Loremasters are harder than other classes to solo, but if you really learn the class, they are far more fun to play. My highest level character is a LM, mostly soloed to level 65.
Runekeepers are insanely easy to solo, and can heal and stuff, so people like them in groups almost as much as minstrels.
I could not manage to solo a Champion effectively, for some reason, although other people certainly can and do.
Wardens are more complicated to play than most other classes and are pretty easy to solo if you can remember the keystroke combinations (there are many).
Oh, and Guardians do crap damage unless you equip them with a two-handed weapon and use the correct stance, then they do reasonable damage. The class is really meant for groups, though.
I agree with Arc. The RM is actually pretty easy to solo. However, I disagree on the Champion. My dwarf champion was a solo machine. He was quite good. For whatever reason, though, I tended to like my Hunter best for soloing. I’m not recommending it necessarily, but I LOVE the extra running speed, which you get pretty early on, and being able to port around the world practically at will? Priceless.
Hunters are very popular in groups for dps.
I think my problem with Champions is that I suck at playing a Champion, not anything inherent in the class. I’ve played all the classes at one time or another, except for Captain, and never really had much of a problem soloing any of them, except that pesky Champion.
Man, you guys are making me miss our ole’ Monday nights. Sniff…sniff…
The EST group is still going, fuzzyslug. We just reached Moria and are now keeping busy killing insects and falling off high places without guardrails.
Warning
1586
I remember I fell off Weathertop. While that sucked, I had a great time playing before Real Life started messing with my schedule.
Dejin
1587
One of the first things that happened to me in Moria, is one of the small rhino things booted me off over a rail and I fell to my death.
well I reached 65 yesterday on my minstel. Just trying to finish all my books now. Still have vol 1 chap 11 to do and up.
But if you need a hand, shoot me a tell and I can run you through whatever. I am battle bard specced by the way but will probably spec back to healing here soon.
I remember that. Good times…
peterb
1590
OK, I started up a hobbit minstrel, Oompaloomparond, on Nimrodel.
peterb
1592
I’ll be on tonight for a bit if anyone wants to show me around. I’m a trial account, so I can’t send tells to you. Name: Oompaloomparond.
Thinking of coming back in to play on my level 27ish something… yeah its been a while.
Have those combat changes/ mirkwood expansions made the general game any better?
I soloed a Champ up to 53 and usually found it pretty easy as long as I didn’t get too many guys on me at once. They do crazy damage and can burn through a mob’s morale pretty quickly. Their very good AOE dps meant even when I got slightly dogpiled, they went down faster than I did, especially with the human trait that heals 3000 morale as a fallback.
The warden strikes me as the ultimate solo class which provides problems when grouping. They get a run speed boost out of combat similar to hunters, they can self-heal, they can evade, parry, and block well with self-buffs, they can muster all over the map sort of like hunter camps, they can even do almost but not quite solid dps so a fight doesn’t have to take forever. I’ve been told that “played correctly,” a warden can be the best tank in the game for grouping, but I don’t know what “played correctly” means here. There is more memorization, but that’s not too bad.
What I like about it is that it makes me think about what tactics to employ moment to moment. Get jumped by a mob, just try to drop him with my DPS attacks. Suddenly 3 more mobs pile on? Better switch to some self heals to hold the morale steady for a few seconds while I get my evade/parry/block buffs going and then settle in for the long haul. Start running low on power? Better let my morale drop below 50% to buff my power back up. Then strike a balance between rebuffing that power until I’m good and not letting my morale drop too low. And that doesn’t even include the pre-fight stealth stun attack for a backstab or a long range spear stun followed up by a backstab. With my champ, it was just all DPS, all the time and hope I could cycle in the slight self-heal here and there while I tried to clobber-nuke everything.
peterb
1595
What’s the overall impression about how active LOTR online is? Is it likely to be around in another two years? The difference in activity level between this and (say) WoW is pretty striking.
Note: not trolling, seriously asking whether I’m just not seeing all the activity because I’m tucked away in the Shire.
Activity in the newbie areas is usually slim, the game is 2 years old after all. Also, with the recent release of the Mirkwood expansion content a lot of folks who had shelved their 60th level characters have dusted them off again to play in Mirkwood, making newbie and mid-range areas all the more devoid of life the past month or so.
Which is, in a word, AWESOME. Being able to gather crafting materials and finish “Kill X of Y” deeds early on is a great boon when no one else is running through the same area. You can pretty easily make it to level 20 without even needing to acknowledge the presence of another person, if you’re lucky.
Dejin
1598
Turbine keeps insisting that the player base is growing. Take that for what it’s worth. But I haven’t had the impression that the game is dying by any means.
The newb areas are vey quiet nowadays. Fortunately, you can solo all the way up to 65 if you wish. Some of the epic quests require grouping though. Let me highly recommend that you use the epic quest chain to give you an idea of where you should be and what you should be doing. There is plenty of content in the lower levels and you’ll outlevel many quests before you can do them. Also keep an eye on your traits (shift-L will open the book). Quite a few are gained by exploration- try to get a few done while you’re in an area so that you don’t have to travel unnecessarily.
Dejin
1600
Also, I’m not sure if a comparison to WoW is a very good indicator of whether or not a game is successful. By that standard all other games are failures.
