The Two Towers (The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Adventure Game) [Misc. Supplies]

Decipher RPG (Author)

Product Details

• Misc. Supplies
• Publisher: Decipher Inc.; Book and Access edition (October 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1582369577
• ISBN-13: 978-1582369570
• Product Dimensions: 11.7 x 9.7 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,533,234 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars NOT a sourcebook - watered down version of the RPG, December 10, 2009

By 

J. Cartlidge - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Two Towers (The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Adventure Game) (Misc. Supplies)

I want to be clear that even though this product claims to be in the "book" category, it is most definitely not a book. I thought it was the Two Towers Sourcebook (which is a real book) because of the department it's under, which is why I bought it. I was surprised to find a decorated box containing a 50-page booklet outlining a single mission that was completely taken from the Two Towers movie, 4 pre-built character sheets for Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, and Gandalf, two hexagonal-grid maps, two sheets of punch-out chips to represent characters and units, a "Fast Play Rules" sheet (there is nothing quick-start-ish about a real RPG), and a single sheet titled, "What is Roleplaying?" This is obviously made for people who have no idea how an RPG works.

To give some perspective on how dumbed down it is, the game uses everyday 6-sided dice for everything, and combat is limited to movement actions and attack actions. Since the entire story is written for you, the GM essentially only reads off the page what happens, and so do the players. Yeah, that's not a typo. Every character's dialogue is already written, with every situation ending with the plot going down Path A or Path B. The fact that most people already know the story of Two Towers completely takes away the suspense. It would be more fun to try and deliberately sabotage the adventures, but you can't do that because the script doesn't account for the whole "In the event that the players attempt to raid Edoras" storyline.

Since I'm planning on doing the actual Lord of the Rings RPG, the only thing I might use out of here might be the maps and the chips. If you want to start an RPG, no matter how complicated you think they are, don't go for this one. You might as well read the book and roll some dice along the way to see how each Uruk-hai dies.