LOTRO Players News Episode 68: Update 15 – Now Bearier

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Featured Comments

Tirian left a comment on Update 15 Landscape Beta:

“It is pretty similar in parts to Western Gondor, but I think that’s to be expected from what is essentially half of the area that doesn’t get too much coverage by Tolkien. However, there are some gems across the landscape, which make it stand out:

– The sandy islands continue for quite some distance into the Anduin, and at the furthest one, you’ll find a rather confused band of corsairs who’ve been finding ways to amuse themselves…

– To the north of Linhir is one of the most stunning areas that we’ve ever seen in LOTRO, and a cousin of Goldberry and the Red Maid of Garth Agarwen is responsible for this beautiful section of the zone.

– Proper beaches! In West Gondor the only ‘beach’ we really get is in at Hashadir, south of Dol Amroth, but here the sandy dunes stretch on for miles in Dor-en-ernil (probably spelt wrong), and really give the coastal feeling that seemed to be missing in parts of West Gondor.

However, I did think that the dawnless day effect, and the fact that they’ve re-used the awful big battles music, in addition to the increased volume of the wind, means that Central Gondor is far less impressive, and also has much more of a depressing feeling about it, unlike the bright blue skies and screeching gulls of West Gondor.”

ickarium commented on “Cithryth’s First Look at Beornings”:

“I like the size of the bears, they look pretty big. I’m sure the graphical glitches will be fixed in time. I admit, I’m not terribly pleased with how -short- the intro is, maybe they’ll ad a bit. Jumping to five like that is a bit eh, to my mind.

I hope they don’t cave on the Beorning appearance, though. I _LIKE_ that the female Beornings are big and bulky, it really fits. I’ve seen complaints already about how they are too ‘square’ and should be more slender.

I tend to avoid the test server, myself, but I’m curious about the skill trees. I hear that the yellow line has a trait a bit like a captain’s mark, where those hitting the enemy gets heals. That can be fun. I wonder if it will stack with the captain’s, and how good the support roll is.

Also curious how well the ‘tanking’ spec works. I’m hoping it’s a strong, viable tanking tree. Finally, I’m really hoping that unlike Champions (where DW beats 2H unless you’re doing PvMP), Beorning powers are tailored for DW or 2H, and they’re equal.”

Emails

Mike sent in an email saying:

“Hullo Lotro Players,

I only found your podcast this past June, and I decided to go back and listen to the old podcasts. So in the past week and a half I have made it through the first 30 episodes and learned some things.

Too much of anything, even a really good thing hurts.
Episode 15 Ethelros has the most amazing diabolical laugh (For the fellowship walk, he bid on being a guest host)
Pineleaf is an amazing at predictions. In episode one (or two) he already guessed we’d enter Gondor through the pathes of the dead.
In the HD episode, everyone scoffed at the idea of a new class, and laughed at the thought of a Beorn.

I don’t know what this means, but I thought I’d share.”

Louni sent in an email saying:

“Hi All, (I would give you all a named hello, but that would take longer then typing this out) 🙂

Of course I want to thank you all for the time you spend on bringing this podcast to the community. It is very much appreciated by myself, and countless others! Well done!!

I have a question that kinda scares me to think about, and I hate bringing it up, because of that. But….

We have been told by Turbine that come update 15, we will be able to level our Legendary Weapons and Items along with our Characters. This was met with great praise and a huge sigh of relief by the community. No more deconstructing Sting!!!!

My worries concern whether or not the lvl 100 Weapons and Items we currently have will be able to level with us, or are we going to have to deconstruct one more time, get a new lvl 100 Item “after” update 15 and then that one will level with us?

If, as I fear, we will be burdened with one more Legendary grind, I think the community might get a bit hostile towards Turbine, since many of the players have gotten their level 100 First age Weapons and Items during the high drop rate farming from OD, that is now been nerfed.

I hope I am over thinking this, but I have heard nothing from any LOTRO news source to tell me one way or the other.

If any of your reporters has any information about this and can let us know, I would be very happy.

Thanks for reading this, and again thanks for the great podcast!!!!!

JJK

Louni, Linlen, Findeladan, Trandoc, Dorolin, lvl 100’s on Landy.(and many other toons on many servers) lol

((yes I have a life….lol, My wife and youngest son also play lotro. It truly is a computer game that the whole family can enjoy!))”

Barnabras sent in their fourth origin story:

“Send help, I’m addicted to origin stories.

Barnabras

Deep in the heart of the North Downs, just west of the Braxwood, next to a small pebbly brook on top of a hill, stood Castle Draculetta. Inside the ancient keep, a troubled Draculetta paced the floor. He/she was anxious, there was trouble on the borders of his/her realm. The Southern Angmar Legion of Evil, or S.A.L.E was causing concern. Now S.A.L.E. wasn’t particularly powerful or good, just more of an annoyance, but for some reason Draculetta was insistent on watching its progress and reporting on it. I would like to ease my mind and get rid of S.A.L.E. for good, he/she thought. He/she called for his/her lieutenant, and asked her advice “Mysteri” he/she cried. “Hello how’s everything” she said. “If I was you, I’d just release the minions and wipe S.A.L.E. out” she advised. Draculetta’s face turned even paler than normal. He/she though back to his/her youth Ages ago….He/she was a tailor sewing coffin

liners for the local high elves when the call came. The Valar were going to defeat the dread lord Morgoth, and were calling for aid. Drac answered the call. There was an enormous epicy big battle, he/she fought bravely. When the battle was at its peak, Sauron in vampire form, swooped down and bit poor Drac. He/she was reborn into the undead spirit Draculetta, caring not for good or evil he/she only served his/her own ends.

He/she returned to the present problem, “I will never risk open war and fight a big battle again” he/she cried. “Ok, how about that one goblin, he might help us, what’s his name….oh yeah Rudolf the Naughty Goblin” said Myst. “What, What Whaaaat? R.N.G.! Everyone knows he hates me and will never give me what I want.” “Wait a minute I have an idea” Draculetta declared. He/she sat down and got out parchment and a quill. He/she began to write on it. “Here take this letter. Deliver it to General Koo-pon, on it is a code. I’m sure he will give us something really cool in exchange.” “Ok no problem, I’d do anything to get out of this zone” replied Myst. She left the room and Draculetta returned to his/her thoughts. “Ah one more thing” Mysteri said as she reentered the room. “What is it?” shouted Draculeta. “I’m probably going to die delivering this” she said. “Of course you will, but do your best” she left again.

Weeks passed and the S.A.L.E. pointlessly broke apart and reformed into different, equally useless versions of itself. Finally Mysteri returned. “How did everything go?” Draculetta eagerly asked. “Pretty good, it was a long walk, but I only died twice.” Mysteri brought a large box into the room. Draculetta ran to it and yanked it open, he/she peered inside. The entire box was filled with legendary weapons. “Meh, I don’t see how this will help anyone” he/she said. He/she continued “Take Pineleaf and deal with S.A.L.E. I’m going to go to lunch with Andang.””

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Final Thoughts

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8 comments

Barnabras / October 13, 2014

Thanks again for the read. I’m not sure about big battles, but spicy battles sound awesome! I think I might have to take a stab at a holiday song based on RNG. I’ve been working on some lines already….

…then when stormy Enttmoore eve Andang came to say
“Rudolph with your knife gripped tight, won’t you join my craid tonight”
then all the monsters friended him and they made this decree
Rudolf the Naughty Goblin, you’ll gain lots of Infamy.

Well at least I’ll amuse myself, or maybe I should change it to Andang the PvPer….

- braxwolf / October 13, 2014
  
  Spicy Battles was *almost* the show title. 🙂
  
Rabbitses / October 13, 2014

Sounds like the first build of Western Gondor.

zyngor / October 13, 2014

Just a notion of curiosity, seeing how the latest offensive Epic Battle operates: If they offered the ability to combine the Helm’s Deep Epic Battles into one huge instance, in which you’d immediately have to run from the Dike to the Deeping Wall (and so on), would players have enjoyed it more (other than the time that would need to be invested to complete it)?

While the latest Epic Battle is offensive, it still seems you are running from one defensive outpost to the next. Still, it looks interesting, and once all balance checks are made, should be something to play around with for at least a little while.

Lewis / October 15, 2014

http://steamcharts.com/app/212500#All

Not everyone uses steam, but of those that do, population halved since F2P has hit. Not to say F2P is the problem (I wouldn’t have ever played if not), but there’s a reference point for you.

Maybe not maintainance mode, but look at the major events they are skipping, I worry that we are rushing to mordor. Eg. Pippin/aragorn with the stone of orthanc. Missing major interest points, which is a shame.

- Lewis / October 15, 2014
  
  and again http://massively.joystiq.com/2014/10/15/rumor-turbine-going-through-more-layoffs/
  
  Which comes less than a year after the previous round of layoffs. I hate to argue with a Welshman, but I do doubt Ethelros’ confidence in the health of the game.
  
  (I know its a rumour post – but see Sapience’s twitter post too, appears to confirm)
  
Kaleigh Starshine / October 15, 2014

Great show, everyone! 🙂

I think Brax’s pick of the week was a very good one, along with the notion that our perspective on things is often affected by the lens through which we, personally, view things. How we interpret things is very much based on our own experience and how things affect us personally.

This struck me forcefully when the idea that was raised that no longer requiring new legendary items to be leveled was something that most everyone wanted. Everyone reacted as if that were fact, and I believe it is the case as well. But, when you think about it, is there, really, any more ‘evidence’ that this is true than there is ‘evidence’ that LOTRO is in a state of decline?

Sadly, I would argue that there is much more evidence of the latter than the former. The notion that most everyone dislikes the fact that LI’s need to be remade over and over is almost entirely anecdotal. In fact, the results of the recent poll here regarding favorite systems and the existence of this facet of LI’s for years now seems to provide more ‘factual’ evidence supporting this than anything factual that argues against it.

Regarding ‘evidence’ that LOTRO is in decline, there is the same anecdotal sort of evidence, of course. Beyond that, it largely depends on how things are interpreted. Some of the ‘evidences’ that (in my opinion) support the claim of decline are:

– It has been said that creating traditional end-game content requires vastly more resources than any other type of content, and that ‘raids’ require ‘an order of magnitude’ more investment. There has been no new content of this sort for two years now. So, if that same investment was being made in other types of content, would not the increase, both in quality and quantity, of that content be far more than merely noticeable? I think it would be closer to overwhelming than merely noticeable, but new content of all types actually seems to be less now than two years ago. There were more quality cosmetics in Rise of Isengard alone than in everything since (this is subjective, of course). Fewer quests, less endgame and so on. Would this be the case if the same expenditure of resources was being made?

– The new essences coming with U15, with the massive amount of self-healing they provide, seem to completely contradict the argument of ‘homogenization’ made for the class changes, undermining that as a reason and suggesting other causes, instead, leading to…

– In one years’ time, we will have gained 2 skill points for our skill trees. Since there were already enough points to get everything desired from one’s specialization before, these two points, by necessity, have to go into a cross-specialization tree. Therefore, in one year’s time, the amount of class progression we have received equates to a single rank in a cross-specialization tree, almost certainly a passive trait..

One of the arguments for the class-changes was that the old system was stagnant. It is difficult to imagine anyone making the claim that a single point in a passive trait in a cross-class tree is less stagnant than the three ‘improved’ skills we would have seen before over this period of time. Where is the outcry from those who argued that the old system was stagnant?

I think there were many reasons for the class changes, but one of the biggest ones was to reduce development time required. It is far easier to just throw players a couple of points to spend on cross-specialization skills at double the cost than to create new powers and abilities. In effect, the class changes mainly took skills away only to give them back later, very very slowly.

But someone could easily interpret those things in other ways if they wanted, based on their viewpoint. The loss of group content has affect my playstyle immensely, and perhaps that is clouding my viewpoint. I really hope that the writer of that article, and I, and everyone else who feels this way are wrong.

But, if we are not, and this trend of decline is reversible, there needs to be open and frank discussion about these things, with the hope that trend can be reversed.

Andang / October 18, 2014

I think the day that everyone believes LOTRO to be ending is the end. As long as we remain positive and spend money on the game as if it will be here forever, then it will keep going as long as Turbine desires or the rights allow.

LOTRO Players News Episode 68: Update 15 – Now Bearier

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