Talk:Stable-master

First Age

Do i have to talk to the stable master or can i just been to the area? If so i have to talk to everyone from the start. --Blakborn 05:04, 19 March 2007 (PDT)

You may only travel to stable masters you have spoken too. I tried to make that clear in the section under Stable masters. Should I try again? --Hellis 09:58, 19 March 2007 (PDT)

No need, i just needed someone to tell me in person, 9 just feel bummed that i covered almost 2 maps without speaking to them so i need to backtrack everyone. That takes some time. thats all --Blakborn 11:48, 19 March 2007 (PDT)

Second Age

Any idea why this is in Gerneral Wiki Templates? DancesInTrees 13:23, 26 April 2007 (PDT)

i've corrected it, we had changed toc-right template at some point and i guess this page was using old one... --Xander 13:31, 26 April 2007 (PDT)

Horse routes

The horse routes part is outdated and missing a lot of info. It also says that it's meant for missing NPC pages and at this moment those NPC pages are not missing anymore. I don't feel much for updating the list since the info is already available on the NPC pages. Is it an option to delete this list? Or am I making people very unhappy then? It just doesn't make much sense to let it stay on the page while it is missing so many locations - only makes the page look more complex. --Ravanel 09:21, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

• Fedaykin and I have actually talked about this page before and would like to update the tables into something a bit more coherent and neat. So for now leave it how it is. I believe he was working on that. Rogue 16:22, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Boats

There are a pair of boat-keepers in Evendim, from Tinnudir to a camp across the lake and back; there may be others elsewhere, but I haven't seen them yet. They aren't stable-masters but serve the same role. Should I just put entries here or create a short (separate) page? If the latter they should cross-link to each other. David 12:47, 21 October 2010 (EDT)

Tentative Formatting

The following format is used for several stable-masters, from their individual pages the table is transcluded onto their location respectively, and onto this page. For a lengthy discussion, see User talk:Adelas#Stable-masters). If there are better suggestions, let them come; this is just a suggestion after all.

• The table has fixed width=600, to give aligned display at this page. For many individual masters and locations it is too wide but...
• The table has fixed column widths for "destination" and "region" which matches most of their names.
• Fixed column widths for "swift" and "cost" to keep them narrow when "prerequisites" is empty (and to cause all text on this page to be aligned).
• Replace XXX with the name of the stable-master.

XXX sells [[Travelling|horse and pony rides]] to the following stables:
<onlyinclude>{| class="altRowsMed" width="600"
! width="140" | Destination !! width="100" | Region !! width="35" | [[Swift Travel|Swift]] !! width="50" | Cost !! Prerequisites
|-
| [[Duillond]] || [[EredLuin]] || align="center" |  || align="right" | {{worth||1||}} ||
</onlyinclude>

Zimoon 05:40, 4 January 2012 (EST)

Also, as far as the swift travel thing goes - can I get some votes on how to do that? I think the four main options are:

1. Leave "swift yes/no" column, but rename to "Swift<br>Avail". Only have one line in the table for each destination, and if swift travel is available, put Yes in the Swift Avail column. The main problem I see with this is that both prices can't be listed. If this is the preferred option, I would lean toward listing the more expensive of the two prices.

2. Remove "Swift yes/no" column and have a completely separate line for the swift routes that looks like "South Bree - Swift Travel".

3. Remove "Swift yes/no" column and include the swift routes as a line-return within the same table cell (see imaginary travel routes below for example; note I also widened the destination a smidge).

Finally, does everyone prefer to see the tables sorted alphabetically by destination or region, sorted to precisely match the strange order that the stable-master uses, or sorted by region-difficulty (ie Ered Luin/Shire, Bree, LL, ND, Ang, Troll, Foro, Ereg, Moria, Loth, Mirk, Ened, Dunland)?

Option 3 table

Destination	Region	Cost	Prerequisites
Hobbiton	The Shire	5
Shire Homesteads	The Shire	5
West Bree West Bree - Swift Travel	Bree-land Bree-land	1   5	Level 40
Michel Delving	The Shire	5

 Thanks! -Adelas (talk) 16:57, 4 January 2012 (EST)

Oh - and... for Moria, as long as the column is kept the same width, in the Moria tables I suggest using the word "Area" instead of "Region" and putting "Durin's Way", "Flaming Deeps", "The Waterworks" etc. in order to clarify routes for people. That sound okay with everyone? -Adelas (talk) 17:01, 4 January 2012 (EST)

I prefer option 2 above, with Swift Travel separated from the slow-travel route lines. I also endorse the usage of "Area" instead of "Region" on Moria Stable-master tables, although this begs the question - should places that offer travel TO Twenty-first list it under Zelem-melek (area) or Moria (region)? Glad you guys are fixed-width-ing the tables, though - having them running wild was making Stable-master quite jarring. :) Sethladan 20:29, 4 January 2012 (EST)

Knew I forgot something: I'm torn between listing alphabetically or listing by region. Alphabetically is predictable and makes it easier to find a certain destination, but sorting by region presentation keeps more relevant locations together, since the difficulty generally moves from west to east in a reasonable progression (just follow the tabs on the deed panel from left to right). If I had to choose one, I would lean towards sorting by region progression, as that feels more tour-guide-y. Sethladan 20:33, 4 January 2012 (EST)

I prefer the swift column, but that is from a strict usability point of view:

It is always, and I mean always, easier to find information on a column with blank/non-blank content, whether "yes", "x", or a check-mark. It is not out of the blue that so many tables use that scheme for whatever reasons, from bus time-tables to Nasa's count-down-lists.

Having to skim through text to find "swift" or not "swift" is not swiftly done. Even though some may think it look neater I am ambivalent whether it does; it mixes links with plain text, and including swift in the link would make it even less easy to spot as then not even the colours make them different. And while just skimming for the destination it adds extra letters that the user must ignore for the moment.

One other possible location would be to have the "swift" column first-most, then destination. That would make skimming for destination name even faster as the swift-info would be a notch to the left, no further. This is not a suggestion though, just establishing a fact, and I think it would look less nice.

Seems like I vote for number 4 then: Leave "swift yes/no" column and have a completely separate line for the non-swift and the swift routes that looks like...

'"West Bree"... ... | |'

'"West Bree"... ... |Yes|'

And that would be exactly as it is today, no change in other words ;)

So far I think I have not came across one such example, or I am just blind maybe. And no Swift/Avail please, the more slim head-lines the better, and a <br/> would make them double size for negligible extra information.

Moria, sure, you know me, 'content is king' they say and I concur. Whether Moria would be mentioned or not ... hmm ... don't know. But it sounds fair enough to tell an area people know better than the region.

Alphabetically or not and ordered on what: I believe the routes were once added in the order they read at the stable-masters, whichever order that is 8-) I love the sortable list RTC had and if possible I hope it can be a side-page to the main stable-master page and people can use whichever they prefer. And that one indeed must have the "swift" in a separate column, if it should be sortable at all.

What is the main reason to not use a swift column? We have already said that we should not go religious about mimicking in-game looks, so I am curious on why this poll?

Finally, the killer thing would of course be an embedded applet that could plan the route all the way. I like that German route-map though believe it has not been updated in a long time. Based on Magill's pointer to that in-game addon thingie it would not be hard to gather info to make such a map, and indeed I am tempted on both the applet and an updated map (mapoholic as I am) but then locations would never ever be finished ;)

Zimoon 04:27, 5 January 2012 (EST)

I hear you on the usability argument: Scanning down a "Swift" column would easily highlight any swift travel options. However, there are several stable-masters that have no swift travel options at all, so this just leaves empty cells on those tables that add nothing of value, and that looks ugly to me. :-P
Grouping the swift-travel options at the end of the table or immediately below their respective slow-travel option makes them easy enough to find in my view, and I don't see link/nonlink information in the same cell as being ugly - the black "(Swift)" is enough of a flag to catch your attention without being obnoxious. And, yes, I agree an applet would be wonderful - I found this on Google, although it's outdated. Dunno if that's linked anywhere, but it's a little more informative (though less neat) than the German jpg Sethladan 07:05, 5 January 2012 (EST)

I personally like the "Swift Travel" as it is written in-game more (option 2.). I think the column is unnecessary; you first have to read what it does to see what all those "Yes"ses mean. People are used to what it looks like in-game and will understand that in one glance. They will expect to see the travel destinations in the same order as they do in-game, with the swift travel locations most times around the bottom of the list. I am not being religiously, but going by how things are in-game as a default makes a lot of things easier on this whole wiki for both the contributor (as you don't have to make many decisions) and the visitor (they are familiar with that format and expect to see it). The reason for me not to do a column is because it, in my opinion, looks ugly. I also don't see the advantage of it. Either way, I spent a lot of time overhauling all stable master pages, adding missing ones (there was a bunch of new ones coming in) and making them look all the same before you lot were active. It was a LOT of work and now seeing them all scattered and going to be changed around is sort of depressing. I can't really be bothered to have much to do with them anymore. --Ravanel (talk) 05:24, 5 January 2012 (EST)
PS The former was about the individual stable-master pages, I think it's fine whatever you do with the Stable-master main page.--Ravanel (talk) 05:27, 5 January 2012 (EST)

The main problem was that the stable-master pages aren't all in the same format. If they had been, I probably would have just transcluded them and not even consulted anyone! Clearly, if you made it a project back a long time ago, others have come behind and neglected to make them match. Since there are multiple versions of what individual stable masters looked like, ie, multiple options for me to choose from, I picked the one I personally liked best at the time I was doing it (before I started reading everyone's feedback here), and tweaked it. There are, fortunately or unfortunately, lots of chances for personal tastes to be exercised on the wiki, and because of the nature of LOTRO a lot of things that have already been done over until they were perfect, have to be re-done; add that to the nature of how a wiki operates, with multiple people authorizing the thousands of changes that happen, and even if we were to come 100% in agreement and all work in accord to make it perfect again, it will have to be re-done yet again in the future. -Adelas (talk) 02:25, 7 January 2012 (EST)

But then we would need doubled info, at each individual stable-master, and then per location, and at this page. No transclusions. And very easy to forget one or two pages when something is updated ... and we sure know this happens all the time, right?

I do not think many visitors ever expect to see things exactly as in game, but they expect to find correct and consistent data, right?

A visitor that almost instantly does not realize what a "yes" in the "Swift" column means (with the link), I guess that user will be equally lost at whatever info we present :)

The order of the destinations, I have absolutely 0% interest in any of today's order but I think that it is the order it comes from in game and whether that is good or not is beyond me. Since the individual tables are very short I guess it does not make a difference to order them per destination-region or whatever, people will find it in a second anyway. Pass.

If you want the "swift" column (re)moved I would rather suggest moving it to come after the destination, and having the text changed from "Yes" to "Swift", the example from above would look like

Destination	Swift	Region	Cost	Prerequisites
Hobbiton		The Shire	5
Shire Homesteads		The Shire	5
West Bree		Bree-land	1
West Bree	Swift	Bree-land	5	Level 40
Michel Delving		The Shire	5

This comes closer to the in-game look but it would still be very easy to spot the swift routes. However, this does just move the column one step left and change its text to "Swift" which is fine, it is very easy to understand and it is very easy to spot what is swift and what is not.

Because some destination names are longer and some shorter this layout would not hide swift routes as much as having "swift" within the same column as the destination name. Forcing it within the same column is very close to "religious" ;-)

I see no reason to have both West Bree within the same row and using <br/>, is there any good reason? That also makes editing harder, does it not?

Having all "swift" at the top or bottom of the table and not strictly following in-game order (which is very much mixed) would be a change. I am not sure you meant that as a suggestion but if it was I am supporting you Rav. :)

The very best thing would be RTC:s great sortable tables. No transclusion to this page from stable-master but very well to the settlement and/or the immediate location for him (is there ever any female stable-masters around??). But will that happen? And again, if that happens we will definitely have to have the "swift" in a separate column, whether "yes" or "swift", otherwise it is impossible to sort on that.

Zimoon 17:32, 5 January 2012 (EST)

With Swift Travel at the bottom I meant this is usually the case in-game. Whether or not this is currently reflected on the stable-master pages, I don't know. I was proposing to do it in the same order as in-game, or otherwise in alphabetical order. Moving the Swift Travel locations down is done a lot in-game, and I agree that it makes the overview better. I also agree that sortable tables would be the best.

There certainly are female stable-masters in-game and on-wiki (example). Perhaps something can be sorted with using the gender neutral "they" and "their".

Another option:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Prerequisites
Hobbiton		The Shire	5
Shire Homesteads		The Shire	5
West Bree		Bree-land	1
West Bree	Swift Travel	Bree-land	5	Level 40
Michel Delving	Swift Travel	The Shire	5	Deed: The Sights of the Shire

Changes:

1) different name for Swift travel column, reflecting in-game more (because I am a fan)

2) some columns centered, looking better in my opinion (e.g. level in prerequisites column)

--Ravanel (talk) 10:30, 6 January 2012 (EST)

If Swift Travel is usually the case it's great, and if then "polish" the exception to have them collected there even more the better. We are in 100% agreement.

The gender thing was more of a joke, great to see some kind of equality on this point :)

Using "Swift Travel" rather than just "Swift" steals a tremendous lot of pixels without adding a single bit of information. I am sorry by pixels are worth their weight in gold, the more so in tables because every column is at war about the available space, and we cannot have tables that are only viewable at wide-screen monitors and maximized windows.

Using "Speed" as header, does that not imply that we should use "Normal" for all non-swift routes? And then the whole idea with easily-spotted is lost once again. For me usability and correct content is more important than mimicking whatever Turbine invents; I am a fan too, of Tolkien's fictional realm first, then the game :)

Centered columns may look nice but they are less reader-friendly, usually. Perhaps not when there is just a few pieces here and there, but as soon as there are more of them they eye will struggle to find its way around. A lot? I guess not in this case, but generally one should avoid centered info unless the content is of Yes/No/Else nature; more than one or two words is usually a good limit to remember.

Remember, I am listening, but also coaching. Usability has been my profession for some decades and perhaps I suffer from some occupational injury ;)

Zimoon 16:38, 6 January 2012 (EST)

I never did actually put in my vote, either. Here are the things I care about:

(A) I do feel very strongly about sorting the destinations. I hate, abhor, despise, detest - add synonyms here - the way that the devs decided to list them. They're not sorted alphabetically, not sorted by "region level"... there is no sense to them at all. I understand your desire, Rav, to make it easy to copy the destinations from in-game into the wiki. It will be a pain in the neck to double check for newly-added destinations at large stable-master lists, if the wiki does not match what you see in game. HOWEVER, even acknowledging that plus the fact that I'm normally a proponent of LESS WORK = ME HAPPY, I just hate seeing a table that is not organized in any way, shape, or form. Furthermore, I think very few people actually pay enough attention to what order the destinations appear in game to memorize them, and (a) if they have them memorized, they don't need the wiki table, plus (b) if they don't have it memorized but are looking at the stable master in game, they don't need to look at the wiki and compare it, and therefore wouldn't be bothered that it doesn't match up, because they would not know.

If you had to pin me down on how I'd like to see them sorted... If it was only for my personal use, I'd sort them by "region level" as described above, but on a wiki, I'd go with alphabetical. That's just my vote.

(B) I don't have a final opinion on how to designate the swift travel, but as I mentioned on my talk page, I don't feel that just seeing "Swift" or "Yes" in that column makes it easy enough to differentiate the columns (thus, my duplication of that information on the two tables I actually altered). I lean towards simply having the text as it appears in game and with the linking formatted as in the past, with "LINKED DEST - unlinked words Swift Travel" (as shown in my table at the top of this section). However, if the table was sortable, then it would be silly not to include that column to allow for sorting.

(C) I keep going back and forth about how to sort the swift travel. I do like having all the swift travels together at the bottom like Rav suggests (or top, I personally don't care - but since Rav has a preference, I'm saying bottom), just because it's more elegant - it looks nicer and neater.

But I also like the sample I suggested above, where the swift travel is together in a table cell with the non-swift (same cell, different line) version of the same destination. Although it's not as elegant on the page as the completely separate version, the grouped-cell version appeals to me because, when the swift travels are separated from regular travel, the mind has a harder time connecting them together, recognizing which of the "slow travel" routes are also available as swift travel. It comes down to how I am actually using the tables (and stables).

When comparing options in the tables, I'm more likely to be asking "I am at LOCATION and want to go to PRE-CHOSEN-DESTINATION, what are my options of how to get there - slow direct, swift direct, or do I have to travel through somewhere else to get there?" rather than using the wiki to see "When I'm in LOCATION and feel like taking a trip, what are my options?" Also, sometimes I'm interested to know "I know there is swift travel from LOCATION to DESTINATION, but is there non-swift travel?" (a lot of times I'll put myself on a stable-master horse and then jump off at a location partway through the ride, so that I don't have to navigate manually).

Also, I think that option 3 would support my MILD preference for removing the swift column and using the text as shown in that "option 3" table, because it helps with the problem you brought up, Zim, of different-length destinations possibly hiding the "Swift Travel" text.

TL;DR version: I think grouping the swift/nonswift in a cell [as in option 3 above] makes the table easier to USE, while grouping all the swifts at the bottom of the table makes the table LOOK more organized. Therefore, I lean towards that Option 3.

(D) As far as Moria is concerned, yeah, if you were outside of Moria and could ride to 21st, I'd put the region (moria) as opposed to the area. But within Moria, I advocate using the area.

(E) If text is sporadic in a column, or too small for the column, centering is nice. If there is a lot of text, especially if it scrolls onto multiple lines making all the lines start and end in different places, it is harder to read. I would support centering the "Level XX" cells but not the other cells, if that is an acceptable compromise. The biggest problem I see there is the lack of any documentation might confuse new editors into doing it the wrong way. Of course, the simple solution to that is to make a stable-master template! :-D!

Whew, 120 "show preview" and edits later, I think I'm ready to save page. And go to bed. This wears me out! -Adelas (talk) 02:25, 7 January 2012 (EST)

Yupp, grouping all "swift" at the bottom solves the easily-spotted issue and then I guess the column can go R.I.P.

Zimoon 04:42, 7 January 2012 (EST)

For what it's worth - in A above, I think you will find that the destinations ARE sorted in "game sequence." Except for the most recent changes which came in response to player petitioning... Destinations are listed as you are EXPECTED to progress through the game AND by "when you have discovered them." You also see a significant difference between each major release; SOA listings and MOM listing are different, as are Mirkwood and now ROI. One presumes this is largely due to internal Turbine staffing changes associated with each different release. It is quite true that in-game, there are times when finding "where you want to go" is problematic at best. That's why both the Travel Lua and RTC's spreadsheet of destinations,exist -- trying to figure out how does one get there from here? -- Especially if you want to move across the world from say Ehred Lun to Dunland (which unless you realize you can short-cut through the Moors is quite complex to get to the first place you can go directly to Dunland -- Rivendell. -- and if you don't understand what I'm talking about, they you have a perfect example of the issue.

As far as Centered tables is concerned -- I completely agree with Z -- they are unreadable most of the time. That is one reason why I don't like trying to center Icons in those left hand columns so common on the Wiki -- there is a ?bug? in the underlying Media Wiki which prevents the "last one" from lining up with the ones above them if you try to put Icon break Icon stacks in that column. See the Tailor_Westfold_Recipe_Index#Light Armour (Men of Dunland) for a remaining example of the centering problem.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC (talk) 13:12, 7 January 2012 (EST)

Tentative Formatting 1b

Revival of this topic, just cuz the had a short snow storm today :)
What about the format of Stable-master#Oatbarton transcluded from Andy Deepwell?

I don't know if I am hallucinating but it seems in-game destinations are now ordered in groups of non-swift first then swift, and within each group A-Z. And Oatbarton also reads it that way. It does not really matter much but this is at least somewhat closer to the in-game look but still easy to spot swift-routes from non-swift. A lot easier than the form
Name (swift)
Averylongname (swift)
Name (swift)
Averylongname (swift)
where the shorter names' (swift) are shadowed by the longer names and much harder to spot, and certainly harder if scanning several different stable-masters scrolling to and fro to find a route. If thumbs-up I can walk over stable-masters at a slow pace during pauses at work ;-)
-- Zimoon 13:55, 19 March 2012 (EDT)

Thanks for your comment Magill (below). And I sure will peek at those tables when finding yet more stable-masters. OK, so the order is subject to developers' mood, which order somebody happens to find them, and the phase of them moon, fine. Then I can confidently use the scheme of two groups, not-swift and swift, and A-Z within each group. That makes the swift stand out the best (equalling user-friendly) and A-Z is the most universal order of all orders. Many stable masters I find don't read the in-game order anyway so... :P

Zimoon 19:45, 20 March 2012 (EDT)

Tenative Formatting - part 2 - just making a shorter section to edit

I believe there is a difference between the "before and after" sections of the world. (As well as the fact that Turbine has not been consistent with this and many

Which is to say... the "older" parts of the world and those areas which have been "reworked" follow the pattern Z described. However, in the new areas that does not appear to be true. I believe that as you discover locations, they are listed.

For instance in The Great River area... most of the routes are ST only. Using my Hunter, who has World Renown, for the following examples.

(Feel free to copy/mod these tables into any pages) Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC (talk) 13:19, 20 March 2012 (EDT)

From the Limlight Gatehouse (Wailing Hills) the stable master shows everything in REVERSE alphabetical order. Or in order of discovery.

Limlight Gatehouse (Cost from a toon with no Riders of Stangard rep discount)

Stable-master sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Stangard		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Parth Celebrant		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Thinglad	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Stangard	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Parth Celebrant	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Rushgore	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Brown Lands	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75

Brown Lands (Cost from a toon with no Riders of Stangard rep discount)

Stable-master sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Rushgore		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Stangard		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Thinglad	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Stangard	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Wailing Hills	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Parth Celebrant	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Rushgore	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75

Parth Celbrant (Cost from a toon with no Riders of Stangard rep discount)

Stable-master sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Rushgore		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Wailing Hills		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Stangard		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Thinglad	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Stangard	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Wailing Hills	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Rushgore	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Brown Lands	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75

Rushgore (Cost from a toon with no Riders of Stangard rep discount)

Stable-master sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Brown Lands		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Parth Celebrant		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Stangard		The Great River	20		Min Level 75
Thinglad	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Stangard	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Wailing Hills	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Parth Celebrant	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Brown Lands	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75

Thinglad (Cost from a toon with no Riders of Stangard rep discount, but with world renown)

Stable-master sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
The Vineyards of Lórien		Lothlórien		17  50	Min Level 75
Stangard		The Great River		17  50	Min Level 75
The Vineyards of Lórien	Swift Travel	The Great River		24  50	Min Level 75
Stangard	Swift Travel	The Great River		24  50	Min Level 75
Wailing Hills	Swift Travel	The Great River		24  50	Min Level 75
Parth Celebrant	Swift Travel	The Great River		24  50	Min Level 75
Brown Lands	Swift Travel	The Great River		24  50	Min Level 75

Stangard (Cost from a toon with no Riders of Stangard rep discount)

Stable-master sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Thinglad	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Wailing Hills	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Parth Celebrant	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Rushgore	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
Brown Lands	Swift Travel	The Great River	28		Min Level 75
South Bree	Swift Travel	Bree-land	36		Min Level 65
Twenty-first Hall	Swift Travel	Moria	36		Min Level 65
Inner Caras Galadhon	Swift Travel	Lothlórien	36		Min Level 65

I believe the last two (out of region) appear as soon as you visit Stangard.

Popping up to Inner Caras Galadhon we find, a different sequence -- namely that which you described...almost.

Inner Caras Galadhon (Cost from a toon with World Renown)

Santhiriel sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Twenty-first Hall	Swift Travel	Moria		17  50	Min Level 65
Rivendell	Swift Travel	Trollshaws		31  50	Min Level 50
Ost Galadh	Swift Travel	Mirkwood		17  50	Min Level 50
Lhanuch	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		31  50	Min Level 50
Galtrev	Swift Travel	Dunland		31  50	Min Level 65
Stangard	Swift Travel	The Great River		31  50	Min Level 75

All of which is to say, the in-game sequence appears to be mostly random, based on the sequence in which you visit the stables. In this case, the order in which the game evolved.

However, I believe the sequence here in Lhanuch is NOT that, which possibly correct, the locations of Echad Dervunn and Maur Tulhau are likely to be discovered in that order, but I might have neglected to.

Lhanuch (Cost from a toon with World Renown)

Barri sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Echad Dagoras		Enedwaith		17  50	Min Level 50
Maur Tulhau		Enedwaith		17  50	Min Level 50
Harndirion		Enedwaith		17  50	Min Level 50
Echad Daervunn		Enedwaith		17  50	Min Level 50
Echad Dagoras	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		24  50	Min Level 50
Maur Tulhau	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		24  50	Min Level 50
Harndirion	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		24  50	Min Level 50
Echad Daervunn	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		24  50	Min Level 50
Rivendell	Swift Travel	Trollshaws		24  50	Min Level 50
South Bree	Swift Travel	Bree-land		24  50	Min Level 50
Inner Caras Galadhon	Swift Travel	Lothlórien		31  50	Min Level 50

Now if I pop over to Handirion, we find - when ROI was released, Turbine just added the two new Travel destinations on to the end. Harndirion (Cost from a toon with World Renown)

Celenath sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Echad Dagoras		Enedwaith		17  50	Min Level 50
Maur Tulhau		Enedwaith		17  50	Min Level 50
Lhanuch		Enedwaith		17  50	Min Level 50
Echad Daervunn		Enedwaith		17  50	Min Level 50
Maur Tulhau	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		24  50	Min Level 50
Lhanuch	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		24  50	Min Level 50
Echad Daervunn	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		24  50	Min Level 50
Echad Naeglanc		Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Echad Naeglanc	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65

Echad Naeglanc (Cost from a toon with World Renown)

Stable-master sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Lhan Tarren		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Galtrev		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Harndirion		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Lhan Tarren	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Galtrev	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Harndirion	Swift Travel	Enedwaith		24  50	Min Level 65

Galtrev (Cost from a toon with World Renown)

Stable-master sells horse and pony rides to the following stables:

Destination	Speed	Region	Cost	Discount Cost	Prerequisites
Echad Naeglanc		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Lhan Tarren		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Tâl Methedras Gate		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Rohirrim Scout-camp		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Avardin		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Lhan Rhos		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Barnavon		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Forthbrond		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Grimbold's Camp		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Dagoras' Camp		Dunland		17  50	Min Level 65
Echad Naeglanc	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Lhan Tarren	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Tâl Methedras Gate	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Rohirrim Scout-camp	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Avardin	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Lhan Rhos	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Barnavon	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Forthbrond	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Grimbold's Camp	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Dagoras' Camp	Swift Travel	Dunland		24  50	Min Level 65
Twenty-first Hall	Swift Travel	Moria		31  50	Min Level 65
South Bree	Swift Travel	Bree-land		31  50	Min Level 65
Inner Caras Galadhon	Swift Travel	Lothlórien		31  50	Min Level 65

Headers

Can we go back to the previous layout without the stable and the stable-master's names both in the headers? I started to "correct" the travel routes section of this page (since the top level header - =Header= should be skipped) and ended up with the ToC stretching across my entire screen. I'm also not fond of those double lines floating around; shouldn't properly sorted headers be enough to distinguish sections? Hooray for Magill and Zimoon setting up all those transcluded Stable-masters, though. Now we just need to get them looking the same, heh. Sethladan 21:23, 23 May 2012 (EDT)

The Great River

I added The Great River to the list of stables since it was not there. The stable-master in the region has destinations listed by the area the horse will ride to other then the settlement except for Parth Celebrant and Stangard. Since the table is asking for the settlement the horse ride will take you to and not the destination the stable-master is offering a horse ride to, I added the actually destination in the notes. When Mirkwood first came out all of the horse rides were by area and not by settlement as well. Maybe in a future patch Turbine will be changing the names of the stable routes so they all are by settlement and not by area. --Pinkfae (talk) 18:05, 25 May 2012 (EDT)

Fair enough. -- Zimoon 18:09, 25 May 2012 (EDT)

Splitting?

This page is really long. It might be a good idea to split up the travel routes into another page, with all of them, or many pages. They could be split as one page for each region's travel routes, as they are arranged now under the Travel Routes section. Or simply split between Eriador and Rhovanion travel routes. -- Candlelight ^{(talk•contribs)} 07:46, 28 May 2012 (EDT)

I wanted to answer the question: "How do I get here?", as well as "How do I get there?". Being able to answer both those questions makes it a little easier to figure out travel routes between destinations without a direct route.

I made some pages, which are now a bit out of date now, exploring alternate organizations of the travel information. I collected the data in an Open Office spreadsheet and generated the wiki table pages in my sandbox pages.

* Travel - At the beginning of July, 2011, my characters visited every travel location in Middle Earth.

** Travel Locations - useful, still useful if subdivided

** Travel Routes - useful for reverse routes

*** Middle Earth Travel Routes - useful for reverse routes

*** Eriador Travel Routes - loses routes from outside Eriador

*** Rhovanion Travel Routes - loses routes from outside Rhovanion

Splitting the travel locations and travel routes to separate pages seemed like a viable options. Splitting the travel routes by region did not seem like such a good idea.

I did consider, but never made an online page for it, the idea of separating regional routes and local routes. At different points in our progress through the game, we have different travel route information requirements. Maintaining the current page is expensive, but getting better as large parts are now transcluded. Travel locations and routes might be a good subject for the Semantic MediaWeb extension. That might offer more options for building special purpose pages through queries without duplicating the data on multiple page.

RingTailCat (talk) 16:09, 28 May 2012 (EDT)

Insofar as this page specifically, one first step might be to spin out the whole later section of this page (the travel routes) as it's only related to Stable-masters instead of being directly about them and has obviously grown large enough to merit a page of its own. Only caveat to that is the resulting "Travel Routes" page would probably a) still be long and b) end up being just a long list of tables (which is fine from time to time, but not always desirable). Sethladan 16:47, 28 May 2012 (EDT)

Widened the Tables because...

... The Misty Mountains caused unwanted line breaks in the region column. Maybe +50 was too much, but it's hard to tell exactly how fonts render at different machines, OS:s, and browsers. Just so we know why I did this raid. -- Zimoon 10:06, 22 August 2012 (EDT)

Factions

Would it be at all desirable to list which faction each stable-master belongs to, if any? (for dealing with discounts) Sethladan 02:25, 26 August 2012 (EDT)

Desirable is one thing, and probably it is. But adding it to the transcluded part from each SM is another thing, and I doubt people choose SM from available discounts, hence that information has a negligible information value at any other page than the SM him/her-self. Right?
-- Zimoon 05:54, 26 August 2012 (EDT)

Yeah, I agree that the value of the information is pretty trivial, so I just wondered if others found it interesting at all. First figure if people want it, then figure how to do it/if it's worth it, heh. Sethladan 10:48, 26 August 2012 (EDT)

After about level 20, the cost of travel becomes almost irrelevant. I have never found travel costs to be a much of a problem past about level 10. The discounts don't make enough of a difference to matter. By the time you have earned the discount, you should not need to worry about the cost of travel. While cash can be in short supply at very low levels, and if you're not careful (as I have been), it is usually very easy to earn more by slaying a few humanoid mobs. It might be more useful to emphasize where travel and vendor discounts apply on the faction pages. Some of those are not so obvious, such as Thorin's Hall discounts outside Ered Luin. RingTailCat (talk) 12:29, 26 August 2012 (EDT)

It is also problematic to determine WHICH Faction any give Stable Master belongs to. Some are "obvious," most of the "important ones" are not. Moria is a case in point, some apparently belong to the Guards, and some to the Miners.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC (talk) 17:41, 27 August 2012 (EDT)

Fell free to add a sentence to the SM:s if you like to. I guess it could do just after the small info text, as any other bits of info we add when appropriate. But don't wear yourself out for it ;)
-- Zimoon 17:57, 27 August 2012 (EDT)

Update 9

With Update 9, Against the Shadow - December 17, 2012 the Stable-master UI was remade, and under the hood some changes made it possible to see also "undiscovered" routes which may now be travelled by buying travel writes from the Lotro Store.

The UI changes could be transformed to our Wiki with the following tentative format:

XXX sells [[Travelling|horse and pony rides]] to the following stables:
<onlyinclude>{| class="altRowsMed" width="650"
! width="170" | Region !! colspan="2" | Destination !! width="50" | Cost !! width="200" | Prerequisites
|-
| [[REGION]] || width="180" | [[LOCATION]] || width="40" align="right" | [[Swift Travel|(Swift)]] || align="right" | {{worth||||}} || 
|-
| [[REGION]] || [[LOCATION]]               || <!-- empty if no swift -->                          || align="right" | {{worth||||}} ||
|-
| [[REGION]] || [[LOCATION]]               || <!-- empty if no swift -->                          || colspan="2" | {{worth||SILVER|COPPER|}}   <prerequisites>
|}</onlyinclude>

Basically this is to switch places with destination and region. In-game they are grouped on region, then I am not 100% sure but thinks the locations are sorted A to Z. The much white spaces is just for this display, it is not required.

However, I found that some prices crash the cost column width, as in the third row. Unless they are too many I suggest we manage them from case to case, probably by making the cost+prerequisites one cell with colspan="2", that won't break alignment too badly.

Your thoughts? -- Zimoon 09:42, 26 December 2012 (EST)

If some costs are too wide for the column, why not make it a little bigger? You could probably "borrow" 25px or so from another space or add more to the total table width. (Ignore this if the proportions were already carefully determined.) A couple of things I noticed, also - One: do we want to reorganize the order of destinations to follow the game now they actually have a system? Specifically, I'm looking at Swift routes being together with their non-Swift counterparts. The second is that not every ride may show up initially when you visit a stable-master; 21st to Inner Caras Galadhon is an example as I don't remember seeing it as an option until I did the quest to enter CG that enabled the route. This might be "not working as intended" or there might be other similar cases like this. Probably should get a mention in the prereq column if the latter? Sethladan 19:25, 26 December 2012 (EST)

We would rather have to widen the tables then. But having columns 100px wide for one occasion (the only one I have seen so far) seems silly, does it not? It was from South Gate in Bree to Stangard I think, the first time I have seen copper on a Stable-master (w/o discount). Most other columns are carefully set up to work with currently widest location names (of course brittle, since if a user is using another font or size the look will break.

Sure, we do not have to reorganize. The convenient (lazy) me is fine with that. The good thing with reorganizing is the grouped-per-region which is user friendly, at least I think it is. The back side is the extra work. But we probably still need to visit many stable-masters and ensure they are correct. Regarding the "missing routes" I am not sure.
-- Zimoon 04:18, 27 December 2012 (EST)

Update 10 changes

In update 10, Travel Writs will disappear to be replaced by "Mithril Coins"

In their place will be a new currency to be used for both Travel and Revivals, replacing the Travel Writs and Tomes of Revival. This currency will be used for other items (as yet undefined) in the future.

Beta 5 is just now being installed in Bullroarer for tomorrow (1 March), so I would guess we will see Update 10 in about two weeks.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 18:29, 28 February 2013 (EST)

U10 Travel window

U10 Mithril coin V1

U10 Mithril coin V2

U10 Wallet

Images of the new interface items... Note the two DIFFERENT Mithril coin pop-ups. If I remember correctly, one comes from the Stable master and one from the wallet.

• Your "balance" of mithril coins is shown at the bottom right of the Travel Panel.
• At least in Beta 4 of U10, using Mithril Coins negated the requirement of "previously visited," i.e. An Undiscovered route could be traveled by using the Mithril Coin.
• I do not know how this effects quest restricted routes. I do know that certain Quest restricted routes, such as 21st Hall to Lothlorian do not even show up as "undiscovered" until the requisite quests are completed.
• Moria now has a bunch of FREE goat rides at the stable masters which are tied to various quests. However, they do not show up as routes, just as "physical" goats you click on to travel!

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 18:56, 28 February 2013 (EST)

New boilerplate for individual Stable-master pages

Boilerplate for Stable-master entries

• Page names should be "Stable-master (location)" -- where "location" matches one of the entries in "other" Stable-master's tables. Previously Stable-master pages were named for the Stable-master themselves; however since "Dunland" (Rise of Isengard Update) Turbine has stopped giving them "unique" names, and simply naming all of the "support" NPCs with generic names -- Supplier, Healer, Provisioner, Stable-master, etc.

==Sells==
He sells [[Travelling|Horse and Pony rides]] to the following destinations:
<onlyinclude>{| class="sortable altRowsMed" style="width:660px;"
! colspan="2" | Destination !!style="width:140px;" | Region !! class="unsortable" style="width:90px;" | Cost 
!! class="unsortable" style="width:200px;" | Prerequisites
|-
|style="width:140px;" |
|-
| [[Limlight Gorge]]  ||style="width=40px;"|[[Swift Travel|(Swift)]]  || [[The Great River]]  || style="text-align:right;" |{{worth||35}}
| Min Level: 70
|-
| [[Parth Celebrant]] ||style="width=40px;"|[[Swift Travel|(Swift)]]  || [[The Great River]]  || style="text-align:right;" |{{worth||35}} 
| Min Level: 70
|-  
</onlyinclude>

• This entry illustrates both the basic table formatting and the use of the "Style" (i.e. CSS) syntax. This is somewhat more verbose, but "more correct" and will eliminate formatting issues going forward as certain historical usages, such as "align=right" simply no longer work as expected in all situations.

• Obviously, the pronoun (He/She) should be changed to reflect the actual sex of the Stable-master. (I believe only Elves have had female Stable-masters.) Moria being the only location where "Goats" replace Horse/Pony offerings.

• The sort parameter allows the base display to match that of the in-game Stable-master, which changed with recent updates. In-game entries are now listed alphabetically by region, not destination.

Post Helms Deep updates and verifications

I have verified/updated the following Stable-masters. Most all needed the addition of the HD or RoR route entries.

1. Bill Rosewood - West Bree
2. Bert Goldenleaf - South Bree -- Moors
3. Ladrochan - Rivendell -- Moors
4. Wíli - Thorin's Gate -- Moors
5. Andfast Tunnelly - Michel Delving -- Moors
6. Stable-master (Snowbourn)
7. Santhiriel - Inner Caras Galadhon
8. Arochon - Esteldin

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 05:15, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Added all Stable masters for Wildermore.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 22:25, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Boilerplate proposal

I was updating the prices on the stablemaster pages and realied it would probably be easier to just generate them based on the data from Travel locations reference plugin (I was wrong, it's somewhat out of date currently and would need a fair bit of checking/updating). While I was doing that I had a play around with the layout of the destinations table as there is a lot of variation as it stands. The issues I see are:

• Region column just repeats what is already in each header row, so would be better to use this for Area name.
• The (swift) link takes up more space than needed, an icon as per the in game travel window is enough.
• Enough destinations have level reqs, that I think it would be better having its own column, it also takes less space that way and looks a lot clearer where there are other prereqs too.

This is what it looks like with the above changes https://ibb.co/YBZ5pbs (but using the actual swift icon obviously)

Zimoon expressed an interest in having the prerequisites below the table to save on width. https://ibb.co/FKDH1X8 something along these lines, although maybe letters or symbols would be better than numbers.

This is the current version of that table for reference https://ibb.co/WDsgZp3 although as said, there is quite a bit of variation between them all. --Garlo (talk) 16:12, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

I have seen Garlo's screenshots and I believe it looks great. Tables are less wide and more info is provided at less horizontal space. I would love to see this moving forward in one way or the other. — Zimoon 20:46, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

Using area names and min level seems like a good change to me, i would keep the prerequisites in the table, did not seem to take much space with removed all the extra text, and it does not require you to jump up and down to check it. Not sure how i feel about the swift, i think i would prefer the swift text, maybe not in extra cell tho. --Drono (talk) 21:13, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

With some of the longer location names in higher level regions plus quite extensive prerequisites the width indeed is a problem. Unless you have large browser window width, but hard to have that when editing and having another window side by side. Maybe try with <small> around prereqs? — Zimoon 22:38, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

Here are some examples in classic lilac/white https://ibb.co/YRzQPgS, I added Drono's suggestion for comparison along with another random one. For me the version with the icons to the left just reads a lot easier than looking for text on the right, I'm not a fan of the bottom one at all, would be good to get some more opinions. I also showed the difference between small and standard text and it's negligible. I rolled this page using the new data so you can get a feel for what the width issues might be. --Garlo (talk) 23:27, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

Looking good. I'm not exactly sure how i feel about the swift travels, part of me would like the swift text there, the other one things it's not really neccessary so i would vote for 2, 1 or even combination :D --Drono (talk) 07:42, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

May I kindly ask about progression on this topic? — Zimoon 20:22, 8 April 2022 (UTC)

Split Proposal

It takes a very long time to load this page, even on an extra broad broadband. And I do not think it is possible to make wiki-pages load "on demand" ... meaning loading a section only when unfolding a collapsed table or such, right?

Unless such a method exists I propose we split this page into the four Lands we have. Using simple links to those. Leaving this page to describe the Stable-master travelling system and those other pages displaying Stable-masters and their routes.

Not only would this help loading times but also server load. Or ... ?
— Zimoon 20:58, 16 July 2022 (UTC)

As I do not see any objection to the suggested split I will do it tomorrow. — Zimoon 16:21, 23 July 2022 (UTC)

Updates

All Cardolan and Swanfleet Stable-masters added as pages. Cardolan and Swanfleet destinations added to connecting stables. All travel hubs (and a bunch of other Stables) checked, and any missing destinations have been added. A number of hubs needed Strongholds of the North, The Dwarf-holds, Vales of Anuin, Elderslade, and/or Gundabad destinations added. Pricing verified as needed. One "Accuracy" tag removed after verifying pricing. Some formatting tweaks.

It's been a productive weekend! Lally (talk) 22:00, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for your great contributions! --Tharondir (talk) 07:04, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

Yondershire Stables, Mission-recruiter stables, and "Stable-master's Assistant" (Rivendell Stables) added. Two small stables outside of Rohan housing areas were added. They are separate from the Far-ranging Stables inside the Homesteads. I think I may have all of the stable masters, finally! Lally (talk) 16:53, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

King's Gondor, Outer Gondor and Haradwaith (Umbar) Stables etc

Starting on the process to get all of the new stables and dock-masters created and linked in. I'm splitting King's Gondor into its own section below Gondor, and breaking it up by Area. Outer Gondor will be part of the King's Gondor table. Haradwaith (Umbar) is a separate Land, and will therefore be a new section. Question: Should we list all of the Dock-masters in with the Stable-masters, or on their own page, with a link? Any comments are welcome, I'll be doing a lot of the table's work in sandbox because the full page is so big. Lally (talk) 17:03, 10 February 2024 (UTC)

I was already adding dock/stable-masters as I travel through Umbar while adding the quests per area (but feel free to do the same :))... Anyhow, dock-masters are not listed on the stable-master map, so imho we should create a separate page for dock-masters, and make a reference to that page - Tiberivs (talk) 12:43, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

Thanks! If I don't have to create NPCs and verify each and every route cost, I'm happy. I can just link them into the big page. There's already a "Dock-masters" page, but it's pretty general. Adding a table of NPCs shouldn't prove difficult, after the Stable-master page!

Lally (talk) 17:13, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

Formatting and Consistency

Some sections (Eriador, for example) have the "Stable-master" column showing either the NPC's name (if there is one) or their title (Stable-master). Other sections (e.g. Gondor) have the column showing "Stable-master (Location)". I would like to change all of those entries to use the Stable-master (Location)|Stable-master format if there are no objections.

Secondly, there's is a "wikifi" tag that could possibly be removed. I think the only unresolved item on that tag is "Lists some boat/eagle travel, but no festival steeds and maybe not Moria insta-goats". I would personally want to avoid listing in the main table any festival stable-masters and those Moria goats that are only useable if you have a specific quest active. I would be happy to add a note to the "Description" section mentioning their existance without going into details. Lally (talk) 16:45, 19 March 2023 (UTC)