Monday, July 29, 2019

LOTR July Update

I got through chapter 9 and am now back on track with this challenge!

I mentioned in my Fellowship Review that I didn't make it through reading these last time I tried. Two Towers is where I failed last time. More specifically, Chapter 7: Helm's Deep is where I quit last time. How do I know? I almost quit this time too. So much battle and I just don't care. 

Chapters 1 - 6 were really entertaining though. I particularly enjoyed the bits with the Ents. Don't be hasty. I whipped through those so quickly... and then Helm's Deep... 

And then I finished chapters 8 and 9 fairly quickly.

I did appreciate the banter between Gimli and Legolas. I thought the kill counts were made up for the movies and was pleasantly surprised to find them in the text!

On another note, I've started playing Dungeons and Dragons again. (Last I played I was in high school. Now I'm the DM.) I can really see how much these books influenced Gary Gyrax when he developed the system. I'm still at the point where I read the Players Handbook over and over and over to try and keep the ideas in my head. The other day I had just read an Aragorn heavy passage in the Two Towers. That night, I was reading up on Rangers in the Players Handbook and realized that all the feats and skills etc are exactly the things Aragorn was doing in the book. The Woodelves are clearly Legolas. The best example was in our game, one of my players, a dwarf, was busy talking about rocks. Waxing poetical about rocks in such a way that he failed a perception check. A couple nights later, I read about Gimli waxing poetical about rocks. 

I only spent a little time in Unfinished Tales of Middle Earth this time. They were mainly more information on the battles at the Fords of Isen that happen between Theodred and the Orcs of Saruman. Might be nice for the one who really wants to know everything, but not necessary for me.

No comments:

Post a Comment