In general, people who are willing to relearn the stat system, take a fresh look at their traits and the new system, and review how they use their skills are the ones who are not complaining. If you are married to your old stats and old traits and don't want to re-examine things you're probably unhappy. I don't blame you though: it's natural to be resistant change. I would suggest if you haven't done a complete review of your traits and the new stats system to do so. Do you still trait yourself with Fidelity because you used to run Rift weekly? It's time to ditch it: no one is hitting you with shadow damage when you are leveling. Did you forget about Empathy because armor didn't do much in Shadows in Armor? Well it's one of the better traits now. Do you not have any -Incoming damage traits slotted? Consider it! And wait till you've played with a few legendary items. By level 52 or 53 you should have be able to equip a few of them, hopefully have a good idea of the legacies you can equip. There are some nices bonuses, especially with runes.
tell ya what bud I spent at least 300 to 500 gold this morning rewiring my minnie in different ways at the bard. I tryed playing with and without war speech and in 3 man and 6 man groups. I have played minnies since beta 2 or over 2 years now and I pronounce he minstrel class has been f**cked.
it's not just me either. In my kinship we have at least 5 level 50+ minnies who play on a regular basis , at least 3 of us who played minnies as our mains at release. Now some are better players than others and we may disagree on our styles and trait lines but one thing we all agree on. Minnes are hosed right now. No way we can do decent DPS for solo and crap will aggro us from halfway across the zone when healing.
Unless you are playing a minnie there is no way you can know how f'ed we are right now. Look at some of my pre release posts. I defended Turbine right up to release figuring the complainers were the ususal board whiners. Last night and today made me a believer. I tried soloing old school style w/o War Speech using my heals, I tried post war speech style. I died at least 4 times , once at the hands of 2 blue mobs LOL. I used to solo two oranges, fearing one while cutting down the other. turbine scred the minstrel , believe it or not. Right now I am playing and out of preobaly 25 people in my kinship that are online there is not a single minstrel being played. Normally there would be three or four 50's and a few pre 50's playing..
By the way for someone who says he doesn't play a minstrel you sure have a good handle on out traits. Fidelity also has secondaries of Vitality and tertiary of increasing power. Anyway it should not matter to the point where you have to spend a gold rearranging traits just to be able to play halfway decently. I never had to change a single trait on my Hunter or Lore Master and they handle Moria just fine. In fact I would say they are both more powerful than they were pre Moria.
Dont get me wrong the class is not unplayable it is just very painful to play in its current form. I used to kill 3 mobs at a time by AOEing them down since it takes me almost the same amount of time to kill 1 as it did 3.
Now I just watch as every other class kills several mobs while I work one down and almost die if not dying in the process.
You can drive 25 on a 55 mph highway but why would you want to?
And I noticed tonight in my kin there were no Mins on at all and we usually have 7-9 of em on. Thank god they are not the only healing class as finding one for a group is dam near impossible now.
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Well we do have one girl in our kin who is now a level 55 minnie and she can't figure out why the rest of us are suffering. She is posting her trait build on the kin boards tonight and I will respec again tommorrow and give it a test.
Still should not have to come down to that though,even if it works. That's just plain bad design.
Think the thing is, to many people played the minstrel improperly. Yes. the Minstrel used to be able to do some good dps, but you have to realise his class is for healing the players with inspirational songs. The DPS class has nmoved to the rune-keep. Again, The Lore-Master used to be good DPS, but most people forget, his man role is to be a crowd control technician. The Pure DPS classes have ben re tooled as Rune-Keeper, Hunter, Champion. If you are not one of those 3 classes and your crying about dps... please
To be honest, I was wondering the same thing. That these classes had crossed over a line they should never had crossed over.
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I can understand the frustration if your class have been nerfed. The minstrels I know seems to be doing fine and I ve done some of the 3-man instances with a minstrel and he had no problem keeping us alive.
But minstrels were overpowerd pre-moria so it not strange that Turbine wanted to bring them down. Probably they did to much but then you will be happy when they buff you again in patch 1
As a captain I love the game more than ever. We have been the underdog since release and finally we get to shine and the class have been made alot more fun to play. A part of me is happy that Minstrels and LMs get to feel how it was to be a captain pre-Moria
If WoW = The Beatles and WAR = Led Zeppelin Then LotrO = Pink Floyd
Think the thing is, to many people played the minstrel improperly. Yes. the Minstrel used to be able to do some good dps, but you have to realise his class is for healing the players with inspirational songs. The DPS class has nmoved to the rune-keep. Again, The Lore-Master used to be good DPS, but most people forget, his man role is to be a crowd control technician. The Pure DPS classes have ben re tooled as Rune-Keeper, Hunter, Champion. If you are not one of those 3 classes and your crying about dps... please
OK so why does my crowd control LM feel more powerful than before Moria? My buddy who's main is a burg feels his burglar plays as well as before. Also what you are missing is our heals also got nerfed big time when soloing and our agro attract is also sky high ingroup when we heal. Even using lute strings and agro reduction techniques, our agro is still skyscraper high. So now we can't solo worth a crap and can's heal in a group worth a crap either.
Also it is not just a DPS issue. The problem is the Minstrel has a single melee attack. the rest of our damage comes from shouts and songs. Turbine brings in legendaries and says ooooohhhh we better nerf the shouts and songs and reduce the chances of stuns . Also if hey want to use the warrior sklad line ( battle mage) lets nerf the crap out of their heals. If I equip 3 triats in the WA line my heals are reduced 30%. If I then activate War speech for soloing they are nerfed a further 50%. A 900 point heal cut down to a bit over 100 points while fighting mobs that are doing 75 points of damage a swing and resisting 50% of my shouts and songs. Whoopee what fun
This has always been a game where a person could log on and play solo for a hour or two and be fun. Now that has been taken away from one class. The game has 9 classes and all are viable soloers now except the Minstrel. Sorry Sol but if I am in the ice cream business and I change the flavor and 4 out of 5 people tell me the changes suck I will change back. Saying well "suck it up" you guys are not meant to solo is something I would expect to hear from SOE or Funcom.
Turbine Devs, employees, and just plain fanbois can defend this till the day they die and it is still wrong. As far as changing my traits I doubt it will make that much difference. I will not play a class that is not fun to play. Sorry dude butt when 4 out of 5 people that play a class think the changes suck then guess what the chnages suck. When long time Minnies like Figgy the Bard and Annie tell you that you broke the class then the class is broken. here is the best and most constructive thread I have seen on the subject
Overall I enjoy the expansion but the Minstrel changes were just stupid and I repeat, the Turbine emplyee for allowing these chages to make retail should be fired, plain and simple. If I have a emplyeee that pisses off 80% of the customers he serves then his ass is out the door.
I am more than happy to give Turbine a chance to fix this but quit pissing on my leg and telling me it is raining. Now I am off to play my Lore Master or Hunter, 2 classes that are still fun to play.
Turbine has been slipping, a lot lately. They go from one of the most polished MMOs to ever launch to problems beginning book 14 and now Moria took a toll when the servers opened and no one could get in the queue. There is one thing Turbine can't fix and that is the community. That as a whole at least on my server has pretty much came to a halt. No one talks to one another outside of guilds of course, people only group up to knock out an epic quest which normally leads into a poorly built party because people have no damn patients to build something that will work. I was enjoying the story this morning had fun running around and feeling the world of lotr around me. Until I hit the first group instance, then it went to a halt of frustrating and to the point where I just logged off and gave up on it. Besides the fact I couldn't find anyone for hours that was doing 15.12, when I did get a group they would whip on the first set of mobs in the instance. Now playing through this damn game for many months and seeing some extraordinary battles and skill, this instance is weak compared to most at yet couldn't go anywhere with it. I might be venting and I know in some days time I'll jump on to try my luck again, it just shocks me that the newest content is so how should I say "Avoided". It seems that the following mobs beyond 50 that we dealt with at cap 50 are more powerful because of the level cap raise. I don't know but there is one damn thing for sure I'm not going out in a field or ice field to grind mobs till I level that is for damn sure. I'm sure I'm not alone, I'm to the point where I think my server is just straight up dead even for the expansion launch, I seen 12 people in Angmar today (where book 15.12 is) on Arkenstone o.O.
Well first thing to consider is that there is much to do in any expansion and given the sheer volume of people I saw trying the new classes Id guess that as the first responder pointed out people are certainly doing lots of other things not just the particular content you want to see. I think you may have hit the nail on the head when you pointed out you are probably just ranting because I have not experienced any of the problems you had play on Landroval and Brandywine and haven't had any trouble logging in nor finding plenty of people around though I myself have not tried to tackle any of the new books.
So I think you can say your personal experience with the expansion may have been bad but to just label the launch "terrible" is just a bit on the high and mighty side.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
The point was/is that Turbine quality control is slipping anyone saying other wise is a god damn lair or blind... As for why I didn't rush to Moria like a little school girl, well I want to finish the damn story of volume 1 before I dive into the next and if Turbine was smart they would have made book 15 mandatory to get into Moria then we wouldn't be having this lack of population problem we are having. To all the posters that only responded to say something stupid like quit whining, bravo you showed me you cared enough to respond. To all those having a great time, great. Try to do book 15 and you will be in my shoes and see it from my side. It isn't pretty. At any point there was downtime already this afternoon, so something is going red over at Turbine, be it a security patch for the servers or other wise it isn't good to see. It is like slowly seeing a company that cares fall down to a I don't give two shits I just want your money (see the history of SOE). At any rate it is what it is. A flaw that could have been avoided.
You should really word your posts better because I'm willing to bet you are the minority in this debate I have experienced and heard of very little down time and I play on atleast 1 of the busiest US servers and wait times happened during double xp weekend so what would you expect when they launch the expansion? It's one thing to come on forums and say "I'm not having fun with the expansion and here is why" but you are in here basically yelling "Fire!" when all that is there is a little smoke. Which in my opinion is still giving your argument a bit too much credit, which I do only because I can't see myself trying to argue what you say you've experienced as you just seem to me to have been unlucky enough to have these issues given your play schedule etc.. But I still think yo should put the soap box away because all this "Turbine is slipping in customer service" junk I ain't buying, I spend countless hours playing this game and other than the 1 hour rolling restart I have not had any trouble getting to play when I wanted to, are there times when there weren't people aorund interested in doing the content I wanted to? Of course but when has that not been an issue in just about every mmo on the market?
Ya know I wonder are you in a kinship on your server? because if you are that would give you a good sense on what people will generally want is your kin rushing to moria or to finish the books? If your notin a kin I think this post may point out why as it's hard to want to stay around a person with as exacting and demanding standards as you have to have to call this a terrible launch just by the things you have pointed out I would guess that it's hard to do anything right in your eyes if ultimate success is not the result.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Well you know what, like a NORMAL person with a LIFE outside of LOTRO. I went to sleep Monday night. Woke up early Tuesday to be amazed the servers where actually live already. Attempted to log in, realized there was a long patch. Thought good Turbine has been busy. Patched, while getting ready for work. Went to work. Came home for lunch, played a couple hours. Went back to work, returned home and played about six hours. Yeah I didn't work much Tuesday, sue me.
makes perfect sense to you that an expansion that came on a dvd had to patch itself on release day? i would think a company like the awesome [::whatever::] turbine would have made it so only the people who DIDNT install from the dvd would have a long patch time to look at.
its mr.brick's prerogative to play the game any way he chooses! whats more he is also allowed to post here. to me the fact that so many of you are posting here and NOT enjoying your mind-blowing [:::whatever again:::] expansion says volumes. like, "its such a great thing i think ill go jerk around on some forums."
they are games not effing crusades, you do not have to destroy the infidels !
personally i think its funny that the easy mode crowd cant handle said chapter (until they "nerf" it for them), but i think its sad that anyone who plays hard will be done with all the new content in under a month. turbine is not some online gaming monolth, lotro may have had a smooth roll out, but it isnt like its a super complex game either, how they made DDO the failure it is or let AC2 flounder the way it did = reprehensible. so get off your soap boxes and stop pretending you know god personally.
said the pot to the kettle. You start the post off by pointing out to us that "oh perhaps there is something to the garbage op is posting" and the n show your true colors by pointing out turbine made you mad in the past and that is ultimately why it's ok to post false posts (overall) I'll put my soap box away if you put yours away.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Hashbrick, you are all that is WRONG with the MMO gamer. Staying up all night/day waiting patiently for the instant the servers come up. Angry when the gates open and the rush of rats run towards the cheese like a mindless zerg. You get stompled over a few times and delayed in getting your cheese. Only to complain about getting yellow cheese instead of white.
Well you know what, like a NORMAL person with a LIFE outside of LOTRO. I went to sleep Monday night. Woke up early Tuesday to be amazed the servers where actually live already. Attempted to log in, realized there was a long patch. Thought good Turbine has been busy. Patched, while getting ready for work. Went to work. Came home for lunch, played a couple hours. Went back to work, returned home and played about six hours. Yeah I didn't work much Tuesday, sue me.
My experience was MoM is hands down the best expansion launch ever and Turbine deserves a 10/10.
I'm sure the honeymoon will wear off a bit, and it may drop to 8/10 or so, but first impressions go a LONG way and Turbine has done an amazing job. Even the engine received a major patch, I'm getting about 20% more FPS.
So in closing Hashbrick, you suck, not Turbine.
Heh and yet how wrong you are, I didn't wait around waiting for servers to open, I was off that night (I work overnights so obviously I'd be up at this hour doing my usual stuff) and tried to login to one of my favorite MMOs live expansion when they opened up the servers. I can't do this now? It's a sin to go in when I can and not wait for your ass to get in first?
It's not the fact that Turbine isn't a great company I am just clearly stating they are starting to slip in quality as they do things, anyone around book 14 would know this. My god don't get me started about the ring-lore setup, if you don't know read my article here at mmorpg.com.
Yep I was an correspondent for Lotro here but politely stepped down because of time and the interest just wasn't there, no drive to go on.
You defiantly wouldn't be a critic I can tell you that much. 10/10? Do you have no shame? 10/10 deserves to be fed to perfection, this was not perfection there was problems right at the get go. It's like judging your granny's pie the best just because you love your granny. You need to step a side and see it from a point where your love for the game or company is not an issue then you can see the flaws.
At any point thanks to some of you who decided to help clear the air for the ones that didn't get it. As others stated I was playing casually I had no drive to fly through the content, I used to be a hardcore gamer when I had time and barely any responsibilities, but I'd rather put food on the table then worry about grinding to level 60 in 2-3 days.
I think it may just be my server we had experienced quite a few population drops during the course of lotro. To give you a good feeling how well I know this game. I beta tested it, played at launch till book 10 with two different account, the other account came much later (I didn't dual box that shit is long gone on my list). Dropped out and then popped back in at book 12 till book 14. Dropped out and picked up on Moria. So I've seen a lot of the game and the events that took place. Very casually out of all that time only two level 50s and a 43.
The community used to be great and fell down hill there is more of the hardcore single player mode players that fled in probably from WoW (at least I wouldn't doubt it) that are used to that being the only mode to play.
To all those not having issues I wish I was in the same boat, but thank you for your time.
Ok so on the first day of launch turbine did not meet your play schedule which ultimately stopped you from being first in when you would have if they had?
" I can't do this now? It's a sin to go in when I can and not wait for your ass to get in first?
" Ok so you are one of the server first types it's killing you that you couldn't get in first doesn't equate to a terrible launch nor any QA or CS problems.
I too would start out with as high as a 10/10 review at the present state due to the fact that everything I've tried in game has worked perfectly I just have not encountered the issues you have nor have I seen anyone other than you make these points, so even as a former correpondent for the game it's hard to give this particular argument any type of weight when the only people so far defending it have already shown they have problems with turbine having such a good rep anyway none of the issues you poitned out are widespread and some even chalk up to tough luck such as you joined a couple groups that sucked I'm certain every group on your server didn't fail. I just think you need to find your legions first before this post goes out the way it did
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Originally posted by jaxsundane Ok so on the first day of launch turbine did not meet your play schedule which ultimately stopped you from being first in when you would have if they had? " I can't do this now? It's a sin to go in when I can and not wait for your ass to get in first? " Ok so you are one of the server first types it's killing you that you couldn't get in first doesn't equate to a terrible launch nor any QA or CS problems. I too would start out with as high as a 10/10 review at the present state due to the fact that everything I've tried in game has worked perfectly I just have not encountered the issues you have nor have I seen anyone other than you make these points, so even as a former correpondent for the game it's hard to give this particular argument any type of weight when the only people so far defending it have already shown they have problems with turbine having such a good rep anyway none of the issues you poitned out are widespread and some even chalk up to tough luck such as you joined a couple groups that sucked I'm certain every group on your server didn't fail. I just think you need to find your legions first before this post goes out the way it did
Whew you went out on a limb and replied to every post so I'll try to sum this up instead of coming up with a huge novel.
I'll admit "terrible" was probably an ill decision in the heat of the madness. A "weak" launch should have been better classified to what it really was.
While a lot of people are not seeing the problems the fact remains there is still problems.
If you play a minstrel you will feel a beat down that makes it feel you are getting abused by Turbine. You can't do your job or you will get aggro and die instantly. You can't solo or you will just die being plain under-powered.
Was minstrel too strong pre-Moria? No way, we still couldn't solo stuff that champions just burst out and killed in matter of seconds to our minutes and that was fine at least we could hold our own. But now we can't even do that, death is almost like a class skill to us now only there isn't any plus in that.
There is bugged quests, from not updating the quest log to completely disappearing and giving you no credit.
Stability issues, though will fix in time just doesn't feel like a AAA MMO, it feels like I'm in a F2P MMO and that shouldn't happen when you are paying top dollar for a subscription. I'm sure some servers are worse than others and some will never experience these "pauses" that happen every 10-15mins or so. Just plain annoying.
I'd rather not get into the new skill system but there is some point issues and some skills are suffering or not working because of the new system.
Like I said I didn't wait around to come in first thing the servers opened, because I work overnights I'm what you call nocturnal. They just happen to release the servers at mid-night PST which they should have waited until all the problems were cleared up but shit happens.
As for a kin yes all they wanted to do was rush to Moria. I stayed behind. I guess I shouldn't have followed the logic flow, and went and did volume 2 content first before finishing volume 1...
At any rate after some hassles and frustration I did decide to do just that only to realize how much my minstrel had trouble handling the content and how no one wants to group up unless it is a fellowship quest. I'm not going to cry about it a cruel world for us minnies.
But I've said my piece some agree some don't and that is what it comes down to.
[[ DEAD ]] - Funny - I deleted my account on the site using the cancel account button. Forum user is separate and still exists with no way of deleting it. Delete it admins. Do it, this ends now.
I have to side with Jakcdog on this the Minst issue. Turbine has already admitted that they overdid things with the Minst, and they are planning do rectify the situation in the first post MoM patch.
A Minst has never been a viable DPS class in a party, a Guardian with a two hander can out DPS one. They simply had the DPS they needed for solo work. Turbine absolutely screwed the pooch on Minst, the changes in place now should not have been in the launch. I can understand why Jackdog is so pissed.
That said, I still say that MoM is one of the best expansion launches I've ever experienced. They absolutely nailed the new zones, the new legendary item system is a ton of fun, and the new trait system works really well...minst and possibly LM excepted. The Warden is also a ton of fun to play based on my limited time with one. It honestly boggles me that Turbine could pretty much hit this expansion right out of the park, and still do something as stupid as gimping Minstrels in solo play.
Regardless, on the balance I think MoM is a screaming shit ton of fun. Makes most MMO expansions I've been through look stupid.
I don't want to write this, and you don't want to read it. But now it's too late for both of us.
My main is a minstrel. He has no Rift gear, a few crafted teals, and pretty lousy virtue stats, since I'm a casual player and haven't done many of the deed grinds. (Maybe one 8, a couple 7s and then all 6,5,4 or even less). I did notice the much lower B/P/E stats immediately. I re-traited for the first time in months to get back some Block, and shuffled a few virtues.
Having done that, I'm now level 52, with 56 quests complete in Eregion (55 solo/small fellow, one fellow), and I've been into Moria for 1-2 hours. I fellowed once, for the fellow quest in Eregion. In that time, I've died exactly once, and that was making a wrong turn in Moria and falling to my death. Not one combat death yet. I've used 3 athelas pots. I've used Elrond's Gift 5 times. I've feigned death twice. I spend 95% of my time in Warspeech.
I'm traited to 4 in the "Warrior Skald" set, which leaves me with 20% healing unless I drop Warspeech. I'm killing almost as fast as before. My shouts still crit, but not at the 50% rate before Moria. Maybe closer to 30% now. All I've done is be a little more careful about the mobs around, and avoiding adds. I've fought some of those named sig Uruk's with their worm pet and survived, although I had to drop from Warspeech half way through for heals. I've fought no more than 2 white-con mobs at once. I've killed yellow and orange single mobs solo with no issues. I've had difficulties with 3 blue wargs at once (feigned death once to survive).
More fragile? Yes. Feeling severely nerfed? No. Will I charge into a room full of goblins and expect to win? No.
So far I'm really enjoying the expansion content. I had some luck on my starter LI weapon and got all tier 5 or 6 legacies that buff ballad/shout/orome damage. I like the new Devastating criticals. I started a new Warden too, and that class is seeming well put together so far.
My only "complaint" is that Eregion is too crowded right now. Try getting 15 dunlending axes, or even finding 8 huorns to kill. ;-)
My main is a minstrel. He has no Rift gear, a few crafted teals, and pretty lousy virtue stats, since I'm a casual player and haven't done many of the deed grinds. (Maybe one 8, a couple 7s and then all 6,5,4 or even less). I did notice the much lower B/P/E stats immediately. I re-traited for the first time in months to get back some Block, and shuffled a few virtues. Having done that, I'm now level 52, with 56 quests complete in Eregion (55 solo/small fellow, one fellow), and I've been into Moria for 1-2 hours. I fellowed once, for the fellow quest in Eregion. In that time, I've died exactly once, and that was making a wrong turn in Moria and falling to my death. Not one combat death yet. I've used 3 athelas pots. I've used Elrond's Gift 5 times. I've feigned death twice. I spend 95% of my time in Warspeech. I'm traited to 4 in the "Warrior Skald" set, which leaves me with 20% healing unless I drop Warspeech. I'm killing almost as fast as before. My shouts still crit, but not at the 50% rate before Moria. Maybe closer to 30% now. All I've done is be a little more careful about the mobs around, and avoiding adds. I've fought some of those named sig Uruk's with their worm pet and survived, although I had to drop from Warspeech half way through for heals. I've fought no more than 2 white-con mobs at once. I've killed yellow and orange single mobs solo with no issues. I've had difficulties with 3 blue wargs at once (feigned death once to survive). More fragile? Yes. Feeling severely nerfed? No. Will I charge into a room full of goblins and expect to win? No. So far I'm really enjoying the expansion content. I had some luck on my starter LI weapon and got all tier 5 or 6 legacies that buff ballad/shout/orome damage. I like the new Devastating criticals. I started a new Warden too, and that class is seeming well put together so far. My only "complaint" is that Eregion is too crowded right now. Try getting 15 dunlending axes, or even finding 8 huorns to kill. ;-) Overall, I'd give a 9/10.
Good for you dude, I guess the rest of us minstrels are just stupid and lousy gamers who are whining for the sake of whining. Like I stated in another post out of 7 players in my kin who were on last night who have 50+ minnies , 6 of us have retired them till they are fixed. The 7th is a lvl 55 who is played by a retired granny who 2 boxes and has something like 8 characters at 50 or above.She emailed me this morning and I set my minnie's traits up as close to possible to hers and I can solo w/o too much pain.
Was that Turbines intent? To force all minstrels to all have the exact same traits in their trees if they want to survive. If so then still shame on Turbine. As Yeebo pointed out Turbine has already admitted they screwed up and overdid things. Now all we have to do is see if they set things right. After retraiting I can solo yellows and oranges but I lose half to 3/4 of my health doing and if I get a add I may as well just "feign death" Meanwhile I can take my LM with light armor and with jusdicious uses of stuns juggle 3 to 4 mobs. All Turbine has to do in my opinion is back off on the healing restrictions when in war speechto 50% as it was pre Moria and I would be fine as a minnie. Also a few less resists to my shouts and cries would not hurt. I am hoping my Legendary book can help out there.
Class Changes D- New Weapons System B+ New Areas B+ New Classes B New Skill Trees C-
Crafting Changes C OverallC Sorry if this sounds a bit harsh coming from someone who has a rep as a Turbine fanboy but Turbine really did fall down a few notches in my eyes on this one.
What? you mean I wasn't trolling when i warned you about the class changes?
and if you think LM isn't screwed up, try using the Ancient Master trait path. It is nice for the solo LM that they got two DPS trait paths, but you're not wanted in groups for DPS. The LM CC is hurting and our secondary use of healing is also in trouble because you have to go pet path for it.
Burglar has one broken trait path as well, but at least the class dev admitted so and that he intends to fix it.
Class Changes D- New Weapons System B+ New Areas B+ New Classes B New Skill Trees C-
Crafting Changes C OverallC Sorry if this sounds a bit harsh coming from someone who has a rep as a Turbine fanboy but Turbine really did fall down a few notches in my eyes on this one.
What? you mean I wasn't trolling when i warned you about the class changes?
and if you think LM isn't screwed up, try using the Ancient Master trait path. It is nice for the solo LM that they got two DPS trait paths, but you're not wanted in groups for DPS. The LM CC is hurting and our secondary use of healing is also in trouble because you have to go pet path for it.
Burglar has one broken trait path as well, but at least the class dev admitted so and that he intends to fix it.
you want a apology, ok you got it. You were right and I was wrong. I don't play my LM much in groups so I will take your word on it and I don't have a burgl above 10 so I will keep my mouth shut there also.
Think the thing is, to many people played the minstrel improperly. Yes. the Minstrel used to be able to do some good dps, but you have to realise his class is for healing the players with inspirational songs. The DPS class has nmoved to the rune-keep. Again, The Lore-Master used to be good DPS, but most people forget, his man role is to be a crowd control technician. The Pure DPS classes have ben re tooled as Rune-Keeper, Hunter, Champion. If you are not one of those 3 classes and your crying about dps... please
OK so why does my crowd control LM feel more powerful than before Moria? My buddy who's main is a burg feels his burglar plays as well as before. Also what you are missing is our heals also got nerfed big time when soloing and our agro attract is also sky high ingroup when we heal. Even using lute strings and agro reduction techniques, our agro is still skyscraper high. So now we can't solo worth a crap and can's heal in a group worth a crap either.
Also it is not just a DPS issue. The problem is the Minstrel has a single melee attack. the rest of our damage comes from shouts and songs. Turbine brings in legendaries and says ooooohhhh we better nerf the shouts and songs and reduce the chances of stuns . Also if hey want to use the warrior sklad line ( battle mage) lets nerf the crap out of their heals. If I equip 3 triats in the WA line my heals are reduced 30%. If I then activate War speech for soloing they are nerfed a further 50%. A 900 point heal cut down to a bit over 100 points while fighting mobs that are doing 75 points of damage a swing and resisting 50% of my shouts and songs. Whoopee what fun
This has always been a game where a person could log on and play solo for a hour or two and be fun. Now that has been taken away from one class. The game has 9 classes and all are viable soloers now except the Minstrel. Sorry Sol but if I am in the ice cream business and I change the flavor and 4 out of 5 people tell me the changes suck I will change back. Saying well "suck it up" you guys are not meant to solo is something I would expect to hear from SOE or Funcom.
Dude, you want your cake and to eat it to ? You either pick heals, or dps. What is so hard about that ?
I hate to say this, cause I think your a cool guy, but your complaing about the true purpose of the role of your minstrel. He is a squishy class, you will have to get used to it, or roll something that fits the style you want, and that would be a Rune-keeper.
I think if Turbine would of gradually changed the class you wouldn't of noticed, but it was an abrupt change that people will have to adapt to. I never played a minstrel cause I know it is a healing class, and I dislike to heal
Actually what I want is for the class to be fun to play again. I don't want to be a hunter or a champ, but I do want ot be able to solo effectively without nerfing my healing to the bone. We have one cont that one melee skill. If I could solo as well as I could pre War Speech I would be happy and guess what they put in War Speech because the class was too slow in killing before War speech and no one was playing them.Sorry but the fancy new weapons system isn't going to help a hell of a lot when we have one lousy melee skill and the rest of our shouts and songs are nerfed
But here is a suggestion for you, if you never played the class then don't make judgements on how they should play. I don't shoot my mouth off about Guardians issues, because I realize I don't know WTF I am talking about with guardian issues. DGo ahead and keep the fanboy attitude though, because if minnies are not fixed people will stop playing them and good luck running those 6 and 12 man instances with secondary healers.
Turbine F'ed up with their new improved trait lines now maybe they will fix it or maybe they will pull a SOE or a Funcom. Time wil tell I guess.
My main is a minstrel. He has no Rift gear, a few crafted teals, and pretty lousy virtue stats, since I'm a casual player and haven't done many of the deed grinds. (Maybe one 8, a couple 7s and then all 6,5,4 or even less). I did notice the much lower B/P/E stats immediately. I re-traited for the first time in months to get back some Block, and shuffled a few virtues. Having done that, I'm now level 52, with 56 quests complete in Eregion (55 solo/small fellow, one fellow), and I've been into Moria for 1-2 hours. I fellowed once, for the fellow quest in Eregion. In that time, I've died exactly once, and that was making a wrong turn in Moria and falling to my death. Not one combat death yet. I've used 3 athelas pots. I've used Elrond's Gift 5 times. I've feigned death twice. I spend 95% of my time in Warspeech. I'm traited to 4 in the "Warrior Skald" set, which leaves me with 20% healing unless I drop Warspeech. I'm killing almost as fast as before. My shouts still crit, but not at the 50% rate before Moria. Maybe closer to 30% now. All I've done is be a little more careful about the mobs around, and avoiding adds. I've fought some of those named sig Uruk's with their worm pet and survived, although I had to drop from Warspeech half way through for heals. I've fought no more than 2 white-con mobs at once. I've killed yellow and orange single mobs solo with no issues. I've had difficulties with 3 blue wargs at once (feigned death once to survive). More fragile? Yes. Feeling severely nerfed? No. Will I charge into a room full of goblins and expect to win? No. So far I'm really enjoying the expansion content. I had some luck on my starter LI weapon and got all tier 5 or 6 legacies that buff ballad/shout/orome damage. I like the new Devastating criticals. I started a new Warden too, and that class is seeming well put together so far. My only "complaint" is that Eregion is too crowded right now. Try getting 15 dunlending axes, or even finding 8 huorns to kill. ;-) Overall, I'd give a 9/10.
Good for you dude, I guess the rest of us minstrels are just stupid and lousy gamers who are whining for the sake of whining. Like I stated in another post out of 7 players in my kin who were on last night who have 50+ minnies , 6 of us have retired them till they are fixed. The 7th is a lvl 55 who is played by a retired granny who 2 boxes and has something like 8 characters at 50 or above.She emailed me this morning and I set my minnie's traits up as close to possible to hers and I can solo w/o too much pain.
Was that Turbines intent? To force all minstrels to all have the exact same traits in their trees if they want to survive. If so then still shame on Turbine. As Yeebo pointed out Turbine has already admitted they screwed up and overdid things. Now all we have to do is see if they set things right. After retraiting I can solo yellows and oranges but I lose half to 3/4 of my health doing and if I get a add I may as well just "feign death" Meanwhile I can take my LM with light armor and with jusdicious uses of stuns juggle 3 to 4 mobs. All Turbine has to do in my opinion is back off on the healing restrictions when in war speechto 50% as it was pre Moria and I would be fine as a minnie. Also a few less resists to my shouts and cries would not hurt. I am hoping my Legendary book can help out there.
I'm not claiming the majority of minstrels are whining for no reason. I was just stating the facts of my gameplay experience so far. I had read the boards once the beta NDA was dropped and was a little leary of trying to solo at all. I even joked in my kinship that I may need to group with them a lot more.
The reality was it wasn't nearly as bad as I expected. I still solo. I do have to pay more attention. A sig tree almost killed me with three consecutive devastating crits. An add can spell disaster now. I guess I don't understand the "our dps sucks now" threads everywhere. MIne seems fine as long as I can maintain Warspeech. I don't see mobs resisting me more than before. I was killing orange angmarim near Mirobel when I was still 50 and I'd be around half morale when they died, and I don't bother healing at all when I'm in Warspeech since the tiny heals you get are instantly negated by the next hit from the mob. It's just burn them down before they kill you. If I'm fighting 2 mobs, then I have to decide when to drop Warspeech to fire off a real heal. Usually when I dip below 900 morale.
If Turbine relents and lowers the heal penalty on Warspeech while a Min is Warrior Skald traited, then solo power would increase.
Maybe I'm just used to adjusting to combat changes after a game's launch. I played a Warden (healer class) in EQ2 from launch and had to adjust when SOE revamped combat and affected their HoTs rather severely. Then adjusted again when Kunark came out and all the mobs were much harder. Perhaps adversity breeds flexability.
Sorry , but only the Minstrels who fail to reconize there roll , are complaining about this. Dude have you even gotten your legendary weapon ? have you seen the stats it will produce? They way Jackdog makes the minstrel sound, it is supposed to be aPaladin, it is not a Paladin lol. Come on dude, take a deep breath and look at the big picture.
Solareus once again you do not play the class so quite frankly you don't have the slightest idea wtf you are even talking about. Look at the boards dude, even Turbine has admitted they went too far.
you play a guardian right. Ok recognize your role then. When solo remove 80% of your armor value. Then equip a weapon which does maybe 85% of the damage of the one you are wielding now. Welcome to the minstrels world, that is pretty much what happened to us.
Minstrels had low DPS at launch, but we compensated by healing ourselves while fighting and using various stuns and debuffs. Well Turbine recognized that a lot of people were not playing minstrels because they were not fun so they gave us war speech which allowed us to kill a bit faster but at the expense of our 50% reduced healing. Now if you equip 2 traits in Warrior Skald mine it cuts that healing another 30% on top of the old 50% so a 900 point heal w/o war speech is a bit over 175 with it. Pre Moria with war speech that same heal was about 450. Add in that our shout only stuns ( 5 sec?) less than 10 to 15 % of the time whereas it used to hit 85% of the time or more and depending on the mob our light damage is resisted 50% of the time now and we are up shit creek.
Funny thing is last week I was labled as a Turbine fan boy. ROFL Strange if you like a game and make positive posts them you are a fanboy but if you are the least bit critical of every aspect you are a troll. I pretty much have always called it as I see it and Turbine screwed the pooch here with this expansion.
Saying omygawd over and over because of some aspects is about as stupid as the AOC fanbois claiming their game is the greatest because it has pretty graphics. Turbine should have left the classes as they were and left out the fancy weapons system and trait trees. If they had just released the game with the same mechanics, the new areas, and the new classes the expansion would have been a solid 10 in my opinion.
by the way here is the Warrior skald trait line form the Dev diary
The Minstrel is a battling warrior-poet who wanders Middle-earth, ever on the lookout for companions in need of a quick boost to their morale. The Warrior-Skald line answers the question of what the Minstrel does while they walk the lonely roads of the far reaches of Middle-earth, using both song and ballad to remove the taint from the land.
Traits in the Set:
The traits for this line focus on the old standbys of the warrior minstrel, whose proclivity for wearing medium armor is well known, but who will also have access to Tempo of Bravery and Enduring Morale to keep the Minstrel very healthy during one-on-one engagements.
Trait Set Bonuses:
The bonuses of the Warrior-Skald line are heavily focused on the War-speech stance, enhancing his abilities to deal raw damage at the expense of outbound healing. The master of the Warrior-Skald line understands when it’s time to raise and lower War-speech.
Capstone Skill: Call to Fate
This skill enables the Minstrel to deal high critical damage while in the War-speech stance. This is another tool in the toolbox of the Minstrel’s solo DPS set.
Legendary Capstone Trait: Call to War
This skill enables Minstrels to not only raise the power of the Call to War and take advantage of criticals, but it also raises many of the critical attributes of their War-speech focused skills, allowing the Minstrel to use their powerful light based songs to bring down their opponents.
sounds a lot like paladin doesn't it . Too bad that in practicce it is about as much fun a root canal minus ansthesia the way it works now. Pre Moria that is what we were, Paladins. We took a 50% cut of our healing to do a bit more DPS. Raising that to a 80%% while increasing resists put us right down the toilet. All I want is that 30% back and a few more crits.
I support these changes, it puts minstrels where they need to be.
Sounds to me like a bit of class jealousy going on here. Thats ok, after a gold in repairs and respecs and a complete revamp or two of my skill bar setup at lvl 50 I can now solo a pair of lvl 52's ( oranges) w/o dying. Can kill em pretty quick too. A single orange takes me about 20secs , a yellow about 10 - 15 secs.
Of course that still does not make it right. If it takes that much work to figure out how to solo that still means Turbine gets a D- on the class redesign. Can you say cookie cutter trait trees boys and girls. We will all look and play the same now, those that have the perseverance to figure it out that is. I guess in a way that is a good thing as I will have my pick of groups. Most minnies will quit before going through the BS I did just to be able to play.
Comments
tell ya what bud I spent at least 300 to 500 gold this morning rewiring my minnie in different ways at the bard. I tryed playing with and without war speech and in 3 man and 6 man groups. I have played minnies since beta 2 or over 2 years now and I pronounce he minstrel class has been f**cked.
it's not just me either. In my kinship we have at least 5 level 50+ minnies who play on a regular basis , at least 3 of us who played minnies as our mains at release. Now some are better players than others and we may disagree on our styles and trait lines but one thing we all agree on. Minnes are hosed right now. No way we can do decent DPS for solo and crap will aggro us from halfway across the zone when healing.
Unless you are playing a minnie there is no way you can know how f'ed we are right now. Look at some of my pre release posts. I defended Turbine right up to release figuring the complainers were the ususal board whiners. Last night and today made me a believer. I tried soloing old school style w/o War Speech using my heals, I tried post war speech style. I died at least 4 times , once at the hands of 2 blue mobs LOL. I used to solo two oranges, fearing one while cutting down the other. turbine scred the minstrel , believe it or not. Right now I am playing and out of preobaly 25 people in my kinship that are online there is not a single minstrel being played. Normally there would be three or four 50's and a few pre 50's playing..
By the way for someone who says he doesn't play a minstrel you sure have a good handle on out traits. Fidelity also has secondaries of Vitality and tertiary of increasing power. Anyway it should not matter to the point where you have to spend a gold rearranging traits just to be able to play halfway decently. I never had to change a single trait on my Hunter or Lore Master and they handle Moria just fine. In fact I would say they are both more powerful than they were pre Moria.
I miss DAoC
Dont get me wrong the class is not unplayable it is just very painful to play in its current form. I used to kill 3 mobs at a time by AOEing them down since it takes me almost the same amount of time to kill 1 as it did 3.
Now I just watch as every other class kills several mobs while I work one down and almost die if not dying in the process.
You can drive 25 on a 55 mph highway but why would you want to?
And I noticed tonight in my kin there were no Mins on at all and we usually have 7-9 of em on. Thank god they are not the only healing class as finding one for a group is dam near impossible now.
Playing- Guild Wars 2, SWTOR
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Well we do have one girl in our kin who is now a level 55 minnie and she can't figure out why the rest of us are suffering. She is posting her trait build on the kin boards tonight and I will respec again tommorrow and give it a test.
Still should not have to come down to that though,even if it works. That's just plain bad design.
I miss DAoC
"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
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To be honest, I was wondering the same thing. That these classes had crossed over a line they should never had crossed over.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
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I can understand the frustration if your class have been nerfed. The minstrels I know seems to be doing fine and I ve done some of the 3-man instances with a minstrel and he had no problem keeping us alive.
But minstrels were overpowerd pre-moria so it not strange that Turbine wanted to bring them down. Probably they did to much but then you will be happy when they buff you again in patch 1
As a captain I love the game more than ever. We have been the underdog since release and finally we get to shine and the class have been made alot more fun to play. A part of me is happy that Minstrels and LMs get to feel how it was to be a captain pre-Moria
If WoW = The Beatles
and WAR = Led Zeppelin
Then LotrO = Pink Floyd
OK so why does my crowd control LM feel more powerful than before Moria? My buddy who's main is a burg feels his burglar plays as well as before. Also what you are missing is our heals also got nerfed big time when soloing and our agro attract is also sky high ingroup when we heal. Even using lute strings and agro reduction techniques, our agro is still skyscraper high. So now we can't solo worth a crap and can's heal in a group worth a crap either.
Also it is not just a DPS issue. The problem is the Minstrel has a single melee attack. the rest of our damage comes from shouts and songs. Turbine brings in legendaries and says ooooohhhh we better nerf the shouts and songs and reduce the chances of stuns . Also if hey want to use the warrior sklad line ( battle mage) lets nerf the crap out of their heals. If I equip 3 triats in the WA line my heals are reduced 30%. If I then activate War speech for soloing they are nerfed a further 50%. A 900 point heal cut down to a bit over 100 points while fighting mobs that are doing 75 points of damage a swing and resisting 50% of my shouts and songs. Whoopee what fun
This has always been a game where a person could log on and play solo for a hour or two and be fun. Now that has been taken away from one class. The game has 9 classes and all are viable soloers now except the Minstrel. Sorry Sol but if I am in the ice cream business and I change the flavor and 4 out of 5 people tell me the changes suck I will change back. Saying well "suck it up" you guys are not meant to solo is something I would expect to hear from SOE or Funcom.
Turbine Devs, employees, and just plain fanbois can defend this till the day they die and it is still wrong. As far as changing my traits I doubt it will make that much difference. I will not play a class that is not fun to play. Sorry dude butt when 4 out of 5 people that play a class think the changes suck then guess what the chnages suck. When long time Minnies like Figgy the Bard and Annie tell you that you broke the class then the class is broken. here is the best and most constructive thread I have seen on the subject
forums.lotro.com/showthread.php
Overall I enjoy the expansion but the Minstrel changes were just stupid and I repeat, the Turbine emplyee for allowing these chages to make retail should be fired, plain and simple. If I have a emplyeee that pisses off 80% of the customers he serves then his ass is out the door.
I am more than happy to give Turbine a chance to fix this but quit pissing on my leg and telling me it is raining. Now I am off to play my Lore Master or Hunter, 2 classes that are still fun to play.
I miss DAoC
Well first thing to consider is that there is much to do in any expansion and given the sheer volume of people I saw trying the new classes Id guess that as the first responder pointed out people are certainly doing lots of other things not just the particular content you want to see. I think you may have hit the nail on the head when you pointed out you are probably just ranting because I have not experienced any of the problems you had play on Landroval and Brandywine and haven't had any trouble logging in nor finding plenty of people around though I myself have not tried to tackle any of the new books.
So I think you can say your personal experience with the expansion may have been bad but to just label the launch "terrible" is just a bit on the high and mighty side.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
You should really word your posts better because I'm willing to bet you are the minority in this debate I have experienced and heard of very little down time and I play on atleast 1 of the busiest US servers and wait times happened during double xp weekend so what would you expect when they launch the expansion? It's one thing to come on forums and say "I'm not having fun with the expansion and here is why" but you are in here basically yelling "Fire!" when all that is there is a little smoke. Which in my opinion is still giving your argument a bit too much credit, which I do only because I can't see myself trying to argue what you say you've experienced as you just seem to me to have been unlucky enough to have these issues given your play schedule etc.. But I still think yo should put the soap box away because all this "Turbine is slipping in customer service" junk I ain't buying, I spend countless hours playing this game and other than the 1 hour rolling restart I have not had any trouble getting to play when I wanted to, are there times when there weren't people aorund interested in doing the content I wanted to? Of course but when has that not been an issue in just about every mmo on the market?
Ya know I wonder are you in a kinship on your server? because if you are that would give you a good sense on what people will generally want is your kin rushing to moria or to finish the books? If your notin a kin I think this post may point out why as it's hard to want to stay around a person with as exacting and demanding standards as you have to have to call this a terrible launch just by the things you have pointed out I would guess that it's hard to do anything right in your eyes if ultimate success is not the result.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
makes perfect sense to you that an expansion that came on a dvd had to patch itself on release day? i would think a company like the awesome [::whatever::] turbine would have made it so only the people who DIDNT install from the dvd would have a long patch time to look at.
its mr.brick's prerogative to play the game any way he chooses! whats more he is also allowed to post here. to me the fact that so many of you are posting here and NOT enjoying your mind-blowing [:::whatever again:::] expansion says volumes. like, "its such a great thing i think ill go jerk around on some forums."
they are games not effing crusades, you do not have to destroy the infidels !
personally i think its funny that the easy mode crowd cant handle said chapter (until they "nerf" it for them), but i think its sad that anyone who plays hard will be done with all the new content in under a month. turbine is not some online gaming monolth, lotro may have had a smooth roll out, but it isnt like its a super complex game either, how they made DDO the failure it is or let AC2 flounder the way it did = reprehensible. so get off your soap boxes and stop pretending you know god personally.
said the pot to the kettle. You start the post off by pointing out to us that "oh perhaps there is something to the garbage op is posting" and the n show your true colors by pointing out turbine made you mad in the past and that is ultimately why it's ok to post false posts (overall) I'll put my soap box away if you put yours away.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Heh and yet how wrong you are, I didn't wait around waiting for servers to open, I was off that night (I work overnights so obviously I'd be up at this hour doing my usual stuff) and tried to login to one of my favorite MMOs live expansion when they opened up the servers. I can't do this now? It's a sin to go in when I can and not wait for your ass to get in first?
It's not the fact that Turbine isn't a great company I am just clearly stating they are starting to slip in quality as they do things, anyone around book 14 would know this. My god don't get me started about the ring-lore setup, if you don't know read my article here at mmorpg.com.
Yep I was an correspondent for Lotro here but politely stepped down because of time and the interest just wasn't there, no drive to go on.
You defiantly wouldn't be a critic I can tell you that much. 10/10? Do you have no shame? 10/10 deserves to be fed to perfection, this was not perfection there was problems right at the get go. It's like judging your granny's pie the best just because you love your granny. You need to step a side and see it from a point where your love for the game or company is not an issue then you can see the flaws.
At any point thanks to some of you who decided to help clear the air for the ones that didn't get it. As others stated I was playing casually I had no drive to fly through the content, I used to be a hardcore gamer when I had time and barely any responsibilities, but I'd rather put food on the table then worry about grinding to level 60 in 2-3 days.
I think it may just be my server we had experienced quite a few population drops during the course of lotro. To give you a good feeling how well I know this game. I beta tested it, played at launch till book 10 with two different account, the other account came much later (I didn't dual box that shit is long gone on my list). Dropped out and then popped back in at book 12 till book 14. Dropped out and picked up on Moria. So I've seen a lot of the game and the events that took place. Very casually out of all that time only two level 50s and a 43.
The community used to be great and fell down hill there is more of the hardcore single player mode players that fled in probably from WoW (at least I wouldn't doubt it) that are used to that being the only mode to play.
To all those not having issues I wish I was in the same boat, but thank you for your time.
Ok so on the first day of launch turbine did not meet your play schedule which ultimately stopped you from being first in when you would have if they had?
" I can't do this now? It's a sin to go in when I can and not wait for your ass to get in first?
" Ok so you are one of the server first types it's killing you that you couldn't get in first doesn't equate to a terrible launch nor any QA or CS problems.
I too would start out with as high as a 10/10 review at the present state due to the fact that everything I've tried in game has worked perfectly I just have not encountered the issues you have nor have I seen anyone other than you make these points, so even as a former correpondent for the game it's hard to give this particular argument any type of weight when the only people so far defending it have already shown they have problems with turbine having such a good rep anyway none of the issues you poitned out are widespread and some even chalk up to tough luck such as you joined a couple groups that sucked I'm certain every group on your server didn't fail. I just think you need to find your legions first before this post goes out the way it did
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Whew you went out on a limb and replied to every post so I'll try to sum this up instead of coming up with a huge novel.
I'll admit "terrible" was probably an ill decision in the heat of the madness. A "weak" launch should have been better classified to what it really was.
While a lot of people are not seeing the problems the fact remains there is still problems.
If you play a minstrel you will feel a beat down that makes it feel you are getting abused by Turbine. You can't do your job or you will get aggro and die instantly. You can't solo or you will just die being plain under-powered.
Was minstrel too strong pre-Moria? No way, we still couldn't solo stuff that champions just burst out and killed in matter of seconds to our minutes and that was fine at least we could hold our own. But now we can't even do that, death is almost like a class skill to us now only there isn't any plus in that.
There is bugged quests, from not updating the quest log to completely disappearing and giving you no credit.
Stability issues, though will fix in time just doesn't feel like a AAA MMO, it feels like I'm in a F2P MMO and that shouldn't happen when you are paying top dollar for a subscription. I'm sure some servers are worse than others and some will never experience these "pauses" that happen every 10-15mins or so. Just plain annoying.
I'd rather not get into the new skill system but there is some point issues and some skills are suffering or not working because of the new system.
Like I said I didn't wait around to come in first thing the servers opened, because I work overnights I'm what you call nocturnal. They just happen to release the servers at mid-night PST which they should have waited until all the problems were cleared up but shit happens.
As for a kin yes all they wanted to do was rush to Moria. I stayed behind. I guess I shouldn't have followed the logic flow, and went and did volume 2 content first before finishing volume 1...
At any rate after some hassles and frustration I did decide to do just that only to realize how much my minstrel had trouble handling the content and how no one wants to group up unless it is a fellowship quest. I'm not going to cry about it a cruel world for us minnies.
But I've said my piece some agree some don't and that is what it comes down to.
I have to side with Jakcdog on this the Minst issue. Turbine has already admitted that they overdid things with the Minst, and they are planning do rectify the situation in the first post MoM patch.
A Minst has never been a viable DPS class in a party, a Guardian with a two hander can out DPS one. They simply had the DPS they needed for solo work. Turbine absolutely screwed the pooch on Minst, the changes in place now should not have been in the launch. I can understand why Jackdog is so pissed.
That said, I still say that MoM is one of the best expansion launches I've ever experienced. They absolutely nailed the new zones, the new legendary item system is a ton of fun, and the new trait system works really well...minst and possibly LM excepted. The Warden is also a ton of fun to play based on my limited time with one. It honestly boggles me that Turbine could pretty much hit this expansion right out of the park, and still do something as stupid as gimping Minstrels in solo play.
Regardless, on the balance I think MoM is a screaming shit ton of fun. Makes most MMO expansions I've been through look stupid.
I don't want to write this, and you don't want to read it. But now it's too late for both of us.
My main is a minstrel. He has no Rift gear, a few crafted teals, and pretty lousy virtue stats, since I'm a casual player and haven't done many of the deed grinds. (Maybe one 8, a couple 7s and then all 6,5,4 or even less). I did notice the much lower B/P/E stats immediately. I re-traited for the first time in months to get back some Block, and shuffled a few virtues.
Having done that, I'm now level 52, with 56 quests complete in Eregion (55 solo/small fellow, one fellow), and I've been into Moria for 1-2 hours. I fellowed once, for the fellow quest in Eregion. In that time, I've died exactly once, and that was making a wrong turn in Moria and falling to my death. Not one combat death yet. I've used 3 athelas pots. I've used Elrond's Gift 5 times. I've feigned death twice. I spend 95% of my time in Warspeech.
I'm traited to 4 in the "Warrior Skald" set, which leaves me with 20% healing unless I drop Warspeech. I'm killing almost as fast as before. My shouts still crit, but not at the 50% rate before Moria. Maybe closer to 30% now. All I've done is be a little more careful about the mobs around, and avoiding adds. I've fought some of those named sig Uruk's with their worm pet and survived, although I had to drop from Warspeech half way through for heals. I've fought no more than 2 white-con mobs at once. I've killed yellow and orange single mobs solo with no issues. I've had difficulties with 3 blue wargs at once (feigned death once to survive).
More fragile? Yes. Feeling severely nerfed? No. Will I charge into a room full of goblins and expect to win? No.
So far I'm really enjoying the expansion content. I had some luck on my starter LI weapon and got all tier 5 or 6 legacies that buff ballad/shout/orome damage. I like the new Devastating criticals. I started a new Warden too, and that class is seeming well put together so far.
My only "complaint" is that Eregion is too crowded right now. Try getting 15 dunlending axes, or even finding 8 huorns to kill. ;-)
Overall, I'd give a 9/10.
Good for you dude, I guess the rest of us minstrels are just stupid and lousy gamers who are whining for the sake of whining. Like I stated in another post out of 7 players in my kin who were on last night who have 50+ minnies , 6 of us have retired them till they are fixed. The 7th is a lvl 55 who is played by a retired granny who 2 boxes and has something like 8 characters at 50 or above.She emailed me this morning and I set my minnie's traits up as close to possible to hers and I can solo w/o too much pain.
Was that Turbines intent? To force all minstrels to all have the exact same traits in their trees if they want to survive. If so then still shame on Turbine. As Yeebo pointed out Turbine has already admitted they screwed up and overdid things. Now all we have to do is see if they set things right. After retraiting I can solo yellows and oranges but I lose half to 3/4 of my health doing and if I get a add I may as well just "feign death" Meanwhile I can take my LM with light armor and with jusdicious uses of stuns juggle 3 to 4 mobs. All Turbine has to do in my opinion is back off on the healing restrictions when in war speechto 50% as it was pre Moria and I would be fine as a minnie. Also a few less resists to my shouts and cries would not hurt. I am hoping my Legendary book can help out there.
I miss DAoC
What? you mean I wasn't trolling when i warned you about the class changes?
and if you think LM isn't screwed up, try using the Ancient Master trait path. It is nice for the solo LM that they got two DPS trait paths, but you're not wanted in groups for DPS. The LM CC is hurting and our secondary use of healing is also in trouble because you have to go pet path for it.
Burglar has one broken trait path as well, but at least the class dev admitted so and that he intends to fix it.
What? you mean I wasn't trolling when i warned you about the class changes?
and if you think LM isn't screwed up, try using the Ancient Master trait path. It is nice for the solo LM that they got two DPS trait paths, but you're not wanted in groups for DPS. The LM CC is hurting and our secondary use of healing is also in trouble because you have to go pet path for it.
Burglar has one broken trait path as well, but at least the class dev admitted so and that he intends to fix it.
you want a apology, ok you got it. You were right and I was wrong. I don't play my LM much in groups so I will take your word on it and I don't have a burgl above 10 so I will keep my mouth shut there also.
I miss DAoC
"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
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OK so why does my crowd control LM feel more powerful than before Moria? My buddy who's main is a burg feels his burglar plays as well as before. Also what you are missing is our heals also got nerfed big time when soloing and our agro attract is also sky high ingroup when we heal. Even using lute strings and agro reduction techniques, our agro is still skyscraper high. So now we can't solo worth a crap and can's heal in a group worth a crap either.
Also it is not just a DPS issue. The problem is the Minstrel has a single melee attack. the rest of our damage comes from shouts and songs. Turbine brings in legendaries and says ooooohhhh we better nerf the shouts and songs and reduce the chances of stuns . Also if hey want to use the warrior sklad line ( battle mage) lets nerf the crap out of their heals. If I equip 3 triats in the WA line my heals are reduced 30%. If I then activate War speech for soloing they are nerfed a further 50%. A 900 point heal cut down to a bit over 100 points while fighting mobs that are doing 75 points of damage a swing and resisting 50% of my shouts and songs. Whoopee what fun
This has always been a game where a person could log on and play solo for a hour or two and be fun. Now that has been taken away from one class. The game has 9 classes and all are viable soloers now except the Minstrel. Sorry Sol but if I am in the ice cream business and I change the flavor and 4 out of 5 people tell me the changes suck I will change back. Saying well "suck it up" you guys are not meant to solo is something I would expect to hear from SOE or Funcom.
Dude, you want your cake and to eat it to ? You either pick heals, or dps. What is so hard about that ?
I hate to say this, cause I think your a cool guy, but your complaing about the true purpose of the role of your minstrel. He is a squishy class, you will have to get used to it, or roll something that fits the style you want, and that would be a Rune-keeper.
I think if Turbine would of gradually changed the class you wouldn't of noticed, but it was an abrupt change that people will have to adapt to. I never played a minstrel cause I know it is a healing class, and I dislike to heal
Actually what I want is for the class to be fun to play again. I don't want to be a hunter or a champ, but I do want ot be able to solo effectively without nerfing my healing to the bone. We have one cont that one melee skill. If I could solo as well as I could pre War Speech I would be happy and guess what they put in War Speech because the class was too slow in killing before War speech and no one was playing them.Sorry but the fancy new weapons system isn't going to help a hell of a lot when we have one lousy melee skill and the rest of our shouts and songs are nerfed
But here is a suggestion for you, if you never played the class then don't make judgements on how they should play. I don't shoot my mouth off about Guardians issues, because I realize I don't know WTF I am talking about with guardian issues. DGo ahead and keep the fanboy attitude though, because if minnies are not fixed people will stop playing them and good luck running those 6 and 12 man instances with secondary healers.
Turbine F'ed up with their new improved trait lines now maybe they will fix it or maybe they will pull a SOE or a Funcom. Time wil tell I guess.
I miss DAoC
Good for you dude, I guess the rest of us minstrels are just stupid and lousy gamers who are whining for the sake of whining. Like I stated in another post out of 7 players in my kin who were on last night who have 50+ minnies , 6 of us have retired them till they are fixed. The 7th is a lvl 55 who is played by a retired granny who 2 boxes and has something like 8 characters at 50 or above.She emailed me this morning and I set my minnie's traits up as close to possible to hers and I can solo w/o too much pain.
Was that Turbines intent? To force all minstrels to all have the exact same traits in their trees if they want to survive. If so then still shame on Turbine. As Yeebo pointed out Turbine has already admitted they screwed up and overdid things. Now all we have to do is see if they set things right. After retraiting I can solo yellows and oranges but I lose half to 3/4 of my health doing and if I get a add I may as well just "feign death" Meanwhile I can take my LM with light armor and with jusdicious uses of stuns juggle 3 to 4 mobs. All Turbine has to do in my opinion is back off on the healing restrictions when in war speechto 50% as it was pre Moria and I would be fine as a minnie. Also a few less resists to my shouts and cries would not hurt. I am hoping my Legendary book can help out there.
I'm not claiming the majority of minstrels are whining for no reason. I was just stating the facts of my gameplay experience so far. I had read the boards once the beta NDA was dropped and was a little leary of trying to solo at all. I even joked in my kinship that I may need to group with them a lot more.
The reality was it wasn't nearly as bad as I expected. I still solo. I do have to pay more attention. A sig tree almost killed me with three consecutive devastating crits. An add can spell disaster now. I guess I don't understand the "our dps sucks now" threads everywhere. MIne seems fine as long as I can maintain Warspeech. I don't see mobs resisting me more than before. I was killing orange angmarim near Mirobel when I was still 50 and I'd be around half morale when they died, and I don't bother healing at all when I'm in Warspeech since the tiny heals you get are instantly negated by the next hit from the mob. It's just burn them down before they kill you. If I'm fighting 2 mobs, then I have to decide when to drop Warspeech to fire off a real heal. Usually when I dip below 900 morale.
If Turbine relents and lowers the heal penalty on Warspeech while a Min is Warrior Skald traited, then solo power would increase.
Maybe I'm just used to adjusting to combat changes after a game's launch. I played a Warden (healer class) in EQ2 from launch and had to adjust when SOE revamped combat and affected their HoTs rather severely. Then adjusted again when Kunark came out and all the mobs were much harder. Perhaps adversity breeds flexability.
"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
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Solareus once again you do not play the class so quite frankly you don't have the slightest idea wtf you are even talking about. Look at the boards dude, even Turbine has admitted they went too far.
you play a guardian right. Ok recognize your role then. When solo remove 80% of your armor value. Then equip a weapon which does maybe 85% of the damage of the one you are wielding now. Welcome to the minstrels world, that is pretty much what happened to us.
Minstrels had low DPS at launch, but we compensated by healing ourselves while fighting and using various stuns and debuffs. Well Turbine recognized that a lot of people were not playing minstrels because they were not fun so they gave us war speech which allowed us to kill a bit faster but at the expense of our 50% reduced healing. Now if you equip 2 traits in Warrior Skald mine it cuts that healing another 30% on top of the old 50% so a 900 point heal w/o war speech is a bit over 175 with it. Pre Moria with war speech that same heal was about 450. Add in that our shout only stuns ( 5 sec?) less than 10 to 15 % of the time whereas it used to hit 85% of the time or more and depending on the mob our light damage is resisted 50% of the time now and we are up shit creek.
Funny thing is last week I was labled as a Turbine fan boy. ROFL Strange if you like a game and make positive posts them you are a fanboy but if you are the least bit critical of every aspect you are a troll. I pretty much have always called it as I see it and Turbine screwed the pooch here with this expansion.
Saying omygawd over and over because of some aspects is about as stupid as the AOC fanbois claiming their game is the greatest because it has pretty graphics. Turbine should have left the classes as they were and left out the fancy weapons system and trait trees. If they had just released the game with the same mechanics, the new areas, and the new classes the expansion would have been a solid 10 in my opinion.
by the way here is the Warrior skald trait line form the Dev diary
www.lotro.com/gameinfo/devdiaries/236-developer-diary-minstrel-advancement-beyond-level-50
The Warrior-Skald
The Minstrel is a battling warrior-poet who wanders Middle-earth, ever on the lookout for companions in need of a quick boost to their morale. The Warrior-Skald line answers the question of what the Minstrel does while they walk the lonely roads of the far reaches of Middle-earth, using both song and ballad to remove the taint from the land.
Traits in the Set:
The traits for this line focus on the old standbys of the warrior minstrel, whose proclivity for wearing medium armor is well known, but who will also have access to Tempo of Bravery and Enduring Morale to keep the Minstrel very healthy during one-on-one engagements.
Trait Set Bonuses:
The bonuses of the Warrior-Skald line are heavily focused on the War-speech stance, enhancing his abilities to deal raw damage at the expense of outbound healing. The master of the Warrior-Skald line understands when it’s time to raise and lower War-speech.
Capstone Skill: Call to Fate
This skill enables the Minstrel to deal high critical damage while in the War-speech stance. This is another tool in the toolbox of the Minstrel’s solo DPS set.
Legendary Capstone Trait: Call to War
This skill enables Minstrels to not only raise the power of the Call to War and take advantage of criticals, but it also raises many of the critical attributes of their War-speech focused skills, allowing the Minstrel to use their powerful light based songs to bring down their opponents.
sounds a lot like paladin doesn't it . Too bad that in practicce it is about as much fun a root canal minus ansthesia the way it works now. Pre Moria that is what we were, Paladins. We took a 50% cut of our healing to do a bit more DPS. Raising that to a 80%% while increasing resists put us right down the toilet. All I want is that 30% back and a few more crits.
I miss DAoC
"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
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Sounds to me like a bit of class jealousy going on here.
Thats ok, after a gold in repairs and respecs and a complete revamp or two of my skill bar setup at lvl 50 I can now solo a pair of lvl 52's ( oranges) w/o dying. Can kill em pretty quick too. A single orange takes me about 20secs , a yellow about 10 - 15 secs.
Of course that still does not make it right. If it takes that much work to figure out how to solo that still means Turbine gets a D- on the class redesign. Can you say cookie cutter trait trees boys and girls. We will all look and play the same now, those that have the perseverance to figure it out that is. I guess in a way that is a good thing as I will have my pick of groups. Most minnies will quit before going through the BS I did just to be able to play.
I miss DAoC