Middle Earth Vs Forgotten Realms

[Chris77Se]

<blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Dramnek_Ulk:
Hmmm, I've always thought that Forgotten realms was better as it was that much more flexible for the DM, it also has a greater range of environments and characters, and you can use it to create just about any adventure you want to. I haven't actually played any middle earth RPG, but although it has a greater unifying overtone of the great battle against evil, it always seemed so stagnated, like a silent tomb of the imagination compared to the dynamism of the forgotten realms.

[ 02-16-2002: Message edited by: Dramnek_Ulk ]<hr></blockquote>

The official ME-RPGs are actually not set during the ring war, but about 1400 years before the events disribed in the books. Then the northern kingdom is still existing (as 3 seperate kingdoms) and there is a lot of politics and adventuring possible. And you have also some adventures in the far south or east, for example some long forgotten colonies of the Numenorians, which survived the 2nd age or some misleaded Noldo, who returned from the west an fell victim to Sauron. I even thought about running a campaign in the first or second age.

And I have to agree to Dramnek_Ulk, that the big picture of the struggle of good against evil and that the world actually was made after the novel makes the whole world a little to constrained for RPG. Although, as I said, If you play in the middle of the 3rd age, this isn't too restricting,because there are also some "neutral" factions present, Sauron isn't active, only his first Nazgut, the Witch King of Angmar, etc. But, then the players would probably never reach the big struggle of the War of the Ring (unless you have an all elven party).

There is something special about the realms. Middle earth is amasing, but not quite there.

[ 02-19-2002: Message edited by: Radiant_Memphit ]</p>

[Sir Byronas]

I like both of them!

[Lord Killjoy]

The icewind dale trilogy is a great set of books but you won't get a feel of the realms from them. even less of a feel from the dark elf they are to confined. If you want to truly experience the realms in all there vastness read the following:

Avatar trilogy (actually 5 books) first 3 then 2 add-ons

Empires trilogy

then start knocking out the harpers books. what are there only 15 or so?

then these:
spellfire, azure bonds, cormyr, elminster

then the other 30 or 40 forty books!

I have about 30 forgotten realms books and love them all.

middle Earth is middle earth and that's it.
Forgotten Realms can't be definded in 3 books there are 50 or 60 books out now and you could write a 100 more on totally different subjects and locales and never hit the same place twice. an actuall large chunk of FR about the size of the US is set aside for just for the development by FASA (an independent writer of gaming material and magazines for D&D) tell me another setting that does that.

as you can see I vote for the Realms.

[khazadman]

there's alot of stuff you can do to f.r.it is a whole world just waiting to be explored.but if you are talking just plain creativity i would go with m.e.tolkein created not just the races and their histories.he created languages,alphabets,calendars,and even genealogies.

[Tancred]

<blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Lord Killjoy:
The icewind dale trilogy is a great set of books but you won't get a feel of the realms from them. even less of a feel from the dark elf they are to confined. If you want to truly experience the realms in all there vastness read the following:

Avatar trilogy (actually 5 books) first 3 then 2 add-ons

Empires trilogy

then start knocking out the harpers books. what are there only 15 or so?

then these:
spellfire, azure bonds, cormyr, elminster

then the other 30 or 40 forty books!

I have about 30 forgotten realms books and love them all.

middle Earth is middle earth and that's it.
Forgotten Realms can't be definded in 3 books there are 50 or 60 books out now and you could write a 100 more on totally different subjects and locales and never hit the same place twice. an actuall large chunk of FR about the size of the US is set aside for just for the development by FASA (an independent writer of gaming material and magazines for D&D) tell me another setting that does that.

as you can see I vote for the Realms.<hr></blockquote>

Um... don't forget the Books of Unfinished Tales, the Silmarillion, the Hobbit and the dozen or so other books written about or around the concept of Middle-Earth. Like it or not, ME IS a world with a creation myth, a gradual evolving of culture, language, architectural styles, a scientifically-plausible geography and an incredible rescource of lore and history. It is a world you can study and study and become an authority on and actually learn something about our ancient world and linguistics and other things that actually apply to real life. FR, alas, isn't like that. It's far more abstract than ME, it's a hodgepodge of different ideas and thoughts, and seems a little... cheaper than Lord of the Rings. It feels too much like it was based on other things; the Drow are Moorcock's Melniboneans, the Halflings, Elves and Dwarves are Tolkien's races, then you have your stock-in-trade christian demons and oddly Greek mythology and your Arabic liches and your fairytale wizards and your steppe barbarians and your knights of valour and your Dungeons and Dragons class-based characters just everywhere. It doesn't feel 'real' enough - I can't imagine living in the Forgotten Realms, there are just too many gaps in the world. To put it succinctly, Middle-Earth was created; the Forgotten Realms were just made up.

Tancred. there ARE knights, demons and dragons in tolkiens world too.
And halflings is of the Forgotten Realms, Hobbits of Middle Earth (midgård).
The elves are a bit of rip of in the FR, but there are differences as well (they are short and have a limited lifespan i FR).

But I, as well, does also prefer Tolkiens world (do not forget Valinor) before any other. If one man dedicates 14 years of his life to write ONE story, carefully designing the world around it, and the inhabitants of this world, it can't turn out other than perfect.

<blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Akar Kessel:
START WITH THE ICEWIND DALE TRILOGY FIRST!!!<hr></blockquote>

NO! IT IS THE DARK ELF TRIOLOGY THAT YOU MUST BEGIN WITH!

[Morgeruat]

Icewind dale was written first, so you get a better idea of what the author had in mind for the characters at first by starting with it, but as long as you read it before moving on to the sequels (starless night and on) you'll be fine.

I definitely like ME better, Elmunchkin and other works of Ed Greenwood turned me off to FR for a very long time(good game designer, poor author), it was only R.A. Salvatore and drizzt that brought me back to reading the books. the problem is one that Dragonlance faces, a great idea that is diluted by many authors, not all of which are of the same quality either in storytelling, or conceptualization, leave something to be desired, or completely contradict another authors ideas of how something should work.

Tolkien had several ground-breaking ideas, and it was from many of these that d&d was based, such as the current incarnation of dwarves rather than the evil-minded sprites they once were, ie rumplestiltskin, and many of the ideas were based on the myths of diferent cultures, such as djinni and liches, but there was also a fair amount that was purely the work of either Gary Gygax(for d&d in general), or Ed Greenwood and the people that helped him(for FR) so yes Tolkien is a great part of the basis, and as such any in depth comparison of the two would show FR as a rip-off of Tolkien merged with historical myths.