Well, I wasn't entirely sure what to do. Gwyll's asleep, Aeron's injured.

I was wondering when the merchant with his henchman would show up?

Dunno. Not til Tharonwe contacts them somehow. Unless they are already out and hunting??

Who is playing them?

I have my hands full with Amroth, Mellondu, Mellonin, and Nethwador. So feel free....

Yes, I was going to play the merchant and his henchman as they are my characters....but, I was going to bring them back when the two parties (the Gondorian and the Rohan one) merged -- they are still going to merge, right??? I thought it'd create more conflict.

Yes, the parties will still merge, but I must have "Tharonwe" there to do it.

Villain, villain, o where art thou?

sorries all around
 

Sorry friends, I've been either busy (up until last night) or unable to get dial-up to cooperate (last night - grrrr.....).

My thought was to have the merchant and entourage meet the Raefindan group around noon of the current day; Tharonwe is using suggestion instead of anything direct, so they think they're on their own. This suggestion can be written into something Amroth can detect. So I'll make the meeting happen between Raefindan's group and the merchant's group, and Immy can take over the merchant from there.... and Helen can have Amroth show up just as soon as she likes. Of course, I'm writing this not having read anything since two days ago, so I'm sure this'll have to get edited.

HE'S ALIVE! hE'S ALIVE!!!!

Er, glad you're back, lmp!!

Shoot and durn it!
 

"According to the lore of hobbits, an evil race of cannibal spirits called the mewlips settled in certain marshlands of Middle-earth. Hoarding phantoms very like the dreaded barrow-wights they seemed, but they made their homes in foul and dank swamps. Travellers in their lands always walked in peril, for many were said to be waylaid by these beings." - Tolkien Reader

Durn it. We goofed... sort of. Tharonwe could have had Mewlips as his "orcs", per se. Phooey. Just goes to show I need to spend more time in Books discussions. :p

Guess it's too late now..... or is it? >:-)

Are they still in the swamps? IF they are, then it is never too late.

Mewlips
 

No, they're not still in the swamps, but Tharonwe's activities have been oblique to Raefindan's company, and frankly, I've been scratching my head a bit for just how Tharonwe has been pulling off all his stunts.

To have some kind of creature, called Mewlip, seems useful. I'm not sure exactly what they are, but will let the poem lead me in any descriptions. I'm thinking some kind of humanoid degraded by Morgoth into man-eating, evil creatures. I'll let the poem lead my descriptions, which I have handy in my bookcase.

"Mewlips" is really rather a Hobbit poem. I love it, but it is awfully cute.

I have no problem whatsoever with having the source of that hobbit-legend spring to life-- or un-life-- in the swamp, but if we **call** them Mewlips, they become cute and comical and I'd rather dodge that.

We can always explain (after some good, slimy horror) that these creatures were the source of the Mewlips legend for the hobbits.

I'm leaning towards the Swamp-dead, as in the Dead Marshes (yes, yes, that is their name.) They can be as mewlipsy as we want-- but let's call them something else?

Mewlips or whatever
 

I can't see Tharonwe messing around with the undead. Don't know why. I see the mewlips or merlocks, whatever you want to call them, as some kind of night-wakeful cannibalistic humanoid that has developed excellent survival skills for swamp life. Sort of Gollumish without the ring-lust.

Wrong place for this, except that I brought it up in this context, :p but it occurred to me that an invisible hobbit-eating Smeagol could possibly be the seed for the folklore behind the poem. Anyway....

By the by, I edited post # 484 to account for Gwyllion's nightmares of Aeron drowning.

Eeeeew.

Okay.

Merlocks would be a good name; hints at Mewlips but not blatant.

I'd rather not get sunken into a swamp battle that lasts for months unending-- what kind of thing do you have in mind? Ten of them? Ten thousand?

Maybe a half dozen. There aren't that many, I would imagine, since they probably would eat each other when they can't have human or fish or frog.

Ah! All-righty-o.

What kind of resistance will these mewMerlocks have to elves?

An elf in a man's body?

Are they affected by osanwe? Do men freak out about them? Who gets squeamish?

How do they attack?

Merlocks
 

How do they attack?

With their bare hands and teeth. Their greatest weapon is stealth and surprise.

What kind of resistance will these Merlocks have to elves?

Um, what do you mean by resistance? At any rate, I suppose no better than humans, being a type of human degraded by Morgoth. Or should they be swamp elves degraded by Morgoth? Hmmmm......

What kind of resistance will these Merlocks have to an elf in a man's body?

Same answer as above?

Are they affected by osanwe?

I reeeeelly need to read up on osanwe. I have my doubts whether we're even using it right. Could Elves affect orcs by osanwe? Same principle, I suppose.

Do men freak out about them?

Yes.

Who gets squeamish?

Anybody not trained for war or will power, I suppose.

Feel free to help me flesh this out!

We pause our regularly scheduled programming for a public service announcement:

:cool:


:smokin:

:D

Awww.....

*blushes and bows*

Thanks you guys!

Right...

A little late, but...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY IMLADRIS!!!

YAY! :D

Feliz cumpleaños!

-Aylwen

P.S. When exactly are the two groups (Rohan and Gondor) going to bump into each other? I've gotten lost along this long, winding road of discussion posts, and I'm unsure how much longer before the big get-together...;)

Happy B-day, Immy! How many?

I'm lost too. I have the general idea that the Amroth party is adhering rather strictly to the originally mapped plan, placing them at this moment close to the Anduin, just south of the south-most mouth of the Entwash.

As for the Raefindan party (erstwhile Ravion party - man, I got used to calling them Ravion's Rovers, and miss it!), I had Tharonwe send them on a more southwesterly way back out of the swamp than they went in. That would put them, more or less, near the mouth of the Mering stream! Which is quite a march away from Amroth et.al.

I suppose we could correct that to southeasterly, which not only makes better sense in terms of the merchant happening upon them due to the osanwe suggestions of Tharonwe, but it puts them in a more direct path toward Minas Tirith. Thus, they would now be only 25 miles (give or take) away from Amroth's group, instead of the 150 which would be the case if they were by the Mering Stream!

To be as exact as the map Helen has provided, allows, I see the Raefindan party just on the Anorien side of the southmost Entwash mouth, on that blue line Helen traced, which is directly above the mid-point between the "o" and "r" of Anorien. Make sense? That means that if Amroth and his Elf friends use osanwe for a while (now that I have better idea what osanwe is, and it seems we are using it right), will find the minds of the merchant and cronies, even if Tharonwe's mind remains hidden. And maybe they can see Mellonin's dreams, too. At any rate, Amroth would set forth at a gallop once he has discovered their location, and would rush to Mellonin, right? Then there are enough of them to take on the merchant party and get Aeron and Gwyllion back.... right? Of course, first Amroth would have to be convinced of their importance, which in terms of finding Nimrodel, um, would it be? Huh. Start thinking of how to convince, my friends. Of course, love and honor and friendship are highly valued by Elves, so I suppose that's the clear way forward.

Enough of my blather. Post away! And correct me where I've blundered, please! :D

Aww, thankee LMP! I am seventeen...wow...seventeen...that is so old. Well, it sounds old to me...I'm sure to the adults seventeen is nothing...

Will the merchant feel the osanwe?

Would it be all right if I bring on an attack of Merlocks in my last post?

Aywlen, what does "Feliz cumpleaños!" mean?

Happy birthday. :)

Yes, thank you lmp. Now I know exactly where everyone is supposed to be. Thank you...

It seems like (assumption, sorry if it's wrong) that Taitheneb would pity the humans, so he'd at least be convinced of their importance...

Off to school...ugh...

-Aylwen

I got in-laws coming for the night, so I won't be doing any more than this and I gotta make this quick.

I'd say that the merchant will NOT feel the osanwe. He strikes me as egotistical and money-hungry enough to be pretty unperceptive in any but ego-feeding and materialistic ways. Same goes for all his cronies.

It's up to you what you want to do with merlocks. They wouldn't appear outside their own area of control unless by the will of Tharonwe, though; and therefore, they wouldn't do anything unless Tharonwe wanted it done, such as attacking. They're not about to attack the merchant and mercenary group, because they're already doing what Tharonwe wants. There's no point in having them attack the Ravion party right now, because the merchant & mercentary group serves that purpose.

By the by, you surprised me by having other merchants. I had imagined this as being 12 men-at-arms with 1 merchant and his bodyguard, but your "extra merchants" thing works fine - we just can't water down the number of armed mercenaries too much.

Gotta go!

I filled in my save and, as I'm sure all of you were expecting, Aeron is *very* upset.

Okay-- so Aeron and Gwyllion are captive, Tharonwe is still hiding with Mellonin captive; Raefindan, Ravion and Erundil are Gond-less. Woot! The Gondorians are all high-stress! How is Jorje taking all this?

Likewise the Rohan team should be exhausted? Yawns, resentment, complaints?

lmp, unless you indicate otherwise, I'm thinking it's time for Amroth to thunder into the middle of all this-- I'll probably do the post tomorrow. (maybe hoping for a few more rohan posts in between-- Nuru? Aylwen? Alak?)

I think right now, Amroth would sense Raefindan-- I imagine his thoughts are pretty wide open, as well as is grief & worry for Mellonin; and Amroth has a bit of a link with Raefindan through the dream.

Raefindan can convince him that Mellonin is the woman he dreamt about.

I think Ravion should plead for Amroth's pursuit of Aeron and Gwyllion? Orual, does that sound plausible?

Ummmm-- I have (....counting...)8 people here, 5 of whom qare specifically here to see ROTK... so that post might not (probably won't) go up until tomorrow.

Hope that's OK....

I'm making one edit to my most recent post. It's basically to catch the leader of the mercenaries in his words. If he's so honorable, he wouldn't countenance the theft of Gond. Thought of that after getting offline. :D

Yes, I'm fully expecting Amroth to thunder in at any moment. Raefindan will be in the midst of telling Ravion and Erundil to start after the merchant, while he stays in the area to recover Mellonin (he hopes) or be picked off by the swamp elf (he hopes not).

Ravion may protest, unsure whether to go after Gond or stay to look for Mellonin. He may trust Erundil to handle the Minas Tirith part of the quest on his own, eh?

Amroth has thundered in, and on, and Raefindan is (once again) in over his head.

Will they pick up Erundil on the way by?

And those two ladies standing alone on the plains-- will they be there when the troop returns?

Ooo, I'm confused:

How would Aeron and Gwyllion help them find Mellonin?

Okay. Edited. Better I hope?

Yes. Much better. :)

I guess Erebemlin's eyes are better than Taitheneb's, but Taitheneb has the better ears...

Alak, how am I doing with your elves??

My save for Bellyn is filled. :D

-Aylwen

I filled in my save.

I just want to apologize that I haven't been posting as often as I should have been. Things have really gotten busy on this end. I'm sorry.

I think we are all busy... and this part does seem a bit fuzzy.

(Lord, inspiration please? How should all this pan out? And how can we best praise you in it?)

lmp, immy, I assume we want to simply overwhelm and disarm these mercenaries, and not kill them?

Will a blast of Osanwe and a little blade work do the job, do you think?

Oh, and about my Math-- if there were a dozen mercenaries and more than one merchant, how many men are there really? Immy?

While he's at it, Amroth will give the dratted merchant Such A Headache. Search and accuse a la Galadriel vs Boromir, I think. Any suggestions as to Merchant's weaknesses for Amroth to expose? And I think Aeron would get a sifting too, to determine what's really in his heart. What weaknesses does the merchant have that Amroth should play off of? What should they find in Aeron?

Immy, would you like to write that post? It would come immediately after the Overwhelm-and-disarm part.

Edit:

On second thought, how about Erebemlin does the Galadriel-mind-sifting bit?

Taitheneb can be busy reassuring Gwillion (there'll be bloodshed, though not fatal) and Amroth can be busy intimidating the men-at-arms; Erebemlin can vent some of his pent-up annoyance and frustration on the Merchant-- and then check Aeron out.

Alak, does that sound plausible?

*cough* Um...hehehehe....let's make it about a nice total of two disgruntled merchant and twelve mercenaries...that'd be fourteen men.

Oof...that's a toughy. The merchant is primarily angry because Aeron has been a thief most of his childhood and teenage years and has not been caught. He has had the good luck to catch him, and is denyed by a ranger no less. In his mind, that is pure and simple wrongness. In his mind, he is helping justice along by handing the boy over. Yet he is proud, refusing to listen to why Ravion is reluctant to give them over. His pride is injured that a boy has escaped him for so long, that this mangy cur dared to touch his gems.

Edit: the merchant has a twisted sense of nobility as well. That, I think, is a weakness...

Also, as was pointed out earlier, he has a weakness for his horse.

Does that help at all?

As for Aeron: though a late teenager I believe (can't remember his age exactly), Aeron is a boy. He never really grew up, and the growing up he did receive was not good. As Ponyboy said in The Outsiders: You see things but all the wrong things (paraphrased of course). He has a happy-go-lucky attitude that takes a serious crash to the ground when he feels betrayed. Currently, he thinks that Raefindan betrayed him, he's probably still ticked with Ravion, and he's concerned for his sister. Right now, all these things have come upon and he's confused and angry.

I hope I answered the question...

Post up! Sorry it's late; I've been having trouble keeping up, what with a crazy rehearsal schedule, opening in two weeks, and other things. I hope it's sufficient!

By the way, Immy--since I don't give out much reputation, I can't give you another boost, but I've been loving your posts lately. Your merchant reminds me a little of Javert from Hugo's Les Miserables.

~O

Aww....thank you...

I've posted; it's long, and the battle is incomplete (perhaps it's just started.) Suggestions & posts welcome! Otherwise I'll continue later.

I went back and counted; Immy, you had named two other merchants, one fat one thin. I left it at three merchants and twelve men-at-arms. I hope the math worked.

Tharonwe's desperation
 

Tharonwe and his five Merlocks now have control of Mellonin, Bellyn, and Argeleafa.
The women sleep.

Tharonwe is desperate. He has seen the merging of the two groups, and understands that his plans are in jeapordy. He is going to do all he can to save his plans and to counter Amroth's purpose. He will make threats, and will follow through on those threats.

So I have some questions:

I will not have Tharonwe kill off any of the three women characters unless I have the writer/player's permission to do so. Even then, I might not. But is anyone willing to let that happen?

If not, I have some other options along the lines of pain and defacing. Tharonwe will follow through on any threats.

One final thing: in the best story telling, the writer is not afraid to let his protagonists get into really hot water. In fact, things get worse and worse, and even worse, before they finally get better. The only way to have a eucatastrophe is if it looks like all hope is gone, and then the story turns anyway. I'd love to see us go there, but it means not taking the easy ways out.

I was actually in favor of not having a battle between the Group and the merchants and mercenaries, because they are "small fry" compared to the big enemy, Tharonwe. I'm feeling like maybe Tharonwe is a little too weak, and am trying to decide between finding ways to strengthen him, or create someone that is behind him, and even stronger and worse. :eek: Not sure which way to go. Reactions?