LOTRO Goings On

Does anyone know if there is a Bundle pack for those of us who own Moria, but want to catch up to the most recent?

There is a Quad Pack on sale now through Turbine for $19.99, but I already own Moria and all the goodies...so feel like I'm overlapping for no benefit.

I vaguely remember they did something like that around the same time they released the previous expansions. I suspect you'll end up double-dipping on Moria.

Honestly, having to double dip on Moria to get the other two at 10 bucks a shot isn't really a bad deal.

True, plus there's no need to spend any additional money after getting the expansions.

PYFF3RJH4EDMDKJ9RME443ZNK - code for Helm's Deep early access I guess. I got it off Facebook but don't play

I just hit Mirkwood the other day. Man, what a cool, spooky-looking area. Perfect for Halloween. The only problem here is that I find myself way over-leveled, and being the kind of guy who likes to squeeze as much as he can from the content, the game just can't keep up. So I broke down and bought the XP Disabler. I wish I had done this sooner: I can continue to enjoy the neat side-quests and lore, get LI experience and faction reputation, but let the game catch up to my level so I don't feel quite so unstoppable. My goal is to be on-level for Dunland.

My brother and I started up again a few weeks ago and we've been really digging the quests up in Forochel. We'll soon be ready for a change of pace with Moria. This game is so well done, it feels like a comfortable shoe.

Yeah, I plan to get the xp disabler when I hit level 65 so I can thoroughly enjoy Mirkwood and Enedwaith

So how is the leveling experience nowadays? I remember it being a bit slow back in the day but willing to give it another shot.

jdzappa wrote:

So how is the leveling experience nowadays? I remember it being a bit slow back in the day but willing to give it another shot.

It's now a lot quicker - even moreso if you use the +25% stone. It might be that you were playing before Turbine added XP for crafting - that really fires things along, so much so that players now often run into the issues that Farscry and Nicholas referred to above.

davet010 wrote:
jdzappa wrote:

So how is the leveling experience nowadays? I remember it being a bit slow back in the day but willing to give it another shot.

It's now a lot quicker - even moreso if you use the +25% stone. It might be that you were playing before Turbine added XP for crafting - that really fires things along, so much so that players now often run into the issues that Farscry and Nicholas referred to above.

Yeah the last time I played was right around the time Mirkwood came out. So it's been awhile.

if any of you have played GW 2 that's about the speed I like - an hour, hour 1/2 per level.

It's not quite that speedy, but it's way faster than ye olden days of LotRO.

Right now its a little insane, for example with the pre-Helm's Deep 100% (which stacks with rested xp and the other xp modifiers), I got the legendary weapon intro for the pre-Moria quest, hopped back to the Haunted Burrow for the festival quests, and 4 burrow quests had the weapon to level 10.

As big LotR fans, I'm considering playing LotRO, just not sure if it's any fun/good. Could someone please enable me?
Played about 10 minutes so far and it looks a bit underwhelming.
Please help.

Also, do I need to know something crucial before I start playing?

I think LOTRO is the best LotR game, if you are looking to get lost in the world of Middle Earth. It has one of the best senses of "place" in any MMORPG I've played. I enjoyed my time playing it earlier this year (about 100 hours), but I ended up stopping due to the grind and because I didn't have any people to play with. One of these days, I'll go back into it with one of my kids and it will be great.

It is free to play; however, I would suggest getting Samwise Gamgee's Starter Pack. For $10 you get the riding skill, a steed, a 4th bag, and the currency cap is eliminated. Plus the account becomes a "Premium" account, which gives you another character slot and some more auction slots. You will eventually need to spend money to unlock more quests (while it is possible to grind to get the currency to buy quests, it is not very practical), but you won't need to do that for a while. By the time you need more quests, you will none whether the game is for you.

Also, dwarves, hobbits, elves, and humans all have different starting areas. If the opening didn't grab you, try a different race. Hobbits are much more focused on delivering pies rather than killing mobs, for instance (so I've heard).

I'd recommend going with a dwarf or elf to begin with, I find the humans underwhelming, and unfortunately the halflings end up starting with them. The Shire is a Marmite area, you either adore or despise it. If you like non-combat quests, deliveries and the like, the Shire is for you; if you hate those things ... avoid it like the plague

That said, Bree these days is a wonderful town, full of life depending on your server (Landroval if RP and tons of social events are your thing). I'd recommend finding a race you like, and a class (hunter is probably the easiest to start with, although the minstrel is very survivable these days), and sticking with things into your early teens before deciding if you like things. The first ten levels will fly by, especially right now with the pre-Helm's Deep bonus xp.

Thanks for the responses, I'll go back to it shortly!

Can I just say every time, I mean EVERY TIME I watch LoTR or the Hobbit, I feel this overwhelming compulsion to jump back into this game.

I'm just going to echo what's already been said: try a different race. The newbie and prologue (the main, "epic" quest line is organized into volumes, books and chapters) areas are specific to the race. Also, finding the right class for your style of play is important. Aside from their role orientation, each class has game mechanics unique to it.

The biggest draw for me is, as Aristophan said, it's sense of place. It feels like Middle Earth, from the landscape, to the NPCs and monsters, to even the mechanics of the game. You have morale instead of hit points; you aren't killed, you're defeated and retreat. The regions have a great sense of place, too. The Shire feels pastoral, Bree feels like a bustling town, the Lone Lands feel desolate, the Misty Mountains feel cold, and North Downs have this feeling of wild plains with pockets of darkness. One time, I was moving into an orc-occupied area of the North Downs at night during a thunderstorm. Scariest time I've ever had in the game. Everything was pitch dark (I had my personal light turned off), except when the lightning flashed. Then, I would see the hulking figures of orc sentries silhouetted on a hill, or the sleek shape of a patrolling warg slip over hill crest. And the trolls... the ground shakes.

It also has a very strong sense of story. It involves you in the War of the Ring without outshining the Fellowship or replacing them, but you still feel like you have an important part. There's a quest in the first book where I found myself (as a level 18 Elf minstrel at the time) stopping in my tracks and exclaiming "What the hell am I doing trailing the Witch King into a barrow? Am I crazy??"

Lotro is an MMO, so there are always 10 rats somewhere waiting to be killed. There are also three trolls frozen in stone, an inn called The Prancing Pony, a party tree, Weathertop, the Argonath, etc, etc. Turbine have done great job of creating a world for us to play in that includes the landmarks but isn't just a small series of set pieces.

The conceit of the epic quest is very clever, as Toanstation says. Sometimes it detours a little too much from the main book plot for my taste, but the levelling speed is so fast now that you can just skip regions that don't appeal. If you can get in a group, that'll help too, as there's some fun group content and mechanics.

Starter pack for sale as part of humble bundle...

Put some time into Helm's Deep. The first part required me to run a really long distance to talk to one person and then run back. After that, nothing but fanservicy dialog quests for about 2 hours. I think I've hit actual game now.

The class changes they've made are huge. I feel like it's harder to make a hybrid role class, which I think is kind of the point. You can put points into all the various skill categories but you need to invest heavily in just one to get the better skills. On the plus side, I'd been grinding out Iron Garrison rep because I wanted to get a bog guardian for my Lore-Master, and since they've abolished legendary traits entirely there's no longer any requirements for any of the pets. Bog guardian, miniature giant eagle, whatever you please.

Oh, and champions can equip crossbows now. I like crossbows.

They've made some huge changes to crafting, too. You can no longer mine any sort of tin. Instead you can buy it from suppliers. No more components, either. They added a bunch of recipes to turn components back into raw materials.

Geez, I gotta get back in and start learning. Like there's not enough games out there already...

Burglar changes are intriguing; dps on my gambler is way up from previously, but I miss having a true self heal I can use when I need it, instead there's a pulse of healing on evade mechanic. Guess I need to get my scholar back into making health pots.

No more crafting components? I have to check with out. I'm interested to see if it'll make leveling my tailoring a smoother process.

Nicholaas wrote:

No more crafting components? I have to check with out. I'm interested to see if it'll make leveling my tailoring a smoother process.

Yeah, but don't misinterpret that. You still need ingredients to make stuff, you just no longer have that intermediate step of making blades and plates and shafts and the like.

LobsterMobster wrote:
Nicholaas wrote:

No more crafting components? I have to check with out. I'm interested to see if it'll make leveling my tailoring a smoother process.

Yeah, but don't misinterpret that. You still need ingredients to make stuff, you just no longer have that intermediate step of making blades and plates and shafts and the like.

That's what always slowed me down, all that extra crap. Happy to see it go.

Jumped back in this weekend and really having fun with my hunter.

LobsterMobster wrote:
Nicholaas wrote:

No more crafting components? I have to check with out. I'm interested to see if it'll make leveling my tailoring a smoother process.

Yeah, but don't misinterpret that. You still need ingredients to make stuff, you just no longer have that intermediate step of making blades and plates and shafts and the like.

Sweet.

How is the PvP or Monster part of the game going? I can only take PvE for so long so PvP is always good to change it up.