Monster play issues and discussion

[Mariuss]

To state the obvious, and probably repeat something that's been said a hundred times in the last 40 pages:
FYI, this post will be really once sided - CREEP

1.Server lines and skill lag are a must. This has really ruined pvp on many levels and is the trigger for many of the random bugs we get.

2. Crowd Control:
I honestly think is overkill, what makes it even worse is every freep has abandoned their main too (if they weren't already one) for a tactical/ranged. As a reaver, you need to be in melee range for any damage, that being said charge gets you all of 8 seconds of fighting, afterwards you're chained down and dead. I know turbine has "fixed" CC and immunity, but it honestly seems worse than ever. My resilience emote doesn't even finish going off and I'm stunned again, how about some immunity for resilience??? Pots are just pointless, I use one and by the time the stun wears off I'm cc'ed by a daze or some other BS. Why are these things 12 silver when they can't even help you (btw I'm referring to pot use in both raids and small fighting, with the exception of 1v1s), they should either be 2 silver a piece or have 1 pot to break you out of all forms of CC and grant you the immunity needed against all forms of CC (at 12silver). There is just no balance between the purpose/usage of post and cost. There are also other things that can be implemented for CC;
- stun immunity from WL's or defilers (much like LM's), however I can see the QQ from this as freep CC would become rendered useless (if you had the buff of course) But freeps have no right to complain as they currently have LM's handing out SI.
- having all forms of CC on one DR timer/and immunity application

I just think there needs to be a little give and take here. As I said earlier, all freeps play these days is ranged/tactical, there is not enough incentive to play anything else. This being said, each freeps has ranged CC and dps, weather I may be in the fight or running out, I don't feel like I'm pvp'ing anymore, I'm just greybarred and dead. This can apply to both ranged and melee creeps, both spiders and BA's get locked down at 40m and blown to kingdom come, burrow or evade for either class doesn't help, theyre usually dead by the time the pot gets you out of the stun/root.
Plz find a balance between Freep CC and DPS. Id say you cant have both, but in the current state they do, worst part is they take it for granted.

BTW, the new pot that grants you 10s of immunity, awesome!! Except what's the incentive for me to spend another 10-12s (probably the cost to be) for 2 seconds of immunity after charge?

3. Inductions/Interrupts;
I say poor WL's, aside from the fact the base healing amount hasnt been increased in years (only heal crit added), with the increased creep morale, increased freep DPS, and added ranged interupts, this class has really become useless. Yes, I've heard the stories, kite, kite, kite, but why have a WL if you're not going to heal, or if you can't heal. Cut the freaking induction timer on both heals, or at least make 'Crack The Whip' instant. Again, there needs to be a little give and take, all these factors play against the WL, even changing several would be a great help. Its really fun to play a WL when you actually get a chance to heal and not run circles around the raid the whole fight. As it stands, if a freep looks at me the wrong way my heal gets interrupted.
- One other example; I dont understand why BA's inductions weather at 10% or 90% dont go off when a target hides (LoS), however when a hunters induction (improved swift bow for example) starts going off, it still hits the target even regardless of line of sight. Id like to assume the induction has to be completed a certain amount/percentage, but regardless its not the same for both side. Why??

3. Traits/Slots;
- Why is it when I spec all damage and lose a good 3k morale, do I not see and substantial improvement in damage output? What am I sacrificing all that morale for?
- Racials, as you rank really fail, not to mention the lack of slots vs amount of racials (and I know, you're not supposed to be able to slot them all). When you hit rank 11 or 12, (not something that can be done in a few weeks), you should be able to have another slot to racial or class be unlocked, heck even all three would be nice.
- Directly looking at racials, Dying Rage (reaver - Rank 9) needs a fix; the fact you get rooted and need to pot, you just lost 3 of your 15 seconds. With the skill only eligible at 1300 morale, I think skill the skill should be similar to a capitans last stand, you get to stay alive the whole 15s, followed by death at expiration. This would really make the skill worth slotting, and less frustrating having to use DR at 1300 morale and get hit by one Improved Swift Bow, as your arms still flap in the air from the freaking emote.
- After purchasing skins (with DP) and having to pay 300s to equip each time really fails(the higher the rank the more $$), I like to switch it up a bit from rank 11 to 12 and be able to afford it. As you may know, im already broke from all the useless pots

4. Freeps:
Can they be reconfigured to do function as the class should. A support/healing class should play it's role and not out dps a class which has been dedicated/assigned as a dps class. For example; Minstrels - they need to heal not explode ppl on the run. Guardians - a tanking class, the BPE is nuts, fine it's there to tank mobs of 600k+, but why is it doing so much dps? Champs should have guardian dps, not guards have both and champs be chumps. This would make perfect sense, a balance between dps/bpe, not guardians be godmode fighting up to 5-6creeps and more while staying alive for 10-15seconds without any issues, then using charge to get away alive. Maybe champs wouldn't be so useless, poor things die faster that a light armor class. SoA had class direction, and its exactly why Minstrels (good example) complained in the moors, they couldn't do any damage. But heck, you're a healer, who forced you to roll a healing class and go out in the moors if you didn't want to heal. If you want DPS roll a hunter. I think Turbine really went the wrong way on this, no idea why they made a healing class a tactical damage monster.

Anyways, there are alot of things that need to be brought back on track before any new areas open up. The same map is the smallest problem

[SeigneurDude]

To state the obvious, and probably repeat something that's been said a hundred times in the last 40 pages:
FYI, this post will be really once sided - CREEP

1.Server lines and skill lag are a must. This has really ruined pvp on many levels and is the trigger for many of the random bugs we get.

2. Crowd Control:
I honestly think is overkill, what makes it even worse is every freep has abandoned their main too (if they weren't already one) for a tactical/ranged. As a reaver, you need to be in melee range for any damage, that being said charge gets you all of 8 seconds of fighting, afterwards you're chained down and dead. I know turbine has "fixed" CC and immunity, but it honestly seems worse than ever. My resilience emote doesn't even finish going off and I'm stunned again, how about some immunity for resilience??? Pots are just pointless, I use one and by the time the stun wears off I'm cc'ed by a daze or some other BS. Why are these things 12 silver when they can't even help you (btw I'm referring to pot use in both raids and small fighting, with the exception of 1v1s), they should either be 2 silver a piece or have 1 pot to break you out of all forms of CC and grant you the immunity needed against all forms of CC (at 12silver). There is just no balance between the purpose/usage of post and cost. There are also other things that can be implemented for CC;
- stun immunity from WL's or defilers (much like LM's), however I can see the QQ from this as freep CC would become rendered useless (if you had the buff of course) But freeps have no right to complain as they currently have LM's handing out SI.
- having all forms of CC on one DR timer/and immunity application

I just think there needs to be a little give and take here. As I said earlier, all freeps play these days is ranged/tactical, there is not enough incentive to play anything else. This being said, each freeps has ranged CC and dps, weather I may be in the fight or running out, I don't feel like I'm pvp'ing anymore, I'm just greybarred and dead. This can apply to both ranged and melee creeps, both spiders and BA's get locked down at 40m and blown to kingdom come, burrow or evade for either class doesn't help, theyre usually dead by the time the pot gets you out of the stun/root.
Plz find a balance between Freep CC and DPS. Id say you cant have both, but in the current state they do, worst part is they take it for granted.

BTW, the new pot that grants you 10s of immunity, awesome!! Except what's the incentive for me to spend another 10-12s (probably the cost to be) for 2 seconds of immunity after charge?

3. Inductions/Interrupts;
I say poor WL's, aside from the fact the base healing amount hasnt been increased in years (only heal crit added), with the increased creep morale, increased freep DPS, and added ranged interupts, this class has really become useless. Yes, I've heard the stories, kite, kite, kite, but why have a WL if you're not going to heal, or if you can't heal. Cut the freaking induction timer on both heals, or at least make 'Crack The Whip' instant. Again, there needs to be a little give and take, all these factors play against the WL, even changing several would be a great help. Its really fun to play a WL when you actually get a chance to heal and not run circles around the raid the whole fight. As it stands, if a freep looks at me the wrong way my heal gets interrupted.
- One other example; I dont understand why BA's inductions weather at 10% or 90% dont go off when a target hides (LoS), however when a hunters induction (improved swift bow for example) starts going off, it still hits the target even regardless of line of sight. Id like to assume the induction has to be completed a certain amount/percentage, but regardless its not the same for both side. Why??

3. Traits/Slots;
- Why is it when I spec all damage and lose a good 3k morale, do I not see and substantial improvement in damage output? What am I sacrificing all that morale for?
- Racials, as you rank really fail, not to mention the lack of slots vs amount of racials (and I know, you're not supposed to be able to slot them all). When you hit rank 11 or 12, (not something that can be done in a few weeks), you should be able to have another slot to racial or class be unlocked, heck even all three would be nice.
- Directly looking at racials, Dying Rage (reaver - Rank 9) needs a fix; the fact you get rooted and need to pot, you just lost 3 of your 15 seconds. With the skill only eligible at 1300 morale, I think skill the skill should be similar to a capitans last stand, you get to stay alive the whole 15s, followed by death at expiration. This would really make the skill worth slotting, and less frustrating having to use DR at 1300 morale and get hit by one Improved Swift Bow, as your arms still flap in the air from the freaking emote.
- After purchasing skins (with DP) and having to pay 300s to equip each time really fails(the higher the rank the more $$), I like to switch it up a bit from rank 11 to 12 and be able to afford it. As you may know, im already broke from all the useless pots

4. Freeps:
Can they be reconfigured to do function as the class should. A support/healing class should play it's role and not out dps a class which has been dedicated/assigned as a dps class. For example; Minstrels - they need to heal not explode ppl on the run. Guardians - a tanking class, the BPE is nuts, fine it's there to tank mobs of 600k+, but why is it doing so much dps? Champs should have guardian dps, not guards have both and champs be chumps. This would make perfect sense, a balance between dps/bpe, not guardians be godmode fighting up to 5-6creeps and more while staying alive for 10-15seconds without any issues, then using charge to get away alive. Maybe champs wouldn't be so useless, poor things die faster that a light armor class. SoA had class direction, and its exactly why Minstrels (good example) complained in the moors, they couldn't do any damage. But heck, you're a healer, who forced you to roll a healing class and go out in the moors if you didn't want to heal. If you want DPS roll a hunter. I think Turbine really went the wrong way on this, no idea why they made a healing class a tactical damage monster.

Anyways, there are alot of things that need to be brought back on track before any new areas open up. The same map is the smallest problem

+rep for you

[Kateraid]

In regards to lag and rollbacks near server lines...

Thus far the only reports we're seeing on this issue are on Brandywine. When you report this please be sure you include exactly what you were doing, where (a /loc would be best) and specify what you lost (list infamy, items, etc). Also be sure to let us know whether you just stuttered, lagged or actually crashed to the desktop completely and had to relaunch the game. All of these things are needed to help us isolate the issue.

Specific information helps us track down the issue. General comments like "it happened again" or "it's still not fixed" just create background noise we have to wade through, delaying any potential resolution. We have the team looking at this.

GM's are aware and responding, but we need to be persistent. Please do what you can to provide (via /bug) the information Sapience is asking for in this post.

• /loc of where the incident happened
• Exactly what you were doing at the time
• What was the result... ie. Stuttering (rubber-banding), Lagging or Rollback (crash to desktop or character screen)
• What you lost... specifically listing renown/infamy, stats, items in inventory, etc etc.

Visit this thread for examples and discussion. Please keep this serious and use it as an opportunity to get this fixed.
http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.p...ing-Rollbacks/

[Rconsole]

I think Turbine really went the wrong way on this, no idea why they made a healing class a tactical damage monster.

Good post. but you do know the answer to this: PvE, No amount of complaints, or Moors-based statistical analysis will take away the fact that Turbine wants each class to be self sustaining in the actual game world.

[huntcorwin10]

I like it that lotro's free and everything, but you guys have to make monster play free isn't lotro supposed to be free?

[mudd_666]

I like it that lotro's free and everything, but you guys have to make monster play free isn't lotro supposed to be free?

It would already had been done, if for now 1 small detail. You can roll a creep and start killing things when you have a toon lvl 10. For a freep to pvp you have to lvl 60+ which takes most people months to get to. So if it was free to pvp, then you'd have 1000 creeps playing vs 50 freeps and we can all agree that wouldn't get unfun very, very fast.

The obvious solution is to make freeps scale up from 10 to 65 automaticaly in the moors and once you leave moors you'll go back to your actual level. Or give Freeps a similar buff you get in moors only, to the one you get when soloing Volume 1 epic quest, which raises your Morale, stats, etc.

[Aelythia]

The obvious solution is to make freeps scale up from 10 to 65 automaticaly in the moors and once you leave moors you'll go back to your actual level.

Thats actually not a bad idea. "Greenie" Freeps would be on par w/ under ranked creeps since they would be missing skills and traits instead of level difference+skills+traits. Would make pvp more inclusive. However the issue of incentive still exists for freeps.

Creeps earn inf for rank/skills/traits. Freeps earn renown for......?.........rank/map/outdated gear?. Getting the rank 9 class barter set is probably the hardest set to earn in the game as it requires both high rank and hard earned bartering materials, yet it is worse than most rad gear. Absurd.

[mudd_666]

Get rid of renown completely, it's pointless. Makes people farm it, which results in more people willing to resort to cheap, unfair, 'lame' tactics and make the game less fun.

Give creeps all the skills and get on with it.

[Aelythia]

Thats an idea... I'd settle for an area without NPC's. Just terrain. Or lets get really fancy...an arena with equal numbered battles. Call it a PvMP skirm if you will. If you win you get marks or something.

[AWS0207]

Note: High chance of repeats

Note: I am against creep aoe class

Note: From persceptive os someone at Brandywine. Lots of people Lots of lag.

List of things I'd personally like to see

~Bugs~
-Removal of the Warleader bug
-Removal of the rollback bug

~NPCs~
-Removal of the ability to 'drop pull' a keep. NPCs should never reset within their own keep.
-Fix the little bug that has happened to me. Was leading a group were going to pull NPCs at TR and there were no NPCs, until we were in the main room 1st floor and they all show'd up.
-Make either Marshall and Captain-General An(YAY!) or make Tyrant Uzulthrang equivalent of freep marshall.

~PvE~
-Change the way available to obtain Brilliant Spirit Stones

~Creeps~
-Weaver class should have more acid/poison damage skills less common damage (Toxin direct damage for instance)
-Add graphic effect of skulls/dead bodies around the area that oneshots will being to kill you at. A prewarning.
-Add Rank3 morale for damage, power for health ect. ect. for creeps.
-Gives reavers some sort of range ability such as a throwing knives skill.
-Make weaver hatchlings ability a toggle skill allowing for a creep pet class. Lower hatchling dps slightly give weavers pet control panel and give a large power every second while skill is toggled.

~Freeps~
-Allow for shared tracking targets for hunters with monster players not just NPCs.
-Increase different choices for turn in of Marks of Valour or whatever they are called. :P
-Increase NPCs strength and/or amounth aroundd GV and EC.

~Overall~
-Increase reason for Arador's End and are around Plains OP. Going and fighting there.
-Increse quests to do at lug and increase in grimwood fighting quest not just collecting. (If we have to quest for maps gives a little pve action not just running around woods looking for wood. )

All i can think of for now, thanks devs!
/cheer
_~Aifury~_~Defyme~_~Airfuri~_

[Forza]

So much information on this thread is outdated and not accurate. I don't see how a dev is going to get any good feedback out of this thread. They should just take notes from old posts and start a whole new thread after patches with big changes to the game.

[Morgul1975]

There seems to be a fairly major lag issue related to captains in the moors. It's something I've seen consistently in my last week of play, leading me to beleive there's something broken with them. I'll attempt to describe it as best I can.

Issue: Big lag spike in small group and raid settings, causing most of the party to relog due to being locked out from using any abilites, It's always a captain right up front running place, lagged, out of range msg even though he's visible.

I'll describe the situation in which I saw it repeatedly occur yesterday.

A small group of creeps were inside OC, freeps controlled lugz, your average small group rez hug pew pew.

A few more people show up. A Captain shows up.

Freeps make a push torwards OC.

Big lag spike. Warping, rubber-banding occurs. Numerous comments of "OMG lag" "I can't do anything" "I'm relogging".

Captain standing right in front, running in place, out of range of any abilities.

Rinse repeat 5+ times.

This lag spike incident repeated itself multiple times, leading me to believe there's something broken with the Captain class. It didn't start happening till a Captain showed up, and it was always him right up front, running in place, unable to be attacked. I don't know captains ability set well enough to have been able to identify what skill or skills he wasusing to make that mess, but I am 99% certain we have a problem with caps.

[Dimoyle56]

@ Morgul1975 I've seen the same thing regularly these past few days when a captain is present. Players lag up run on the spot and the captain will always be amongst the lag/freezes then I've seen the captain stuck in a running position whilst mounted.
We'd be waiting for them to mount up but they'd be mounted as far as they're concerned.


-------------

My biggest issue in Moors play is that pvmp tends to only happen around keeps and npc's. I'd rather turbine increase incentives to move away from the keeps and npc protection. Also for the most part it's zerg against zerg and while this is going on there is little to no small group play or singles around.

If they made it so destiny points reset after 2 months to zero and made them so creep characters had one destiny pool and freep players an entirely separate DP pool, I think this would force both creeps and freeps into the moors and to regularly complete quests to buy skills (creepside) use DP -pve (freepside).

I also think they could remove the glimmering/Luminous/Brilliant etc items required for corruptions/pots/food and items. Introduce a few quests for Delving of Fror and reward players with destiny points for those quests and quests already in the moors.

The currency for the replacement item requirements would be DP alone, both sides having them reset after two months.

I don't think it would hurt to introduce a few more quests/zones/pvmp small group instances either.

[karamummy]

I've noticed a few bugs, and so far it isn't common, aside from #3.
1. And Ongburz Tracker at Orc-Camp is bugged on a Player Character, but shows no anti-exploit question marks, and is just rooted there, forever in combat. While it is useful (you can track that person's Morale and Power, precisely) it is also annoying (one less mob on patrol), and also is an exploit, to both Monsters and Freeps. (EDIT: a few minutes after this post: ) More orcs are being player trackers - three Skirmishers and yet another Tracker. (By the way, I think the Freeps may be exploiting that, and if they could do that to OC Tyrant, or any other keep-taking NPC ally, then that'd totally be terrible! And, they CAN be killed, and are NOT in Anti-Exploit mode. From the looks of it, it is a Boundary bug - again.)
2. An Ongburz Archer, Corpse of, was standing up, never falling. I wasn't able to see his death, but it was visible to others. And it fooled them. It was dead, had no floating name, and no health. Why this occured? I'm not sure.
3. Ground effects. It seems if you are running and you step in something, like Sticky tar or Slug Goo, the effect may stay on you. A theory I ave for that is that is it RIGHT AS it is going away, and is therefor there yet not, confusing the game, and causing it to stay there.
4. The Rune-Keeper's stuns seem(ed) to be impossible to potion out of. I had put the buff on, a while before but still in effect when I was stunned, repeatedly, with no automatic immunity afterward and only my potion one, by the same Rune-keeper. Whether or not the automatic after-stun immunities are supposed to be there or not, none "broke", nor did my potion do anything. And I made sure it WAS the Stun one, I used it previously to escape a stun. There was no lag that whole time, nor that hour.
5. I've seen a single "/ooc" chat of this, where a Rune-Keeper (whether class is relevant, I'm not sure) potion-break five to seven stuns/mezzes in a row. What the timing was between is unknown to me, and I've forgotten the person who said so. Aren't they to have cooldowns? Or is it a rank-related very-low-cooldown potion/brand (or whatever the Freep-side version is) item? Or a class skill? If either of the last two, why don't any Monsters have an equivalent? (Last time I checked, potions usually had a 1 minute Cooldown and the Rank 15 Brand had two minutes to fifteen minute cooldown, and the Reavers' doesn't Cooldown that fast either.)

[brunnhilda]

As several of us are aware (or not aware) our Russian conterpart LOTRO server (actually NOT Turbine from what I've been told), has so far let the Creeps out of the Ettenmoors at least 3 times. Our counterpart creeps on Hnnpl (no backwards characters sorry) have been let out into Angmar, Forochel, and most recenty this last fall into Eregion. I've been in contact with an old school pal over in the Czech republic area who informed me they now have plans to let the Creeps out a FOURTH time. FOURTH.

We creeps haven't been out of the moors ONCE. ONCE.

Nice to know that servers on the opposite side of the globe (that are half our age timeline wise) have been out 3 times now, going on 4.

*BY ALL MEANS....check out Youtube where the Forochel, Eregion and Angmar runs have been posted. Try searching Lotro Russian EREGION ettenmores (HQ) or Lotro , Event Масштабное вторжение в Эрегион (1080p HD)
if you wish to see these forays. The most recent Eregion break-out was posted as have over TWO HUNDRED creeps on ONE SERVER alone.

So...

1) Let us out of the Moors one time. Once.
2) Upgrade your Commodore 64 servers, because we're all WELL aware that none of OUR servers could handle 200 creeps plus counterpart freeps.

Sigh...

They'll probably let em into Mirkwood next.... how cool woulda that been.

Sigh....Guess I'll dream about it....

[honorscall]

Thats actually not a bad idea. "Greenie" Freeps would be on par w/ under ranked creeps since they would be missing skills and traits instead of level difference+skills+traits. Would make pvp more inclusive. However the issue of incentive still exists for freeps.

Creeps earn inf for rank/skills/traits. Freeps earn renown for......?.........rank/map/outdated gear?. Getting the rank 9 class barter set is probably the hardest set to earn in the game as it requires both high rank and hard earned bartering materials, yet it is worse than most rad gear. Absurd.

Actually this would not work, because you then have to try and scale all the abilities, including giving the Freep new powers and abilities they would earn at higher level. This would be very difficult because not every 60+ has certain end tier skills, so where would you draw the line?

Instead of scaling up Freeps, the better choice which has been proven to work in other MMO games, is to simply create lower tiers of the moors. Sure this would require some work, but the advantage here is it would increase their business model and sales considerably because more players would get involved and progress from there.

A good model to follow is old school - Dark Ages of Camelot (DaOC) Their tiered battle grounds was a lot of fun and very active throughout all the levels. So many companies looking for innovation, when you have a proven method that "works" if you do it right.

I see this forum started April 2008, with many great suggestions, yet the company has not taken any real steps in making real change, let alone add to, or change the map dynamics. A few things have been changed over the past 3+ years... but again, as many have pointed out, this is a PvE game, not PvP.

In my experience as both someone who has worked within the gaming industry (QA work) and played many of these MMO games, having some level of healthy PvP / RvR system in place can and will bring the community together as a whole.

In its current state that requires Freeps to spend months on average to get to 60+ in order to be competitive in PvMP, compared to those who make a career Creep by getting a Freep to lvl 10, then hopping the fence, is just silly, let along very frustrating. I would have thought by now that the dev team would realize this shortcoming years ago, especially after MoM was released, and realize that players will migrate away from their game if they have no real opportunity to get involved with the PvMP conflict early on.

I do wish Turbine the best! Honestly, I think they need to change out some of the decision makers and creative directors with those who can help direct and make these aspect of game play much more enjoyable by going back and utilizing other game models that "work".

[Solien]

1) Let us out of the Moors one time. Once.

<picturing the folks with zero interest in PvP getting ganked over and over again at the rez circle, unable to even map home>

Yeah, no thanks.

[hemostat]

aren't weavers supposed to be CC mainly.. you want to be everything? yeah you probably do. I play a reaver and i want to be able to web people lol... k. enough bashing.. its too easy. I've never been one to want to change a game because I suck at it. Almost every comment I see is..."can you make this easier for me". This comment is coming from a creep perspective. Creeps have it good, the strength of angmar is the strength of many. I can see that the devs didn't intend for you to be able to solo 5 freeps which makes sense. Orcs etc. just aren't as skilled or whatever. As for being able to break stun and/or daze effects every 2 mins no matter what rank you are i think that is almost overpowered and should not be touched, just right. I know you never want to be stunned, but thats kind of part of the game mechanic. Btw i'm gonna start a trend of saying what i like before these threads get to be too much of a whine session. I love the reaver ability where it takes off about half their life lol, thats a nice perk. can't remember the actual name of the ability sorry. And i like the design where we're more powerful as a group but are vulnerable alone. If you can't grind for destiny points in one area go to another. Just some thoughts, and yes I am an enemy of the ever dissatisfied and unaccountable state of mind ;]

love, hemoglobin... arkenstone

[CharlesRollinsWare]

I have a great many problems with the way PvP works, very few of which relate to most of the complaints I read/hear about in chat or on the forums. My thought process runs like this:

1. Any LOTRO player that wants to play creep can easily bring a starter character to L10 in a modest one day of playing. Then, it is off to Moors on a L65 toon that, while it has dang few abilities to start, can wipe the floor with any L50-60 freep. Conversely...

2. I spent nine months getting my main, and elvish hunter, to L65. During that time she had no hope of surviving 5 minutes in the Moors. And, even if I wanted to go out, no freep raid would be interested in having me.

3. I spent another eight months getting her really nicely geared up the way I want. During that time, mostly because my Kin leader loves PvP, I headed out to the Moors to join him. During that time I also brought a Burg up to L65, and got her pretty wellmgeared up too. So, after 17 months, I have two toons that can go to the Moors

4. So what is the first thing I find out when I get there with my Hunter - a whole bunch of my abilities/skills and items suddenly don't work.

a.) Can't DF from combat [with the CD, exactly how often would I get to do this anyway?]
b.) Can't use Lothlorien item sets (apparently Galadriel's power is slippy badly)
c.) Hugely expensive traps don't stop anything when you use them
d.) Fear isn't very scary since no creeps can be feared
e.) Distracting shot isn't since no creeps can be distracted
f.) Rain of Thorns isn't because no creeps can be trapped
g.) Slow sure isn't because because no creeps can be slowed
h.) The greatest archers in middle earth are not because orc BAs actually out range them

Now, before you say "hey moron, all this ain't so" - yes, it is - because any creep can can buy truckloads of pots that nullify darn near any bad thing that can happen to them.

5. Combine that with some creep abilities. Reavers can avoid combat inside the copious NPC areas until their charge is available - which, combined with pots, can't be stopped by anything. Wargs can stealth around until their sprint is ready and then race around virtually immune to anything most freeps can do...

Prior to the last update, my Burg's [huge CD] trip could stop either ... but apparently that was too much of a hardship on the creeps - I mean, their great ability did not work 100% of the time - so - those trips no don't work now either. Oh, and those nasty CJs (wasn't that the whole purpose of a Burg in the first place - they need to go too.

6. Now, before you say I am anti creep, I am not - however, Turbine's concept that we take stuff away from freeps L65s on entrance to the Moors is utterly asinine. You want to balance things, give creeps more skills - but don't take mine away! Further, and far more importantly, don't give any class any skill that works 100% of the time - or any stupid barter item that nullifies enemy abilities 100% of the time either - reduce a timer, sure - but nullify an ability - not right.

7. Furthermore, where in the lore of Middle Earth (i.e., the actual books) is there ANY validation to the concept that the anyhting but uber boss creeps were ever a one-to-one, or even a few-to-one match for the heroes of the free peoples. Again, except for the notable anti-heroes of the enemy, no creeps are not SUPPOSED to, and should not, match freeps - period.

8. Which means, in my opinion, Creeps should have to spend 12 months "leveling" before they any on par with any L65 freep. And before anyone complains that won't be fun I ask - why not...

9. ...creeps take great pride in ganking every body they can, as often as they can - which by the way, I freely admit is EXACTLY what "honourless" creeps should do - so what is the problem with forcing them to use numbers to make up for their lesser skills set at low ranks - great numbers of mediocre forces is, according to the lore of Middle Earth, what the enemy used.

10. At high ranks, those same creeps should become uber foes that can take any freep on one-on-one. I have no problem with that at all - HOWEVER, give them abilities/skills that they use to make them that way - don't just turn off freep skills/abilities because some body decided complained "they were not fair."

11. Because what assuredly is NOT fair, is taking away abilities from a freep class because the devs are not willing to flush out creep classes when they decided to give the freeps said abilities.

12. And finally, in case I did not make it plain, enough of the endless supply of the "pot that solves all problems" - for both sides. Think that one side has too much CC - give the other side abilites [with CDs] that nullify them - not a freakin endless supply of "get me out of jail free" potions that you can take before hand that are guaranteed to work.

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Now, you can all feel free to trash and bash me all you want. But what is wrong with the Moors is not lag lines and OP classes - it is a lack of desire by Turbine to make any attempt to mesh PvP only creeps with primarily PvE freeps by any method except their proverbial - oh - just take enough stuff away from the freeps and it will work.

[Batman2239]

The biggest issues that I see currently with the PVP is the lack of balance for the Freeps and the Creeps. I know I am going to be flamed on this constantly, but you look at how the PVP is set up in this game and I scratch my head on why it is set up how it is. When I first started to play this game, I got to level 20, decided to check out the monster play and went out there expecting to have to grind out a toon to get it good. To my dismay, I logged over, and found a totally empty zone with no action, keeps all red. I looked at the infamy, and wondered what I had to do to get better skills than the 2 or 3 skills that I had. Frustrated that I couldnt do anything, I logged out and played the PVE area for a few months.

I came back to the PVP zone, and see that there are keeps that are different colors, both red and blue. Now I start to understand what I have to do to play the game, but my creep is way under powered, I get slaughtered by almost anything that sees me, and again I log out of frustration.

After revisiting the zone many times, I was able to grind out a creep while hugging a group, because anyone who has been to the moors knows a greenie is any freeps favorite food. I rank up and they go through different versions and revisions to Infamy/Renown, making it now in any dps classes best interest to solo and hug a larger group hiding in it to keep them from being singled out. As I see them change the cc, the conjunctions, and every facet of the game, the more that I wonder a few subjects and ideas.

1) This is a question that I have had a long time. why are the creep skills tied to destiny? I know that with each skill and level you should get improvements, but why cant there be a lesser form of the skills that can tier up with each rank. Charge skill could be a 10 s duration for the charge until you hit a certain rank, that way the creeps dont feel underpowered until they hit that uber rank of 3.

2) Balance of position/skills. When you are dealing with 2 opposing sides to any "conflict" each side is going to believe that their side is being shafted or being singled out with each change. I have seen my hunter be nerfed and buffed only to be nerfed and buffed again. I know we want variety and balance to make the experience in the game enjoyable for both sides, yet I seem to find that my "Freep" charactors vastly have more skills/gameplay than my creep charactors. I have played this game since launch, and have watched the pvp progress to where casual players can only play on freepside, because it takes 200 plus hours to get a Creep charactor that anyone would care to play. This means you start out in the greenie phase, dying 300 plus times to get 100 kills to get rank 1. I also know that i can level a toon to 65 in about the same time, but he has twice the survivability.
The frustration level for most people at hitting their head against the wall 300 times mounts to where mostly only the more hardcore gamer would consider to play the Creep class freely.
Now concerning the balance to the positions in the Ettenmoors, the more one side gets pushed back, the more their forces should be consolidated. Also the more territory a group has, the fewer npc resources they also would have available to them. If the pvp were to be truly balanced, the harder it would be for each group to hold onto the posessions they have, and the more they would need to rely on Player charactors for defense. I dont see why if one group has all the areas in the Ettenmoors, the npcs should be such a huge part of any zerg or run. I see time and time again a group will get an advantage and they will pus the other side to Gramsfoot or Glan Vrag. To discourage something like that from happening, why not buff the remaining npcs or weaken your npcs if you have all the keeps.

3) As we get further into the game with Infamy and Renown, I also wonder why the Freeps and Creeps who farm the nubs get the same return on their kill for killing a Nub as for killing a Lieutenant or Tyrant on the opposing side. The infamy system as we know it could use an overhaul and one that would be more in alignment with what they are calling it. I know if I am a soldier in the field, and I capture a general, Im going to get a bigger reward from my superiors than if I were to capture a private. I have thought long and hard about this and see this being a huge thing that could balance things a bit more and kind of balance some pvp issues. I know we have issues currently with new players getting beat around because the system is designed for a level 50 more than a level 65. But what if we had a bonus for a rank 0 killing a rank 13, or reduced some of the renown/infamy for a rank 10 killing a rank 0. That would also help to kill the ratings that people have, or "stars" as most people still refer to them. In lore terms, it makes a bit more sense that you would get more infamy/renown for killing a champion/general from the opposing side than just go out and kill the same greenies/nubs 5000 times.