Thursday, September 22, 2022

Roll Your Own Middle-earth Adventure: A Party Game

All you need to play this game is either an ordinary six-sided die or an online number generator.  The numbers you roll determine how your Middle-earth adventure will go!


Share your adventure in the comments so we can all enjoy it.  (Yes, comments are still on "moderation" because of the previous games, but I will approve these as soon as I see them.)  You can elaborate on the different bits of your story as much or as little as you like.

You

Roll to determine what Middle-earth race you belong to:

1. Elves
2. Dwarves
3. Hobbits
4. Men
5. Ents
6. Maiar (wizards)

Your Quest:

1.  To reclaim your homeland from the goblins
2.  To buy a lifetime supply of pipeweed
3.  To find your family's lost heirlooms
4.  To learn to ride a horse
5.  To destroy all the spiders in Mirkwood
6.  To return a book you borrowed

Your Companion(s):

1.  Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli
2.  Gandalf
3.  Fili and Kili
4.  Merry and Pippin
5.  Galadriel and Celeborn
6.  Eomer and Eowyn

Your Adversary:

1.  Lobelia Sackville-Baggins
2.  Saruman
3.  the Goblin King
4.  Gollum
5.  Smaug
6.  Shelob

The Outcome:

1.  You all get eaten by a snake before you can complete your quest.

2.  You finish your quest and return home filled with quiet satisfaction.

3.  You abandon your quest in favor of trying out the latest batch of beer at the Green Dragon Inn.

4.  You succeed gloriously and return home in triumph.

5.  You succeed, but just barely, and spend the trip home debating whether it was all worthwhile.

6.  You complete your quest successfully and promptly set out in search of a new adventure.


Now just put them all together to make your very own little story!

Mine:

I am a hobbit on a quest to find my family's lost heirlooms, some small but sentimentally important items that I would like to hand down to my kids.  Eomer and Eowyn agree to accompany me on this search, and I'm very grateful for their help since I'll be facing Saruman and he's pretty scary.  Or, at least, I thought he would be scary, but when we got to Orthanc, he just threw my heirlooms down at me from a high balcony and told us to leave.  I guess he had better things to do than argue with a hobbit and a Horse-lord and a Shield Maiden over a few trinkets.  Having completed our quest successfully, the three of us returned my heirlooms to my hobbit hole and promptly set out in search of a new adventure!

19 comments:

  1. I love this type of game and I was wondering if you'd do one for this party!

    So...I'm a woman, intent on reclaiming my homeland from goblins. In order to complete this quest, I end up joining forces with Fili and Kili. On our way back to fight for my land, we meet Gollum and have an unpleasant, though short-lived fight with him. (Short-lived because I'm pretty sure Fili and Kili could subdue him in a minute.)

    In the end, I succeed in my quest and enjoy a life of peace and quiet satisfaction in my homeland. :)

    Your adventure was so fun to read about!

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    1. Eva, I realized that the reason I was holding off on doing one was not because I didn't have ideas for the adventure, but because coming up with the little options for how to decide which option is yours is just sooooooooo time-consuming. And then I realized that really, a dice roll would work just fine! So then I just tossed the whole thing together in like half an hour :-D

      Yeah,Fili and Kili would probably make short work of fending off Gollum. And I love the ending for yours!

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  2. It seems the RNG did think me in the same category as you (which I am not!). Only the ending was different. I tried to put it into a short tale:
    I was a young and foolish Hobbit, and one wonderful spring day I set out from the Shire to find your family's lost heirlooms. On the border I met Eomer and Eowyn patrolling. After hearing me out they took it on them to accompany me there and back again. I was happy, because it turned out it was Saruman himself who had made off with the heirlooms. After a long and arduous journey we arrived at Isengard, where we found the heirlooms in a discarded knapsack on his compost heap. When I grasped the bag, we were beset by orcs. I hid in a corner, clutching the knapsack while Eomer and Eowyn valiantly slayed the orcs.
    When the two exalted riders discovered the collection of silver teaspoons and other mathoms in the knapsack we spend the trip home debating whether it was worthwhile after all.

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    1. Charlotte, that's so funny that our rolls ended up so similarly! What is with Saruman stealing and then throwing away our heirlooms, though? Rude! Very glad your adventure turned out well in the end :-)

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  3. I'm a dwarf whose quest is to reclaim my homeland from the goblins, accompanied by Gandalf, and opposed by the Goblin King. (Well, that fits.) Fortunately, I complete my quest successfully (what else do you expect, with Gandalf along?) and promptly set out in search of a new adventure.

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    1. Samantha, wow, that's a really fun and fitting way for your rolls to fit together! I dig it!

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  4. I'm a dwarf trying to learn to ride a horse. I've traveled to the Shire on foot, but it's a good idea to learn how to ride in case I'm ever in a hurry. Gandalf is pretty much a pro at riding, having had thousands of years of practice, so I ask him to help me. He agrees because he never knows when he'll have to send me on an adventure. Since he can have to disappear at any moment, we also take Merry and Pippin with us. Lobelia doesn't like that we are practicing in the Shire. She says we are squashing the grass with how often I fall off. The number of times she whacks me with her umbrella motivates me to get it right. And I succeed gloriously! I buy Gandalf and the hobbits some supper at the Green Dragon with some gold sent from my cousin in Erebor and then I set off for the Blue Mountains. On foot. I'm a bit sore from riding and falling off and being whacked.

    ReplyDelete
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    1. Bethani, I feel like there's a lot of comic gold to be mined out of a dwarf learning to ride a horse, especially with Gandalf's help. I'm chuckling at the idea! Especially over Lobelia's protest -- so funny! Hurrah for your happy ending!

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  5. I am an Ent, and I have been trying to find my family's lost heirlooms. Merry and Pippin were visiting Treebeard, so I ask them to join me and help me get my things back from the Goblin King. Instead, they convince me to abandon the quest in favor of trying out the latest batch of beer at the Green Dragon Inn.

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    1. DKoren, how fitting that you got Merry and Pippin to help you on an Entish quest! And that they would rather visit the Green Dragon than face the Goblin King -- too funny!

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  6. I like your adventure. I suppose it's just like Saruman to just throw someone's heirloom down like that.

    I used the random.org generator. Here's the result:

    I am a simple man on a quest to find our family's lost heirloom, a bequest by my dying father. By some elf's advice I met on a drunken night, Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli accompanied me. My three companions were quite optimistic even when I told them we had to go to Mordor. For the one clue my father left was that, Shelob, the demon spider, was last seen with the heirloom. We found Shelob in her cave with little trouble but Gimli was stung right after he saved me from the creature's vile liquid that came from her mouth. But then she stabbed me but Aragorn and Legolas came and freed me. After a few struggles, she pinned the men to the ground. I picked up Gimli's axe and plunged into her, cleaving her almost in half. Something gleamed within the blackness of her body and that's when I found the heirloom. As we began our return home, I regarded my companions. Gimli was unconscious and lying on his horse though Legolas assured me he will be well in a day or two. Aragorn had an injured arm and scratches all over his face and hands and Legolas was left with a few scratches upon his pale face. And I was stabbed and I never shall forget the pain. I wondered out loud to my companions if it was worth the journey just to get this piece of jewel. Aragorn said, "A family's heirloom held much value even if the material itself held none. And beside that, you had a grand adventure to tell your grandchildren." I smiled at his words.

    This was fun. I like these type of games. Have a lovely day.

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    1. Lissa, I like your adventure too! How dare Shelob steal your family heirloom. Mean! Very cool that you were able to recover it, even if everyone got a big banged up.

      So glad you like these kinds of games :-) They're fun to come up with!

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  7. I decided to write a long version after the short one. Here's the link if anyone care to read it: Fiction: A Simple Quest.

    Thanks for the inspiration, Rachel.

    Have a lovely day.

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    1. Lissa, that is soooooo cool that you were inspired to write a longer version! I will have to check that out when I get a minute.

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  8. These games are so much fun! Here's my story:

    I'm a hobbit (yay! I wanted to be a hobbit) setting out on a quest to reclaim my homeland from the goblins (have they invaded the Shire?). I am a friend of Bilbo so Fili and Kili decide to join me once they hear what's going on. We find Smaug on the way, he challenges us to a game of riddles but as soon as we win and manage to escape from him, we abandon our quest in favor of trying out the latest batch of beer at the Green Dragon Inn to celebrate our victory against Smaug.

    That ending was kinda disappointing, I wanted to save the Shire!

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    1. Glad you had fun with it, Rose! Sorry your ending was a bit anticlimactic... but maybe defeating Smaug somehow draws the goblins away from the Shire, since it seems safe enough to hang out at the Green Dragon now?

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    2. That's a very good point I hadn't considered, thank you!

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  9. This was so fun! Love it!

    Mission log: I am a dwarf off to find my family’s list heirlooms. Merry and Pippin have kindly agreed to accompany me on my journey, which I fear may bring us face-to-face with the dreaded Goblin King!
    Mission update: I appreciate the high spirits of my companions although our travel progress is slow considering the almost constant stopping for meals.
    Mission update: After a long dark sojourn through the Misty Mountains we were faced the Goblin King and defeated him by means of surprise. Rather, I surprised him while the hobbits gave him a lengthy speech on food, pipe-weed, and the basics of hospitality.
    Mission update: We finished our quest and returned home filled with quiet satisfaction and ale.

    ReplyDelete
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    1. Lydia, I'm happy you enjoyed it! Your story made me laugh aloud -- I love the status update style! Good stuff.

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What do you think?

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