Thread: Weatherstock IV

Weatherstock IV is Saturday, June 16th from 4pm to 7pm servertime. Our lineup:


For more information on Weatherstock, visit our lorebook page!

Do not miss this one!

/push

Are you sure Weatherstock is over that way? I certainly dont want to miss it!

Just a reminder of how EPIC this event is

Did you know that BBB once actually tried to play at Weatherstock?

Me neither but here's the story about that:

Bumping for freshness and visibilty. It looks as if there will be a horse caravan in the minutes prior to the start of Weatherstock. we expect there to be over 100 riders leaving the Forsaken Inn. If you like horse processions you might want to check it out. also Weatherstock vendors will be handing out ale, smoke, and hope tokens at the Forsaken Inn for a time before we head out so make sure you have room in yer bags. Hope tokens cannot be used by players under level 15 so beware of that.

The community of Landroval has been exceptionally warm and inviting to all of the "international" bands. On behalf of all of us at LMB a huge /hug-/kiss to all of ye!

While everyone knows the kind of lag we will be experiencing, there is a general hope we will exceed last years 500-600 attendance figures. Our advertising has put out feelers to many game related sites and we definitely encourage anyone on Landy to give this event "word of mouth". There is still time to start an alt and get ready for that big day.

It looks like there will be no less than 300 gold to be divvied up between the 3 winning bands. Two of those categories will be determined by the crowd so let us know when you are raptured by any performance! Using Hope Tokens after a performance is your way to vote!

It is expected that "Casual Stroll to Mordor" will live broadcast this event. We also expect color commentary from Galenhir, the founder of The Lonely Mountain Band. He and Harperella, and kin member, Bowlin brainstormed the first Weatherstock so many years ago. So be sure and get that page bookmarked. The lower audio setting works best for that site.

Here's a picture of part of our whole Weatherstock-Team. In the next 2 days we will tell you more about them and what services they provide.

Here's an update on prizes for Weatherstock IV:

In addition to the normal prize of 100G and the title that goes with it. This year we will be giving out Perlino Mount and Green Anniversary Cloak codes so that our visiting bands have something to take home!

--Harper

Weatherstock Team Information:

And here is the last team: The Stage Crew with out host Harperella!

Weatherstock IV Schedule

Note: All times given are Landroval servertime which is EDT timezone.
You can use the /servertime command on Landroval to see what's the time on the server
and calculate the time difference to your local time.



Weatherstock opening:

We gather at about 15:00 at the Forsaken Inn and start a procession to Weathertop at 15:30.
Opening ceremonies begin at 16:00




Weatherstock Music competition:

The event is one large competition with 10 bands attending.
Every band has a timeslot of 20 minutes for their gig.
The first band in the competition will start to play at 16:20


There are three different prizes/categories in the competition:

1. A Light In The Dark prize
Visitors can get hope tokens from our vendor team members.
Every visitor will get three tokens so you have three votes all in all.
After each gig our host Harperella will ask the audience to pop a token
if they liked the band and want it to win the Light In The Dark prize.
The votes are counted by our specialized team.


2. Battle Of The Bands
The nine remaining bands spread out on the outer ring of the venue
and have 20 minutes playtime in which the audience can vote for the
winner of this "battle" by standing with "their" band.

Note: The winner of the Light In The Dark prize is allowed to play in the middle
of the venue but is out of this competition.


3. Lonely Mountain Cup
This prize is given by The Lonely Mountain Band kinship.




Closing Ceremonies:

After the competition our host will award the prizes to the winning bands.

For my final bump on this Weatherstock thread, there will probably be a horse caravan leaving Weathertop. Last year the caravan procession headed to the Prancing Pony if memory serves for late night activities. It is not known whether Lone Lands can handle 500 horses and hikers all at once. We shall see....

Any volunteers who want to stay behind and clean up Weathertop are welcome to do so!

Last year there was interest in T shirts from the event. Here is the link we endorse for you to make your own personal "I was there" design. If anyone thinks they have a marketable design for Weatherstock Tees please show it here for extra points in rawk star status! We may just make it the "OFFICIAL" TEE of 2012.

http://www.zazzle.com/tom_miller_shi...26279180982117

Thanks to all for a great event.

Andunie thanks the Lonely Mountain Band and all it's helpers and organizers. It was a fun event. The lag cooled off after an hour or so.

A major thank you to both the Lonely Mountain Band for putting together such a wonderful event and ensuring poor Sparkleigh didn't end up as some warg's elevensies on the way to Weatherstock, and of course thank you to the bands that put on an amazing show! Congratulations to everyone!

There should be a write-up of the event tomorrow, but in the meantime, here are a few pictures of the bands performing:






full set of images at: http://www.landrovaltimes.info/galle...herstock-2012/

Also, if any of the bands want the originals, just send me a PM and I'll send them over :)

*yawns and waves*

Weatherstock 2012 was great fun! It sure was a memorable experience, from the pre-Weatherstock concerts to the main event itself.

I would like to thank Floradine, Tinki, Harperelle and lots of others from the Lonely Mountain Band as well as other kinships that made the event so much fun. I owe one of you some green fireworks and I will repay you, I promise!

Sadly, I must depart your lands and return home before my little brother does something bad like let another dragon loose in the Shire. I might drop by from time to time to visit, and of course, I'm sure I'll be back with the Songburrow Strollers next year!

#The night is for dancing, but so is the day#
#The Songburrow Strollers played at Weatherstock today#

Dear Miss Harperella and all that helped organise,

thank you very much for all your great work! Once again, this was a night to remember! From our arrival in Bree, the journey to the Forsaken Inn, the ride up the mountain, the many people being gathered there, of all races, many come from such far-away places... it was an extraordinary experience! And the bands! Such joyful music, toe-tappers every single tune, lovely swayers, merry hoppers - it made a hobbit's heart glad to be there. So thank you very much for the concert, and also thank you to all the bands that played - to me you were all winners yesterday night!

With my best wishes, and until next year,

Tibba Stoutfoot

This was great fun! I took some pictures. Well... a few... actually... a lot.

See them here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/floradi...7630157900988/

Had a blast, cant wait till next year.


....In the meantime i guess i could lvl my toon on landy

We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves at Weatherstock and were delighted to pick up a prize – The Lonely Mountain Cup! The LMB and all the other helpers and organisers did an outstanding job, and it felt privileged to be part of what is surely the greatest and most spectacular event anywhere on LOTRO.

We loved hearing all the other bands who it has to said varied widely in style and choice of music. Congratulations to the other winners, Andunie and the Batttle of the Bands Winner – Mornie Alantie, who were my personal favourite of the night. It goes without saying that we greatly appreciated the support from friends on Laurelin that not only came with us but stayed up into the early hours in many cases.

I disconnected right on the final announcement and nothing I could do would coax me back into the game quick enough to learn the verdict. Many long minutes passed until I saw the result via Twitter. Poor Rohaena was left all alone on the summit of Weathertop this morning, but she had a big smile.

*cheers*

Rowana (Rohaena on Landroval)
The Songburrow Strollers

A large gallery of the nights events as seen through my eyes.

Thanks to all organisers and to the bands. It was great. *cheer*

*sings* Weatherstock forever ...

I am a visitor from another server and this was my first Weatherstock. Thanks to The Lonely Mountain Band for organizing such an enjoyable and memorable event, this is what makes LOTRO so great! Also thanks to the bands who played such great music and to the people of Landroval who were so kind to all of us low level visitors! I think I will visit Landroval more often to enjoy some of your other events!

Wow, the event was huge. I'm sure there's no shortage of pictures, but here's a few more.



A haze of names hanging over the crowd.





I wonder if Waldo is in there?

Thank you to all who attended! It would be pretty dry to run an event with no participation.

Originally Posted by morrowbreeze

I attended Weatherstock and all I got was this Awesome T-shirt.

And a lot of sand fleas.....

Congratulations, LMB, on your fourth wildly successful Weatherstock event.

I've had the privilege of playing in all four (the first time with a band from the kinship Gweth Valacirca and the other three with my own MVT band) and it truly is a musical event like no other.

Unfortunately, the event was soured a bit for us this time because of some very... special person questing in the Lone Lands during MVT's set who decided to report Ingolemo for posting lyrics in /regional. This led to him getting a warning on his account from a GM. Seriously bad timing for us, the last band, considering that almost all the bands had been posting their lyrics thus according to instructions from LMB. It was pretty discouraging for Ingolemo, who worked hard on his lyrics.

Congratulations to the winners (especially Andunie!) and we'll (probably) see you next year!

Being a first time participant at Weatherstock, it was overwhelming, it was confusing, it was ...

Magical.

A few thank you's:
Thank you everybody for voting for Anduine! We came to Weatherstock happy just being given the opportunity to present our weird and wonderful music to such a large audience. We had not, even in our wildest dreams, imagined that so many people would appreciate what we do. We are humbled and grateful.

Thank you to all the bands! The real winner was the music!

Thank you LMB for hosting and organising such a spectacular event. Special thanks and a big hug to Anthemisi, the best roadie any elven band could ever wish for!

Last but not least thank you to the nameless Turbine techs who must have worked frantically behind the scenes to keep the servers from exploding! You did a great job, the music stream was remarkably steady.

Weatherstock forever!

Wait--a GM actually warned you guys? Was he unaware A) that the event was going on B) that Turbine advertises said event and C) that it's been done this way for 4 years now? Cripes! Must be a white-hander.

Originally Posted by Fionnuala

Unfortunately, the event was soured a bit for us this time because of some very... special person questing in the Lone Lands during MVT's set who decided to report Ingolemo for posting lyrics in /regional. This led to him getting a warning on his account from a GM. Seriously bad timing for us, the last band, considering that almost all the bands had been posting their lyrics thus according to instructions from LMB. It was pretty discouraging for Ingolemo, who worked hard on his lyrics.

Yeah, that person was a seriously bitter betty and I felt so extremely horrible that your set was so rudely interrupted by that. I always look forward to the awesome lyrics Ingolemo manages to come up with. I honestly didn't understand why they had their underthings in a twist over it. It isn't like anything else is ever normally posted via /regional, and they had the option of disabling regional for what, fifteen minutes?
Truly shameful behaviour on their part.

Originally Posted by redpoisonapple

Yeah, that person was a seriously bitter betty and I felt so extremely horrible that your set was so rudely interrupted by that. I always look forward to the awesome lyrics Ingolemo manages to come up with. I honestly didn't understand why they had their underthings in a twist over it. It isn't like anything else is ever normally posted via /regional, and they had the option of disabling regional for what, fifteen minutes?
Truly shameful behaviour on their part.

I will repost what I have said in our kinship forums:

Originally Posted by Harperella

This year at Weatherstock we had a kerfuffle near the end of the event concerning our use of /regional. We had a couple of players make a complaint to turbine that we were misusing the /regional channel for something that did not concern the entire region. In part, he was correct, and this argument swayed a GM to give us a gentle warning in the /regional channel. I don't think either party really thought through the reasons why we use /regional channel, and I will list them here:

1) Global Accessibility
When a player from another server rolls an alt for Weatherstock, he's set up with the default settings. At this point he can see /regional, /trade, /ooc, and /lff channels. That's why we use those channels. If we tried to get all 500 participants to use a custom channel, it would be a tech support nightmare. Not only do you have to know how to use /joinchannel, but spell the channel correctly and enable it in your chat tab.

2) Range and reach
The /say channel can only reach so far and is often cluttered with various RP banter and commenting from the audience. In addition, it gets bugged periodically so that some players can't see anything in chat at all. The /emote channel would seem a reasonable substitute, but it gets very cluttered with everyone /smoking, /clapping, or even /sitting.

3) Appropriate Audience
On the day of Weatherstock, we have around 500 participants. There are probably around 10-20 players in the Lonelands (and thus the /regional channel) who are not in on the event. That means that everything in /regional is of specific interest to 95+% of those on the channel. I can think of no other time in the game where chat on any global channel reaches that level of interest.

So I think we make the right choice by using the /regional channel. However, we didn't have a good plan for dealing with a stubborn curmudgeon who is sure we -shouldn't- be on the /regional channel. The way it was handled ended up being less than perfect. We had audience members arguing with the critics, and we even had a clueless GM weighing in. In the future, I think we need to have a PSA ready to go. Something like this:

Originally Posted by PSA

Weatherstock will be using /regional as it's "Stage Micropohone" for the duration of the event. We apologize for any inconvenience this causes non-participating players. You can easily mute us by right clicking your chat tab, then filters, then the regional channel. If you feel someone is using this channel inappropriately, help is just two clicks away with right-clicking the name, and then adding to your ignore list.

That would be simple, concise, and cuts both ways--both for non-participants who want us to go away, and for concert-goers who want to silence critics on the /regional channel.

--Harper

We'll have this better handled next year.

But on a brighter note, I want to thank everyone for a fantastic Weatherstock! This was the year that Weatherstock became a LOTRO event instead of a Landroval event, with bands from Belegaer, Brandywine, Crickhollow, Landroval, Laurelin and Silverlode all participating.

The crowd was very well behaved, and the FOZ and Security team both remarked that there was a lot fewer problems than in years past. We did have some issues at the very end, but all in all it was a smooth event.

My hats are off to all you talented bands out there. I am constantly impressed with what our musicians come up with at Weatherstock! We had creative costumes, great use of the stage, and some wonderfully creative lyrics to songs both old and new.

Have a look at the @weatherstock twitter feed. There are some great pics there as well as links to the various write-ups and blogs that are starting to get published. And don't forget to visit http://www.tinyurl.com/WeatherstockForever to hear the Weatherstock Anthem that LMB put together. This event is a labor of love for our kin, and the song is our gift to the community.

--Harper

Originally Posted by redpoisonapple

Yeah, that person was a seriously bitter betty and I felt so extremely horrible that your set was so rudely interrupted by that. I always look forward to the awesome lyrics Ingolemo manages to come up with. I honestly didn't understand why they had their underthings in a twist over it. It isn't like anything else is ever normally posted via /regional, and they had the option of disabling regional for what, fifteen minutes?
Truly shameful behaviour on their part.

I was at the event briefly and had fun, but to play devil's advocate, what did this user do that was so deplorable? He was trying to play the game and his experience was hindered by the event. It doesn't sound like he did anything malicious. After about two hours I left the event and I'm currently questing in the Lone Lands, but the lag was so severe that I couldn't play. I didn't report anyone and instead just switched to an alt on a different server for the duration of the event. I could very easily see how someone unrelated to the event would be pissed, between the lag and the extreme amount of chatter in nearly every channel (trade, LFF, regional, etc). I even said during the event up at Weathertop in /say that I felt bad for anyone just trying to quest in the area. Maybe next time hold it at an off time instead of a peak time (as 4-7PM EST on a Saturday is)?

I did have fun though and it was an awesome experience. Just adding my two coppers.

Weatherstock 2012 was the greatest event in LOTRO I ever enjoyed! Many thanks to the Lonely Mountain Band who gave both bands and attendees from other servers such a warm welcome and many a helping hands. And of course many thanks to the bands for their excellent music and performance, I'm sure everyone had a great time on the Weatherstock IV!

Best wishes and see you next year,
Miria

Thank you all the staff members and bands and attendees for making this a great event despite all the lag, troll, and side drama!
With about 500 people, 1 chicken and 1 horse, I must say it went rather well.

In response to the opposing view, If the event is going to be called Weatherstock it needs to be on Weathertop. If we intend to have multi server participation we need to accomodate the prime hours for the most players. That leaves changing the day we have it. It is assumed that saturday is a heavy play day and so......

Here is an event that showcases the social parts of LOTRO in the best possible way we think. Its once a year for about 5 hours total. Big events take some time to run. While everyone ought to have all the rights of playtime to a game they feel immersed in or have paid monies to engage, cant there be accomodation for an annual epic event? Heck, we dont like it when the servers are in maintenance mode but we put up with it. We download updates without too extreme withdrawal.

What bothered me personally was that with 500 attendees there were 2 or 3 who either trolled or argued about the use of regional chat for a broadcast medium and sent tickets causing even more turbulence. One of those "trolls" took pleasure in forced emotes and was a total jerk but thats what low lifes do.

What was especially hurtful to those who worked hard to organize this event and by Fionnualas post above was the "turnaround" of attitude by Turbine of this event. We, in the past, had approval for the broadcast channels for this event and the same event has surely been a "feather in the cap" for the PR folks at Turbine. Now to issue a warning on a band members account for using regional to sing a song?!

As in politics and now in MMOS there is a polarization of not accomodating anothers rights in gameplay or viewpoints no matter what and no matter how "minority" one may be. We are seeing where the one or the two may be able to overthrow the doings of the many. This is a real shame and by shame I mean its a total embarassment.

This needs to be ironed out completely and we should have concrete printed permissions for whatever broadcast mediums we shall use ingame next year. There is nothing we can do about the lag, take that up with Turbine/WB. If it were up to the LMB we would have 1,000 attendance. Live and learn.

Otherwise Weatherstock rawked didnt it!

On behalf of Symphonious, I'd like to say thanks to everyone involved in Weatherstock. We had an awesome time, just as we did last year, and I hope everybody enjoyed our performance. The lag was better this year as well, and it was great to hear the other bands instead of lagging out like I did last year, hehe. Everyone's music was so good this year. A particular congratulations to all the winners, you guys were all awesome.

If anyone is interested in hearing MORE of Symphonious's music, including our unique freestyle jam sessions, we will be hosting a weekly musical event on Crickhollow starting next week. This event will be held at 4pmEST on Sundays. That time is still tentative, in case we need to change it to accommodate a bigger audience. Although the location is undetermined, just send a tell to anyone in the Riders of Ravencrest kinship when you arrive in Crickhollow and they should know where it is being held.

For musicians interested in joining Symphonious, please send me a forum message or talk to me (Dessuidhiel), Theobrend, or Oridon in-game. We especially welcome anyone with an interest in playing music in LoTRO by hand, and previous musical experience is not required.

Again, thank you! We're already looking forward to next year's Weatherstock! Wooooooooo!!

~ Dessy

Now that the dust has settled and this hobbit is back home safe and sound, how about a recap of the absolutely wondrous Weatherstock! Hundreds of spectators, dozens of organisers, ten bands, six servers, three prizes, and even one elusive, yet loudly roaring stone-troll – this was Weatherstock 2012!

Hundreds of visitors met up just outside of the border of Bree at a small tavern known as the Forsaken Inn. The owner Anlaf was most gracious, though a bit surprised at seeing so great a gathering. There was ale, and weed, and tunes aplenty as we waited for the procession to the top of the rock known by the elves as ‘Amon Sul,’ a fact I discovered from a surprisingly exuberant elf while we waited. Finally, Harperella, the amazing lead coordinator of the event, arrived and the march of horses, goats, and ponies began. There were many ferocious beasts on the path to the hill top. Luckily, there was a mighty group of warriors providing security so all we saw were their corpses littering the ground.

When we finally reached the top, there were large groups of men, dwarves, elves, and hobbits already gathered. I picked up a few bottles of ale from a pair of darling vendors, Byrcha and Tinki, as well as a few packets of weed and some shiny glowy ‘tokens’ used to vote for our favourite bands.

Everyone was mostly very kind and sensitive to the fact that we hobbits are of a smaller stature, and so made room for us in front, or would sit down so not to obstruct our view. We settled down on the warm stone floor and were serenaded by a band called Old Winyards as more Free Folk poured into the area. After a few songs, the dust settled and visitors slowly stopped trickling in and the show could truly begin.

The first band to play was a fantastic band clad in bright cyan, the Breakfast Club! They played a wonderful set that had everyone on their feet and reaching quickly into their pockets for those shiny glow tokens. Old Winyards came back again to perform the Weatherstock theme song while the next band readied themselves. Symphonia et Gloria jumped up onto the rock and straight into a set of amazing tunes. Indeed, some in the crowd were so moved by the music that they felt the overwhelming urge to dance as Cosmoson, a young hobbit I’ve had the pleasure of meeting before, defended his right to dance against would be detractors, who were possibly unimpressed by his dance moves.

Don’t Tempt Me Frodo came up next and they were truly a spectacular sight! Seriously, a sight to see as they donned a wardrobe change during their set complete with frightening masks! They were also a treat for the ears as they played a song near and dear to many hearts that harkens back to a cold, northern land some once called home.

Winners of the 2011 Weatherstock Light in the Dark prize, the Songburrow Strollers came on afterwards and they immediately captured the attention of the crowd with their Grand Weatherstock Song. We hobbits took to our feet to dance and were left with our mouths watering for more music, and for biscuits after the lovely Linaela reminded us all of how much the Strollers love them.

RKO, a band I had the pleasure of meeting with and listening to during warm ups played next. They all looked quite dapper in their powder blue outfits and the crowd warmed up to them immediately, many recognizing the fun melodies they had prepared. In a brighter, deeper blue, The Chosen Few took the stage afterwards. They were certainly a crowd favourite as many began to dance, and were quite literally flipping themselves in the air in excitement. I heard one dwarf lament that the songs were far too short, which must mean they are doing something right to leave the crowd wanting more.

Mornie Alantie, looking absolutely divine in shades of red, took the stage by storm, stirring the crowd into a frenzy with their hypnotic tunes and lyrics. Indeed, it seems their music transcended species as a group of chickens took to the stage with them for a song! Andunie, consisting of a most elegant and most regal looking group of elves dressed in white, went on afterwards and put on a spectacularly unique show that set them apart from the rest of the bands. They opened with an exciting drum set before delving into what seemed (to this hobbit at least!) to be more traditional elven songs, which calmed the crowd down into a sense of serenity.

Charged with reinvigorating the crowd, Symphonious followed and their outfits were the talk of the show! Huge, lovely hats on all of their members! Many in the audience clamoured for information as to who the hatmaker was but were met with sly smiles and slick songs instead. There were roars of approval and calls for more theorbo!

The Great Smokeout came next. No! That was not the name of a last minute band addition to the lineup, but instead a span of time in which all audience members were encouraged to pull out their pipes and take a puff or two of one the fine weeds being vendored by the organisers. Many wondered what the goal was, and if the cloud of smoke could be seen in far off lands such as Ro-han (some horseland far south I’m told).

After putting our pipes away, it was time for the last band of the evening. They went by the Travelling Ingolemos for this show, but readers might know them better as Mar Vanwa Tyalieva from one of their many concerts around Bree. Ingolemo was dashing as always in his purple robes, and eyepatch, and his rumoured lady love Etaoin was a stunning sight to see. They had the audience dancing their feet off and nostalgic for the tales of heroic adventures parents tell their younglings.

Unfortunately, it seems that the smoke from earlier in the evening, while it may not have reached that far off horseland, did manage to reach away enough to rouse a terrible and ferocious troll from its slumber! The clumsy and lumbering beast roared and growled as it attempted to make its way to the top of the rock. Indeed, its loud, ungraceful snarling made it a bit difficult to make out the Ingolemos’ final song. Luckily, the tall, strong muscled security I mentioned earlier were there to wrestle the foul thing to the ground, besting it before the winners were announced.

Once the troll was put down, Harperella readied herself to announce the winners! The Light in the Dark award went to the elven group Andunie for it seems their most unique and inspiring performance touched the hearts of many. There was a short, but hectic, battle of the bands to determine the Free Peoples’ Choice, of which Mornie Alantie came out victorious! Finally, a hush fell on the crowd as the remaining bands stood waiting to hear their name called as winners of the Lonely Mountain Band Cup for 2012. It was a tough call and there was but a one person differential in the votes, ultimately leaving the Songburrow Strollers as the winners of the prestigious award!

Much to the delight of the crowd, the three bands performed a final time before the sun set on another wickedly entertaining Weatherstock. On behalf of the Landroval Times, I would like to extend a congratulations all of the winners and participants for putting on such an amazing show, as well as to the Lonely Mountain Band for doing such a fantastic job of setting up, and organising everything.

Until next year!

~Sparkleigh Larkspur of Buckland