Update 17.

[monk_tbd]

The answer is that the team is just not big enough to deliver both sorts in one update - each update requires the team to make choices - not what to include but rather what needs to be left out. Of course finances are at the root of this - in the form of a very limited budget. So if the team decides that a Big Battle is the right form of content for the stage of the story then the instances / raid go on the back burner.

I agree with this.

The problem is that the main reason why even instances do not work as well as they did previously is - as you mentioned - the loot tables and the missing progression through the different tiers together with proper difficulty scaling of the content and its tiers.

However fixing the loot tables and the loot progression will never make a big splash on its own money wise so it might be hard to justify from a marketing point of view.
Which then diminishes most efforts done on actual good group content.

Best would be if they could bite the bullet and fix the loot tables, difficulty scaling and progression in one update instead of group content (be it classic or BB) to be prepared for any future group content but I am sure that will never fly as it will not generate income (at least not for that update).

[peachykins]

Anyhow, I've been of the view since early 2014 that all of this nonsense about minorities and percentages was just a smokescreen to mask the reality that Turbine no longer had the capability (people, talent, experience, money) to develop raid content

I have always believed this is the reason for no raids. If by some small miracle they do a new raid, it's gonna be poor quality like the new pvp map.

[BangoTwinkletoes]

I have always believed this is the reason for no raids. If by some small miracle they do a new raid, it's gonna be poor quality like the new pvp map.

But what is so frustrating is that when Turbine built the Osgiliath cluster they re-acquired the basis of the talent needed. They've done the hard part - taking what was a pretty big step with the development of that cluster - and moving onto a raid is the natural progression for the team that produced it. Yet rather than keep the foot on the accelerator pedal (or gas pedal as the yanks call it) they slammed on the brakes and turned their attention to doing something with the BB engine - which I will stick my neck out and state that by any measure has the worst customer satisfaction of any part of LOTRO - including playing a burglar on MC - which I did when RoR was released and that was an experience.

[Twissle]

In what universe is this update ready to go live?! Ah, I see SWToR launched its expansion today... coincedence? I think not.

[Pavlosh]

We heard you loud and clear. We heard it after Update 14 when you mobbed Tarlang's Crown and we heard it over the Roving Threats and in responses to the full-fellowship Retaking Pelargir. There's a hunger among you guys for hard. And after thinking things over, we knew just what kind we wanted to build for you next: a little love letter to Lord of the Rings Online past.

Which begs the question, if Tarling's crown was mobbed, why the hell hasn't similar content been created in either Update 15, 16 or 17?

Osgiliath was a prime location for some possible Tarling's Crown style content. In fact is it 9 Maps now since the excellent Tarlings Crown? More than enough locations. I could list an endless stream of possibilities for group content in these maps.

Sometimes I think Turbine are lucky they have the LOTR IP tbh.

[Requiemslove]

OK....so...

I have not got into the game yet having not been on lotro today. The team gave no indication this was going live today, and there was no indication from the last time I played, a few days ago, this was happening. So why is it happening now?

Don't get me wrong here, I am happy to see an element of the game get some love that has been neglected for TWO bloody years, being crafting. And of course I want to continue my characters adventure throughout middle earth...but the thing of it is I cant get my head away from the fact this seems like a very much rushed affair, considering the amount of "known issues" Frelorn stated, and the general amount of negative vibes the forum here seems to be showing. And still no new raid content?

Where is the 12 man raid Turbine?

Big Battles is not and never will be a substitute to an actual instance.

[ElanorFb]

In what universe is this update ready to go live?! Ah, I see SWToR launched its expansion today... coincedence? I think not.

Also STO which I have played all day. This really should have waited until late November after hardware upgrades.

[bucko39]

Also STO which I have played all day. This really should have waited until late November after hardware upgrades.

Agreed, I made a second attempt to log in and try and enjoy myself...but, the hobbit who was following me kept getting lost and I got tired of resummoning him and the lag was bad. So in order to experience the grand city of Minas Tirith lag free I have to reduce my graphics? No thanks. I played STO, SWTOR and FFXIV today with zero problems. I log into LOTRO with it's ancient game engine and, well...there you have it

[WayfaringNomad]

Last year's expansion provided a short term boost, but WoW subs have continued to drop since then.

Number of subs peaked at around 12.1 M in 2010.

It had dropped to 8.2 M in 2013, when approximately 90-110K were leaving per month.

In the 4Q, 2014 (Warlords of Draenor was released in Nov. 2014), the number of subs bounced from a low of about 7M up to 10M. But that dropped back down to 7.1 M the following quarter.

As on June 2015, the number of subs had dropped to 5.6 M.

So, while there was a nice bump for a few months, the expansion's dungeons and raids didn't keep the numbers up.

This is a misleading post if you don't know why the subscriptions have dropped. They aren't dropping for no reason. Blizzard has handled themselves in a very shady, disrespectful way in the past year, and did a lot of things that made a lot of players very angry.

It was more the company's dismissive and stubborn attitudes to problems than it was the game that was driving people off. They've been turning it around a bit.. Slowly. But it'll take them a long time to build up the trust they lost from their players.

[Beaniemooch]

Raiders are the minority, pure and simple.

Has been stated time and time again.

And a dev later came and said ignore that, it's nonsense.

Oh, and they never actually defined a raider. Is it by character or account? I'm a raider with 3 lifer and 3 premium accts. I have 2 raiding characters. The rest support the raider - over 25 or 30 characters. By my own stats I am less than 10% raider just counting all my characters, but without a raid worth running I don't have a reason to play any. So... tell me how they determine their number. Any character ever created, maybe played only 1 minute and left? Every character on an account, regardless of status?

There are lies, damned lies and statistics. ~Mark Twain

[Dolamrothdame]

And a dev later came and said ignore that, it's nonsense.

Oh, and they never actually defined a raider. Is it by character or account? I'm a raider with 3 lifer and 3 premium accts. I have 2 raiding characters. The rest support the raider - over 25 or 30 characters. By my own stats I am less than 10% raider just counting all my characters, but without a raid worth running I don't have a reason to play any. So... tell me how they determine their number. Any character ever created, maybe played only 1 minute and left? Every character on an account, regardless of status?

There are lies, damned lies and statistics. ~Mark Twain

That's an interesting question. I'm primarily an RP person, but I do raid occasionally with my kin. T1 stuff mostly, I've managed a bit of T2, but I'll never reach T2C-too old and too slow, though I have a well-geared character because of willingness to grind. Do they consider me and others like me a raider? If so, then the percentage is definitely higher than single digits!

And I see in the release notes that they've reduced the number of marks you get from Sambrog and Glinghant. Don't know exactly how I feel about that. I'm sure the hardcore folks will be happy there is no more Sammy/Glinghant farming. But if it's an attempt to drive folks to the other raids, then I'll echo what others have said-fix the loot tables! I shouldn't end up in the hole for running a T1 Osgiliath instance.