Talk:Lotro-Wiki Contributors' Corner/Archive 2013

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Welcome to the Archive of the Talk Page of Contributors' Corner for 2013



Edit Problem.

Good day, I was trying to Edit our Kinship Link in the Social:List of Kinships -> Kinships of Snowbourn -> The Blades of Arnor.

The current link directs visitors to our defunct Euro Website before the move to the US servers. But regrettably i don't seem to be able to Edit the page. After editing i get the Spam bot Cat box but it does not give me the submission box to authorize the change.

If possible can someone edit the link to the new Kinship webpage.

www.light-knights.com

Much Appreciated

Jored

Fixed. I hope you understand why we have a captcha, and that in an ideal world it would be superfluous. On the other hand, we know some players have problems with it and we have tried and are trying different solutions. Thanks for your patience. -- Zimoon 03:22, 16 January 2013 (EST)
Hello, same problem here. When trying to add a link to our kinship website the cats and dogs Captcha comes up, but without a submission button of its own. Making it impossible to submit the edited page. Might be worth checking if the submission button can be added again somehow. -- Kaldegrim 07:25, 15 April 2013 (EDT)
Same problem here - I want to add a link to a picture showing where to go for a quest, but I cannot get through the cat pictures due to no submit button, really annoying :( -- ThunderZtorm 23:56, 29 May 2013 (GMT)
I've heard that the cats and dogs Captcha does not work well in Internet Explorer. And I hear it's hosted at Microsoft. Sounds like its some kind of stealth advert for Firefox! I've not had problems using Firefox with it, except when the web site which hosts the Captcha itself is down. Then, the image of the beasties comes up, but no matter what you select, it won't validate. If you were using IE, try one of the other browsers, such as Firefox or Chrome. If you still get an error message, you might have to wait until the hosting web site comes back up. RingTailCat (talk) 01:09, 30 May 2013 (EDT)
The cat capture still dosn't work. Trying to edit kin listing (Rangers of Evendim)and no submission button shows - in IE, Google Chrome, or firefox, so I cant link to our Kin website. --Bowman (talk) 11:39, 23 September 2013 (EDT)
Try it now... I promoted you to Ninja. That should allow updating.
tyvm sorted! --Bowman (talk) 12:47, 23 September 2013 (EDT)
Just a future note, the latest version of the CAPTCHA only appears to work on account creation. On the plus side this bug is very effective on stopping the recent spam attacks. So if you want to add a link, please request to be promoted here or better yet on my talk page. I will also see if there's a way to tweak the text on the captcha that will speak to this issue. --Lotroadmin (talk) 14:42, 23 September 2013 (EDT)

Update 10 now up on Bullroarer

A "little thing" in the release notes

  • Dread on Defeat effects removed.
Players will no longer receive the dread effect when defeated. This applies to defeat dread only. Other forms of dread will continue to exist as before.
  • Monster Kill XP adjustments
XP from mobs that are more than 8 levels above has been zeroed out to prevent some extreme cases where scaling could provide unintended amounts of experience
  • Crafting XP values are being adjusted down
  • Tooltips for Skills, Items, and Effects will now more consistently use red to indicate harmfulness (implying possible template changes ?)

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Magill (Contribs • User Talk).

My level 85 character got stuck on the loading screen after accepting Quest:The Road to Erebor. Now I am stuck during log in at "Cleaning up old connection...". That's not an encouraging start to testing the U10.
Item:Festival Tickets convert to 5 Mithril Coins.
Item:Revival Tomes convert to 15 Mithril Coins.
Stable-masters take 1 Mithril Coin instead of 1 Item:Stablemaster's Writ.
- RingTailCat (talk) 17:35, 30 January 2013 (EST)

Update 10 -- Itemization changes!

The latest Dev Diary from RockX describes the "itemization changes" in Update 10.

Where "Itemization" apparently means "stats on loot drops"...

Significant philosophical changes to the concept of "set bonuses" -- allowing mix and match without impacting the overall set-bonus. This is a particular problem I have noticed in creating some comparison tables over at lotro-wiki for various crafted armour sets.

Compare:

Comparison: Level 75 Light Armour (Tailor's Guild)

with (still a work in progress)

Comparison: Level 85 Light Armour

With the level 75 Light armour, each "set" has 4 possible items for each component -- two "Normal" and two "Critical." (With the Tailor's guild offering auto-crit recipes) I assume the Level 85 is the same, I just haven't dug up all the data yet.

The philosophy with these sets being -- you can pick either of the two critical components depending upon which "stat"*you want to emphasize. With Gloves, for example, you can pick a version which emphasizes Will or one that emphasizes Vitality. You can "fine tune" your entire set the same way.

This actually started back with Return of Isengard, and is now going to be "world-wide."

Personally, I view these as very positive changes. Not being a Raider, the whole business of "End-Game armour" always drove me crazy trying to sort out what was what that was NOT Raid Gear. That was the main reason I started with the comparison tables over at LOTRO-Wiki. ... Sorry, I'm a Hunter/Rune-Keeper/Minstrel/Lore Master so I'm not likely to every get around to doing the same for heavy armours.... I'll barely be able to get Lvl 85 stuff done before the next Cap increase!

And, for what it's worth -- the Update 10 Stats are still changing. We just loaded Beta 4 this week. Argh! (Maybe these will be "final.")

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 12:59, 21 February 2013 (EST)

Twitter Dev chat... Update 10 -- early March And Player Council info too

https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?502317-Transcript-LOTRO-Developer-Twitter-Chat-Thursday-February-21-2013

Many interesting comments about stat changes to gear, recipes, etc. Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 10:58, 22 February 2013 (EST)

Transcript: LOTRO Developer Twitter Chat - Thursday March 21, 2013

Transcript: LOTRO Developer Twitter Chat - Thursday March 21, 2013

One of the most detailed and extensive dev chats yet! A couple of interesting items...

  • No level cap increase at this time. U11 features solo end-game content and rewards.
  • Q6: Elemiire - Any plans for a 'combine all' and / or 'refine all' option for the Relic Master? Carpal Tunnel isn't fun.
A6: Matt “Scarycrow” Fahey
This is a very good suggestion. I'll ask around and see if it is a viable option.
(Note: Scarycrow was responsible for the Bree update and has been the "most visible" and "communicative" developer in the past six months.
  • Q8: OverlordGate - Can we expect new instances within the new area of U11 this summer?
A8: Lauren “Budgeford” Salk
No instances this time. Instances were the focus of U10, and U11 features a new region & epic.
  • Q14: ISS_21 – Will there be mounted combat instances?
A14: Lauren “Budgeford” Salk
All content now incorporates some Mounted Combat gameplay, but there are no group MC instances atm.
  • Q23: Hurant - Can healers expect items with proc on heal in the near future? Especially the golden Rohan final ring upgrades or mooncandle necklaces?
A23: Evan "Verizal" Graziano
There are two new healer rings being released with Update 10.1 – one that is might-based and another that is will-based, both with on-heal procs
  • Q37: @bob101910 Any idea how much the new region in U11 will cost? #LOTRO
A37: Aaron “Rowan” Campbell
Wildermore will be free for VIPs.
  • Q41: @Mithrandir99 any plans to give us cappies mounted helpers? #LOTRO
A41: Evan "Verizal" Graziano
Although captains aren't getting mounted helpers, all classes will be seeing new mounted traits and skills with U11.
  • Q42: @PArriola Will we be able to have crafting in houses?
A42: Matt “Scarycrow” Fahey
Yes we will be adding crafting facilities to housing.

In-Combat Power Regen

Hi all,

I've been running some rough calculations recently and I came across ICPR against Fate. On the article for this, the equation stated is that ICPR contribution = 30*SQRT(Fate). I no longer think this is correct (for Lore-master at least).

I obtained these values by removing equipped items one by one as a Level 78 LM:

Fate ICPR contribution
592 3507
560 3331
510 3055
461 2784
436 2646
180 1233

By the previous equation, the correlation should be getting less and less near the top, but you can see it is very linear in nature now (up to Update 10). The equation Excel gave was ICPR = 5.5*(Fate) + 239 (R^2 = 1).

I then tested this with my Level 14 Champion and found the same relationship:

Fate ICPR
37 444
33 422
31 411
22 361

Is this the same relationship for other classes? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Oginocasino (Contribs • User Talk) at 08:57, 25 March 2013‎.

  • I don't know the direct answer to your question, and it will likely take some time to come up with the answers... Turbine no longer exposes this information directly to the player community. Quite some time ago, they terminated the Forum thread "Game Mechanics" where such things were openly and routinely discussed. Now you just have to hunt around the forums for threads that seem likely, and or, start one of your own. Or communicate with others who are interested in the subject.
Q46: @pieeatingchamp will you be making tweaks to fate/power use because since U10 my warden barely uses any power fighting 10+ mobs #LOTRO #DEVCHAT
A46: Evan "Verizal" Graziano
10.1 will bring adjustments to fate and power to bring the stat down to a more managable level. Fate's contribution will be reduced. Skill costs will also be reduced. All classes underwent a round of balance.
  • Other than that, you will have to look back at the more recent dev notes to see how the various traits changed beginning back with Update 8 - Riders of Rohan.
  • See: User:Magill/Reference-Diaries for an index to the Dev Diaries.
  • Note that Character Stats and Traits have been under revision -- check the discussion pages for each one.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 20:15, 25 March 2013 (EDT)

A significant number of items have been renamed in Update 10.1

NOTE: this is modified from the original formatting from the release notes. The items all appear to be Instance drops.

The following items have had their incomparable versions renamed

  1. Battle-historian's Loop is now Battle-annalist's Loop
  2. Necklace of the Gathering Dark is now Necklace of the Gathering Night
  3. Trampled Silver Ring is now Stifled Silver Ring
  4. Increased the potency of the 4 piece Minstrel set bonus for Greater Erebor Armour of Resolve. The HoT applied by Bolster Courage is now more potent and scales more appropriately
  5. The Erebor Bowmaster and Erebor Huntsman sets should now appropriately display their 4-piece bonuses
  6. The 'Riddle-keeper's Earrring' from has had its stats adjusted slightly. It will now provide more Fate and less Tactical Mastery
  7. “Gaunt-lord's Pitted Stud” that drops from the disease wing in Ost Dunhoth has been renamed to “Red-huorn's Putrid Stud”
  8. “Gaunt-lord's Pitted Stud” that drops from the posion wing in Ost Dunhoth has been renamed to “Earring of Blight”
  9. Created two new healing-focused ring upgrades for the Eastemnet Shields, Weapons, Jewellery Quartermaster
  10. Lowered the Finesse progressions on Opportunistic Brigand's/Ruffian's Gloves and added Critical Rating
  11. Captain - The 2-piece set bonus on the “Erebor Leader” item set now works with Improved Defensive Strike
  12. The Tapped Rohan Keg will now apply an intoxication effect on players when used
  13. Toasting Mug-Fixed a bug that allowed this emote to bypass the 'Disable Involuntary Emotes' option.
  14. The Breastplate of Nightfall is now correctly a Rare quality item
  15. Mindful and Careworn Mender's Breastplate now give Vitality in place of Tactical Mastery
  16. Abandoned Dalesman Journal now gives Vitality and Evade Rating, in place of Block Rating.
  17. Rune-etched Stone now gives additional Parry Rating
  18. The Fine Iron Warden's Shield now gives both Max Health and Fate.
  19. Robe of the Treaded Road is now 100% more Solemn!
  20. Rune-keeper Greater Armour of the Erebor Cleanser 4-piece set bonus now applies an appropriate-strength Writ of Fire effect
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 10:00, 3 April 2013 (EDT)

Very Interesting article -- which really does apply to lotro--wiki!

https://alistapart.com/column/responsive-typography-is-a-physical-discipline

NICK SHERMAN on TYPOGRAPHY Responsive Typography is a Physical Discipline, But Your Computer Doesn’t Know It (Yet)

While this is specifically about "Typography," those of you who don't follow me... start with the definition of "typography" from the Wikipedia: [1]:

Typography (from the Greek words τύπος (typos) = form and γραφή (graphe) = writing) is the art and technique of arranging type in order to make language visible.

then change the word "type" to information, and you should begin to recognize what I'm talking about.

We have often discussed the display merits of various aspects of the WIKI -- how large is the typical screen that folks use (Google size) is one example (at one time it was a 9 inch diagonal, now much larger screens are common) -- with regards to how wide to make a table, or how many images across and how large they should be.

So, read and think about the future. Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 13:45, 6 April 2013 (EDT)

Does anyone still have their Keyboard Map?

Sigh... I've often kicked myself for not carefully saving it when I recently moved...

All of the "hard box" editions of LOTRO over the years have included a Keyboard Map.

Recent discussion with some new F2P players have made it painfully obvious that they are neither aware of the existence of the Players Manual buried in the middle of the download for both the Mac and PC Clients --

"..Program Files/Turbine/The Lord of the Rings Online/<de/en/fr>/LOTRO Game Manual.pdf"
"~/Library/Application Support/Steam/Steam Apps/common/Lord of the Rings Online/The Lord of the Rings Online(tm).app/Contents/Resources/<de/en/fr>/LOTRO Game Manual.pdf"
"~/Library/Application Support/The Lord of the Rings Online(tm).app/Contents/Resources/<de/en/fr>/LOTRO Game Manual.pdf"

nor that a keyboard map exists.

So, the question is -- does anyone have a copy of the keyboard map distributed in the Boxed Sets who could make a PDF/jpg of it (each side) and upload it. (I can convert it from a PDF to a jpg if you do not have the needed tools.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 12:33, 11 April 2013 (EDT)
Scanned one for ya -- File:Keymap.png Savi (talk) 18:08, 12 April 2013 (EDT)
thank you ... now to integrate it in the "new player" info...Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 01:21, 13 April 2013 (EDT)

Inconsistancies between Title/Deed/Title Reward templates and doc

Here we go ... as Yogie would say "dejavouis all over again" ... Beginning on the Help page:

Create Articles:
However, the Template does not appear to process certain attributes. "Create new deed," does not include "Title-icon" found in the Template and the boilerplate.
That value is processed by: |<tr><td>{{Title Reward|{{#if:{{{Title-icon|}}}|{{{Title-icon}}}|{{{Regional-sub|}}}}}|{{{Title}}}}}</td></tr>
Which makes use of Template:Title Reward !

One issue is that too many things, like the newly created Chambers of Byrgenstow are defaulting to a slayer deed icon, instead of an explorer deed or something else. Something appears to be broken.

References at Category:Titles (referred to by Template:Infobox Titles) imply that "Reward Icons" are multi-worded, which is different from the one-word references at Reward/doc.

  • So the basic question becomes -- Does anyone know how this is all supposed to integrate (i.e. Deeds and Titles and their respective templates) before I start trying to force them all to be consistent?

Right at the moment, I don't really know what is SUPPOSED to be happening, so it's difficult to say what is broken vs. poorly documented (or maybe both!)

Note that I started this question at Template talk:Deed but no one has responded there, so I thought I'd try here before I start hacking and slashing. :)
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 23:00, 18 April 2013 (EDT)
converted nowiki text to links
Look at Template:Deed/Preload for the text that actually gets used by the Create new deed page.
- RingTailCat (talk) 08:25, 19 April 2013 (EDT)
Found my earlier incursion into this arena... Talk:Lotro-Wiki_Contributors'_Corner/Archive_2011#Creating_a_new_recipe_... - some 2 years ago...
Ok. so off to the races. First, I guess I'll fix the Doc vs doc -- issue in Category:Template Documentation starting with Deed/Doc. I've revised all "what links here" things that show up to "doc".
See: Template_talk:Deed#doc.2Fboilerplate.2Fpreload_cleanup for details.
  • Please review for any things I broke... Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 14:57, 20 April 2013 (EDT)

Creatures organized by level

Hello - New to this wiki and somewhat new to wiki, I edit/contribute to the big daddy 'pedia but not frequently enough to remember all the protocols. I know you'll correct me if I'm wrong.

In any event, I came looking for a chart of creatures organized by level as I need Journeyman Woodworker Scroll Cases: dropped from humanoids level 13-23.

Organized by type and area - but not level.

As an old database geek I know creating a table of data is easy enough but I'm not sure how to get it in the wiki.

I don't know if this is a big or small project, or even one to be considered.

- —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Ursa major prime (Contribs • User Talk) at 2013-04-22T21:31:57‎.

First, to help you find your Item:Journeyman Woodworker Scroll Cases, see Item:Journeyman Scroll Cases, because any mob of the right level has a chance to drop any of the different Journeyman Scroll Cases. Then, you can use the "What links here" link to get to a page like: Pages that link to "Item:Journeyman Scroll Case". But, be aware that the drop information for mobs is very incomplete.
Second, in the absence of a breakdown of mobs by level, you can look for quests by level. The regions where these quests occur will be populated by similar level mobs. See Quest Levels or Category:Regional Quests.
Middle-earth is organized into level bands within which all the quests and mobs are of a similar small range of levels. If you are in an area where there are level 23 beasts, you will likely also find level 23 humanoids which will drop Journeyman level scroll cases. Within these bands, mobs often appear with levels randomly distributed over that small level range. In other words, you will find a mix of different level mobs in one band. If you go to the next lower band, you will find lower level mobs, and in the other direction, higher level mobs. This general pattern spans all levels, from level 1 mobs in the intro areas to the current level cap mobs at the south end of the Sutcrofts in Eastern Rohan.
It might be possible to parse the level range we use for mobs so that we could classify mobs into one or more categories, much like we do with quests. There are, however, a wide selection of mobs which can appear at a very wide range of levels. The mobs in scalable skirmishes and instances have levels appropriate for the level of the skirmish or instance. It would be more appropriate to continue that discussion at the Template talk:Creature page.
- RingTailCat (talk) 02:01, 23 April 2013 (EDT)
@RTC, Excellent explanation of the "level bands" in Middle Earth... I understand them, but can never explain them :)
Just to expand on RTC's comment: "be aware that the drop information for mobs is very incomplete." This is an important, and not widely recognized fact about lotro-wiki -- 99% of the information contained on the wiki is purely empirical! That is to say, it has been acquired by Players-Playing LOTRO while simultaneously performing tedious information collection, and some judicious extrapolations. Turbine provides very little information (specific or otherwise), either via the Lorebook or data.lotro.com -- and especially provides extremely "hidden" strategic information. While they publish "Dev Diaries" from time to time, those frequently raise more questions than they answer. "Blue Name" responses in the forums are equally cryptic. Rarely does a dev respond to strategic or tactical questions, and if they do, their response is either couched in humor, or otherwise written so as to obscure a direct answer.
Two other pointers for you. One, from the crafting main page, in the recipes section, you will find indexes to the recipes available to the various professions. Woodworker Recipe Index will show you which recipes are available at each Tier. The second pointer is somewhat more subtle... that page is composed of a number of Tables of data. Note that Media-wiki does not provide a direct interface to any sort of database engine other than itself. That is to say, you can't build and display a table "on-the-fly" from a set of submitted parameters. (And LOTRO-wiki does not provide an interface to "call" other "off-site" sources for security reasons.)
As far as "protocols" are concerned -- we have tried to document many of them through the "help" section (see the left frame column). And through various "project" pages:
I have a collection of "editing stuff" (that I can never remember) at User:Magill/Editing - misc information. This includes local references as well as pointers to both Media Wiki and Wikipedia help pages (especially for tables).
Right now, we seem to be at a "low point" of participation by "senior" editors, so don't hesitate to tackle an editing project for fear of "stepping on toes." Gandalf knows we have more to do than bodies to do the work! So, dig in and enjoy!
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 10:52, 23 April 2013 (EDT)

BIG changes to Lorebook, MyLOTRO, Forums and data.lotro.com

Posted Wednesday 24 April 2013 by Sapience):

Soon we will be making several significant changes and updates to the LOTRO community websites. Some features of the existing community site will be upgraded, while others will be discontinued.
Forums
The forums are going to be upgraded to a slightly newer version of VBulletin.

Changes will include:

* The forum styling/appearance will be updated.
* We will be adding a new forum home page that includes forum category navigation and feeds of recent turbine announcements/recent player discussions.
* The reputation system will be discontinued.
* Forum performance will be improved.
* The forum layout and the number of forums will be streamlined to reduce the number of forums and sub-forums.
* Our bug reporting system is being revamped. We will update the bug reporting links as soon as the new system is available.
Lorebook
The LOTRO Lorebook will be discontinued. Official Guides will be relocated to LOTRO.Com website. If you have created a guide and wish to save it, please copy it from the lorebook in the next few days. We will be creating a new “Player Created Guides” forum for you to post your guides in.
MyLOTRO
Several MyLOTRO components will be moving to LOTRO.com or retiring. Details are as follows:
* The current player blog functionality will be discontinued. We are investigating ways of bringing blogging to players in the community site, but in the meantime existing player blogs can be exported for use at a later time. Exporting your blog will create an XML file containing all your blog entries, comments, and images, which can be imported into a variety of blogging platforms.
* Character and guild data will be discontinued. Please note that this will also impact any systems that rely on character data including PVMP leaderboards, Character Signatures, and API functionality (data.lotro.com).
* The Character Copy tool is being revamped and migrated to LOTRO.com.
* The LOTRO referral system is being revamped and migrated to LOTRO.com. Please note that if you currently have active referrals, you will continue to accrue bonus points from your existing referrals, but you will be unable to redeem bonus points from your referral wallet or add new referrals until the new front-end of the referral system is launched.
LOTRO Lotteries
The LOTRO Lotteries will receive a slight refresh and a new widget that should make them easier to find and enter. Our current expectation is the new system will be available with the launch of the new community site.

Post #6

ETA -- mid-May, possibly later in the month.

Post #12

Q: No API is disappointing. I assume that includes the item data. Not that the item data was 90% accurate or up to date at all. But this totally kills most third-party tools.
Q: ust a quick question: considering that the Lottery system will go on (and that we can therefore suppose that the tech behind the characters data gathering will be still on), can we expect (possibly not at the relaese, but later) that we get the character data back (even if only as xml like in data.lotro.com)?
A: These are sort of related. The data will still be there for some time, but it will not be supported or updated and will eventually be disabled. So anything, in terms of third party apps, that work now will continue to work as they do now until such time as it's finally disabled completely.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 09:56, 25 April 2013 (EDT)


Looks like we will need to root through pages to see if any refer to Lorebook pages for most of their content and copy it over. As one example I came across while checking Moria pages in need of revamp, The Vile Maw 12-man raid page relies entirely on Lorebook for the walk-through (most but not all of the walk-through is duplicated on the lotrolife webpage also linked to). Shardis (talk) 12:32, 25 April 2013 (EDT)

Pages can be exported from one WIKI and imported to another without too much trouble.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 11:19, 26 April 2013 (EDT)
Yeah, read the forum thread you linked and one of the later posts linked the Lorebook wiki export page.
Shardis (talk) 13:31, 26 April 2013 (EDT)

Update 11: Treachery of the White Hand now up on Bullroarer

Update 11: Treachery of the White Hand now up on Bullroarer -- is now patching on Bullroarer. Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 10:11, 25 April 2013 (EDT)

Help needed -- External links to Lorebook.lotro.com

Here's an idea... We can use Special Pages External links search with a search string of "https://lorebook.lotro.com" to generate a (surprisingly large) list of links to the Lorebook. Many appear to be simply "credits" or "footnotes," although they don't use the "cite" syntax but simply embed the URL.

Which brings up the question -- how do we cite a defunct website? We probably need a page called "the now defunct Lorebook.lotro.com" or something...

My brain is too fried by trying to finish (catch up now) quests in East Rohan... and now in Wildermoore to really think about something with such a scope... however, we have almost no time to work on it!!! (maybe 4-6 weeks at most!)

And randomly looking at the pages we have, like Defiler's Enemy I find some fascinating artifacts from lotrowiki history!!! ... a lorebook beta "stub" -- something that was never verified/updated/deleted.

Help is needed to:

  1. design and implement a standard "cite" to replace the html link to Lorebook.lotro.com and other similar things. So that we can eliminate references to lorebook.lotro.com that will no longer resolve.
  2. Identify pages with significant information which needs to be exported from lorebook.lotro.com and imported here so as not to lose the information.
  3. Figure out what else needs to be done so that important (and or historical) information is not lost.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 21:33, 26 April 2013 (EDT)
Tried to export a couple pages from the Lorebook using the link I mentioned in the above section, but apparently the system on their side is already so messed up that even the export feature not working. To export I finally had to go into edit mode on the Lorebook page and turn off the rich text editor to see the raw wiki markup and then copy all of it into a text document on my computer. Now I just need to paste them into the relevant pages on this site.
--Shardis (talk) 21:51, 27 April 2013 (EDT)
Please read the boilerplate below the edit window on this wiki. Perhaps we need to get permission to preserve some of that material before it vanishes. Or permission of the owner of this wiki that copying that text is OK. Just because it sounds like the other site's owner doesn't seem to value it now does not mean that they won't assert their rights to it at some later date. RingTailCat (talk) 00:04, 28 April 2013 (EDT)
That is good housekeeping, perhaps, but at the very least we should make an effort to save parts of the information in the meantime, be it here or some form of external storage. While I understand the potential legal concerns, I doubt we to want to end up losing information for the sake of process.
One particular question I have - should we record the information about the quests, monsters, and areas originally planned for Moria's hidden dungeons, for the sake of posterity? We could give it a header similar to the Obsolete tag, denoting that it's a feature that never made it to the game. While not a part of the Live game, it is a part of the history. Someone who hears about these long-lost spaces might get curious, and where before they could find it on the Lorebook, that source is about to vanish. -- JnK (talk) 20:52, 3 May 2013 (EDT)

Lalia's Market and Middle Earth Mannequins

One of the upcoming features of U11 is Lalia's Market. This space features a plethora of cosmetic items, including the much-maligned mannequins of Middle Earth. Most if not all of the items sold there (and on the mannequins for that matter) are cosmetic versions of various armor pieces, so documentation could draw from/drive similar documentation of those armors.

However, these items aren't technically in the store. Nor are they properly available via gameplay - they cost the mithril coins, which are bought from the store or won via hobbit presents. In order not to end up making the Outfits page that much longer, I'm thinking three pages would be in order:

  1. A page for the Mannequins that will list mannequin locations, as well as current and past sets
  2. A similar page for Lalia's Market Items (which might or might not be separate from the Lalia's Market location page)
  3. A combined gallery page similar to Outfits.

Any comments or suggestions on this idea would be most welcome! -- JnK (talk) 21:03, 3 May 2013 (EDT)

I'm guessing, but from the positive comments so far on Lila's store, it may become not just a permanent fixture of the game, but a primary interface to the Store... a "real live bricks and mortar" establishment as opposed to just the "clicks" in the Store... :)
There is also a lot of comments suggesting that the same kind of "display" Stable, be created out at Hechengers for all of the various mounts available. -- meaning that there goes another "chunk" of the store inventory.
Basically, the MTX (Micro Transaction) folks are finding more ways to "monetize" the game :)
So, yes, this is "a new thing" so some kind of new organization is definitely needed.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 00:39, 4 May 2013 (EDT)
I've started the Lalia's Market location page, and started building the structure for Category:Lalia's Market. One thought I had was to list the current offerings in each equipment slot category on that category's page, and transclude those into the location page perhaps. It would still be a long page, but not as bad as listing all past offerings as well (which is part of what the categories are for). The page can simply say "below is an itemized list of offerings, see (Lalia's Market Outfits) for a gallery listing).
Granted, the gallery wouldn't be quite as useful as Outfits, which pulls together disparate cosmetics from all over the world and festivals in one list. Anyone can ride to Bree, walk into the market, and try it on for themselves before buying. Not to mention the sheer logistics of a shop whose starting inventory boasts about 102 individual items and 9 outfit sets.
Then again, we don't know how frequently it'll change inventory either. -- JnK (talk) 16:15, 4 May 2013 (EDT)

Massively announces Update 11 to be released next Monday 13 May

https://massively.joystiq.com/2013/05/06/lotro-update-11-brings-five-new-areas-on-may-13/

No "official" word from Turbine, but CSTM followed Massively with the announcement, and supposedly it went out to Turbine's "Press release" mailing list.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 22:41, 6 May 2013 (EDT)
"Update 11: Treachery of the White Hand is coming May 13. Learn all you need to know here: (https://www.lotro.com/en/u11)"
C/o the @lotro Twitter feed. -- JnK (talk) 01:15, 7 May 2013 (EDT)
With Spring Festival tentatively scheduled to start Tuesday May 21, that gives them a week to also come up with the patch for whatever they manage to break with Update 11 as well. - Shardis (talk) 13:02, 7 May 2013 (EDT)

Brand new...want to help

Hello,

with lotro's recent decision to discontinue the lorebook...this site becomes critical to the gaming community. Im sure I don't need to point that out to you.

I am one of those "completest" gamers who have to do every quest. I want to help contribute to the quests categories. Not entirely sure how to start.

I would also like to know if there is a way to export the quests to a csv file format...I saw it can be done with xml...but im not xml savvy.

Apologies if this is not the correct place to have put this inquiry.

Thanks,

Groothewanderer —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Groothewanderer (Contribs • User Talk) at 10:07, 9 May 2013‎.

Welcome aboard... I just created your "talk" page which points out a couple of starting points.
  • I don't know how familiar you are with a Wiki, however one thing as we mention at the end of the "Welcome Message" -- "Please remember to sign your name on talk pages (like this one) using four tildes (~~~~) as this will automatically produce your name and the date."
  • Take time to create a "home page" -- tell others a bit about yourself, your characters, your server, playing history, what interests you have on the WIKI, etc. Just visit other's pages to for ideas. (And keep in mind that some of those pages have evolved over significant amounts of time.)
  • There are more things to do than hours (let alone people) to do them. In particular, Turbine is constantly updating quests, deeds and the like, so as you progress a character, please check out the quest write-ups we have here on the WIKI and see that they are "current." -- Especially things like stats on rewards get changed with essentially no notice from Turbine.
  • Question for you: when you say "export the quests" are you referring to from the WIKI? or from in-game? or from the Lorebook?
  • There are Lua Plugins which contain Quest lists -- lotro compendium being one, that I can think of off hand.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 13:27, 9 May 2013 (EDT)

U11 unvails a Mounted Companion for Lore Masters

I just now encountered the Mounted Companion for the Lore Master... It will take some writing up as it is not obvious where/how one activates it. Similarly, I don't know if the other "Pet masters" get mounted companions or not, I've only seen reference to the Lore Master's companion ...

It appears that this is related to:
"Mounted Combat Update
Mounted Combat receives a significant update, with the yellow trait tree being integrated into the base War-steed for optimal maneuverability. In place of the previous movement trait tree, each class will get their own specific yellow tree, with boost and skills tailored to each role."

I'll write up a page for the Mounted Combat stuff, and we can figure out what to do with it as time goes on.... hopefully others with "Pet-masters" can fill in and elaborate for them.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 13:56, 9 May 2013 (EDT)

Continue this discussion at: Talk:War-steed Traits -- Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 01:56, 10 May 2013 (EDT)

U11- Effect of changes to "Enhanced XP" on Quest "rewards."

We currently provide some number for the amount of IXP and SXP when we record a quest.

This value is NOT provided by the quest, but only appears in the chat window at the completion of the quest.

From the discussions on the changes in Update 11, it appears that 90+% of the time, those values are incorrect... or will be in the future (i.e. Monday), I'm not certain which.

It appears that currently neither IXP nor SXP have any bonuses applied to them. That is the values in the chat window are in fact "base" numbers. (Although there seems to be disagreement on this from the players, and Turbine has not commented on how things work "now.")

With the changes in U11, various Enhanced XP bonuses will be applied to both IXP and SXP, and the numbers in the Chat window will reflect those bonuses.

In short, I would recommend, that we eliminate the NUMBER associated with IXP and SXP when recording a quest and simply post them as Turbine does -- as Icons.

This could be accomplished retroactively by simply modifying the template to NOT DISPLAY the value, even though it would not barf if handed it. Alternately, a bot run could eliminate the "last stuff" on the right in the template call, and the template modified to not accept the value.

Hopefully there will be a Dev Diary by Monday (13 May) when U11 goes live which will explain the details of this change -- the Bullroarer Release notes and the Focus evaluation don't answer many (if any) questions.

Please continue this discussion in : Talk:Boilerplate:Quest#U11-_Effect_of_changes_to_.22Enhanced_XP.22_on_Quest_.22rewards..22

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 11:40, 11 May 2013 (EDT)

Some interesting numbers.

I have no idea how accurate this information is. Source: https://lotroaltfinder.net/

1,308,845	Characters
1,153,797	Freeps
155,048	        Creeps
 
476,579	Unique accounts
57,588	Accounts with at least one max level freep
56,422	Accounts with at least one max level creep

I can guess it might be acquired from data.lotro.com. There are a couple of global retrieval commands which could allow this to be collected by server. This is one of those things going away very soon when the Lorebook and data.lotro.com are decommissioned.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 19:17, 14 May 2013 (EDT)

Legacy Table Not Working

In regard to Stealth_Level page, I have edited it for the Max Rank 3 table from this page Legacy_Cost_Progression which I also edited the Max Rank 3 table for. However, the values are not showing-up under the Tier/Rank section that it is supposed to correspond to. What am I doing wrong?

Doxiwit (talk) 17:28, 21 May 2013 (EDT)

You are not the first, nor will you be the last, to run into this problem.
The legacy tables are a very complex set of templating. The obvious thing to do with them is wrong, as I found when I first attempted to modify them. Somewhere on one of the pages I link to from here (or on their talk pages) is a description of how to modify these tables. It's not simple, and it's a bit painful, so I leave it as an exercise for you to figure out how to do it. I hope you find that "Ah ha" moment that will let you make your changes correctly. Until then, you have my sympathy.
- RingTailCat (talk) 23:08, 21 May 2013 (EDT)
It appears that Boilerplate:Legacy not correct. A quick "create new legacy" test reveals that in fact either the template is broken; or the documentation is completely incorrect.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 13:05, 22 May 2013 (EDT)

An ongoing debate

I am also thinking...do many people use monster pages to find specific drops? ie If I am looking for a 'Light Hide' I will go to the item page and see where to get it, then go to a specific mob page to find that mob's location, I've actually not used the drop section myself for finding things (on the mob page). Hence why I figured it would be better to simply show the icons. Browsing for the sake of curiosity can still show the item name and details on click or hover, but it saves a LOT of space that is probably not needed....

--Savi (talk) 11:53, 23 May 2013 (EDT)

This topic has been debated as long as I have been editing on the Wiki, and from those debates, apparetnly since the WIKI was started.

We have no real way to determine how or why people visit LOTRO-wiki. ...
* Do they come for explicit information? ... typically from some search engine link or maybe from some forum posting.
* Do they come to the home page just to browse around?
* Do they come to the home page expecting some kind of hierarchical structure and find they are "short circuited" into using the search function and so therefore can not really do any browsing?
The only "opinions" we have are from the few editors who take part in those discussions (a precious few).
We get zero input from the casual visitor.

I suspect that a lot of the information on the WIKI is very superfluous. ... That is to say, the Editors have found it "interesting" to include that information because they found it "interesting to themselves." A classic example is the Monster page itself. I would guess that over 90% of the Monster pages have never been completed. I know this is especially true as you get to Monsters above about level 40. Why is that? The answer is quite simple -- the display we have for a Monster is the output of the Lore-master's "Knowledge of the Lore-master" spell. There are very few Lore-master's in-game, and even fewer of them existent as toons used by Editors. Getting the KOLM information is "risky" -- the Lore-master is a "squishy," the "cool-down" long meaning, it is a requirement that the LM acquiring the info do so in the company of "protectors" who are aware of the fact that the LM is acquiring data for the WIKI, and not available for "crowd control."

The number of "creatures" listed by region falls off dramatically as the average level goes up. Category:Creatures by Location And the Creatures page itself has not bee updated to include any from Rohan... it's all a matter of interest and time available on the part of Editors who have toons of a particular level. (I've been working on the Quests in both Rohan and Wildermore and have been ignoring the creatures.)

There are many other topics in the WIKI which are seriously incomplete -- information was added because an individual became interested in some topic for some time, and then lost interest... either in the topic or, more commonly, in LOTRO itself.

Personally, I've never used the WIKI to find out information about mob drops, or what is dropped where. Crafting drops, basically hides only, are all from "well known" sources, found in well known locations. Task drops are "a joke" -- you get one type of drop when you are working one part of the geography from the mobs found there, and another type from another area.... but none of them are necessary. You get more "task items" from deed grinding (kill 300 mobs) than you can ever use, so who cares what mob drops which one? -- the only "unique" task drops in Middle Earth are for the Heroes of Limlight Gorge and those two items are unique to the daily quests in the Limlight Gorge.

I don't have the tools to do this, and I don't know if they exist as part of the MediaWiki or even basic WIKI tool kits, however, it would be interesting to see some kind of graphing or other pictorial representation of "Special:PopularPages" -- broken down by Registered WIKI users and others. And then the portion of Registered users by frequency of edits.

Similarly, I note that the Main Page‏‎ has 9,091,719 views, while the next most viewed page is Class‏‎ with only 1,330,960 views! (I also have no idea what time period is being used here for these counts ... is it a rolling 30 day count? or since some point in time? or ???)

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 13:11, 23 May 2013 (EDT)
Those mob pages are particularly difficult when you get into Skirmish and Instance mobs. It's harder to document things, or snap quality images of monsters, when you're in the middle of a difficult fight. And some creatures aren't able to BE scanned at all - they're in session play, or class-restricted instances, or some other barrier to use of the skill in the first place. I've long thought it would be nice to have an option not to display the empty data slots, or trigger the stub classification just because a mob we can't scan doesn't have a scan.
But to be fair, mob scanning was more important in years past than it is now. The referential data on what something was weak to was handy in planning a fight, because no, not every group HAS a loremaster to scan for them, nor do they want to wait until the fight is at hand to prepare equipment. Nowadays, though, most mobs seem to have very generic setups, and damage type is rarely as crucial to defeating a monster as it once was. That said, I am planning to dust off my Loremaster and scan the mobs of Rohan as she works her way through. I'm especially curious to see the data on the Warbands, though it'll probably be the uniform "Good" or "Superior" across the board again.
Still, we don't know what will or won't be useful to someone. I had someone PM me on the forums asking if I could please update Category:Mount Appearance Traits because some traits were missing and several still had Beta tags. I've gotten most everything I have data on in now, aside from the Store-bought hides, tails, and accessories (the icons are in, the pages just need to be written). Or there was the GLFF feed on Landroval the other day, where someone was asking about daily quests that awarded Silver Riddermark Tokens. Someone linked our page on those Tokens, which has a list of said daily quests. I can't even count the number of times I've seen people answer questions on where something is with direct copy/pastes from our articles.
Ultimately, it's best to just include everything we can find in as elegant a fashion as possible. Some of us are more technical or skilled at number-crunching, so documenting the math of how legacies are distributed or skills applied is more up their alley. Others are more visually-inclined - I myself favour screencapping of icons, cosmetics, and monsters. Everybody does their part, and while it's far from perfect, some data is better than nothing.
Back to the topic at hand - mob drop data for landscape creatures is a bit of a troublesome thing. Often, loot lists are highly generic - there's a few vendor trash items befitting the species, and then there's pretty much universal drops for that area, and for all the world. Humanoids drop additional items. Aside from bosses who drop specific things, I should think there would be little direct interest in this data. But on top of that, we tend to record drops (if we record them at all) on a monster-by-monster basis, rather than shared loot lists. Certainly, one should be cautious drawing assumptions, but if something drops one crafting item, it's very likely able to drop any.
The how and the why of gathering and implementing such data, if at all, should probably be left to those who are actively working with it, though. -- JnK (talk) 17:55, 23 May 2013 (EDT)
As mentioned above, the creature pages are not so important as they used to be. Now, even many of the squishy classes can solo on-level mobs, and any kind of group faces no challenge at all with on-level mobs. But quite often, you see a high level player shepherding one or more lower level characters through all the tough patches, so they are in no danger what-so-ever. It hardly matters if the mob is weak to ancient dwarf or fire any more. Just bash away at it with any available weapon, quaff a store-bought pot if your morale drops, and race off towards the end-game.
At one time, the armour and weapons dropped by the level 15-16 Southern Raiders near Dogwood's Farm gave you the best gear you could get for that level, unless you could crafted it. The lottery, Hobbit Presents, and the store have eroded the value of those drops. Most of it truly is just vendor trash now.
I think a lot of our pages bring back fond memories of tough battles and hard won victories. Filling them in took a lot of care and dedication from many editors. But it doesn't seem to be so rewarding any more.
Perhaps using the Semantic web extension will make it easy enough to collect and record game info that more folks will rise to the challenge and carry on the tradition.
- RingTailCat (talk) 21:12, 23 May 2013 (EDT)
As a side note, non-Lore-masters can scan creatures with the Wildlife of Middle-earth Tome but there isn't much class-specific content after level 50 that a Lore-master couldn't scan. You can also hide the resistances and weaknesses on the creature template with the "noharm" parameter as seen at Winter Fox. This is used mainly for critters but similar functionality was discussed being implemented for session play creatures and the like but no action was taken as far as I know. Oh, and if there's a skirmish and/or instance mob data-gathering project forming, I'll gladly contribute. They usually have a lot less loot to deal with. Neum (talk) 07:55, 24 May 2013 (EDT)
Leaving the whole "why and what people use the wiki for" aside, this, in my view, is merely an organization issue, since it neither adds nor reduces information, it will simply reorganize what we already have. If one wants to see the stats and detailed information of any item he will still be able to do so by hovering the item, while those that don't want to do it will be able to just see the icons/names without having to browse through everything else. I really don't see why not do it (other than perhaps an somewhat unnecessary need for this organization as not many people may use this information, but if it can be done by a bot this shouldn't be a problem either), its a win-win.
Gwenwyfar (talk) 16:17, 24 May 2013 (EDT)
Please see Template talk:Lootbox#New version of template using Has Drop property for the latest developments. RingTailCat (talk) 08:37, 5 June 2013 (EDT)

Forum revamp (and end of the Lorebook)

According to Sapience's post yesterday, the long awaited Forum Revamp will occur "later this month."

Sapience: Character Levels Not Updating

I would not expect this to be addressed. As we've already said this feature is being removed from the website and the next version is currently underdevelopment and testing (estimated to release the end of June), this would mean diverting resources better used elsewhere.

So, if there is Lorebook information or references which folks want "saved" -- now is the time to do it.

Two items I've done that with is: Chicken Play Guide and another The Stone of Wyrgende. I've contacted both original authors, but so far have not had a response from either. I've simply credited them at the bottom of the article as the original authors.

Apparently Forum posts are being retained. However, no comment has been made as to the extent (if at all) references (links) to those posts will continue to work. Past updates to the Forums have resulted in most all of such links simply failing, or redirecting to the main Forums page.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 11:29, 12 June 2013 (EDT)

End of the Lorebook and Google Maps

Does anyone know (or heard rumors about) the Google Maps aspect of the Lorebook?

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 11:33, 12 June 2013 (EDT)

A significant problem with Creatures vs Mobs; the Creature template and auto-characterization

Please see the discussion Template_talk:Creature#A_significant_issue_with_Creatures_vs_Mobs.3B_the_Creature_template_and_auto-characterization

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 16:00, 18 June 2013 (EDT)

"Catching up"

As I've been creating the pages for Wildermore and laying some boiler-plate for West Rohan i.e. the Helm's Deep expansion, (but which we have already entered via the Epic line's visit to Edoras), a number of things have become apparent.

There are MANY "lists of things" which do not include references to East Rohan "things," and in some cases "things" from even earlier updates. Similarly, many pages have confused and/or conflicting references to Store items... or have them missing.

I realize that both tracking these changes is difficult as the Release notes are rarely "inclusive" of all the changes which take place with any given update, and the fact that, for whatever reasons, the number of editors at the WIKI seems to be at a seriously low point. (I would love to have the Special:ActiveUsers list available in "activity" order, not just alphabetical.

Travelling is one such I've just started working on. Part of that effort has been to create an additional Category Category: Travel Skills for transclusion and in an effort to collect together in one location all of those sort of references. In addition to the "Return to" skills, which are general, are the "Guide to" and "Muster to" skills of the Hunter (Hunter Travel Skills) and Warden respectively. I'm about to split out the Warden mustering skills out in to its own transclusion, but at the moment, it is simply part of the big long list of Warden skills Warden_Skills#Travel_Skills. The goal being to provide transclusions for the Travelling page.

From what I can tell there are many Titles (and deeds?) which need to be created/completed, especially for Wildermore, and probably for East Rohan as well.

I've tackeld the Creatures issue for Category: East Rohan Creatures and Category: Wildermore Creatures so at least they are all sorted back into Region instead of Area... but I have only cringed while looking at the Category: Moria Creatures mess. See: my immediately previous post.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 19:19, 19 June 2013 (EDT)
I have slowly been working on updating the Moria content. Admittedly the creature entries are at the bottom of my list for Moria. I try and do an entire major area at a time. Been working on Great Delving lately. I don't have any characters above 60, so can't really help with the higher content updates. As of a moment ago when I looked at Moria creatures, the categories looked ok. There are "Mob" categories for the instances, and "Creature" categories for the major areas (Great Delving, Flaming Deeps, etc). In Moria, the major map areas act more like regions (with their own quest log categories) than areas. There are a few misnamed "Mob" or "Creature" categories but they are empty or few pages for most part.
-Shardis (talk) 01:58, 20 June 2013 (EDT)
Somewhere "recently" Moria got "changed" -- all creatures (and MOBS) should be by REGION, not by Area. I'm not certain if I started it when I was working on the first Moria update (when I didn't understand the creature organization), or if Zimoon did.
It's easy, but tedious to change all of the individual character pages so that the Region is "Moria" not, Great Delving, for example. However, if Moria is consistent within itself, (Creatures in areas) that is probably more important than moving them all up to their upper level categories. :)
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 23:37, 24 June 2013 (EDT)
While I agree Creature pages should be usually categorized by region, I consider Moria to be a rather odd special case where the line between region and area is blurred. The 11 major areas in Moria (Great Delving, Durin's Way, etc) each have their own large map, quest log heading, and such like the older regions. Each of them also sometimes have sub-areas of their own. I try to treat them as areas where possible in boilerplate. If the consensus is to change the Moria creature pages to location = Moria and then edit the location info after the infobox with all the major areas where it is found, I have no problem with that. It will actually cut down on the total number of Moria creature pages. It may be a bit tedious but then again a lot of wiki editing is tedious.
-Shardis (talk) 07:43, 25 June 2013 (EDT)
You hit on an interesting point -- Moria IS different... almost as if it's creation had been contracted out. :) Mirkwood shares some, but not all of the similar "disconnectness" with the rest of the game mechanics. The two Moria revisions primarily addressed quest flow, and to a lesser extent "mob density;" the graphics enhancements by contrast were simply tweaks to the overall and highlighting Lighting effects, they did not represent "content changes" as did the new "quest hubs" and the like.
I have no objections to leaving Moria as it is. It is more complex than Lothlorian, The Great River, East Rohan or Wildermore. I'm expecting West Rohan to look pretty similar to East Rohan. I believe it has already been implied (or specifically stated, I forget which) that there will be another five "Ridings."
In a posting I was reading today, the statement was made that Turbine did NOT come close to revenue projections they made to WB for Riders of Rohan. That was apparently the primary driver behind the October 2012 staff layoffs.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 12:36, 25 June 2013 (EDT)

New housing upkeep panel

Just noticed today -- there is a new housing upkeep panel... allows one to use in-game gold or mithril coins for upkeep.

You can use a slider to select how much you want to pay in advance.
It also allows upkeep to be stretched out until year end (12/29)
note that there is a major update to housing coming between now and Helm's deep.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 23:28, 24 June 2013 (EDT)

11.2 is up on Bullroarer

Update 11.2 is up on Bullroarer.

New Mobil skin for Forums!

Works like a champ on iPhone and apparently Android phones as well..

You have to go to lotro.com and login first, then access the forums. Then scroll to the bottom and change theme to the mobile version.

I had the login attempt "fail" -- too many re-directs... but when going back to www.lotro.com/forums <-- note the plural, I was successfully logged in; then just scrolled down to the bottom and in the lower right corner pick "Default Mobile Style."

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 10:48, 4 August 2013 (EDT)

Holy Guacamole Batman! -- translated as ;.... Holy Lembas Gimli!!!

Make certain you read the latest ...

20 Questions – Big Battles

A significant new game mechanic is being introduced.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 20:20, 6 August 2013 (EDT)

An important comment by Sapience in that thread...

The question by Fredelas

The response by Sapience:

And commented later

And by jwbarry

By jwbarry on UPSCALING ...

Worth remembering this game mechanic comment by jwberry:

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 21:48, 6 August 2013 (EDT)

What (if any) are the effects of the loss of the Lorebook for LotRO-Wiki?

I know its been a long time since I've made any (attempted) edits to the lotro-wiki and I apologize to everyone for that. I'll spare any of the drama that explains why and just get straight to the point...

Since we've had some time to feel the effects of the changes made to the lotro community website now, I was wondering what effects they've had on what is provided here? I ask because I recalled vaguely that I'd used the Lorebook to source some of the info I was considering for edits/updates to the info that is provided here before, as well as, recalled (vaguely yet again) that a lot of the lotro direct content came from there also.

Being that (I think) I'm finally going to be able to start back to work on helping out the gang here again, I was hoping to get more involved with what and how things are done here -and- what protocols to follow beyond the basics that are provided already. I ask because, I'd believed that I'd followed them on an actual edit I'd made but sadly, had it reverted by Zimoon to my dismay. lol --Maldavia (talk) 04:39, 16 August 2013 (EDT)

  1. Visible "internal issues" -- dead links to the Lorebook
  2. Visible "external issues" -- who knows? Some folks keep referring to the Wiki in the Forums as "the replacement!" I have seen (I think) a few more PC and Kinship entries appear.
  3. A number of articles were copied over from the Lorebook to the Wiki before it shutdown. Translations and Chicken Play Guide being two I did. Others brought other information over Elinnea brought over some music related things, I don't recall the pages off hand.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 21:54, 16 August 2013 (EDT)
Just happened to re-read your note ... there is very little content on the Wiki which came directly from the Lorebook. (Copyright and all that.) It, supposedly all came from in-game screen-shots. One other issue with the Lorebook was that it had not been "successfully" updated since Rise of Isengard's release (Update 4 back in September of 2011). Consequently, a lot of things had been changed in game, and were WRONG on the Lorebook as their entries had not been updated. The break in the link between the on-line database and data.lotro.com/Lorebook was one of the reasons for abandoning them.
Other than that, reading Z's comment on your talk page -- suffice it to say, not everyone agree(d)s with much of the auto characterization "stuff." As it turns out almost all of Moria is wrong... but that's a problem in determining the difference between "Region" and "Zone" something which the Templates to not take care of. I.r. there are only 21 Regions in Middle-earth, and ALL of Moria is one Region. [[Area]s more correctly respond to "Zones," but the templates don't do much with that distinction.
The "Questgroup" field vs "questchain" is particularly problematic. In particular if you look at the Rohan and Wildermore quests (and most of Great River) you will discover that by using "questchain" an infobox is automatically placed on the quest page, essentially in place of, the "Questchain" box which the template automatically installs. That Questchain box is a transclusion of the contents of a particular Category page. In particular, starting with Dunland (RoI), where Turbine was not as "consistent" the serious problem of "quest gating" became apparent. While Turbine had stopped using the Questchain parameter in the in-game quest boxes (See the "Explanation of Parameters" section drop-down on the Boilerplate Quest page), it became more than slightly necessary to list the quests in the order in which they had to be completed as in-fact the quests were chained together ... or as Turbine put it "quest gating." They became much more "emphatic" about gating with the Great River and later regions. You really were required to progress through the region in sequence. It was not possible to "pick and choose" as it had been in the past. Put another way -- there was a significant change in the Game mechanic.
hope this helps make sense of things...
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 17:16, 17 August 2013 (EDT)

Update 11.3 is up on Bullroarer

11.3 Came up on Bullroarer late Friday. Expect it to be a short run... [quote] Lag and Mounted combat Players who have previously reported issues with lag and 'rubber banding' while using a Warsteed or during Mounted Combat should see these issues improve. [/quote] Being the most visible (of the 5 items) in the release notes.

The Great Documentation Project

As part of my great documentation project: User:Magill/Project-Documentation, and part of documenting "Tools for Editors", I took comments from the LOTROadmin talk page the other day and expanded on it to create Help: Patrolling. (A term which I had often heard, but had never had defined.)

There is undoubtedly still a great deal to do and much "oral tradition" to be captured. Just getting the Article Management Tags to be consistent has been a lot of work.

And then there are the "templates," and Bots .....!

Please add/correct/comment on things... There are so few of us "old timers" around that much knowledge is in danger of being lost. (Hey, I'm still a newbe!)

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 16:12, 18 August 2013 (EDT)

Changes to the WIKI "planned" for this Fall!!!

Just reading between the lines of .... the last 20 questions MAJOR MAJOR changes coming to virtually everything as a result of the pending Class changes and Trait-lines ....

LI's, Legacies, Skills, Effects, Traits, Deeds, Virtues, all are going to be "updated" ... nominally 20 skills per class! ... no more Bards or Class Trainers!

Not clear how(or if) "Items" will have their stats changed... other than LIs and Legacies, which the Devs clearly indicated.

It's going to be like starting the WIKI all over again! "Trait Specialization" begins at level 6! So, the whole theoretical process of "leveling" changes.

Simply updating the various "skill effects" is going to take a lot of effort.

  • I'm wondering if a positive or negative "stub" would be appropriate --
"Not yet verified for Update 12" -- applied to everything, and then removed when updated or verified. This might have the side benefit of putting everything in a "look here" category, i.e. to be updated... no idea how much load that would put on the server.
Alternately, a stub -- "Verified with Update 12 info"
  • Thoughts?

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 11:05, 26 August 2013 (EDT)

The negative stub would probably be more useful (Not yet verified) because then it can be removed once the check is done, and the category can be used as a work-list. We already have Template:Stub/Expansion, which would do the trick nicely - no need to re-create the wheel here. I (or someone else) can just go through ahead of time to do a little sweeping out of the ones currently in Category:Stubs/Expansion. I don't know if it makes sense to have a bot add the stub to all pages in the affected categories, or if we should stick to manual.
Depending on exactly how extensive the changes end up being, we might want to actually start fresh and come up with new skill and trait templates, make fresh pages, and mark all the old ones obsolete. Based on the examples we've heard from the Burglar, it sounds to me like most of the skills that we will have will be keeping the names of current skills, so the skills might just need to be updated, instead of completely re-written. The traits on the other hand might need something completely new, as well as a way to show the trait trees. The war-steed trait trees I hacked up using tables are not ideal. It'd be nice to scout out if there are any more user-friendly options already devised out there in the wiki-verse.
I'm guessing the LIs, effects, and other things changing peripherally won't need such a drastic overhaul, in terms of wiki structure. Now the actual updating, that is going to take a lot of work. -- Elinnea (talk) 21:22, 26 August 2013 (EDT)
Minimally, the new "trait tree" system will change the "Look and feel" completely -- out goes the old "circle of virtues" to be replaced by a "Mounted Trait" type set of screens.
The big "problem" will be finding out which "skills" (etc.) are changing. Some can be pretty easily "discovered" from the new trait trees, but others, will probably just be random encounters... much like the changes brought about by "Fate" replacing ICPR/ICMR.
Yes, I suspect the names won't be changed, ... just to confuse the innocent :)... probably won't even get new icons.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 16:04, 28 August 2013 (EDT)
They've said that virtues will "remain mostly the same", to quote the 20 questions, so I don't expect that structure to change. The racial traits won't be changing either. But I actually am very interested to see how the new class trait system will turn out, visually.
I think you're right about the challenge of finding all the skills. Looking again at the 20 questions, they said about skills: "Some will be gained from the tree, others will be auto-granted based on level." Those auto-granted ones will be trouble, because currently I depend on taking a low-level character to the class trainer to check out all the high-level skills. I may need to get leveling. Or start convincing my kinmates they really wouldn't mind standing around taking dozens of screenshots for me. Or hope that more high-level burglars and captains and lore-masters and rune-keepers flock to the wiki as contributors. Hmm.
I hope the bards stick around at least to sell me my musical instruments. It's actually quite handy to be able to pick up a harp or horn in just about any town. -- Elinnea (talk) 22:34, 28 August 2013 (EDT)
I'm just taking a stab at the dark with this one here but, maybe at least with the level-based auto-granted class skills, all the characters that are high level will automatically get those skills added to them the first time they log in after that update hits the servers. If so, we maybe able to just screenshot the list and details of each new skill in our in-game update list?
I remember having a bunch of new level-based and/or area-specific auto-granted skills/traits/titles/deeds spooling out in mass for each of my upper level characters when I logged in with them immediately after several like updates were released in the past -and- each one showed up highlighted in my update logs the first time I opened it... Only problem with that was, after I opened my logs for the first time to review them, they all blended in with the previous skills/traits/titles/deeds so, they didn't stick out from the previous ones so I could go back to easily spot/review them again at a later date.
So, maybe making a list of prior [to the update in question] skills would be worth making -to balance against the new ones gained from the update- just in case those that are planning to capture that info for translation/addition to here would have at least a little bit of an easier time of going back into their update logs to piece it all together in bite sized chunks [instead of having to go through them all at once] to see all of what came with the update for each class.
Just an idea about a possible solution for that Magill that wouldn't require grinding new characters out to max just to find what new skills came with the update. Considering that it could take longer than how long the LotRO Dev's would take to come out with one or more new updates after that [potentially bringing a whole host of new data to translate/add to here on top of working out the new skills issue you've expressed above] whatever we can do to expedite that process would be to our benefit for sure.
--Maldavia (talk) 08:59, 29 August 2013 (EDT)

Bullroarer invitations have started going out today.

Join us for the opening of Beta with an event on Thursday, September 5, 2013 starting at 7:00 PM(-4 GMT)!

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 22:11, 29 August 2013 (EDT)

Massively breaks Helm's Deep NDA....

https://massively.joystiq.com/2013/09/03/the-determined-defense-of-lord-of-the-rings-online-helms-deep/

Despite their opening line... as far as I am aware, the NDS has NOT been lifted... One presumes that Massively jumped the "embargo date" pretty substantially.

At least they have a screenshot of a preliminary version of the new Trait Tree Interface.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 18:47, 3 September 2013 (EDT)

Or maybe the NDA ia lifted...?

Sapience posted this screen shot of the Trait Tree earlier today in the Helm's Deep forum: (the WIKI's spam filter has blocked this)

        //ow.ly/i/3337W/original

He futher explained...

[QUOTE=Sapience] You mean the one on the bottom RIGHT of the image I posted? It means you can purchase additional stored trait configurations. You start with two for free and can purchase more. So you can save multiple "builds".
[QUOTE=Sapience] The skills on the left unlock as you progress through the trees. They're not gated by Turbine Points.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 19:00, 3 September 2013 (EDT)
They didn't break an NDA. This wasn't part of beta testing, it was a one-time event hosted by Turbine on TwitchTV to which certain members of the Lotro "press" were invited. Today a similar article was posted on the French site JoL, and they went into more detail on the specifics of how the half-hour alpha pre-viewing session was organized. I know I was ecstatic to get a picture of a trait tree setup, however preliminary it might be at this point. :) -- Elinnea (talk) 19:24, 3 September 2013 (EDT)

Housing update

[QUOTE=Sapience] The housing update is not part of the expansion. That doesn't mean we aren't still planning on making changes this year (after the expansion launches).
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 19:10, 3 September 2013 (EDT)

Quad pack deal - all 4 expansions $39.99 at the revised LOTRO Market

The Lotro Market -- store.lotro.com (different from store.turbine.com) has just posted a new "best deal"

  • The Quad-Pack -- All four expansions for $39.99 -- Mines of Moria/Siege of Mirkwood/Rise of Isengard/Riders of Rohan --

Includes a Rohirrim mount, but no Turbine Points.

If someone can recall where we have the "current best deal" listed on the Wiki, please update it for me...

I'm slogging through Moria with an alt at the moment, and collecting Bounder's Tokens.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 15:20, 4 September 2013 (EDT)

Dev Diaries for the Class Changes coming in Update 12: Helm's are posted

The Dev Diaries for the Class Changes coming in Update 12: Helm's are being posted.

They are being posted in alphabetical order -- first was Burglar. Still to come: Rune-keeper and Warden.
  • These changes will entail some re-thinking and re-writing of the individual class pages here on LOTRO-wiki.
Remember, these changes will be driven by the new "Trait Trees," which have not yet had a Dev Diary elaborating on their working, only the screen-shot posted by Sapience.
However if one assumes the same mechanism as is used in the Mounted Combat Trait Trees, which that screen-shot seems to imply, there will be some significant changes coming in the way in which Skills are acquired as players level-up. One can infer some implications from statements like: "This however can be somewhat mitigated by investing some points..."
U12 Traits Panel posted by Sapience
War-steed Traits Panel
  • There are some interesting words in these descriptions -- I have a hunter as my main and I note: "and maximize their procs?" Duh... what "procs" That is a term which is "undefined" on LOTRO-Wiki, save for an "academic definition" found at: Game_Terms#Proc_.28Special_Procedure.29 (and that I can recall, the hunter has no procing "stuff").
  • Similarly, "Making the Bowmaster the stationary, long ranged damage dealer, the huntsman the mobile-induction harasser, and the Trapper of Foes the utility hunter who primarily uses traps for damage and crowd control." implies some significant "play-style" changes are coming.
  • "Being able to shoot on the move" -- Wow... this is something which Hunters have been asking for for years!
  • So read through the description of your favorite character class and compare it to what we describe on the Wiki today. Contemplate how our pages will need to be changed to reflect these new efforts... we have a little over a month until Launch (18 November).
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 00:56, 28 September 2013 (EDT)
  • LOTRO-Wiki class page for the Warden.
Greetings, fellow Runekeepers! Working on this class turned out being a tough nut to crack. The Rune-keeper was built to be a good healer and good damage dealer at the same time by swinging from one end to the attunement bar to the other. When we started, we felt it was very important that the swing remain intact. Being able to be a damage dealer and then swing to provide backup healing was our number one priority and so the trees were built in such a way to encourage this play, while making you great at one at the same time.
Greetings! Deviled_Egg here again to talk about changes to everyone’s favourite singer-songwriter: The Minstrel.
Hey folks! I’m Deviled_Egg and I’m going to fill you in on some of the goodies the Lore-master will be receiving in the Helm’s Deep expansion. The Lore-master will feature three distinct specializations, each one catering to a different play-style. The Keeper of Animals is the Lore-master’s pet line. Specializing in this line will make your pets stronger and tougher to take down, as well as offer new interactions between you and your pets. The Master of Nature’s Fury is the Lore-masters DPS Line. Traits in this line will give you the ability to wield Flame, Lightning, and Frost to great effect. Last, but certainly not least, is The Ancient Master. This specialization will give you a suite of debuffs and disables which can render your enemies’ attacks useless, or make them more vulnerable to the attacks of you and your allies. The Ancient Master also has the ability to restore the Morale and Power of allies.
Hey Hunters! It’s been an honor to work on this class for the revamp and am very excited with the changes we made overall...
Hey all, Verizal here to talk to you about all the fun, new changes coming up with the Guardian. I was pretty pumped when I found out that I was going to have the opportunity to work on this class, given both my experiences in LOTRO, and my inclination towards heavier classes in other MMOs. For whatever reason, the idea of charging headlong into battle, covered in plate, and swinging a giant axe appeals to me much more than hanging out on the outskirts of the fight, plinking away at the enemy and hoping they don’t look my way (sorry Hunters). It was with this sort of mentality that I tried to approach this rather sizeable revamp.
When tapped to work on the Champion, it was important to me that the main functionality not change drastically, but instead work into the trees in a meaningful way. As it existed before the revamp, each line had a specific purpose, some more focused or successful than others, but each had a distinct goal and way of going about things. So when it came time to define each line, it just made sense from the start.
Hello all! RockX here, and it’s time to talk Captain. Captain was definitely challenging, as I needed to keep in mind all four roles the Captain fills. As such, the main goal was to allow each of the three specializations to fully function in its chosen role while allowing the Captain to buff their allies appropriately. In addition, I wanted to make buffing offer more active and engaging gameplay, rewarding the Captain for using buffs at opportune moments.
Hello all! RockX here, and today I’m talking about the Burglar class revamp. I really enjoyed working on the class, as I felt each role could use a little something to really make them shine. Therefore, my main goal was to really home in on what made each of the three Burglar specializations unique and focus gameplay into each line’s strengths. The Quiet Knife line focuses on dealing high burst damage using Stealth and positional skills. The Mischief-Maker line uses the application and removal of Tricks to control and whittle foes down through attrition. The Gambler manipulates chance with Gambles, ensuring an outcome in their favor. Each play-style should feel familiar to existing players, with new skills which offer potent additions to the chosen specialization.


NEEDHAM, MA – September 12, 2013 -- Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment announced today that The Lord of the Rings Online™: Helm’s Deep™, the next expansion to the award-winning free-to-play massively multiplayer online roleplaying game (MMORPG) developed by Turbine, will launch on November 18th. Helm’s Deep will continue the Epic Story into the western plains of Rohan, allow players to take an unprecedented role in the legendary battle for Helm’s Deep while advancing to the new level cap of 95.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 00:56, 28 September 2013 (EDT)

Helm's Deep Pre Order and release date announced

https://store.lotro.com/en/expansion-packs/item/hd-pre-premium-bundle/

Release date 18 November

Trying to make sense out of this one is "fun" --- when you click "Buy" you discover that you can also purchase the Quad Pack for $19.99 and 5K TP for $34.99

The Legendary Item Pack for $39.99 includes 1- movie ticket, value UP TO $13.00 (i.e. can't use it for the 3D Version in the Phila area --- that costs $17.00) Expires 1/31/2014 (Gives you a little over 6 weeks to see the movie.)

(Smaug is scheduled for 13 December release).

2- Star lit crystal x3 3- Legendary Level Cap increase -- no indication if this is the "standard scroll" good fro one LI or something different 4- Relic Removal scroll -- sounds like the standard scroll 5- Premium Relic Pack -- have to look that one up in the store. I think it is 5 or 6 Lvl 6 Relics.

So, at $59.99 for the Expansion, not quite premium edition

plus 39.99 for the Legendary "Pack"

That makes $99.98 -- and people complained about the cost of Riders of Rohan!

Already the forum thread is pages long....

And they are now called "Epic Battles" (no longer Big Battles). According to Sapience:

[QUOTE=Sapience]Yes. Prior to this expansion the Epic Story line has been free.
The Epic Story in Helm's deep is very tightly entwined with the Epic Battle system. The story in Helm's Deep [B]is[/B] the Epic battle we all know from the books. We've returned to the core story line from the lore and that line leads in a direct path, laid out by the Professor himself, into Helm's Deep and the battles and heroic deeds that occur there. As a result, this means the Epic story requires the purchase of the Helm's Deep expansion. Otherwise you'd not be able to complete it as it moves through the Epic Battle system

I don't really believe this "deal"...

The LOTRO Store has a new deal... [url]https://store.lotro.com/en/special-offers/item/questpacks-bundle/[/url]

For ONLY $79 you get ALL the quest packs in the game!!!

A big deal -- yeah right. $79 for ONLY the quest packs.... and while it includes Wildermore, it does not include Rohan.

[QUOTE=QuartermasterU]It's called All Quest Pack - because it includes all things currently labeled as "Quest Packs" in the LOTRO In-game store.
This would not include Expansion Quests, or Expansions.
Inn of the Forsaken and Halls of Night are Instances and won't be included in this pack.[/QUOTE]

oops.

Especially, when for $59.99 USD, one can pre-order the Helm's Deep Premium Edition Expansion and for an additional $19.99 at checkout obtain the "Quad Pack" -- all 4 previous expansions -- Which DOES give you all of the previous Quest packs. i.e. a total of $79.98. (98 cents more!) ?!?

Or you could get the Base Edition for $39.99 and still get the Quad Pack for an additional $19.99 at checkout obtain the "Quad Pack" -- all 4 previous expansions -- Which DOES give you all of the previous Quest packs. i.e. a total of $59.98. (20 dollars cheaper!) ?!?

:) :( Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 01:46, 28 September 2013 (EDT)
If you're buying Helm's Deep and get the Quad Pack you don't get any of the quest packs. All you'll have is the five expansions (Moria, Mirkwood, Isengard, Rohan, and Helm's Deep). The new Quest Pack set includes everything else in the game, except for skirmishes and the two standalone instances. If you got all those eleven quest packs separately using Turbine Points, it would cost 7545 TPs - which could be equivalent of anywhere from $75 to $97, depending on how many TPs you buy at once. So the new set can save you money, as long as you're not buying your Turbine Points in huge mass quantities, and only if you don't already have any of those quest packs, and if you wouldn't buy any of them individually on sale during one of their 20% or 50% off sales.
Not something I would go for, but it isn't a completely unreasonable way to let someone basically purchase the whole game (minus expansions) in one go. -- Elinnea (talk) 18:14, 28 September 2013 (EDT)

Player Submitted 20 Questions – Supersized to 40.

The latest batch of questions has been released:

Player Submitted 20 Questions – Supersized to 40.


They are kind of mixed up... so read them all. The headers collect most of the questions on one topic together, but not all.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 15:03, 7 October 2013 (EDT)

Update 12 - Helm's Deep

Please note: Because of the significant changes to Game-play coming with the Release of Helm's Deep I have created the page normally associated with the official release notes: Update 12, Helm's Deep - November 20, 2013 and linked it to Turbine News on the main page.

This page contains the "collected works of Turbine" on the Helm's Deep Release -- You Tube Videos, Twitter Chats (20 Questions) and Dev Diaries -- "Explaining" and "Elaborating" on the various Class changes and Trait tree changes coming.

The page is mostly a transclusion of a page I maintain tracking all of the various Dev Diaries and other materials from Turbine: User:Magill/Reference-Diaries.

Note that following the Forum (i.e. website) revision this past summer, many of the links to older Dev Diaries are no longer functional.
This is not a major loss as the Class Changes in particular render a very large number of them seriously obsolete.
Note also: I have included links to the "CLASS PAGES" for each class here on the Wiki.
  • Right at the moment, I am envisioning doing something like...
Head each Class page with something like: Update 12 - Helm's Deep - Class Update. And then simply "pushing down" everything else on the page as "Historical" until we can identify what information (if any) is still valid. At that point, obsolete information can be moved to a section lower on the page and tagged "Obsolete" or "The way it used to be."
  • I'm going to start playing with the Rune-keeper page for experimentation. I would expect to be able to include a screen shot of the Trait Tree as soon as possible as the "starting point" of the page.
  • Please feel free to include other information which you may be aware of which is missing.
  • Also, please feel free to comment on the RK Discussion page. I plan to make it a pattern for updating the other class pages. There will be a TREMENDOUS amount of work to do. For what it's worth -- my three main characters are Rune-keeper; Hunter; Minstrel. I also have a Lore-master and Warden, but rarely play them.
I have never played Captain, Guardian or Champion, so someone with experience in those classes will have to spearhead their updates.
  • The Release notes will be included on this page as normal on the 18th.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 11:58, 19 October 2013 (EDT)

QuartermasterU -- Helm's Deep - Legacy Changes - Store Items

This post is an important one -- touching on the vast changes coming to the WIKI with the Class Changes in the HD release: https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?&postid=6980911#post6980911

Greetings!
Helms Deep brings class changes, and with them come some updates to the Legacies provided in game, and in the LOTRO Store. From now until Nov 18th, we’ll be removing the items being revamped from the LOTRO Store. We hope that by doing this it will help you all to avoid purchasing things that might change out from under you.
When Helms Deep is live, the legacies will automatically be replaced by their new versions. This will include legacies already applied to weapons, standing in inventory, or stashed in storage.
Below is a list of all the legacies which will be unpublished:


  • Burglar:
Non-Enrage Tricks Duration
Aim Cooldown
Hide in Plain Sight Cooldown
Burglar Skill Bleed Damage Multiplier
Small Snag Cooldown
Feint Attack Cooldown
Critical Response Skill Damage
Location is Everything Cooldown
Lucky Strike Cooldown
Well Placed Strike Cooldown
Provoke Threat
Ready and Able Cooldown
  • Captain:
Kick Cooldown
Morale from Motivating Speech
Tactics: On Guard Parry Rating Buff
Tactics: Relentless Attack Critical Rating Buff
Cutting Attack Bleed Damage
Tactics: Focus in-Combat Power Regen Buff
Rallying Cry Healing
Rallying Cry Cooldown
Strength of Will Effects
Melee Skills Healing
Time of Need Cooldown
Escape from Darkness Cooldown
Muster Courage Cooldown
Grave Wound Cooldown
Shield of the Dúnedain Cooldown
Shadow's Lament Cooldown
  • Champion:
Ardour/Glory Parry and Evade Rating
Ardour/Glory Pip Interval
Dire Need Cooldown
Heroics Morale Heal Chance
Ardour/Glory in-Combat Power Regen
(Glory) Armour Rating
Battle Acuity Duration
  • Hunter:
Induction Bow Threat Down
Endurance Quick Shot Threat Down
Melee Critical Multiplier
Improved Strength Of Earth Morale Regen
Swift Stroke Parry and Evade Rating
Agile Rejoinder Heal Multiplier
  • Guardian:
Catch a Breath Morale Heal
Threat Generation
Sting Damage
Reactive Block Damage
Power Restore on Reactions
Guardian's Threat Block and Parry Rating
  • Loremaster:
Wizard's Fire Pulses
Burning Embers Pulses
Fire-Lore Targets
Sign of the Wild: Rage Threat
Cracked Earth Range
Burning Embers Initial Damage
  • Minstrel:
Song of Subdual Cooldown
Piercing Cry Damage
Call of Oromë and Earendil Damage
Healing Threat
Anthem Duration
  • Runekeeper:
Frozen Epilogue Cooldown
Fury of Storm Damage
Steady Attuned Skill Power Cost
  • Warden:
Defiant Challenge Cooldown
Fist-Spear Gambit Threat
Shield-Spear Gambit Threat
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 01:37, 2 November 2013 (EDT)

Helm's Deep NDA Dropped as of Today, November 4, 2013

https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?&postid=6984174#post6984174

As of today, the Non-Disclosure Agreement for the Helm’s Deep beta has been dropped. Beta participants can now share their thoughts and impressions of Helm’s Deep thus far. Please note that while the NDA has been dropped, any copy and pasting of threads, posts, and other materials from the beta forums is not permitted. This is not the end of beta, and testing continues so some things may be subject to change before release.
Several players were kind enough to create very complete guides to the upcoming class changes based on the most recent beta build. You’ll find them in the appropriate class forums.
Links to the Guides. (I did not copy the links -- see Sapience's post for them)
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?528706-Class-Changes-Summary-Burglar Burglar by bobhashum
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?528697-Class-Changes-Summary-Captain Captain by Belnavar
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?529368-Class-Changes-Summary-Champion Champion by Redit
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?529394-Class-Changes-Summary-Guardian Guardian by Smartbean and Schinderhannes
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?528990-Class-Changes-Summary-Hunter Hunter by Widoch
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?529490-Class-Changes-Summary-Lore-master Lore-master by Easca and PKCrichton
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?528772-Class-Changes-Summary-Minstrel Minstrel by bobhashum
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?528761-Class-Changes-Summary-Rune-Keeper Rune-keeper by Eomon
https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?529327-Class-Changes-Summary-Warden Warden by Redit.
Please note these guides were written by players who volunteered to create them. They are certainly works in progress as beta continues and additional changes may occur. It is our hope these will be updated by their authors as we approach the release of Helm's Deep. it is also worth noting, that while a single author is credited here the truth is many players worked on or contributed to each guide. Some were gracious enough to translate them as well.
Last edited by Sapience; Today at 02:08 PM.

West Rohan Maps are up

  • I've put up the maps for West Rohan as of Beta 6 (7 November). They don't appear "defficient" and therefore not likely to change over the next 8 days.
For those Editors who are unfamiliar with the Map process:
  • I've also created the Area Navigation templates for West Rohan -- the "Landmarks" are those found in the Exploration Deeds.
  • Also now existent are most of the appropriate categories for West Rohan (I think). I should have the basic layout pages for each Region completed by this afternoon.
  • With Beta 6 comes the first "Tutorial" for the Epic Battles.
I've started a page Epic Battles to capture the various "20 Questions" and similar information, as an anchor for documenting them.
I can see, eventually, separate pages for each of the 8 battles (5 different, several multiple size), and another for the Tutorial. It will be good to hopefully have the "experiences" of some lower level players who have been "up-scaled" to participate in these Epic Battles in the not to distant future.
One thing which I have just written from scratch off the top of my head -- "Level Differential" -- Turbine has not defined this term as they use it. Therefore it is left to us to "intuit' what they really mean. This section is my "best guess" at a definition and explanation. Please feel free to add/subtract/modify this with your insight.
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 12:29, 8 November 2013 (EST)

HD updates -- who has which class info and other related pointers

So far, I've seen the following folks apparently involved in collecting info for the class updates.

    • Please add yourself to this list if you have an "accumulation."
  • We still need to define what the new "class traits" pages will look like.

This list is garnered (mostly) from Category:Stubs/Beta

END OF BETA EVENT! TODAY, Tuesday November 12! 5PM Eastern (-5 GMT) The Beta Forums will remain open and active until Friday November 15 at 3:00PM Eastern time. At that time, we'll be saying farewell to them as well.' —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Magill (Contribs • User Talk).

Garabrand's work is for the Champion, so I've moved it to the correct heading. It's the Captain who's an orphan at the moment. I have characters of all classes, and once Helm's Deep goes live I plan to either collect info or verify it on all of them, but I haven't had a chance to try them all in beta.
As for the new pages, I like where Neum has been heading with the tables. I have a few comments that I'll put on the Rune-keeper sandbox talk page. -- Elinnea (talk) 00:02, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

Burglar

Captain

  • --- seems to be very much an orphan :)

Champion

Guardian

Hunter

Lore-master

Minstrel

Rune-keeper

Warden


Other HD Updates

  • Maps have been created for all areas, so all of the "Tooltip Coord" should work correctly
  • Vault - especially housing chests
  • Basic Category structure:
Category: West Rohan

Templates

base pages

Item: Dim Edhelharn Token Recipe

I would like to know how to delete pages. The page Item:Dim Edhelharn Token Recipe must be deleted, because, since it is a critical success product, it doesn't have a recipe.

Thanks, Elgileth (talk) 06:16, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

I deleted that one for you. For future reference, you can add the template {{Delete Page}} to the top and someone will be along to take care of it. Only administrators have permissions to delete pages. -- Elinnea (talk) 13:48, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

12.1 is up on Bullroarer

Sapience just announced that 12.1 is now up on Bullroarer.

Beta release notes are here: https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?534112-Update-12-1-Preliminary-Release-notes-BULLROARER-ONLY-SUBJECT-TO-CHANGE

Implication being that the Beta of 12.1 is open. Release is scheduled for 18 December along with the Winter Festival.

And, wow, it is a big patch. Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 02:42, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

(1) Item renaming and (2) icon naming/organization

A couple of newbie issues, and apologies if these are answered elsewhere:

(1) Is there a standard procedure for renaming (moving) crafting items such as Clump of Riddermark Eastemnet Peat? Aside from moving the item page and icon, should I also update the recipe index and all related recipes with the new name, or simply leave the matter to redirects? Are redirects even permanent? It looks like a redirecting page can be edited, and potentially lose the redirect. Updating the index and recipes with the new name takes some time but seems safer.

(2) While adding metalsmith items, I noticed that a few crafted shield and chest icons don't follow the naming theme of <Shield # (quality)-icon.png> or <Heavy Chest # (quality)-icon.png>. Didn't rename any (see (1)) but stuck the ones I was using into the style tables. Long lists of icons make my eyes glaze over when looking for existing icons, so IMO the more organization the better. :)

Speaking of icons, it sounds like we'll be getting new crafting icons when Update 12.1 goes live:

Numerous icons have been updated to better reflect what they are trying to represent.
Many duplicate icons have been updated to avoid confusion, especially with class skills and items.

From Update 12.1 Preliminary Release Notes

Thank you in advance! -Laineth (talk) 03:19, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

LoL... one assumes that the "Acorn" masquerading as a "Walnut" will be one of those. For such items, simply replace the "old" icon with the new one. (Often by simply by using "upload a new image.")
Some of the changes can be dealt with easily by changing (moving) the original item. Item:Gnarled Ilex Branch was one. (It was formerly Log of Mallorn Wood). Just make certain to check "What Links Here" so that you change those pages.
  • It is always better to change the root pages than to leave a re-direct. Re-drects are "permanent," but can easily be removed, and frequently when on a "clean-up" binge they do get removed, especially if they make it to Special:DoubleRedirects
The "redirect" is often simply used as "quick fix" while the individual pages are modified, and then deleted after "what links here" shows nothing left.
TIP: if you select "advanced" in the editing bar, at the far right is an icon for "Search and Replace". It works, but it is rather brute force -- you can ONLY use it on the contents of the entire Edit Window. i.e. you can't restrict it to only change a certain group of lines... which can be extremely surprising!!!
I always "save" before doing a big change which makes it easy to "undo" if much more changed than I expected.
  • I started to list/make changes to some of the resources. see: [[The Lord of the Rings Online: Helm's Deep]] near the bottom of the page. Obviously, that list is not complete.
As for 2, I suspect that what you are seeing is simply the fact that the Icon reorganization is a HUGE task, which gets worked on by individuals in dribs and drabs. And it is complicated by the fact that Turbine is "randomly" re-using old icons. Sometimes, especially with a new release, the "old icons" are simply used as "place-holders" (i.e. the Acorn for the Walnut) because the "artists" or whoever is responsible were on a different time clock than the "devs." This is what we are seeing with 12.1
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 17:27, 8 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for the reply Magill. "Search and Replace" is going to be my new best friend! You've saved me a LOT of copying/pasting. :) Will get started on renamed items, but going to avoid doing anything with icons until after Update 12.1. -Laineth (talk) 21:28, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

Pages of OFFICIAL loot information

Verizal has posted his "Update 12.1 Scaling Instance Loot" with a series of postings: Start with https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?&postid=7043125

He has intended to post the loot drops for each class by instance. (All level 95)
He includes screen shots of the Jewelry drops as they exist as of 12.1 - expect changes in 12.2
  • Annuminas - Glinghant
  • Annuminas - Haudh Valandil
  • Annuminas - Ost Elendil
  • Dol Guldur - Barad Guldur (Boss 1)
  • Dol Guldur - Barad Guldur (Boss 2)
  • Dol Guldur - Barad Guldur (Boss 3)
  • Dol Guldur - Barad Guldur (Boss 3)
  • Dol Guldur - Sammath Gul
  • Dol Guldur - Sword-hall of Dol Guldur
  • Dol Guldur - Warg-pens of Dol Guldur
  • Fornost - Wraith of Earth
  • Fornost - Wraith of Fire
  • Fornost - Wraith of Shadow
  • Fornost - Wraith of Water
  • Great Barrow - Sambrog
  • Great Barrow - Thadur
  • Great Barrow - The Maze
  • Ost Dunhoth - Disease
  • Ost Dunhoth - Poison
  • Ost Dunhoth - Wound
  • Ost Dunhoth - Fear
  • Ost Dunhoth - Ivar
  • Ost Dunhoth - Gortheron
  • Library at Tham Mirdain
  • School at Tham Mirdain
  • Sari-surma
  • Stoneheight
  • Northcotton Farm
  • Lost Temple
  • Halls of Night
  • Inn of the Forsaken
  • The Flight to the Lonely Mountain
  • Iorbar's Peak
  • Seat of the Great Goblin
  • The Battle for Erebor
  • The Bells of Dale
  • The Fires of Smaug
  • Webs of the Scuttledells
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 03:15, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Spreadsheet

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 03:19, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Helm's Deep on sale in the LOTRO Market (store.lotro.com) now to Dec 29 - $19.99

The Lotro Markeet (store.lotro.com) is offering the Helm's Deep expansion on sale. 50% off Helms Deep : LOTRO Market : Now - Dec 29th

  • Premium edition $29.99 -- Apparently still includes 2000 TP!
  • Base Edition $19.99 -- Apparently still includes 1000 TP
Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 20:17, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for the heads up! There goes my weekend. Perfect timing, too - I'd just gotten a gift card and finished my last exam! Sethladan 21:01, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Category: Items by Level vs Item-level

This is primarily an FYI -- I have tagged all of the "level related sub-categories of "Category: Items by Level as below.

  • NOTE: This category refers to the minimum level of the Player Character able to use the item.
It does NOT refer to the "Item Level" parameter introduced (displayed) on the tool-tip with the release of Helm's Deep - Update 12.

The Item Template auto-categorizes entries based on the "level" parameter. The "item_level" parameter is used strictly for display in the Tooltip.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 13:04, 20 December 2013 (UTC)