Summer LOTRO Executive Producer’s Letter

[DakiorwenDARK]

Since some months ago, the option of buying turbine points via steam got broken....So with this new content, will the the option of buying Turbine points via Steam be able again? Or even better?

[frost702]

Oz map is a go huh. After all the years of killing a pvp system that would've limped along on its own, you had to go and put the final nail in the coffin on it to appease a few PC members who can't win at PVP without Turbine's help. LOTRO is about to get one map smaller, what a lousy thing to do to its remaining fans. No wonder everyone quit this game. Well, you deserve what's coming. Enjoy.

Oh wow. Glorious Turbine finally decides to do something for you doggone .01%er pvmpers and all you do is whine. Yadda yadda fanboyismfanboyism.

Ugh. That got me so triggered. Back on topic, I hope that Turbine will finally make a step in the right direction and start working on the next festival. I want a new horse and a new cloak to add to my 700 horses and cloaks collection.

Alright, time to go back to sacrificing goats to my Turbine shrine. Join me in prayer fellow forumites, thegameisnotdead thegameisnotdead thegameisnotdead thegameisnotdead

[Hallowisp]

Overall, this is an awesome letter. Even though I don't PvMP, I'm very happy for those who do. And I've been waiting for Minas Tirith for YEARS!

But...server merges put a cold, hard lump in my stomach. Why? Because I play exclusively on Landroval, an RP server. What will happen to RP communities in the merge? Will the new, merged servers be labelled as well? Please please please say yes...

[mrfigglesworth]

Frelorn, since free transfers won't be until September (unless i'm reading this incorrectly), do you have an ETA on when paid transfers will be back online?

[Snowlock]

Oh wow. Glorious Turbine finally decides to do something for you doggone .01%er pvmpers and all you do is whine. Yadda yadda fanboyismfanboyism.

There's really no more sense in arguing about this as Turbine rarely ever reverses course. But they didn't do something for the .01% or whatever that idiocy means. They did it for themselves and a couple PC members whose playstyle this map supports. This isn't at all for pvp'ers in general. You're a fool if you believe it is.

[Frelorn]

Frelorn, since free transfers won't be until September (unless i'm reading this incorrectly), do you have an ETA on when paid transfers will be back online?

They should be back on now. Please let us know if you are still having issues.

[Deniorona]

How about you making the current t2s doable. Not even playing lotro till they make it so I do t have to spend 7hr I a 3man t2 and not be able to Complete it

noooo please don't nerf it! Its fine as it is, mayb u have the wrong set up or dare I say not geared well enuf for them?

7 hours tho wow.........

I am very excited about this years lotro! seems to be going in the right direction for the players and ive seen many old faces come back even now, with this news mayb more will

now if only we had a raid...........

thanks turbine!

[Sullo]

Sounds like its going to be an exciting few months.

[mrfigglesworth]

They should be back on now. Please let us know if you are still having issues.

ok thanks, i can't til june though.

[Laire]

Eh, for the new instances, the t1 ones need to have some incentive to run them via marks + medallions at the least. Chances of Morgul crests dropping would be nice too (not 100% like t2, or is that only t2c?)

As for the letter- thank you for the update. I am cautiously optimistic. I sincerely hope the Turbine team looks at real world stone cities to get a look at poorer districts rather than assuming everyone in Minas Tirith was rich, like they seemed to do with Dol Amroth. I hope that interiors are not neglected as they were in Central Gondor (Linhir and Pelargir are dismal in that regard).



Re: server transfers. What will you do for players who have capped out their character slots on a closing world, but want to bring them all to another world where they already have characters?

Frelorn, any word on the 2015 Council? Been keeping an eye on my email, hah.

[companyslacker]

I'm pleased to hear about the new map and the closing of low population servers.

Will the old PvMP map be playable after the new map becomes available?

Will there be any restrictions for the number of transfers to any particular server? Is OK if everyone transfers to Brandywine for instance?

Any chance of re-purposing one of the old servers for open world PvMP?

[Grapold]

There's really no more sense in arguing about this as Turbine rarely ever reverses course.

No, they just plan something (like housing updates), and then forget about it hoping that we'll all do the same.

[Snowlock]

No, they just plan something (like housing updates), and then forget about it hoping that we'll all do the same.

I mean from the dev stage. The only thing I can ever think of other than balance tweaks is Radiance. Otherwise, they never reverse. Housing never got to dev stage; or at least the dev stage that Oz appears to now be in. Always seemed more conceptual, the housing update I mean.

[Frelorn]

I'm pleased to hear about the new map and the closing of low population servers.

Will the old PvMP map be playable after the new map becomes available? As of right now, yes.

Will there be any restrictions for the number of transfers to any particular server? Is OK if everyone transfers to Brandywine for instance? We will have a full in-depth FAQ for transfers when we are closer to the service going live that will answer this and many other questions.

Any chance or re-purposing one of the old servers for open world PvMP? Not likely

Answers in-line.

[Laire]

Will the old PvMP map be playable after the new map becomes available?

Will there be any restrictions for the number of transfers to any particular server? Is OK if everyone transfers to Brandywine for instance?

I would be surprised if the Ettenmoors just shut down entirely. I do not see the purpose behind that.

As for restrictions, I genuinely hope so. Make it so you already had to have a character already several months old before transferring to Brandywine, or make Brandywine cost money and the medium-populated servers free of charge. Brandywine is the biggest issue when it comes to server stability from what I understand, so it may be that only Brandywine needs it.

(Granted, if everyone then chooses Landroval instead, perhaps this server will need a similar restriction).

[Brandon_Blackbird]

Overall, this is an awesome letter. Even though I don't PvMP, I'm very happy for those who do. And I've been waiting for Minas Tirith for YEARS!

But...server merges put a cold, hard lump in my stomach. Why? Because I play exclusively on Landroval, an RP server. What will happen to RP communities in the merge? Will the new, merged servers be labelled as well? Please please please say yes...

Servers aren't "merging". People will be able to transfer to whatever servers they make available. Then they'll close the smallest ones.

[Zithlinraiss]

Good news overall but I have a question I haven't been able to find a answer to anywhere. I have all my character slots filled everywhere. While a couple of worlds-mostly rp and foreign language based- I don't play much, the others I like to drop in on off and on and play for variety. Will I be restricted to the same number of slots per server that I have now and have to lose some of them, locked and unplayable until I delete some? Or will they be grandfathered in as other things have been throughout the years. I know it's a lot of alts but that was/is one of the main attractions for this game. I'm attached to a fair number of them and I dread the thought of losing them. Possibly I could pare them down a bit but losing a lot of slots is going to cause problems. *Says prayer for silly stuff anyway .

[Boskone08]

Turbine will do as they feel best, but if I were them, I would not initiate free transfers until:

1) The new servers were fully in service, and

2) It could be determined what impact the new servers had on system performance, and on Brandywine in particular (both general and in PvMP).

And even then, I'd consider long and hard if I would allow free transfers (in an effort to discourage such transfers) to Brandywine, unless the new server performance was outstanding. As a player with characters on Brandy, the current performance is marginal at best, and I do not know what the performance in the Moors is like (I doubt it is very good). Brandy seems to offer the 'perfect storm' for load-testing the new server hardware, as there has been a significant influx of new (to the server at least) players into Brandywine - many of who appear to be from the servers formerly operated by mail.ru (the advent of Russian-language Kins is an indicator, IMO). I know that I would not recommend anyone transfer to Brandywine at this time, based on current server performance - perhaps the new servers will significantly change that, but perhaps not.

[Snowlock]

Answers in-line.

"Will the old pvp map be playable" "As of right now yes"

What does this mean? Also, in a recent twitch stream you said Turbine was doing this switch to a pvp layer of the Oz map because of lag in the Ettenmoors. It's been claimed by Turbine in the past that the lag we experience in the Moors was due to memory leaks due to fatal flaws in the map itself. So, why keep the Ettenmoors map open at all, cause it's broken, right?

[Reximus]

Oz map is a go huh. After all the years of killing a pvp system that would've limped along on its own, you had to go and put the final nail in the coffin on it to appease a few PC members who can't win at PVP without Turbine's help. LOTRO is about to get one map smaller, what a lousy thing to do to its remaining fans. No wonder everyone quit this game. Well, you deserve what's coming. Enjoy.

PvPers cry for years for a new map, and cry every time Turbine hinted they might make one and didn't, and now they are crying they are getting one.

[ELAzalin]

Servers aren't "merging". People will be able to transfer to whatever servers they make available. Then they'll close the smallest ones.

I hope that isn't really the case but it sounds like the most likely scenario. Because then the whole naming thing will be screwed up. Since I had my names since the servers were first up and now I run the risk of not having those names?

With that said, my question is what about our houses the outside and the inside nooks.. Can we just pack them up and then place them back down on the new server? What about kin houses that have other bound items from other people in them what about those items as well.

[infinitewhimsy]

PvPers cry for years for a new map, and cry every time Turbine hinted they might make one and didn't, and now they are crying they are getting one.

When you say hint, do you mean when they explicitly stated they would provide a new map as part of the selling points of an expansion, that every PvPer then bought, then didn't provide said map? The mistrust is profoundly warranted.

[Reximus]

Overall, this is an awesome letter. Even though I don't PvMP, I'm very happy for those who do. And I've been waiting for Minas Tirith for YEARS!

But...server merges put a cold, hard lump in my stomach. Why? Because I play exclusively on Landroval, an RP server. What will happen to RP communities in the merge? Will the new, merged servers be labelled as well? Please please please say yes...

If Landroval has a healthy population I wouldn't expect you need to move.

[furtim]

I hope that isn't really the case but it sounds like the most likely scenario. Because then the whole naming thing will be screwed up. Since I had my names since the servers were first up and now I run the risk of not having those names?

I think the point of doing it this way is to let people check for name collisions and move to a server where their preferred name is available. As long as they're not "Leg0l4s" or something else that probably exists on every single server.

[corrakkas]

• New PvMP Map: It is true, we are currently working on a new PvMP map which will take place in a version of Osgiliath. We are designing this space now and it should be going through its first round of feedback with the Player’s Council in the near future. It will also be getting extensive Beta feedback on Bullroarer when ready and released this summer.

can anybody please tell me why the player council is getting any input on the future of pvmp, the player council as shown they have no interest in pvmp, this should go to active people that play pvmp and have pvmp experience, again, why would you have somebody give you advice on something that has no knowledge of it?