As I was reading through the cultures in the 2e pdf, I noticed a few things that were odd and stood out to me. Here are my thoughts; forgive me if this rambles a bit.
Attributes
Every culture's attribute spread adds up to 14, nothing lower than 2 and nothing higher than 7. This is fine, I'm just not sure it had to be presented in the format where you have to pick from a set of pre-determined options. Why limit the range of possible combinations?
Derived stats
The bonuses for each culture add up to 40.
Bardings: End STR +20, Hope HRT +8, Parry WITS +12
Dwarves of Durin: End STR +22, Hope HRT +8, Parry WITS +10
Elves of Lindon: End STR +20, Hope HRT +8, Parry WITS +12
Hobbits: End STR +18, Hope HRT +10, Parry WITS +12
Breelander: get End STR +20, Hope HRT +10, Parry Wits +10
Rangers: End STR +20, Hope HRT +6, Parry WITS +14
Skills:
Bardings get 21 ranks (favored Valor rolls)
Dwarves of Durin get 19 ranks (Half load on armor, restrictions on weapons and armor)
Elves of Lindon get 18 ranks (1 hope for a magical success, harder to get rid of Shadow points)
Hobbits get 18 ranks (favored Wisdom rolls, +1d to resist greed, restrictions on weapons and armor)
Breelander get 21 ranks (Fellowship rating +1)
Rangers get 20 ranks (+1 to attribute, half hope recovery)
Lets take Breelander as standard human. Makes sense since they are not Dunedain, just 'middle-men' as Tolkein would say. That means +20, +10, +10 is the baseline and that 21 ranks plus 1 cultural blessing is base for skills and such.
Bardings trade parry for hope to represent their more martial prowess which is ok. They get 21 ranks and a cultural blessing.
Dwarves trade hope for endurance, which is ok. They lose 2 ranks for a strong blessing and no downside (besides limited weapons and armor).
Rangers trade hope for parry twice which really doesn't make sense at all. The rangers are the last remnants of Arnor, they are literally keeping the flame of hope for the Numenoreans alive in Eriador. They are skilled in battle yes, but they are much more experienced in woodcraft and survival and such like that. They should trade parry for hope. They lose 1 rank for a very strong blessing and a downside.
Elves and hobbits get shafted. Elves trade hope for parry which is a tad weird but probably makes the most sense, but it does leave them with the same spread as Bardings. They trade 3 ranks for a strong blessing and a downside. That's more than anyone and makes the comparison to Bardings even more lopsided.
Hobbits trade endurance for parry for some reason. They should trade parry for hope since hobbits aren't martial at all. They trade 3 ranks in skills for a blessing like Bardings get and nothing else. The blessing isn't strong enough to warrant the decrease in ranks.
Suggestions:
Rangers should have End STR +20, Hope HRT +8, Parry WITS +12, like elves and Bardings. Their +1 to an attribute helps define them more than the derived stats.
Elves should have at least 1 more rank of skills. I could also see giving them a 42 point spread of derived attributes to show their heritage as the first-born of Iluvatar. That would give them End STR +20, Hope HRT +10 and Parry WITS +12. With that and their strong blessing, I could see 19 ranks of skills.
Hobbits should have End STR +20, Hope HRT +12, Parry WITS +8. They should have 2 or 3 more ranks in skills since their blessing is almost exactly the same as the Bardings.
What do you all think?