Yule festival’s end, 2012

It feels like I wrote more about Yule festival than most festivals this year! the previous post listed a few more Yule links.

The clincher was that there were a lot of horses and warsteeds to talk about, which got the Steed Gallery fired up (all-steeds).

The lildanas always show up for festival, though the hobbit quadruplets usually stay home. This Yule festival however saw two very important reasons for them to come out.

#1 - Sack of Presents: Everyone who showed up to Yule Festival and did one quest got a sack of presents. It didn’t take us long to figure out that the sack of presents was worth camping out in Frostsbluff to get daily. Gifts we got from the sacks included Festival tokens, a special hat and cloak, stat tomes, Danaish got a hobby horse, and level 25 Danadalyn even won a Tarnished Symbol that she gave me to build my level 85 2nd age LI.

#2 – Festival Quest leveling: The quests were all considered as “on-level” quests. That didn’t do so much for me since I was at level 85, although the LIs all advanced with iXP for each quest. The lildanas were all level 25 or level 6, and never really leave the craft-halls except to come to festival. So, going to festival, it was like they were getting free xp for doing what they planned to do anyway. What a win! That reminds me, craft-leveling, I’ll talk soon about the joy of how crafters get xp just for crafting. J

A few friends: As always, festival is a good time to see people who you might not see often. Here are a few friends who I saw at Yule.

Bluepop has a sparkling good time at Yule.

Mysterixox and I wait in line for the Frostbluff Theater. Myst is the talent behind the Lotro Academy podcast Lotro Academy and thinks I am Awesome. J http://lotroacademy.com/?p=962

Aeronwy and I sport matching Fleet-footed Goats to stroll around the town of Frostbluff.

Betzi and Danaszar brave the winter’s cold to run through the snow toward a snowball fight.

Lildanas: The lil-danas As mentioned, because of the Sack of Presents (and general good time of festivalling), the lildanas showed up for the party. Here are a few parting shots to close Yule 2012.

DanaClaus disappears just before Christmas, muttering something about checking lists and and working off cookie weight. Yule festival is one of his favorites.

Danaish rides her new Hobby Horse around Frostbluff like a hobbit on too much sugar and pipeweed.

DanaOnar, one of the hobbit quadruplets, grips a Spring fest giant flower in one hand and a new Yule mug in the other. She enjoyed the warmth of a Spiral Horned Cloak from one of the Sack of Presents.

Danadelion poses stoically with one of the snowmen who leans his head on her shoulder.

Yule Festival was a great time and we look forward to seeing you again next year!

Spring Shrews, Shrews, Shrews!

Hello hello! I know… you came looking for Ingolemo… but I have to get something off my queue.

Shrews!

Shrews... Shrews... Shrews... Exciting word, yes?

The Spring festival ended two weeks ago and I haven’t written a Spring festival wrap-up post! I will obsess over it if I don’t get it written. I was trying to think which festival I like most, and decided that I like all of them. I love the Haunted Burrow, and the Shrews & flowers, and summer fishing, and even Frostbluff (though the idea of stealing from people makes me sad, so I normally just eat too much food instead).

Spring festival holds a special place for me, because I arrived in Middle Earth during the 2010 Spring festival. As an elf, I started my adventure in Celondim, and I recall seeing the big orange message throughout Ered Luin concerning “Stomp-a-shrew in Duillond”. It took a bit to find Duillond and understand that a festival was going on, but I was hooked.

I’ve said it before, but it still rings true that festival is a great way to break from the routine and meet new people as well as celebrate with people you know. Spring festival was no exception as I got the honor of meeting a few people like Tomeroric, Cessy, and Llynthe.


Here is the most noble Tomeoric. He caught up with me in Duillond and said he actually recognized me from this blog! It is common to ask a fan for his picture and autograph, right? He graciously obliged for this photo.

I had to chase Cessy down into Moria, having missed taking her picture in Duillond with the shrews or flowers. (Note to self, remember to charge the camera each time I go out.) Cessy shows that she can work a Supergirl pose! Own it, girl! Watch out boys, Cessy is Fearless!

And, Llynthe! I was saying hello to people I pass on the street when I came across Llynthe. I was thinking... "she looks so familiar. did we do Foundry? no. Roots? no. Moors? no. Some older content? no." Llynthe is the famous writer of http://thehobbitsinthestories.wordpress.com/.

It is a bit mind-numbing during the Spring festival, but I liked the collecting flowers quest! It is peaceful to roam the countryside collecting flowers, lol! The rewards for collecting flowers were… really lame, hehe. Of course, the only good thing to come out of it was the Steed of the Jester (Jester), which is just a matter of luck, and I got enough Huge flowers that all the hobbit quads could have one. If I was the boss, I might change this quest to reward spring leaves or marks. Even I, who really enjoyed it, couldn’t imagine collecting even one more flower after about 4 hours of it during festival.

Danadalyn (with Cave-claw Masked Steed) paid a visit to the Hobbit golfing statue in Brockenborings. On the "Bullroarer’s Challenge", it takes a bit of patience, steely determination, and nerve to “just go for it”, but the lildanas all got the fence walking done and spring deed completed. That is a fun one. J

"When I grow up, I want to be just like Danaszar!" 
Indeed. Me too little hobbit quest guy. Me too.

Love the festival maze. The only downside is that one can only do it about 4 times a day for collecting barter leaves. I think Danaclaus was more interested talking to the Wandering Elves than actually mazing.

 It is a good place to run crazy, have a few Dire Beers, scold some naughty tween hobbits… Good times.

Symbelmyne Spring horses for all. It suited Danaish quite well as she prepared for a ride across the countryside.

My love/hate part of the festival is the "consumables for deed". If you use 300 of a certain consumable, you will be allowed to do that specific action as a skill. For example, this spring's consumables were the Doom-shrooms and D.R.A.G.O.N. I totally love setting a goal and achieving it, especially with these consumables.

What I Hate though... I deal with the fact that the consumables take many festival tokens (ex. spring leaves), typically about 180 tokens per 300 consumables. However, the really bad part, which is on my top 5 least favorite things in lotro... is that the consumable has a 5 minute Cooldown. With some of the ones in the past (youll-yule-festival), they were on the same CD timer. Fortunately, the spring ones were not, but we still must wait 5 minutes between uses. At best, that is about 25 hours of throwing tricks at other people. AND... they do not advance while in a raid, and they do not work in the Ettenmoors. 

So, you have to be (1) somewhere with people, (2) not in the moors, (3) not in a raid, (4) be willing to continue to throw obnoxious things at people as often as the CD timer expires. I need to make buttons for "/thank you for helping me with my deed" and "sorry I had to hit you. again. with a doom-shroom". My goal is to finish the 300 by the start of summer festival, so I can get more things to throw and wait on long CDs.

Here is one of my victims getting a face full of of exploding shroom and dragon fire.

Alas, spring festival only happens during the spring (or in lotro’s case… early summer). I will see you again next year Mr. Shrew.

Finally, here is Danaszar in her Anniversary hat, Yule robe, riding a Dusk steed, in front of the Angel’s Draigoch statue (draigoch-statue-lil-danas-moving-day). It doesn’t have anything to do with Spring festival, but it was a nice picture and I told her I would post it.

I’m already excited for Summer festival! It must be coming up soon-ish!

Update 7 Changes, RK changes

When I was younger, Updates would happen and I would be none the wiser. The update would be like a foreign language because I had no reference to understand. I have gotten a bit better at sorting through and figuring out what matters to me.

Now when Update 6 was released, it changed virtues and traits (Update-6-relics-and-virtues) and changed RKs significantly. I totally intend to explain those changes because it was really important and lots of people discuss (complain) about upcoming changes without revisiting the subject with actual data evaluation after they play it. Rest assured, I have data to show the RK changes of U6. J  However, I won’t post-mortem dissect U6 today.

Today, I want to look at Update 7 that is coming down the pike next. The way I read these Updates, I mentally classify changes as words (typos and such), minor fixes that to have things work like intended, and real changes that matter.

The entire release is an interesting read. I picked through it to note some of the most interesting things. If you want to read the entire thing (or are interested in classes other than RKs), CasualstrolltoMordor has a nice PFD right here (Update-7-bullroarer-release-notes).

Because there are too many words on this page and not enough pictures, here is a shot of the Stangard steed. For the low low price of 20 gold Anduin tokens, it can be yours also (Less-math-more-ponies). My next targeted steed is probably the Isengard Warhorse... we shall see how much longer that takes to save up the 99 Orthanc sigil fragments.

Summary of interesting things:

• "Fields of Fornost in North Downs gets a revamp, instance panel, group play level 30 – 75."     *Haven’t been there in ages.

• "Moria gets a revision."     *No new quests or consequence of interest at level 75.

• "Storm on Methedras New Skirmish."     *Will need to add it to skirmish table. (Fastest-skirmishes-marks-per-minute). Hopefully, it will be super and give reasonable marks for its length.

• "Star-lit Crystals for Legendary Items - available as loot from monsters. Up to 3 can be used on LI... displayed as star icons… will upgrade the DPS, tactical healing rating, tactical damage rating or shield use rank of your LIs & will upgrade any ratings based legacies as well as secondary ratings and stats."        *Well jolly that. Without new quests, there is less reason to go wandering looking for mobs and I am not known for “luck loot”; so hopefully, they will show up on AH. We shall see, and I'm sure it will be great. J

• "6th inventory bag will be made available as part of the Riders of Rohan pre-purchase."       * Want it. Must have it. Give it to me, my preciousss…

• "Relic change: Tactical Mastery was added to the Westfold Rune of Power and the Great River Rune of Power."    *See Update-6-relics-and-virtues - previously, it boosted Fate, Physical Mitigation (defense), and Physical Mastery (useful for non-tactical classes) and was inappropriate for a tactical class. I still probably won’t give up the “True Rune of the Two Trees” though.

• "The Jester horse jingle, jangle sound is now playing on the sound effects channel and not all channels."    * <06/01 EDIT: That horse has been located at Spring Festival; see him here @  Danania's Steed of the Jester >.

Photo break... It was a great Anniversary party. Danaszar, in party hat, bids you all Auf  Wiedersehen until the next festival... which might not be that far away since Spring is here and we aren't yet spring festing.

U7 Rune-keeper changes:

The released doc lists 17 changes to RK.

11 of them are just words, typos, and tooltips. They have no bearing on how a RK feels.

5 of them are fixes, mostly minor:

• The effects of Glorious Foreshadowing and Wondrous Foreshadowing will no longer stack

• Essence of Storm no longer increments Winter-storm on a critical hit.

• Winter-storm is no longer expended by an attack that is resisted or misses.

• Adjusted the trait set bonus for Calming Verse to boost movement speed +20% to match the tip.

• Fixed a bug where the Rune-Keeper skill “Ceaseless Argument” was not receiving the appropriate damage increase from the Legacy.

The lack of Calming Verse speed buff was annoying when first spotted with Update 6, but it looks like it is fixed currently even before Update 7 (at least most of the time). These five are not a big deal since they are revising to work “as intended”. Ceaseless Argument legacy is the only other one that is easy to spot as the Legacy will now be able to add +15% damage at maximum.

The last one, about the Riffler?:

• All Riffler of Writs class items should now grant increased Tactical Mastery, a reduction to Writ power cost, and the ability to nullify attunement shift while the Rune-keeper is attuned.

I had to go look up Riffler of Writs at the metalsmith since I don't use that one. So to recap, the new version has Tactical Mastery (all rifflers and chisels do), reduction of Writ power cost (if you are running out of power, we need to figure out why… this riffler probably isn’t the solution), and it has the ability to nullify attunement shift when casting writs. Yep, that is what it is supposed to do. It must also be a fix and not a real change. 

Danadelion sends a copy of all of the level 75 rifflers and chisels available for us to review, with the mention that any decent metalsmith can make these and are relatively inexpensive. So, don't get suckered into overpaying for something so easy to craft and so necessary for your RK-ness.

I will stick with the "Exceptional Superior Calenard Chisel of Lightning". It's simple, effective, and super. There is never a reason to change from it.

Happy 5th Anniversary, lotro!

Happy 5^th Anniversary to lotro!

And Thank you all for visiting Danania.net! Last Friday, the site saw its 10,000th visitor, which is absolutely amazing to me as the site is right at 2 months old. Thank you! спасибо! 谢谢 Danke! Salamat! Bedankt! Merci! Thanks, eh?! (...to my Canadian friends).

There is so much excitement in Middle Earth and the Anniversary party is in full swing! It is such a hit that the party's end has been extended from April 30 to May 9.

I have been having a great time and I hope you are also! Often, when festivals start, I rarely leave to do anything else. This time my friend Lartessa set up a Helegrod run and I couldn’t pass that up (still need to kill Thorog, but at least now I am eligible to open the Dragon Wing when the opportunity presents itself), and Nimitar organized a visit to Ost Dunhoth and I had never had the opportunity to see much of that and we totally ran the tables (I got some good pictures for another post).

However, today’s post is about the Anniversary party.  Since the previous horse post went over so well, we will have more horses today. J

First of all, when planning to maximize fun, I always visit party planner Goldenstar at  casualstrolltomordor.com  . I would say I just visit for the highlights, but in reality I study and absorb everything she posts like I am preparing for the medical boards.

One of the best things about the Anniversary festival is obviously the fireworks. Middle Earth has had fireworks before but nothing on the scale of what came with the Anniversary party.

Here is a shot of me visiting the Methel stage in the Shire. The funny thing is, it seems like I’ve seen that stage before when I quested through the Shire as a much younger elf, but that has been so long ago...

I wanted to ask my friend Gandalf about it, but he seemed preoccupied, like his mind was elsewhere. He muttered something about hidden hobbits, but it was drowned out by the blasts and flash of fireworks around us. So we just stood and enjoyed the festivities.

One of the Anniversary quests, Firework Explorer, takes you on a tour to launch fireworks and bring festivities to other parts of Middle Earth, which earns the title “Firecracker”. The most far-reaching place is Elrond’s house in Rivendell. That is an easy leap for a Supergirl but was no small task for the lil danas. Fortunately, there are kind hunters and captains around to help out. Memyr delivered all the lil danas safely to aid in the spreading of party cheer.

OMG! Memyr, why are you on one knee in front of Danaszar?? <blush, omgomgomg> 

Whew, just lost a contact lens?

When Danadelion saw Rivendell for the first time, it brought back memories of just how lovely it is. Imagine fighting through the Trollshaws, hurriedly crossing the Ford of Bruinen, arriving at Rivendell, and finally seeing this breathtaking sight?

We had a great time at the beer brawl! There are three versions: Beginner (1 token), Intermediate (2 tokens), Expert (3 tokens). As long as there aren’t 50 people in the arena and you aren’t being targeted specifically to fail for some reason, the Expert version is totally achievable, gives the most tokens, and leads toward a deed which awards the title “Battered, Bruised and Contused” for 25 expert wins. For hitting others 200 times in brawls, you can earn the title “Clubber”.

When you win on Expert, you glow for 3 minutes in the glory of your victory. Danadalyn wears her glow proudly.

When you launch 50 fireworks of one color, you get an Anniversary token. When you launch 50 fireworks of all 6 colors, you earn the title of “Master Blaster”. DanaClaus was having good fun whacking people around and working toward the Master Blaster title. The interim between brawls is a good time to launch fireworks.

Macswife was one of the first people I met who had the /toast emote from the Lost Invitations quest. Ok, so it isn’t the most flattering picture. Lol. It is funny and the emote is a good one.

Even the lil dana hobbits get into the act. Danaarodel, the “keeper of dana outfits”, dressed up in a green imp outfit complete with oversized flower from the spring festival and did a lil toast-ing herself.

Danaish was the first lil dana to get a steed from the Lost Invitations. Here she is riding the “Steed of the Dusk Watch” (aka Warden’s steed). It has very nice leather-embossed tack.

It took a bit, but I also got the Lossoth steed from the Lost Invitations. The picture isn’t the best; I was mostly asleep when I took it and it was a black horse in the dead of night (Note: If you are awake, wait til daylight to take better pictures.)

Definitely, one of the best things about festival time is that it brings people together, some of whom you otherwise don’t see often. Here is a shot of my friend Jastirria who I had not seen in ages. When I was a level 48 noob, Jas was the one who pointed out that I had to go get a Legendary Item (even though I had no idea what it was or where to get one) and came and picked me up out of Forochel and drop kicked me into the Gates of Moria. Some people and events you never forget. Thanks Jas.

Danadelion actually won a Steed of the Champion in the champion’s lottery! This steed is the first and only steed we have ever won in the lottery. Of course, I went and bought one for myself, but I’m not catty and will let Delion have her moment in the sun. Like the rest, it is a beautiful horse. :)

In the “can’t have too many steeds category”, we all went and got our Anniversary steeds. The new one is the Fireworks steeds. It actually does randomly shoot fireworks out the saddle pack.

The 2011 Anniversary steed is the white garbed one.  For fun, I scrolled back 9000 pictures  and pulled last year's picture out of archive to show the steed. That day, for that picture, I tried on the 2011 Anniversary clothing that I had borrowed from my friend Sparowen. (Yes, I probably should have taken off the red gloves…)

Alas, time to go to sleep and dream. May your festival spark and pop and your dreams be pony-filled.

The Herbalist is my skirmish friend

Skirmishes can be a lot of fun! True, I was older by the time I ever experienced my first skirmish. But, when I got there, I enjoyed this part of the game as much as I did while questing… just different.

The first thing I needed to learn was what a soldier was, what I wanted from a soldier, how do I develop a soldier, etc. I started off with the soldier I was assigned by the Skirmish Captain. It was some man warrior guy. I barely remember him; I think his name was Stud. I tried to recall the story to Danaszar and she sent this shot of her going out with her inept level 1 Soldier. He improved to a level 1 Warrior after their first skirmish, but he isn’t much about which to get excited.

So, there I was at level 65, with my basic warrior and did not know beans about anything until Menelchol taught me about the Skirmish Captain and the Skirmish Trainer. Until then, I had skirmished a half dozen times at Amon Sul. My warrior was always running off getting into trouble and was quick to die (he was, after all, a level 1 warrior with no skills in a level 65 skirmish since I had not figured out how to train him).

First thing, the Trainer allows you to train up your skills, and the Captain lets you slot those skills. You need to visit both to get your soldier to be productive. Good to know. J Here is a picture of the skirmish camp in Galtrev; the other camps should all have people covering these jobs in each camp.

You have the option of training up several different types of soldiers:

·         Warrior – melee, like a Champion,

·         Archer – ranged, like a Hunter,

·         Sage – tactical, like a runekeeper/loremaster,

·         Bannerguard – buffs, like a captain’s herald,

·         Herbalist – heals, a healer, 

·         Protector – aggros, like a Guardian.

After reading about all of the soldiers, I chose the Herbalist. I am sure the others are all nice in their own ways, but Herbalist fits me best. When I play solo, I unleash the Fury and Wrath and am looking to cause the most devastation possible as fast as possible. I do still move and kite some and work to sharpen my skills, but the Herbalist lets me unload the damage with no recourse of needing to worry about my morale bar. Think about that; I am a light armor wearer and am never concerned about getting hit since the Herbalist always has my back. Healing is her job; it is all she does. She heals me, she heals herself, she heals our allies. She never attacks. She never runs off in the wrong direction. She just stands there, sometimes in the middle of the fray if necessary, and heals. Bold. Powerful. Awesome.

I did have to train her though. Once you know about the Trainer and Captain, it isn’t too bad and it isn’t that expensive. The previous post (best-295-tp-ever) gave some insight into soldier training cost. By the time you get the hang of skirmishing, marks wil be rolling in and leveling the soldier feels really cheap. Here is what I chose for my Herbalist traits (That which I was taught, I pass on to anyone who wants to know).

Attribute: Attribute training is easy enough. She is a Herbalist. The other slots under “Attribute” are for changing the way your soldier looks. For example, I have slotted an elf, with long hair, red hair, red dress. (Hint, the skirmish “Cosmetics” barter can sell you all kinds of different looks for your soldier. You can see the Cosmetics guy in the background of the skirmish camp picture above.)

Skills: The Herbalist is skilled to heal me and all allies with the skills: Herbs of Boundless Endurance, Nature’s Cure, Refreshing Herbs, and Ultimate: Words of Healing.

Training: She is trained to heal better (more tactical mastery), have more morale and power, and never run out of power (ICPR) with the training: Boundless Morale, Boundless Resolve, Tactical Potency, and Resurgent Power.

Personal: I don’t just “feel” better by having a wonderful Herbalist, I AM better. The personal trait section is for boosts to the player because “You are more powerful while leading a Soldier in Skirmishes”. I chose Battle-master, Defender’s Bane, and Tactical Artistry. All three improve my ability to unleash Fury and Wrath, which is something I really enjoy while skirmishing.

Please do feel free to copy the skill choices of this Herbalist. I have nearly never lost a Skirmish with her (only Icy Crevasse a few times early on) and we always have a good time!

“It looks like we are having some roast bear tonight Quinn!”