Tag: Review

Review: Eaves of Mirkwood

rasmusnord018 Comments
Eaves
Eaves of Mirkwood also contains pre-generated characters.

Eaves of Mirkwood is a combination-product for Cubicle 7’s Adventures in Middle-Earth. It contains a Loremaster’s Screen and an introductory adventure which contains brief versions of the rules unique to Adventures in Middle-Earth and some pre-generated characters. You can therefore play Eaves of Mirkwood without the Player’s Guide to Adventure’s in Middle Earth.

I’ve now run the Eaves of Mirkwood adventure and used the Loremaster’s Screen on several occasions (running Wilderland Adventures) and will below provide my point of view on the product, and give a little advice on running the adventure.

Overall, we enjoyed the adventure a lot. The Loremaster’s Screen is more of a mixed bag.

Odd product combination

Eaves of Mirkwood costs 20£ in Cubicle 7’s online store. I think that is a very reasonable price, comparable with the 15$ for a regular D&D screen. That said, I find the product composition weird. I don’t understand why you would package an introductory adventure, that is supposed to pull new players to the game, with a screen, which is something that Loremasters that play regularly needs?

I think the screen fits much better with the Road Goes Ever On product (a collection of inspiration, journey tables and other things, which you can read about here). I would have made the adventure and ‘light’ version of the rules freely available for download, to get more players, and thereby more revenue.

As a note, I can see the screen came with a Laketown sourcebook in the One Ring Game – the game Adventure’s in Middle-Earth was converted from.

The Screen

part of screen illustration
This is most of the illustration used on the screen (without the text box).

[EDIT: Below I have some critique of the screen, which Cubicle 7 really couldn’t do, so it isn’t quite fair. I would like info from the core game, but to print it on the screen, they also had to print the full OGL text on the screen itself, which is obviously unfeasible. I stand by most of the core points though. To make the ultimate most useful screen, you need to rework the screen a bit – or make your own.]

To me the core product is the screen itself. The cover art is a beautiful illustration of Laketown. If you look carefully, you can see the Lonely Mountain and the ribcage of Smaug sticking out of the water. It fits very well with the campaign that Cubicle 7 supports.

You could argue that a more generic illustration of typical Middle-Earth landscape, heroes and monsters would suit a broader spectrum of groups, who might play in different ages of Middle-Earth or different geographical locations. But it certainly looks good.

What is a good screen?

The core purpose of a screen is, in my view, to help the game master run the game more smoothly. Therefore, it needs the information you most commonly need to reference on it, or – like on my original D&D screen – assist your common improvisational tasks, such as deciding encounter distance, which happens often in regular D&D. So that is the curve I’m grading on.

To be fair, my regular D&D screen is also not perfect, in my view.

The screen has four panels.

  • 1 is Starting Attitudes and Degeneration.
  • 2 is Anguish, Blighted Lands, Misdeeds, Tainted Treasure and Page References.
  • 3 are rule summaries for journeys, Audiences, Corruption and the page numbers for Fellowship phase undertakings.
  • 4 are raw embarkation and arrival tables.

To me, it seems like the team at Cubicle 7 has stretched to use all their own tables, with not enough regard for what a Loremaster needs.

What do I use:

I use the Starting Attitudes in every session. It is a matrix with more than 100 results, so it is impossible to remember.

I could have used the journey rules summaries in the beginning of the campaign, but I remember the rules now.

Why aren’t I using the rest?

I run Wilderland Adventures, so I don’t need to invent my own journey events. Therefore, it is difficult to say if I would find the raw tables helpful? I think some Loremasters might find them quite helpful for improvising journeys. But I can’t say for sure.

All the information on misdeeds, degeneration, tainted treasure, blighted lands and shadow points seems misplaced to me. The misdeeds chart might be useful, if I didn’t run a published adventure, and I ran over a long period of time. The other overviews look so rarely used to me, that I would much rather want other information available.

The page references I don’t use, because I have a pretty good sense of where to find things in the books after having played 8 sessions.

Listing the page numbers for the eight Fellowship phase events seems particularly as weird filler, as the first page is already in the page overview and they only cover three pages in the book.

What am I missing

conditions
There are many Conditions in D&D and it can be hard to remember which one has which game effect.

Every time I use the Starting attitudes, I get annoyed that they didn’t also include the Final Audience Check DC chart, which is the reason why you need the culture matrix in the first place!

Secondly, I’m slightly annoyed they didn’t include an overview of the different Exhaustion levels. It is on my regular D&D screen, but it is a much more prevalent mechanic in Middle-Earth.

I would argue that most of the Conditions should be included.

In a thread in the Adventures in Middle-Earth Facebook group, I mentioned this fact. Jonny Hodgson from Cubicle 7 was very nice to answer that they weren’t included due to the space they eat up [EDIT: because of the OGL, which wasn’t clear in the post to me].

All in all, I’m fond of the art, but somewhat disappointed with the information presented on the screen.

The Adventure:

Snorri
Snorri is one of the NPC’s the characters meet in Eaves of Mirkwood.

I ran Eaves of Mirkwood as part of a homebrew quest for one of my characters. I had three characters of levels 3 and 4, and I only had to make minor modifications to make it work.

It is fundamentally a very fun and thematic adventure, which a Loremaster could easily turn into an adventure lasting two or three sessions.

In short, the adventure is a journey through Mirkwood, where the characters encounter some dwarves fighting orcs. After the fight, the dwarves invites the characters to feast on roast pig. One of the dwarves took it from where it was tied in the woods. It turns out that a nearby village had tied it there in order to sacrifice it to a great warg. The villagers are pissed and capture the players, while they sleep after drinking too much beer. During their audience with the village chief the angry warg attacks with its orcs, and the characters have to defeat it.

How was the adventure?

We had a great time playing the adventure. The feast with the dwarves and the final battle are particularly well done. When the characters meet the dwarves there is an extended scene for the feast. It includes a smoking game (blowing different smoke rings), there is a riddle contest and the text of a dwarven song. The smoking game rules are worth a third of the product price on its own in my view!

The warg and the final battle is very well described, and the players thought the talking warg was a scary and cool bad guy. The battle is also quite hard.

Warning to new Loremasters

warg
The Warg’s ‘Pack Tactics’ ability makes it even more dangerous accompanied by a minion or two.

The last encounter looks extremely volatile to me.

If you are new to the D&D system you should be aware, that the Warg is an incredibly tough opponent against a 1st level party for a number of reasons.

First of all, the warg’s attack does so much damage that almost any 1st level character is likely to go down from one hit. The average damage is 11, and only two of the six pre-generated characters can withstand more than one average damage hit. And, when a character goes down it can quickly turn into a death spiral.

The warg also has a fear aura, which the group’s melee types are likely to fail their saves against half the time, making the encounter more volatile.

Eaves minis
Our setup of the final boss encounter.

The adventure advises that with more than four characters the Loremaster should add one orc per character. That makes the warg even more dangerous. Its pack tactic ability will ensure that with allies it is likely to hit around 75% of the time.

I added three orcs against my group of two 3rd level characters and one 4th level character, and it was still a tough encounter that could have gone both ways.

I love the fact that the encounter has a lot of tactical elements and that they get to roll saving throws. It makes it very dramatic. But I worry that the very cool boss is too ‘swingy’ an encounter.

One option is to have the dwarves participate in the fight and add an orc or two on top. The Warg attacks a dwarf first and wound him grievously and throw him to the ground. That way, the players see what they are up against, and you create drama by wounding or killing their allies – a classic game master trick.

I didn’t have time to include the dwarves. But with experienced players, you could have the players control the dwarves.

Expanding the adventure

If you plan to use this to play more than one session, or a longer session, you could expand the adventure a bit.

It would be natural for Eaves of Mirkwood to be the first part of the adventure. Instead of defeating the Warg, the characters manage to kill some orcs and drive it off. You could divide the action in the village into two – first they run down and face orcs that have climbed the palisades and then they have to run back and fight the warg, which is about to eat the village elder.

As a second part, you could have the characters go to get allies in order to defeat the warg and the orcs in their lair. This could be wood elves or woodmen in another village. That would require an audience and perhaps a small quest to demonstrate that they have the ability to lead such an expedition.

The third part would be the characters leading an expedition on a short journey to the warg lair – a ruin in Mirkwood or a series of caves – where they have to face the orcs, together with the three dwarves and the allies they’ve been able to muster.

That way the characters would be third level when they face the warg and its allies. A much less ‘swingy’ fight, and you get much more mileage out of a very cool big bad evil guy (wolf).

And if you want to homebrew after that, the warg could always be a lieutenant of something worse…

Final words

All in all, it is a solid product, and I’m glad I got to use the adventure. The adventure captures the mood of Middle-Earth perfectly and I’m confident newcomers to Adventures in Middle-Earth or newcomers to roleplaying-games will enjoy it. But I do think combining a screen with an intro adventure is a bit odd. The screen itself is useful, but not perfect.

If you’ve used the adventure as an introduction to people, who’ve never played with the D&D 5e rules or who’s never played and RPG before, I would love to hear from you on how that went? Was is accessible? Too complex? How did the final encounter go?

Wilderland Adventures: Kinstrife & dark tidings

rasmusnord015 Comments

I’m running all seven Wilderland Adventures with my group of 7 players. You can also read reviews of other AiME products on this blog. These adventure blog-posts are part review and part suggestions for Loremasters on how to run or adjust the adventure, based on my experience of running it. And to provide context for those two things, I will also describe what happened during the adventure. Art is copyright Cubicle 7 and pulled from their material.

I had 4-5 players for this third adventure in the series.

Mirkwood full cover
If you want to run a longer campaign in Middle-Earth, I’ve written about this long campaign – which can be combined with Wilderland Adventures.

Kinstrife & dark tidings is an adventure with a darker mood and more focus on investigation, particularly compared to the second adventure. It has some action in the second half of the adventure. The adventure centres around a murder inside a family and the escape of the murderer – a young conflicted Beorning. Can the characters catch him, and can he redeem himself before Beorn’s judgement?

I think it was a good adventure, with a great atmosphere, but the second half didn’t play out quite as well as I had imagined. It partly depends on the group of course, our engagement on the day, my decisions, time left etc., but it is in the second half I would make a few modifications.

We played it over two and a half sessions. I would probably stretch it to three, and modify it a bit, if I were to run it again.

How it played out

Session 4 & 5:

Beorns home
Visiting Beorn’s home and the role-playing around it was probably my favourite part of the adventure.

We played the introduction to the adventure at the end of session 4. The characters stumble upon a boat with two dead Beorning warriors and discern that it would be the right thing to bring them back to Beorn’s house. They bring the bodies to Beorn and are relatively well received, they participate in the wake for the warriors, the Dunedaín of the group speaks of the ancient heroics of men, and the audience goes well. They are invited for the funeral and tasked with finding the murderer.

They find his tracks along the river, and the wanderer uses his special ability to gain almost magical insight, if he rolls high enough.

He rolls a 23 and I describe how he can see that the footsteps is of a man who has a heavy soul, a soul that weighs him down, and that worked very well. It was very Tolkinesque.

They encounter some travelling dwarves, fail a persuasion check, and learn little. Then they pass the Old Road and reaches a house where the murderer, whom they learn was named Oderic, stayed.

A day later they reach Stonyford, the village where Oderic came from, and they are grudgingly admitted. Here the warden employs his special ability to gain information, and they learn of Oderic’s fosterfather and his foster sister and the circumstances of the murder (as understood by the villagers). They manage to get into the angry foster fathers house and talk sense to him, and they get a good portion of the story from his foster-sister Brunhild, and learn that he was indeed there and took a boat to get across the river.

The group follows and tracks him to a small forest, finding clues and a dead merchant along the way. They find the bandit camp, which Oderic has joined, scout it, and understand that he is a ‘guest under guard’.

When he slips into the forest, and is followed by two guards, they attack the guards. They defeat them, Oderic bursts into the clearing, they invoke Brunhild’s name, he calms down, and that is where I ended the session.

Session 6:

file
I ran the final battle with minis, using the beautiful battle maps that comes with the adventure. I think that was a mistake.

We start the session with confronting Oderic and convincing him to return with the group. With some wrangling and rolling they manage to convince him that the bandits are evil and he reveals that they mean to attack the Beornings.

The group marches quickly to warn Beorn. They encounter a group of bandits on the way out of the woods. They get to the Old Ford, start warning the Beornings about the approaching bandits and get to Beorn’s house. Here they rest while Beorn gathers his troops. The next day they march to face Valter the Bloody and his bandits. The armies meet at the Old Ford, the group break through the shield wall and fights Valter, and slay him, when Beorn comes and finishes the fight. Afterwards they find the mummified head in his pack.

Finally, Oderic gets his sentence, and I thought that had a cool mood. The characters speak for him, and he is sentenced to paying a man’s worth to Brunhilde and afterwards he is to become a ward with one of Beorn’s men, to teach him better ways.

How was the adventure?

The mood was great. The interaction with Beorn worked really well, and the first part of the adventure had a very strong Tolkien atmosphere. The second part presented some challenges to me, partly because of the conversion to D&D 5e.

The investigative part is quite well done. There are multiple versions of what happened in the village, and the great thing is that there is no doubt that Oderic killed his foster-sisters husband (or is there?). Therefore, the players can deal with the motive, which in many ways is more interesting than ¨’who dun it’, and it never leads to a blind end. The success of the investigation is never in doubt, as it doesn’t rely on a dice roll or players asking the right question. That is good design.

Furthermore, both the Wanderer and the Warden really gets to show off their special abilities, such as Ever Watchful, which makes them shine, and I can tell the players enjoy.

I think tracking Oderic and the events along the way also works well and adds to the mood.

Valter the Bloody
Valter the Bloody is actually a cool bad guy. But he doesn’t get much screen time.

When the characters encounter the bandit camp, which was around half-way, things become a little less smooth.

Scouting the camp and getting to Oderic worked ok. But I think there are a few ways I could have made the bandit camp more interesting. I think it is a shame, for example, that the villain, Valter the Bloody, isn’t set up to meet the characters. It can happen, depending on how extracting Oderic happens. It is worth considering not making him an easy target. If he stays within the camp, the characters will have to disguise themselves, or offer themselves up for service to get to him. That could lead to some interesting role-playing and let them understand Valter better.

A couple of weak points

The conclusion of the adventures has a few weaknesses, in my view.

Mainly, Oderic should get more ‘screen time’ before they get back to Beorn. There is a long description of his personality in the adventure, and the different aspects of his persona needs time and space to play out.

There is an option to force march back to Beorn to warn him, which makes sense, but there are no benefits in the adventure for doing so. There are no rewards for that risk (getting exhaustion levels), and it requires DC 15 con saves every day, so it is a gamble.
There is no set timeline with consequences, depending on their speed, and there is no discussion of what Valter does as a response to Oderic escaping/being kidnapped.

In my case the characters achieve the ‘normal outcome’ and has to fight Valter’s forces at the Old Ford, but in reality fighting at a river crossing is a massive disadvantage for the attackers as it restricts their movement.

The way to set up the battle on a grid with minis isn’t really supported either. There are no suggestions in the text on how to run it. It is clear that in the original adventure it is more a ‘story event’. I used minis in two long lines facing each other, where the characters had to break through, and it was ok, but a somewhat wasted opportunity to use the terrain to make it interesting and tactical.

Lastly, Beorn shows up as a bear. It is very thematic, but – and the players were quick to point this out – why didn’t he just show up sooner to decide the outcome of the battle and probably spare the lives of many of his men? I think the underlying premise is that Beorn never openly transforms into a bear, and that is fine, but why show up at the last minute?

What did I or would I change?

My changes were in the second half of the adventure, but in hindsight, I could have added things to Stonyford.

rumours
There are many rumours in Stonyford, which is a great help to the Loremaster. 

The small village Stonyford has an old ruined watchtower. Because it is mentioned half the group went there. I should have made something for them to find. A small dungeon or something. That would have improved the pacing. They would have like a bit of action at this point.

When the group finds Oderic, I added that Oderic had heard Valter speak to some kind of unseen advisor in his tent. I think the mummified head is a bit too vague a clue, so I wanted to underscore that a bit. They’ve not connected the dots yet anyway, and I didn’t expect them to.

I would add more events and opportunity for interaction after Oderic joins the group. He has been built up by stories, but he needs more play time to display his faults and qualities to the characters. It could be that they meet Beornings at the Old Ford who wants to expense justice right away, or simply shames him – how does he react to that? A second combat encounter with his new allies can also reveal his character.

With five characters I also added a second bandit warrior to watch over Oderic, to make the encounter a little tougher. It worked well.

Make a timeline and consequences

I added degrees of success to the Forced March mechanic. Basically, in the final battle, the enemy would have surprise if they didn’t force march, the characters would have a surprise round if they succeeded with one day of forced march, and advantage for 1d4 rounds if they succeeded with two or three days of forced march.

I didn’t have enough time to do this, but I think you could develop more of a timeline with Valter’s actions, after Oderic’s disappearance, and combine that with the forced march rules. You could merge that with a timeline of how many warriors Beorn can gather in a day. The more days Beorn has, the stronger a force he can assemble, and getting the word to him early would become more meaningful.

I have paid to have the battle maps printed, but in the situation, I should have either: improvised my own map to manage the design of the terrain, or run the battle as a story. In my experience the story method works well, because the miniatures doesn’t really capture the chaos of battle well. That way you can also add bits of narrative events for each character in between.

All in all, it was a good adventure with a good atmosphere. But with a little effort the second half could be made more dramatic and interesting. 

Last week I ran Eaves of Mirkwood combined with a home brew adventure for a side quest. Will write about it soon. Next time we will begin Those who tarry no longer, which I really look forward to.

Happy Easter and happy gaming!

/Rasmus

 

 

Review: Mirkwood Campaign

rasmusnord014 Comments
Adventures_in_Middle-earth_front_cover_1000px
Adventures in Middle-Earth is made by Cubicle 7, and a conversion to D&D 5e. from The One Ring RPG. You can read my review of the core book here.

The Mirkwood Campaign is a campaign framework for an Adventures in Middle-Earth campaign, set in and around Mirkwood. The campaign evolves over 30 years and contains one or two adventures – or at least an adventure framework – for every year, which takes the players from 5th to around 15th level.

I think it is a very strong campaign framework, with a grand narrative scope and an epic ending. But the format is also unlike any published campaign I’ve read, which is why this review is more than just evaluating if it is good or bad.

The purpose of the review

I think the most important thing I can do for other Loremasters, who consider buying this campaign, is to do some expectation management.

My job is to make you – the reader – able to judge whether this campaign is something you and your players would like playing? That is not easy, as there are many variables, and this is not a standard campaign format.

The approach Cubicle 7 has picked to present the campaign and the philosophy behind it might surprise or disappoint Loremasters, if they expect something else.

Perhaps an easy first step is to tell you what the Mirkwood Campaign is NOT?

  • It is not a Sand Box campaign with a selection of locations and NPC’s with motivations that will influence the game.
  • It is not a series of fully fleshed out adventures, like Wilderland Adventures or classic campaigns like the Enemy Within (classic Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay).

Spoiler Alert!  If you are a player, you should consider not reading any further.

What is the campaign about?

Holdings
There are also rules for player Holdings in the campaign – a farm, inn or other permanent residence where the characters live. It fits nicely with the long years of the campaign.

The campaign takes place in and around Mirkwood, and the outcome of the campaign decides if the Woodmen of Mirkwood and the Beornings are able to withstand the Shadow during the War of the Ring, decades after the campaign concludes. The three Nazgûl that moves into Dol Guldur are the main antagonists, with the Werewolf of Mirkwood as a primary lieutenant. The struggle over the Lamp of Balthi in Woodmen Town is also central to the campaign.

During the campaign the players will be instrumental in countering the influence and machinations of the Nazgûl. That is cool. I think the overall scope of the campaign will be immensely satisfying for any players interested in the Middle-Earth setting.

It is however recommended that at least one character is a woodman, and that is important advice. The characters need to care – or have been made to care through level 1-5 – about the place and the people living there. Otherwise, many of the adventuring hooks won’t feel that important. That said, there are also good hooks for dwarves and wood elves through the campaign.

What kind of product is it?

Structurally, the campaign book is divided into five periods,  of 5-10 years. For each year in a period there is an overview of important Events that happens that year, an Adventure that is central to the main story, and a Year’s End, which describes the general outcome of the year.

The campaign begins around level 5, so you either need to make your own adventures up to that point or run some or all of Wilderland Adventures to get the players to the required level.

The Events for each year are a source for potential adventures, but the described Adventure is one that drives the epic story arc forward.

The adventures vary in scope, detail and quality. As a Loremaster, you are expected to do quite a bit of work yourself. Most of the adventures are not ‘ready to run’. There are no maps of key adventuring locations, such as Tyrant’s Hill, and it is up to the Loremaster to weave the adventures into a cohesive campaign, with hooks and motivations that align with this epic narrative.

Varying detail level

folkmoot
Is the guy with the orc heads a good ally?

As an example of one of the less impressive adventures is The Folk-moot at Rhosgobel. It is one of the first adventures, where the Woodmen will make some very important political decisions that will influence the rest of the campaign.
There are several NPC’s at Rhosgobel, some of them detailed in the Rhovanion Region Guide, but there is nothing on how they stand on each position, or any indication of how they might want to influence the characters. There is also no hook as to why the players are there. And – more importantly – no hook as to why they should get involved or care about the decisions being made.  Because the players don’t know that the decisions made at the end of this adventure will matter in the rest of the campaign, you should consider at the beginning of the campaign, why this moot should matter to them?

On the ‘bare bones’ side is an adventure, where the characters get involved in reclaiming a dwarven stronghold. The books lays out the plot, but you have to make the dungeon and any adversaries yourself.

A fleshed out example is one of the last adventures called Nine in the Hall, which is basically a horror adventure ready to run. It is – by the way – very cool that you can run a horror style adventure at around 13th level. That is virtually impossible in regular D&D, given all the magic available to the characters.

Nice long term view

The author, Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan, generally does a good job of presenting the effects on the campaign of different outcomes of adventures. For example, if the characters fail or if they support one, or another, NPC in an undertaking, how does that affect the coming years and the campaign.

Are the adventures good?

Most are good – or work with a strong core idea. There are several adventures in the book that I find great, very dramatic and interesting, such as Saving the Maiden, where the adventures have to journey to the Parliament of Spiders and negotiate with two of Shelob’s Children and then go and confront the third child of Shelob, Tyluqin, in her lair. Or when the characters -unexpectedly, face a Nazgûl the first time. And, as mentioned, one of the two final adventures, fits perfectly with the Middle-Earth mood.

A few of the adventures feel a bit underdeveloped, even for frameworks, and a few feels too railroaded for my taste, or have assumptions built into them that are odd.

Odd or underdeveloped

Hollow tree
If this concealed the entrance to a larger interesting dungeon, it would be more interesting.

For example, in the adventure, Questing Beast, the players come upon two dwarves, who have kidnapped an important elf. Never mind that this is sort of random (fate I guess) as part of the hunt of the White Deer, but the fact that the location they are holding the elf is just a hollow tree, seems underwhelming to me. There are obviously plenty of ruins in Middle-Earth (just check out the Road Goes Ever On supplement), so why not make this into something interesting? An elven ruin with some secrets and maybe a monster lurking somewhere?

An example of odd assumptions is, when the Werewolf of Mirkwood begins attacking the wood elves, the adventurers track it to its lair, and find the remains of a legendary elven lamp (although they probably don’t realise this at the time). The adventure assumes that the players describe the lamp to the elves, and maybe figure out what it is, but my players would with 99%  certainty bring the remains of the lamp with them. They also might try to restore it or investigate it further. But that isn’t at all considered in the adventure.

Probably the poorest example, in my view, is when the Forest Dragon wakes up. I was quite disappointed with that adventure. There has been no effort made into making facing a dragon in Middle-Earth feel epic or interesting. It is just a ‘hunt this monster’ story, and the dragon doesn’t do anything interesting, the Enemy isn’t doing anything interesting with it, and it doesn’t have a cool lair or any interesting abilities.

Is the campaign good?

Yes. Very good. Excellent even. I think. No, I’m sure it is. But there are a few clunky parts that I think could frustrate me.

I think there should have been more advice, particularly for new or less experienced game masters, on how to weave this framework into a campaign. A page or two of with an example would be useful.

The finale of the campaign is fantastic, and the fact that there are two different adventures to end the campaign, depending on how the characters decide to defend against the Shadow is very cool. Option 2 needs some work to have an epic finale, but the overall idea is good.

As I mentioned, as a whole, I think player’s would find the grand tale very very satisfying, if the ending is done right.

In general, the campaign does a good job of allowing failures as an outcome of an adventure – and that the failures impact the outcome of the campaign. You are given suggestions how to adjust most adventures depending on whether, for example the Woodmen are allies with Tyrant’s Hill or whether a particular ruler is still alive. That is great.

What are my main critique points?

There are instances where it feels railroaded. For example, where someone escapes, or something automatically happens, because that development or person is important to a future story. In a story driven game like this, you can have it happen ‘off screen’ as the ‘appendix’ to the story, and my players would be fine with it. But if it is part of the action, it is dissatisfying.

I also miss a flow-chart or graphic presentation of all the different adventures, with key decision points and a discussion of progression/leveling through the campaign.

Too much NPC Wizards

I think the Wizards are overused as participants in the adventures. They are to join the group in four adventures and show up in others. I think including them in two of the adventures, makes sense. I rarely enjoy having powerful NPCs participating in an adventure. If an immortal wizard of vast power is leading a group of 7-8th level characters, they will defer to him.  And because it is Middle-Earth, the players will know exactly how powerful that NPC is. Scouting Dol Guldur as 6th level sounds much more interesting, if  they alone. The solution in Wilderland Adventures, where Radagast is a patron that confers a useful blessing for a mission is much better. I would use that more.

Uninspiring locations

Too many locations are not very inspiring to me, as I mentioned. Perhaps it is the difference in play style from the One Ring, which the campaign originally was developed for, to Adventures in Middle-Earth, where I still think you need a measure of old-fashioned dungeon exploration.

It may be also be the play-style difference when it comes to the maps. There are no local maps of dungeons, locations or the like, which I’m going to need. I would have liked some.

Conversion problems

Werewolf and nazgul
Fighting a Nazgûl and the Werewolf is a very cool encounter, and it happens, but I think the stats don’t match their fear factor.

The game mechanics, and particularly combat mechanics, of D&D seems to be a weak point for the people at Cubicle 7. It is as if they haven’t run a mid-to-high level game for players who care about the mechanics.

If you are an experience Dungeon Master, these things will be relatively obvious, but for newer players it may not, and that could lead to disappointing/less dramatic moments.

One example is the Werewolf of Mirkwood. It is Challenge Rating 6, according to the Loremaster’s guide. The players will face it at around 6th level, at 10th level and again at 12th or 13th level, where they with the Lamp of Balthi have advantage on all attacks and their foe disadvantage. That they haven’t added significant amounts of minions or lieutenants is odd. There isn’t even a text box addressing this is baffling to me.

The Dragon of Mirkwood has the same problem. It is CR 12, and they are to face it at level 12. As any DM, who has run a significant amount of games will know, a single foe, with two attacks versus a group of characters, with probably six or seven attacks between them is not going to last beyond round three.

Finally, the Nazgûl are weaker now, compared to the time of the War of the Ring, but I still think they are on the weak side. And they don’t have enough tricks. They don’t even have Legendary Actions or Legendary Resistance. That is a weird design choice to me…

Silly difficulty

On the other hand, in one of the later adventures, the characters suddenly face wisdom saving throws of DC 20, which even proficient characters will fail half the time, and those who aren’t proficient will almost surely fail. Or when on a trip with Beorn, characters have to pass two out of three DC 15 constitution saves. If they don’t they can’t continue in the adventure. I guess they have to sit and watch or go home for the rest of the evening?

Outlaw
Not exactly an epic foe for a 13th level character…

Finally, the consistent use of the standard NPCs from the Loremaster’s Guide becomes silly. At 12th or 13th level, the characters are supposed to deal with a band of outlaws, numbering between twice and four times the number of characters. According to the adventure, they can ‘get allies to besiege the tower’. But Outlaws have 33 hit points, AC 15 and +3 to their attack rolls. How is that going to challenge four 12th level characters – even in the Middle-Earth system? If they were to really score top marks, they should have added descriptions of a couple of tough lieutenants that you could add to the mix.

It can seem like it is simply lack of effort in converting an otherwise excellent campaign.

Final Words

The Loremaster gets a huge helping hand to run this campaign, but she will have to make a significant effort herself to weave the character’s tale into this grand narrative and flesh out the weaker points (and drawing maps). The Mirkwood Campaign will be an epic and memorable tale for every player who is along for the journey, I’m sure.

I hope I will find time to run it within a couple of years.

Agree? Disagree? Have you run it? Please, let me know in the comments!

 

 

 

 

Wilderlands Adventures: Don’t Leave the Path

rasmusnord017 Comments

I’m running all seven Wilderland Adventures with my group of 7 players. You can also read reviews of other AiME products on this blog. These adventure blog-posts are one part review and one part suggestions for Loremasters on how to run or adjust the adventure, based on my experience of running it. And to provide context for those two things, I will also describe what happened during the adventure.

Our first adventure had a somewhat fragmented group. We began late December, and due to vacations, illness and work, I had 3-4 players when running the adventure, but in different constellations, so I had to do some narrative adjustments to keep it logical.

How it played out

Session 0.5:
The first four players made their characters, and we began the adventure. I followed the adventure and had them wander along Long Lake, when the young Belgo comes running, and tells them that his father is being attacked by his guards. The group rush after to help him and drive off the thugs with a well-aimed attack and a solid intimidate roll. They agree on helping him getting through Mirkwood, travel with his elven friends on rafts to the Halls of Thranduril and manage to convince the elves that they can stay and get some nice supplies, while they rest. They still feel that they are rather an unfriendly lot, those elves.

Adventures-in-Middle-earth-Wilderland-Adventures-cover-900
A book of 7 linked adventures for Adventures in Middle-Earth by Cubicle 7. 

Session 1:
The group begins the journey through Mirkwood with the merchant Baldor and his son Brego. With two of the original four players missing, and two new players participating, and one still not able to make it, I create an encounter, where the two new characters are fighting two attercops, and the third – still unnamed character – has been poisoned and is unconscious. The two ‘old’ characters come upon the battle, while leading the small caravan, and throw themselves into the fight. During the fight, the non-present characters ‘guard’ the ponies, Baldor and Brego against other attercops. The two groups agree to travel together for safety (obviously).

For the journey we rolled Feast for Kings for Embarkation and two journey events. I decided to place the journey events in between the fixed encounters, and they arrive at the sink holes, a place touched by the shadow, before the Castle of the Spiders.

Baldor drinks from the stream, and the present characters chase after him, while the non-present two characters remain behind to guard Brego (felt fitting with the story, actually).

They follow his trail and arrive at the castle of the spiders, where they successfully rescue him, after a tense and fun battle. I had one of the absent PC’s arrive, a world weary Dunedaín, to provide bow cover-fire for their escape.

After the battle, Baldor and a dwarf player character have a great role-playing exchange on Baldor’s experience of the death of Smaug and the reclaiming of the Lonely Mountain.

I introduce the second journey event, and the group comes across Tauler, one of Shelob’s children, but they manage to avoid him without being seen, but gain a few shadow points, and run for their lives.

Session 2:
The unconscious (7th) characters wakes up, but due to unusually low attendance, he only has two active travel companions. I narrate how the absent characters are so exhausted and mentally drained from the trip, that they stay around the Baldor and Bregor to guard them. The new character is a Wanderer, and as the group really needs a long rest, he activates an ability, to lead them to a hideout, where they can have a long rest.
After the rest, I introduce an additional journey event, where they find warg paw prints at a potential camp site, and the wanderer shines again. Then comes the storm, they fail their audience with the hermit, and a thrown out of his home.

Finally, they arrive at the well, the Dunedaín fails his save, and jumps into the well. They fight the Thing in the Well and survive.

As we still have good time left, Baldor tells them of the rumour of the new Easterly Inn. They head for that location, we role-play the arrival, have a fellow-ship phase, and I introduce the hook to the next adventure. We end the session when they depart to find Dindoas Brandybuck.

How was the adventure?

It was a strong adventure, and it played better than I had expected. After reading all seven adventures, I considered this the weakest of them all. But it was dramatic, had a strong mood and reflected the dangers of this journey well.

My players have had different play experiences, because of the fragmented group. But, overall, they are happy that there is action, but a greater focus on role-playing than in my home brew campaign. A couple of them did fear that the setting was too – how shall I say it – light and too focused on pure narrative role-playing drama. They want to roll initiative and fight orcs. And they still get that!

One of my players also told me that he really liked that he knew that everyone is a hero. In regular D&D, he must consider everyone’s true motives, but in AiME, they can fundamentally rely on each other.

Dark mood
The mood inside Mirkwood was excellent. The journey events enhanced the mood really well. In the second session I did change one of the random events from an encounter with more attercops to the ‘place of shadow’, because they were fighting attercops when I introduced the new characters.  For pacing reasons, I had four journey events (including the attercop attack in session 1), and it worked well.

The oppressive and exhausted mood that is the essence of the journey played out very well. Particularly, after the group rescued Baldor, and he told his story of losing his wife and home, wishing the dwarves had never woken Smaug, we had one of the best role-playing scenes in recent years. The frayed bond between father and son also gave the last part of the adventure a shadow of sadness, which I think worked well.

IMG_0092
I’ve had the battle maps printed. It adds an extra dimension, for sure.

Good & bad encounters
The Castle of Spiders was an awesome encounter. It was very tactical, because of the terrain. It was tense due to constantly appearing spiders, and it looked like the players had a great time. The small things, like 25 ft. movement, and wielding a spear with reach, was important.

The Thing in the Well was not quite as interesting a battle. I had to boost its hit points, despite there only being three characters, as they had reduced it to half hit points, before it had a chance to act.

At first level there is a lot of luck involved in combat, and one blow can fell a character. So, on one hand, the encounter is very dangerous. Characters falling down the well, or who are hit more than once, have a good chance of going down, and that will quickly turn the tide. Particularly, if they have spent their powers already, they will be in great danger. On the other hand, the Thing has AC 12. With starting characters having +5 or +6 on hit rolls, it means it is likely that 3 out of 4 attacks will hit it the first round. Three attacks can quite easily do 20+ damage. As written, it is unlikely the combat will last more than 2 rounds.

As I considered the Thing a bit of a boss encounter, it was a little bit disappointing.

What would I do differently?

I would change the hook:

MAtt C Tavern
 You can listen to Matt Colevilles arguments for starting in a tavern, here.

The hook is rather weak. I understand they want to introduce the action quickly, but if I were to run it again, I would start the adventure in Lake Town at a tavern. I would let the thugs be competitors to the characters, which would create tension in the first scene. It would also give the characters a way to introduce themselves, the can haggle with Baldor, and intimidate the thugs. Later on, the thugs can follow them, and try to attack them at night.

I would introduce scenes:

When Baldor drinks of the enchanted stream and runs off, it is one of several cases, where something happens during the Wilderland Adventures, where it seems like the characters can act, but the outcome is basically certain, if you want a fun adventure.
The problem is that the characters think they can catch Baldor, before he runs into the forest, for example with a skill roll. I mean, Baldor is an older, not very fit man. It seems plausible, but there is no indication of how far Baldor is from the watch, when he goes crazy. That can create frustration with players. My player just shrugged it off.

The same can basically happen, if Brego is the one enchanted by the Thing in the Well, and throws himself into the well, and a similar situation occurs in the next part of the adventure.

The solution is to me – suggested by a player, who also DMs – that I tell them there is a scene, and I then describe what happens in a dramatic way. They are cool with a fun story unfolding, and that way there is no ambiguity to create frustration.

I would change the final encounter:

I think the final encounter could use some more terrain to make it more interesting. If the well is inside some kind of ancient structure, just with some walls and perhaps a couple of rooms, it would create more tension when they explore it.

Review: The Road Goes Ever On

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The Road Goes Ever on is a travel supplement for Adventures in Middle-Earth by Cubicle 7. It contains four large maps with print on both sides and a 32-page booklet.

The most significant value lies in the eight maps that covers each of the four large regions of Middle-Earth, Eriador (where the Shire, Bree and Rivendell lies and the site of ancient Arnor), Wilderland (which is the initial focus of the setting), Gondor & Rohan and Mordor.

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Cleverly, the player map and the colour coded map for the Loremaster map is on two different pieces, so you can hand out the player map, while keeping the Loremaster version. 

The hexed maps are essential if you wish to use the Middle-Earth travel system. In this system area has a colour code and a symbol for how difficult and dangerous the terrain is. With the core books you only get the map for Wilderland, so if you run a game in one of the other areas these maps are needed (I guess you can make something similar yourself, with some graphic skills!).

The booklet contains expanded events, rules and inspiration for generating random NPC-encounters on the road, inspiration and random tables for creating ruins, a few groups of enemies, a couple of camp-site battle-maps, a system for avoiding battles, a couple of pages of inspiration for sights along the way, and two pages on lodgings on the road and finally two pages on experience for journeys and travel related oaths.

Is it good?

Yes, I actually liked the supplement, and was inspired by it. As always, Cubicle 7 captures the mood of Middle-Earth very well.

The maps are of good quality, and I now have one I can hand out to my players.

The best part, was – for me – the random events, encounters on the road and the section on ruins (which covers about 2/3 of the booklet). I don’t need them that bad, as I run Wilderland Adventures, where there are dedicated event charts, but if you run a more open sandbox style game, the will be handy. But I did get a better sense of details in the setting, like which plants are you likely to find and what travelers can you meet on the road.

The section on motivations for random travelers on the road is thorough, and has some suggestions for turning expectations on its head, and they help you ask questions, that can generate plot hooks and interesting role-play situations.

Bones of the Earth

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A ruined farmhouse from Road Goes Ever On.

The ruin section helps you create ruins with a distinct Middle-Earth feel. The odds of encountering something dangerous is actually quite low, though. I think the best way to use the section is to spend 30 minutes rolling up a couple of ruins for later use, in stead of slowing down the game and doing it at the table. That way, you also make sure you have something ready, if you want to change the pacing of the game, or need to introduce a place to rest for the players.

The eight dangerous encounters are also handy. They run from CR 4 to 10. They claim the CR can be modified by giving the boss or the warband one of the strengths or weaknesses from the Loremaster’s Guide. I have serious doubts that they have that great an effect, as the deciding factors in encounter CR are mainly the number of attacks arrayed against the PC’s. Secondly an unusually high AC or nasty (area of effect) special ability, is normally a key danger point.

The part on avoiding battle is basically a set of skill checks, and may be useful for beginning Loremasters, but something a more experienced GM/Loremaster can wing quite easily.

The ekstra battle-maps and the oaths PC’s can make to gain experience are also ok, but minor additions, in my view.

That also goes for Lodgings on the Road, which describes the poor and rich farmhouses and inns in Middle-Earth. Again, fine inspiration, but not needed for most Loremasters.

Is it worth 30 dollars?

If you need the maps and/or if you have little time to prepare, I would say yes. But if you are on a budget, and you don’t need the maps, you can probably get more value for your money elsewhere. I would suggest the Rhovanion Region Guide. It is only 10 dollars extra, and has 135 pages of ready content and setting information. Will review it soon.

Except for the maps, there aren’t really anything in Road Goes Ever On that can’t be made by a relatively experienced Loremaster with time on her hands.

But if you – like me – are a fan, like the tables and the direct inspiration of the charts and questions, this is a useful supplement. I will definitely roll up a few things, just in case I need them in my game.

Why should you buy Road Goes Ever On:

  • Your game moves outside of Wilderland
  • You enjoy tables and charts for inspiration
  • You want to save time preparing your game

Why should you consider buying another supplement?

  • You have plenty of time to prepare
  • You prefer planned encounters
  • You are on a budget and don’t need the maps

 

Wilderland Adventures – a new campaign and a review (sort of)

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My current D&D homebrew campaign has been put on hold, because I just got a new job, and to eliminate a stress factor, I decided to run a published campaign, to cut prep time. Instead we will pay Wilderland Adventures for Adventures in Middle-Earth by Cubicle 7.

I’ve written about Adventures in Middle-Earth on this blog previously (Player’s Guide and Loremaster’s Guide), and been quite excited on their use of the D&D 5th edition rules and their very thematic take on Middle-Earth.

But you can’t really know how well the rules work unless you’ve tried them in your game. As the youtuber Matt Coleville, so rightly puts it: the map is not the territory, the recipe is not the meal.

Adventures-in-Middle-earth-Wilderland-Adventures-cover-900
The cover of the adventure. A classic desperate stand in Middle-Earth, and the characters will have plenty of opportunity to try it. 

This new – and relatively short campaign – will therefore be an ongoing review of the seven adventures that makes up the Wilderland Adventures. They read well, but do they play well? And where do they need adjustments? Playing the campaign should also provide other GM’s, who might be interested, some insight into how the rules actually play out? In effect a review/playtest of the entire game.

When we’ve played through the seven adventures, we will return to my home brew campaign. I hope I can publish my backlog of session recaps over Christmas, so we have the game recorded while we are on a break.

As I’ve also bought the Rhovanion Region Guide and the Mirkwood Campaign, two new products for Adventures in Middle-Earth, I may drop in elements of those source books as well.

We make characters December 6th, and I hope we also get to play the first part of the first adventure.

Initial Review of Wilderland Adventures

This is not an in-depth review of the 156-page campaign. It is hard to really recommend a published campaign you haven’t run. This is more my first impressions from reading it, and getting ready to run it.

I won’t describe all the adventures. But it will have mild spoilers. So, if you are a player (especially one of my players), and you want to know absolutely nothing about the story or adventures, you should read no further.

Wilderland Adventures is seven linked adventures, where the first four can be dropped into most Middle-Earth campaigns set in this area. The final three are more closely linked, and are hard to run independently. The adventures take place in various locations in Wilderland and will take the adventurers to around 7th level.

My first impression of the seven adventures is very positive overall.

All of the adventures feel like they are set in Tolkien’s Middle-Earth. The mood is spot on and follows the themes outlined in the Loremaster’s guide (such as The Long Defeat in a Fallen World and Deliverance Arrives as All Seems Lost).

Particularly the second, fourth and fifth adventures looks like they are excellent. The second one features a captured hobbit and fun goblin feast song, the fourth evolves around a Noldor elf the players have to escort towards the sea, but her powerful song and presence attracts a lot of attention and the fifth is an infiltration mission.

Actually, I think the first adventure is the weakest of the seven. It takes the group through Mirkwood, and has quite a dark tone. It is not a bad adventure at all, but I would have liked a much stronger hook.

As it is for 1st level characters, it would have been nice, if the adventure also accommodated getting the group together, with a strong motivation, as Mirkwood is a dangerous place for first level characters. Instead it assumes they already know each other and are wandering along the Long Lake, when something happens. The designers opt for having an action hook that can result in combat. I think it will work as intended, but I would have appreciated getting help with getting the group together.

But let’s see how it plays out!

TFW05loading

The book is very well organized with summaries of the campaign and each adventure. It is also fully colour illustrated like the rest of the Middle-Earth products. As an added bonus, it contains colour battle maps for most of the encounters. But

On the design side, I really appreciate that all the adventures don’t assume the heroes succeed. There are usually options for various alternate solutions or paths that the adventure might take and failure is frequently an option – the one they are supposed to protect dies or they are discovered and need to flee before they learn key information. This is a refreshing change from the published adventures I’ve typically seen. But to be fair, I’ve not run a published adventure since 2007 or something like that.

That said, it is not a sand box-style series of adventures, like e.g. Curse of Strahd. Each adventure has a clear plot line, with a hook, a journey and a couple of adventuring locations, and a climax.

The transitions from one adventure to the next may need a bit of work, and I expect I might add some minor additional adventures or events to create a smooth flow.

An excellent additional value for money is the customized journey events that are included. A journey has 12 possible events, and there are 12 unique events for all 7 adventures. That will add some interesting spice to each adventure, and will ensure that two groups running the same adventure will have somewhat different experiences, as typically only two or three events will come into play.

npc mannerism
An example of help for the Loremaster.

On the role-playing side, there are plenty of opportunities and interesting NPCs. I particularly like that there is a box on how to role-play the major NPCs. They describe speech patterns, mannerisms and movement – elements that I’m generally not great at coming up with for my own NPCs. I hope the assistance will add a lot of extra fun to my game.

All of the adventures also use the Audience mechanic, and sometimes the outcome of an audience can be critical for the outcome of the adventure.

 

 

Adventures in Middle-Earth – Player’s Guide Review

rasmusnord0113 Comments

 

The player’s guide for the Dungeons & Dragons version of a Middle-Earth role-playing game is perfect for a fan of Tolkien’s world. The designers basically nail the atmosphere and feel of the setting and demonstrate that the D&D 5ed. rules can be reworked to fit a very different style of play.

Adventures in Middle-Earth is very true to the original material and is therefore a very low magic game. There are no spell-casting classes and the abilities the players do have can be heroic, but the magic in them are always subtle – just like in Tolkien’s novels.

Adventures_in_Middle-earth_front_cover_1000pxThe game is published by Cubicle 7, who also makes the One Ring role-playing game, and Adventures in Middle-Earth is their D&D interpretation of that game. It is clear that the designers already have a deep understanding of the lore. All the classes, cultures and virtues are clearly grounded in the source material and the book is filled with relevant quotes from the books.

I was so inspired by this book that I began re-reading the Lord of the Rings (for I don’t know which time), and this is the first role-playing supplement that I’ve read cover to cover since D&D 3.5.

The setting focus on the 70-year period between the events of the Hobbit and the events in the Lord of the Rings. The default area for the game is the Wilderlands, which covers the area from the Misty Mountains in the west to Erebor in the East. The death of Smaug, the return of dwarves to the Lonely Mountain and the rise of Dale as a center of trade has created a cautious surge in optimism, and Bard of Dale calls for adventurers to help them rebuild the land.

The most significant mechanical innovation is the Journey system the game has and the game also features corruption of the character’s spirits through Shadow Points. That said, all the fundamental elements, such as class, races, feats and equipment have been re-worked to fit the setting. That creates – in totality – almost a different game entirely.

I look at some of the major features below.

Making a Character

AME-Men-of-Minas-Tirith-819x1024
As a prosperous culture you get pretty nice starting kit.

The Cultures

Each player picks a culture instead of a race, such as Men of Bree, Men of Minas Tirith or Dwarves of the Lonely Mountain. All of the cultures are flavorful and has long lists of appropriate names. Mechanically they are similar to the races of the PhB, but with fewer fantastic abilities. They mainly provide stat increases and skills, and – importantly – define which virtues (feats) you can pick.

The Classes

The classes are where the rules begin to diverge significantly from a regular Dungeons & Dragons game. There are six available classes: Scholar, Slayer, Treasure Hunter, Wanderer, Warden and Warrior. Some of them are mechanically quite similar to the core classes. Fx the Slayer is similar to the Barbarian and the Treasure Hunter is similar to the Rogue. But all the spell casting classes are gone and replaced by the Scholar, who is both healer and keeper of lore.

The two or three archetypes for each class also sets all the classes apart. These are closely molded to the Middle-Earth setting and blurs some classic distinctions. For example, the Warden has Counsellor, Herald and Bounder as archetypes, and they are part bard and part fighter, depending on which one you pick. What I love about them is how well they fit the setting. The Bounder for example, if you don’t know, is referenced in the Lord of the Rings, as the halflings that keep the Shire safe.

Mechanically, it is hard to judge, without playing the game, how well they are balanced.

Virtues

In place of feats there are a number of virtues, and most of them are tied to the character’s culture. Thus, only wood elves can learn Wood-Elf magic – which gives you the “awesome” power to enchant an arrow, and, if you pick the virtue three times, make a victim fall asleep! I love how low magic that is. And again, they fit the setting perfectly.

A few of them seems to be a bit over-powered. For example, Bardings can pick Swordmaster. It says: when fighting with either a broad sword or long sword, add your proficiency bonus to your AC. I can’t see myself not picking that Virtue. Even if it added half your proficiency modifier, I would pick it. That indicates an imbalance… (P.S. and I’ve now noticed that one of the pre-generated characters has this Virtue, and he only gains +1 to AC, so perhaps they made an error in the write-up?)

Backgrounds:

The backgrounds have much more flavor, compared to the PhB, and again connects well with the setting. Examples include Doomed to Die (You know your life isn’t going to end well, but soldier on anyway), Loyal Servant (as a squire or gardener or close kin) or Hunted by the Shadow (the Shadow is constantly after you and your family, as you are renowned foes of the Enemy).

Equipment:
The equipment chapter is short, but mechanically relevant. All the armor and weapons are found in Tolkien’s world, so there are no great swords or plate mails on the list. Particularly, when it comes to AC, that can influence gameplay. Heavy mail provides the highest AC, which is 16. They’ve added Great Shields, which gives +4 to AC, which is probably to close that gap. On the “magic item” side, they don’t compare to the regular DMG. Cultural Heirlooms can be gained as a feat on level 4 and on. It could be a weapon, like the Dalish Longbow, that gives +1 to attack and damage, and +1d8 extra on a critical hit. On one hand, I like that player’s can add cultural heirlooms ‘off screen’ so to speak. But will they? And if they do spend a feat on an heirloom, how do they feel about another player finding something similar in a treasure hoard?

Journeys and rest – adding meaningful encounters:

ame mapThe most significant ‘new thing’ in the game, in my view, is a system for journeys. I won’t go into the detail of the rules, but whenever the group needs to travel to an adventure location, they need to use the journey rules, in place of the regular overland travel and random encounters described in D&D.

Each map area has a difficulty level (color coded), and the start of each journey the group pick characters for a number of roles: Guide, Scout, Hunter and Look-out. Embarkation dice are rolled and modifiers added, and depending on the roll and the land they travel through, they may have a number of Events. The events can be combat events or obstacles, but they can also be beneficial.

The tough part is, when the characters arrive at their destination, they roll an Arrival roll. If that goes badly, they might gain exhaustion levels or Shadow Points. Both are bad.

Furthermore, travel connects with the rest and healing rules of the setting. Long Rests can only be had in a Sanctuary – like the House of Elrond or Beorn’s home. Therefore any damage or exhaustion they acquire from encounters or bad luck may be hard to heal when you reach the destination.

The rules will add danger and flavor to the game, and they can be used in other campaigns with a little modification and work.  In my current regular D&D campaign, with 9-10th lvl characters, one random encounter should either be very dangerous or have a deeper purpose, such as providing clues, potential allies or add depth to the setting, because it won’t drain resources or make their lives significantly more challenging, as they are back to full power the next day, unless I want to spend several hours just running random encounters. I think this system solves that issue – you basically want to avoid wolves or orc raiding parties – because they can impact if you are able to succeed in your greater goal or quest.

Of course, it also adds a lot of flavor, and, as the group has no magical aid – like Purify Water, Good Berries or Leomund’s Tiny Hut – the journey will become something dangerous the group must consider closely.

The Shadow

The game has a system for gaining corruption. It can happen through sorrow, blighted places, misdeeds and tainted treasure. The results are negative psychological traits (Shadow Weakness) and ultimately a complete fall into Shadow. Boromir is the obvious example from the novels.

It is hard to judge how big a threat it is to the characters over a campaign. But I like the mechanic and, again, it feels right for the setting.

Audiences:

In accordance with the fiction, not everyone welcomes travelers from afar, and the game therefore has a system for Audiences with the various rulers of Middle-Earth. It is basically skill challenges modified by how various cultures see each other. Not everyone enjoys a system for a role-playing encounter, but I can see why it is included. It can certainly add drama and consequences, and again fits the game setting perfectly. In the published adventure Wilderland Adventures, the mechanic is used frequently – but more on that in a future review.

The Fellowship Phase:

TORFellowshipPhase2
An adventurer returning home to rest.

This down-time system also fits well with the setting. The assumption is that you adventure and travel in the spring and summer, maybe autumn, and settle down for the winter, perhaps to help bring the harvest home, to research ancient lore or to open a new Sanctuary. It is also a way to regain hit points and exhaustion levels, which might be sorely needed, given the trials that the characters can go through.

It is certainly a much more interesting down-system compared to the original D&D rules, but without a whole lot of clunky mechanics added.

Final Thoughts on Adventures in Middle-Earth:

I would love to run a campaign in this game and setting. It is very well done, and it feels like you can really play a Dúnedain ranger, a dour dwarf of the Blue Mountains or a hobbit off seeing the world and stride right into Tolkien’s pages.

I don’t think it is for everyone, though. It is probably the least magical fantasy setting I’ve encountered, certainly in D&D, unless you go for an actual historical or near-historical setting.

As a DM (or Lore Master I should say), my greatest concern is that I doubt the setting works well with characters above 7th level or so. I could be wrong, but I think making stories with fitting enemies and drama at level 8+ will be a challenge within the Middle-Earth setting – partly because the most epic plots have been told by Tolkien. But these concerns are for the review of the Loremaster’s Guide, which should arrive at my door soon… and perhaps the upcoming campaign: Mirkwood.

It can be hard to judge if the game is well balanced, and particularly how well the different classes and cultures compare to each other. Player’s really dislike if one class or character build outshines every other, and almost every group has a player who will spot those ‘killer combos’ in an instant. And as there is little or no enchanted equipment, except for heirloom items and good dwarven steel, the player’s AC and attack modifiers, will generally be lower, compared to standard D&D. It is hard to tell how they stack up against monsters?

Exhaustion can also be crippling and it is hard to remove. Are the journey rules too hard, if you don’t have characters built to be good at survival, perception and so on, or if they are plain unlucky?

To summarize:

Why should you buy this book?

  • If you love Tolkien’s world and want to play in it.
  • If you plan on running a low magic campaign. It will have many things you can lift.
  • If you are a newcomer to DM Dungeons & Dragons this game is in some ways easier than regular D&D, as there are fewer spells and so on to keep track of, and the setting will be familiar to most people. However, … see below
  • If you want inspiration for your own campaign, such as classes, feats and backgrounds.

Why shouldn’t you buy this book?

  • If your players want plenty of cool spells and magical gear, Adventures in Middle-Earth isn’t for you.
  • The murder hobo, kick in the door play-style is also a hard fit with the setting. This is a game of heroes and often tales tinged with sadness.
  • A newcomer DM might find it hard to deal with the game, if it turns out there are imbalances, whereas core D&D is quite robust.