The following release notes are for the Bullroarer public test server only and may not reflect the final list of changes or updates included at release. Please be aware that everything here is subject to change. These notes are not final.


Known Issue: NPCs in Evendim have decided they are no longer interested in constantly answering questions and offering services and quests to players. Instead of interacting with you they will simply stare at you with a slight look of displeasure on their faces until you go away. (This is fixed in a newer build, we reminded them they are under contract.)


Of Special Note

Shores of the Great River
A new region with 200 quests, free for VIPS, is now available! Read about this new region in the developer diary!

Epic Story
The Epic story continues! Free for all players.

Skirmish Soldiers on Landscape

Skirmish soldiers can be summoned on landscape, restricted to areas outside of high-population zones. Landscape soldier tokens provide one hour of soldier time. This does not apply to your skirmish soldier while it is in a skirmish (skirmish functionality is unchanged). Full details will be included in an upcoming developer diary.

Class Updates
The following classes are receiving important changes for Update 6. Full details will be available through developer diaries.

Free Peoples
Warden
Rune-keeper

Monsterplayers
Warg
Weaver

Changes to Itemization in the Ettenmoors
After sitting down and reviewing the PvMP rewards, we came to a few conclusions. First of all, we have a singular itemization path that is accessible through either PvE or PvMP. In our current offerings, we had to ensure that the PvMP items did not devalue the PvE offerings. Because of this, we have both reduced their potency and increased their gating mechanisms. This leads to PvMP rewards that are either underpowered or too difficult to acquire. Read more in the full Developer Diary.

A New Ettenmoors Currency
We've created a new-universal PvMP currency to replace the role of Destiny in the Ettenmoors. The new currency (Commendations) will be the primary driver of all PvMP rewards and advancement for both Freeps and Creeps. Read the Developer Diary for more details.

Instance Finder
Many changes have been made to the Instance finder. You’ll learn more about them in two upcoming developer diaries including instance finder rewards!


By Player Request & Suggestion

• Virtues have been extended to Rank 14.
• Stat Tomes from Sturdy Steel Lockboxes: fix for old version that would allow you to use the same tier more than once (to no effect). New drops will only have tomes that are unusable if you have already used the same one in the past.
• Stat Tomes and Relic Removal Scrolls: all tiers of stat tomes and the relic removal scroll can now drop from the final bosses in scaled instances.
• All items that are restricted to a character class or a small selection of character classes have been removed from the lockboxes.
• Melding recipes for the store exclusive relics can now be found in game on the Relic Forging Master.
• Marks, Medallions, Seals, and Relic Currency are all now bind to account.
• Worn Symbols of Celebrimbor are now available via Skirmish barter vendors.

Release Notes

General

• Using an item on an object that disappears mid-usage should no longer generate a “General Error 0x00000027”, producing a more user-friendly error instead

Classes

• Unique class titles have been added as rewards for the level 15, 30, 45, and 58 class quests. Characters who have previously completed these quests will be rewarded the titles retroactively.

Burglar

• Burglars: fixed an issue in which item links in loot messages generated by the Burgle skill would show incorrect tooltip information.
• Burglar - Improved Riddle will now be affected by the 3-Trait bonus of Mischief-maker trait set.
• You will no longer fight without a weapon in hand if you are interrupted while mining ore or chopping branches.

Captain

• The Captain skill Tactics: Focus will now scale its effects after level 65.
• The various Song-brother skills will now affect the Herald's healing skills

Champion

• The “Battle Acuity increases Critical Hit rating of Area of Effect skills” set bonus will now increase in duration based off the “Battle Acuity Duration” Legacy.
• The Hedge skill will now properly allow parrying while in Fervour stance.
• Skills - Champion - Raging Blade now properly re-applies the bonus Critical Hit effect from Battle Acuity when the Ruithador / Berserker set is on the character

Guardian

• The Guardian trait Heart of Fire will now improve the unified Critical Defence stat displayed on the character panel not each individual Melee/Ranged/Tactical Critical Defence shown on the tooltip.
• The Guardian traits Deflected Blows and Parried Blows will now return power to the Guardian when the block or parry event is transferred by Protection and Protection by the Sword.
• The Guardian skill Improved Challenge will now function normally against Monster Players.

Lore-master

• Lore-masters now have a choice of two items that can go in their ranged slot: the Brooch of Rage and the Brooch of Regrowth. The Brooch of Rage increases the Lore-master pet’s critical rating while the Brooch of Regrowth increases the pet’s in-combat morale regeneration and evade rating. Both of these items are available via multi-output Jeweler recipes. Aside from the Tier 2 recipe which is available from the Novice Jeweler vendor, these recipes can be found via treasure for Tiers 3 through 7.
• New talismans are available for the Lore master class: Talisman of Nature. These talismans will turn the Lore-master's Spirit of Nature pet into one of the following: Sprit of the Raven, Spirit of the Bear, Spirit of the Lynx and Spirit of the Saber-cat. These talismans are made via a multi-output, single-shot Jeweler recipe. The recipe requires Friend standing with the Men of Dunland and can be found on the Dunlending Quartermaster in Galtrev. There are also a couple of stand-alone talismans that can be found as drops in the new instance.
• Lore-master's Improved Sticky Gourd's burning fire will now last as long as the damaging effects. No more getting burned after the fire goes out.

Rune-keeper
(pending)

Warden

• With the changes to the Warden class, the 'Porbad' and “Fist-way' armour sets have been altered. The sets will now give Wardens Damage-dealing stats, instead of the Tanking stats they previously gave. In addition, their set bonuses have been altered as follows:
  o Porbad 3-set (and Fist-way 5-set) - Changed to give +10% Critical Multiplier to all Javelin skills
  o Porbad 5-set - Changed to give +10% chance to apply bonuses when using Warden's Taunt, Warden's Scorn and Warden's Aim
• Warden heals have been adjusted to scale with elevated monster damage added with ROI.
• The new effect that provides wardens with a boost in their partial defensives has had its duration increased to 20 seconds.

The Ettenmoors

• Minimap icons for Arador's End outpost and Isendeep outpost switched to be correct.
• Angmar's X Quests - Angmar's Chieftans, Scouts, Taskmasters, Soldiers, and Tyrants all now have quest tracker locations
• Monster players can now open their Traits panel with the same hotkey (default: 'J') as Free Peoples.
• Monster players will no longer receive an error stating that they cannot use the Sturdy Steel Lockboxes; instead they will be told that they are missing the required key.

Reaver

• Wrath: no longer require Defeat Event to use
• Devastating Strikes: Power cost significantly reduced
• Against the Odds: Cooldown reduced to 10min
• Against the Odds - Health and Power restore changed to a percentage of max health/power
• Resilience - Now cures and provides a 10s immunity to slows. Cooldown increased to 2min
• Devastating Strike - Now applies a 25% Incoming Healing debuff for 15s
• Thrash- This skill has been significantly overhauled:
• Changed to an area of effect skill with 4 max targets
• Skill and Savage Wound damage has been reduced
• Skill no longer requires Disarm to use
• Cooldown has been increased to 30s
• Power Cost has been significantly increased

Guardian

• Fixed a bug that was causing the Monster Play Insignias to remove and bar the Shield-wall effect. Shield-wall is no longer classified as a “Slow” and now stacks with “Slow” effects.

Defiler

• Blessing of Darkness: Defilers can no longer cast this on themselves.
• Enhanced Skill: Curse of Sticky Feet: Fire Defence debuff changed to Tactical Mitigation debuff. Duration increased from 10s to 15s.

Raids & Instances

Pits of Isengard

• The correct text shows up in the chat log at the beginning of the instances
• Exploit area in Ironarm's Boss room fixed
• Opening VO of the Ironarm fight doesn't play over itself
• Players running Tier 1 will now receive Imbued Sigils of Orthanc off whichever troll boss (Ironarm or Fshbraf) they fight.

Helegrod Dragon:

• Removed an extraneous quest

Tower of Orthanc

• Acid Water in Extermination Pit boss fight will no longer randomly be absorbed
• Saruman elemental shift will stop when ring is destroyed
• Ring UI will disappear when ring is destroyed
• Kalbak has escort style vitals
• Shadow/Light will not re-trigger in throne room
• Lab exit door stays open after boss kill
• Bukots escort vitals disappear on death
• Some Orthanc pieces of equipment have seen their stats adjusted.

Tower of Orthanc Rewards Drops have been adjusted across the board.

• Worn Symbols of Celebrimbor have a 100% chance to drop on T1.
• Worn Symbols of the Elder King have an increased chance to drop on T2 (50/75/100%, depending on boss), and always drop on Challenge.
• Broken Cloak Clasps have an increased chance to drop from Saruman (50/100/100%, depending on Tier)
• Crafting Recipe drop rates have been improved.
• An additional Relic and IAXP rune drop have been added.
• Equipment drop rates have been adjusted.

Skumfil

• Looting the Corpse of Brumbereth no longer sounds as if you are opening a chest.

The Foundry

• The amount of money dropped in the Foundry Challenge chest has been reduced to be in-line with the other 3-man instances introduced at the same time.
• Tier 1 & 2- Quest no longer resets if player leaves and rejoins partially completed instance.

Odd Benefactors

• Players can not complete quests if they leave the instance

Skirmishes

• The Skirmish instance quests (the quest you receive every time you play a Skirmish) will now award gold, reputation, XP and IXP. This quest, unlike the old daily quests, will be awarded every time the Skirmish is completed, and will scale more accurately to the level of the Skirmish. The previous XP bonus on monsters has been reduced to compensate.
• The Skirmish Soldier trait Ultimate Banner of Protection will now affect the unified Resistance stat displayed on the character panel instead of individual resistances.
• The Skirmishes Strike Against Dannenglor and Protectors of Thangúlhad will now award Malledhrim reputation.

Skirmish Defensive Tutorial

• Death Penalty is back to marks and not dread

Attack at Dawn

• Control points now show up on the mini map

Legendary Items, Relics, Legacies

• Heritage Runes are now Bound to Account.
• Melding recipes for Tier 8 relics, Level 75 relics and Level 75 legendary items have been added.
• Legendary Items level 66 and above have increased relic return from deconstruction if they are advanced to level 31 or higher. The increase is more significant if the item is advanced to level 60 and above.

Instance Finder

• In Instance-Finder-made fellowships, you can now vote to change loot rules, loot quality threshold, or to dismiss players.
• Solo players can now get back into an open encounter using an alert just like they can when they are in a fellowship.
• Instance Finder window can now be resized vertically
• Instance Finder: Fixed a bug which caused excessive lag between when the fellowship leader clicks “Join” and when the other fellowship members would see the “Confirm Role” panel.

Crafting
General

• New recipes for Level 75 crafted relics are located on the Crafting Guild vendors. The Compendium of Middle Earth, Volume III, can be acquired via a reward for completing the daily repeatable quest "The Forges of Isengard," given by Bron in Galtrev.

Woodworker

• Corrected the plural name of Westfold Nestad Infused Parchment.
• Slightly reduced the physical and tactical mitigations found on all “Steadfast Protector” / “Iron Will” Spear, Shield, and Fist Warden carvings.

Tailor

• Corrected the icon and description for the following recipe: Wyrmscale Cloak

Items

• Many shields found throughout Dunland have updated icons. Some of the Isengard raid shields (Tier 2 and Challenge) have new appearances.
• The On Use effect of the Ancient Annúminas Statuette can now be used within 5 seconds of equipping the item.
• Helm of the West Tower (level 55 version) - Appearance has been changed back to the pre-Rise of Isengard appearance, and is once again dyeable. The post-Rise of Isengard appearance is still available with the Helm of the West Tower (level 65 version)
• There was something here, but it has been removed.
• The Warden "Porbad" and Guardian "Laingarth" sets now properly refresh the duration of their additional threat over time effects. The Hunter “Gonathradir” set now gives Swift Bow a chance to reduce both Physical and Tactical Mitigation. The Mitigation reduction amount is slightly less than before.

Deeds & Virtues

• Virtues have been extended to Rank 14.

Quests
The following quests will now use the quest item button alongside the quest tracker to allow for easier access to the text documents provided in certain objectives.
Anyone who had these quests underway will have them versioned out of their quest log. You will be able to pick them up again from the quest bestower.

• Bree-Land - Blackwold Valuables
• Bree-Land - Report From Staddle
• Bree-Land - Message for the Constable
• Bree-Land - A Failed Delivery
• Shire - The Dwarves of Needlehole
• Shire - Recovering the Lost Leaf
• Shire - Gerebert Misses a Meal
• North Downs - An Urgent Message
• Evendim - Breakfast in the Ruins
• Trollshaws - Calenglad Remained
• Forochel - A Midwinter's Thaw
• Eregion - The Worm-keeper
• Lothlórien - The Good Will of the Galadhrim
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Prologue: The Wisdom of the Thrushes
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Prologue: The Emissary
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Prologue: Finding Amdir
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Prologue: Mundo's Complaint
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Book 10, Chapter 1
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Book 10, Chapter 13
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Book 11, Chapter 9
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Book 12, Chapter 2
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Book 12, Chapter 8
• Epic Book - Volume 1, Epilogue
• Epic Book - Volume 2, Book 2, Chapter 3
• Epic Book - Volume 2, Book 4, Chapter 3
• Epic Book - Volume 2, Book 7, Chapter 6
• Epic Book - Volume 2, Book 9, Chapter 2
• Epic Book - Volume 3, Book 2, Chapter 11
• Epic Book - Volume 3, Book 2, Chapter 14
• Gandalf now appears and disappears in the Prancing Pony properly during Volume 1, Book 1 when he is supposed to and he is not there when he is not supposed to be. The door is always open.
• Ending the Nightmare Quest: Players can no longer get stuck in an incompletable state if they cancel the quest before turning in the completed decision quest
• Fighting Slime with Slime - Stonecrest now despawns and must be resummoned if player goes out of combat.

Mounts

• The dismount animation is back and used only when you dismount from a stationary horse/pony/goat. If you are moving and you dismount you will do so instantly. If you want to get off your steed fast, do so while moving.
• There is a new icon on the new mount Winter Festival mount. This is the correct icon for the appearance.

Housing

• Each Neighborhood now has a publicly-available Mailbox
• Various Housing Hook Placement issues have been resolved

User Interface

• Added a new lock-on camera mode which keeps the camera pointed towards your target. By default this can be engaged using the [X] key, but you can remap it in Options->Key Mapping->Camera.
• Fixed an issue where rank 1 would display on the icon for virtues when the virtue has not yet been earned.
• Certain lingering UIs can now be "minimized" via a button on the UI. To restore them, right click on your character's vitals and toggle them via the new UI toggle sub-menu on the pop-up menu.
• Added new examination (tooltip) for monsters which will display the Quest Tracker status of all current relevant quests/objectives.
• Examination (tooltips) for NPCs will now include Quest Tracker information for all quests currently associated with the NPC.
• Examination for items will now include Quest Tracker information for all underway quests that can be advanced by that item. This includes both items in your inventory and items on the landscape.
• Players can no longer quit (or resign) from their kinship via the right-click portrait menu. Players can still quit their kinship via the Kinship tab of the Social Panel, or by using /kinship quit.
• Using a ? in your chat text will no longer cause your character to play a shrug emote.

Events & Festivals

• Treasure hunt: trained cave-claw cooldown extended to avoid issues with lost cave-claws.

Town Services, Barter & Reputation Vendors

• Landscape soldier tokens can be bartered for marks and medallions at the skirmish upgrade vendor.
• Cosmetic versions of the Helegrod armor set can now be found on the Cosmetics skirmish barter vendor.
• The Moria and Bree NPCs that exchanged reputation items for potions now accept the trading of those items.
• You can now exchange Moria Guards and Miners reputation items by visiting the reputation vendors in Moria.
• Some barter vendors in Lothlórien, Mirkwood and Enedwaith will now allow you to exchange their region's respective Gold Tokens for Silver Tokens (along with the other way around).
• The value of five ducks is now one pig, however pigs will continue to be worth their weight in gold because you can make bacon out of them!
• The Dunlending Quartermaster now has a Travel to Galtrev skill, available to all players with Kindred standing.
• Barter costs of the Level 45 Class Items and some Consumables have been adjusted.
• Worn Symbols of Celebrimbor are now available via Skirmish barter vendors.
• The Reputation rewards from Enedwaith have had their Minimum Level requirements lowered, based on the required Tier of Reputation. Kindred items remain at Minimum Level 65.
• Players may now exchange 50 Marks for 1 Medallion at the Currency Exchange NPCs found in the various Skirmish Camps across Eriador. There are also options to exchange for 10 and 50 Medallions.

NPCs & Monsters

• The Hobbits in Dunland and the Hobbits in the Shire have spruced up their appearances a bit. Dusted off some new threads, so to speak. (Or perhaps just new to you.)
• Trollshaws: Elder Stonehoof boars found in South Trollshaws now drop Sturdy Hides occasionally.

Auction House

• There is now a new auction house category for players to use to buy and sell trophy items which are used for Tasks. This auction house category is called Task Items.
• Scholar scrolls can now be found under the Crafting - Scrolls and Scroll Cases category
• Fixed an issue where non-store stat tomes were not showing up in the Auction House when searching under Premium Items - Stat Tomes.

Visual FX, Graphics, and Physics

• The Gloomglens now has fewer cliffs and more traversable terrain.
• Fixed issue with water in the Gloomglens
• Fixed terrain texture seams and stretching in Gloomglens
• Fixed floating object issues in the Gloomglens
• Radar images have been regenerated for the Gloomglens, Windfells and Mournshaws
• Various terrain texture seams across Enedwaith have been cleaned up
• Mailboxes in Dunlending villages in Enedwaith now use a more appropriate appearance
• Additional Deco and Lighting work in Brenin's Council Hall
• The sky objects will no longer vanish when you travel to certain instances and then return. Told ya; The sky is not falling. It was just…missing.
• Floating objects in Volume 3 Book 6 have been grounded
• Grounded various floating objects in Enedwaith
• Cleaned up various terrain texture issues in Enedwaith
• Fixed various placement issues in Enedwaith
• Various floating assets in Dunland have been grounded.
• Various terrain texture issues in Dunland have been resolved
• Floating objects in the Ered Luin have been grounded
• Floating objects in the Misty Mountains have been grounded
• Floating objects in the Mirkwood have been grounded
• Terrain seams in Mirkwood have been fixed
• Floating objects in the Eregion have been grounded
• Stuck locations in the Ettenmoors have been fixed
• Lighting issues in Moria have been resolved.
• Terrain seam issues in Forochel have been resolved.
• Floating objects in Moria have been grounded
• Floating objects in Forochel have been grounded
• Various floating objects in Lothlórien have been grounded.
• Various terrain issues in Lothlórien have been resolved.
• Various terrain issues in Angmar have been resolved.
• Various floating objects in Angmar have been grounded.
• Physics issues in the Shire have been resolved.
• Various terrain issues in the Shire have been resolved.
• Floating items in Lothlórien has been grounded.
• Physics issues in the Shire have been resolved.
• Fixed various placement issues in the Trollshaws.
• Crafting Gear should better match the female form, and class armor updates should fix minor flipping issues or form.
• Guardian saddle should fit better when riding.
• Guardian Gloves for the Isengard Raid Gear should not clip anymore

Audio

• Pibgorn is now the same volume as other player instruments and the notes are fixed.

Lua

• Fixed: The armor values returned by GetArmor are not correct.
• Added: FreePeopleAttributes.GetBaseAr mor method and BaseArmorChanged event.
• Fixed: ChampionAttributes.GetStance now works correctly.
• Fixed: Bad deinitialization of FreePeopleAttributes that lead to a crash on shutdown.
• Fixed: The plugin manager UI will now set the size of the user options panel when it is changed allowing for the panel to properly layout itself.
• Removed: ChampionStance.BloodRage since it isn't a stance for champions.
• Updated: The documentation on Equipment better explains the event firing order for ItemUnequipped.
• Changed: The time autoload plugins are loaded has been pushed back in the loading process to avoid initialization race conditions.
• Fixed: Quickslots better support items on load.
• Added: DragStart to controls that is fired when a drag drop operation starts. NOTE: This is a work in progress still and is subject to change.
• Added: DragDropInfo now has IsSuccessful/SetSuccessful for getting and setting the success state on the drag drop operation.
• Fixed: The base Turbine.UI.Window class to properly erase its background.
• Added: Player now has a GetPet method and PetChanged event. This method works for the LocalPlayer and PartyMember classes and will return the current pet of that player.
• Added: Wallet support. This is available on the LocalPlayer as GetWallet. The Wallet provides a list of WalletItems and the notifications for them changing. WalletItems have accessors for the Quantity, MaxQuantity, Name, Description, Image, SmallImage, and IsAccountItem.
• Deprecated: Entity.RegisterForClickHandlin g is deprecated. Use the EntityControl instead.
• Added: New control, EntityControl. This can be used to create controls that can select entities and/or display a context sensitive menu for the entity.
• Added: PluginManager.ShowOptions which can be used to display the options for a plugin by its plugin reference.
• Fixed: Party members leaving a party should not longer cause a crash.
• Fixed: Party member leave events should fire properly now.
• Fixed: The GetReadyState function and ReadyStateChanged event function properly now.
• Fixed: LocalPlayer reports IsVoiceEnabled properly.
• Added: IsVoiceActive and IsVoiceActiveChanged so plugins can know when users are talking.