SHARKEY'S SHIPPING

1. Barracks. Several guards are asleep here. If you stay in the room for too long, they wake up and attack. (If you stand close enough to the door when this happens, only the nearest guard will be alerted. The others do not wake up even during the fight.) Sneak to get past the guards unnoticed. At the table in the lower right corner, read the journal for a password.
2. Use picklock or the Unlock spell to open the door. The tunnel beyond (3c) allows easy access to the levels below Sharkey's Shipping.
3. Sharkey's Shipping.
   • a. Oldenad has some useful items for sale. If you go downstairs despite his warning, he gets mad at you and will no longer sell you anything. If you did not buy a White Hand already, you have to go all the way to the Shire or Bree to get one. Oldenad will not call the guards, though.
   • b. Store-room. You find a locked chest among the wooden crates. The game does not tell you, but there is a letter attached to it that you can read. The letter will be different depending on whether you destroyed the machine or not in Hobbiton. Use picklock or the Unlock spell to open the chest. Get the objects inside (rations x 2, silver pennies).
   • c. Tunnel to back door. The lower levels of Sharkey's Shipping are not situated directly below the store but more to the west, as indicated by relative placement of the stairs (see below). According to a book in the library of Rivendell, the dungeons once belonged to the old Tower of Gorthad, ruled by Gardeleg.
   • d. Office. In the standard version, sneak up to the sleeping orc, then use perception and get the rusty key. If you try to steal the key without being sneaky, or if you take too long, the orc wakes up and attacks. In the enhanced version, the orc wakes up immediately. The reason seems to be the format of the script, i.e. the same bug as for the red acorns.
   • e. Guards. If you have been to Rivendell to get help – to be more precise, if the Black Riders have been defeated at the Ford – there are six guards here, otherwise there are three. If the guards see Nob Appledore they attack immediately. Otherwise they ask for the password. Say NAN CURUNIR. Since they are not overly bright, the guards will just keep asking for the password if you tell them anything else (such as yesterday's password...). If you move or attack, you have to fight them.
   • f. Use the rusty key to open the door to Nob Appledore's cell. (Using picklock does not do it.) Nob joins your party.
   • g. Grimbosh's office. If Athelwyn is present, she reveals herself as a traitor and joins Grimbosh. If she has the Ring the game is over. Grimbosh tells you to surrender; if you do, it is game over as well. You have to fight Grimbosh, and Athelwyn too if she is present. Luckily she does not use her magic. If Grimbosh is alone, and you have defeated the Black Riders, he throws in three orcs to even the odds.
     There is a locked chest in a corner. Use detect traps to learn that the lock is, indeed, trapped. Use devices or the Unlock spell to open it without harm and read the letter inside. If you use picklock without disarming the trap you are struck by a poison needle and take 2–6 points of damage. Since Athelwyn is no longer around at this point, and other characters with the necessary spells or skills (such as Gimli, or Gandalf) do not join you until Rivendell, you may want to save the chest for later if you went here on your way to Bree.
   • h. Three or six guards, as in 3e. The encounters are very much the same, except that these guards do not want a password, but a pass. Use the White Hand to get past them.
   • i. The witch's bedroom. If you read her diary Athelwyn drops her guise and attacks, revealing herself as the oldish Witch of Cardolan.
   • j. Nob warns you against reading the black tome on the altar. Read it anyway three times for cryptic clues on Moria (the West Gate, the sanctuary of Durin's Axe, and the Golden Wheel, respectively). On your second reading you get a warning that all is not well. If you read the book a fourth time, the character who last used the Read skill receives Dark Lore and turns against the others (although, since he does not say anything and need not attack first, it may look as if the others suddenly turn against him). You have to kill him. Use a torch or the Firefinger spell to burn the Black Book.
   • k. Three snaga orcs are sitting here, exhausted. They will not attack you unless you attack them. Use perception to find and get two shovels and a pick. Use either shovel or pick, and the screen turns dark as you unwittingly release the Moria Doom spirit who gasses you for your trouble (luckily you take no damage). Get the Golden Wheel.

Questions Oldenad Sharkey, Rangers, White hand, News, Rayf/Brogan, Bree

Stores & prices Sharkey's Shipping White Hand 35 rope 10 prybar 5 shovel 8

Silver pennies Store-room 30

• The unused room marked '?' was probably intended to be the basement of Sharkey's Shipping. You can teleport inside (map 4, x 3040, y 940). The room is empty and the stairs do not lead anywhere (there are no scripts), but the scrapped level explains the placement of the stairs in the published game. If you teleport to map 3 using the coordinates above, you find yourself on the ground floor of Sharkey's Shipping.
• There are several unused text strings in the map data, probably more than for any of the other maps. Some of the strings have to do with the crates in the cellar:
  • You find a number of wooden crates.
  • They are labelled: 'Lotho Baggins, Hobbiton, Shire'
  • You see a number of crates on the floor here. Do you wish to open them? (Y/N)
  • The boxes contain parts for machines. A strange and evil looking machine, by the looks of it.
  • You hear footsteps behind you. You stop prying at the crates.
  Apparently the idea was that you could use a prybar on the crates, but in doing so risked alerting the nearby guards. The connection between the crates and the Hobbiton machine made it into the published game in an unobtrusive way (see 3b above). Also see paragraph #238 in the manual.
• According to Paul Jaquays's design documents at www.jaquays.com/paul/lordoftherings_maps.htm, the password needed for Sharkey's Shipping was originally intended to change from day to day, making the game more challenging. There were three passwords to choose from (HORNBURG, NAN CURUNIR, ORTHANC), and you had to look in a ledger to learn the correct one for any given day. In the published game, only one password is used. Perhaps the need to keep track of time turned out to be too unwieldy. An unused string reads: 'You notice an open ledger. The handwriting is very difficult to read, but it seems to be open to today's date, with a password: "Nan Curunir".' Cf. paragraph #63 in the manual.
• The draft map also shows a locked door sealing off the Black Book area (3j). The door was supposed to open magically if you spoke the correct password. Again, the password was to be set randomly, and learned from a scroll in Grimbosh's room (LUGBURZ, GROND, or MORGOTH). Some unused strings may belong here: 'A scroll? All this for a lousy scroll.' and 'The scroll says "Lugburz".' There is also a paragraph in the manual (#32) that reads simply, "GROND".
• Grimbosh's chest was to be guarded by a poison pin, a trapdoor, and a crossbow trap, and there are two unused strings that read 'A huge steel crossbow bolt pierces you!' and 'You trigger a device that throws all of you into a Pit!'. All this for a lousy scroll. Apparently the entire complex was quite deadly as originally designed.
• The passage beyond the magical door was to be protected by a another trap. A mechanism in the outer hall disarmed the trap if you entered the correct combination. It is not entirely clear what the mechanism was supposed to look like, but it allowed you to move three levers into a number of combinations. One of the combinations was to be disastrous to you (WIZARD, DWARF, ORC), while another disarmed the trap (WIZARD, WOLF, SCULL). This was not implemented either. Paragraphs 67 and 102 in the manual may have been written as clues to the puzzle (compare the first line of each riddle to the combinations mentioned by Paul Jaquays).
• The following unused string may have been intended as the last words of whoever read the Black Book one time too many: 'I want the Ring. It could've been mine. It should have been mine! Thief, give it to me now! It is too precious for someone like you to have it. Give it to me now!' There is also a line for Frodo: 'A strange look appears in Frodo's eyes. "Why destroy It? Madness! The Ring is mine forever!" You are shocked to see him place it on his finger, laugh in an evil, un-hobbitish way, and disappear.' However, since no book is mentioned, it might refer to some other situation. Of course, it is not hard to imagine Frodo being tempted to claim the Ring just about anywhere on the current map, e.g. in one of the evil stone circles.
• As originally designed the room next to Grimbosh's office was a ceremony chamber, where evil spirits (displayed graphically as sparkling lights) would drain your Will and Endurance and you had to defend yourself with the Iron Mind skill (not used in the game, but data for it exists and a script could be implemented). The following unused string probably belongs here: 'The lights try to affect your mind, and waste their energies in a futile struggle.'