Bullroarer Update 28 - Preview #3 CLOSED

[Elmagor]

Content is not easier with maxed everything? Really? So I can do as much dps, have as many mitigations and as much morale as you with free level IlIs and virtue values around 50? And soon I won't have any reason to buy new content because I can't play it. Easy solution to all this dilemma, reinstitute new weapons every update, then everybody has something to go for and nobody is disadvantaged due to gear.

Content can be completed without maxed everything. Landscape content one of more easy things in the game right now.

[flirtswithmediocrity]

Bullroarer is OPEN[*]Champion - Horn of Champions trait now has two tiers - the first grants the skill, the second makes it taunt.

good change. Thanks for listening.

[K1llyah]

29 contributors provided 24 000 words of feedback in a for LOTRO standards large scale month-long qualitative assessment of customer satisfaction of the LM class, managing to accumulate 5000+ thread views during August and September.

Project outcomes

• The Lore-master is fun to play: 75 / 100
• The Lore-master is challenging to play: 61 / 100
• Red line satisfaction: 43 / 100
• Blue line satisfaction: 47 / 100
• Yellow line satisfaction: 71 / 100

A clear indication of the subpar satisfaction among players of the class, with subsequent quantitative insights for resource allocation yield maximization, backed-up by skill-by-skill feedback by quantified desired targets.

Project results
0 SSG staff responses
0 Bullroarer text dedicated to LM class

SSG, your LMs are dissatisfied with the class design, and have been vocal and constructive about it.
Awaiting future bullroarer rounds before making conclusions, but prepping the line for you to spit in the face of Lore-masters abound.

[Xaviere]

[*]The Embers of Enchantment received for disenchanting armour and jewellery dropped in Minas Morgul Instances, War of Three Peaks Instances, and Askâd-mazal, the Chamber of Shadows has been halved.

Could we please hear dev reasoning behind this change?

[AZHuman]

I am running 64 client. After logging on the choose server window doesn't have transfer button.

[Elmagor]

I am running 64 client. After logging on the choose server window doesn't have transfer button.

Try 32 bit client on test server

[cwswim03]

Guardian - Cooldown for Thrill of Battle heal reduced to [20->8s].
Guardian - Stoic bubble now provides damage reduction during its effect rather than a heal on expiration.
Guardian - Break Ranks now applies a group-wide buff rather than individual.
The skill is now triggered by Shield-taunt rather than Shield-smash.
This buff can only be triggered once every 60 seconds.
Fortification can now begin rebuilding immediately after being cashed out.


Make the Stoic buff -50% Incoming damage instead of -20% incoming damage. It's closer to dunedain then.

Pledge + Juggernaut need a second pass. You can't BPE any crucial attacks anymore from bosses. (Rukhor/Shelob/Thossulun --> all have unblockable attacks and I assume the new raid will have mobs that have them too). Those skills were fine in Anvil when tanking the dwarves or the whelplings but are obsolete now.

Don't use shield taunt for such a critical buff. It's part of the tanking rotation for a LOT of players. Just add a new skill to trigger it (like you added the warden interrupt). This is a great and welcome change though, thanks!

[Sezneg]

Is there any work being done on Monster play Characters? The WarLeader for one still does 2k damage auto-attacks to slugs with a 41% boost to attack damage

PVMP is certainly getting "worked", just not in the way you're hoping ...

[Pewpewmidget]

Content is not easier with maxed everything? Really? So I can do as much dps, have as many mitigations and as much morale as you with free level IlIs and virtue values around 50? And soon I won't have any reason to buy new content because I can't play it. Easy solution to all this dilemma, reinstitute new weapons every update, then everybody has something to go for and nobody is disadvantaged due to gear.

Content difficulty increase is natural, so is gear and skill adaption.
Those who take care of their characters won't see as much difficulty as one who just hangs around with just quest rewards and the basic flickering essences that drop.
If you are having problems progressing then you'll need to change something about your gear, LI's, essences, virtues or skill rotation.
We all did in the past.

How do you think everyone got better?
Waving wands and pixie dust?

[wispsong]

Content difficulty increase is natural, so is gear and skill adaption.
Those who take care of their characters won't see as much difficulty as one who just hangs around with just quest rewards and the basic flickering essences that drop.
If you are having problems progressing then you'll need to change something about your gear, LI's, essences, virtues or skill rotation.
We all did in the past.

How do you think everyone got better?
Waving wands and pixie dust?

No ILI but normal weapon drops like we had in the past didn't require to chase after enhancements. Even with the LIs from 50-100 we got new item drops and crafting recipes, no chase after enhancements required for landscape. Items were replaced, not fed constantly. Quest rewards and crafted guild gear was mostly enough to go into a new area, no essence chase/ special mat chase required. And virtues were really not necessary for landscape because they didn't blow out of proportions. You might like always having to chase after something that will enhance your skills, I want to see a goal that doesn't change every time I see it. And new characters ... 400+ scroll single click ... that might be fun for you.

[Marxlne]

Bullroarer is OPEN
Release Notes:
Classes:

• Guardian - Cooldown for Thrill of Battle heal reduced to [20->8s].
• Guardian - Stoic bubble now provides damage reduction during its effect rather than a heal on expiration.
• Guardian - Break Ranks now applies a group-wide buff rather than individual.
  
• The skill is now triggered by Shield-taunt rather than Shield-smash.
  
• This buff can only be triggered once every 60 seconds.
  
• Fortification can now begin rebuilding immediately after being cashed out.
• Guardian - "Bellow" trait reduces Challenge cooldown by 5s per rank. Trait tooltip has been updated to reflect this.

Thrill of Battle - This change is not good. Whole trait is actually a mess and should be changed. Better rework it completely and instead it should give 2% Critical Rating per rank (10% in total) because red guards are lacking both DPS/Crit Chance at the moment.
Break Ranks - Buff is good but please don't tie it to any available skills, especially the ones that are used in current tanking rotations actively (any shield skills/War-Chant/Shield Taunt). Just make Break Ranks independent skill.
Stoic - This change is not good. Yet again you are trying to tie additional debuff to the best panic skill Guards have atm. Leave Stoic as it is and instead rework other Guardian cooldowns as follows:
>>>>> Juggernaut - Negate 100% damage (15s duration)
>>>>> Pledge - Negate 30% damage (15s duration) as base. So with currently maxed out LI Pledge Magnitude rank it can be reached to 65% damage reduction.
Challenge - Should be 6s per rank if you plan to leave the cooldown same as it is at the moment on live servers.

Also, revert Vitality to Morale Contribution from 4.8 back to 5 or make it even 5.2 to bring Morale pool closer to Captains.

[cdq1958]

So, this one is new (after playing for 10 years): I start the updated cliënt and try to log in the usual way, and the cliënt then just exits. No sign, no backlog in Windows processes, nothing.... anyone else having this problem?

I ran into this issue. A workaround for this is renaming the userpreferences64.ini file and let the game make a default one. Then you can copy over the lines of the new file with those in your backup file that you made my renaming it. It should launch now.

Update, well, the did let me log in, but once I log out, it did not let me log in again using the 64 bit client. I can use the 32 bit one. Hmm.

[Tullkas]

Thrill of Battle - This change is not good. Whole trait is actually a mess and should be changed. Better rework it completely and instead it should give 2% Critical Rating per rank (10% in total) because red guards are lacking both DPS/Crit Chance at the moment.
Break Ranks - Buff is good but please don't tie it to any available skills, especially the ones that are used in current tanking rotations actively (any shield skills/War-Chant/Shield Taunt). Just make Break Ranks independent skill.
Stoic - This change is not good. Yet again you are trying to tie additional debuff to the best panic skill Guards have atm. Leave Stoic as it is and instead rework other Guardian cooldowns as follows:
>>>>> Juggernaut - Negate 100% damage (15s duration)
>>>>> Pledge - Negate 30% damage (15s duration) as base. So with currently maxed out LI Pledge Magnitude rank it can be reached to 65% damage reduction.
Challenge - Should be 6s per rank if you plan to leave the cooldown same as it is at the moment on live servers.

Also, revert Vitality to Morale Contribution from 4.8 back to 5 or make it even 5.2 to bring Morale pool closer to Captains.

100% agree, great ideas, will we ever see these changes? Doubtful

[Cordovan]

Could we please hear dev reasoning behind this change?

One of the main drivers for this adjustment is that the sources for this armour and jewellery have increased. In addition to War of Three Peaks instances, the upcoming raid will have separate chests for Tiers 4 and 5, which will be released a short while after War of Three Peaks.

[ItaOperor]

One of the main drivers for this adjustment is that the sources for this armour and jewellery have increased. In addition to War of Three Peaks instances, the upcoming raid will have separate chests for Tiers 4 and 5, which will be released a short while after War of Three Peaks.

In other words it means people will earn embers in game and not need to use the store and this is a bad thing as the store is more important than actually playing the game. Message received and understood.

[Cordovan]

With the new raid Amdân Dammul, the Bloody Threshold available for preview up to Tier 3, we wanted to talk a bit about how difficulty will work with this raid as we are changing things up a bit:

Tier 1 has been made significantly easier, and can be considered a “Story Mode” aimed at lower difficulty raiding.
Tier 2 is the new “base” difficulty, and is as complex mechanically as a previous Tier 1.
Tier 3 is now as difficult as a previous Tier 2.
Tier 4 is now as difficult as a previous Tier 3.
Tier 5 is now “challenge mode”, and will introduce a raid-wide mechanic to further test our best raiders.

When War of Three Peaks is released, Tiers 1 through 3 will be available, with Tier 4 releasing a short time later, and Tier 5 a short time after that. A "lead the charge" style title will be available for Tiers 4 and 5 only. Players can expect raid chest locks to operate per usual, although we are considering offering several favored pulls per week at Tier 1 difficulty.

[Thurallor]

In other words it means people will earn embers in game and not need to use the store and this is a bad thing as the store is more important than actually playing the game. Message received and understood.

It's to prevent people from stockpiling disenchantable items prior to the expansion, and immediately being able to barter for all of the new embers gear when it goes live.

You can still "earn embers in game and not need to use the store", it just won't be as easy for you to ignore the new content and immediately start complaining about a lack of things to do.

[TexanHobbit]

As for 64 bit not working - removing the ini files will fix it but it defaults to directx 9 and cant be changed. If you change the ini file the 64 bit client wont start again

[ElanorFb]

With the new raid Amdân Dammul, the Bloody Threshold available for preview up to Tier 3, we wanted to talk a bit about how difficulty will work with this raid as we are changing things up a bit:

Tier 1 has been made significantly easier, and can be considered a “Story Mode” aimed at lower difficulty raiding.
Tier 2 is the new “base” difficulty, and is as complex mechanically as a previous Tier 1.
Tier 3 is now as difficult as a previous Tier 2.
Tier 4 is now as difficult as a previous Tier 3.
Tier 5 is now “challenge mode”, and will introduce a raid-wide mechanic to further test our best raiders.

When War of Three Peaks is released, Tiers 1 through 3 will be available, with Tier 4 releasing a short time later, and Tier 5 a short time after that. A "lead the charge" style title will be available for Tiers 4 and 5 only. Players can expect raid chest locks to operate per usual, although we are considering offering several favored pulls per week at Tier 1 difficulty.

wow, this may be the best news I've heard about raiding in well.... ever. It would be nice to get to participate in the raid.

[Thurallor]

As for 64 bit not working - removing the ini files will fix it but it defaults to directx 9 and cant be changed. If you change the ini file the 64 bit client wont start again

64-bit works fine for me with DX11. You might need to (re)install the DirectX legacy runtime library from Microsoft.

[cwswim03]

Thrill of Battle - This change is not good. Whole trait is actually a mess and should be changed. Better rework it completely and instead it should give 2% Critical Rating per rank (10% in total) because red guards are lacking both DPS/Crit Chance at the moment.
Break Ranks - Buff is good but please don't tie it to any available skills, especially the ones that are used in current tanking rotations actively (any shield skills/War-Chant/Shield Taunt). Just make Break Ranks independent skill.
Stoic - This change is not good. Yet again you are trying to tie additional debuff to the best panic skill Guards have atm. Leave Stoic as it is and instead rework other Guardian cooldowns as follows:
>>>>> Juggernaut - Negate 100% damage (15s duration)
>>>>> Pledge - Negate 30% damage (15s duration) as base. So with currently maxed out LI Pledge Magnitude rank it can be reached to 65% damage reduction.
Challenge - Should be 6s per rank if you plan to leave the cooldown same as it is at the moment on live servers.

Also, revert Vitality to Morale Contribution from 4.8 back to 5 or make it even 5.2 to bring Morale pool closer to Captains.

Agree with Juggernaut and vitality change.

Make break ranks a separate skill.

Add these changes and guardian will be equivalent in strength to a captain in terms of tanking (As I'm sure was the intention (maybe guardians were meant to be stronger tanks)).

You can't have a fight that REQUIRES last stand (Zabothak) and then have your main tank class not have that skill.

[gildhur]

Tier 1 has been made significantly easier, and can be considered a “Story Mode” aimed at lower difficulty raiding.
Tier 2 is the new “base” difficulty, and is as complex mechanically as a previous Tier 1.
Tier 3 is now as difficult as a previous Tier 2.
Tier 4 is now as difficult as a previous Tier 3.
Tier 5 is now “challenge mode”, and will introduce a raid-wide mechanic to further test our best raiders.

YES. FINALLY. Please retrofit this scheme to old raids when you have time.

[ItaOperor]

It's to prevent people from stockpiling disenchantable items prior to the expansion, and immediately being able to barter for all of the new embers gear when it goes live.

You can still "earn embers in game and not need to use the store", it just won't be as easy for you to ignore the new content and immediately start complaining about a lack of things to do.

If that's the case why isn't there a limit on opening lootboxes/buying keys? I could stockpile level 130 lootboxes and on day one spend £££s on keys and get all the embers I need.

If this was truly about balance then the store would be balanced too but it's not.

Also if someone does ignore all the new content and complain then they've only got themselves to blame.

[TexanHobbit]

64-bit works fine for me with DX11. You might need to (re)install the DirectX legacy runtime library from Microsoft.

hmmm might be worth a shot. Just that 64 bit on live works with directx 11 and 32 bit on both work with directx 11.

edit - nope said I had the most current version installed.

[rodin12]

from the first preview approximately how long it takes up 28 to be on sale