It's Call of the Rings...

[J3W1]

..or Rings of Cthulhu.

I'm new to The One Ring RPG (which I'm in love with by the way), I've seen the movies of course, and read the books ages ago but I have to confess I've never really understood the level of fear of Sauron inspires.

Yeah he's big, and powerful and scary with creepy followers etc., but the level of fear he inspires described in the books and films like referring to him as "The Enemy" - like even saying his name out loud would be bad news. I'd be much more afraid of those Cave Trolls personally. Frodo puts on the ring and sees some ghost claws and/or a big fire eye looking at him? Scary sure, but not "This is the end of days" scary to me at least.


And then it hit me. He's akin to a Great Old One like Cthulhu or an Outer God like Nyarlathotep.

For anyone that has experience with the Call of Cthulhu RPG the descriptions for Sauron seem very similar to what Lovecraft would later use to describe the attention of one of these horrific alien intelligence's from outer space plotting the downfall of mankind.

Do you dare read a book with information about Great Cthulhu (or Sauron in this case)? Certainly not - it may drive you mad. He contacts his followers through dreams and portents, the doom of mankind is assured "When the stars are right" and dread R'lyeh rises from the depths (or Sauron recovers the One Ring). You dare not say his name out loud for fear of drawing his attention!

And heaven forbid Cthulhu himself takes a personal notice of your activities (Eye of Mordor rules). Or worse you actually see the terrible form of Great Cthulhu yourself in the flesh! Madness and ruin are all but assured.

Ironically you must learn more and more about this dread being in order to have a chance to thwart his activities. Doing so, however, increases your own vulnerability to manipulation and madness. If you are lucky (or unlucky) enough to discover a relic of his cult, it may be used against them, but only at great peril to those who use it.

Anyway that notion really helped me understand and appreciate the level of fear Sauron inspires.

[Glorelendil]

For anyone that has experience with the Call of Cthulhu RPG the descriptions for Sauron seem very similar to what Lovecraft would later use to describe the attention of one of these horrific alien intelligence's from outer space plotting the downfall of mankind.

Lovecraft died six months before the Hobbit was published.

But otherwise I agree with the gist of this post: a little bit of Lovecraftian horror punctuating the idyllic/bucolic lives of Hobbits and Elves and Woodman emphasizes the shock.

[J3W1]

Ah thanks Glorelendil, I wasn't sure of the dates,

[zedturtle]

And just think... He's little, compared to his boss.

The level of fear that Sauron commands at the end of the Third Age is remarkable; he's gone toe-to-toe with heroes before and lost, he shouldn't be that scary. But the big thing is that he's not personally beatable. Elrond et al went that route last time and it didn't quite work out in the end. That's why he's so scary, facing him means you've already lost, no matter the outcome.

[Rocmistro]

So...it's your mind, J3W1, and you can of course reason and make parallels however you see fit. But I would caution against comparisons between Lovecraft and Tolkien, as they had vastly different world views, and the literature they produced comes from completely different places, and different personas. It's not that such comparisons can't be made, of course, but you may be tempted to form conclusions and see things that aren't there.

I'd say the central conflict in Lord of the Rings is the lust for power, and the corruptive influence of it. Lovecraft's work centers more around Esoteric knowledge, and the madness that awaits humanity knowing things its not supposed to know. Certainly both can be reduced to humanity's desire for "xxxx". I think Lord of the Rings is a more primal and base allegory, in that it illustrates humanity's desire for power...why? Generally to govern. And what makes you think you'd be a good governor? Pride. In this respect, Sauron is much more akin to Lucifer than one of the Old Gods. It also more closely mirrors his actual power (at least by the late third age), in that Sauron had little power to physically (directly) affect things. But his lies and threats and promises and the delusions of grandeur he could ellicit put all sorts of beings on ruinous paths. This view of "ultimate evil" would more closely match Tolkien's catholic understanding of Lucifer/Satan as the great tempter, where he (the Devil) has no power to physically assail humanity with demons or devils, but can certainly bring lives to ruin by temptation and the consequences of our actions.

Insomuch as that is true, the fear that Sauron generates is 2 part, I think. One part is illusory; mortals fear him simply because it is part of the terror he evokes. Note that Elves are generally immune to this, having a knowledge and understanding of his weapons. The second part is more inwardly focused; mortals fear him because they fear the sin and corruption reflected in their own hearts. Knowing that he can manipulate mortal desires causes a mortal to come face to face with his own weakness, often to their detriment. But the animus for this is knowledge of one's sin (for lack of a better word)

I think this contrasts to the Lovecraftian mythos, which is based more around esoteric knowledge, the punishment for which is psychological dementia and other, more secular provisions. As I understand C'thulu, while they are referred to as "old gods", they have more of an alien origin than a spiritual one. Tolkien never strays from the spiritual and the divine. Middle-earth is birthed in and replete with theistic spirituality and those concepts are understood and defined from a theists point of view. C'thulu is really represented as more "alternate dimensions where psyches beyond human comprehension dwell...". I don't know that I would call Lovecraft supernatural so much as hypernatural.

Anyway, the conversation interested me and I thought I would contribute to it.

[J3W1]

Great analysis Rocmistro, thanks. That all rings very true to me after reading it.

I certainly don't intend to cross these two world views into any other tangent than I simply had trouble understanding the fear Sauron seemed to generate among the people/characters of the world. I am in no way advocating a cross of these two very different ideologies.

I personally did not grow up with faith, and outside an academic understanding of Christianity I guess childhood fears many people have of "The Devil" was never something I ever experienced. But having read your comments I can see the parallels to The Fallen First Angel, The Great Deceiver, etc. and other parables related to Satan.

It's all very interesting to me, thanks very much for your comment.

[Rocmistro]

No problem! I'm glad you got something useful out of it (and just for good measure, it's not my intent to "convince" you of anything, per se, just offering up a different perspective).

[zedturtle]

I think Elves are not immune to fearing Sauron (though less troubled by some manifestations of his power) because they fear the corruption. Both Galadriel and Gandalf acknowledge the danger of the Ring and I think that if either were brought before Sauron they would be turned into powerful agents of his.

[Glorelendil]

The (dis)similarity between the experience of a Hobbit or Man encountering a Nazgul and that of a newspaper reporter encountering a slithering Old One might depend on whether the horror is due to reasoned thought (based on a system of beliefs) or primal instinct. I'm assuming the latter, which suggests the experiences are quite similar. I think Lovecraft is a great analogue for, say, what the Hobbits must have experienced as the Nazgul got off his horse and sniffed for them.

Regardless, what makes Lovecraft compelling is the feeling that the scenes evoke is us, the readers, and that if we're trying to tell a great story in Middle Earth we could do worse than replicate that feeling in our players.

[Otaku-sempai]

Incorporating the Cthulhu Mythos into a one-off game of TOR could be fun. I just wouldn't want to combine the two in a long-running campaign!

Even the original Star Trek ("Catspaw" written by Robert Bloch) and Babylon 5 (in the B5 movie Thirdspace) featured Lovecraftian stories.