What if...... Part 1

Disclaimer: I do not work for Turbine nor Codemasters.

In this series, I would like to speculate about the future of Lord of the Rings Online. dotfive has a good post on the US-forums.

So, there will be a new raid and instance-cluster (probably with a mixture of 3-, 6- and 12-mans, not sure about a 24-man raid) in the next weeks or months as well as a new raid and some instances in the Anniversary Update (which would be April 24th 2011).

The Rise of Isengard will be released in Fall 2011. He adds, that there will be three more regions for PvE and one PvP area, indicating, that this will happen in Fall 2011.

In this post I wrote about the new locations which have appeared near the stones/relics. Those could very well be where the next instances and raids will take place. The ruins in the south of Enedwaith, near the white rabbit, could be the raid-cluster for the Anniversary Update.

This would mean, that there is no new landmass till Fall 2011. Dunland, Gap of Rohan and Isengard would arrive at the same time, which would make sence, if the level-cap is going to be raised to 70, as there would need to be lots of content for those five levels.

Concerning the new zone for PvP, my guess would be the east of Isengard, with the Fangorn to the north (as a border, not a part of it). If I remember correctly, there was an statement, that the PvE would never be reachable by monster players. So there will be some kind of zoning dividing PvP from PvE.

Will the Ettnemoors be closed? Probably not, so how will they bring MPs to Isengard? Turbine has managed to suprise us in the past, so lets see what they deliver.

Monster Play will be F2P. You could be able to play a bit for free, but if you wanted to be a 'blue' or a 'red' dot (which are higer ranks than the beginning 'green' ranks), you would have to buy those perks. Would not be that difficult to implement.

So take a short look at Dunland:

Dunland, at least from the climate point of view, is no too different from Enedwaith. It should have about the same size, probably also a longer north-south than east-west.

On this map, we have all three parts. Dunland, probalby the same size as Enedwaith with Methedras in the East.

source: http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/i/isengard.html

The Gap of Rohan would cover the River Isen and the peaks of the White Mountains in the south. We could even get Helms Deep with the Gap of Rohan. This is nothing more than me speculating.

Iseangard would still be big enough with Orthanc and, again speculation, Entwood.

We could meet up again with part of the Fellowship, getting pipeweed for Pippin or taking a peek into his Palantir.

If I remember correctly, when we arrive at Isengard, the Orthanc will have already fallen and the Ents are watching that Saruman does no harm. I would guess, that we would raid Orthanc as he might have still some loot hidden (yay, more climbing of towers....).

We could also have Raids in the caves behind Helm Deep and Skirmishes in Helms Deep and Session Play in Helm Deep and Orthanc.

Back to PvP. If we get mounted combat, the PvP area could be quite huge. My favourite zone for this would be the northern fields of Rohan with borders to Fangorn to the north, the Anduin in the east, Isengard to the west and Helms Deep and Edoras in the south.

The Rohirrim would be the best fraction for the new PvP area, as it could offer some nice horses for the mounted combat.

Of course, this is a lot of speculation. Neverless, this area has a lot of possibilities to offer, mightier than killing boars for food or searching for hobbit boots (not that it was not fun to do it once or twice).

P.S.: Link added according to Adam's link in comment-section http://thekhazadguard.wordpress.com/2010/12/04/dunland-and-isengard/

A brief introduction

As my blog has quite a few more readers since I joined http://combo.mmeow.net/, I would like to introduce myself.

Almost fourty years ago, I was born in Basel, Switzerland. I have two sisters and am the only son of my parents.

After a few years, we moved to London, where my father worked. There I was introduced to the world of the fantastic and Narnia is one of the first books I remember. Soon thereafter I read The Hobbit and some years later Lord of the Rings.

My father worked for IBM and I grew up with computers. I enjoyed the Kings Quest series and the Infocom games which soon led me to Middle Earth Role Playing Game among others.

I never tried World of Warcraft as I did not like the graphics but some months after its release, I started with Lord of the Rings Online on an English speaking EU-server. Even though German is my first language, English is the language I watch movies, read books and play games in.

I still remember the day, when I was questing in the Lone Lands and grouped up with a Lore Master who then invited me to the kin he was in. After the ‚dreaded’ interview, I became a recruit in the greatest kin ever and am a member since.

We use vent a lot and we have some great characters and players from all over Europe. Most are based in the UK but our Skandinavian fraction is strong (Viking Power), our Polnish player knows everything about the game, our Greeks are the most fun and we have some great raid leaders.

Back to myself.

Soon after starting playing Lord of the Rings Online, I got a second account and shortly afterwards, a third account. All are Lifetimers. I also have three computers, three 24 inch monitors and yes, I need a bigger desk.

Most of the time, I just run one computer, when I craft or farm, I use two or three computers. Three computers are great for power-leveling.

I have one main of each class at level 65. I also have some crafters at level 65, as some recepies demand reputation with certain fractions. In total, I have 30 characters. 16 of them are in two kins of my own (so I can have two kin-houses of my own) the rest are in ‚my’ main kin.

Which is my main? I don’t know, to be honest. Either the Minstrel or the Hunter. I feel quite proficient on my Rune-Keeper and Champion, a bit less on my Lore-Master and Burglar. Captain and Guardian I do need to get more practice and this is also true for my Warden.

I really like the Warden, so don’t be offended, that I put him last. I will play him a lot more, in the future.

Even though I have some Creeps, I hardly play them. I sometimes go freeping, but usually just with some Kinnies.

Besides LotRO and Computer games, I am also interested in politics and am running two politic-related blogs. I also have an adult-oriented blog but I keep these blogs seperate from LotRO.

An other blog is http://funfactfiction.blogspot.com/ which has the LotRO posts but also some other topics such as movie or book reviews.

Hightly Recommended Site

One of my most visited sites (besides http://combo.mmeow.net/ of course) is HdRO - Der Widerstand.

Yes, it is on German. But there are some English captions and there are lots of pictures and maps.

I especially like the part for the Housing. This page shows the diffent wall decorations and this one helps you finding the right floor. On the main page, right at the bottom, you can listen to all the ingame-juke-boxes for your house.

Darzil does a great job with his site, but HdRO - Der Widerstand has a similiar site worth checking out.

Where HdRO - Der Widerstand has no competition, is the quest descriptions. Check out this page for example, which shows all the locations and people involved in that specific quest.

Having the picture of the mob (with its morale, power and level) as well as the item starting the quest can help a lot.

Not sure, where to hand in? Voila, the map as well as a picture of the man where you can hand the quest in as well as all the details about the reward, prerequisite and follow-up quests, what could you wish for more???

OK, I know, for it to be in English.

Update

These last weeks, I have done quite a lot of runs for Supreme Third Marks (S3M) even joined some PUGs.

I am in an active and fun kin, so I usually do not join and PUGs. But as the in-kin-demand for S3M-runs has calmed down these last weeks, I have started to run some of them wit PUGs. PUG is short for Pick Up Group which usually have a higher risk of failure as the communication is worse.

Doing runs in a kin is more fun. You know the strength and weakness of your kinnies. Communication is better due to Ventrillo being used. Last but not least, the chances of getting an awful player or person is far less. In one run, we had a champion which didn't even have the Glory-skill (for tanking) nor a shield. He didn't even know, how to use potions and what they were for. I have no idea, how he got to level 65...

Besides the S3M-runs, I have been doing the repeatable quests in Enedwaith to get to kindred, even though I somehow guess, that the next raid will give reputation. I have been hunting a lot of Legendary Items, even low level ones, and have been deconstructing a lot of them at level 2+ to get more relics.

I also joined on a very nice Sammath Gûl run. Two Symbols of Celebrimbor dropped, I didn't win one though. I got one through a pugged Shool-run and made my Warden a nice DPS spear.

Last weekend, I tried to trio-box the Library, but failed. I used the Hunter-Guardian-Rune-Keeper combination. I will try the Champion-Minstrel-combo or the Hunter-Captain-combo next weekend. My attempts at soloing the Library on my Warden also failed. The School will be the next target.

Even thought I haven't played the Warden a lot, I like the potential this class has. I also did a lot of runs with my Captain and the results have been great. There is no class, I don't like to play. Sadly, I don't have as much time as I would need, to be able to play them all well they could be played...

Minstrel - Legendary Items

There are two pools for Legendary Items (LIs for short):

Class Item Pool A 

Target Ballad Resist Rating 

Healing and Motivation Skills Morale Healing 

Raise the Spirit Healing 

Bolster Courage Healing 

Inspire Fellows Healing 

Ballad of War Magnitude 

Healing Skills Power Cost 

Class Item Pool B 

Target Song Resist Rating 

Chord of Salvation Cooldown 

Echoes of Battle Resistance Rating Debuff 

Cry of the Chorus Cooldown 

Song of the Dead Cooldown 

Ballad of Unshakable Will Fear Resistance 

Ballad of Flame Fire Defence 

Weapon Pool A   

Triumphant Spirit Cooldown 

Call to War Skills Resistance Chance 

Piercing Cry Damage 

Call of Oromë Damage 

Soliloquy of Spirit HoT Pulses 

Rally! Cooldown 

Healing Threat 

Weapon Pool B

Call of the Second Age Targets 

Call to Fate Critical Multiplier 

Recovery time Still as Death 

Tier 1 Ballad Damage 

Tier 2 Ballad Damage 

Target Resist Cry of Valar 

Cure Fear Cooldown 

So what does this mean? The Minstrel Class Item is the Songbook. I usually use my characters in raids and as Minstrel, Healing is our main job. 

Minstrel Songbook Pool

•Healing and Motivation Skills Morale Healing
This legacy is the most important one, as it affects all healing skills.

•Bolster Courage Healing
BC is our main healing skill, which makes this legacy the second most important.

•Inspire Fellows Healing
A group-healing skill (with a small buffing) which costs a lot of power. For short fights and when a Lore-Master is around, I have started using this skill. Watcher and Turtle come in mind.

•Healing Skills Power Cost
Maxed out, this skill reduces power consumption by 10 percent. Certainly nice to have.

•Ballad of War Magnitude
Champions will love you for this skill, as it gives maximal 10 percent melee offence.

•Chord of Salvation Cooldown
Reducing the cooldown for an nice, instant, power-costly single-target-heal.

•Cry of the Chorus Cooldown
Even less important, but better than what follows.

•Raise the Spirit Healing
Don't know, when I last used this skill.
•Song of the Dead Cooldown
With the Barad Guldur instance and probalby more undead in the next big raid, this might come in handy. But nothing I would really look out for.

•Target Ballad Resist Rating
•Target Song Resist Rating
I don't seem to get too many resists.

•Ballad of Flame Fire Defence
•Echoes of Battle Resistance Rating Debuff
•Ballad of Unshakable Will Fear Resistance
Don't seem to make that much of a difference.

Main Hand Weapon

•Rally! Cooldown
Reduces the cooldown for rally from 30 minutes to 24 minutes. This might seem to be not worth it, but I would recommend to get this one maxed, even if it is only on a rezing-weapon (i.e. a weapon only used for this skill. I often put the weapon on the quick-bar, above the Rally! icon and swich, when I need it.

•Recovery time Still as Death
Same as above. If possible, get one weapon with these two skills. This legacy reduces the cooldown from ten to four minutes. Nice! Saves a walk up the Tower of Barad Guldur.

•Healing Threat
In most fights, threat has been less of an issue lately. But it is always a good thing to lay low, so go for this one, if possible.

•Triumphant Spirit Cooldown
I like this legacy, even though it costs a lot of power and adds aggro. A lot of aggro. Not a skill I consider to be a must-have.

•Call of Oromë Damage
•Piercing Cry Damage
Two important attacks made 20 or 30 percent stronger? Must have on your war-speach-weapon, not that important, on your raiding-weapon.

•Call to War Skills Resistance Chance
•Call to Fate Critical Multiplier
•Call of the Second Age Targets
•Tier 1 Ballad Damage
•Tier 2 Ballad Damage
•Target Resist Cry of Valar
As I said, I usually heal or team up. These skills are important for your war-speach-weapon, but less (or not) on your raiding-weapon.

•Cure Fear Cooldown
A 3m range and a long cool-down makes this skill useless in most circumstances.

•Soliloquy of Spirit Heal Over Time Pulses
Can't remember, when I used this one.

Legendary Items

I just read on CStM, that you can move your LIs from the six slots you got at the moment.

If your main weapon is at slot 5 and you want to move it to slot 2, open your bags and open your Legendary Items panel. Switch the later to slot 5 (the one you want to move your level-up-and-decon LI to and which now holds the weapon you want to move to slot 2).

Find your decon LI in your bags and move it into the slot 5 (click-hold-and-move). Et voila.

Mercenary

I was questing in Enedwaith (for the last time, as I had already taken my other eight mains through there) and I saw that a minstrel was being searched for Volume II, Book 5, Chapter 5.

Some quests later, he was offering 1 gold for a minstrel. Half an hour later, the price had gone up to 2 gold, then to 4 gold, then to 8 gold.

8 gold made me switch.

Somehow, I feel a bit bad. OK, 8 gold are probably not that much for a regular player. On all characters, I might have about 120 gold.

I don't mind helping people, but the 2.5.5. are not really fun instances to run. Fights are followed by periods of time where you just stand around. There is no loot which would make it worthwile to run them either.

All of them take about two to three hours to finish.

Gandalf, is it you?

This is the last instance in Volume III Book 2 Chapter 15.

Today, I ran it with my Warden, the last of my nine main characters. I always thought, it was a bit an anticlimatic instance, so I tried to explore it a bit. Instead of heading deeper into the mines, I climbed up the stairs.

When I reached the top of the ramps, I saw a hooded man walking in the mines. This is the picture I took. Sadly the quality is bad. I tried to improve it a bit, but it still looks bad. I think it is Gandalf, but why he is here, I don't know, it hardly makes sence. Any ideas?



An other thing. After fighting the bats, you can either attack the Cave-claw Scraper or run past him. If you just run past him, the other monsters don't spawn and the instance is finished faster (as you only need to fight the first few bats.

New things to come

It started with a letter. Bungo Grubb from Oatbarton wrote to Mayor Whitfoot, that a "tall stone block bearing unpleasant symbols" had appeared in his field. My first thought was 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Logging my Minstrel, I rode to Oatbarton and soon found the stone and talked to the people around it. The rock was oozing a green mist and around it, a large part of the field it stood in, was dead.

A new deed popped up too, called Mysterious Relics. This deed showed, that there were more of these relics hidden in Middle Earth. Sadly, there was no information given where to search. So after a short google, I found the other places (no, I am not spoiling it myself here, google it yourself).

I would have liked it better, if some hints had been given, so I would have been able to find them myself (not just by riding through the whole of Middle Earth).

The last quest sends you to the Prancing Pony with the innkeeper promising to help.

There had been a lot of rumours, that the next raid would concern the Gaunt-Lords.

We have alread met Ivar the Blood-hand in the swamps of Garth Agarwen in the Lone-lands, Drugoth the Death-monger who you can meet in Helegrod where he is part of the Dragon-instance, most have killed Thadúr the Ravager who hides in the Great Barrow and porbalby gets a lot of beating these days (thanks to Superior Third Marks), Ferndúr the Virulent who is the one I have seen the least of yet, as he resides in Imlad Bachorth, Angmar, where I hardly have gone to and, last but not least: Gortheron the Doom-caller. We have seen him in one of the quests in Lhe Colvarn in the Lich Bluffs and is probably our next target.

So we got five Gaunt-Lords and five Relics. Each of the relics has his colour. For pictures, please go here.

I would arrange the Gaunt-Lords differently than the OP does, so here is my suggestion:

Oatbarton - green - poison - Thadúr the Ravager
North Downs - red - blood - Ivar the Blood-hand
Forochel - purple - fear - Drugoth the Death-monger
Trollshaws - yellow - disease - Ferndúr the Virulent
Thror's Coomb - no colour (yet?) - Gortheron the Doom-caller

This is of course pure speculation. Some make more sence than others.

Some of the relics have new locations nearby.

In Oatbarton, there is a village to the north-west.
In the North Downs, there is a new settlement called Stoneheight.
Thror's Coomb bunny castle in the south-west could be the hot location for Gortheron, bring ye holy hand grenade.
Trollshows has no new location, but Elrond talks about the place behind the locked door.
In Forochel, I didn't see a new location either, but there easily could be an expanded castle further to the north-east.

I guess, the Enedwaidth stone will start to 'bleed' (or ooze) too and that this will happen, when the new raid-cluster goes life. As in Helegrod, I think that you need to defeat the 'old' Gaunt-Lords (all four of them), before you can fight Gortheron.

Even though I only got a new title, I like the way they are introducing the new raid.

Bambi

I know, Bambi is probably not in Middle Earth. But when you visit the lake in Dûn Corvan (near 71.9 S and 13.5 W) you will find a lot of critters. There are Deers and Squirrels all over the place, but nowhere as dense as here.

Sadly I need some more time, till I can post screenshots. Soon I am going DX11 and then this blog will be a bit more colourful.

Some thoughts about the Lieutenant Fight in Barad Guldur

How much radiance do I need to kill the Lieutenant of Barad Guldur? The LT-Hard Mode gives 250 gloom. So if you use 130 Radience and a 50 token, you are still missing 70. You usually have a +5 Token, which reduces the dread to 20. The Destiny Point hope (another 10) is cheap and should be used by all who are not F2P.

If you have less Radience, you can loose much health which makes the chance to get killed by one hit much higher. As the last boss-fights do punish deaths, one death can start an avalanche and cause a wipe.

An other aspect is, that your skills are resisted more often, your arrows hit less and your damage you deal, sink.

In my last Lieutenant fight, I used the 150 Helegrod-Set (Armour of the Aurochs) till the second phase, when the dread gets stronger. This is when I switched to my Barad Guldur Set (I don't have the complete set yet, still missing the shoulders...).

My recommodation is to use the highest radiance you have, at least for the last phase of the fight. This will make you die less and hightens the chance of success.

Update

I managed to get the title „the Openhanded“ on my main three characters. I haven’t used the fifty Frostbluff Coins I got back nor did I do any other Yule festival questing.

With my guardian, I continued my tour of Enedwaith but I didn’t get as far as I had wanted to.

Most of the time I played, I either did runs for Superior Third Marks, short S3Ms, or was raiding.

The Superior Third Marks drop in several instances, usually if you succeed a challenge. The easiest way to get them is to run the School and the Library in Eregion. These are two tree-man instances which quite easy to do.

There are also one of the three Great Barrows instances which is easy, the Thadur one. I would have put he Maze down as an easy one too, but you need a good kiter for that one, Warden seems to be perfect. Sambrog I sadly have never managed to finish, which might tell more about my skills than I want to reveal...

In Annuminas, there are also three instances, Haudh Valandil (Tomb), Ost Elendil (Throne) and Glinghant (Garden). Glinghant seems to be quite buggy, the others are nice, easy and fun.

You would think, that the Helegrod wings would also drop some S3Ms, as they require two full fellowships (I know, you could do it with less) and take much longer. But no, you get some loot and some instances are fun and can be challenging, but not S3Ms. I would suggest to run the other instances for the S3Ms and run the Helegrod wings at level 51 to get the Helegrod Marks. You might even just do the daily challenge and not even kill the boss, as the loot is not worth your time. If you are at max-level, you can run the wings with about six people.

Why do you need Helegrod Marks or S3Ms? There are two new sets, lets take a look at them.

First we have Helegrod Epic Set. This is a 25 radiance per piece set with six pieces, so with the full set, you have 150 radience. Each class has its own set and therefore you get some class-based bonuses. These differ from class to class, so some classes have a great set, some sets do not offer that much. They cost five S3Ms and two Helegrod Marks. I got the complete set on hunter and am trying to get more on other characters.

I don’t like the look of most of them, but most players are happy that Middle Earth gets a bit more colourful.

The second 25 radiance set ist he Annuminas set. We don’t get class-based sets, only one light, one medium and one heavy armour set. This set is cheaper or easier to get, it only costs 3 S3Ms and 1 Annuminas Mark (which of course drops in the three Annuminas instances). This set has six armour parts and a cloak.

I guess, Runekeepers and Lore-Masters tend rather to go with this set than the Helegrod set.

Supreme Third Marks can also be used to buy Symbols of Celebrimbor. I have got one in an classic instance and used it to do an other rune-stone.

There are also tomes dropping. I got one, a tome of travel which is useless for me. There was a Tome of Agility which dropped in a kin-run. I didn’t win it.

I got the shoes from Barad Guldur for my Lore Master. Last week, I won nothing on the runs. They were a bit more painful than they really should be and we had lots of wipes and a bit of shouting. Things have cooled down since.