ROLE * GAMES AMidde Earth Role-Playing Dy John David Ruemmler The following tale is set in mid-Third ‘Age, after Gondor’ civil war and the Great Plague of 1636-7, The climactic War of the Ring is yet to occur. The setting is a de- cayed watchtower on the lonely and dan- serous Tirlang Road between Erech and CCalembe, two rough-and:umble Dunnish hil towns in northern Gondor. The high vales ofthe White Mountains of ‘Gondor have long sheltered extraordinary secrets. The black Stone of Erech, an object, of reverence and awe, rests yet upon hill above the partiyruined Hillmen town ‘which lends the stone its name. Not far away the infamous Paths of the Dead be- ‘in, winding under the mountains toward the Dead Door at Dunharrow a settlement founded long ago by a mysterious race of Men all-but forgotten. Guarding the per- ‘ious Paths is the Army of the Dead, ancient and accursed pathbreakers and living dead who strongly “discourage” travel in the region ‘A lesser but nonetheless commanding mystery surrounds a crumbling stone tower on the winding mountain road south of Erech. Known 35 Troggha Tower, the site was originally the burial tomb of a high Dunnish lord, Troggha, who was mur-