Using Heart of the Wild in your campaigns ?

[Glorelendil]

I quite like the idea of the Sorceress being misinformed about the Nazgul and their rings, thinking they are physically on their person rather than with Sauron. Perhaps she finds this out during a campaign and turns her attention to find and acquiring one of the missing dwarven rings instead.

This is what I was alluding to earlier. I'm envisioning the scene where he elaborate plan comes to fruition, the Ringwraith is destroyed, and as the wraith dissolves into mist, she pounces on the shapeless black cloak to claim her prize....only to discover it's not there.

Agreed. This kind of thing appeals to me a lot - ie, an enemy NPC antagonist working under false assumptions and then, if discovered, altering their objectives accordingly. In this case the PCs could be present, perhaps they've aided her in some way (destroying a ring wraith being motivation enough to help her - ie, the enemy of my enemy is my friend) and witness the revelation first hand.

Maybe the PCs are closer to the "body" and she thinks they double-crossed her and took it...

And in order to secure their help, she has been posing all along as a good guy (although they discover hints to suggest otherwise), and in this climactic scene she reveals her true colors.

I'm going to call PJ: he should turn this into a movie.

/duck

[Lugija]

I've been thinking of introducing the Sorceress in the middle of the Tales from Wilderland. The players will cross the Old Forest Road on their way to ask Gandalf some questions. In the woods they meet a woman who introduces herself as the Mistress. She is a trickster who needs help from the players, and in return gives councel (the chain could be of special interest to her) and a gift: A powerful jewel that can help something bad from happening but instead gives a Shadow point. Since this is before 2951 she is mostly after information of the defences of the Forest Road and appears friendly but with a dark sense of humour.

[Murcushio]

If you want the players to regard her favorably, I would have her pick a different name than "the Mistress."

One, depending on the maturity level at your table there may be a lot of snickering and people making whip-crack noises.

Two, that name is suspicious as all get out. Depending on the intelligence level at your table people are gonna immediately think "well, this is clearly someone out to use out."

[Lugija]

Oh yeah, I only thought of it as a twist of Tom Bombadil who is Master, but now that you mention it... The original name provided by HotW might be better (except that players remember descriptive names better than weirdly prounounced ones).

[Glorelendil]

"The Madame"?

Oh, wait...

[Hermes Serpent]

Or an old favourite, Milady

[Murcushio]

Okay, so. Last night my Fellowship had our second encounter with the Sorceress. It did not go well.

Well, I say "encounter." We were marching along the elf-path, en route from the Elven-King's Halls to the Vales of Anduin. And we were really frickin' paranoid, because right before we'd left the Werewolf of Mirkwood had just murdered a whole bunch of elves. And then a bunch of Woodmen whose half-devoured corpses we found on the path as we traveled.

So when we found the note with our names on it pinned to a tree with an elf-arrow, we were not precisely in the best of moods to begin with.

Good afternoon, my friends. I fear I must inform you that someone has awoken Laegcarch; he's off hungering for fresh meat and for some reason is especially interested in eating Hobbits like dear little Largo and his kin at the Easterly. He seems to think one of them stole something from his lair, though the last I knew, there was little there but his own dung. But wolves are not very sensible, unlike you and I, the Children of Iluvatar, not puppies with delusions of grandeur.

-The Lady of Mirkwood

The postscript was a passage from the Lay of Leithian about Carcharoth devouring Beren's hand.

(Largo is one of our fellowship, a hobbit, obviously.)

Oh, and then there were the personal messages to each of us containing information she could only have known if she'd been watching us in Dale. Watching us very closely.

We are kind of freaking the hell out over this. Our GM is deeply smug.

[nazgul_2000]

Or how about this tack? She was trained by Sauron in the dark arts, but she's actually in league with Saruman? He's entrusted her with finding the ring if it indeed exists in Mirkwood. She's also a convenient spy on Dol Guldor and whatever Sauron is doing there.

This spy of Saruman's might further explain why he always cautioned the White Counsel from moving against "The Necromancer." Because he wanted his spy to develop more information for him.

[TheScribbler]

Anyone thought of adding in elements of the former Queen of Gondor (eventually sent home due to her... quirks) who was of the same origins as the Sorceress and famous for her cats? Cats were attracted to her because they could sense she disliked them, and eventually she began torturing or experimenting on them until she had 9 black cats to spy on the people of Gondor (with 1 white cat to spy on the 9).

Huh... The one, watching the nine black-covered servants. Funny.

Maybe the Sorceress has followed a similar tradition.