Lord of the Rings developer diary explores Dol Guldur
by Rubi Bayer 
Nov 12th 2009 at 8:00PM
Filed under: Fantasy, Lord of the Rings Online, Expansions
Tsieng Liu from the LotRO Dungeons Team describes Dol Guldur as "the fortress where Sauron dwelt when he was known as "The Necromancer." It's an old fortress that is now full of the foul servants of the Enemy on the edge of Mirkwood forest. It is in this region that the elves of Lothlórien are mounting an offensive in order to keep the Enemy from penetrating their forests."
Dol Guldur will contain three 3-person dungeons and a 6-person dungeon, leading up to a 12-person raid in which you storm the tower of Dol Guldur and take on the "leadership behind its forces." This area will also feature some fun new mechanics and challenges that should turn your tried-and-true group methods of playing neatly on their ear.
Dungeon overviews, as well as a look at the new surprises Dol Guldur has in store, can all be found in the diary entry. It's well worth the read.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
pogger said on 8:16PM 11-12-2009
LotRO is (to put mildly) a beautiful game. You can find the box on the bargain shelves and play for $10/month (3-month subscription). They got so much crap from the critics when they first released... I'm so glad they stuck around.
Whoever is designing the Wheel of Time MMO should take note.
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Jay said on 9:39PM 11-12-2009
LorRO is (to put mildly) a boring game. The game is easily found on the bargain shelves and cheap for subscription; it is also rather clunky combat wise and once you hit the level cap there isn't much to do. They got so much crap from the critics when they forst released.... and with good reason.
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Mr Angry said on 1:01AM 11-13-2009
I agree with Jay on this one, I need to be impressed as LOTRO has got stale.
aion.naamah said on 12:14AM 11-13-2009
I agree with Pogger. LotRO is a great game PvE-wise.
I must admit, however, that I have never heard of this LorRO game that Jay is talking about. Good thing, I guess, since it sounds pretty poor.
Good thing we have LotRO, which is a great game.
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Jay said on 1:08AM 11-13-2009
Spelling nazi's must die.
pogger said on 1:22AM 11-13-2009
I agree with aion.naamah on this one, I need to be impressed as LorRO sounds stale.
Jay said on 1:44AM 11-13-2009
Ah, and to think that LotRO players and fanboys actually pick on WoW players for their rudeness and unhelpfullness.
LF1M Turtle, must have 3/6, non-sit aware means no loot.
/nod.
Go on fanboys, make fun of spelling as you know that you have no other facts to back up that once you have one toon to level cap the repeat of Lonelands, Dol Dinen, Everswim and so on is incredibly dull. Where in other games you would want to just have one toon to specialise in LotRO is so mind-numbingly boring at cap... grinding for a LI and Coins... doing your rep grind, doing your virtues again (mmmm 260 crawlers in the Trollshaws is real fun! >.>)
Then try it with your third, fourth, sixth toon, just to get out of Moria and grind.
pogger said on 2:46AM 11-13-2009
The point of my initial post was that it's a beautiful looking game and you can start playing for just about nothing and the monthly cost is less than Aion, WoW, or most other games -- if you go the multi-month route.
So maybe it's not fun after you cap out... so what? Which game has perfected end-game? Level another character/race or move on to another game. If you enjoyed the books or the movies, you'll have fun interacting with them in the game. Doesn't mean this is the only game you'll be allowed to play ever again.
I don't know much about this cap business -- I'm only level 16. All I know is it's a beautiful game, I'm having fun, and it's costing me less than a movie ticket per month.
Jack said on 1:45AM 11-13-2009
I agree that LOTRO is one of the worst mmos out there and put lotr to shame!
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Jack said on 1:46AM 11-13-2009
I did play Dragon Age and It had many epic lotr kind of moment and I hear my self say I wish LOTRO was like this...
Bernie B said on 2:00AM 11-13-2009
LotRO lost much of its charm when they changed it from being a fellowship centric game to a solo player game where the level cap can be reached in 2-3 weeks by casual players. That and the legendary weapon system which is a Korean grinders wet dream.
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Tom said on 9:05AM 11-13-2009
I had a lot of good times in LotRO but just kind of ran out of interest once I hit Moria. The Mirkwood addition sounds fine, but I feel LotRO/Turbine is not really addressing some of the major problems with the game (for one thing, they should give all classes [not just hunters] the ability to teleport around to major cities).
My biggest frustration? The inability to complete group quests and group epic quests at levels 10 to 50 because most players are now clumped in Moria and beyond.
In contrast to Bernie B, I felt the game became increasingly solo unfriendly as my character progressed, particularly in those "tween" levels of 30 to 50.
Moria---dark, dreary, and monotonous---got old really fast for me, so I never made it past the first couple of regions before I canceled my subscription. The legendary weapons system (and here I do agree with Bernie B) is also very grindy and dull.
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kirklazzarus said on 6:24PM 11-13-2009
Lotro was great up till moria. SoA had an epic feeling that you would expect from LOTR based game. Moria you could literally solo every inch of the game, a huge change from their original game. The only group content provided is a few 6 man instances that are terrible compared to the old CD/uru/Bg instances they created earlier. Then 2 boss in a box raid rooms that take longer to form a group than do the fight and also DN which very mediocre compared to the rift and nothing to compare to helegrod.
They should have never increased the max level for moria since there was not near enough end game content for players who didn't want to play a solo game. They should have updated old instance loot and you would still have played running the old instances because they were fun. Also it would have players still in older parts of the game instead of the completely empty zones they have now.
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heynow said on 2:22PM 11-15-2009
I just started playing LOTRO and I'm having a blast! I'm more of a PvE type player, so the game works well for me. I really enjoy the rich environments, and the quest system seems to work really well. I'm only level 13, and I haven't done any group instances, or raids, so the jury's still out. But, coming from 4 years of WoW(which I still enjoy playing-just raiding w/ friends at this point) LOTRO is a refreshing change of pace.
I'm considering giving Aion a try, too. Any thoughts?
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gildhur said on 1:16PM 11-16-2009
So some people here are complaining that you CAN solo your way to 60, and some people are complaining that you CAN'T solo your way to 60.... lol.
Either way, there are more solo options being added in SoM and beyond. Lone-lands is being revamped to be more solo friendly, and Book 2 is starting a new trend to add a soloable version of the Epic book quests. Again, they're OPTIONS. If you want to group level your way to 60, you can certainly do that too. There is plenty of group content out there. (GB, Agamaur, GA, Fornost, Dol Dinen, Angmar, etc etc etc)
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