Lord of the Rings mass battles

Like many fellow geeks, I was sucked into Middle-Earth during my junoir high days. There was a fantastic RPG put out by ICE around that time... fun, fun.

Nowadays, LotR is a hot property again thanks to the Jackson movies. Games Workshop has a line of very inexpensive plastic LotR soldiers that are perfect for building a mass-battle system around.

I haven't been able to invest as much time (or money) in this as I'd like, but I'm off to a good start.

Fantasy Wargame Dungeons Rules

I'm reserving this space for the Dungeons rules, once I have a good first draft ready to post.

Dungeon 3: Haunted Forest

Another dungeon planned but not yet executed. The only critters I have for it are a few DDMs and some Chainmail guys:

You got your owl in my bear!
You got your bear in my owl!
Two great tastes that taste great together... and then rend you limb from limb while you're helpless with laughter.



Crazed Minotaur Cultist:



Dire Boar:



A pack of Hyenas:



For the Master Adversary, I want a 'Dark Druid' type... I'm thinking Reaper's Vulthus Oathcroak will serve nicely.

Dungeon 2: Vampire's Castle

What's D&D without Ravenloft?

I don't have this map ready yet, but it shouldn't be too hard to at least draw up a floorplan. I'm building on 3' x 3' foam boards, with a 1.5" grid, which means 24 x 24 squares.

I do have some un-dead critters ready to go:

Reaper's Flesh Golem:



Mage Knight Metal Wraith:



Mage Knight Metal Shade:



Mage Knight repainted Stalking Skeleton:



Reaper pack of Skeleton Archers:



For the Master Adversary, I have Reaper's vampire mage Morrdha.

Dungeon 1: The Underdark

My first (and only, so far) scratch-built D&D map for this scale. My terrain skills are still in their infancy; fortunately, it's not hard to make half-decent cave walls.




Toxanimer strikes down an Abyssal Maw:



Elisha menaced by a Displacer beast:



Tristana versus the Caller in Darkness:

Lizardfolk lounging around the Black Water:

Critters in the caverns:

The Master Adversary contemplates further wickedness:

A Carrion Crawler... crawls:

D'Khul, Mind Flayer:

Carrion Crawler (Reaper's Charnel Grub)

Repaint of DDM's Caller In Darkness:

Chainmail Abyssal Maws:

Chainmail Displacer Beast:

A pair of Ghouls:

My first Reaper dragon, the Nachtlufte:

Colorful feller, ain't he?

Doggie Break

Time for some pics of my other loves:

Berger:



Zoe:

"We're so cute! Give us Crunchy Bones!"

D&D Heroes

The core idea of my D&D game will be that one player controls the Monsters (like a Dungeon Master) while each other player has a team of 4 Heroes: a Fighter, a Mage, a Cleric and a Rogue. The Hero players will score points by killing Monsters and recovering Treasure (or rescuing Prisoners, or what have you). Also, one of the Monsters will be the Master Adversary... and there will be Dragons. Oh yes, there will be Dragons.

Each of the Hero types is going to have (at least) 3 classes. Fighters will be Knights, Barbarians, or Archers.

My first Knight, Sarno Stonechild:



This guy is a repaint of the D&D Minis Stonechild.

Mages will have 3 classes: Wizard (buffs/debuffs), Sorcerer (direct elemental damage), and Druid (bit of both).

Toxanimer, a Sorcerer:



Loremistress Tristana, a Wizard (Witch?):



Archmage Valdarynn, another Sorcerer:



And Elisha Lightsedge, a Sylvan Elf Druidess:

Clerics will come in 3 flavors: Hospitallers (healers), Paladins (fighter/clerics) and Monks (buffs).

Tolzar, a Hospitaller and priest of the sun-god Pelor:

Rogues will have 3 classes: Thief, Ranger and Assassin.

Ridley Darkedge, a Thief:

I'm still mulling over the mechanics for Heroes, but right now I'm leaning toward starting them at 1st Level and advancing to 3rd (meaning a player needs 8 level-ups to max out his party). Third-level Heroes will be tough enough to take on Master Adversaries and Dragons; lower-level, not so much.

I'm thinking each class can have its own point system that it spends on uses of special abilities (thus giving a way to limit the more powerful ones). Fighters will have Action Points; Mages, Spell Points; Clerics, Faith Points; and Rogues will use Skill Points.

More to come as I work it out.