Thread: Update 9: Against the Shadow PRELIMINARY Release Notes - SUBJECT TO CHANGE

Originally Posted by Freia

Please please please scale the Barad Guldur Raid. Don't make it skirmishish like Helegrod. You should have to fight your way through the gauntlet to get to the second boss. The BG raid is IMHO the best raid in the whole entire game. The bosses, the challenge modes, the guantlet- all amazing concepts and mechanics..

It's scaled. Go check it out =)

If this is an open beta, as stated by Sapience, can I have a link to the download server please? If It's closed & I misunderstood an invite would be jolly

I thank you!

ugh. I hate almost every major item listed here, with the possible exception of scalable BG (and if they split it up like Helegrod, or otherwise ruin it in the process, that will become possibly the biggest negative in a list full of them and being able to get gear from raids in skirmish camps is fail (see: people running level 50ish helegrod to get level 65 gear when that was the cap), so I'm not overly optimistic there, either...)

specifically: i hate the remote looting, i hate the craft xp, i hate the induction/interrupt changes (and not for dps reasons, but for the nightmare that a coordinated interrupt rotation is likely to become)

Originally Posted by GingerAj

I think you misread it ...their giving crafting exp for the tier required to use the node, not combat experience ...If I read it correctly.

Well it does say...

Originally Posted by Sapience

Use of craft nodes and crafting recipes now awards characters with experience upon use for nodes or completion for recipes.

And Sapience appears to confirm crafting will give character experience with this response...

Originally Posted by Sapience

It's not mentioned (my fault), but there is a new XP disabler coming with Update 9 that is much closer to what players have asked for (it's basically the opposite of the XP stones currently available in the store).

Guess we'll know for sure when we can get on BR...

Originally Posted by TCinDAUK

If this is an open beta, as stated by Sapience, can I have a link to the download server please? If It's closed & I misunderstood an invite would be jolly

I thank you!

http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.p...c-Test-Server)

Welcome to beta =)

Originally Posted by Lestache

I hope that those changes are Ettenmoors-only, but whether they are or not, we brought this on ourselves. Using interrupt skills in an unintended way to artificially increase DPS probably wasn't the smartest idea.

If using Fast and Immediate skills to our advantage is not intended, then what's the point of having them?

I guess you're saying using Clobber or Addle every 5 seconds was not intended?

Originally Posted by awesome

Base Miss Rate
We have removed the base miss rate for all classes (freep & creep) and pets. This means, when fighting an on-level or lower level monster, you will not miss. It's important to note that Miss Chance can still be debuffed, so in some cases missing will be possible. Due to this change, the following have been altered:

I'm really excited about this... As a guard and a captain miss chance has been very depressing and I didn't think you guys would ever get rid of it. Really want to thank you for that... I don't think people have realized the impact yet... But it's a pretty huge buff for non agi users and will make tanking a lot better.

Re: interruptions putting skills on cd... I assume stuns count as interrupts... So when I use my 30m blood of numenor CD and get stunned it's on cd? Might want to re-think that. I guess the moral of the story is don't use it when you can get stunned?
Poor defilers and LM's. Although I think it's a reasonable change, it should put it on a short cd (10-15s) instead of its full CD.

Originally Posted by Shoshonie

Sure would be nice to see a few SOLO instances when they make these new additions...

Just what we need, more solo content in an already overly solo-friendly MMORPG... /rolls eyes.

Originally Posted by Nakiami

If using Fast and Immediate skills to our advantage is not intended, then what's the point of having them?

I guess you're saying using Clobber or Addle every 5 seconds was not intended?

To boost DPS? No, I don't think it was. Especially Addle, considering that it doesn't even have a damage component like Clobber does. People have been using them to break animations, nothing more.

If we needed any evidence that the devs thought so as well, I'd like to point everyone to the SoM beta when Champs started using Clobber purely as an animation-breaker and so its cooldown got boosted to 5s from 3.2s.

Some time after that, Wardens saw a nerf to the Immediate skill (Recovery or Quick Recovery) that they were using to break long animations like the old Defiant Challenge.

Now Champs and Burgs are getting a 10s cooldown on their interrupts. Either it's part of a wholesale "interrupt skills need to be on a longer cooldown" change - which doesn't seem to be true given the cooldown reduction that Hunters and some creeps are getting - or it's step 3 in the devs trying to tell us, "Hey, stop using Immediate skills to interrupt animations."

Oh, and using Clobber or Addle every five seconds can actually be perfectly fine, and clearly intended... if you need to interrupt something every five seconds.

Originally Posted by Lestache

I hope that those changes are Ettenmoors-only, but whether they are or not, we brought this on ourselves. Using interrupt skills in an unintended way to artificially increase DPS probably wasn't the smartest idea.

According to the patch notes, all the interrupt nerfs are Ettenmoors-only EXCEPT the brilliant change to put a shared cooldown on Warden interrupts.

I would like an explanation of why Wardens, who need to hit 2-5 buttons to interrupt, are the only class being hit by this nerf in both PvP and PvE.

It means, for instance, if you are trying to interrupt a specific ability, and your target starts to cast a different ability while you are using Onslaught to DPS or Wall of Steel to buff yourself, you just lost your ability to interrupt anything else for 12 seconds. In PvE.

Where is the Bg set located? I checked The skirm classic, nothing, and Ost guruth - mirk, nothing there that's scaled.

Talking about the addle cd going from 5 to 10 seconds here(I'm posting from my phone and didn't feel like quoting it):

Dear lord, I hope you're removing the animation for Flashing Blades or make it a lot shorter or my whole Ettenmoors rotation is ruined.

I guess jumping Defilers en Warleaders is out of the question from now.

still no reaver bow i see .... okay then

Originally Posted by Crell_1

http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.p...c-Test-Server)

Welcome to beta =)

Ta muchly, lost the client when I had to reinsatall Windows recently

Originally Posted by Cloudie-wan

A lot of things in this update looks very good, but the above concerns me greatly.

There are skills that are on long cooldowns that also have inductions that will become impossible to use in PvMP if this change makes it to live. Think about a Lore-master's Legendary Trait skill Ents go to War. This has a rather long induction, has a very obvious graphic, and is one of the hardest-hitting tools in a LM's arsenal... and it is so very easy to interrupt. With this change, it will go on a 5 minute (or 3 minute, if traited all red) cooldown. There is also Lightening-storm with a 5 minute cooldown and a long and obvious induction. Not to mention that most all of a LM's DPS (and heals!) is induction-based.

And what about healers? Many of the heals that a Minstrel uses in the Ettenmoors can be used on the move or are inductionless, but not all of them. Bolster Courage does not have a cooldown, but Raise the Spirit does, and our Legendary Skill Fellowship's Heart has a 10 minute cooldown! One interrupt should NOT put the skill on cooldown! The same goes for Warleaders. Crack The Whip only has a 4 second cooldown, but Quit Whining and Fight! has a cooldown of 10 seconds (unless in Brawler's Stance, obviously).

How about Hunters? They need their inductions to go off to build Focus, but with this one change they could become completely neutered in terms of their RvR DPS potential. Same goes for Blackarrows.

I absolutely think that the interrupt skills that all classes have should work, but they absolutely SHOULD NOT put the skill being interrupted on cooldown. This isn't even just a PvMP matter, either. Hopefully, I have misinterpreted the quote above and it doesn't mean what I think it means. Please let me know, if so, and I will breathe a sigh of relief. If it does work like I think it does, hopefully it will be changed due to my feedback and the feedback of the testers.

The obvious answer is that minis will just go warspeech and LMs will be so frustrated they won't come out. Hunters are used to all sorts of insults to their game play so what's one more?

Originally Posted by Sapience

Open Tapping & Remote Looting
Open Tapping and remote looting are now available across Middle-earth! We look forward to hearing your feedback.

Just awesome. Love it. One of the best ideas.

Moria Revamp Part II
The second half of our Moria revamp is now complete! A full developer diary will be available prior to release.

Honestly thought this would never come out. Very cool

Interruption Revision
We've altered how Interrupt skills function in the game to give them more impact. When an induction is now interrupted by an Interruption Skill, the induction will be canceled and the skill will go on cooldown.
In PvE, we have adjusted many monsters so that they will generally not hit a player with an interrupt more than once every 15-20s.

Not sure how I feel about this. Sounds good for short cooldowns, but long ones? I mean, I guess it gives more power to interrupts, but it may be too uneven. We will have to see.

Base Miss Rate
We have removed the base miss rate for all classes (freep & creep) and pets. This means, when fighting an on-level or lower level monster, you will not miss.

This drove me nuts. Thank you.

Induction Setback
To ensure that Induction Setbacks are applied equally to all skills, we are adjusting the policy so that when a player is hit during an induction the induction will be extended by .5s. This penalty is only applied once. These changes have been made to all player and monster player skills that are usable in combat.

I may not understand this correctly, but does this mean that if a caster class is getting wailed on by like 10 mobs, we will only be penalized .5s? Cause that's great. Always felt weird that I couldn't take on multiple mobs as easily.

Experience Added to Craft Nodes and Recipes
Use of craft nodes and crafting recipes now awards characters with experience upon use for nodes or completion for recipes.

I think this just makes sense.

Fast Travel Stable-master System
The Stable-master system underwent a structural and functional change. The UI will look very different and is not entirely finished. You will now see ALL available travel options, regardless of any restrictions on going to each location. You will be able to travel to locations for gold/silver/copper as usual, with all restrictions applying, or use a specially made writ to go anywhere, regardless of restrictions.

Thank you so so so much. As a new player, it's been a real struggle to learn which places connect to where and to remember them. I've taken several long pony rides to find out the town I thought was one place, was actually in another, and I went the wrong way and I need to have a 20 minute ride back. Thanks you so much for this.


There are other things I like, but I want to keep it short. I'm excited from what I've seen so far!

Originally Posted by Sapience

Base Miss Rate
We have removed the base miss rate for all classes (freep & creep) and pets. This means, when fighting an on-level or lower level monster, you will not miss. It's important to note that Miss Chance can still be debuffed, so in some cases missing will be possible. Due to this change, the following have been altered:

• Champion: Deadly Storm 2-set bonus no longer reduces AoE Miss Chance.
• Burglar: Hidden Dagger trait no longer reduces Miss Chance.
• Hunter: Precision Stance no longer reduces Miss Chance.

Shouldn't Hunter's Heart Seeker also be buffed to improve hit chance since part of the value of the skill was it couldn't miss on-level enemies? So shouldn't it auto-hit yellow enemies or something?

'Burglars can no longer stealth on a war-steed'

Wait, what?! Whyyy?? Oh no Turbine, no no no. (Explain, please? Does this mean no more Stratagem?)

Originally Posted by Crell_1

Can you publish what they do now instead?

It was mentioned earlier in the notes that you no longer miss with on-level mobs.

I am guessing they will do whatever they do minus the miss chance for on-level mobs. For example, Precision increases crit chance. But mobs higher in level will still have a miss chance.

Looking forward to running bg, joined with f2p and never really got a chance to run it. I am concerned about lore masters being interrupted placing skills on cooldowns. Lore masters most powerful attacks have lengthy cooldowns and inductions. Sign of power righteousness prevents interrupts perhaps?

Can someone on bullroarer (preferably lore master) confirm that being interrupted places skills on full cooldowns?

Originally Posted by Sapience

The following release notes are for the Bullroarer public test server only and may not reflect the final list of changes or updates included at release.

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Please be aware that everything listed here is subject to change. These notes are not final.

Let's hope so cause wow, some of these changes are "dumb" for lack of ability to use a different word.

Originally Posted by Sapience

Interruption Revision
We've altered how Interrupt skills function in the game to give them more impact. When an induction is now interrupted by an Interruption Skill, the induction will be canceled and the skill will go on cooldown.
In PvE, we have adjusted many monsters so that they will generally not hit a player with an interrupt more than once every 15-20s.

So by you implementing this you are in fact shutting down "pugging (grouping with players you don't know)" if you are an induction class for fear of having a bad tank. No matter even if you put the monsters "interrupts" on minute CDs you are still shutting down the majority of pugged groups and reduces the fellowing in this game considerably. Now I am talking about this from a healer's perspective. I have done many of pugs with less than spectacular tanks and have "tanked" more than the designated tank. At times I've had to pop my CD skills to ensure the survival of my group and seeing as how my best fellowship survival skill is an induction if by chance I were to get interrupted you are in fact killing my group.

One of the things I liked about this game is the fact you could have one "bad" player but if the rest of the group works well together even if the "bad" player was a tank/healer there were ways to power through at least for easier content I.E skirm raids and simple 6-mans like foundry, with this update you are hindering that.

Originally Posted by Sapience

Induction Setback
To ensure that Induction Setbacks are applied equally to all skills, we are adjusting the policy so that when a player is hit during an induction the induction will be extended by .5s. This penalty is only applied once. These changes have been made to all player and monster player skills that are usable in combat.


Several skill adjustments have been made to Player and Monster Player interrupt skills:

• Burglar Addled cooldown has been increased from 15s to 20s.
• Champion Clobber cooldown has been increased from 5s to 10s
• Hunter Blindside cooldown has been reduced from 20s to 12s.
• Reaver Gut Punch cooldown reduced from 15s to 10s.
• Warleader Fracture cooldown increased from 10s to 15s. Brawler Stance now reduces Fractore cooldown by 5s.
• Stalker Pounce and Sudden Pounce cooldowns increased from 10s to 15s. Raking Claw Brute bonus has been replaced with a 50% Induction Duration debuff.

These changes kind of frustrate me further, mostly for the moors which I understand is not the focus of this game but also for PvE.

You shortened induction set backs even further which to be honest I was for the original update but this update seems to be excessive especially because of the nerfs to many Free players and Monster players interrupts alike.
I play a DPS champ, by increasing clobber CD you are not only reducing my ability to get interrupts in general PvP/PvE but effectively nerfed champions DPS in general

Also, I play a r10 reaver as well and I felt that my interrupt was on a satisfactory cooldown of 15s and I would gladly give up that "buff" to ensure that my "adventure/PvE player" would not get a nerf with their interrupt skills.

Originally Posted by Sapience

Miss Chance Revision
1H and 2H Swords now grant bonus Parry chance instead of Hit-chance. 1% for 1Hand Swords and 2% for 2H Swords.

Once again I play a Fervour champ, by giving us parry on our sword you are in effect laughing at me and other Fervour champs and also giving Guardians a slightly increased advantage for tanking/OverPower.


Now I understand there are many other points I could have presented but I stuck with the classes I know from experience.

Having played this game from beta it's disappointing to find that an ''update'' consists of old content being polished. Whilst a lot of these changes will be nice, it doesn't get away from the fact that new content is slow to arrive and when it does its a trio of 3 man's and then the next instalment is Watcher / Turtle / Draigoch do-over...

Major sigh Turbine, as much as i loved the SOA, Moria etc, i have multiple high level toon's and i have no desire to revisit re-done content...

I want new content, multi boss raid for one, not a kill one boss, log off for 5 days whilst i have locks!

Sad raider,

Lob

Originally Posted by DuneBug

I'm really excited about this... As a guard and a captain miss chance has been very depressing and I didn't think you guys would ever get rid of it. Really want to thank you for that... I don't think people have realized the impact yet... But it's a pretty huge buff for non agi users and will make tanking a lot better.

Do you that most raids have mobs 3 levels above you, so you will still be missing a lot?

I dislike the several hunter nerfs I am seeing.
If I read correctly (the description is mostly subject to interpretation, sadly), hunters will now:
- use more power (no more -12% power cost)
- generate more threat (less reduction from legacies)
- lose the precision stance bonus that is very beneficial against +3lvl raid mobs

Any chance,

Hybolt Aid quest
Civling
Quest: "Dressage"

getting added to the test server as an item getting fixed? Im sure their is a lot of folx's including me that would like to get it done..

Also,

Travel to Quest NPC tech
You will now see little check marks next to your quests at the quest tracker if your final quest objective is to go talk to an NPC to complete the quest. You should be able to use these check marks to get the option to fast travel back to the Quest NPC.

will this feature have a enable / disable switch? so that those players who do not wish to utilize this feature can shut it off so we do not see the green check marks?

REALLY liking the Breevamp!

There are plenty of really good changes here (auto tap and auto loot world wide, hoping to see mine from horseback world wide too!)

However I am really against the interrupt changes. Lotro is not a PvP focused game and these changes listed under PvP are affecting the entire playerbase. A minstrel healing a T2 raid gets feared mid fellowships heart and we die? That does not seem like a "fair" mechanic for raiding.

The champion clobber increase seems absurd. It's twice the cooldown for no reason on pve. Of course you wouldn't want these classes spamming it on PvE, but that interrupt made champions in DN/SG days and I find myself waiting on its cooldown often enough during skirmish raids where I have to interrupt 2 or 3 liutenants and the trash. This will heavily impact not only output dps of the champion but also the damage taken by the rest of the raid by enemy inductions gone off. I would dread an on level Saruman T2 with the shadow being now impossible to stop with one player on it.

Please reconsider

@BG cluster

Dungeons - 6-man
SH - 3-man,
Warg Pens - MIA (I hope it is being replaced by 6-man as well)

Unless size change is still in the air, this kind of info deserves a mention

Originally Posted by Sapience

A new radar mapnote which tracks nearby enemies, the Enemy mapnote, is now available.

• Any nearby character (player or non-player) which is a valid combat target will be tracked in this way. Stealthed enemies are handled correctly - the mapnote will disappear as the enemy enters stealth, re-appear when the enemy is detected, and disappear again when the enemy re-enters stealth.
• This new mapnote has ONLY an on-screen indicator. When the tracked character moves off the radar screen, thee is no arrow pointing to it.
• Note: The track enemy mapnote is not shown in the instance clusters and any other private encounters without instance quests. Public instances and private enounters with instance quests (such as skirmishes) retain the track enemy mapnote.
• Note: The track enemy mapnote is not shown for enemies that will not aggro on you (trivial or neutral mobs).

Most everything in the notes looks pretty good, but HATE HATE HATE the idea of this. This would ruin the Ettenmoors! Encouraging people to just watch their radar instead of their surroundings...sounds super fun. Ha. Ha.

Originally Posted by Ferthcott

@BG cluster

Dungeons - 6-man
SH - 3-man,
Warg Pens - MIA (I hope it is being replaced by 6-man as well)

Unless size change is still in the air, this kind of info deserves a mention

Interesting.

I wonder if the Dungeons wings are still simple enough that we can send two people into each and clear the place much faster.

"Players can no longer join instances that have been scaled to more than 10 levels above their current level."

Why? I've spent money on my accounts , why can't I level my alts?

I do not enjoy having to spend months and months working on a single toon. And I don't like having to redo quests, I get bored after doing it once .



If ANYONE can make sense of this and can tell me why this was done, please say something

Thanks.

~Rich

Originally Posted by richtheminstrel

.
If ANYONE can make sense of this and can tell me why this was done, please say something

To make you start crafting instead

Originally Posted by Ferthcott

To make you start crafting instead

Ah! must have missed that haha well hopefully it is decent xp to make crafting really worthwhile

Thanks mate!

Any chance you'll be fixing the Nvidia crash bug anytime soon? It's getting really old consuming food/scrolls/potions/etc. and having to log back in every 30 minutes.

I can extend the time between crashes by reducing the graphics quality, but then certain elements don't even draw. Sucks to be attacked by a drake on medium graphics since you can neither see nor target said drake.

Truly, this is a lame bug. My best guess is that it's a video memory leak.

I think a lot of you are missing something...

there are plenty of ways to prevent interruption induction via skills/crafted items

the items for lms and minis scholar's can craft prevent interruptions for a short time, use those for your important cds. I have never had my Fellowship's Heart interrupted in moors.and as a warg, I hate when lms use those items and I can't stop their lightning storm ;D but I love it too because I have an lm ;o

also skills. Cry of valour 9yeah, I know 10m cd...) also prevents induction interruption.
Mini bubbles and some other bubbles prevent induction interruption.

so all this "Inductions will never go off again" is nonsense will it be harder? yes. Is it gonna make being an LM hell? probably... yes... but not impossible.

now... ensue rage about how I don't understand how bad this will be =D

Definitely looking up!
Scaled DG isn't as exciting as something new, but at least it's something... please make it worthwhile.

Wow, this is a much meatier update than I expected. Some really nice changes in there. I'm not quite sure about the interrupt changes but I'll wait and see what folks think.

Another concern I have is with with the Dol Guldur cluster. It's awesome that it's being scaled, but does this means that Medallions of Dol Guldur are gone as a currency? I've been saving them up for my alts so they can grab some armour when they eventually get to Mirkwood but I'm worried that if the Medallions of DG are gone, they will have a poor conversion rate to marks/medallions and make it impossible for my alts to get their goodies. It wouldn't be a problem if the barterers in Ost Galadh on live weren't inaccessible to everyone but members of the right class, but unfortunately they are.

Any insight?

As of this posting "Last edited by Sapience; Today at 01:06 PM"

I love the changes so far.
Open tapping and the looting, xp for crafting, Moria update, Great River tasks levels fixed, single tokens for all festivals, adjusting some of the interrupt skills so they are longer to use for those that use them for non interrupt reasons and some more instances scaled.

what will happen to the race tokens that we already have?

Originally Posted by Aiseki

I think a lot of you are missing something...

there are plenty of ways to prevent interruption induction via skills/crafted items

the items for lms and minis scholar's can craft prevent interruptions for a short time, use those for your important cds. I have never had my Fellowship's Heart interrupted in moors.and as a warg, I hate when lms use those items and I can't stop their lightning storm ;D but I love it too because I have an lm ;o

also skills. Cry of valour 9yeah, I know 10m cd...) also prevents induction interruption.
Mini bubbles and some other bubbles prevent induction interruption.

so all this "Inductions will never go off again" is nonsense will it be harder? yes. Is it gonna make being an LM hell? probably... yes... but not impossible.

now... ensue rage about how I don't understand how bad this will be =D

I think you are missing something. items such as minstrel sheet music does not protect against cc (stun, daze, knockdown) which is still counted as an interrupted skill. Minstrel bubble also does not affect cc.

this change would also make the already OP Flayer auto-interrupt skill a game breaker in the moors.

where is the mac client for bullroarer?