We've been enjoying the gorgeous screenshots and trailers from Turbine in the weeks leading up to the release of Lord of the Rings Online: Siege of Mirkwood, and the latest LotRO developer diary gives a behind the scenes look at creating the regions in Mirkwood.

Jesse "Vastin" Kings writes about the fun the team had getting to play with new areas, monsters, and quests, and the challenge of balancing those plans with the available resources. Working with the original Lord of the Rings story line posed another challenge sometimes when it came to filling in the game and still remaining true to Tolkien.

Of course, not everything was on the showy, fun, creative side: "...it might interest you to know that the single largest share of all the time I've spent working on Mirkwood was in trying to figure out and implement ways to keep our servers from being reduced to piles of smoking slag within hours of Siege of Mirkwood going live and all of you hurling yourselves at it at once."

The full entry can be read here.

The Ashenslades name fits what the screenshots show -- take a look at the forest in flames in one picture, and what appear to be burned and blackened trees in the background of another one.

This is the fourth region that Turbine has shown us in our tour of Mirkwood, giving us glimpses of Dol Guldur, Gathburz, and the Scuttledells regions in previous weeks. Monday's release of a trailer gave us a bit more of a look into Dol Guldur as well. We have just over three weeks until the release of Siege of Mirkwood, and hopefully Turbine will continue their previews to make the wait go by a little faster.

"Let's be honest, people play new content for the rewards." Perhaps not the most uplifting or metaphorical way to start off a developer diary, but if nothing else you need to give Lord of the Rings Online credit for being so direct about it. But with the most recent developer diary regarding the Skirmish system coming in the Siege of Mirkwood expansion, they really deserve still more credit than that. One of the larger new features of the upcoming expansion, the Skirmish system has had a number of diaries devoted to it, but this one is focused on exactly what the opening would suggest: the meaty rewards from taking part.

Some of the specifics might seem a bit arcane to people unfamiliar with Lord of the Rings Online, but the short version is that the various bosses and so forth will be devoid of any loot except for what's referred to as skirmish marks. Accumulating them as well as special tokens depending on group size and skirmish difficulty will allow purchases from a wide variety of powerful items. However, the system is balanced so that even consistently solo players can still work toward the highest tier of rewards, although the road will be quite a bit longer. There's only so much we can get across in a quick overview -- it's better to take a look at the actual diary and get ready for one of the more dynamic systems coming with Siege of Mirkwood.

While we didn't get in a bunch of Halloween shots, we did get a handful in, which I'll be sharing with you as we move into another great weekend full of gaming fun. Today's not-so-spooky image comes to us from the Lord of the Rings Online Landroval server, which seems to be a great place to be if you're into getting lots of RP out of your MMORPG! Harper Hendee sent back this annotated postcard from their events and explains it for us.

Turbine is stepping it up with their newest Lord of the Rings Online: Siege of Mirkwood trailer, Lieutenant of Dol Guldur. The voice acting, editing, music, creatures and setting are all enthralling to a degree that goes beyond our standard expectations. We've no doubt this one will get people's blood pumping, and in a good way. Seriously, this is the kind of stuff you expect when a company adopts an important IP -- especially where the voice acting is concerned.

We can't wait to see what the future holds for Turbine trailers, especially considering the locales of Middle-earth the game has yet to expand into its world. Rohan? Helm's Deep? Minas Tirith? Osgiliath? Thinking of trailers for all these places makes us tingle with anticipation.

Check out the trailer after the cut.

With the Siege of Mirkwood expansion less than a month away from launch, Turbine is keeping an eye on it's current Lord of the Rings Online players with their special pricing deals. Each deal includes the phrase "and get Mirkwood for free!" and they've included something for every pricing plan. Turbine first made these offers way back when they announced the release date for Siege of Mirkwood, and they must be going over pretty well, because they've extended the offer through November 18th.

Current subscribers have three offers to pick from. If you're a monthly subscriber and upgrade to multi-month by November 18th, you'll get the expansion free of charge. The deal applies for 3, 6, or 12 month sub plans. Players who are already on a multi-month plan seem to have the easiest deal, because Mirkwood is free to them for simply maintaining their subscription. Those on a lifetime subscription will receive Siege of Mirkwood free when they pre-order the Adventurer's Pack.

Siege of Mirkwood is scheduled for release on December 1st.

For the day before Halloween we thought we'd bring you something pretty scary. But then we thought to ourselves that it's Friday, and that's pretty awesome. So we opted for a compromise showing both scary and awesome at the same time! Today's great Lord of the Rings Online One Shots comes to us from Leitchy, who captured this mix of beauty and danger just ahead. Leitchy writes in: I know you've had lots of pics from Lord of the Rings Online, but I think this one is the best of all. Looking from a point beyond Far Chetwood, we can see the ruins of Amon Sul in the distance. A couple of half-orcs in the middle distance are the only blot on the landscape.

With so many different Halloween events going on this weekend, we know there are going to be some great screenshot moments. So grab some of those and send them in to us here at oneshots AT massively DOT com along with your name, the name of the game, and a quick description. If we get enough, maybe we'll do a special spooky version of One Shots to show off all the holiday adventures!

With the release of the Lord of the Rings Online expansion Siege of Mirkwood barely over a month away, Turbine continues to keep interest and anticipation high by releasing screenshots, trailers, and even treating us to a developer tour.

The latest batch of screenshots, released by Turbine today, takes us onward into the forests of Mirkwood, into the Scuttledells region. The Scuttledells are a beautiful area and a bit less gloomy than much of what we've seen before, but seem to offer up just as many monsters (giant spider!) and adventures for players to explore.

This is the third region that Turbine has given us a look at while we wait for Siege of Mirkwood. Their tour of Mirkwood has included the fortress/dungeon Dol Guldur and the Gathburz region, as well as a trailer offering some backstory and a challenge from Galadriel to answer the call of war. Given what we've seen so far, we're anxious for December to arrive so we can take her up on her offer.

If you've been faithfully following along with the Lord of the Rings Online: Siege of Mirkwood beta, you may be excited by what you've heard -- or even seen yourself -- so far. The new expansion, which is set to launch on December 1st of this year (December 3rd for EU), centers around the forest of Mirkwood, just to the east of Lothlorien. It introduces us to a large new map of Mirkwood, the skirmish system, five new instances and much more.

On top of this officially-released news of these features, we were able to get together with Turbine's Aaron "Rowan" Campbell for a sample tour of the new content. Follow along after the jump for what we saw.

Lord of the Rings Online fans are looking forward to the December 1st release of the Siege of Mirkwood expansion, and Turbine is keeping our interest high with regular doses of video, pre-order information, screenshots, and beta news. Now we've got some beautiful new screenshots to add to the mix.

Back at the beginning of October we got a look at screenshots of Dol Guldur, a gorgeous (in a fairly scary way) vertical dungeon that you'll be encountering in Siege of Mirkwood. The new screenshots are just as impressive - taking us farther into Mirkwood, past Dol Guldur. If you make it out of the dungeon, push onward and you'll come to the new Gathburz region deep in the forest, an area that looks just as forbidding. Follow along after the jump for the newest serving of eye candy from Turbine.

Siege of Mirkwood is set to release December 1st in North America.

It's one thing to accept that in the average fantasy MMO, you're going to be killing a truly astonishing number of creatures. That's not the most commendable concept ever, but it at least falls under the header of expected. But every so often, you find yourself stopping to think about the real-world ramifications of what you're doing. The Angry Bear took a closer look at the activities that Lord of the Rings Online is currently moving through in the Mines of Moria, and come to some rather interesting conclusions about the game's stance of invading the homes of other sentient creatures, killing them, and claiming everything they'd owned for several thousand years as rightfully yours.

Of course, Lord of the Rings Online is hardly the first time you've been tasked with invading someone's home for little reason other than it being convenient, but the argument outlined here is rather compelling and interesting. It also comes to an interesting conclusion after all the moral sides of the argument are fully explored, one that puts you largely back in the same place you started -- but it's still an interesting argument to consider. Take a look at the full piece, and perhaps tread a bit more lightly the next time you venture into Khazad-dum.

Tis the season for spooks and spectres, and we can tell you honestly - Ringwraiths are some scary, scary things! That said, today's Lord of the Rings Online is all treat and no trick! This great image was sent in to us from Tiki on the Brandywine server, who captured this image after a long night of adventure. Tiki writes in: I was in the Barrow-Downs one night, taking a break from Moria, helping lower level players and working on rep items when I stopped at the Dead Man's Perch. I saw this beautiful view of Bree town and just had to take a moment to appreciate the beauty of this game. We thought the name was especially fitting for a great October screenshot.

While you're out having fun this weekend, why not grab a screen from your favorite MMO for us! Just email it to oneshots AT massively DOT com along with your name, the name of the game, and a quick description. Halloween events are especially welcome! Yours could be the next One Shots.

There's nothing quite like spending two hours in a muck-filled dungeon, hacking and slashing your way through countless monsters and creatures best left to the realms of twisted imagination, to receive an ultimate reward: a sword which gives you an extra .25% chance to hit enemies in sunlight. Or an extra .2% damage to any monster you've killed more than four of in a given play session. Or you get an extra 1% health for five seconds every time you correctly spell "exalted." Ravious over on Kill Ten Rats recently posted his thoughts on precisely this phenomenon: the issue that you're looking at a lot of work for, ultimately, almost one percent of a reward.

While the post is specifically talking about Lord of the Rings Online, it can easily apply to many other games, and we can all think of rewards that were similarly important and yet less than overwhelming. Part of the reason behind this, of course, is that MMOs need to have a power curve ramp-up without granting everyone too much damage or health or what-have-you, as Ravious dutifully notes. However, there's a point where too much balance becomes too little meaningful impact -- it can be better, at times, to only have one bonus but make it a big one. It's ultimately up to the player which one they prefer, but most of us certainly do seem to prefer having each upgrade be a big one.

Turbine is encouraging North American Lord of the Rings Online players to give my.lotro a try if they haven't yet, by offering some in-game rewards in the form of a lottery. Players just need to log in to my.lotro to see what drawings they are eligible for, enter, then check back after the drawing to see if they won.

The lottery system is character based, which opens the door for more personalized prizes. While we all love in-game cash and items, things specific to your character are even more fun -- some lottery drawings will give "specific rewards based on a character's class, race, level, etc.," so take that into account when you choose which of your characters to enter with.

Because my.lotro is currently in beta and Turbine is anxious for players to test it out and give feedback, the current lottery system is a daily event through the end of the month, and winners will receive a level-appropriate amount of silver and two bundles of fireworks delivered via in-game mail. Good luck to all who enter!

European Lord of the Rings Online fans are anxious to get their hands on Siege of Mirkwood, especially after Codemasters told them about the great pre-order deals being offered. Players who purchase the expansion will receive the Harbinger's Cloak, and players purchasing the expansion and the Adventurer's Pack add-on will receive the cloak and an extra mount. So they've heard the story of Mirkwood, seen the screenshots, watched the trailer, been offered some extra items with their purchase and are just left with the big question: when?

Sam "Satine" Russell, the Director of Community Relations for Codemasters, answered that question recently when she commented that Siege of Mirkwood "is currently tracking 3rd December for launch", two days after the scheduled December 1st release date for Mirkwood in North America.

It's important to note the phrasing "currently tracking", meaning that this isn't an engraved-in-stone date. However, that date isn't too far off, so we feel pretty good about Satine's statement. We also feel pretty anxious to get our hands on Siege of Mirkwood, so it's great to have some dates to look forward to!