Hidden Nuggets we see all the time...

[Ashrellion]

I entered Goblin-Town and was greeted with this background music...

Actually, GT rotates between two tracks of music. One is the reworked "Down to Goblin Town" track you noted. The other is a slightly more reworked version of this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdXQJS3Yv0Y
Just about fell out of my chair over both of them.

[Inore]

Hey just migrated over from the EU servers, i'm gonna look out for these because I love little easter egg type things in games!

[Ashrellion]

Hey just migrated over from the EU servers, i'm gonna look out for these because I love little easter egg type things in games!

Welcome! Definitely post anything you find here!

[Arawos]

It might have been mentioned, but I'll say it anyways. In the starter area of Forchel there is a man who needs help to slay wolves, because they have overspread and some of them ruined is house by howling at it and blowing the house down. This is obviously a reference to the the story about "the three little pigs" (if that's what it's called) Really liked that one

[Davidus]

One thing I've wanted to do isnce the luanch of the game and the end of beta was post in this thread so Turbine taking charge from codies has upsides!

Shame everything I noticed is already listed. Amazing thread though!

[Hendrixius]

Great thread - I read a surprisingly large amount of it - it is massive!

I would kill for a Session Play with Fingolfin where you battle Morgoth...that to me is the most epic scene out of any of Tolkein's writings...an angry little elf-king actually managing to wound one of the Valar.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...a/Finglfin.gif

Also, The Doors of Durin read "Speak, friend, and enter" - not "Say..."

[thinkingbear]

I would kill for a Session Play with Fingolfin where you battle Morgoth...that to me is the most epic scene out of any of Tolkein's writings...

Agreed, but alas Turbine only has license for bits from the LotR books, so First Age stuff is out......for now

[Dankanthegood]

I remember seeing the fox near the campfire the hobbits stayed at behind... drawing blank now lol... the town across the way from Hobbiton. Remember in the FOTR when the fox sees them and says something then just walks away? Also, the hobbit cloak dropped by one of the Dark Riders out front of Crickhollow. All the little things in this game make it that much cooler.

Wait a sec, so there is a fox in the game that speaks? i dont remember reading this in the books hmm...

[Macfeast]

Wait a sec, so there is a fox in the game that speaks? i dont remember reading this in the books hmm...

From the Fellowship of the Ring, Three is Company:

Just over the top of the hill they came on the patch of fir-wood. Leaving the road they went into the deep resin-scented darkness of the trees, and gathered dead sticks and cones to make a fire. Soon they had a merry crackle of flame at the foot of a large fir-tree and they sat round it for a while, until they began to nod. Then, each in an angle of the great tree's roots, they curled up in their cloaks and blankets, and were soon fast asleep. They set no watch; even Frodo feared no danger yet, for they were still in the heart of the Shire. A few creatures came and looked at them when the fire had died away. A fox passing through the wood on business of his own stopped several minutes and sniffed.
'Hobbits!' he thought. 'Well, what next? I have heard of strange doings in this land, but I have seldom heard of a hobbit sleeping out of doors under a tree. Three of them! There's something mighty queer behind this.' He was quite right, but he never found out any more about it.

Him speaking to us in-game, is during chicken session-play.

[Irin19]

The constellations that Tolkien mentions in LotR do appear in-game and in the alignment he describes. Our skies-guru was awesome!

WAS? Okay, I have played this game since the beggining of the closed-beta about an age ago. One of the amazing things about this game is the sky and weather, is he no longer coding for you guys at Turbine?? That would be a crime!

I notice all of that stuff, the puffs of dust as the wind blows in Enedwaith, how the sky transitions as you ride up to Dol Guldur and in Angmar, visibility changes in the snow. I know that requires some server horsepower, but that's what makes the game even more real-feeling!

Is he gone?

[Ersyrius]

My nerdboner just got soo big from sifting through this page. ._. If you'll excuse me, I have an urge to read the books again too.

[Adder]

Wow! I've been gone from LOTRO for quite some time. I've just returned two weeks ago and started relearning the game. After perusing through here once again after all this time, I think I'll first revisit some of these nuggets mentioned. I've really missed roaming the Lands of Middle Earth and 'discovering' all of the detail from the story I've loved since I was a youngster (seems two ages ago now). Thanks to everyone for keeping this thread alive and well and to Turbine for such attention to detail of the Prof's masterpiece!

Actually, GT rotates between two tracks of music. One is the reworked "Down to Goblin Town" track you noted. The other is a slightly more reworked version of this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdXQJS3Yv0Y
Just about fell out of my chair over both of them.

Where There's a Whip, There's a Way! I absolutely LUV that tune! I will most definitely be paying a visit to Goblin Town just to hear that! Way back in the late '80s & early '90s, I was founder and leader of a tournament-level paintball team. Our name was ORKs (Organized Rapid Kills). Take a wild guess at what our theme song was. We'd march onto a tournament field singing this song and where the whip cracks, one of us would fire our gun (dry, no paintball) and it sounded just like the whip. After a while, no matter where we were in the country or no matter what level tournament, nearly everyone knew immediately that the ORKs were in attendance. Heh. Even playing paintball, I still was a Tolkien nerd.

[Berephon]

Hey, Adder, welcome back!

Yeah, your master thread is still alive and kicking.

[annaliisakass]

I wish I could say that was so, because it would be funny, but it isn't. Aphlanc is Sindarin and Aslak is Finnish (or is supposed to be anyway). We do follow a very strict guide for naming (with some rare exceptions, such as the Inklings characters), with specific guidelines for every race and culture, pulling from real-world languages, as Tolkien did. But I guess you could say that's a nugget in itself.

hehe many finnish things in this game anyway. I love it, as an estonian - it brings the game and through that the book so near to me. once a NPC in Forochel was talking about smelling like "Kala" or something, ans it made me shout "YEAH look they're put an estonian word here!" it was propably finnish, anyway. but it made me smile
i havent noticed any lotr-related nuggets that haven't been mentioned here yet - but the finnish names of Forochel kind of felt like being close to home (Hey! look, finns! estonians must be near!" :P) middle earth kind of is home thu, thank you, turbine
oh and sometimes it is really good to have a little "nugget" with real world also

[annaliisakass]

oh and right entering celondim with my lvl 14 hobbit i see a nugget... lol.
so female dwarves do exist. they did in the book and they do in the game.
"my wife is in the Thorin's halls, braiding her beard. i will soon go to visit her," he said, or something like that. anyway, go look at him. maybe someday we'll find the beard-braiding dwarf-wife also

[Berephon]

oh and right entering celondim with my lvl 14 hobbit i see a nugget... lol.
so female dwarves do exist. they did in the book and they do in the game.
"my wife is in the Thorin's halls, braiding her beard. i will soon go to visit her," he said, or something like that. anyway, go look at him. maybe someday we'll find the beard-braiding dwarf-wife also

Good catch! There's also a quest line in Moria that references female dwarves.

[Macfeast]

Going through V3B3 and looking through the bookshelves of Zugrugund, I found another nugget.

One of the books you read through in Chapter 8, mentions the ranger Túgonn (the same ranger who is found in Ost Dunhoth) visiting the two dwarves, Nár and Frithgeirr, from time to time. It also tells of his chieftain being in Mirkwood on some secret mission. A reference to Aragorn hunting Gollum, and the latter's imprisonment there, perhaps?

[TheAC]

The constellations that Tolkien mentions in LotR do appear in-game and in the alignment he describes. Our skies-guru was awesome!

I can vouch for this. I was so exited when I was running Trouble in Tuckborough skirmish and saw the Sickle of the Valar in the northern sky.

[wasteland]

I liked the changing appearance of Acca; long beard in the depths of Isengard and clean cut during the Wizards Vale instance. Nice little touch.

[Sylux14]

*slow clap*


Very clever nugget that's been in for a long time, Turbine.

(It looks to be the former resting place of a Palantír.)

[auximenes]

OT/
I can see how that UI skin you use would be nice for RP'ing in The Shire, but it looks like it's a detriment to combat, what with all the grass leaking over into the hotkey slots and the bright colouring around the radar.
/end OT

Thanks for the contribution to this awesome thread.

[Reniannen]

OT/
I can see how that UI skin you use would be nice for RP'ing in The Shire, but it looks like it's a detriment to combat, what with all the grass leaking over into the hotkey slots and the bright colouring around the radar.
/end OT

If I were the guess the brightness of the radar is equal to the amount hope. (And the grass doesn't cover the quickslots so that's a non-issue)

[she-elf]

I just completed the Wild Hunt quest chain. It seemed to me to have lots of little references to the sort of stories Tolkien might've heard as part of English myths. Like the Horned Huntsman, the Wild Hunt itself, little things like that adapted to fit Middle-earth. I also noted that the Huntsman's handmaidens' names seemed to relate to their Ancient Spirits. (Bear in mind, these are internet-aided translations, I'm no scholar of Elvish.) Arassiel sends you to meet a stag. Aras = Deer (in Sindarin). Lavaneth sends you to fight a boar (possibly the most maligned animal in Lotro ). Lavan = Animal. Munfaeril sends you to protect an ox. Mund = Bull. The only one I couldn't fit correctly was Gwenaewen; she sends you to race a falcon. The closest I could find on my little list were Gwael (Gull) and Gwaun (Goose). I'd guess my list is incomplete/inaccurate.

Oddly enough, it took me a while to find the names because, since these are Ancient Spirits (and presumably ancient handmaidens), the first place I looked was Quenya translations. Still, it was fun to find the names. (I'll also say, I'm not at all surprised that they had meanings related to the quests, that's a very Lotro thing. )

[airsoftg36c]

Not sure if this is in the books or not, but when King Theoden is riding back and forth outside Minas Tirith giving that speech, as he runs down the line of soldeirs, sword out, hitting their spears, he shouts "Now for wrath, now for ruin, and a red dawn" or something like that....


One of the Captain deeds is called "Now for Wrath"

[Nydorewyth]

Still, it was fun to find the names. (I'll also say, I'm not at all surprised that they had meanings related to the quests, that's a very Lotro thing. )

One of the things I've been kind of disappointed about is the lack of NPC names in the middle/later parts of Dunland. In the center of Galtrev everyone is named "PROVISIONER" and "SUPPLIER", and the skirmish vendors are named "LEGENDARY ITEMS" etc. Elsewhere their "provisioner" title is small text underneath the actual name. But in so much of Dunland/Isengard they just have the giant title as their name.

Not sure if this is the way of things from now on, or if they ran out of name creativity, or if they just ran out of time and plan on adding the names in later. I hope it's the third option, because you're right the creativity in creating NPCs is a part of LOTRO.