I think there are a lot of good ideas here.
Hilde - The stones in the blanket are a nice touch. They are heavy enough to fly true even with the winds.
Brinniel - Your point about the bow and arrow is a good one. My guess is that some of the "older" runaways would already have made a bow for purposes of catching game, if nothing else. They can certainly be used as weapons, and the skills and extra weapons can be given to the newcomers. You'll probably need to get in very close, however. With the winds blowing so hard just as the attackers come in range of the camp, there is a possibility of arrows going far astray. The advantage of the winds and sand is that the slavers will be hard pressed to see you, especially since they won't be wearing any protective covering. You might want to consider taking shelter behind some boulders and keeping your heads down, then darting in very close to shoot as the slavers come roaring by you.
Nogrod, Folwren -- This sounds good too. I'd love to see both Folwren and Dorran part of an "advance" horse guard. I especially like the idea of using this advance guard to spook the other horses and run some of them off. Any character who can sit a horse is welcome to borrow a horse and join. (We have enough horses between us, and I doubt that characters like Carl or Vror will want to fight on horseback!) Of course, if Dorran or someone wants to finish up with a blade to the rider they are chsing that is fine too!
Because of what Rog and Aiwendil are doing out on the plain, some of the slavers' horses will aready be running away and/or partly spooked. This will only be a small number, however, so further help in this department when the slavers actually reach the outskirts of camp would be good.
I think there is one thing we are all going to have to be careful about. We have 24 or so slavers so we should probably resist the urge to take out 6 at a time! Rather than describing large numbers hitting the dust at once, we will probably need to have the focus be the single individual and the particular enemy he/she is facing.
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Regin and other orcs---
I know I haven't posted as an orc in a long time. I'm sorry, but I will get up something for Makdush. And now that the three groups are coming together, I expect to be doing a number of orc posts. It would be good if we could have some other orcs post in that scene as well as the later episode in the slaver camp.
The general idea is to have the main body of orcs be slightly (totally?) soused by the late night when the freed slaves triumphantly arrive to take over the slavers' camps. That is when the confrontation of the three groups will
finally occur! (YAY!)
Regin came up with this, and I think it is a good idea. There is a basic problem here in terms of that first meeting. The natural instinct of the slaves would be to try and kill an orc if he/she was pillaging and stealing, which is what the orcs are doing in the camp. But it is a lot harder to kill someone if they are tipsy and not able to stand up straight. You have a choice...you can kill an orc who isn't capable of fighting back, or you can stay your hand and see what happens.
At the same time, we need one or more sober (or semisober) orcs who can make a plea for mercy to the followship and the slaves for their fellow orcs....explain how the group plans to settle in the foothills of the northern mountain and how they ran off rather than fight in the war against the Easterlings.
Maybe one or more of the female orcs could do that? In Morgoth's Ring, Tokien once said that, in the entire history of Arda, an orc had never made a plea for mercy, but if they should happen the free peoples of Arda would be obligated to take the plea seriously. We're going to take Tolkien at his word and see what happens....
I know we're still a ways from those scenes but I wanted to give you an idea which way this is leading. I have a feeling that different characters will respond to the orcs/slaves in different ways. It will presumably strain the unity of the group.....in fact probably both groups! It won't be easy for either side to forgive or at least to learn and live with the situation. In the end however mercy will gain the upper hand. (It better or the game will be over a lot quicker than we had planned!
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