I too am on a “but what about your backlog?” break from LOTRO. I just finished both the games I’d been playing on the break though, so I should return to Middle Earth soon.
I was very close to finally, for the first time in 10 years, pushing a character all the way through Moria, and I am excited to see what lies on the other side.
I had my first real QT3 night in around 5 years, last night (a work night !) when I started the Battle of Pelennor Fields. It was around 10:30 pm when I started and I figured it would be the 30-minute “epic battle” scramble for side quests that I would ignore just to push through the epic quest line.
This was the most fun I had in LOTRO since I don’t remember when. It’s a series of landscape and instance quests. I could have saved/quit mid-way through but I didn’t want to. I’m not going to spoil it for those who haven’t reached this point yet, but here’s one shot:
They did a great job of creating a open field battle. I know it’s a lot of smoke and mirrors but it worked very well.
Well, that looks lovely. Time for me to come back from break, methinks.
Boy howdy did I hit the wall hard in this the other day.
Playing my little old hunter that was level…5? Or 6…in December. Today she’s 109. Did everything I could find along the way. Learned about imbued legendary weapons. Took the time to make mine. They’re good, mostly.
Walked into Mordor, got murdered. Did a little work and got better armor. Okay so now she doesn’t die, but it takes so long to kill anything that it feels like it’s not worth doing. So I notice I’ve capped my DPS legacy on my bow. Might explain it. So I need more star-lit crystals. Which come from epic battles (that no one wants to do) (stars of merit from epic battles, that is). Also I hear they drop from an instance in Mordor…that I would have to play quite a while to reach. Or the store, but I’m not paying them for something like that.
So I figure, hey alright, I can get them. I head to the auction house. Not sure when everyone became Mr. Fat Cat Bigpockets but cripes. No dice.
So I ask my kin mates about BB’s, but they’re all level 115 and off in the new Mirkwood/Dale stuff. And silent.
So I ask the LFF channel about BB’s, seems the entire server is in Dale having a Dale-old-time.
Then I guess I quit? At least I saw the ‘end’ of the non-Mordor business (which is honestly where the epic story should have ended in the first place).
Lord of the Rings spoiler: the Ring is destroyed, Sauron is beaten, but why is it that when you enter Mordor, it sure doesn’t seem like it? Everything is tough as nails and they have that silly shadow/light system. Pretty sure the shadow was beaten. But hey. I’m no game designer.
Then I logged into a different character and the idea of doing it all again to reach that same point made me ill.
And I bounced back in. A couple of decent kin/guild mates took me to a dungeon that I had to wade through Mordor to discover (which was entertaining) and now I have some jewelry with Light of WhatevertheElfGuy’sNameIs which counters the silly shadow mechanic.
Turns out Mordor is just another zone when you get a bit into it. The nice part of it is that if I do go alt-crazy, I can hold on to some of the stuff I pick up so they can have some Light of BingoWingo if they ever get this far.
Still wondering how everyone in the game became rich, but whatever. I imagine they buy things off the store and sell them. Dislike that but I can’t stop it.
I’ve played LOTRO for 10+ years on and off (mostly on), and you’re apparently playing a different game than I have. My top 2 characters are 106 and 100. Neither has reached Mordor although one could go there tomorrow.
I just enjoy the view, level up my LI’s, etc.
In my case … 10 years of resource-gathering. I’m doing spring cleaning and can sell stacks of ore/wood/crystals from pre-Mordor for tons of gold. Up to 4000 gp at one point in my bank. Others (not me) farm some instances that drop ingredients to First Age items and sell them for ~200g (I’ve bought a few).
I am anticipating this. I’m building and leveling my imbued legendaries on the side while the killing is still easy at the pre-105 point. Same with essence gear. I’m in no hurry. By the time I get there they probably will have nerfed it anyhow
I honestly didn’t go very ‘fast’, I just have a lot of free time.
I did notice that stacks of ‘old’ resources are horribly expensive now, because of everyone’s big pockets. I think it’d be pretty trivial to go gather oodles of whatnot and sell it, I just need to do it :)
And yeah the first time I went into Mordor, I got slaughtered. But I pay my VIP sub and get those daily rewards, saved a set of Mathom-hunter boxes, opened those up and slapped them on, and tripled my morale at level 109. That helped. My kin helped far more with the 2 instance runs that got me some Light of Whatsit.
I think the ‘endgame’ for me is reaching 115 and then moving to another character.
PSA : The 11th Anniversary Event started last week and runs through next Tuesday. 11th Anniversary Gift Box contains some cool fireworks (permanent launcher) and a new title (Elvenses). The new mount for the event is pretty nice looking, and only 40 tokens, so pretty easy to nab. There is also a new Beaver pet (alright, settle down!) that is 15 or 20 tokens. Last year’s Steed of the Unflagging Dragon can also still be purchased, for only 20 tokens, which is a steal given it’s 68% speed and cool armored appearance.
The rewards for doing the Anniversary Event Quests (the repeatable Yearly Yield ones) have been adjusted as well. Pretty nice haul of useful stuff like Shadow Essence, Essence Reclamation fragments, and Universal Solvent for completing them. I can’t use any of it yet, but I’m guessing it’s handy for 100+ folks.
Ohhh, thanks for the reminder! I took a burnout break, but it sounds like a nice time to jump back in.
Same here, was on a break to play other (single player) stuff, and just happened to decide to jump back on and discovered it was Anniversary time. Glad I didn’t miss the opportunity to pick up a new horse. You can never have too many horses…
11 years in and I finally see the Tower of Orthanc! My progress is slower even than the extended editions.
This game really comes into it’s own when it presents epic locations. While I found Dunland to the north more than a little boring, seeing Isengard pre and post is fantastic. It is so clearly a fortress from a greater age, in the same way that the ruins of Amon Sul are much earlier in the game. Very cool… I am fired up to push down the great river to see the Argonath and and into Rohan for Helms Deep.
That’s what drew me in early on. LOTRO gets the look of those iconic locations better that the movies in my opinion. I only wish that the game would be updated to ESO graphics quality, but I know that will never happen, and it still does well for its age.
You’ll like the upcoming locations…Argonath, Edoras, Helm’s Deep, Minas Tirith. Plus some locations that I never really thought about much until I saw them in the game. But…
There’s kind of a lull in there. It’s not bad, but if Dunland bored you then you’re in for kind of the same except with mounted combat.
Man, now you made me read the ESO thread and get interested.
Vacation in Frostbluff event for the next 7 days. You’ll get a nice fluffy bunny pet.
Streaming some Mordor now, not doing the event though:
I would watch, but I haven’t been in Mordor yet and don’t want to spoil it. I do have two characters that could “walk into Mordor” now without much prep, but am still enjoying the scenery in Gondor (and ramping up my imbued legendary items).
Don’t worry, I got stuck down a mountainside pretty quickly and had to recall to another city, then the client crashed after a while so I quit.
Hope they get working on the 64-bit stable client soon.
Mordor looks pretty nice when you get there. One downside to Mordor though is that I recall SSG reducing the drop rate of some currency resource that you could use to buy near end-game gear, because people farmed it. Now that all those people have farmed it (i.e. the hardcore), us normal players can hardly obtain the resource to get a single item. (typical mmo fix…)
That, combined with the elite-level combat grind for even trash mobs, booted me out of the game again.
I’m still in Mordor, too. The gear based difficulty ramp up once you get in there is kind of brutal after trucking along relatively easily all through Gondor.
I imagine I’ll be head back in eventually, maybe after I’m all caught up in Elder Scrolls Online, again.
So I guess another Lord of the Rings MMO is being developed?
I guess the title licensing is not exclusive for MMOs.
