Playing Lord of the Rings within Star Trek

[Doug Taylor]

Yesterday I was spending time reading over the different adventure ideas in the Narrator's Room when I got to thinking about the kinds of adventures that could be done in a holodeck. At first I was leaning towards doing something fun in a different time period, but as I reflected I realized that one could really go anywhere or do anything!

And then it hit me: I could do Lord of the Rings within the holodeck! We haven't played LotR for years, but our group is mostly the same people, and the systems are the same (for the most part) and we even have a character (our lowly Ensign) who is pretty skilled with a sword!

One thing I think I'll change is to allow our two characters who are familiar with a bat'leth the ability to be decent with a sword. Playing the rules correctly, our Captain, who has 9/12 (skill ranks/skill total) in Armed Combat: Traditional Klingon Weapons would end up being a 0/1 with a standard sword. And our Klingon First Officer would be close to the same. I think what I'll likely do is average the two scores (so the Captain above would have something like a 5/6).

For damage, since CODA doesn't really have any kind of 'stun' or subduel damage, and since this will be in the holodeck (purportedly with the safeties on) I will have to look at the 'Mook Rules' for LotR or figure out some other kind of way for the heroes to take some damage, but not to be cut to pieces by all of the sharp weaponry they face!

For the first scene I'm thinking I'll try to recreate the battle against the Cave Troll (yay - I'll be putting my Fellowship of the Ring Sourcebook to use!).

This should be fun!

[I'd love advice, commentary, or input, as this place has been really quiet lately]

[Doug Taylor]

The more I've thought about this, I'm leaning towards one of two things regarding allowing the 'proficient with a bat'leth or other similar weapon' being able to wield a sword well.

I'll likely either:

a) Allow them to use their skill numbers with a sword as if it was a bat'leth (they're going to be similar in many respects)

b) Give an affinity bonus much bigger than usual, probably 1/2 of their skill level with the more advanced skill.

So for our Captain as in my original example, instead of being a 0/1 with a sword, he suddenly would be a 0/6, making him decent enough to hold his own against most adversaries.

Seem reasonable?

[somaticon]

That's an interesting idea!. Not sure about the Batleth, sword comparison but I'd probably go with your idea.

[Doug Taylor]

I went with option (b), with a slight modification. I ended up using half of the person's other Armed Combat skill, as well as removing the -2 they get for having 0 Skill ranks.

I have to say it went very smoothly, and I actually liked how it worked better than with Lord of the Rings, only in that most of the characters weren't such beasts (with swords) that they automatically got Extraordinary results each time.

We have our own chart that we use for Superior and Extraordinary results (in LotR), and it was nice to have the Extraordinary results be the exception, rather than the rule.

The dozen Orcs and single Cave Troll I threw at them (recreating the 'Balin's Tomb' scene from Moria) proved to be the perfect challenge. The Captain was taken out, numerous characters were taken down to almost nothing left, and most of the characters (all but the Klingon) were severely challenged (even using up most of their Courage). Occuring as it did in the holodeck, it of course meant that they weren't really injured, either, as the safety precautions were in place to prevent actual injury.

All in all it was a fun session and it provided a welcome and enjoyable diversion for the crew. The Ensign who orchestrated it even got kudos from the Captain for his exercise in teamwork!

[Jem'hadar]

Interesting idea. I've always wanted to run a Holodeck adventure in Star Trek. Your idea combines both Decipher games for the same group of PCs.

How do you resolve the issue that in the Holodeck adventures, the PCs can't be killed? Since there's no actual lethal threat in any combat on the Holodeck (assuming no computer malfunctions or alien interference) the PCs have no reason to fear a huge horde of Orcs or even the Nazgul. The can go into combat knowingly they'll never seriously get hurt or no possibility of dying. Of course, they can always slip & fall & hurt themselves but no Holodeck characters can hurt them.

I'm curious if combat for your PCs was different in the Holodeck than in their "real life" in the Star Trek universe.

[Doug Taylor]

Good question, Jem'hadar!

That is true (that the characters were never in true danger), and both the players and their characters knew this. Of course there's always "the holodeck safeties no longer work" (which seems to happen as often as the transporters malfunction), but I didn't go that route.

So while there wasn't the "oh my gosh, we're about to die!" feel to it, it was still thrilling based on the fact that the adversaries were tough enough that they did massive amounts of "damage" to the PCs (and incapacitated a number of them).

I'd told them (at the start) that any damage done wasn't real (it was tracked in the computer, so they would be told by the computer/holodeck when they were incapacitated or taken out), so it didn't truly affect them. But we reasoned that the computer could calculate the normal penalties that would incur as damage was taken, so if a person was at -3, we incorporated that into the fight (even though the character truly felt fine and didn't suffer from any actual trauma).

It was really done just for fun, so it's okay that the PCs come out of it just fine.