Character creation

Loyal Servant
"I can’t carry it for you, but I can carry you and it as well. So up you get! Come on, Mr. Frodo dear. Sam will give you a ride. Just tell him where to go, and he’ll go."

You have dedicated your life to the service of another. You might be a member of a retinue of followers, or a knight in the king’s house, or just a humble gardener in the employ of a gentle-hobbit. You always put your master’s needs above your own, even when your master ignores or overlooks yours.

Skill Proficiencies: Insight, Traditions

Doomed to Die
"So it ends as I guessed it would", his thought said, even as it fluttered away, and it laughed a little within him as it fled.

Things are not going to end well for you. You’ve known this for most of your life, although you don’t quite understand why. It may just be a gut feeling or perhaps you took some prophetic dream to heart and assume that you’re going to be denied a happy ending in life. You just soldier on as best you can before the inevitable happens, hoping that your actions will at least make you worth remembering in the songs and tales now being written.

Skill Proficiencies: Athletics, Intimidation

Driven from Home
"They seem to have made a last stand by both doors," he said, "but there were not many left by that time. So ended the attempt to retake Moria! It was valiant but foolish. The time is not come yet."

You have no place to call home. This may be because it no longer exists, your people cast you out for some real or imagined reason, or you have done something that would prove troublesome should you ever return. For whatever reason, those who you meet know that you are no longer welcome home even if they do not know the full details. You know that you are on your own as others are intimidated by you and prefer to keep you at arm’s reach, placating you only for as long as they must tolerate your presence.

Skill Proficiencies: Intimidation, Survival

Emissary of your People
"Give me leave," said he, "first to say more of Gondor, for verily from the land of Gondor I am come. And it would be well for all to know what passes there. For few, I deem, know of our deeds, and therefore guess little of their peril, if we should fail at last."

The Free People of the West are beginning to again make connections with each other. Trade is improving, alliances are forming and folk who have had nothing to do with each other for centuries are finding reasons to communicate. You have been sent by your people to go out and meet other cultures, see strange lands and report back on what is out there in the grand world. The Shadow is lifting, and not just in Wilderland, and you are a beacon of hope for a new age.

Skill Proficiencies: Persuasion, Traditions

Fallen Scion
"The King under the Mountain is dead, and where are his kin that dare seek revenge? Girion Lord of Dale is dead, and I have eaten his people like a wolf among sheep, and where are his sons’ sons that dare approach me?"

You are the last of a powerful bloodline, or at least that’s what your parents and those closest to them keep telling you. Your aristocratic line was highly influential, perhaps even royal, before some calamity befell them. Perhaps the lands they once ruled were overrun or a coup drove them from power. Perhaps it’s as simple as your forebears disappearing while travelling through treacherous terrain. Whatever the case, you have a powerful destiny ahead of you should you choose to seize it.

Skill Proficiencies: History, Traditions

The Harrowed
"For on the eve of the sudden assault a dream came to my brother in a troubled sleep, and afterwards a like dream came oft to him again, and once to me."

You are plagued by a persistent dream. It beckons you to complete some task, although you are currently unsure of its particulars and whether fulfilling the dream will lead to good or ill. All that you do know is that the dream is strong and its intensity increases whenever you neglect its demands of you. It is simply impossible for you to get a good night’s sleep otherwise.

Skill Proficiencies: Lore, Investigation

Hunted by Shadow
"I do not know for what reason the Enemy is pursuing you,"answered Gildor, "but I perceive he is – strange though that seems to me. And I warn you that peril is now both before you and behind you, and upon either side."

You or your family have struck a blow against the Shadow and it hit back hard. The Shadow’s agents are tracking you everywhere, making it dangerous for you to stay in one place for too long. If that wasn’t enough, your reputation precedes you and your mere presence is disturbing and troubling to local notables. Most will still extend you the common courtesies due your station, but you are often encouraged to move quickly onward before the Shadow finds you.

Skill Proficiencies: Stealth, Survival

Lure of the Road
"I want to see the wild country again before I die, and the Mountains."

You are a rover; the road calls to you and you must answer. Sometimes, rare years, you return home to friends and family, but it does not take long before you start longing for the next adventure, to explore a new land, or meet unusual people.

You aren’t limited to roads or the towns that dot them. No, you’d just as happily camp within a cave in the Misty Mountains or make a lonely camp in a deep wood than settle down in a roadside inn for the evening. Not even the Shadow will deter you from traversing every nook and cranny in this part of the world, no matter how dark and dangerous.

Skill Proficiencies: Animal Handling, Survival

The Magician
"Not the fellow who used to tell such wonderful tales at parties, about dragons and goblins and giants and the rescue of princesses and the unexpected luck of widow’s sons? Not the man who used to make such particularly excellent fireworks!"

When your wagon rolls into a village you are immediately beset by happy children who can’t wait to watch you perform magic under the sceptical eyes of their parents. You are only too happy to oblige – that is how you make your coin, after all – but you are careful to guard your illusions as real magic. Amongst your company, of course, you are free to operate as you truly are, a companion whose skills at deception, legerdemain and other such arts are useful assets to have on an adventure.

Skill Proficiencies: Performance, Sleight of Hand

Oathsworn
"And when all this land is clean of the servants of Sauron, I will hold the oath fulfilled, and ye shall have peace and depart for ever."

You are a pillar of your community, whether noble-born or someone who has already accomplished great deeds, and you have publicly sworn a great oath. Due to your station no one doubts that you’ll either succeed in your oath or die trying. Towards that end you muster all of your energies to fulfilling your oath, as you know that both fate and Man do not look kindly on oath-breakers.

Skill Proficiencies: Intimidation, Traditions

Reluctant Adventurer
To the end of his days Bilbo could never remember how he found himself outside, without a hat, a walking-stick or any money, or anything that he usually took with him when he went out, leaving his second breakfast half-finished and quite un-washed-up, pushing his keys into Gandalf’s hands, and running as fast as his furry feet could carry him down the lane, past the great Mill, across the Water, and then on for a mile or more.

If you had your way, you’d lead an idyllic life staying at home and tending your garden, perfectly boring and peaceful. You don’t know why you keep leaving home and walking the roads and trails of the land. It is never your choice, at least never your direct choice, but circumstances conspire and there you are, a hundred miles from home, cold, wet and without your handkerchiefs.

You never actually enjoy your adventures… do you?

Skill Proficiencies: Medicine, Nature

Seeker of the Lost
"Where iss it, where iss it: my Precious, my Precious? It’s out, it is, and we wants it."

There is something missing from the world and you feel that it is your mission to find it, whether is be something from your own history or from those close to you. You might wish to reclaim an ancestral home, a forgotten treasure, or long faded lineage. Whatever it is, the search drives you and threatens to consume you.

Skill Proficiencies: Lore, Investigation

World Weary
West, west away, the round sun is falling. Grey ship, grey ship, do you hear them calling? The voices of my people that have gone before me? I will leave, I will leave the woods that bore me; For our days are ending and our years failing. I will pass the wide waters lonely sailing.

You’ve had quite enough of the world; you’re either very long-lived or you’ve just seen so much in your life that you’ve grown tired of it. All of the pain and misery that you have endured was for naught; you simply want to live out the rest of your days until that merciful final journey commences. Unfortunately, something always calls you back to face danger one last time…but you’ll never admit that that ‘something’ likely comes from within.

Skill Proficiencies: History, Insight