Review – The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying: Starter Set

The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Starter Set is Free League’s LoTR game set in 5th Edition, packaged as a Starter Set for the first time. The Starter set comes with a small rulebook to get you going on the rules, a 3-part story that should take about as many sessions, 5 pre-generated characters based on relatives of known characters from LoTR and The Hobbit, enemy and character cardboard standees, a set of 7 dice with custom success and failure symbols on the 20 and 1 respectively, and a fold-out map that doubles as a combat map. Read on to see if it’s everything you’ve wanted and more in a roleplaying game starter set!

Content Guide

There aren’t any images scarier than the sides and backs of the goblins you can see on the cover. During part of the story, players will find a sacrificial pit with animal bones in it. The main big bad character revels in having crushed other would-be heroes, but if any of those elements don’t play with your group you could tweak it slightly without changing much of the story.

Review

Having originally started as its own roleplaying system under The One Ring banner, The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying (5E) has yet to get its own starter set until now.  The box comes with everything a group could need besides pencils and a screen for the Loremaster (this system’s version of GM/DM). And of course more dice. 

The rules booklet included does a good job of giving the basics, the biggest difference of which is Shadow. Players gain Shadow points to represent the difficulty in facing an almost all-powerful enemy with a near-endless supply of evil minions. Shadow can be resisted with a saving throw, but if players are ever about to commit a Misdeed then they will gain Shadow points with no save allowed. When the number of Shadow points accumulated equals or exceeds half a Player’s Wisdom score, they become miserable and will fail dice rolls on a 1 or a 2. Should their Shadow Points increase to the full amount of their Wisdom score, they become Anguished and have Disadvantage on all dice rolls. There are a few other differences to a vanilla 5E game such as Combat Stances, Council, and Journeying, but Shadow is the most prominent change. 

The included adventure, “Over Hill and Under Hill,” sees the players meeting in a tavern, travelling to a dangerous location, having a couple encounters, then facing off against the big bad. Very standard RPG stuff, but appropriate for an on-the-rails starter kit. Just know that there isn’t much here that will wow any roleplaying veteran, but if your players are fully invested in Tolkien’s universe there will be plenty for them to get excited about. For example, you’re not just meeting in a tavern in Act 1, you’re meeting at The Prancing Pony. If that doesn’t excite you, you must be 1 of the 4 nerds who don’t like LoTR (*cough* Stephen *cough*). 

Having physical standees (cardboard with a removable plastic base) is a cool touch, and while you may want to frame or hang the included map, the back side is a combat map to use with the standees. The dice are standard RPG dice, with the 20 on the d20 replaced with a stylized version of Tolkien’s Cirth for “G” and the 1 replaced with an eye. The 5 included character sheets are for Geira, daughter of Gautarr (who survived the fire of Lake Town as a baby), Regin Stonefist (whose father was a traveling blacksmith, killed by the Goblin-gate), Fimbrethil of the Havens (an elf wishing to see as much of Middle-earth as possible before the Grey Ship sails), Mentha North-Tooks (a daring Hobbit who snuck away from home and met some rangers), and Duinhir “Eaglenose” (a ranger who prefers traveling alone probably because people give him nicknames based on his physical features). Each character feels fully thought-out and would be amazing to play in the sandbox that Free League and Tolkien have created. 

In the end, there’s nothing world-shaking inside the box of this Starter Set, but there isn’t supposed to be. It’s supposed to give you a taste of what you could have more of in this particular game world, and at that it does a great job. If players finish all the content in the box and want more, then your next book(s) to seek out would be the Core book – The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying, or Shire Adventures. If your players want more delving into dangerous places, you could also check out Moria – Shadow of Khazad-Dum. Or you could check out our latest review, the Trials of Saruman. In any case, if you’re looking to dip your toes into Middle-earth in RPG form, you should check out The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Starter Set. 

A review copy was provided by the publisher.