"show your competitive side at the horse race"

[ifreborn1]

I loled@ one time this was a true race FTPers.

[Lestache]

I remember learning the best path to take for the Bree race, then showing it to the occasional person - even leading them through the race then stopping at the end so that they could win.

[K'Arian]

Oh I remember that...yea, it was a bit more of a challenge then

[BelamanthDE]

Of course it was more of a challenge. But anyone wanting to go back that system has forgotten the countless times when people complained because their client showed that they had won, but the server was of a different opinion and announced another player as winner.

This was due to an unsolvable tech constraints from network latency and other things.

Oh, and waiting 10 minutes before the next four players could take the race was also not always fun, although the queues were usually well self-organized and there was a lot of music and fun during the waiting times.

[Sapience]

Of course it was more of a challenge. But anyone wanting to go back that system has forgotten the countless times when people complained because their client showed that they had won, but the server was of a different opinion and announced another player as winner.

This was due to an unsolvable tech constraints from network latency and other things.

Oh, and waiting 10 minutes before the next four players could take the race was also not always fun, although the queues were usually well self-organized and there was a lot of music and fun during the waiting times.

As Billy Joel once said, "The good old days weren't always good and tomorrow ain't as bad as it seems."

[bohbashum]

yeah, it had some horrible aspects :/

with above noted people would give up races with one little mistake. people who had practised purfect route would do it constantly ruining other people's changes and there were lodes of people who didn't get the horse simply because they played at peak times when the chance of winning was slim.

I remember waiting with a kinny till 3am to race so we could acually win it and try the track properly to get some good times and the tricks. the track was broken like mad, while most people followed the road, you could off-set your time dramatically by missing obsticals that looked like you needed them.

[Nymphonic]

Or to mention people trying to set the race up so you had to purposely let someone win since it was their "turn", which defeated the whole point of the race. Or trying to race during prime time hours. There was too much abuse, and it had to go.

[Forcedgrouping]

But the real race was fun.

I liked the experience, I could care less about the fugly horse It is not much of an experience now.


But, I guess the new design philosophy of the developers is to take all the sharp objects off the server and pad the walls really good.


Make sure you wear your festival head gear, it can get rough out there LOL those hobbits are ankle bitters.


Maybe we will see the festival head gear as a reward in the future with some cute text outlining its intended use.


Is the race a compelling part of the festival now? Or was it more of, lets say "event" pre nerf?

[Fiely]

I hated that aspect of the race, now it is better to compete just against my own clumsinees instead of some 16 year old punk which reflexes are so much better than mine.

[Forcedgrouping]

I hated that aspect of the race, now it is better to compete just against my own clumsinees instead of some 16 year old punk which reflexes are so much better than mine.

Ok I know those 16 year old punks can be nasty. You wont get any complaints on that.


But what if you could have been flagged as a "winner" and got your horse token for finishing the race three times or just winning once?

That punk could only win once in a day as i remember it.


I just think turbine is coding the human element out of their game at any and all cost and wile it may look like the quick easy and right choice it may have some profoundly negative effect on what is at its core a community based game.

I have have witnessed 90 year old get in to a physical fight over a bingo game. People can suck and be immature and childish but there are times you got to let them just be people for the sake of the potential good that may result.

[Fiely]

Ok I know those 16 year old punks can be nasty. You wont get any complaints on that.


But what if you could have been flagged as a "winner" and got your horse token for finishing the race three times or just winning once?

That punk could only win once in a day as i remember it.

I think I did win once or twice against those 16 year olds, but that was really late at night, likely. I played back when the game was new in 2007 or whenever that was, and when I came back to the game I had a couple of characters who had the harvest horse token in vault because I saved them back when you had to go back to Bree to trade them, and I had saved them for when my characters were of level. It's been a while, but I think I won those races by running them really late at night, and I don't remember if I had to redo the races when I came back to the game, when it went free to play (see that enticed me to come back). I guess there was a way to get that harvestmath horse back in the day even for old people like me. Know that I don't claim to not be a punk, though I'm older than 16, my husband thinks I may be one at times, lol.

[guguzza71]

As frustrating as the old race could be(having to wait so long for the next race and then being too slow to get one of the 4 saddles), I still remember lining up at that start line and having my heart beat faster as I totally focussed on the optimal race line which I learnt from multiple races on all my alts.

That old race was really intense and you knew if you made one mistake or raced someone with a faster con, or who knew the race course tricks better than you then you would lose and frustratingly have to wait another agonising 10 minutes for another chance to race for those saddles.

[duvelmoortgat]

As frustrating as the old race could be(having to wait so long for the next race and then being too slow to get one of the 4 saddles), I still remember lining up at that start line and having my heart beat faster as I totally focussed on the optimal race line which I learnt from multiple races on all my alts.

That old race was really intense and you knew if you made one mistake or raced someone with a faster con, or who knew the race course tricks better than you then you would lose and frustratingly have to wait another agonising 10 minutes for another chance to race for those saddles.

Remember the time people would scramble to get the saddle, that made it impossible, then queues were made, I tell you, bloody queues!! That is so lotroesque and something to be proud of (started on landroval by someone I met later).

Then some entitled brat made the queue worse by saying only one person at a time to guarantee the win!!! I was there trying to fight that as it is supposed to be a race, not entitled Queueing!

The person who started the queue returned and recruited me to wreck havoc to ensure the queue of 4 for racing is returned.

Good times, even through I know about the server client lag, lost some race, won some races cos I know all shortest circuit cuts and making sure I am on my toes at all time knowing even I am ahead I am not, and win in a thriller! Then having to bear the confusion of my defeated opponent who told me he was ahead!

Sapience, still good old days for me even the damn deeds and quests of angmar. Many difficult contents and it was rewarding to finish them all although you are not forgiven for the kergrims of skumfil deed!

[Tinuvela]

Forgive me for pointing out but queuing the players to ensure wins certainly does not seem like showing one's competitive side, at least to me. It is more like fixing races on the backstage which in real world is illegal too

I never been a part of those queues, whichever race I won, I won fair and square and whichever I lost, I lost gracefully.

But for me the old race was pretty much: Set the graphics to ultra low in order to prevent lag and then try to take the known route among a screen of intermingled avatars sometimes trying to see your own. Rinse and repeat.

I like how I race against myself in the new format and if you still want to have a competitive race against other players what is stopping you? Actually this thread gave me a lovely little idea, I think I will organize a kin horse race once the festivals are over hehe

[Thorwyn99]

Forgive me for pointing out but queuing the players to ensure wins certainly does not seem like showing one's competitive side, at least to me. It is more like fixing races on the backstage which in real world is illegal too

I never been a part of those queues, whichever race I won, I won fair and square and whichever I lost, I lost gracefully.

But for me the old race was pretty much: Set the graphics to ultra low in order to prevent lag and then try to take the known route among a screen of intermingled avatars sometimes trying to see your own. Rinse and repeat.

I like how I race against myself in the new format and if you still want to have a competitive race against other players what is stopping you? Actually this thread gave me a lovely little idea, I think I will organize a kin horse race once the festivals are over hehe

You know that's a great idea.
I think it'd be even more fun to do the race on the race track on warsteeds heh. In fact i think that'd be hilarious .

[Fiely]

I never saw such display of "nice" back in the day in Gladden, as to people making queues to ensure the win of anyone. It for sure was a tad aggravating to do the race, but it was nice that the timer for re-try wasn't as long as it is now. I also liked that it wasn't as grindy as it is these days to get festival horses. That's the thing that makes me leave the game sometimes, they like to create difficulty by numbers not by difficulty in this game so stuff gets grindy. I didn't do the last yule festival when I saw the numbers needed to get stuff, now I think I should have pushed through that.

[Forcedgrouping]

now you cant even use emotes and consumables in the festival grouds


It is "serious Biz"

yep the light hearted fun festivals are gone. The grinders took over and time is the new metric even in the festival.


It is the little things.


maybe they needed to up participation numbers to get more resources for festival content. The sad thing is maybe they killed the spirit of the festival in the process.

[PartyPlayer]

ForcedGrouping, the forced emoters are out in full force attempting to disrupt other revelers. You feel badly about Turbine clamping down on FEs? I was having MORE fun watching FEers fail in their attempts than anything. Turbine has now created a new class in Lotro - FE Ragers! As for the race, I am unable to complete the race, but I am by no means mad that I cannot complete it. How can anyone possibly be mad about that?! Sighs, even free stuff from Gift Boxes is being complained about. Read my sig.

[Yula_the_Mighty]

I remember learning the best path to take for the Bree race, then showing it to the occasional person - even leading them through the race then stopping at the end so that they could win.

In the original implementation it was four characters racing against either other. There was no limit on how many races you could enter.

On Meneldor we had one player that would enter every race for 4, 6, 10 hours a day. Win 95% of the races. Nobody else could get their race tokens. I changed my work schedule. Got up at 3 am eastern time. I got my race token while this jerk was sleeping.

I do not miss the old bad days. Once the race was changed to one win per day, life was better because it usually token me one race to get my token. It might take 8 races to get one token for each of the seven character I was using. I am sure people were not particularly happy when the first Yula showed up at the race track.

[Lestache]

I think a few of you are misunderstanding the idea of the queues for the original incarnation of the horse races.

On Silverlode, when there were queues they were there just to ensure that people got to enter the race in the order that they arrived to the track. The queues weren't a device to help people win - just to enter.

[phaelan2]

When my wife, daughter, and I are playing LOTRO together (all in the same room where we can see each others' screens), what we see on each screen is different. If we are running close together at all, each one of us appears to be in the lead on our own screens.

This was an issue with racing against each other in the original implementation. We had a plethora of threads about "how LOTRO cheats" because they "clearly won!" -- on their own screen. But not necessarily on the server.

This is why the race was changed to racing against a clock. With all the different PC/graphics builds, server latency, etc., there was just no way to make the results appear accurate for everyone's view.

[techknowrat]

As Billy Joel once said, "The good old days weren't always good and tomorrow ain't as bad as it seems."

so in other words we should just continue "Keeping the Faith"

[monteeburns]

Read my sig.

Except it's not true. Lotro won 'most passionate fanbase' at Dragoncon, whatever that is, probably translates as ' community who is most likely to put up with whatever they are given just because of the IP'. Best community 2012 was infact won by City of Heroes at Ten Ton Hammer.
http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/246959/page/3

I was having MORE fun watching FEers fail in their attempts than anything.

Doesn't really say much for the rest of the festival when the highlight for you is watching others trying to use FE's does it?

[BelamanthDE]

I think a few of you are misunderstanding the idea of the queues for the original incarnation of the horse races.

On Silverlode, when there were queues they were there just to ensure that people got to enter the race in the order that they arrived to the track. The queues weren't a device to help people win - just to enter.

This is how it was handled on Belegaer. There was never even a mention that there was supposed to be a certain winner.

[Dotlbeme]

I don't wax nostalgic over the old way. The low point was arriving at the venue in The Shire, only to find a queue of people, all going one at a time to ensure the win. Several beligerent people were running the show so I filed a ticked and left. Race procedure changed by the next festival.