[Child of the 7th Age]

Littlemanpoet,

My sincere apologies. I will erase my save. I am bogged down with real life but there is a secondary problem here. To be truthful I have been stalling on this post because I am totally uncertain what to do with Owl. The way the story has panned out, there is no comfortable place for the animal creatures, since they are not the intended victims, nor do they have the power/clout to make any kind of positive contribution to killing the shadow thing. The best they can do is lie low or comment on what's going on.

Pio's and Tevildo's beasts have also stayed low (as have the hobbit folk at the actual Inn.) I don't know about Pio's characters but I do know Tevildo is hard put to come up with a meaningful way to involve the cat in the plot line and is therefore "sleeping it out".

From my personal perspective, there are two possibilities. Finish up the game quickly on the lines you've suggested...i.e, have a fast show down involving the major characters with the istari getting there after a near miss. The other option is to do what Envinyatar is suggesting. That idea looked interesting to me: that there be some kind of diversion that momentarily leads the wizards and the animal creatures back to the Inn. This would delay the wizards from confronting the nasty shadow, give the beasts and others at the Inn a chance to actually do something, presumably against some kind of threat. Once the Istari saw that the Inn folk and animals could stand up and fight on their own, they could even race back to help do in the shadow thing if that was desirable.

I am willing to go with either option, though the latter obviously has more leeway for my character. The advantage of option #1 (just focusing on the current central characters and plot) is that we get things tied up quickly. I can definitely understand if that's the preferred path. The advantage of inventing a sub-plot, by contrast, is that the original characters in the Inn would be able to lend a hand in some small way in the fight, plus Mori and Stamo would have an excuse for not being there right off to dispense with the shadow. The disadvantages of option #2 are that it would take longer to wrap up the story (even if we're careful to keep things short and sweet), and, sadly, I can't seem to come up with any credible notion as to what the threat to the Inn might be.

I would be quite happy to play this out along either of the lines outlined above but, like Envinyatar, would be curious to hear your thoughts on this.

P.S. For the moment, I will leave the save there until I can confirm the direction we're going. I will erase it later if it's not needed.