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Anorien Concerns

Fireinferno13

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Hello all,

Its your friendly neighborhood spider-fireinferno. I have two concern about the Anorien Upgrade and, since the project post is locked tight, I thought I would post here:

1) Why is only 1/2 of the Firien Woods being redone? According to both the map and in-game progress, only 1/2 of the Woods is scheduled for demolition and redo. It would obviously make no sense to have two completely different forests on either side of the river dividing Gondor and Rohan.
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2) I found some possible lore that suggested the beacon caretakers in the Firien Wood lived in treehouses. This should be taken into account when redoing the forest homes.
 
Nice finding! They lived in lodges in the trees indeed!
I found this description of Halifirien. It's VERY different from our current beacon hill.
Unfinished Tales - Cirion and Eorl said:
The Halifirien was the highest of the beacons, and like Eilenach, the next in height, appeared to stand
up alone out of a great wood; for behind it there was a deep cleft, the dark Firien-dale, in the long
northward spur of Ered Nimrais, of which it was the highest point. Out of the cleft it rose like a sheer
wall, but its outer slopes, especially northwards, were long and nowhere steep, and trees grew upon them
almost to its summit. As they descended the trees became ever more dense, especially along the Mering
Stream (which rose in the cleft) and northwards out into the plain through which the Stream flowed into
the Entwash. The great West Road passed through a long cutting in the wood, to avoid the wet land
beyond its northern eaves; but this road had been made in ancient days, 32 and after the departure of
Isildur no tree was ever felled in the Firien Wood, except only by the Beacon-wardens whose task it was
to keep open the great road and the path towards the summit of the hill. This path turned from the Road
near to its entrance into the Wood, and wound its way up to the end of the trees, beyond which there was
an ancient stairway of stone leading to the Beacon-site, a wide circle levelled by those who had made the
stair. The Beacon-wardens were the only inhabitants of the Wood, save wild beasts; they housed in lodges
in the trees near the summit
I think we have to change some terrain too: "behind it there was a deep cleft", "nowhere steep"
 
@BWOT I know you do not want the Anorien revamp to extend too far, but, I really do think this should be given consideration given that 1/2 of the Firien Wood has already been nuked. Putting the lore aside and just considering the appeal visually, it would look awful to have two completely different forests side by side...
 
Fair points, would you be willing to take on part leadership of such task? Or maybe co-lead that portion with Ober?
 
Fair points, would you be willing to take on part leadership of such task? Or maybe co-lead that portion with Ober?
I unfortunately do not have the time to co-lead a project. But I dont think this extends the scope of the project very much!
 
Also.

Many of us feel like the planned cities in Anorien are far far far too large given that no cities show up on the map in this area and, as such, it should be predominantly farm land/small farming villages. NOT full blown cities.

For example, both Dol Caranthan (not to mention the city to the north of it) are pretty much the size of Calembel or Aldburg. While I am all for filling in Northern Gondor with farming or fishing towns, adding full blown cities seems ridiculous, unrealistic, and lore inappropriate. Especially given the city to farm ratio in this region, there is absolutely no way they could feed a multiple city populations.

I really think the size of these cities should be reconsidered. @BWOT @Patrick_0901 @Eriol_Eandur
 
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Most of the cities will be farming villages or defensive forts etc, only Dol Caranthan will be a city. The one north of it isn't going to be that size at all, I think it was planned as being dol Caranthan first, but we moved it.
 
Also.

Many of us feel like the planned cities in Anorien are far far far too large given that no cities show up on the map in this area and, as such, it should be predominantly farm land/small farming villages. NOT full blown cities.

For example, both Dol Caranthan (not to mention the city to the north of it) are pretty much the size of Calembel or Aldburg. While I am all for filling in Northern Gondor with farming or fishing towns, adding full blown cities seems ridiculous, unrealistic, and lore inappropriate. Especially given the city to farm ratio in this region, there is absolutely no way they could feed a multiple city populations.

I really think the size of these cities should be reconsidered. @BWOT @Patrick_0901 @Eriol_Eandur

This is also what I mentioned in my trail when I was researching Anorien a bit. The only city there is Minas Tirith (original name Minas Anor), the rest are just farmlands. Not even sure about villages. I was reading the land was sparsely populated.
 
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In regards to if there should be settled villages or not, ooits is right in that after osgo was abandoned, people ‘went to Anorien.
I disagree in finding Dol Carabthan to even be regarded as a city. Mainly a fortified village. I believe our Aldburg and other cities are too small. Obviously not going to change them now but I don’t think there’s a need to compromise on this. Also it is not like it fits out of proportion to the land around it and therefore there is enough room to get the feeling of barren lands with farming in the east/south part.
 
Anorien is and always has been Gondor's sparsest populated region. We know this from several passages describing the founding of Rohan in Calenardhon. Also it would be unrealistic if Anorien would be anywhere near as wealthy and populated as the rest of Gondor, because it is so isolated by the lack of sea ports and the dividing White Mountains. Lastly, in the chapter Minas Tirith, forces come from every fief except Anorien. This is because all of Anorien's forces are in Minas Tirith, which can be considered part of Anorien imo. So the fortified towns are a bit lore inaccurate imo, so is the dense population.

I understand that you guys want Anorien, the last project of Gondor, to be the most outstanding fief of them all, but that can better be achieved by following the lore and realism, than by building as many cool towns and castles. -imho
 
I belive if i remeber correctly farmers from ithilian escaped from ithilian and settled in anoria and continued farming
I searched for any quote about that, but wasn't able to find anything.

People left Osgilath and Ithilien because of the perils there. Anorien wasn't much safer that Ithilien as it was quite open for raids over River Anduin. I would expect people move to the south of Gondor instead.
 
I searched for any quote about that, but wasn't able to find anything.

People left Osgilath and Ithilien because of the perils there. Anorien wasn't much safer that Ithilien as it was quite open for raids over River Anduin. I would expect people move to the south of Gondor instead.
Adding to the reasons of unsafety: the goblins from the Misties attempted to settle in the White Mountains, -mentioned only in Rohan, but why not also Anorien?- after the Dwarves successfully drove them out of the Misties.
 
Thank you all for contributing your two cents to this concern, I really appreciate being able to get the full picture.

@BWOT would you consider our argument convincing enough to reconsider the planning of Anorien villages in order to make them both smaller and less fortified?
Im happy with the idea purposes, its lore accurate and realistic
 
After noticing that ANOTHER castle is set to be built in Anorien, I want to bump this thread as I it feels as though these collective concerns about excessive size and fortification of villages in Anorien were, unfortunately, largely ignored. @BWOT ? @Patrick_0901 ? @ooitsbirdo ?
My bad, it's meant to be fort (bigger outposts than those we have.) I think its fair to have the size of defence along the two roads coming from rohan, and the idea behind it is that these would mainly be to watch over the road and defend from raiding orcs, while they could call in reinforcements from the slightly bigger camp. It's not going to be huge either.

My mistake with the sign
 
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