Campaign outlines

[Stormcrow]

The rulebooks present an example campaign outline, the Darkening of Mirkwood, which has been expanded into a supplement. I hear a lot about people playing this campaign, but not so much about anything else. I'm curious whether anyone here is running or playing in a different campaign, and how it would be described in terms of the campaign structure set out in the rules. Or are you just going from adventure to adventure without an overall theme?

I've always found it difficult to think of many other campaign outlines that aren't "Darkening."

[zedturtle]

Well, here's my one line response to a similar thread a long time ago (in a different place): in 2951 the Witch King is a powerful being, feared by many. By 3018 he is a shade that has barely a morgul knife to his name. Your PCs are responsible.

[jamesrbrown]

Before the Darkening of Mirkwood book was created, all we had was the description in the rulebook of the campaign. So, I imagined my own campaign of the destruction of the Werewolf of Mirkwood and the Lamp of Balthi. I knew I was treading on dangerous ground at the time, thinking that Francesco and Cubicle7 would eventually come up with official material to deal with the Lamp and the Werewolf. But, it sure was fun thinking of a campaign. It was called "The Hunting of the Wolves" and you can find it here.

[zedturtle]

The rulebooks present an example campaign outline, the Darkening of Mirkwood, which has been expanded into a supplement. I hear a lot about people playing this campaign, but not so much about anything else. I'm curious whether anyone here is running or playing in a different campaign, and how it would be described in terms of the campaign structure set out in the rules. Or are you just going from adventure to adventure without an overall theme?

I've always found it difficult to think of many other campaign outlines that aren't "Darkening."

Here's the thread I was referring to, by the way.

I've also considered a campaign centered around reopening the Old Forest Road (aka the Dwarf Road). I know Darkening touched on this, but I had the idea years before that... In any case, the PCs would start on the Western end of the old road, chartered to meet up at the Eastern exist with a group of dwarves that are building a fortress there. Much danger ensues, as the PCs have to not only open up new stretches of the road, but keep their previous progress intact. Of course, once the reach the fortress (at the end of a grueling campaign) they find it destroyed, and must figure who destroyed the fortress and if the road can be kept safe.

[Rocmistro]

In a manner similar to zed's, I took the passage in the Return of the King about Aragorn and Gandalf finding the white tree sapling high up in the mountains, and I devised an entire campaign around it. I posted it on here about a year ago, but it was panned, unfortunately. But essentially it's the same idea; that the one-in-a-million chance of there being a second white tree is entirely the work of PCs.

[Glorelendil]

In a manner similar to zed's, I took the passage in the Return of the King about Aragorn and Gandalf finding the white tree sapling high up in the mountains, and I devised an entire campaign around it. I posted it on here about a year ago, but it was panned, unfortunately. But essentially it's the same idea; that the one-in-a-million chance of there being a second white tree is entirely the work of PCs.

That got panned? It sounds like a freaking great adventure to me. What an amazing way to give players an adventure that makes them feel like they're integral to LotR without actually stepping on that plot.

[Robin Smallburrow]

Currently playtesting monthly my Fourth Age campaign "Return of the Shadow", set in Fourth Age 1220 - the PC's have just finished the first adventure, "A Kidnapping in Umbar", which you can find on my resources page. I can post more to anybody who is interested in the overall campaign structure ( I had actually written this campaign for MERP but am now gradually converting to TOR).

As far as the original question re campaign structure, one thing I have found unique to TOR is that you have to factor in Fellowship Phases - as a result I have now rewritten Adventures 1 & 2 to allow for a Fellowship phase after Adventure 2! Although what I got from DoM the great thing about Fellowship Phases is you can as a writer incorporate more events that are happening as 'Options for the Fellowship Phase' for PCs.

Robin S.

[Rocmistro]

In a manner similar to zed's, I took the passage in the Return of the King about Aragorn and Gandalf finding the white tree sapling high up in the mountains, and I devised an entire campaign around it. I posted it on here about a year ago, but it was panned, unfortunately. But essentially it's the same idea; that the one-in-a-million chance of there being a second white tree is entirely the work of PCs.

That got panned? It sounds like a freaking great adventure to me. What an amazing way to give players an adventure that makes them feel like they're integral to LotR without actually stepping on that plot.

Yeah, well it was a little more in depth than that. The campaign was intended to allow the players to alter the history of Middle-earth (if they wanted to) or keep it as Tolkien wrote it. One of my players' complaints about playing TOR (and Middle-earth in general) was that they were only observers on the great railroad of life. I had to promise them that history was malleable in order to get them to play.

So I took two devices that interested me and played with them. One was the fate of Elwing's brothers: Elured and Elurin. Their deaths are assumed. In my campaign, they lived, and produced a "noble" line, similar to Aragorn's, that was kept in secret. Since the White Tree was the symbolic analogy to Aragorn's life, of course a second sapling was preserved along with their line (that was the second device). One of my PC's played the ancestor of Elured/Elurin. Of course, we never got as far as the white tree sapling, but that's life.

[Otaku-sempai]

One of my PC's played the ancestor of Elured/Elurin. Of course, we never got as far as the white tree sapling, but that's life.

I presume that you meant that one of your PCs was a descendant of one of the brothers (unless your campaign took place in the early First Age).

[Stormcrow]

I like the idea of presenting before and after facts from the legendarium and saying that the player-heroes are responsible. This sounds like a good way to sell it to your players. This would correspond to what the Loremaster's Guide calls the campaign goal. I'm especially interested in how you combined the stated goal with what the book calls the focus and the company. What is the meat of the campaign about, and what makes the player-heroes go on adventures?

Let's imagine that The Hobbit was a campaign planned by a Loremaster, and its event are unknown to the players. He spins it to the players this way: the focus of the campaign is to overcome the dangers of the journey from Hobbiton to the Lonely Mountain, and to deal with the dragon at the end of it. The company has various reasons for beginning this campaign: the dwarves want to reclaim their treasure, the hobbit wants to satisfy his Tookish pride, and the wizard wants to get rid of Smaug so he can better focus on the Enemy.

Now, how would the focus and the company of the before-and-after ideas you mentioned be written up as above?