Thread: Soldiers on the landscape

I'm very excited to hear about Riders of Rohan! This all sounds great, but this skirmish soldier thing gives me some pause.

If skirmish soldiers remain as stupid as they are now, I'm worried, because I suspect difficulty will have to be "scaled" to expect the presence of a soldier, so his presence may become near-mandatory while soloing.

Put as charitably as I can think, skirmish soldiers would not win a contest for "best engineered feature of LoTRO." It seems that much of the time they get stuck behind an ankle-high box or a branch or twig or something. On the rare occasions where they aren't stuck, they often standing around stupidly admiring the landscape while I'm barely surviving, wondering why the hell "direct soldier" is on a minute-long cooldown.

When he finally deigns to move his steatopygiac rear and actually try to help, his "skills" are sometimes very disruptive. Some squishy classes live and die through the application of timely abilities to temporarily remove adversaries from a fight. I have on sometimes died because my imbecile soldier ruined a crucial lore master mez or root, hunter trap or fear, burglar sneak-attacks and riddles, mini fear, etc. "Ooo good work on that mass root, boss! Let me just run right up to the lot of them and do my AoE melee attack here. No need to thank me, really."

So, to make that a bit more abstract: many classes have "cool" abilities (LMs and burgs especially), but pay for this coolness since these abilities are somewhat delicate and require some degree of finesse, thought, and consideration. The skirmish soldier is, in contrast, totally incapable of thought and consideration, or the appreciation of any broader plan beyond "immediately run straight at the enemy and start wacking." (At best it's practice for being in a fellowship with a terrible player.) So, he sort of dilutes the enjoyment of LoTRO's most interesting classes while playing skirmishes, and spreading that dilution to the rest of the game doesn't seem positive.

Now, I sort of suffer through the idiocy of my skirmish soldier because he's confined to skirmishes which are, for me, a small portion of the experience. It's sort of like how I can stand to watch Sesame Street with my kid because Elmo's World takes up "only" the last fifteen minutes. I'd have to stop our watching if the red menace took over the entire hour (with ten minute long Mr. Noodle segments -- shudder)... her plaintive cries of "Elmo? Elmo?! Elmo!!" notwithstanding.

If things are still soloable without skirmish soldiers, I'm less concerned. But I'm finding it hard to imagine how that would work without skirmish soldiers simply turning things into ezmode. (Edit: Hmm, unless it's just a TP cost usage skill as others just said... which given the direction of the game, would not surprise me at all.)

Great news! I've been asking for this basically since Mirkwood came out.

I doubt they will re-balance it - bear in mind, while something might be "EZ Mode" for those of you with top end gear and the like, the game is actually pretty hard compared to others, at least once you get up into Moria.

Yes, it might come as a shock to many of you, but it's true. LOTRO was originally a very old school game (albeit not a sandbox) and thus had a very high difficulty level and silly restrictions. The F2P switch removed some of the sillier restrictions (the horse at level 35 most notably) but the difficulty stayed intact, and indeed, as the gap because the top end gear and gear obtained just doing PVE grew, the game grew harder.

For instance, at 65, mobs in Enedwaith have more morale than my champ does. By comparison, at early levels, he had 4-5x as much morale.

And lets not forget the treadmill that is LIs. If you don't do it, you won't be doing much DPS at high levels, much less improving your skills. This reduces the reliance upon having to grind those out (then you'll now also have to grind up your horsie...)

I truely hope we won't be able to summon there everywhere.
And please, not for marks or TP each time ( one time mark investment would be okay if it's a skill you need to buy)
And please don't balance it in a way that you NEED them all the time for everything. Not everybody likes a pet.


How about the way soldiers work in the homesteads.
You can only summon him in a certain area ( your house)
They could allocate such places in the landscape, with something apprearing on your screen when you can summon him ( so you wont have to check the summon soldier skill all the time)

We will see in a few months.

Originally Posted by Fortinobrand

I see three things --

1 -- hopefully this means we won't be getting inane cosmetic pets after all.

2 -- you think the latest hub is laggy now? Just wait...

3 -- fellowship -- already a dying concept -- is done. This is a video game up to end-level, then a bit of fellow/raid.

My my, aren't you the cheery one. I bet you're the type that just goes around and kills every critter you find, for being guilty of being "inane". lol

Originally Posted by Adanamir

Ok, a few things here: in SWTOR, your companions are indispensable for everything but group content, because the quests are designed in such a way. One of their developers said that companions were expected to deal about 40% of combined DPS, which is actually quite a lot. What this means for LOTRO? Well, you either will have to redesign content from level 20 on, or it will become really easy to reach level cap.

On the bright side, this will help non-DPS classes to practice at least a little bit their more specific roles, especially healers and tanks. Even if they don't do very hard content, healers with have to deal with threat generation, while tanks will have to learn how to pull mobs and keep threat. I only hope that skirmish soldiers will become more customizale, so that it will matter what you do.

Besides, Captains will really feel like such even when soloing, commanding a small fellowship all the time

Well, remember, they did say they wanted to help speed up leveling for the lower levels, so they can join everybody else. That was kinda the reason for the store armour debacle, and you have to admit, this would certainly do the job as well.

I really hope playing with a skirmish soldier doesn't become mandatory. I have a profound hatred against my soldier as he never quite seem to "get" it, is always too late, stands next to mobs without doing anything, in other words is so useless I would love to be able to fire him. On top of that, I play a loremaster who already has a pet, and I don't want to be forced to run around with a pet on my other characters as well.

Originally Posted by Lyzau

I really hope playing with a skirmish soldier doesn't become mandatory. I have a profound hatred against my soldier as he never quite seem to "get" it, is always too late, stands next to mobs without doing anything, in other words is so useless I would love to be able to fire him. On top of that, I play a loremaster who already has a pet, and I don't want to be forced to run around with a pet on my other characters as well.

There's a reason my Hunter's tank soldier is named "DoingItWrong"

Captains and LM's know how much better the Soldiers could be if you could control them. This seems like a lot of work, but it really isn't. Set the basic aggression level (never attacks, attacks if you attack/are attacked, attack on sight), set if pet attacks the same target, attack wait and follow. Controlling the "skills" the pet has can be left automatic, they don't make a such impact in normal questing. Pets miraculously do NOT attack dazed targets like players unless told so, making them a bit smarter than us.

All this is more micromanaging though, I can see why Soldiers only have summon and direct buttons. Removing the cooldown of Direct would make a big impact on how well Soldiers perform the way we want to. Burgs could really use a "wait here" button sometimes for Soldier.. groan...

Skirmishes are (used to be) optional, and maxing a Soldier does require you to do the same instances repeatedly. Thankfully there are now a lot new ones for high levels (who have finished the right epic quests). But it is still a lot of same stuff, same places. IF soldiers gain experience from PvE combat like the player... how would that work... no idea. More to do anyway, hope they find more fun ways to improve your Soldier.

I'm all for it. If it works.

If it doesn't. I'll be here whining and moaning with the rest of you!

wow, swtor is out for a month and they already start to copy its core-systems, nice ...

I dont see this happening if they not start to minimize population on the individual
layers of the areas (like in swtor)

and well, 9 month ... ? ... if this game still exists in 9 month, ok

but if they arnt afraid about making it over the next 9month, why anonce
this expansion so early ... ?


greetz

Originally Posted by hitomo_x3

but if they arnt afraid about making it over the next 9month, why anonce
this expansion so early ... ?

huh? rise of isengard was announced november 2010
i'm not worried about the existence of lotro until that time... ToR obviously isn't going to change anything about that either

For the use of skirmish soldiers in the landscape to be anywhere near as good as the SWTOR companions they will have to do a number of things.

1. Vastly improve the AI of the soldiers, the companions in SW have far superior AI in combat.
2. Totally change how leveling up soldiers works, in SW they automatically level with you.
3. Make soldiers able to wear gear like the companions in SW, gearing up your companion is what keeps them viable, you have low level gear on them, they suck. You have on level gear on them and they are very useful. As a byproduct you companion ends up developing a look that changes over time.
4. Provide far more control over the soldiers by allowing the AI use of each of their individual abilities to be toggled on and off.

If they just make the same old skirmish soldiers useable in the landscape it will just be a case of rushing out something to be able to say, "we have something just like that". It will not address the ongoing problems and weaknesses of the soldiers and their awful AI.

Overall, the companions in SWTOR are far superior in their implementation than the Captain minions or the LM pets, much less the skirmish soldiers.

They don't need to be as "good" as in Swtor. They are a way too op....They replace a player and that's too much. I just want to give them instructions like a LM pet that would be enough.

Originally Posted by Rothan117

Overall, the companions in SWTOR are far superior in their implementation than the Captain minions or the LM pets, much less the skirmish soldiers.

"stronger" doesn't equate to "superior AI"
and that's all they are

companions in ToR are just as dumb as heralds/LM pets in lotro

the only real difference is the option to let them wear gear and skirmish soldiers already have a similar mechanic

Originally Posted by Lilka

"With the landscape, we're going to be doing a new feature of soldiers on landscape," Kate explained, "so your skirmish soldier, which right now can only be summoned within the skirmish system, is now going to be accessible on the landscape."

Discuss.

Could this lead to AFK-mob killing? A form of legalised botting? AFK-Players camping out with their soldiers killing all in sight?

I'm assuming that Rohan is going to be a battlefield of sorts. Wandering and roaming brigades of Mobs that will gobble up any afk boting that goes on.

I think it would be awesome if these mobs roam the zone and if aren't dispatched, camp out somewhere to spawn bigger baddies and so on and so on. An organic form of mob spawn.

And lotro isn't coping anything from ToR. Actually I WANT ToR to cop LOTRO and the cosmetic system entirely.

Originally Posted by Lilka

Could this lead to AFK-mob killing? A form of legalised botting? AFK-Players camping out with their soldiers killing all in sight?

No .

In any case, who cares, there are already bots for this game if you're inclined to cheat?

I love this idea, I enjoy playing with my NPC fellow in FFXI where they can be really useful, although they only have a limited time per day.

Well right now, undergeared players (typically squishies) have been complaining about being unable to take out tough sigs with adds.

This could help them out. And would make some of the lesser used classes such as the Protector more useful.

I mean compare it this way.

Soldier options
Minstrel, Could use a tank or some melee dps.
Skirmish: Power herbalist
Landscape: Protector (WS), Warrior (Heal)

Captain, Could use some melee/ranged dps or some healing for himself.
Skirmish: Power herbalist, Archer
Landscape: Warrior, Archer, Herbalist.

Loremaster, Could use some tanking to replace the bear, or more dps, or buffs for bear.
Skirmish: Herbalist, Archer,
Landscape: Protector, Archer, Warrior, Bannerguard.

Burgler, Could use a tank.
Skirmish: Herbalist
Landscape: Protector

Champion, Could use some more Melee DPS, or a healer.
Skirmish: Herbalist
Landscape: Warrior

Hunter, Could use a tank, or some ranged DPS, or a CC option.
Skirmish: Protector, Herbalist.
Landscape: Archer, Sage.

Warden, Could use some Melee DPS, or a buffer/debuffer.
Skirmish: ?
Landscape: Sage, Warrior, Bannerman.

Runekeeper, Could use some CC or a tank.
Skirmish: Power Herbalist
Landscape: Sage, Protector

Basically due to the fast pace of combat, Skirmish Soldiers are mainly focused on healing or adding damage. Since people want the most Skirmish marks per hour.

In landscape content, the goal is more not to die, and to make things easier. In landscape, it is possible to overpull, while in skirmishes, the skirmish is designed so you cant overpull at T1.

So I think this will shine a new light on Skirmish soldiers.

Originally Posted by ararax2

Well right now, undergeared players (typically squishies) have been complaining about being unable to take out tough sigs with adds.

This could help them out. And would make some of the lesser used classes such as the Protector more useful.

I mean compare it this way.

Soldier options
Minstrel, Could use a tank or some melee dps.
Skirmish: Power herbalist
Landscape: Protector (WS), Warrior (Heal)

Captain, Could use some melee/ranged dps or some healing for himself.
Skirmish: Power herbalist, Archer
Landscape: Warrior, Archer, Herbalist.

Loremaster, Could use some tanking to replace the bear, or more dps, or buffs for bear.
Skirmish: Herbalist, Archer,
Landscape: Protector, Archer, Warrior, Bannerguard.

Burgler, Could use a tank.
Skirmish: Herbalist
Landscape: Protector

Champion, Could use some more Melee DPS, or a healer.
Skirmish: Herbalist
Landscape: Warrior

Hunter, Could use a tank, or some ranged DPS, or a CC option.
Skirmish: Protector, Herbalist.
Landscape: Archer, Sage.

Warden, Could use some Melee DPS, or a buffer/debuffer.
Skirmish: ?
Landscape: Sage, Warrior, Bannerman.

Runekeeper, Could use some CC or a tank.
Skirmish: Power Herbalist
Landscape: Sage, Protector

Basically due to the fast pace of combat, Skirmish Soldiers are mainly focused on healing or adding damage. Since people want the most Skirmish marks per hour.

In landscape content, the goal is more not to die, and to make things easier. In landscape, it is possible to overpull, while in skirmishes, the skirmish is designed so you cant overpull at T1.

So I think this will shine a new light on Skirmish soldiers.

Bias against Guardians?

All the same, good points.

Actually, I don't like this idea. I understand the point to make game easier for some players, but where is the spirit of MMO then? If I am unable to do some task in the game, I simply ask anyone for help and situation solved (fortunately, there is very helpful community at Laurelin). Or I simply investigate what I am doing wrong and I will do that right, it's some kind of challenge.

Second thing is - where is the world atmosphere? Will it mean that there will be tons of brainless dummies running around?

I will rather die 10 times on one pull while questing than summon herbalist to heal me!

Dont need stupid skirmish soldier to help me level.
And i rly think it will lag the game in some areas (galtrev) even more when you have ppl running around with their soldiers.
They were called SKIRMISH SOLDIERS, keep em there!

Originally Posted by hitomo_x3

wow, swtor is out for a month and they already start to copy its core-systems, nice ...

Yeah right ... That's like saying every mmorpg ever made is just a copy of WoW.


I must confess: I'm not a fan of this idea at all.

The lag in 21st Hall 'was' bad, the lag in dunland 'is' bad and with every character having a pet following them, the lag will just explode. And if you think you're having no problems with lag: Just imagine 12 people, one eagle and 12 herbalits in Vile Maw ...
Soldier AI is also god awful! With his ultimate skill equiped, my warrior charges into battle while I'm just preparing to pull a group of mobs.


On second thought I must confess that playing lotro would now be a bit like playing Neverwinter Nights (if that name rings a bell) where you hired a henchmen to aid you in battle (although everyone I know picked the burg since he was the only one who could open chests and disarm traps)

Originally Posted by hitomo_x3

wow, swtor is out for a month and they already start to copy its core-systems, nice ...

LOTRO has had skirmish soldiers long before TOR ever came out. The only thing you could possibly say they're "copying" is that they're going to let you have them with you for the "outdoor" content which still isn't even anything TOR came up with. There are other MMOs that let you bring NPCs with you, such as DDO and Guild Wars. As far as I can tell, the only thing that really sets TOR's companions apart is the conversation system.

Putting soldiers on the map seems like a terrible idea for two reasons:

As a hunter, my skirmish soldier rarely gets involved in any battle. I have tried every type of soldier. Herbalists are useful, but the rest hang back with me at range, unless I blow the horn to send them after a specific foe. Basically, if your primary form of attack is ranged combat, they're almost useless.

They also have a nasty habit of running in crazy directions over uneven landscape and bringing in random foes from elsewhere.


The second, primary reason is this: I don't enjoy skirmishes. I outfitted a soldier on ONE character. I don't want to have to grind soldier upgrades on all of them. If the higher level quests are designed with the assumption that you'll have a soldier with you, I won't be able to solo anymore, because I'm not going to have one with me. At least, not one with any training.

Originally Posted by Eluros

Bias against Guardians?

All the same, good points.

Doh! Knew I forgot someone!

I'm not sure if I like this idea. I like skirmish soldiers in skirmishes but I'm afraid that on landscape they might be a hinderance. They seem to have problems with navigation, especially in elevation changes, and they sometmes get stuck behind objects. They also curtail my burgle skill by attacking before I get a chance to use this skill. Lastly, how would they work if we are on our war horses? and wouldn't they add to server load causing frame rate problems and maybe crashing.

expectation:
INFINITE POWER!!!!!!!!

reality:

I can't help but have a horribly disgusted feeling about this... Captains have heralds because it changes gameplay, allows shield brother without a fellow, etc. Loremaster has pets because they rely on them for many things. Add a skirm soldier to that, or to any class, and what do you get? EASY MODE.. Skirmish soldiers do not ever need to be summoned outside of skirmish zones.. ever.

I can't even think of a rational idea of implementing this other than making everything challenge-less for people that don't actually want to play.

Please do not turn this game into easy mode..

Skirmish soldiers are called skirmish soldiers for a reason. You're removing some of the uniqueness of the captain class by giving everyone a pet, and turning them into nuke mode if you give them a herald AND a soldier at the same time.

As others have stated, crowd clutter/lag/mob camping/easy mode..

Anybody have any positive points about this other than "it will make things easy?"

A lot of good/interesting points here - particularly the suggestions for how to make this as painless as possible. Nevertheless, I can't get past the basic problem: If I wanted to have universal pets, I would have played a different game. Or, more precisely, I probably wouldn't have left my last F2P game which long ago recognized that omni-present pets were a great opportunity to sell even more stuff to the min/max (end-game raider) crowd in the store. Count me as not wanting this and highly suspicious of it.

Originally Posted by XinaLotRO

Putting soldiers on the map seems like a terrible idea for two reasons:

As a hunter, my skirmish soldier rarely gets involved in any battle. I have tried every type of soldier. Herbalists are useful, but the rest hang back with me at range, unless I blow the horn to send them after a specific foe. Basically, if your primary form of attack is ranged combat, they're almost useless.

They also have a nasty habit of running in crazy directions over uneven landscape and bringing in random foes from elsewhere.


The second, primary reason is this: I don't enjoy skirmishes. I outfitted a soldier on ONE character. I don't want to have to grind soldier upgrades on all of them. If the higher level quests are designed with the assumption that you'll have a soldier with you, I won't be able to solo anymore, because I'm not going to have one with me. At least, not one with any training.

No one is forcing you to use them.

Originally Posted by Gilriar

I can't help but have a horribly disgusted feeling about this... Captains have heralds because it changes gameplay, allows shield brother without a fellow, etc. Loremaster has pets because they rely on them for many things. Add a skirm soldier to that, or to any class, and what do you get? EASY MODE.. Skirmish soldiers do not ever need to be summoned outside of skirmish zones.. ever.

I can't even think of a rational idea of implementing this other than making everything challenge-less for people that don't actually want to play.

Please do not turn this game into easy mode..

Skirmish soldiers are called skirmish soldiers for a reason. You're removing some of the uniqueness of the captain class by giving everyone a pet, and turning them into nuke mode if you give them a herald AND a soldier at the same time.

As others have stated, crowd clutter/lag/mob camping/easy mode..

Anybody have any positive points about this other than "it will make things easy?"

Who cares if someone chooses to play easy mode. It doesn't directly affect you. I'm sure Turbine as taken crowd clutter and lag into consideration.

I think it stems from the whole "dynamic' landscape theyre going to be implementing. Although it has been discussed and announced it was sort of veiled inthe release. But I think these roving warbands they spoke of are going to be akin to rift invasion from the game Rift, I assume more than half the people playing Lotro played thatgame so theyre at least familiar. So having some help on the landscape will help with that. I highly doubt Lotro will be implementing public grouping, although they probably should. So I think this is their compromise to keep it their own little turbine spin on it.

as I have said this game would be a lot better if it incorporated things from other games. But Turbine has gone well out of their way to make sure the things in it can be associated with them (turbine) as much as possible. iMO them making the game a better experience would serve a much bigger purpose. Public grouping does work, the only downside is the lag and performance issues. Something this game has aplenty. Anyone who has played in the Moors knows this. So maybe it is Turbine want to keep this from rearing its head in the open world and thus isnt keen on having pubic groups.

But open world encounters used to be a staple of the MMO genre, now theyre all but non existent.Mostly because developers weened then out and thus 'trained' players to either ignore them or find them not worth the effort.

You don't feel a champion with a pocket healer and power provider is a bit over the top in terms of OP? Do we get to keep the personal skirmish bonuses as well?

Originally Posted by XinaLotRO

Putting soldiers on the map seems like a terrible idea for two reasons:

As a hunter, my skirmish soldier rarely gets involved in any battle. I have tried every type of soldier. Herbalists are useful, but the rest hang back with me at range, unless I blow the horn to send them after a specific foe. Basically, if your primary form of attack is ranged combat, they're almost useless.

They also have a nasty habit of running in crazy directions over uneven landscape and bringing in random foes from elsewhere.

I might be wrong but I would attribute those issues to the way skirmishes are designed - i.e. differently from actual landscape (and the soldiers AI has to take that into account). Heralds on landscape don't have those issues, I don't think soldiers will.

They'll probably design future solo content around having soldiers. In SWToR, the content is designed in such a way that you pretty much need your companions.

I love the idea of my skirmish soldier coming out to play. My wife and I duo a lot and having our skirmish soldiers out will just make it more fun.

I tried TOR, quite liked the companions running around with me and just kept wishing I was doing it in LotRO instead (Quit TOR after about 2 weeks as I got a bit bored and there were no Hobbits *grins*)

We both enjoy skirmishes, so no problem 'levelling a soldier' - they're all already above our own levels...

Originally Posted by Traur

You don't feel a champion with a pocket healer and power provider is a bit over the top in terms of OP? Do we get to keep the personal skirmish bonuses as well?

OP relative to what? Soldiers certainly aren't OP in skirmishes.

We don't know anything about this feature other than that it's coming. We don't know if you have to reach a certain level to use it, we don't know if it takes any trait slots, we don't know if it costs any type of currency, we don't know if the soldier is out for a limited duration, and we don't know if the ability to summon the soldier is on a cooldown. It could have any of these things, which would make it something you pull out when you're doing a quest you can't get through on your own and there's no one around to group with.

Originally Posted by Ehra

OP relative to what? Soldiers certainly aren't OP in skirmishes.

We don't know anything about this feature other than that it's coming. We don't know if you have to reach a certain level to use it, we don't know if it takes any trait slots, we don't know if it costs any type of currency, we don't know if the soldier is out for a limited duration, and we don't know if the ability to summon the soldier is on a cooldown. It could have any of these things, which would make it something you pull out when you're doing a quest you can't get through on your own and there's no one around to group with.

Not OP in skirmishes? how many classes can clear a skirmish in 8 minutes (to be honest you can probably do Dannen faster with a sage and if you don't do counterattacks) - but 8 minutes is very doable with survivor bonus marks for defeating counter attacks.

In skirm raids I never use power potions or heal potions, I only ever get healed by other players when I am pulling aggro because I can keep cycling my dps meaning I routinely pull aggro off tanks. I only summon my soldier once during skirms, so CD is not going to be much of a problem - it takes a hell of a healer to draw aggro from a dps champ. I would give up all my racials, 2 legendary traits, a couple of virtues and at least 2 class traits to have my healer with me in PvE since I wouldn't need to slot second wind.

I am assuming this feature will only be available in the new content so you would need level 72 to get it - which is frankly not much of a problem.

So what you're saying is that Champions should be nerfed?

I am anxoius to see how this works out. I can't wait for Update 6 to hit Bullroarer.

I disagree with what some people have said about SWTOR companion upgrading. I HATED having to upgrade my companion in SWTOR. I had to make/buy gear for myself, my ship (assuming you wanted to do space missions), and my companion(s). I geared my main two companions (my healer and my tank). It was cool they got new skills automatically as I leveled up but it was not cool having to hit the GTN every few levels to get new gear for them. Some stuff you got as quest rewards but only for one companion so I had to gear the other myself.

I like LOTRO's soldier trait system. I'd like it even more if some basic traits were built into the class role rather than being a class trait. Consolidate armor rating, block, parry, evade, crit rating, etc into bonuses obtained when you rank up the role. It would also be nice to get new cosmetics for our soldiers. I don't know if it's an animation issue but I'd LOVE to see new character models for soldier's. Rohirrim and Dunlanding NPC's look much improved over Eriador NPC's in my opinion. Even the NPC's in the Eyes and Guard Tavern look better than our soldier's so Soldier 2.0 would be much appreciated. But I don't know how much time and resources Turbine put into this change so I guess only time will tell what we get.

I'm sure Captain's will get a Rohirrim herald in the expanion this fall. It would be cool to get a Rohirrim cosmetic for man skirm soldier's. Wishful thinking at this point.

Although I'm waiting to hear more details about this change, I'm really not impressed.

I dislike skirmishing in this game mainly because the AI for soldiers is so horrible, as many have already mentioned. The lack of control we have is just sad and irritating all at once.

Now, if the soldiers were even a sixteenth as well developed as heroes in Guild Wars, perhaps I would be excited about the possibility of using my solider. (A girl can hope.)

The other thing I will really dislike about this is if the green ground marker under the soldiers cannot be shut off via our graphics options. Both as a roleplayer and someone who likes making and viewing screen shots, those markers are a disaster in most cases. (Lore breaking disco vids not included, of course--then they can be awesome. *grins*)

So, I'm not very hopeful about this...but I am eager to hear details that will make me feel better about the idea.

Number one, for those that say a skirmish soldier makes you OP in the landscape, I would ask you why does that matter and I would ask if you were aware of just how many OP people are running around the landscape currently. The landscape is not hard to run around in. If you can successfully run an instance, you're OP for the landscape. If you're level 75, you're OP for about 95% of the existing landscape as it is. And as I said, why does this matter? What exactly does being OP in the landscape get you? OMG you can do quests faster and kill mobs that drop no meaningful loot! The horror!

As for the AI issue, I have never had my soldier bug out as far as I can remember except for currently in Thievery and Mischief where it had never happened before. I all other instances and past versions of Thievery and Mischief, the soldier worked just fine. Those situations where the soldier won't attack certain lieutenants (until directed to) is intentionally coded in so they don't beat on the zealot of pain and buff all the other mobs. As there are no lieutenants in the landscape that issue won't even come into play anyway. Most of all, if you really don't like the AI, then don't use the soldier. There is nothing significant to gain by doing so anyway. It'll be a convenience thing for those that want to use it and at best you might level up slightly faster if you're not at the cap already.

The lag issue is certainly a fair concern to raise. Even if Turbine takes measure on their end to compensate for the increased load, people with slower computers or internet connections would still be affected. Even so I would say on the whole that I don't object to this as an idea but we have yet to see all the details on it.