[Rivendell] High Elves and Shadow

[aramis]

Doc and aramis are saying what I was trying to say before (when I was typing from phone so keeping it short.) The rule is designed so that, in all probability, you will never have to mark more than a skill of 4 to clear your shadow. But what's C7 supposed to do then? Just stop filling out the table at 4? What if you do have a crazy edge case? What if you've already checked off all your skills of 4 and below, and you just want to know how much shadow it would have been? What if some new rule or situation is introduced in a later supplement?

Maybe they're just future-proofing the game?

I agree with you that 21 seems improbable and excessive, but I'm reminded of a famous quote: "640k ought to be enough for anybody."

I wasn't saying anything of the sort - I was, in fact, pointing out that it's possible to accrue that much fairly easily if the Enemy has you squarely bracketed. A single failed roll of Wisdom can be 5+ points of shadow.

And I had a group of players accrue 4-6 points of shadow each on The Marsh Bell alone...

My players in my current group have accrued no less than 10 points each - but were only one exceeded 4 on the sheet. (And none have gone mad.) A High Elf can't get rid of shadow so easily... and I've not been pulling out the big guns.

And the potential All High Elf party is in for a world of pain. My usual group size of 6, should they all decide to play high elves, the won't get anywhere without revelation episodes as often as I care to throw them. And that means a lot of chances to cause corruption rolls. And temptations to raid treasure hordes for ancient magic (itself a shadow source, per 2E), plus add the potential for a cursed item...

[Glorelendil]

I still think you're describing an edge case. But whatever. I'll edit my post.

[doctheweasel]

The thing is, once you pass your Hope, each additional Corruption test is also an opportunity to clear your Shadow … by having a Bout of Madness. Even the 6 shadow mark can be a precarious situation (depending on how well your party manages Hope).

[Francesco]

...wow, a lot of hasty conclusions over at rpg.net, considering the lack of actual play. And a lot of misconceptions about the supposed 'power level' they new rules should be portraying - Galadriel and Aragorn are obviously NOT the character types we wanted to introduce in the game.

Btw, to stay on topic, the rules for Shadow are supposed to represent why the Elves do not leave their sanctuaries often, and why they are leaving ME. Eye-marked skills make them unwilling to commit to tasks, not incompetent (they do not 'fail').

Francesco

[beckett]

...wow, a lot of hasty conclusions over at rpg.net, considering the lack of actual play. And a lot of misconceptions about the supposed 'power level' they new rules should be portraying - Galadriel and Aragorn are obviously NOT the character types we wanted to introduce in the game.

Btw, to stay on topic, the rules for Shadow are supposed to represent why the Elves do not leave their sanctuaries often, and why they are leaving ME. Eye-marked skills make them unwilling to commit to tasks, not incompetent (they do not 'fail').

Francesco

Similar to what Francesco just wrote (and sorry for going off topic, Rich) I think people are looking at this from the wrong perspective. The adventuring age for the High Elf playable culture is between 500-1000 years old (that only encompasses the Third Age). So these High Elf heroes are not meant to represent a High Elf as old and powerful as Galadriel or Elrond (Elves who have seen many ages of the world). Those types of Elves are in the realm of the Wizards -- that is to say, not playable. And the book specifically says that Aragorn is not your typical Ranger.

[zedturtle]

...wow, a lot of hasty conclusions over at rpg.net, considering the lack of actual play. And a lot of misconceptions about the supposed 'power level' they new rules should be portraying - Galadriel and Aragorn are obviously NOT the character types we wanted to introduce in the game.

Btw, to stay on topic, the rules for Shadow are supposed to represent why the Elves do not leave their sanctuaries often, and why they are leaving ME. Eye-marked skills make them unwilling to commit to tasks, not incompetent (they do not 'fail').

Francesco

Doesn't seem quite as bad as all that, sure there are some vocal naysayers but there are also some others who are responding positively to the "semi-random" nature of magic items and the High Elves/Dunedain will have to be borne out in play... I know for me, a character who is a Noldo or a Dúnedan will have a lot of doors open for them that won't for others (both narratively and mechanincally, e.g. my magic lores, cultural rewards and magic items).

[Rich H]

Similar to what Francesco just wrote (and sorry for going off topic, Rich) I think people are looking at this from the wrong perspective. The adventuring age for the High Elf playable culture is between 500-1000 years old (that only encompasses the Third Age). So these High Elf heroes are not meant to represent a High Elf as old and powerful as Galadriel or Elrond (Elves who have seen many ages of the world). Those types of Elves are in the realm of the Wizards -- that is to say, not playable. And the book specifically says that Aragorn is not your typical Ranger.

I'm confused; I wasn't trying to establish anything about elves such a Elrond or Galadriel, but I think we're starting to post here based on opinions expressed on RPGnet which probably isn't wise. I'm not saying we can't ask the same questions here as well as over there, and reply here and there in the same way, but I think it needs to be relevant to the discussion we're having. All this about Galadriel and the like is from a comment by a guy over on RPGnet and it hasn't been mentioned here, as far as I'm aware.

To be clear, I was just trying to understand the high Shadow values in the table as I felt I'd missed something. And I had; Aramis' post and a few others highlighted how certain new undead and the Eye of Mordor rules could quickly leave a High Elf with a high shadow score.

[beckett]

Similar to what Francesco just wrote (and sorry for going off topic, Rich) I think people are looking at this from the wrong perspective. The adventuring age for the High Elf playable culture is between 500-1000 years old (that only encompasses the Third Age). So these High Elf heroes are not meant to represent a High Elf as old and powerful as Galadriel or Elrond (Elves who have seen many ages of the world). Those types of Elves are in the realm of the Wizards -- that is to say, not playable. And the book specifically says that Aragorn is not your typical Ranger.

I'm confused; I wasn't trying to establish anything about elves such a Elrond or Galadriel, but I think we're starting to post here based on opinions expressed on RPGnet which probably isn't wise. I'm not saying we can't ask the same questions here as well as over there, and reply here and there in the same way, but I think it needs to be relevant to the discussion we're having. All this about Galadriel and the like is from a comment by a guy over on RPGnet and it hasn't been mentioned here, as far as I'm aware.

To be clear, I was just trying to understand the high Shadow values in the table as I felt I'd missed something. And I had; Aramis' post and a few others highlighted how certain new undead and the Eye of Mordor rules could quickly leave a High Elf with a high shadow score.

Sorry, Rich. My reply was a thread derail in response to Francesco bringing up Galadriel and Aragorn here (Galadriel and Aragorn are obviously NOT the character types we wanted to introduce in the game.) and it also dovetailed into an opinion expressed from someone at RPGnet. Again, my apologies for straying from the relevant discussion on this thread.

[Rich H]

Sorry, Rich. My reply was a thread derail in response to Francesco bringing up Galadriel and Aragorn here (Galadriel and Aragorn are obviously NOT the character types we wanted to introduce in the game.) and it also dovetailed into an opinion expressed from someone at RPGnet. Again, my apologies for straying from the relevant discussion on this thread.

Hi Marco; I wasn't looking for an apology so no need for that! I'm just leery of bringing 'arguments' from RPGnet over to here. I blame Francesco for bringing it up. I'd put money on it that we could start an OP thread here and there, asking the same thing, and they'd look VERY different within just a couple of pages. That's actually a good thing, by the way.

[Rich H]

Btw, to stay on topic, the rules for Shadow are supposed to represent why the Elves do not leave their sanctuaries often, and why they are leaving ME. Eye-marked skills make them unwilling to commit to tasks, not incompetent (they do not 'fail').

That's actually interesting because I'd misread that focussing on the bullet point on page 118 (emphasis mine):

Whenever a High Elf hero uses a marked skill outside of an Elven sanctuary, all rolls producing an EYE result gain him 1 point of Shadow and are considered to fail automatically.

BUT! ... The paragraph above it states (emphasis mine):

When an High Elf makes use of a marked skill, there is always the possibility that the hero is overwhelmed by a sense of hopelessness and fails to find the motivation to do the deed.

That's actually *very* different to failing the task and the nice bit about it only applying outside of a Sanctuary actually means it covers off high-ranking NPCs like Elrond, Galadriel, and Glorfindel perfectly. Its exactly the reason why they very rarely venture forth from their Demesnes.

I really like this rule. I like it a lot.