Havard wrote:Big Mac wrote:JamesMishler wrote:Essentially, the Valar and Maiar (together known as the Ainur) were the Angels, and Eru was God.
So in D&D terms, would they be most similar
aasimar or
chosen or aspects, in power level?
I would say Valar are equivalent of D&D Gods/Deities (Lesser, Intermediate or Greater) while Maiar would be considered demigods. Eru is beyond the scope of a D&D game.
-Havard
Bingo. That's how I'd do it, with as Big Mac mentions, Eru as the Overgod of the Middle-earth plane (Ardasphere in Spelljammer terms).
Note however, that unlike other realms, the Elves and the Dunedain know of and directly revere Eru, and the Valar and Maiar do not accept worship.
This means, in D&D terms, that there are no true clerics in the Ardasphere, if you go by Tolkien's ways in this, and thus there are at best anti-clerics of Morgoth (and later Sauron) known as "sorcerers," and perhaps magic-users, trained by the Council (Gandalf, Elrond, Galadriel, etc.).
The old MERP RPG handled this by there being the trained magicians and also "animists," who revered the Valar and Maiar but gained their power through the loyal spirits of the world itself, rather than directly from the powers as a D&D cleric would (so Elrond, IIRC, was the equivalent of a cleric, as he had animist levels rather than magician levels).
I am not sure how this is all divvied up with the new 5E RPG from Cubicle 7. One of these days I'll get around to buying it, as I've heard good things about it...