PB posted this on January 31st, 2012.
Categorized as DPS, End Game, group, hard-mode, instances, Lore-Master, lore-mastery, lotro, Pits of Isengard, Raids and End-game, Rise Of Isengard, threat, Update 5.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2012/01/31/lore-mastery-update-5-instances-guide-pits-of-isengard/
DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View
I was tossing up whether to do a Riders of Rohan wishlist post this week or continue with the update 5 instance guides, but I figure that the longer I take on these guides the less relevant they become so into the Pits of Isengard it is…
Pits of Isengard
Read the rest of this entry »DocHoliday posted this on January 30th, 2012.
Categorized as beta, gambits, group, lord of the rings online, lotro, threat, update 6, Warden.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2012/01/30/warden-update-6-dev-post-2/
DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View
Orion has the second part of his Warden updates posted and this walks through the Shield and Spear line gambits. If you missed Post #1, head over here 
As a follow-up to that post, Orion also responds to some of the comments on the forums as well:
DocHoliday posted this on January 27th, 2012.
Categorized as beta, gambits, group, lord of the rings online, lotro, tank, threat, update 6, Warden.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2012/01/27/orion-outlines-update-6-warden-changes/
DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View
Orion’s starting to open up a bit more as he gives us some pretty hard details about what’s coming for the Warden class with Update 6. While these are posted on his my.LOTRO blog, they’re still subject to change based on feedback. Also, keep in mind this post is titled “Blog #1” so there will be more coming.
First up, he describes how Battle Preparations will work which sounds pretty slick. Essentially, using the skill will turn builders and masteries no longer require a target and as such can be used outside of combat. This will allow you to build and store a gambit pre-fight for up to 30 seconds. I’m a little curious to see if there will be a cool-down for this skill.
Read the rest of this entry »DocHoliday posted this on January 17th, 2012.
Categorized as Draigoch, End Game, group, instances, isengard, legendary items, lord of the rings online, lotro, Patch Notes, Raid, Raids and End-game, Skirmishes, Update 5.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2012/01/17/update-5-1-patch-notes-and-known-issues/
DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View
Notice the name change for this update, which makes sense for me as it is a bug-fix patch for Update 5.
The Known issues are up first with a few:
Read the rest of this entry »DocHoliday posted this on January 11th, 2012.
Categorized as beta, gambits, group, lord of the rings online, lotro, Raid, threat, Traits, update 6, Warden.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2012/01/11/orion-teases-update-6-warden-changes/
Last night, Orion posted a few teasers on what he has up his sleeve for the upcoming Warden changes planned (hopefully) for Update 6.
Orion didn’t give too many details, but laid out some ideas that sound interesting but I will admit it doesn’t sound like the class is getting any simpler. Keep in mind though that these ideas are still subject to change, but here’s what he’s thinking so far.
PB posted this on January 5th, 2012.
Categorized as End Game, group, hard-mode, lotro, Raid, Raids and End-game, Rise Of Isengard, tower of orthanc, Update 5.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2012/01/05/update-5-instances-review/
Luckily for me, unlike Doc I have had the chance over the past few weeks to play through all of the new instances and 3/6 wings of the new raid. I thought I’d jot down some quick impressions and give people an opportunity to post their reviews and thoughts on the Update 5 group content.
Overall I have to say that I’m extremely impressed. This is a content update that seems at least equal to the excellent In Your Absence cluster that was released last year. The first thing that stands out is the excellent visual design of the spaces. Imo you’d be hard pressed to fault these instances from a visual perspective, the landscapes and dungeons are interesting, varied, fit well with the lore and the real space that they exist in and are just fun to look at. I particularly love how the raid begins outside the Tower of Orthanc and then you head into the various wings – being able to see the building that houses the raid really adds to the immersion factor and is a really nice touch.
The three 3-person instances are all quite varied and I enjoy the various tricks and gimmicks in them. Some people have complained about the frogger in Fangorn’s edge or the punting in the Pits, but both are very manageable mechanics with a bit of awareness and positioning. The T2 fire troll trash in the pits can get pretty brutal, but once you figure out the positioning it’s quite doable. Of the three, I think Dargnákh Unleashed is the weakest. While the first few areas and particularly the first boss fight are quite fun, the final fight is a bit of a joke. There’s literally no DPS element to the fight so if you’re a pure DPS class you have absolutely nothing to do in the fight. It’s purely a healing/tanking check, and while that’s fun to have, surely they could have put some sort of DPS element in there. The difficulty level of these instances is pitched pretty well I think. T1s are all easily puggable and very flexible on class makeup (perfect for instance finder). T2 is tougher and for a smooth run you’ll pretty much want a proper tank (including champ) and healer (including captain), but people can challenge themselves with some success with more varied groups.
Read the rest of this entry »DocHoliday posted this on December 19th, 2011.
Categorized as Armies of Isengard, End Game, group, instances, lord of the rings online, lotro, Raids and End-game, screenshots, Update 5.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2011/12/19/new-lotro-armies-of-isengard-screenshots/
A few new screenshots were released today showing off the new instance spaces. The spaces highlighted in these shots are the Pits of Isengard, Fanghorns Edge, and Dragnakh Unleashed.
Sadly I’m still haven’t had much chance to get into these spaces so I’m living vicariously through these images and what I hear from others 
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PB posted this on December 18th, 2011.
Categorized as End Game, group, hard-mode, instance finder, instances, lotro, Raids and End-game, Update 5.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2011/12/18/instance-finder-experiences/
I thought it might be interesting to put up a post for people to share their early experiences with the instance finder. While still in an early iteration, the IF is a pretty big change to the game and could have a big impact on how people play the game.
Personally I usually run groups with kin or friends, but have hit up the IF a few times in the past week when others were busy. My experiences have been generally positive, getting fairly quick 3-person groups three times, all 3 for fangorn strangely enough. Two of those groups cleared T1 while the other failed T2. I felt that group composition was reasonable, though as a lore-master I’m lucky to have some flexibility in retraiting for different roles. The failing T2 group was me a cappy and Hunter which might have been workable but just couldn’t get the tanking happening.
Personally I really like the concept of the tool but strongly suspect that it won’t really have its full impact until it becomes cross server. I also think people shouldn’t expect to be able to do T2c fears with the IF. T1 is designed for pug groups for a reason – keep T2 for groups you trust!
Read the rest of this entry »PB posted this on December 12th, 2011.
Categorized as group, Instance, lotro, moria, trait, Update 5.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2011/12/12/undocumented-change-to-moria-class-quests/
There are reports on the forums that the moria class quests have been changed to no longer require you to complete the full fellowship quest at the end of it to get the trait attached to the quest line. Apparently all of the quests to kill the special mobs inside various moria instance remain, but the traits they used to reward have been added to the previous quest in the quest chain, so that you no longer to go into Forges, Skumfil etc. to get the relevant trait. The trait is rewarded retrospectively if you had already finished the second to last quest.
This change makes a good deal of sense from the point of view that these instances are no longer end game content and so it’s much harder to get a group for them nowdays, but it’s strange that this appears to be another fairly large change in game mechanics for which we have absolutely no official statement or patch notes about. Turbine sprung the “bound to account” change with Medallions of the North Men in update 3 and moria/loth/dul gudur medallions in RoI without any official announcement, it seems another fairly large change which will be relevant to a lot of players has managed to slip through the patch notes.
Read the rest of this entry »DocHoliday posted this on December 12th, 2011.
Categorized as Armies of Isengard, End Game, group, instances, lord of the rings online, lotro, Patch Notes, Prince of Rohan, Raid, Raids and End-game, Update 5.
Shorthand Link:
Full link: http://docholidaymmo.com/2011/12/12/update-5-patch-notes-and-known-issues/
While we’re all waiting for the servers to come back up, you can browse through not only the Patch Notes but also the Known Issues posted today.
The patch notes are pretty extensive with all sorts of things hanging especially for many classes. I highly suggest taking a read for your class of interest to see what’s new as there’s a ton for both the Freep side as well as creep side. A few that jumped out for me:
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