Struggling

[Glorelendil]

I second the recommendation for Morris for inspiration/insight. Plus it's just an amazing & fun read.

[JoeArcher]

Have you ever played warhammer fridokind? I think that would suit the theme well

[Fridokind Wargaug]

Nope, just checked Tales and Hartfast is no different from any other chief of a Woodman clan in terms of his care for the clan first and it's members/. Check his response to the characters after the attack. Everything he says or does is directly a result of the heroes response to the attack, He's a typical Anglo-Saxon style clan chief, gift-giver to his clansmen and protector of the members of that clan, nothing feudal about him at all.

I didn't mean he was a feudal lord, I meant he was a lord (or clan-chief). The other houses had a council where everybody had equal rights (although some "ruled" unofficially, because they had the most experience); Hartfast ruled by himself. Hilltown wasn't feudal either (no exchange land for work or soldiers and so forth), they just had a lord who became seduced by the shadow...

Have you ever played warhammer fridokind? I think that would suit the theme well

I haven't, but it sounds interesting, so I might try it out. Unfortunately, my group can't meet that often, cause we study all over the country. Thus, when we meet, we only play TOR. And we all really like the system, because it gives room for a lot of good roleplay and you don't have to use dozens of tables for each dice roll (like MERP).

[JoeArcher]

Have you ever played warhammer fridokind? I think that would suit the theme well

I haven't, but it sounds interesting, so I might try it out. Unfortunately, my group can't meet that often, cause we study all over the country. Thus, when we meet, we only play TOR. And we all really like the system, because it gives room for a lot of good roleplay and you don't have to use dozens of tables for each dice roll (like MERP).

I'm doing a warhammer conversion of TOR. It will be nice to at least have the 2nd edition book as a source book for the world and Sigmars Heirs. Plus the TOR rulebook for basic mechanics of course.

viewtopic.php?f=7&t=2353

[Celebril]

Thanks everyone for the feedback and sorry for the super late follow-up to my thread. I basically put it to the players that I didn’t want to water down the Shadow rules because it went against my vision of how I wanted to run a Middle Earth inspired game. So I gave them the choice of whether to continue the game or not. They overwhelmingly decided to continue. One player wants to explore the “anti-hero” route and will live with the consequences of Shadow Points. Another player made the point that their Fellowship isn’t on an adventure that has the same or even close impact as the Fellowship of the One Ring. Here is how he put it:

“We aren't playing roles anywhere close to that grand. Not one of us is descended from royalty in line to inherit a long lost throne, or will likely play a pivotal role that will forever alter Middle Earth on the scale of Frodo. We play much smaller stories -- no less fun or interesting, but smaller. This means we're closer to the ground and we're going to get our hands dirtier. This means accumulating Shadow. This doesn't mean we're not heroic; compared to most people who live in the lands where we come from, we're crazy adventurers who consort with wizards, piss off kings, and put themselves into unnecessary danger instead of settling down, running a business, and raising a family.”

Going forward my plan is to warn them if they are about to do something that will give them more than 1 Shadow Point. That way they can decide if the action is still something that they envisioned their character doing and the consequences are something they can live with.

[Glorelendil]

“We aren't playing roles anywhere close to that grand. Not one of us is descended from royalty in line to inherit a long lost throne, or will likely play a pivotal role that will forever alter Middle Earth on the scale of Frodo. We play much smaller stories -- no less fun or interesting, but smaller. This means we're closer to the ground and we're going to get our hands dirtier. This means accumulating Shadow. This doesn't mean we're not heroic; compared to most people who live in the lands where we come from, we're crazy adventurers who consort with wizards, piss off kings, and put themselves into unnecessary danger instead of settling down, running a business, and raising a family.”

"And with that attitude you'll never be a king, young man!"