I like both of these ideas a lot and I've been thinking for a couple of days since I saw your post and haven't come up with much. One thing I was hoping to do when I get a Goblin Town board done (whenever that happens!), is I thought it would be cool to come up with a scenario where the Fellowship entered the Misty Mountains and face the forces of the Goblin King (but without him since he was dead at this point) in their tunnels.
I think are a lot of opportunities in the game to do some alternative storytelling and scenarios if people are interested and have the creativity
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