Trouble logging in.

[station13]

Two hours late. so far.

[MummyLord]

Yeah forgot to pay utilities bill

I saw the car being used to transfer the servers (said lotro CEO on the side). It was one of those 3 wheeled cars with the CEO holding the server on his lap and all was going well till he broke a pedal and had to pull over.

[Fatty]

Really? How many do out of the hundreds of mmo's going today?

Zenimax' Elder Scrolls Online, for example (of course that game went into maintenance mode after less than a year, but still)

[Kaynith]

I don't think you understood him. Your client opens, but it's access to the database to give a new update on extended downtime is still under maintenance. You just have the last updated info, which was before the maintenance. It's like wanting to update a webpage that isn't connected to the internet. You could have it saved in cache and see the old version, but you won't get the new info till the server is back online.

I appreciate that they at least send info via twitter. Is it ideal that it's still down? Of course not. Is it nice that the last launcher message says there is maintenance today? You bet. If you can't figure out that it's likely longer maintenance issues when the whole last 12 hours couldn't connect b/c of maintenance issues...well, to each his own I guess.

----
EDIT: Frelorn beat me to it by a minute.

I don't mind that it's still down. Ext Maint is never a problem and is perfectly understandable.

It's all the added steps to know whether I even CAN log in or not that irk me.

I guess that in lieu of any other options the new login procedure should be something like this.

1.) Check https://twitter.com/lotro to see if you should even bother to fire up your LOTRO launcher.

2.) Check the forums at https://www.lotro.com/forums/forum.php as well to see if something is down, but not yet up on Twitter.

3.) Pray. (If ye are thus inclined.)

4.) Fire up the LOTRO launcher and if you get to the login and pw screen enter in your information.

5.) Pray again. :P

Then maybe, MAYBE, you'll get to login.

Or you can do it like I did today when I saw that it was an hour and a half after maint was supposed to have ended, fired up the launcher, saw that there was no further updates on it, it got all the way to username and pw and then had it spew out some weird authentication sounding error message that had me wondering for a brief moment whether my account had been hacked.

THEN check the forums and twitter in a search for what the heck is wrong THIS time.

There's gotta be a better way to do this.

[Fatty]

I saw the car being used to transfer the servers (said lotro CEO on the side). It was one of those 3 wheeled cars with the CEO holding the server on his lap and all was going well till he broke a pedal and had to pull over.

Now we KNOW you're trolling. It is obvious they wouldn't expect anyone to actually pedal themselves - they naturally use a wind-up engine.

[MummyLord]

Zenimax' Elder Scrolls Online, for example (of course that game went into maintenance mode after less than a year, but still)

Well that was one of hundreds. Funny.

[Lobengulu]

So we click on the launcher icon, it runs and gives us the password screen and then says to be PC "sorry"

[greatlord365]

Understandable. Except that the launcher is up and working.

At the very least, update the launcher in ADDITION to your Twitter feeds, or whatever. Twitter should be an auxiliary means of communication. Not the first line of defense.

When I go to login and type in my password, I should not have to check your TWITTER feed FIRST to see if it's even possible.

If the launcher is up to date, it would save you guys a heck of a lot of negative energy.

Honestly, it's ridiculous. Own it.

You really shouldn't even talk, you have zero idea of how servers, news feeds, or websites work. It is not possible to update something you don't have access to. If you have that big or a problem checking twitter then thats just simply on you not them. So stop blaming somebody for not putting the message out there when it clearly is.

[MummyLord]

Now we KNOW you're trolling. It is obvious they wouldn't expect anyone to actually pedal themselves - they naturally use a wind-up engine.

I always get a chuckle when I make a joke and it becomes trolling but I've been making jokes for almost 50 years and that was long before the term trolling came about....

[Fatty]

I always get a chuckle when I make a joke and it becomes trolling but I've been making jokes for almost 50 years and that was long before the term trolling came about....

Of course, I was just playing along with the joke, but whatever.

[Kaynith]

You really shouldn't even talk, you have zero idea of how servers, news feeds, or websites work. It is not possible to update something you don't have access to. LOL

And yet, as others have noticed, other companies somehow manage to update their launchers in realtime. Perhaps some reformulation of how these things interact is in order? Perhaps separate the login functions if necessary.

Minimally, when you go to log in, you should get an accurate error message of why you cannot log in, that is easily understandable and common sense. This would save people a lot of trouble, and save Turbine a lot of hate, would it not?

[Aldeld]

The launcher itself was up but the feed for news flows through the website. If we cannot access the website, we cannot update the launcher.

Sound like bad design to me. Your primary means of communication is the launcher. If your launcher has dependencies on other pieces of the site which can render it useless, then it should be re-worked to break that dependency. The feed for news should be independent of the website and the launcher to prevent your main channels of communication being cut off.

Regardless - the one thing that irks me about this maintenance is there is no indication of WHAT is being done. There's obviously a list of what you're working on somewhere, throw the people who pay your wages a bone and fill us in. Even if it seems like boring mundane junk to you guys, it still lets us know why there was a huge maintenance scheduled, and this also will lend sympathy from us when things go awry (as they have a bad habit of doing).

[Fatty]

Stop making so much sense, @Kaynith, it only confuses people

[Kaynith]

If you have that big or a problem checking twitter then thats just simply on you not them. So stop blaming somebody for not putting the message out there when it clearly is.

You miss the point entirely. Someone should not have to visit an outside source every time they go to log in. It's ridiculous.

If the grocery store is supposed to open at 8 AM and it's now 10 AM, would you call them first to make sure they were open? Would you check their Twitter feed first? Of course not! That would be silly beyond reason. Yet that's what you are asking me to do.

How many people do not use Twitter? How many casual players have no idea that they even HAVE a Twitter page for LOTRO?

There needs to be changed made to the launcher to enable it to be updated in REALTIME. I don't think that's unreasonable.

[Firgrim]

Regardless - the one thing that irks me about this maintenance is there is no indication of WHAT is being done. There's obviously a list of what you're working on somewhere, throw the people who pay your wages a bone and fill us in. Even if it seems like boring mundane junk to you guys, it still lets us know why there was a huge maintenance scheduled, and then also will lend sympathy from us when things go awry (as they have a bad habit of doing).

The staff have explained more than once on the forums in the past what "maintenance" entails. I suppose it's more of the same: reboots, install security patches, clean up databases, who knows. All of the above? Pretty mundane stuff, yeah.

As for the longer-than-normal maintenance window...good question, but maybe they're not at liberty to disclose that. Or maybe they tried to do things different this time and start earlier. Anyone's guess right now.

[bigred0727]

The thing I would be interested in knowing is what exactly are they working on today? Data center move? Server upgrades? Enlighten us Frelorn, inquiring minds would please like to know!

[Aldeld]

The staff have explained more than once on the forums in the past what "maintenance" entails.

Cutting & pasting takes less than a minute. Not everyone has seen whatever communique you're referring to.

[BangoTwinkletoes]

I saw the car being used to transfer the servers (said lotro CEO on the side). It was one of those 3 wheeled cars with the CEO holding the server on his lap and all was going well till he broke a pedal and had to pull over.

Just in - Turbine's servers captured on-route to new data centre...

[Frelorn]

The thing I would be interested in knowing is what exactly are they working on today? Data center move? Server upgrades? Enlighten us Frelorn, inquiring minds would please like to know!

This maintenance is prep work for our larger global datacenter move. This work is being done across all franchises and systems.

[Aldeld]

This maintenance is prep work for our larger global datacenter move. This work is being done across all franchises and systems.

Now we're getting somewhere. Bunch of server techs pulling CAT5 cables out to figure out where everything goes so they can label them. $5 says someone yanked a cord and plugged it back into the wrong port.

[Jurny]

If people don't know by now to search for such things like https://twitter.com/lotro well then, it's pretty much on them now isn't it. Why can't you all just be a little bit more patient/understanding. Maybe it's that I have been on this game for so many years, you kinda get numb to these kind of things. But reading what some of you have posted, you would think it was the end of the world.

Patience is a virtue!

[Fajardo]

I am having the same error msg

[Kaynith]

Ok, honesty time.

Being an IT geek myself, I'm very familiar with what 'no ETA' means. However, also being said IT geek, I also know that's a general cover term.

So how no ETA are we really talking here?

1.) Slightly borked. We're working on it, know exactly what's wrong, and expect to have it resolved in an hour or two, tops. Go watch a movie.

2.) Mostly borked. We're working on it, don't know exactly what's wrong, and it'll probably be down for several more hours, at least. Go watch a movie. Or three.

3.) Totally borked. Like with a capital ORKED. Seriously, no ETA, could be down for several more hours or even longer. Time to watch the entire Trilogy of LOTR and maybe even the Hobbit Trilogy back to back. Then maybe... MAYBE... it'll be back up.

[Moochi]

And yet, as others have noticed, other companies somehow manage to update their launchers in realtime. Perhaps some reformulation of how these things interact is in order? Perhaps separate the login functions if necessary.

Minimally, when you go to log in, you should get an accurate error message of why you cannot log in, that is easily understandable and common sense. This would save people a lot of trouble, and save Turbine a lot of hate, would it not?

It sounds like you've got it all figured out. Perhaps it is time for you to go build a better lotro, and show it to the licensors, secure rights, and we'll all be along shortly to give you our money. I'm sure someone as bright as you will have it all ready in a month or two, yes? See you there soon.

[Firgrim]

Cutting & pasting takes less than a minute. Not everyone has seen whatever communique you're referring to.

It would take less time for someone wanting to know the answer to search for it (Google, whatever your fave) than it would for me to find it and repost myself.

The point is that if one has a question, realize that many such questions have been asked in the past. Go find it.