LOTRO Developer Twitter Chat - Thursday March 21, 3:00PM Eastern Time

[Ixinix]

The main question on the minds of most people of my kinship:

* Are you working on a new, multi-boss (5 or 6) raid instance with raid locks?

If yes: What are you currently aiming for? After summer?

[Joene]

I love these dev chats!

- Can you tell us a bit about the schedule of this years' events? When is the spring event planned?

- Will you release some new skirmishes in the (near) future? It's been a while since the last one (Storm on Methredas).

- Will we be able to use cosmetic weapons in the future. If not, why?

- In the last dev chat you mentioned you might revamp vanilla zones if time allows. Which zone(s) do you consider that need the most attention?

Thank you for your time!

[.cy]

Q: When could Wardens expect some "tanking" bracelets with VIT/AGI beside the Horse-Lord Bracelet?

[Dainain]

Q: When could Wardens expect some "tanking" bracelets with VIT/AGI beside the Horse-Lord Bracelet?

And Earrings too (there are 3 different earrings with 150vit 38 might, but no VIT/AGI ones execpt the Revered Warden's Earring)

edit:found them - in stoneheight and ncf
So ill just 2nd the question about bracelets instead

[Firebryt]

Can we expect to see the same kind of interaction Rock and Kelsen have been giving to Captians and Burgs to the rest of the classes?

I would certainly like to have some discussion with the RK dev!

Any mention of "RK Dev" will be completely overlooked or probably is filtered. They have NO REPLIES at all to any questions about the RK Dev since Isengard. Check the posts. We are &&&&&&&&.

[Solofnarnia]

Are there any plans to include a desert region like Harad in future content?

[DanteIL]

for the Systems Dev: Any plans to revisit the functionality of the Instance Finder? Specifically, any possibility of tweaking it (and/or the Social panel) into more of a group finder?

[Merwick]

Thank you for coming back to do these community chats, they go a long way towards demonstrating that you are listening to your player base. My questions are a bit of a crossover between world, content and design so I'm hopeful they will sound relevant to this month's Twitter chat.

1.
Are there any plans of changing quest bestowal to increase immersion? Walls of text starting to get a bit dated (customisable text size might help with accessibility)

2. (SPOILER ALERT)
V3 feels extremely fragmented, from Rivendell to Forochel to Dunland to Isengard to Lorien to East Rohan and back west. When will V4 start?

3.
Any intention of revamping Isengard and Nan Curunir as we approach from Rohan? Isengard itself would probably feel more dangerous were it simply boarded off.

[Raowyn]

Q. Any plans towards making landscape barter tokens upgradeable to the endgame factions tokens and/or shared accross the entire account?

[theguru1]

Q. Will the LI system be fixed (again) and will it be done right this time.

Q. Will the stuttering/rubber-banding ever be fix, especially in Mounted Combat.

[cossieuk]

When will you fix the login issue with the forum as login details are sent in plain text and are not secured or encrypted?

[Levanas]

- Is there a chance that we will see the new avatar desings and animations? Perhaps with new expansion?

- Did you ever consider about revamping the Volume 1 Epic's? With improved graphics and voice overs for instanced quests, maybe?

- Are we going to see new voice overs for "talking with text" characters?

- Helm's Deep is going to be as a Raid or something else, like skirmish?

- Do you have an possible - date for Update 11? There is almost nothing to do except the grindy-new-raids?

- In future, can we see huge raids and 6 mans like Moria-ones? Or just tiny lair raids?

- When we would to hear about new expansion? Like it's name or possible release date?

[Linus_Alaska]

Is it planned to make festival and reputation steed skins available for war-steeds the same as the class-steeds?

[SabrielofLorien]

1. Any reductions/combining in the works for the large amount of "bonus" consumables?

example: LMs have a large number of "foods" they have to carry to feed pets. While these "foods" provide many types of recipes for Cooks, the LM has to dedicate a fair number of inventory slots to carry some of everything. Crumbs, Water, Honey Pots, Meats etc.

In addition some players have to carry class related scrolls of different types.

Any plans on consolidating Pet Foods or reducing the number of scroll by having a more universal scroll?


2. U10 introduced some unfortunate changes on the Ettenmoors (Nimrodel). What plans are there to have interim fixes for these issues? Play is now Zerg v Zerg.

While LMs may have some very powerful heals, we have long inductions. Warg Packs of 10+ (3/19/2013) are not survivable even when grouped. Once one side gets zerged enough, they retreat to GV or Grams and we fight in the one-shotters.

Healing chains Mini->RK->RK->Cappy->LM->Mini are nearly unstoppable. With the same results as above.

Both sides have incredible powers. RKs hit for 8,000 or more. Creeps can load up Crit Rating Buffs to @25%. Wargs add in +20% Crit from stealth. The fights are all one sided.

Of course, along with this goes the never-ending Rez Camping. This deters the fights from happening. Creepside you map out to Grams or Elsewhere. Freepside you map to MD or TH or anywhere rather than cross the landscape to the battle point.

While not much of this is "new" it's certainly appears worse after U10 stat changes.

[floreane]

Question :

1) Was the idea of "widely opening 1st age farm and later close it" planned from the beginning as a commercial trick, or is it just amateurism of some incompetent designers ?

2) How do you plane to reduce the gap between those who got 5 to 10 first age tokens through Erebor farming, and should not in you opinion since you removed the loot, and other who did not get any, e.g. because they were away or unlucky ?

[Nasami]

Is it planned to make festival and reputation steed skins available for war-steeds the same as the class-steeds?

I asked this during the last chat, and if I recall correctly, the answer was no.

Which really sucks, because after working my bum off trying to get the Steed of Eriador, I'd really like it to be a warsteed skin.

[floreane]

Other question :

3) Random loot in Erebor T1 was the source of 1st age for 99% of peoples, far far before buying it for seals (earn 2, costs 488). Now that this is removed as a loot, do you plan to reduce the cost of 1st age for seals in skirmish camps ?

4) Since apparently you made a huge mistake in letting Erebor T1 loot 1st age symbols, do you plane to assume you fault completely and remove all 1st age symbols and weapons earned until now, giving 2nd age in exchange ?

[bastiat1]

Q1: Have the Developers given any thought to creating some cool wormhole sequences?

I'm level 85 adventuring through Rohan. To do the Road to Erebor content I have to travel back in time to Rivendell to get the quests. I then leap forward in time to Erebor, after the destruction of the ring, to complete the quests. I then travel in time again to go back to Rohan to trade my space gems to the Rohirrim for some cool jewelry. That all makes perfect sense, but it just feels a little empty without an Einstein-Rosen Bridge graphical sequence each time I leap through time. Maybe you could draw some inspiration from this.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypy5hoYjlkk

[bastiat1]

Q2: Can Rowan shed some more light on JWBarry's reference that the Instances Team is now working on the "The Helms Deep Experience"? Does this involve a multi-boss progression raid, or is it some other kind of instance content?


Q3: Is the LoTRO random number generator "seeded" with any derivative of static character data?


Q4: How many new instances are being released with Update 11?


Q5: Are the Deveopers planning to phase-out "Power" as a game mechanic?

The changes to Fate made it's contribution to ICPR so powerful that all class power restore skills and power saving legacies are now irrelevant. That in itself raises the question of why the Developers felt the need to "nerf" those skills- it's not worth nerfing something no one will use. As it stands Fate is the only stat in the game that produces increasing returns to scale.

[Rapidan]

What is going on with the lotteries?

[Brethwyn_EU]

Questions.

1. Where does the wooden gate in eastern Hytbold lead to? There's an "open space" in between the mountains east of Hytbold, and wondering if this may be an area planned for future content?

2. When will we get more news on the new area coming with Update 11?

[jasonmwells]

Are you sure that the RNG truly is random? Some people seem to be perennially lucky or unlucky, and that luck has persisted longer than U9 and U10.

With a small enough sample, there are always going to be those that appear lucky or unlucky, but when there are enough reports of people running 100-150 instances or more without seeing specific drops (symbols, teal items, much less gold items) and others reporting 2-4 wins of "rare" gold items plus other desirable loot, then the player base becomes skeptical.

Can you share at a high level what you do to generate a random number? Is a static value part of the seed?

+ 1 to this... I would like an explaination. I find it hard to believe this is truely random. Have seen this behavior over and over for too long to believe it is truely random. I think there is an underlying "value" in the equation that is skewing results either to the good or bad.

[Omen_Kaizer]

Q. With U10 yall changed a calculation behind enemies' damage in scaled instances. Is the current amount of mob damage satisfactory, and why?

Chop out "With U10" if you must include my name "Argendauss", but I don't really care if you do.

My context behind that question: While some enemies such as BG armors probably hit too hard in U9, damage output of other enemies felt just right. Everything was do-able in the Mirkwood, Fornost, etc. instances. While the across-the-board tweak implemented may have helped out with certain overly-strong enemies right now and nipped future problems of exponential damage in the bud, I and many of my friends feel much of the current, newly-scaled content @85 and T2 if applicable has been rendered too easy. Impotent, even. For those I most often associate with, we need either a tank or main healer for content like NcF, Warg Pens, Fornost Water, Glinghant... but not necessarily both.


Q. For 1st ages, I find the dual-acquisition methods of deed-gated barter and RNG chance to be a good blend. May we get that for Gold gear?

139 characters, I'm trying to be succinct!
Context: This is an RPG, and a key facet of an RPG is progressing character ability. Increasing stats is one way to do that, and Gold legendary gear is for many an end-goal for that particular aspect of the game. Purely having to rely on luck, however, seems to be demoralizing for many folks; I say this based on seeing and hearing complaints of the RNG from strangers and friends in game and on the forums. That said, I feel a tangible goal of "complete X instance deed and acquire Y-hundred seals" brings light to the end of that tunnel for folks daunted by a random number generator that does not care about how many instances they've completed. FYI I feel the seal cost for 1st ages is appropriate, and a similar cost for Gold gear would be too. I also feel that first ages belong in chests as well as at a barterer, but in T2 raid chests as U10.02 has made it.

[Dovakhim]

Gladden Fields:

Question from the off, but I recently discovered that there is now a rocks-sealed entrance to a valley in the northeast of Lothlorien leading up to what must probably be the Gladden Fields.

Is there some development ongoing for that region or something planned or was this only introduced "in case" the Gladden Fields became an option?

Curious,

Dovakhim

[Elrantiri]

Any chance the herpa-derp 99% luck dependent loot drop system will be reverted back to the pre-RoR system?