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Otaku-sempai wrote:Although I'm not strongly advocating the Lossoth as an Heroic Culture, we are provided more to work with than with the folk of Dorwinion.

While true, you're starting with a pretty low bar. They make potent wine, and they live to the east? Heck, we know more about the Wainriders than we do about the Dorwiniom.

Glorelendil wrote:

Otaku-sempai wrote:Although I'm not strongly advocating the Lossoth as an Heroic Culture, we are provided more to work with than with the folk of Dorwinion.

While true, you're starting with a pretty low bar. They make potent wine, and they live to the east? Heck, we know more about the Wainriders than we do about the Dorwiniom.

We get a bit more about Dorwinion and its people through TOR, but not very much. This is from Erebor - The Lonely Mountain:

Dorwinion
Dorwinion lies hundreds of miles downriver from Esgaroth, surrounded by the River Running bordering the inland Sea of Rhûn. It is a land of merchant princes and princesses, who trade far and wide; with the Elves in the West, Esgaroth in the North and even as far as Gondor in the South.

Dorwinion is particularly known for its vineyards, from which the finest of wines are made, much sought after in the courts of Men – and Elves. To the Northmen, the folk of Dorwinion seem exotic, with dusky complexions, deep, dark eyes, and clothes of brightly patterned cloth; ’tis no wonder that King Bard was so enchanted by his queen, Una.

This is a bit more than Tolkien provided and is geared specifically for TOR. We can also guess that the chief city of Dorwinion is likely a free port where Easterling traders can mingle with merchants from Gondor, Dale and Esgaroth while being spied upon by river pirates and bandits who roam the Marches and East Rhovanion.

I'm the obly Lorrmaster in my two groups, so a sourcebook like "Adventurers Companion" has an hughe importance in my scenarios and campaigns, even to players choice as to my backgrounds info. That said I really like how Bree-man and Bree-hobbits can add to "The One Ring". And I truly hope see something about Bkue Mountain Dwarves and Grey Havens Elves.
Now, in what concearns Woses, Dorwinion anf Lossoth, I have to agree that there's a lack of Tolkien information and they play no proeminent roles in the main narrative of the books. But can we say quite the same about the Woodmen? Or the Grey Mountains Dwarves? Speaking on the last, why can Lossoth be like a variant of Rangers of North, but 15 or 13 points based, for example? Don't know, just thiking of it. I understand that backgrounds and virtues and rewards will suffer a little bit from a lack of canonicity, but I think Beornings also have to be created more from the RPG authors than by Tolkien.
Well, that's my two cents on that matter

Eli wrote:I'm the obly Lorrmaster in my two groups, so a sourcebook like "Adventurers Companion" has an hughe importance in my scenarios and campaigns, even to players choice as to my backgrounds info. That said I really like how Bree-man and Bree-hobbits can add to "The One Ring". And I truly hope see something about Bkue Mountain Dwarves and Grey Havens Elves.

Well, I think we can rule out the High Elves of the Grey Havens for the time being. The Grey Havens might make for a good Sanctuary but not a great source for adventuring Heroes, if only because the Elves who dwell there are either involved in the construction of the White Ships or are preparing themselves to sail into the West.

Now, in what concearns Woses, Dorwinion anf Lossoth, I have to agree that there's a lack of Tolkien information and they play no proeminent roles in the main narrative of the books. But can we say quite the same about the Woodmen? Or the Grey Mountains Dwarves? Speaking on the last, why can Lossoth be like a variant of Rangers of North, but 15 or 13 points based, for example? Don't know, just thiking of it. I understand that backgrounds and virtues and rewards will suffer a little bit from a lack of canonicity, but I think Beornings also have to be created more from the RPG authors than by Tolkien.
Well, that's my two cents on that matter

The Lossoth come across as a distinct culture and people very different from the Dúnedain of the North. I don't think that one could simply write them up as a variant of the Rangers any more than the Drúedain (Woses) could be presented as just a variant of the Rohirrim, the Dunlendings or the Men of Gondor. I will say that I see little reason why the Snowmen would be any more unlikely to produce Hero-characters than the Dunlendings. That said, I think that the Men of Dorwinion could make for an Heroic Culture that would be easier to integrate into TOR.

I agree with Eli: in canon, there is almost no informations on the Woodmen, yet we got them.
To the contrary, I think the lack of info on the Woodmen gave Nepitello and Maggi plenty of room to work.
No reason to not have a playable culture from Dorwinion (I say Dorwinion 'cause these people roam the Wilderlands, so they can fit the DoM campaign)

Corvo wrote:I agree with Eli: in canon, there is almost no informations on the Woodmen, yet we got them.
To the contrary, I think the lack of info on the Woodmen gave Nepitello and Maggi plenty of room to work.
No reason to not have a playable culture from Dorwinion (I say Dorwinion 'cause these people roam the Wilderlands, so they can fit the DoM campaign)

Well, I think the thing there is that it's an "open secret" that Tolkien was thinking about House of the Wolfings when he mentioned the Woodmen in The Hobbit and thus we had a rich culture to draw on for the Woodmen of Wilderland. We don't (as far as I know) have the same for Dorwinion or the Lossoth. We can certainly make some educated guesses but we don't know what it takes to convince the powers-that-be that such a guess should be approved.

I see your points Zed,
then again, I doubt there is much "convincing the powers that be" ongoing between the game creators and.. some lawyer of whoever hold the rights to Tolkien's stuff? These lawyers just care, I think, about what is in the license and what is outside. And I doubt the House of the Wulfings is "in".
Again, my own are just speculations.

Corvo wrote:I agree with Eli: in canon, there is almost no informations on the Woodmen, yet we got them.

We get a lot more information from Tolkien than you think. We know they're Northmen, related to the Rohirrim, who used to live in the Anduin valley, as they do. This brings with it the Anglo-Saxon–like culture of the Rohirrim, sans horses. We get Beorn who, while not one of them, lives in the same area and has the same Anglo-Saxon–like manner of living. We get quite a bit of architectural style of his house and land. The authors of The One Ring simply extrapolated these things into a full-blown culture.

Of the people of Dorwinion, however, we know only that they make wine. Nothing else. There's no data from which to extrapolate a culture.

Stormcrow wrote:Of the people of Dorwinion, however, we know only that they make wine. Nothing else. There's no data from which to extrapolate a culture.

That's certainly my impression of the state of things; borne out by the fact that, among other things, it has been hypothesised that the Dorwinion could actually be elves rather than men.

Rich H wrote:That's certainly my impression of the state of things; borne out by the fact that, among other things, it has been hypothesised that the Dorwinion could actually be elves rather than men.

True. Going strictly by what Tolkien wrote in The Hobbit, we could speculate that the folk of Dorwinion were meant to be the Elves' "kinsfolk in the South". Even the placement of Dorwinion on the shores of the Sea of Rhûn was a later addition. And it doesn't help to clarify the issue that Dorwinion seems to be a Sindarin name that was previously used as a name for a region of Tol Eressea.