Frelorn Test Stream 14/08/14
Frelorn Test Stream 14/08/14
Please note: I am paraphrasing here. Anything said here is coming through my interpretation of what was said, and is subject to being corrected, so don't take this as the final word.
If anyone who was present has any additions or corrections, feel free to post.
Frelorn Test Stream 14/08/14
Video here and here.
- Frelorn explains he’s doing an impromptu stream to test the sound and video so that future streams will be as error free as possible.
- Players mention they can’t hear him so well.
He says he’s going to get a better headset. - Someone asks about the Ice Bucket Challenge Turbine did this week for ALS (otherwise known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease).
The water was really, really cold. They actually had the ice sitting in the water for about 15 minutes before they did it, while they were waiting for their cameraman, so the water had time to get really really cold. - Someone asks about Frelorn’s plans for the stream
He’s going to roll up a new character and play through from start to finish, he’s also going to try to do some monster play stuff as well, and when we get closer to the Beorning launch, he’ll do a bit of that as well. He has a few other things they’re going to try to stream, based on suggestions from players in the forums. There is some really cool stuff they’ll be doing not from his desk. They have a recording studio there in the building that they will use to make it look more professional and cool and exciting, and hopefully we’ll be seeing some more of him and Rowan and a few other people from the team. - Someone mentions they’d love to see a fellowship of devs running an instance
That’s very much within the realm of possibility. - Someone asks who is behind Frelorn
Frelorn asks Jacob his forum name. It’s QuartermasterU, who is the brand manager and ecommerce manager. - Someone asks which server QuartermasterU is on
He doesn’t need to share that info. Team members like to keep their anonymity when playing the game. - Frelorn says he’s really looking forward to streaming. He’ll put up a schedule and let everyone know via Twitter, Facebook, the forums, etc. ahead of time. He’s still finding stuff that Sapience left behind which they may use for giveaways. Toys and goodies and games and swag. He did a bit of streaming when he was at Infinite Crisis, so once he gets all the technical stuff worked out it should go pretty smoothly. He has some really good ideas that hopefully he can incorporate in to do some cool stuff.
- Did Sapience leave any candy behind?
No he didn’t. Thankfully, because it probably would be pretty gross by now. He does have some Neapolitan astronaut ice cream. He’s been told it’s pretty good but he’s almost afraid to open it because then he won’t have any more astronaut ice cream. He’s going to keep that for now and save it for an emergency. Maybe put it in his escape bag at home. - Frelorn gives a bit of background about himself. He has been at Turbine for over 10 years now. He started out in customer service and then worked into community management. He started out at Asheron’s Call and then a bit at Asheron’s Call 2. He focused as the PvMP community manager for a time, and then he went to work as North American community manager on Batman: Arkham City. He worked on Gotham City Imposters, he did some global organization stuff for awhile, and for the last couple of years he was working on Infinite Crisis, and now he’s back at LotRO.
He did learn a lot from working on all those other titles, so hopefully he can bring some fresh ideas and some fresh blood to LotRO. They’re going to start doing some contests, so if you aren’t following LotRO on Facebook and Twitter – some of you may not like it, but he recommends doing it because it’s going to be a good chance to win some great prizes. He is also going to encourage players to stream as well. They’re going to start up a stream program where players can get stuff for streaming. Maybe some T-shirts or other things that they can dig out of the abyss. So lots of good fun stuff happening as he gets his head wrapped around what’s happening with the game and what’s happening with the community. He says the players have been really warm and welcoming, and great. He thinks it’s a great game. He loved it back when he worked on it before, and he’s really excited to be back working on it again. So it should be a lot of fun.
He’s also working on unifying LotRO on Twitch because right now there is an account for Moria, one for Helm’s Deep, a whole bunch of them so he’s going to unify them into just being one LotRO account so it’s easier to find. But he is going to work on getting players streaming because the more people that stream the game, the more people that see how awesome and fun it is, and then they’ll get in and play. He reminds players that he is open to suggestions and ideas. - Question about his beard
He usually has a beard, but there was a freak shaving accident and it will be coming back in. - Someone asks if Frelorn is Sapience’s permanent replacement
Yes, he is the permanent replacement. - Can you show us what QuartermasterU is working on?
No, he cannot. He will hurt Frelorn – we will see him get bludgeoned and that wouldn’t be good. - A player asks if he will sneak up on someone in the office
No, he will not. That’s how people get hurt. :) - Is Infinite Crisis coming soon?
Yes it is. The team is working very hard on it. There will be a pretty big update to the game soon and it’s going to be awesome. If you are a DC fan you want to play it. It’s fun, it’s great, he loves everybody there. - Someone asks him to play as a Beorning
Once the Beorning are ready he will definitely be playing one. - When will we next hear about the Beorning?
When they have more information to give us. It’s not easy creating a whole new class out of the blue, so as soon as they’ve got more to share with us, they will. - Which server are you going to be playing on?
He hasn’t said yet which server it will be. He hasn’t decided yet. He may make it a coin flip, or he may take a recommendation from the team, he hasn’t figured that out yet. He thinks he’s going to start the steady streaming next week. He knows DDO does streaming on Wednesdays, so maybe he’ll do Thursdays, or Mondays and Fridays, or Tuesdays, he doesn’t know yet. He’s still nailing all that down. - Did Sapience give you his copyright to Soon?
No. No no no no no. - Someone suggests Landroval
Landroval was actually the first server he played on when he started playing way back in the day. He still has several characters there. Once he started doing monster play stuff he was pretty much on every server. - Frelorn says he’s going to start repopulating the YouTube page and get more videos archived there. He also says we are welcome to tell him if he’s bad at streaming. He’ll still do it, but he’ll take constructive criticism.
- Someone reminds him to set the Twitch videos to save so that people can watch them later on
That’s what he’s going to do. He’s going to archive them all on YouTube as well, because he knows sometimes Twitch doesn’t replay very well, it’s a little slow sometimes. - Someone mentions his voice isn’t very loud
He says that’s partly because he has a really loud voice that projects all over the building and annoys people (QuartermasterU nods enthusiastically in the background). He’s going to get a new headset for streaming, something with a better microphone. He will talk a bit louder, but he doesn’t want to get too loud because people are trying to work around him. - Is that an Orc behind you?
That’s an Uruk-Hai called Lurtz. He has a bow as well. He has Gandalf as well. And the very best on is Peter Jackson as a corsair. [ PETER JACKSON AS A CORSAIR!! – Frick ] All of them were gifts from a friend of his who loves LoTR. - Any giveaways with all expansion packs and quest packs?
Never say never. He will give away whatever they will let him give away, and even some of the stuff they won’t let him give away. Part of the streams, part of following on Facebook, following on Twitter should be getting stuff. People love free stuff, and they have lots of stuff. He goes around the office a bit showing off the various things he’s found so far. LotRO sweaters, a Riders of Rohan T-shirt, old game guides, etc. He holds up a flyer for “free gift” and says we’ll be finding out more about that soon. - Does LotRO have a Google+ page?
He will look into that. - Someone asks if QuartermasterU is being punished because he doesn’t have a chair
Actually he uses a stand-up desk. He actually chooses to work standing up. Crazy. - Frelorn shows of his Nerf gun and says some of the wars there have been pretty epic.
- Someone asks about more T-shirts
They’re actually looking into getting more done. They’ll have some cool stuff this year. - Will you ever make another game guide?
He doubts it. They didn’t even do that well when they first came out, and most people just use online guides now. There’s not a lot of sense to making a book version of a guide. - Can you tell your boss I want an option in the LotRO store where I can get a figurine made of my character? I want a male elf minstrel beside my computer screen.
Preaching to the choir. He can certainly tell them. He doesn’t know if it will do anything but he can tell them. - Someone asks if Sapience shaved off his beard
No, he did not. He’s not Sapience, he’s Frelorn, the new community manager. Sapience left LotRO for Extra Life, and last he heard, is currently in Las Vegas. - Do you have a mini-fridge at your desk?
Yes, he does have a fridge. He inherited it. - Do you really have an ice cream vending machines in the office?
Yes, and they have several other vending machines, a ping-pong table and an arcade. They also get to play video games a lot so it’s great. They do work, but they get to play video games a lot. - Which games are in the arcade?
Too many to name. Tons. Lots of classic games. - Do you need a bachelor’s degree to work at Turbine?
He doesn’t know. He doesn’t have one. He started out with just a high school diploma and worked his way up over the years. He started as a customer service rep and worked his way up. - I could work for Turbine, but I’m from Romania
That would be a tough commute. - Is it hard to get hired there?
Yes. It’s as difficult as with any job. Unless you’re taking an entry level position you need experience and all that stuff. But he’s not HR and it’s been 10 years since was hired and gone through the process.
Frelorn closes the stream by saying he may be doing another unannounced test stream tomorrow, but once they get into the regular stream cadence he will put up a schedule and he’ll try to bring in some special guests, Rowan and other team members. They’ll do some Q&As, some gameplay, all sorts of things. He looks forward to it, but for now, everyone have an amazing day and he will see us next time.
LotRO Update 14.2 Preview Tour 11/09/2014
LotRO Update 14.2 Preview Tour 11/09/2014
The team starts out by introducing themselves. Present today are Community Manager Andy “Frelorn” Cataldo, Executive Producer Aaron “Rowan” Campbell, Senior Content Designer Jeff “MadeOfLions” Libby, Lead Systems Designer Matt “HoarseDev” Zimmitti, Game Systems Engineer Leo "Ransroth" Zelevinsky at the computer driving things and taking questions from players.
Frelorn asks the dev team what they'd like to show off first.
Rowan – It’s a small update, but they’ve managed to sneak a few features in. The two things they’d like to highlight are the new collections system, which rewards people for mounts and pets they’ve collected in the game, and the other will be a preview of the Dead Marshes. He wants to start out with collections.
The New Collections System
Frelorn brings up the collections panel. He says he doesn’t have anything collected yet.
The panel has a list of deeds and progress bars for those deeds. When a deed is selected, the section of the panel expands to show the title available, along with the items required to earn that deed. Clicking on an individual item – a mount or a pet – will bring up a preview of that pet.
HoarseDev – There are all these great rewards for playing the game, but no means for players to show them off, so they wanted to create a system where you can check and see which rewards you have, how to properly go out and find some of them, so if there was a specific mount that you really liked but didn’t know how to get, or if you wanted to know how to get this version of this chicken. They’ve also worked in a reward for collecting a bunch of different thematic rewards.
For a start they’re really only working with pets and mounts, but they’ve got a lot of fancy features to add more. So right now if you were to collect four mounts that were seasonal festival mounts, the system would give you a title that was thematically appropriate to that. They’re also looking into more rewards for getting the collections together. One thing they really like is that the system allows them to show us what the rewards look like before we even get them. So we can browse through now and check out mounts we’ve never had and decide if we want to go out and quest for it.
They’re really excited about this system and they’ve had a lot of feedback that people want to see them expand on it. This release is their opening salvo on the system, but they’re looking at adding to it in the very near future.
Rowan – The important thing for him is, they actually tell you where to find these things. Which quest to do, which festival to go to, so we’ll know where in the world to go get them.
Frelorn is notified that the sound is poor due to in-game sounds obscuring what’s being said, so the adjustments are made and they decide to go over it all again.
HoarseDev – They built this new system, both for elder players and for new players, where they have all these rewards in-game, they have mounts, they have pets, they have festival content, they have rep rewards, and they’ve never really had a consolidated place where we could see not only what we have but what we could earn, and on top of that reward us for collecting thematic groups of items. They want to stress that this is their initial foray into having this kind of collection system, so this is not the end of the road. They’re going to add a ton more to it, but as an example we could go get four different mounts from four different seasonal festivals, and as you acquire them, it’s going to show you in the UI, which ones you have, which ones you don’t have and how to get them. And you might get a cool title for getting four seasonal mounts, or for getting three difficult rep mounts.
This is their springboard into the new system and they’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback. They’re definitely going to be adding a lot more collections to it. One of the things he likes best about the system is that, regardless of which items you have or don’t have, it will show you what they look like, so you can actually see a specific mount and how it’s adorned, and so you can decide, “Well I am going to be around for the winter festival so I’m definitely going to stop by and get that one.”
It’s a really big step for them, it gives players a lot of feedback in terms of a lot of things they’ve accomplished over the years. LotRO has been around for quite awhile and a lot of folks have gone and quested for things like mounts and pets, and now we can take a look at our entire collection. So they’re very excited about it.
Rowan – Knows they’ve started out with titles as a reward, do they have any ideas for other rewards in the future?
HoarseDev – The first time out they’ve kept it kind of simple, but they can attach all sorts of rewards through the system so in the future they may do something where they look at a group of rep mounts and add an additional mount for a reward, or practically anything that drops in the game could be dropped through this system. They went with titles to start, but they’re definitely planning on taking the opportunity of blowing this up and giving players all kinds of things to collect and quest for.
Ransroth – He changed the collections window to demonstrate that it can be resized if a player wishes to expand it, in response to a player question, and was wondering if it’s possible to expand the preview of the mount/pet at this point.
HoarseDev – Not right now, but some of the feedback that they’ve gotten has been about the UI and layout and things like that, so they’re still looking into things like that.
Frelorn asks if there are any more questions from the players regarding the collections system.
Why this new system instead of using the deed system?
HoarseDev – They looked at the deed system, and there are definitely similarities there, but in a nutshell, under the hood, piping strictly through the old deed system was going to add a lot of extra overload to characters and things, and wasn’t going to give them things like the viewport, so this actually doesn’t have a lot of the extra weight that the deed system does and allows them to go in a different direction in terms of, it’s always going to be collecting things for a reward. It just turned out to be a win-win both technically and in terms of the load put on characters.
Is there a search box?
HoarseDev – He doesn’t know if there actually is right now. That’s something they have gotten feedback on and so it’s on a roadmap. Right now they don’t have too many collections in there, but he can definitely see as they expand down the road they’re going to want people to be able to search.
Is it possible to rewrite the deed system to have a similar window? This window is awesome.
HoarseDev – One of the things they like to do is propose something new like this and then see what about it is backwards compatible, so there is a bit of experimentation going there. The deed system is much more broad, so a lot of the things that we would do or find aren’t as concise as, say, a horse. Like visiting Weathertop, now they’d have to go and get a camera shot of Weathertop and add it in there. They are definitely looking at ways that they can potentially cannibalize this and back-fill something, but each one of those is kind of its own separate question. He thinks it would be very challenging to just take this and transpose it onto the deed system.
Rowan – There are a LOT of deeds (Everyone laughs and nods).
Ransroth – So that answers the other question. Someone was asking if this would replace the deeds system.
HoarseDev – No.
Rowan – This would not replace the deed system.
The Dead Marshes
MadeOfLions – The Dead Marshes! First some history of how we even got to the Dead Marshes. It seems that every one of these streams that they do, he’s always astounded at the places they’re talking about. Like West Gondor. Games never go to West Gondor. The Dead Marshes? He’s played the Dead Marshes in one single other game. Almost no games get to go to the Dead Marshes so that’s one of the reasons that – he thinks it was during development of Flooded Isengard when they started talking about the Dead Marshes – and then certainly in Western Gondor. They were trying to come up with a way to touch in with Frodo and Sam on their journey, because it’s been a long time since we’ve seen those hobbits and the story of The Lord of the Rings is in large part, the story of those guys.
It seems like a really good idea to check in with them occasionally, and one of the difficulties is that they’re on a secret mission. It has to stay secret. But we still want to find out what’s going on with them. So the idea was that during development of Western Gondor they started working on a session play experience where we’d get to see Frodo and Sam again, and check in on their story. And as the world builders were putting together the Dead Marshes, it quickly became apparent that they were doing a lot of work to make this place look really cool and creepy, and players would want to see this with their own characters. It’s really cool to see the Frodo and Sam story that takes place as they’re trying to get across the Dead Marshes, but there’s something really cool about going there with your own character. So they came up with a short quest arc that would give us a reason to go to the Dead Marshes, something to do there, and by completing the short quest arc it would unlock the ability to play the session play. So the goal expanded a bit as they started looking at the area.
MadeOfLions asks Ransroth to bring up the map. It’s actually pretty big.
MadeOfLions – The Dead Marshes, in all their glory. Larger than they initially expected, to be perfectly honest (everyone laughs). This was initially going to be a session play and while looking at it they decided to expand it a little bit, and initial feedback from QA and other sources was that this should probably be more than just a session play.
The Dead Marshes themselves are the site of a battle towards the end of the War of the Last Alliance, so the pools here are filled with bodies from long ago – orcs and men and elves – and you can still see some of the – it’s hard to say if it’s spirits from Mordor or if it’s swamp gas, it’s probably a little of both – playing tricks on your eyes while you’re adventuring. The chapters on Frodo and Sam and Gollum’s journey across the marshes goes into some detail on the creepy things that you see and we’ll certainly get to experience that for ourselves also, when we explore the Dead Marshes.
It’s a confusing, sort of gloomy place, on purpose, and he thinks that the atmosphere there is pretty good.
Question about whether the collections UI will be in French and German
HoarseDev – He certainly hopes so (everyone laughs).
Rowan – That’s certainly their intention.
The little lights are cool, people want to light their own lights whether it’s through a consumable or an item or a cosmetic pet
MadeOfLions – The game side of him says, “That would be awesome!” The story side of him says, Gollum talks about Frodo and Sam joining the dead ones and lighting little candles of their own. That’s a little more ominous.
Ransroth – They’d need to actually die to do that.
MadeOfLions – It’s a scary thing. From a game perspective it would be kind of neat to have a consumable in the future maybe.
Ransroth – You could just kill an orc and suck its soul and then release it in the marshes. That sounds feasible.
HoarseDev – They are expanding their ideas in terms of what’s cool for cosmetic pets and things like that, so they’ve definitely got some surprises to come.
Question about the cost of the region since it’s a lot more than they were expecting
Rowan – This is free. That’s basically it. So enjoy it.
HoarseDev – To be clear, it’s bigger than their initial intent was, but it’s not a full-blown, crazy region. They started digging in and it’s such a pivot point in the story where you really get that sense of solitude and all this really interesting stuff that they wanted to show, they just decided to build it out more than they’d initially planned.
Why is there an orc camp in the marshes? According to lore it was barren and empty
MadeOfLions – He thinks it’s important to point out that when Frodo and Sam and Gollum go through the marshes, it’s March 2nd, maybe the 1st and 2nd 3019. When we go through, it’s a little more than a week later. He doesn’t want to go too much into the quest arc itself, but the idea they’re working with is that orcs came here after Frodo and Sam went through. They weren’t there when they came through. The idea being that perhaps Sauron has sensed that something isn’t entirely right here so he’s sent orcs to investigate. This isn’t a settlement. One of the reasons for this not being a full-fledged region is because, for example, there is – with a minor exception – one quest giver in the Dead Marshes. They didn’t want to have a hub of NPCs waiting around and handing out quests. Honestly he wanted to minimize the number of players that are running around at a certain time. While they definitely want players to go out and enjoy exploring and playing through the Dead Marshes and experiencing the atmosphere, one of the reasons to keep the number of quests down was to make it so that it doesn’t feel as if so many people are tromping all over the marshes filling it up. There is an orc camp, but he thinks it’s a late arrival compared to when Frodo and Sam where here.
Is it the Dawnless Day, and do we always have that sky?
MadeOfLions – In the Dead Marshes, he believes we will.
Rowan – Because there is a daytime cycle there too (it’s night in the preview).
Frelorn and Rowan switch seats so that Rowan can sit near the computer.
How are we going to get to the Dead Marshes, because there is no existing map that borders it?
MadeOfLions – That is true. The pickup point for the quest in the Dead Marshes begins conveniently close in Western Gondor in the cave of the Avorrim from Dorthaneth. So they had to balance the ways to get people there.
Rowan adjusts the in-game time to show what the Dead Marshes looks like in the daytime at a later game point.
Rowan – It doesn’t get much brighter. That’s Daytime.
HoarseDev – A fun vacation spot. Get a tan (everyone laughs).
Rowan – That sky is pretty ominous out there.
MadeOfLions – So it’s not incredibly close, but the idea is that he wanted the on-ramp to the Dead Marshes to occur at roughly around the time when the Dead Marshes content is taking place. But since it’s gotten to that point, the Western Gondor… He doesn’t know how much has been said about future updates, so he will not really say much.
Rowan – Says, “Jump in there.” He wants to know what MadeOfLions is saying (everyone laughs).
MadeOfLions – OK then. Since the Dawnless Day will be arriving at Gondor soon.
Rowan – Shows the cloud coming over the horizon.
MadeOfLions – It makes sense for them to deal with the Dawnless Day in the Dead Marshes, from Western Gondor, which is shortly before the Dawnless Day arriving in Gondor.
If the start is in Western Gondor, does that mean it’s only free for people who have West Gondor?
MadeOfLions – He believes the quests are not part of the West Gondor content. Which means you can get into the cave of the Avorrim without West Gondor and you should be able to talk to everyone you need to talk to without it. Now, you won’t know who the Avorrim are, or who Dorthaneth is, but you should be able to.
The Dead Marshes Session Play
Frelorn starts the session play and we see Sam onscreen in the Dead Marshes.
Is it always raining?
MadeOfLions – No, he doesn’t believe so.
Rowan – Like other regions of the world it has its own weather cycle.
Ransroth – Actually really likes the rain in LotRO, and the cold. It makes him genuinely feel cold and wet at his desk when he plays.
HoarseDev – Thought he’d moved away from all that.
Ransroth – He came to Boston to get away from the British weather (laughs).
Frelorn moves the camera view around so that people can see the sky toward where the Dawnless Day will be coming through.
MadeOfLions – So Sam is bedraggled, because he’s been journeying.
Ransroth – He needs a wash!
Frelorn – He does. You’d think in the rain he’d get cleaned up a little bit.
MadeOfLions – Frodo is unhappy about having to travel through the Dead Marshes, and Sam is unhappy about having to trust Gollum.
Frelorn – Shocking.
MadeOfLions – Is so happy to be able to use Gollum again. It has been a long time, and he thinks Gollum is great, and super fun to write.
HoarseDev – He seems so at home there.
Frelorn – He really does.
MadeOfLions – Gollum says he’s going to guide them to Mordor. There are places throughout this section of the Dead Marshes where Sam might get stuck in mud, and have to work to get out of the mud. Frelorn gets stuck in the mud.
Rowan – Says he’d better follow Gollum carefully.
Frelorn – He got stuck again! This will be his downfall.
Ransroth – Says we need a session play as Gollum for the whole story (everyone laughs).
MadeOfLions – Gollum epic!
Frelorn – That would be amazing.
HoarseDev – That would be awesome.
MadeOfLions – Every chapter is the same. Follow the ring (everyone laughs).
HoarseDev – One quest.
MadeOfLions – They had to resist putting birds in there, because that’s lore-appropriate too. No birds.
Frelorn – Doesn’t imagine they’d fancy being in a place like that.
Frelorn gets to the end of the first part of the Dead Marshes session play, which basically consists of Sam and Frodo following Gollum through the marshes. MadeOfLions decides he wants to show just a bit more of the session play.
MadeOfLions – Tells Frelorn to step with care. The ground is treacherous. Follow him closely. But don’t follow the lights.
Frelorn – The lights are bad.
Frodo has been lost! They decide to end it there.
Rowan – They expect this to go live early next week.
Frelorn – As soon as it’s been confirmed exactly when it’s going live they will post up the usual posts in the forums and social media, etc. but hopefully early next week it will be going live.
Is this level 100? And thank-you for the stealth housing upgrade!
Rowan – Yes, it’s level 100.
Frelorn thanks everyone for tuning in and checking it out. He hopes we enjoy update 14.2 and says it will be going live soon.
Will the docks quest with the turtles be returning with 14.2?
Rowan – Yes, they fixed that.
Frelorn – The release notes are ready to go, and they’ll be put up on the day of the release as usual.
Will the turtle bug fix delete any existing turtles in the inventory?
HoarseDev – He doesn’t know if the inventory will be affected, but he thinks they may have to create a new pet to commemorate the situation.
Rowan – The angry turtle.
Frelorn – Asks Ransroth if there are any more questions from players.
Ransroth – No questions, just a lot of thank-yous (everyone smiles and ‘awws’ about that).
Frelorn – Says thanks to the players, and says he looks forward to seeing us in-game.
When are you going to stream your new character?
Frelorn – Technically he was supposed to go today but since they were doing this, he’s not sure. He may jump on this afternoon. He will let us all know via social media if he’ll be playing today.
MadeOfLions – Asks what Frelorn is playing.
Frelorn – He’s playing a hobbit minstrel. First time ever playing a minstrel.
HoarseDev – Excellent choice.
Frelorn – It’s been an exercise in humour, as players tell him what to do and then make fun of him when he messes it up.
Frelorn thanks the viewers again, and ends the stream. Everyone on the team says goodbye.
