Carcassonne Central

CKorfmann has let me do some work on an old expansion of his:

Lord of the Rings

Due to the detail of the books (and the movies), this will become three expansions- one for each book.

To get rid of some complexity, there will be no new meeples (yet?). Instead I think there could be 'quest' tiles.

Out of 12 tiles, I think about 8 could be quest tiles. These are tiles with an arrow somewhere on them pointing in a particular direction. Each new 'quest' tile must be placed in line with the arrow from the previous tile. All 12 tiles will have some special features on them.

Some of the quest tiles may not be playable due to sides not matching up in line with the previous tile, in which case they are discarded.

Some ideas for tiles (including some CKorfmann's original ideas) are:

1. RRRR The Shire, first quest tile, including a four way road intersection with a few magic gates around it. This tile would be given to the first player to place a tile?
2. FWWW Lothlorien, a quest tile, a forest with some white houses and a large tree. This could work as a logging camp.
3. FRRR Bree, a quest tile, a three way road with an inn and a well.
4. FRFR a straight road with black riders on it, maybe cancels out the effect of any inns along the road, if no inns, roads are worth nothing when completed. Not a quest tile.
5. MMMM Moria, a quest tile, maybe flames coming from somewhere within the mountains? Maybe the tile could be worth extra points when placed (maybe double points?)
6. WFFF the barrow-downs, a quest tile, a forest ending with a graveyard.
7. FSFS the Argonath, a quest tile, a straight river with statues on either side. This could be like an inn along the river.

If anyone else has any other ideas for another 5 tiles, let me know.

EDIT: two draft quest tiles without the arrow and watermark.

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-moria.jpg)
Moria

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-lorien.jpg)
Lothlorien

Thanks to JPutt927 for the flames. I don't really like the lorien tile but I can always fix that...

EDIT2:

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-barrowdowns.jpg)
Barrow-downs

Honestly, I've kinda detached myself from this one, but I'd be more than happy to comment on it. 

I like the quest idea, it gives the expansion a sense of purpuse if you're not planning on using the meeples.

Not sure where the flames come in on the Moria tile.  Isn't that the Dwarf city?  I was thinking about an oversized fortress looking thingy in the center of the mountains. 

I had the same thought for Lothlorien... on oversized tree in the middle. 

I don't remember the Barrow downs, so I probably can't comment on that one.

Moria is series underground mines, and when the dwarves delved there, they unleashed the last remaining balrog; a beast of fire and shadow. In order to trap the fellowship and capture them, the lower levels of Moria were set on fire by the orcs and trolls.

In Lothlorien (which I am not happy with), there is a giant gold tree in the centre.

The Barrow Downs weren't mentioned in the movie, they were only in the book. In the book, the four hobbits get caught there (after leaving the shire, they pass through the old forest, are saved by Tom Bombadil, whom you seem to know about, pass through to the barrows, get captured by a barrow-wight, get saved by Tom B. again and then go on to Bree and meet Aragorn. I think it's a shame none of that made it into the movie.)

I remember that now.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking, a big tree in the middle...

I know about Bombadil because I've talked to several people about him.  Never read it though.  I've heard about the Barrow Downs as well, but didn't know the story.

Latest tile updates

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-shire2.jpg)
The Shire

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-barrowdowns2.jpg)
Barrow Downs

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-bree2.jpg)
Bree

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-amonsul.jpg)
Amon Sul upon Weathertop

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-moria2.jpg)
Moria

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-lorien2.jpg)
Lothlorien- I tried to fix it up, but I'm not fully satisfied- open to suggestions.

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-anduin.jpg)
The River Anduin

If anyone has any more ideas for 3 more tiles, I'm all ears...

Here's some ideas for you. Hope they help. You will have to look up names yourself since I can't remember half of them.
The Old Oak
Tom Bombadil's House
The Wild
The Stone Trolls
The river where Arwen comes and rescues Frodo (book)/Arwen takes Frodo to safety
The snowy mountain that the Fellowship tries to cross before deciding on Moria (name forgotten)
Those two huge statues along Anduin (sheesh, I need to reread these books for the twentieth time!)
The waterfalls (where they stop and camp the last night, before Frodo and Sam leave)

Something with Ring Wraiths I feel is also a must, but that probably isn't tile-related.

I don't have to look up the names, I'm a massive fan and remember the books and movies by heart.

I've already done the two statues, I think they're known as the Argonath. I've called the tile Anduin. The snowy mountain must be Caradhras- which I never thought of. I had considered the falls of Rauros, but I've already got one river tile.

I've decided to add Rivendell, the last quest tile:
(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/lotr-rivendell2-1.jpg)

I'm having 8 quest tiles and 4 other tiles each in the LotR expansions, I have the quest tiles done now, so I just need to come up with 3 other ideas non-place related (I've already got one if you see my list above).

Thanks for all the tips though  ;)

Finished all 12 tiles: added in three black rider tiles (with 3 riders each to make 9) which have a penalising effect on roads, and 1 mirror of galadriel tile (fortune teller)

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/LotR1alltiles.jpg)

I'll get to work on the rules shortly.

Wow, great job buddy!  I think the quest symbol is great!  Very simple, but it sticks out and really looks good.  All of the tiles look really nice.  I don't think anything you've made needs to be changed, but here are some suggestions:

I thought the fortune tell tile was Bombadils house at first.  Maybe it would be better if it were.  While the "mirror" concept is a good one, I'm not sure it works as a tile.  But, I could be mistaken
 
As for Lothlorien, I would make the tree either double or triple in size if not redrawn all together.  Under the circumstances, I don't think it would be a bad thing if this tree took up half the tile. 

Snow topped mountains would be cool!

The Weathertop tile is a great idea, hadn't thought of it.

I never thought about Rivendel being a cloister.  I envisioned a tile that was half city and half forest, but I guess it works pretty well as is.

Bree is great, the river tile is super, and the wraiths are BAD (the good kind)!  ;D

For the non-quest tiles, I wanted to do things that were person or object related- not places. In the mirror of Galadriel it is possible to get glimpses of the future, hence the fortune teller.


I'll have a go fixing that tile, I've never been satisfied with that one.


Since I don't know how many people use mountains, I don't want to include too many mountain tiles in each expansion.


I already had enough forest tiles, and Rivendell isn't really a city, so that's why I went cloister.

Rules are coming soon.

Rules: http://www.mediafire.com/?mof01zh5myw
They're not very good, I can tell that there will be a few rewrites...


Tiles are here: http://www.mediafire.com/?mz1inlndyut

It looks good.  The only question I have is regarding the inability to use tiles.  I'm not a fan of discarding tiles.  I think they should be put back in the bag (or whatever) IMO.

That can be a house rule. In the base game, unplayable tiles are discarded for good. But I agree with you, I'd use that as a house rule too.

This could easily grow into it's own fan-made spin-off - Carcassonne: Middle Earth

I think I'm satisfied with just making an expansion...

That sounds funny, but kinda cool...  :)

No other reviews, comments? Where's Novelty when you need him- I'm sure he could find plenty of things for me to fix up  ;D

You suggested you weren't completely satisfied with the Lothlorien tile. Is this still the case? Could you possibly post a larger picture of it so that I can get a better look at it?...It may be easier for me to give a suggestion of what you could improve.  As far as the other tiles, I think they look pretty good. The only one I'm not necessarily keen on is the Rivendell tile. I don't mind the usage of a church, but I feel like the tile could possibly use a little water...and some sort of elevation. Other than that, I think you did a nice job. I look forward to seeing how it all plays!  :)

I don't have a bigger picture, sorry. I guess I'm still not completely satisfied with it, but I guess I'll get by. I'll see if I can put some water into the Rivendell tile, but remember it's in a Valley, so that might be a bit hard for me to draw...

Well, I've put some water onto the Rivendell tile, which I think wraps up the tiles, but not neccesarily the rules. I'll wait a little longer before I call them finished.

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/LotR1alltiles-1.jpg)

I've also done the tiles for the Two Towers, but I'm not ready to do the rules and create a thread. Just a preview of the expansion:

(http://i585.photobucket.com/albums/ss294/meepleater/LotR2alltiles.jpg)

Merit point for the first person to identify 6 of the quest tiles.

I don't really care about merit points, but I do like challenges. My guesses are:
1 - Dead Marshes
2 - Minas Ungol
3 - Something Rohan-y?
4 - Edyn Muril (totally spelled that wrong)
5 - Fangorn Forest
6 - Edoras
7 - Helm's Deep
8 - Osgiliath

4/8

Anyone else care to give it a shot? (I'm not saying which ones were wrong/right)

I take back #2. It's the Black Gate!

All right, 5/8.

For anyone else who cares to give it a shot; here's a hint: the first 4 are Frodo and Sam's journey...

Once again, if no one else has anything to say then this could become 1.0...

I understand the Black Tower and the White Tower tiles, but what are the three tiles at he bottom?
Isn't Shelob part of the second book?  I can't remember.

The second set of 12 tiles is for the second book. He's using the one thread for the trilogy, at least I believe he is. That probably wasn't the intention but it seems to work.

No, I'm going to have separate threads, but I'm not starting a new one until I wrap up LotR1 and R&G. I was just impatient to show the tiles from LotR2.
None of the tiles have Shelob/ Cirith Ungol on them (and incidently, you mentioned the white tower, it's actually nowhere in particular, but a gift tile (I'll explain that in the rules). The other three tiles contain maps, of which certain pieces can be obtained to give rewards...

For your 1.0 revision, could you

1. Spell out in full Lord of the Rings please
2. Change "discard" to "set aside" (throughout the document) and note in the Preparation section that the tiles will not be used in the game.  Discard has the connotation that it is to be thrown away (e.g. into the bin, which would be a waste for a fan-made tile ;D).
3. Clarify that "The first quest tile drawn may be placed anywhere" in accordance to the normal rules of Carcassonne, or otherwise.

That's about it!

Okay, v1.1 http://www.mediafire.com/?mtitzhmj1nn I think this *should* be ready now...

Gents not wanting to pee on anyones bonfire here but please be careful with this as Gamws Workshop own the rights to LoTR and are very protective of it so any references to the realm that they find being used without their consent they tend to shutdown very quickly. So please watch out when doing this when freely distibuting.

Games Workshop only owns the rights to making miniatures, so we should be outside their jurisdiction. However, there is definitely one or more companies out there with rights to making board games. When the movies were out, I know Decipher had card game rights and whoever owns RISK and Monopoly owned board game rights. They also created the pre-film Lord of the Rings board game. However, I have never really heard of either of those companies attacking small independent fan sites like this.

Do they own the rights for the movies, books or both? This is based on the books (so includes places excluded from the movies)...

Doesn't work like that. They all own the rights to the books (or at least some of the books). New Line Cinema owns the patents to make movies based on the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit (but not any of the additional material). Decipher had separate contracts with Tolkien Estate and New Line to make the card game. Parker Brothers owns the right to make games based off of both as well (again, a dual contract). It's all very complex but basically Tolkien Estates and New Line Cinema gave out rights to a bunch of companies to make merchandise for the movie releases, but some of the companies kept their contracts long after the movies came out and still make stuff in relation to it. Like Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Harry Potter, and other franchises, it's all a complex network of patronage.

Added to public downloads.  I think as a fan-made thing, it's fine.  We aren't using any images or anything that has a copyright from Tolkien, the only thing that maybe contentious are the names, which we can easily change.

Nov, nice to see you woke up  ;D Some of the names are copyrighted I think you'll find.

Which is why I said:
Has there been any cases of the Tolkien estate, or any of the franchisees, coming down on things like fan artwork, fanfiction, etc?

Games Workshop have shutdown various projects from other companies due to the names being "too like" tolkien stuff !!!!! Just be careful as you dont want a lawsuit, especially when you arent making anything out of the game....