Forced Labor

So Squid and I finally managed to push a little bit farther in the epic line, and wouldn't you know it, those stupid Dunlendings, who we'd helped and helped and helped, they sold us out to Saruman. Now we're prisoners, forced to work in his dungeons. Squid had the worst of it, as I think I was too busy being a photographer to actually help her with her tasks. She manages to carry a barrel full of weapons magnificently though. Sashays like a boss. Her taskmaster is staring like a creeper over the top of the barrel. Try as we might, we couldn't get rid of him. Kept stalking her. Course, she is gorgeous. I only wish it wasn't so dark underneath Orthanc, because it makes for dim, hard to see pictures.

And she has some awesome moves. Like this one, to the left, where she douses a rat in holy light. We actually had a quest called "Kill Ten Rats." I don't know if that was just lazy story-writing on the part of the devs, or pure genius. Also, my eagle, can't remember his name, looks fantastic in this picture. All swoopy. Ahem. Even though we were prisoners, our wardens were kind enough to let us keep our weaponry. And our nanimals. What kind of prison is slavery in Orthanc, anyways? Other than the hard labor and disgusting living conditions, it wasn't that bad.

So a short post, because I am out of sudafed.

Dunedain Outfittery and the Prince of Rohan

Let me start out by saying I am really enjoying what Turbine is doing with their new book content. Either they've got some new tech or they're showing off some new trick, but either way, some of the things I've seen in the Rise of Isengard expac and the new update 5, which just launched today, are making me bouncy happy.

Preparing for battle

Mounted npc's? Yes please. Now, when do we get mounted combat? Would that even be possible, Turbine? Also, looks like they are getting more comfortable with putting lots of npcs in one spot - some of the epic solo chapters are, well, epic. Between Wulf's Cleft and this new chapter, the Prince of Rohan, I am finding the story to be much more immersive, and superbly written. I suppose with the launch of SW:TOR looming on the horizon, it makes sense for any mmo other than WoW, and maybe even that one too, to throw everything they have at their player base in an attempt to retain subscribers. I have come to the sad decision to cut off my lotro subscription in the coming months, but that is the beauty of the game being free to play, I suppose. I can keep playing, and only pay for what I want. How a la carte of Turbine.





I haven't finished the new book in Volume III yet, but I'm loving what I have seen so far. Especially the fact that Indy finally has Dunedain clothing. I have wanted that since she first stumbled into Esteldin, over three years ago.Back then, the rangers were cool. And now, Indy is about 20% cooler. I'm just wondering how it will hold dye. My wardrobe is drooling, waiting for both sets to be put in it. That is, assuming I can afford the extra wardrobe space. I might just pick certain pieces for everyone else, and reserve the complete set for Indy. She gets all the shiny things. Boot knife!!! It's only fair, you know. Okay, now I'm just rambling. I'll stop.

I can't wait to get into some of the new Isengard instances. It will probably be a while, and Indy is kind of behind on her gear, but I'll catch up eventually. It just might take me a while.

Since Squid hasn't made much of an appearance lately, here she is in her sultry new duds, beating an old goat about the brainpan with a stick.

I miss my free time.

Leaving Moria

So, the other night, Squid and I finally left Moria (I know, I have been slacking severely in my Lore-master chronicles and I can't recall if I even mentioned us going IN to Moria in the first place, but whatever, we left it). She had been refusing to leave Moria until the epic line prompted us to, because, in her words, "Once I leave Moria, I'm not going back." After running all the way east to First Hall, we stood for what seemed like ages at the doorway, just staring out into the last bit of darkness. Squid claimed she was afk, but our burglar buddy, Licentious, suggested that maybe she had Stockholm Syndrome and that perhaps Moria had been so bad to her that she couldn't tear herself away from it. She huffed and puffed at this and claimed that she could leave anytime she wanted to, thankyouverymuch.

So we left. The sunlight outside was bright and stark after the long dark of Moria. The elves of Lorien, of course, were snobby and wouldn't let us in. So we had to run back and forth, carrying arrows and clearing the orc muck out of the Nimrodel before they would let us pass. They are very protective of their realm, and even shot Squid for trying to enter Lorien before they said she could. Heck, they even stuck a couple arrows in me for getting too close to their borders while trying to clear out orc muck.

Finally, we had done enough menial demeaning work to satisfy the elves, and they let us into Lorien. As we rode our horses down the pathway, with twilight just coming on and the last bit of sunlight fading away into blue duskiness, Squid couldn't help but exclaim how beautiful everything was. I had to agree with her. Lorien has always been one of my favorite places. We ran around performing more tasks for the elves, helping them keep the forest alive and well, like in this screenshot, where we are singing to the sick trees. Apparently, in Lorien, that helps.

Eventually we had done most of the quests that didn't involve a lot of killing and resorted to outlandish acts, simply to see how far we could push the boundaries. One of the defining marks of Lorien architechture is the construction of Talan, or great platforms high up in the boughs of the Mallorn trees of Lorien. There is a deed to discover all of them, and in the process of climbing up all of them, we discovered that the huge branches can be walked out onto.

This of course led to all sorts of shenanigans, which, inevitably, led to misadventure. The problem with jumping around in branches high up in trees is that you will most likely fall out, and it is a lonnnnnggggg way down. And when you fall a long way, you will die. Which we did, more than once. It was loads of fun though, and in the end, as the sun came back up over Lorien, we called it a night and went our
separate ways, leaving the rest of Middle-earth for another day.

Perhaps eventually we will make our way further east towards Mirkwood, or even south into the wilds of Enedwaith, but for now I am content to sit and relax in the eaves of the Golden Wood.

Death to Narmeleth!!!

So Squid and I finally finished Volume 1 of the epic story in lotro. Thank heaven. Finally. I think she was ready to strangle the elf-woman by the time we were done. But, all that matters, besides strangling, is that we finished, and that we have these lovely white horses to show for it.

Oh, and matching cloaks, but it was night-time in Rivendell when we finished, so the pic didn't turn out quite as well for that one.

The story really is nice though, and if you pay attention to it (unlike sis, who just accepted and moved on without reading) it pays some interesting tributes to some lesser known Tolkien lore every now and again.

I found these white horses...

So I finally finished Volume 1 today, only because Turbine was gracious enough to let us poor people who can never get fellowships for quests do the quests on our own. For a few glorious minutes I felt like one of the heroes of ancient elvendom, staring at my morale bar of over 18,000 hitpoints. I was doing 2k damage an arrow, easily. I felt like.... something divine and all-powerful. Granted, the quest was still hard, and I did almost die. But I finished it. I fought the witch-king himself, too:

Why I decided to show up in that dress instead of any armor I don't know, it probably had something to do with me almost dying, lol. But I did fight him, although I didn't kill him. That glory was reserved for Narmeleth there, in the red dress. Poor girl.

After I returned to Rivendell to inform the elves of our triumph, they handed me a bunch of nifty items, namely a cloak, a picture for my house, some armor I can't use, and a fairly decent ring.

Oh, and this:

A white horse. Anyone who knows anything about me and about how I play lotro knows that I am obsessed with two things: clothes and horses. Everytime I get a new horse I am ecstatic and take lots of pictures of it to show it off. This horse I named Bainrhi, which is elvish for "beautiful crown," because I consider this horse to be the symbol of the crown of my achievements in the game thus far. You can also see my new dress, but I didn't get that from the quest, I got that from the lovely beer-filled dwarves of Thorin's Hall. I handed them enough goblin heads and they were happy to give me a dress to say thanks.

Welp, I'm off, back into the game, to see what other wonders I can discover!