28.2 - More Ember Nerfs????

[liverpaste]

Why you trying to hurt me SSG??

Coming in the future with Update 28.2:

• The quest Sigils of Imlad Ithil for Embers will become Sigils of Imlad Ithil for Motes.

[BadJuju]

Why you trying to hurt me SSG??

Motes, embers, medallions, pendants, slivers, symbols, coins, leaves, brands, tokens, pieces, tools, branches, emblems.... all meant to make your gameplay worse, not better.

[Rugongrod]

Also note that the dailies in Elderslade offer no way to earn embers, so this is going to leave common folk with no way what so ever to earn embers. Shameful really.

[thinx]

Just to stop that train before it runs too fast:

• Completing any missions quest will now award 5 Motes of Enchantment, in addition to Gabil'akkâ War-marks.
• A cap level weekly missions quest has been added as an additional source of Embers of Enchantment. This quest will automatically bestow if you are at the level cap and do level cap missions.
• We will add a new Copper Coins of Gundabad for Embers quest.

This does not mean everything is ok and I will comment in my next post. I just wanted to bring in the full information before things go wild.

EDIT: added copper coins for embers quest.

[Fegefeuer]

I'm missing 3000 embers weekly with this removal. I will NOT buy Elderslade, I wasn't going to do it before, and I will not do it now. You remove this source of embers? Perfect. I'll log less, I won't buy more gear pieces for alts. Thanks for killing my alt fun. I could get around 6k embers by running weeklies with 2 alts and do sigil quest with 6 chars. A Remmo jewel piece costs 5k, so I'm going for 1 piece a week. You remove half of my ember source? Goodbye. I won't bother anymore.

Don't worry, I'll play my low level characters and have fun with good content, not this endgame ####.

[thinx]

There is a new source for embers by now, so let's summarize. I hope this is complete.
expenses:

• New quest rewards cannot be deconstructed at all (compare: Vales of Anduin quest rewards can be deconstructed, barter gear can not).
• Prices for the next essence type went up. Availability of essences in new instances is given, but drop rates are low in comparison to demand.
• Price of old stuff remained the same

Income:

• deconstruction embers went down for instance drops.
• MM sigil quest gives motes instead of embers
• new quest (effort unknown, 1 or more?) gives embers
• missions give 5 motes (e.g. 20 missions for one L74 SoE, ridiculous IMO)
• MM 4 instance quest remained the same, but new instances are accepted, so there is no need to have full runs anymore.
• MM 10 instance quest meta can be done quickly be doing 10 resource quests instead of full instances.
• MM landscape quest meta remains the same
• (there is a chance that other things change that were not in the release notes)
• EDIT: copper coins for embers.

Additional Pro:

• The new dailies were not worth doing for well geared chars. This might change now (dependent on effort/value).

Additional Con:

• The reasons to run MM instances were reduced again. IMO there is no longer a reason. The current cap has 11 instances/raids and only 3 of them are (by now) really worth running. IMO a waste of material.
• EDIT: Sigils of MM will run into cap. No use...

Overall this means that things are not as bad as they seem when just reading the first post, but we are (again) at a point that says more work per income (EDITED), at increased expenses. We will see the increase in work today, the expense increase is already there and it is 50%.

In addition, the pressure to own the new expansion was increased, even though I would expect this pressure was quite high already before - for all people that want progress. What was reduced is the possibility to keep remmo gear and fill it with new essences, so players that play raids and did not buy the new expansions are definitely a little less desired for quick safemode remmo runs.

[Fegefeuer]

There is a new source for embers by now, so let's summarize. I hope this is complete.
expenses:

• New quest rewards cannot be deconstructed at all (compare: Vales of Anduin quest rewards can be deconstructed, barter gear can not).
• Prices for the next essence type went up. Availability of essences in new instances is given, but drop rates are low in comparison to demand.
• Price of old stuff remained the same

Income:

• deconstruction embers went down for instance drops.
• MM sigil quest gives motes instead of embers
• new quest (effort unknown, 1 or more?) gives embers
• missions give 5 motes (e.g. 20 missions for one L74 SoE, ridiculous IMO)
• MM 4 instance quest remained the same, but new instances are accepted, so there is no need to have full runs anymore.
• MM 10 instance quest meta can be done quickly be doing 10 resource quests instead of full instances.
• MM landscape quest meta remains the same
• (there is a chance that other things change that were not in the release notes)

Additional Pro:

• The new dailies were not worth doing for well geared chars. This might change now (dependent on effort/value).

Additional Con:

• The reasons to run MM instances were reduced again. IMO there is no longer a reason. The current cap has 11 instances/raids and only 3 of them are (by now) really worth running. IMO a waste of material.

Overall this means that things are not as bad as they seem when just reading the first post, but we are (again) at a point that says more work for the same income, at increased expenses. We will see the increase in work today, the expense increase is already there and it is 50%.

In addition, the pressure to own the new expansion was increased, even though I would expect this pressure was quite high already before - for all people that want progress. What was reduced is the possibility to keep remmo gear and fill it with new essences, so players that play raids and did not buy the new expansions are definitely a little less desired for quick safemode remmo runs.

This is a slap in the face for everyone who don't buy Minipeaks and it makes it even less desirable to buy just because it feels annoying. A business should not pressure people to buy something. Call me stupid but I don't fall for that. I only buy if it's worth. I don't care of their dumb marketing strategies.

[Elmagor]

I'm missing 3000 embers weekly with this removal. I will NOT buy Elderslade, I wasn't going to do it before, and I will not do it now. You remove this source of embers? Perfect. I'll log less, I won't buy more gear pieces for alts. Thanks for killing my alt fun. I could get around 6k embers by running weeklies with 2 alts and do sigil quest with 6 chars. A Remmo jewel piece costs 5k, so I'm going for 1 piece a week. You remove half of my ember source? Goodbye. I won't bother anymore.

Don't worry, I'll play my low level characters and have fun with good content, not this endgame ####.

Imagine what you have Ered Mithrin and Vales of Anduin, and don't have Minas Morgul...

[Fegefeuer]

Imagine what you have Ered Mithrin and Vales of Anduin, and don't have Minas Morgul...

Mate I'm not even bothering to reply to you anymore because you really look like a troll. But just answering to this one because something, not directly related with what you wrote since I won't even bother with that.

When Vales of Anduin was released, did they remove Longbeard Marks for Embers in Skarhald? Anyone remember? Because I don't think they did! In fact, I think I didn't do the Gulmarks for embers because the waste of Gulmarks was too much compared with the Longbeard marks.

Lotro must be the only game that makes players to feel that they must delete their alts. My solution instead deleting is to make alts stuck at a certain cap, so I won't have to bother with these stupid practises. No alts, no bother with this.

[WorrBinpike]

Nice, now they force you to do this garbage missions.....

At least they are doing the same thing what they did with mordor when they removed black keys from the game (we heard you, you want progression through playing....lol).

And now they force people to buy this "expansion".

And i wish this forum had a ignore function, ELmagor would be the first to be in it. Honestly most of your posts are really a laugh.

[Melkorben]

Why you trying to hurt me SSG??

Not that I dont support you but why even bother to get embers these day?
The gear that you can get from it is trash comparing to what you can get so easy at T1 and the new T6 essence are pointless.
Most of us are already cap mastery and crit so, beside Tank's that would/might find a use for it, you can only stack more/better Vit essence so why even bother?
I just stopped running these instances for "Embers farm" and dont really care about the new essence either.
This new runes/relics also ruin REM raid that become now an alt B1 farm tool mostly...
This game become so boring at cap

[Fegefeuer]

Not that I dont support you but why even bother to get embers these day?
The gear that you can get from it is trash comparing to what you can get so easy at T1 and the new T6 essence are pointless.
Most of us are already cap mastery and crit so, beside Tank's that would/might find a use for it, you can only stack more/better Vit essence so why even bother?
I just stopped running these instances for "Embers farm" and dont really care about the new essence either.
This new runes/relics also ruin REM raid that become now an alt B1 farm tool mostly...
This game become so boring at cap

You are right, and this perfectly works. The problem is: alts. Personally, I finished gearing my alts, but since I got 1 month VIP to unlock swift travel/traits on a couple alts, I thought in using the extra xp to level my 2 missing alts (that are lvl120) to 130 via tasks, and then get some easy teal gear. As no jewels in Elderslade, I have to get Remmo. But now that they are removing half of my embers source, I think I'll wait for Gundabad, when Remmo gear costs motes, and then I'll entertain myself gearing those 2 alts. So I make time for when Gundabad is released into the Lotro Store. Sounds like perfect plan: I won't bother with endgame, I won't pay any money, I won't buy Gundabad on release (I wasn't going to do it anyway, but now I have more reasons to not do it), and I will have fun for months. Meanwhile, I'll play low lvl alts and have real fun.

[Braer]

On the up side you can fill your yards with Black Wolf-dogs and get to see them all.

That's what you get buying new stuff, it depreciates so quickly. Today of all days shows what happens with an entrenched divisive populous.

[Arnenna]

And i wish this forum had a ignore function

It does. Left click Name, click View Profile, then Ignore user is on the left.

[thinx]

Not that I dont support you but why even bother to get embers these day?
The gear that you can get from it is trash comparing to what you can get so easy at T1 and the new T6 essence are pointless.

Depends on viewpoint.
For a well geared char the only reason to want embers is to update essences from T4 to T6. This is IMO minor, but people were running Thrang up and down for minor updates, so opinions seem to differ.
For an optimized effort char the reason to want embers is that the new gear will most probably bring more essence slots that need to be filled.
For low effort chars the reason to want embers is to finally get *any* essence to fill that slot. The main problem here is that the drop rate of T1 essences is extremely low (e.g. 4 essences for questing one char through the whole new area, with a chance of ~50% to get an essence that is actually useful.

Ín some cases people will use embers to fill up neglected ILIs, but this can be done with motes too, so nothing changed.

[thinx]

On the up side you can fill your yards with Black Wolf-dogs and get to see them all.

Definitely. The choice is dogs or currency cap.

[Arnenna]

On the up side you can fill your yards with Black Wolf-dogs and get to see them all.

Nope. Why do you think they aren't including that change in this weeks patch?

They'll make sure the Curator has gone on vacation before they bring in a mote yield increase.

[thinx]

Nope. Why do you think they aren't including that change in this weeks patch?

The black wolf dogs are for sigils of Minas Ithil, not for embers or motes.

I agree. It is not by chance that we also get motes *after* the curator is gone.

[Arnenna]

The black wolf dogs are for sigils of Minas Ithil, not for embers or motes.

I agree. It is not by chance that we also get motes *after* the curator is gone.

But you can't put them in your yard just by buying them for sigils. One needs motes, to turn to figments, to purchase harnesses off the Curator to do that.

[Starliteyes]

There is a new source for embers by now, so let's summarize. I hope this is complete.
expenses:

• New quest rewards cannot be deconstructed at all (compare: Vales of Anduin quest rewards can be deconstructed, barter gear can not).
• Prices for the next essence type went up. Availability of essences in new instances is given, but drop rates are low in comparison to demand.
• Price of old stuff remained the same

Income:

• deconstruction embers went down for instance drops.
• MM sigil quest gives motes instead of embers
• new quest (effort unknown, 1 or more?) gives embers
• missions give 5 motes (e.g. 20 missions for one L74 SoE, ridiculous IMO)
• MM 4 instance quest remained the same, but new instances are accepted, so there is no need to have full runs anymore.
• MM 10 instance quest meta can be done quickly be doing 10 resource quests instead of full instances.
• MM landscape quest meta remains the same
• (there is a chance that other things change that were not in the release notes)
• EDIT: copper coins for embers.

Additional Pro:

• The new dailies were not worth doing for well geared chars. This might change now (dependent on effort/value).

Additional Con:

• The reasons to run MM instances were reduced again. IMO there is no longer a reason. The current cap has 11 instances/raids and only 3 of them are (by now) really worth running. IMO a waste of material.
• EDIT: Sigils of MM will run into cap. No use...

Overall this means that things are not as bad as they seem when just reading the first post, but we are (again) at a point that says more work per income (EDITED), at increased expenses. We will see the increase in work today, the expense increase is already there and it is 50%.

In addition, the pressure to own the new expansion was increased, even though I would expect this pressure was quite high already before - for all people that want progress. What was reduced is the possibility to keep remmo gear and fill it with new essences, so players that play raids and did not buy the new expansions are definitely a little less desired for quick safemode remmo runs.

I think you missed one pro: "Coming in the future with Update 28.2:" Today's update is 28.1.1. We don't know how long until 28.2, but until then you can get embers from BOTH areas. Surely a pro?

Also, so many folk complain about lack of communication, but they are giving a heads up for the change so people can stock up in MM if they wish, AND in Elderslade. Depending on how long until 28.2, it could add up, no?

[Melkorben]

Depends on viewpoint.
For a well geared char the only reason to want embers is to update essences from T4 to T6. This is IMO minor, but people were running Thrang up and down for minor updates, so opinions seem to differ.
For an optimized effort char the reason to want embers is that the new gear will most probably bring more essence slots that need to be filled.
For low effort chars the reason to want embers is to finally get *any* essence to fill that slot. The main problem here is that the drop rate of T1 essences is extremely low (e.g. 4 essences for questing one char through the whole new area, with a chance of ~50% to get an essence that is actually useful.

Ín some cases people will use embers to fill up neglected ILIs, but this can be done with motes too, so nothing changed.

Sorry m8 but for each case that you mentioned just run the content and gain free and easy a much better gear.
For example now you can easily join REM B1 farms and get the best gear, what you couldn't do with Anvil and Abyss on lvl back then.

[Braer]

People chasing Embers aren't chasing motes so much maybe? If peeps are chasing all three they need pity. However I will be doing a Lhringrish mote daily a few times after the servers come back, but that's only 20 minutes of my time. The problem with many chasing only figments is they haven't completed the content that gains them access to motes regularly, can't see beyond festivals.

I did think that a peacock would make a great lawn feature but then remembered how annoying I find them in real life, so haven't made a halter purchase yet.

The treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen only works for one reason, people self-justify their "choices".

[Morellian]

This is just really frustrating, because I very much would like to be able to praise SSG for actually listening to feedback and making missions more rewarding, as well as adding some actual sources of embers in the new expansion! But, as always it seems, we're taking one step forward, two steps back.

If you want people to buy a piece of content for your game, one of the most crucial things to ensure is that said content is actually rewarding for players to complete. This was why I was incredulous that WoTP offered no quests for embers, and why I was initially glad to hear that this was being changed. However, this should never come at the expense of devaluing other recent content, which, I might add, still costs real money, and is still part of the current endgame.

Instead of encouraging players to buy WoTP because they now see the chance to earn additional rewards, SSG have taken away some of the rewards players already paid to have access to and told them that they need to pay up, again, if they want that quest back.

Does SSG need a refresher on the fact that, by their own definition, Embers are a level cap currency, and Motes are a below-cap currency? There has been no level cap increase, Minas Morgul is as much part of "endgame" as Elderslade is. This is a choice SSG made themselves by deciding not to include Elderslade in the Gundabad expansion and release it separately for more money as an "addendum" to the level 130 cap. It makes absolutely zero sense to have a quest that is only completable by level cap characters award low-level currency, and is so blatantly an attempt to force more people to buy Elderslade that all it's going to achieve is driving them away.

People buy game content if it looks new and interesting, fun to play through, and rewarding to complete. They do not buy game content because a game studio told them to, or tried to strongarm them into it. They just go and play something else instead. It would have been nice if SSG had managed to figure this out before they had to find out the hard way.

[BigLotroFan]

This is no good. MM is still level cap, it should continue to offer embers.

[Fegefeuer]

This is just really frustrating, because I very much would like to be able to praise SSG for actually listening to feedback and making missions more rewarding, as well as adding some actual sources of embers in the new expansion! But, as always it seems, we're taking one step forward, two steps back.

If you want people to buy a piece of content for your game, one of the most crucial things to ensure is that said content is actually rewarding for players to complete. This was why I was incredulous that WoTP offered no quests for embers, and why I was initially glad to hear that this was being changed. However, this should never come at the expense of devaluing other recent content, which, I might add, still costs real money, and is still part of the current endgame.

Instead of encouraging players to buy WoTP because they now see the chance to earn additional rewards, SSG have taken away some of the rewards players already paid to have access to and told them that they need to pay up, again, if they want that quest back.

Does SSG need a refresher on the fact that, by their own definition, Embers are a level cap currency, and Motes are a below-cap currency? There has been no level cap increase, Minas Morgul is as much part of "endgame" as Elderslade is. This is a choice SSG made themselves by deciding not to include Elderslade in the Gundabad expansion and release it separately for more money as an "addendum" to the level 130 cap. It makes absolutely zero sense to have a quest that is only completable by level cap characters award low-level currency, and is so blatantly an attempt to force more people to buy Elderslade that all it's going to achieve is driving them away.

People buy game content if it looks new and interesting, fun to play through, and rewarding to complete. They do not buy game content because a game studio told them to, or tried to strongarm them into it. They just go and play something else instead. It would have been nice if SSG had managed to figure this out before they had to find out the hard way.

Driving me away is what they have done. I'm even thinking in getting Elderslade for LPs when Gundabad is released, so all weeklies will give motes, and then I will use it better since Remmo gear will cost motes too. Win-win for me. Also, I will reach lvl135 with quests, tasks and dailies from Elderslade. I actually think this is truly the thing I'm going to do.

Sorry, I was pissed with many of the things that SSG have done with time, but now it was truly the last drop. I don't repent buying VIP this month because I wanted to unlock stuff for alts, but they don't deserve my money. SSG can take this VIP month I paid as my last payment in many many years.