The infamous Balrogs of Tolkien's Middle Earth are making their way into Lord of the Rings Online!  In Book 11 we shall see the foes unlike any other first hand. …

I found an interview over at WarCry that has no new information but provides a few exceptional screenshots.  Some new screens of housing have emerged in this interview and they…

More information has come out detailing some changes to LOTRO in Book 11. I’m not sure at this point of these changes are leaked or not, and given that lack of info for all I know these could be inaccurate. They are however very interesting changes and for the first time detail what changes the Lore-Master and Minstrel will be receiving. The information on housing has already been covered here at Keen and Graev’s Gaming Blog but a little rehash is always nice.

Lore-Masters

Lores of Warding.
LMs get a number “Lore of Warding skills. Basically a LM sets up a warding field against a certain kind (creatures of nature, the dead, etc etc) of monster. This field does damage to monsters if the monster type corresponds to the Lore type. These skills have cast timers and affect the area around the LM, and are stationary.

Sticky Tar
Elves and Dwarves already know this ability, the one that the goblins use on you and Dwallin in the beginning instance. Only where as the goblin tar stops you from moving completely until the dialogue is over, LM tar slows creatures down in its area of effect (50% snare, I saw). This skill has a cast timer and affects the area around the LM, and is stationary.

Thunder Clap
The skill description was something like “The Lore-Master strikes the ground with his staff, causing lighting to bla bla bla.” I didn’t get the details of this spell but I saw that when the mouse was hovered over the icon, the description of the spell had 3 rows of damage, so I figure this is chain-lightning type of spell.

Lynx Speech! (Super cool DPS pet)
Yup. The fourth LM pet is a Lynx. A stealth using, DPS oriented, high-level pet. The lynx has 3 skills: stealth, an AoE attack (I saw this baby hit a light blue troll for 730ish damage) that strikes 3 targets in front of the lynx. And another one I didn’t get to see.

A Rez
Yup, LMs will be able to rez those who died.

Scan-esque ability.
This casted ability shows you the stats of the opponent on which you use this skill. It basically brings up a window, which has useful info about the target. This info includes, but is not limited to, the damage mitigation for each type of damage, the resistance rates for each type of status ailments, and whether the target is susceptible to conjunctions.

Minstrels

War-Chants
New types of songs, which afflict your enemies. There were a number of was chants, but I remember only one, and not even the name of it. This war chant cut the healing done to the target by 50%.

New Tales
These are variations of the currently existing Tale of Heroism. The couple I saw included Tale Of Battle, which increases agility and might, and Tale of Warding, which gives 1 hope and increases morale or vitality (can’t remember which).

Weapon Chants
Minstrels will be able to increase their fellow’s effectiveness with skills like the Oathbreaker’s Blade. Oathbreaker’s Blade adds some damage to every attack, but also causes the weapon to do additional damage in the form of a DOT (which will be a % of the initial hit). There are other weapon chants, but I saw only this one.

Gift of the Hammerhand.
Yup. You will be able to give the shiny bubble to your friends now! Only this is a lesser form of the spell which you can cast on yourself, and thus eats up more power, faster.

Minstrels get MORE COWBELL!
Seriously. No joke. Minstrels get to play the cowbell (the item’s name is “Moor Cowbell”) and the bagpipes as new musical instruments.

Clicky to read more! –> (more…)

I wanted to create a new blog entry to focus on the September Podcast because I feel that out of all the information, this podcast explains and clarifies things the…

At Gamesday UK the Eva Vix guild got their hands on a Squig Herder, an Orc Choppa, and a Paul Barnett!  I want to first start with the gameplay footage…