Category Archives: RPG

Putting the Magic Back

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Remember when magic items used to be mysterious and cool? The excitement of finding a new sword, ring, or cloak was the highlight of the evening, second only to vanquishing that pesky foe.  These days it seems we have our checklists of magic items we want for our character and if that item is not in the treasure trove we just took, we will trade that magic hammer in and get what we really wanted to begin with. It has all become routine.

I often wonder if this is because we have been playing the game for so long or simply because as we grew older some of the magic lost its luster when it came to finding new magic items. Have we become too familiar with all the available magic items that we have simply become characters with a list of necessary items to complete the build or the concept?

Why Magic Items Lose Their Luster

From the familiarity standpoint there is certainly a case to be made that many of us have been playing for a long time. We probably know the descriptions of the more popular and frequently acquired items like the back of our hand. Rings of protection, cloaks of resistance, bags of holding – all must haves and something even first level characters know they want those items. It doesn’t take much for our characters to soon just have shopping lists. This does not do much to keep the magic and mystery in magic items.

Then on the other hand we sometimes get caught up with builds of characters. Builds aren’t just reserved for the optimizers, builds are also for certain concepts a player wants to roleplay. Inevitably builds seem to come with their own shopping lists in order to complete these builds just the way we want them.

And finally there is the naming convention some of the more common magic items use. Longsword +1, Ring of Protection +3, Cloak of Resistance +2 and so on and so on. This naming mechanism really depicts the magic item for the pure mechanical advantage it is.

Bring That Shine Back

There are a lot of factors conspiring against keeping the magic in magic items for anyone that has been playing RPG games for many years. What can a GM do to help put the magic back into magic items?

Kobold Quarterly just released the first in a short series on removing the game mechanic “plus” value from the item by substituting in a name for that level of bonus. The first article talks about weapons and armor and suggests a bastion shield would note a +2 shield bonus and +1 bludgeoning weapon would be a “thumping” mace. You can of course change these designations, but the article is certainly a launching pad for coming up with your own naming conventions to step away from simply listing a numerical modifier.

Another thing a GM can do is build a little history behind the magic item. Who had this ring or cloak before? How did it end up tucked away in a trunk in the back of this orc’s cave? Perhaps there were some initials sewn into the cloak or engraved into the inner band of the ring.  The player may never fully investigate the history, but he will quite likely remember that the cloak he wears had initial sewn into it when he found it.

Sometimes the manner of getting the magic item into the character’s hands can make a difference. I had a GM give one of my characters, who at the time was a two-weapon ranger type, a finely crafted bow via a minor goddess. This shifted my character’s whole motif with him retraining feats and such to learn to use this bow more effectively.  The character even went as far to turn in a magic sword he had obtained previously to a deity’s temple so he could focus on the bow.

Most games I play in have access to the ever popular “magic shop”. Magic shops can certainly vary under different GMs though. One way to help make magic items a little more special without banning magic shops is to just limit their availability of items a bit. Do not assume that any item a character ones can be found in the magic shop. There should be some scarcity to not quite so common items. Sure, a bag of holding? Good chance the shop has that or can get one pretty quickly. A +5 Holy Avenger? Eh, not so much.

By limiting the magic shop’s supply a little you can help make going to a magic shop feel more like going to Half Price Books hoping to find that legendary Deities and Demigods book with Cthulhu rather than going to WalMart to buy a gallon of milk. The scarcity is not to punish your players, but to let them know sometimes it takes a little work to get just what you are looking for.

Summary

Tackling the lost luster of magic items is not an easy task for groups that have lost it. The GM will have to work a little harder with some of the suggestions made above to make magic items fun again. Add in that it is a fine line between keeping the player happy and trying to put the magic back into magic items the task difficulty further increases.

Still work with your players, you do not want to deny them characters they find fun. But maybe that item they desire so badly isn’t available at the corner magic shop just yet. Maybe that noble in town happens to have one that he is offering as a reward for clearing the family crypts of the undead that have infested it.  The extra effort needed to gain magic items just might make it that much more special to the character and put some of the magic back in to magic items again!

Thinking Like A Villain: Tricks & Traps

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This blog post is inspired by this month’s RPG Carnival subject of villain’s tricks and traps and how does the GM effectively use tricks or traps on behalf of their villains.

I suspect many find this a fine line to walk when determining how to place traps or plan tricks. Is the trap you are planning appropriate for your villain? How do you tell? Will the players think you were unfair?

It is easy as a GM to put a trap or trick in place, but one must do so in a manner that is fair to the players and furthers the game. Blindsiding players with tricks from nowhere is not fun for anyone – okay, maybe fun for the GM, but you won’t have many players for long! Well planned, villain appropriate tricks and traps are much more fun for everyone involved.

Strategy

One strategy is to take a step back and think for a moment about the villain in question. Who are they? What are their motivations? Are they an intellectual villain or perhaps a crafty villain or perhaps a villain by chance? Are they concerned with their plans being found out and pinned to them? Taking some time to think about these things can help with the decision making process when determining what traps and tricks the villain in question would be capable of.

A villain that tends to use his head may plan out an intricate trick or trap, likely involving several layers to further themselves from being accused of the act. A less thinking villain, but cutthroat villain may rely on brute force effectiveness. The trap or trick may have fewer layers of complexity but more outright brutality and carnage.

Beyond the basics of just taking a closer look at the villain and what drives them the GM can move on to consider just how much does the villain know about the heroes. Are they being considered a genuine threat to the villain or simply an inconvenience? Has the villain been observing them or gathering information about them? These questions can further help the GM determine how thought out the trick or trap might be that the villain sets in motion against the PCs.

Villain A

Let’s take Villain A. She is a plotter and well versed in the ways of the politically correct as well as the actions that take place behind the scenes to gain her position of power. Intelligent and charismatic she is a very real threat, but has strong motivations to never be attached to her plots against others. She tends to learn all she can about her enemies and use that information to her advantage before setting her plans in motion.

Villain A is much more apt to have a much more intricate plan to trick or trap the heroes she considers a threat to her grand plan of gaining power. She has motivation to end the threat the heroes are to her while minimizing the chance of any action taken against them resulting in her being marked the responsible party.

Villain A is the type of villain the GM can really work out the intricate plots and layers to trick or trap the PCs. Organizations or gangs working as buffers between the actual villain and the PCs so that if (and most likely when) the plot is foiled the PCs still have a difficult time pinning the plot on Villain A directly.

Villain B

Now we look at Villain B. He has made a name for himself on the street. While not the most intellectual man, he hasn’t survived life in the streets without knowing how to get what he wants. Often getting what he wants is through cold acts of brutality. He lives by his reputation as a no holds barred individual. He sees a threat and moves straight to eradicating that threat with plans to do so definitively removing the need to thoroughly research the heroes before doing so.

Villain B is has very little concern about people knowing it was him or his people that exacted some form of trap or trick on the heroes he deemed a threat. His reputation demands it. For him a swift, brutal attack in an alley arranged under the guise of an information exchange is perfectly valid tactic.

The GM can play Villain B as a cold and cunning individual. The traps and tricks are simple, but effective. One is not as likely to find as many layers in the trick setup against the PCs from this type of villain, maybe a small street gang that reports to the villain, but not much more than that.

Player Reaction

By thinking about your villains and determining their mindset you can more closely develop traps and plans that are more representative of the villain. Together this helps present greater verisimilitude for your world as traps and tricks employed by your villains seem to match their mindset.

This means traps and tricks by Villain A are going to be much more deceitful and sprung with potentially much less warning or indication that what the PCs are about to walk into is a setup. Meanwhile the PCs are much more likely suspect something or at the very least not be surprised as greatly when Villain B puts his machinations into play.

This also allows the GM as range of tools at his or her disposal when plotting against the PCs. The complex plots and tricks he wishes to weave are perfectly appropriate when being orchestrated by Villain A. For times the GM wants to spring something much simpler he can unveil Villain B.

Player reaction to tricks sprung by the GM’s villains is more likely to be favorable if the GM works within the complexity and clandestineness level of the villains at play.

Summary

I have taken a brief look at how a GM can study their villains and use their motivations and style to help shape the tricks and traps set in place against the PCs. Providing examples of two types of villains there are many villain types that fall in between the two examples I outlined above. In some cases Villain A may have enlisted a Villain B type to do her work to further insulate her form being found out.

One of the most important things you can do as a GM is to really learn your villain’s aspirations. It will not only make designing tricks and traps used by your villains easier, it will help make many other parts of your game easier as well.

We Need Intro Sets

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Earlier this week Robert Schwalb posted his Mythical New Gamer article over on his blog. In the post he expresses his skepticism about the success of introductory or starter sets actually bringing new people into the hobby. With big-box bookstores struggling and those that do exist putting the sets in the sci-fi/fantasy sections they lose some of their visibility or become products for those that already have an interest in starting pen and paper gaming. He then boils it down to three different customers – those that want to switch game systems, are trying to complete their collection and those that want to get someone else in the hobby and using the intro product as a crutch to do so.

The article is a good read and well worth taking a look at. He has several interesting points – some I agree with and others not so much. I suspect this has a lot to do with how I got my start in gaming.

I was one of those that came pretty cold to the hobby back around 1981. When I was a kid I used to sell greeting cards as a bit of fund raiser once a year and like any of these fund raisers, the more you sold the more points you received to cash in on a reward. That particular year the reward catalog had the Moldvay D&D Basic Set as one of the offerings. As a young kid looking to spend some reward points that purple box cover with a green dragon rising up in some subterranean chamber called my name! I applied my points and waited for it to arrive.

A few weeks later it showed up at the house. I opened it up to find some booklets, weird looking dice and a crayon. HHmmm, did someone forget to pack the game board? And what’s this crayon for? Why aren’t these numbers colored in? Time to start reading! It took some time as a kid to make my way through the books, sort of learning the rules as the best I could. It took me longer than I care to admit to realize the cure light wounds spell was not talking about wounds caused by light.

See, I grew up in a very rural area. There weren’t a lot of people my age nearby, there certainly wasn’t an Internet, and the nearest game store was 45 minutes away. There wasn’t anyone to teach me this game or even someone to give me an overview of what a roleplaying game was. In fact it was probably another two or three years before I finally found someone in school that knew about and played D&D and that was only after we hit middle school where the satellite elementary schools were combined into one, the great mixing of the rural kids in our district.

But I stuck with it. I slowly read the rules and gained enough understanding to play with some resemblance of the game as it was supposed to be. Eventually I taught some of it to my younger brother and other times I played solo games. I fully credit the Moldvay D&D Basic Set as my start into these many years of RPG enjoyment.

This set was something that I as a kid picked up with no previous exposure to RPGs. I did not buy it at a boxed store and an evangelist of the game did not give it to me. But it opened the door for me to the world of RPGs.

I think that is why I like the intro and starter sets and believe they are needed to continue growing the gaming hobby. I was excited to see Paizo putting out the Pathfinder Beginner Box. Because I know there are not always game shops close or mentors available to help teach you the game in those early years.

Good introduction sets include everything I need to play the game in one purchase. This is important to someone new to the game who might not even know there are dice other than a 6-sided die much less that they are needed for the game. Anything that lowers the hurdle to the entry to the game is a good thing and another legitimate avenue to bring new people to the game. Introductory sets fill this need.

Getting the intro sets into potential new gamer’s hands can be a tricky issue given our niche hobby. But the answer isn’t to not make introductory sets, it is to figure out how to get them into new gamer’s hands.

Review: The One Ring

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Publisher:   Cubicle 7
Audience:  GM/Players
Price:  Print+PDF – $59.99
Pages:  Slip Cased Set
Tankard Rating:  4.5/5


The One Ring: Adventures over the Edge of the Wild

The One Ring: Adventures over the Edge of the Wild is a new roleplaying game published by Cubicle 7 Entertainment and Sophisticated Games and written by Francesco Nepitello. I have made several other posts about The One Ring here at the Iron Tavern. I have written an Initial Look at The One Ring, a handy list of resources for The One Ring and The One Ring Unboxing. With this post I will be providing a comprehensive review of this new game that is based in Tolkien’s Middle-earth.

The One Ring (TOR) comes in a slip covered case and contains the following items:

  • 192 page Adventurer’s Book
  • 144 page Loremaster’s Book
  • Loremaster’s Map
  • Adventurer’s Map
  • Six 6-sided dice and One 12 sided die

The One Ring: Adventures over the Edge of the Wild is the first of three planned core releases for the game with other supplements to become available over time. This portion starts in the year 2946 of the Third Age in Middle-earth. This places it about five years after the Battle of the Five Armies which was at the end of The Hobbit. In addition the areas described all focus on the Wilderlands region which includes Misty Mountains, Mirkwood, the Lonely Mountain and the town of Esgaroth on Long Lake. The future releases will expand the geographical area and cultures available to be played.

Adventurer’s Book

The Adventurer’s Book is geared for the player of The One Ring RPG and provides an intro that does not assume future roleplaying experience, including a short example of play. Next up is the section on character generation where one can choose from one of six cultures – Barding, Beornings, Dwarves of the Lonely Mountain, Elves of Mirkwood, Hobbits of the Shire, or Woodmen of Wilderlands. This section provides information on all the customizations a player can make for their character.

Artist: Jon Hodgson

The following section goes into the mechanics with a more detailed look at the attributes, skills, traits and introduces the endurance and hope mechanics of the system. This section also contains more information on the gear you can select and how encumbrance functions in TOR.


Continuing on in the Adventurer’s Book we reach the Character Development section. Here we learn about valor and wisdom, virtues, rewards and finishes with life and death in the game, states of health and how one gets better if they are injured.

The fifth section provides additional information on action resolution, how tasks are resolved, the dice mechanics and the importance of the journey. Traveling through various areas require a number of checks which can lead to a hazard as you travel. Combat is also addressed in this section of the Adventurer’s Book as well.

The final section of the book talks of the Fellowship Phase which is the opportunity the characters have to recover from their journeys and adventures through the Wilderlands. It covers how the heroes can develop their character further during these phases.

The Adventurer’s Book includes a pre-generated character for each culture and also a blank character sheet for creating your own characters. The book does include an Index.

Loremaster’s Book

Within the Loremaster’s Book we find a section that explains what the Loremaster’s role is in playing the game before moving into the next section on the Game Mechanics.

Artist: Jon Hodgson

The Game Mechanics section takes a much closer look at the structure of running a game including the Adventuring Phase and Fellowship Phase. Dice rolling mechanics are covered, resolving actions, how to run Loremaster characters within the game. How characters advance and how to award them is included as well as more details on the Journey aspect of the adventure and how to plot the character’s journey to determine how many hazard checks they will need to make. Combat finishes off this section with a more detailed look at it from the Loremaster’s perspective.


The third section is most akin to the bestiary section. The ever present Shadow of Middle-earth is covered and the influence of the Shadow leading to corruption. Then the primary threats in the Wilderland region of the Middle-earth are covered which include orcs, trolls, spiders and a few more creatures.

The following section gives the reader more information on creating a campaign within the world of Middle-earth. It tells about the region, the timeline and some of the world events in that region to help provide the Loremaster with enough background information to start their own campaign.

The final section of this book is an adventure called The Marsh Bell to help a Loremaster have something to work with for their first adventure using this rule-set.

Accessories

There are two fold-out maps that come in the slipcover, one for the Loremaster which has hexes on it and keyed to indicate difficulty of passage and whether the land is affected by the Shadow or not. This is to allow for the calculation of journeys the fellowship may embark on.  The Adventurer’s map shows the same geographical area, but without the hexes and difficulty of terrain keyed on it.

The game also comes with its own dice which have some notations specific to TOR mechanics. There are six 6 sided dice with the numbers 1-3 marked in outline and a tengwar rune on the number 6. The d12 has the number 12 replaced with the Gandalf Rune and the 11 replaced with the Sauron eye.

Mechanics Summary

Characters have three main attributes – Body, Heart and Wits. They also have a collection of skills and traits. Instead of hit points the characters have endurance scores which have points removed when they are hit during combat. If you fall below a fatigue score then the character becomes weary which has an effect on the dice rolled during combat. A character also has hope points that come from a limited pool that are primarily spent to allow an attribute score to be added as a bonus to a skill or combat check. 

 A character also tracks their Shadow rating. One accumulates shadow points in several different ways, once the number of hope points falls to less than or equal to their shadow score they become miserable. If a character who is miserable has a Sauron eye show up on the d12 they suffer from madness and temporarily lose control of their character.

Skill resolution is handled by rolling a number of d6 dice, plus the d12 feat die. You roll a number of d6 dice equal to the number of ranks you have in the skill. For example, if you have two ranks in Athletics and need to make a skill check you would roll 2d6 + d12 to try to beat a target number (TN). An average TN is a fourteen. There are varying degrees of success indicated by rolling a 6 (with the Tengwar rune) on the 6 sided dice. One 6 is a great success and two 6’s is an extraordinary success. Rolling a Gandalf rune is an auto success and rolling a Sauron eye most often means the result on the d12 counts as a zero.

Combat resolution works very similar to skill resolution. A character has a number of ranks in their weapon of choice and that indicates the number of 6 sided dice they roll. The TN they roll against is determine by their stance in combat. Which can range from an aggressive stance to defensive to ranged combat. If the roll also exceeds the edge rating of the weapon then the opposing side needs to roll a protection check to avoid being wounded. The armor one wears helps determine how many d6’s are rolled for the protection check.

The Good and the Bad

The One Ring is a very solid offering. The artwork in the books is outstanding and goes far in putting the reader in a Middle-earth mindset. The art really sets the imagination running as you make your way through the books.

Artist: Jon Hodgson

The mechanics also do a very good job of emulating feel of Middle-earth adventuring as well. From the emphasis on the journey itself and not just the destination much like a fair amount of Tolkein’s work. The addition of the Hope and Shadow mechanics also serve to further reinforce that there is this constant Shadow in the world that seeks to drain your strength or corrupt your being. These feelings can be difficult to emulate through rules, but I think The One Ring has done a great job at getting this feeling from the game.


I have play tested the combat several times against varying party sizes and numbers and types of monsters. Once you get used to the combat round it flows very quickly. Since you fight by stance there is less reliance on precise tactical movement allowing you to narrate freely and also greatly reduces the need of a battle mat for play. Battles can range from trying to wear down someone’s endurance to rapid turns due to wounds being scored against your opponent. In one test battle against a troll the heroes barely pulled it off, running it again later and the troll went down quickly.

The largest complaint I have is in regards to the book layout. I find myself frequently hunting for some rule information and the information is often not near the section you would expect it to be. This sometimes gives it a disjointed feel – the rules are all there, they just aren’t always logically grouped together. This is a relatively small complaint and not a game breaker by any means.

The One Ring is a great release. If you have an affinity for Middle-earth gaming with a relatively rules-light rule set and enjoy excellent artwork it is well worth picking this product up. It is sure to provide enjoyment to long time Middle-earth fans or even those new to Middle-earth gaming. 

Tankard Rating

4.5 tankards out of 5 tankards.The One Ring at The Iron Tavern

The One Ring Unboxing

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My physical copy of The One Ring from Cubicle 7 arrived on Monday much to my excitement. While I still have a review in the works after a little more playtime with the system, I wanted to post an unboxing of The One Ring for those on the fence about picking up the system or curious about what it looked like.

It was delivered very well protected in an oversized cardboard sleeve with bubble wrap inside. That is a good thing as I knew it had been delivered on Monday by the sound of Ron, my mailman, throwing the package onto the porch from a good six feet away. Ron hates us.

Most folks know by now that The One Ring comes in a slip covered case. Now just what does this slip covered case contain?

  • 192 page Adventurer’s Book
  • 144 page Loremaster’s Book
  • Loremaster’s Map
  • Adventurer’s Map
  • Six 6-sided dice and One 12 sided dice

Initial impressions of The One Ring are great. The artwork in the books just has that Middle-earth feel to them. The books themselves seem of good quality and it is nice to finally have the dice that have the runes on them as they should for use with The One Ring.

My full-length review will be coming in the next few weeks as I mentioned after some more actual play with the system. So with that in mind, let’s move straight into the unboxing photos. I hope you enjoy!

Winter is Coming!

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Winter is Coming RPG Blog FestivalWinter is coming. Wait, what? Yes, with the first day of fall the Winter is Coming RPG Blog Festival launches! This will give you plenty of time to take the articles from this festival and work them into any winter themed games you may have!

@twwombat has kicked off the idea of a week-long RPG blog festival that starts today, September 23rd. The theme for the festival is winter-themed elements for a variety of RPG game systems including D&D, Pathfinder and a few more. The elements can be new magic items, encounters, NPCs, feats and more all written by a wide variety of contributors to the RPG blog festival. At last count @twwombat had twenty-five participants lined up for the upcoming week.

The Iron Tavern will be participating in RPG blog festival with two contributions during the upcoming week. First we will look at the cold and mysterious Linnorm Ice Throne. From the frozen lands to the north this long lost, powerful artifact of the cold has been discovered again. This will be a magical artifact designed using the Pathfinder rule system.

Next up The Iron Tavern will publish a winter chase encounter using the Pathfinder rule system chase rules. What winter hazards will your players have to face to succeed? This chase encounter will be a drop-in encounter possibly with slight modifications for your specific campaign taking place during the winter.

There are lots of other contributors lined up for the Winter is Coming RPG Blog Festival. Be sure to keep an eye here for The Iron Tavern’s contributions and an eye on Wombat’s Gaming Den of Iniquity so you don’t miss any of the great stuff in store for the upcoming week. Winter is coming!

Monte Cook Back at Wizards?

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Monte at WotC - Good or Bad?Twitter was afire yesterday with the announcement Mike Mearls made stating that Monte Cook was brought on board at Wizards of the Coast to work with R&D in “making D&D the greatest RPG the world has seen”. In addition he will also be taking over the Legends and Lore column that Mike has been writing weekly for the past eight months.

There appear to be several different camps and a lot of speculation about what this means for D&D. Some camps I agree with, some of the speculation out there makes sense and some not so much!

My thoughts? I am actually excited to see what Monte will bring to D&D. I was not a big fan of 4e as it just did not seem to match what I feel D&D should be for me. Because of that I spent most of my time playing 3.5 or Pathfinder and only paid cursory attention to what was going on in the D&D world. Don’t get me wrong though, I fully understand that many people do enjoy 4e and I don’t begrudge them that one bit. I am sure the game I prefer might not match the game they prefer.

But with this announcement? I plan to at least become a regular reader of the Legends and Lore column. Now my curiosity is piqued! What is in store for D&D? Will 4e just be modified with changes Monte might bring to the table? Or is this the beginning of a new edition? For someone that hasn’t followed D&D in its 4e iteration very closely, Wizards seems to have succeeded in at least getting some of former customer to pay closer attention again.

I am still not sure D&D can pull me back in just yet, but for the first time in a long time that possibility is there. I have been quite happy with my Pathfinder and other systems and the entertainment they have provided me. It would take some major changes to draw me back to the D&D brand.

My hopes with this addition of Monte Cook to the R&D staff? It is hard to put my finger on exactly what I want to see, but I hope that he helps bring back some of the 3e feel to the game again while retaining the ease of DMing the 4e system that every lauds. Maybe something with newer mechanics but retains the “old school feel”.

Regardless of how this plays out, it does indeed seem that there are exciting times ahead for D&D! I am looking forward to watching things unfold in the coming months ahead.

The One Ring Resources

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The One Ring was released at Gen Con Indy and many people that were there have their slipcover set, others have received their early bird pre-orders and the rest of us wait with PDFs for our slip-covered sets to arrive. During this time many fans have been busy putting out some excellent fan-created materials for the game. In addition there have been some other gems out there that I felt needed to be consolidated into one place for the moment.

Let’s take a look at some of these gems that are out there!

Cubicle 7 The Video Files

First up is Cubicle 7’s own video series about The One Ring. Likely if you have done any searching for more information about The One Ring you have come across these. But I felt this post would not be complete without some reference to them. These videos include interviews with game designer Francesco Nepitello and art director Jon Hodgson. An excellent series – either for those considering picking up The One Ring or for those waiting for their books!

Jon Hodgson’s Deviant Art Gallery

As mentioned in an earlier post I was very impressed by the artwork in The One Ring books and that was one of the things that drew me into looking at the game closer. Jon Hodgson has been very cool with posting various wallpapers and such to the Cubicle 7 forums. In addition he has a Deviant Art gallery that is well worth checking out if you are looking for inspiration for your Middle-earth game.

Azrapse’s Web Character Builder for The One Ring

One of the more impressive fan created tools for The One Ring is the Web Character Builder written by Azrapse from the Cubicle 7 forums. In a very short period of time he has developed an excellent online character builder TOR characters. The character builder has import and export options, a print option, the ability to export to BBCode for PbP campaigns, a dice roller and he’s recently added an Online Character Server for storing your characters online. In addition he has thus far been very quick at handling feature requests and squashing any bugs. An excellent tool and well worth a look!

Voidstate’s The One Ring Dice Roller

If you are interested in a standalone dice roller for The One Ring, voidstate recently posted just such a thing. It stands to be a great tool if you need to make a quick roll for something. You can choose the type of roll, the number of skill dice, whether you are weary, how to handle the feat dice, whether to spend a Hope point and set the TN if you know it. This is a relatively new creation, but so far voidstate has been updating it to correct for any errors the community has found. Another great tool!

The Rune Generator

This next tool is not specific to The One Ring but one I have already found useful – a rune generator! The rune generator is quite useful for creating handouts and such and can take the text you input and output runes in either Old English runes from The Hobbit or Cirth, Moria Dwarf runes from Lord of the Rings or Elvish Tengwar.

The One Ring Actual Play Post

And the final item I mention is less a resource and more an example of play that might help some people. John Marron over on rpg.net has started an actual play thread of his The One Ring game and includes some of the mechanics behind the action. I found it an interesting read. Be warned though he is running the sample adventure in the game, so there will be spoilers abound. If you might play the adventure it might be best to avoid this last thread to prevent spoiling any fun for you.

The resources highlighted above are just some of the ones that have caught my eye over the past month. Keep an eye on The One Ring Forums at Cubicle 7 and you can find some other fan created resources that might help you with your game as well. Enjoy!

The One Ring at The Iron Tavern

A Look at The One Ring RPG

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Like many my initial delve into fantasy worlds began with The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien crafted the wonderful world of Middle-earth and that has allowed many an opportunity to escape into a far away world.

Along the way there have been several role playing systems that have tried to emulate the feel of Middle-earth. Some of the notables include Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE) Middle-earth Role Playing (MERP) which came out around 1984. In 2002 Decipher released The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Game. And most recently Cubicle 7 released The One Ring – Adventures Over the Edge of the Wild at Gen Con 2011.

The One Ring (TOR) caught some buzz on twitter over the past few weeks and there have been many threads over at rpg.net on the game and a couple surfacing at EN World. Catching wind of some of this from these sources, I became curious and checked the system out.

Before I venture too far into this post, let me state up front this is not an in-depth review. I fully intend to post a more thorough review, but I need to get more experience with how the combat system actually plays out. Consider this post more of a cursory overview of The One Ring.

The One Ring was written by Francesco Nepitello and artwork was done by John Howe, Jon Hodgson and Tomasz Jedruszek and as noted earlier, put out by Cubicle 7 Entertainment. TOR was released as a box set that includes an Adventurer’s Book and Loremaster’s Book along with maps for each and a set of dice to be used with the game.

One of the very first things that drew my attention was the artwork in the book. The feel and style of it really has a Middle-earth feel to it. Yes, that is difficult to describe, but the art within the books seems to have a soft, earthy tone to them in many cases. The characters depicted in the art also have this feel to them, from the dwarves to the elves to the Beornings.

The artwork drew me in with its Middle-earth feel, but how about the game itself? How does it stack up with the feel of Middle-earth? From my initial read it appears to emulate this feel quite well!

The game includes an emphasis on fellowship and includes a mechanic for “fellowship focus”. Basically a character chooses another member of the fellowship as their focus and certain mechanical rewards occur if this person is not wounded or allows them to more easily recover Hope points in certain situations. Hope represents the perseverance of a character. There is a limited amount of hope, but it can be used as a bonus to boost your chance of success at something like a skill check.

On the flip side, there is the ever present threat of The Shadow, a force of corruption. Think of how the One Ring drove people to madness. This element is represented in TOR via shadow points, a method of tracking ones potential move to madness, at times resulting in temporary loss of control for your character. It certainly seems an interesting mechanic.

The One Ring will be a series of releases and expand in the future. For now this release focuses on starting in the year 2946 of the Third Age about five years after the Battle of Five Armies. It also focuses on the Wilderlands region which includes areas such as the Misty Mountains, Mirkwood, the Lonely Mountain and the town of Esgaroth on Long Lake. Future releases will advance the timeline further and increase the geographical area.

Playable characters can choose from one of several cultures. In this initial release you can choose from the Bardings, Beornings, Dwarves of the Lonely Mountain, Elves of Mirkwood, Hobbits of the Shire and Woodemn of Wilderland. These heroic cultures will be expanded as the geography covered by the game expands.

The game is not based on d20 which in some ways is nice for someone like me who plays a lot of d20 based games. Task/Skill resolution is determined through success dice (d6) and a feat die (d12). You roll a number of success dice equal to your skill level and the feat die. Sixes on your success dice improve your success and the feat die is a bit of a wildcard with a Sauron rune and Gandalf rune that also affect your success.

There is much more to the game, but this is simply an initial look at the game. In my full review I will get into more of the mechanics and such and how they fit into the feel of Middle-earth in this game, including a closer look at combat resolution.

At this point I am quite impressed by The One Ring. It really seems to hit the right chords in getting the feel of Middle-earth just right – at least for me. If you haven’t taken a look at the game yet and you hold a fondness for Middle-earth take a look. And keep checking back here for a more The One Ring coverage.

The One Ring at The Iron Tavern