I have been writing about this campaign idea/story in another thread that was about a "Spider Ring" but decided to create a new one for this.

The storyline can be easily adapted to go along with the Tales from Wilderland and that is what I am doing right now. The story started with the Marsh-Bell adventure and a plain and simple looking silver ring from the treasure of the Marsh-dwellers was found by the players and one of them start wearing it.

Now the ring is actually a lesser ring of power that was crafted by an apprentice of Celebrimbor during the Annatar taught them the Ring-craft. After the Eregion fell the apprentice escaped beyond the mountains and died somewhere near the Gladden Fields. The reason for his death could be either he was wounded or got attacked on the road or something like this. He managed to write a note about the ring and the recent events but after he was dead the note was forgotten and his body left in the wilderness. After sometime passed the Marsh-dwellers from the marshes of Mirkwood found him and took the ring along with any other valuables and brought them to their lair. The ring stayed there hidden and asleep for thousands of years until the players take it during the Marsh-bell.

The Rámar (Q: Wings) Ring was created with dark and secret thoughts of Sauron involving Eagles. It was simply a practice ring for the newly learning elves of the craft and an experiment for Sauron. The ring itself is actually a half failure. It doesn't work quite well nor it is very powerful. But the ring gathered the strength from the shadows of Mirkwood and the sick and twisted nature of the Marsh-dwellers. So it is actually now a more powerful ring than it was during it's creation. It is also tainted with Shadow because of the hidden goal of it's creation and Sauron being present during it's craft. The goal of Sauron was to control the Eagles of Middle Earth with this ring. The ring supposedly have powers that effects birds. Little or big. Unimportant or important like giant Eagles. The player will start to hear talkings of birds without knowing. It might take a little time for the player to discover it is actually the birds that are talking and he appears to hear them randomly. He will roll a Shadow test everytime he hears a chat of the birds and it will be TN 10 at first then gradually will become harder since the Ring will start getting into the character's personality and spirit. The ring stayed inactive for a year in the game and it will be randomly activated one night during two ravens fly over the party and they talk something about the weather or whatever ravens talk about. Basically it was supposed to control the mind of birds but currently just works as a communication device between birds and the wearer.

Then the story will connect to the Tales from Wilderland adventure "Those Who Tarry No Longer". The Eagles coming to party's rescue part will happen because of the ring and the Eagles will hear the character crying for help. Whether they simply heard the call and come to help or felt compelled to help him will stay unclear but personally I don't think the ring can effect the Eagles that easily so it is basically just Eagles being good and helping when they hear it. But the hearing part is because of the ring. So perhaps the Eagles might question this a bit like how they were able to hear the character and so on.

Then I plan to make them find the note the apprentice of Celebrimbor wrote.
The note: http://i.imgur.com/1jed8.jpg
I "tried" to write it in Tengwar but used English as language, the note says:

"The Kingdom of Eregion has fallen. The Ring-Maker has been slained. All hope is lost. The Ring of Wings will be buried with me to be forgotten like the rest of the failed and corrupted rings. Curse the Gift-bringer and his name! Curs-"

Now I am a bit confused on how to make the players find this very old note so please feel more than free to give me ideas and advices and tell me if you liked it or not. The note will be meaningless for the party even if they got an Elf of Mirkwood with them so they will probably head to Rivendell to Lord Elrond for help and he will read the note and send them to Eregion to find some answer in the long destroyed and ruined libraries or archives. This will be my second campaign after the Tales from Wilderland finishes.

Can someone help me out in the crossing of Misty Mountains matter? I think there are three ways to do it, Caradhras, Moria or travelling all the way south and going back up again around them. Can the party travel through other passes? Are there any known and safe passages other than Caradhras? I wish to make this crossing a really hard and epic job like it is in the "The Ring Goes South" rather than a few dice rolls for fatigue tests. Anyone got any ideas?

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Oh and also,

I thought on the note a bit and it was written in English by using a simple Word font. I think it was wrong and not accurate so I created a mode for Tengwar in my mother tongue and used it as writing the note anew. Players will need to imagine it is Quenya though since it would simply take too much time if I give them the dictionary and wait for them to translate it. A simple letter table for the mode would be quicker and as much fun I think.

(The new note: http://i.imgur.com/7RFeW.jpg without the fancy effects of burned paper lol)

hmmm, I basically used the high pass for crossing at Caradhras, the time frame of the scenario would help, as the watcher in the water would not be present (Gandalf said the valley had flooded recently I think) and Durin's Bane may be slumbering.

Moria, without the watcher and the Balrog you could have them constantly harassed by goblins.

Via Caradhras, avalanche's, having to push through huge amounts of snow, moving into mountain caves maybe dealing with Trolls inside those? If you have any elves that can speak with stones, have the mountain lie to them and say he'll let them pass if they ask nicely? then boom another avalanche?

If you go via the gap of Rohan, you could take the time to give the players an uneasy encounter with Saurman? Rohan may have some stuff going on at the time so maybe check the appendix's?

We are currently, I think, about to enter 2949 in our campaign. I am tempted to make it so that the Gathering of Five Armies happens on 2951 as the 10th year anniversary instead of the one in '46 that is in the book.

I have completely forgot about the High Pass! I have dismissed the Gap of Rohan since it is too far away and the journey would take too long. So it is either High Pass or Redhorn...or highly unlikely and would be probably the end of the fellowship, the Moria.

Now that I checked the Map of TOR, there is also another pass between Redhorn and High Pass, called Mountain Pass. I didn't know there was another pass there.

if you have the adventure book"Tales from Wilderland" a few adventures visit the high pass as well, so the mountain pass might be good for a little difference?

Also with finding the note, I've been working on an adventure where Elrond sends the group to the ruins of Ost-In-Edil to collect some minor item (can't decide what) that belonged to either a close friend or relative. In searching the rubble they might also find that note?

as an intro you could have the group get used to travel tests in fairly simple terrain, and have a basic combat against say wolves? This would take very little time and you could easily just blend it into your adventure

I also think about making the Redhorn pass a blighted place and get some Corruption rolls from them if they chose that way. We are currently playing the Kinstrife adventure from the Tales and the player who has the ring found the note in a box, buried, near the Gladden Fields, where the apprentice of Celebrimbor, the one who wrote the note had died before being taken away by Marsh-dwellers into their lair.

So it is still a far away thing but I want to get the story set properly in my mind. I will start this campaign after the Tales book ends. Please share the details of your adventure in Eregion since my players will also travel there after they meet with Elrond to find more information on the Rámar Ring.

And if the travelling happens after 2951 as I stated in my earlier post it could be more difficult for the company I think since Sauron would have been declared himself and sent Nazgul to Dol Guldur and possibly watching the passes.

The corruption test sounds like a good idea, and sure, but my group starts Kinstrife next saturday and it'll be a couple of weeks after that before I do the Eregion area. Thou I can always type up some notes i've got for it

That would be great! I am looking for similar things that you will use, like some kind of research being done by players in the ruins and possibly in the remnants of libraries or archives or the crafting areas and forges etc.

I had an idea that Elrond/Erestor or others want the PC's to head down to Ost-In-Edil to find the said elven item for Elrond before servants of the enemy do. (They have only just tracked down it's themselves) EDIT: in Elrond's Library, they previously sent a ranger to do it, and he was to travel via Tharbad. He hasn't returned yet so they should follow his route to find him.

They can receive boats or they can walk, but at some point they'd pass various areas.

Tharbad, the ruined city. The players will have to avoid a flood at night and cross the dangerous ford.

Swanfleet, this is an excuse to try out the Marsh Creatures from the Laketown supplement, also it's harder to travel in (2 days down river to Tharbad, 4 days heading east from it) at the end of the swan fleet there is a waterfall, the idea is at the top of it there is the body of (Insert foe here) slain by an arrow used by the rangers.

Ost-In-Edil, once the group get close the foes arrive (Dunlings, orcs, warg riders I can't decide) the ruins where left with not one stone standing upon another, but as it's a former elven city the foes will avoid entering it for a few days, but draw ever closer. The group would find the body of the ranger, and the item and have to work out an escape plan, pursued all the way.

Borders: The main thing about Hollin is those hills covered in Holly trees, would be a cool last stand esc battle. The fans of the books would get the reference, the fans of the films would just find it cool


Hope it helps

A little late to the discussion, but with regards to passing over the Misty Mountains, Gandalf says something about many of the passes have been closed-off either because they were likely looking valleys leading deep into the mountains, but false as they were not true passes leading across the range. Or that any really viable passes were blocked by evil creatures. I believe this is in the Hobbit somewhere around the Goblintown incident.

It should be noted that this closing of the passes is a strategic objective as a prelude to the War of the Ring. So campaigns set in other times might experience different situations. Particularly as it implies that there might be other routes through the mountains at other times. Although I would guess that these alternatives were not optimal in some manner (insufficient water, too rocky for carts, cross a glacier, etc) as otherwise they would be used - and better known - by other people. I would exclude the southern end so as to support Tolkien's implication that Fangorn and Isengarde are not generally approachable by passing over the mountains to approach them from the rear. Not impossible, just improbable.


As for coming up with an acceptable looking note...

I would suggest looking at a few of the online Elvish Dictionaries. Write a proper sounding note in your own language, swap out words for Elvish, tweak as necessary (sometimes a word just doesn't exist).

Once you have all of the words translated in this manner, switch the "roman" spelling for the appropriate alphabet font. You can find most of the Tolkien related fonts at LotR Fonts.

Hisweloke's Sindarin Dictionary. Choose a language on the top left. On the next page, choose the type of data arrangement for the dictionary that would work best for your needs. Finally, the dictionary listing will appear. You're best bet might be to use the browser's Search function and look for the word or phrase you need.

I thought writing it fully or partially in Quenya would have taken their time to translate and that means less game time so I just adapted Tengwar to my own language and wrote the note with it in my own language. I will give them my own table of letters and tengwar letters so they can decipher it.

So would you do it as the passes are being watched by the enemy in 2950s?