Massively

Update came out too early and with too little communication between the dev teams on what everyone was doing.

Like WoW they over did it on class balancing(hunters nerfed too hard, RK's buffed too much).

Like Everquest, they gated the new raid because its not done yet, requiring weeks of collecting junk.

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im sooo glad that codemasters are holding back on this until its working, :)

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"On the upside"? Really? So skipping levels is a plus? I love MMOs, but I hate the notion that everyone who plays them is just rushing toward the finish line.

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Man, people are such whiny little girls sometimes.

Most of the bugs are minor animation problems. If they had held back Book 7 because of that crap, a lot more people would have been pissed off. Either way, you have been complaining. People seem to think that, because Turbine posted a known bug list, they're the only developers out there who'd release a patch that's not perfect. And when's the last time you've ever seen a content release for an MMO that was absolutely perfect?

And, yeah, skipping levels is a plus. If someone hasn't got a character up into the 50's in the 2+ years the game's been out, I doubt they're that big of a fan of the game's lore. So if levels matter more to you than story, or if you're leveling an alt, you win here. If you want to go slow and read every quest, you can still do that. You lose nothing here.

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Realistically speaking there's some allowance you're going to have to make for bugs in patches. There are some that are much too much, of course, like a recent WoW patch that made headlines. But in general, every big content patch will break *something.*

By all accounts this new Book is going swimmingly. The leveling changes were ultimately required because the game had advanced ten levels. You need to re-adjust the leveling curve after a linear expansion like this, otherwise getting to the level cap becomes too intimidating for new players.

Even if the leveling content is fun, none of us can deny the sense of gamer-fulfillment that comes from dinging for the last time. It shouldn't be a snap to get there, but it shouldn't feel like scaling a cliff either. Adjusting the curve ensures that the process is less arduous.

Personally I too noted a problem in the 30s-40s where there weren't enough quests. If you start thinking to yourself "Well if I kill 500 boars, I'll make up the XP", there's a content gap problem.

There are two ways of fixing that. Fill in the gap with content, or change the XP curve. The latter is easier, and in this case was also necessitated by the relative lengthening of the game through Mines of Moria. That said, Turbine *has* added content in the past to fill in gaps. Forochel was a huge help in the 40s and a great alternative to dreary Angmar. It gave you more choices.

Eregion also gives some leeway from 48-50. So if you're tired of looking at black ash or snowy tundra, you can pop over to a pastoral landscape and get to 50 there with no consequence.

So I'm not about to call Turbine lazy for this- especially when they built up Lothlorien and rejiggered the lower levels with this patch.

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Man, I can't get enough of Skypps comments. Everyone go back and make sure to read them all, they're the most petulant posts on massively.com!

Also, be sure to read his free cloak LOTRO entry LOL

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I'm pretty sure this will be the update that finally convinces my best friend to drop WOW and jump over to LOTRO.
All thanks to the revamped new player experience and the optional (key word right there) Quest Guide, so I must thank Turbine for those.

As for me, I simply cannot wait to visit Lothlórien! :)

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I am loving the Book 7 additions.

Just today I used quest tracker to help my Lore-Master find an elite bear, Driftclaw, that he needed to kill in the (elite) Land of the Giants in Misty Mountains. I charged in, aggroed about 6 bears and 3 giants, and ran about until I found Driftclaw AND a relatively mob-free place to die.

Then.... I used the new autorez feature to get back to business and kill Driftclaw. Such a quest would have been impossible for me to solo a few days ago on that toon.

Thanks, Turbine! :)

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