Update 18 - The Battle of Pelennor Fields - April 12, 2016
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Update 18 - Official Release Notes
Welcome to Far Anórien
- Follow the Rohirrim out of Rohan and into through secret ways hidden within the Drúadan Forest. In the westerly Beacon Hills, aid Gondorians stationed in the vastness of Ost Rimmon and wade into the Mouths of Entwash to behold the mighty Falls of Rauros. Follow the distant drumming into the ancient wood and encounter the Wose people, ancient crafters of the Púkel-men and sworn foes of Orc-kind.
Epic Story Books 5 and 6
- Aid the armies of Rohan in Volume IV, Book 5, 'The Ride of the Rohirrim,' and help them find a safe road to Minas Tirith in time to defend their allies against the ravening hordes of Mordor. And in Volume IV, Book 6, 'The Battle of the Pelennor Fields,' take part in the final defence of Minas Tirith as the Witch-king of Angmar descends upon the field and many fates are decided…
Instance Cluster – Battle of the Pelennor Fields
- Plunge into the thick of battle with a fellowship in three new instances: The Blood of the Black Serpent, The Quays of the Harlond, and the Silent Street
- The Blood of the Black Serpent (Small Fellowship)
- Ride with Théoden-king against the Haradrim and fight by his side as he slays their king. Mounted combat optional for portions of this battlefield instance.
- The Quays of the Harlond (Small Fellowship)
- Fly to join Aragorn and his men as they arrive on the Pelennor and turn the tide in Gondor’s favour in this second battlefield instance.
- The Silent Street (Full Fellowship)
- While the battle rages below, Denethor vies with Gandalf over the body of wounded Faramir. But they are not the only ones who have come to make claims and vie upon the Silent Street, mortuary path of stewards and kings!
The level cap has been raised!
- You can now advance your character to Level 105! All scaling instances and skirmishes can now be played at level 105, however Epic Battles will remain capped at level 100 for now.
Featured Instances
- Every week, one scaling instance or raid from a list of old favorites, will provide new chances at noteworthy prizes. The instance or raid, shown in a new bar on the Instance Join panel, can be played at level 100 and above (with mithril reset) to win Scrolls of Empowerment and new, cap level essences and pieces of equipment.
- With Update 18, the rotating list includes: Halls of Night, Inn of the Forsaken, Ost Elendil, Sammath Gûl, The Bells of Dale, and Ost Dunhoth – Wound and Fear Wing.
New Features
- There's a new "PvMP Performance Override" option on the Graphics page. This option is turned on by default. With the option set, entering monsterplay areas will automatically set various advanced graphics and UI options to lower values temporarily to improve PvMP performance. Your settings will be restored up leaving monsterplay areas.
- There are two new checkboxes in the social options panel which allow you to suppress effects from showing up in the Opponent Vitals panel. These function the same as the ones that suppress effects in the group vitals, allowing you to suppress effects that are non-dispellable or effects that aren't cast by you. Checking these boxes may improve your performance in the thick of combat.
- There is a new option in advanced graphics "Avatar Texture Compositing". Disabling this option reduces facial details displayed in game and may improve client performance.
- All housing neighbourhoods now contain Task boards. You can accept and complete every task at these boards.
Quests and Festivals
- New dyes have been added to the seasonal festivals! Look for four new exclusive dyes available in the Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter festivals this year. In each festival, two of the new dyes will be available for festival currency, and two will be available for Mithril Coins. The dyes available for Mithril Coins this year will be available for festival currency next year, and vice versa.
- The Glorious Beer-mug trophy is now available to barter during the Anniversary festival.
- During seasonal festivals, festival tokens can now be bartered for each other by visiting the Token Exchange vendor at the Party Tree in Bywater.
- Anfalas Star-lit crystals were added for barter to all festivals.
- Legolas and Sigferth in III.13.1 shouldn't fall through the floor anymore.
- Elladan's hair color should now match wherever he shows up in III.2.15.
- The enemies in III.13.8 should no longer become un-attackable if the player vanishes during combat.
- It should now be impossible to wedge yourself between the stairs and the red barrier wall during III.2.8.
- The Grand Stair - Deed: The Followers of Igash - slaying White Hand Arrow and White Hand Shield Uruks now counts towards the deed.
- Thinned out some of the monsters in IV.1.12, 'The Shadow in Morthond,' since Rovalang was dying more often than a Swan-knight should.
- Now you appear closer to Aragorn if you are defeated in IV.2.9, 'Even in Darkness'.
- Magor will no longer get stuck during 'Return to Azanarukar'.
- Landroval is now his appropriately majestic size during 'Enter the Easterlings.'
- Willem Whisker is now the correct size during 'Enter the Easterlings' and 'Bingo's Burden.'
- Reduced the timer on Bingo Week 27, 'Bingo's Scattered Thoughts' (from eight minutes to two).
- A new Elf has come to Thangúlhad, and he has some more readily-accessible advice for 'Second Breakfast.'
- Minas Tirith Quests
- In Days of Youth: moved flowers aside, so they don't compete with the plaque
- Several Mendings: Lady Raenemel now has her feet firmly on the ground at all times
Combat and Skills
- The effect of Block, Parry, and Evade ratings on your avoidance chance and partial avoidance mitigation have changed. The caps and rating contribution have all been modified so that you are much more likely to partially avoid an attack, and partial avoidances mitigate more damage, while your chance to fully avoid an attack is reduced.
- Characters that wear medium armour will need less mitigation to reach their mitigation cap than heavy armour wearers do.
- The formula for converting physical/tactical/ranged mastery to damage bonus percent has been changed to remove diminishing returns - you can now get more damage bonus for higher mastery points to a level-based cap. The mastery cap increases above level 100.
- The Burglar's Daggery Mastery trait now improves dagger damage up to 5%.
- All types of archers now advance the Captain deed "Precise Ally".
- Champions specializing in The Martial Champion can now block with a 2-handed weapon.
- Champions now get 5 points of Block per point of Might, and 3 points of Evade per point of Might.
- Swift Blade now counts towards the Champion deed "Swift to Anger".
- Guardian's Insult to Injury now grants 3% increased proc chance per rank.
- Guardian's Pledge has been reduced to grant +20% to each avoidance.
- Burglars now receive 5 Tactical Mastery for every point of Agility.
- Rune-Keeper Flurry of Words can be used while moving.
- Wardens specializing in Recklessness receive -50% outgoing healing.
- Warden Light damage over time effects have had their magnitude decreased from level 92+.
- Wardens now get 0 points of Tactical Mastery per point of Might, and 5 points of Physical Mastery per point of Might.
- The Unique Gem of Faith and Unique Rune of Courage give less partial avoidance mitigation.
- Anfalas Poison, Disease, Fear, and Wound draughts are now usable on effects up to level 110.
- NPC formations, such as Corsair Captains and their allies, should path more smoothly relative to one another.
Misc.
- You can now loot individual items out of open crafting nodes without getting dismounted.
- You can now use ó, as in Anórien in various search fields.
- Fixed an issue where fishing rods were not visible while fishing if the main-hand equipment was hidden. Cosmetically hidden fishing rods should now become visible while fishing.
- Items that can't be sold to vendors but have a monetary value no longer show their worth in examination tooltips.
- Crafting tutorial quests Introduction to Weaponsmithy and Introduction to Woodworking now offer more crafted weapon options to fulfill the quest.
- Horse-lord armour and jewellery recipes are now available from Hytbold barter vendors.
- You are now able to barter Hytbold tokens for Wold, Norcrofts, Entwash Vale, or Sutcrofts rep by talking to Rinwald.
- Non-unique special class quest items such as Ashen Gorthorog Horns will now stack up to 100.
- Skirmish camp barter now offers tier 10 crafting items and level 100 essences instead of level 95.
- Several instances that were not properly giving gear to Beornings have been fixed.
- The end chests of many instances, including the Pelennor, Osgiliath, and Road to Erebor instances, now drop up to Tier 14 stat tomes.
- Fixed various cosmetic problems around weapon glows.
- Fixed a few minor UI problems in the Social/Fellowing/Open Fellowships tab.
- Client load and memory usage should be reduced around Minas Tirith and greatly reduced in the Minas Tirith Epic Battles. This work is ongoing.
- Minas Tirith - Teleport travel horses have been removed. As a measure to improve performance in the city.
- Fixed various instances of T-Posing throughout the game.
- Store - Opening the store should no longer cause client crashes
- Store - After completing a PayPal transaction, the pop up window should now close.
Known Issues
- The Dome of Stars instance has been closed due to a last minute issue found with one of the doors.
- Epic Battles - Characters above level 100 get scaled down to level 100 upon entering an Epic Battle.
- Legendary Items - Scaling Third Age legendary items are designed and intended to cap at level 100. These items are incorrectly dropping with a minimum usage level above 100; these will never be any better than the level 100 legendary items. Existing Anfalas items have been altered so they will work on these unintended legendary items.
- Osgiliath cluster bounty quests that award morgul crests are only awarded at level 100.
Source
- https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?608442-Update-18-Release-Notes
- https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?608446-Update-18-Versionshinweise
- https://forums-old.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?608445-Notes-de-la-Mise-à-jour-18
Articles
- https://www.lotro.com/en/game/articles/making-battle - Developer Diary - The Making of a Battle - Ben Schneider (DrOctothorpe), Design Lead (Posted 11 April 2016)
- https://www.lotro.com/en/u18 - Promotional description posted by QuartermasterU 8 April 2016