Movie Review: Sucker Punch

Sucker Punch is a 2011 movie about...

To be honest, this movie has no story worth telling.

This doesn't mean, that watching this movie is a complete waste of time, but I did fast-forward a lot. The good, sometime even great scenes is when Babydoll (Emily Browning) with her co-prostitutes fight to get four items needed to escape their prison. These brief fights range from ok to great, sadly they are only a small part of the two hours.

I would not reccomend buying this movie and if you watch it, don't be afraid to use fast-forward a lot.

For the two great fight-scenes, I give this movie a 2/10.

Trouble with GMs, Follow-up

Concerning the problems we encountered with Draigoch and the bad attitude the GM had, we asked for a senior GM. As I was not part of that conversation, and I didn’t get any screenshots, this is just hearsay.

But what I got from two sources, is that the senior GM was very polite and apologetic. They thanked for the bug-report and seem to be aware of the problem. On the other hand, the existing tools available for the GMs seem to be far less powerful than in other games. Such tools were in development.

Personally, I doubt these statements. I have seen GMs one-shooting players and mobs. I have seen GMs spawning chests and handing out loot as well as handing out loot from one player to an other even though the loot was bound on the first player. I don’t doubt reports of other players, that they have been thrown in the air and fell down for thirty seconds before hitting the ground and with that killing the player.

Anyway, even though there was no palpable result, at least the better attitude seems to have satisfied the kinnies.

The problem with Draigoch seems to be related to fellowship movements, which, when happening before he flies off from the ground in the third phase, seem to bug him out. This does not happen in the first two phases, so it should be something quite easy to fix. Not sure if I want to run the instance in the current status though...

We did return to Barad Guldur and had a quick run through the tower. We wiped once at the twins, as not everyone knew where to place the pools. Even though the raid-leader told em twice... I don’t think not being on vent is an excuse. If you don’t know what to do, it is your responsibility to tell the raid-leader, not the other way round.

Tonight is skirmish-night and I hope I’ll be able to get two more characters to level 75.

LotRO - Isengard

It has been some time, over four months actually, since I last posted. Even thought I have been away from here, I haven’t been away from LotRO. I did spend some more time in World of Tanks, but haven't touched that game for some weeks.

There have been a lot of posts regarding Isengard, so much I will write here, you might have heard somewhere else.

What have I done in the expansion? First I have leveled my Hunter, Minstrel and Captain to level 75. Triple-boxing has been a less positive experience with Rise of Isengard, as the amount of client-crashes has exploded. These crashes mostly happen in high-traffic areas, say Galtrev, or when moving from one part of the world to an other (say, entering the vault in Galtrev or an instance on three characters at the same time.

Even thought I had taken some days off, I didn’t hit level-cap as fast as I had planned. I did like most regions of the expansion and the Epic Book, the parts I didn’t like were Dunbog and the Pit of Iron, the latter mostly because of the buggy tracks and the missing map.

My favorite parts were in the Epic Story as well as the Gap of Rohan quests.

After getting three characters to level-cap, I started gearing my Hunter and my Minstrel. I did some twelve-man skirmishes and some of the upgraded three- and six-mans. I really like them and they seem to be a bit easier than they have been before. I am looking forward to triple-boxing the school and library again.
I started leveling my next two characters, Burglar and Rune-Keeper. They are at level 69ish and Champion and Lore-Master will be next.

Hunter seems to play more or less the same as before the update. Minstrel and Captain have changed a lot. I didn’t spend a lot of time on my Captain but like the changes for my Minstrel a lot.
We also visited Draigoch, the big, bad (?) dragon. The raid well done. I sadly was always too late for the first few 'failed' attempts but was lucky enough to bring my Hunter to the first Tier 2 and Challenge run. I even won the coin for the head-piece.

Draigoch fights in his pit which has three levels. A small part of the raid does the tanking on the upper level, whilst the rest fights the paws on the lower and central levels. After ‚killing’ the paws, Draigoch falls to the ground whilst the raid hits his body. Fellowship movements are important, as a specific series of twelve FMs weakens the paws. After a bit, the dragon wakes up again and this repeats over and over again. Withe the FMs weakening the paws, less time is needed to ‚kill’ these and the phase to attack the body will start sooner.

There are three phases, as I have only been on the dps team, and the first and second phase seem to be different mainly for the tanking team. I also think that a Rune-Keeper is a better healer for the tanking team as a Minstrel should be in line-of-sight with the boss to play ballads, which is not recommended with Draigoch.

The third team is quite easy if you have lots of ranged dps. Even though melee dps get a better buff than the ranged dps, the Hunters and Lore-Masters don’t suffer from the distributed attacks of the paws.

After a long time, the fight takes about 90 minutes, he was finally dead. I was very happy to be on an other server-first. Four chests spawn. Most sought after were the scales, three of which are needed to craft an epic cloak. Three scales dropped on the first run, four on the second. Then we had two coins fort he set on the first run and three on the second run and on the first run, we got an Worn Symbol of Celebrimbor. Some teal items (jewelery and amour) and some runes and settings completed the loot.

With three accounts, I spent around US$ 150.00 for the Rise of Isengard expansion. Money well spent? Yes, I think so. Even with the buggy Pit of Iron and the failure to have enough quests to get to level-cap without having to do repeatables and tasks, I like the expansion.

LotRO - Update mostly Isengard

Almost two weeks since my last post. Lets start with Isengard. I had expected to get some news from E3, but there was nothing really new.

We have known since months, that that Isengard would be next and that the level cap would be raised. I had thought about it being raised to 70, but 75 it is. I doubt this is an improvement as a ten-level difference will make the level 65 equipment obsolete. I still use equipment with level 60, but nothing at level 55.

A raise of the virtue cap was also on the horizon and has now been confirmed. Again, I had hoped for some new virtues instead of a raise, but again, my hopes were not fulfilled.

Then we get a new crafting tier. This could also be expected, with a raise of ten levels. I just hope, that they will stop naming them and just say Tier I, Tier II, etc.

The three zones were also announced months ago and due to the lore will be similar to what we have seen. Getting 400 quests sounds like a lot, but Enedwaith had about 120, Moria about 250, Eregion about 75 and the Book 140.

As Enedwaith was released later, the size of the update will be about the size of Moria and Eregion and Volume 2. Decent, but not overwhelming.

With Moria, we got Legendary Items and two new classes and with Siege of Mirkwood, we at least got Skirmishes. With Isengard, we get nothing new? This is hugely disappointing!

I hope they will add something, but right now, I am not willing to spend money on that expansion. I did think about pre-ordering the expansion and I haven't ruled it out completely. On the other hand, I have three accounts, so I will have to pay three times as much as others...

What I like are the horses and the cosmetics. The Bonus-XP pocket item till level 65 is neat too. But again, when Isengard fails to capture my interest, I might go for the TP version.

I have been playing less of Lord of the Rings as I have used to. I only went to the Inn of the Forsaken once (and failed after being in there for a long time) and haven't been in the Halls of Night at all.

On one hand, I blame World of Tanks. On the other hand, we had some bad runs in Ost Dunhoth. We did have some great ones too, but...

We lost a raid-leader and officer. Hm, to be honest, I don't know if he will come back or if he is gone for good. I fear the later as he told me once, that he nearly left the game because I had criticized him once.
Last time I saw him, the main raid-leader told him to concentrate (and not talk about World of Tanks during the raid) and he wasn't seen again. We also lost other people, some for similar reasons, other because they were raiding at different hours.

Now we have not enough experienced and good raiders and the replacements often aren't as well equipped or don't know how to play their characters well enough. After all, Ost Dunhoth is not an easy raid and probably not meant for casual players, at least not when you try to do Tier 2 runs with the challenge.
This means, we fail more and this leads to the atmosphere not being what it should be. Bad atmosphere leads to less raid attendance and so we go in a downward spiral.

We either need to get some great raiders from other kins or do some Barad Guldur and other runs for getting everyone to the necessary skill levels for Ost Dunhoth. Master classes have started again, which is positive.

LotRO: Proposition for new zone: The Tower Hills

Since I have started to play Lord of the Rings Online, I hated the gap between Ered Luin and the Shire. The Westmarch is the zone filling this void.

I don’t understand, why this zone hasn't been done earlier, as it has a lot of potential.

Who lives in the Westmarch and which places does it cover?

The southern border are the Tower Hills. Elostirion is the tallest tower on the Tower Hills and once held the Palantir of the Northern Kingdom. Even though the Palantir has been long removed, the towers still might hold some secrets to be uncovered by some adventurers.

Near the main tower, is the future site of Untertowers, a village founded after the coming wars. I want this place to be special. A place where the grass is greener than in the other fields and where there are more flowers. A place where the eldest daughter of Sam Gamgee would want to live. There will be no settlements of Hobbits, but one or two could wander the wild.

To the west, we find the Gulf of Lûne with the Elven settlement of Mithlond, the Grey Havens. From here to the north we can either travel by boat to Celondim or by foot to Ered Luin through the now unblocked pass near Rath Teraig.

The zone has the shape of the letter J, the south-western part being Mithlond. I wouldn't make the zone so big, that it reaches Forochel to the north. On the parchment map on the LotRO site, there is a small forest on the eastern side of the river Lhûn the river being the western border.

Finally, we would be able to explore the castle we have seen from the Wardspire.

Besides the Grey Haven, I would not add a major settlement. There are some ruins, like the towers and the castle I mentioned before. But in general, there would be an empty place with some bandits and wildlife.

Quest hubs would be Mithlond, where we could try to convince elves not to leave Middle Earth and to fight Sauron. Other quests could evolve around two feuding families, one farming and one nomad shepherds who are in conflict over land.

Of course there could also be a Romeo and Juliet story ongoing where the player could either help the farmers the shepherds or the young in love.

Movie Review: Pirates of the Caribbean: On stranger Tides

I have looking forward to this for a long time and am disappointed.

Even the movie is said to been shot in 3D, the quality of the effects is mediocre. For most of the time, 3D is not relevant and does not add to the immersion in the movie. I would recommend, not to watch this movie in 3D.

Jack Sparrow, sorry Captain Jack Sparrow (Johny Depp), is searching for the Fountain of Youth. Why is not quite sure. He meets Angelina (Penelope Cruz) an old love interest and daughter of Blackbeard (Ian McShane). Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) completes the main cast.

I liked the Barbossa of the first movies and understood why he behaved in the way portrayed. In this movie, he wants to kill Blackbeard because he lost a leg in a fight with him. This would have been in concordance with his former character.

But I doubt the Barbossa of the first movies would have used a poisoned blade.

Why Angelina is ready to give her life for her father is never made clear. One could argue, that she wants to save his soul with her sacrifice. Blackbeard accepts her death, which is in his character, but why didn't he kill the boy as that sacrifice would have given him many more years to live?

Jack seems to be clueless, even more than usual. It seems that he has been to the Fountain of Youth but didn't know the ritual. At the same time, I don’t think he really wanted eternity for himself.

Then we have the little love story between the mermaid Syrena and a priest which does not bring much to the movie. And some Spaniards who stay unnamed and uninteresting.

Gibbs returns, but others are deeply missed. I am not talking about Keira Kneightly or Orlanda Bloom. Their story has been brought to an conclusion. I miss Pintel and Ragetti (Lee Arenberg and Mackenzie Crook) and Cotton (David Baillie). The crew played a major part in the first three installments and they are missed a lot.

Captain Teague (Keith Richards) has a brief appearance and this scene is one of the best in the movie.

So, what did we get? Sword fight? There are two fights, but nothing impressive. Nothing comes anyway near the first fight between Jack and Will Turner in the forge, the fight on the water-wheel or the final fight between Jack and Davie Jones.

But sure we get naval battle? Nope. The Spanish and Barbossa meet at sea, but (probably for budget reasons) they decide not to fight. Blackbeard has a beautiful ship, but we never see him using it to attack an other.

Locations? Locations are ok. Some are beautiful, some are ok and some just look too much like sets (Fountain of Youth).

Memorable lines? Nope.

Verdict: When I left the theatre, I gave the movie a rating of 6/10 (ten being best) but now, a few days later, I change the rating to 4/10.

Something I found on the net.

LotRO: Proposition for new zone: Umbar

Unlike my Mirkwood, Heart of the Forest, proposition, Umbar does not border the world we have visited.

This does not seem to be a huge problem, as Ered Luin is not connected to the rest of Eriador and an other gap exists between the eastern exit of Moria and the Mirrormere.

But still, why wander a far and not stay closer to the book?

Scenery! Most of Middle Earth has European climate. If not for Forochel, all would be different shades of green. Given this restriction due to the lore, Turbine has done a good job. They incorporated the seasons, Shire being spring, Eregion autumn, North Downs summer and Forochel winter.

But if we wanted something new, a bit exotic, we have to travel further.

The south would offer deserts and jungles, we could even penetrate the underbelly of Mordor. This would offer some visually very distinct choises. Not only the landscape would be very different from what we have seen, the architecture and clothing of the Harad would offer new choices.

How get there? By shanghaiing of course! The journey starts with a quest or two including some beers as a reward. When you drink that ale, you fall in a deep sleep and awake on a ship. This brings you to its harbour, a small town a bit north of Umbar.

This town would be instanced, meaning that you could not leave it, until you have done a certain amount of quests (like the Mirkwood- and Moria-Starter Instances). Outside, you would be able to travel by the usual means.

It would also offer new monsters to fight, instead of spiders there would be scorpions, instead of boars antelopes and so forth. Even the bosses in the instances could have a Ali Baba / Oriental / Persian theme.

LotRO: Proposition for new zone: Mirkwood, Heart of the Forest

We had a glimpse of Mirkwood with the Siege of Mirkwood expansion. But even though I liked to quest there, the Mirkwood in game is not what is described in „The Hobbit“.

It is not completely braking the lore of the books, as it can be argued, that the presence of the Lieutenant and his rabble have reduced the power of the forest somewhat. So what do we know?

Beorn speaks about a river which is „black and strong“ and „crosses the path. He warns „neither drink of, nor bath in“ it as it as it „carries enchantment and a great drowsiness and forgetfulness“. Perfect bounder border of a zone!

„By the afternoon they had reached the eaves of Mirkwood, and were resting almost beneath the great overhanging boughs of its outer trees. Their trunks were huge and gnarled, their branches twisted, their leaves were dark and long. Ivy grew on them and trailed along the ground.“

There seem to be few things alive in the heart of the forest. Bilbo describes some black squirrels, some moths that come to the fire at night, the elves and the spiders. I doubt that the elves would wander that far south, so I would not add them to this zone.

I do want this zone to be distinct from any other zone. Lets see how: There will be no horse-routes, no camps to fast-travel, no milestones and no quest-hubs with pesky elves or humans. There will be no killing of mobs, at least not anywhere near the scale of the other zones.

The spiders are different from other spiders we met. They talk! Besides Mirkwood which is some kind of entity, spiders are the only intelligent denizens of the forest.

When we can’t kill a lot of monsters, what is there to do? Exploring, recovering, surviving and some very selective killing is my proposition.

The adventure into Mirkwood starts with a letter where Fuirgam in Emyn Lûm asks for your aid. Probably after some minor quests, he sends you to Echad Sirion where you can take the boat to Gladden Fields. I will write more about the zone Gladden Fields in a later post.

For now we only need to know that there is a small settlement with some preliminary quests into Mirkwood, heart of the forest.

The first quest is to rescue a young woodworker whose return from the forest is overdue. Mirkwood is an instance. I want it to be different every time you enter. Lhaid Ogo, the instance in Volume 3, Book 3, Chapter 4, is a hint in the right direction, but of course far too small.

Some big trees, which can be climbed are always at the same place and work as a marker and a resting-place. But the paths to those trees will change every time you enter.

The first time you enter, a countdown starts. If you are on your own and don’t use any special skills or reach on of the trees, you have three minutes to explore the forest. If the time expires before you are out of the forest or at a safe place, you fall in a endless sleep and are automatically rescued by some npcs. After some minutes of dread, you can retry again.

When you find the first tree, ten seconds are added to your counter (as you have learned to cope better with the dread of the forest). Each tree gives this reward only a certain amount of times and the closer the tree is to the Gladden Fields, the fewer time you get this bonus.

The three trees closest to Gladden Fields give this reward three times, so if you have found each of these trees for three times, you get three more minutes before you fall to the forest (three times ten seconds per tree is thirty seconds per tree, is ninety seconds for all three trees plus a bonus of ninety seconds for deed completion).

The next three trees are further in. A second counter starts. To reach the second line of trees, you get an other three minutes. The same rules as with the first trees apply. So for every new found tree, you get an other ten seconds, again with all the bonuses for the second trees, you get an other six minutes to reach them.

What changes is that if you travel on your own, you have only half the time. While it is not impossible to reach the second trees on your own, it will not happen a lot. So bring a friend or two to reach the second set of trees. But remember, the chain breaks at the weakest link. So if one member of your band of three has never been into the forest, you only have three minutes to reach the first trees.

The third set of trees need a full fellowship to get to. If you have completed the deed (reach all the trees of the different lines three times) you get after entering Mirkwood the option to travel to the central of those trees. This only applies, if everyone in your group (if grouped up) has finished that deed.

What kind of loot is there? The further in, the better it is. The borders of the forest mostly have been cleared over the years, but deep inside, there still can be hidden treasures.

Remember, the shadow of Sauron corrupted the forest and there might still be caves and homes the Sindarin Elves left when they fled the shadows. In such caves or ruins, there is room for some classical instances.

I did mention skills. Some skills, like the Irresistible Melody or the Call to Greatness does add some time to the counter. The Minstrel and the Captain have the most skills to help the group. Food and beer also help to raise the spirit and stay longer inside Mirkwood. And smoking pipe-weed has some relaxing effects as well.

Back to the spiders. I don’t see the spiders as purely evil. Living in such an unpleasant environment has some negative effect on ones character. Remember, „when they roasted it, it proved horrible to taste, and they shot no more squirrels.“ So befriending a spider could be beneficial too. Spiders seem not to have that much interest in gold and treasure and might be willing to trade some for raw meat or livestock.

It is also very possible, that the spiders are in conflict with the evil dwelling in the elven ruins and caves as well as with scouts from Dol Guldur. Again, I don’t want this to be just an other zone with some quest-hubs, but this doesn't mean that there are no quests to be found.

Making this zone instanced will make the loneliness believable when you don’t see other people doing their quests all the time.

LotRO - Gortheron (Ost Dunhoth) some tactics, contains spoilers!

After having done the first five bosses, Gortheron is left. We have seen him many times during the instance and even in the quests leading to the instance. Now is the time for payback.

I like, that there is no time wasted with adds. After killing Ivar, the gate opens to the arena which has the shape of a pentagon. As most evildoers, Gortheron likes to talk. A lot.

Which classes are or rather which setup is the best for this fight?

Two Captains, two Minstrels, two Lore-Masters and a Guardian seem to be a necessity. An additional healer, probably a Rune-Keeper does help too. So we got eight. I would bring three Hunters and a Warden (as the warden has the best corruption removal skill of all classes).

The fight starts, when Gortheron moves into the body of a troll and opens one of the walls of the arena. Some monsters from the Shire join the fight. The adds of the first phase consist of two huge boars (Thadur's Boar, about 24 k morale) and three big goblins (Thadur's Thug 11k). When one of these five is killed, it is replaced almost instantly.

The boars have anger, which needs to be removed before they can be CC'ed (so you need to CC them twice in a row). Lore-Masters seem to work best here. We usually damage them till they have about 5 k morale left and leave them CC'ed till the next phase.

The goblins have corruptions which should to be removed as fast as possible. So if your corruption removal skill is off cool-down, use it to make every one's life easier.

Using buffbars is also very helpful. It is easy to install and there is little room for error in this fight. In every phase, players get different buffs which they need to remove with the right pot as soon as possible. In the first phase, this is a green pool which does a huge amount of damage. Actually there are three pools (similar to those in Oatbarton Farms). If you use a pot right away, you won't drop a pool at all which can make all the difference.

When the boars are damaged and controlled, the goblins can be killed. This has two advantages. First, it gives Captains a defeat response which they can use for a group-heal. Secondly Gortheron is building corruptions about every eight seconds which are reduced by killing every add.

Hunters damage Gortheron, others kill goblins and Lore-Masters CC boars. At a certain point, Gortheron switches phases and moves to the second wall and opens it. Now the Hunters switch to the adds, but don't kill them before the new gate is opened and the old gate is closed. Yes respawns do even apear, when the wall is closed again...

New adds come form the North-Downs, two Defilers and three Wargs. Defilers need to be CC'ed and I like to range-dps the Wargs. But don't forget to kill all the adds from the Shire.

Defilers only have about 10 k health so just keep em CC'ed, kill wargs to keep everyone powered and healed up and again, remove corruptions.

In this phase, you get wounds which you need to remove by a pot or it will spread to the players close to you. When this happens, they too get a wound which even can be transferred back to you, when not removed at the right time. This can lead to a wipe, as pots can be off cool-down when needed. But you can move away from the other people to not spread the wound.

In the next phase monsters from the Trollshaws join. They consist of two Virulent Stone-Trolls (24k) and three Virulent Worms. We haven't lasted long enough here to work out our tactics. Last phase, the adds will come from Forochel and consist of Starved Kilpa-Kita sabretooths (which get bloodlust when kited for too long) and some caeryg.

After an other phase-switch one monster of each kind will spawn as well as some skeletons. On Tier 1, the skeletons can be killed and won't respawn, so I'd guess, those are the first targets for dps. But as I haven't done this on Tier 2, I am not sure about this. The rest of the monsters will vanish, as soon as Gorthereon is at his next phase-switch, so killing the adds is not the priority.

Gandalf appears and kicks Gortheron out of his troll-body and (again in Tier 1) the last 35 k are easy (in Tier 1). We were thinking about only doing the other bosses in Tier 1 to get the locks and to have almost a full week for trying to kill Gortheron in Tier 2.

The challenge is connected to the buff Gorthoron has, which increases his damage output. Every eight seconds, his buff tiers up one point to a (shown) max of fifty. Killing a monster reduces the tier by one. When the tier reaches fifty, you get a message. So killing an add in the next eight seconds fails the challenge. Sadly there is no in-game-way to see how many adds you can kill without loosing the challenge...

Again, Ost Dunhoth is a very interesting raid with some nice rewards. I like how the raid and the last fight mirrors to some degree the three- and six-man-instances of the Echoes of the Dead-Update. Gortheron on Tier 2 with the Challenge is a great fight with only minor complaints from my side (the buff-counter being one, the 'need' for buffbars an other).

LotRO - Amarthlang from Durin's Bane Tier 2

It is not that I won nothing, this is what I got for my Burglar:

 

LotRO - Frothskold from Ivar Tier 2

Yesterday, we managed to do Ivar again on Tier 2 and he left a shield behind. Needless to say, with these stats, it was a very happy Minstrel.

It is in purple but the lucky Minstrel seemed to like it anyway. To be honest, with those stats, what is not to like?

LotRO: Echoes of the Dead, a brief review

The last six weeks, I have been enjoying the update Echoes of the Dead. I gave my first impression here so I don’t want to repeat myself.

As usual, in the beginning a lot of people signed up for the new raid and instances. There was even some moaning or bitching about who could go. Now some of the runs had to be cancelled due to too few people online. Tempus fugit. I blame the nice weather and World of Tanks.

Echoes of the Dead is one of the best updates released.

The three-man instances are fun and challenging on Tier 2. Tier 2 favours a certain set-up. Healer, Tank and Damage Dealer or Healer with two DD. Classes like Burglars and Captains are less useful for Tier 2 runs. Of course it can be done, but the other members need to work extra hard. It would have been nice, if the skill-reset we have in Ost Dunhoth were implemented here too...

The two six-man instances are fun and challenging too. No complaints here, with six it is easier to bring a Burglar and Captains.

Ost Dunhoth is almost perfect. The skill reset is great. Fights are short, fun and challenging. After a wipe, no time is wasted. Everything is in a short walking distance, no more running up the tower for five minutes to kill the Lieutenant.

Trash mobs are non-existent, instead we get some small fun fights before the boss. Rewards are good. What I dislike is the amount of medallions needed for the armour. I doubt, that I will get a full set anytime soon...

We managed to do four of the bosses on Tier 2 with the challenge and one more on Tier 2 without the challenge. Getting Gortheron on Tier 2 with the challenge will take some time. We raid a lot in the kin, about six days a week, but we are not a hard-core raiding kin. This means that we have a lot of different people on every raid and some are better raiders than others.

I would also suggest to use Buffbars as it does make fights easier. A kinnie programmed a small add-on which analyzes the combat-log and helps with acoustic warnings and big flashing letters.

I have done the book-quests on all of my main characters, save my Warden.
Ten being best, I give this update 9.5/10. Well done!

Update

Three months have past since my last update (not post, updates are a more general post). I use these posts to reflect what has happened since.

Then I had tried my first attempts at multi-boxing the school and library for Superior Third Marks. The weeks following that update-post, I have successfully run school and library loads of times while using thee accounts (triple-boxing with Captain (main) Hunter and Minstrel).

I stopped doing those runs, when I ran out of Legendary Fragments which are needed for crafting Legendary Items. I did spend about 200 gold, almost everything I had, on the Auction Hall to buy them (at about 3 gold a piece). So before the Echoes of the Dead update, I was broke.

The plan was to get at least two level 65 2nd Age Items for every of my main character. To make things a bit more challenging, I wanted them to have four Pool A legacies.

Sadly, I run out of cash, before I could achieve this. I did manage to get about 14 of them which is not too bad.

Since then, I was able to sell quite a few Legendary Items, some even have four Pool A legacies which are not producible anymore since the update and fetch quite some money on the Auction Hall.

At least at the moment, I have enough cash again, I even donated some gold to the poor tanks in our kin.
I've been in a lot of Ost Dunhoth raids. I missed the first few, but have been in almost every one since. We go to OD about six time per week.

Right now, we are working on our tactics on Gortheron, something I will write more about in a future post.
I have won two Symbols of the Elder King for a level 65 First Age Legendary Item. One I used for my Hunter to get him a bow, the second one I used for my Burglar. The bow is maxed out. The dagger for my Burglar is still missing the "Trick Range"-Legacy. I have been trying to get it for some time, but have run out of Item Experience Runes.

So I am running the Enedwaith repeatable quests on my Burglar to get ixp. The barter items and reputation are a welcome addition. I miss some skirmish marks to get the complete Epic Helegrod set for my Burglar. Taking him to the moors will be a priority.

I didn't have time to work on my Warden, I have started do some runs on my Guardian. I wish, my Captain had more to do during fights...

About my blog, my first post was on November 3rd 2010. My main blog is http://funfactfiction.blogspot.com/ and contains all of the LotRO post as well as some others.

Out of the 200 post there, 70 are LotRO related. I also have some games-, book- and movie-reviews as well as some other fun topics. Political comments can also be found there.

Most hits got a post about some 3D pictures of sexual positions.  This is after all the Internet. And are we really surprised, that I got most hits for that site from Pakistan and India?

I also run two other blogs, one about sex on the Internet and one about politics.

Back to this site. Thanks to http://combo.mmeow.net/ I have 2'500 page views, 1'300 of them in April 2011. Thanks a lot! There is a lot of interest about Ost Dunhoth and I will share some thoughts and tactics.
More than half of my visitors are from the USA followed by UK, Germany and Canada. 40 percent use FireFox, 30 percent Internet Explorer, 15 percent Chrome. 85 percent use Windows, 5 percent Mac, 3 percent iPhone and 2 percent Linux.

I would like to get more comments or feedback. Any idea how?

LotRO: Frothmar (Ost Dunhoth, Poison) on Tier 2 and Challenge done!

Frothmar is an other fight I like. And finally, after loads of tries, we managed to get him down.

The twelve people are split up in four groups of three. One of each group stays on the platform most of the time. We used healers for the far two platforms (from the entry) and Hunters for the close two. Setup is two tanks (again, probably Guardians), two Captains, two healers (probably Minstrels). These stay close to the door on the other side of the room.

The rear needs one healer (we used a Rune-Keeper) and a Lore-Master. The rest are dps, Hunters probably are best (high range). They can either stand in the center or to the left and right of the room, between the platforms.

To not fail the challenge, someone has to stay on the platform at any time of the fight. This means, you can't loose a platform, which happens when more than two people stand on a platform, or two people stand on the platform for too long.

Knock-backs seem to be the highest risk to fail the challenge, so those not standing on the platform should stay far away from them as possible (in the center) and the switching should happen after knock-backs.

It is not an extremely difficult fight, but it is very easy to fail it, as it only takes one mistake. So if you have laggy Internet-connection, this might not be the fight for you...

Even though the sentiment in the kin was not to do it again, I would really like to keep doing or at least keep trying it. Again, I don't think this is difficult to do. If you fail, you can reset the fight easily. The fight itself does not take very long. It just takes some practice and a lot of concentration.

Doing this challenge was very rewarding. Not only because I got my second Symbol of the Elder King which I used for a First Age Burglar Dagger.

I had thought long, what I should do with the symbol. I have a First Age Bow for my Hunter which is maxed out. On my Minstrel, Rune-Keeper and Captain, I have lots of ixp-runes. My Minstrel is one of my mains, but we have a lot of Minstrels at the moment. As I usually have been asked to either bring my Hunter, Burglar or Lore-Master, the choice was between the Burglar or the Lore-Master.

If I win a next Symbol, I might go Lore-Master or Minstrel or Captain. As I already have won two symbols and lots of people haven't won one, I am not sure, if I should roll on the next few symbols. An idea would be to roll on them, but if I win one, to pass on it, so that if I won a forth roll, I could get a third symbol.

LotRO: What is coming next?

After the Echoes of the Dead Update, which I like very much, the first news of the next updates emerge.

Update 3, sadly we don't have a name yet, will offer two 3-man instances and two skirmishes which are scaled up to level 65.

One of the new instances is called "Inn of the Forsaken" and has a pirate theme offering new armor, weapons and pocket items as rewards.

The other one is "The Halls of Night" and is an other haunted Barrow with a focus on traps. Rewards here are new armor, jewelry and cosmetic items.

The skirmishes, will be in Dol Dinen in North Downs and called "Attack at Dawn". The other one is "Icy Crevasse" in, who would have guessed, in Forochel. Both are offense skirmishes.

Source

Isengard will bring the level-cap to 75. Which will make everything we have now be useless. I would have rather gone for a five level step or two five level steps with some months in-between.

There might be a new level of crafting. I had expected this, not sure, what the name of the tier is going to be.

There will be a lot of chapters in the Isengard Epic update, more than thirty. Even though the Epic books usually are just a small part of the actual released content, I like to do them on all my characters.

The 24-man Raid will be about a giant dragon. Not to sure how much I like this. I recognize the restrictions on the lore but still would like to have a more diverse bestiary. Saruman would have been my target for a Raid in Isengard...

PvP will probably get no new zone and opening Monster Play to F2Pers will continue to reduce the value of VIPs and Lifetimers...

We will hear more about Isengard at E3, which will take place on June 7 - 9, 2011.

For the next few months, there seems to be a nice stream of content. Besides the new instances and skirmishes and the new regions, there will be smaller events keeping the players happy.

I have been running a lot of the Ost Dunhoth instances and still want to do some of the three- and six-mans from the latest update. I got two First-Agers (Hunters-Bow and Burglar-Dagger) and am not sure, if I should/am allowed to roll on more coins (would be happy with three more ;).

LotRO: 4th Anniversary Review

Again, we on the old side of the pond got the worse deal. Turbine listened to the complains of the players about the huge grind for the tokens and added them in the lotteries which Codemasters is not able/willing to offer.

I wanted to have the maps, so I knew I had to grind 160 tokens (8*20). As I didn't wan to waste too much time, I tripple-boxed the bar-fight. Of course, this works only during the night, as there is less competition.

So this Easter weekend, I had little sleep, at least at night. Which was a pity, as the weather was fine. But at least I got the maps and as they are tradable, this will get me closer to the deed Cartographile.

CStM has discovered, that the other maps seem to be available during the next four festivals. There even seem to be maps of the other regions of Middle-Earth and one of the whole of Middle-Earth. So finishing this deed, will take more than a year. Back to the festival.

In Europe, the only way to get tokens was the races and the beer-fight. The races are fun, even though I have done them so many times, that I can almost do them blindfolded. Sadly, they can only be done once a day, so maximal two tokens from them.

So even if you do the races every day, you will not get enough tokens to get the horse and you have to join the bar-fight. The dreaded bar-fight.

The first few times, it can be fun. But after an hour or so, I just wanted to get my tokens. So getting the beer but being hit out of the arena and dropping it wasn't fun the first time, and it became more and more annoying the next few times.

So instead of wasting my time, I started doing the fight at around midnight and kept fighting till the sun went up. With the three accounts, I at least got three tokens per run, which made the grind a bit more bearable. I even got the horse, even though I don't like the design very much. The toy windmill is very nice, the large one still is missing its blades, but they should be added with the next update.

What I didn't get yet, are the cosmetics. The cloak is OK, especially when it is dyed, the dresses, I could do without. I am still not sure, if I am going to try to get them.

There was some discussion going on in kin, if deliberate kicking people out of the arena is griefing. I was in the minority saying yes. It might be fun, to do it once or twice, but after a bit, you just want to get your tokens and go to bed. During the night, there was an understanding to be friendly to each other as everyone could get a token each round. During the day, things were a bit more chaotic and heated.

Last but not least, the verdict. Even though some of the rewards are nice, the toy windmill and the windmill being the best, the grind is enough to make you sick. The race and the bar-fight are not new to the game, the maps are nice, but not much work to do, the cosmetics are ok, if you are an elf but the huge grind overshadows the rewards. Ten being best, I would give this festival a 3/10.

LotRO: Durin's Bane (Ost Dunhoth, Fear) on Tier 2 and Challenge done!

Gentlemen, we got him!

After a lot (and I mean a lot) of wipes during several evening, we finally managed to slay Durin's Bane on Tier 2 and complete the Challenge.

To be honest, I had my doubts, that we were able to do it. Luck did play a very minor role, tactics worked and noone f*cked up. On the first try, I ran off the platform after the first pool. That was embarassing.

In the next runs we managed to work on tactics and after some wipes, the first people announced that they would leave soon. We dropped one Burglar for an additional Minstrel and started the fight.

Soon the first kinnies (including myself) disconnected from ventrilo and we switched to ingame-voice. Things got a bit heated as most of the platform was covered with fire-pools.

The last few ten thousand morale were nerve-wrecking. One of our tanks died seconds before Durin's Bane and one of the two chests spawned on top of him...

I won a high-dps mace for my Burglar (off-hand) and two settings and a rune. We got two coins for the Ost Dunhoth armour, a rather crappy piece of jewelery and a purple armour which I didn't even want as a cosmetic.

Some of these new instances favour certain set-ups.

Two tanks are a must. Either two Wardens or two Guardians. Guardians seem to work better.
Two Minstrels for main healing, two Captains, two Rune-Keepers (do not Fall to Flame).
Two Burglars and one Lore-Master, for debuffs and power.

This leaves one spot open. We used a Champion, Hunter would have been better. Or a third Rune-Keeper.

It will be fun to try other set-ups. When more people get first-agers, this could leave room for changes.

Where are we? We did three wings on Tier 2 with the Challenge and an other wing on Tier 2. The fifth wing seems to be doable, but Gortheron will not be easy. We might even go back to Barad Guldur (yay, more stairs) and to Dar Narbugud. I don't mind running those two instances, especially as the DN set is still quite nice and BG can also be desireable.

I have brought Minstrel, Rune-Keeper, Lore-master, Hunter and Burglar to Durin's Bane. I want to get my Guardian raid-ready. I have not used him a lot but he is fun to play. And tanking is the one thing, I haven't tried much yet.

Youtube, funny video

I haven't laughed that much since a long time:

LotRO - Mammoths (Ost Dunhoth, Wounds) on Tier 2

Sadly we did not manage to get the Challenge. We did manage to kill one Mammoth in time. Does not seem impossible to do, but will take some more practice.

We learned a lot. For one, when you finish the fight, you can walk back through the corridors and see, that the gates and levers are actually colour-coded. So:

The middle (green) lever opens the right gate,
the right (purple) lever opens the left gate,
the left (orange) lever opens the middle gate,
the middle (blue) lever opens the left gate,
the left (purple) lever opens the right gate and last but not least,
the right (white) lever opens the middle gate.

Even the first gate has the same colour as the gates, which houses the mammoths.

Balancing the dps is a bit of a challenge as you don't want people to have to wait for other groups pulling their levers.

And this is my 200th post, yay!