Tom’s idea to get forum members interested in Lord of the Rings Online is great. Unfortunately, due to the travesties of the sun and the clock, many of us living in the eastern parts of the U.S. simply can’t participate due to time differences. So, here is a group for those wishing to play the casual Monday LOTRO game, but unable to make the 7PST/10EST starting time of the main group.
In order to avoid pilfering from Tom’s group, I shall assume nothing based on previous EST/PST distinctions that were made in that thread. Many of the people in EST are perfectly able and willing to play at 10EST, in which case you should join Tom’s group and have a great time. In order to avoide leveling/questing difficulties, I ask only that you try not to do too much questing between the two groups. In other words, if you are in the EST group here, don’t use the same character for the PST group, and vice versa. However, feel free to have a character for each group, as this is no problem at all. This is not meant to exclude anyone. In fact, my whole purpose here is to include as many people as possible in casual Monday night LOTRO play.
Whether you have played LOTRO or not doesn’t matter. You are welcome to join up. I myself am only just now starting the game and will be discovering much of the world along with you. I’m sure some experienced EST people will join us, and I know the Knights of Quarter to Three will offer any assistance we might need along the way. But again, this isn’t about hardcore leveling, etc. It’s casual play. Be whatever character type you wish. If possible, stick to Tom’s opening post in the main thread as far as trying to name your character similar to your forum name, etc. Meet at the big statue in the middle of Micheal Devinshire (you can’t miss those giant hobbitses!) at 7EST. If you wish to let me know your character’s name and class in advance, that’s great. I can friend you and find you easier. If not, just be there around 7EST and send a tell to Sharpimir. See you then.
I can’t show up until about 9pm EST, so I’ll probably just join in for a couple of hours with Tom’s gathering. Perhaps in a future week I can join the east coasters.
And a reminder that you can’t send Robert a tell if you’re in the trial, so you might want to post here so he knows to look for your toon.
Wow, glad I rechecked the LOTRO thread today; there’s no realistic way I’d be able to make the 10-2 EST times of Tom’s group, but this is much more feasible.
I plan to be there this evening, Robert; I’ll edit this post with my name & class.
I’m EST, but likely won’t be able to play until 10pm anyway. I had simply planned to join the PST folks for a couple hours, but if you guys are still at it when I log in and need a melee type, let me know. Slainte - Lvl 8 Champion
Sounds good. Tom linked to this thread from the main thread. As stated in the OP, people don’t have to announce to me here if they will play. They can just show up, since the group will likely be smaller. I just wanted to give people a chance to play on Mondays and join the fun, even if they can’t stay up that late, especially since I am one of those people!
Well, we aren’t starting until 7EST anyway, so you won’t be late at all, Wader. You can skip the tutorial, but it’s an all or nothing thing. Plus, I wasn’t given the option when I tried my hobbit. It may be that you have to do it the first time. I’m not sure. But you can do most of it in around an hour. If you aren’t completely done by 7, no worries. You can just join us when you get finished. It’s casual!
We played from 7EST-10EST. This seemed best, since some people needed to be up the next morning early (including me! I’m about to go sleepies myself). I had a great time, and I hope others did. I feel like I rushed some of the quests. That wasn’t intentional, and I’ll try to slow down a bit and give newer people a chance to soak up the game a bit more. It’s tough because some people have done these quests and know them pretty well, and others are still learning the UI. I’ll try to strike a balance as best possible, to keep things entertaining for all.
But again, it’s all pretty casual, so feel free to let me know if there is anything you prefer to do differently.
For some reason, chasing chickens was one of the highlights for me.
Glad you guys had a good time! Since there’s so much interest, I think we’re perfectly fine splitting into various groups by time zone. So you guys can feel free to jump into the stickied thread to plan it out. I promise us Californians won’t treat you like second-class citizens any more. :)
Will you take back what you said about my mom, because that was harsh!
I think you’re secretly hoping we’ll take some of the load off the PST groupings. Seeing all that blue at the statue was quite a sight! There must have been like 30 of you.
I had a great time running with the East Coast crew last night and am looking forward to doing the same next week. I actually enjoyed how random we were in what we did, and suggest we make that our theme. If I want to do lore, I can go back through the area solo later to see how it all hooks up. Its much more interesting in a group to say “hey, look at that giant bear, lets go kill it”
Though the best part was that apparently we all decided to roll Captains, thus the majority of our fighting involved shouting the enemy to death.
I do have an idea for keeping us a little more organized. Since it seemed like we were at the edge of most of our experience in the Shire, lets do a single quest or quest chain at a time. Half of the confusion (for me at least) last night was from trying to figure out which quest people were on and if we had the same ones or if I missed one. If we all just look, grab the first quest we see, do that one, turn it in, etc.
Its not the most efficient way to quest, but it might be a little more organized.
I ended up playing with the PST folks last night, which I think may work out better for me in the end. I can’t really get online earlier than 9:30 or so, and I can play until 12:30 without being too big a zombie the next day. That seemed to mesh pretty well with the group I got into last night, and I had a lot of fun running with those guys. I may have to play a little catch up completing a couple of quests during the week that get done after I log, but it’s easier to do that then to join a group in progress at 10pm and be behind in their quest chains.
I am bummed a little though, as I was looking forward to playing with you Robert, seeing as how we only live a couple hours away from one another.
You might be aware of this, but by going into the quest log (which you get to by clicking ‘l’) you can see the status of people in your party is for quests you are on. Whether they have it, have it and have finished it, are on the next stage in the quest, etc. I used that quite a lot to make sure everybody was synched up. A few times somebody hadn’t picked up one of the quests. You can also share quests from the log, to avoid making somebody run over to get the quest.
