LOTRO: Marching into Mirkwood

I’ve been bitten a bit with wanderlust in LOTRO lately, experimenting with a few new alts (nothing serious, just curious how the classes felt) and wrapping up my month-long stay in the Haunted Burrow.  End result of the fall festival?  Like most everyone else, I assume, I’ve gotten every housing decoration, a billion tokens and failed to get the skeleton horse for any of my mains.  I did snag it for the character I play with my wife, so that’s something.

Fortunately, I gave myself permission to get over this obsessive need to finish Volume II book 8 before heading into Mirkwood, and just started trekking into the dark forest anyway.  I have to say, it feels great to finally see the second LOTRO expansion, and after the smothering confines of Moria and the oppressive cheerfulness of Lothlorien, Mirkwood feels terrific.  For a gloomy forest, it’s pretty fun to explore so far — I’m up to the Haunted Inn quests — and I don’t find the atmosphere as emotionally dampening as Angmar.  In fact, this is the perfect zone for the fall season, methinks.

And now that I’m questing hard once more, my character’s starting to shoot up in levels, going from 61 to 63 in a week.  I have three legendaries I’m working on, a Captain’s emblem that’s in the mid-40s, a second age one-handed sword (Cherry) that’s in the 50′s, and a second-age great sword (Cord) that’s in the 20s.  My goal for Mirkwood is to really dive deep into the content and experience as much as I can solo while working on the main reputation grind in the area for the horse.  I’m pretty psyched that in the next update, rep horses will become these beefy tanks with huge health pools and the ability for you to evade and parry attacks — meaning that you’ll get knocked off rep horses less than normal ones.

I’m of mixed feelings when it comes to almost having a max level character in the game.  On one hand, I love being able to run dungeons with my kin and see any of the zones I want, but on the other, I’m hitting that wall where character development slows to a mere trickle if not stops altogether.  I’m not a gear progression type of player, which leaves just a few virtues to work on, a few reputation grinds, and questing at 65 for item XP to level up legendaries.  By now, my build and battle rotation are all but set in stone, and that’s a little sad.  But I shan’t cry, dear reader, for Turbine’s working on the next expansion and level cap increase, and with it I’m hoping more room to grow.

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• Posted in: Lord of the Rings Online