Thread: Update 7 teasers required!

Originally Posted by Louvre

Are we there yet ?

Can I have bullroarer today pretty please ?

<3

MEWANTMEWANT, pretty please Sapience ? You'll get a /hug

Originally Posted by wikjif

The thing is that those hateful people have been running devs off the forums for years. About the only one that seems to be resilient to that effect is Orion while some of the other previous class devs probably have a total of 0 posts to their names.

Yet people cant understand why Turbine doesn't communicate more on the forums- get a clue people!

Originally Posted by wikjif

The thing is that those hateful people have been running devs off the forums for years. About the only one that seems to be resilient to that effect is Orion while some of the other previous class devs probably have a total of 0 posts to their names.

Originally Posted by Eartholloth

Yet people cant understand why Turbine doesn't communicate more on the forums- get a clue people!

In gaming communities, hysteria is always rife. But: information needs no discussion. All these devs that are supposedly "run off the forum" can still release vital information without engaging in discussions; lorebook or dev diaries for example. In fact, engaging in the forums is not a good way to inform at all.

For example, there are several posts by Graalx2 that have major importance, or describe changed mechanics, or describe mechanics of relevance to all players, buried somewhere in player-made class discussion thread. While it is nice and helpful that he does it, these major things should be made available more publicly. As it is, to understand everything going on in a simple fight you have to grab your information together piecemeal and then some.

As an interesting side note, both Orion and GraalX2 not only release fuzzy cute information. They also tell people why they CANT have what they want, why things are the way they are and not "better". And BECAUSE of that, these two are probably the most respected devs and you´ll rarely encounter the aforementioned hysteric gamer in their discussions.

Or consider something different: Turbine received much criticism for their decision to ship U5 with 3x3mans and a 6man that can be done faster than all of the former. Now, U6 came with another, challenging-in-comparison instance - and noone knew it! 11 Developer diaries concerning U6 and not a single peep about Roots of Fangorn. Even if they wanted to keep this a happy surprise... it makes no sense from a publicitiy Point of view not to give at least some official info after-the-fact. But no, Turbine releases U6 with big posters for "Soldier on the landscape" while it was quite obvious that their chosen way to implement it (which I dont disagree with) would draw considerable ire. (On that note, the soldiers have different abilities on the landscape than they have in skirmishes, which is undocumented as well AFAIK).

Lastly, even at the risk of exposing themselves to the "hysteric gamer", there is a business relationship here, and hence accountability. Just look at the issue with tooltips. Numerous tooltips and skill descriptions are outdated or incorrect, and some have been for years. Its even worse in the french and german clients, where whole classes are more or less broken to unplayability for over 7 months now! Because Turbine apparently cant get a bilingual intern to sit down for an afternoon and properly translate those.

These are problems that should be fixed with changing a few lines of text, and yet Turbines reaction was complete denial at first and then "Oh, how curious, please file a bug report in the rare cases of encountering an error".* It is mindboggling how easily this company dismissed this playerbase and the potential revenue from them.

Bottom line is: apparently the relevant managers at T. think it is good business to shroud the game in mystery and keep their customers in the dark about many important aspects, or let the customers figure out their pastime for themselves.

*in case there ARE considerable technical difficulties changing these lines of text: they can still own up to that .

I think it is great that more content is being added before the next expansion. The game sorely needs it. I even like that no hint of what it is to be is made, as this makes it more exciting when it goes live. I do hope more fellowship content is part of it. I find fellowship content lacking in this game in general. This is further compounded by the level cap increases which make the old fellow instances obsolete to those of us who prefer to do them on level. I also hope that work on the bugs is not stopped in the process of this update. I look forward with anticipation.

Originally Posted by Vandervahn

In gaming communities, hysteria is always rife. But: information needs no discussion. All these devs that are supposedly "run off the forum" can still release vital information without engaging in discussions; lorebook or dev diaries for example. In fact, engaging in the forums is not a good way to inform at all.

For example, there are several posts by Graalx2 that have major importance, or describe changed mechanics, or describe mechanics of relevance to all players, buried somewhere in player-made class discussion thread. While it is nice and helpful that he does it, these major things should be made available more publicly. As it is, to understand everything going on in a simple fight you have to grab your information together piecemeal and then some.

As an interesting side note, both Orion and GraalX2 not only release fuzzy cute information. They also tell people why they CANT have what they want, why things are the way they are and not "better". And BECAUSE of that, these two are probably the most respected devs and you´ll rarely encounter the aforementioned hysteric gamer in their discussions.

Or consider something different: Turbine received much criticism for their decision to ship U5 with 3x3mans and a 6man that can be done faster than all of the former. Now, U6 came with another, challenging-in-comparison instance - and noone knew it! 11 Developer diaries concerning U6 and not a single peep about Roots of Fangorn. Even if they wanted to keep this a happy surprise... it makes no sense from a publicitiy Point of view not to give at least some official info after-the-fact. But no, Turbine releases U6 with big posters for "Soldier on the landscape" while it was quite obvious that their chosen way to implement it (which I dont disagree with) would draw considerable ire. (On that note, the soldiers have different abilities on the landscape than they have in skirmishes, which is undocumented as well AFAIK).

Lastly, even at the risk of exposing themselves to the "hysteric gamer", there is a business relationship here, and hence accountability. Just look at the issue with tooltips. Numerous tooltips and skill descriptions are outdated or incorrect, and some have been for years. Its even worse in the french and german clients, where whole classes are more or less broken to unplayability for over 7 months now! Because Turbine apparently cant get a bilingual intern to sit down for an afternoon and properly translate those.

These are problems that should be fixed with changing a few lines of text, and yet Turbines reaction was complete denial at first and then "Oh, how curious, please file a bug report in the rare cases of encountering an error".* It is mindboggling how easily this company dismissed this playerbase and the potential revenue from them.

Bottom line is: apparently the relevant managers at T. think it is good business to shroud the game in mystery and keep their customers in the dark about many important aspects, or let the customers figure out their pastime for themselves.

*in case there ARE considerable technical difficulties changing these lines of text: they can still own up to that .

I pretty much agree with this, I have a ton of respect for the developers of this game, but that does not mean that I want 0 Information from them. I hope that ZC will do a good job with the Hunter updates, and that there is one soon, for the sanity of the Hunters. Honestly, I hope that this odd trend of 'revamping' the classes that has been going on over the past year (some just because they could, but Ward obviously because it was needed) will continue to all the classes(some obviously only need a Champ/RK style revamp or even less) because every class would like to see some improvements, especially with all the changes that have happened.

As a semi side note, in no way is the hunter community the only one that gets upset at their dev for not posting. Right after RoI hit there were several threads on the Guard forum berating Graalx2 for never posting in the forum. Honestly both sides need to be more vocal, both the Devs and the not ranty people on the forums(though they do not need to argue with the ranty posters, just drown them out with posts that are more constructive than asking for ZC's removal as dev or the like).

Originally Posted by Witch0King

The bullroarer thingy which Sapience told us bout, is that for U7 or Fornost itself? [...]

Sapience said Bullroarer would have U7 and that Fornost was a part of that.

Originally Posted by JBomber

[...]Honestly, I hope that this odd trend of 'revamping' the classes that has been going on over the past year (some just because they could, but Ward obviously because it was needed) will continue to all the classes(some obviously only need a Champ/RK style revamp or even less) because every class would like to see some improvements, especially with all the changes that have happened.

The 'revamping' that they are doing now are fairly reminiscent of the "Month of" changes that they gave to all of the classes during SoA which would mean that they are most likely going to do them all or else they will end up with the classes that don't get it being left behind and that does include Monster Players.

Originally Posted by JBomber

As a semi side note, in no way is the hunter community the only one that gets upset at their dev for not posting. Right after RoI hit there were several threads on the Guard forum berating Graalx2 for never posting in the forum. Honestly both sides need to be more vocal, both the Devs and the not ranty people on the forums(though they do not need to argue with the ranty posters, just drown them out with posts that are more constructive than asking for ZC's removal as dev or the like).

This is correct in that it has been happening since probably around the middle of SoA, if not earlier, and only got worse during the MoM beta and after. In fact I can think of at least 3 devs during MoM that got really bad treatment one of which was so averse to posting on the forums that the only communication that we had with him during the closed MoM beta was 2 posts by Sapience after begging Sapience to tell us who our dev was.

As an aside devs tend to talk much more to beta testers with the more private ones getting the most attention, so Palantir and closed expansion betas have the most communication and the open betas and live get the least.

Based on his Twitter activity Sapience is scribbling patch notes like right now.

I played the GW2 beta weekend and I can say this with complete confidence:

1. GW2 WvW is indeed fun but is pretty much an expanded Moors with players or simply much like DAoC zoned world combat for those who played that. It is entirely separate from the rest of the game.

2. The core GW2 pve world is interesting but is ENTIRELY different than Lotro pve. Story drives Lotro and it has a laid back world with the feeling of a directional story progressing. Be it a themepark clone or not Lotro does what it does very well. GW2 feels entirely different. Everywhere you turn you are faced with action and combat outside your control. You walk into it. Great for action mmo combat but almost devoid of living NPC feel and interaction when it comes to story. You explore and find what to do. A good thing if that is what you want but completely different than Lotro where the story is larger than you are. Pretty much two entirely different genres.

3. Story driven content. In Lotro you all know what this is and how it is done. The books are done very well in my opinion and serve their purpose. Lore is tied into the world and your characters in a way most mmo's have never managed to do (In Wow the VAST majority of players frankly know jack about the world lore or gain a sense of progression of time. It's mostly about what current expansion they have queue'd content through to mass queue end game). In GW2 story is about your character and less about the world. You are teased with choice when making your character yet run into often very stale and bad voice acting with little choice along the way in many sections. My time is limited with this but your personal story there is more a side arc than the main story drive is in Lotro. Again the two games are so different that they are pretty much different genres.

4. Combat: GW2 is pure action. Run and gun if you will. The fps pc and console gamers will want a game like this but there will always remain a class of player who wants more laid back action. GW2 has been accused of as a key masher but this isn't entirely true. You do however rotate through powers far more frequently than in Lotro, have to keep moving and use reactionary moves. This can lead to combat burnout for many players and combat is expected to occur in GW2 far more often than in Lotro. Again this is a different genre of mmo. Love it or hate it.

5. End game: It has been stated in GW2 that "The end game starts at level 1". This means the public dynamic system at level 1 is what pve is mostly about all the way through to level cap (minus obvious complexity differences). It also means that WvW participation is for all levels and what you are expected to participate in for the entirety of the game. I know there are dragon story arcs thrown in at various points but massive story driven climax points are not what GW2 are about. I know lore is big with the hardcore GW fans but frankly most of the new GW2 players will know nothing about it nor is the game set up well to introduce them to it. Granted this is an issue for any custom world created for an mmo without previous novels and history with fans. It will feel mighty alien to long time Lotro players.

In short GW2 will be a different game choice but most certainly NOT a replacement to Lotro. Lotro offers something few other mmo's offer at this time despite what shortcomings many may see it having.

Originally Posted by Tamanous

4. Combat: GW2 is pure action. Run and gun if you will. GW2 has been accused of as a key masher but this isn't entirely true. You do however rotate through powers far more frequently than in Lotro.

Button-mashing didn't work at all for me and several players I talked to had the same experience. For me, I was actually penalized for button-mashing due to the delay, so it's definitely not a game where you spam the same skill over and over. Combat is much more intuitive than that. Plus, all your skills are designed work together, so you really hamstring yourself by focusing on only one skill. Combat IS faster and more mobile, and some less experienced players will find that overwhelming, but like most things there is a learning curve and once you get used to it, moving in combat feels much more realistic than spamming shots while being rooted in place a la the hunter. Plus, learning to dodge skillfully meant I avoided a ton of damage coming at me, plus dodging was fun because there's a subtle timing to it.

To be fair on the voice acting, LOTRO has its own stale and bad voice acting at times. I mean, every Ranger in Dunland having the same voice, NPCs with the same voice saying all the same things....please.

WvW - There is no comparison to the Moors whatsoever. Four huge maps + 3 servers = lots of action and fun. Even the lag wasn't all that bad, considering there were so many of us out there and no optimiziation at all yet. My thief did well against other players and I had a blast (sometimes literally) looking for blueprints so I could help my team build a trebuchet to in turn help another team lay seige to a fortress. Avoiding the damage coming down on us from the enemy turrets while trying to break in was also pretty wild and fun. And I'm not even a hard-core PvPer.

You're right, though, it is a very different game. LOTRO will always do stories best, so if that's what you like, LOTRO is second to none. Tolkien's world is entirely unique and always will be.

Open BR alrdy D: lol

Interesting that this turned into one of those "GW2 is the best thing since sliced bread" threads. Truthfully, with every new big release of an MMO we will see these kind of posts, be it for GW2 or Tetris online (now with Hindi subtitles). I find that it is not so much about the new game itself as a frustration about the current state of LotRO. From what I've been able to gather these are the main points of frustration for the ordinary player in LotRO (in no particaular order);

1. PvMP - yes it was a late addon but it is now a part of the game and as such it also needs to be looked at. Some attempts have been made to rectify it and some of the ideas, such as commendation, have in themselves merit but a less than stellar implementation. Atm we're looking at an imbalance (in terms of healing and dps) between the classes, lack of new content and and VERY high treshold for new players to start a creep.

2. GMs - As it is now the power of a GM feels like they are reduced to copy-pasting standard responses (the two most popular being; "This is not a known issue" and "In-game support are unable to assist you in this matter"), turns out if they're able to assist you or not is very much dependant on who you talk to, catch them on a bad day and you'll get reported (yes, a couple of my friends have gotten reported for "abusing the report tool", that was after they followed the given instructions. Another got reported for submitting too many tikcets). GMs need to be able to solve problems in the game and preferably also refrain from using the copy-paste responses for people to feel happier. Another problems with GMs are response times. Yes it might take longer on busy nights but waiting in Orthanc for 2h for a GM to respond and open a bugged door... (we disbanded after ~30m and the official response, that came at about 3am in the morning to our RL was "you weren't online so we closed it").

3. Information - We don't know whats going on. Keeping us informed of development in progress and whats planned for the future more than twice a year is another way to make people look forward. As it is now we don't know what issues are being worked on nor do we know when and what will happen.

4. Bugs - What can i say, the game seems more and more broken the more it gets patched. Draigoch is still bugged after almost ½ year (fun part being that GMs after the first official braindead patch said in response to tickets "this is not a known issue"), multiple gates in Orthanc bugging even after 5 months, well, Saruman was fixed... after weeks of exploits by people (none mentioned in particular) . Quest icons not resetting properly for EU players in the middle of the night (come to think of it that's been around since the merger so close to a year). The problem is not the bugs as such, although they are annoying, but rather your (turbine's) response to them. A bug can, in my experience, be classified as one of the following;
a) Something that falls outside of the in-game support and thus the GMs cannot help with it.
b) "This is not a known issue", on how to proceed check a.
c) Something that a GM can help with (e.g. swapping wrong class items... as long as you're not a creep, in which case see a.
d) Something that gets multiple fixes and only becomes marginally better and is still considered an unknown issue (Draigoch)
The bugs wuld be easier to live with if there was some information as to which bugs are being looked into (though personally I've kind of given up on draigoch ever being fixed, come to think of it the rift bug where you get stuck in combat isn't fixed either). As it is now the bug reporting tool seems kind of useless since you cannot see it going any further, if-you're-lucky-your-reported-bug-will-be-looked-at-in-a-patch-sometime-next-year-feeling-now-go-away-and-don't-bother-us-again-feeling


So to recap;
1. PvMP
2. GMs
3. Information
4. Bugs

If you worked on those people would be a lot happier

Sapience, its later in the week.When can we get some info on update 7?

Originally Posted by Fralin

4. Bugs - What can i say, the game seems more and more broken the more it gets patched.

I'm sure you forgot MoM times. Now is much less bugs than in MoM times.

Originally Posted by SHADOW83

Sapience, its later in the week.When can we get some info on update 7?

[gazes into a crystal ball]

I'd guess that unless something went terribly wrong we'll see a U7 post in the BR forums by the end of the day, maybe even some release notes sooner than later.

This of course will be followed by a number of replies such as "Yes! I love this, this, this and that" or "ooh wow, lots of good stuff", etc. Then there will be the "I can't believe there is nothing about ____" and "Why did this get changed when that is much more important". Lastly, there will be "<patch note quote> LOL, I love these things". All the while, players everywhere will be scouring the notes looking for how to get a leg-up on the next update.

Originally Posted by Fipiara

[gazes into a crystal ball]

I'd guess that unless something went terribly wrong we'll see a U7 post in the BR forums by the end of the day, maybe even some release notes sooner than later.

This of course will be followed by a number of replies such as "Yes! I love this, this, this and that" or "ooh wow, lots of good stuff", etc. Then there will be the "I can't believe there is nothing about ____" and "Why did this get changed when that is much more important". Lastly, there will be "<patch note quote> LOL, I love these things". All the while, players everywhere will be scouring the notes looking for how to get a leg-up on the next update.

Yeah that is true.People wonder why they dont get much info from turbine anymore.Within 10 minutes of getting info the complaining starts.Look at the RoR forums.At least half of all posts are complaining about something they dont even know yet.

Apparently, the Eyes and Guard Tavern is now available on Bullroarer so I expect the tentative release notes to be added very, very soon to the forum.

Originally Posted by Fralin

[...]3. Information - We don't know whats going on. Keeping us informed of development in progress and whats planned for the future more than twice a year is another way to make people look forward. As it is now we don't know what issues are being worked on nor do we know when and what will happen.[...]

One of the main reasons they don't post about the future is because LotRO players take anything as if it were the gospel according to Turbine and if anything gets pushed back for any reason, usually because it isn't ready, then you get all of "broken promise" complaints and even if it does go live on time you get the following:

Originally Posted by SHADOW83

[...]Within 10 minutes of getting info the complaining starts.Look at the RoR forums.At least half of all posts are complaining about something they dont even know yet.

Fix endgame content and lag before you revamp a low level instance that no one will run anyway. Thanks.

Originally Posted by Verlo420

Fix endgame content and lag before you revamp a low level instance that no one will run anyway. Thanks.

They scaled it. It is now not 1 low level instance. It is now 4 end-game instances.

More on-level content for the win!

So 5 more endgame instances are certainly nice!

Originally Posted by Crell_1

They scaled it. It is now not 1 low level instance. It is now 4 end-game instances.

More on-level content for the win!

They scaled fornost? if yes, how'd u know?

Originally Posted by marlwyn

They scaled fornost? if yes, how'd u know?

Just like anyone else, by reading the press release

With Update 7, Fornost will be split into four separate instances with two levels of difficulty for groups of six players from level 30 to 75.

Ah, ty....Still no hunter update....Sure a new skirm is more important...

thats only few informations, we dont know what's the full notes.

For many people, it is :P

Originally Posted by marlwyn

Ah, ty....Still no hunter update....Sure a new skirm is more important...

Another hunter update before RoR?? For what reason?? It's solid class without serious problems. In RoR all classes will get their updates.