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Mark Thorne:

Let me begin with the obligatory congratulations on a wonderful magazine. Other Hands comes as close as I've ever seen to being exactly what I was looking for in a gaming magazine. Not only are the articles, adventures, and reviews contained within intelligent and interesting, but the whole periodical deals almost specifically with Middle-earth! What more could a guy like me want? Well, I'll save that for later...

I recently received Other Hands 12, and was rather impressed with the quality of the articles. I found it slightly humorous that Other Hands 10/11, which was a "double-issue," was shorter in length than #12! I take this as a positive sign of the growth of this venue for Middle-earth gaming. Anyway, first I'd like to make some comments concerning the new column "Digital Hands" by Fredrik Ekman. At first glance, it seemed to me that the concept of this column was out of place. But then I looked at the cover again and noticed that it said, "The International Journal for Middle-earth Gaming." Considering that computer games are just that, I guess that "Digital Hands" fits after all.

However, for some reason I still feel that the column as it is now is perhaps too limited. I have this unfortunate vision of "Digital Hands" stagnating in the future, where it falls into a rut of supplying old and rather useless information about games no one plays anymore. Hopefully, however, Mr. Ekman will be resourceful enough to not let that happen. I'm not really criticizing the column or the concept itself, but I just hope that it continues to stay as lively and useful as it is now.

Moving on to Bernie Roessler's piece concerning aggressiveness and morale in Middle-earth, I would like to say that it was truly one of my favorite articles in #12. The beginning brought to light many of my concerns about the over-eagerness of PCs to jump into a fight at the slightest provocation. A very good article, in my opinion; useful as well. It even gave me an idea for a new adventure.

I thought it was very interesting to note that in the interview, Pete Fenlon still managed to make allusions to the strong future of the MERP line, even in the context of talking about his map-making skill. Truly remarkable. For a moment, I saw a brief glimpse of the same Pete Fenlon Other Hands readers saw back in the premier issue in his "Open Letter."

Finally, I would like to voice my concerns for the future of Other Hands. It has obviously grown by leaps and bounds since its inception. This is an excellent thing for everybody, as Chris even mentioned in #12 that a number of OH articles have been translated into other languages. However, whenever a publication such as this experiences good fortune, it is all to easy to lose the original vision that made the magazine so attractive to people in the first place. As direct examples, look at Shadis magazine or the now-deceased Inphobia. For those familiar with the above, you know that what can happen to once-good publications when the original vision is lost. To Chris, and to everyone who reads this, I urge you to keep up the excellent work in making Middle-earth the best place in Arda to adventure.

Honors #6

1001 E. Harrison

Springfield, MO 65807

USA

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Bernie Roessler:

Wow! Best issue yet (#12). Congratulations to all involved. My one reservation would be my own article on "Aggressiveness and Morale for Non-player Characters." In my effort to complete the article on time, I must admit that I sinned in terms of rule development. First of all, I believe I should have explained under what circumstances the rules were meant to be used.

My intention was to present a set of rules for determining the response of hostile NPCs in a more or less random encounter (e.g. your party is detected by an Easterling patrol). The rules as they exist now were not designed to simulate what the NPCs' reaction would be if they had a personal grievance against your party. For example, even Hobbits would respond aggressively if you broke into Great Smials and tried to kidnap the Thain's daughter. Perhaps I need to come up with a table for those motivational factors. Until then, as always, the GM's discretion will have to be used.

I also overlooked the fact that Orcs and Trolls usually have negative Presence modifiers due to their race. This will tend to make them a bit less aggressive than I feel they should be. Perhaps one can ignore the racial modifiers when determining the Presence bonus for these races in this circumstance, or use the secondary skill of leadership as a modifier instead.

Now that that's said, I think the "Arda Lore" section is a terrific concept. I think Chris' points regarding the Cult of Melkor/Sauron there and in the reviews are quite important. As he suggests, one aspect that needs to be further explored is just what it is that made this worship of darkness so damn appealing (or, one could say, so appealing to be damned) to so many for so long. One would think that, even if a people were slyly seduced by Sauron or his minions, if the cult did not produce positive results, its promoters would meet a similar fate to that which Luke Potter depicts for the Cult of Maladûm in his fine article on the Balchoth.

Looking forward to next issue and my compliments to the artists.

3907 S Woodland St

Visalia, CA 93277-8048

USA

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