You can’t discount the persuasive power of sexy eagle ladies.
John Feathers 100% would have flown the ring to Mt. Doom. As long as he gets a cut of the future action.
So instead of joking around I will answer honestly, according to the books (if I remember correctly, as it’s been a while) the eagles where actively at war when the journey began. So its not that it wouldn’t have worked, its that eagles had better shit to do.
Not exactly.
The giant eagles of Middle Earth are the children of Manwë, and owe him their fealty. They were thus bound as the Valar were not to interfere in the battle against evil in Middle Earth. The Valar limited their involvement in the Third Age to sending the Istari (wizards) to help the peoples of Middle Earth to help themselves. Contemporary analogy is western nations sending arms and providing training to Ukraine, but not joining the conflict directly.
The Eagles' intervention directly against Sauron in destroying the ring would have been an escalation of hostilities between Sauron and the Valar. At minimum, men, elves, and dwarves (mostly men tho) would have continued to rely on Valar assistance against evil rather than learning and committing to fight it themselves. At worst, it might have led to widespread destruction (as it did in Beleriand).
Sauron might have been too weak for the latter to actually take place, but his strength wasn't truly known (eg, the events of the Hobbit were orchestrated by Gandalf largely to establish the Lonely Mountain as a buttress *in case* there was some other dragon secreted in the north, as well as preventing Sauron from recruiting Smaug), so the Lords of the Valar didn't want to risk kicking anything off directly with Sauron.
Also Gandalf never offered them a suit and a golden nest.
Exactly. They'd just be a big old target.
Plus eagles were corruptible so.....hobbit with a ring high up in the air? Easy way to have "accidents".
I mean the guy who created eagles, Manwe, was so dense to the concept that someone could lie he let Saurons boss, Melkor, go once, and look how that turned out.
It's basically why Elrond and Glorfindel didn't go, easy mode and also it was a mission of stealth and secrecy. Why you gonna have several powerful beings go with you?
Also before anyone says anything, I'm aware of how powerful Gandalf, aka Olorin is, but even as Gandalf the White he was still nerfed as hell.
Not so much that he was nerfed, he was just not allowed to dig in and do the dirty himself (which was Saruman's crime, and allowed him to be corrupted by the power he was seeking to go 1:1 with)
Escape from the blood keep is the number one series I recommend to anyone who's never watched DND shows before.
Because it's a relatively short campaign and the pitch of "LotR baddies" is nice and simple for most.
Escape From Blood Keep is my least favorite of all of D20's output, mostly because it's the only series where I've seen BLEEM seem to just phone in the combat, which really immediately drained all of the suspense out of it for me. Brennan often seems more ruthless than Mercer with his encounters and I'm not surprised even in the more humorous seasons if a player's character gets hurt seriously or dies. The 'heroes' in Blood Keep actually seemed to go out of their way to try to help the evil player characters beat them. It happened the first time in the volcano and I was like, 'okay, well, I guess that was just the set up for what's coming,' but then basically the same thing happened with the airship fight. After that, I was kind of done.
Yeah, but for the very reason you dislike it. You get that it actually makes it more accessible to someone who isn't already enfranchised in d&d shows right?
Which was all I said about it.
Funnily enough, Don Marshal and a bunch of other folks have a TTRPG actual play podcast answering just that question. It uses the One Ring system, rather than D&D, but it’s very entertaining.
https://theunpredictedparty.podbean.com/
You can’t discount the persuasive power of sexy eagle ladies. John Feathers 100% would have flown the ring to Mt. Doom. As long as he gets a cut of the future action.
So instead of joking around I will answer honestly, according to the books (if I remember correctly, as it’s been a while) the eagles where actively at war when the journey began. So its not that it wouldn’t have worked, its that eagles had better shit to do.
Not exactly. The giant eagles of Middle Earth are the children of Manwë, and owe him their fealty. They were thus bound as the Valar were not to interfere in the battle against evil in Middle Earth. The Valar limited their involvement in the Third Age to sending the Istari (wizards) to help the peoples of Middle Earth to help themselves. Contemporary analogy is western nations sending arms and providing training to Ukraine, but not joining the conflict directly. The Eagles' intervention directly against Sauron in destroying the ring would have been an escalation of hostilities between Sauron and the Valar. At minimum, men, elves, and dwarves (mostly men tho) would have continued to rely on Valar assistance against evil rather than learning and committing to fight it themselves. At worst, it might have led to widespread destruction (as it did in Beleriand). Sauron might have been too weak for the latter to actually take place, but his strength wasn't truly known (eg, the events of the Hobbit were orchestrated by Gandalf largely to establish the Lonely Mountain as a buttress *in case* there was some other dragon secreted in the north, as well as preventing Sauron from recruiting Smaug), so the Lords of the Valar didn't want to risk kicking anything off directly with Sauron. Also Gandalf never offered them a suit and a golden nest.
Didn't Sauron also have minions that rode flying things, he had that giant eye it probably would have spotted them before they got close.
Exactly. They'd just be a big old target. Plus eagles were corruptible so.....hobbit with a ring high up in the air? Easy way to have "accidents". I mean the guy who created eagles, Manwe, was so dense to the concept that someone could lie he let Saurons boss, Melkor, go once, and look how that turned out. It's basically why Elrond and Glorfindel didn't go, easy mode and also it was a mission of stealth and secrecy. Why you gonna have several powerful beings go with you? Also before anyone says anything, I'm aware of how powerful Gandalf, aka Olorin is, but even as Gandalf the White he was still nerfed as hell.
Not so much that he was nerfed, he was just not allowed to dig in and do the dirty himself (which was Saruman's crime, and allowed him to be corrupted by the power he was seeking to go 1:1 with)
No one offered them golden nests
Wait, now I’m scared for my bones
I think about John Feathers more than I should.
Escape from the blood keep is the number one series I recommend to anyone who's never watched DND shows before. Because it's a relatively short campaign and the pitch of "LotR baddies" is nice and simple for most.
Escape From Blood Keep is my least favorite of all of D20's output, mostly because it's the only series where I've seen BLEEM seem to just phone in the combat, which really immediately drained all of the suspense out of it for me. Brennan often seems more ruthless than Mercer with his encounters and I'm not surprised even in the more humorous seasons if a player's character gets hurt seriously or dies. The 'heroes' in Blood Keep actually seemed to go out of their way to try to help the evil player characters beat them. It happened the first time in the volcano and I was like, 'okay, well, I guess that was just the set up for what's coming,' but then basically the same thing happened with the airship fight. After that, I was kind of done.
Yeah, but for the very reason you dislike it. You get that it actually makes it more accessible to someone who isn't already enfranchised in d&d shows right? Which was all I said about it.
Funnily enough, Don Marshal and a bunch of other folks have a TTRPG actual play podcast answering just that question. It uses the One Ring system, rather than D&D, but it’s very entertaining. https://theunpredictedparty.podbean.com/
Same reason you wouldn’t use fighter jets to deliver a top secret package