Thread: Sooooo, you want to skip deeding?

I thought I'd clear my bags and complete a standard humanoid deed and take a look at what was left once the smoke cleared.

Here are the rules:
1. If a node for my profession (tinker) was in my path, I'd mine.
2. If a satchel/chest/corpse was in my path, I'd mine.
3. No going out of the way to farm resources like nodes.
4. No killing of anything other than the deed I'm working on.
5. The time counts login and travel from Stangard.

Here are the results:

Deed: Defeat 120 Brigands in The Great River Region.
Time: Completed in 1 hour on a 75 burg. I took my time and used lots of stealth. Time could easily be reduced by a fair amount.

9 Level 75 Third Age Legendary Items (no cash value). Can be ID'd and broken down for relics. 9 Tier 1 relics isn't bad for 1 hour, but I'd rather not spend any money so I destroyed them.


8 Adorned Scroll Cases (11.55 each) - 92.4 silver. I didn’t need any of these and vended them all.


700 Riders of Stangard rep


5 TP


10k IXP rune

Raw Cash: 3g, 554s, 0c. (just so we are clear, this is before vending ANYTHING. This is straight coin right off the mobs).



IXP – I logged the wrong tab However, I'll just round down. Each mob yields about 300 IXP. X120 = 36,000 IXP for an hour.


Vendor Trash: = 311 silver


7 Jade Gemstones - 151.90
Blessed shield of healing - 9.66
Leggings of Vigour - 9.66
Enduring leggings of fleetness - 7.75
Helm of vigour - 7.68
Enduring Helm of Fleetness - 7.68
Balanced leggings of might - 7.75
Helm of Vigour - 12.80
Balanced Leggings of might - 16.10
Crossbow of skill - 15.50
Boots of Fate - 8.96
Mask of Fleetness - 7.68
Shining Shoulder Guards - 14.88
Breastplate of Vigour - 16.32
Keen Breastplate of Might - 9.79
Shoes of Determination - 7.24


Task Items:

107 Punctured Shields - 770.40

53 Decorative Sword Sheaths – 413.40



This is pure vendor pricing. There is much more value in these considering task completion which yields progress to the task deeds (The task deeds lead to rare cosmo items, TP). The tasks themselves also provide LI XP and rep. Since my rep is maxed and I already have a toon that completed 500 tasks, I'm vending. However, note that the AH value is easily 2 to 3 times vendor price. I'm only counting vendor price.


Keepers: (things I'm keeping for my toons that will use and therefore not counting as "cash". However, they are gained assets for this effort and have value in and of themselves. This will vary pending class and playstyle).


Tome of Accomplished Resolve - 215 morale / 45 minutes.

Pinch of Westfold Herbs

25 Green Garnets

5 Large Hides

20 low grade skarn ore

4 high grade skarn ore

6 birch sapwood branches

6 pages of gondorian parchments

11 scraps of weathered dunlending text

5 gnarled birch branches

Adding: 5 level 75 moralle pots. (these were recorded but I forgot to include in post since they stacked with existing)

Adding: 5 level 75 power pots. (these were recorded but I forgot to include in post since they stacked with existing)



Repair: -46.45


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Summary:

Cash gained(copper ignored): 3g, 554s, 0c + 311 + 92 + 770 + 413 - 46 = 5 gold, 94 silver.

IXP gained: 46,000

Rep gained: 700

Crafting Items/resources gained: 83

TP gained: 5

Time Spent: 60 minutes.

TP spent: 0.

Cash spent: 0.

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Potential items that I did not luck into finding:

Cracked Sigil - 0. (I only ran across 3 - 5 nodes to mine during this time)
Lootbox - 0.
Lootbox key - 0.

These are listed as they are incentive to choose the longer option of completing the full deed manually. However, in this standard deed sample of 120 mobs, I was not lucky enough to record one.

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Notes:

The point isn't to talk anyone out of skipping deeds if they enjoy skipping them. The point is to help some understand they are skipping quite a bit more than just the end result of +1 to a trait. Its also to show the difference in SPENDING money to skip a deed and only get deed credit, versus spending only a moderate amount of time and gaining a wide variety of items in game in ADDITION to deed credit. I hope to complete the advanced deed of this soon so I can post more results. (and also record the correct chat tab ). Whether you enjoy skipping deeds or doing them... I find it helpful to be infomed in your decision.

My toon is level 75. Another benefit to deeding the "long" way is skill deed advancement. Since all of my skill deeds are maxed, I did not record any value to that, but its worth noting as something else skipped when deeds are ignored or traits are purchased. You can see how multiple flocks of birds are killed with one stone if you attempt to put some time into deeds early and often

Adding: Being level 75 I also did not record LEVELING XP. Obviously if you "deed" along the way, you will level as a benefit. It does not have to be a marathon run as I've done to show the results. Just get in the habbit of taking down things in your way along the way and it will benefit you in some ways all along the way.

Adding: I specifically ignored non-brigands so my numbers wouldn't skew. Normally, during this hour, I would also dealt with a few mobs from another deed category to progress them as well. In this specific instance, I stealthed past over a dozen "creature" type mobs that would have counted towards another deed and provided some more vendor cash and hides.

I thought this was a very informative post, and well written and formatted. I like the fact that you took the time to highlight how important it is to finish deeds as well as how really silly it is to buy traits in the store for relatively little time.

This needs to be made into a sticky under a new forum category:

"People who whine and complain non-stop about being unable to earn gold in this game...look here stupid."

Edited to add morale/power pots that I forgot to post since they stacked (but I did record the "pre" number, so its accurate).

Edited to add note about leveling XP as a benefit.

Edited to add note about other deed types I was working around as a benefit.

you've inspired me -need gold for new LI
+ rep

Great Post :P just a question..in all these do you count Corpses,Backpacks and chests? I think there is a great quantity of them in Rise of Izengard zones and every one of them have 100-150 silver cash plus raw materials :P

That was very inspiring..especially the fact that you do not need Auction to make 5 gold per hour :P

+rep

Recipes sell for more than scroll-cases, so you should open them before you sell them.
Brigands on the Field of Celebrant are quite abundant, but many other deeds are not so easy to have a good stream of monsters to kill.

Originally Posted by Ampalaea

Great Post :P just a question..in all these do you count Corpses,Backpacks and chests? I think there is a great quantity of them in Rise of Izengard zones and every one of them have 100-150 silver cash plus raw materials :P

That was very inspiring..especially the fact that you do not need Auction to make 5 gold per hour :P

+rep

I did. I found 6 during. I made a point to not go out of the way for them. The assumption is that you would never walk past a backpack during normal play, so you would not while deeding either. However, if you choose to skip deeding, then you will choose to skip some backpacks as well... so I see it as an incentive. More time on landscape gives a greater opportuinty for things like backpacks, nodes, lootboxes, etc.

Yeah, no doubt grinding mobs can be a solid gold-maker. However, I've found there is sort of a "dead zone" in slayer deed grinding. Really low level slayers go by fast because the trash is so worthless you don't have to bother looting, the mobs get 1-shotted (or close enough) and you don't have to kill very many of them anyway. Higher level ones are good gold earners. In the middle levels, though, trash items are only *just* worth picking up, and looting slows you way down. Also, it's those middle levels with the dreaded 150/300 slayer deeds.

Working on grinding out a few of the more obnoxious ones on my RK these days...not looking forward to giants and trolls in the Misty Mountains. Nossiree.

The OP is an excellent post that well describes the virtues of deeding for an established player.

Now write one about all the mobs you have to kill in level 20-60 zones to make the deeds you do in endgame zones worthwhile.

Now - see how long it takes with a 75 champ.

Originally Posted by Gylve

Working on grinding out a few of the more obnoxious ones on my RK these days...not looking forward to giants and trolls in the Misty Mountains. Nossiree.

yeah, not every deed is equal... that is for sure. The one bonus to the trolls/giants is they do drop more loot. Another bonus from the mid level deeds, since everyone hates them... is that the mats are a bit pricey on the AH. So if you can stomach it, you can promit from those who cant

Also, keep in mind that there are more deeds that there is trait cap. Cap is currently 14. I have one deed in the 20's. There was a good 6+ deeds I could have skipped and still been at cap.

For some reason, I also hate the angmar wargs... not sure why, they drop valuable hides, there are plenty of them, and there is tons of dwarf-iron, platinum, and lebethron wood around... but that one always makes me sigh, even if I do make a fortune from it.

Is the deed really only to kill 120 brigands? Sounds like only the first tier. Maybe 120 is all you had left to grind after questing?

But regardless, your point stands. I'm a deed completing kind of person.

Originally Posted by Hellgato

Is the deed really only to kill 120 brigands? Sounds like only the first tier. Maybe 120 is all you had left to grind after questing?

But regardless, your point stands. I'm a deed completing kind of person.

Correct, I said "standard" but just meant first tier. I picked a deed I had 0 in to make it easier on me. I had typed up somewhere that I also plan on doing "advanced" and reporting that as well to get the whole picture on rewards (versus buying the trait or relying too heavily on scrolls)... but that must have been edited out. (I get wordy). I know some people that LOVE the scrolls... and I'm not trying to talk anyone that knows what they are doing out of it. This is more for those that haven't thought it through.

I believe 255 is the advanced tier.

Originally Posted by hucklebarry

This is more for those that haven't thought it through.

Which is a bit weird since I find your post to be pretty conclusive proof that deeding *isn't* worth it. You've shown that to earn a virtue point will take 2-3 hours (about 2 hrs. if questing finished the first tier deed already, about 3 hrs. for things like Forochel worms, Moria dragonets, etc. where you kill maybe a dozen-ish questing and have to go back at 75 for the other 300-400ish). Of the other rewards you list, the only one that I find meaningful is the TP. I find this interest in the gold one earns as a side effect of slayer deeds to be very strange - to quote one of the old D&D games (Icewind Dale? I forget...): "If I wanted 5gp I'd pull it out of my ..." Seriously, all of my characters have far more gold than they can ever plausibly spend, and if for some reason I wanted more it's very easy to get.

The way I see it, quest deeds, exploration deeds, and the "low hanging fruit" slayer deeds (starter zones plus certain later deeds like Trollshaws trolls that are mostly finished during normal play) get every character to the point where their virtues are more than good enough for all content short of hardcore raiding. To fill in the other twelve points to get my main's slotted virtues to all 14s (well, one is already a 15 ) would take 24-36 hours of playing time - about two weeks - of mind-numbing boredom (or half that if I stopped using Zeal). I have much better things to do, like leveling some of my alts. Which is another major disincentive to serious deeding - if I had just the one character, OK, spread the tedium over a few months and get it done. But with potentially six characters reaching level cap before RoR, forget it, no way I could endure that much boredom without quitting LOTRO entirely.

Originally Posted by J_Howell

Which is a bit weird since I find your post to be pretty conclusive proof that deeding *isn't* worth it.

Sounds like you simply quoted the wrong statement. I also said this:

"I'm not trying to talk anyone that knows what they are doing out of it."

Personal preferences are just that... personal. No one is wrong to hate deeding. No one is wrong to love it either. Your feedback that some people find deeds boring is very valid. But its also true that some people have never spent the time to add up all the rewards because they get vended over time and money is spent between sessions.

I do disagree with your assessment of how many quest mobs will advance most deeds. While there are some deeds that have very little quest mobs... MOST deeds have bountiful mobs around the area and a few quests for them as well. If you adopt the play style that you never kill a mob that isn't for a quest and run mobs off from quest giver to quest giver... I would claim that your play-style is what makes deeds more boring.

When ROI came out I never ground out anything. I only killed mobs that aggroed on me or were directly in my path while I quested. I reached 75 in just a few days and every deed in ROI was in the advanced stage on my first toon through. I was not on the path of "months" that you mentioned from a time frame perspective at all.

So, I'm not disagreeing with you when you say you find deeds boring. But I am disagreeing that they are as timely as you claim. At least, I can say that I have seen otherwise. As mentioned above in other posts, some deeds are less kind, but most are very easily completeable with very little side effort.

I struggle through them because I need them for raiding, but your post does point out the mind-numbing number of hours and pathetic gold rewards to do it.

Ugh. I wish it were less grindy.

Originally Posted by Chanah

I wish it were less grindy.

It is less grindy. In Great River only one deed - Shades - doesn't have some repeatable content associated with it. The daily repeatables and RoF will take care of all the rest in no time. Same for Enedwaith and Dunland.

The painful slayer deeds are all in mid-level content. There is no way to complete most of the Misty Mountain, Angmar, Forochel, Trollshaws or Eregion deeds other than grinding mobs, and the numbers required are mostly higher and the coin/vendorable rewards are lower.