lord of the rings online

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Official Site: Lord of the Rings Online
Studio: Standing Stone Games, formerly Turbine/WB Interactive Entertainment; published by Daybreak Game Company
Launch Date: April 24, 2007
Genre: Fantasy Themepark
Business Model: Hybrid F2P (Optional Sub, Cash Shop)
Platform: PC

Lord of the Rings Online continues to fine-tune class adjustments

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How many number twos can Standing Stone Games put after a Lord of the Rings Online patch before it collapses from the sheer decimal weight? We’re getting close to finding out, as Update 22.2.2 arrived today, bringing further adjustments to last week’s mid-tier patch and its class balance changes.

Hunters, Guardians, Lore-masters, and Minstrels all should definitely read the fine print on this update, as many of the skills changes have been changed once more. Some nerfs, some buffs, you know the drill.

The studio also added a new chat restriction to premium accounts: “To help alleviate some chat spamming issues, characters on premium accounts must now be level 10 in order to chat on the global chat channels. Characters on VIP accounts continue to have no level restriction to chat, while characters on free accounts must still be level 20 to use the global chat channels.”

Source: Patch notes

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Battle Bards Episode 122: Happy town

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In peaceful villages and bubbly burgs, you just know that there’s bound to be an abundance of happy music! Whenever the Battle Bards regroup to lick their wounds and drink the terrors away, they often find that happy town music is perfect to soothe jangled nerves and re-center one’s heroism. There’s plenty of those tunes in today’s episode, so recoup with them as they listen to the songs of the common folk.

Battle Bards is a bi-weekly podcast that alternates between examining a single MMO’s soundtrack and exploring music tracks revolving around a theme. MOP’s Justin co-hosts with bloggers Steff and Syl. The cast is available on iTunes, Google Play, TuneIn, Pocket Casts, Stitcher, and Player.FM.

Listen to Episode 122: Happy town (or download it) now:

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Massively OP Podcast Episode 174: Fallout vs. Elder Scrolls

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On this week’s show, Bree and Justin take tentative steps into the early reveals of E3 — including Fallout 76, Elder Scrolls Online, Anthem, and Final Fantasy XIV, all while dealing with a ton of updates and even an expansion launch. June is here, and we’re all gaming hard!

It’s the Massively OP Podcast, an action-packed hour of news, tales, opinions, and gamer emails! And remember, if you’d like to send in your own letter to the show, use the “Tips” button in the top-right corner of the site to do so.

Listen to the show right now:

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The Daily Grind: Will you sub to EA’s new ‘Origin Access Premier’ service?

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During EA Play this weekend, EA announced Origin Access Premier, its attempt at a subscription service on PC. For $100 a year, you’ll basically get a service pretty similar to what already exists on Xbox: You’ll be able to play all the big new games, like Anthem, plus other titles within the Origin Vault, for that flat fee.

Subscriptions rise again, right? Is this a good thing for games outside the service?

“As always, I want to Bree to win the lottery, buy up some MMOs and take them to the Island of Misfit MMOs where $200 per annum gets you sub/pref access to all of RIFT, LOTRO, STO, SWTOR, et al.,” MOP tipster Sally wrote to us, urging us to write about the sub. “But picture that you are a hard-working indie dev. You already have the issues with dealing with Steam. Now a customer has to decide whether to buy your game or just play something like Anthem for no additional cost.”

Will you be subbing to EA’s new Origin Access Premier service? Do you think it’ll have a catastrophic impact on indie games or MMOs with subs?

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The Daily Grind: What MMO celebration do you never miss?

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The first year that any MMORPG that I’m playing launches a new festival or holiday, I’m usually all over it. Sometimes I get too much into it, spending so much time farming rewards or digging through the activities that it sours me for future years.

But there are always those celebrations that I make a point to check in and see. The allure of a free Tier 6 starship in Star Trek Online usually brings me out for its summer holiday event, and I am a huge fan of the haunted burrow in Lord of the Rings Online’s fall festival. And it wouldn’t be Christmas if I wasn’t logging into World of Warcraft to see what awaited me under the tree!

What MMO celebrations or holidays do you never miss? Which ones pull you back to the game, if only for a day or two, even if you’ve been away for months?

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Apple’s OpenGL deprecation could spell trouble for some MMOs on Mac

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Get all the “haha people game on Macs?” out of your system right off the bat because this one isn’t funny. MOP tipster Apparition pointed us to a GamingOnLinux thread yesterday in which Linux and Mac gamers worry over Apple’s recent decision to deprecate OpenGL as of the next macOS release. OpenGL is basically a programming interface for graphics rendering, and it’s used heavily in gaming, particularly for supporting games on Macs.

Apparition’s, and our, first thought was for MMORPGs that might be affected. There are plenty of large MMOs that utilize this tech for Mac support, including Elder Scrolls Online, but it’s probably the smaller ones who might not be able to afford to switch to updated codebases. According to GOL, plenty of smaller devs, though not for MMOs, have already announced their intention to simply stop supporting OSX altogether rather than migrate to new tech.

As for MMOs, Guild Wars 2 may be affected, Lord of the Rings Online is reportedly already working on the problem, and of course, World of Warcraft has already migrated. We’ll be digging around for more clues from Mac MMOs. If you play on a Mac and your MMO of choice has made a statement about its security or its plans for the client, sound off in the comments and we’ll try to keep this post updated.

Source: GamingOnLinux, Reddit via @that_shaman. With thanks to Apparition!

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Lord of the Rings Online 22.2 update is live with sweeping class balance changes, wearable instruments, and new story quests

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It’s release day for Lord of the Rings Online. Update 22.2 is the big ol’ class balance patch that everyone’s been fussing about for the last few weeks.

“We have taken steps to improve the power, gameplay, and overall enjoyment of numerous classes throughout the game, as part of a longer-term effort to optimize class balance,” Standing Stone says. It’s buffed the potency of multiple traits and reset trait allocation for all affected classes too. Notably, Champions got a hefty damage and healing buff, Guardians will find Keen Blade got a do-over, Hunter lines and skills got major overhauls, Warden DPS is up up up, and some of the Lore-master’s traits have been outright deleted (I’ll let MOP’s Justin be the arbiter of whether that class is improved or not!).

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LOTRO Legendarium: Why Mordor fails and Northern Mirkwood succeeds

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When Lord of the Rings Online turned its sight toward Mordor, it had been running off of a rather hot streak. Not perfect, mind you, but the past couple of years had seen a lot of great content come into the game. Gondor itself was beautiful and, taken together, a full expansion’s worth of content. Minas Tirith is one of the most breathtaking cities ever created for an MMORPG (performance issues aside). The game reached its 10th anniversary and had us all buzzing about with the new scavenger hunts.

And then… and then we knew we were finally headed into Mordor. That in itself was a monumental moment for many players, and I lost track of how many friends I saw taking screenshots of themselves “walking into Mordor.”

Unfortunately, this ultimate moment of storytelling in a story-heavy, IP-grounded game ended up being a disappointment. Mild for some, crushing for others. From my perspective, I say without malice that Mordor, as an expansion and a region, failed. Today we’re going to touch on the multiple reasons why this is, as well as how Standing Stone Games is getting its groove back with Northern Mirkwood.

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The Daily Grind: Which MMO has the best mount selection?

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Lately my attention has been arrested by all of the news coming out about Battle for Azeroth’s mounts. I know it’s totally dorky, but I’m really intrigued by the notion of riding a giant bee. Seriously, I want that bee mount yesterday. Yes, it’s completely impractical and bordering on farce, but it’s right down my alley.

There have been many opinions over the years about mount selections and varieties in MMORPGs. Some people enjoy the diversity and creativity that these exude while others find them annoying and immersion-breaking. I can appreciate how LOTRO keeps its mounts somewhat more practical while still having a blast with RIFT’s eclectic array (racing snail, awayyyy!).

Which MMO has the best mount selection — and why?

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The Stream Team: Springing into LOTRO’s Spring festival encore

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Spring has resprung! The spring festival has returned to LOTRO for an encore, which means Massively OP’s MJ can participate! She’ll be running the maze rescuing elves, shushing tweens, and downing ales. The question is, will she find her way out? Tune in live at 6:00 p.m. to see if she gets lost.

What: Lord of the Rings Online
Who: MJ Guthrie
When: 6:00 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, May 23rd, 2018

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Lord of the Rings Online continues to iterate on its class change patch, extends spring festival

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The third build of Lord of the Rings Online’s Update 22.2 is now up on the test server, and players can preview it to see how Standing Stone Games is reacting to the testing and feedback of all of the class changes that are coming with this patch.

Hunters received a “more substantial” balance pass this time around, with more changes to focus generation and skill inductions. Lore-masters will rejoice to see the return of a changed Wizard’s Fire, while Minstrels might not be so pleased to see that their cries and calls have an increased cooldown. The patch also factors in the low-level anniversary scavenger hunts and featured challenge quests for certain instances.

And even if it’s starting to feel more like summer than winter outside, you can hang on to the vestiges of the verdant months with the extended encore of LOTRO’s Spring Festival. The event ends on May 30th.

Source: Patch notes

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Perfect Ten: The unique pitfalls of licensed MMOs

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Making a list of the “biggest” MMOs currently running is always an exercise in frustration. It’s easy to put a few things on the list – no one’s going to argue with placing World of Warcraft on such a list, for example – but then everything else always gets mired in opinions and controversy, and endless cycles of “why isn’t this game I love on there while another game I don’t like is there?!” I speak from experience.

Still, on our list of the healthiest MMOs at the moment, we’ve got only three licensed games: Neverwinter, Star Trek Online, and Star Wars: The Old Republic. Those are by no means the only entries on the licensed game list, of course, but there does seem to be something of a dearth of those. And perhaps that’s more understandable than it seems. For all that we talk about how one setting or another would be perfect for an MMO, there are some unique troubles you inevitably run into when you get into the licensed MMO shuffle.

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Massively OP Podcast Episode 171: Bless you, my subscriber

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On this week’s show, Bree and Justin delve into the future of Lord of the Rings Online, debate when a sub isn’t a sub, head on into Summerset, fly high with Worlds Adrift, and more!

It’s the Massively OP Podcast, an action-packed hour of news, tales, opinions, and gamer emails! And remember, if you’d like to send in your own letter to the show, use the “Tips” button in the top-right corner of the site to do so.

Listen to the show right now:

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