Transcript: LOTRO Developer Twitter Chat - Thursday March 21, 2013

[Edhereth]

It was a bug. Nothing more. Nothing less. Sorry, but it really is just that simple.

Sapience:
Sorry. You insult my intelligence.

[Stealthiness]

Sapience:
Sorry. You insult my intelligence.

I find it hard to believe that this "bug" made it through 5 Beta Builds and has passed numerous rant threads unnoticed as well. Plain lying to our face. At least they've fixed it now, and hopefully they won't make this mistake again.

[Fralin]

I read: All other classes can cap tactical mitigation without giving up their main stat in their main roll, except for Hunters and Burglars, because we just don't care about them.

Afaik, the only ones who can cap it without loosing anything would be guards... perhaps some casters, a champ in full dps is roughly on the same level as a burg/hunter, slightly above but not by much

Sapience:
Sorry. You insult my intelligence.

Well, it COULD have been a bug. Although seeing as the same thing more or less happened with the farming of Hytbold and BG AND the fact that it was pointed out on BR... well, if it was a bug the QA team did a rather poor job. Still, bugs are acceptable, a poor job in system design is worse.

[Ullr_of_Aesir]

Cant believe nobody asked why they implemented this terrible loot system !

It probably was asked, Turbine decides what questions to answer....

[Ferthcott]

Well, it COULD have been a bug. Although seeing as the same thing more or less happened with the farming of Hytbold and BG AND the fact that it was pointed out on BR... well, if it was a bug the QA team did a rather poor job. Still, bugs are acceptable, a poor job in system design is worse.

Or it was known issue, but due to some triage system, only truly critical bugs were possible to address in time, and - as current cluster shows - even not all of critical ones.

I am not sure which answer is worse though. If tinfoil approach has merit, Turbine at least has a plan, as obnoxious it may be. However, if bug triage was indeed so demanding and resources are so limited, I wonder how long their stocks of duct tape are going to last

[Yulin-Gladden]

I want to thank the LOTRO dev team for their time to answer (some) of our questions.

Too much negativity in this thread.....

^^this

[BigLotroFan]

Wildermore being a half answer was simply because there was no one from Ecommerce there to answer it. We make a point of letting everyone know who is attending the chat and what they are working on and can answer so people don't ask a lot of questions we have no one present to answer. THat said, I asked and the answer is the price is on par with the Great River. I don't have an exact price, but you should be able to look that up in the LOTRO Store. Best I could do at 9PM.

Thanks for the clarification!

[andracy]

the best part who make me laugh is the fixing bugs part.

Q5: Midford - Can you guys focus not just only on new content, but also the bugs?
A5: Lauren “Budgeford” Salk
We always fix many bugs each update! If you see something broken, feel free to /bug it in game so we’re aware of the issue.

- on short:
- GB Maze and Sambrog. if you fail CH, you cannot take it again leaving instance. Unsolved since ages.
- Annuminas: If you fail CH, you canno take it again leaving instance. Unsolved since ages. Even better since U10, in Ost Elendil, boss will not even enter in combat except if you kill the sorceress, being required to fail the CH to be able to finish the instance
- Dale not working. Waited 6 months for a 6 man instance ...
- invisible wall in Erebor
- Epic quest - A Relic in Lumul-nar - bugged. since ages. sended ticket to GM everytime i leveled a toon. Reported as bug. Nothing.
- Fornost. Trebuchets quest not working. Reported many times.
Those was only a few of them.

To conclude:
- the issue is not the bugs not being fixed, is the new bugs who appears after an update, fix or patch. So instead fixing something, you broke even more the content.
- Lotro raiding days are closed. We will give some more goes on OD since was the last true raid ... but except that, i will not bother to schedule a raid in my kin.
- ALL THE CONTENT rescaled is TOO EASY my dear developers. Too easy. Scaled bad .. very bad. In annuminas you take a wound of 56 morale damage every 2 sec? In sambrog you take a disease of 90 morale damage every 5 sec? Doh. You dont need tank and healer for the content, all the groups use a cappy and 5 dps. Is hilarious.
- Not being able to spend 1k of my power as healer after 2 min fight is incredible bad. Fate is too powerful, all the new gear fill you with fate, no survivability.


After 4 years i may say that Lotro is broken.
One more thing. If you implement the skill trees, that will make Lotro the new WoW. Amin.

[Eartholloth]

One more thing. If you implement the skill trees, that will make Lotro the new WoW. Amin.

Pretty much & pretty sad they are resorting to doing such things.

Please Turbine dont implement this. All this is gonna do is cause even more of a mess with the game.

[ShadowPet]

I find it hard to believe that this "bug" made it through 5 Beta Builds and has passed numerous rant threads unnoticed as well. Plain lying to our face. At least they've fixed it now, and hopefully they won't make this mistake again.

Didn't we say that after the Durchest fiasco too? Maybe third time is a charm ...

[Loreineth]

Pretty much & pretty sad they are resorting to doing such things.

Please Turbine dont implement this. All this is gonna do is cause even more of a mess with the game.

Actually, WoW scrapped their old talent tree system, and went to something different. Three (four for druid) specializations for each class. For example, warrior still has Fury, Arms, Tank as choices. However, all the old 'cookie-cutter' stuff is built into the specialization. You get a new talent choice every 15 levels (max is 90, so you get six talent choices). Talents are usually extra abilities or extra passives, and you have to pick one of three. Sometimes the choice is easy, sometimes it's not, depending on how you play. Almost all the min/max choices are built into the specialization now, and the talents are other choices.

So, going to talent trees here won't be like WoW. More like Rift.

[Southpa]

No, I'm sure you don't. However, it also means that few people will bother to want a dialogue with you.

I don't see eye to eye with Lestache, either, but he doesn't adopt the attitude that only people in lockstep with his thinking should be allowed to play 'his' game, which is how I understood your rant.

Have a beautiful day.

Hardly a rant...

Dialogue is moot because neither side ever changes - nor should they.
I espouse my feelings for the devs to see. Whether others agree or disagree is collateral and largely inconsequential at this point.

If you got the feeling that I think this is "my" game, then again you naturally assumed the worst, which you like to do with my posts. I don't care what else exists in this game other than what I enjoy. If you take that to mean that I think this game should be 100% tailored to what I personally want, then you have put a whole lot of words in my mouth. Don't infer when you read internet, k?

[Eartholloth]

I find it hard to believe that this "bug" made it through 5 Beta Builds and has passed numerous rant threads unnoticed as well. Plain lying to our face. At least they've fixed it now, and hopefully they won't make this mistake again.

This is one of the things that just burns my butt with Turbine. They know these type of bugs exist but yet let them go live & they know people are going to be pissed. I just cringe when the known issues for each update is posted wondering what wont be working. Bugs that affect your game play should not be let go & into the live updates. For example last year in one of there updates there was a bug where in one of the stances for the warden it was not advancing your skills. Things like this should be fixed before it goes live. I dunno it just irritates me to see a list of known bugs when a update goes live. I sit & think well if you know they exist fix them before letting the update go live.

[Sapience]

It probably was asked, Turbine decides what questions to answer....

It was answered, in great depth, and requoted many times, in our previous dev chat. People complain when we just answer the same questions over and over and over. So we try not to.

Also, how you choose to word questions has a great impact on whether they are chosen or not. Insulting, agressive, or otherwise abusive comments are ignored out of hand.

[Lothirieth]

I'm going to have to point out a couple of points. First, Question #1 was about game performane. Second, it strikes me the majority of those complaining about the quality of the questions and making the most negative comments did not themselves ask any. Perhaps in the future you could seek to rectify that?

Probably because it's made clear some of the more "uncomfortable" questions are outright ignored... so why waste one's time? Though I suppose you're right and we should at least try... though, for me personally, others had already asked the questions I was wanting answers to.

[Tangaar]

just a small question that has been asked many times ago and almost every day...
Even though i know it requires a lot of programming..


Any chance to have an oprion On LIs weapons to reshape them in the old skins?

For example i remember a FA of moria skin(which was never used but exists in the files) to reshape the new ones we have

[bastiat1]

Any chance to have an oprion On LIs weapons to reshape them in the old skins?

I don't think they could have been any more definitive. No cosmetic weapons.

Q26: Nasami - Cosmetic gear slots? My LM has found some gorgeous staves, only to lose how they look because she found better quality gear. Please?

A26: Evan "Verizal" Graziano
Unfortunately due to tech limitations, this is not really an option

[voalkrynn2]

Q1: Drunken_Valar – Any plans to update the stability of the game?

A1: Aaron “Rowan” Campbell
With Update 10 we hit some unexpected issues that required us to close “Flight to the Lonely Mountain” The engineering team is tracking those down, and we hope to have them fixed soon.
We’re also looking at ways to add more monitoring to the game servers to help us track down bugs. We continue to push the boundaries of our game engine with new features like mounted combat. Those are great for new gameplay, but also create new challenges for our engineers.

Can you define "soon"?

Q5: Midford - Can you guys focus not just only on new content, but also the bugs?

A5: Lauren “Budgeford” Salk
We always fix many bugs each update! If you see something broken, feel free to /bug it in game so we’re aware of the issue.

How many more times does Draigoch need to be /bug reported to address the fact that the dragon can still bug out in Phase 3 and that GMs still aren't enabled with tools or permission to award chests? Yes I know it's not really being run atm; however, it's evidence that "we always fix many bugs" is a false statement. Why is broken content, the raid that is still offline, being released in the 1st place? We paid for this release ages ago and it's....more like a Ford Pinto (exploding gas tank) than a Ford Mustang.


Q28: OverlordGate - Which instance cluster will be scaled and revamped next and when can we expect it?

A28: Derek Flippo
Right now we’re focusing on prototyping Helm’s Deep instanced content for the upcoming expansion pack. After we’ve shipped the expansion we’ll evaluate the remaining potential revamps vs. making new instances.

Please pay particular attention to building a right 1st time product that won't explode, won't be farmed, nor will it be exploited from day ONE - something on par with DN, BG, OD or ToO (without wings if possible). We really need a winner after the detritus that washed onto the servers in the form of the current release. At this point I'm only logging in to socialize with friends and maybe run the odd piece of content.

[Dmunney]

[QUOTE=D3str0yer;6721473]Q38: @Honvik Any idea if you will bring in a PvP tournament system I.e 12v12 or smaller PvP warzone #devchat#lotro

[B]A38: Derek Flippo
We have no plans to add additional PvMP content


Thx turbine just spent 200$ on tps because of this answer. Would probably spend $1k on tp if u got rid of the moors to help offset your money loss

[Pelethor]

I read all the comments and the transcript so far,as i did before and i have also a few comments to post both to turbine and the player base.

1)I see that many questions are being asked again and again.That has some logical explanation since not all can remember or read what was talked 2 months back. Isn't time for an archive with all transcripts being built?

2)I like this new communicative style with the company but i see also a lot of unsure questions and complains rising. Maybe it would be better for the company to give some guidelines.For example stuff for expansion or class changes wont be answered.

3)And this, guys is somewhat my question. Why anyone hasn't asked yet about the game? 1) How goes the game in online games marketing? Is it promising? Server status? Or in another way and kind, How do you see Middle Earth form based on your plans? Is it a priority for you to reach Mordor and the end of the books. I am not recommending to go the conversation to licences cause frankly i don't know even if they have the answers for those things yet.

Lotro is a game based in an old age engine and i don't know how kind can be the future to it. I am a huge fan of the game ofc and would like to be here like forever but i think guys even questions for pvmps or areas like erebor and dale really comes down if marketing, or the company aims are enough to let this game stay that long to take sidewalks.

Dont come down to eat me i am not a doomer just looking the point from another view.

I certainly dont think there is a person who is doing this job and dont want to give us the best of service. They must first have the means to do it and second....in the end its a company that makes profit. Thats their main concern and also the future of Lotro.

[andracy]

Dear Devs, with all the respect ... please understand our frustation. Is worst and worst each day. This is not the game we loved to play some years ago. For example:
- just realise how bad was the update 10 thinked. You launch the new fate stat, with stupid amounts of icpr, all the gear have fate now, is no toon without having at least 400 fate which practicaly make you have unlimited power amount, but ...
- you created pieces of gear (check erebor minstrel gear) with 187 power. Lol, why?
- we have so many legacy useless now for legendary weapons who are reducing power cost. USELESS. Check hunter power cost legacies, minstrel, RK etc.
- half of the yellow line on minstrel is about reducing power costs. God, why? I barely can use 2k power in 10 min not using a single pot.
- the ppl are complaining about survivability since long time ago ... though the new gear, ALL the jewellery from any instance have the same amounts of: 150 stat, hugh critt, hugh fate. maybe some morale. No vit. YOu are doing this from purpose, or the developers are really dont trouble with what ppl want?
... and i can continue many pages.

The ideea is.. you cannot make such changes, and not thinking at all the stuff which involves those changes. You cannot launch something not enought tested. And you cannot wait 3 weeks to tell us that the raid is still in repairs ... that make us wonder what is the time alocated for repairs, 30 min daily?

[Gylve]

To clarify a bit more on this:

When the changes first went in, Fate's contribution to ICPR was so high mainly to account for the fact that I was worried that classes might not be able to obtain as much Fate from gear as I would have liked. As it turns out, we were able to get in a bit more Fate gear than planned which, when combined with a multitude of +Max Power, easily left many classes without power issues. Due to such a high ICPR contribution, however, I found that I was having to scale back a bit more than I would have liked on skills that increased ICPR and Fate, almost placing Fate on its own level, rather than in-line with the other four primary stats.

With the changes that you will be seeing, yes Fate will see a decreased ICPR contribution, but I have also further lowered skill costs to make up for it. For those of you that have been spending time building up Fate, it will certainly not be going to waste, as all adjustments have been made to continue to hit the goals that we originally set forth. Given some of the newer gear for U10, classes should find that they are able to hit 400+ Fate rather easily, which is the intent going forward. With that said, we are still continuing to balance these changes and will certainly be addressing any classes that still appear to be having issues

Hi Verizal, good to put a name to the fate/power changes. I'm glad that the system is going to continue to be tweaked down the road, but I do have a couple of comments.

1) +Max Power is a total trash stat for all classes and has been for some time now, and it has literally nothing to do with any current power management issues. A single slice of power on a piece of gear provides on the order of a single skill use. Power management is entirely due to the interplay between skill power costs and ICPR/power returns.

2) Nerfing Fate in any fashion seems like a generally bad idea at this point. Lots of people have already invested quite a bit into acquiring Fate in their builds. Plus, current itemization makes it clear that Fate was meant to be an important secondary stat for all classes. Rather than change the effectiveness of the stat, I think you should instead work on tweaking skill power costs to the point where power management is balanced without making people regret their investments.

3) Ultimately, I think appropriate balance would be such that people who get reasonable levels of fate as a secondary stat (i.e. without sacrificing any of their primary stat or other priority derived stats like crit rating) should be able to achieve "infinite power" in a group setting provided they use everything at their disposal to save/return power - LM's sharing power, Captains returning power, legacies saving power, ICPR food, etc. In solo play, you should be able to achieve infinite power via sacrificing some amount of main stat for extra fate.

4) Raw ICPR on gear needs to be addressed. Currently, slices of derived stats come in larger quantities than you'd get out of a slice of primary stat consistently (i.e. you get much more block out of a slice of block than a slice of might, but you miss out on the other benefits of might). However, a slice of fate gives MUCH more ICPR than a slice of raw ICPR, so raw ICPR on gear is also now a trash stat. It would be nice if it scaled better with item level.

[KidShowbusiness]

So... is it confirmed that the new skill trees are going to be replacing the trait system outright? Doesn't seem outlandish to me to think that the "tree" system could be a new layer of progression rather than a replacement for what we've already got. The trait system seems pretty heavily rooted in-game for them to just jerk it out and put in something else. Anyone have any kind of real answer for this?

[mjk47]

Being that this was obviously a conscious decision by the developers, how should a "real" gamer feel other than ostracized?

What the heck is a "real" gamer?

[Loreineth]

What the heck is a "real" gamer?

To Southpa, it's anyone who plays the game the way he does. Any other avenues of play are obviously not real.