SHIELD Dwarf Runs through Moria Q&A - Notes on What Was Said

[frickinmuck]

The Dwarves through Moria runs will be happening starting with the first competing server on June 24. As each transcript is completed, the server name will become linkable to the transcript for that run, to be posted in this thread.

Official post and standings.
All runs will be livestreamed from the LotRO Twitch page. You can sign up there to be notified via email when each livestream begins.
Tips for getting a good time for your server.
Thurallor's awesome deed-tracking for each run can be seen here.

Auf Deutsch (Danke Orodbril)!

Test Run - Bullroarer June 17 2:30PM - Frickinmuck

1. Eldar Tuesday June 24 2:30PM - Moochi with some help from Frickinmuck * Guest(s) present
2. Dwarrowdelf Thursday June 26 5:00PM - Moochi
3. Windfola Tuesday July 1 5:00PM - Frickinmuck * Guest(s) present
4. Anduin [DE] Thursday July 3 2:30PM - Mar-Evayave
5. Vilya Tuesday July 8 5:00PM - Frickinmuck
6. Nimrodel [NA] July 10 Thursday 5:00PM - Ravynne
7. Gilrain [UK] July 15 Tuesday 2:30PM - Frickinmuck
8. Meneldor [NA] July 17 Thursday 5:00PM - Frickinmuck
9. Maiar [DE] July 22 Tuesday 2:30PM - Frickinmuck
10. Brandywine [NA] July 24 Thursday 5:00PM - Frickinmuck
11. Estel [FR-RP] July 29 Tuesday 2:30PM - Frickinmuck
12. Gwaihir [DE] July 31 Thursday 2:30PM - Frickinmuck
13. Vanyar [NA] August 5 Tuesday 2:30PM - Frickinmuck
14. Arkenstone [UK] August 5 Tuesday 6:00PM - Frickinmuck
15. Withywindle [DE] August 7 Thursday 2:30PM - Eldalleth
16. Silverlode [NA] August 7 Thursday 6:00PM - Eldalleth
17. Evernight [UK] August 19 Tuesday 2:30PM - Frickinmuck
18. Riddermark [NA] August 19 Tuesday 6:00PM - Frickinmuck
19. Snowborn [NA] August 21 Thursday 2:30PM - Eldalleth (No Show)
20. Imladris [UK] August 21 Thursday 6:00PM - Eldalleth
21. Sirannon [FR] August 26 Tuesday 2:30PM - Eldalleth
22. Gladden [NA] August 26 Tuesday 6:00PM - Eldalleth
23. Laurelin[NA] September 4 Thursday 2:30PM - Eldalleth
24. Elendilmir [UK-RP] September 4 Thursday 6:00PM - Eldalleth
25. Morthond [DE] September 9 Tuesday 2:30PM - Eldalleth (No Show)
26. Crickhollow [NA] September 9 Tuesday 6:00PM - Eldalleth
27. Firefoot[NA] September 10 Wednesday 6:00PM - Eldalleth
28. Belegaer [DE-RP] September 11 Thursday 2:30PM - Eldalleth
29. Landroval [NA-RE] September 11 Thursday 6:00PM - Frickinmuck

Thanks to everyone who helped with the transcripts. I really appreciate it!

[frickinmuck]

(I will keep these updated - anyone with suggestions let me know and I will add them)

1. No cloaks or mounts
2. Keep the amount of players around Sapience – especially within his line of vision – to a bare minimum to reduce lag
3. Keep the need to swim to an absolute minimum, keep broken legs to a minimum, keep combat to a minimum – anything that will slow run speed
4. Ensure people around Sapience stay out of combat and can focus on running
5. Find a good route and practice it, preferably with at least a couple of raids worth of people to ensure the test runs imitate server conditions at the time of the actual race (i.e. tons of people on)
6. To use the plugin Sapience uses for these runs, go to LotROInterface and dowload Thurallor's plugin there.
7. Take special care around bridges and other obstacles so that he doesn’t fall off or get stuck or hung up on things
8. Keep any run speed buffs on him that you are able to
9. Watch previous streams, particularly fastest times, for ideas
10. Good idea to have a backup group waiting back at the start in case he dies so that they can get running again right away
11. (Suggested by Orodbril) Hunters can not only use "Find the path". They can increase this buff a lot: Once via the blue trait line "Pathfinder" 10% and then by a LI for the main hand/Melee with the major attribute "Find The Path movement speed" another 6 per cent. So with these two improvements the buffs would increase more than 100% putting the speed buff to a total of 31%.
12. (Suggested by Orodbril) Captains could increase the duration of the "Make haste" speed buff with their LI (Weapon minor). It can be increased from 20 seconds without LI to 45 seconds with LI, which is also an improvement of 125%.
13. Have a small, streamlined group running with Sapience consisting mainly of a hunter with maxed out run-speed, a bunch of captains who can spam their speed boosts when they came off cooldown, a mini, and a guardian with Shield Wall up on Tosmii.
14. Have a vanguard raid group running out ahead clearing mobs, connected to the escort group via voice chat.
15. Have a number of decoy characters at Tosmii's level or below running with the escort group and drawing any aggro before Tosmii can be targeted.

[frickinmuck]

Thanks to everyone who has volunteered to help out with the transcribing! Please take a quick look over the schedule to see if the dates you've been put down for will work for you. If anyone who's already listed wants to do more than one, let me know how many, and which dates you can't do. Don't worry, there are plenty of dates to go around. If we run out of spots I will start moving my transcripts to every other week to make room for more people, because that would actually be better for me.

If anyone else wishes to help out with transcribing, please let me know which date(s)/server(s) you would like to do.

Thanks guys!

[frickinmuck]

SHIELD Dwarf Run Q&A – Bullroarer Test

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 all this as the final word.

If anyone who was present has any additions or corrections, feel free to post.

SHIELD Dwarf Run Q&A – Bullroarer Test

Video available here.

1. Why did you decide to do these Dwarf runs
   It seemed like a nice follow-up from the TTHTI runs. It’s an iconic location some people might not have seen for awhile. Something a bit different, potentially fun.
2. Has there been any conversation about opening the freep Moors to premium
   Anyone can now access the Moors by purchasing a Moors pass.
3. Will you do something for elves and humans to give them a chance to shine
   Probably. Once these runs are over he will see about finding something for elves and maybe humans as well.
4. Is Bullroarer open to anyone playing the game
   It’s by no means a closed beta world – anyone can copy a character over and test things out. It’s only open when there is something to be tested. It will be coming down after this run to get a new build up, which will be available later in the week.
5. Any nifty new cosmetics coming anytime soon
   There was actually a discussion about cosmetics earlier this morning. He won’t go into the details of what may or may not be coming.
6. Is there a possibility of exchanging or combining IXP runes at a relic master
   There are no plans for anything like that at the present time.
7. Any plans to release photos of the new class soon
   Probably not by our standards of soon. Later on, closer to the release of the class, they will start sharing images with us.
8. Question about essences replacing gear
   Essences are in the current Bullroarer build and will be coming for U14. They do not replace gear, they enhance it. Think of them as buffs that can be slotted into your gear.
9. When will U14 be released live
   They haven’t announced a date for that yet. Not in the next couple of weeks, anyway, because they have at least one, maybe 2 more Bullroarer builds coming before then.
10. Question about extending timing of flips in the Moors
    That’s something better dealt with in the suggestions forums.
11. Question about pricing for U14 for non-VIP players
    U14 will be free for VIP. He’s not sure what the cost will be for non-VIP players.
12. Question about adding more prefix titles, like the Moors ones
    That’s something best brought to the suggestions forums.
13. When is the treasure hunt coming back
    He thinks it’s Thursday or Friday – this weekend.
14. Will you come PVP with us on Brandywine
    He has a challenge in his Extra Life fundraiser that if donations reach a certain level, he will go PvP on freep-side and on creep-side. He’s considering making it a server challenge, if people want him to play on a specific server.
15. Is there a limit to how many people can come on these runs before crashing the servers
    There have been several hundred people without crashing anything. No one has ever told him to avoid going over a specific number.
16. Question about Weatherstock problems
    That problem was a deliberate attempt by some individuals to cause bad things to happen. That’s all he’s going to say about that.
17. Is Beorning the only major change you have in mind for player side game changes
    No. There is a 5 level cap raise coming, 3 new areas with U14, additional new areas later in the year. The essences system, the new end game content for U14 that you can read about in the Bullroarer forums. There is actually quite a lot coming, and more later in the year as well.
18. What are the thoughts on making it possible for a hobbit to be a champion
    They talk about expanding which races can be which classes fairly frequently, but that shouldn’t be taken as “it’s happening next week.” It’s something they discuss, but there are no current plans.
19. Question about why all the devs don’t chime in on threads for content/items they are working on
    Because they aren’t required to. The only person who is required to interact with us as part of their job is Sapience. Devs are required to work on the game, and that’s it. Participation in the forums is not a job requirement for them. Devs do read the forums, and they often will respond, but they have no obligation to do so. Quite often they do so by taking time out of their personal time at lunch, after hours or during a break, so we should try not to be too hard on them when they post things we don’t like.
20. Question about specific class changes
    Feedback like that should be addressed to the class forums or to the Bullroarer forums if it’s about something in the current beta build.
21. Further comments on devs in the forums
    All devs do read the forums, some just choose not to comment. It’s as simple as that. He understands that people want to read something into that – they don’t like you or they’re disinterested – but there’s nothing further from the truth. As he’s said before, they do this for their livelihoods. No one cares about the game more than they do. If a forum post is how you gauge whether someone is interested or not, then it might be time to pick another scale.
22. When was the last time you played your hunter
    He was actually playing his warden on a different server than he usually plays for most of last week, so it’s probably been at least a couple of weeks since he’s played his hunter. He tends to bounce around a lot. He has a lot of characters on a lot of servers. Plus he spends a lot of time leveling characters for events like this. He does everything just the same way as us – he doesn’t use any admin stuff for these.
23. How did you come up with the idea for these events
    They are player-created events that came out of a livestream he did during his vacation one time, just to hop on and play with us for awhile and level to level 10. When he got to about level 8 someone suggested they try to get him to Isengard. So they gave it a shot, he died miserably, and a couple of people from other servers said, “well, if you were on our server we wouldn’t have let you die.” There was a lot of boasting so it became a challenge. A few weeks before those runs were all done, people were asking “what’s next” and some people suggested the dwarf through Moria thing, and that’s how these runs came about.
24. Question about new housing wallpapers and flooring to make a house look Rohan-ish
    He thinks it’s a good suggestion. Not sure where it would fall in terms of priorities, but recommends bringing it up in the suggestions forum.
25. How long was LotRO in development before it went live
    Years. He can’t go back to the earliest dates because he wasn’t around then. He came in 2008, but it was in beta in 2006 and obviously in development a lot longer than that.
26. Question about asking questions in the in-game chat
    He doesn’t pay attention to in-game chat. He pays primarily to Twitch, and takes his questions from that chat.
27. Question about more creep races or warg mounts for the Moors
    No current plans.
28. Sapience comments on how there was a discussion earlier in the day at a meeting, about pizza in Boston. The meet and greet that is happening on Friday is happening at a Boston Pizza restaurant in Niagara Falls Canada, and they were talking about how strange it is that there is a restaurant chain called Boston Pizza when Boston isn’t known for pizza, and it’s actually difficult to find good pizza in Boston. There’s also no restaurant in Boston called Boston Pizza. However, there is one good pizza place in Boston called Regina Pizza. [Which is just doubly odd, since Regina is the name of a town in Saskatchewan, Canada, that is definitely not known for its pizza. This is rapidly becoming the Great Pizza Recursion… - Frick]
29. Why is the player you are following level 100
    Because the run is on Bullroarer, which is currently live with a U14 beta build, and the player has leveled his character to cap. U14 is coming with a level cap raise to 100.
30. What are the expectations of a visit in Europe anytime soon
    Currently there are no plans for anyone from Turbine to visit Europe for business or for pleasure anytime soon. A couple of players actually suggested a Kickstarter campaign to bring a couple of devs to Germany.
31. Would you say the dwarf runs or the hobbit runs are harder
    He would say they are different. They each have their own set of unique challenges.
32. Where did you get the name Sapience
    Sapience is wisdom. It’s what makes us human. It’s the application of knowledge through wisdom. He likes that idea.
33. Who is the cappy dev
    He doesn’t know. Years ago they stopped assigning devs to a specific classes, so they move around a lot. He doesn’t know who is currently working on the captain. For anyone who wants to give feedback on a specific class, by all means do so, the dev will read it. Turbine really discourages people making posts directed at a specific dev. Generally posts like that get overlooked first because they don’t tend to go to good places. Post about what your issue is, not about who the dev is.
34. What are the current plans for Osgiliath
    It will exist. They will talk about what it will be closer to the time. He knows there has been some discussion about what it might be, but he wants to remind us that “thinking about” “talking about” “might be” are in no way shape or form a guarantee that anything specific will happen. It’s just a conversation.
35. Have you ever talked about making cosmetic weapons or shields
    Yes, they have. And then they start looking at the technical issues, the costs, the difficulty and all of the challenges and they stop talking about it very very quickly.
36. How do devs do all their research to make a new zone
    It’s not as complicated as we might think. They have people who are very well versed in the lore. They pretty much go off of the descriptions in the books as best they possibly can. They have members of the team who are going to Mythcon this year, a symposium for mythology fantasy writers at a local university, and they’re hosting a panel on taking the lore and world of Middle Earth and converting it into a game. So if you happen to be in the area…
37. What would you want to do after LotRO as a career
    He’s assuming they’re talking about down the line when all is said and done many many years from now. He’d like to do something similar he guesses. Despite what some people may think, he really enjoys being a community manager, specifically this community’s manager. Because he thinks we’re pretty epic.
38. Question about livestreaming the Mythcon panel
    Probably not. It’s not their event so probably not, but it’s an interesting idea and he will look into it. But it’s probably a no.
39. Someone mentions that Eldar is planning an event for later in the fall
    He reminds everyone that if we’re hosting an event, if we PM him with enough notice, he can often get us title codes, Turbine point codes for prizing, etc. He can’t always guarantee custom titles, especially for newer events or small events, but he can get the Celebratory or the Sociable. The earlier we can get him info about the event, the better.
40. Sapience reminds everyone about the meet and greet happening on Friday in Niagara Falls Canada. So far there are 64 people planning to attend. He will be there with Well Met titles for everyone and is looking forward to it and thinks it will be a lot of fun.
41. Reminds people that Weatherstock was livestreamed and is archived in the Twitch channel if you want to watch the whole thing. He also reminds people that the dev roundtable chat is on Twitch as well. He’s got more livestreams planned besides just the dwarf runs, including a U14 preview tour in the next few weeks sometime.

[frickinmuck]

SHIELD Dwarf Run Q&A – Eldar

Transcript by Moochi, with some help from Frickinmuck

Guest for this run, Matt "HoarseDev" Zimitti, Lead Systems Designer.

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 all this as the final word.

If anyone who was present has any additions or corrections, feel free to post.

SHIELD Dwarf Run Q&A – Eldar

Video available here.

1. What is he drinking?
   He thinks it is coke or something. He doesn't remember what he dumped in there. Or root beer. [He samples] Coke, yup, no root beer.
2. Will you have to start Beornings at level 50?
   That is the current plan and thinking. Pretty much a fairly solid plan at this point. He hasn't heard any discussions to the otherwise, but until it ships, nothing is locked in stone.
3. So far, without picking favourites, what has been his most memorable run to date?
   That would probably be the Bullroarer TtHtI run. It was just Mayhem. Everyone just had a whole lot of fun being stomped by Balrogs.
   Matt "HoarseDev" Zimitti, LotRO's Lead System Designer joins the text chat.
4. Can he ask the lore people if they can release what suggested naming schemes for Beornings will be so people can create placeholder characters for names that they want?
   Sapience - That’s a really good idea and he will speak to them about it and see if they can’t get a post up about how you should name your Beorning.
   HoarseDev - Says they're not at the naming phase yet.
5. When is the summer festival going to start?
   Sapience - He doesn't have the exact date in front of him. The concern is that it will be the last week in July and first week in August and he has a bad feeling that will make people unhappy. It will be after Update 14, that much he does know. He thinks last week of July and first week of August will at least encompass part of the festival.
   HoarseDev - Soon, once u14 is out the door.
6. Will U14 have any changes to the treasure hunt?
   Sapience - None that he is currently aware of, although he believes that the suggestion and request has been made for updating lootboxes
7. When is launch for U14?
   Sapience - Can't tell us just yet probably in the very near future we'll be talking about a date.
8. Any idea if any new raids are coming; I know you guys said no new raids?
   Sapience - So that question is kind of answering itself, pretty much. As Rowan said in the roundtable and as they have been saying for the better part of a year, or actually a little longer than a year now, there are no raids in the foreseeable future.
9. Is U14 in the next month?
   Sapience - U14 will release on the exact date on which it is release. Pretty much, when he says he's not going to tell us, he's not going to tell us. But it will be sooner rather than later that he can tell us. [I was unable to determine the presence or frequency of capitalism and trademarks attached to that soon - Moochi].
10. Any word if the trait promotion pre-set quick-swapping method is going to make it in for Update 14?
    HoarseDev - Off the cuff, no idea on the trait pre-set thingy.
11. Sapience reads from HoarseDev: We are looking into essence components. We have seen that thread on essence crafting in the forums, which is proof that devs do read what player write, so please continue to write, make suggestions, and provide feedback. Even if they don’t comment directly on a thread, they are reading them.
    Sapience comments that they're sliding past the 9 minute mark of the run, and looking pretty good. He thinks these will run 25-30 minutes based on Bullroarer test runs. He thinks there will be seconds between times made by the different servers, closer than the TTHTI runs.
12. Does the timer for these runs count seconds in the thousandths?
    Sapience - No, whole seconds. That may not be such a terrible idea if things get really tight. Falling and swimming and such little things are worth considering [when planning a route - Moochi].
13. Question about fixes to swan pets?
    Sapience - Maybe if he had a better understanding of the question.
    HoarseDev - Swan pets are in the hands of the art team at the moment.
14. Question about new 3 and 6 man instances.
    Sapience - The broader answer is that when they say raids they mean group instances. Group content is not out of the question, but what we consider traditional raids and traditional instance clusters pretty much falls under Rowan's comments. They've been saying for a year that there are no raids or that type of content in the roadmap in the foreseeable future or planned. Rewording the question will not change the answer. He's sorry to be the bearer of bad news. It is not new news.
15. Some more information on swan pets. HoarseDev asked DEViled_Egg about the changes [Erika Ng, System Designer - Moochi]. According to them, new animations have been hooked up for the swan pets. They now waddle when walking and run whilst flapping if you run.
16. Question about the problem on Landroval with moving stuff around in the vault.
    Sapience - The team is looking at it; were working on it earlier today. Not sure if they cleared it up, there were a couple of other issues that he knows they cleared up. Problems with "myaccount" pages that may or may not have been related. He's not in the database end of the biz or the building, but he knows the myaccount stuff was clear up and they were investigating the Landroval storage stuff.
17. What does it take to create and test a raid.
    Sapience - A huge amount of time and resources. It takes animators, it takes artists, it takes QA, it takes play teams, it takes repeated play testing, it takes huge and massive amounts of tech to get all hooked up and tested out. It is incredibly time consuming, most people would be shocked at how time consuming it really is.
18. Question about raids.
    Sapience - Repeated answer. The answer is in Rowan's producer's letters, and in the past statements he's laid out a very clear path for LotRO and those are not part of the plan. It really is that simple.
19. Is the answer about time consuming true about any piece of game?
    Sapience - Some things take more time than others. The question was "what does it take to make a raid."
    HoarseDev - Raids are an order of magnitude larger and are vastly more risky than anything else. They are definitely on a level all their own
    Sapience - He wants to be really clear on this; that is not why they are not doing them. He doesn't want anyone to conflate the question and the answer to an unrelated question.
20. So if not raids, what about big battles?
    Sapience - There was a mention of a big battle in Rowan's producer's letter, so that’s still floating out there as a possibility. There are also some changes coming to big battles; a few little tweaks he thinks can already be tested on Bullroarer, which he expects to be open again on Thursday, in a couple of days.
    Sapience notices, at nearly 21 minutes into the run, that run is nearing completion, and that it will be done in far less time that he had thought. He had thought that 25 minutes would be a good run, but this will beat that expectation.
    Team Eldar arrives at the gates of Caras Galadhon with an official time of 22:17, faster than either of the Bullroarer test runs. He thinks this is a very quick time. Photos are taken.
21. Has Turbine ever thought about making a character boost all the way from level 1 to level 95 and have it cost a thousand dollars?
    Sapience - Not that he's aware of. They've talked about various level boosts. They ended up at level 50 because they felt that was a good place. It puts characters at an iconic moment right at the gates of Moria. To the best of his knowledge, a higher auto-level is not currently in the offing.
22. Sapience talks about the components of the OriginPC computer he's using and the settings he uses. Watch the video from the 27 minute mark if you'd like the details on this.
23. What streaming software is he using.
    XSplit Broadcaster.
24. If the devs and Rowan see that more and more of the player population want raids as endgame content, will they try their best to satisfy them?
    Sapience - Their decision is based on nears 8 years of data, as far as what players do and don’t do, so they focus primarily on what players do. Should somehow those numbers radically change, he's sure they would change direction. But they haven't, so that was a key factor in deciding.
    HoarseDev - Correct, they have to weigh everything on the table and right now they are looking at a heaping pile of different things.
25. How was the first run?
    Sapience - The first run was really good. They did a really great job getting him through alive. He thinks there was only one point where he was a little worried something bad was going to happen. The run was very good; he thinks it will be a high bar for other servers.
26. Question about a small game upgrade that would allow people to make Hobnanigans teams, sign people up, and have overhead team titles sort of like a sport kinship.
    Sapience - Personally he thinks it’s a cool idea, but calling it a small upgrade is a bit misleading and understates the amount of work involved. There's not anything small about that, it’s pretty much a whole new system, which is never a small task.
    Sapience decides to take his dwarf on a run around some parts of Lothlorien to show off how great it looks
27. Based on the short duration of the runs, is he going to consider doing two runs per day?
    Sapience - If they hover around 20-25 minutes, yeah, he probably will. Mulls about perhaps doing an earlier one at 2-2:30 like this one, and a later one at 5:00, perhaps. He'll do a couple more and see how it goes. Thinks that’s reasonable to do a couple a day if they stay this short.
28. Further comments on the earlier Hobnanigans question
    HoarseDev - It depends on how much traction Hobnanigans gets.
    Sapience - So whether we get a lot of updates, additions, and tweaks to Hobnanigans is going to be dependent on how much it gets used. If people get disinterested in it, then it probably won't get the level of attention required to create an eSport based around it.
29. Question about a bug
    HoarseDev - Are there bugs submitted on the issue?
    Sapience - Sometimes questions about bugs are best answered with the question "Did you file a bug report?" because not all bugs are kept in all staff's heads.
30. Bare-chested dwarf on next run?
    No, he likes his Hauberk of the Mithril Guard. It is one of the old promo items he's trying to get new codes for, to make them possible to award again, through twitch, twitter, Facebook, and ExtraLife. Cloak of the Dark Halls and Cloak of the Raven Friend are a couple he already has in the works. Steed of the First Marshall he has request in for. The Celebratory title, more codes for that coming up. He's looking for more and more ways to make these available to us. Someone mentions housing items Colourful Songbird and Pesky Dormouse; he likes those a lot and is making a note about them.
    HoarseDev leaves the text chat, saying he will look into the wall items not being wall items.
31. Question about ever seeing area locks again, like reputation locks and one-shotters.
    He can't speak to forever or ever or never questions because those are really long time frames, and everything is subject to change. Blocking regions off from players who just want to explore is killing a playstyle that there really isn’t a problem with. He thinks that's why they unlocked them, so we wouldn't have to grind just to go to a place. That could change in the future, but that was the reason behind unlocking most of Lothlorien. One still has to get reputation to enter Caras Galadhon, but just to enter the region, no.
    Sapience decides to head to Rivendell; it’s one of the places he likes.
32. Question about integrating streamers into the community more.
    Streaming is pretty new; they keep track of who is streaming. How we stream, what we stream, how often we stream. He knows some of us stream from time to time; they've had some conversations about integrating them a little more. For Turbine it is about making people aware that LotRO streams are happening and that information may be had by watching them.
33. Any more hair styles or beard styles.
    Nothing the he is aware of, nothing currently planned. [I assume bear pelts are an exception to this - Moochi]
34. Does he feel like he's being stalked with all these people following him?
    No, he thinks it’s funny. It reminds him of the Beatles' "Help" movie.
35. Has he ever fallen into the water in Rivendell.
    Yes he has. More than once. Often enough to know which way to swim to get out without thinking about it.
36. Question about setting servers as the recommend server in the launcher.
    Recommended servers are only changed when Turbine pushes game updates, not during regular maintenances. Update 14 is the next time they would be able to do that.
37. Stream every day?
    No sure he can do that, time wise. Might be a way to get in the Moria runs a little quicker, one every day of the week.
    Sapience mentions Galuhad who's streaming for ExtraLife, trying to level from 1 to 95 in 100 hours of playtime. He's well on the way to the goal of $1000.
38. Question about seeing Amarthiel runs in the moors again
    Not Amarthiel in particular, for lore reasons, but similar things are not impossible. No timelines on that. Conversations have been had, not saying just what at this time.
39. Questions about doing live "radio shows" instead or in addition to streaming.
    Not a terrible idea. He's not necessarily opposed, but thinks it might be less interesting, and thinks streaming in-game is a great way to interact with players on their servers.
40. Hire a documentary crew to follow and stream everything for a year?
    Funny idea, but would be incredibly boring to always watch him leaving for meeting and the camera stopping at the door cause we cannot sit in on those.
    Sapience mentions his ExtraLife has broken $6k milestone and is well on its way to the $100K goal. There was a deal that when 6K has hit, a new reward would be released. The Celebratory code was added at 7K. Many more cool things ahead including some secret items that are expected to make people quite happy.
    Sapience talks about the ExtraLife tattoo that he may be getting. He's willing to withstand the pain due to the fact that the money is going to help sick kids. No, it’s not going on his forehead. He's already receiving input at home for just agreeing to a tattoo at all.
41. What does Sapience like most about Update 14?
    The essence system is very cool. And his secret things. [Sapience chuckles] We cannot imagine how hard it is for him to keep quiet about what they are. They're not earth-shatteringly game-breaking top-secret, but he wants to wait and reveal them at the right time, and it’s really hard to keep them quiet.
42. Bare-chested humans because of Beornings.
    Good suggestion. He'll pass it along.
43. Can we see pictures of the Steed of the First Marshal?
    Shown in-game. Picture on his ExtraLife goal page, as well.
    Sapience adds that should the $100K goat be met, Jeremy Adams, ExtraLife co-founder, will get the same tattoo as Sapience. Jeremy's wife may override that decision. Sapience is getting his regardless. It will be his first tattoo.
44. Why is there a 1337 option on his ExtraLife.
    1337 is LEET
45. Question about Hobnanigans tokens
    The idea is to save up the tokens, and continue to work towards your goals when it’s open. Save them.
46. When will Bullroarer be back up?
    Thursday or Friday.
47. Will we see the treasure hunt again this year?
    More than likely, yes.
48. Will Hobnanigans tokens become bound or go into wallet?
    He doesn't know, but will ask. If we want them to be handled differently, should post in the suggestions forum.
49. Can players raise money for ExtraLife?
    Absolutely! By all means, jump right in! Go to ExtraLife.org and sign up and register. If you want to join Team Turbine you can do that too, and you can raise money on your own. He thinks Team Turbine in currently in 3rd or 4th place overall in terms of funds raised. Galuhad is a member of Team Turbine and is playing for Boston Children's Hospital, which he thinks is awesome. But it’s not restricted to Turbine employees; they think it’s great when fans join.
50. Question about balance in the moors in regards to U14
    Balance is always being considered and looked at, not just in the moors, but everywhere. He'd be more surprised to hear that they were not than to hear that they were. Broadly speaking, balance is an ongoing challenge which, to some greater or lesser extent, is addressed every update.
51. Any changes to mounted combat on the horizon?
    None that he's aware of at the moment.
52. Sapience gives us a look at the Steed of the Red Dawn, which he's also seeking to get a code for by which to share it. It’s the mount he was riding at Weatherstock. To the best of his knowledge, no associated warsteed package comes with this, just the regular mount.
53. Question about get warsteed gear and accessories made dye-able. [The rear saddle bags items - Frick]
    He's going to pass that request along. That request has been made a few times. Will nudge a bit.
    Sapience decides it’s time to wrap today's run up. Congratulations to Eldar, the current leader! In addition to the upcoming SHIELD runs, we can expect a dev tour livestream of Update 14 shortly before it goes live, and another dev roundtable probably scheduled sometime after Update 14, to get U14 feedback and to let us know what’s coming for U15 afterwards.

[frickinmuck]

Thanks so much to Moochi who did the transcript for the Eldar run. Excellent job!! I really didn't help much, just a bit with formatting and some editing.

[Galuhad]

Thanks so much to Moochi who did the transcript for the Eldar run. Excellent job!! I really didn't help much, just a bit with formatting and some editing.

Thank you both for the write-up. Was interesting to watch the video back. There's a bit in Durin's Way where I got stuck with the spinning bug so you see my character running a bit like he was drunk lol.. Not great when trying to lead a dwarf safely through Moria. Looking forward to the rest of the runs now.

@Sapience, is there any chance this thread can be moved to the Ask the Lotro Team Archive where the other transcript threads are please? Would help for finding it in future.

[Dernudan]

SHIELD Dwarf Run Q&A – Eldar

Question about new 3 and 6 man instances.
Sapience - The broader answer is that when they say raids they mean group instances. Group content is not out of the question, but what we consider traditional raids and traditional instance clusters pretty much falls under Rowan's comments. They've been saying for a year that there are no raids or that type of content in the roadmap in the foreseeable future or planned. Rewording the question will not change the answer. He's sorry to be the bearer of bad news. It is not new news.[/LIST]

I am confused about this, because there is a new 3 man coming in U14.

[Sapience]

SHIELD Dwarf Run Q&A – Bullroarer Test

These all look right to me!

SHIELD Dwarf Run Q&A – Eldar

Ditto. Looks good.

Quit note, I cleaned up some of the 'house keeping' in the thread to compact it a little bit. it was mostly Frick and the other volunteers setting up schedules which appear to be finalized based on the OP now. So I cleared them out to de-clutter the thread a little bit. Also moved it to the dev Q&A Archive.

I am confused about this, because there is a new 3 man coming in U14.

That's one we managed to get in, but is still a very long way from a full raid or instance cluster. A cluster involves several 3 and 6 player instances plus a 12 player. This is a single 3 player. So the comment still stands.

[Dernudan]

Quit note, I cleaned up some of the 'house keeping' in the thread to compact it a little bit. it was mostly Frick and the other volunteers setting up schedules which appear to be finalized based on the OP now. So I cleared them out to de-clutter the thread a little bit. Also moved it to the dev Q&A Archive.




That's one we managed to get in, but is still a very long way from a full raid or instance cluster. A cluster involves several 3 and 6 player instances plus a 12 player. This is a single 3 player. So the comment still stands.

Ok
Need more characters

[Runesi_EU]

SHIELD Dwarf Run Q&A – Eldar

• If the devs and Rowan see that more and more of the player population want raids as endgame content, will they try their best to satisfy them?
  Sapience - Their decision is based on nears 8 years of data, as far as what players do and don’t do, so they focus primarily on what players do. Should somehow those numbers radically change, he's sure they would change direction. But they haven't, so that was a key factor in deciding.
  HoarseDev - Correct, they have to weigh everything on the table and right now they are looking at a heaping pile of different things.

Isn't this something of a self fulfilling prophecy though? If there is no new traditional instance cluster players want to do (because they are tired of the old ones they have been running for years) then the number of players doing traditional instance clusters will never increase?

[Giliodor]

Isn't this something of a self fulfilling prophecy though? If there is no new traditional instance cluster players want to do (because they are tired of the old ones they have been running for years) then the number of players doing traditional instance clusters will never increase?

Precisely what I thought when reading it. Pretty typical.

[jewahe]

1. Bare-chested dwarf on next run?
   No, he likes his Hauberk of the Mithril Guard. It is one of the old promo items he's trying to get new codes for, to make them possible to award again, through twitch, twitter, Facebook, and ExtraLife. Cloak of the Dark Halls and Cloak of the Raven Friend are a couple he already has in the works. Steed of the First Marshall he has request in for. The Celebratory title, more codes for that coming up. He's looking for more and more ways to make these available to us. Someone mentions housing items Colourful Songbird and Pesky Dormouse; he likes those a lot and is making a note about them.

Also, maybe codes for The War Cloak of Isildur? It was offered in an issue of PC Gamer back when the game launched.

http://cstm.mymiddleearth.com/2011/0...ak-of-isildur/

I think it came with another (pocket?) item.

[Sapience]

Isn't this something of a self fulfilling prophecy though? If there is no new traditional instance cluster players want to do (because they are tired of the old ones they have been running for years) then the number of players doing traditional instance clusters will never increase?

Only if you view it from this moment forward and ignore all past data. We based it on past data. The percentage of players involved has remained largely constant (and quite small) since launch.

Also, maybe codes for The War Cloak of Isildur? It was offered in an issue of PC Gamer back when the game launched.

http://cstm.mymiddleearth.com/2011/0...ak-of-isildur/

I think it came with another (pocket?) item.

Added it to my list.

[Mar-Evayave]

Isn't this something of a self fulfilling prophecy though? If there is no new traditional instance cluster players want to do (because they are tired of the old ones they have been running for years) then the number of players doing traditional instance clusters will never increase?

Ah, but Sapience said they had statistics for the last 8 years (we are pushing into the 8th year of LOTRO). If the statistics over those 8 years shows that the interest isn't high enough to realistically keep supporting that kind of content on a regular basis, then I think the raiders (and other end-game groupers) have pretty much missed the boat. I sympathize, as I thoroughly enjoy a proper raid (much better than I'll probably ever enjoy the EBs), but that's the downside of being a minority. Turbine is faced with either A: Keep giving us large group content clusters on a regular basis, hoping more people will be drawn in, and spending a lot of time and money doing so, or B: Recognize that it simply is not making a big enough return on their investment. So yes, it will be hard for the groupers, because their options are limited. But hardly a self-fulfilling prophecy. There simply isn't enough of us for Turbine to justify the time and money spent. Now, I can't say how we would go about turning the situation around, but I would much rather have this result. If the return (monetary if nothing else) isn't enough to compensate for the time/costs of developing raids, then how long do you think LOTRO would have survived with the continuing support of that content? If cutting back on low-return content means LOTRO can live to fight another day, then I'm satisfied. Better a game without raids than no game at all.

At least, that's the way I read and understood it to mean. *shrug*

[Sapience]

Ah, but Sapience said they had statistics for the last 8 years (we are pushing into the 8th year of LOTRO). If the statistics over those 8 years shows that the interest isn't high enough to realistically keep supporting that kind of content on a regular basis, then I think the raiders (and other end-game groupers) have pretty much missed the boat. I sympathize, as I thoroughly enjoy a proper raid (much better than I'll probably ever enjoy the EBs), but that's the downside of being a minority. Turbine is faced with either A: Keep giving us large group content clusters on a regular basis, hoping more people will be drawn in, and spending a lot of time and money doing so, or B: Recognize that it simply is not making a big enough return on their investment. So yes, it will be hard for the groupers, because their options are limited. But hardly a self-fulfilling prophecy. There simply isn't enough of us for Turbine to justify the time and money spent. Now, I can't say how we would go about turning the situation around, but I would much rather have this result. If the return (monetary if nothing else) isn't enough to compensate for the time/costs of developing raids, then how long do you think LOTRO would have survived with the continuing support of that content? If cutting back on low-return content means LOTRO can live to fight another day, then I'm satisfied. Better a game without raids than no game at all.

At least, that's the way I read and understood it to mean. *shrug*

Pretty much this.

[Moochi]

Transcript by Moochi, with some help from Frickinmuck

I'm of the opinion that Frick is being humble here, and fails to mention the good chunk of time spent over the last day helping me to get up to speed on how to do these properly. I'm looking forward to taking another shot at it with the Dwarrowdelf run soon.

[Mirnir]

Ah, but Sapience said they had statistics for the last 8 years (we are pushing into the 8th year of LOTRO). If the statistics over those 8 years shows that the interest isn't high enough to realistically keep supporting that kind of content on a regular basis, then I think the raiders (and other end-game groupers) have pretty much missed the boat. I sympathize, as I thoroughly enjoy a proper raid (much better than I'll probably ever enjoy the EBs), but that's the downside of being a minority. Turbine is faced with either A: Keep giving us large group content clusters on a regular basis, hoping more people will be drawn in, and spending a lot of time and money doing so, or B: Recognize that it simply is not making a big enough return on their investment. So yes, it will be hard for the groupers, because their options are limited. But hardly a self-fulfilling prophecy. There simply isn't enough of us for Turbine to justify the time and money spent. Now, I can't say how we would go about turning the situation around, but I would much rather have this result. If the return (monetary if nothing else) isn't enough to compensate for the time/costs of developing raids, then how long do you think LOTRO would have survived with the continuing support of that content? If cutting back on low-return content means LOTRO can live to fight another day, then I'm satisfied. Better a game without raids than no game at all.

At least, that's the way I read and understood it to mean. *shrug*

Pretty much this.

It is at least good that things have now moved beyond the frustrating and indecisive 'not in 2014' or 'not currently on the roadmap' statuses and we now have a pretty definite no. I can now retire most of my alts and stop the gear and other grinds and just relax and enjoy what is left of the story and landscape. It is a shame that the game has lost what I consider its best feature, but oh well, it's not the end of the world.

[cossieuk]

Ah, but Sapience said they had statistics for the last 8 years (we are pushing into the 8th year of LOTRO). If the statistics over those 8 years shows that the interest isn't high enough to realistically keep supporting that kind of content on a regular basis, then I think the raiders (and other end-game groupers) have pretty much missed the boat. I sympathize, as I thoroughly enjoy a proper raid (much better than I'll probably ever enjoy the EBs), but that's the downside of being a minority. Turbine is faced with either A: Keep giving us large group content clusters on a regular basis, hoping more people will be drawn in, and spending a lot of time and money doing so, or B: Recognize that it simply is not making a big enough return on their investment. So yes, it will be hard for the groupers, because their options are limited. But hardly a self-fulfilling prophecy. There simply isn't enough of us for Turbine to justify the time and money spent. Now, I can't say how we would go about turning the situation around, but I would much rather have this result. If the return (monetary if nothing else) isn't enough to compensate for the time/costs of developing raids, then how long do you think LOTRO would have survived with the continuing support of that content? If cutting back on low-return content means LOTRO can live to fight another day, then I'm satisfied. Better a game without raids than no game at all.

At least, that's the way I read and understood it to mean. *shrug*

In every expansion before HD there was a instance cluster (RoRs was late but still there), and now it is not cost effective to make them. Given the the percentage of players that raid has remained largely constant over the life of the game this leads me to two possibilities, either they have never been cost effective, which I doubt, or the overall player base has shrunk.

[Sapience]

In every expansion before HD there was a instance cluster (RoRs was late but still there), and now it is not cost effective to make them. Given the the percentage of players that raid has remained largely constant over the life of the game this leads me to two possibilities, either they have never been cost effective, which I doubt, or the overall player base has shrunk.

The interesting thing about doubt is it has little impact on fact. As I said in the stream, I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news (which isn't really news because we've been saying this for some time now).

[frickinmuck]

In every expansion before HD there was a instance cluster (RoRs was late but still there), and now it is not cost effective to make them. Given the the percentage of players that raid has remained largely constant over the life of the game this leads me to two possibilities, either they have never been cost effective, which I doubt, or the overall player base has shrunk.

My guess would be that both statements are true.

[Gedachtnis]

I'm curious how EB's stack up to Raids in terms of both cost to develop and player use.

I agree with Mirnir, to me, the "no raids" answer has evolved from "not in 2014" to "not planned in the foreseeable future."

It becomes a distinction because I would assume, correct me if I'm wrong, that the Cirith Ungol is at the very least in the early planning stages. Between Shelob's Lair, The Guard Tower, Minas Morgul, the caves near the Black Gate, if the plan for these areas doesn't include Instances and Raids, I would really like to know. For me at least that would be a huge disappointment, as they are areas begging for IC's/Raids, as well as Skirmishes, in my mind to the same degree as Mounted Combat for Rohan, it's just expected.

I don't mind the EB's through this section of the story, they make sense for battles with a predetermined outcome and that outcome is losing the Battle. We don't get to "win" or fight to a draw and have the "boss" retreat which I can see as hard to portray in a traditional Instance/Raid environment. So while EB's aren't my favorite type of end game content, I understand their usefulness currently.

I would have never imagined the above areas would possibly be barren of Instances and Raids, but as we draw closer to them and "not in the foreseeable future" is the mantra, it seems more and more likely.

[cossieuk]

The interesting thing about doubt is it has little impact on fact. As I said in the stream, I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news (which isn't really news because we've been saying this for some time now).

As someone that rarely runs instances the lack of new ones does not really affect me. I doubted that instances and raids have new been cost effective to develop, if that is not correct why were they not dropped from the development process before HD?

[Mirnir]

I agree with Mirnir, to me, the "no raids" answer has evolved from "not in 2014" to "not planned in the foreseeable future."

Since, according to Rowan, the foreseeable future and roadmap include Minas Tirith at the end of next year, my interpretation of Turbine's recent statements on the issue is that there will likely never be another traditional raid and I will base my decisions on the time and money I spend on the game with that assumption in mind. I'm not intending to hold onto hope any more that it will be otherwise. I will instead try to enjoy the story and landscape and continue to stay clear of the aspects of the game I don't enjoy very much (grinds, festivals etc.)

[Runesi_EU]

Only if you view it from this moment forward and ignore all past data. We based it on past data. The percentage of players involved has remained largely constant (and quite small) since launch.

Isn't looking forward what you were talking about?

Should somehow those numbers radically change (presumably in the future)*, he's sure they would change direction.

*added by me

It's obvious this decision has been made and yes, it has been mentioned multiple times in the past, doesn't make it less disappointing though.