Rise of Isengard – what will I get?

4 Comments

I preordered Rise of Isengard, LotRO’s next expansion, as soon as it became available. However, I still don’t know what I’ll get.

Three features are listed:
1) 3 new zones
Dunland, Gap of Rohan and Isengard. With those, we’ll get lots of new quests. Storywise and questwise, I will get something new and hopefully, it’ll be fun. I really like Enedwaith but greatly dislike Mirkwood. So hopefully, at least one of those new zones will be more like Enedwaith.

2) 10 new levels
I really enjoy levelling in MMOs. I love alts. In LotRO, however, this seems to be different. I like the game but I don’t enjoy the combat system as much as I do in other MMOs. It just seems slow compared to WoW or Rift. Still, I don’t mind those extra ten levels for my main character.

(3) A new 24 player raid)
A one-boss-raid. – I don’t get why that’s listed as a feature for the expansion. It was supposed to be added for LotRO’s 4th anniversary but didn’t make it into the game in time.
Massively mentions this here: What is coming, however, is a long-awaited raid against a giant dragon. The raid was scheduled for a previous update but had to be delayed for further development and testing.

So, we basically get 10 new levels and 3 new zones to quest in and, of course, a few new skills and changes to the classes. They will also reduce the different stats on the items to make the system easier.

Call me spoiled but… is that really everything? Why no new features? Something fresh and new to keep us playing the game instead of “more of the same”? A new hobby/profession? Housing overhaul (I do not want to believe that they were serious when they introduced this housing design)? Anything else?

We’re 2 months away from the expansion and only know about those few things. I’ve been following the official forums but there’s no news about anything else. There are optimistic players who are sure that there’ll be tons more. And pessimistic players who say that there won’t be anything else. I’m in between. So far, I can’t and don’t want to believe that this is really everything there is. On the other hand, if there was that much more coming and new features etc., then Turbine would’ve used all this stuff to promote their expansion.

If only I knew what the beta testers can see… *insert long dramatic sigh* Maybe they read the players’ fears and are laughing because they’ve already seen the nice amount of stuff coming with the expansion that Turbine is keeping from its playerbase to surprise them (or because they’re not sure it will be done in time).

GamesCom is coming soon (less than a month now) and I hope we’ll see something more then.

4 Comments

  1. I know an American LOTRO player who fears the 10 more levels and 3 new zones will be the “world” of LOTRO for a long time. Invalidating the areas before through 10 more levels. Another was excited about “real progress” of 10 more levels.

    I’m afraid people will have to pay a lot more … no longer micro but now somewhat larger than Mirkwood expansion but smaller than Moria … expansions before mounted combat and Rohan come along.

    LOTRO is based on the same aging system as WoW and for veterans it simply has to become boring. New horse as reward for new grind stops being fascinating after a while. But there is little that Turbine can do about that. Even a huge expansion for the “Hobbit” wouldn’t change the fact that new upcoming MMOs are just more exciting, even if they are like SWTOR just another DIKU MUD derivate.

    Like

    1. I think I agree. ^^ I haven’t done as much in LotRO as I have in WoW, so for me, there is still lots left to explore.

      Still, with not liking the combat system that much, questing and fighting does get boring after a while for me.

      I think I’m also annoyed with the amount of carrots they’ve been dangling in front of us. They never actually said they’re working on a housing revamp but they said they’d like to do it. It’s not the top of their priority list, though. They started implementing addons but don’t really do much about them now to help the makers. As one of the developers said, it’s more a side project that a small team does whenever they have time for it. Mounted combat… people thought it’d come with ROI but it won’t. A new PvMP zone was talked about… who knows when we’ll get that. Non-combat pets are also something they’d like to add but after that, we haven’t heard anything about it anymore. They did say that they want to add more hobbies but, apparently, it’s not the top of their priority list.

      So what IS the top of their priority list? *sigh* Having new stuff to play with (apart from grinds for more reskinned mounts) would be great and would keep me in the game for a longer time.

      Like

  2. realistic and sad answer from me:

    we have scaling instances en masse -.-

    get it?

    who needs new instances when u have scaling ones?

    Everything except the 3 regions and the extra levels will cost TP! the anniversary raid is a giveaway that it doesnt look THAT small ;)

    real new raid cluster in orthanc / around isengard – VIPs free, rest has to pay
    new hobby – shop
    new housing space / rooms / whatever – shop
    new cosmetics – shop
    new pvmp zone – VIPs 4 free, rest …. right: shop

    WELCOME TO FREE TO PLAY :)

    ah i forgot one: radian… i mean finesse stat tome – for people too lazy to craft/quest/group for them when entering the real raid (where u need a good batch of it) – shop is your solution…

    Longasc can tell u, i’m a big #LotRO fan but that’s the truth we have to face with in the coming updates. As a LTA-VIP i can look at it well suited but i know alot “normal” players paying monthly or collecting points as free/premiums – how do they wanna bind them with that strategy when the content u get as VIP is the same u have since ?

    Just look at the great new class set coming with RoI and where u get the marks from -.- [if u miss the same point as i do: where are fitting RoI instances mentioned for this, then we understand each other] :(

    Like

    1. I think I am much too nice and careful with my blog entries. Everybody who comments is so much snarkier. ;)

      You’re absolutely right! Although I actually don’t believe we’ll ever see a housing upgrade, for example. It would probably take too long to produce and when they’re calculating how much hours their developers and code-monkeys are taking to implement it, the cost would be too high and people wouldn’t buy it. So they rather offer yet another reskinned mount for 20€ that exactly ONE character on your account can use. *sigh*

      I like the scaling instances. But not if that means we won’t get new ones!

      Like

Comments are closed.