Tolkienised DnD

[Christopher Lambert]

Anyone have racial stats for a Dunedain?

 

[D+1]

Okay ... I know D&D borrowed heavily from Tolkien in the first place, but I am considering running a campaign in middle earth and I would like some of the mechanics to reflect this and not just a map.

I have never really looked at any Middle Earth specific games. Why? To run a truly ME campaign you need to adopt some rather stringent setting-specific limitations. First is magic. There were 5 actual "wizards" in Middle Earth: Gandalf, Saruman, Rhadaghast and two others called the Blue Wizards IIRC who never entered into Tolkiens work other than a reference that they wandered off to the East or somesuch. As of the end of the Third Age Saruman is dead, and Gandalf is retired, leaving only three. There are other spellcasters though the only two that spring to mind are the Witch King of Angmar and of course Sauron - both of whom are dead as of the end of the Third Age. Elves in general have "magical" abilities, especially among their leadership, but again at the end of the books they have almost all left Middle Earth. Their abilities are also lessened since the three Elven rings were being relied on heavily and have now all left Middle Earth with their owners. Unless you assume an INTRODUCTION of a significant magic-using class to Middle Earth there just ISN'T any magic left of tremendous significance in the hands of PC's.

Crafting I think would need to replace magical weapons and abilities. Dwarven-forged weapons, discovery of forgotten elven-forged weapons, elven cloaks, whatever.

Races are a problem too. Elves are DISTORTEDLY superior to everyone. Tolkien made them that way. Aragorn and anyone else of Numenorian descent are less superior than the elves but STILL greatly superior to NORMAL men.

One of the things I suppose you COULD do is to "replay" the War of the Ring but "rewrite" much of it to suit an RPG. Throw out most of the major PC's and NPC's of the books and replace them with the PLAYERS PC's and your own NPC's. That would give you more freedom to deviate from the most well-known events in Middle Earth and make up your own rules and justifications for how and why things work the way they do. Instead of just 5 wizards you have hundreds. Instead of elves leaving Middle Earth en masse they decide to remain and become lesser, mortal beings. The Nine Ringwraiths and the other forces controlled by Sauron are being held back from open war for whatever reason. Additional rings of power are forged creating lesser wraiths and somewhat lesser heroes to oppose them. Or perhaps the ringwraiths are very graduated in power such that low-level PC's could face and destroy them one at a time as they advance in level. And you could introduce False Rings; rings that are repeatedly mistaken for the One Ring but turn out to be mere rings of invisibility, or protection, or x-ray vision, or jumping, or 3 wishes, etc...

One thing is certain and that is that in an RPG, if you stick closely to the world that Tolkien created, halfling characters are gonna die in droves. Frodo & Co. survive largely because of plot immunity. In a more RPG-like setting that nonetheless remained true to Prof. T's work then Frodo would have died at LEAST as early as Weathertop (4 hobbits vs. 5 ringwraiths and they all LIVE?), or if not there then in Moria pierced by that spear, and then again in Cirith Ungol eaten by Shelob. Sam would have followed. Merry and Pippin, since the orcs would not have special order regarding capture of halflings, would have died instantly after Boromir.

Everything in the books hinges on what happens with the One Ring. That's a problematic plotting device for an extended campaign. For a more limited or short term game it works better. There is also just ONE real enemy - Sauron. Sauron drives ALL the opposition in the world of any significance. The Easterlings, Southrons, Haradrim, orcs, trolls, wargs would not be serious problems were it not for Sauron conscripting and coercing them all into his service in an attempt to find the ring and utterly destroy the West. A campaign that does not focus on the War of the Ring would need to begin deviating a great deal from where Tolkien left off in order to better serve the needs of an RPG.

Just my opinion of course.