In the frozen land of Nador they were forced to eat Robin’s minstrels. And there was much rejoicing.
When I first started playing LOTRO and saw that the primary healers were called “minstrels” and played music to restore health, the first thing I thought was, “That’s stupid.”
After all, it really does seem kind of silly that your healer is standing in the back playing a flute/theorbo/harp/cowbell. I can accept the idea of the rune-keeper or lore master as healers. After all, Middle Earth is a fantastical world, and it seemed to me that those two classes draw their power from a kind of magic. But you can’t tell me that a guy with a lute is going to heal me after a giant steps on me or an orc tries to run me through with its spear.
I had similar reservations about the captain as a healer. The basic description of captain healing makes them seem more like cheerleaders than someone who’s going to staunch the bleeding or stop your intestines from falling out. However, after thinking about it in the context of the LOTRO lore, captains and minstrels as healers makes some sense.
The Core Mechanic
In order for me to accept a minstrel as a healer, I had to suspend my disbelief and accept the basic premise set forth by the game that your green bar isn’t health in the same sense of most games.
Having come up through role-playing games (pen n’ paper or computer), I’m used to the concept of hit points (or health, structural damage capacity et al). When the bad guys deplete your hit points, you die. Medpacs or cleric spells can restore hit points, and it was always a good idea to keep a guy around who could cast Raise Dead or Resurrection. Pretty simple, huh?
Since there is no perma-death within the game of LOTRO1, they had to come up with some mechanism to explain rez circles and player-initiated revival. I’m no authority on Tolkien, but I’ve read that in his view of the mortal races, death is not reversible, which created a quandary for the game devs.
Their solution was original, and works both within the context of the game and Tolkien lore. Instead of health/hit points, your character has “morale”, and when it is gone, you are rendered incapable of resisting (the kneeling “death” pose) or driven from the field of battle (to the rez circle). You then regain your morale and live to fight another day. This seems to be purely a concession to the Tolkien lore, since the game makes specific reference to “healing”, and it is pretty clear that you deal death out left and right; kill something and you’ll see that its remains are clearly marked “Corpse of . . .”
So the question I had was, “Is there a real life equivalent of minstrels in combat?”
Minstrels in real life
In the seminal text defining the theory of modern warfare, On War (Von Kreige), Prussian general Carl von Clausewitz wrote, “War is an act to compel our enemy to do our will.” He was one of the first modern theorists to encompass the idea of “total war” in which civilian populations acted as an extension of the military. The logical extension of this idea is one that the US military teaches as one of the nine principles of war as “Objective”: The ultimate military purpose of war is the destruction of the enemy’s ability to fight and will to fight.
Many things factor in to the will to fight: equipment, training, resources, food, transportation, etc. This will to fight is reflected both in the military which takes the field and the civilian population who supports the soldiers, sailors and airmen. If the collective will to fight is broken, a force, no matter how great its technological or tactical power, will ultimately lose. This is why the Soviets were driven from Afghanistan2 On a tactical level, if the will of a fighting force is broken, they will retreat, even if they held other military advantages. And on an individual level, when the bullets/arrows/cannonballs start flying, if a soldier loses the will to fight, he or she will retreat or surrender.
On a strategic level, what keeps a soldier’s morale high?
If you know anyone who has ever been deployed overseas, or maybe you yourself have been sent downrange, it should come as no surprise that the two most important things to keep soldiers spirits up are a warm, dry bed and good, hot food.
Do you know what the #3 thing is? If you ask most soldiers, for the vast majority of them, it’s getting mail from home. It may be a letter from a sweetheart, a care package from Mom, or even a “To any G.I.” letter.
Historically, shortly after the mail is probably entertainment; back in the day, armies organized bands to play music. Before iPods, laptop computers, Playstations or any thing electrical, songs and music were the primary social activity of a large group of soldiers. While the standard marches and tunes of the “old days” have fallen out of the modern public consciousness, the armed forces still maintain a healthy budget for military bands, the most famous of which is probably The United States Marine Band (“The President’s Own”). In addition to the service bands, entertainers (including musicians, comedians, actors, athletes and other celebrities) are instrumental (pun intended) in keeping the morale of deployed troops high. Just ask the USO.
Nowadays, it’s easy to forget how important music is to binding a culture together, but back in the old days, and in a role-playing setting like D&D or LOTRO, it would be one of the defining attributes to a group. Anyone who could play a tune would be welcome in camp. There are stories during the (American) Civil War of truces between the sides where Union and Rebel soldiers would lay down their arms for a night to sing standards. Even during World War I, there were several unofficial and unsanctioned Christmas truces when the opposing armies would exchange gifts, bury their dead, and swap prisoners. In most cases, the evening ended in the two armies singing carols before they went back to killing one another the next day.
So how would songs or music “heal” on a tactical level?
At the request of his commander, Lord Lovat, Private Bill Millin (pictured above after D-Day) played the pipes as the First Special Service Brigade landed on Sword Beach. After the war, a German commander said they didn't shoot him because they thought he was crazy.
Before wireless communications, or even before wired signals like the telegraph, the principal method for a commander to communicate with his subordinates and orchestrate a battle was through music, usually drums or horns, that could be heard above the roar of battle3. Often the commands they could give weren’t very complex (ie-forward, retreat, halt), but that was the most effective way to tell a large number of soldiers what to do. In addition, each unit often had their own “code” so that they could tell whether it was their regiment being ordered to advance or the one two hills over.
If the advance was being sounded, that would mean your side was doing well. If you heard a horn sounding the retreat, maybe it was time to panic. Drums were used to keep a cadence and set the pace (march, quickstep, double-quick, etc.).
Music was played to buoy the spirits of an army, and this is the key to tactical healing as it applies to LOTRO. Sometimes, bands would play as soldiers would march by and in to battle. In a few documented instances, musicians played on the field, some being more successful than others. At the Battle of Dargai Heights (in what is now Pakistan), George Findlater, a piper with the Gordan Highlanders was awarded the Victoria Cross for playing his pipes as the Highlanders and Gurkhas advanced and carried the day4. If you’ve seen The Longest Day, you saw piper Bill Millin playing his pipes (in violation of standing orders from the English War Office) as the First Special Service Brigade landed on Sword Beach.
While I think it is something of a reach to have a gazillion minstrels roaming Middle Earth and providing as much healing as they do, it’s not something that is unheard of in the context of the morale mechanic and real life examples.
Captains in real life
Once you reconcile the idea of morale as the green bar, the step to captain healing is a short one.
After all, LOTR captains are at the front of the charge, and they hold the line in the face of an advancing foe. If you want to be inspired by what captains do, listen to the Captain’s Roundtable and forward to about the 35 minute mark. If that doesn’t make you want to play a captain, send me the name of your hunter or champion and remind me not to heal you.
The captain’s primary healing skills (Rallying Cry, Words of Courage, Muster Courage) are aptly named for their role and lore within the context of LOTRO and fit seamlessly into the morale mechanic. Good leadership is often the difference between victory and defeat. It should go without saying that all things being equal, a force that has better leaders will triumph over a force with lesser leaders. It is also true that an inferior force may overcome a superior force if its leadership is good. The most commonly cited example is the Army of Northern Virginia under the leadership of Robert E. Lee and his primary subordinates, Lieutenant-Generals James Longstreet and Thomas Jackson. From the Seven Days Battles to Chancellorsville, they went on an unprecedented winning spree against numerically superior Union forces under a string of uninspiring leaders, the rebels often routing the Army of the Potomac.
A tactical example would be the Allied landings on Omaha Beach. The Germans held the high ground and had every inch of the beach zeroed in on their machine guns and mortars, yet it was the individual bravery of squad leaders, senior non-commissioned officers and platoon commanders in the First Infantry Division (“The Big Red One”) and the Twenty-Ninth Infantry Division (“Blue and Grey”) that got the invaders out of the kill zones and off the beach. It helped that in some places, the units defending the Normandy coast were made up of conscripts from the Ostlegionen batallions who were not as well-trained or as motivated as volunteer soldiers5.
Sergeant Thomas Plunkett of the 21st Massachusetts Infantry lost both arms at the Battle of Fredericksburg while carrying the regimental colours. After his death in 1885, the flag he was carrying was brought from the Massachusetts state house to lay in state alongside his casket. For his bravery as a standard-bearer, he was awarded the Medal of Honor.
The other captain mechanic that has a real life equivalent is the banner.
A few paragraphs ago, I mentioned how music was used to signal maneuvers from the commander to their army. The other device historically used by armies was the battle standard. Each regiment had a flag that was distinctive to their unit. The names of engagements they had participated in were sewn on to the flag (streamers were added to ceremonial flags). If soldiers didn’t know where to go or what to do, they simply followed the battle flag. If the colours were moving forward, they advanced. If the colours were moving to the rear, it was time to retreat.
Being a part of the colourguard or even being the standard bearer was considered a great honour, even though it meant that your life expectancy just dropped. Conversely, to capture an enemy flag became a point of pride. Lieutenant Thomas Custer was awarded the Medal of Honor on two separate occasions for capturing two battle standards6. I don’t have an exact number, but a large percentage of the Medals of Honor awarded during the Civil War had to do with actions around the battle flag7.
In LOTRO, the captain’s banner has a nice healthy glow to it, so much so that you can see it over the crest of a hill and even through smoke, fog and night. From a role-playing point of view, whenever a captain plants a banner, you (and your character) should be inspired to do great things.
Minstrels and captains: Not as silly as you think
I think of all the healing mechanics in the game, the captain’s Rallying Cry and banner skills are probably the most “realistic”8, but within the framework of the game, I can see how both minstrel and captain healing work to fit the lore of Middle Earth. I still find it a little odd to think that a cowbell or clarinet can cure a nasty frontal AOE or poison DOT, but who am I to question the value of inspiring words or a melodious tune?
Shines the name, Rodger Young!
Fought and died for the men he marched among.
To the everlasting glory of the Infantry
Lives the story of Private Rodger Young.
- Character deletion is an out-of-game event. ↩
- Vizzini’s Classic Blunder #1: Never get involved in a land war in Asia. ↩
- I hate to break it to you, but Alexander the Great and Robert E. Lee didn’t have Vent or Teamspeak ↩
- So don’t laugh at the next minstrel playing the bagpipes because the pipers have a Victoria Cross and the LMs and RKs don’t. ↩
- The Ost Battalions were “recruited” from eastern Europe who were incorporated into the Reichswehr. Some were volunteers, but many were pressed into service. Due to this, they often operated in support roles under the supervision of German sergeants who would shoot deserters. ↩
- Yes, Thomas was George Armstrong Custer’s younger brother and died at Little Big Horn in 1876. ↩
- Just to be clear, there is no such thing as the “Congressional Medal of Honor”. It’s the Medal of Honor. It is given by the President in the name of Congress, but it’s not part of the name. I’d also like to get on my soapbox for a second, and tell you that the Medal of Honor—or any combat award—is not “won”. You “win” a football game. You “win” a prize at the fair. You “win” $50 at the blackjack table. Combat medals—whether they are the Navy Commendation Medal with “V” device, Silver Star, or Distinguished Flying Cross—are earned or awarded, and the men and women who wear them are “recipients”, not “winners”. Rant over. ↩
- Not that anything in a fantasy game should be confused with “reality” ↩
October 25, 2011 at 10:38 am
Excellent, Excellent, Excellent Article. Probably one of the most insightful articles I’ve seen in a while.
October 25, 2011 at 10:39 am
Great article!
Now explain Rune-keepers. -_-
October 25, 2011 at 11:17 am
Everybody loves pet rocks!
October 25, 2011 at 1:08 pm
The Tolkien Professor explains Runekeepers, in the podcast with his interview.
October 25, 2011 at 2:42 pm
Good write up. Very good points and I think they’re all spot on.
I guess at the end of the day many things in MMORPGs are going to feel somewhat silly if you really sit down and think about it. Some blood thirsty orc’s “morale” has been brought down because I’m luting and screaming at him him a lot. He just gives up, so demoralized that he collapses and lets me take his stuff.
There are some caveats people just have to give things because it’s a game haha.
October 25, 2011 at 2:42 pm
Darn sorry, I didn’t mean this as reply to your post.
October 26, 2011 at 11:30 pm
Yeah but have you got your cowbell yet? Those orcs really lose morale when you chinka-chunka=chinka at them with the killer cowbell.
October 25, 2011 at 7:09 pm
they really really like rocks
October 25, 2011 at 10:27 pm
Y’know, I’ve contemplated scribbling out a ‘In Defense of Rune-Keepers’ piece to tackle this sort of thing… only thing is I don’t think I’m anywhere near well-versed enough in Tolkien lore to give it any ‘oomph.’
But eh, who knows, maybe I’ll give it a whack anyway. They’re my favorite class, after all. 
October 26, 2011 at 11:49 pm
It’s not about the rocks. The rocks aren’t the runes — they are only the things on which the runes are inscribed. Runes are symbols, like letters or pictographs, written to represent words or phrases. In Tolkien’s world, as in many other fantasy worlds, words have power. Names have power. Tolkien was a linguist, so for him, words were even more powerful than for most people. They were the premise on which he built his worlds and his tales. The languages came first; the stories came after. Language was the stuff of creation, and without his languages, the tales we know and love, and the game created from it, would not exist.
Within the stories themselves, words have power and influence. Frodo is given the special title of “Elf Friend”, not only because of his courtesy, but because he can speak Elvish. Evil things are repelled when the name of Elbereth is spoken. The power of the Luthien Tinuviel is not just in her music, but in her words. Secret doors open when the right words are spoken. Gandalf’s first attack on the Balrog is with words. The basic tragedy of “The Silmarillion” is words — the words of Feanor’s oath. In “The Hobbit”, Gandalf conquers the trolls with words.
So I don’t think the Runekeeper class is much of a stretch, or out of character with the lore.
And by the way, I named my loremaster Eolha, after Eolh, the rune of protection. And also, no, I don’t play a runekeeper.
October 26, 2011 at 11:52 pm
This is why many of the Runekeeper’s skills have word-oriented names. (“Ceaseless Argument”, “Fiery Ridicule”, “Chilling Rhetoric” etc.)
However, even being aware of all that… it’s still kind of amusing to make fun of their pet rocks. ;P
October 27, 2011 at 9:32 am
Even the RKs make fun of their rocks!
October 27, 2011 at 12:57 am
See, this is precisely my thinking. While perhaps not entirely fitting the letter of the lore, it fits the spirit brilliantly – words in Middle-Earth quite obviously hold power, for those who know how to wield it properly and not to use them recklessly. It also suits the dualistic nature of the rune-keeper class – words are either able to harm in a rather scathing manner (mirrored by their DPS role) or soothe a tumultuous mind or heart (reflected by their healing role), all depending on how the one wielding them chooses their words. And following the rules of rhetoric, one cannot easily ‘shift sides’ in an argument without taking the time to transition logically from one into the other, also reflected in the ‘attunement’ idea – as one must take it step by step to come to a logical conclusion, so too must one slowly build up to their ‘epic conclusion’, and the farther they get into one side of an argument, the harder it is for them to make a strong argument on the other side without ‘winding down’.
Maybe I’ve just spent way too much time thinking about this sort of thing, but hey, I was a linguistics major myself.
Words are my life. 
October 27, 2011 at 9:51 am
That’s a fascinating analogy! Whether the devs intended it or not, it certainly works. It’s interesting that with your background, you play an RK. This makes me smile, because it reminds me of something in my own life.
My best friend was the California debating champ when we were in high school, so she is well-versed in the practices you describe, and is very hard to best in an argument. When I do win, it’s because she tries to shift the topic to something other than what I am talking about, and I won’t let her do it. So what is my main class? A warden. And what’s the warden’s role? To keep the battle focused on her, and not let the mobs stray. Thus do life and craft reflect one another!
October 25, 2011 at 10:43 am
I always thought that minis and caps being healers made sense, since I play the game for the lore, and having read practically everything Tolkien wrote 2 or 3 times at the moment of this comment. Remember than in the universe of Ea, the words itself have power (the most simple example would be Invocation of Elbereth, in the books, movie and game).
October 25, 2011 at 11:38 am
Absolutely, indeed one only needs to read about Luthien Tuniviel who lays some serious singing smack down on a few middle earth notables!
October 25, 2011 at 11:06 am
This has been a brilliant read! Great post! And I love the first tag =p
October 25, 2011 at 11:12 am
Yes! After I heard that roundtable, I DID roll a captain! And I named her Battlehope (see the current weekly poll on “Naming”).
Great article!
October 25, 2011 at 11:49 am
What an excellent article! Very well said. I enjoyed reading this very much. I’m finally glad to have something to reference to when I bring up this point in GLFF or other in-game channels. Wow.
October 25, 2011 at 12:39 pm
Good stuff.
I used to live across the street from a Soldier’s Award recipient (the highest honor a Non-Com can receive) who -EARNED- his accolade by pulling a pilot out of a downed burning plane behind enemy lines in China.
AFAIK, he’s the last Flying Tiger left. And he isn’t even mentioned on the Wiki page…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Tigers
October 25, 2011 at 12:42 pm
This was a hilarious article, yet at the same time, I feel I learned something.
And yes, the Captain roundtable! That speech that Geiri gave at 35:10 on is basically why I started my Captain and why he has basically become my main. So EPIC!
One thing, you forgot Inspire in the list of healing skills, which I think is a very poignantly-named skill, and with the new Shield-brother, Song-brother, and Shing-brother skills, it has become even more meaningful, because it restores power to the attack of Shing-brother, etc. Very cool.
But there are so many good skills and names, like Last Stand and In Harm’s Way. By the way, the best picture of those skills roleplay-wise that I’ve ever seen was your very own story when Garald saves his friends. That also might have made my Captain my main.
October 27, 2011 at 1:32 pm
“And yes, the Captain roundtable! That speech that Geiri gave at 35:10 on is basically why I started my Captain and why he has basically become my main. So EPIC!”
Indeed, and agreed.
October 25, 2011 at 1:39 pm
Lovely post, I have always understood the role of the Minstrel is to keep other folk wanting to fight.
The songs and balads and anthems are the key (pun intended) to this.
A little while back I wrote a short story about my Minstrel’s morale boosting tunes in Pumrya’s Prompts on the Turbine Landroval forum http://goo.gl/HvqBD
October 25, 2011 at 1:44 pm
Great article; Thanks!
October 25, 2011 at 1:47 pm
Vraeden. You knocked it out of the park my man. Especially with your great examples from military history. (You left out Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain but I forgive you!) I couldn’t be more proud to BE a Captain than I was hearing Geiri’s remarks or reading your splendid piece. Thanks indeed.
/swordsalute
October 25, 2011 at 2:06 pm
Saw this on Twitter recently, you may get a chuckle. http://t.co/Do3QJhab
October 25, 2011 at 4:12 pm
Fantastic write up Vraeden. Inspirational even.
October 25, 2011 at 5:26 pm
When I first started playing LotRO, I actually felt that the morale concept (and its refill through song and cries), made much more sense than the typical RPG conceit of hit points. Morale is easily understood in real-world terms, but ‘hit points?’ What is a hit point? If real-life, almost any injury is a one-shot. Brigand slices you with a sword? It’s not taking away 100 of your 800 ‘hit points’ – it’s taking off your arm or spilling out your intestines.
If you imagine that that brigand’s sword “grazes” you (thanks to armor, partial evade, etc), it’s sure going to scare the shit out of, lowering your morale, without much affecting any real-world analogue of your hit points.
October 25, 2011 at 5:46 pm
If anything, it’s Loremaster and Runekeeper healing that’s silly, given how low-magic middle earth is supposed to be. Also, there’s a reason our health pools are called “Morale” and we retreat, not die upon defeat.
Of course it’s all fluff designed around standard MMO mechanics, but I always liked it.
October 25, 2011 at 10:04 pm
Lore-master healing actually makes perfect sense, as their main skill is Beacon of Hope, which comes from their ties to light-producing flashes and bangs. Leechcraft was also a good name for their wound-cure, though that has been changed to Ancient Knowledge of Cures (which is still pretty good).
RK healing is not too far removed from Minstrels, as the fabric of Middle-earth was woven with powerful music and verses. I love that Rune-keepers are “masters of True Names,” which has many religious and spiritual ties. Speaking the true name of something in Middle-earth gives you power over them.
October 25, 2011 at 10:34 pm
Wonderful article! I really appreciate the thought and time put into it. And… mmm, footnotes!
October 26, 2011 at 1:10 am
Fantastic article – you really do these classes lore justice. I have always loved the Morale vs. Health distinction that Turbine implemented, as it’s just that much more immersive when running around in fictional Middle Earth. And oh, that speech in the Captain’s Roundtable never ceases to inspire.
October 26, 2011 at 1:37 am
I don’t think we should have any “Real Life” comparisons here, to be honest (Yay for the footnote number 8) .
And I did raise my eyebrow while reading this semantic rant of yours –
For me in both cases the award is given because of some kind of accomplishment, be it a football game or State-beneficial actions. The difference is purely stylistic.
October 26, 2011 at 1:37 am
* footnote number 8
October 26, 2011 at 5:38 am
Yes, the green bar is not health, but instead “morale”. Meaning when you get too unhappy you’re out cold. The minstel has to keep us all cheered up…er…yeah.
October 26, 2011 at 5:39 am
Oh, and enemy strikes don’t actually hurt us physically, they just make us sadz…n’ stuff. A little ridiculous when you think of it that way I suppose.
October 26, 2011 at 6:33 am
Not really sad, but worn. Even when you got armor all over your body and when sword blows are actually “only” causing bruises, you get tired, your will to fight slowly taken away, it’s a concept easily understood by people in the military or martial arts practitionners : the fighting is mainly done with your guts and will, a concept well rendered through the morale mechanics.
It could be compared to the effect supporters can have in sports, often called the 16th man in rugby or the 12th for soccer : it helps you not giving up.
Even today, Captain healing is perfectly real when you get away from the concept of “health” and more to morale. Suppressive fire is efficient at lowering it, sometimes leading to surrenders, and an officer rallying is a damn efficient way to make it rise again.
Put into context, Minstrel, Captain and lore master “morale raising” is perfectly valid, keeping your will to fight on, through inspirative songs, rallying cries or striking descriptions of the fights of the Old Ages where heroes prevailed, and predictions of the fact that YOUR actions will deserve their own legends ‘see “Epic for the Ages”
October 27, 2011 at 1:27 am
Excellent. Loved the writing, the thought process and glad to see (in no particular order) Alexander the Great mention for Captains, Princess Bride reference, Holy Grail reference, and reference to D Day.
But most of all just excellently put together explanation
October 28, 2011 at 7:14 pm
Great article!!