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ukrainius maximus
Mar 3, 2007
So gently caress those deeds then, I will just quest and craft to my heart's content. Thanks for the encouraging words.

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Remy Marathe
Mar 15, 2007

_________===D ~ ~ _\____/

These freaking Yulefest dailies have taken over my life, the rewards are too good. Absurd quantities of marks (at least for a level 30 skirmisher), a couple tomes of will- I pretty much have to spend an hour every day cycling through each of my alts doing the keg emergency quest.

ruffz
Dec 20, 2007

Remy Marathe posted:

These freaking Yulefest dailies have taken over my life, the rewards are too good. Absurd quantities of marks (at least for a level 30 skirmisher), a couple tomes of will- I pretty much have to spend an hour every day cycling through each of my alts doing the keg emergency quest.

I was originally doing the full circuit of dailies on four characters but started to get burned out after only three or four days, so I scaled it back to two characters doing everything with the other two only doing the keg quest. I've read about people with up to 20 alts doing the full circuit every day, that's got to require some serious endurance and time. I'm up to like 4500 marks on my account just from the daily presents, and I've got two spiral-horned snow beast cloaks.

binge crotching
Apr 2, 2010

Beach Party posted:

Oh one more thing, are the race traits just kinda "fluff" or do they somewhat matter in the late game?

Play whatever you like best, but if you want to go full :spergin: mode, human is the best, especially for a tank.

human > hobbit/dwarf > elf

Humans have an innate +5% extra incoming healing, in addition to a racial trait that gives +1% each to block/parry/evade. They have a skill on a 1 hour cooldown that gives a ~2.5k morale heal. Awesome heal when you're level 45, almost pointless when you're level 75.

Hobbits have an innate +1% fear and shadow resistance, and a +1 morale per second out of combat regen. They have a skill on a 1 hour cooldown that causes them to immediately shed aggro and go invisible. It is hilarious to use in a raid when you're tanking, and is why Hobbit Guardians are the best.

Dwarves have an innate +1% common resistance, +0.5 morale/power in-combat regen, -1 morale/power out of combat regen. They have a skill on a 1 hour cooldown that gives 10 seconds of -50% incoming damage. It used to be -75% and was a lot nicer, but they nerfed it to 50% a year or two ago.

Elves have an innate +1% poison/disease resistance, -20 morale, and -1 morale per second out of combat regen. They have a skill on a 1 hour cooldown that gives 10 seconds of +75% parry (seriously, it's poo poo).

Each of the races has a few stats they either get a bonus or penalty to, but by the time you're level 30 they are almost meaningless, and completely pointless at end game. Even the innate bonuses are pretty much ignorable, unless you're going full min-max.

Really, take whatever race you like the look of best. But if you like say elves and humans the same and want a Lore-master, make a human one.

Mode 7
Jul 28, 2007

I just discovered that Staff and Sword is now just a level 40 skill instead of a trait. I am so happy right now. This really is like coming back to an entirely different game to the one I left.

My 41 LM is just sitting in Forochel now waiting until I pull the trigger on subbing again. Meanwhile my Dwarf Guardian (had to make a Dwarf after watching The Hobbit) is just tearing through the levels. I can't believe how quickly I hit 15 where previously I would have had to do every last dreg of quests in Ered Luin to do it.

I also have a 16 Captain but the pace of killing things is so slow that as much as I adore the theme and feel of the class, it's hard to stay inspired to keep going - do Captains have a level where, like LMs, they just suddenly start rocking?

ruffz
Dec 20, 2007

The Yule Festival was extended to January 3rd to make up for the downtime last week. I'm kinda surprised they're only doing an extra two days, I think it was last year that they extended it out to the middle of January.

Rarity
Oct 21, 2010

~*4 LIFE*~
Am I an idiot or did the game really expect me to trek all the way from Gondarim to Bree on foot? That can't have been right :psyduck:

Is it worth doing the quests in Buckland or should I just head on over to Bree?

Sheep
Jul 24, 2003
You can free fast travel to and from any of the starting cities from any other starting city (plus Bree). So you could go from that.. dwarf place, Celondim, or Michel Delving for free, and it's insta-travel to boot.

Remy Marathe
Mar 15, 2007

_________===D ~ ~ _\____/

So my guardian has an interrupt skill (stamp), but I have yet to spot anything resembling casting on the part of mobs. Is there any way to tell when an ability with a cast time is being used, or a UI option I've missed? Use of interrupts were a huge help in WoW but I've had this ability for 5 levels and yet to use it to any effect.

Cao Ni Ma
May 25, 2010



Remy Marathe posted:

So my guardian has an interrupt skill (stamp), but I have yet to spot anything resembling casting on the part of mobs. Is there any way to tell when an ability with a cast time is being used, or a UI option I've missed? Use of interrupts were a huge help in WoW but I've had this ability for 5 levels and yet to use it to any effect.

You wont see a bar but mobs stop auto attacking and you'll see them strike a weird "charging up" pose before having a casted attack. Thats your queue to kick em.

Hysterix
Dec 4, 2011
Enemies usually get a glow around their feet when they're casting. The pose is the other clue.

Cutedge
Mar 13, 2006

How can we lose so much more than we had before

Hysterix posted:

Enemies usually get a glow around their feet when they're casting. The pose is the other clue.

Yeah I think every interruptible skill the enemies use now shows the induction indicator at their feet, which will be either red or green depending on if it's a damaging or healing ability.

Remy Marathe
Mar 15, 2007

_________===D ~ ~ _\____/

Wow I never noticed that, gonna have to pay more attention to their feet. Their other body language vs autoattack has proven too subtle for me so far.

ruffz
Dec 20, 2007

A lot of mobs don't use those types of skills with a large induction time that would cause them to glow at their feet. At low levels there's a good chance that you just haven't encountered any of those mobs yet, because it's pretty obvious when they're casting something.

Geektox
Aug 1, 2012

Good people don't rip other people's arms off.

SeaTard posted:

:words: about races

You know, now I don't feel quite as bad for letting my elf warden accidentally die before I got my Undying titles. :doh:

Quixotic1
Jul 25, 2007

Probably going to regret getting into an mmo, but after watching the Hobbit a second time and there being a sale on steam for a couple of exp packs and sales on the turbine store, it seems inevitable.

I just can't make heads or tails of which packs, expansions, starter sets, etc to pick. All the info on what to get I've seen relies on the person having some previous expansion or subscriber, but I'd be going into this raw.

Sheep
Jul 24, 2003
If you're new then just make a free account and go. You don't really have to buy anything until level 30ish, and then you can just sub for a month and get access to everything you need until Moria, which is like level 65 or something.

Also guy who played Thrushrod, are you logging on tonight? I'd like to play my hunter!

Sheep fucked around with this message at 11:39 on Dec 29, 2012

Baron Porkface
Jan 22, 2007


Have they cleaned up the North downs and Angmar since Mirkwood?

Hysterix
Dec 4, 2011
They've totally revamped Evendim and Moria (they're awesome now) but they haven't touched North Downs or Angmar.

Also, regarding deeds/virtues: I would definitely work on you class deeds (use your abilities to get your class skills) as your first priority. As others have said, virtue deeds are best done when they're gray to you. All classes should take a look at Zeal (it's an awesome virtue) and Tolerance and/or Fidelity (bosses do tactical damage for the most part.) I also usually slot Valour if I'm running low on Vitality. There is also a virtue that helps your main stat for your class. Try and level that one, too. Honestly, I stop at 40 (at the content gap I usually run into) and get my virtues up to around 6 doing the low level deeds. This is mainly because when I hit max level I'm ready to group up, and it's hard to get groups for harder stuff if your virtues are in the 2-3 range.

Dark_Swordmaster
Oct 31, 2011
Yeah, I saw some of the virtues mitigate "tactical damage" but I have no loving idea what that meant. Is there a handy-dandy damage chart with examples on the wiki?

Rarity
Oct 21, 2010

~*4 LIFE*~
Oh god the Old Forest I keep getting lost and I'm meant to kill bats bears and wolves but there's only bats everywhere loving bats it's driving me crazy :gonk:

Just like the book, really. Good job, Turbine.

Hysterix
Dec 4, 2011
Here's a link to a good explanation of tactical vs physical damage: http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.php?439084-What-s-the-difference-between-Physical-and-Tactical-damage-mitigation

Roughly:
if it's hitting you with an object = physical
magic/non-physical = tactical

This non-intuitive distinction happens because according to the lore, there is very little magic that our player characters can do. Captain's cries aren't "magic" and minstrel heals aren't "magic" according to the lore, etc.

I am *still* not completely sure how resist rating works into this. I just know that tanks tend to emphasize physical and tactical mitigation, and that resistance rating is apparently not as effective.

Edited: Resistance rating is resist to fear, disease, poison, and wound. Things you can use a potion to get rid of.

Sydney Bottocks
Oct 15, 2004
Probation
Can't post for 61 days!
I recently dipped my toes back into the game after a bit of an absence, and after paying the upkeep on my dude's house, found myself drawn into running the Yuletide dailies without having intended to do anything more beyond make sure my dude's rent was paid. And the best part was, it was completely casual and didn't give me the "oh my god I gotta hurry up and get this done :gonk:" feeling other MMOs can sometimes give.

I forget who said it originally, but the description of this game as "WoW for the pipe and slippers set" is pretty much spot on (and it's got such lush, gorgeous visuals :3:).

TheHoosier
Dec 30, 2004

The fuck, Graham?!

The game certainly has changed for the better. It still looks amazing and now plays even better.

Question about leveling: I know with deeds it can be beneficial to complete gray questlines, but early on should I even bother? As in, if I hit level 12, should I finish these drat Shire mail quests or pack up and head to Bree-land?

Hysterix
Dec 4, 2011
Also, for those of you who are 85, get in on the Durchest action. Basically, devs have said that they can't put locks on scalable instances. Barad Guldur is scalable, and the first boss, Durchest, drops tarnished symbols and riddermark starlit crystals among other things. People are pugging Durchest like mad, which is why tarnished symbol prices have crashed. 250 gold for a tarnished symbol 2 weeks ago, 70 gold today on Brandywine, at least. It takes maybe 15 minutes per run.

Tsurupettan
Mar 26, 2011

My many CoX, always poised, always ready, always willing to thrust.

I liked LOTRO except the buttons felt non-responsive in combat. Yeah, they did stuff, but actually pushing them felt 'sluggish'. That was literally my only issue. Is that still a thing?

loquacius
Oct 21, 2008

TheHoosier posted:

The game certainly has changed for the better. It still looks amazing and now plays even better.

Question about leveling: I know with deeds it can be beneficial to complete gray questlines, but early on should I even bother? As in, if I hit level 12, should I finish these drat Shire mail quests or pack up and head to Bree-land?

You're not really getting a whole lot out of gray quests other than the deeds (which aren't going anywhere and won't matter for quite a while) and any intrinsic enjoyment you may derive from playing them. On a first character I'd say just move on to Bree-land unless (a) you're having a blast in the Shire and don't want to leave yet (understandable since the Shire is by far the best noob zone) or (b) you just really enjoy mail quests. People love to hate on those things, but as I said multiple times in the old thread they're a great system of breadcrumbs to lead you around the Shire to all the cool little towns which have their own unique touches but which you really have no particular reason to see if you're powergaming.

As plenty of people have said, also, this isn't necessarily the kind of game where you have to rush to endgame, skip scenery, or ignore quest dialogue, so take it at whatever pace you want. I didn't really stop to smell the roses until my third character or so, but it's worth doing whenever you feel like getting around to it.

Tsurupettan posted:

I liked LOTRO except the buttons felt non-responsive in combat. Yeah, they did stuff, but actually pushing them felt 'sluggish'. That was literally my only issue. Is that still a thing?

Perf kind of takes a hit when you're in mounted combat, but that's still a brand-new system and it has improved since it launched. I've never seen anything like this in pre-Rohan content myself. Maybe ease up on the graphical settings a bit?

Captain Candiru
Nov 9, 2006

These hips don't lye
They did make a few attempts to make the actionbar feel more responsive to input back in the day. I never really suffered from the perception, myself, so I can't say for certain. Other games with "unresponsive actionbar syndrome" like TOR or WO didn't bother me much until it was pointed out, either.

TheHoosier
Dec 30, 2004

The fuck, Graham?!

loquacius posted:

You're not really getting a whole lot out of gray quests other than the deeds (which aren't going anywhere and won't matter for quite a while) and any intrinsic enjoyment you may derive from playing them. On a first character I'd say just move on to Bree-land unless (a) you're having a blast in the Shire and don't want to leave yet (understandable since the Shire is by far the best noob zone) or (b) you just really enjoy mail quests. People love to hate on those things, but as I said multiple times in the old thread they're a great system of breadcrumbs to lead you around the Shire to all the cool little towns which have their own unique touches but which you really have no particular reason to see if you're powergaming.

As plenty of people have said, also, this isn't necessarily the kind of game where you have to rush to endgame, skip scenery, or ignore quest dialogue, so take it at whatever pace you want. I didn't really stop to smell the roses until my third character or so, but it's worth doing whenever you feel like getting around to it.


Sounds good. Im not really approaching it from a powerleveling angle, I was just curious if its like crafting where I should do it as I level or wait to do it later.

The game is absolutely gorgeous and I plan on taking my time. The storyline is also rather unique. For those who are reading this thread wondering on whether or not to play based on story, here it is from a hobbit perspective:

Your character goes through a rather traumatic experience where he/she gets nabbed by brigands working with Angmar to an unknown end. You're saved by Strider and Amdir, but Amdir is wounded by a Morgul blade in the process. You end up in the Man town of Archet which is quickly going all to hell. Long story short: poo poo gets real, real fast. You end up back in the Shire and things seem calm again. Quests involve feeding fat hobbitses, exploring the beauty of the Shire, dealing with wild life... normal daily life. Relaxing. Mild.

As you level, however, it becomes apparent to you and your character that the world is changing. Normal life of loafing and chores gives way to death and darkness. The quests slowly start to open your eyes to the world in conflict and the plight of the Fellowship. There is a natural escalation to it.

It's goddamn amazing.

Mandragora
Sep 14, 2006

Resembles a Pirate Captain

TheHoosier posted:

The game is absolutely gorgeous and I plan on taking my time. The storyline is also rather unique. For those who are reading this thread wondering on whether or not to play based on story, here it is from a hobbit perspective:

One of the coolest things about this game is how even the "throwaway" newbie area quests dovetail.

The dwarf starting experience begins in a flashback to pre-Hobbit Ered Luin, as Gandalf is gathering Thorin's company together and preparing to depart for the Shire to hire on Bilbo as a burglar. You team up with young Gimli and help stop a rampaging troll in the mines, and find the corpse of an ancient dwarf lord while you're down there. Flash forward to the more modern time and you've been recognized as a skilled adventurer rather than a mining grunt. The Dourhand clan has absconded with the corpse and you have to go find it, and from there you discover that said dwarf lord was actually attempting to traffic with fell spirits and achieve immortality hundreds of years ago but one elf warrior sacrificed himself to bring the dwarf down before the ritual could be completed.

The Dourhands think that if they finish the ritual the dwarf Skorgrim will return and lead them all to glory and wealth, and in finishing it they end up fusing the corpse with the spirit of an elder wight who answers directly to Sauron and the Witch King. You barely escape with your life and become entangled in a plot by the surviving Dourhands to lure the dwarf and elven kingdoms into open war against one another by staging kidnappings and recruiting local goblin tribes. It ends with you unifying the previously estranged dwarf and elf heroes and beating back the tide, at which point you learn that this is only a symptom of a larger threat and are sent as an emissary to Bree to see what services you can offer a ranger-lord named Strider.


And if you do the elf starting area, it actually takes place 600 years ago and you get to assist the elven warrior in stopping that dwarf necromancer you learned about in the dwarven newbie zone. It all ties together beautifully. You can run all four races through the end of their prologues for the complete story if you want, or you can focus on one and still get a great, personalized little tale.

Tsurupettan
Mar 26, 2011

My many CoX, always poised, always ready, always willing to thrust.

loquacius posted:

Perf kind of takes a hit when you're in mounted combat, but that's still a brand-new system and it has improved since it launched. I've never seen anything like this in pre-Rohan content myself. Maybe ease up on the graphical settings a bit?

I didn't even know this game had mounted content. I just meant from the get-go the action bar felt unresponsive. It did things without issue and there were no problems with input lag but I'm talking about the 'feel' of the bar. I'm not sure how better to describe it.

Captain Backslap posted:

They did make a few attempts to make the actionbar feel more responsive to input back in the day. I never really suffered from the perception, myself, so I can't say for certain. Other games with "unresponsive actionbar syndrome" like TOR or WO didn't bother me much until it was pointed out, either.

I'll have to try this again then, I haven't played in a very long time. Thank you. I get what you mean about TOR but I don't recall that issue in Warhammer. :shobon:

Oxphocker
Aug 17, 2005

PLEASE DO NOT BACKSEAT MODERATE
Part of the issue you might be experiencing is that there is no weapon/skill speed in this game. The attacks take place in cycles and might be a bit 'off' from what you're used to. After a while you'll get the hang of it. Play a class like minstrel or rk and you'll really get a lot of practice at it.

Tsurupettan
Mar 26, 2011

My many CoX, always poised, always ready, always willing to thrust.

Oxphocker posted:

Part of the issue you might be experiencing is that there is no weapon/skill speed in this game. The attacks take place in cycles and might be a bit 'off' from what you're used to. After a while you'll get the hang of it. Play a class like minstrel or rk and you'll really get a lot of practice at it.

I actually recall liking RK when I played and not having that issue. Most of the issue came from melee abilities.

3 Stacked Midgets
Jul 29, 2004
Triple Threat
After seeing the Hobbit, I couldn't restrain myself from buying Rohan and resubbing. So far, I'm liking the many little UI enhancements that have popped up since I last played about 1.5 years ago.

Dots on the radar? Yesss. I'm still not up to East Rohan, but I'm liking the quests so far.

How do you get access to the RoI instances? I've completed the epic quests in those areas, but they're greyed out for me.

Remy Marathe
Mar 15, 2007

_________===D ~ ~ _\____/

My take on responsiveness, this definitely felt sluggish for me coming from Warcraft. It stopped bothering me as I got used to the different play mechanics. WoW plays like a fighting game, you hit the button exactly when you want the skill to fire off, global cooldowns are fast, key presses for abilities that aren't immediately available fail. It's 3D mortal combat.

In LOTRO by contrast you actually queue up an ability in advance, sometimes it even seems to queue two (haven't quite figured this out). So one reason it may seem less responsive is the exact timing of your keypresses isn't as relevant when you can queue it during the cooldown instead of needing to hit it right after. The slowness might also be an illusion caused by the animations. Either way I think the sluggishness is less of an issue than it seems; my last-moment self heals don't seem to fail any more in this game than they did in WoW.

ukrainius maximus
Mar 3, 2007
I used to worry about the whole idea of a class being overplayed and would shy away from something like champion. This time I said gently caress it and made a Dwarf champion, something I had always wanted to play in this game yet never did for some reason (Dwarves are always my favorite).

Champion is some awesome fun, being a Dwarf makes it doubly so. Seriously, play what you want and don't worry about how popular a class may be in the game. If you have half a brain you are already better than most of the people playing (not to knock them too much, the community is generally very nice and helpful, but they just sort of suck at playing vidya games).

Is it worth buying those stat tomes? Are they obtainable any other way or should I drop some points on them>

Drone
Aug 22, 2003

Incredible machine
:smug:


Someone once described LOTRO as the only MMO that always just feels like a comfortable, guilty pleasure. No worry about grind, no pressure to get the best eq or a perfect raid, just put on your slippers and bathrobe and enjoy your time in Middle Earth. I think that fits pretty well.

I just reinstalled, been an off-and-on subscriber since like 2008. I played F2P a bit about a year ago, and I'm just now coming back (again) for some casual fun. At the time, I thought LOTRO had probably the best F2P model out there (generally unrestricted for the first 20-30 levels or so, and you can earn cash shop points by getting achievements through normal gameplay). One thing I am noticing after playing around in the Shire on a lowbie Hobbit burglar is that they seemed to have hosed around with the fast travel system a little bit. I can't really fast travel anywhere anymore by paying silver/gold, but have to purchase tokens with Turbine points? Please tell me I'm wrong here and just reading the interface incorrectly.

Example: trying to take a horse from Michel Delving to Hobbiton. There are two buttons at the bottom, one to pay with a few silver (greyed out) and one to purchase more tokens with Turbine points. Can't take the silver option since it's greyed out -- in fact the only fast-travel point I can use by paying in silver is transport point at the Shire player-housing area.

Drone fucked around with this message at 00:59 on Dec 30, 2012

Radio!
Mar 15, 2008

Look at that post.

Is there any reason not to finish the Vol. I epic quests before finishing Moria? It seems like most people just go straight to Moria after Forochel/Angmar, but I loving hate Moria so I'm way more interested in Vol. I.

Also oh my god pending loot is SO GOOD. I haven't played for a couple months, so this is the first time I've seen all the post-Rohan changes, but I really like everything they've done.

Sheep
Jul 24, 2003
You have to discover destinations for fast travel first. The exceptions are Bree and the starting towns (Thorin's Hall, Cerewhatever, Michel Delving, and I think Combe).

There's nothing in this game that you have to pay for aside from the expansions/quest packs.

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Fried Sushi
Jul 5, 2004

Radio! posted:

Is there any reason not to finish the Vol. I epic quests before finishing Moria? It seems like most people just go straight to Moria after Forochel/Angmar, but I loving hate Moria so I'm way more interested in Vol. I.

Also oh my god pending loot is SO GOOD. I haven't played for a couple months, so this is the first time I've seen all the post-Rohan changes, but I really like everything they've done.

No reason not to, you don't have to complete them to move on to Vol 2 though. If you aren't in a hurry to get into Moria might as well finish them up, can get the white horse for completing them as well. Too bad none of the rep/deed horses can be used for WarSteed cosmetic purposes. I have 20 horses that serve no purpose now.

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