Streaming every evening on Twitch.tv/Pharone

[Pharone]

Hello World.!

I am Pharone The Gnome, and I have been streaming content for a number of years now. Recently, I came back to Lord of The Rings after many, many years away. The last time I played LoTRO, I only got to maybe level 20-30ish. This time, I am having a blast, and already have two characters in their 40s.

Please come join me on Twitch as I make my way through Middle Earth. I play every class, but right now I am focusing on a Human Hunter and Elven Champion.

You can catch me on Twitch at http://twitch.tv/pharone every evening.

Schedule (Times in Central US):

• Mon-Thu 7pm-9pm
• Friday 7pm-whenever
• Sat-Sun all day sporadically lol

I also do some special one off streams like "How to setup your UI", "What does this do", etc related to the games I play.

For the most part, I am only doing Lord of The Rings Online streams right now. I do also stream PS5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and PC content from time to time.

You can catch all of my back content on:

• Rumble: https://rumble.com/pharone
• YouTube https://youtube.com/pharone1

Feel free to chat with me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/pharonethegnome @PharoneTheGnome

[Pharone]

I am getting close to reaching my goal of 100 followers. Last I checked, I was at 93 followers on Twitch.

Please come support a Lord of the Rings Online streamer on twitch at twitch.tv/pharone

[Pharone]

I reached my goal of hitting 100 followers recently. Thanks to everyone who helped out!

Update on my schedule
I have been extra busy with work and life during the holiday season, so I have not been able to get as much game time in as I would like. Here lately, I have been getting online around 7:30pm (Central US) time, and I get about 2 hours in a night on weeknights. With the holidays rapidly approaching, my weekends have been super sporadic as far as streaming anything.

Update on the Hunter

• The hunter is now level 57, and in Moria.
• I did as much of Angmar as I could solo, and then...
• I moved on to Moria to work on quests there and my Legendary Items (Sword and Bow)
• I 100% LOVE LOVE LOVE Moria. This is hands down one of the coolest expansions I have ever seen in a MMORPG
• Thanks to a friend who helped explain the system to me, I have reforged my LIs, assigned gems to all the slots, and have been leveling them up
• I have done a ton of quests through out Moria, and I am sure I still have a ton left to do lol.

Update on the Champion

• Last I played the Champion, I believe he was in his mid 40s or early 50s. Sigh.. I need to get back to him
• The champion is about a third of the way through Angmar currently
• I believe I still need to do the quest that allows him to cross Angmar with out dying

Coming Up This Week

1. Plan to get back on the Champion starting tonight
2. Champion - Get attuned to the death ray system in Angmar, so he can pass across it with out being insta-killed
3. Champion - Head to the Walls of Moria to get my Legendary Items
4. Champion - Head back to Angmar to do as much content as I can solo (want to compare his abilities to that of the Hunter when he went through)
5. Champion - Head inside Moria to work on quests and LI upgrades

Christmas Eve Special Stream

• I am going to create a brand new character! Hobbit Lore Master
• Will be playing through the original Hobbit starter content (I've never done that, so it will be new to me)
• Plan on working on getting him the new festive clothing from Holiday Festival Area
• Help me come up with a name for my fat little hobbit... something Christmasy

I hope to see you all in chat this week.! HO HO HO Merry Christmas.!

[Pharone]

Was a great stream last night. My champion got his Legendary Items and entered Moria.!

I am so loving this game.

[Pharone]

Happy New Years everyone!

We finally made it out of 2022. Congratulations everyone on surviving 2022. It was an interesting year for sure.

2022 Accomplishments/Happenings

• Rings of Power series renewed my interest in the lore of Middle Earth
• I came back to Lord of the Rings Online after eleven years away
• I finally broke my two decade long addiction to Everquest lol... /sigh
• Blew past the 100 follower goal I had sat myself in Twitch. Thanks everyone for helping me. I truly appreciate all of you!
• Became blue check marked on Twitter
• Bought my very first RV travel trailer, and very quickly learned just how much stress goes in to towing one lol

I'd say it was actually a pretty good year over all.


LoTRO Updates - Hunter

• Reached level 64 (turned off experience gain to work on content in level)
• Completed the base storyline of Moria
• Completed all solo quest hubs in Moria
• Visited Lothlorien for the first time, and I was absolutely awestruck with the beauty of the elf city!
• Completed all solo quest hubs in Lothlorien
• Completed Epic Volume I - Book I through Book IX
• Got everything I wanted this year from Yulefest (my first time ever doing it, and I loved it)

LoTRO Updates - Stout Axe Guardian

• I started a new Stout-Axe Guardian to play through all of Before The Shadow (Swanfleet and Cardolan)
• Currently working on the Herne story arch (my favorite part of Before The Shadow)

LoTRO Updates - Human Lore Master

• Figured out how dyes and wardrobe work together.... omg... so much fun...
• Created the most bad as.... er... awesome looking outfit ever for my Lore Master
• Working through Before The Shadow content...currently in Cardolan
• Intending to put a lot more time in to the lore master here soon (tm)

LoTRO Updates - Elven Champion

• Currently in Moria working on the quest lines there
• Haven't worked on him in a bit, but will get back to him soon (tm) lol

LoTRO Coming Up! - Hobbit Burglar

• I am going to give the burglar class another try. The last time I tried one, I only made it to about level 8 I think
• Planning to play through the hobbit starting area as I have never done that before
• I need advice on early build and ability rotation for soloing a burglar through the first 20 levels... please let me know your thoughts
• Will let everyone know ahead of time when I am going to make the burglar, so we can all experience it together over on Twitch.tv/pharone

I'm really looking forward to 2023, and I hope you all will come along and enjoy the ride with me. Follow me over on Twitter @PharoneTheGnome and on Twitch at twitch.tv/pharone.

[Pharone]

Good morning and happy Tuesday everyone.!

Updates on the Hunter:

• We have officially finished all books for volume 1!!! Woohoo!
• Reached Level 65
• Began working on Volume 2 in Moria. Currently on Book 5.

All I can say is.... WOW VOLUME 1 WAS AMAZING!!!! Seriously. It was 100% worth going back and playing through every book in volume 1. I am so glad that everyone suggested I do that even though I was way above the level of the content. If you are playing Lord of The Rings Online with out ever doing any of the books at least once, you are missing a huge part of what makes this game so great.

I've started uploading some of my streams from Twitch to Youtube and Rumble in order for them to be available long term since Twitch only holds on to content for so long before it rolls off. If you would like to go back and watch certain bits of LoTRO lore, hit up my YouTube or Rumble pages. Be forewarned though that SPOILERS will be abound. Don't watch the my rebroadcasts if you haven't already seen the stories. Going forward, I am going to try to do a better job of cutting up the streams and pushing the good parts to my YouTube/Rumble accounts. As always, follow me on Twitch first and foremost because that's where I do the vast majority of everything.

While I am mainly streaming Lord of The Rings Online, I am going to try to get a bit more organized on my Twitch streaming schedule, and will likely start setting aside a night a week to do other content. I possibly might do something like WoW Wednesdays, Console And Chill Fridays, or something. Who knows. I'm just spit balling here lol. Either way, LoTRO will always be the main focus of my streams.

Thanks to everyone that has come and hung out with me on Twitch. We are now up to 121 followers and growing.

See you all in game.!

[Pharone]

Updates on the Hunter:

• Reached level 66
• Tossed on the tortoise pocket item until I get out of Mirkwood content
• Finished all Epic Volume II Books up through Book 8
• Started Epic Volume II Book 9 in Mirkwood. Woohoo finally in Mirkwood!

Updates on the Lore Master:

• Leveled up to 31 now
• Did the level 30 Lore Master quest... had to cheat and look up the answers /(>.<)\
• Ran all three Great Barrow Downs instances with a champion friend
• Attempted to duo Fornost with a champion friend... died a lot lol
• *** Need to befriend a similar level healer to run instances with me and the champion ***

Due to my work ramping up a lot lately, I haven't gotten to stream nearly as much as I have wanted. I'm hoping that work will settle down some here in the next couple weeks.

As always, thank you all for hanging out with me on Twitch. Love yall!
Pharone the Gnome

[Pharone]

Update on Hunter:

• Working my way through Mirkwood content
• My estimate is that I am 30-50% through Mirkwood

Update on Lore Master:

• Worked through the majority of Evendim content
• Reached level 40
• Switched from Red to Blue spec (loving it)
• Heading to Forochel soon (tm)

Goals this week:

1. Reach level 55 on Champion in Moria
2. Work through Forochel content on Lore Master
3. Work on Mirkwood content on Hunter
4. Remake my Rune Keeper and get to level 20... not sure what race to go with this time.

Stream News...

• Twitch followers is over 130 right now. Follow me on Twitch at Twitch.tv/Pharone
• Twitter followers is over 1100 right now. Follow me on Twitter @PharoneTheGnome

Thanks everyone. Love you.!
Pharone the Gnome

[Pharone]

Update on Lore Master:

• Lore Master is now my main character
• Reached level 60
• Completed a lot of Moria (will go back to 100% it eventually)
• Moved in to Lothlorien... got bored... moved on to Mirkwood
• Currently working on Mirkwood content

Stream Updates
I am currently looking to get more organized on my streaming schedule. Up till now, I have just been streaming when ever I felt like it, and I feel that is not helping my viewers to get the most out of the content. Therefore, I am looking to come up with a more dedicated schedule for streaming.

I have a poll up on my Twitter to get a feel for what the community would prefer. Head over to @PharoneTheGnome if you want to be part of shaping the future of my streaming schedule.

What I am looking at is having a set schedule for Monday through Friday with Saturday and Sunday being open for optional play. You can always count on me taking the option of doing long streams on Saturday and/or Sunday. It's a given. I'm looking to come up with a set schedule for the rest of the week.

The current options are:

• Monday, Wednesday, Friday
• Tuesday, Thursday, Friday
• Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday

As always, the times on those days is 7pm to 10pm Central (give or take an hour either way).

This in no way means that I won't be streaming on off days. It just means that unless there is something that keeps me from being there, I will be streaming on those days.

Thanks everyone. As always, love you all.!

Pharone The Gnome.

[Pharone]

Now that both the Hunter and Lore Master have reached level 60 and entered the Mirkwood expansion, it's time to start my next goal for the stream...

Get every class to level 20!

A while back I made it a goal of mine to play every single class to at least level 10 before choosing a class that I wanted to play up to max level. I did just that, and it resulted in me playing the Hunter as my main. Then I swapped to the Champion, and a while later I swapped to the Lore Master.

What I realized is that level 10 is not far enough in to a class' life to truly have a good understanding of it. Now level 20 is not really a good indication of that either, but it's a step in the right direction.

My idea is that I will do this in 10 level increments for every class in the game.

The order in which I will be playing each class to level 20 is as follows:

1. Brawler
2. Minstrel
3. Guardian
4. Rune Keeper
5. Burglar
6. Captain
7. Warden

*please note that I have already leveled Beorning to 20, Champion to 50, Hunter to 60, and Lore Master to 60.

The next phase of this little experiment will be taking all classes to level 30, and so on. I think you get where I am going with this whole thing.

I started the Brawler last night, and he is in his early teens at this point. I should finish up hitting level 20 tonight on the stream.

See you all tonight!

[Pharone]

'Getting All Classes To Level 20' Series Update:

• As of Sunday, all classes (except Captain and Warden) have officially reached level 20
• I will be holding off on leveling a Captain and Warden until the classes changes go live

Out of all of the classes I have played up to level 20, Burglar is the only class that I just for what ever reason am not enjoying playing as much as the others.

Easiest to level class: Hunter
By far, the easiest class to level up from 1 to 20 was the Hunter. This class destroys just about everything before it even gets to them. It's ranged damage is incredible and fun. I was easily making my way through just about any open world content including some content that recommended bringing friends (fellowship).

Most enjoyable mass killing class: Champion
There was nothing quite as enjoyable than to run in to a mess of mobs, and obliterate them with a few AoE melee attacks. The champion was a lot of fun to play, and this class could easily be my main after I get all classes to max level. Truly fun class.

Most surprising class: Minstrel
I really thought this was going to be a difficult class to level up due to it being seen as one of the main healer classes in the game. I figured it was going to be a slow killer. I couldn't have been more wrong if I tried. This class was destroying mobs at range by singing and shouting at them from a distance. The game play was similar to that of the Hunter in that it killed mobs often times before they made it to me. I was highly surprised at how much of a killing machine the Minstrel was on the battle field. I greatly enjoyed my time playing this class.

Least favorite to level up class: Burglar
I tried. I really tried to like playing the Burglar class, but I ended up struggling to get him to level 20. I'm not quite sure what it was that made me not enjoy playing this class, but I have a theory. For the most part, the "level up" content in the game is that you come across in doing quests and deeds in the open world areas. The vast majority of that content involves running to a mob, hitting it for a few seconds, and then running to another mob to do the same. The amount of time traveling between mobs usually is longer than the time taken to kill them. The thing with the Burglar is that it is a stealth-based position class. When you get to do that in an instance or raid, I am sure it is a highly involved and enjoyable experience. On the other hand, when you are running from mob to mob hitting each one for a few seconds each time, there really is no need for stealth and/or position attacks. The fights simply are not involved enough to warrant that level of finesse. Therefore, during the leveling up process, the majority of the time the burglar ends up being a class where you are simply running from mob to mob and hitting a few buttons until the mob dies. It's not fun. It's just a chore. It's that thing you have to do to level up, so you can get to what is likely the fun part of playing a Burglar.

Honorable Mentions:

• Rune Keeper was a surprising pew pew pew class if you spec'd for lightning. The super fast casting lightning abilities had me cracking up every time I raced in to a pack of mobs and started electrifying the #### out of everything. It was hilarious, fun, and extremely satisfying to those orcs and goblins get fried. I recommend this class and build to anyone who wants an alt to just go ham on mobs every so often.
• Brawler was hilarious to play.! I laughed so hard playing this class. I couldn't stop myself from exclaiming "KNEE TO THE FACE!!!" every time I used that ability on mobs, and let's not forget the 'HULK SMASH' animation LOL!!! This class is so much fun to play. Seriously, everyone needs a Brawler for days when you need a good pick me up.
• Lore Master is a very fun and complex class that is rewarding. Just know going in to this class that it is not the kind of class that you just sit back and watch mobs melt. This is a complex class that can do a lot of things at the expense of a lot of attention to detail. This is a powerful class, and can be very fun to play.

I'm not sure if I will go straight in to the next series (Getting Every Class To 30) or do something else for a bit before getting back to it. We will have to see. I know I want to spend some more time on my Brawler and Rune Keeper here soon, so that might be what's next. We will see.

Thanks everyone for coming along with me on my journey in to the world of Middle Earth. The misadventures continue.!

[Pharone]

Lore Master Update:

• Finished Mirkwood Quest lines (except fellowship quests)
• Finished main Mirkwood epic story line ... it was really cool!
• Switched back to Blue spec because I love being a beast master
• Dinged level 70
• Went back to Moria to work on completing all Moria epic story lines

I'm having a really great time on the Lore Master, and seeing as it is now my highest level character, the Lore Master is now my official main character. Yay!

I finished the epic quest lines in Moria on my hunter before, but I was hating that I didn't complete them on my lore master. Therefore, I have gone back to Moria on the lore master to work on completing all epic quest lines in that area as well as finishing up any quest hubs that I didn't finish before on him.

For the most part, I am streaming every night starting at around 8pm (US Central) Monday through Friday, and sporadically all day Saturday and Sunday.

Thanks for the continued love and support from the community. Love you all.!

See you online,
Pharone the Gnome.

[Pharone]

Lore Master update:

• I have gone back and completed all Epic Volume 1 Books up through Book 12
• Currently working on Epic Volume 1 Book 13
• Dinged level 72

Other Characters:

• Deleted my old weaponsmith because he was a duplicate guardian, and I didn't want to level 2 guardians right now
• Guardian - Got Dunsquat (the guardian I am keeping) to level 21
• Guardian - Picked up Weaponsmithing
• Guardian - Got a sword and shield to play around with because my actual favorite playstyle for a tankie character is Sword and Board... 2 Hander kills faster, but man I love the look of sword and board!
• Guardian - Working on quests in Herne over in Cardolan
• Beorning - Dinged level 30 and discovered the awesomeness of "I AM BEAR! SLASH SLASH SLASH... MAHAHA...!!!"
• Beorning - Did a whole lot of Lone Lands content... avoiding main story arch (epic books) because I want to keep that for just my main character (the Lore Master)

This week...

1. I plan to finish up Epic Volume 1 Book 13 on the lore master
2. Level the Guardian to 30
3. Level the Rune Keeper to 30
4. Start on Epic Volume 1 Book 14 on the lore master

Thanks for hanging out with me on Twitch everyone. Love you all.!
Pharone the Gnome

[Pharone]

Lore Master Update:

• Finished all of Epic Volume 1. If you haven't done all of the epic books in Volume 1, go back and do them. The story is great.
• Realized that the one epic volume 2 book quest I still had was an optional quest, and I had already completed that book, so I didn't bother going to finish that optional step
• Began Epic Volume 3... currently in Eregion!

Other Character Updates:

• I got super busy this week in real life, and didn't manage to play the Guardian nor the Rune Keeper *Doh.!*

Plans for the weekend:

• Guardian - going to try to get to level 30
• Lore Master - going to work mroe on Epic Volume 3

See you all in game and on Twitch!
Pharone the Gnome

[Pharone]

Streaming live on Twitch at Twitch.tv/pharone every evening starting around 7pm Central (US).

Lore Master update:

• Got to Enedwaith
• Didn't work on Epic Volume 3 Book 2... sorry

Hunter update:

• Joined the Cooking guild
• Looked at what was involved in doing the daily/weekly Cooking guild writs and was like are you kidding me?! lol

Guardian update:

• Got to level 30
• Completed Before The Shadow (Swanfleet/Cardolan) Epic quest line... Loved it!... Again lol
• Figured out that I have some how missed the continuation of the Luilloth story arch at the end of Cardolan on ALL of my other characters
• Played through the full Luilloth story arch through completion in Southern Old Forest. It... Was... INCREDIBLE!!! 10 out of 10. Make sure not to miss it!
• Completed Guardian level 10 and 30 class quests
• Moved in to Trestlebridge to start quests there next time I load him up

Stream News:

• I have a few polls running right now over on Twitter @PharoneTheGnome. Please go take part in them, so I can get your feedback on what YOU want to see from my stream
• I've been tossing around the idea of doing non-Lotro stuff every so often on my Twitch stream, and last night I ended up doing that for the last hour of my stream
• I ended up downloading a Lord of The Rings action RPG game on my Xbox One, Played a little of the new Gameboy emulator on the Nintendo Switch, and ended the night out playing Hogwarts Legacy on the Playstation 5. Only a couple people stayed on to watch anything after I logged out of Lotro. I get it. No hard feelings of course. I just hope everyone understands that sometimes I want to play other things, but Lotro will always be my main focus on my stream
• I haven't worked on my web site in ages... Its odd that my career is based around web application development, and yet I haven't actually worked on my own web site in years. I'm planning on changing that and recreate it as a hub for everything Pharone the Gnome related. stay tuned for that coming soon(tm)!
• Pharone the Gnome discord server coming ..... soon(tm).

Plans for this week:

1. Lore Master - Work on Epic Volume 3 Book 2
2. Lore Master - Do a bunch of farming to stock my Hunter up with ingredients for cooking
3. Hunter - Knock the dust off, and do some work in Mirkwood as well as continue my cooking stuff
4. Champion - Work some more on Moria content
5. Guardian - Work on North Downs and Lonelands content

Thanks everyone for your continued support. Love you all!
Pharone the Gnome

[Pharone]

Lore Master update:

• Worked some more on Epic volume 3

Hunter update:

• Dusted off the hunter, and headed back to Moria to see if there was anything I missed that I could do
• Quickly realized there really isn't much left in Moria that doesn't require a fellowship or raid
• A level 140 Hunter and 100 Lore Master joined me to do The Grand Stairs instance (thanks both of you!!!) It was a lot of fun, and after that we went and completed two raid events in Moria, so I got to see a raid for the first time in Lotro. I didn't do much on the first raid where we killed a massive giant turtle, and I got one shot at the beginning of the second raid where we killed the monster in the water. Even though I was more of a spectator than a participant for these two raids, it was a lot of fun getting to experience that content. Again, thank you to the two random people that showed up to help me out after I asked in World chat. This is why I keep saying that the majority of people you find playing Lotro are way nicer than other MMORPGs.
• After that, I headed over to Dunland, and began the starter quest for that area
• Dinged level 70 out in Dunland, and worked through a good portion of the content there
• Tried out the Red line on the Hunter again, and once again was like NOPE... NOPE... NOPE! lol. The thing is that my muscle memory is pretty much set with the build I leveled the hunter up with in the first place; the blue spec.

Farmer/Cook update:

• I got the idea of playing a hobbit that is a pacifist that only levels by farming and cooking, and so Flitfo was born.
• Flitfo is a warden that ran in to a little misadventure one night while strolling along a path. He was captured by a Nazgul and swept away to Archet for some reason that he simply didn't care to find out about as he was SCARED OUT OF HIS MIND!!! A friendly hunter happened to be captured there with him, and helped him escape. Along the way of escaping from that prison, he had the unfortunate fate of having to actually use his Warden-training that he never thought he would in real life. He killed evil men in order to help save the town of Archet and make his escape back to the hobbit land he so loves. When he signed up to be a warder early in life, he never truly believed he would ever have to fight anyone. It was just a job to him, and frankly, he was tired of hearing his father complain about him sitting around the house all day eating. The reality of having to take another's life made him see that the way of the spear was not for him. It never was, and it never will be again. So, he vowed on that very day that he would lay down his weapon, and never pick it up again. Instead... he became a farmer and a cook because he quite liked eating... a lot.
• Flitfo has worked his way up to Westemnet Farming and Cooking.
• He joined the Cooking guild, and has been working on gaining reputation among the fine cooks there in.
• Along the way, his farming and cooking has garnered him levels in Warden of 32 so far.

[Pharone]

Stream Update:

• We now have a Discord server setup for use by everyone
• The link to join is https://discord.gg/BhFWqKtBZp
• There are no voice channels as of yet. I may add some at a later date, but I want to avoid issues with bad users for now
• Feel free to jump in the discord and use it for any of your Lotro desires
• I will be checking the discord chat channels daily and through out my streams, so feel free to give me feedback or just say hi anytime!

Guardian update:

• Played a little last night on the guardian. Headed out to Evendim and worked on some quests there.
• Dinged level 32
• I really do enjoy playing this class with the red spec as a solo DPS machine. Bashing mobs with my shield and watching them drool all over themself as I beat them down never gets old!

Brawler update:

• Dusted off my human brawler (level 20) and headed over to The Lone Lands
• I didn't play long because it was the end of the night for my stream, but I had fun running around Hulk Smashing mobs and yelling "KNEE TO THE FACE!"
• This is one of those classes that truly is a blast to play, and it puts a big smile on my face every time

Coming up this week...

• I'm in a ...SQUIRELL!!!... kind of mood this week which means I am probably going to be very random on what I am playing from night to night
• Guardian: quests in Evendim
• Brawler: quests in The Lone Lands
• Hunter: quests in Dunlands
• Lore Master: Epic Volume 3 and quests in Enedwaith
• Everybody: work on Spring Fest and filling up my wardrobe requiring me to spend more and more and more and more money on more slots... dang you wardrobe... DANG YOU!!!! lol

[Pharone]

The Discord server is setup and ready for use. Feel free to hang out there and chat all you want.

You can join the Discord server here.

[Pharone]

So much has happened since my last update on here... I've been busy! lol

My main character has changed .... again
I have decided that I love the play style of the Yellow Champion. There's nothing quite as fun as running in to a large pack of monsters, and swish swishing them to death all in one go. It's ... just ... sooooooooooo satisfying! lol

Champion Updates:

• Attempted to 100% Lone Lands and North Downs to get my virtues caught back up to my level
• Went back to Moria to continue questing and working on the epic books there
• Reached level 60 and used my tortoise pocket item to lock my experience to level 60 until after I finish Moria and Lothlorien
• Completed epic volume 2 books 3, 4, and 5
• Made it out of Moria to Lothlorien and begun work there on driving the orcs back to their holes
• Went back to Moria to start book 6

Stream Updates:

• I've gone back to starting my streams at 7pm Central (US) time
• Will be focusing mainly on the Champion for a long time
• Been posting a lot of updates and screenshots to my Discord server

[Pharone]

Stream Updates 4/11/2023

• I was away from the game on a vacation trip this past weekend, so no streams were done
• There are photos of my trip on my Discord server. Go join our Discord server, and check them out
• Made it back home late yesterday, and did a short stream on Twitch
• Looking forward to getting back to my nightly schedule of streaming on Twitch starting this evening at 7pm central (US)
• Our Discord server is starting to grow and get more active with new players to Lotro on the Gladden server. Come join us, and make new friends
• I still have not had an opportunity to sit down and completely redo my website, but I promise this is coming... soon(tm)... at some point... in the future... probably... definitely.

Champion Updates (from before my vacation)

• Finished up epic books in Moria, Lothlorien, and Mirkwood
• Went through all content in Mirkwood
• Dinged level 65 and re-locked experience
• Gathered the Dunedain, and headed to Enedwaith on our way to meet up with Aragorn
• Currently working through Enedwaith content
• Planning to keep my experience locked at level 65 until I finish Enedwaith and move in to Dunlands

Guardian Updates

• Changed crafting vocation from Weaponsmith to Armorsmith because I felt it would give me more benefit while leveling him up
• Leveled up Armorsmith to rank 4 (I think... can't remember) and ran out of ore lol

Pacifist Hobbit Farmer Updates

• Made another rank in farming
• Made another rank in cooking
• If you are on the Gladden server and need food/drink at any level up to 100 (so far), let me know on my Discord server in the Crafting chat channel. I make tons of food and drink (including coffee), and store it in his personal storage. Selling on the auction house is an act of futility. Just let me know on my discord server if you have any requests, and I will check to see if I have some available to send you.

As always, I love Lotro and all of you. Thank you for hanging out with me nightly over on Twitch and in my Discord server. You all are the best.!

[Pharone]

Live right now! Come join me

[Pharone]

Champion Updates

• Got through the epic story line in Enedwaith
• Enedwaith content was dragging on a bit, so after finishing the epic story line there, I moved on to the Dunlands
• I chose to go the way of the river to the Dunlands which put me at the Stag Clan to start the new area
• Dinged level 66
• Finished up the first quest hub, and moved to the second one
• I'm enjoying Dunlands this time around... probably because I am taking the time to actually pay attention to the quest dialogues

I'm looking forward to checking out the anniversary stuff tonight!

Stream Updates

• I added a couple games to my "off night" rotation for streaming
• Off night rotation - added World of Warcraft Classic Hardcore Mode (if you die, you have to delete the character and start over)
• Off night rotation - added World of Warcraft Live (Area 52 server) to do 10 man raids with some old MMO friends
• Off night rotation - Looking to add EverQuest in order to do something with the game again. I doubt I will play it nearly as much as I used to though

So, what is this Off Night Rotation I mentioned above?

Glad you asked. I have found that if I play one game and only one game every single day, eventually I burn out on that game. There in lies what happened to me recently with Lotro.

I was beginning to burn out on Lotro, and this lead me to not reading quest dialogue, racing through regions to get to the next one, and generally getting really disconnected from the game. I didn't like that feeling at all because I love Lotro.

So... I took a couple days off and played other games (like WoW and EQ mentioned above). It did two things for me.

First, it reminded me just how much better the quests in Lotro are compared to those in WoW. I was starting to think that Lotro had too many quests to do that were not part of the main epic story line. Then when I went back and played WoW some, I realized that WoW (and many other MMOs) have like a hundred times more filler (aka throwaway) quests than Lotro. Even the "filler" quests in Lotro seem less throwaway than those in games like WoW.

The second thing it did for me was allow me to refresh my desire to play Lotro. Taking a short break basically got rid of my Lotro burn out.

That all being said, I learned a valuable lesson; I need to make sure to sprinkle in other games every so often in order to not burn out on my main game (aka Lotro). Therefore, do not be surprised if you login to my stream some nights and see me playing something other than Lotro. It in NO WAY means that I am done with Lotro. Instead, it means that I am doing what is necessary to make sure that for me Lotro never goes away by eliminating the potential for Lotro burn out.

That's it for this weeks update. I hope you all have a great week, and I will see you in game!
Pharone the Gnome.

[Pharone]

Champion Updates:

• Dinged Level 69
• Completed quests in Galtrev
• Began working on quests for the Falcon Clan in Tal Methedras
• Took some time away from questing to go work on the Anniversary event and got the fireworks goat mount

Goals This Week:

• Champion - Reach level 70 and turn off my experience gain
• Champion - Obtain enough Anniversary coins to buy the Spark Maker's Pack and the fireworks horse mount
• Champion - Finish Tal Methedras, Starkmoor, and Dunbog quest hubs
• Pacifist Hobbit Farmer - Obtain enough Anniversary coins to buy the Happy Pig pet
• Pacifist Hobbit Farmer - Get my daily 10 fishing skill ups
• Guardian - Work on some more completionist goals in Eriador

Current Streaming Schedule

DAY	START	END	GAMES
Monday	9pm	11pm	Lord of The Rings Online
Tuesday	9pm	11pm	Lord of The Rings Online
Wednesday	9pm	11pm	World of Warcraft Classic Hardcore
Thursday	9pm	11pm	Lord of The Rings Online
Friday	9pm	Late	Random
Saturday	random	random	Lord of The Rings Online
Sunday	random	random	Random

[Pharone]

Champion Updates:

• Dinged Level 70
• Completed quests in Tal Methedras (Dunland)
• Completed quests in Starkmoor (Dunland)
• Completed most quests in Tal Dunbog (Dunland)
• Just picked up the quests in South West corner of Dunbog. Assuming Dunbog quests are almost done.

Goals From Last Week:

• Champion - Reach level 70 and turn off my experience gain - Success
• Champion - Obtain enough Anniversary coins to buy the Spark Maker's Pack and the fireworks horse mount - Success (Spark Maker's Pack)
• Champion - Finish Tal Methedras, Starkmoor, and Dunbog quest hubs - Success
• Pacifist Hobbit Farmer - Obtain enough Anniversary coins to buy the Happy Pig pet - Failed
• Pacifist Hobbit Farmer - Get my daily 10 fishing skill ups - Failed
• Guardian - Work on some more completionist goals in Eriador - Failed

Goals This Week:

• Champion - Obtain enough Anniversary coins to buy the fireworks horse mount
• Champion - Finish Carreglum and Gravewood quest hubs (Dunland)
• Pacifist Hobbit Farmer - Obtain enough Anniversary coins to buy the Happy Pig pet
• Pacifist Hobbit Farmer - Get my daily 10 fishing skill ups

Current Streaming Schedule

DAY	START	END	GAMES
Monday	9pm	11pm	Lord of The Rings Online
Tuesday	9pm	11pm	Lord of The Rings Online
Wednesday	9pm	11pm	World of Warcraft Classic Hardcore
Thursday	9pm	11pm	Lord of The Rings Online
Friday	9pm	Late	Random
Saturday	random	random	Random
Sunday	random	random	Random