Thread: An (unpopular) solution to the problem of PCs at Helm's Deep

There is a very specific Lore reason why player characters can't be at the battle of Helm's Deep. It is that, according to LoTR, there are Rohirrim plus one elf and one dwarf present, and no one else. It is for this reason that I have consistently stated--despite many who wish otherwise--that the only way to handle the battle is as session play.

I think I have a way around this that will satisfy all but the most adamant lore purists and still be consistent with LoTR...

First, there should be a reputation faction based at Edoras. Kindred with that faction would make a character an Honorary Rohir.

As an (honorary) Rohir, presence at the Battle of Helm's Deep would count the player character as a Rohir, not as a non-Rohirrim Man or a member of some other race when tabulating who is there.

This would mean, though, that Kindred with the Edoras faction would be *requirement* to access the battle instance.

It would also open up the design of the battle to be either a solo (preferably, duo permitted) instance or even a skirmish. This should NOT be a group instance, since people of all play styles WILL want to access this content and if it is spec'd for a group, there will be immediate, loud and persistent demands that it be soloable. Obviously for it to be a skirmish *every* member of the group doing it would have to be kindred with Edoras.

If it is a skirmish, and if the tech permits, it would be a nice touch if all skirmish soldiers were "recast" to appear as Rohirrim. Failing that, adding Rohir skirmish soldier cosmetics would be nice option. Real purists would probably not only want to use Rohirrim soldiers, but use some variety of Rohirrim armor and weapons as well.

The unpopular part of my thread title is the kindred requirement. For premium/f2p accounts that would almost certainly require purchase of the quest pack the covers the area containing Edoras and potentially entailing some grind to get the required reputation regardless of account type.

--W. H. Heydt

Old Used Programmer

i quite like the solution..although (personaly)i wouldnt ming 'bending' around the lore a little bit :P and i also would love it to be anything from a solo to a 24 man raid..there shouldnt be a problem with that since the new skirm in u7 allows players to play from solo to 12 man's , and that way people with not so good pc's (yes, me lol) could play it..i cant play dragoich for example because i lag so much it takes 1 hour to switch off the game when i enter the raid ( after the game crashes that is ) but i still love the idea..though i hated session play up to now..if they change it so you can choose your class and have a bit more skills than 5-10 of them at lvl 60+..and also maby choose the class you want to play?..and get some descent looking armour..and stuff like that i wouldnt mind having a helms dep battle as a session play ( if they dont just bend the lore a bit :P ) thats my opinion as a single player with weird views about the world though lol

I vote no to the proposition as stated.

However ... if we could have a session play in which we take on the aspect and visage of a Rohir, but keep our player's class with its skills/traits/et cetera, that would work.

But there were at Helm's Deep one Elf, one Dwarf, no Hobbits, and one Man who wasn't a Rohir. And none of them were us.

Originally Posted by Eliaf

i quite like the solution..although (personaly)i wouldnt ming 'bending' around the lore a little bit :P and i also would love it to be anything from a solo to a 24 man raid..there shouldnt be a problem with that since the new skirm in u7 allows players to play from solo to 12 man's , and that way people with not so good pc's (yes, me lol) could play it..i cant play dragoich for example because i lag so much it takes 1 hour to switch off the game when i enter the raid ( after the game crashes that is ) but i still love the idea..though i hated session play up to now..if they change it so you can choose your class and have a bit more skills than 5-10 of them at lvl 60+..and also maby choose the class you want to play?..and get some descent looking armour..and stuff like that i wouldnt mind having a helms dep battle as a session play ( if they dont just bend the lore a bit :P ) thats my opinion as a single player with weird views about the world though lol

Session play is very tightly scripted. The skills list is short because they have to account for people playing an unfamiliar "class" with limited exposure to the sorts of skill list that a normal character would have. Think of it as just getting a basic skill rotation and having 30 seconds to learn it. If, for instance, the session character is a Hunter, there is no need to include all the ports...because you're not ever *going* anywhere.

If Helm's Deep is done as a session play (and previous to my suggestion I would have said it'd have to be), then you'd be playing a common Rohirrim soldier, with armor weapons and a limited set of skills to go with. It would also be solo...and nothing but solo. I think Wulf's Cleft battle is a "trial run" for both the Battle of the Isen Fords and--possibly--Helm's Deep, though the later is probably--at best--only in the preliminary planning stages. (This is not to say that I think that is a bad option, but it would cut out a lot of what people want out of that iconic battle.)

--W. H. Heydt

Old Used Programmer

what about the player chars, that are from Rohan? *eg* I would like to hear the whining of all those non-man, non-Rohan chars (though my main also falls into this category and my Rohan twink ist just level 16 ;-))

As much as I admire the creativity here, I don't want Turbine to go this route.

Reasons:

1) Granted, "time" in LOTRO is an area where we generally agree to suspend disbelief. But in the lore, Gandalf cures Theoden and within hours the king and his men are riding for Helm's Deep. Hardly enough time for my character to arrive at Edoras and build up to Kindred rep with the Rohirrim. And given Theoden's hostile policy to outsiders prior to his awakening, it's hard to believe we could build up to Kindred before Gandalf arrives, either.

2) "Rohirrim" as an honorary title doesn't really make it easier for me to accept the presence of outsiders other than Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas.

I'd rather just say, okay, maybe there were other non-Rohirrim at the Battle of the Hornburg, but they don't figure into the books because the main characters weren't aware of them. Maybe they came in with Gamling's people, but Gamling didn't mention the newcomers because he had more pressing matters to discuss with Theoden.

I'd also be fine with experiencing most of the battle as session play, and then switching back to our characters as Erkenbrand and Gandalf arrive at dawn with all the folk they mustered during the night. I wouldn't mind taking part in that charge down the hill and helping to drive the Uruk-hai into that uncanny forest that sprang up overnight.

Originally Posted by whheydt

As an (honorary) Rohir, presence at the Battle of Helm's Deep would count the player character as a Rohir, not as a non-Rohirrim Man or a member of some other race when tabulating who is there.

Turbine tend to be none too worried about such niceties of lore as who was where when and with who in the first place. I think I'd prefer them to simply be brazen about it rather than resorting to the sort of obvious fiddle you're suggesting here; at least it'd be honest.

Originally Posted by whheydt

Session play is very tightly scripted. The skills list is short because they have to account for people playing an unfamiliar "class" with limited exposure to the sorts of skill list that a normal character would have. Think of it as just getting a basic skill rotation and having 30 seconds to learn it. If, for instance, the session character is a Hunter, there is no need to include all the ports...because you're not ever *going* anywhere.

If Helm's Deep is done as a session play (and previous to my suggestion I would have said it'd have to be), then you'd be playing a common Rohirrim soldier, with armor weapons and a limited set of skills to go with. It would also be solo...and nothing but solo. I think Wulf's Cleft battle is a "trial run" for both the Battle of the Isen Fords and--possibly--Helm's Deep, though the later is probably--at best--only in the preliminary planning stages. (This is not to say that I think that is a bad option, but it would cut out a lot of what people want out of that iconic battle.)

--W. H. Heydt

Old Used Programmer

yes certainly the OLD sesion play is like that, but what i meant is that just your apperance and if someone in turbine wants to be picky, the race traits are changed and the skills etc. are kept thesame. so it can be a changed session play..or maby turbine could be a little bit more creative and make up a new concept of group/solo play instead of being quite..stereotypical (about SOME concepts not all )

other instances are gated by the epic story line, why not make this gated as well where as part of the epic story line you are inducted as a rohin thus keeping the instance inline with others and apart from the rep grind

Originally Posted by Ghost_Star

other instances are gated by the epic story line, why not make this gated as well where as part of the epic story line you are inducted as a rohin thus keeping the instance inline with others and apart from the rep grind

First...you are assuming that the battle will be part of the Epic (it doesn't have to be, and--indeed--other seminal events from the books have not been). Second...there have been other parts of the Epic that have been rep gated, so there is precedent, though not to the level of requiring Kindred standing.

I tried to leave the idea as open-ended as possible. Will it fly? I don't know, but people do seem to be finding it interesting to chew on.

--W. H. Heydt

Old Used Programmer

Originally Posted by djheydt

... there were at Helm's Deep one Elf, one Dwarf, no Hobbits, and one Man who wasn't a Rohir. And none of them were us.

Precisely.

This particular battle, indeed all the big ones in LoTR, are heavily described in the book(s). The participants are set, how the battle came to be is set, how it progressed is set, the outcome is set. There's not much room for maneuverability on Turbine's part.

I love your creativity and out-of-the-box thinking, but I can't feel good about this battle unless "our" participation is limited to the only character we can be if it isn't strictly session play, and that is a Rohir. That means that for us to participate with all our earned skills and whatnot, they'd have to introduce a technology that had us being a Rohir in appearance and wardrobe, yet still have access to all our skills and stats. Since the outcome of the battle cannot be changed no matter what we do, that would seem like a lot of work for not much gain.

It is fun thinking about how they might play it out though.


Edit to add: Forgot to mention one other point: I am not, and don't think I ever will be, in favor of rep-gating anything having to do with game play. Rep is a grind, and only those of us who are completionists, or interested in the goodies available from rep NPCs, or simply foolhardy, should be expected to complete such a grind.

Yea I like the idea of a session play, no reason why not but it gets tired quickly. I don't see why we can't have other battles at helms deep after the fact though, when 'nearly' everyone has left..I'm sure you could find a few olrcs who made it to helms deep to cause some havoc and a skeleton crew remaining being able to defend it. Of course it kind of lends itself to a skirmish more than anything but whatever.

I do hope they do something with it one day.

Gondor (after the Necromancers Tower) is the next epic space I'm really looking forward to TBH, I really hope they put the kind of efforty there that Moria got and more. Rohan just never really appealed to me much in the books or the movies.

As part of the Rise of Isengard expansion, we are allowed to assault Saramun in his tower. There is no lore base that I know of that suggests that anyone bothered him until Gandalf and company showed up on his door step. All the exterior cleaning was done by Treebeard and company with the a pair of rabble rousing Hobbits to get them Ents all fired up.

Who knows what Turbine is going to do? I certainly do not. Before Rise of Isengard I would have agree that there is no way we would be at Helms Deep. After all the fun inside the Isengard Ring and in Saramun's Tower, lore restrictions are not compelling point to restrict our being at Helms Deep.

IMHO - I think there a very good chance that fun content and compelling game play will easily defeat the lore.

I'd like to adhere to lore as much as possible, but in this case I think it will just have to be bent for the sake of gameplay. Such is the consequence of adapting a book to an MMO. People (including myself) would be up in arms if we couldn't participate in the battle of Helm's Deep, one of the most iconic events in the trilogy.

Originally Posted by Yula_the_Mighty

Who knows what Turbine is going to do? I certainly do not. Before Rise of Isengard I would have agree that there is no way we would be at Helms Deep. After all the fun inside the Isengard Ring and in Saramun's Tower, lore restrictions are not compelling point to restrict our being at Helms Deep.

IMHO - I think there a very good chance that fun content and compelling game play will easily defeat the lore.

That included the utter fail of how being 'captured' was handled. Are you really saying you found that to be 'compelling' gameplay, too?

Fact is, Turbine will ride roughshod over the story (e.g. Rangers dawdling, being generally pretty useless, a whole bunch of them getting killed*) regardless of whether the end result is at all compelling. Nowadays it seems they only want it to be crowd-pleasing.

*Which was a shameless lore-break: oddly enough, Halbarad did not have to tell Aragorn "there were loads more of us to start with, but because we messed about so much a lot of us were killed off on the way"

Is there any reason we can't arrive at the battle late with Erkenbrand and Gandalf?

Turbine could make the Battle of Helm's Deep a session play that you can play through multiple times as ...gasp... a skirmish soldier of the Rohirrim. You only have to play it once to complete this quest in the chain, but you have the option to repeat it as a different type. Each type has a different role to play in the battle. For example:

Protector - Keep Theoden (and yourself) alive as he becomes a target for attackers
Warrior - Guard Legolas' flank as he makes forays into the piles of dead to grope for spent arrows.
Archer - Pick off enemies that try to interfere with Gimli supervising the repairs to the breach blasted by the fire of Orthanc (while he makes pithy remarks about ranged fighters).
Bannerguard - Protect Eomer's flank as he works on his orc and Dunlending slayer deeds.
Herbalist - Heal Gamling during his counterattack against the breakthrough at the culvert.


A lot of people know the capabilities of at least one type of skirmish soldier. The session play setup could let you pick your Soldier Traits so you get the skills you want. Plus it would be an opportunity to make a Skirmish Soldier OBEY YOUR COMMANDS. (Certain measure of satisfaction there.)

Then, the next quest in the arc is another session play with your own character outside the walls of Helm's Deep...

Originally Posted by gildhur

Is there any reason we can't arrive at the battle late with Erkenbrand and Gandalf?

So the terrain build for this area would get at least two playthroughs per character up to as many as 6 or 7. The session play inside Helm's Deep or The Hornburg would be as one of the Rohirrim. The sesion play outside with Gandalf and Erkenbrand would let you use your own character.

Originally Posted by Talaixa

what about the player chars, that are from Rohan? *eg* I would like to hear the whining of all those non-man, non-Rohan chars (though my main also falls into this category and my Rohan twink ist just level 16 ;-))

Well! If that's the way you're going to be, you won't be welcome at our Battle of Bywater on the Freep side!

I never!

Originally Posted by Radhruin_EU

Turbine tend to be none too worried about such niceties of lore as who was where when and with who in the first place. I think I'd prefer them to simply be brazen about it rather than resorting to the sort of obvious fiddle you're suggesting here; at least it'd be honest.

They are indeed prone to obvious fiddles, though, perhaps starting with the "you're not really DEAD dead... your morale simply broke." Even the devs don't really buy that one -- "I killed the hobbit!", "Tuco the Undying" and so on. That leads to the idea that there's a minstrel who can do in-combat healing (which even Strider (the most proficient healing combatant) couldn't do)... just reskinning the D&D character that can do that. I'll stop here while I'm only mildly crabby about making it like a standard MMO so that it'll be familiar to the customers we want to seduce from others.

Seems to me they are *less* prone to messing with who's where and when than they are with things like this. We just have to remember that different bits of LotRO's Middle-earth happen at different game calendar times.

I kind of like the idea, but have reservations about the rep gating.

Originally Posted by Tuco

They are indeed prone to obvious fiddles, though, perhaps starting with the "you're not really DEAD dead... your morale simply broke." Even the devs don't really buy that one -- "I killed the hobbit!", "Tuco the Undying" and so on. That leads to the idea that there's a minstrel who can do in-combat healing (which even Strider (the most proficient healing combatant) couldn't do)... just reskinning the D&D character that can do that. I'll stop here while I'm only mildly crabby about making it like a standard MMO so that it'll be familiar to the customers we want to seduce from others.

The 'morale' conceit was a necessary evil to avoid having to deal with permadeath, which is a niche feature and just wouldn't play in a mass-market game. 'Morale' was tolerable in itself, the problem was when they started cynically abusing it. That's the thing: they haven't 'reskinned' a D&D-style Bard and called it a Minstrel; this idea of doing some serious DPS 'musically' is all their own. The nearest equivalent is, I think, shadowpriests in WoW (it's got that same heal/harm thing going on). The real problem is that it's a thinly-disguised caster class when it would have come across better as a hybrid; it's even more wrong to have hobbits getting in on that.

Seems to me they are *less* prone to messing with who's where and when than they are with things like this. We just have to remember that different bits of LotRO's Middle-earth happen at different game calendar times.

There are some major examples of who/what/where/when messing. Moria, Mirkwood and the ride of the Grey Company in particular. If they're going to subject the story to direct change (as with the reason why there were only thirty Rangers in the Grey Company) rather than maintain the pretense that it fits into a gap somewhere then they might just as well come straight out and change Helm's Deep too. However, I still draw the line short of messing with Sauron (if we ever got to fight him, it'd be a travesty) or having anyone but hobbits at the Battle of Bywater, as that would mangle the story something awful.

I think whheydt's idea is acceptable enough, only because of this fact:

The Lord of the Rings was (fictionally) written by Frodo (and sam), based on tales told to him by many poeple who took part in the battle (Gimli,etc.). The Appendices were written by many people, from Shire, from Gondor (I think Eldarion but not sure).

Fact is, all of these people could've made a mistake in the records. An Elf, for example, could have disguised himslef as a Rohir, and none of the people who wrote the Lord of the Rings would've noticed him.

As Napoleon said, "What is history but a fable agreed upon?". This applies to fictional histories as well.

Originally Posted by Haunt123

Fact is, all of these people could've made a mistake in the records. An Elf, for example, could have disguised himslef as a Rohir, and none of the people who wrote the Lord of the Rings would've noticed him.

And how would that work for Dwarves, or hobbits? Plus it clashes with the whole idea of our characters being noted heroes whom everyone remembers, everywhere they go. The idea of them disguising themselves so as not to clash with the existing plot would be metagaming, as there'd be no valid story-based reason for them to do any such thing. The simplest and most honest course would be to ignore entirely what the book said about who was there. It's not as if the essential nature of that battle would be altered by our characters being there and that, I think, is the important thing.

That's not to say such a conclusion would apply everywhere, though, as for example the Battle of Bywater would be fundamentally changed in nature by having anyone other than hobbits there (and by how Turbine would have to enormously magnify the threat in order to give our characters something worthwhile to fight).

I personally think that the battle of helms deep is to important to be handled by a session play that each charater does once and then moves on. I want to see the battle from multiple places and in multipule forms. I want to use my charater and with my equipment and my skills in the fight. This is someplace I want to spend some time not just do a single scripted fight and then move on. I personally feel that helms deep should be am instance cluster that is added as one of the big book updates like update 6. I would love to see a 3, 6 and 12 man instance related to different areas or times in the fight and maybe even a skirmish. If the fight ends up something like wolfs clift I would still be disapointed because although it was with my charater and my skills it was still scripted and not repeatable.


Making people grind out rep to get in there does nothing to remove the lore conterdictions. Its just semantics to please people that want to force everyone to follow thier way of playing the game and following the lore. Your charater will still be an elf, dwarf or hobit. Calling a elephant a cat does not make it a cat. The developers are very creative at finding ways around lore restrictions. I hope they put a lot of effort into how they depect Helms Deep because they will lose a lot more players if it is limited to session play or people are forced to grind rep to be part of it then if they just do a complete break with the lore and let us be part of the fight.

Originally Posted by Yula_the_Mighty

IMHO - I think there a very good chance that fun content and compelling game play will easily defeat the lore.

IMO, if Turbine takes THAT route, this game is through & finished.

I think Helm's Deep should be handled as a session or some other such method (which I wouldn't do, because I dislike the concept) or not at all.

Originally Posted by Radhruin_EU

The 'morale' conceit was a necessary evil to avoid having to deal with permadeath, which is a niche feature and just wouldn't play in a mass-market game. 'Morale' was tolerable in itself, the problem was when they started cynically abusing it. That's the thing: they haven't 'reskinned' a D&D-style Bard and called it a Minstrel; this idea of doing some serious DPS 'musically' is all their own. The nearest equivalent is, I think, shadowpriests in WoW (it's got that same heal/harm thing going on). The real problem is that it's a thinly-disguised caster class when it would have come across better as a hybrid; it's even more wrong to have hobbits getting in on that.

I defer to your knowledge of D&D and WoW -- I'm woefully (or thankfully) ignorant. In any case, it sounds like we agree that it was a fiddle, but a necessary one for playability and/or for the desired market. In any case, although it's fun to play a minstrel (or was before I lost track of how to do it when their skills were realigned), I feel guilty when I play any of what I consider the three lorebreaker characters.

There are some major examples of who/what/where/when messing. Moria, Mirkwood and the ride of the Grey Company in particular. If they're going to subject the story to direct change (as with the reason why there were only thirty Rangers in the Grey Company) rather than maintain the pretense that it fits into a gap somewhere then they might just as well come straight out and change Helm's Deep too. However, I still draw the line short of messing with Sauron (if we ever got to fight him, it'd be a travesty) or having anyone but hobbits at the Battle of Bywater, as that would mangle the story something awful.

I had to read up to see what you meant by the real reason that there were only 30 of the Grey Company, and yes, it's a fair cop.

I have to say that I'm not wedded to the idea of us participating 'live' at Helm's Deep. Tolkien indicated that he thought a particular terrible movie treatment focused much too much on the combat bits. Of course, nearly all of LotRO is about combat, so I can see that much of the current audience would miss it. I once went through The Hobbit and LotR to count how many pages were devoted to actual combat (Weathertop, wargs before Moria, the Watcher (was it more than a paragraph or two?), Mazarbul, and so on up to the Black Gate, and it was a tiny proportion -- I think my count was lost in one of the forum wipes, though. One of these days I'll redo it, then do the same with the Jackson movies. Any bets on whether the fight/non-fight will come out differently with the two media?

I dont now if anyone has written this before but: Legolas killed 28 Uruk-hai and Gimli killed 29 so if there is to be any lore in this we cant kill more than uruks.

Originally Posted by Radhruin_EU

That included the utter fail of how being 'captured' was handled. Are you really saying you found that to be 'compelling' gameplay, too?

This situation did not bother me. I am sure Tantalus was shown those two big Trolls at the gate. You run for it. The Trolls will make Elf stew out of you.

The USA standard of disarming and putting a prisoner in a locked box (jail cell) is not the only way it is done. If you look in Earth history, you will find cases - especially when the prisoner is considered valuable - you will find that the person can't leave the restricted area. They have a lot of freedom within that area. They can interact with people. Wave weapons around. Make a nuisance of themselves.

The closest modern equivalent that you might be aware of is house arrest.

Originally Posted by Yula_the_Mighty

The USA standard of disarming and putting a prisoner in a locked box (jail cell) is not the only way it is done. If you look in Earth history, you will find cases - especially when the prisoner is considered valuable - you will find that the person can't leave the restricted area. They have a lot of freedom within that area. They can interact with people. Wave weapons around. Make a nuisance of themselves.

The closest modern equivalent that you might be aware of is house arrest.

See, also: Japanese internment, USA, 1940s.

Session play is a sucky button-mash waste of gaming time that breaks immersion, and the lore says our characters can not have been there. So...skip it. There are other routes we could take, other important things we could be doing at that time.

Orthanc was a disgusting bit of nonsense -- the mighty Saurman imprisons us and is so stupid that he allows us to walk around with our gear and attack his organization from the inside. Some of the worst writing to come out of Turbine. They should have never had us there. Sometimes the best writing comes from sticking to what you KNOW is correct instead of giving into popular demand. Stand strong, skip Helm's Deep.

Originally Posted by Fortinobrand

Stand strong, skip Helm's Deep.

Yeah, and also prevent anyone from getting interested in the expansion which could've had it. Who doesn't love poor sales.

Originally Posted by Yula_the_Mighty

This situation did not bother me. I am sure Tantalus was shown those two big Trolls at the gate. You run for it. The Trolls will make Elf stew out of you.

The USA standard of disarming and putting a prisoner in a locked box (jail cell) is not the only way it is done. If you look in Earth history, you will find cases - especially when the prisoner is considered valuable - you will find that the person can't leave the restricted area. They have a lot of freedom within that area. They can interact with people. Wave weapons around. Make a nuisance of themselves.

The closest modern equivalent that you might be aware of is house arrest.

I'm calling shenanigans on this. Who in their right mind wouldn't disarm a prisoner of war? Merry and Pippin were disarmed when they were captured, and the only reason they were spared a brutal strip-search (which was what happened to Frodo when he was found in Mordor) was that the Uruk-hai were under specific orders not to despoil any hobbits they captured. To that, you can add Saruman's magpie-like acquisitiveness; a load of neat stuff and ancient treasures was found in Orthanc after he'd left, as he hadn't been able to take it with him. None of that suggests any reason as to why they'd let prisoners keep all their gear.