TAngband: Tolkien Angband The purpose of TAngband is to create an angband variant that is true (or much closer, at the least) to the works of JRRT. Vanilla is currently (very) loosely based on Tolkien's works. In fact, very little would be lost if all Tolkien references were replaced, and there is much that just doesn't fit within 'historical' middle earth. Hopefully, TAngband will be a variant to correct this, or at the very least, to have some fun coming up with ideas that would correct this :) Races ===== Hobbits, half-orcs, half-trolls, Dunedain, and half-elves (sorry, Elrond need not apply :P) all have to go. Some new classes to consider. 1) Feanorian (kin of feanor) elves -- the equiv of current dunadain, with (much) lower wisdom 2) Fingolfinian (:P) elves -- the equivalent of the current high elves 3) Sindar (grey) elves -- 4) Haladrim 5) Beor's people 6) Marach's people (tall and warlike) Hithlum or Ered Wethrin 7) Dwarves 8) Possibly Turgon elves. 1&2 (and 8) are a bit iffy. I'm actually thinking of removing the kin of Feanor (possibly making them uniques, bent on stopping anyone but themselves from destroying Morgoth, and retrieving the Silmarils), and changing Fingolfian (doesn't that sound odd) to Noldor. Possibly green elves can be added. Gameplay ======== I'd to change things so that, instead of starting in a town (quite stupidly) placed atop angband, start in a place more apropriate (Noldor would start very close, grey elves in Doriath, dwarves in Belegost or Nogrod (Tumunzahar), people in the places where they should start (I'll look it up later :).) They'd have to journey thru Beleriand to Angband, and then start the perilous descent. The benefits of this approach: 1) It mostly gives a good relative start points for the (stronger) elves and (weaker) dwarves and humans (Feanorian and Fingolfin elves start very close)) 2) It will actually be sensible to have the weak creatures, typical of early dungeon levels, in the wild. I've always thought it rather stupid to have such terrible wimps in the dungeon stronghold of Morgoth :P Problems will definately include game-balance. Humans cannot be nearly as powerful as elves, in terms of the current game system. Another little neat idea would be to have names and places given in the game according to the language of the player race (this could be difficult with dwarves, tho, since I don't recall all that much being written about the dwarven language) Uniques ======= Obviously, a lot of the uniques have to be removed. I don't see this as a big problem, because uniques now are nothing more than slightly tougher monsters who drop slightly better equipment, and their spot can easily be taken by tougher normal monsters. I think it would be interesting if uniques could interact with the player, rather than just fighting with them (and even with the current uniques, it's quite out of character for them to be psychopathic killing machines). I'm thinking of uniques for most of the important personalities in the first age (time frame permitting) - Turin, Beren, Feanor (this would have to be very early), most of the important elves and men. This could afford for some interesting opportunities and quests (and possibly even playing one of these characters yourself!). Magic ===== This is what first prompted me to the idea of a 'closer to JRRT' angband. The 'casting spells from books, fueled by mana' is totally wrong for Tolkien's world. From his writings, magic was very much an inate quality, not to be learned, though it seems that the power could increase with learning and experience. Also, note that only elves and Maiar (and Valar, or course) had any powers of this sort (there appear to be some exceptions [Aragorn and Tar-Palantir come to mind right now]) These powers basically acted upon physical objects or the minds and wills of others, so were more closely tied to psionics than traditional magic systems. (weather control? But this should probably be reserved for the immensely powerful i.e. not player characters :P) Words, and songs in particular, have power in Middle-Earth. Perhaps a bard character can go in the place of the mage character, learning new songs and gaining a stronger voice as experience increases. Also, since these are mostly external, it will allow all races to choose to be a bard, keeping something of the current balance (tho they will be closer to warrior-mages than mages). A more complicated problem comes with magic in the form of lore, or the understanding and creation of items of power. These are huge parts of Tolkien's stories, and most magic used can be traced to these (the rings, the infamous Ringil :P, come to mind). The interesting thing is that basically anyone can create items of power. It is also known that an amount of the creators power must go into the item (and does not return. Sauron is a good example), and that the item acts as a kind of focus, increasing the users power by amplifying it in some way[1]. The items can still provide power to any user, of course, but the maker seems to get a big bonus in this department (or at least, has full knowledge in applying the power of the item). Perhaps this could make artifacts more interesting, as well (i.e. a dwarf wielding Ringil would get nowhere near the advantages a Noldor would). The question is how to represent this accurately in a player character, without things getting too nuts (a player with armour and weapons that make all the artifacts look like crap is not something that I'm particularly interested in :P) [1]: Probably more of a musing than an important point, but I have to wonder about the special, non-artifact items (i.e. weapons of Westerness). Particularly, I wonder if the inscription of runes can be considered a part of the process of creation (and therefore part of the creators transference of power), do the runes just make the weapon look pretty :), or is this just another case of language as a source of power in Tolkien? Classes ======= I can't see priests and paladins fitting in with the overall theme. Even the elves, tho mostly revearing the Valar, don't appear to actively pray to them, and, in any case, they weren't sitting around working miracles for everyone who would utter their name in middle-earth. The most you could generally hope for would be to keep Osse from drowning you (yeah, I know, I'm too lazy to set up my computer for the li'l dotties :/) Rogues could imaginably become more powerful through this (think Beren). Rangers are a bit on the iffy side, at least under that name, since that would generally only refer to the Druedain of the north in the third age. Probably become archers. Mages will be gone. Bards will step in to that role, I think. Warriors... well, they just keep on hacking and slashing :) Bards ===== Much more than the current magic system, bards and songs of power, etc, fit in with the world of Tolkien quite well. I'd like to make them different from the current mage (that is, don't just replace spell books with song books :P) They won't get nearly so many 'spells' as the current mage (no matter how hard or loud you sing, it's not going to cause fire balls to come flying from the air :P) Perhaps the type of bard will be determined strictly by the class, with elves having more defensive and enchanting songs, humans with more aggressive and warlike, and dwarves having very wierd and mostly unsuccessful songs :). LoreMasters =========== Time Period =========== This is where I really need to do some research... I'm thinking that it could offer a choice of time periods (after Fingolfin's death, for example), and this could work towards allowing different approx. length games. For example, a game taking place soon after the return of the Noldor to middle earth (or even before... very limiting to the race selections, tho) would be a shorter game (the dungeons of angband not being delved so deep). This would also force certain races (elves or dwarves), but that wouldn't be too bad, since you'd likely need a more powerful character to survive this anyway.