Any adventures you might add to the list?
Might be helpful to first restate what we mean by Middle Earth Adjacent. The author lays out a few themes: āā¦very few wizards, creatures who inhabit Middle Earth, and a more grounded, even somber toneā¦ā
I think Iād add:
Magic of any kind being subtle and rare (hence few wizards), with the possible exception of the sorcery used by enemies.
Extremely rare magic items, and those that do exist are deeply tied to the history and place.
Isolated and often hidden enclaves and small settlements in a vast wilderness.
The somber tone is often one of loneliness and melancholy and of living among the ruins of brighter times.
Maybe thatās a bit too on the noseā¦
Iām the author of the blog post and went back and forth a lot on trying to decide on how narrow the definition should be - I think your additional qualifications are great points, and I try to bring in those themes when I am converting adventures to Middle Earth. My only hesitation is if I was more of a āsticklerā I would be only be able to include a select few adventures, as the OSR tends to live in a more magical setting with more magical items and fantastic elements than Middle Earth, either in the fairy tale or the sword and sorcery tradition. I should have definitely mentioned in the blog post some conversion is always required!
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I agree with you completely, and why I wondered after I listed everything if I wasnāt being too specific!
When I look at āDnDā as a setting it often feels to me like Middle Earth and then layering on top every other thing. So itās about distilling the themes out of all that other stuff.
Iām running Nightmare over Ragged Hollow and aspects of that have a very middle earth feel. In particular the āBleak Mountainsā and āMount Mournā areas.
Iām using Cairn and agree with you that it has the right feel to support a Middle Earth inspired game. Iām definitely going to give Wilderlands a look!
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I think Nightmare over Ragged Hollow is a great example of a module that could be in the original blog post list along with a few ideas on how to align some of the more overtly magical effects (the bubble dome over the town for example) to a Middle Earth feel - but the bones are definitely aligned (and its a great adventure by itself!). Perhaps I should have spent a bit more time discussing some guidelines for how to convert other adventuresā¦
Itās a great post. I think the thematic elements weāre discussing are as much, or more, about what you put back in or wrap around a module once you strip out the elements you donāt want. But Iād love to read more about your process. Maybe a deep dive or case study example in a future post?