DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I saw a short dev update on this, so I wanted to share it.  Turbine has made a mess of creep-side mitigation in recent history by breaking them in Update 5, “fixing” them with Update 5.1, but that fix really didn’t quite work.  Many on the forums had been reporting that, and finally we hear [...]

DocHoliday Creep Mitigation 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: Skill Cooldowns are not resetting for the Kalbak fight in the Tower of Orthanc Quest log is not displaying challenge rewards Whipmaster can fall into [...]

DocHoliday Update 5.1 Patch Notes and Known Issues

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 [...]

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 [...]

Given the christmas season and upcoming holidays, this will be my last column for the year. I’ll aim to return to posting in approximately mid-January. I was going to use this post as an opportunity to link some of my past posts for people who might be new to the column, and also solicit some [...]

1. Lore-mastery: Introducing a new column I’ll start with a brief introduction of myself and what...
2. Lore-Mastery: What does a lore-master do? Pt. 2 This is the second part of a two-part column giving...
3. Lore-Mastery: What does a lore-master do? One of the questions that’s most commonly asked about lore-masters...

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 [...]

1. Bullroarer Patch Notes (Build 2) for Update 5 The second build to Bullroarer is now live for the...
2. LOTRO Update 2 Patch and Known Issues Today was the first update for the Echoes of the...
3. LOTRO Update 3 Official Patch Notes The official Patch notes are live, no big surprises but...

I know many, including myself, have been wondering how all these marks, medallions, and seals will work out and how our current stuff will transition to the new.  Luckily Zombie Columbus puts it all out for us with a nice Q&A section to describe all the new currency changes coming with Update [...]

1. Bullroarer Updates for Instances and Skirmishes There’s been quite a stir of late regarding the upcoming...
2. Update 5: Armies of Isengard Release Notes I’m sure many have already found these but I at...
3. Developer Diary – Instances 2.0 Part 2 The next portion of JWBarry’s Developer Diaries is up, this...

As you should know by now, I really like the lore-master class and I think it’s well designed and very useful in both group and solo situations. Today’s column, however, focuses on one of its weaknesses – lore-masters don’t play particularly well with other lore-masters in tougher group content, [...]

1. Lore-Mastery: What does a lore-master do? One of the questions that’s most commonly asked about lore-masters...
2. Lore-mastery: Lore-master legendary items in Isengard A while back, in fact quite a long while back...
3. Lore-mastery: Using lore-master cooldown skills Lore-masters have three or four long cooldown skills at their...

Instead of just a single Developer talking about the update, we’re given a healthy dose of the whole crew.  The diary focuses on all the new instance spaces and gives some nice background from the team. They start off with the smaller instances and have some nice fun discussions in there regarding the Ents.  Initial [...]

1. Developer Diary- Instances 2.0 (Part 3)
2. Update 5: Armies of Isengard Release Notes
3. LOTRO Rise of Isengard Itemization Developer Diary

This episode is a little old as I recorded it prior to the Thanksgiving holiday but never finished editing it.  However, be on the look out for another episode this week as well as another Turbine Interview next week. News Warden Updates Update 5 for Wardens Never Surrender Changes Orion Continues on the Wardens Lottery [...]

1. Sally Forth in LOTRO – Episode 11
2. Episode 24 – Off to Isengard
3. Sally Forth in Middle-Earth – Episode 15