I am not sure about this Beorning Cultural virtue.

Can someone give me some info about it?

What does "-explore an area within 3 days of travel" really means? Does it mean you can explore a specific area at a maximum distance of 3 days of travel or that you can move up to 3 days of travel to "see what there is to see"?

And if i understand correctly, you can take any action that you normaly could if you were awake and physicaly there, using your normal attributes and skills but as soon as you loose Endurance you wake up. Right?

Any others things to know or take into consideration with this interesting virtue?

thank you very much.

I take it as meaning the former. You can explore an "area" located within three days travel from you. I would guess that the size of the area is limited to what could be explored during the time before waking if the character were actually present.

I suppose there is some room for leeway. If a character wanted to explore the path ahead for obstacles I would probably allow them to scout the path for three days travel worth of distance ahead, but only things that were on the path or directly visible from it would be found. A fallen tree or a washout blocking the trail would be found. A group of goblins camped near the path seeking to ambush passers-by probably would not be found.

That was ,and is currently, my vision of this Virtue.

I pretty much read the entry the same way as Horsa. Although I have concerns with two other points.

As always, it is a question of a word's meaning / intent. Specifically:

• What are we calling an animal? Mammals only? What about crustaceans? Insects (spiders!)? Other naturally occurring creatures with feet, regardless of taxonomy? Does this exclude Morgoth's and Sauron's unnatural creations and hybridizations? What about those Aberrations from the dawn of time hidden in obscure s (Watcher in the Water, etc that Gandalf mentioned)?
  
• What is a 'track'? Was footprint meant (which means players can travel anywhere)? Or a game trail (which means players can only travel along highly traveled paths that creatures have worn into foliage)?
  
• Is time a factor? Over what length of time is the passage of an animal included in the tracks that can be followed? One hour? Day? Year? Century? Millenia? Age?

The reason this is a concern is because it implies that in areas with less fauna, the character's ability to travel is impeded as there are fewer footprints/game trails to follow. This might be the case in Forochel, the Wasted Heath, Harad and Far Harad deserts, and any large body of water (see para below). It might also affect certain other areas where game is artificially suppressed (Dead Marshes, Cirith Ungol).

This quote would also imply that large bodies of water cannot be crossed because their are no animal paths per se, although bears are very good swimmers. Particularly if you include polar bears - who are known to swim across small channels and bays. With >12 hrs of sunlight to accomplish tasks polar bears have an advantage over other types of bears in this respect. This would affect any large lake (Mirrormere, Evendim, Rauros, Rhun, Nurnen) as well as rivers (Anduin, possibly others).

This quote strongly implies an altered rate of travel but provides no mechanic. Three days travel is 72 hrs. Assuming constant motion - without the need to eat, sleep or rest - we are still limited by the Virtue's wording to 12 hours of travel, at most (player instantly falls asleep at sunset to invoke the Virtue and then is automatically awoken at sunrise - roughly 12 hours ignoring seasonal position of the sun, lattitude/longitude, etc). And assuming we are not impeded by any potential conflict.

But it is still limited to 12 hrs of travel before sunrise occurs. Unless, in spirit-bear form, the character is capable of moving at a greater rate of speed and/or ignores terrain and travel modifiers. What travel rules changes would allow 3 days travel in 12 hours, max?

Also, the spirit-bear form is corporeal, it leaves tracks and can be injured (implying it can be engaged in combat). So does this mean the spirit-bear is affected by terrain issues? That is, if a very steep canyon - almost a crevasse - is in the characters path and he attempts to travel down one side and up the other, can the spirit-bear trip and fall, tumbling down?

More and more this seems to be a Co-Rider situation rather than a spirit form or Out of Body Experience (OOBE).


I am quite sure I am over-analyzing things here, but during a gaming session players have a tendency to do the unexpected, so having greater clarity helps. These might be some issues to consider prior to being confronted unexpectedly in the middle of game play. Forewarned is fore-armed and all.

We've been keeping it rather simple. The bear pops out of the sleeping Beorning (who can, by spending the point of hope instantly put himself to sleep).

It's just a quasi-real bear that can do everything and go anywhere a real bear can. I've had my Night-Goer drag things back to camp. It's also lost things it was trying to bring back because it ran out of time.

It doesn't get tired like a real bear (so it can, running, make a three day journey away by running maximum bear speed for the night).

It can attack with the character's dagger skill and does damage like it was armed with a dagger.

It has the senses of the character (so a Night-Goer with Brother to Bears has extremly acute senses) and all the character's skills and abilities.

Anyone who crosses its path can interact with it just like it's a real bear.

If the bear takes endurance damge/a wound from an injury/fall or something similar, the damage goes to the character and the character wakes up. While the Night-goer is out, the character still counts as resting for healing/wound recovery/whatever.

I suppose we might revisit some of what it can do if the official stats for a bear are ever published, but it's worked fine so far.

This ability points up something that I am finding more and more in TOR. The RAW posit a game and players very much in the spirit of Tolkien, things break down when confronted with rules lawyers and power gamers. This is neither good nor bad.

As a GM my style is very much "use the rules as guidelines to help tell a good story". So I tend not to worry so much about how fast does a Beorning's "spirit bear" run? It just runs fast enough to allow it to search an area within three days travel.

I recognize that for some gamers and groups this style simply will not work and hard and fast answers to this sort of thing are needed. There are times when I wish the Professor had been a gamer so he could have made some of these things clearer in his writings....

I'd likely have the Spirit Bear do Wisdom+Valor in base damage rather than Dagger Damage if it ever comes up.

The only problem I've had with it so far is it feels like the Beorning becomes the Netrunner of TOR. You end up having a special case rule/session for the player to do things. Not terrible, just kind of a burden at times.

Thank goodness it costs Hope.

You ain't seen nuthin' yet. Just wait until I commission a saddle so we can have night-bear-elf-cavalry.

jbuck,
Go ahead, saddle up... I'm sure you can withstand the extra Encumbrance.


Horsa,
I admit I am a Rules Lawyer - when it comes to understanding the scope of a skill/ game mechanic/ whatever as thoroughly as possible. Not because I have any intention of interrupting game play, but because it makes it easier to adjudicate during play with less dispute.

While I love the flavor text, IMO it seems that in not providing more sharply delineated game mechanics SG/C7 are setting themselves up for more clarification discussions and the publication of more errata.

I am not proposing that TOR should add extra game mechanics. As an example appropriate to this thread, would it have taken much extra space to say something like "In bear-spirit form the character can travel continuously, without searching or examining things, in a 30 mile radius from their point of origin with sufficient time to return. Any delay will decrease the maximum distance." Done. Little or no chance for dispute. Yes, hard-core rules lawyers are going to dispute that anyway (after all they dispute everything!) but the vast majority of players would not.

How about a Beorning climbing into a nice, light, cart or carriage and falling asleep.

Then, summon the night goer.

Hook the bear up to the carriage.

Bear powered night-train!

It will revolutionize the transportation industry of ME!

UPS...Ursine Parcel Service....What can brown do for you?

Personally I like the vagueness of this particular ability. It allows for a lot of creative narrative. It hasn't been a burden to our group and I definitely limit the activity to quick descriptions of what the character did during the night.

I feel it is very flavorful like so many of the Virtues.