Question About Character Progression

[AmySmith]

So, in Dungeons & dragons, character progression is measured in character levels. The higher level a character is, the more powerful enemy he/she can fight. In TOR, how is character progression done? Do characters get more powerful as they adventure? I don't think characters gain levels in TOR so how do they become stronger, more powerful over time to fight harder enemies? How do you keep track of damage dealt since I don't think TOR uses hitpoints or does it? Such a BIG change in rules from Classic AD&D that I am used.

Haven't bought any books yet, still researching with what little resources I have available to me atm. Still deciding if I want to commit to buying the core rule book or not. Money is a little tight for me currently so I really need to make sure I want to commit to TOR or not and I know I do not want to invest in AiMe with its yucky 5th edition rules haha but I do love Middle-Earth. Watched the movies multiple times, never read the books though. I simply adore this fantasy setting.

[Zulgolra]

If you want to estimate how powerful a TOR-character is, you look at his total expierience. That is the best way. There are also some players who look at valor and wisdom to get a feeling how powerful a character is because this determines the amount of virtues (which you could interpret as special abilities) and "better than normal gear" ...

More in general: Instead of D&Ds levelsystem it is a point-buy-system. You get exp. and you spend them on buying better skill-levels.

Hit points:
There is some design like hitpoints in TOR. It is called endurance... You lose endurance if you get hit by an opponent, but also from other exhausting activities like wandering. Because it is endurance, you do not automaticly die if you reach 0 endurance, you get just unconscious. There is a second system working with injuries parallel to endurance which shows how healthy you are. It gets really dangerous if you are exhausted and wounded...

[AmySmith]

Yea ...... now I am more confused than ever haha. Probably help me more with TOR being explained by someone that has played D&D before ...... I do appreciate you replying though, thank you, even though I am still scratching my head over this

[Hermes Serpent]

TBH TOR is nothing like D&D and any comparison would be more likely to confuse you. TOR allows the player characters to build up their skills and throw more dice thus giving bigger total numbers to succeed.

Combat is rolling against a target number made up of your stance value (extra aggressive, extra defensive or normal) and your enemy's parry. Typically the stance value is 6, 9,or 12 and parry value's are 4 and up with shields adding to the parry number. If you reach the total TN then you check for 6's on the D6's. 6's add a fixed value to the fixed value of damage (by weapon) - a dagger does 3 and a sword 5 when wielded one handed. Typically a starting character is rolling 3d6 and a d12 against the total enemy TN.

Skills work in the same way with varying numbers of dice for each skill (done at chargen) and the PC needs to get typically a total of 14.

A character typically earns a XP point for each successful skill check called an advancement point and spends those on skill and weapon skill advancement. A PC gets 1XP after each session and sometimes a second.You generally get 4AP and 1 or 2 XP for each session. A skill cost 4 AP to go from one dice to two etc. XP are spent on raising Valour and Wisdom which give you special gifts and weapons.

I'd suggest you check out on-line actual play videos to get a good feel for the game. One thing to bear in mind is that TOR is very narrative in style. Players need to do a lot of talking to describe what their characters do and the LM needs to describe everything about them and also the NPC's actions and reactions. If your players aren't comfortable in doing this TOR may not be for them.

[AmySmith]

I'd suggest you check out on-line actual play videos to get a good feel for the game. One thing to bear in mind is that TOR is very narrative in style. Players need to do a lot of talking to describe what their characters do and the LM needs to describe everything about them and also the NPC's actions and reactions. If your players aren't comfortable in doing this TOR may not be for them.

I was looking through Youtube for some tabletop gameplay but I am just not sure which one would be the better one to watch for me to really understand whats going on .... any suggestions?

[Hermes Serpent]

'Fraid not I've been playing TOR since the early days, 2012, and my local group was involved in the original playtesting so I haven't felt the need to watch others playing on line.

[Zulgolra]

Yea ...... now I am more confused than ever haha. Probably help me more with TOR being explained by someone that has played D&D before ...... I do appreciate you replying though, thank you, even though I am still scratching my head over this

Sorry, but this I´m saying as someone having played D&D. Seems more like you could read up some roleplaying theorie if you don´t know what a "point-buy-system", a "levelsystem" or "roll-over dice-pool" mean...

But I will give it another try:
There are no levels in TOR. You get expierience after the adventure (this is a simplistic way of telling this). Then you take your expierience points like money and buy higher skill-levels for them. So the outcome is: your unspend experience account is lower, like your bankacount after buying in the supermarket. The total experience is the same as before (like your pacheck is not losing its worth, just beause you spended its money after you got it).
You only buy skilllevels in TOR, no D&D raising of Stats... (very simplified said)

Hitpoints again:
No classical hitpoints in TOR. You have just endurance. When beeing hit, you loose endurance like hitpoins in D&D. But because they are not hitpoints you do not only loose them when beeing hit with a club, but also when you do something exhausting, like climbing a mountain, walk 20 miles...
Because endurancepoints are not hitpoints you do not die, when they just reach zero. you just collapse, like you beeing exhausted...
But of course someone with a club can kill you. So if he hits you "strong enough" with his club, he will injure you. No matter how many endurance points you have or lose when beeing clubed..! Beeing injured is not the same as beeing exhausted.
This I ment with "a second system" meaning the wounds or injuries...

Beeing exhausted you collapse, beeing injured you are wounded. These stats are not good but do not kill you alone. But if you are injured and exhausted or injured more than once it gets life threatening...

So let us summarize: No levels in TOR, no hitpoints in TOR, no classic statraising in TOR (well, just valour and wisdom normaly, but this would get complicated so let us stop here), just skills and special abilities (like invocate a damagebonus against ors, or other bonuses) and modifying your equipment by investing unspend expierience (wich makes the unspend to spend exp.).

[Enevhar Aldarion]

If you do not want to get into a brand new system, but still want to play in Middle-earth, you could always go with Adventures in Middle-Earth. It is also by C7 and combines Middle-Earth and D&D 5E rules. It also uses all the same background and fluff details that are used in The One Ring.

[Rich H]

Hi Amy!

Such a BIG change in rules from Classic AD&D that I am used.

To be honest, if you're used to Classic AD&D then take a look at D&D 5e; I don't think its really too far away from what you're used to, and comfortable, with playing. You can even pick up the core player rules for free over on the WotC website. Personally, I'm not into D&D and TOR system really is spot on for emulating the literature and stories of The Hobbit and LotR but take a look at the new D&D; if this is okay for you then AiMe would be a great fit to your needs.

[AmySmith]

If you do not want to get into a brand new system, but still want to play in Middle-earth, you could always go with Adventures in Middle-Earth. It is also by C7 and combines Middle-Earth and D&D 5E rules. It also uses all the same background and fluff details that are used in The One Ring.

Yea but kinda turned off by that game, I heard it did not really stay with the FLAVOR of Middle-Earth, that it went off into adding new stuff to the lore, the world and the setting that were not already in it + if it plays anything like 5th edition D&D then I would not touch it just as I refuse to touch 5th edition D&D. I am primarily 1st-2nd edition only.