Update 35.0.1 Release Notes
Here are the release notes for Update 35.0.1, released on Wednesday, April 5th, 2023.
News and Notes:
- Disarm Effect
- For a long time we haven’t been happy with the way disarm works (by temporarily treating your weapon as un-equipped), which has a lot more performance and statistical implications than is necessary, so we’ve taken this opportunity to change it to work identically to Silence – your weapon is no longer disabled, but disarm simply blocks the use of certain skills for the duration.
- We also removed several cases where a skill could be affected by both Silence & Disarm – any given skill should now only be vulnerable to one or the other (or neither).
- Monster Health & Armor
- Due to the changes in Mastery, player damage has increased fairly substantially – this was expected, but we wanted to take a little while to get a sense for how much the increase was.
- Now that we’ve got a better measure of it, we’re adjusting base monster stats to compensate. This change amounts to a +25% adjustment to monster morale at cap level, scaling down to +0% at level 30.
- Additionally, as of level 116, monsters now recieve a bump to their base armor rating, increasing their mitigation from [37.5% -> 45%]. It remains unchanged below this level.
- Note that player pets and NPCs should also benefit from these adjustments.
- Creeps are NOT affected by these adjustments as they use their own formulae.
- Return to Carn Dûm
- Various quests at Bail Avarc now provide an option to open the Instance Join panel directly to the related Instance or Raid. NOTE: These quests have been versioned and will be removed from your quest log, so you will need to accept them again at Bail Avarc.
- Fixed a bug in quest “Into Sant Lhoer, the Poison Gardens” where only one member of a Fellowship was able to advance the quest at certain locations.
- The quest “Into Sant Lhoer, The Poison Gardens” has been updated so that if a player misses talking with Dolag outside of the greenhouse and kills the boss first the quest can still be completed.
- Cleansing devices are now usables earlier into Rádarríg’s fight in “Sargroth, Lair of Vermin”.
- Sargroth, Lair of Vermin: Players may return to the quest hub in Carn Dûm by leaving through the instance’s entrance
- Adjusted physics in portions of Sagroth.
- Fixed Z-fighting in Under the Drearspire.
- Removed portal FX from Bail Avarc.
- Grounded floating deco in Bail Avarc.
- Repeatable quests for Into Sant Lhoer, Thaurisgar, and Sagroth now properly require Level 140 to be accepted.
- The Heavy and Superior Heavy Iron Mace of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin, with might as a granted stat, should no longer drop from the instance chests for Burglars and Hunters.
- The Balanced and Superior Balanced War Hammer of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin, with agility as a granted stat, should no longer drop from the instance chests for Champions.
- Both the “Carn Dûm Drum of Deep Doom” and “Carn Dûm Drum of Aged Secrets”, including all rarity levels, have had their Ballad and Coda damage increased to 30%.
- All Class items from the Return to Carn Dûm instance cluster are now Bind to Account
- All Class items from the Return to Carn Dûm instance cluster now have max levels of 144
- “Finely-strung Lute of the Veteran Minstrel” now has a max level of 115
- Carn Dûm Travel Skills have been moved to their own Return to Carn Dûm barter profile without any prerequisites.
- Return to Carn Dûm – Balance updates have been made to Sant Lhoer, Thaurisgar, and Sagroth.
- Monster Play
- There were a handful of quests that were blocked behind completing the old version of the monster player tutorial. These are now available to monster players who have played the new or old versions of the monster play tutorials.
- Fixed an issue where the skill to Return to Glán Vraig will now correctly execute and advance the tutorial quest.
- Updated the responses in the Ettenmoors to extend the bonus granted by controlling the mine to all territories in the Ettenmoors.
- Missions and Delvings
- Completing tier 11 or tier 12 Delving quests in Cardolan missions will now advance some tier 11 and tier 12 specific deeds.
- General Notes
- The Delver’s Vivid Essence Box will correctly display as Item Level 481
Known Issue
- In German, some translations for the in-game Carry-all text may still read as “Tasche” instead of “Beutel”.
Update 35.1 Release Notes
Here are the release notes for Update 35.1, released on Wednesday, April 19th, 2023.
Happy 16th Anniversary!
Happy 16 years of The Lord of the Rings Online! The Anniversary Event returns at 10:00 AM Eastern (-4 GMT) on Thursday, April 20th, and the event continues until 3:00 AM Eastern (-4 GMT) on Thursday, May 15th! Read more about the Anniversary Event in our guide on LOTRO.com. This year’s event features new rewards, including new rewards with both the Anniversary Barter and Festivity Anniversary Barter! Cosmetic outfits of Illumination, Forged Staves, new Goats, housing items, and more!
Log into the game starting at 10:00 AM Eastern on Thursday, April 20th to pick up your 16th Anniversary Gift!
Free People of Middle-earth receive inside of their 16-Year Giftbox:
- Incandescent Lightning Fireworks
- Sixteen Year Portrait Frame
- Title: Illuminator
Monster Players receive inside of their 16-Year Giftbox:
- Violet Explosion Fireworks
- Sixteen Year Portrait Frame
- +5% Attack Damage x5 Potions
- Title: Extinguisher
Any player who received the 15-Year Giftbox last year will receive a 16-Year Giftbox on every character they log into in addition to their associated title. The gift will be granted permanently to your account as long as you log into at least one character starting at 10:00 AM Eastern (-4 GMT) on Thursday, April 20th until 3:00 AM Eastern (-4 GMT) on April 1st, 2024.
Gwathrenost, the Witch-king’s Citadel – Coming Soon!
Gwathrenost, the Witch-king’s Citadel is a new Raid for Level 140 Players set in a re-imagined Carn Dûm! This raid will be available on Tiers 1 and 2 in the near future.
“Once the seat of the Witch-king of Angmar, the dread citadel of Gwathrenost casts a long shadow upon the city of Carn Dûm. All but abandoned after the Steward of Angmar was deposed, the remnants of the Iron Crown have crept forth from the shadows, seeking to master a lost artifact of the Witch-king and reclaim dominion over the realm.”
Players who wish to aid in the fight against the Iron Crown should travel to Bail Avarc in Angmar. Bail Avarc can be reached via the stable-masters at Esteldín, Gath Forthnír, and Rivendell. Bail Avarc can initially only be accessed via stable-master routes. Travel skills are also available for barter from the Stewards of the Iron-home.
ALSO: Return to Carn Dûm instances (Into Sant Lhoer, Thaurisgar, and Sagroth) are now available up to Tier 5!
LOTRO is celebrating the uniqueness of every player!
Our latest update celebrates individuality with additional character customization options for the Race of Men (humans) that let players express themselves in new ways. We want to make as many players feel represented in the game as possible, and we are introducing new character creation options for your face, hair, and body! We know there is more work to do to offer a wider variety of character creation options, and we will be following up this release with additional options in the future.
Here are some things to know:
- Your existing characters remain mostly unchanged, although we have updated some textures to improve their look.
- There are now more shared options between genders, including hair and beard styles where applicable.
- The body proportion range has been increased.
- These new options are also available at the Barber for access to existing characters.
News and Notes:
Classes
- Beorning
- Mark of Grimbeorn no longer requires facing your target and now has a cooldown of 3 seconds.
- Mark of Beorn cooldown reduced to 3 seconds.
- Brawler
- Brawlers now can barter for jewellery at the Dol Amroth Big Battle vendors, in addition to the Minas Tirith vendors.
- Fixed an issue where some Brawler jewellery was restricted to the Beorning class, instead of Brawlers.
- Captain
- Healing from the Standard of Honour is now correctly improved by the ‘Relentless Optimism’ trait.
- Courageous Convocation no longer prevents Words of Courage from turning into Courageous Heart while Stand Alone is active.
- Stacks of At the Fore no longer suggest that they affect your Outgoing Healing.
- Blade-brother and Stand Alone now state that they will prevent the other from being used while active.
- Captains should now have only one version of Valiant Strike.
- Minstrel
- Chord of Salvation is once again an Immediate skill.
- Toggled Melody/Echoes of Battle skill cooldowns reduced to 2s.
- The Call to Greatness tooltip once again refers to the correct Captain skills.
- Improved Story of Courage no longer requires facing your target.
- Warden
- The Gambit healing bonus from specializing in Determination now correctly affects healing from Conviction.
- The ‘Fist Gambit Damage & Critical Chance’ tracery now correctly improves the DoT from Resounding Challenge.
- The trait ‘No Respite for the Wicked’ no longer refers to the Offensive Strike Gambit line.
- The max range and AoE size of Deflection was reversed for its melee and ranged variants. The melee version is now correctly centered on yourself, while the ranged version has a smaller AoE centered on your target.
- The description of the trait ‘On the Offence’ has been corrected, and no longer suggests that Offensive Strike has a morale-tap.
- Desperate Combat now activates Desperate Spear/Shield/Fist for 90 seconds, rather than 30, so you can spend charges until all of them are consumed or the skill’s cooldown has expired.
- The blue-line trait ‘Never Surrender’ now displays the correct cooldown reduction.
- Damage increased slightly for direct-damage gambits (The Boot – Wall of Steel & Offensive Strike – Boar’s Rush).
- Several class traceries were giving the incorrect secondary stat on legendary quality versions. These now give the appropriate secondary stats, matching their lower-quality counterparts.
Items
- The “Carn Dûm Standard of Victory” and “Carn Dûm Standard of Hope” have had their names swapped on all rarities to reflect the roles each Standard’s stats are better associated with.
- Fixed a typo in the Jewellery that appears in the three person instances of Carn Dûm.
- Adventurer’s and Traveller’s Steel-bound lootboxes contain new “Alchemist’s” cosmetic items including avatar cosmetics, housing items, a steed and matching war-steed appearances. These items are also available on Myrtle Mint for Figments of Splendour.
- Adventurer’s and Traveller’s Steel-bound lootboxes also now contain a Rust Corgi cosmetic pet.
- Adventurer’s Steel-bound lootboxes now have a chance to drop Delving Adventurer’s Vivid Essence Boxes.
- Newly acquired Adventurer’s lootbox gear, for level 140 characters, will now scale to item level 478 – 480.
- Some older avatar cosmetics and steeds have been moved off of Myrtle Mint and onto the Curator.
- The following shields have their armour value updated to correctly reflect Incomparable rarity:
- Superior Broad Targe of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin
- Superior Stout Targe of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin
- Superior Reinforced Aegis of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin
- Superior Bright Aegis of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin
- Superior Reinforced Targe of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin
- Superior Restorative Shield of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin
- Superior Resilient Shield of Sagroth, Lair of Vermin
- Newly acquired Wayfarer Shields from Traveller’s lootboxes will now have the appropriate amount of stat bonuses, which increases the stats at levels 10-40.
- Beorning, Champion and Guardian drops in the second boss of Sagroth have been corrected.
- Legendary bows for Beorning, Champion and Guardian added to treasure pools at Sagroth in T4 and higher.
- Warden shields will now drop for Wardens in Sagroth at all tiers.
- Adventurer’s and Traveller’s Steel-bound lootboxes contain new “Alchemist’s” cosmetic items including avatar cosmetics, housing items, a steed and matching war-steed appearances. These items are also available on Myrtle Mint for Figments of Splendour.
- Adventurer’s and Traveller’s Steel-bound lootboxes also now contain a Rust Corgi cosmetic pet.
- Adventurer’s Steel-bound lootboxes now have a chance to drop Delving Adventurer’s Vivid Essence Boxes.
- Newly acquired Adventurer’s lootbox gear, for level 140 characters, will now scale to item level 478 – 480.
- Some older avatar cosmetics and steeds have been moved off of Myrtle Mint and onto the Curator.
Delvings:
- Completing Tier 11 or tier 12 Delving quests in Cardolan missions will now advance some Tier 11 and Tier 12 specific Deeds.
- The tooltip for the Delving Malice “Lingering Fear” has been corrected to reflect that it affects both Outgoing and Incoming Healing.
- The delving malices Sauron’s Touch I and II have had their offensive and defensive monster buffs reduced.
Monster Play:
- A grammatical issue in the new free people tutorial in the Ettenmoors has been fixed.
- Defeating Tyrant Burzgoth now properly advances the Weekly objective in the Ettenmoors weekly quest.
- The second tier of the weekly Free People Ettenmoors quest now requires 21 Ettenmoors general quests to complete – this is technically the same number as before, as the previous version of the weekly counts toward the completion of the second weekly quest.
- Audacity now correctly multiplies damage by 0.55, reducing incoming damage by 45%, rather than by 55%.
Pets:
- Bear and Herald Taunts no longer apply threat catch-up.
- We’ve been having some issues with pets breaking instance encounters if they are able to hold aggro on bosses, so until we have a more comprehensive fix ready we are reducing them to force-taunt only.
Quests & Instances:
- Return to Carn Dûm
- Repeatable quests for Sant Lhoer, Thaurisgar, and Sagroth now properly require Level 140 to be accepted.
- Players can return to the Quest Hub in Carn Dûm by leaving through the instance’s entrance.
- Sant Lhoer, the Poisoned Gardens
- Venom-twisted Reavers in the Oganuin encounter are no longer eligible to become Scions.
- The quest has been adjusted so it shows up in the “Angmar Reborn” category in the Quest Log.
- Repeatable quests have had their quest items adjusted so they don’t show up as highlighted on the landscape map.
- Fixed a bug where the boss and other monsters sometimes spawned in at level 1.
- Thaurisgar, the Vile Apothecary
- The final boss on Tier 4 now drops the correct chest.
- Bile Tanks are no longer eligible to become Scions.
- Sagroth, Lair of Vermin
- Class items received in the six-player version of this instance have had their stats reworked to better fit class themes and roles.
- Goblins in The Further Adventures of Bilbo Baggins have become less experienced.
- Throne of the Dread Terror class items now have a maximum level of 115.
UI:
- The “Show Avatar Update” check box for the Race of Men has been disabled.
General:
- Shadows on water now only affects the water debris layer (algae, seafoam, etc) and not the water itself.
- Ocean water in Belfalas and Pelargir now correctly retains is green color in the dawnless day.
- We’ve backed out the monster mitigation changes, as they were exacerbating the differences between DPS classes’ armor penetration too much at higher levels.
- The heath adjustment is changing from [+25% -> +15%] so it’s less impactful on high end instance difficulty as well.
- Crafting recipes for Gundabad traceries will now use the proper Crit Item for the recipe’s profession.
Known Issues:
- Some animations are not displaying correctly for human Rune-keepers.
- Minstrel instruments for human characters are not appearing consistently with skill use.
- Some Minstrel animations are not displaying correctly.
- Some /emotes are not animating correctly.
- The hobby-horse animation is not functioning correctly for male humans.
- Burglar and Brawler crowd control removal skills are currently only working on roots, and will not remove Daze, Stun or Knockdown effects.
- The facepaints from Hobnanigans do not currently work on race of Man.
Update 35.1.1 Release Notes
Here are the release notes for Update 35.1.1, released on Wednesday, April 26th, 2023.
News and Notes:
Avatars
- Slider settings are now preserved when using the barbershop.
- Corrected a human male dance to match other avatars.
- Human male scars have been re-added to the Details and Details 2 lists.
- Numerous clothing bugs have been corrected for human males and females.
- War-steed animations for Humans and Beornings have been corrected. Travel mount animations for human males and male Beorning will be corrected in the next game update.
- Beards and stubble on female human characters are now default to “locked” to Option 1 so they are not included in randomized appearances by default.
- Players can unlock this setting if they wish to have it included in randomized results.
- Color pickers now support clicking and dragging.
- Several visual issues with Brawler Gauntlets and Hands have been corrected.
- An issue with lower body baggy outfit meshes has been corrected.
- Corrected an issue with human male Helmingas, Eorlingas, and Westfold Hooded and Non-Hooded cloak appearances.
- Corrected an issue with Beorning female hair styles fourteen through sixteen that resulted in a bald appearance.
Classes
- Numerous Brawler animation issues have been corrected for male and female humans.
- Slip Free is once again usable while Stunned, Dazed, or Knocked Down.
- Find Footing is once again usable while Stunned, Dazed, or Knocked Down.
- Corrected an animation issue with male human Lore-masters when using Power of Knowledge.
- An animation has been added for “Defiant Challenge” for female humans.
Items
- New “Mighty Ram Fireworks” are now available on Anniversary barters in both consumable and permanent versions.
- Legendary tier bows now drop all versions of Beorning, Champion, and Guardian classes in Sagroth and Gwathrenost.
- Drop chances for class items are now consistent across all classes in Sagroth and Gwathrenost.
- The “Fireworks Wall Rack” has been renamed to the “Fireworks Rack” and now works on wall hooks.
- The “Fireworks Throne” is now usable.
- Colors and textures now fender correctly on female elves and high elves with the Firework Launcher’s face guard.
Quests and Adventure Areas
- The missions “Stirring of Spirits” and “The Ruins of Gaervarad” now work correctly on Delving variant six.
- The final Orkish Gate on the mission “The Bridge to Caranost” no longer stacks the Delving Malice “Sauron’s Touch” when played on Delving variant four.
- The mission “Caranost Courtyard” now has proper malice strength at high tiers.
- The mission “Caranost Courtyard” now properly activates for both players in duo mode.
- Completing the quest “A Cave in the Hills” will once again correctly unlock access to Raid: Draigoch’s Lair
Update 35.1.2 Release Notes
Here are the release notes for Update 35.1.2, released on Wednesday, May 3rd, 2023.
Of Special Note:
Gwathrenost, the Witch-king’s Citadel has arrived!
“Once the seat of the Witch-king of Angmar, the dread citadel of Gwathrenost casts a long shadow upon the city of Carn Dûm. All but abandoned after the Steward of Angmar was deposed, the remnants of the Iron Crown have crept forth from the shadows, seeking to master a lost artifact of the Witch-king and reclaim dominion over the realm.”
Players who wish to aid in the fight against the Iron Crown should travel to Bail Avarc in Angmar. Bail Avarc can be reached via the stable-masters at Esteldín, Gath Forthnír, and Rivendell. Bail Avarc can initially only be accessed via stable-master routes. Travel skills are also available for barter from the Stewards of the Iron-home.
Gwathrenost, the Witch-king’s Citadel is a new 12-person Raid for Level 140 Players set in a re-imagined Carn Dûm! This Raid will be available on Tiers 1 and 2 at 12:00 PM Eastern, Wednesday May 3rd.
- Tier 3 unlocks on May 10th, 2023 starting at 12:00 PM Eastern (-4 GMT)
- Tier 4 unlocks on May 24th at 12:00 PM Eastern (-4 GMT)
- Tier 5 opens at 12:00 PM Eastern (-4 GMT) on June 7th
- The “Leading the Charge” deed for the raid is available to earn until 3:00 AM Eastern (-4 GMT) on September 7th, 2023.
News and Notes:
Avatar Update
- Several clipping and texture issues on clothing has been corrected.
- Many animation issues have been corrected, including the Beorning Bulging Eyes and the Travel Mount animation for Male Beorning and Race of Man
- The Character Appearance Menu in Character Generation and the Barbershop will now show group controls in categories.
- Barbershop now has lighting consistent with the character creation screen and is no longer tinted yellow.
- Male Race of Man character is now centered in the barbershop screen.
- The Emote ‘dance_man3’ will now display properly on Female Race of Man and Female Beorning.
General Notes
- Reward Track Season 6 debuts on May 17th at 10am server time.
- Incandescent Lightning Fireworks and Violet Explosion Fireworks now have corresponding firework sounds when used
- Eastfold and Kinstead premium housing now have additional neighborhoods available.
- The Kingstead housing committee discovered two neighborhoods with the same name. One of the Bitterwade neighborhoods has been renamed to Birkenbold.
- Missing structures in Mission: The High Dig are no longer missing!
- Text has been corrected for some source information in the Mount Collection panel.
Instance Rewards
- Sant Lhoer and Thaurisgar Earring stats adjusted slightly.
- Light shields no longer drop for Guardians in Sagroth.
- All three light shields can now drop for Captains and Minstrels in Sagroth.
- Rádarríg’s Spear Carving’s bonus now correctly applies to all Warden damage over time effects, rather than just physical bleeds.
Update 35.1.3 Release Notes
Here are the release notes for Update 35.1.3, released on Wednesday, May 10th, 2023.
News and Notes:
Quests and Adventure Areas
- Return to Carn Dum:
- The Mighty Restorer (Might-based healing) jewelry set proc now correctly gives +10% Outgoing Healing, matching the Will-based set.
- The Willful Mender (Will-based healing) jewelry 3-piece set bonus now gives Will rather than Tactical Mastery, so it should have a greater direct benefit for healers.
- The Willful Curer (Will-based support) jewelry set proc effect now increases your target’s inductions by 25% (up from 5%).
- The Agile Rapscallion (Agility-based support) jewelry set proc effect now increases your target’s attack speed debuff by 20% (up from 5%).
- Return to Carn Dum ring and earring icons updated to reflect their primary stat distributions. This has no impact on their stats.
- Rádarríg’s Immaculate Stickpin of Ancient Wisdom now gives additional Fate, as its rare and incomparable variants do.
- Gwathrenost, the Witch-King’s Citadel:
- Gwathrenost, the Witch-king’s Citadel (Weekly) can now be shared.
- The Fight for Carn Dûm (Daily) now tracks completion of Gwathrenost, allowing it to count for the related Weekly Quest. This quest has been versioned, so your progress will reset when this update is launched.
- Impaling Shard’s duration has been reduced to 15 seconds from 60 seconds.
- Corrupting Influence now Slows at an increasing rate as its potency increases.
- Castellan Obáshurz should no longer become unattackable during his encounter.
- The Storming of Gwathrenost has been corrected to not allow for overwriting raids in progress and to fix several unintended behaviors. In addition, the Path-finders now spawn naturally as you complete the encounters in Gwathrenost and are not reliant on this Quest to appear.
- Class Essences received from Castellan Obáshurz’s chest is now found in a crate, which will have Essences appropriate for whichever class opens it, rather than the class which received it from the boss chest.
Known Issues:
- Raid Progress Quest: The Storming of Gwathrenost – The Hill-man Pathfinder for Obashurz does not Spawn
- Raid Progress Quest: The Storming of Gwathrenost – This quest can be erroneously completed via the Quest Actions Available UI. This quest is intended to complete as part of the Raid resets.
- Some translations are pending and may not display correctly.
