Brand New to this Place With Questions!

[MaSQue_]

I think this has been addressed in other responses, but I'll try to rephrase it in case you missed it. D&D 5th Ed, and by extension AiME, is built to present PCs and scenarios on a more superheroic scale, where the PCs have a long list of special maneuvers and abilities. This might enable a player to do the kinds of things that Legolas and others do in the movies -- surfing down stairs on a shield, or spinning about beheading Orcs while wearing a barrel. D&D and its related games are generally very focused on combat, and in the opinion of many players, that's not really the spirit of Tolkien.

hmmm thats much better explained and actually this sounds like the EXACT thing that kept me from progressing with the D&D editions past 2nd ed. Just this quote right here is why I think I am staying with TOR over AiMe. I am not at all interested in having my players more concerned with characters becoming powerful as time passes.

TOR, on the other hand, does not make the player-heroes superhuman. They are competent, to be sure, but the servants of the Enemy are often much, much more potent. PCs often have reason to avoid battles, or to seek non-violent solutions to problems. Some of this certainly comes down to adventure design, of course, but the ways in which characters evolve and grow over the course of the game could be seen as less focused on increasing their combat abilities, since that's not the point of the game.

Kinda like in D&D at higher levels characters will wade into hundreds of Orcs and not die, but keeping it more real characters wading into hundreds of Orcs can easily get killed off, sure like I Fellowship of the Ring towards the end when
Boromir dies, the others wade into lots of Orcs to try to get to him, something like that is more real feeling, they had to fight for there lives in that fight whereas in D&D characters would just be wading through the Orcs.

You asked earlier if there was a "monster manual" book, and the answer was no. This is because there simply aren't that many different kinds of monsters in Tolkien! Spiders, Trolls, Wargs, and Orcs and Goblins -- that's about it for the "common" creatures. This may be clearer to readers of the books, but Tolkien's work was never about the fights. It was about character, and story, and the journey itself. TOR is built to capture that, in a way that AiME kind of isn't, just by virtue of being laid over the top of D&D 5E.

I am sure the enemies are all statted out in the books/adventures. I am more about the adventure also.

You have been a HUGE help, I understand now and now know I will need to go with TOR. I can easily keep the flavor of the movies alive using TOR, but also keep the sillyness out as well. Waiting on my friend who is supposed to be handing his books over to me due to he does not RPG anymore. Someone sent me a list of all the TOR books, he says he does not have ....... Wilderland Adventures, Rhovanion Region Guide and Eaves of Mirkwood & Loremaster's Screen. So I will have to find those. (I'm sure I will shoot him some money for the books, doesn't feel right taking them off his hands for free)

Also, the 30-year campaign others have mentioned is The Darkening of Mirkwood. It's amazing!

Sweet! I look forward to this

[zedturtle]

he says he does not have ....... Wilderland Adventures, Rhovanion Region Guide and Eaves of Mirkwood & Loremaster's Screen

Those are supplements for Adventures in Middle-earth. Sorry for any confusion!

[MaSQue_]

he says he does not have ....... Wilderland Adventures, Rhovanion Region Guide and Eaves of Mirkwood & Loremaster's Screen

Those are supplements for Adventures in Middle-earth. Sorry for any confusion!

ahhhh .... he must have not noticed he mixed the list up, So he posted this list for TOR, did he miss anything?

1. Adventures over the Edge of the Wild (Two books, Dice set, and Maps (the Index for it you can find on the official cubicle 7 website)),
2. Words of the Wise,
3. Tales from Wilderland,
4. Loremaster's Screen and Lake-town Sourcebook,
5. The Heart of the Wild,
6. The Darkening of Mirkwood,
7. The One Ring Roleplaying Game
8. Rivendell,
9. Ruins of the North,
10. Horse-lords of Rohan,
11. Journeys and Maps,
12. Erebor The Lonely Mountain,
13. Adventurer's Companion,
14. Bree.
and soon the following title will be available:
15. Oaths of The Riddermark.

[Otaku-sempai]

One thing that worries me about AiMe and those 5th ed rules is,you mentioned being able to bring in things like armor or weapons from 5th ed D&D. I would not want to add things to my setting that are not already in it, to me that would take away from what makes Middle-Earth special to me. Let me open up discussion on the 5th ed rules if anyone wants to discuss this with me. In D&D 5th ed rules, I hated how they did things like allowing Wizards to wear plate ARMOR .... really? Plate Armor for Wizards and STILL be able to cast spells while wearing it? (nope nope nope nope) not happening in my game, Wizards DO NOT wear heavy armor and still cast spells imo - Wizards are Robe wearing only, I like how the movies had Gandalf wearing robes and using a sword, thats how its doen as a multiclass character, if they train in sword use they still have to not wear armor for spell casting.

5th ed in D&D just did too many things that took away from what made D&D special for us old classic D&Ders and the armor thing is just the tip of the problems ..... I won't go into it more, but the armor thing pretty much sums it up. I am worried these 5th ed rules may do the same thing with AiMe and I want to keep my game classic and true to the movies.

I hear you. We (my wife and myself) played with 3e for a bit, but our default campaign is still (to this day) AD&D 2e incorporating Skills & Powers. Feats were a good idea, but became very much over-done. Neither of us liked the video game-like mechanics of 4e and just said no when that came out. D&D 5e has walked much of that back; and if we had enough players to make it worthwhile, we would probably have at least the 5e core books.

The 30-year campaign that zedturturtle wrote about is the the Darkening of Mirkwood campaign that was released as a companion for The Heart of the Wild region guide. Of course HotW is also an excellent resource in conjunction with Tales from Wilderland.

In the movies, you saw Magical weapons, armor, rings etc etc but they were not just laying around as much and they were not all godlike either (no more I have a +5 Longsword of "whatever" that is intelligent and talks to me and can cast spells etc etc) KISS (Keep it simple stupid) lol thats what I like .......

So, with all that being said I ask you guys .............

Without having read the books, and only watching the movies, why would it be hard for me to run a campaign setting with TOR and still keep the flavor of the movies intact (since thats what me and my players know LotRs from) because they have so much material in TOW over AiMe. I just don't understand how AiMe is better for movie watchers over TOR because all I am taking from the books and adventures is material, I am the one working up my own setting, so I should be able to maintain the feel of what we got from the movies shouldnt I? oh and I agree about the retarded feats they did in the movies .... the river/barrel thing and they silly crap during the goblin fights beneath the surface but its all in good fun, me personally I would have made that way more believable lol that stuff in the movies got a little .... well it just got a tad too silly at times.

What's funny is that one of the changes made to 5e is that magical weapons have been de-powered a bit. No more +4 or +5 weapons, even Holy Avengers are only +3 swords.

One thing that would be difficult in TOR would be replicating the weapons and armor of the Dwarves. TOR includes few bashing-type weapons for Player-heroes (no maces, war hammers, morning stars or flails) and no plate or even partial plate. At least long swords can be thought of as essentially the same as bastard swords. Spears and great spears can function as javelins and lances.

I do have a hard time imagining many of the sillier stunts from the films being replicated in TOR: Legolas' shield-surfing, running up an oliphaunt, shooting arrows while hanging upside-down from a giant bat, the catwalk chase in Goblin Town, Bard's juryrigged ballista, the dwarven twirlie whirlies, etc. I was also greatly irritated by how ridiculously quickly Jackson's characters got around (traveling hundreds of miles--and back--through wilderness in a handful of days. I know that movie audiences are stupid (or at least ignorant), but filmmakers should challenge that, not encourage it.

[Otaku-sempai]

So he posted this list for TOR, did he miss anything?

1. Adventures over the Edge of the Wild (Two books, Dice set, and Maps (the Index for it you can find on the official cubicle 7 website)),
2. Words of the Wise,
3. Tales from Wilderland,
4. Loremaster's Screen and Lake-town Sourcebook,
5. The Heart of the Wild,
6. The Darkening of Mirkwood,
7. The One Ring Roleplaying Game
8. Rivendell,
9. Ruins of the North,
10. Horse-lords of Rohan,
11. Journeys and Maps,
12. Erebor The Lonely Mountain,
13. Adventurer's Companion,
14. Bree.
and soon the following title will be available:
15. Oaths of The Riddermark.

If you have #7 then you don't need #1 (it's still useful because of the dice and fold-out maps, but Journeys & Maps takes care of the latter). Also on the way is The Laughter of Dragons an adventure book for Erebor and its surroundings. And if you're interested, you might be able to track down Hobbit Tales (sadly out-of-print) a story-telling card game that can also be used to generate Hazards during journeys. And sets of TOR dice can be purchased separately.

[MaSQue_]

So he posted this list for TOR, did he miss anything?

1. Adventures over the Edge of the Wild (Two books, Dice set, and Maps (the Index for it you can find on the official cubicle 7 website)),
2. Words of the Wise,
3. Tales from Wilderland,
4. Loremaster's Screen and Lake-town Sourcebook,
5. The Heart of the Wild,
6. The Darkening of Mirkwood,
7. The One Ring Roleplaying Game
8. Rivendell,
9. Ruins of the North,
10. Horse-lords of Rohan,
11. Journeys and Maps,
12. Erebor The Lonely Mountain,
13. Adventurer's Companion,
14. Bree.
and soon the following title will be available:
15. Oaths of The Riddermark.

If you have #7 then you don't need #1 (it's still useful because of the dice and fold-out maps, but Journeys & Maps takes care of the latter). Also on the way is The Laughter of Dragons an adventure book for Erebor and its surroundings. And if you're interested, you might be able to track down Hobbit Tales (sadly out-of-print) a story-telling card game that can also be used to generate Hazards during journeys. And sets of TOR dice can be purchased separately.

He for sure has #7.As far as adventures go, I am pretty sold on The Darkening of Mirkwood since it's said to be a 30 year long campaign ..... that will pretty much cover our Middle Earth adventuring haha. The dice .... can you link them where they can be bought? I haven't seen them as of yet. Going to Google them, maybe I can find them myself. (pfft nevermind, found em easily. these look odd)

[MaSQue_]

Looking at the dice, they appear to be 6 sides and 12 sides? Am I seeing this correctly? The reason I ask is myself and my group plan to play from now on using Skype and Roll20. Trying to see how dice will get rolled using Roll20.

[Otaku-sempai]

Looking at the dice, they appear to be 6 sides and 12 sides? Am I seeing this correctly? The reason I ask is myself and my group plan to play from now on using Skype and Roll20. Trying to see how dice will get rolled using Roll20.

Yes, 6-sided dice for your skill dice and the 12-sider is your feat die. You can use normally-marked dice; the markings on the TOR dice just make them easier to use in-game. A '6' on your skill dice denote special successes on a successful role (which is why it is marked with a Tengwar), while the numbers '1' through '3' on them are not counted when a character is Weary. The feat die is numbered '1' through '10'. The G-rune (or Gandalf) denotes an automatic success on a skill role. The Eye of Sauron (or just Eye) can be counted as a 'zero' or it can denote an automatic failure, depending on circumstances. If you are using a normal d12 then count '11' as the Eye and '12' as the Gandalf (or the other way around, if that is easier for you). Note that when Monsters or Adversaries are making skill rolls, the Eye is a success for them and the Gandalf is a failure.

[MaSQue_]

Looking at the dice, they appear to be 6 sides and 12 sides? Am I seeing this correctly? The reason I ask is myself and my group plan to play from now on using Skype and Roll20. Trying to see how dice will get rolled using Roll20.

Yes, 6-sided dice for your skill dice and the 12-sider is your feat die. You can use normally-marked dice; the markings on the TOR dice just make them easier to use in-game. A '6' on your skill dice denote special successes on a successful role (which is why it is marked with a Tengwar), while the numbers '1' through '3' on them are not counted when a character is Weary. The feat die is numbered '1' through '10'. The G-rune (or Gandalf) denotes an automatic success on a skill role. The Eye of Sauron (or just Eye) can be counted as a 'zero' or it can denote an automatic failure, depending on circumstances. If you are using a normal d12 then count '11' as the Eye and '12' as the Gandalf (or the other way around, if that is easier for you). Note that when Monsters or Adversaries are making skill rolls, the Eye is a success for them and the Gandalf is a failure.

I "think" Roll20 has a patch I can download to give me the skin for those dice. I assume this is legit, I have yet to try it. https://wiki.roll20.net/The_One_Ring

Also if those are the only dice you use for the game, how hard can the rules actually be?

[Hermes Serpent]

As one of the people who developed that Roll20 material and wrote the How-To it's very easy to install and use although not automatic, you will still need some familiarity with computer skills. It will do the die rolls for you and the official Roll20 TOR character sheet has bells and whistles that assist the LM.