854
But first they would need to invent some tape
(i.imgur.com)
They could have fitted the whole ring / tape / mouse assembly into a small paper bag Aragorn could have kept it in his jacket and fed it little bits of lembas on the way how lovely x
Here's my answer from the last time this came up (which might as well have been yesterday from how often people unfairly lionize Sam and shit on Frodo):
“As he stood there, even though the Ring was not on him but hanging by its chain about his neck, he felt himself enlarged, as if he were robed in a huge distorted shadow of himself, and vast and ominous threat halted upon the walls of Mordor…”
"Wild fantasies arose in his mind; and he saw Samwise the Strong, Hero of the Age, striding with a flaming sword across the darkened land, and armies flocking to his call as he marched to the overthrow of Barad-dur… He had only to put on the Ring and claim it for his own, and all this could be. "
"In that hour of trial it was the love of his master that helped most to hold him firm; but also deep down in him lived still unconquered his plain hobbit-sense: he knew in the core of his heart that he was not large enough to bear such a burden, even if such visions were not a mere cheat to betray him. The one small garden of a free gardener was all his need and due, not a garden swollen to a realm; his own hands to use, not the hands of others to command."
Sam was tempted, and if he possessed the ring long enough he would have been overcome like any other, but his Hobbit-sense saved him in that one small moment, when he had held the ring but a short while.
We can read the same words and take something different from them. That reads to me like he was able to pretty easily dismiss the temptation. Maybe he would've been tempted like Boromir was, maybe he would've had the resolve of Frodo, maybe he could've held it for much longer like Bilbo.
His Hobbit-sense saved him there. The only one who can tell us with certainly where it lies in relation to Frodo is no longer able to.
It would eventually corrupt anyone... except Tom Bombadil.
Which is equally funny, because he'd have no reason to keep it from Sauron, except kneejerk comedic denial when someone tries to wrong him. The forces of Mordor could rain death upon his woods, and he'd somehow catch hellfire in his chimney and make an especially strong pot of tea. Sauron himself, re-embodied, could swing that ox-sized mace at his door, and howl impotently as each strike bounces off and becomes a knock-knock joke. And then one day, some orc siege captain (who'd slowly gone from digging trenches to tending the carrot patch) would remark on what a fine piece of jewelry Tom wore, and he'd just hand it over and skip away.
Literally they say in the books that the ring has no effect on Tom, it's not simping its just cannon. He would have forgotten about it and lost it because it has no hold on him and can not influence his will. It literally could not corrupt him. Every one is influenced by it to some degree just being around it, the awe and fear of the power it hold. Tom can not even think of the ring like that it's just a little trinket to him. He isn't some super strong being or anything, he just doesn't have the ability to want things like that.
Not what I said at all but okay.
They say he couldn't keep it safe. And he couldn't - because he does not care. He is the personification of Middle Earth itself, and the ring has no effect on him because the plot has no effect on him. Whatever you think of his inclusion, being a cartoon character set firmly askew in a fairly grounded universe, he is a reminder that Sauron threatens the people of this world... not the world. In his wildest egomaniacal fantasies, Sauron still lacks the power to impact the stage for all this drama. His boss, the devil, can't even do that.
The executive summary of Tolkien's whole cosmology is that Melkor declared he would ruin the song that is reality, and the omnipotent creator of all things told him, "You can try."
Yeah that totally contradicts where I said he could keep it safe, oh wait.
The text is outright telling you, eventually Sauron would get it. Not by "steamrolling" anything. Tortuously, through the use of all his power, with several hint-hint comparisons to the world itself having no strong opinion. Not because Tom Bombadil is any less capable than some half-pint farmers and a few aristocrats. He's filled to his feather-topped brim with bullshit magic. But the power to defy the enemy is not within him. Frodo shows him the ring and he barely gives a shit.
You're arguing like I think he's the bestest OC ever, donut steel. Nah. He's Roger Rabbit. Eddie gets handcuffed to Roger, they barely survive some shenanigans, and when he finally gets a hacksaw to separate them Roger slides his hand out so he can lean in and watch. Eddie understandably throttles him, demanding - "You mean you could've done that, at any time?!" Roger tells him: "No! Only when it was funny."
Yeah that totally contradicts where I said the good guys were flush with capable holdouts, oh wait.
Who are you talking to?
Also arguably the ring was having a big effect on him the entire time. The entire journey sam hates Smegal, which he sees as what Frodo is becoming carrying the ring. Smegal was a walking personification of the fear sam had for Frodo. That fear was turned into hate by the ring slowly corrupting Sam's love for his master into a weakness for the ring to leverage. He absolutely was not immune to its power.