Benefit to Yellow line

[ObGynKenobi]

I generally run Red with some Blue and Yellow when solo, and Yellow with some Blue in group content (mostly for catnip with it's benefits to the spirit pet's damage return and the raven's fire mitigation). However, I'm not running Tier 3 plus raids or anything like that, so I'm wondering if there is really much gain from Yellow as the primary tree. Test of Will is so-so Light damange with a long CD. BE extra damange when stunned doesn't really help except on trash. Warding Knowledge is nice, although not a lot of Tactical DPS in my groups, usually only 1 RK doing DPS and 1 healing. And a little splash healing from Beacon of Hope.
Otherwise doesn't seem like a whole lot of yield to picking Yellow over Red. I can contribute more DPS, especially for things that require more of a DPS race. Frost/Fire lore don't lose any potency, just some duration. I can still go deep in Yellow and pick up pretty much the same traits as I would with Yellow as primary, while also throwing out things like Ring of Fire and generally feeling like I'm contributing more while still keeping uptime on Ancient Craft, Fire/Frost Lore, pet debuffs, etc. Or is there something I'm missing? And as a secondary question for those running the higher tier raids, what do you tend to do when your buffs are all up, you've hit all your pet debuffs, and your heals are on cooldown--are you throwing out a BE or something else?

[Gandolf_TheOld]

Need to learn your classes' trait lines and their purpose.

What do you do when all your debuffs, etc are up and running? You are refreshing them, healing/curing, giving power to those who need it!

In a raid, the only time a Yellow LM should be putting out damage is when it is burn time; and you still keep the debuffs up, and healing-curing, and giving power. In most cases, if you attract a mob, you did something wrong.

<snip: cut out the lecture on what a LM is>

NOTE: I just started raiding in LOTRO. The above advice is based upon a culmination of many years as a Hard-Core Raider (EQ, STO, SW:TOR, Aion). My main in LOTRO is a LM (solo, 11 years)

[cbfan14]

I generally run Red with some Blue and Yellow when solo, and Yellow with some Blue in group content (mostly for catnip with it's benefits to the spirit pet's damage return and the raven's fire mitigation). However, I'm not running Tier 3 plus raids or anything like that, so I'm wondering if there is really much gain from Yellow as the primary tree. Test of Will is so-so Light damange with a long CD. BE extra damange when stunned doesn't really help except on trash. Warding Knowledge is nice, although not a lot of Tactical DPS in my groups, usually only 1 RK doing DPS and 1 healing. And a little splash healing from Beacon of Hope.
Otherwise doesn't seem like a whole lot of yield to picking Yellow over Red. I can contribute more DPS, especially for things that require more of a DPS race. Frost/Fire lore don't lose any potency, just some duration. I can still go deep in Yellow and pick up pretty much the same traits as I would with Yellow as primary, while also throwing out things like Ring of Fire and generally feeling like I'm contributing more while still keeping uptime on Ancient Craft, Fire/Frost Lore, pet debuffs, etc. Or is there something I'm missing? And as a secondary question for those running the higher tier raids, what do you tend to do when your buffs are all up, you've hit all your pet debuffs, and your heals are on cooldown--are you throwing out a BE or something else?

Going yellow gives you the group-wide power restore, the improved beacon of hope which will cast a group-wide HoT in addition to its usual heal, instant-cast knowledge of cures, herb-lore which is important for CC, air-lore which is super important to keep on the tank to help them survive, and the yellow capstone trait enfeeble which doubles the potency of ancient craft allowing the whole group to do more damage. All of these are key for the LM to perform its support role. Outside of maintaining your pet debuff rotation and lores, maintaining any CC that's required, keeping stun immunity on the tank if needed, keeping water lore on the tank if able, and making sure no one's running out of power, you'll occasionally be able to throw out a damage skill or two if your rotation is really good. What you need to understand about LM dps though, is that it is very weak overall. Even if you went full red and capped out your dps and crit rating, you still wouldn't wouldn't deal half the dps that's required for the higher tiers.

[Mithithil]

Showing up yellow line should be what the raid, or at least the raidfleader, expects. If the expectations are otherwise you may be in for a rough ride :-)

[TobiasEstForte]

At end game:

Yellow + Blue = Raid
Red + Blue = Solo

You always want -pet attack duration (for debuffing, bear taunting), catmint and the -induction bonus from blue. The tact mastery from Prepare for War also helps a little.
If you're using red, the -induction bonus in yellow is too deep, so that's why you get it from blue (as well as the red one)
Using yellow line, you can juuust about get the -induction trait from red as well as blue + yellow but you need to sacrifice some yellow points. Maybe you're in a fight that requires no CC, skip Pleasant Breeze, maybe even Ancient Master. I rarely Trait Ancient master during raids because Wind-Lore spreads to adds, ancient master is animated and does nothing else. So for example in Beast of Slaughter when a Mammoth or bats arrive, you use air-lore on the boss which maintains/tiers up the -inc damage, refreshes your lores and spreads them. Ancient master + Fire Lore (6 targets) + Frost Lore (6 targets) is slower.

As for downtime, one of the reasons I like LM the most is because you get a good view of the fight and can look for any shortcomings in the raid. Unlike DPS when you have to be constantly working. Healers may get a reprieve too to scope the battle. Tanks have the boss in their face all the time and operate away from the group.

[Yazuli]

As a LM trying to adjust and learn the end game I do fine solo with Blue and a bit of Red and Yellow.

I set up a Red trait and a Yellow trait. One thing I don't understand is when I trait Red or Yellow I lose about 30k morale and 110k Finesse. I lose the exact amount whether Red or Yellow. I don't see where the Blue trait is giving me that extra morale and Finesse.

I'm working on learning the Yellow trait. Using LotroHQ as a guide but nowhere near the gear yet. I do have the virtues recommended maxed (same virtue set for all three color traits). And I'm working on a separate set of imbued LIs for use with Yellow trait.

Felintray on Landroval

[Gandolf_TheOld]

As a LM trying to adjust and learn the end game I do fine solo with Blue and a bit of Red and Yellow.

I set up a Red trait and a Yellow trait. One thing I don't understand is when I trait Red or Yellow I lose about 30k morale and 110k Finesse. I lose the exact amount whether Red or Yellow. I don't see where the Blue trait is giving me that extra morale and Finesse.

I'm working on learning the Yellow trait. Using LotroHQ as a guide but nowhere near the gear yet. I do have the virtues recommended maxed (same virtue set for all three color traits). And I'm working on a separate set of imbued LIs for use with Yellow trait.

Felintray on Landroval

The extra moral come from the pet line, and you receive a 5% moral buff from the bear, which you loose when you change trait lines - you lose the bear and have to re-summon. The bear does not give the +5% Moral in R and Y lines.

The finesse, where that is coming from, I do not know. Are you changing any jewelry, armour, class items, food?

[Yazuli]

Not changing any jewelry or gear. Don't use bear when blue, use either bog or lynx.

I did see where I gain 9k morale from one of the blue traits.

The Finesse loss/gain is a mystery to me especially such a big difference.

[TobiasEstForte]

As a LM trying to adjust and learn the end game I do fine solo with Blue and a bit of Red and Yellow.

I set up a Red trait and a Yellow trait. One thing I don't understand is when I trait Red or Yellow I lose about 30k morale and 110k Finesse. I lose the exact amount whether Red or Yellow. I don't see where the Blue trait is giving me that extra morale and Finesse.

Blue is very slow compared to red at end game. Red kills a large group of mobs in a few skills (Cracked Earth, Gust of Wind, Ring of Fire, Improved Sticky Gourd, Lightning Storm, Nature's Fury even has an AOE element as long as the original target doesn't die immediately. Ring of fire even has two big hits, a small radius initial impact and a larger radius secondary impact.

Yes, you do have/can get some of those skills in blue but they hit much harder when maining red. You will not miss that morale, you won't even need a pet except for a bear to herd 5-10 mobs together and then nuke them. Then when you have 300k+ morale, you can just herd them yourself. Watch out for disarms!

As for gearing, don't worry about LOTRO HQ for now. Get the following.

Wit and Confidence to lvl 75. (75k finesse)
The Adventurer's Agility Sword (50k finesse)
The Cat-Mint Remmo Boots that require no deed (27k finesse)
Wilderland Scholar Bracer (30k Finesse each = 60k)

I've included Will values in the finesse.

That gets you just over 200k finesse, then you will have more finesse from Will gear, if you've levelled Honesty and Wisdom you'll likely be over 300k.

Slot enough vit to get over 200k morale, and you're raid ready. Lore-master is very forgiving gear wise, being able to pet swap, keep lores up, use AC pretty much every time it's up you're better than a lot of lore-masters on whatever server you're on.

[Froyo_K_Baggins]

Blue is very slow compared to red at end game.

Not important. All that matters is that Sic 'Em is the funniest skill in the game now that nobody uses Trample because only a medium steed is useful.

In reality, I tried both red and blue comparing. I didn't see a real diff in speed, so I've been blue landscape for years. Yellow in raids means you play whichever you like in solo. Just have fun.

[Yazuli]

@TobiasEstForte, I appreciate the feedback and explanations. The explanations help.

When Blue I have 275,240 Morale and 371,184 Finesse. (8,940 Morale coming from one of the blue traits).
Yellow or Red I have 243,153 Morale and 263,584 Finesse.
Virtues I have slotted: Loyalty, Fidelity, Confidence, Wit and Wisdom. Fidelity is at 72. All the others are at max 75.

I have eloquent blade of the adventurer. I'll look for the sword you mentioned.

I will give soloing Red a try. I seem to have the most trouble playing Red so some practice may help.

I did my first Remm T1 last night. I believe I did OK Yellow but need more practice. I also think I need more reputation in some faction to get the Remm T1 gear from quartermaster. The 'Acquaintance' loremaster gear that was available was limited and created some difficult trade-off choices compared to my current gear. I'll save my embers for now until I understand this more.

Thank you again for your explanations - much appreciated.

Felinstary on Landroval

[Brinuw]

I generally run Red with some Blue and Yellow when solo, and Yellow with some Blue in group content (mostly for catnip with it's benefits to the spirit pet's damage return and the raven's fire mitigation). However, I'm not running Tier 3 plus raids or anything like that, so I'm wondering if there is really much gain from Yellow as the primary tree. Test of Will is so-so Light damange with a long CD. BE extra damange when stunned doesn't really help except on trash. Warding Knowledge is nice, although not a lot of Tactical DPS in my groups, usually only 1 RK doing DPS and 1 healing. And a little splash healing from Beacon of Hope.
Otherwise doesn't seem like a whole lot of yield to picking Yellow over Red. I can contribute more DPS, especially for things that require more of a DPS race. Frost/Fire lore don't lose any potency, just some duration. I can still go deep in Yellow and pick up pretty much the same traits as I would with Yellow as primary, while also throwing out things like Ring of Fire and generally feeling like I'm contributing more while still keeping uptime on Ancient Craft, Fire/Frost Lore, pet debuffs, etc. Or is there something I'm missing? And as a secondary question for those running the higher tier raids, what do you tend to do when your buffs are all up, you've hit all your pet debuffs, and your heals are on cooldown--are you throwing out a BE or something else?

First off, your forum name is one of the best I've ever seen. Ok moving on.

The only thing a yellow LM can do that Blue/Red cant is maintain a higher uptime on Ancient Craft which significantly reduces targets mitigations and inproves overall dps for everyone. In addition to that Herb Lore gives the ability to root 3 targets instantly whereas Cracked Earth takes 3s to apply. Doesnt sound like alot of time but 3s is more than enough time for the goblins in Zabothak to run into the group and start tossing their poisons so Herb Lore is useful there.

A few things to not and correct from what you said though:
Warding knowledge also increases the damage of various Damage over Time effects from Warden and Captains (even though they are labled as melee skills the DoTs are tactical, but not all off and Ibdont recall which off the top of my head) plus at the end of the day it increases your damage so that in itself is a reason to toss it out.

Maybe I missed in your post but the lack of Wind Lore is pretty big. 5% incoming damage with easy uptime and your doing it to maintain your lores anyways is a win win.

If you can maintain your lores, rotate the pet debuffs appropreate to the dps classes in your group, and toss relavent utlitly like AC, Tar, Warding circle when needed/ off cooldown, and are still bored then the LM should absolutely be contributing to dps. Lightning Storm and Test of Will (with legacies) can be your hardest hitting skills and Burning/Searing Embers are solid damage to maintain. If your group doesnt require the spirit reflect with catmint, which honestly outside of FoKD t2+ you really dont, then the remmorchant red set gives a pretty dencent damage increase due to ease of maintaining Searing Embers. Lms will never be the dop of the damage heap but even in yellow line they can do some damage and ANY damage you do is damage the dps wont have to when the boss is at 2% and its utter chaos.


I also saw someone in this thread with 390k finesse, and honestly thats not needed for current endgame pve. At 315k finesse I havent gotten a single resist from any mob, from t1 roost/harrows to t5 Remmy and Threshold.

[cbfan14]

As a LM trying to adjust and learn the end game I do fine solo with Blue and a bit of Red and Yellow.

I set up a Red trait and a Yellow trait. One thing I don't understand is when I trait Red or Yellow I lose about 30k morale and 110k Finesse. I lose the exact amount whether Red or Yellow. I don't see where the Blue trait is giving me that extra morale and Finesse.

I'm working on learning the Yellow trait. Using LotroHQ as a guide but nowhere near the gear yet. I do have the virtues recommended maxed (same virtue set for all three color traits). And I'm working on a separate set of imbued LIs for use with Yellow trait.

Felintray on Landroval

Each time you switch trait builds, your virtue setup will technically change as well if your builds use different equipped virtues. The reason for the drastic change to morale and finesse is most likely due to your virtues changing each time you change trait builds.

[TobiasEstForte]

To give you an idea on what red is capable of, here are all my AOE skills tooltipped. A special mention goes to Improved Wizards Fire, while low damage (27-32k, 80k on a crit) it becomes 3 targets and you can still use it on the move.

I currently have 540k mastery, so it can be higher but I do landscape in my yellow gear. In raids you nerf your TM because a LM is not needed for its DPS but rather staying alive to support everyone else's endeavor, so vit stacking is of more import. Blue Tree is incapable of outputting these kinds of numbers at higher levels when summoned pets, both Captain and Lore-master inherently cannot keep up with mob scaling. It is no longer rolling through Forochel with a Lynx that one shots. Nor is it pulling two mobs, CCing one and burning the other. You herd a crowd, annihilate it and move on.

Do equip some crit rating though, water-lore pulses do crit after all and a critted gust of wind unlocks pleasant breeze.

[Yazuli]

I see what you mean by Red. As I'm moving into higher end game areas the mobs are tougher. I will need to practice it as group and nuke is a different play style than I am used to but I can adapt.

@cbfan14 - Thanks for the tip about virtue sets. I will have to check that. I only have 1 virtue set so I thought it applied to all 3 trait lines. If I need to replicate the virtue set for each trait line then that is where the difference in morale and finesse lies.

[TobiasEstForte]

I see what you mean by Red. As I'm moving into higher end game areas the mobs are tougher. I will need to practice it as group and nuke is a different play style than I am used to but I can adapt.

@cbfan14 - Thanks for the tip about virtue sets. I will have to check that. I only have 1 virtue set so I thought it applied to all 3 trait lines. If I need to replicate the virtue set for each trait line then that is where the difference in morale and finesse lies.

What they meant was that if you have 2 trait setups, unlock a third, fourth, fifth etc with mithril coins, putting virtues on your 1st setup will not put the same traits on second, third et al. So always check that when you switch trait lines you have the same virtues equipped. They weren't talking about having different virtues for each build, although in some cases like tank vs support you would have different virtues. Or you might use 2x anvil pieces that result in you lacking finesse so you equip Wit.

There can be a situation where you have a trait line for deeding, so you put on EARNING virtues and your stats suffer, and you forget about it. Then when you're telling people your stats while using that tree, oops those aren't your true stats. Or you switch to your raiding tree, so your virtues switch and you EARN the vexp in a placed you don't want. There's also that you may have no virtues equipped because you've made a second, third fourth setup for the first time. Just like when you first make a trait tree your virtue slots will be empty, so will your other tabs be.

I've just checked to see if Blue Line gives Finesse, it does not. See below. So your finesse difference is from something else (probably using different virtues as they said). You can use the same virtues for all LM builds, unless you are fully geared and want to make tweaks. BTW, 250k finesse is on the lower side, see later.



As an extra for this thread, I've equipped my finesse sword and gone to yellow tree to give a more accurate representation of stats. The above 250k is on the low side for raids, I had my tact mastery sword equipped and earning virtues (red tree). I have enough finesse here that I can forgo using finesse settings on my LI's and use more mitigation focused virtues - confidence is still one of your largest finesse contributors as well as crit, so there might call a time where I switch swords, slot confidence and wisdom to make up for the finesse loss. LM is one of my favourite classes because it's easy to be raid ready (only morale and finesse gates raiding), and then room for adjustments later on, not having to worry about maintaining stat caps.

[Yazuli]

@cbfan14 issue on the big difference on stats solved. It was the virtues. I did not know I had to set virtues for each trait line. Now all 4 of my trait lines have 397,776 Finesse (even up to 385K Morale on Yellow). I had pushed Finesse way too high trying to get it up on the Yellow trait lines. Wish I had understood the that the trait lines were both traits and virtues a day earlier. Wasted a slade essence on Finesse. I can sacrifice some Finesse as I upgrade gear or remove that essence and save if needed later. I think about 320K Finesse is all that is needed.

I may redo my Red line to max it all out by adjusting down a bit on the Yellow traits I have points while in Red Trait.

Thank you all for the great feedback and advice and a +1 to those that set me straight on the virtues for each trait line (they were empty for the Red and yellow lines so I wasn't getting the Finesse and several other buffs for those lines).

In the Remm raid I did last night as Yellow LM I rarely used a damage ability - only to help break cocoons or binds. Simply too busy with the debuffs and buffs. Didn't rotate pets that much but I have an alias on the hotbar to quickly release pet so bringing another up is easier. I see where being a Yellow LM keeps you busy.

Felinstray on Landroval

[Loox]

To give you an idea on what red is capable of, here are all my AOE skills tooltipped. A special mention goes to Improved Wizards Fire, while low damage (27-32k, 80k on a crit) it becomes 3 targets and you can still use it on the move.

I currently have 540k mastery, so it can be higher but I do landscape in my yellow gear. In raids you nerf your TM because a LM is not needed for its DPS but rather staying alive to support everyone else's endeavor, so vit stacking is of more import. Blue Tree is incapable of outputting these kinds of numbers at higher levels when summoned pets, both Captain and Lore-master inherently cannot keep up with mob scaling. It is no longer rolling through Forochel with a Lynx that one shots. Nor is it pulling two mobs, CCing one and burning the other. You herd a crowd, annihilate it and move on.

Do equip some crit rating though, water-lore pulses do crit after all and a critted gust of wind unlocks pleasant breeze.

The 4 skills my blue tree share with red tree are significantly higher, ie: Cracked earth 85,413 - 122,019 fire damage, Gust of Wind 61,761 - 88,230 frost dmg, Ring of Fire 63,011 - 90,015 fire dmg + 178238 fire dmg. w/in 5 meters, Lightning Storm 3 attacks 145,817 - 208,309. I also have Sic'em and storm lore AOEs

Those numbers are self buff only with NO pet triggered buffs. No T2 or better looted gear. Blue trees are not wanted in T2 or better :P

I have up to 4 100% chance crit per minute (pet triggered), +5% dmg (cat) (pet triggered) fellow buff or +10% dmg Bog Guardian buff, +15% dmg from "don't you touch him" (pet triggered), Coordination (pet triggered) removes induction, with an eagle and staff sweep I can get a 45% crit chance on fire skills. Plus Sic'em can land all pet debuffs and give all pet buffs including spirit heal within a few seconds .. with class essence it's possible to get the skill reset to a minute, maybe less.

Maybe I was doing something wrong in red tree because I can't match the overall AOE dmg blue tree offered me.

[TobiasEstForte]

The 4 skills my blue tree share with red tree are significantly higher, ie: Cracked earth 85,413 - 122,019 fire damage, Gust of Wind 61,761 - 88,230 frost dmg, Ring of Fire 63,011 - 90,015 fire dmg + 178238 fire dmg. w/in 5 meters, Lightning Storm 3 attacks 145,817 - 208,309.

I can only respond on tooltips, I am lacking damage due to being at only 153.3% worth of tactical mastery. If you are at 200% there will obviously be some disparity. I'm not seeing anything in blue tree that would directly increase your skills damage, apart from inherent pet induced buffs (which you outlined are not included).

Those buffs you've added are interesting nonetheless and add a lot of layers to gameplay than just faceroll offensive skills.

[Loox]

I can only respond on tooltips, I am lacking damage due to being at only 153.3% worth of tactical mastery. If you are at 200% there will obviously be some disparity. I'm not seeing anything in blue tree that would directly increase your skills damage, apart from inherent pet induced buffs (which you outlined are not included).

Those buffs you've added are interesting nonetheless and add a lot of layers to gameplay than just faceroll offensive skills.

That was no pet triggered buffs, I did have Bog Guardian out when I listed those numbers and self buff.

Yes, that is with TM and crit at max (213% and 25%) although it's possible (when all the stars are aligned, lol) to get to 255.5% TM momentarily solo play. So those damage numbers do go higher.
Timing those mastery buffs with crit buffs becomes a gameplay style for best results. Which makes it NOT a next button in rotation gameplay as buffs/triggers are random.

This makes for decent blue tree AOE burst damage but red tree is far better at sustained single target with it's DoTs. At least that's my experience so far.

Edit: forgot to include "don't you touch him" skill buff in momentary TM solo play .. edit: in game test with ithilian rolls

[Mithithil]

I've found that a net 30% finesse, +/- a couple of pecerntage points, has always been sufficient Finesse and that stacking additional Vit is where its at. >350K morale and you are not bulletproof by any stretch of the imagination, but your survival is enhnaced during those moments when the fertiliser imapcts the air conditioning.

A fast summining of the bear, coupled with using its taunt, is a useful skill to remember to use if the tank goes down, it gives a brief interlude for a proper tank to step in/get rezzed, but remember if the boss slots the bear you are next in the queue.

As far as the dps are often concerned, you are expendable ballast slowing up their farming, always worth remembering when in a PUG :-)