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Wednesday, September 25, 2024

Over the River and Through the Woods: A Party Game

One last game for this year's Tolkien Blog Party!  I hope you've all been enjoying the festivities thus far, and I look forward to catching up on reading all your posts soon.  But, for now, let's play a storytelling game!


All you need to play this game is a six-sided die (or an online number generator that will give you results between 1 and 6).  Simply roll your die once for each question, and the number you roll determines the path your adventure takes.


Who are You?

What Middle-earth group do you belong to?

1.  Hobbit
2.  Man/woman of Gondor
3.  Wizard
4.  Rider of Rohan
5.  Dwarf
6.  Elf


The Quest Begins

Where are you when you receive the call to adventure?

1.  The Shire
2.  Rivendell
3.  Minas Tirith
4.  Edoras
5.  Erebor
6.  Bree


The Call 

What is your quest?

1.  catch a runaway gingerbread man
2.  help a harried mother put her kids to bed
3.  find the owner of an abandoned glass slipper
4.  rid a village of some pesky giants
5.  find the queen's stolen tarts
6.  stop a talking wolf from waylaying travelers


The Helper

Who's going along to help you on your quest?

1.  Frodo
2.  Aragorn
3.  Gandalf
4.  Galadriel
5.  Tom Bombadil
6.  Eowyn


The Adversary

Who's trying to hinder your quest?

1.  Saruman
2.  Old Man Willow
3.  Shelob
4.  Gollum
5.  Lobelia Sackville-Baggins
6.  Sauron


The Conclusion

How does it all end?

1.  You succeed and are rewarded for your efforts.
2.  You succeed, but nobody really cares.
3.  You succeed, but you're badly injured in the process.
4.  You succeed, but you and your companion are both injured.
5.  You fail, but you resolve to try again later.
6.  You fail, and your reputation is forever tarnished.


Now you simply put it all together into a little story!  Like this, based on how my rolls went:

I am a hobbit, and I'm visiting Rivendell when I'm asked to stop a talking wolf from waylaying travelers in the surrounding woods.  My friend Gandalf and I are confident we can take care of this pesky little affair before tea, but we soon discover that Gollum is intent on stopping us!  Apparently, he's made friends with the talking wolf and thinks it will help him regain his Precious.  After a great deal of annoyance and not inconsiderable danger, we succeed in convincing the talking wolf that it would be wise to go waylay orcs in Mordor instead from now on.  But I am badly injured in the process when Gollum bites me while Gandalf is "persuading" the wolf to leave.  I have to remain at Rivendell for simply weeks while my wound heals, which I don't mind a bit ;-)


Your turn!  Comments are still on moderation thanks to the previous two games, but I will publish your answers to this game as soon as I find them in my inbox so we can all get a good chuckle reading them.

12 comments:

  1. Here's mine! :D

    This is the story of how I, a woman of Gondor, had an Adventure. (I beg the reader to bear in mind that Adventures are not always good or pleasant things.) I was visiting the Shire when I learned that a talking wolf was waylaying travelers. I didn't like this at all, having just spent and would soon again be spending many weeks on the road. Thus I, with the elf Galadriel, set out to confront this miscreant. We never, however, even saw the wolf, for our way was blocked by a huge web. Its weaver was no ordinary spider: monstrous and horrible in every way. Galadriel, looking very grave, recognized it and said its name was Shelob, and that its mother--well, I didn't want to hear. I ran. I suppose that was cowardly of me; certainly everyone else (who have never laid eyes on that beast!) says so. But Galadriel did more than run: she boarded a ship and sailed into the uttermost West. Meanwhile I live out my lonely days known to all as a shirker and tale-teller.
    If the reader can glean any wisdom from my unhappy experiences, then perhaps I can die satisfied.

    (. . . I have so many questions??? XD Thanks for providing me with a good laugh, Hamlette!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ruth, I mean, I would run from Shelob too. I have run very fast and very far from much smaller kinfolk of hers.

      Such a fun story! :-D

      Delete
    2. Spiders don't bother me that much, but Shelob? Nope. I am not sticking around to find out what her plans are.

      It was a lot of fun! :D

      Delete
  2. I am an Elf! (Promising beginning.) I am in Erebor (yesss, challenge those senseless cultural prejudices between Elves and Dwarves!!) when I learn that, for reasons unknown, it is imperative that I find the owner of a missing glass slipper. I frankly could not care less about this quest, but thankfully, I have Frodo (who also could not care less) to help me. The Dark Lord Sauron, par for the course of his historic obsession with accessories, is apparently mega-invested in making sure that we do NOT find the owner of the slipper. In the end, Frodo and I reunite the slipper with its rightful owner, but no one really cares, least of all ourselves, and we decide to travel to Rivendell for a little R&R as a reward.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Olivia, well, at least you kept Sauron from acquiring more fabulous accessories? Hope you and Frodo enjoy Rivendell!!!

      Delete
    2. Poor Frodo. Sauron needs a new hobby XD

      Delete
  3. I'm a wizard in Erabor! My quest is to rid a village of pesky giants, because we all know that's a wizard's specialty. My companion is Frodo, although I have no idea how he's gotten to Erabor in the first place. Along the way we come across Old Man Willow, who I have no idea who that is, but I guess he's someone unlikable. It seems like Old Man Willow isn't necessarily old in physical age because he defeats the two of us rather quickly. Now I must return home as a failure and my reputation so badly tarnished that even Radagast the Brown wouldn't think of hiring me.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ivy Miranda, haha! Well, Old Man Willow is a particularly unpleasant tree who traps and tries to kill Merry and Pippin (this happens in The Old Forest in the books, but in Fangorn in the movies). He seems just the sort to side with the giants! Still, how rude!

      Delete
  4. Very fun!! So I'm a wizard in the Shire when I receive the call to adventure (though, of course, in my case as I'm a wizard I'll be the harbinger of adventure xD). Which adventure is.... oh, to find the queen's stolen tarts (my least favorite adventure of all time, so yes, I'm definitely going to be superintending others in this venture XD). Fortunately, my helper is Galadriel. (Is finding stolen tarts a far too lowly use of her powers?? I literally feel like it's kinda scandalous. XD) Though, do we do have a scarily worthy opponent, because apparently it's Saruman who has stolen the tarts. And.... we succeed, but nobody really cares. (Haha. That's hilarious.)

    All joking aside, what a fun game idea. Thank you!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Heidi, perhaps they were Galadriel's tarts? She's basically a queen, after all. That might explain why she was so keen to get them. Though I suppose thwarting any of Saruman's plans is a good quest, regardless?

      Glad you had fun with it :-D

      Delete
  5. As it turns out, I am a dwarf who happened to be staying in Rivendell (rather an unusual place for a dwarf to be...I suppose I'm an extraordinarily broad-minded dwarf). I found a glass slipper, and it looked pretty important, so I decided to find its owner. Tom Bombadil sounded like the ideal person to help me, so I traveled to the Old Forest to enlist his aid. Unfortunately, Sauron took umbrage at my quest (it didn't concern him, so I don't know why; he gets these whims, I suppose), and he made things quite difficult for me and Tom. Eventually we did find the owner of the glass slipper, but she had forgotten she lost it and said it didn't fit her anymore anyway, and certainly no one else cared about it, so we might as well have not bothered.

    Thanks for this fun game! :D

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. LIzzie -- glad you enjoyed it!

      Sauron certainly does stick his nose in where it's not wanted rather often, doesn't he? Too bad no one cared if you succeeded or not, but at least you got to hang out with Tom Bombadil for a while, eh?

      Delete

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