Hidden Nuggets we see all the time...

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Originally Posted by Merciful_Death

Well, except that my Mistrel's "go away shout" works on them....

But really, aren't we ALL doing what they are? The only difference being that we raid tombs and ruins all over the place, instead of specializing in one set of ruins.

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It is our just rewards! :D

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Originally Posted by Berephon

Lol, maybe not quite *that* tame, but still not utterly beyond redemption (well, not all of them anyway.)

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Aww darn, and here I thought I could start giving them food to make them go away instead of defeating them :)

Btw, kudos to whoever came up with the Leland Underhill quest - it's cute! Koala thinks so too. It's even in her Bio I think. :D

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Originally Posted by ManticoreFalco

Something that's bugged me for a while though: How, fundamentally, is what the tomb-raiders do any different from what the Eglain do? For the most part, the tomb-raiders get relics from the ruins, and not the tombs necessarily (which, admittedly, the Eglain don't do).

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...or for that matter what museums and private collectors do with ancient artifacts all around the world today. Yes, most are for preservation and historical education, and treat the dig sites with care, but they're still removing artifacts from their original resting grounds, where to at least some degree the ancestors probably want them to stay.

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Originally Posted by Merciful_Death

But really, aren't we ALL doing what they are? The only difference being that we raid tombs and ruins all over the place, instead of specializing in one set of ruins.

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Yeah, but our side is GOOD and they're on the side of EVIL. If a person is good, he lies, cheats, steals and kills for the greater good; if a person is bad even his good acts are done merely as a cynical manipulation. It's a sort of literary Calvinist doctrine.

This is the shallow psychology of Tolkien. His baddies are inherently bad and his goodies are inherently good - they are stereotypical archetypes. That's not really Tolkien's fault - LotR is based on ancient mythologies and sagas in which character psychology and motivations weren't examined too deeply. It's freeing in a way, in that it allows us to act in a world in which morality isn't really an issue - our morality is pre-defined for our characters. But on the other hand it removes that whole interesting moral question, which makes things a little less involving.

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Originally Posted by Beery

Yeah, but our side is GOOD and they're on the side of EVIL. If a person is good, he lies, cheats, steals and kills for the greater good; if a person is bad even his good acts are done merely as a cynical manipulation. It's a sort of literary Calvinist doctrine.

This is the shallow psychology of Tolkien. His baddies are inherently bad and his goodies are inherently good - they are stereotypical archetypes. That's not really Tolkien's fault - LotR is based on ancient mythologies and sagas in which character psychology and motivations weren't examined too deeply. It's freeing in a way, in that it allows us to act in a world in which morality isn't really an issue - our morality is pre-defined for our characters. But on the other hand it removes that whole interesting moral question, which makes things a little less involving.

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I'm guessing you never read the Silmarillion...

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Originally Posted by Schildawg73

I'm guessing you never read the Silmarillion...

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I have read The Silmarillion, but we're talking about Lord of the Rings here. There are no conflicting motivations in LotR - we have good and evil. If you're good everything you do is good: if evil, everything you do is evil. The only character who has any sense of conflict is Gollum, and Peter Jackson made more of his inner turmoil than Tolkien ever did. We only ever get clues as to the real message behind LotR (i.e. Tom Bombadil) and although Tolkien was a good enough writer to know not to beat us over the head with it, in my view he errs on the side of caution and as a result he doesn't get his point across with enough force, and that's a fatal flaw in a book that concerns itself with the violent and chivalric themes he chooses. It's far too easy for the reader to get caught up in the "Boy's Own Adventure" form of the story and far too easy to miss the underlying criticism of simple-minded chivalric values and mindless violence that I think Tolkien is trying to make.

On the other hand, maybe I'm misreading Tolkien and applying my own late-20th century mindset to an author who was a product of the early 20th century. Maybe LotR is what it seems on its face - a simple homage to jingoism - maybe Tolkien's criticisms are merely subconscious (and it could be argued that that's the case - again Tolkien's unwillingness to pin down Tom Bombadil may have been inability to pin him down due to his not consciously knowing what Bombadil represents). I hope that's not the case, but it may be. In my view the book would work better if it was intended to be a condemnation of jingoism rather than if it was merely meant to be a glorification of it.

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Originally Posted by Beery

I have read The Silmarillion, but we're talking about Lord of the Rings here. There are no conflicting motivations in LotR - we have good and evil. If you're good everything you do is good: if evil, everything you do is evil. The only character who has any sense of conflict is Gollum, and Peter Jackson made more of his inner turmoil than Tolkien ever did. We only ever get clues as to the real message behind LotR (i.e. Tom Bombadil) and although Tolkien was a good enough writer to know not to beat us over the head with it, in my view he errs on the side of caution and as a result he doesn't get his point across with enough force, and that's a fatal flaw in a book that concerns itself with the violent and chivalric themes he chooses. It's far too easy for the reader to get caught up in the "Boy's Own Adventure" form of the story and far too easy to miss the underlying criticism of simple-minded chivalric values and mindless violence that I think Tolkien is trying to make.

On the other hand, maybe I'm misreading Tolkien and applying my own late-20th century mindset to an author who was a product of the early 20th century. Maybe LotR is what it seems on its face - a simple homage to jingoism - maybe Tolkien's criticisms are merely subconscious (and it could be argued that that's the case - again Tolkien's unwillingness to pin down Tom Bombadil may have been inability to pin him down due to his not consciously knowing what Bombadil represents). I hope that's not the case, but it may be. In my view the book would work better if it was intended to be a condemnation of jingoism rather than if it was merely meant to be a glorification of it.

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Actually you forgot about some of the inner turmoil...We have Tom Bombadil...who is beyond turmoil who fits your description...we have Gandalf and Galadraiel...who must combat the inner demons to win...we have Boromir who looses that battle and must redeem himself for his sins...the distrust between Gimli and Legolas that grows into a great friendship...LOTR is all about those inner demons and fighting the evil in side you...

Ok -- think we've all, myself included, derailed this thread again. Lore-bits in-game please (discussion about said bits, ok; philosophical discussions about the nature of good and evil . . . let's take that to another thread. Not a bad topic to start a thread about, but just not here. :) )

Hehe, Berephon REALLY wants this to stay on-topic. :D

I think off-topic discussions usually start because on-topic discussion is flagging. Plus, it's hard to continue topics in a new thread - the motivation often isn't strong enough. Sometimes threads ought to be allowed to flow from the original topic (after all they often flow back on-topic very quickly). But having said that, I guess I can respect the wish. I reckon if the thread was stickied it would be easier to keep it on-topic. :)

Anyway, I thought this message board system allowed moderators to split off off-topic discussions and make them into new threads. Is that not the case? I used to do that as a moderator on Subsim forums and I think that used vBulletin.

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Originally Posted by raccoon_king

There's a bonfire on the west side of the Ford of Bruinen. That's the bonfire Glorfindel started in order to scare the Nazgul.

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Thanks, I had not put two and two together and made that connection. The fire is lit when I go past with my high level main that has done the books, but when I go by with my low level alts the fire is not lit because they have not progressed to that part of the story yet. Nice touch :)

Once when I was in Rivendell near the Last Homely House I thought I heard a bell ring, the one used to call everyone to many meetings. Maybe it was just the TV on in the other room, but I could have sworn it came from the house.

Berephon, is that sound ingame or just my imagination?

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Originally Posted by Hayoo

Once when I was in Rivendell near the Last Homely House I thought I heard a bell ring, the one used to call everyone to many meetings. Maybe it was just the TV on in the other room, but I could have sworn it came from the house.

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I thought I heard that too. I also wondered if it was coming from the TV in the other room.

Not a lore nugget, but I absolutely LOVE the way the Vault Keepers in Bree interact with you. You walk up to them, use their services, then as soon as you close the Vault and walk away, they say something like "Next in line, please!" in the chat channel. Brilliant immersion nugget.

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Originally Posted by Hayoo

Once when I was in Rivendell near the Last Homely House I thought I heard a bell ring, the one used to call everyone to many meetings. Maybe it was just the TV on in the other room, but I could have sworn it came from the house.

Berephon, is that sound ingame or just my imagination?

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Honestly, I don't know. I've not gotten a character to Rivendell yet, not even just as a bold run for the sake of seeing it, but it would certainly be a nice touch.

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Originally Posted by Berephon

Honestly, I don't know. I've not gotten a character to Rivendell yet, not even just as a bold run for the sake of seeing it, but it would certainly be a nice touch.

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You are NOT hardcore....

I like it that its possible to get just about anywhere in Bree... like yesterday when a bunch of us were jumping all over the place on the roofs of the houses, trying to get to places that look just impossible and succeeding in some cases (try getting on top of the arch just south of market square! Also trying to avoid falling into the inner courtyards that have no way out except to map out!

I am not even a lore monkey of even the smallest sort although I did spend the night at a Holiday Inn Express....

I am wondering about the Southing and Westing on the in-game maps. It very much irritates me since I am so used to the real-world use of Northing and Easting. Does this have anything to do with lore or is this the result of some mischievous developer?

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Originally Posted by Bun

I am not even a lore monkey of even the smallest sort although I did spend the night at a Holiday Inn Express....

I am wondering about the Southing and Westing on the in-game maps. It very much irritates me since I am so used to the real-world use of Northing and Easting. Does this have anything to do with lore or is this the result of some mischievous developer?

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I'm not sure what you are referring to. If you could give an example, I might be able to answer you. :)

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Originally Posted by Berephon

I'm not sure what you are referring to. If you could give an example, I might be able to answer you. :)

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I thing he/she means that when you use ;loc to find your coordinates on the map it's given as ##W,##S

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Originally Posted by Tairii

I thing he/she means that when you use ;loc to find your coordinates on the map it's given as ##W,##S

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Ah, not a clue, unless someone was playing off the fact that everywhere you go in the books, the only gates that seem to get mentioned are south and west. I highly doubt that's it, though.

*saves the post*

It was almost on page 3....


Giants that throw rocks: I laughed my *** off the first time I got hit by a rock throwing giant. Bilbo encountered something similar when he went through the Misty Mountains.

I was checking through my hobbit deeds today, and happened to mouse over the description of "Enmity of the spiders" - this is what it said.

"You have killed quite a few spiders now, but have little more clue as to why they seem to find hobbits so offensive, save for rumours of an unusual encounter in the forests far to the east some years ago."

I'm sure Mr Bilbo Baggins and company could tell us exactly why spiders find hobbits so offensive...after all, nobody likes to be called names, especially not in the middle of preparing a tasty dwarven dinner.

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Originally Posted by Bun

I am not even a lore monkey of even the smallest sort although I did spend the night at a Holiday Inn Express....

I am wondering about the Southing and Westing on the in-game maps. It very much irritates me since I am so used to the real-world use of Northing and Easting. Does this have anything to do with lore or is this the result of some mischievous developer?

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It may be that Eriador is in the SW *I honestly can't remember the term but the East/West half of a hemisphere, quadrisphere?* of Middle Earth, if you go into the easternmost parts of the Misty Mountains you'll notice that ;loc will start yielding XXe insteast of XXw. Of course this is all hypothesis, and doesn't jive with the fact that Eriador is supposed to be a part of modern Europe.

Talking about coordinates. Has anyone got any idea what's at 0/0, i.e. the origin of the coordinates? I looked it up, it's not in the playable area at the moment.

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Originally Posted by steelsnake

Talking about coordinates. Has anyone got any idea what's at 0/0, i.e. the origin of the coordinates? I looked it up, it's not in the playable area at the moment.

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i doubt anything is there, at least for a while... it's simply a point far enough north that we won't ever have lands in the game (i.e., what's on JRR's maps) to get past the north point. I'd rather have seen it be at the _south_ boundary, but that would be a ways south of Gondor/Mordor.

As for the east/west meridian, it does kinda make sense to have it somewhere along the Misty Mtns. - once everything in LOTR is in the game, it'll be reasonably centered on the map.