{"id":102804,"date":"2017-03-20T10:16:30","date_gmt":"2017-03-20T15:16:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/?p=102804"},"modified":"2017-03-20T10:16:30","modified_gmt":"2017-03-20T15:16:30","slug":"middle-earth-march-madness-round-1-bracket-vote-now-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2017\/03\/20\/102804-middle-earth-march-madness-round-1-bracket-vote-now-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Middle-earth March Madness \u2013 Round 1 Bracket \u2013 Vote Now!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Middle-earth Madness\u00a0officially starts today! We\u2019ve split our field of 64 characters into four divisions: <\/span><\/p>\n

Movies Only<\/strong> \u2013 characters who appeared only in Peter Jackson\u2019s The Lord of the Rings and\/or The Hobbit movies
\nBooks Only<\/strong> \u2013 characters who didn\u2019t make the final cut for the movies
\nMovies and Books<\/strong> \u2013 characters who graced both the written page and the silver screen
\nWider Mythos<\/strong> \u2013 Middle-earth characters not in the movies from Tolkien\u2019s works outside of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit<\/p>\n

There are some very interesting match-ups in round one this year.
\n\"\"<\/a>In one of the more intense match-ups in the Movies Only division, Tauriel is up against the Warg Matriarch, Azog\u2019s vicious white warg. A perennial TORn fav, FIGWIT (stay-tuned for the story behind the name if you don\u2019t know it already) takes on Alfrid, and it\u2019s anybody\u2019s guess as to who will come out on top in the match-up between Sebastian the Hedgehog and the Goblin Scribe.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Books Only division is chock-full of interesting matches such as Ghan-buri-Ghan vs. Quickbeam, and The Fox (who wondered at Hobbits traveling through The Shire in FOTR) vs. Prince Imrahil.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>It was almost impossible to narrow down the Movies & Books division with so many amazing choices, but there are some gut-wrenchers in the contests as they stand with Beorn going up against the Balrog and Shelob battling Sauron.<\/p>\n

Finally, some of Tolkien\u2019s Titans go mano-a-mano in the Wider Mythos division, with two powerful dragons, Ancalagon and Glaurung battling it out, and Beren and Huan facing each other in what is sure to be a close call.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
The Slaying of Glaurung, by Ted Nasmith<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A note on how the bracket combatants were determined. TheOneRing.net created a document containing all combatants, sub-divided into divisions. We asked staff to cast sixteen votes per division, with the votes having a weight of 1-4. Each staffer cast four 4 votes, four 3 votes, four 2 votes and four 1 votes in each division. We then totaled all the votes from each division to determine their rank, and ultimately placed the top 16 into each bracket for seeding.<\/p>\n

As you can imagine, our staff is diverse and the results were very interesting! Not only are there some great match-ups in this first round, the final four will pose some amazing choices between the various literary and film sources.<\/p>\n

Voting in Round 1 will remain open until March 22nd at 10:00 p.m. EST. At that point, we’ll calculate the winners and post the next round on March 23rd. Follow after the break for a complete bracket image [download it<\/a>], and to vote on all of our Round 1 match-ups! [Round 1 Bracket<\/a>]
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Movies Only – Round 1<\/strong>
\nMarch 20th – March 22nd 2016<\/em><\/p>\n

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