Two weeks ago, Standing Stone Games told Lord of the Rings Online players that the unexpected demand for the four new 64-bit servers had prompted the team to open two more servers. Now, we have a timeline for when one of those servers is coming and what both of them will be called.
“Due to popular demand, we’re pleased to announce the addition of two brand-new 64-bit servers,” the studio announced this morning. “Grond (EU) will officially open Wednesday, April 9th, while Sting (US) will launch in the following weeks. Exact dates for Sting (US) will be announced soon, so stay tuned.”
Do note that this time, the launch of Grond will be staggered – and the way it’s phrased is pretty confusing. It looks as if VIP players can roll new toons, begin playing, and commit to housing purchases on Grond on the 9th at 2 p.m. EDT. Non-sub players can then join in with transfers, play, and housing at 3 p.m. EDT. The post does not expressly say that subbers can transfer at 2 p.m. EDT; indeed, the implication is that subbers can’t transfer until 3 p.m., same as everyone else. It also means that whoever logs in first with newly purchased writs gets first crack at the “best” housing.
We’ve seen a lot of people asking about when the dark worlds will open, as their planned reopening was delayed last month. We still have no new timeline for those, meaning those characters remain in limbo. “More information on Dark World transfers and Sting (US) openings will be available soon,” an update to the original post now says.
Likewise, we know many players are still waiting on responses to tickets from the original transfers, as people lost everything from housing writs to wallets in the move. MOP’s own MJ was affected by the bug that seems to have swallowed some players’ housing inventories, too. It looks as if there isn’t going to be a game-wide fix and that affected players should put in a ticket.
“CS is mostly through the wallet tickets, and working through tickets involving housing writs,” Severlin wrote in Discord. “The hardest ones to do, and the most queued up atm, is when something happened to the housing bank so that is going a lot slower than we’d like. […] A lot of tickets turn out to be people who didn’t click the check to move shared items, so CS is doing a pass to make sure that has been done as they work through the tickets.”
