The Wizard of Orthanc
Creator: Ninja_Weasel || First Published: 12/23/2014 || Players: 3 || Size: 31x31
Categories: None
Rating: 0 in 0 ratings
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Comments:
Ninja_Weasel (12/23/2014 12:40pm):
Okay, so for those of you who know your stuff, this might not need much explanation. For
the rest of you, this is a Lord of the Rings themed map. To clear up the title for the
confused, Orthanc is the tower of Isnegard in which Saruman, the White Wizard, resides.

Obviously Isengard is the top left of the map and is surrounded on 3 sides by mountains.
The Isen river flows from the mountains and off the west side of the map. Due east of
Isengard is the southern edge of Fangorn forest where you can see the desolation (broken
pipe seams) that has taken place at the hands of Saruman (well, his followers anyway). To
the southeast, we have Edoras where Theoden, Lord of the Mark, sits in Meduseld (The
Golden Hall). Further west, along the White Mountains, is Helm's Deep, a fortress built
into the mountianside where the people of Rohan seek refuge.

We enter the scene near the first half of the second novel of the trilogy with war on the
doorsteps of Rohan. Saruman is quickly building his army of Orcs (and men) and some of
them are out terrorizing the people of Rohan and capturing their cities. There are a few
who resist but it will only be enough to stall the enemy. With the powerful fortress of
Helm's Deep, Rohan can hold their own and possible turn the tide but it will be a gruesome
battle. Fortunately, and unbeknownst to them, they have allies from the north. Two little
hobbits have helped to tip the tide by spurring on the angered Ents and Huorns. Towers
represent morale/anger boosting. Saruman's army gets a moral boost for burning the
villages, Rohan gets a morale boost with Helm's Deep, and the Ents/Huorns get angry as
they see the destroyed trees and as they approach the battle and get sight of the orcs
they hate so much.


Obviously the map can only be partially geographically accurate because open plains
constituting a majority of the map would be boring. Therefore I added a lot of
mountains/forests etc. to make it look and play better. Aircraft also made their way to
Middle Earth for the same reason. On that note, let me know how it looks and whether or
not you think it will play nicely. I tried to balance funds etc. but we all know how
difficult it can be to make asymmetrical maps fair. After I get some initial feedback to
work out the major kinks, I'll do some playtesting to fine tune.
Xmo5 (12/23/2014 12:46pm):
Also, I can't promise that I put as much effort into balancing this as I should have. I
originally planned to calculate out capture rates and incomes for the first several days
and make sure things were fair, mostly because I'm worried BH can expand too quickly. I
tried to delay that a bit by making the bases neutral to start, but I wasn't exactly
calculating in my decision making process. If I feel a little less lazy then I'll go back
and be a bit more thorough later on.
Walker Boh (12/23/2014 02:56pm):
You spelled Isengard wrong.
Xmo5 (12/23/2014 04:47pm):
Oh, you mean you didn't get the memo that they changed the name to Isnegard? Rookie
mistake not to pick up on that, but I'll let it slide this time.



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