Overall Thoughts on the Riders of Rohan Expansion

The Lord of the Rings Online: Riders of Rohan expansion has now been on the live servers for a little over two weeks. During this time I have gotten to experience a good bit of the content. My main character made it to level 85 two nights ago, but had gained a lot of the XP needed for that by way of hunting warbands, and has not done any of the quests in the Sutcrofts yet.  With that said, I wanted to take some time to share my thoughts on the expansion as a whole.

The Ugly

Let me start by getting the ugliness stated and out of the way: there are some major tech issues, that I think most of us are at least aware of, if not impacted by them. This is common with most games when releasing new content. It is impossible to find and fix all bugs during beta sessions, and it is also impossible to know exactly what is going to happen when the player-base at large gets a hold of the new stuff.

We’re seeing some instances where certain players are almost completely unable to participate in mounted combat because of the slingshotting that is taking place. Since Mounted Combat is really the centerpiece mechanism of this expansion, I have no doubt it’s being looked at and they will hopefully be trying to address this as soon as they can.

Sapience even posted on the forums yesterday that they believe they have found the solution to the problem and that they may start implementing it as soon as right now (the time of this writing):

We’re aware of this issue and have ben actively tracking it. We beleive we’ve found a solution and will be making a change to the servers. Most likely tomorrow morning.

If you’ve followed what I’ve had to say, you’ll also know that I am very unhappy with and concerned about the Turbine Store prices associated with customizing the aesthetics of your Warsteed. This is my only other gripe with the expansion.

Now that the Ugly is out of the way… let’s move on to the good stuff.

The Good

Where do I start? There really are too many good things about this expansion to even really know where to begin. I could start with Warsteeds and Mounted combat, but I am fairly certain if you are here, reading this site, and have seen the URL… you probably know how I feel about it! To put it simply, and to echo something I’ve said a few times on the game forums: This is the most fun I have had in LOTRO since the Shadows of Angmar days. Absolutely nothing has lived up to the bar that was set in SOA when I was running around, rediscovering Tolkien’s world for the first time. Getting to a point where I am having as much fun as I was back then can directly be attributed to the Warsteeds system and Mounted Combat most specifically.

Or, I could start with entering Rohan, at long last. I think I played this a bit differently than most of the people I know in game. I think most of them started with Galadriel and worked the epic lines until they got to Langhold and started the quest to get their Warsteed. I like the epic books, I love the stories behind them; but I wanted my Warsteed more. The night before launch my Hunter suspected he would very soon be needed in the lands just south of his current camp near Stangard. The next day he received a note saying the Rohirrim was in need and that I should go find one of their riders and see where I could help.

That first time seeing the Wold, and realizing one of my characters was finally standing in the zone that I had been waiting for, dreaming about, since launch; I was ecstatic.

Working my way through the Wold, obtaining my Warsteed and then working backwards to pick up the epic line and continue through the East Wall, Norcrofts, Entwash and then into the Sutcrofts has been an amazing experience.

I am finding Warbands are extremely fun for me to find and hunt, even though the rewards I personally have been getting from them have been pretty lackluster (I want an Orc head on a Pike, why won’t it drop!?)

The music? We normally play music from an outside source while we play. I don’t think either of us have fired up Pandora once since Rohan launched. Chance Thomas and the rest of the people behind the sound have done an amazing, extremely high quality job of bringing us epic music that fits the settings very well.

The quest stories are some of the best, if not the best we have seen in LOTRO. This goes for both the epic lines and the regular regional quest story lines. They are well written, and very enjoyable.

The last bit I want to point at is Hytbold. Over the years I have been gaming I have changed from being a very group oriented player with a lot of time to play, to a solo/duoist type player with much less time. I think the Hytbold mechanic is simply brilliant for a player like me. Yes, it’s going to take some time to complete it, but it does allow me to work at it, at my own pace. You may say the 5 quest a day limit is too little, and for some that may be true. The limit may need some tweaking, but for now – for me, it’s working just fine. The amount of time it takes to go run the five dailies and head back to Hytbold and rebuild a couple things just about perfectly fits my play times on any given evening during the week.

Too Long; Didn’t Read

The lag sucks. Some Warsteed Cosmetic prices are way too much. The content is awesome, the music is amazing. I AM FINALLY IN ROHAN and I like the Hytbold Mechanic. This is the most fun I have had in LOTRO since Shadows of Angmar.