A new player is more than welcome, the party does need a full time animist and could use another warrior or alternate class.

For the most part I'm feeling better, still got pressure in my ears, probably an infection, so I get headaches and crap. I'm going to try to get some help in the next couple of days. Game is still Sat night hopefully.

Currently the party is scouting the Weather Hills and the old realm of Arnor for orc lairs/orc/warg activity and making notes for captain Arathorn IV of King Elessar's forces. These forces have begun assembling in Rivendell and at the ruins of Weathertop (Amon Sul) in preparation to retake Arnor and Angmar. The party found a old ruined watchtower from the 2nd/early Third Age and have explored it, discovering a hidden armory beneath the tower and a further secret door / stairwell (dwarven make) that leads into some sort of tunnel system. They encountered some traps and had to figure out some runes/puzzles. They also fought a large spider dwelling in the tunnel. They killed the spider, but now they hear sounds of battle from above where some of the party was on watch. Evidently orcs or something has come along....

I've got several openings for serious mature roleplayers if anyone is interested. I can provide you a rulebook (pdf) if needed as this game is long out of print.

Game Time/Day: Saturday evenings 9 pm-1 am EST.
Session #13
Game Server: Mayhem
Game Room: Middle-Earth Roleplay
Timeline: Fourth Age 1
Game: MERP 2e rules with possible Rolemaster expansion later on.
Level: 2
House Rules: 100 gp to start (ignore 2 gp starting funds), you may pick your background options or roll them randomly. However, if you wish to combine them all into one mighty magic item/heirloom or the like, you must seek approval from me first. You can buy minor magic items with your gold or herbs or the like. See pgs 258-260 MERP 2e.

Also no Orcs/Trolls/Corsairs/Easterlings/Haradrim/Variags/Black Numenoreans as pc races. Noldor are also going to be rare. Sindar or Silvan elves ok, most other men and dwarves, hobbits are alright. Also you may reroll your attributes if they're all lower then 65 one additional time, keeping the results. Remember that you can replace your lowest stat with a 90 for your prime attribute. Also remember any stat below 20 can be rerolled at any time.

Sheets should be in .doc/.rtf/.txt/,pdf or pc node files preferred, but the .xls file that trollblood offered will work too. Send me your completed sheets to my email at landothearchmagi at comcast.net.

House Rules
Fate system for more cinematic play (limited to 3 pts each session per rules on thread)
Roleplay encouraged. Please be sure to state your actions clearly.


NPCS (who hired the pcs) (brother/sister)
Grithnir - Dunedain Warrior
Morwen - Dunedain Animist

PARTY
daddystabz-Dunedain Ranger
debo11-Ashetar Noldor Elven Mage
Maltar - Dunedain Scout (played by Kyanna)
Max - Olrin Dwarven Warrior
Opening: Animist
Opening: Any class

a) Correction, the 100 gp is in addition to your starting armor/weapons and 2 gp per the rules. If you use background options for magic items, then that is how you get those. You can of course get more funds too with background options.

You can play a mage/animist very well at low level, just go prepared. Herbs are useful. They've found useful magic items and gear too. These guys did give themselves away a few times and elves are rather tall, you can be shot over as evident in the books and movies.

For mages it is hard. Even rune paper and magic items are based on your present level. I couldn't use rune paper to cast a lvl 6 firebolt or other such attack spells until I can cast it normally. Though when you do get up to those levels, you not only can cast the spells, but you can make items that can cast said spells. I am not complaining, I have fun with my mage. Might make another one to replace Ash instead of a warrior. It's just the climb is slow and difficult.

At present, since I ignored weapon skills, actually I can cast a spell immediately and still have a huge chance at hitting crits with said spells. I think once I look through the essence spell book, I will have a better outlook, since the rule books lists, quite frankly suck a big one. Even shock bolt is limited to crit a and bs. Though that is when you fate your crit roll and laugh when you come up with a greater than 120 roll and slay whatever it is you are fighting.

For animists, yeah go for herbs to your hearts delight. If you can use them, we as a group will invest in herbs for you to use on us. That way you can use herbs and heal us, while you gain levels and spells to heal us all up later on. Ash has some on him, though they are the cheap ones that your animist can have.


By the way, can someone send me the essence spell book. Since Lando made a few comments about it's greatness, I figured I may need to take a look at it. Even if Ash doesn't make it, my next mage will have access to it. To think about it, yeah I will go mage again. Now got to come up with yet another elven name.

Glad you are feeling better Lando. Hope you stay that way, can't wait til Saturday.

Bet Ash is wishing that he hadn't missed the boat now:-)

I could do with the additional spell books too, as I aonly have the core at the moment and might look at genning a mage if ash and olrin fall. I've always liked mages in MERP, although they are a challange at low level they're still not as wimpy as original D&D mages

I was thinking abouse a wose anamist, but I'll shelve that.

Ash: You don't have a pointy enough hat, that's where you have gone wrong. Take pride in your pointy hat and your pointy hat will take care of you.

Nice to see you're a bit better lando.

I have the three Spell Laws from '99 but I'm not sure if that's what you're talking about. "Greatness" isn't the word I'd use to describe them; my experience with playing a magician in that version of RM (essentially the same as MERP mage) is that casting is still secondary to stabbing things in the face. You're not stuck only getting 1-2 lists per character level, and there are more lists, but the whole prep-3-rounds-or-your-face-melts thing is still in place, and generally the spells are written from an OOC/utility and "how much energy would it take to accomplish this task in real life", rather than "how level-appropriate/combat-effective is this task", perspective.

I've always been of the impression that in the setting mages are NOT ment to be availiable to stoke up combat. Hence spells going first, as that should be a rare thing. They're ment to be more subtle in their arts, and let the people with swords get in there during a fight. Just my take tho.

Still, I'd like to see them books - even though I didnt mention greatness

I have an older printed Spell Law book from the Rolemaster boxed set, but I paid for the expanded PDFs for Spell Law (Essence, Channeling, Mentalism, each with its own book) when I upgraded to RMFRP. Looks like Iron Crown is undergoing new ownership and considering doing more wth Rolemaster in the near future.

RMFRP
http://www.ironcrown.com/?page_id=619

You didn't see Gandalf in the books going around slinging Gygaxian style vancian fireballs and it has no place in a Middle Earth game either, imo. The magic of the setting is more low key and subtle and that is how it should be. As the magic system is right now, lots of fans thought it was too much already. The biggest 2 complaints on this system as a whole are the incessant use of tables for everything and the overdone magic for the setting. I personally have no issue with the tables and have learned to enjoy them but the magic can get way overblown for this setting if you include all the Rolemaster spell law options that are out there.

Check out this article in Wkipedia about the critical reaction to the game and its magic system by Tolkien fans: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle-earth_Role_Playing

Now, overall I think the magic in the core rulebook is not too bad but if you add in all the stuff from Spell Law from Rolemaster it gets into D&D territory fast. I think we have handled things pretty well in this campaign in this regard so far. I would not be opposed though to adding in some Rolemaster options after each has been looked over by the GM and approved for appropriateness to a Middle Earth based game.

Are you playing with risk factor and/or corruption?

Yes, however, it hasn't been used much since everyone is still low level and not a lot of spells have been cast. There has been some finding of minor magic items though (+5-15 range) as well.