Casual Stroll to Mordor

Turbine gave us a press release this morning announcing a stand-alone expansion coming spring 2013. Adventures of Bilbo!

The LOTRO Game Servers will be brought down on Monday, March 12th from 6:00 – 10:00 AM Eastern (-5 GMT) to launch the latest game update, Update 6: Shores of the Great River.

As many are probably aware, the Warden and Rune-keeper are receiving some major revisions in Monday’s Update 6 patch. And today we received Developer Diaries covering both classes.

Today saw the release of a Developer Diary concerning the new ability for players to bring Skirmish Soldiers out onto the Landscape.

We have two Developer Diaries that have recently been released covering changes to the Instance Finder system coming in Update 6.

Budgeford has released a Developer Diary centering around the creation of the new area in Update 6, The Great River. And I have to say that the content in this are looks to be stunning.

The Patch Notes for Update 6’s initial release to the Bullroarer Server have been posted. And it is important to note that as always the notes are in Beta and subject to change.

Yesterday, Jinjaah released the Developer Diary for Update 6’s Warg Revisions.

The Treasure Event is now live across all servers!

Another Developer Diary has popped up on LOTRO’s website and it is once again written by Jared “Kelsan” Pruett. This time however the subject matter is the Weaver monster class.

Today, Brian “Zombie Columbus” Aloisio released a developer diary relating to a new PvMP stat coming with Update 6 named “Audacity”.

The first of the Developer Diaries for Update 6 came out yesterday, centered around a new currency that will be used solely in PvMP: Commendations. Commendations will be replacing Destiny Points as the currency to purchase skills, weapons, consumables, etc. while Destiny Points will be limited to “…strictly a “perk” currency that will only be acquired through leveling.”

It wasn’t too long ago that the LOTRO community was debating the validity of Turbine’s decision to sell armor in the in-game store. In an effort to resolve the ill-will that was generated by the initial integration of the store-only armor into the game, it was announced yesterday that…

It was only several days ago when a user on the forums asked Orion to take a look at Wargs and to help them with a revamp. What we (the public) didn’t know was that Orion and another designer, jinjaah, were already hard at work on the Warg class.

Last week Eurogamer interviewd Turbine about mounted combat and LotRO’s Future. Here are the interesting things they found.

Orion has posted his third blog covering more of the Warden changes coming with Update 6. And while there is a lot to read over, many of these changes seem to be for the better.

In his second post on Wardens, Orion discusses some of the Legendary Skills as well as the Shield and Spear lines.

After the release of Turbine’s Press Release regarding the upcoming Riders of Rohan expansion, news sites have been posting up interviews that they had with Turbine regarding the exciting news.

Orion has been busy over the holiday with some changes to the Warden Class that are coming in the future. And although some people might tense up at the thought of Orion touching another class, he assures us that his intention is to enhance the Warden, not to wreck it.