Yule Warsteed

Okay, so the Yule Festival is long over, but in my defence, this post has been half written for weeks now! I thought I’d share a screenshot of my own Yule Warsteed. I could only face grinding the Frostbluff quests on one toon, Barandis, my Cappy of Rohan, to get the warsteed cosmetic appearance. And that was only because babies think it acceptable to wake up for milk at 5am, leaving me a little time to play before Baby Dwarf woke up and demanded coco-pops. I didn’t really mind the deed system brought in for this festival, or the gating of the warsteed cosmetics, but 120 quests was a bit too many in my opinion. Also it was nice being able to buy a reset token in the store if needed, but really, to reset one quest? I didn’t buy any of them, at 100 TP’s per quest that was a bit too steep, but I might have paid 250-350 TP’s to reset the days limit, like a task reset.

Here Barandis models the full cosmetic festival set, dyed burgundy.

This shows only the saddle and leg parts of the outfit slotted, again dyed burgundy. I wanted to show these two pieces on their own, as these are probably the most generic and non-festival specific pieces. Granted, the saddle is decorated with a holly motif, but it looks fairly inconspicuous, and is actually a very useable item on its own. As you can see, the legs have no motifs on them, and can be used to add an interesting flash of colour as part of any outfit.

I like these cosmetics a lot, and am looking forward to seeing the ones associated with the other festivals as and when they come up. With the current system though, I’d be lucky to acquire them on multiple alts, although with the updated quest XP for festivals, doing the festival quests is an alternate way of levelling alts, which does give a bit more of an incentive.

Emma

The Story so far

I’m sat here bored waiting for the imminent arrival of our second Baby Dwarf. The original not-so-baby-anymore Dwarf is sleeping. Waiting for a baby’s due date is like waiting for Christmas – your focus is on a set date, but then once it comes, you realise you’re not going to get any presents, and may not for some time to come.

So, I thought I’d write a little post rounding up the things we have been doing over the last month – what became of our preparations for Rohan, and our first experiences with the expansion.

Ganin and Azaghar

We spent a bit of time finishing off reputation with the Stangard and Limlight Gorge factions, which involved completing all the quest chains and taking on a lot of trees. Duoing the titans in Limlight Gorge was actually a lot of fun ( Adam soloed a lot of them on either Ganin or his champ Elgalandir) and we finished most of the deeds around there. We cherry picked deeds to do and worked on those, but weren’t too worried about getting all the virtues to 16, assuming (rightly as it has turned out) that we could get the last few whilst exploring Rohan.

They were our first characters to foray in to Rohan. It just seemed natural that it should be them to explore the place first. Taking it slow and exploring everything there is to offer in the expansion, tweaking graphics settings to try to see the landscape at its best without compromising game play,  and submerging ourselves in the storylines has us currently at 81, and ready to leave Cliving.

Adam has been experimenting with his warsteeds, resetting trait points and trying out Light, Medium and Heavy steeds, while to be honest I’m sticking with a Medium Steed and spending points as I see fit, whilst I get used to it. We did both spring for a hide colour pack from the store, being a lot more restrained than we wanted initially to be. Horse skins, were okay but a bit pricey, Horse hide colours we were a bit less comfortable with, but accepted, though they were a little more than we wanted to spend, cosmetic colour packs for the items we are still staying clear of as they are too much! We made a conscious effort to restrain ourselves – each alt can have one horse colour and/or skin as a treat, and that’s it. We have found that the free cosmetics from the epic book dyed either orange or sienna match the uniform pretty well, otherwise the horses are au-naturale. Ganin does have a grisly Orc head on a spear with matching pestilence cloud equipped on his blonde horse, which he found in a blue gift box, a quest reward for defeating a solo Warband. Tyri, Adams hunter also has one of these, again from a blue gift box.

Ganin and Az are both now master crafters, and as the main players it is their responsibility to filter down recipes and supplies to our legion of hungry alts. With the open looting system, we both now end up with stacks of recipes and crafting materials, whereas previouslywe would each roll on certain items and stackables and then split the winnings after as we needed. While both of our bags get full, it does mean that we end up with a lot more crafting materials than we would usually do, very handy when you have as many alt crafters as we do.

Fairwen

Yep, Fairwen, my little Hobbit Warden finally got out of the cupboard and got some play time. I fancied having a solo character I could level through the day, as a little side project. I was pondering what to do, unsure whether to level my burglar, my second tank, my second hunter, my second minstrel or my warden (all hobbit ladies) with a strong compulsion to create a brand new alt.

In the end it was after we teamed up with a couple of guys from our old Heroes Kinship to kill the really big spiders in Limlight Gorge that I settled on my warden. Rich’s warden Feleg (an alt of the Khazad Guards Aulin) was great fun to play with, and it made me realise how good a class warden is. I created Fairwen my warden probably on the day Moria was released, and since then she has been sat at level 20 in Michael Delving cooking.

I hadn’t actually played with a Warden in a fellowship since the days when the Watcher was end game stuff, and whilst Adam had dabbled on his as a solo projects that he can’t really get into (one at 36 one at 50), they kind of slipped by me. Fairwen got a complete makeover to get me excited about playing her as a character again, moving from fresh-faced blonde to a feisty red-head, complete with killer outfit. Within the week she had gone from 20 to 31, and completed all of the Lone Lands quests.

Barandis and Eodraed

Our brother and sister cappy crime fighting duo progressed nicely from 65 to 73 in the days leading up to the Rohan launch. As they are both from Rohan it seemed fitting that they get ready to enter the area. We tried to cherry pick areas on them, missing out the Dunbog completely as we both hate it in there having been through a few times, but we are still only at Isendale. We now have the choice of whether or not to skip vast swathes of landscape (Nan Curanir, The Great River, Stangard, Limlight etc) in favour of starting Rohan fresh on them.

While we would like the reputation with the Riders of Theodred faction, and the Riders of Stangard and Heroes of Limlight, but even with the re-levelling of the Great River zone, if we did those it means that we would be greatly over level going into Rohan, and our dwarves are already 2 levels ahead of their quests, just heading into Rohan at 75.

Having gone into Rohan with Ganin and Az, and getting our crafting up to par, we know that while still nice, the Draigoch raid set and the Limlight jewellery set are not really necessary, though things like the cloaks are still nice, so we will probably keep hold of our medallions on those two as the crafted sets will be a suitable substitue. I was going to have to do that with Barandis anyway, as she is the only really played character on our third account, and as such has a lot of ground to make up in terms of saving up shards, seals and medallions, compared to the main account. It would be nice if Turbine could come up with a way of transferring characters between account, but I guess that has too many potential exploitable applications.

Azbarak

Even Azbarak has got a little play time, being my solo project in Rohan. Granted what with everything else, she hasn’t got very far, only to Harwick (I didn’t follow the epic book on her and so will have to go back and do the East Wall) but she has got her warsteed. I’m pretty happy with it, as I can utilise parts of the Steed of the Guardian which I won in a lottery, and the free colours for horse cosmetics include indigo and rose (which looks purple), Azbaraks signature colours.

Haki, Izbaruk and Vithar

The main Khazad Guard triumvirate got themselves into Rohan too, immersing themselves in the Epic Book and the East Wall area. This was actually a bigger achievement than it sounds as Vithar (aka Forrest) and his wife had their own second baby Dwarf only six weeks ago, so while the Khazad Guard is growing in numbers, our play time is reducing. We love our regular 5-6 man fellowship group, though recently has been on a bit of natural hiatus with a new baby there, and the imminent arrival of a new baby here, work and other real life commitments have made it nigh on impossible.

The main achievement on these guys in the couple of weeks leading up to the Rohan release, was that we managed, over a couple of nights (one night a week), to three-man all of the Moria instances and complete all of the associated deeds and meta deeds. We are now only a Watcher defeat and about 40-50 arms of the Watcher away from getting the Moria Meta Deed goat on these guys. We did try to three-man it, but it was just too much for us on our own, even 15 levels ahead. The plan is to go back and have another go when we reach the new level cap (and the babies have hopefully settled into some sort of routine to allow coordinated game play again), and maybe bring a few mates!

Haki also got his act together and went back to Enedwaith, getting Kindred with the Grey Company and the Algraig, and is now World Renowned. It’s a shame that Reputation and Meta Deed Steeds are not granted Warsteed matching appearances!

Tyri

Adam has been playing Tyri in Rohan as a bit of a solo project, for when I need to have a bath to ease the aches of advanced pregnancy. He’s done pretty well, getting up to 80 and round about the same area as Ganin and Az are currently questing in. True to form, on reaching 80, Tyri was treated to a Tobiano horse skin and a brown hide and hair colour pack as a nice treat, as well as the rear up horse emote which happened to be on a 50% off sale this week.

Adams been having fun tackling all warbands he’s encountered so far, be it solo or fellowship size mobs. As a hunter on a light warsteed, the mobs rarely even get to close on him, so he’s not had any problems so far. Tyri has also had a bit of a makeover in the cosmetic department. Playing solo, Tyri is in civies rather than Khazad Guard uniform. I love this get up on Tyri, I think it makes him look like one of the Lords of Winterfell from A Game of Thrones.

The Mother of all Monitors

Finally, a little work has been done on tweaking my PC, the weaker of the two in the house. The Christmas before last my PC was given a shiny new graphics card, which has been awesome, and now it has been treated to new overclocked i5 processor and cooler, new motherboard, and 8 GB of RAM, which Adam installed last week, and it has really brought out the detail. Coupled with that, we inherited a massive 22 inch monitor from Adams brother, which has also been installed. Now I am running everything turned pretty much to the max on 1680×1060. The difference is amazing. Even on a huge monitor like this one, the new processor means that everything still looks better than it did, and runs even smoother. I now spend even more time taking screenshots than I did previously, and every time we enter a new area or instance, Adam has to run downstairs to check out the view from my perspective.

Next week Adam has a new Solid State hard drive he is going to install, and reinstall windows and LOTRO onto, which in combination with the graphics card I alreay had should keep me set up for the forseeable future. Hopefully Adams PC can have the same treatment in the new year.

Thanks for reading

Emma.

New Devilry- Screen Shots (Image Heavy)

As Adam mentioned in his last post, he had been kindly giving me a hand levelling both my cappy and my second champ. As the cappy is on our second account, I get two toons levelled for the price of one. I really just wanted them out of Moria, and so we worked mainly on getting the Moria Epic book done.

Azagan modelling the Cloak of Shadow and Flame

Anlafski and Izbaruk modelling the Singed Cloak

Vol 2, Book 6 Chapter 8 is New Devilry – an instance that I particularly love. You can go in either solo or duo, either way getting the inspire buff. It’s pretty simple, its fun, you get a nice pile of cash, a load of rep items, and one of two possible cloaks – The Singed Cloak, or as a rare drop, The Cloak of Shadow and Flame. One of these will drop from the boss, Gwathnor, who is in effect some type of lesser Balrogesque spirit. On level (60) these are pretty nice and for some classes really worth wearing, otherwise they are worth it for cosmetics. I love them both and use them on various alts. They are a permanent fixture in my Wardrobe.They dye really well, with the cloak of Shadow and Flame having some interesting outcomes because of the existing colours on it.

However, the best thing about this instance is the ambience, and screenshots in here are always stunning. We went in duo, and I spent the whole boss fight taking pictures. I put down a banner, then let Adam do all the work on champ while I clicked F11 and enjoyed the view. Gwathnor is an interesting boss fight to witness and capture screenshots of as he will periodically change appearance throughout the fight. Blacks and purples for the Shadow phase and reds and oranges for the flame. There are no special tactics needed, its just a tank and spank fight, and great to watch. The good news is that if you need these cloaks for yourselves, the instance can be revisited via the reflecting pool in the Twenty First Hall, under Return to Azanarukar. I think I ran this about four times on Ganin my main Champ to get the Cloak of Shadow and Flame for my wardrobe. Although I will say that if you go in through the reflecting pool, you will be left in the Shadowed Refuge, and if you don’t have the rep for the swift travels, this can be a bit of a pain in the proverbial.

As you can see from the following screenshots, its a nice instance to run, especially if you have a friend to do all the work. I probably took close to 50 screenshots in there, and it was difficult to choose some to show because they are all pretty good.

Disapearing Tricksy Elves!

Sorry about the little tonic bar icon in the bottom left, we always forget to unload them, but they are just too usefull! Thanks to Adam for levelling my character,and I hope you all enjoyed the pcitures!

Emma

Some of our New Outfits- Cebelia

Cebelia was the second character that I ever created, but in four years she is still little played and is languishing at level 35. I plan to level her up at some point, honest! As yet, she is not a priority project, but I made a point of bringing her out for the Anniversary Festival. I’m glad that I did because she won a Lossoth Steed in the envelope quest. Just because she is not currently being levelled doesn’t mean that she can’t look good.

Power Ranger

Most Hunters seem to try to emulate some sort of Ranger type outfit, and Cebelia is no different. However, as a Hobbit lady with attitude, she sees no reason to blend into the background. I love the Grey Company cosmetic rewards you get for various stages of the Epic Book, and use some of the pieces a lot. The boots really do not work on a Dwarf, there is too much stretching and the dagger in the boot becomes strangely distorted.

Head – Fine Grey Company Hood (Epic Book Cosmetic Reward, Vol 3 Book 5 Chapt 1) Sea blue dye.

Armour – Reinforced Leather Dunlending Jacket (Medium Armour Dunland Quest Reward) Sea blue dye.

Shoulders – Fine Grey Company Wrap (Epic Book Cosmetic Reward, Vol 3 Book 5 Chapt 1) Sea blue dye.

Gloves – Fine Grey Company Gauntlets (Epic Book Cosmetic Reward, Vol 3 Book 5 Chapt 1) Sea blue dye.

Boots – Fine Grey Company Boots (Epic Book Cosmetic Reward, Vol 3 Book 5 Chapt 1) Sea blue dye.

Steed of the Guardian

I was lucky enough to win a Steed of the Guardian on Cebelia in one of the lotteries, so of course I had to make a suitable outfit to go with it, but at the same time make one different to the one I previously made for Emsibelle, my little Hobbit Tank. Again the Rangers cosmetics make an appearance. I needed to stick to the same colour scheme of reds, whites and greys to match the horse, but in a different ratio to Emsibelle’s outfit. I didn’t want this outfit to look too much like a heavy armour set

Armour – Forged Iron Dunlending Hauberk (Heavy Armour Dunland Quest Reward) White dye.

Shoulders – Fine Grey Company Wrap (Epic Book Cosmetic Reward, Vol 3 Book 5 Chapt 1) Crimson Dye.

Gloves – Fine Grey Company Gauntlets (Epic Book Cosmetic Reward, Vol 3 Book 5 Chapt 1) Crimson Dye.

Boots – Shield Bearers Boots (Guardian Moria Class Armour) Crimson dye.

Steed – Steed of the Guardian (Limited Store Exclusive)

Thanks for looking! The next Hobbit lady to get a makeover will be Dandilyon.

Emma

Some of our New Outfits: Gilforniel

(Emma) While we have taken a small break from blogging, we have still been more or less active on LoTRO, and I have been taking a little time to work on some of my outfits. I bought some extra wardrobe slots when they were on sale, and have been playing around with it. One thing I have noticed is that it is very hard to be a girl who primarily plays a Dwarf. My three main characters are all Dwarves, and as such I think I have missed out on some pretty sweet quest reward cosmetics, because a lot of stuff just looks downright hideous on a Dwarf but very nice on an Elf maiden. So my wardrobe has to cater for a load of Dwarves and some ladies. Some cosmetics change in appearance completely depending on the gender of the character, but I’m pretty pleased with what I have so far, and have an idea of what quest rewards to get next time round.

Gilforniel had been having a little extra playtime recently, As Adam has been using her to help me level my Cappy Barandis, on our second account. Having been taken off the shelf, albeit temporarily most likely, she has had a bit of a makeover.

Moria Outfit

(Emma) As we were playing in Moria at the time, I made her a suitable outfit for traversing those deep and dark Dwarven halls, with a suitable injection of colour.

I  went for a Sea Blue and Yellow colour combo here, mainly because I realised that I had never used yellow dye before, and when the Cloak of Shadow and Flame is dyed sea blue, you are left with some interesting yellows and greens where the flames are portrayed.As you will notice for the most part I tend to try to leave the head bare. This is purely personal preference, as I like to see my characters.

Armour – Forged Iron Dunlending Hauberk (Heavy Armour Dunland Quest Reward) Sea Blue dye.

Shoulders -Ornate Pauldrons of the Dunland Swordsman (Heavy Armour Dunland Quest Reward) Yellow dye.

Gloves – Burnished Dunlending Gauntlets (Heavy Armour Dunland Quest Reward) Yellow dye

Boots – Boots of Durin’s Guard (Guardian Moria Class Armour) Sea Blue dye

Cloak – Cloak of Shadow and Flame (Vol 2 Book 6 Chapter 8 New Devilry rare drop quest reward) Sea blue dye.

Rich Elven Warrior

(Emma) Adam created this outfit in rich crimson colours, to portray a wealthy and noble Elf Warrior-Maid. He made this outfit to wear while he levels her for me, a fair exchange as far as I can see! The mixture of utilitarian leather and chain mail with furs and richly enamelled details really works here we think. ((Adam) : I like red outfits, so if I was going to play Emmas champ for a bit, I fancied having a cool outfit. I love these gloves from the Great River, and thought they’d bring out the rich reds and golds of the cloak, and the fur and chain mail would make it still a warrior and utility based set.)

Armour – Trappers Leather Jacket (Medium Armour Nan Curunir Quest Reward) Crimson dye.

Shoulders – Potent Calenard War Pauldrons (Westfold Crafted Heavy Armour) Crimson dye.

Gloves – Gloves of Forbidden Love (Medium Armour Great River Quest Reward) Crimson dye.

Boots – Reinforced Leather Dunlending Boots (Medium Armour Dunland Quest Reward) Default dye.

Cloak – Swan Cloak (Store only cosmetic) Crimson dye.

White Warrior

(Adam) Whilst playing Emmas champ, I must admit I got quite involved in outfitting. Its nice to have an elegant torso to fit outfits too sometimes, especially when you are used to playing a male and more often than not a dwarf! So I made another outfit. This time I wanted to use a cool chest piece I picked up from a world drop, and thought it would be another great oportunity to use the gloves and boots I had above, and a great way to get the yule cloak incorporated in a non christmassy way! Anyway I have reached my goal of hitting level 60 for Emma, so I am now finished levelling and outfitting Gilforniel, and am handing her officially back to Emma, which is a shame because I had a lot of fun cross dressing… hmm, perhaps thats too much information!

I think this last shot shows just how versatile and awesome those gloves are!

Armour – Shining Elven Leather Jacket (Medium Armour Evendim/Lonelands/North Downs Landscape drop) White dye.

Leggings – Elven Hunters Leggings (Medium Armour Level 35 Crafted item) White dye

Shoulders – Padded Mantle of the Dunland Soothsayer (Light Armour Dunland Quest Reward) Crimson dye.

Gloves – Gloves of Forbidden Love (Medium Armour Great River Quest Reward) White dye.

Boots – Reinforced Leather Dunlending Boots (Medium Armour Dunland Quest Reward) Default dye.

Cloak – Snowy hoodless cloak (winter festival cosmetic) White dye.

There is going to be a lot more outfit offerings in this little series, so keep looking!

Adam and Emma

A Whole Lotto Horses

Got to say that I love the lotteries! As an EU player they still have the novelty value, and both  myself and Adam check them regularly on all our accounts. So far we have been pretty lucky, but this last weekend Adam came away with a Worn Symbol, and I got a shiny new horse on two of my alts. The lucky ladies were Emsibelle, my little Hobbit Tank, who won the Steed of the Guardian in a Guardian only lottery, and Fearien, my Elf Loremaster, who won the Cremello Steed. I was pretty excited, and had to rush off and design new outfits to match.

When I first saw the Cremello Steed on A Casual Stroll to Mordor back in March, I wasn’t sure that I liked it. But when I saw it come up in the lottery, I entered it anyway. It is actually quite a difficult horse to outfit with I thought, as it has quite a busy pattern on it and the reds and blues on it can be difficult to replicate on some items. Cosmetic LoTRO have recently done their excellent version of a matching outfit for this horse, so I decided to do my own something simple and elegant suitable for a noble Elf lady.

Fearien on her Cremello Steed

Dress : Elegant Dress, Store Cosmetic, undyed

Cloak: Widows Drape, Dunlending Reputation Vendor, dyed red.

Now, for Emsibelle, she is a tomboy, no-frills Tank, and so I needed something suitably heavy armoured, and yet looks fairly comfortable to be riding in. Her usual attire is the Durins Guard moria set, dyed rose, but I needed a whole new colour scheme. The Steed of the Guardian is quite dark, mainly made up of what looks like a worn mid grey leather armour with various red and white shield motifs and a couple of weapons and saddle bags. Because of the leather on the horse, I looked mainly at what I had collected in the way of medium armour and went from there. Fortunately for me, the Isengard expansion came with alot of very nice looking pieces, which I have been hoarding.

Emsibelle on her Steed of the Guardian

Chest: Reinforced Leather Dunlending Jacket, Medium Armour quest reward, burgundy dye

Shoulders: Ornate Pauldrons of the Dunland Swordsman, Heavy Armour quest reward, default dye

Gloves: Burnished Dunlending Gauntlets, Heavy Arour quest reward, default dye

Boots: Reinforced leather Dunlending Boots, Medium Armour quest reward, default dye

Incidentally, today is the first day that the Steed of the Guardian is openly available. It is a Store only mount, and only available until 8th December, although it may crop up in further sales and lotteries. At 1995 TP’s per character its pretty pricey, although its run speed is 68% and has 250 morale, putting it stat wise up there with the Steed of Eriador (world renowned) and suchlike. I will say that like the Steed of the Hunter, these horses are inspired by the classes only, and do not come equipped with any other skills. They can be ridden by any character, regardless of class.

If you do feel like you have a pile of Turbine Points burning a hole in your pockets, have a look at the Mounted emotes. These are emotes that you command your horse to do, and look pretty impressive. They were also available in some of the lotteries recently, and it may be that they are in lotteries around the same times that horses are available. Currently there are three mounted emotes available in the Store – Bow, Rear, and Kick. They come in at 195 TP’s each, and again it is per character. I was lucky enough to win one of them on my little Hobbit Hunter, Cebelia.

Cebelia demonstrating the Bow emote

Happy Riding!

Emma

Current Cosmetic Outfits: Part 2

The next in my series of run through’s of my characters cosmetic outfits is my hobbit burglar: Chumbo Bobbins.

Very early on I started dressing Chumbo in deep reds and burgundies. I do not role-play my characters heavily, but they always develop a distinct personality in my mind. For some reason his personality seemed to develop along a proud, stubborn, and regal hobbit, rather than the cheeky chappie I initially intended or hoped him to be. As a result the rich reds, and burgundy suited him, as did the more unusual wearing of boots for a hobbit. He is not exclusively a shoe wearer, occasionally he will go without, but as a rule I keep them on. I also have a couple of different cloaks I use with his outfit, and two different horses he uses as part of the ensemble, all designed to work together. As with all these posts, click on the images to see larger more detailed versions.

The first outfit consists of the High Heralds level 56 medium armour, leggings and gloves dyes burgundy, and the High Heralds boots left dyed Umber (no shoulder guards with this outfit). The hooded cloak is the Cloak of the West Tower from Annuminas, again dyed burgundy.

The second outfit is really just a variation on the first, and the one I have been favouring most lately. I have shown it here without boots, though again I tend to run with the boots on as above. The basic armour, leggings, gloves are the same as above, only this time I have the level 56 High Heralds shoulder guards dyed burgundy. In addition the cloak on here is hood down for a bit of variety, and is the Twilight cloak from the LOTRO store (not the hooded version), again dyed burgundy.

The pale green highlights on both these cloaks serve to tie both outfits in quite nicely to the mounts I use. The first mount is the white Lothlorien kindred reputation mount, and the greens, golds, and brown of its tack match nicely the brown and gold of the outfit, and the trace of green around the edge of the hood on the West Tower cloak, and the green pattern on the back of the Twilight cloak.

The second mount is the Mathom Society Reputation mount, which seems to universally get called the ‘cow horse’! Once again the tack is green, brown and gold, and matches in well with these colours on the cloaks and outfit in general.

So thanks for looking, if you are on Eldar server and spot Chumbo sneaking around please feel free to give him a wave and say hi, he won’t bite, and if he does its only your knee caps at risk.

Cheers

Adam

Khazad Guard News Roundup

I’ve just realised that its been a while since I’ve written a post, real life has been a bit hectic recently, but things are settling down nicely now. We had been on a bit of a craft-athon in real life, making a few bits for a re-enactment fair and trying to get a little holiday money together. Thats done now, and Baby Dwarf has obliged by sleeping through again (he’s just had his jabs, perhaps that’s what to thank) so we’ve had a little time to ourselves to sit down ad have a bit of a sort out on LoTRO.

We’ve decided to put levelling the Loremasters Feaglin and Fearien on hold for the time being while we refine our other Duos, Ganin and Azaghar of the Khazad Guard, and our first characters, Elgalandir and Azbarak, who are in our other kin. This is to make sure that they are both ready to explore all the new regions with the Rise of Isengard, which we have already preordered.

Ganin and Az fighting Giants in Enedwaith

Ganin and Az can safely say they have completed Enedwaith (well, as far as its possible as a duo) having done all of the quests, even duoing the Thrors Coombe small fellowship repeatable quest chains, smacking Giants and Gwiber. We did the whole chain once, and completed the epic book ready for Isenguard, and are now just in the last stages of grinding rep with the Algraig and the Grey Company, being well into ally with both. We’ve also been duoing the Halls of Night instance, setting it on 40 and just going nuts in there. All we want are the tokens, for the lovely new bits of jewellery, we can easily skirmish to get the required skirmish marks.

Having noticed that we are not far away from getting the World Renowned horse, at worse being half way through friend status with some of the factions, weve been having a little rep grind, easy on a Champ/RK duo. Last night saw us in the orc camps of Mallenhad in Angmar, a great place to mop up some Rangers of Esteldin rep. In about an hour we got around 120 Orc campaign medallions and 70 War Masters lashes. Another small run and we’ll be kindred for sure.

Elgalandir and Azbarak, our Champ/Tank duo have finally started Enedwaith and are ploughing through the Epic Book. They’ve been at level cap for what seems like forever, but have for the most part been untouched since Baby Dwarf was born. Adam has done some kin runs on Elgalandir, North Cotton Farms and Ost Dunhoth and the like, and a night of grinding Skirmish Marks, mainly when I was too tired to play. That means that Adam has some of the nice end game jewellery, but Azbarak is still in the Aureate/Malledhrim rep jewellery. While its nice, it’s no longer the best, and Azbarak could do with a little work to catch up. I’m kind of shying away from this at the minute just because while I love Azbarak and Tanking, it just seems really slow after playing a Champ.

Anlafski, Izbaruk and Haki in Mirkwood

The original Guard trio, Izbaruk, Haki and Anlafski are on their way to cap getting to 62. We’ve been having a sporadic play for a few hours a week, working through the Epic books, and are now blasting their way through Mirkwood. We have been a bit completionist in the past as we’ve worked our way through the zones, so we took our time getting to Mirkwood, but are now on track. The plan is to get to cap, get the book done, then Anlafki, a tank can move on to play with Ganin and Az, and Forrest, the Hunter, can join Izbaruk and Haki ready for Isengard.

If that wasn’t enough, Adam has offered to help level my Captain Barandis, who’s currently 49. She needs to be ready to explore her homeland of the Westfold with Eodraed (Adams Cappy) her brother. Rather than simply levelling Barandis, which would be quicker but leave me with worrying gaps of knowledge of how to actually play a captain for myself, he is blitzing through levelling Gilforniel, my other champ, who was 36, but is now 43. His plan is to level up Gilforniel (we have both already levelled a champ to cap and so know how to play the class) to the same level as Barandis, then we can do Moria together. Luckily Barandis is on our other Account. That way I get Barandis levelled, while actually playing her and learning the class, as well as another alt higher up, who can then move on and play with Tyri, Adams Hunter. Gilforniel and Tyri originally levelled together, and are keen to get re-aquanied.

Dralli, Haki and Hain on Weathertop

Hain

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Adam and a friend of ours on a F2P account are having a weekly session levelling a Champ/RK dwarf duo, Hain and Dralli. As they are both red-haired, Haki has adopted them as his twin sons. Having earned enough Turbine Points, Dralli has purchased Evendim, and at 29,  they are both set to explore there. In the meantime, I have started to level my Dwarf hunter Fluzi. Thanks to pre-purchasing Isengard and slotting the 25% extra XP rune, it isn’t taking long. I’ve got to 22 and the Forsaken Inn fairly quickly, given that I only play Fluzi when Baby Dwarf has his mid morning nap.

So, as you can see, the Guard are having a busy time of it at the minute. Hope to keep you posted! Emma

Fluzi rides through Ered Luin

Heroes of Eriador Birthday Event

A little Elgalandir and Azbarak in the North Downs

Three years ago Emma and I started playing LOTRO around April/May time on the recommendation of our friend Mike (the ugly one on the right of the header bar above). I have been a Tolkien fan since I read the Hobbit aged 8, and Emma soon became a fan when I made her read LOTR before going to see the films (I had to really!). It was our first MMO and, to be honest, Emma’s first real computer game since the Mega Drive.  We had a great summer exploring Middle-Earth, we liked it so much we did Bree, then the Shire, the Ered Luin, and by the end we were in our 20s and getting virtually no XP from quests, but we didn’t really care. It was about the adventure, and that’s a philosophy that has stuck with us since. Towards the end of Summer we started to take thought to joining a kinship, as it seemed that as we got further on in the game, this would be pretty essential. Our friend Mike had recently joined Heroes of Eriador (Eldar Server), but I had a good look around as they were not active recruiters at the time, and we wanted to make sure we found a kin that fits as there are so many focuses to the game, that if we ended up in a heavy PvP or Raiding kin we probably would not have lasted long. As it turned out, they seemed like just what we were looking for, they raided, but for the most part were about having fun as a group, and were always happy to help anyone stuck with an instance.

On the 19th May it was Heroes of Eriador 4th birthday. So on Sunday 15th May we decided to hold a party to celebrate (it was less grindy than Turbines too :D). It was strange to look back over what is quite a period of time, and to be honest some great friends I have met in-game, some from back when we joined three years ago, and some we have only really met recently. We have friends and players from all over Europe, reflecting a diversity of culture, and yet a common love of LOTRO, with any luck and time zones allowing, we’ll be able to add yet more countries to the mix soon. That is the beauty of Heroes of Eriador, we have had many leaders, and many officers (I was one myself for a time)  and many different people and motivations in the kin; a real old mongrel bunch. Yet the philosophy remains; it’s all about playing a game we love together.

The whole event had been Organised by one of our Officers Feleg (A nicer chap you’ll not meet), with a some assistance from other officers and kinnies, and some very generous donations from them too. We had about 50 gold and several sealed relic settings amongst other things at the last count I think, but even now after the event donations have come in from ex-members. If nothing else, I think speaks of who and what HoE is.

Heroes gathering around the Boar fountain and the usual shenanigans begin to unfold!

The First evenings events were to all meet up at the Boar fountain in Bree, it was a fairly flexible event and people came and went all evening. we had a decent turnout (these sorts of things are not to everybodys taste). We very swiftly moved on to the Prancing Pony for a few beers and a kin discussion. To be honest it was mostly just fun and photographs, we have 2 raid night a week which people seem mostly happy with, and Myself and Feleg are going to be starting an Instance evening on Sunday night, just as an opportunity to group up and have some fun.

Here is a slideshow of Pics of some of the HoE beer lords and ladies in action!

Then we moved on to the kinhouse for some fireworks, and a quiz! The fireworks were actually awesome, sadly our screen shots really don’t do them justice, and as you can see a mix of beer and the watcher yard trophy didn’t end well for some! Finally our quiz master Feleg held a 25 question quiz on a mix of Tolkien, and LOTRO, which Adam was lucky enough to win, and Emma came 4th.  In her defence,  Baby Dwarf decided to get grumpy half way through so she missed some questions out. Adam would also like to point out there were two questions about Champions, particularly their relationship to minstrels, which he refused to answer sensibly. So between us we got a butt load of cash. Emma was also very lucky in that one of our Officers and kinmates who finished second in the quiz  was incredibly kind enough to donate his prize to her (and it was a butt load of gold too!) as she doesn’t get on as much as she’d like these days and he wanted to give her a helping hand. Thank you Val, it is very much appreciated.

During the quiz and afterwards, there was also a spar contest going on… To be brutally honest, I’m not sure who the heck won it.I  was busy messing about, taking pictures, and answering questions, but there was a lot of ‘whacks’ and ‘aaarghhhh’ noises, so I assume those folks had fun too, and somebody beat everyone else up!

Next up was a 24 man raid in the Ettenmoors which unfortunately we weren’t able to attend as Baby Dwarf needed a bath, and bedtime (yes we dwarves do wash!). From all accounts everyone had a lot of fun, and the creeps must have wondered what was going on, on a quiet Sunday night! By the sounds of things though, the creeps soon grouped themselves up and retaliated, and a tough fight was had.

The Beer Starts to flow in the Pony

When we returned later on, we decided to end the evening on  a lighthearted and fun note, so we all reassembled in the Prancing Pony again for beer. This time it got a bit sillier, and Azbarak went to put a dress on, and a few of us all went and got silly haircuts for the evening. I sported a very fine handle bar and bald spot.. not my best look I’ll concede!

Alcohol induced haircuts... not a good idea!

Finally we moved of to the Tag grounds in the Bree fields, near the festival grounds. Now if you have never played the tag game there it is a lot of fun, but with that many players, it is very hard for the person who is ‘IT’, so we decided to let them use a horse after a few minutes of trying. Of course there are always a few spoil sports who ride the horse when being chased too, but by that time the beer had stopped any one caring too much anyways!

So a final thank you to Feleg for organising the evening, to all our donators for providing prizes, for all the Officers and Leaders; past and present, and finally to all the Heroes themselves that make our kin a great one to have fun in!

So this is a little late in being posted thanks to having to reinstall windows, but better late that never! Apologies to all kinmates who have been waiting for the pictures (imagine it was the old days and they were being developed :D).

Adam and Emma

Steed of the Night Leaving Stores

Today it has been announced that the Steed of the Night is leaving stores this Sunday. It has been reduced by 20% to 1596 TPs, so if you want it get it now!

There has been alot of discussions on the forums over this with speculation that it is only a temporary removal, or that it may return as a possible faction reward in further expansions.

Personally, while I like the look of it, I can’t justify spending that many points on it.