Ok guys, I just want to make sure I'm doing Fellowship Points correctly.

First, my reading is that at the beginning of each session we get a pool of fellowship points equal to the number of heroes in the party (5, in our case). Add 1 to that because we have a Beorning with Twice Baked Honeycakes, so 6 in total.

So we have 6 Fellowship Pool pts. and this is what we get refreshed at the beginning of every session.
Is that correct?

Assuming that it is, my next question is on usage:
As I understand it, players spend hope during the session, but at any point they can request replenishing their own pool of hope with pts from the Fellowship Pool. My party generally does not have a problem managing the requesting and approval of communal Fellowship Pts.

So, my next question is, does it matter if we play it strictly this way, or is it ok for people to just use the Fellowship Points as a communal pool from which to draw additional hope pts. if they need them, as long as they get 1/2 party buy-in?

Is there some nuance of the economy of hope points that I'm not understanding? I realize it may sound trite, but spending Hope Points out of the
communal Fellowship Pool first saves on some eraser-ing trauma to everyone's character sheet.

Thanks for any comments.

You have it exactly right. That's pretty much how I played it. Someone says, "I want to spend a point of Hope from the fellowship pool. Is everyone all right with that?"

You're correct in your understanding of how the Fellowship Hope pool works. I personally don't like the idea of how it refreshes so have house ruled it heavily - see the link in my signature and the appropriate chapter of the supplement for what I do in my games.

See link in sig for my scratch sheet.

Ok, I have a feeling I'm going to say this poorly, but here goes...

Didn't this Forum once have a discussion about this exact issue and come to the conclusion that if characters directly spend Hope from the Pool, it effectively undermines the RAW for things like Shadow Points, bouts of Madness and the temptation to steal a point from the Pool without permission?

So ultimately you had to start using the RAW from the start and not modify them because otherwise their is no desperation and no temptation. It also makes the game a bit too easy for the heroes.

I agree it is easier on a character sheet, but I would probably suggest that instead of spending from the Pool, the character spends one of their own and immediately replaces it from the Pool. Ok, that's semantics, but the idea is that as the session goes on and Pool Points decrease there is the possibility that someone is going to deny that character as they're hogging all the points and no one else has points on which to fall back on.

Maybe use some kind of indicator instead? So at the start of the session through some of those flattened glass beads (or pennies or anything else really) into the center of the table to represent the Pool. Do the same for each character. Spend the beads instead of marking the sheet.

Not at all. If you want to "spend a point from the pool," there's no reason you can't draw from the pool first, then spend your own point of Hope. There's even an example like this in the book.

Spending Hope this way still allows players to take from the pool without permission, thus gaining a Shadow point.

Great idea on the beads, Garn (and I love Rich's Notesheet, too).

Yet another idea is to put your character sheet into a clear plastic protector sheet (easily found at any supply store like Staples). Then you can mark whatever you want on the character sheet with a wet erase or dry erase pen and it's easy to change stuff like Hope Points.

I've been using plastic protector sheets for three decades, and they work really great!

I'm going with Beads. We have a bunch that we use for various tasks. For some reason, tangible props make me feel a little more "in the moment"

But I digress.

Garn, I "feel" this as well:

"if characters directly spend Hope from the Pool, it effectively undermines the RAW for things like Shadow Points, bouts of Madness and the temptation to steal a point from the Pool without permission?"

But I can't see how it really would...it just *seems* like it would to me.

Anyone have any other direct experience with it?

Rich, I'm also tempted to houserule the rate at which Fellowship Pool refreshes..seems a little too easy.

It's not that it's too easy, in my opinion, it's that it's poor design. In the RAW it refreshes at the end of a game session which is a "construct" brought into the game from the gaming table and causes all kinds of issues with variable session length, players knowing when the session will end and burning Hope from their Fellowship pool, etc... Check out the link in my signature for the additional rules. There is a chapter on recovering hope which I think improves this part of the system no-end, bringing control back to the LM and making Hope recovery narratively significant within the game at all times; therefore increasing the richness of play.

Agreed on all counts. And that's really what I was driving at with "easy" which I thought was an....easier...if not entirely accurate criticism of why I didn't like it that much :-)

Gotcha. Well, like I said, take a look at the rules supplement in my sig... It may give you want you want more than the RAW does.

That's a really good point. Sometimes session lengths vary, and having game mechanics resolve around artificial time periods like that can lead to abuse. As players we've often joked before regarding this, and as a player when coming to the end of a night/session it can be almost tempting not to spend those points (that are almost burning a hole in your virtual character sheet's pocket), since they're going to be replenished anyway!