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Hi there,

I'm thinking of running a TOR campaign for a single player. As written, the rules certainly seem group-focused, which is fully understandable.

Has anyone thought about tweaks/changes that would make the rules friendlier for a single player?

Do the Final Fantasy thing, and let the player run a party controlled by him. There's no law that says a player must run only one character.

Or, in Middle Earth, this would be equivalent to having one player control the entire Fellowship of the Ring. "Well, Aragorn's going to stab that troll, Gimli hacks an orc down, Legolas shoots that troll Aragorn's fighting, Frodo stabs it in the foot..."

What type of character is the player thinking of making?

As RPGs are social things the RAW are really quite innovative and work extreamly well. However, running a solo game does take a little thinking. Which I kind of find a little strange as there are as many examples of solo adventurers in Tolikens stories (Baran, Aragorn, and Gandalf) as there are Fellowships of Heros.

If the player is making something along the lines of an Aragorn, Boromir or Faramir I would run as is, maybe cut back a bit on travel rolls and the like; just enough so they don't get overwhelmed. The problem occurs if they are taking a Hobbit. In that case I would probably set the campaign around a group of Bounders (Hobbit Border Patrols*) in one of the outlying areas of the Shire. That way they could do somethings on their own, but still have the support of the Sherriff and the rest of the lads.

*see The Guide to the Shire on Rich H's Resource page.

I believe the character would be a silvan elf loremaster/wanderer - running an entire party isn't an option, as the player really wouldn't be into doing that.

I agree that there are quite a few solo characters (at least at times) in the stories, which is something I'd like to explore.

I know it is limiting the canvas you have to work with, but what about keeping the game to a small section of the Wilderland (Mirkwood I guess in this case); to start with anyway. The PC could a memeber of a unit sent out by the King to re claim part of the forest from the Spiders and other nasties. This way you cut back on travel rolls, but pretty much keep everything else as is. Or, the PC could be an established envoy to Dale, Lake Town or even Rivendell.

You might want to consider giving him some kind of bonus hope point renewal to make up for the lack of a fellowship pool.

Wouldn't the pool be one, or two if a Hobbit or Beorning with honey cakes? So if he isn't wounded or badly injured he get's one back and one for protecting himself

cegorach wrote:I believe the character would be a silvan elf loremaster/wanderer - running an entire party isn't an option, as the player really wouldn't be into doing that.

Agreed. I think doing that would be missing the point and isn't the best way of dealing with the issue.

cegorach wrote:I agree that there are quite a few solo characters (at least at times) in the stories, which is something I'd like to explore.

I think you're on the right track here... Beran has already offered some great advice.

The main issues you're going to have with running a solo game of TOR are a combination of what you always experience running an RPG for one player and some specific to the TOR rules*:

1) Character Utility
This is a problem that you'll experience with all RPGs. One PC is not going to have the same range of skills and competencies as four PCs. One way of dealing with this is as Beran's suggested; having him within a group of other NPCs. The challenge with this is that you're going to have to RP those NPCs and when they take front stage you player may feel like he's surplus to requirements unless you are very careful. There are some other options though...

i) You could make the PC more experienced, letting him raise some zero and one point skills to 1 and 2 points respectively - or award him a number of AP and XPs.

ii) There are also some options within the Laketown supplement (page 12) where items of particular quality add bonuses to particular skills. With a few of those it may help supplement his missing competencies.

iii) Also in the Laketown supplement (p29), the Merchant Prince virtue has the character accompanied by 'support NPCs'. It's not a stretch to imagine an elven Loremaster having the same kind of options. Granted, this is usually applied to Laketown characters, but as you're playing a solo campaign it doesn't really matter.

iv) Just avoid running scenarios that require competencies in areas where the character has none. If you think that players spending points on the character is a way of suggesting to the LM what kind of content they want the game to include this is a particularly common sense option.

2) Combat Encounters
This is going to be an issue that you'd face in any fantasy RPG. Combat isn't central to TOR though so it's not the be-all-and-end-all but you can easily scale encounters in TOR to one combatant. The problem you'll have is that beyond opening volleys the PC won't be able to use a bow so caution against your player investing in that skill at the expense of a melee-based one.

If the PC is going to be in a group of other NPCs then the above isn't really a problem. The issue you have with that is that you, as LM, will need to 'run' those NPCs and adversaries within the combat. Personally, if you go this route, I'd apply the rules loosely or even narrate the combat as it develops rather than go with a blow-by-blow account. If you went this way then I'd recommend taking a look at James R Brown's Mythic Battle rules. In there you'll get advice on how to run a more narrative-based combat.

3) Travelling
A PC travelling Wilderland on his own is not going to be able to cover all roles within the journey rules. If you make the character part of a patrol then such an issue is alleviated but you get the complication there of NPCs dealing with challenges rather than your player's character which, as referred to above, may make them feel somewhat surplus to requirements. Personally, during a journey if a Hazard occurs just have it happen to the character's (PC) role rather than an NPC one, that way they're involved directly and you don't really lose anything from the game.

4) Hope Resource
This is a potential issue but not insurmountable. Your PC isn't really going to have a Fellowship Hope pool to draw on so you're going to have to explore other options. I have some additional rules (https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/795 ... 0Rules.pdf) and within it on page 35 there are options for recovering Hope. Check them out, I think they'd solve this issue.

* I'm sure there are others but I'm travelling at the moment so it's not easy posting on a phone for me!

Rich, do you mean the Laketown Supplement? I'm fairly sure you do, just thought I'd check

You could make him what I'd call a 'Paragon Elf.'

Which looks kinda like this:

Name:

Culture: Elf of Mirkwood Standard of Living: Martial
Cultural blessing: Folk of the Dusk
Calling: Scholar Shadow weakness: Lure of Secrets
Specialties: Fire-making, Woodwright, Boating, Swimming, Elven Lore, Mirkwood Lore, Rhymes of Lore
Distinctive features: Quick of Hearing, Swift, Lordly, Fair
Body: 6 Heart: 4 Wits: 7
Body (favoured): 9 Heart (favoured): 7 Wits (favoured): 10

-Common Skills-

• Awe: 4 Inspire: 2 Persuade: 2
• Athletics: 5 Travel: 2 Stealth: 4
• Awareness: 4 Insight: 2 Search: 2
• Explore: 2 Healing: 3 Hunting: 3
• Song: 4 Courtesy: 2 Riddle: 2
• Craft: 2 Battle: 4 Lore: 5

-Weapon Skills-

• (Spears): 4
• Dagger: 3
• Bow: 4
• Sword: 3

-Rewards-: Keen, Reinforced
-Virtues-: Wood-elf Magic, Elvish Dreams, The Speakers
-Gear-

• Dagger damage: 3 edge: G injury: 12 enc: 0
• Spear damage: 5 edge: 8 injury: 14 enc: 2
• Bow damage: 5 edge: 10 injury: 14 enc: 1
• Leather corslet enc: 8
• Great shield enc: 5

Endurance: 26 Starting Endurance: 26
Fatigue from Encumbrance: 16 Fatigue from Travel: 0 Total Fatigue: 15
Hope: 12 Starting Hope: 12
Temporary Shadow: 0 Permanent Shadow: 0 Total Shadow: 0
Armour: 2 Headgear: 0
Parry: 7 Shield: 4
Damage: 6 Ranged: 6
Wisdom: 4 Valour: 3
Experience: 0 Total Experience: 0
Fellowship: 0 Advancement: 0 Treasure: 0 Standing: 0

A paragon anything is built in the following way:

Base stats are always 4, 6, 7. In an Elf's case, that's 6 body, 4 heart, 7 wits, because the maximum body an elf can have is 6, maximum heart is 4, maximum wits is 7. They get +3 to all favored attributes, leading to 9/7/10. No single stat is better then a normally chargenned elf, as a normal 'noble blood' elf could have 4 heart and 7 favored heart, a normal king's envoy could have body 6 favored body 9, and so on, it's just they're all chargenned to be the best possible, they are simply equal to the best an elf can possibly be. They get all specialties available to their race. In this case, the paragon elf can make fires, boat, swim, carve wood, know about the ancient past, and know Mirkwood, all like a pro. They also get 4 traits instead of 2. They get both weapons packages available to their race, and get +2 to both of them. Elves have (spears), sword, dagger and bow sword, dagger, so they start with 4s in (Spears) and bow, and 3s in sword and dagger.

Skills are simply 'base elven skills +2 across the board.' This applies to common skills, weapon skills, and even Valor and Wisdom. This means the paragon starts with some 4s and some 5s in some skills, like Lore 5 and Athletics 5, awareness 4 and stealth 4, song 4 and battle 4 and awe 4, and even hunting 3 and healing 3. Of course, this means he gets 4 in his primary weapon (Spears), and 3s in sword and dagger. And either 4 Valor, 3 Wisdom, or 4 Wisdom, 3 Valor. My setup with the reinforced great shield and the spear lets this particular elf have good survivability with his parry score of 11 and an unbreakable shield. Elvish dreams will keep his endurance up, speakers will give him all sorts of information, and elven magic (he has all uses handy) will let him use elven lights and enchanted slumber to deal with being outnumbered.

The downside to the 'paragon' approach is that the character cannot be later integrated into a normal campaign later. Also, this kind of elf more represents Link or James Bond then anything Tolkien conceived of.