Tolkienizing the Gibbet King

[Tolwen]

I haven't read Darkening of Mirkwood yet, but I wonder if a solution might be devised making the wolf forms actual wolves that have been bound to the Werewolf's will, and granted great power by him.

That might be an approach, though there might be some limitations too. But it is definitely worth considering.

The problem with the Werewolf as written is that he is supposed to has been doing this "hopping" for centuries already. HotW is more precise in it too, as it says explicitly that the beast cannot be slain, as it will inhabit another body, then another and another etc. It also goes into greater detail, that the next reincarnation is ready for action on the next moonless again (HotW, p.87). Depending on the time when you kill its previous "version", you might have banished it for about four weeks or it may prowl again the next night.

When you have it controlling normal wolves directly and infusing them with part of his power, over time the Werewolf will constantly lose power as well. The power "invested" into a regular wolf will irrevocably be lost once the wolf is killed. In this manner, the Werewolf would gradually be weakened by destroying his "servant" wolves. depending on the campaign chosen (and the supposed role of the Werewolf itself), this might be an option.

Cheers
Tolwen

[Corvo]

(...)
In the context of this question (the un-tolkienish "grab a fresh body and carry on") I find the Werewolf of Mirkwood much more problematic. In its description in the Rulebook, he is described as an ancient spirit from the past, embodied in the form of a great wolf for centuries. Now in the CB, and especially later in DoM, he is described as doing exactly this "body-hopping" regularly. This is - according to the available sources - IMO much more un-tolkienish than the Gibbet-King (who was wisely limited in his supernatural abilities).
(...)
A forceful destruction of its physical body is even for a powerful evil Ainu a traumatic event (and probably even more so for the less powerful ones) and not easily shrugged off. And with every destruction, it becomes more difficult to achieve the "critical mass" of finding the strength to re-embody themselves.
One might argue that the Werewolf is not creating new bodies, but inhabiting existing ones, but to me this seems a bit like following the letters of theme (as he is not creating a new body), but not the spirit (the traumatic event and difficulty of embodiment with the associated loss of power after the destruction of the old body); i.e. some sort of wriggling around the theme laid out above.

And this is what disturbs me with the Werewolf as very un-tolkienish - his effortless ability to hop from body to body, just as it suits him and the old one is destroyed. Of course it is an important plot device in the CB and DoM, but I'll definitely fix that part for me due to the aforementioned reasons. By now, I don't have a good idea how to do it, as it so interwoven with this theme of "body-hopping", but I am sure a solution can be found eventually.

Cheers
Thomas

Thank you Tolwen for these interesting inights.
By the way, that "body-hopping" is troubling to me as well. Not because I'm a scholar of Tolkien (I'm not), but for narrative reasons: to me, all that (apparently) easy body-hopping is rather un-dramatic.
I just played year '53 of DoM, and I choose to make the "death" of the WW a rare and traumatic event for the beast, hence his mad desire for revenge.
In this sense, I enlarged the role of poor Orophal, making him a tragic hero, and depicted the WW as a cunning and devious beast, keen on avoiding any direct confrontation.
That said, I know I just postponed the problem.

What avenues do we have to search for a solution?

What precedents about "cheating death" (in the broadest sense) are there?
-You already mentioned Sauron. Later in his "life" he got the Ring to reinforce his permanence in M-e, yet "death" is a serious thing.
-The Nine. They aren't spirits, nor really dead, yet they behave as the WW is supposed to behave in DoM (I'm thinking of their "destruction" at the Bruinen). There is an item of power that keep them in this world.
-The wights: if their treasure is intact, they keep coming back.
I'm asking: can the persistence of the WW be tied to some item of power?

Can you span a bridge between these "undead" (for lack of a better term) and the WW? Or is there some fundamental contradiction?

PS: then there is the Curse (page 103 of DoM). I love that idea, but I don't know if it makes easier or harder to reach a solution...

[Tolwen]

Thank you Tolwen for these interesting inights.

You're welcome

What avenues do we have to search for a solution?

That's tricky indeed and not easy to answer...

What precedents about "cheating death" (in the broadest sense) are there?
-You already mentioned Sauron. Later in his "life" he got the Ring to reinforce his permanence in M-e, yet "death" is a serious thing.
-The Nine. They aren't spirits, nor really dead, yet they behave as the WW is supposed to behave in DoM (I'm thinking of their "destruction" at the Bruinen). There is an item of power that keep them in this world.
-The wights: if their treasure is intact, they keep coming back.
I'm asking: can the persistence of the WW be tied to some item of power?

Here we have to differentiate, as it is easy to mix up two things that look similar, but are not the same.

The Nine and the Barrow-wights (possibly) are beings (Men or houseless elven fëar) that normally exist in Middle-earth as a union of body and spirit (hröa and fëa). When this is no longer given (e.g. the body slain or the lifespan has expired) and they still stay in Middle-earth this is unnatural and sonehow "undead". Elven fëar have the power to do do voluntarily (though it is a sign of taint to do so) while men have not and "magic" on the scale of the Great rings is necessary to preserve their continued existence.

The Ainur (including Maiar - greater and smaller ones) are by nature purely spiritual and may assume a body at will to interact with the physical world. If they are only spiritual (unbodied), this is no unnatural existence for them but their original and inherent form of existence. As laid out earlier, if they turn towards evil and use the body for such purposes, they become more and more bound to it. An item to tie them would be possible, but it requires - IMHO - an act similar to the one Sauron did with the One: Putting part of your own spirit or essence into it. Then you're heavily dependent on the continued existence of this item (see Sauron and the One).
Having an artifact like a Great Ring (see the Nine) might help to preserve and enhance your power/strength (it will likely do so), but once you are killed you have a problem as the item is then no longer under your control (your enemy that just slew you can grab it) and you might face a problem

And even if we were to construct some solution with an item that serves like an "anchor", there is a timescale problem. If you do not have a powerful overlord that might help "re-constitute" you (like Sauron did probably for the Nine after the Bruinen disaster), you have to re-assemble yourself the strength (and the Werewolf is described as being entirely independent; part of the solution could be to tie him much stronger to Sauron). And as we see from the example of Sauron, this works - but it takes a long time. But even with such an "outside assistance", I doubt that it would be something of a regular "fallback" position after being killed. After all, being killed, always saps significantly on the strength of an evil Aniu. There's no way around that.
The problem is - IMO - exacarbated by the - likely - fact that the Werewolf is - compared to Sauron - a maiarin Ainu of far lesser inherent power which gives him much less ability and "safety" margin to achieve a re-embodiment. Even if he had such an "anchor item" or "assistance", I'd say that re-assembling himself would take several decades (or even perhaps a few centuries) until a form is achieved that might be comparable in power to the old one. And as already said, it might work once (perhaps twice - but then the re-embodiment would take even longer) but not several times without any significant effort within a few months or years. The timescales where such creatures operate in (especially after a significant defeat) outrange human lifespans by far.

The Curse might work if it is the first time ever that the Werewolf is slain, but certainly not in the fashion as it is written (i.e. being killed already a few dozen times and always coming back after and being really p*** off by the experience )

Cheers
Tolwen

[Tolwen]

What avenues do we have to search for a solution?(

IMO the best solution would be to delete the "he always comes back" thing without any substitution. Then you'd have to slightly alter his background as well, but that's not a big problem. A broad outline would be: He survived the Fall of Beleriand (rather than being killed in it as now) and fled East. Later on he served Sauron but always avoided being killed (after all he's indeed quite cunning). Perhaps he was killed once (the Last Alliance would be a fitting point) and took centuries to re-constitute himself. I'm not sure whether one 'kill' is a good idea, but at least it wouldn't be too bad (personally I'd skip it altogether). Then he carried on with his evil business. Here you only have to note and take care that during his rampage in the Third Age in Mirkwood he is never killed (badly hurt is OK which would take him out of action for a convenient period), but only possibly at the end (the DoM event).

That'd be the easiest way IMO.

Cheers
Tolwen

P.S.: I just had an idea for a much more complex (and slightly different) background for him, though that would certainly be too much for here. But it could make a good OM contribution

[Otaku-sempai]

The Nine and the Barrow-wights (possibly) are beings (Men or houseless elven fëar) that normally exist in Middle-earth as a union of body and spirit (hröa and fëa). When this is no longer given (e.g. the body slain or the lifespan has expired) and they still stay in Middle-earth this is unnatural and sonehow "undead". Elven fëar have the power to do do voluntarily (though it is a sign of taint to do so) while men have not and "magic" on the scale of the Great rings is necessary to preserve their continued existence.

Cheers
Tolwen

Sorry, Tolwen. I've got to disagree with you over the nature of the Barrow-wights. Wights were never human nor elvish. They were evil spirits, possibly corrupted Ainur, that inhabited the bodies of the slain. That doesn't mean that many Men could not have thought them to be undead humans.

[Bram Corolev]

What avenues do we have to search for a solution?(

IMO the best solution would be to delete the "he always comes back" thing without any substitution. Then you'd have to slightly alter his background as well, but that's not a big problem. A broad outline would be: He survived the Fall of Beleriand (rather than being killed in it as now) and fled East. Later on he served Sauron but always avoided being killed (after all he's indeed quite cunning). Perhaps he was killed once (the Last Alliance would be a fitting point) and took centuries to re-constitute himself. I'm not sure whether one 'kill' is a good idea, but at least it wouldn't be too bad (personally I'd skip it altogether). Then he carried on with his evil business. Here you only have to note and take care that during his rampage in the Third Age in Mirkwood he is never killed (badly hurt is OK which would take him out of action for a convenient period), but only possibly at the end (the DoM event).

That'd be the easiest way IMO.

Cheers
Tolwen

P.S.: I just had an idea for a much more complex (and slightly different) background for him, though that would certainly be too much for here. But it could make a good OM contribution

If I recall correctly, isn't he "woken up" in DoM by the Messenger of Morder who then tells that the lamp is what keeps him in agony? How long has he been asleep before the Messenger wakes him up? I would also attribute some of his past "deaths" as actually not him being killed, but hounds of Sauron or large wargs that hunters wrongly assumed were the Werewolf of Mirkwood.

Using both of these points, I intend to make his "hopping" rarer than what it seems. Also when it does happen, I will say that the warg he his "hopping" to is willfully volunteering the use of it's body. Therefore the werewolf is dimished less than he otherwise would be attempting to hop to an unwilling victim such as a player character.

Mechanics-wise I will probably use some of the new adversary qualities in the Rivendell book to make him harder to kill. If and when the werewolf "hops" to a player character, it will probably be the last time he is ever capable of doing it.

[Bram Corolev]

The Nine and the Barrow-wights (possibly) are beings (Men or houseless elven fëar) that normally exist in Middle-earth as a union of body and spirit (hröa and fëa). When this is no longer given (e.g. the body slain or the lifespan has expired) and they still stay in Middle-earth this is unnatural and sonehow "undead". Elven fëar have the power to do do voluntarily (though it is a sign of taint to do so) while men have not and "magic" on the scale of the Great rings is necessary to preserve their continued existence.

Cheers
Tolwen

Sorry, Tolwen. I've got to disagree with you over the nature of the Barrow-wights. Wights were never human nor elvish. They were evil spirits, possibly corrupted Ainur, that inhabited the bodies of the slain. That doesn't mean that many Men could not have thought them to be undead humans.

I agree with you Otaku-sempai that they were evil spirits. I think the confusion that comes in is that there is evidence of past lives. IIRC, after the hobbits are rescued by Tom Bombadill don't the have old memories of the war against Angmar in thier minds? Also, though I know it's not cannon, in DoM you have a chieftain in the East Bight that is possessed by a wight who draws on some memories of a chieftain of ancient times. It begs the question, are these evil spirits somehow stealing the memories of thier long dead host bodies?

[Tolwen]

Sorry, Tolwen. I've got to disagree with you over the nature of the Barrow-wights. Wights were never human nor elvish. They were evil spirits, possibly corrupted Ainur, that inhabited the bodies of the slain. That doesn't mean that many Men could not have thought them to be undead humans.

I seem to have expressed myself unclear. You are absolutely right that they are definitely not human (my posting was mistakable unfortunately). But they can be Houseless. After all, we only know that they were "evil spirits from Angmar and Rhudaur". And both an ëala or a houseless fëa equally qualifies as a "spirit". Unfortunately our only source doesn't say anything about the nature of these spirits.
The scarce source does not really tip the scale in favour of one or the other IMO. The "cold (i.e. "undead") touch" that is in other stories usually associated with "undead" may be a - very - small hint towards the Houseless (as such an existence would be very unnatural for them), but the evidence is far from being strong indeed.

You're right of course that man's understanding of this may be severely limited and thus easily confused with "undead" and human undead (given that they animate long-dead human bodies).

Cheers
Tolwen

[Tolwen]

If I recall correctly, isn't he "woken up" in DoM by the Messenger of Morder who then tells that the lamp is what keeps him in agony? How long has he been asleep before the Messenger wakes him up?

In HotW he's described as being awakened when Sauron came to DG. Sauron used him (being an independent spirit) as a decoy to draw attention away from DG. Since then he is said to have roamed Mirkwood to quench his bloodthirst. If he is slain, he'll come back on the next moonless night (HotW, p. 87).

In the CB (p. 247 in the new HC) he is said to have inhabited his terrible body for "uncounted centuries", indicating that he wasn't killed for quite a long time.

In DoM (p. 101) it is said that is has been realised that the Werewolf cannot be defeated easily since he is always coming back soon thereafter. This implies a series of killings of the beast in relatively short succession to come to this conclusion.

Thus the "body-hopping" is in its written form a pre-requisite plot hook. But that can be altered easily IMO so that it is not necessary to rationalize something difficult to base on Tolkien's ideas.

Cheers
Tolwen

[Rich H]

Thank you for discussing this Tolwen, it's much appreciated. I didn't like the idea of the werewolf hooping from body to body so was going to alter it for my campaign. Not only didn't it feel particularly 'Tolkieny' to me but, more importantly, I thought it was a pretty frustrating thing for PCs to encounter and have to deal with - I could also see it leading to some silly discussions, comments, and actions at the game table; which is something I try to avoid!