LOTRO and the computer genius..

I have a feeling this is going to be a mammoth post, so go grab a cuppa and settle in. I have sooo much to tell you.. [Gather round children, the old man’s going to tell a story – Ed].

I finally got my graphics problem sorted out. I’m a bit of an air head when it comes to fixing computers, so what I usually do is keep notes so I can track what I have done and what changes I have made. That way I don’t forget what I have tried and can eventually eliminate resolutions I have tried to sort the problem. I thought I would share my notes with you so you can see how I got on fixing it. Apologies for the crappy scribble on the notes. They obviously were meant just for my use, and I can read them ok. Hopefully you can too. I used small note pad paper so have numbered each bit in the top right hand corner so you can read them in order. [If you can be bothered with the ramblings of a madman of course – Ed]

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Scribblings of an IT specialist

So, what did I think of LOTRO? Well, I have played it before on release for about 4 days only. So I had completed the tutorial parts and done a little bit extra previously. To be honest though, I really didn’t remember anything so it was all pretty much fresh and exciting stuff!

Let’s start at the beginning. I rolled a Hunter from Rohan (Man). He’s called Caedluuf. So I started in the town of Archet and following a nice introduction that saw me assist a Halfling and a Ranger to escape some brigands I witnessed a crazy cut scene where Amdir the Ranger confronts a Black Rider. From the start little things like that help grab me in an MMO. I knew straight away (even though I had been previously told) that the ongoing plotline would be interesting and more importantly interactive, with me being able to witness key encounters and developments in the story it made it all the more immersive.

Oh, one other thing I forgot to mention was how the fear from such NPC mobs like a Nazgul effect your toon. The graphical effects of when you have this incredible fear are really great, it adds to the atmosphere incredibly. Turn the lights off, it’s really cool.

So after completing this short introduction I was duly deposited in the town of Archet, where I was met by my brother on his Loremaster Ghryff ( I think I got the spelling correct). He kindly helped me through some of the little foibles of Lotro, something I will mention later. Thanks for your help with this Bro, your insights were pretty darn useful. Cheers man.

This is where the gaming gets a little bit like other MMOs. Basically you are given tasks and a plotline and have to complete these to progress in experience. I liked the fact that I wasn’t just told to “Go and kill X of these”. Yes, I was told to go do some killing, but there was always a reason given and one that clearly linked with the plot. Because of this I didn’t feel like I was doing the normal, ‘gather 10 of these’ or ‘kill 10 of these’ for no reason. It made the experience a whole lot more worthwhile and something you wanted to be involved in. Then whilst you are going around completing the general quests given, you could also indulge in the plotline quest, which eventually led you to an instance to get out of the newby area. This was really fun! I could only enter the instance solo, so I had to disband from my Fellowhip (group for all you EQ2 followers), then headed on in. I had to help the to defend Archet from the brigands, who following a bit too much campfire bromance had obviously decided that Archet would be their revenge for me kicking their arses earlier. I only took me 5 minutes to go through and kill the brigands, but it was still a lot of fun.

One thing I did notice and something my Bro pointed out to me was that if you hear NPCs talking to each other, or indeed themselves, especially where you are supposed to get quests or possibly hand them in, in that area, it is well worth taking a couple mins to stop and listen to what they are saying. Some of the content given by NPCs is certainly interesting and I have a sneaky suspicion that later the information may prove useful with the main plotline.

A few other things my Bro helped me with was the options setup. For example you have to go in to the combat tab to make sure the correct box is ticked that will enable you to target through other toons etc. Also, little things like how to adjust your hotbars [They are not called Hotbars in LOTRO – Ed], how to use the UI and so on. All the things that after playing the same MMO for 5 years, you start to take for granted. I made a few other adjustments. Like when I wanted to look in my bags the key was ‘I’ for Inventory. When I wanted to look at my toon and his equipment, it is ‘C’ for Character. So I changed my bags to ‘B’ like in EQ2 and my Character to ‘I’, again like EQ2 and what I am used to. I feel there will be a hundred little adjustments like that until I ‘m fully happy with my UI setup. And that’s before I pick which UI I want to use.

So, that’s where I am at. Level 7 and progressing nice and steady (I’m in no rush to level, just to learn the game!). I’m hopefully going to be heading back in to Middle Earth tonight, and I’ll let you know how I get on.  Hopefully Jahf will be joining me at some point in game also :)

Last night saw me raid ToMC in EQ2 with the Fraternity. We ploughed through without much trouble and after just a couple of wipes killed Xebnok. So we went through to do it all again after an instance reset and again had no problems until we hit Xebnok again. We didn’t get him the second time, but I honestly think that was down to a bit of lack of focus. It was late, I know I was very tired and wasn’t concentrating as much as I should have been doing, and if just a few others in the raid felt like me and couldn’t give it their all (I tried but did actually fall asleep at one point), [Adurj has neglected to tell you he has actually been quite ill and is not recovered yet. – Ed] then I can understand why we failed the second time. I know it wasn’t the ability to do the mob, we have that down. It was just silly mistakes that cost us, and I reckon honestly that was down to lack of concentration. I did win my T4c boots from Thet, which was nice. So I now have two of the T4 set and the lovely bonus that ‘percussion of stone’ no longer costs me a concentration spot. Which is also nice.

After I had finished raiding and after a refreshing brew, it was time to log on to Blacke and finally go see what this Grender fella looked like who is a threat and a terror to Kelethin. And here he is, although he didn’t last very long, I must say. Anyhow, not the most fearsome of hairy legged goat folk.

The Grender. Terrifying.

Until next time,

Be well.