; while Mirenlea nearly left the party driven by her wrath at the Orcs - only Gandalf's words and example (he made a point of keeping Glamdring sheathed) were able to keep her wrath barely contained (she stressed out with emotional stress, but then Gandalf was able to help her recover so she was still badly stressed but not stressed out).As the company headed south, there appeared in the sky CREBAIN FROM DUNLAND which threatened the PCs with being WATCHED. (This scene distinction had the rider that, if it was still in play when the PCs arrived in Ost-in-Edhil, they would have a WATCHED scene distinction in the next scene that would grow the Doom Pool when it came into play.) Mirenlea sang a song of weather control to try and summon a storm that would drive them from the sky, but failed. So Dwalin led the company into Moria where they could take shelter from the evil birds.In THE DEEPS OF MORIA MORIA, the company found themselves split up. Dwalin, having returned to the halls from which his people had been exiled, headed off to explore. He encountered a strange old man, with a walking stick and a lantern, who remarked how rare it is to see on of the Dwarvenfolk in Moria, and asked him to join in a search for gold and trinkets. But Dwalin, unmoved by the Dwarven lust for gold, refused. The old man, frustrated, suggested that he had spent too long in the company of the foolish grey wizard, and then turned Dwalin's armour to rust and tried to clock him on the head with his walking stick. But Dwalin avoided the blow, and was able to escape to one of the ancient armouries, where he found a new axe.Meanwhile, Nehar and Gandalf found themselves confronted by the Orcs, sho had been reinforced by others from within the depths of Moria - the pursued had become pursuers! They were both hard beset (d12 physical stress each), even when Mirenlea, who had become separated in the halls of Moria hunting Orcs in her wrath, found her way back by following the sounds of combat through the halls. She hurled herself into the fray to draw the Orcs away from Nehar, becoming overwhelmed by her wrath and grief in the process (completing a Milestone in the process by stressing herself out while helping an ally). Gandalf was forced to draw Glamdring again, and to fight with sword in one hand while blasting with fire from Narya.In this way Gandalf was able to defeat and drive away the Orcs. But such a flagrant display of magic also announced his presence, and someone - perhaps the mysterious stranger! - was able to come and take away the palantir, so that it was not found among the defeated orcs. (Between Mirenlea's deeds of grief and Gandlaf's magic, the doom pool had grown to include 2d12, which I spent to end the scene.)The next session will start with a Transition Scene in Moria. And for anyone who's interested, there's a more technical system-oriented report <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/how-was-your-last-session.667468/page-9" target="_blank">here, on my Cortex+ LotR thread</a>.</blockquote>

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