Scarburg Meadhall Discussion Thread

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Nogrod

Also, if we wish to have some added interesting characters, we might leave one or both of lord Athanar’s sons there – they were really reckless guys when they were young the last time we wrote about them. It might be interesting to see what kind of men they would turn out when growing little older.

Lord Eodwine should, I think, be the lord and eorl but he’s clearly getting older – which I then think would make Thornden ever more important character in the Mead Hall (he was alredy appointed a seneschal by lord Athanar), if Folwren is ready to take that.

That combination would be interesting to develop, since all of a sudden W&W (or at least the elder of the two) would lose his status as the "son and heir" of the eorl, seeing as Athanar is no longer eorl - and maybe they would actually start behaving like actual men...eventually?

And Athanar leaving would create the same situation as Athanar coming, but in reverse, and potentially stir old grudges, but this time I think the grudges would be mild and brief, because 1) Athanar leaves in honour at the request of King Eomer to see to another challenging task, he's not just dismissed, 2) Athanar's men saw Eodwine in action and know he's a worthy man, 3) the two households have had time to begin respecting each other and cooperating, and they are above open quarrels for the most part, and 4) bringing up the old tensions is like chewing cud - it's boring to rehash the same story.

Originally Posted by Nogrod

Plotwise I think the local lords could be a wealthy supply of problems, like fex. they had acted "decentlyish" as long as Athanar was there (as they had learned for good that he can play it tough as an eorl) but with him gone - and them not knowing Eodwine - they'd form a conspiracy or even rebel openly - whatever we wished.

I vote for open rebellion. Maybe even a justified rebellion - overall wrong, but not without cause. Maybe some of the lords would feel rightfully wronged by the eorl(s) or by their men, or there is some misunderstanding that ends in tragedy. That way they aren't just jerks either, and they may have the support of some of their people (otherwise the rebellion wouldn't be sustained unless they hired brigands or something). Thoughts?

Originally Posted by Legate of Amon Lanc

In any case, I'm all for some local trouble stirring there. Like G55 said earlier, you can only spend so much time describing how people are eating their breakfast. Although I am not as bloodthirsty, I don't think we need a full-scale bloody rebellion or all-killing plague, but something dramatic, and rather closer to the too dramatic side than to the peaceful side, would not be bad.

An all-killing plague! That's perfect!!! <3 No, seriously - it's plausible within the setting, it puts pressure on individuals and on the entire Meadhall alike, and it creates tension when developing the story. A plague a plague a plague! Delicious!

Ok, sorry, I suppose I am more bloodthirsty than most of you here, so I won't push on with it, but I do think that an event like that could be kept in mind to be used in the future.

Another alternative drama could be the disappearance of some man/men. Just plain old disappearance. No one knows what happened or where they went. We may or may not know what happened or where they went. And that could lead to search parties and unwanted discoveries of... I dunno. Things.

I've reread the last 3-4 pages of the thread, and there are a few notable subplots/details that I think deserve attention. Firstly, there is stuff brewing between Ginna and Harreld. Are they now happily married? What did her father say? Then there is some very different stuff brewing between Rowenna and Scyld. That probably needs resolution, or at least continuation (re: Firefoot: to avoid the too-rapid transformation, Scyld could have been sent away or gone away to do some task for a significant amount of time. Say, a group of Scarburg men was dispatched to aid the reconstruction of a village after the whole thing birned down in a harsh fire during a very dry summer, and due to complications the project lengthened. The whole thing could be described briefly in passing, but Scyld's character development would sort of be put on pause, or perhaps he could reflect on it in a flashback). Then there is the dead body, which Rowenna and Scyld (well mostly Rowenna) decided to investigate. I can't see how this plot line can be suddenly reopened again after several years. Either we drop it or we flashback-narrate it. Finally, Athanar was bothered about Saeryn's parade of her condition and her martyr-like show/attitude, and he considered ordering her to stop working so much but was loathe to give her commands in her own house. Now that Eodwine is here, though, Athanar could do the thing discreetly with his help, and Ledwyn's coming would have been an argument in his favour, so my guess is that the three of them would convince Saeryn to lay down her duties for a while. She would also probably get a few months of "maternity leave". I don't think she would stay away from her position as the Lady of the hall for very long, but it would be a few months at least. How would people react to her coming back? How would she feel if in her absence as the person in control things started going differently somehow?

So there. I agree with Firefoor - I think that we don't need a too long jump to get out of stagnation. But then again, some characters are hotter coals than others - I can see how the Harreld, Ginna, Rowenna, Saeryn, Scyld, and the children would develop much faster than, say, Hilderinc or Eodwine, who are in a way already established and slow to change, and therefore would benefit from a shorter jump, while on the contrary someone like Hilderinc would benefit from a longer jump... Oh the indecisiveness...

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by Firefoot

I guess I don't really understand the push for a large time jump. I've been thinking about it quite a lot the last couple days and I feel like I could do three years. My biggest problem is with Scyld's development (and if I'm honest, the way his relationship was progressing with Rowenna) - that's something that's not going to remain stagnant for an incredibly lengthy amount of time, but I also can't write that development independently since it depends on another character's writer. To get to three years, I'm probably going to write in that he left for a while (and I have an idea to work that in), but five years is a long time. In some ways at least I think Scyld is on his way to being a very different person but I can't just gloss over that and skip to the end without it feeling totally contrived.

I think it's what G55 said, the "new" characters who had just acquired their personality, or characters who are already fairly established and are not currently growing, would benefit from longer time jump simply because it gives the chance to go fresher with them. It's like Bilbo Baggins has been introduced in the first chapter, then it's nice skipping over the trek through the Shire, Bree and most of the wilderness until we reach the trolls, because there isn't really much room for development. Obviously, the problem being that not everyone is on the same boat and just when we last left off, there were a few plots going on at the moment, involving basically three or four characters, one of which being Scyld, so it's logical from your perspective, it would even be logical to continue just at the very day we left off. And exactly, the same with others who are not present - the main problem I see with any longer time jumps is that there might be players who would like to continue writing their characters as they are, because there is material for growth here and now (although again, often upon thinking about it, a time-jump could serve better).

As a side note to the time jump, although I would not personally submit "creative license" to "realism", it would be more realistic if more shifting of lords didn't occur too quickly after each other (already we had the unusual case of Athanar being appointed to replace Eodwine, and then suddenly in a matter of weeks upon Eodwine's unexpected recovery the shift occuring again).

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

And Athanar leaving would create the same situation as Athanar coming, but in reverse, and potentially stir old grudges, but this time I think the grudges would be mild and brief, because 1) Athanar leaves in honour at the request of King Eomer to see to another challenging task, he's not just dismissed, 2) Athanar's men saw Eodwine in action and know he's a worthy man, 3) the two households have had time to begin respecting each other and cooperating, and they are above open quarrels for the most part, and 4) bringing up the old tensions is like chewing cud - it's boring to rehash the same story.

Yep, I think we should stay away from the "old lord/new lord/old people/new people" grudges and not touch them even with a ten-foot pole, only occassionally if it really sounded like it might be fun and there's a good reason for it. Heck, I even thought we technically got over it already in the game itself - the stuff was essentially getting settled, as far as I am concerned. And after several years of living together, I think we could more or less gloss over it.

Originally Posted by G55

I vote for open rebellion. Maybe even a justified rebellion - overall wrong, but not without cause. Maybe some of the lords would feel rightfully wronged by the eorl(s) or by their men, or there is some misunderstanding that ends in tragedy. That way they aren't just jerks either, and they may have the support of some of their people (otherwise the rebellion wouldn't be sustained unless they hired brigands or something). Thoughts?

Not an uninteresting idea, the question would exactly be how and why. Currently I don't have any ideas, but I'll think about it. Side note - I would not like, however, this to turn into a "war RPG" - I haven't been in Scarburg that long, but it always seemed to me rather on the peaceful side, and certainly I'd prefer it to be more like drama than to turn it into "Eodwine slashed the first soldier, then the second, then he killed four Orcs. Next post: Sixteen new orcs arrived and attacked him."

Originally Posted by G55

Another alternative drama could be the disappearance of some man/men. Just plain old disappearance. No one knows what happened or where they went. We may or may not know what happened or where they went. And that could lead to search parties and unwanted discoveries of... I dunno. Things.

Same as above. Sounds good, but whereas I like the "not knowing and planning on-the-go" part, I am very, very, very well aware of the pitfalls of that, because that easily turns to be "um... yeah... we've been writing for fifteen pages, searched the whole Rohan, and still have no idea what happened in the first place". I'd be for it, but we probably should have at least some idea, not necessarily even who or what did "it", but at least what we're trying to accomplish by that.

Originally Posted by G55

I've reread the last 3-4 pages of the thread, and there are a few notable subplots/details that I think deserve attention. Firstly, there is stuff brewing between Ginna and Harreld. Are they now happily married? What did her father say?

I think this is most of all the issue of their respective players. I think that's one thing we should figure out anyway (regardless of how far we timejump, even if we didn't timejump at all), try to check with players of previous characters, if they are still interested, if they have any vision for them, if we should rather quietly move them out of sight for the time being (exactly - "Ginna and Harreld settled for a time on a small farm nearby...") if the player isn't planning on returning now, just in case we don't do something they wouldn't consent to in case they wanted to come back later ("Ginna and Harreld both died in the terrible plague last winter - oops").

Originally Posted by G55

Then there is the dead body, which Rowenna and Scyld (well mostly Rowenna) decided to investigate. I can't see how this plot line can be suddenly reopened again after several years. Either we drop it or we flashback-narrate it.

Unless it somehow was never solved, swept under the rug, whatever, and it might serve as starting point for some later cases (e.g. the sudden disappearances [TM] - it will be revealed that it was the work of evil Sméagol, who has been lurking around and kidnapping poor villagers ever since, until he finally became too bold for his own good, kidnapped a few of people straight from the Mead Hall at once, and that started our new pursuit!). To be honest, I have no idea what it was supposed to be to begin with - Firefoot? Was there a specific idea behind that?

Anyway, generally speaking, to me, it really doesn't matter how long time jump we make. But I don't have anything against making it longer rather than shorter. Three years is decent already, in any case. But could be much more or even less.

Of course - random thought at the end - we could jump just a little ahead (a few years) and into the "Fell Winter" idea of Nogrod's with people dying left and right (happy, Ms. Plaguebearer?), and do something there. I think the main point of time-jump is though that there should be some time between Eodwine arriving and Athanar leaving, and between Athanar leaving and our start (at least some time so that the new routine has been established).

[Thinlómien]

Originally Posted by G55

That combination would be interesting to develop, since all of a sudden W&W (or at least the elder of the two) would lose his status as the "son and heir" of the eorl, seeing as Athanar is no longer eorl - and maybe they would actually start behaving like actual men...eventually?

And Athanar leaving would create the same situation as Athanar coming, but in reverse, and potentially stir old grudges, but this time I think the grudges would be mild and brief, because 1) Athanar leaves in honour at the request of King Eomer to see to another challenging task, he's not just dismissed, 2) Athanar's men saw Eodwine in action and know he's a worthy man, 3) the two households have had time to begin respecting each other and cooperating, and they are above open quarrels for the most part, and 4) bringing up the old tensions is like chewing cud - it's boring to rehash the same story.

Wulfric and Wilheard behaving like actual men? Wow you're feeling optimistic today...

I think a three-year time jump would be a nice compromise for those who might want to see long term character development taking place in their characters and to those who have more pressing matters to solve. I don't see any problem with writing a couple of interludes, eg. with Scyld and Rowenna if there's something that needs to be addressed.

As for what happened during the time jump, feel free to use Wulfric and Wilheard as culprits. Maybe they did something stupid that forced Athanar to take King Éomer's invitation and resign himself and (most of) his household from Scarburg. You know, plotting with the local separationist () lordlings or assaulting kitchen staff who are under Athanar or Eodwine's protection. You name it, they probably did it. And then if we wanted extra trouble, they could reappear to stir up a subplot in the new timeline.

Or maybe they stayed and matured a little, possibly going away on a campaign to Harad or the East with an éored for a year or two, and maybe once they came back Athanar and Eodwine named one of them in an important position in the household upon Athanar's departure? And then that one could have little cockfights with Thornden in the new timeline?

Whatever sounds the best. I mean, writing for those two idiots was great fun but I'm afraid it won't be as fun if they go full chaotic evil or if they grow up, but I'm okay with that. I mean, I haven't written them for years. I won't regret if I let them go now.

(Ackk now I'm thinking, maybe they indeed went on a campaign and Wulfric - the older and bolder one - actually died, and Wilheard returned to Scarburg with his head down, grieved and alone, and his unpredictability hidden but even more dangerous... that could make an interesting plotline for certain.)

[Mithalwen]

Ok I don't really want to get involved in the discussion much since I feel it is for the writers of existing characters to do what is right for them and for the newcomers/ returnees to fit in. However I just thought I would mention, and I hope that I am correct since I don't have access to many texts atm, but if the Mead hall was previously in late FA15 wasn't it the next year that Elessar went to dwell a while by lake Evendim.

I know that it doesn't effect Rohan directly but there must have been an increase of traffic and not necessarily exclusively consisting of denizens of Gondor. I am sure many would have taken to have a relatively safe adventure. Anyway I will wait and see what is decided.

[Nogrod]

I think I'm being a somewhat realist in thinking that whatever we'll do with the new installment / continuation of the Mead Hall it will take several weeks or month(s) before we are up and writing it again. Therefore I think it very plausible all different considerations we'd need to think can be thought of & solved both individually and via a lot of PM'ing between the owners' of the characters in need of dealing with. I don't think there is any hurry. At least there shouldn't be.

It is very true different writers & characters are in different situations. Some might easily make a ten year jump and it would be only more interesting that way. For some others it would be much harder - or more of a jump into relative darkness where one would need to just decide or negotiate a bunch of things before we continue.

But considering what I said above about us having all the time we need, we could arrange for some "inrterludes", as someone called them, and give everyone a chance to write their character's POV posts about the years we jumped over (possibly collaborated posts with some other writers if there would be some important relationship-issues to solve) before we actually jump forward and start / continue writing the actual story.


~*~

Why I favoured a longer jump was that it would make it easier for the new writers to fit in as the shadows of the past would be lighter.

And for some reasons, well actually for quite many, I still favour a longer jump. For example I think it would do good to us former writers as well to take some distance.

It should naturally be a shared decision - and so I'm going to be happy with whatever that decision is, especially as I'm looking forwards to giving the reins back to lmp once again.


~*~

Just as a general point of agreement... I too think the Mead Hall is not a war game (I still find it odd collaborative storytelling is called 'game' in Barrow Downs) and should stay like that. But it should be drama for sure.

So a hard winter, a plague... we should have something along those lines to get rid of the enmities and to just throw away the characters whom no one is going to write (or adopt) for.

In general terms, it should not be too hard to come up with a plot concerning the local lords causing problems to the Mead Hall. They wouldn't be a unified gang any more (which I think was one of the major outcomes of the Mead Hall's confrontation with them as we wrote it), but it should provide us with a lots of nice plotting.

With some of the other ideas I'd tend to agree with Legate that we should have a point for them first. Just writing anomalies and seeing if they catch up or not isn't, imo, the most fruitful approach to writing in general.

Also I think we should get rid of Athanar even if I kind of really started to like writing him. And probably his household as well. But we could leave some soldiers, especially those who have writers, just with the pretext of not letting the Mead Hall fall too weak (by King Eomer's orders I presume). And what Lommy said about the brothers here could be just real messy (in a positive way)...

Originally Posted by Lommy

Or maybe they stayed and matured a little, possibly going away on a campaign to Harad or the East with an éored for a year or two, and maybe once they came back Athanar and Eodwine named one of them in an important position in the household upon Athanar's departure? And then that one could have little cockfights with Thornden in the new timeline?
...
(Ackk now I'm thinking, maybe they indeed went on a campaign and Wulfric - the older and bolder one - actually died, and Wilheard returned to Scarburg with his head down, grieved and alone, and his unpredictability hidden but even more dangerous... that could make an interesting plotline for certain.)

I mean we could come up with a nice combination of these ideas...


~*~

What else?

Mith's finding could be fruitful. And it is a nice spotting.

But it is at the same time a bit "earlyish" for our plans of jumping a little more than just a year. And on the other hand, there just being more people wandering around in Tolkien's universe by the time X might not be that important because we can always come up with reasons to introduce wanderers to our Hall if we wish to (we've come up with reasons to bring dwarves, hobbits, elfs, rogues etc. to the Mead Hall thus far with no problems) - or if we wish more of them wandering around, we can come up with a reason for that as well.

Or could it be the kind of a nice background story we'd tell happened during our jump - that besides the terrible killer-winter / plague, there were a year or two of lots of people coming to and fro - and maybe some of our newcomers to the story would be ones who had visited the Mead Hall by that time and had come back for some personal purpose? Wouldn't that actually be a nice place to start writing a new character?


Okay. Stopping my thinking aloud for the time being...

[Firefoot]

I certainly hope it doesn't take months to start writing again! I think we have momentum now and the longer it takes to actually start writing, the more momentum we lose. And personally, I'm really eager to start actually writing again. I don't think we necessarily need to have all the details worked out - we can leave some room for making it up as we get there.

In the interest of expediting things, I've attempted to make a character list of all the characters currently at the hall, no longer how long ago they were last written about. I've grouped them by characters whose writers have expressed interest in continuing the story, characters whose writers we haven't heard from, and NPCs, along with a brief description to let those who are new or who have forgotten sort of who they are (character bios linked on the first page of the discussion thread). From this we can create a shorter list of characters who will still be around at the time when we pick up.

Characters with Active Writers
Athanar son of Herewald - new Eorl of Meadhall (Nogrod)
Stigend – Carpenter (Nogrod)
Modtryth – Stigend’s wife (Lommy)
Cnebba – Stigend/Modtryth’s son (Nogrod/Lommy)
Wulfric & Wilheard - sons of the new Eorl (Lommy)
Rowenna – Serving woman (lmp)
Eodwine – Former Eorl (lmp)
Master Falco Boffin – Hobbit (lmp)
Harreld Smith – Smith (lmp)
Garreth Smith; - Smith (lmp)
Laerdil – Elf (lmp)
Léofric (Leof) – Ostler (Firefoot)
Scyld – Formerly of the household where the new Meadhall was built; makes himself useful where possible (Firefoot)
Ledwyn and her son, Theolain – Recent arrivals to hall (G55)
Hilderinc – Athanar’s soldier (Legate)

Characters with Inactive Writers
Coenred (Coen) - Athanar's right hand man/in charge of his men (Durelin)
Tyrdda – Serving woman, originally from Scarburg area (Durelin)
Raedwald – Soldier, did not come with Athanar (Eonwe)
Thornden – Eodwine’s 2nd in command (Folwren)
Javan – Thornden’s younger brother, assists in stables (Folwren)
Saeryn – Eodwine’s wife, lady of the hall (Folwren)
Quin of Edoras – One of Athanar’s younger soldiers (Folwren)
Náin son of Narin son of Nori – Dwarf (Formendacil)
Crabannan – “Trouble-maker”/Jack of all trades (Gwathagor)
Wilcred – Seems to have come to Scarburg with Eodwine (Gwathagor/NPC?)
Kara – Serving woman (Kath)
Frodides – cook (Kath)
Ginna – serving woman (Lhuna)
Randvér – Ginna’s father, not necessarily at hall (Lhuna)
Lilige Wynflæd's maid (loslote)
Wynflæd - wife of Athanar, the new Eorl (Mnemosyne)
Balvir – soldier (Nerindel)
Iomhair – young woman (Nerindel)
Aedel – young woman (Nerindel)
Matrim Astalder - soldier, caretaker of Aethel (Nerindel)
Ædre - daughter of the new Eorl

NPC's
Baldwic – soldier (NPC)
Fearghall – soldier (NPC)
Áforglaed – soldier (NPC)
Scyrr – soldier, troublemaker (NPC)
Aldric – soldier, womanizer (NPC)
Garstan – Stone worker (NPC, originally Celuien)
Garmund – Garstan’s son (NPC)
Leodern – Garstan’s daughter (NPC)

For a start, I'd recommend writing all of Nerindel's characters out - she only wrote about 5 posts for all her characters in the thread. Eonwe's character Raedwald can probably go as well; he hasn't been active in a long time. I'd be hesitant to kill off (distinctive from write out) any of Folwren or Durelin's characters since they were active "recently" in the hall thread. Wilcred has not been written about since the very beginning of the Meadhall thread - he can probably go. Not sure about Crabannan - Gwathagor sometimes pops up. Kara, Frodides, and Ginna are long-time fixtures of the hall - not sure how that affects what we do with them (also sort of depends on Ginna's romantic sub-plot...). Aedre, Wynflaed, and Lilige can all go with Athanar. And Nain can just be out and about - as a Dwarf, he's obviously not from Rohan and need not be present at the hall. Thoughts?

Obviously anyone present can make their own decisions about their characters.

Thoughts on the NPC's from the writers who have had more to do with them?

As far as the intervening timeline, I think a hard winter followed at some point by Athanar and co leaving is a good outline; should be enough of a basis for people to start thinking/writing about their characters in the interim. And as far as the conspiracy/rebellion goes, what sort of details do we need to hash out before starting to write? I personally don't feel over-concerned about this as I feel like I can create enough personal drama for my characters regardless of the overarching plot-line, but understand why others who are more involved might feel differently.

I just don't want this to stagnate with ideas and lose new writers while we sit around hashing out the details. Hope this helps a bit.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Good job, Firefoot. Just a short comment from me now - I think basically what's been said here all makes sense to me. As for the starting, we sure are not in any rush, although I can also understand the eagerness to start. In any case, I think it's good to do something. I think nothing prevents us to plan more details (and Firefoot has already supplied us with first thing to sort out. Maybe we could try to e.g. contact Lhuna and Kath and Gwath regarding their characters?)

And at the same time, whoever wants can start on working or even write some details about what happened to their characters during some of the transition, like Nog suggested. So exactly if Scyld would seem to have ongoing stuff which can happen before the transition, that can be written, or at least some of it, which isn't dependant on the final shape of the transition. But if we roughly agree e.g. that there was normal routine for a year, also maybe some bigger random happenings around the King-spedition that Mith mentioned, then some evil winter, and eventually Athanar leaving on Éomer's call, people already have enough basic background info for writing something. Or at least trying to make it clear which direction their character's development would take during the time, which is something all of us would have to think of at any rate.

Or I don't know, if somebody would be really hyperactive to write, of course nothing would prevent in the meantime to continue in the "present" just where we left off on the thread if they'd have stuff to do; the main point however being anyway that we want to sort of bring people together on this and start a bit further "properly", as so far I think the main issue for most is to get to a spot where something is happening which can involve everyone and we have something to start from.