My players are using their Fellowship Points instead of using their individual Hope Points. They are actively using up the Fellowship Pool before digging into their own Hope and since the Fellowship Pool refreshes every session, they are almost never using their own Hope.

Page 106 of the AB says:

"Members of the company may recover spent Hope by tapping into the Fellowship pool: for every Fellowship point spent, a character may raise his Hope score by one."

It says they can use Fellowship Points to RECOVER spent Hope. I don't see anywhere where the rules say they can use Fellowship Points as Hope Points instead of using their own readily available Hope Points.

It's kind of the same thing. They are spending the Fellowship Point to raise their Hope, then immediately spending that Hope. The alternative if they are full on Hope is that they spend the Hope point, and then immediately replenish it with a Fellowship Point. Since Miserable doesn't linger if you cross the threshold of Shadow, it doesn't matter.

As a side-note, I've been considering making the Fellowship pool refresh during the Fellowship Phase, rather than per-session. I'm running into an issue where the last session ended just before the "wish I had Hope left" part of the adventure (the end of Those Who Tarry No Longer" if you are familiar). Having a full refresh may kill the tension on that one.

I feel like it does matter. Almost as if they are exploiting a loophole so to speak where they never hardly touch their own Hope, or worry that it dip too low. I would love to know what Francesco thinks about this issue.

How would you suggest they work? It seems to me like they are working as intended.

Hi there,

Like doctheweasel says, the use of Hope Points and Fellowship Pool points is more or less indistinguishable.
Even if a Player-hero is on zero Hope, if there are points in the Pool at a time where he feels the need to use one, he can ask the group for it there and then, it (presumably) passes over to him, and then he has the point of Hope to spend.
The neat thing about the Fellowship Pool is the fact that it takes a majority vote to approve someone being given a point from it. It's a great way of holding people back from being d**ks, as long as the group doesn't get in the habit of waiving the vote and letting everyone treat accessing the Fellowship Pool as their god-given right.

When I was last running a game, it felt like Hope was being thrown around quite freely, but when we reckoned up at the end of the session -- when we typically divvied up the Fellowship Pool to make sure it wasn't wasted -- all but maybe one or two Hope Points of the whole fellowship's expenditure was replenished. (And this without having any hobbits in the fellowship.)
If we tended to have more hours available in an evening, and longer gaming sessions, things might have been different...

It would have helped the atmosphere of the Long Marshes and the ruins of the Marsh Bell if they did feel like they were 'losing' -- suffering attrition of their Hope instead of staying even.
And it might have raised the tension around that vote if the players in the group knew that one or more people were likely to suffer Hope attrition when the Pool was exhausted, and they would each prefer it not to be them... But the Fellowship Pool is meant to be more of a unifying force than a divisive one, so for their very first adventure, I was content to just apply the rules as written.

Cheers,
--Os.

I was going to bring this up to my group as well. The Fellowship pool as written, IMO, is supposed to be a reserve to stop PCs from falling into dispair, not a bucket that can be dipped into at any time.

Also, you are supposed to discuss the use of Fellowship Hope point with the group, and if half of the party doesn't agree with the spending at that time, you can use the Hope Point, but you get a Shadow point at the same time.

Your suggestion, Doc, was a good one: considering making the Fellowship pool refresh during the Fellowship Phase, rather than per-session.

I'm not really suggesting anything. Just wondering ... is this correct?

Players who want to invoke an attribute bonus and who have 10 Hope Points or their maximum score in Hope and instead use a Fellowship Point (assuming approval from the other players) for the bonus.

I see your point. It seems to be correct, and fine. And why not let them. Should I make the sessions tougher so they burn through their Fellowship Points faster, thus forcing them to use Hope? I guess I feel like they are abusing the system.

This is exactly what I was thinking, just could not find the words. Thank you, Beran.

"Fellowship Points are supposed to be a reserve to stop PCs from falling into dispair, not a bucket that can be dipped into at any time."


And, yes, the party ALWAYS agrees to using the FP first. In fact, this all started with one player who said to the group. Don't use your Hope. Let's use up these 8 Fellowship Points first.

How about this for a houserule:

You can only use Fellowship points when the party can take a moment (say 30min-hour) to rest and recuperate. During this time, you can narrate how your character helps a companion, and can then hand them one or more Fellowship (subject to group approval still).

This accomplishes a few of things:

• Makes Fellowship more of a recover mechanic that happens outside the action.
• Forcing someone to give you points rather than you taking them reinforces that it is the camaraderie of the group that is providing it.
• It makes the group have to consider the resource management aspect of who is likely to either go mad or struggle with the next challenge ahead of time.

The first line of the rules under Fellowship Points (AB, 106) says they are used to replenish spent Hope. The way Francesco worded that makes me think that a player-hero first must use his or her Hope. And, after using that point of Hope, if there is consensus among the players, then the spent point of Hope can be recovered exhausting a point from the Fellowship pool.

Also, if there are four player-heroes in a Fellowship then the Fellowship pool has four points on which all four player-heroes draw. This as opposed to every player-hero having four Fellowship points each to draw on at any given moment. This makes the consensus all important. (AB page 24 is the reference that states thepool is a common one even if all player-heroes track it on individual character sheets.)

It seems to me unless you have a really large Fellowship, the pool is small relative to the number of player-heroes that might draw on it to recover spent Hope. All of this to say that there is usually only one point available to replenish spent Hope per adventure session per player-hero. More becomes available with the inclusion of Hobbits in the Fellowship. Also, if you think of one point in the Fellowship pool available per player-hero, for a player-hero to use more than the one point from the Fellowship pool that he or she contributes entails another player-hero sacrificing what might be the point they need somewhere later on in the session. The consensus, in narrative terms (and very much like Tolkien) becomes a player-hero sacrificing his or her contribution to the Fellowship pool.

At least this is how I have read it and played the system as LM. Would any of you agree with this...?

Regards,
E

If you want the heroes to spend more hope than they receive, make the adventures harder.

The way it's been working in my group is that the players use their character's hope during the session and then share out the fellowship pool at the end of the session. If everyone has spent hope, then everyone gets 1 point back. The remainder gets shared out generally on a most needed basis. The loss of hope is gradual, but it's there. Mainly as the players are quite conservative with their hope spends. Changing the refresh to the fellowship phase is going to have quite an impact on the company, especially of they are still limited to the fellowship pool points.

I have a house rule where I don't refresh the Fellowship Hope Pool at the end of each game session but rather at a logical point (or points) within the Adventure. I have the loose rule that for a short adventure there should be 1 refresh opportunity, a medium adventure should have 2 refresh points, and a long adventure should have 3 or 4 points, which for me works at roughly to the same amount of game session refreshes as would occur in the RAW. I also only allow Fellowship Hope to be spent when directly aiding others.

The houserule has a number of advantages for me:

1) It still allows Fellowship Hope to refresh during active gameplay

2) It stops players from realising they are nearing the end of a game session and draining the Fellowship Pool of any Hope that is currently in it just before it refreshes

3) It refreshes at a logical point within the adventure rather than it happening at the end of gaming for the evening

4) It gets the players thinking about Hope refresh points within the adventure and active RPing telling stories, cooking coney's, singing, etc in order to build opportunities to refresh hope

5) As the players don't know when the next refresh is going to occur they are more wary of using the Fellowship pool and so they do dip into their own pool so this reduces the usage of the fellowship pool as merely a buffer to a PC's personal pool, although it is still an active pool of hope - which I think is how it should be

I've been using this houserule since I started and it works pretty well for me.

Hm, I don't see why fellowship points should be the "last reserve" - to my players, they are the "first reserve", which makes sense - of course you use up the one resource that refreshes relatively easy first.
My group did it the same way as Valarian's, refreshing from the Fellowship pool at the end of the session. If they were to run low on hope, they would certainly tap the fellowship pool earlier - anyway, they would always use up all the points in the fellowship pool to refresh their own hope score at the end of the session. That's how the rules are written and how they seem to be intended, I would say. For us, it works quite well. There are always enoupg opportunities to spend hope ...

Fellowship Points are not Hope Points, they are not a 'pool' to use before you use Hope, or points that you can use when you use all your Hope.

As others have said, Fellowship Points replenish spent Hope. So as a very basic example, you have 4 players with a Fellowship pool of 4. If each player spends 1 hope in a game, or if 4 points get spent by any combination of players, then they can replenish that Hope using the Fellowship pool. As the rules state there has to be a greater than 50% agreement in the group that the Hope can be replenished in this way, but if the group spends equal to or less Hope than they have Fellowship then it should be OK as at the start of the next session the Fellowship Pool refreshes.

The issues come into play when you spend more Hope than you have Fellowship, and each players Hope points start to diminish, then replenishing becomes a group discussion.

But you could still 'spend' your Fellowship Pool, in a rules sense you are spending Hope then immediately refreshing it with Fellowship. As long as the players know that's what they are doing and that they don't have a bunch of 'free' points to spend before spending Hope.

My players, so far, have managed to be very economical with their Hope spending. They have never spent more than their Fellowship Pool in any game, though it has been close a couple of times. So a general rule they have is that anyone can spend Hope if it means it helps the group and it doesn't go over their Fellowship, then at the end of the game everyone just goes back to maximum Hope.

One of the reasons for this is that we can't play very long games, about 3 hours or so due to work/travelling. So there aren't many situations when spending Hope is an issue, mostly it is spent during combat. But I wouldn't change the rule to make Fellowship refresh in the Fellowship Phase, it just seems like a very long time to wait until they would get a little back.

The good thing is that even though they have been able to spend a lot of Hope during the games, it has never seemed to over balance the game, some Hope spending has even been on very normal or even trivial rolls.

But I am thinking up new challenges for them that could mean they have to spend Hope, without just making combat more difficult, but I think it will take something pretty big as they are quite a stubborn group when it comes to spending Hope, but that just makes it more fun and interesting for me.

Eight points? Do you have eight heroes in your party, or are all the heroes Hobbits?

As others have said above, Fellowship Points are in much shorter supply than each character's Hope Points, so I don't see where the problem is. Consider "The Fellowship of the Ring": 9 characters, including 4 Hobbits = 13 points, to be used to replenish the Hope of 9 characters. Most of those characters would have individual Hope scores in the mid to high teens, i.e. 100+ Hope collectively. By all means allow players to draw on Fellowship Points when they don't really need them, if that's what the group has decided to do, but they won't get much Hope that way.

I think the Fellowship Point pool is more of a "buffer" for each character's own Hope, in case they have to go "above and beyond" what would normally be expected of them. For example, if all but one of the company are captured, and the remaining one has to rescue them, he will get a few extra Attribute bonuses to help free the others due to the Fellowship Points reserve.

That is my understanding as well. I was wondering reading through some of the posts how players could (apparently) replenish so many Hope points through the Fellowship Pool.

If other groups are like mine, they don't dole them out 1 per player, but hand them out to whoever needs them at the time.

That's how my group works too - certainly one player may roll badly (or have an extended bout of bad luck or need to succeed where others can fail) and draw on the Fellowship Pool more than others, particularly if their own Hope is low and they have some Temp Shadow Points.

6 players (one of them is a Hobbit) so they actually have 7 Fellowship Points. That was a typo on my part.

This is an elegant house rule. I may use it. If I do I will let you know how it works.

I'm wondering if I'm making something out of nothing. However, I do wonder if it is not within the spirit of the rules for players to draw from the Fellowship Pool when they are at full Hope themselves, or certainly not in any danger of their Hope falling below their Shadow.

I really don't see where it would go against the spirit of the rules to use the fellowship points as soon as they are needed - why should the characters only think of the strength they can give each other as a last resort? Why not tap into it as soon as the need arises?

I don't believe Fellowship Points were meant to be used as Hope, or in lieu of Hope.

"Members of the company may recover spent Hope by tapping into the Fellowship pool: for every Fellowship point spent, a character may raise his Hope score by one."

But I guess there is nothing wrong with tapping into the FP instead of your own Hope which is essentially spending a point of hope and then immediately getting that point back. However, to me, this feels like going against the intention of the rule. The intention, it seems to me, is that the Fellowship Pool heals spent hope. Your bonds of friendship sustaining you when your own reserves of Hope run low. That healing feels like it should occur outside of the action -- unless someone in the party inspires you in the thick of combat (for example).

I understand that Fellowship points are not meant to be used directly in lieu of hope, but the rules also say that they can be tapped at any time, even in the midst of combat - I don't have the book at hand, but I seem to remember there was even an example with a dwarf character who does exactly that.

What I still don't see is why the bond with one's friends should sustain a character only when his or her own reserves of hope run low - why shouldn't this bond sustain the character constantly and help to keep his hope up in the first place?

Nicely stated Jakob. You are correct. I am clearly over-thinking this. Probably related to LM burn out. :-)

Here is the example from the AB I think you are talking about?

Desperately trying to ward off a Giant Spider deep in Mirkwood, Ada Took spends her last Hope point for a Body Attribute bonus to her attack roll. But the fight is not yet done, and she cannot afford to become hopeless and flee. Ada’s player, Suzie, appeals to her companions to be allowed to draw from the Fellowship pool; they readily agree, and she claims two points, bringing her Hope score back up to 2. Ada thinks of her friends, unconscious and bound in webs in the trees around her, and redoubles her efforts...

That's it, thanks!
Of course, it actually supports the notion that tapping the Fellowship pool is a last resort

I guess you can look at it both ways, but in the end, I would tend to leave it to the players when they want to tap into their fellowship points. You can still push them harder if you feel that it doesn't get interesting because they never really have to use their own reserves ...

@Nolmir, thanks for confirming that...!

@Jakob,
Thinking of the "spirit of the rules" as being something that not only captures the spirit of Middle-earth from The Hobbit and The LotR, but also re-creates that spirit in our games. As it relates to Shadow points and the all-important consensus from the group that enables a player-hero to draw on the pool, the Fellowship pool should represent a temptation to take what should be freely given.

Take from the Fellowship pool without that consensus is to become like the "Machine" that "coerces other wills" and bull-dozes over others to make its own will more affective without care or regard (The Letters, #131). The Machine takes without the need or a regard for free assent, and ultimately is the work of the Shadow and the Enemy. ("Machine" is an important Tolkien term that best describes in my opinion the mechanic in TOR for recieving Shadow when taking from the pool without consensus.)

At the heart of it, then, may be the Motive behind your player-heroes usage. And, even though, the group concedes to the usage of the Fellowship pool before one's own Hope, this could be grounds for you a LM (in the spirit of Tolkien) to award Shadow points.

Now that could be tragic, an entire Fellowship unwittingly increasing their Shadow by this type of action. And, with everyone in the Fellowship agreeing, this sudden buildup of Shadow might be confusing and invisible to the player-heroes "Moral-vision" (another important Tolkien term that applies). This could even be a great teaser for future adventures or Fellowship Phase Undertakings: the process of learning this insight that the sudden accrual in Shadow is coming from the way the Fellowship draws on the Fellowship pool...?

Regards,
E

Nobody talked about taking without consent - as I see it, it seems to be the expressed consensus of said group to use up the points in the fellowship pool first.

With the rest of your post, I think your mixing up the actions and intentions of the players with the actions and intentions of the characters. I have to think a little more about why I consider this kind of argument fundamentally wrong in rpg terms - but right now, by rpg group is at the door ...

Oh no! Now we're back to where we started again. Francesco, won't you save us?

"By all means allow players to draw on Fellowship Points when they don't really need them..."

I don't really understand this statement. Why would they use a hope point (personal or otherwise) if they didn't need to?

Here's my take on this, for what it's worth. Whilst there is nothing in the rules to say you can't use up all the Fellowship points before resorting to your own Hope, to do so would be unwise. Fellowship points are a reserve that all players can tap, whereas Hope points are not transferrable. If the players use up all the company's Fellowship points to keep their individual Hope scores topped up, the character with the least Hope will be in trouble if subsequently faced with a tough challenge by the Loremaster.

So, maybe don't disallow use of Fellowship Points as a "First Resort" rather than a "Last Resort" but explain to the players why this is basically bad tactics on their part.

[EDIT]

The message you should essentially be trying to get across to the players is this. If your character is 1 Hope point away from being Miserable, you will not be too pleased if the Fellowship pool is empty because everyone kept topping up their Hope from it when they were nowhere near Miserable.

With luck, everyone will see the logic of this and will vote against frivolous use of Fellowship points, thus inflicting Shadow points on players who continue with their selfish use of the pool.

I also think the poster who pointed out that the "Miserable" condition does not "linger" was on the money. If players realise that if their character become "Miserable" they can immediately use Fellowship points to raise their character out of this condition with no lingering effects, they will see it as a kind of "bank bailout" to use in an emergency. In other words, you don't need to use Fellowship points until you are actually Miserable. You don't need to worry about being "nearly Miserable", as if there are sufficient points left in the Fellowship pool (and the other players aren't mean enough to vote against you drawing on it) you can always lift yourself out of the Miserable condition at the last moment - like a bailout.

While all of this is true, it still makes sense to use ALL fellowship points that are left at the end of a session to regenerate hope, doesn't it? I'm really confused ... it seems to me that people are suggesting that using up the remaining fellowship points at the end of a session to regenerate as much hope as possible where somehow against the spirit of the rules. Maybe I'm misunderstanding.

No one has yet quoted the second paragraph under Fellowship Points on AB p. 106:
"If this [player-group] consensus cannot be found, he may [...] spend Fellowship points anyway and gain a Shadow point for each Fellowship point used."
We and our players are presumably all too smart and too well-aligned with the intended spirit of TOR for anyone to actually do this. After all, we're mostly talking about the importance of staying clear of the influence of the Shadow! But this example demonstrates the fact that the Fellowship pool can be dipped into whenever any one person wants to do so. Sharing it out equably at the end of a session is perhaps more civil and formalised than it should be.

I like this! As ook-productions and I have said, if you refresh the pool at the end of every short gaming session, the fellowship's Hope levels only fall very slowly. IF the LM prefers not to let the game be too comfortable, taking control of when the Fellowship pool refreshes -- and making it a little bit less frequent -- is an elegant way of doing it. Rich H's 3), 4) and 5) are all great. (There may be a strong argument for 2) as well, but I have to admit that everyone enjoys a burst of heroic successes at the end of the session, even if it is a bit artificial.)

doctheweasel suggested only allowing people to draw on the Fellowship pool when they have chance to rest and recuperate and narrate their interactions -- much like 4), above. And it has the effect, even more than 5), of challenging them to work a bit tactically.
But it loses the original intention of being able to draw on the Fellowship pool when you're in a crisis and otherwise likely to go Miserable. I think that's too high a price to pay for getting your tactics wrong, or suffering a run of bad rolls. And I like the idea that the group vote might be called in the middle of the action, and involve everyone in discussing their atittudes on exactly what a Player-hero is doing right there and then.

Cheers!
--Os.

Personally, I kind of lean toward the Fellowship pool refreshing after the adventure being played out is over. That way the party needs to think really carefully about how Hope is used in a game.

You could do that, although I went with the refresh points (varied by adventure size) to maintain the part of the rules where Fellowship Hope can refresh and the other points I mentioned, like I said earlier, that setup seems to create some nice RPing moments that really fit in with Tokien's literature.

My group has vetoed Fellowship usage, usually once a session. Most of the time, there is a consensus to use the pool, but every so often there is a not-so-important roll that someone wants to pass, that two other people don't think warrants a Fellowship Point (usually because of a character/personality issue). They just end up spending Hope instead.

It's never become a debate, because the stakes aren't high enough (when the stakes are high and someone is near being Miserable, no one is denied use of the pool).

I think my group is capable of spending the point without the group's consent, but it would require a really dramatic moment. I don't see that kind of thing happening any time soon, so I don't really consider that rule a big deal.

Hey Os,
I'm glad you quoted the second part for the discussion! That paragraph was preceisly what I was eluding to in my earlier post.

Regards,
E