The Michel Delving Mathom-House (OOC)

[Lady of Shadow]

Exchanged for the word RAG with the 'r' in outer instead, also played vertically (though I didn't include it in the role play part, so I took out the bold for the first word I tried). Sorry about that. Like I mentioned in an earlier post, it's been a while since I played Scrabble.

[Drífa]

I adjusted your score, @Lady of Shadow. No worries, we all have to refresh our memories. It has been a while since we played.

1+3(TL)+2=6+5 (ME)=11

A Middle Earth Bonus:
A bonus of 10 points will be applied to scores for Tolkien words, and 5 points for generic words (i.e., words not specific to Tolkien works) played that are supported by a valid quote from the approved list of J.R.R. Tolkien's writings of fiction:
The Hobbit
The Lord Of The Rings
The Silmarillion
Unfinished Tales
The Children Of Húrin
The History of Middle-earth (HoME)
A Tolkien word is defined as a word not found in the Word Sleuth Dictionary yet found in Tolkien's works or a word that, although located in the Word Sleuth Dictionary, has a unique meaning in Tolkien's works, for example, the word Shire.
When using a quote, it can be no more than 250 words in length and has to be one single quote. If you play the same word twice in one turn, the word must be found twice in the quote. For example, if you play AN and AN in one turn, the word AN must be featured twice in the quote you provide for you to get the Bonus for each word.
The Bonus will be added BEFORE any additional increase (Triple Word Scores, etc.) The word being quoted must appear exactly as you have played (i.e. "jumped" cannot be used if you only played "jump").
If you wish to play a Tolkien word, yet a quote on another word in the same play will gain you a higher score (for example, you play ARAGORN under an E also forming EA, and ARAGORN falls on a TWS, then quoting ARAGORN will get you more points than quoting EA) you may give a separate quote verifying that it exists in a Tolkien book. Still, you won't score points for it.

• Words must be placed horizontally or vertically, reading left to right or down. Diagonal words are not allowed. Words reading from right to left or up are not allowed. Words requiring apostrophes or hyphens are not allowed. All words must be found in the Word Sleuth Dictionary unless quoted from Tolkien's works.

@Pele Alarion, @Lail, @Akhenanat - you get to use one hyphen word if you so choose. After that we follow the rules. Thanks!

[Drífa]

I am going to have to update after my day in the mines. I ran out of time again! Have a good day!

[Lady of Shadow]

Whoops, sorry about that. It has now been fixed. Don't know where I got the 13 from, since I checked an earlier post of mine and it was an extra 5 points for an accompanying quote, not 13.

[Drífa]

My dear, @Akhenanat. I have blundered. I thought I updated the board on Thursday evening, but did not. It is now updated, and Lady of Shadow used the R in OUTER, creating the word RAG vertically. Could you please play another word? Thank you, and sorry about this.

[The Good Hunter]

Two rounds, two blunder. If I get a third, then I say I should get 100 points, or have 100 points taken away depending on who's responsible.

[Drífa]

I will try not to make any more blunders, although I am having a mug of ale (or two or three) in the Pub, and things could become confusing.

[Pele Alarion]

Hmm, hmm... @Drifa , I was about to post, but then began to look... wasn't it @Akhenanat turn after Lady of Shadow, not mine? Or should I go ahead?

[Drífa]

My god, you are right!!! I can not blunder again or I will have to give Frost 100 points!! And I see that he is a minion again. He might torture me in other ways, besides taking all the points.

Do you mind waiting, @Pele Alarion? I have all kinds of virtual cookies. You can have as many as you like.

Sorry folks, I have been working long hours.

[Pele Alarion]

Do you need tea and some honey cake, @Drifa ? To make sure you are relaxed and mistakes run from you? Hehe... sure, I can wait. Errr... Also I ended up saving a draft instead of posting this. Go figure. Here.

[Drífa]

Thanks, @Pele Alarion! Tea and cake sound lovely! We have been at this 'Plaza thing' a long time now, eh? It's always good to see you around!

[The Good Hunter]

I must apologize to you all, I am not going to drop off, but I am about to go on a small vacation for the next few days and unfortunately I'm not going to have the time to bumble about as much as I would have liked. I give you all permission to move Tarquinius as a chess piece wherever you need to put something until I get back. Good luck all ye wild and merry folx!

[Drífa]

We will keep the ale frothy and cold for your return, @Akhenanat! Have an excellent small vacation, lad!

It looks like you are up, @Pele Alarion whenever you are ready.

[Pele Alarion]

Okays, will tend to it soonish!

[Drífa]

Hi @Pele Alarion, I'm not sure you can play the word WARD using the A in ANON. The D falls above STUNT. Correct?

[Pele Alarion]

@Drifa Ah, yes, it does! Suppose I wanted to find a word somewhere so bad that I didn't notice. Am I still allowed to pick something else or the play is forfeit?

[Drífa]

You may find another word, @Pele Alarion! Just edit it into your post.

Some rules may become more lenient, as there are fewer of us playing, and it is for fun and not a league. Do you agree?

[Pele Alarion]

Well, fun is always good! Let's see what I can figure out from that collection of mine...

[Pele Alarion]

@Drifa Done, hopefully correctly this time.

[Drífa]

Hi @Pele Alarion ! You can only use one quote per post, 250 words per quote. You could get the bonus for ER if both ER and ACT were in the same quote.

[Pele Alarion]

Eeeps! I really have forgotten half of the rules.

[Drífa]

Hi ho! @Pele Alarion ,@Lail , @Akhenanat and @Lady of Shadow

Sorry for the long delay in updating the game. I went and caught the Holidays, the head cold, and the back-to-work blues. I should have a post up soon. Happy New Year!

[Pele Alarion]

Oiii, @Drifa ! I forgot... was away visiting the friend, but will hop to it quick, if it is not too late yet.

[Drífa]

Never to late @Pele Alarion . *grin*

[Drífa]

@Lail I assume you mean the first N in ANON where the DL is, right? :)

[Lail]

@Drifa haha yes I did indeed!

[Drífa]

Hi ho! Word Sleuthers! @Pele Alarion - looks like you are the last hobbit standing.
There are seven tiles left in the bag. Do you want to keep playing, or do we call you the official longest-ever Word Sleuth match champion? I guess we can always rp the end of the match, eh?

[Pele Alarion]

@Drifa , it is not that much fun playing alone, but can definitely RP.

[Lail]

I completely lost track of this! but I did really enjoy it. I'm happy for @Pele Alarion to be declared the winner, it is most deserved! and thank you @Drifa for hosting a fun game! If I get a chance, I may try to pop up a RP post to wrap up the story but also understand if you prefer not to continue. <3

[Drífa]

Thank you, @Pele Alarion and @Lail. Thank you, @Lady of Shadow and @Akhenanat. I will attempt to make a closing post. I must say, this has been the longest word sleuth match ever, eh? :) Thanks for playing.

[Pele Alarion]

It may have been the longest, @Drifa , but it surely was fun! Thanks for running it. And thanks to others for playing.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Hoi @Dungeon Delver. So I had not thought this out at all. But it seems that I will now deposit the letter at the Shire post office, along with instructions to call at Elostirion to pick up the gold ring (if desired). Then the letter can be delivered to the Mordor post office for attention Giqhohqha. Maybe you need a map too?

Any suggestions welcome.

This way I hope to avoid paying Qrraru even a nominal fee.

[The Good Hunter]

The best way to do anything on the Plaza is to not plan anything whatsoever at any given point. Haven't you read anything I've written? Do you think I have the slightest clue what the hell I'm doing until it's posted? Wrong sir!

Your idea is good, though mayhaps we ought to wait to see what others might join this foolhardy, farcical quest?

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Hmmm. I'm quite relieved to read that on the no planning. I had this sense that it was only me who has no idea what i'm doing from one post to the next.

Also happy to wait as I was not expecting any volunteers and so have to organize a little. If there are any more volunteers we could maybe get ambitious and send them off through all the postal offices of the plaza, or something.

[Aikári Salmarinian]

Chrys: Anyone can post in all the kingdoms. And any letters sent anywhere can be posted in the post office threads. Simple as that. You have no need of any volunteers.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Aiks, I don't want to go to Mordor. I went there once before, and I aint going again because I like my limbs attached to my body. I need some volunteers. Why not sign up?

[Aikári Salmarinian]

Chrys: I don't understand the purpose? It is all about OOC or RP. But cool nonetheless, if you like to create a journey a Frodo out of it, if that is in your mind?

I can give you Utchuk, he is a disguised Uruk/Orc as human.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Aiks, it may be that I have not got clear on the difference between OOC and RP. But thank you for your generosity with Utchuk.

The Frodo bit was just trapping. All I wish is to write a letter in the Shire and have someone else deliver it to Mordor. But if the others are journeying from the Shire to Mordor they are following in Frodo's footsteps, no? But now that two people have volunteered - and who knows but there may be others - I'm happy to elaborate. I am a tad worried about the messengers reading the letter, and am considering dividing the letter into parts and distributing the parts in the post offices of the plaza kingdoms. But it is just a thought Any suggestions are welcome.

All I really care about is getting my letter into the hands of the new manager of the Black Star and Sand Spa. Here is where I don't get the OOC/RP distinction. I am scared of the manager of the Black Star and Sand Spa both in OOC and in RP - so on both sides of the border, so to speak, I wish someone else to do the dangerous work for me.

[The Good Hunter]

You're scared of Giqhoqha?! Chrys, she's like three and a half feet tall

[Chrysophylax Dives]

I have observed on this site that 'Farmer Giles of Ham' is not as well known as it might be. I chose my name from the dragon of this story for various reasons, including the meaning of the name, and my deep desire to be able to fly and roast villages with a single breath. But most of all because the dragon of this story is not overbold.

My youngest is about three and a half feet tall and a total menace! She hits and bites when she does not get her way. Did not the movies teach us that even the smallest person can bite a dragon, or something like that?

[Aikári Salmarinian]

Chrys: The distinction is not so strange. This chat and planning thread is Out of Character (OOC) with is our RL us behind the PC, and all roleplay threads are In Character (IC), meaning our LOTR characters. That is all there is about it. Out of Character you can always decide how your characters are treated anywhere. If you say, you don't want to get hurt, other players are not allowed to hurt you, or can only make an attempt to, at which you can decide it is not happening. Otherwise it is called godmoding other's people characters, their actions and that is not allowed. Only the original writer have this privilege to decide over the actions of their characters, that is the ownership.

The post office is where the context of the letter is posted in a single post, but there is no must to add extra material how the letter got there or who is the deliverer. You can do off course.

And the tone of my IC posts is very different than my RL OOC posts. And if you still don't grasp it fully, we'll help you along the way. I had to learn too twenty years ago. A a newbie I added computers in my IC posts as Aikári using them in an Imladris setting, which was impossible. So I merged my 21st century with the 3019TA back then as one timeline. That is a fault of mine and always stayed with me, that has become an anekdote.

But about your idea: Oh it is possible your Hobbit character writes a letter and give it to a (few) messenger(s) who travel roleplay wise to Mordor and leave it at the door of the Spa and Star and the new manager there. The whole happening can be in character (IC). If planned well, there is barely any OOC needed then, usually.

[The Good Hunter]

Point well taken, I'm familiar with the broad strokes of the tale but have not read yet. I'll tell you what though, I promise Giqhoqha will not bite (unless you ask her to wherein she'd likely slap the ever-loving hell out of you) and will be a perfectly reasonable host

[Chrysophylax Dives]

:)

This is Mordor buttering up, eh? I do like butter so it may yet work.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

But about your idea: Oh it is possible your Hobbit character writes a letter and give it to a (few) messenger(s) who travel roleplay wise to Mordor and leave it at the door of the Spa and Star and the new manager there. The whole happening can be in character (IC). If planned well, there is barely any OOC needed then, usually.

Aiks, that all sounds good. Only I am sending the letter as Chrys. Dives, which is to say my dragon character. I know the Shire is for Hobbits. But Undertowers is a bit different - the Librarian is an Elf from Rivendell (@Saranna), and I am the Librarian's assistant (replacing Hill, who ran off with a fairy).

[Chrysophylax Dives]

You're scared of Giqhoqha?! Chrys, she's like three and a half feet tall

Welll, one result of last night's conversation is that my youngest now has a new nickname: 'the Goblin'.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

I'm now considering two letters to Mordor, the original and a proposal for scientific collaboration. Elostirion is the Library of Undertowers, and so we are quite up for research. To be absolutely honest, though the Librarian does not know this the Library owns the infamous huorn-breeding farm in the Westmarch (how else are we to afford luxury imports like Dwarvish tea?) But we don't like to talk of the huorn farm, at least not outside of Undertowers. Anyway, we have been looking up all the old manuscripts that might tell of the effects of sprinkling fairy-points. We wish to know if any races of Middle-earth are allergic to such sprinkling. But we can find almost nothing in the canonical Lore works. So we were considering conducting some scientific experiments. Obviously, this kind of thing is properly done in Mordor. So I am presently considering also a second letter.

As we have at present two volunteers, I could cut both letters in half and mix them, so that the messengers cannot read them, and send the two mixed letters off with different messengers. In Mordor they could then do the same to the messengers (this is how we managed to fuse birds and trees, in the end).

But I'm still in the turning-things-over-in-my-mind-and-hoping-for-a-few-more-volunteers stage atm. Just giving another heads up.

[Saranna]

@Chrysophylax Dives I should love to know more about the unknown - in terms of how far the tendrils of the library organisation reach. I shall be there for a short time today, trying to catch up with the shelving.

[The Good Hunter]

Fairy dust in Mordor, eh? This is sounds utterly Machenean. Time to brush up on my "Novel of the Black Seal"

[Chrysophylax Dives]

@Dungeon Delver, the experiment was inspired by this exchange. As I don't wish for any more strikes at present it seemed best to confine the experiment to non-administrative plaza members, at least for the moment.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

"The Novel of the Black Seal" is a horror story by Arthur Machen, part of his 1895 novel The Three Imposters. In its account of a hidden society of malevolent "Little People", the survivors of ancient days,

Another frequently anthologized excerpt from The Three Imposters, “The Novel of the Black Seal” leant its pacing and style to M. R. James as well as H. P. Lovecraft. For James’ part, it has an uncanny resemblance to some of his most respected ghost stories (specifically “Count Magnus,” “A Warning to the Curious,” “The Treasure of Abbot Thomas,” “Oh, Whistle…,” and “A View from a Hill”), virtually inventing the trope of the loner academic whose discovery of a mysterious artifact – and propensity for wandering off into the country by himself – puts him in harm’s way.

Wow! You are a source of unexpected riches @Dungeon Delver. We share a love of fin-de-siecle literature, but I start to appreciate how limited my reading has been. I confess that I never read any Lovecraft. I never even heard of 'The Novel of the Black Seal'. But those M.R. James stories are most excellent - Count Magnus and Oh, Whistle being two of the best. I will put The Novel of the Black Seal on my kindle holiday reading.

Edit. Just purchased (one dollar). Yeah, I recognize and love this kind of style. A world before television when people read more books because there was not so much else to do.

My father was a clever and well-read man, and left behind him a small but select collection of books, containing the best Greek, Latin, and English classics, and these books were the only amusement we possessed. My brother, I remember, learnt Latin out of Descartes's Meditationes, and I, in place of the little tales which children are usually told to read, had nothing more charming than a translation of the Gesta Romanorum.