Hobbits to Isengard - Q/A with Sapience notes on what was said

[LethalLethality]

Was nice to see some new-ish questions.

[Thurallor]

Working at a public library in the same building that also houses the local Senior Center, I deal a lot with elderly patrons who, bless their hearts, can't speak or hear clearly. I've become the resident "listener" when they leave vague and hard to understand phone messages. xD So...

Sapience: Ah, somebody wants us to, uh, talk about the... the possibility of new classes, or what Kate was hinting at in... in her Producer's Letter at the end of last year. I'm just gonna be quiet and let you talk.
Rowan: Yeah, well, I'm not gonna ruin all my updates for my next Producer's Letter, that would just spoil the surprise.
Sapience: Ah, so that sounds like we... we should be expecting another Producer's Letter; um, and I don't know how to speak a capital S with a TM on it, but Soon^TM.
Rowan: Well, I just had a great, uh, conversation with, uh, you know, Saul Zaentz, Enterprise, and Tolkien today, just around that very topic.
Sapience: Ah, and the mystery deepens.

Hmmmmmm......

From Wikipedia:

Middle-earth Enterprises, formerly known as Tolkien Enterprises, is a trading name for a division of The Saul Zaentz Company, located in Berkeley, California. The company owns the worldwide exclusive rights to certain elements of J. R. R. Tolkien's two most famous literary works: The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

The plot thickens...

[Mar-Evayave]

Hmmmmmm......

From Wikipedia:

Middle-earth Enterprises, formerly known as Tolkien Enterprises, is a trading name for a division of The Saul Zaentz Company, located in Berkeley, California. The company owns the worldwide exclusive rights to certain elements of J. R. R. Tolkien's two most famous literary works: The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

The plot thickens...

Now, if I'm not mistaken, the only content that Turbine has access to is LOTR, correct? I wonder if perhaps they will be adding The Hobbit to that. ^_^ If they did... land sakes, we could go to Dale and Erebor for REAL!

[Sapience]

Please note: I am paraphrasing here. Anything said here is coming through my interpretation of what was said, and is subject to being corrected so don't take all this as gospel.

If anyone who was present has any additions or corrections, feel free to post.

Q&A Hobbits to Isengard - Snowbourn

1. What is your favourite hunter skill in-game
   Probably Heart Seeker, but he’s always liked Rain of Thorns, too.
2. Question about whether the meet and greet in North Carolina is still on
   Yes, it is. More info available in the forums.
3. Did you get any guests lined up for this evening
   Executive Producer Aaron Campbell will be joining us later on when he gets out of some meetings.
4. Why don’t you lower your settings to help with lag
   Because with this many people he’d have to lower his settings so far that it would be unpleasant to watch, everyone would just be blobs, and there would still likely be lag anyway. If people really want to help with lag they will dismount and remove cloaks.
5. Could you show us a screenshot of the new inventory
   He would if he had one, but he does not. However he has seen it and says it’s quite cool.
6. Will you be checking the plugins to ensure they work with the new inventory
   No. They do not build the plugins, nor do they support them. It’s up to the plugin developers to take care of that.
7. A mention that one of the LUA developers is working on the inventory
   Yes, that is true but under no circumstances should you assume anything about LUA support in the new system. The position of Turbine is that they do not support plugins, and that hasn’t changed.
8. Why won’t the Rift be scaled
9. Joe Barry has given some great and detailed answers on that in the past, most recently in the Ask the LotRO Team. The bottom line is, it’s a no-win situation. If it’s not scaled, people will be upset they can’t play those old raids again at end-game. If they do scale them, then people feel that something they really loved has changed beyond recognition.
10. Question about Ettenmoors lag
    Most lag is render lag at the client side. Turn down your settings until it improves. Anywhere there are tons of people, there will be lag. Lots of forum threads start out with people saying, “Everything is fine for me until I get into the Ettenmoors and then there is lag.” Yes, because you’ve gone into a region where there are tons of people.
11. Why not create original and scaled versions of raids
    That basically means twice the work, and splitting the usage of those raids – totally impractical
12. What are you looking forward to most in U13
    Flooded Isengard, some of the rewards from that region, inventory changes
13. When will the full patch notes for U13 be released
    On the day U13 is released
14. What is the expected play time as an Ent
    He doesn’t know how long the session play lasts
15. Question about people jumping off roofs in Bree and trying to get to unauthorized areas
    Going to those areas is very risky, and you can get stuck in such a way that your character can never be recovered. They block those areas off to protect players from losing their characters, and they strongly discourage people from trying to go to places that aren’t intended to be explored. If you think the risk of losing your character and all your progress so far is worth it, then there’s not a lot he can say to stop you but he and the GMs strongly discourage it.
16. What are the mail changes coming with U13
    You will be able to send multiple attachments – 10 items. And yes, they can be stacks (i.e. 10 stacks). Second, if you are a VIP you will be able to check your mail from anywhere in the game world via clicking on the notification icon, without having to go to a mailbox.
17. What about a ‘kill self’ command to get people out of stuck areas
    You are getting stuck outside the game world, where no command – not even GM commands – can help you. You are stuck outside the game world, and the game can’t find you. There isn’t a “you” in the place that doesn’t exist. You are broken, there is no recovering that character. They’ve warned players for years not to go to those areas, so don’t be mad when it happens to you.
18. What about U13 pre-release notes
    There are no such thing as pre-release notes. The only notes posted are the patch notes at the time of release on BR and on live, and the occasional forum or Q&A discussion. There are no published release notes of any kind, and won’t be until the update goes live on Bullroarer.
19. Have you discussed any character appearance changes
    It was discussed in the recent dev chat and in the last Hobbits to Isengard stream. Basically no, there are no major changes to appearance coming
20. Suggestion for Hobbits to Isengard stream on Bullroarer
    He likes the idea and will think about it. The chat sort of exploded with support for the idea so he’s going to give it more thought and see if he can’t work it into the schedule.
21. Is Bullroarer install available for download right now
    No, it’s not available for download right now, but if you already have it installed then no problem, it will patch. But if you’re needing to install it from scratch, a new install should be ready sometime before U13 goes live.
22. Are you planning a character wipe for Bullroarer
    They hope so, but want to make sure their new copy system works correctly before they do.
23. Question about balance
    This one is asked/answered every run. Yes, they are aware that players have strong opinions about balance, and they do take that into consideration when making decisions about balance. Balance is something they are constantly working on and will never really be “done.” So yes, it is being worked on and they will continue to work on it.
24. If you could add a cosmetic pet or herald to the game, what would it be
    Ask him after U13
25. Suggestion about making an after-action report about the run
    He doesn’t help anyone on any server. He is just a package to be carried. Check the Hobbits to Isengard thread, people are sharing tips and suggestions there, or start one for your server to get people working on ideas and strategies.
26. What would happen if he followed an agent from another server who got him killed just before Isengard
    Like any death, it would reset and they’d start over from the Prancing Pony and try again. It would be pretty much impossible to prove and unlikely that anyone would want to admit and bring that degree of shame on their server. Also it’s way too much effort to go to just to spoil someone’s fun. Way outside the realm of likelihood.
    Aaron Campbell aka Rowan, Executive Producer for LotRO, joins chat
27. If you could add a cosmetic pet or herald to the game, what would it be
    Rowan - He would love to have a Gollum pet, despite that it’s completely lore-breaking. Not to be close beside him, but to follow him around in the shadows and freak people out
28. What role do you plan to take in the council applications, will you be reviewing them and approving them or will Sapience be doing that while he’s on vacation
    Rowan - Sapience will be reviewing those, and Rowan will give final approval.
29. Do you personally read the suggestions that are made in the forums
    Rowan - Yes he does. Not all of them, but he definitely reads quite a few.
30. Are the Dwarf game models based off Sapience, he looks very dwarvish
    Rowan – They actually have a guy who looks much more Dwarvish than Sapience. Some of you may have met him at a game conference.
    Sapience – Yes, they have a member of their tech team who a lot of the German players were impressed by because of his very Dwarven beard.
31. When will you be accepting applications for the 2014 Player’s Council
    Sapience – He’s set the date for the 21st of March. Just in time for him to go on vacation and read them.
32. Will there be a review of cosmetics and what is on the slate cosmetically speaking
    Rowan – They are continuing to build out new ones. There has been a lot of art released over the past couple years that he’s pretty excited about – he’s a big fan of some of the armour sets that launched with Dunland on the landscape. “We’ll see what we can get.”
33. Do you play LotRO, and do you play creep
    Rowan – His personal main is a hobbit guardian who’s spending most of his time bashing through Rohan right now.
34. Scaling instance and HD loot are in need of updating - what can we look forward to
    Rowan - Lots of discussions happening around that right now, but he won’t have an answer for a couple weeks yet.
35. Any plan to go back through the cosmetics and fix items that bleed into each other
    Sapience and Rowan think it would be a good idea to bring the Art Director in to talk about cosmetics one day. These are the types of questions he’d be better able to answer.
36. Do you guys socialize over BBQs on the weekend
    Sapience – Rowan doesn’t invite him to his house, but he buys Rowan wine.
    Rowan – Says that he’s a producer so everything has to be scheduled.
    Sapience – Usually when they do trips and things together, usually Rowan and Sapience tend to buddy up. They let all the PR and marketing people go one way, and they go explore cities.
37. Any chance that people can enter the Moors without VIP
    Rowan – They are looking at temporary access options, or rentals.
38. Any new lore lore master pets in the near future
    Rowan – They are looking at other pets. Lore masters will have to share.
39. Will shard-droppers be added to Dunland and Rohan – they’ve disappeared from the game since Mirkwood
    Rowan - Warbands were the shard-dropper solution for Rohan. As they move forward into new areas they will be looking at that mix of more challenging landscape mobs outside the standard quest mob.
40. Will the Moors pass be account-wide or character-based
    Rowan – He’s not 100% sure. He saw it working last week, and thought it was character-based, but they’ll have to check on that.
41. Question about getting Sapience to use special admin powers in-game
    Sapience - The characters he uses for these runs are not admin characters, and have no special abilities beyond what a regular player has.
42. What are the odds of pets for all classes – actual pets, not just cosmetics
    Rowan – He thinks that would diffuse the roles of Captains and Lore-masters, and they don’t want to break up those classes and take away from their core roles. Including rune-keepers and their rocks.
43. Can you clarify the comments you made recently on group content
    Rowan – All he’s doing right now is laying out their priorities. Their number one priority is building great new story and great new regions for us. He’s not ruling out group content at all, just telling us what they’re doing first.
44. Do you need to buy the quests for the upcoming regions, even if you’re VIP
    Rowan – The quests in the new regions will be free to VIP
45. When will First Age items for L95s be coming
    Sapience – HoarseDev recently told him they are trying to get them in for U13 but they may not make it in until 13.1. They aren’t sure just yet.
46. Question about the possibility of new classes, or the surprise that Kate Paiz was hinting at in her letter
    Sapience – He’s going to sit back and keep quiet and let Rowan answer that one
    Rowan – He’s not going to ruin all the updates for his next producer’s letter. That would just spoil the surprise. He just had a great conversation today with (unintelligible) on that very topic.
47. In your producer’s letter you mentioned that we would be going to flooded Isengard. Does that mean we will get to play as an Ent in session play
    Sapience – Says somewhere Chris at MMO Reporter is about to cheer loudly
    Rowan – Says they love Chris dearly and thanks him for his ideas. Yes, Ent play is coming. In fact he thinks they have two versions of the model, one with Merry and Pippin, and one without.
48. How frequently are you planning to do producer’s letters
    Rowan – He will be doing them at least quarterly, but a letter isn’t the only way to communicate. He plans on doing more of these streams, just dropping in and chatting, showing up on the forums – more of that kind of thing.
49. What’s happening with festivals – same events and schedule, or will anything be changing
    Rowan – Says we will have a lot of the same events, Hobnanigans the fan favourite is also being revised, resurrected and rebuilt, and they’re talking about new boosts new events and new things they can do as they move forward.
    Sapience – Wants to point out that after 5 years of passing Rowan in the hallways and saying “Hobnanigans” and getting terrible faces, he is ecstatic and says that if you pester Rowan enough, eventually you can win.
    Rowan – Doesn’t like the sound of that
    Sapience – Apparently it only works for Sapience, and you have to have a 5 year plan.
50. How will we be acquiring the First Age symbols
    Sapience – That’s probably a better question for HoarseDev. They may get him in on one of these in the future.
51. Is Hobnanigans going to be tied to festivals, or will it be more like the treasure hunt where you guys can turn it on whenever you want
    Rowan – It’s more like the treasure hunt. It will be an independent event.
52. Explain Hobnanigans
    Sapience – Think of field hockey, and replace the ball with a chicken.
    Rowan – They’ve actually been experimenting with different field sizes. They have a 3V3, and he thinks a 5V5.
    Sapience – Multiple team sizes.
53. Any update at all on housing
    Rowan – They have a plan, it’s centred around guild crafting right now. They will get more details out there for us.
54. When will we finally be able to use the /fart emote
    Sapience – When you try to use it, it does say you can’t use it “yet”
    Rowan – He will add that one to the list. He admits that he’s been playing the South Park game recently.
    Sapience – Speculates that maybe that means we will get multiple forms of the /fart emote
    Rowan – Reminds him it’s a teen game
55. Are there any plans to add new emotes to the game
    Rowan – Nothing specific, but they typically do add stuff like that in

As usually a very good wrap up.

Hmmmmmm......

From Wikipedia:

Middle-earth Enterprises, formerly known as Tolkien Enterprises, is a trading name for a division of The Saul Zaentz Company, located in Berkeley, California. The company owns the worldwide exclusive rights to certain elements of J. R. R. Tolkien's two most famous literary works: The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

The plot thickens...

Before we go too far down this rabbit hole I want to remind everyone that they're our licensor so we often have meetings with them and bring ideas to them for approval. Our representation of the tower of Isengard and also Helm's Deep and the Hornburg are good examples. So let's not read too much into this.

[Thurallor]

Before we go too far down this rabbit hole I want to remind everyone that they're our licensor so we often have meetings with them and bring ideas to them for approval. Our representation of the tower of Isengard and also Helm's Deep and the Hornburg are good examples. So let's not read too much into this.

So, hypothetically speaking, if a new player class were being considered, would that be something to run by the licensor?

[Sapience]

So, hypothetically speaking, if a new player class were being considered, would that be something to run by the licensor?

It would.
As would new regions.
New Epic story lines.
New building designs.
Certain types of Art.
Etc. Etc. Etc.

[furtim]

Certain types of Art.

From which we can conclude that Turbine is hiring somebody named Art to work on the secret surprise.

[maiki1978]

1. Question about Ettenmoors lag
   Most lag is render lag at the client side. Turn down your settings until it improves. Anywhere there are tons of people, there will be lag. Lots of forum threads start out with people saying, “Everything is fine for me until I get into the Ettenmoors and then there is lag.” Yes, because you’ve gone into a region where there are tons of people.

Let s all snowbournians remember what we did during 2013. We all play from Europe, we were all so outraged with the Ettens lag that we decided to make lag videos, Also bug reports. The answer we got back then was ridiculous. switch back to DX9, very low graphics blahblah. I refuse to do that. On my high performance laptop with crossfire I want to play the game on high settings. (even let s say medium) and without lag or rubberbanding. This is for me not an answer which can be accepted. Plus, back then we didn t get any answer on our reports separately but only a general recommendation on the forum. Why is it always the user to blame if the game mechanics are so ancient ? sometimes you say it's the internet, sometimes it s the pc. I play from switzerland I always have a latency of 120 ms on a 100 MBPs connection, I fly to USA twice a month, playing from a hotel with a 1MBps connection I get 20 ms latency. It s the distance that matters people. Let s all face it. You encourage transfers to our server (most of them will be ofc lvl 95) , do you think that they will go for HD stuff? OFC no! they ll come to ettens since Snowbourn has the reputation of a PvP server and cause even worse lag. Since there is no major raid atm after HD and people have all played the new expansion where do you think they will all go ? Invest more time in Ettenmoors it s one of the things that still keep this community interested.Especially high level characters, who are so many in Snowbourn server.?Take us, the VIp players more seriously, take european players more seriously when we write a feedback about these things. STOP those annoying automated answers!
TIP : come by on a friday night around 14:00 Boston time incognito and check the action on the server yourself. You will see what s going on.

Thank you.

Monstreous.

[Sapience]

The answer we got back then was ridiculous. switch back to DX9, very low graphics blahblah.

As I mentioned in my answer and in Frickinmuck's post you quoted. Most posts we hear start off with much the same thing. If you aren't willing to follow the suggestions as to how to address it, there is really not a single thing I or anyone else can do to help you.

[Mar-Evayave]

Before we go too far down this rabbit hole I want to remind everyone that they're our licensor so we often have meetings with them and bring ideas to them for approval. Our representation of the tower of Isengard and also Helm's Deep and the Hornburg are good examples. So let's not read too much into this.

:P You're raining on my parade. I was getting excited there for a moment! I, for one, would love to visit the northern parts of Mirkwood and the surrounding lands.

[Angadan]

From which we can conclude that Turbine is hiring somebody named Art to work on the secret surprise.

lol awesome! Made me snort-laugh.

[Lohi]

I've gotten about 10 emerald shards just via random prospecting and woodcutting as I quest through Western Rohan,

I think I've gotten two total so far, all the rest I've gotten from barter. In all warbands ever, including Rohan, I've only had one tarnished crest ever, and I do a lot of warbands (to earn coins to buy more shards :-). These are a lot more rare than earlier shards; the barter is nice but it is limited since you can only earn more coins via warbands I think.

[anthonyx]

"Joe Barry has given some great and detailed answers on that in the past, most recently in the Ask the LotRO Team. The bottom line is, it’s a no-win situation. If it’s not scaled, people will be upset they can’t play those old raids again at end-game. If they do scale them, then people feel that something they really loved has changed beyond recognition."


So are you saying the technology does not exist to scale the rift? They were able to scale Fornost and Helegrod. I don't think anyone would complain if it was scaled. But I guess in modern day lotro scaling that would mean breaking it up into several wings. Plus you would have people who would want to solo it. I know there is more involved in just upping the mob levels but this seems like a project, that if done well, would make the veterans happy as well as the newer people who never experienced it before.

[frickinmuck]

"Joe Barry has given some great and detailed answers on that in the past, most recently in the Ask the LotRO Team. The bottom line is, it’s a no-win situation. If it’s not scaled, people will be upset they can’t play those old raids again at end-game. If they do scale them, then people feel that something they really loved has changed beyond recognition."

So are you saying the technology does not exist to scale the rift? They were able to scale Fornost and Helegrod. I don't think anyone would complain if it was scaled. But I guess in modern day lotro scaling that would mean breaking it up into several wings. Plus you would have people who would want to solo it. I know there is more involved in just upping the mob levels but this seems like a project, that if done well, would make the veterans happy as well as the newer people who never experienced it before.

My understanding is that the technology exists, but there is a lot of trepidation around reworking something that players idealize so highly, and have such a huge attachment to and nostalgia for. Inevitably changes would need to be made, and there is too much potential for players to freak out and claim their favourite raid has been completely butchered by the devs.

[Cheery]

Frickinmuck:
Don't doubt for a minute that your posts are read: this is the first place, sometimes the only place, that I go on the forums.
I'm so glad that you were rewarded with your own, unique title.
Thanks, again. Not only have you told us about the conversations but you have provided a place for Sapience to elaborate.
Priceless...

[Acushla]

Let me add my appreciation for and my thanks to Frickenmuck.

I try to have the live stream running for all the 'Hobbit to Isengard' events, but the Q&A posted here for the few I have missed makes me feel I am still very well informed.

[SouthernBelle0927]

I second (third, fourth??) Cheery's thanks, and also thank you for offering to help our fellow players get questions answered who are unable to attend the hobbit run livestreams due to time conflicts. It's greatly appreciated.

Speaking of time conflicts...I have discovered that I have one myself this evening. I forwarded some questions to you by private message. Could you try to get one or two of those into the conversation today? Pretty please?

Thanks from the LOTRO Forum Minstrel Society and Moor Cowbell Chorus!

[frickinmuck]

Thanks for all your kind words, everyone!

Speaking of time conflicts...I have discovered that I have one myself this evening. I forwarded some questions to you by private message. Could you try to get one or two of those into the conversation today? Pretty please?

I replied to your message, yes I will try to get that question into chat for you, although no guarantees about getting it answered. That part isn't up to me.

[bobbylobs]

As I mentioned in my answer and in Frickinmuck's post you quoted. Most posts we hear start off with much the same thing. If you aren't willing to follow the suggestions as to how to address it, there is really not a single thing I or anyone else can do to help you.

Really?? that the stance?

If someone wants to play a game in 2014 on a high end gaming machine and use the full power of that machine to give themselves the best gaming experience possible, your answer is basically "tough luck" I dont know of any other game, online or not that would take that stance, lotro is the ONLY game I cannot play smoothly on max graphics, thats mmos, other online games, just released single player games etc etc, yet this one struggles even on medium when doing the thing it supoosed to be i.e massively multiplayer and you say its our fault and there is nothing anyone can possibly do about it?

It is not our fault, it is not our systems or our client, it is the game, granted you may not be able to fix that problem due to whatever reason but please stop telling us its our fault, its getting silly, I can log on any game you care to mention and have zero lag issues on max graphics and log straight back into lotro, go to the moors(and before you say going to the moors with loads of people is the problem, I play other games where the are WAY more people on my screen at any given time with no dramas), get on my warsteed, and lag like crazy, same machine,same graphics card, same IP, the only thing that changes is the game I try to play.

[frickinmuck]

The schedule has changed – be sure to check the forums. Belegar, Sirannon and Anduin have moved, and Bullroarer has been added to next Friday. Since there is a lot of flexibility on Bullroarer he is working hard to ensure it’s anything but a normal run

Please note: I am paraphrasing here. Anything said here is coming through my interpretation of what was said, and is subject to being corrected, so don't take all this as the final word.

If anyone who was present has any additions or corrections, feel free to post.

Q&A Hobbits to Isengard - Arkenstone

1. Will Gilrain be recommended server
   He doesn’t know what current recommended server is, thought they’d already changed it. He will check on it
2. What are the odds the character slot limit will be increased
   He doesn’t know. Some players have expressed a desire to have that limit raised, and it has been passed on to the engineers and some other people to take a look at and see if it can be done.
3. Is the recommended server set manually
   Yes, they can set it to whatever they want. Only difference is with European servers, which will recommend German or French servers if you are in those regions.
4. A few class-specific questions
   For class-specific questions, it’s best to post those in the forum for that class. He can tell the dev, “Hey, go look at the minstrel forums there are a few new questions.” But generally he’s not the best person to answer any class-specific questions.
5. Has the new Bullroarer client been fixed so it doesn’t install Pando
   Currently Pando has been removed across the board, but there is no Bullroarer install at this point, and it won’t be around until one or two rounds of bug fixes on Bullroarer. So if you don’t have the Bullroarer client at this point you will have to wait a bit. If you do not currently have Bullroarer installed there is no way for you to have it installed for next week. You will have to wait until an installer becomes available.
6. How did Aaron enjoy being on the stream
   He seemed to enjoy it quite a bit, and a couple more team members have expressed an interest in being involved so he’s going to try to get some people in for Bullroarer. If they can’t get in on voice chat he’s going to try to get them to at least roll up a hobbit and do the run with us.
7. Question about end game content
   There has already been a lot said on this topic, so he’s just going to say, read Aaron’s letter and the comments he made in the thread following. He spells it out pretty clearly in his follow up comment, so if you read that thread you will have the answer you are looking for.
8. Any clues on the name of volume 4
   You will find out when we go to Bullroarer. If you read what was said so far about U13 you should be able to make a close guess.
9. Question about the timer Sapience uses
   It’s called Event Timer, and was written by a player. On the 3rd or 4th run, the player decided that it would be nice to have an onscreen timer so people wouldn’t have to keep asking for the current time, so went ahead and created the plugin for it.
   EDIT: The player in question is Thurallor of Landroval, and the plugin can be found here.
10. Do you know how to pronounce all the things and places and people in the game
    No, he butchers a lot of them, tries to keep the need to pronounce the difficult ones to a minimum
11. What are the odds of getting major events such as Weatherstock into the splash screens in the game
    It never occurred to him before, but he’s definitely going to look into it – thinks it’s a great idea
12. Do you enjoy the runs
    He enjoys them a lot. He thinks it’s fun to watch how different groups try to approach things differently, and enjoys some of the weird and interesting questions.
13. What is your most memorable moment from all the runs so far
    The last run (on Snowbourn) – at the exact moment Aaron was about to answer a question, a member of the Turbine QA team let out a scream that was perfectly timed in the gap. She was very embarrassed and everyone had a good laugh.
14. Why can’t we have monster players in these runs
    Because monster players exist exclusively in the Ettenmoors and we aren’t in the Ettenmoors for these runs
15. Comment that splash screen ads would be a nice tip of the hat to people organizing events
    Even if they can’t do a splash page, using the example of Weeatherstock, in the past they’ve put Weatherstock on Facebook and Twitter, they’ve added special codes so participants – people who go to Weatherstock and who organize it – can have account-wide titles associated with the events, etc. Even PC Gamer magazine has covered Weatherstock in the past, so they do support it a lot.
16. What is Weatherstock
    Think Woodstock only in-game. A group of players organized an in-game music festival that happens every year at Weathertop on Landroval. If you are not familiar with the music system in-game, you can start a band and play music, and there’s a group on Landroval who organize a concert every year called Weatherstock.
17. Can we expect balance changes in U13
    Yeah, balance is something that they are constantly working on. There are definitely some changes coming with U13 specifically to address difficulty. He was just talking with Jinjaah today about some of the things he and other people on the team are working on to address balance and difficulty level. They’ve been getting feedback from the Player’s Council on it as well to get their thoughts on it.
18. There are a lot of groups that do things on a very regular basis on different servers. Windy Acres Ranch does mounted races, Ales and Tales – there are a lot of player-organized events. Check the forums, people usually do post a notice and you can find all sorts of fun in-game events to take part in.
19. Why doesn’t DeviledEgg post on the forums
    She has posted on the forums. Remember that no dev is required to post or interact on the forums. They do it when they can, if they can, if they wish to. Some people choose to post more than others, but everyone does read them. Even if they aren’t posting, they do read them and are aware of what’s being said. Even in the recent chat Aaron mentioned that he reads the suggestions forums. He doesn’t get to read them all, but he does read them.
20. Is there a perfect route for this event or are there multiple and it’s just about execution
    He thinks there may be a perfect route, but execution is extremely important. Arkenstone appear to be doing everything right, so their time would be good regardless of route.
21. How were run times/dates decided
    He made it up as he went along. Times are decided based on time zone of those servers, so that factors into it. The earlier in the day he can do it, the more likely he can get a dev in to chat with us.
22. Do the people who group up get anything special such as a title
    Nope, they just get bragging rights
23. Has there been any talk about when we may see Shelob appear within the game
    He doesn’t know if that specific conversation has taken place, but they do try to get lore moments in the game at appropriate times, so when the time is right the conversation will happen.
24. Any news about the housing revamp
    No news about housing revamp, beyond what Aaron said in his letter
25. Where is the Bullroarer download link
    There is no link at this point. If you don’t have it installed you will have to wait until the middle or end of the month, he thinks.
26. How does one apply to work for LotRO
    Go to turbine.com/en/careers. All their jobs are in Boston. They have some engineering, marketing and tech jobs open at the moment.
27. Are the in-game GMs all in Boston
    All the English speaking ones are. The French and German ones are in those regions, but for the most part all LotRO jobs are in Boston.
28. Could the BR run be rescheduled until there's a fresh installer build
    No, the only reason he was able to pull off a Bullroarer run at all was because a couple of runs needed to be rescheduled due to translator availability and an opening was made that gave a perfect opportunity for a Bullroarer run

[frickinmuck]

Tips on Getting a Good Time to Isengard For Your Server
(I will keep these updated - anyone with suggestions let me know and I will add them)

• No cloaks or mounts
• Keep the amount of players around Sapience – especially within his line of vision – to a bare minimum to reduce lag
• Have most of the party waiting outside of Bree, and have just a few people run him from the Prancing Pony to the gates where everyone else is, to keep lag down in that area
• Keep the need to swim to an absolute minimum, keep broken legs to a minimum – anything that will slow run speed
• Ensure people around Sapience stay out of combat and can focus on running
• Find a good route and practice it, preferably with at least a couple of raids worth of people to ensure the test runs imitate server conditions at the time of the actual race (i.e. tons of people on)
  To use the plugin Sapience uses for these runs, go to LotROInterface and dowload Thurallor's plugin there.
• Take special care around bridges and other obstacles so that he doesn’t fall off or get stuck or hung up on things
• Keep any run speed buffs on him that you are able to
• Watch previous streams, particularly fastest times, for ideas
• Good idea to have a backup group waiting in Bree in case he dies so that they can get running again right away
• (Suggested by Orodbril) Hunters can not only use "Find the path". They can increase this buff a lot: Once via the blue trait line "Pathfinder" 10% and then by a LI for the main hand/Melee with the major attribute "Find The Path movement speed" another 6 per cent. So with these two improvements the buffs would increase more than 100% putting the speed buff to a total of 31%.
• (Suggested by Orodbril) Captains could increase the duration of the "Make haste" speed buff with their LI (Weapon minor). It can be increased from 20 seconds without LI to 45 seconds with LI, which is also an improvement of 125%.

[Lohi]

If someone wants to play a game in 2014 on a high end gaming machine and use the full power of that machine to give themselves the best gaming experience possible, your answer is basically "tough luck"

If you've got a high end machine like that then you should not have these issues. The answer was in regards to people with mid or low range machines, where at least once a week someone is giving the advice on what to do to eliminate lag. No one has said tough luck, but instead please follow the advice that has been given already.

If you do have lag on a high end machine, the problem is not the machine and not the servers (unless there's a huge crowd of players), so start to suspect your network connectivity.

No one has said it is your fault!

[Galuhad]

Thanks once again for the write-up FM.

[Beaniemooch]

[*]A few class-specific questions
For class-specific questions, it’s best to post those in the forum for that class. He can tell the dev, “Hey, go look at the minstrel forums there are a few new questions.” But generally he’s not the best person to answer any class-specific questions.

The minstrel forum has been filled with requests and questions and all manner of pleading for months. There are no new questions, simply the questions that have been there from the beginning. Which incidentally are the same questions that were there in beta. We are still waiting. Thank you to whoever posed the question.

I give up.

[Mar-Evayave]

The minstrel forum has been filled with requests and questions and all manner of pleading for months. There are no new questions, simply the questions that have been there from the beginning. Which incidentally are the same questions that were there in beta. We are still waiting. Thank you to whoever posed the question.

I give up.

Don't give up yet. Something else mentioned is that other staff members (presumably devs) are interested in joining in these runs, much as Rowan joined Sapience. For all we know, the minstrel dev (Deviled_Egg? I can never remember them all...) may have been one of them. Additionally, a "roundtable" was suggested at some point and I think they are hoping to implement it -- that will get all the devs to the mic.

Sapience is not a dev and he doesn't have all the answers. There is the simple truth that he doesn't know. Additionally, this run was done from his home, and his personal computer. That's also why there was no video feed. And that's totally understandable. I wouldn't care for hundreds (thousands?) of people being able to see inside my house. It was also a Friday evening. Coupling all that together, he couldn't really call various devs, interrupt their dinner/date/whatever, to ask, "Hey, someone on the Twitch chat wants to know ______..."

Sapience may not have an answer, but that doesn't mean there isn't an answer, and that doesn't mean we won't get to hear what that answer is. We just need to catch the right people at the right time.