The Harad Desert - A Campaign Guide

[Robin Smallburrow]

Thanks for all the praise everybody!!

I made this for myself when I realised that after Umbar my campaign was likely to lead into the desert, and realised that there was very little that had been done, not just on Deserts in Fantasy RPG generally, but also specifically on the Harad desert of Middle-earth. This work is also on the desert only, not on Far Harad, so stuff on jungles etc. may have to wait for a further work!

To comments that perhaps there are 'too many rules', my own style of GMing is that I prefer to have the 'rules on hand' and then in practice 'use or not' depending on how the story is going - I don't like having to 'make up rules on the spot'.

In regards to the Variags of Khand I have based them on the work previously done on them in the Fan-Modules work 'Near Harad' (see the fan-modules website). Yes, Tolkien has written very little on them, but he does say (I forget where) that Khand is the steppe region that divides Mordor from the Ered Harmal, so I agree with the author of Near Harad that the Variags are a Hun-like people rather than the 'Varangian' model.

Robin S.

[poosticks7]

If I recall - Nowhere in the Lord of the Rings does it actually say Variags are even human. They are just Variags from Khand.

(they likely were intended to be men, just saying).

[Falenthal]

As for the "companies of Men never seen before [in Gondor]. Not very tall, but stocky and fierce, bearded like dwarves, and wielding great axes. They come from a wild land somewhere in the vast lands of the East," I don't think he is talking about Variags. The Gondorians speak of Variags as a people they have fought before.

In my own campaigns, I have taken them to be Men of the East who, unlike most cultures of Men, received their "higher culture" from the Dwarves. The description fits such a culture. Tolkien wrote about this possibility somewhere, in a letter or in a private paper, I do not remember. Though the People of Durin had largely fought against the Shadow, Tolkien suggested that possibly not all Dwarven Houses had ever been innocent of colluding with Morgoth or Sauron. Not necessarily a committed allies, but when it suited them, particularly those little known Houses that stayed or moved East. I believe he wrote somewhere that there were Dwarves on both sides of the Battle of the Last Alliance against Sauron, though most Dwarves shut their halls and remained out of the battle.
Along with that, I've based their culture on that of the medieval Russians, to get an East meets West sort of nation.

I like the idea of "men teached by dwarves" a lot, specially when the description made by the gondorian soldier who saw them is that their appareance somehow reminded him of dwarves. That is, of course, following the "Varangian Road" I choosed.
They could be, to some extent, a similar case as the Numenoreans: humans influenced by dwarves as opposed to humans influenced by elves.
As a side path, I'm also thinking: what could have brought them together? Maybe they fought one of the Blue Wizards "who went into the East" and, therefore, caused the Wizard to "fail in some way"? Just thinking out loud...

Great idea,cad1132!

[Otaku-sempai]

Well, since a number of us have discussed the Variags of Khand, I've read every reference I can find in every one of Tolkien's published books, as well as his letters, & I can't find a single one where he describes them in any detail.

For example, he only briefly mentions them during the Battle of the Pelennor Fields in LotR, & again during the discussion of the Wainriders in UT. There isn't much to go on.

Tolkien does at least imply that the Variags are Men, even if he doesn't state it outright. I was riffing off of what Robin wrote in his guide:

Appearance & Clothing: Dark grey
skin, black slanted eyes and red or reddish -
brown hair, they are short and stocky, only
1.7metres for men and 1.6m tall for women.

MERP came up with a similar description with some notable differences:

Build: Medium; men average 155 pounds; women, 125 pounds.

Coloring: Extremely dark grey or black skin, straight black hair, and red or reddish brown eyes.

Endurance: Variags can travel for extreme periods on horseback with little or no rest.

Height: Medium; men average 5'9"; women, 5'3".

Lifespan: Short, about 50-70 years.

That may have influenced my memory in my initial reply.

This is neither here nor there, but the alleged half-trolls from Far Harad are also mentioned twice in "The Battle of the Pelennor Fields," first as "black men like half-trolls with white eyes and red tongues" and just as "troll-men" a couple of pages later: "East rode the knights of Dol Amroth driving the enemy before them: troll-men and Variags and orcs that hated the sunlight." I cannot say whether Tolkien truly intended them to be a hybrid of Men and Trolls, although MERP treats them as such.

[Falenthal]

This is neither here nor there, but the alleged half-trolls from Far Harad are also mentioned twice in "The Battle of the Pelennor Fields," first as "black men like half-trolls with white eyes and red tongues" and just as "troll-men" a couple of pages later: "East rode the knights of Dol Amroth driving the enemy before them: troll-men and Variags and orcs that hated the sunlight." I cannot say whether Tolkien truly intended them to be a hybrid of Men and Trolls, although MERP treats them as such.

I was hoping that someone with english as native language could tell me if this two quotes meant that those men were trolls or if they looked like trolls. But it seems that also the original sentences are doubtful.

Well, something else with which to put our brains to work and a whole new race/culture we can use!

[Tolwen]

I was hoping that someone with english as native language could tell me if this two quotes meant that those men were trolls or if they looked like trolls. But it seems that also the original sentences are doubtful.

Well, something else with which to put our brains to work and a whole new race/culture we can use!

I am no native speaker in english, but can say with a good degree of certainty to have a fairly good understanding of it.
IMHO, MERP totally bungled this quote up and used it as justification for introducing "Half-trolls" as a race. IMO the quote is far from clearly suggesting this and according to my understanding it clearly states that these are men. The "Half-troll" part later is only a colourful and evocative way of expressing their foreign and hideous outlook for western eyes. In a similar way, today we call someone with a strong physique and lots of hair a "bear" and still won't consider him a member of the family Ursidae.

Cheers
Tolwen

[Falenthal]

I guess that "black men like half-trolls" has to be read, literally, as men with a monstruous appareance.

[Tolwen]

I guess that "black men like half-trolls" has to be read, literally, as men with a monstruous appareance.

And depending on the degree of propaganda one is willing to give the quote, the appearance may be only very foreign. "Monstrosity" may then lie only in the eye of the beholder - or the (biased) chronicler

Cheers
Tolwen

[Falenthal]

This paragraph reminds me of the mûmakil rider from Peter Jackson's movies.



A gondorian soldier that sees a 2 meters (or more!) tall warrior, with black skin, all tattoed, bald and a ferociuous look, might as well think he is looking into a new kind of troll.

[Otaku-sempai]

This paragraph reminds me of the mûmakil rider from Peter Jackson's movies.



A gondorian soldier that sees a 2 meters (or more!) tall warrior, with black skin, all tattoed, bald and a ferociuous look, might as well think he is looking into a new kind of troll.

These days I would probably go along with an interpretation much like this. The hideous appearance can be explained by practices (encouraged by Sauron and his servants) that would be seen as barbaric by Gondorean soldiers: Tattooing, scarification and probably chewing some root or compound that dyes the tongue bright red. This culture might even have shaman who produce a drug or potion that reduces fear in battle (explainging the wide, white eyes).

It is known that Tolkien was born in South Africa and was not a racist (claims of trolls to the contrary), so he was probably imagining the sight of the warriors from Far Harad from the perspective of the Northerners.