Mordor: What they didn’t tell you about allegiance and more

So, what do you do when the update first comes out? If you ask me, usually it’s the Epic Book or the epic story. But since this update came with increase in legacy tiers I waited a little bit and finished my legendary items first. It is certainly a big help in an area like Mordor. After that… Epic story. But, where did the story go?

Where is the story?

I will probably become even less liked than I already am for writing like this about a developer who is probably the favorite child of the player base, but so be it. Made of Lions, or as you can recognize him in some of my articles – Voltron, has told us on many occasions that the pinnacle of the story has been in the works for probably more than ten years. He has envisioned it, worked on it, dreamed about it, etc. I believe this is said in several interviews. In the last developer interview he even says that we have probably paused the previous chapter of the story seconds before the ring is destroyed. And he wasn’t kidding. As soon as we start it, we kill a few orcs and then… THE EAGLES ARE COMING. The words that will make some fans wet their pants, but what comes next, not so much. A little bit of running around fields of Cormallen and the story… the anecdote… is done in 15 minutes. The rewards at the end? A miniature model of Mount Doom. An emote called Strength of Sauron, ironically shortened /sos, looks nothing like the eye of Sauron as is more of a quest ring. The emote is ridiculous, but you can certainly have some fun if you go to a festival and mess with people trying to click on you. What else is there? 1 trait point and 5 LOTRO points. No mount, no cosmetics, no special items, nothing. From here you will continue on to the Black Book of Mordor which is also hiding an extra trait point behind its completion of chapter 4. Again, no special items at the end.

Some of you may want to jump in and say that it is not about the items, it is about the story. But, like I said, I am missing both. I am missing the story and I am missing the items to remember this point in time by something.

Allegiance, Crafting, Fushaum Bal and other quests

 

What is Allegiance?

Allegiance is this big mystery that nobody tells you what it is. No developer interview, diary or anything for that matter, a regular forum post for all I care. No, we are to guess how it all works. Well, it works like this. At level 110 you can start an introduction quest to Allegiance of your choice. But what nobody tells you is that you need to go do it or where to do it. What ever happened to those letters we used to get? Is it hard to make an invitation now? The introduction to Allegiance system starts in the camp of Udun Foothold by speaking to Eomer. Eomer will then send you to behind the Black Gate to speak to one of the faction representatives. After finishing these quests you will get a travel skill to the Allegiance of your choice. What the quest tells you in red lettering is that you can advance only one Allegiance at the time, but what it doesn’t tell you is that you can finish all the intro quests if you like. By finishing all these intro quests once you hit level 115 and the crafting instances become available you will be able to gain 2000 Allegiance Points for every faction weekly by doing just one crafting instance. Or 2 in case you start with Barad Dur, which has one relic bugged in a wall. So, potentially, 8000 AP daily from these untill you finish the 7th chapter of an Allegiance, which then for some reason makes the quest for it disappear. So, if gear is not an issue, I already suggested you don’t finish these and collect more points daily to finish the other ones faster. But how in Eru’s name do you start the crafting instances and the daily quests?! Well, these will start only after you have reached rank 30 with one Allegiance and finished the Black Book of Mordor. Which makes no sense, because you will have to go through almost 100% of the content to get one Allegiance to 30 by questing, deeding, etc. And what content is that? Well, in order to finish the level 109 Lost Lore of Dol Agarnaith quest you will need to go through a camp of level 115 mobs and with 100 shadow that you can in no way counter on that level. Then and only then will you be able to start the crafting instances and nothing else. Only after you restart the game will you get the landscape granted quest to visit your expedition leader and you will be able to pick up daily and weekly quests. Travel skills to Allegiance halls are also a different kind of headache. If you didn’t buy the hurried traveler and reduced the cooldown to 5 minutes you will be doomed to wait for 50 minutes to advance or turn in a quest. So, one quest can take you several hours. For some reason there is a travel option from the hall to Mordor, but nothing from Mordor to the halls.

Fushaum Bal and other quests

Many quests are for some reason very unintuitive. Allegiance to start. Fushaum Bal are also in that group. Once you start with FB you are considered to be very close to an enemy. Even though I do not know why you don’t get attacked right away then. After questing you will eventually become an outsider. Once you reach this standing you will open  your second set of quests for these groups. First set is available from landscape. Then after reaching neutral nobody tells you that there are new quests, you need to find this out on your own and check all the NPCs. And when this quest line is done you won’t be able to go back to the dailies they offer and fix it. Most quests when turning them in give positive reputation with one and negative with another faction. If you are using reputation accelerators you will gain double than you lose. There are also one or two quests that do not have this negative reputation, so you can use them to top of the reputation, reach neutral standing with both sides and then finish the quest FB resolution. Many have complained about this quest, since you are fighting the chieftains of the camps at once, so my suggestion is that you skill Talath Urui (or only do the start and skip Fushaum Bal) and go to Agarnaith and then come back. You will have some nice rewards and possibly a bit more Ash to trade in for other items. Watch out for the quests that can fail if you are seen by the Fushaum Guard. These are not properly shown on the radar and sometimes it’s even hardly noticeable in the quest description. Some have the red lettering you shouldn’t be seen, some don’t. There are few occasions where you need to talk to a statue. You know, like talking to SSG. But in this case, the statue reacts. But nobody tells you that you need to do this other than the quest ring on the radar. But you may have this turned of or have it very small or something else. You choose.

Missed opportunities

I think that SSG has missed a lot of opportunities to give some nice rewards in this expansion. In total there are maybe 3 or 4 good items that you can get from questing that you would use for your gear. Everything else is not really something you would want to use, just disenchant it to Ash right away. The Wastes for some reason had 3 or 4 dogs, but here zero pets. We can even have a person as our pet, a Loyal Swan Knight, but the goblin that says we will be the bestest friends doesn’t become our friend. The number of statues that gave us quests, we could have gotten one for housing.

Bugs or whatever it is

Through the whole region I did have the new kind of lootboxes drop, but I also had the Anorien ones. Black keys do not drop, but Steel sturdy ones do. I do not understand why instead of buffing hunter scrolls for Doomfold crafting the Anorien crafting ones were nerfed, but the +all stats food in Anorien was buffed. Crafting instances are still bugged. You are unable to finish anything except the main quest now. And it seems like they don’t reset properly, as the Alliance quests don’t appear either. I do not know the money issues with SSG, but the trailer they have put out has reached a very bad reaction and I would have expected them to take it down by now. I don’t mind some outtakes from the game, but some of those don’t even look like real fighting, just some posing of auto attacking while “a shot” is made. Some GM paning through Mordor and someone as a narrator speaking about it would have been much better than what goes for a trailer at this point. People are still very disappointed there are no High Elves in the game after promoting them as a part of the expansion and the disappointment isn’t small. Remember when I proposed they fix this item, due to its description on the item and in the quest? It should have been teal.

 

Well, they fixed it now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bellow is a gallery with some of the curious sightings in Mordor.

And for the end, the best Mordor boy band. You are…. My fiiiire. My ONE… De-sire… Believe when I say… I want all your money.

Top 25 LOTRO Videos OF ALL TIME!

After two years and hundreds of hours of research it is finally time to release my list of the top 25 LOTRO videos of all time!  The rankings are based on story, editing, visuals, music, emotion and overall composition.

 

25. The Tale of Dynnagon and Ircine Trailer

The best PvMP trailer ever.

 

24. Lore-Master

This is one of the best class trailers for LOTRO.

 

23. Last Watch

Last Watch tells a truly heroic story that pulls at the heartstrings.

 

22. Riders of Rohan Launch Trailer

The narration by Gríma juxtaposed to what is actually happening in Rohan is so powerful in this trailer.  This is easily one of the best trailers for LOTRO.

 

21. Windy Acres Ranch Horse Racing

This trailer really captures how much fun horse racing can be in LOTRO and it is put to the right song for the event.

 

20. Through the Mines: A Mad World

Who would have ever thought this song would work so well at capturing the feeling of Moria.  The excellent visual application of images to the song really helps sell the experience.

 

19. The Call: A Hobbit Journey

This machinima does a great job portraying the emotional struggle a hobbit goes trough when they decide to have an adventure.

 

18. The Hobbit An Unexpected Journey Trailer

I honestly didn’t think The Hobbit trailer could be done well in LOTRO but clearly I stand corrected.  The replication of shots and character cosmetics is truly amazing.

 

17. Would You Be My Minstrel

Would You Be My Minstrel is one of the best original songs for LOTRO and the music video is really well done.  I have likely listened to the song over 100 times and it is still great every time.

 

16. Time-Lapses

I am pretty sure I could watch time-lapses of LOTRO all day long.  This video showcases some of the most beautiful shots LOTRO has to offer.

 

15. Lieutenant of Dol Guldur

It was such a creative idea to have a trailer telling the auto-biography of a Nazgûl.  I hope whoever made this trailer got a raise.

 

14. Durin’s Folk: Baruk Khazâd! Khazâd ai-mênu!

This video is easily one of the best kin trailers ever.  It does a great job showing how a group of dwarves would be in Middle-earth.

 

13. Where The Tale Ends

This video is one of the most beautiful and artistic videos for LOTRO.

 

12. Middle-earth

This fan trailer has such high quality and scope that it could be used as an official trailer for LOTRO.

 

11. Trucido in Tower of Orthanc

This trailer showcases how awesome and challenging a raid can be in an MMO.  Game advertisers should showcase their game’s content like this trailer showcases Tower of Orthanc.

 

10. Curse of Harperella

The Curse of Harperella has more special effects than any of the other videos on this list.  With extra enemies, moving mouths and at times entire sets created to better tell the story, it is clear a lot of effort went into creating this short film.

 

9. The Ride of Eorl

Featuring an obnoxious number of players, this video does a great job telling one of the better stories from the books and the story is told with a good song.

 

8. The Shire

I don’t think you could feel more in the Shire without going to New Zealand.  The song used in the video is the perfect fit and really draws you into Middle-earth.

 

7. The Last of the Giants

I am almost positive there is not a better video about Ents in the world than The Last of the Giants.

 

6. Payback

Revenge always makes for a good story, even in Middle-earth.  Containing a training montage, special effects and a superb use of emotes, Payback is a great LOTRO video.

 

5. Bain Ennorath – Beautiful Middle-earth

Beautiful Middle-earth indeed!  From the breathtaking Lake Evendim time lapse to the glow of Lothlórien, this video reminds me instantly why I love LOTRO.  It has fantastic visuals put to great music.

 

4. Eurielle – Song of Durin

A beautiful song, great imagery, a good story and it all comes together to make a fantastic video.

 

3. Beyond The Infinite Mind

A beautifully abstract video that truly lives up to its title.  Beyond The Infinite Mind goes beyond what I thought was possible in a LOTRO video.

 

2. No Return

No Return tells a simple, yet incredibly emotional story and tells it very, very well.  It has a good music track that works well with the video and uses cross-fades and general editing techniques to enhance the story.  The use of environmental color palettes to reflect the state of the character and the use of well-timed emotes really sells the story and furthers the pull on your emotions.

 

1. Morning Never Came

When watching Morning Never Came, I completely forget I am watching a LOTRO video and instead I am fully pulled into the created world.  The story, music and editing are all amazing.  With one beautiful shot after another, this video is the best LOTRO video I have ever seen.  If LOTRO ever makes another trailer, I hope it is made by this content creator.

Thank you all for supporting this series and thank you to the LOTRO community for making so many great videos.  This series would not be possible without your passion for the game.

You can view all LOTRO Video Highlight articles here.

LOTRO Video Highlights: Update 16 Fan Trailer

This week’s video highlight is a fan-made trailer for Update 16.  “Game Trailer LOTRO Update 16: Ashes of Osgiliath” was released in 2015 on Vincent Clark’s YouTube channel.

Do you know of a good LOTRO video and want it to be featured in this series? Send an email to contact@lotroplayers.com with a link to the video and it might end up in a future article.

Actors Needed for Middle-earth Lore Project Film Shoot

Dear LOTRO Players,

Ever wanted to be famous and in the moving pictures like the big stars? Now is your chance!

Lilikate’s Play Actin’ Spies are looking for actors to film a pair of scenes this Saturday 18th July 2015 at 4.30pm EDT (Landroval) onwards, for the Rivendell episode of the Middle-earth Lore series (the not so secret project).

Rivendell

We are looking to cast:

10 Dwarves of varying appearance.

We also need about 5 varied Elves.

In our second scene we are looking to cast:

A Legolas lookalike (Blond Elf Male with Bow)

A Gloin lookalike (Axe is essential)

4-5 Elves to act either as Servers, Extras or Elf Lords.

 

Server: Landroval

 

We will be shooting the first scene in Rivendell but we have not yet decided on the second scene location, I will announce this asap.

Please send me (Lilikatebuggins@gmail.com) an email or leave a comment here for details or to sign up!

The shoots can be quite repetitive with recordings being taken several times and from several different angles. Patients is needed to get the right footage.

All who attend will be credited in the the final edit of this episode of Middle-earth Lore.

Here is the trailer to the series to give you a taste of what we are creating.

 


 

LOTRO Video Highlights: Middle-earth 2013

This week’s video highlight is my favorite trailer for LOTRO.  “Lotro – Middle-earth by Jarwin 2013” was released in 2013 on Jarwin Bardener’s YouTube channel.

Note: This trailer contains minor language.

Do you know of a good LOTRO video and want it to be featured in this series? Send an email to contact@lotroplayers.com with a link to the video and it might end up in a future article.