Update 9: Against the Shadow and the Rohan Instance cluster

[Deorwyn]

Raiders want challenging encounters, casuals don't want to be locked out from seeing Erebor and Dale.

Well...isn't that exactly why there are tier 1 and 2 levels of instances? Make t2 cm hard, please the raiders. Casuals can use t1 to experience the story. But please, no challenge mode should be puggable...instead it should be true to its name and be a challenge.

[Ratharim]

I'm quite happy with this scheme, but even as a very casual player I'd say that 2x3 man plus 1x6 man as a final instance would be better solution. And for the raiding guys it would be more interesting to get maybe just two raids, but one of them being multi-boss one.

But what I'd really, really want to see is gradual transition of majority of instances to scalable ones. Some small ones do not have sense to be fully scalable (like Goblin Thrown Room), but there are a lot if great instances (and raids like Rift) that are not run at all! As nowadays there are not many new players who do not rush to max level (and guys doing nth alt are of course interested in straightforward levelling), it's nearly impossible to find fellows to play mid-level 3-mans or 6-mans. As for 3-mans I usually solo them with my champ, just when I'm a little bit higher level (or in case of some public instances like goblin town I soloed whole, except the throne room - will try in the next few days if the final is also possible for determined champ ). It still is fun cause the challenge is still there (landscape is really easy for me atm), but no ridiculous one-shooting - such soloing really taught me how to optimize skill rotation, when to use long cooldown skills and what consumables are out there to help me survive. On the other hand 6-mans are not possible to solo until you really overlevel an instance, and then it's not fun anymore, just doing the deeds. Such soloing is fun because you can see the new instance, earn some virtue levels through the deeds, grab some cosmetic gear/housing trophies, but the actual gear you get is useless... That is something which takes large part of fun and purpose of instances - proper rewards are core of grouping for beating hard content!
Also, not every instance is soloable even if 30 levels above because of mechanics which just enforces presence of more than one player and I don't think one can solo Rift even if 85 in Hytbold armour and optimal LI/jewellery.
So please Turbine devs, make 1-2 instances scalable every time you release and numbered update. I bet even some raiders have missed a few instances and for other players it will be more elasticity to be able do an instance maybe some levels after its first available to them but adjustable to their current state of character development and get some cool gear they can use.

[GithlithMonaghan]

I'm starting to believe that Turbine doesn't want us players to play their game. They just keep disappointing a huge amount of players. Well it's possible that they don't realise what players of the endgame really want. Well here it is:

- Less 3-Mans
- More 6-Mans
- At least one Multi-Boss-Raid

It's actually that simple. Yeah.

-------

About bringing content only when it's ready: That's right. Better bring stuff with as little bugs as possible. But... If you create a new level-cap you just have to bring enough content to go with it. You can't just make people wait. That's mockery of all the players that actually want to do something. Waiting would have been fine with me. But I would have preferred to wait for Rohan completely until it has enough content for an acceptable endgame. Even if it was until next year.

[Wanderv]

I'm disappointed.

I expected ROHAN instances not Hobbit-themed.

[SensBeard]

I'm not too worried about the normal moaners and groners...



Draigoch is still bugged yet you expect to have a bug free Smaug Raid? :'(

Atleast its not a mounted raid...

[MessyR]

As long as there are no game breaking bugs i am happy we are getting something. Just make the raids like The Watcher back in MoM and i will be happy.

On a side note, fix PvMP.

[Fralin]

And whats the problem with single boss raids?

If they can all be completed in a couple of hours, or, if we're to go on history, the itemization is &&&&. Also saying that they had to break them into single instances for "story telling" reasons is just absurd. I suppose BG, Rift, DN and OD were all really bad at telling the story. Not to mention ToO, the story was impossible to follow.
Also, if we are to look at RoR, their definition of "raid" is slightly skewed. No matter how you look at it Bugud is NOT a raid.
I hope I'm wrong, but I fear I'm not.

Don't forget skirmish raids and scaled instances. Sadly skirmish raids seem to have died down for some reason, I still need many marks/medallions and I'd rather do the skraid than solo them.

They've died because quite a few of us who were around for last years grind have racked up 300+ raid skirmishes in less than a year. There's only so many times you can d them before they get boring. But I suppose that's what we have to look forward to until february.

1) There are those that complain about the 12 instances have a single boss. They complain because they'll be easy and boring.
They've tested them and they know.
2) People complaining about 3 man instances. They're saying "We will get 3 instances for 3 in the first part? Who wants this kind of playing? It´s usually so hard for the support classes!" (this is an exact post a few posts before me). So they're too hard for them and they want something easier.
This kind of contrasts the 1st complain where people want difficult instances.
Those people also play-tested the new stuff and they know.
3) We got people that hate the idea of Turbine bringing us 3 small fellowship instances before on December.
4) We got people that hate the idea of Turbine bringing us new instances at all because it's not Rohan-based. Yet if they were Rohan based and had mounted combat, people would complain before the instances were released cause we would surely get laggy instances (just cause of the mounted combat). This would even be before they've tested those instances.

1. The difficulty of saingle raid bosses has been... lacking lately. draigoch was a walk in the park with a good leader /i.e. one who know what to do) and is very forgiving on mistakes. Bugud is.... not a raidboss at all, although classified as such. VM was interesting and required skill on level, but after that we've recieved easier and easier single-boss raids. There's also the question of itemization, which has been less than stellar as well. Not to mention that it is being released waaaaay after the xpac...
2. With a three-man you're more constrained with THT than in any other setting. This leaves the support classes in a bad spot since they are not top in any aspect. From what I can see in this thread people are not complaining that 3-man are too hard but that certain classes are more or less left out from them since they cannot properly fill a role. Also the gear from 3-men is usually quite bad apart from one or two pieces. Once you have those pieces, no more reason to run the instance.
3. Yes. See number 2 as well as the fact that it took 5½ months for them to give us this information.
4. You can do RoR themed instances without MC. How about an attack on e.g. Eaworth or Snowbourn? The elimination of an orc-camp? There's LOADS of possibilities

One aspect that no one has touched so far is the aspect that quite a few of those evil hardcore show-off raiders (yes, I'm one of thsoe evil ahrd-core raiders that only do raids to show off my gear... which is also the reason i usually am on anon) also do quite a few pug runs for different things. So if the evil hardcore population is reduced the amount of pug runs could also be reduced.
Personally I'm quite happy about the turn of events and this information. Was considering getting some more TP from the store but now I don't have to. I now also have time to spend on other things... and I'm not even missing out on anything. Frankly I'm not surprised by the news. Turbine's art department is among the best I've seen but their content and group content department *shakes head and walks away*


PS. Personally I preferred the BG way of making challenges (also the trash in BG served a purpose and it was also an accomplishment getting past it). no t1/t2 but certain criteria that had to be met to get the challange (hm) done. decide depending on how the group performs.

PPS. Bye bye raiding kins

[Hamelor]

I find this a little disappointing.. The raid kins are falling apart. I know they need to get the game working properly but really...

[Leri927]

There are some Skirms that are completely seperate from the world map (Icy Crevase/Storm of Methedras) as well... The initial 3 3-mans however, will all have world map equivalents as well (2x MM, 1x Mirkwood), and the tie in COULD be 'Flight to Dale' (DOH! Maybe I was right about the eagles!!! ) being MC from eastern MM through Mirkwood bringing us to Dale for the final two?

I can say u that icy carvesse is in forochel and very easy to find the place. The storm on mathedras is also in game between gravenwod (dunland) and isengard on the mountains...

So basically they made a great part of that place. (yes they made every raid in landscape, but u can play them only in layers coz they have gates). The only sad thing in this is that u will never see it coz our loved FIX ME: unassigned surely they wil add that part of game later...

[Trickstah]

Can't say I'm surprised. Oh well, I am actually a bit surprised, because while I didn't expect Turbine will honor their first announcement (instance cluster including raid "later that year"), I thought they'll have no more than month delay. Longer delay only proves lack of respect towards players. It's getting worse and worse, the delays are longer and they give us silly "time fillers" like 44 days of doing dailies or stupid skirmishes, which were done for hundreds of times by everyone (personally I refuse to call skirmish raids a proper content) and people are getting sick of them. Also I don't expect much of new raids. They're single bosses lairs and, like it was already mentioned, they'll be easy most likely (like Watcher, Turtle and Draigoch). I'm so glad, that I didn't spend any money on Rohan, at least I don't feel cheated now. But at the same time I feel really sorry for people, who bought RoR, especially the more expensive editions. Turbine is more and more insolent. I'm lucky to be a lifetime subscriber, so I get my 500 pts each months, so I can spend it for expansions and instance packs - but if I weren't I'd quit LOTRO long ago. I'll check those new raids of course, if we'll get them eventually... well, I hope I'll be able to do that, if my kin won't fall apart, as more and more people are giving up with the game. But generally what's going on with LOTRO is very disappointing...

[Bhorn_EU]

Really disappointed in the lack of decent endgame content for groups. As many others have said, gone are the glory days of GROUP content in Moria and GROUP content in Mirkwood.

Wonder how long it will take for wardens to work out how to solo the on-level 3 mans :/ . Which, if you ask me, should be impossible to be solo'd on level.

[Belechael]

Fantastic news for casual players without the long hours needed to crack and then farm multiboss raids. For the hardcore raiders, well, I guess Turbine has done their calculations and they don't think hardcore raiders are a very big % of the paying playerbase, or they gamble that most of them will stay and pay after they see the new raids.

Perhaps Turbine knows more than they can tell.

Oh, and as a side note: I'm soooo glad I didn't preorder Rohan!

[Chris91]

What I don´t understand, is why only 3 mans now and all 6/12 mans later?

I put my hope into the words of Sapience and Rowan who both said "single boss raids" and not "lair raids". I hope we see a BG-like raid, just in 3 pieces, with hard trash and exciting boss fights.

[Lestache]

There were at least 115 kinships raiding Orthanc and posting in the progression thread. Probably at least 20 players per kinship. I'm sure there were more raiding and not posting. I know not everyone is progression raiding, but virtually everyone seems to be wearing raid gear from T1 pugs. Most raiders that I know also do just about everything else the non-raiders do.

I hear what your saying, I'm just hoping there is some tracking statistic that shows it's not true.

I hope that you're right.

Speaking of progression threads: a friend jokingly asked if we should start a 3-man progression thread to tide us over until February.

[Dorothir]

Having slept, I can finally post whilst I'm fully functional.

Goods:
- Finally getting some news
- Getting at least some of the instances sooner rather than later.
- Immediate re-assurance that these instances will all be included in the RoR price.

Bad:
- A 2 month delay on releasing the rest, blaming a 1 month delay on the expansion.
- 1 raid being cut up and marketed as 3 x 1 boss raids (confirmed by Rowan), presumably to make it look like more and hopefully calm some people.
- Pretty much the same size cluster as RoI but split over a longer duration.
- A possible attempt at masking a lack of content in Feb by using the second half of the IC (hopefully, we'll get an additional update at that time and the IC won't be seen as suitable alone).
- Themes for the IC are completely inappropriate to the expansion.

[Pelethor]

HEY DRAMA LAMAS, GUESS WHAT?
NO MATTER HOW MUCH YOU SAY YOUR QUITTING
YOUR STILL HERE AFTER SAYING IT FOR THE PAST 3 X PACS


whatever happened to patience and moderation? Im sure for any casual player there is more than enough content to last you through to the next instance cluster/update.

and there's always the ettenmoors.... constant action always!

Lol sorry that worths good reputation
The more people say that though i think are kids and they have an excuse...
Most are angry about lack of content. I suppose all of them have completed Saruman T2? Or is it to easy now... If it is let me see you try.
You are angry because they are not in Rohan? What exactly you want? Recapture of Amon Hen? You have Edoras coming up dunharrow, Helms deep and Fangron! These are nice places to do a raid. AS far as legit don't remember anytime signing for Instances on Rohan. Just Instances.
So explain me how it works? You want a raid for get a new gear? (cause we just did some new gear and more will come up)
Or you want it to have something hard to complete?A challenge? That reminds me... how many in here complete Saruman T2 again??

I am happy we ll get there to see these areas and dont whine about how they think. OF course they ll try and throw the net to find more people from the hobbit go to the cinemas. People which will bring money to the game and will be able to revive it and have actually people to go to raid ( for us low population servers)!! Rohan content is not finish so stop being like the guy above said. Lets hope their trick actually works and see more people on game and faster updates with them (Fixes,landscapes, IC)

What i understand though is the complains on delay. To that i am with you guys cause you cant buy a product on June when you were promised it for December and get it on February. but to be honest there i dont think its Turbines fault. I think this how fast they can go! What can you do...Orthanc ,Skirmish raids ,Hytbold and new 3 man has to hold us for the next 2 months. patience... other games has it worse on end game content.

P.S cause i am a fan here still waiting if there is a possibility to see these areas as landscapes one days.If someone can answer this it would be great.

[molgamic]

I'd like to say that I do like Riders of Rohan so far. Sure, it may be a little buggy, but I've throughly enjoyed exploring the vast plains. Rohan is, in my opinion, the most beautiful landscape yet, not to mention the amazing music and the nice lore.

HOWEVER --

Turbine is sorely mistaken if they believe that deviating from their original plan and capitalizing on the the Hobbit Movie hype will be better in the long run than to pay a little more attention to the end-game community. The actual number of people who see the movie and become a DEDICATED LoTRO player is, in reality, not that high at all. Sure, they might see what LoTRO is all about, but the chances that they will stick out the grind to 85 and beyond in this age of a plethora of MMOs to choose from? Low. Very, very low.

In business school, we are often taught that a loyal customer is FAR more valuable than anything else. Speaking as an avid raider myself - I spend a lot of money on this game - Expansion Packs, VIP, TP Points for all sorts of things (LIs, P2W Buffs, Alts, etc). Heck, I TRANSFERRED SERVERS in hopes of being in an enviroment that offers better end-game raiding. It's no coincidence that end-game raiding kins have the most loyal customers; keeping toons at a raid-ready caliber takes a substantial amount of time and commitment.

It is clear that this revealing of the new instances has come up short. Short not in terms of paltry content - 3 part 12-man, 6-man, 3 3-man is plenty and all seem very interesting - but rather, the timing of this content. Promoting the jolly awesome benefits of preordering in July when the main raid (12-man) instances won't actually be released until at least SEVEN months later is, at best, a cheap business tactic. Had you added the caveat:

***Raid won't be released until NEXT YEAR*** ,

no serious end-gamer would preorder. But what Turbine has done is exactly this, just drawn out longer so that they can release the same amount of content in the same amount of time, while still managing to leech off of us so called "loyal players." Let's be honest, if you weren't loyal, there's no way you would drop $60.00 on an expansion.

I stress this 12-man timing because Raiding Kinships exist to clear end-game RAID content. You give us half a year off - we're going to play other games. Skirm raids, Moors, trivial non-onlevel content and daily grinds can only satisify you as much as a late night chinese food run. And upon playing other games, there's a pretty good chance that we won't come back. This can be succinctly summized in the diagram below:





As an avid LoTR fan, I'm going to say that I probably will never quit this game. I'll always come back. I postulate that this is true for a lot of end-gamers: we're just too hooked. Can I be disappointed? Absolutely. Might I take an extended break? Sure. But with every new expansion, I'll come back and check it out. And if Turbine just so happens to hit the nail on the head, you can bet that I'll be dropping as much money on this game as it takes to accomplish what I like to do at the end-game level. Why? Because the satisfaction of beating on-level challenging content is worth it. But for the Love of God, Turbine, give me some solid reasons to throw my money at you!

[Dwargin-Vanyar]

An extraction of the Producer Letter 2011 from Aaron Campbell:
In 2012, you can expect more content that you've seen at any time since our launch in 2007.


So, what Content we got...
Great River with a few days of questing and one 6-man instance
Update 6 with the Fornost instances - One evening to run through all challenge modes and then never come back Because of the lack of loot
And then rohan with 1-4 evenings of leveling and then 5 hytbold dailys to do
And finally 3 3-man - hopefully enough to fill one more evening

So no Raid and only 1 serious instance in 2012, Yeah, i'm sure we had no better Year since 2007

[Burio]

Lol sorry that worths good reputation
The more people say that though i think are kids and they have an excuse...
Most are angry about lack of content. I suppose all of them have completed Saruman T2? Or is it to easy now... If it is let me see you try.

Been there, done that.

Rohan brings no new group content. Because of the level Cap increase old content gets too easy. So what to do as a group? Nothing you can do except skirmishes. With release of Part I you can do 3 mans, not 6 mans, only 3 mans.

Bring a common group of 1 tank, 1 supporter, 1healer, 3 dd's. How many 3 mans group you will build from this 6 ? One. Nice the three other need to wait.

It's just bad. I can wait for the raid until February, but no 6man group content for over 4 month's after a expansion. That's really really bad!

[p3tar]

As many of us expected from this thread, tons and tons of really bad feedback for Lotro and this new instance cluster. Lots of details that is written here does not refer only to the new instance package and RoR exp., but it is also accumulated discontent throughout this whole year. It is important to note that a lot of players who have written that they are very disappointed, feel-cheated and dissatisfied with this update and RoR exp. are passing the opinions of other players from their servers (friends/kins). At least i know i am, already dozens of players are playing the game less. I just hope Turbine don't sit on their ears any longer.

[Hordvin]

People complaining about instances raids :

1) There are those that complain about the 12 instances have a single boss. They complain because they'll be easy and boring.
They've tested them and they know.
2) People complaining about 3 man instances. They're saying "We will get 3 instances for 3 in the first part? Who wants this kind of playing? It´s usually so hard for the support classes!" (this is an exact post a few posts before me). So they're too hard for them and they want something easier.
This kind of contrasts the 1st complain where people want difficult instances.
Those people also play-tested the new stuff and they know.
3) We got people that hate the idea of Turbine bringing us 3 small fellowship instances before on December.
4) We got people that hate the idea of Turbine bringing us new instances at all because it's not Rohan-based. Yet if they were Rohan based and had mounted combat, people would complain before the instances were released cause we would surely get laggy instances (just cause of the mounted combat). This would even be before they've tested those instances.

The facts now :

Most of them were raging cause we didn't have an announcement for the new instances. Announcement is here. Moaning mostly based on predictions.

Turbine has been working on Mounted Combat for years. And they claim there's much more stuff to improve. They're also working on the server issues with the next update coming at November 28th. So yes. Whether you want it or not they don't have people working only for Instances and New Content. They also have people working on bugs and stuff that'a already there. And hopefully on scaling the instances?

Moaning like little kids about stuff that's not even here and you haven't played, is just dumb. People already putting down the new instances saying it will be &&&& without even playing them - without even seeing a single screenshot...

At least up until now. So relax.

Well, after you were replying to my Statement (being too hard fir support classes) I want to explain further:

Its just like Burio postet above - Take this setup (Guardian, Captain, Champion, Hunter, Lore Master, Minstrel) an divide them into 2 3man groups. You will have one classical 3man Party - Guardian, Hunter an Minstrel and Champion (has to be the tank), Captain and the Lore Master.

I considered it being hard for support classes, because, they are not really needed or not helpful. It can be only done when the instance is like the Fangorn from ROI.

[Bhorn_EU]

Ok, trying to be just a little bit positive from a position of a main toon that is a "support" class, ie raidng captain.

Peeps have said the 3 man's will be tough for support classes, well, thinking about it, this is what I'd do (with kinnies)

1) trait Ltc - need a healer and tank

2) trait LoM - need healer and dps

3) trait HoH - need tank and dps.

Yes, absolutely not as fast as the holy trinity would go, but most certainly do-able.

All support classes can do "relatively" good dps depending what they slot, but yes, no 6 man before Feb really really sucks the rally outta my cries

[a4_papier]

So many 'single bosses'..

Any chance for some multi-wing level cap content in 2013?

Or at the very least a 'Raid Single boss' that requires some SIGNIFICANT effort to get to the boss? (I dont mean walk in and kill it [turtle, watcher], or Minimal effort (Draigoch [quest line]+brief walk down, which can be circumvented with only half the group)

[cossieuk]

Not much, but why does it have to be Rohan? You say you want Rohan and that's fair, but remember that players have been asking for Erebor and other stuff from The Hobbit for a few years now, other players have been predicting Turbine would be foolish if they didn't have any Hobbit movie tie in, etc.

It has to be Rohan since this is the instance cluster for the Rohan expansion.

MoM had its instance cluster in Moria
SoM had its instance cluster in Mirkwood
RoI had its instance cluster in Isengard
RoR will have its cluster in Dale, which is no where near Rohan and is not part of LOTR, but of The Hobbit.

By all means cash in on The Hobbit but why didnt they release these zones as the expansion then go to Rohan next year.

[Feldanor]

well done turbine, i think you may have just lost a load more players with that news.
no multi boss raid really! anyone missing codemasters?