> Whenever someone asks what a good system for Middle Earth would be I
> recommend HeroQuest for precisely this reason.
It depends what your after. If you want crunchy rules, endless charts of weapons and spells and uber systems of pc/npc growth by year mechanisms then you probably will be frustrated by a system that asks the people playing it the questions, rather than the other way around.
For example you say you want a 30 year old farmer, Heroquest asks you how good at being a farmer is he, considering that a clan farmer has his best farming abilities in the 10M level and the best tribal guy is 10M2. Hmmm. Lets call it 1M2 - he's on his way to becoming a trbal thane - a real highg flyer.
What some folk seem to be looking for here is a system that requires the input of character data which will then be computed by a 'one size fits all' mechanism that will calculate a rating. So you go, um he is 30, this that and the other - do the math - um thats 8M, erm, I think I will bump that up to 1M2, he's on his way to becoming a trbal thane - a real highg flyer. Cut out the math and just go with what you feel god dammit!! :^D
In our games club people that play many different games, and you can see for example each D&D player with some book or other that they refer to constantly. Tonight I found I actually forgot my Heroquest rulebook!
I guess what I am lobbying for here is that people embrace the spirit of the incredible Heroquest rules and not add on clunky mechanics that sort of mirror systems that we had inother games, that were frankly imperfect then. However YGWV....
Now, if you want clunk then I recommend the new edition of Pendragon, which has the most gloriously elegant clunk you are likely to find, and hey, is just like playing a gang of Rokari or Hrestoli!!
All the best
Rob
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