A Complex Problem / Solution

[Rocmistro]

Hello.

Been a while since I posted due to a group hiatus.

I wanted to discuss a problem with Middle-earth games in general, and give you the way I resolved it this once. I am the Loremaster in a group of 5 (including myself); while all players appreciate Tolkien's Legendarium, I am the clear Middle-earth dork.

One of the objections I heard when I expressed interest in playing TOR with my group, is that given the tight narrative and back-history as well as future history, the players felt they didn't have much impact on Middle-earth. They could not, for example, kill Bilbo and take the Ring and do something else with it (at least, not without majorly screwing up the events of Lord of the Rings, which they are respectful enough not to do). Indeed, they see it Tolkien's Legendarium as too much of a sacred cow/artifact...observe but do not mess with it.

And I somewhat agree with them.

So I endeavored to...alter the course of History that did not actually change too much the surface of Tolkien's Legendarium. Here is how I did/am doing it, and I'd like to get comments.

I have built the entire story-arc from a couple cryptic passages from Silmarilllion and Return of the King. Here are some facts: The first involves how the 2 older sons from Dior and Nimloth were lost in the forest (Elured and Elurin). They were left for dead after the siege of Doriath.

Skip ahead 2 ages.

The faithful Numenoreans land on Middle-earth; Elendil in the North to setup Arnor, and Isildur/Anarion in the South for Gondor. Isildur brings a seed of Nimloth and raises a white tree in Gondor. Hrrm...

Skip ahead 1 age.

The Battle at the Black Gates is over. Gandalf takes Aragorn to Mindolluin and shows him another white tree that survived somehow despite the White Tree in Gondor having been destroyed during it's siege.

I decided to create a story around this. It goes like this:

Elured and Elurin did not die in the forest. Instead, they were found by an Ent who carried them out of the forest, and to the East, settling in what is now Lindon. When Gil-galad settled there at the end of the First Age, the Ent turned over the custody of the 2 boys to him, and told him to raise them in secret, as a deed of repentance for the sins of the Noldo. The two boys' life somewhat mirrors the next generation of Elrond and Elros. One son adopted the Elven way (Elured, the "Heir of Thingol") and one the mortal path (Elurin, the "Rememberance of Thingol"). These two bloodlines thrived in secret in Mithlond for many ages.

At the end of the second age, Elendil the tall lands in Mithlond. Unrecorded in the legendarium, however, Elendil also stole away with a fruit from Nimloth, and, upon arriving in Gil-galad's lands, he planted a tree there in secret unbeknonwst to only him and Gil-galad. He then marched to war and was slain, along with Elendil, and the knowledge of the 2nd planting of Nimloth was lost, along with the knowledge of the other bloodlines of Thingol. The Ent, however, did not forget, and the bloodlines of Thingol intermarried with the daughters of Numenor, thus by the 3rd Age, the bloodlines are tied back together and "other line" includes all the heroic components that are realized in Aragorn: Earendil's, Beren's, Melian's and Thingol's.

For the rest of the third Age, this Ent takes it upon himself to see to the stewardship of the 2 other lines of Thingol and he also watches the Tree that was planted, every so often, taking it upon himself to move it to another location of Middle-earth. The line of Thingol continues down until the late 3rd age, where before the Age reaches it's conclusion, the bloodline awakes again.

One of my players, who expressed an interest in playing a "fey" character with some "minor magic", is the latest human in the line of Thingol's heirs. His blood has stirred and strange things are happening. Here is where I take some serious creative license. Aragorn was born 2931 and would be 15 years old at the start of a standard TOR campaign. In our group it is 2948 and so Aragorn is 17. It just so happens my player is the same age.

What if....my player(s) go about their regular journeys in Middle-earth, playing through any combination of the the written material and homebrew adventures, eventually ending up in Rivendell (as they did from Those Who Tarry No Longer). Estel (Aragorn) sees something kindred in this player who is of Thingols line, and desires to go about and learn the ways of Sword and War. Elrond reluctantly agrees to this and Estel joins our party for a foray north (homebrew adventure) north into the Trollshaws and Cameth Brin. There, the Witch King of Angmar learns of his identity and slays him (Estel). Aragorn is dead; the blade Narsil falls from Aragorn's dead hands and lies at my player's feet (indicating that he is meant to take up the mantle of Aragorn) The party flees to Rivendell in defeat.

Now my player has a choice...he..can take up the guise of Aragorn...effectively becoming Aragorn and fulfiling all the things that Aragorn did, and thus keeping the Lord of the Rings as is...or he can go his own way and change the course of events. As an heir of Thingol, he would have all the trappings and bloodlines of power; Melian's blood, Thingol's blood and Barahir (Beren's) blood. He would be the rightful heir to the Ring of Barahir, (Elured and Elurin having been older than Elwing). The only thing he would be lacking is direct descendancy of Earendil, and thus the favorhood of the Valar for having participated in the War of Wrath, thus I see him having a closer tie to his Elven/Maiar ancestry than his Human/Numenorean ancestry.

The player goes about his deeds and eventually his path intersects with the Ent who has been watching his bloodline all these years. He tells the player of the unique history of his bloodline, and turns over the sapling of the white tree that he has been harvesting for the third age, suggesting he plant it somewhere safe.

IF The player decides he wants to establish the Lord of the Rings as the official ending, then the "finale" of the campaign, will see the players journey to Mindolluin, where THEY plant the other white tree safely there. At some point after that, Gandalf runs into this Ent, and the Ent tells Gandalf about it. The player then goes on to fulfill all the deeds that Aragorn accomplishes in the book, eventually returning to MIndolluin at the end of LotR to find the white tree there, having forgotten all about being it was some 65 years ago, and suprised that the tree survived.

[Mim]

Wow.

You're not kidding about departing from canon

You have some original ideas & this story can make for cool sessions, though from my first read I see a concern:

What happens if the fellowship doesn't flee at the death of Aragorn? Am I missing something, or do you actually have them face the Witch-king? You may want to give them another out, in case they don't take the hint & you end-up with a TPK. We've probably all known some great players who - because of their exhaustion late at night or for whatever reason - just don't take the hint until it's too late.

BTW, which Ent does Gandalf speak to?

[Curulon]

I personally wouldn't do anything remotely like this. I find it slightly disrespectful to Tolkien to alter things so drastically as killing one of the of the most important characters in the legendarium.

Sure, we all make minor alterations in our TOR games, but those are usual trivial ones that don't affect the larger mythos. Honestly, if your players don't like the inability to drastically alter the story, I might suggest they look for a different game.

Again, this is all my personal opinion, but if my Loremaster (or player) intended to do something, I would politely drop from the group.

[Rocmistro]

Thanks Mim.

Just out of curiousity (and no, I'm not being rhetorical), where do you see the departure from Canon (exactly). Where does it violate?

As far as the TPK, yes, it's a concern. Fortunately, the way I've set it up will be in Cameth Brin. (I'm recylcing the old MERP/ICE material). Cameth Brin is a big tall tower. Aragorn rushes off to confront the Witch King, and is "higher up" on the tower. They will see Aragorn engage the Witch King one one one, and will watch him get killed, but they will be physically separated from that battle, instead dealing with their own fight. (think of it kind of like when Luke observed Ben Kenobi get cut down by Vader but was not close enough to help.) Hopefully the party will take the hint and NOT try to attack the Witch King of Angmar, Captain of the Nazgul, and Chief Lieutenant of Sauron the Deceiver. But hey, ya never know.

As for the Ent, he's just a homebrew character I came up with called Wrinklefoot. I don't know much about the genealogies of Ents.

[Rocmistro]

I personally wouldn't do anything remotely like this. I find it slightly disrespectful to Tolkien to alter things so drastically as killing one of the of the most important characters in the legendarium.

Sure, we all make minor alterations in our TOR games, but those are usual trivial ones that don't affect the larger mythos. Honestly, if your players don't like the inability to drastically alter the story, I might suggest they look for a different game.

Again, this is all my personal opinion, but if my Loremaster (or player) intended to do something, I would politely drop from the group.

Thanks Curulon, but I'm not looking for judgements about my or my group's play-style so much as looking for feedback on the craftsmanship I've executed in tying together some loose ends of Tolkien's narrative into a subtext that gives max wiggle-room for minimal disruption; whether or not there are "facts" that can be mined that support or refute my story.

[Mim]

As far as your departure from canon, well, Curulon kinda says it for me as well, though I don't want to tread on your style. It's your game & do what works for you, though I wouldn't kill off Aragorn either. I tend to stick closer to the books, which I believe ToR does as well.

At any rate, you ask for my take

On a positive note, I like the name Wrinklefoot. This fits an Ent.

In addition, I recall the Cameth Brin adventure well. You should be able to have a lot of fun with it, & by hitting your player-heroes with a powerful horde, they'll have their hands full & won't be able to protect the future king.

[Mim]

PS Since you're writing so many different turns, have you considered some sort of denouement having the Dark Lord potentially learn of the seedling of Nimloth & send his minions to poison the tree (think Ungoliant)? This could make your heroes race to defend the tree.

[SirKicley]

have you considered some sort of denouement having the Dark Lord potentially learn of the seedling of Nimloth & send his minions to poison the tree (think Ungoliant)? This could make your heroes race to defend the tree.

Nitpicking a bit I guess - but that sounds more like a climax than a denouement.


I would agree with the general consensus that I personally wouldn't go this route - I think Aragorn is enough of a sacred cow to want to mess with it. But at the same time I certainly wont disparage you for your choices nor would I ever tell you that you can't or shouldn't.

If it works for you by all means this could be a campaign worthy of remembrance.



Robert

[Rocmistro]

Before things go too far in the direction of poo-pooing on this idea...I want to make clear something that I don't necessarily think I properly highlighted in the first post:

The central idea is that I leave it up to the PLAYERS to decide if the account of the Lord of the Rings that we have all heard, ie, the Red Book of Westmarch is exactly how it really was, or if things happened a little differently.

In other words, IF my player decides to play out his character exactly as Aragorn, the idea is that..Nothing has deviated from the original story, and the implication is that the Aragorn that we have all read about and the story we know still stands. The ONE Change is that the real birth-child of Gilraen and Arathor died in his early years...but it didn't matter because another male heir...of the line of Kings including Numenorean, Maia and Elven Blood stood in to take his place...and in fact THAT was the guy who became Aragorn in the books/movie and the guy that Sauron REALLY had to worry about. Gilraen and Aarthor's child was a feint...that bloodline was a cover...the real bloodline was kept in secret.

Now IF the player takes his character another way with "his" Aragorn, then, yes, we will end up stomping all over Canon. The beauty is that I leave it to the PLAYER to decide how the story ends. I got my idea to set this kind of character-driven choice from the end of Da Vinci code when Robert Langdon asks Sophie (paraphrasing badly) "What would the descendant of Christ do...keep faith or destroy it?"

[fbnaulin]

Well. I think it's a matter of escale. Our fellows can't kill Bolg or Saruman, but they can defeat their 'local' Bolg. There is a Bolg everywhere, it depends on story. That's because this is a GAME about Middle-earth, and not somekind of Book Simulator. The Tolkien feel is modelated in a micro-escale, the escale of your fellowship.

I think in game terms, the large history is just an accesory. PC are interested in living their own heroic lifes LIKE Aragorn and not Aragorn's life. They can.