LotRO's Wargs to be stealthy or beefy fighters

by Justin Olivetti on Feb 28th 2012 6:00PM

Fantasy, Lord of the Rings Online, Classes, Patches, PvP, Free-to-play, Dev Diaries

It's a dog-eat-dog world in Middle-earth, and only the most vicious of canines will succeed in the cutthroat world of PvMP. Lord of the Rings Online is preparing for a whole host of monster play renovations with Update 6, and Wargs are on tap for some serious love. A new dev diary on the official LotRO site lists all of the many, many changes coming for Wargs due to this shift in focus.

As a stealth class, Wargs were seen by developers as being too vulnerable to imminent death after entering into combat. As such, the devs are beefing up the class' survivability by giving players a choice. With Update 6, Wargs can move between Shadow (stealth) and Flayer (brawler) stances, depending on the player's preference and situation. The Flayer stance will replace the old Shadow Howler one.

Turbine previously outlined other changes for PvMP in Update 6, including Weavers, Audacity, and Commendations.

Source: Dev Diary
More coverage: LotRO official site

Tags: brawler, dev-diary, lord-of-the-rings-online, lotro, monster-play, pvmp, pvp, stealth, turbine, turbine-entertainment, update-6, warg, wargs

Reader Comments (16)

And with 90% drop box chance ?

No thx. Uninstalled LOTRO last night and will not ever play it again while the dropbox feature is in the game.

@Deadalon
Not sure what you're talking about there with that 90% chance business.

I can say that with my current character I have between levels 1 and 55 encountered two drop boxes. In that time, I've also gotten two keys as drops.

I actually got the key first and put it in my bank. Several levels later, I got a box, but its top level was one below me so I couldn't open it. No big deal -- I sold it on the auction house for two gold. A couple levels later I got another box that was right for my level. I got the key out of the bank and received items worth 8,400 Council of the North reputation from it. Not bad at all! A few levels after that, I got another key, which is in my bank waiting for another box to drop. Of course, I could also sell it and make a few gold.

So I completely fail to see the validity of your complaints about drop boxes. It seems that boxes and keys drop at about the same rate, which means that if you're willing to stick one in the bank while you wait for the other you're not going to spend a dime in the store. And if you truly loath the things, why don't you sell them? Or give them to your guildmates? Maybe run a guild event with that as a prize? You know -- things that make MMO's fun.

And if even that is too much for you and you're so determined not to see anything positive from the boxes, then why not simply discard them and their keys on the occasions that they drop for you? Does that hurt the game in some way that you have the option to do so?

@aurickle

Some1 seemed to miss that they have increased the droprate of the boxes now.

http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/02/13/lotros-update-5-2-showers-players-with-lock-boxes/

Thats what happens. You start at resonable rate to get ppl used to the idea... then go nuts.

Fanboys will be fanboys. Im not a hater of any game. I will however take a very clear stand against features that

a) do not support gameplay mecanics but just put in to make money
b) Work like a slot machine
c) is allowed for kids

Its a total and utter disgrace to see one of the biggest story of all time sink this low. To think that 12 year old kids relate LOTR with Lock boxes is just unbelivable. And it shows how low ppl will sink for the idea of pulling few extra gold out of the hat.

Total disgrace.

And if you think Lockboxes are considered to be good feature in ANY RPG game then take a look at this here on Massively.

http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/02/27/leaderboard-lockboxes-yea-vs-lockboxes-nay/

@Deadalon

agreed. they are just money grab

I agree with the poster above me. I do not need nightmares of STO dropboxes, but then i do not play freeps.

As for the Warg love? This game is a joke of a roller coaster, first up, then down in the balancing act of powers in the ettens. The devs are worse than clowns as are the community managers in that game that have less than a clue when it comes to dealing with angry fans and hows the ignorant dev clowns continue to screw up this shadow of a title.

Let's face it. Lotro is in decline. Time to jump ship.

Please enlighten me, what's the "dropbox" feature that has some people's panties in a twist?

Every time there's a post about LoTRO, I read it and think it sounds good. Then I scroll down and hit the comments.
Such hatred for a game that I, and so many others, love. Why is that? Is it the same people hitting each thread? I haven't checked. Is it just the cool thing to do at Massively? I don't understand why.

To anyone that scans these posts and thinks that perhaps the comments afterward reflect either the playerbase or the quality of the game in question, please know it doesn't. There are heaps of friendly players in game that enjoy it. There's a great game there waiting to be played and letting some angry comments stop you from seeing that would be a shame.

I haven't replied to many LoTRO posts because I don't like what has been said in the comments and it feels like there's no place here for someone that genuinely enjoys the game and has great respect for what Turbine does. But, then I wonder if I'm the only one and surely I'm not. There must be players that read these posts and are happy with the changes. Players that are actually in game and not on message boards. Players that find it frustrating when the first comment on each one of these posts is negative.

I urge anyone with a little bit of interest to just jump into the game and try it out. Have a chat with the regular playerbase and explore the world. If the game still isn't for you then walk away and try something else. That's fine. Your not logging in to the game tells Turbine you don't want to play it. We don't need to know that here.

@(Unverified)

I agree with you. The game is awesome and I really don't understand where all the hate comes from on here either. I've heard a lot of responses though and there seems to be a lot of pvmp ragers that visit the site, as well as long-time players that have just developed a complex over the game/company.

Although I do disagree with some things that Turbine has been doing recently (particularly lootboxes) I can't see myself dedicating my time to any other MMO in the same way.. Nothing comes close to LOTRO for me.

@(Unverified)
Well said!

And in reply to your first paragraph, I do remember Deadalon right off the top of my head. In no small part for the fact that the last LotRO article had someone mentioning how he trolls every single LotRO post. :-/

I'm a lifetime subscriber. I'm not 100% happy about the various directions Turbine has taken the game, but it's still the game I always come back to. My best friend also recently got his wife to finally give it a decent chance and she found herself having a great time in spite of herself.

@(Unverified)

"Every time there's a post about LoTRO, I read it and think it sounds good. Then I scroll down and hit the comments.
Such hatred for a game that I, and so many others, love. Why is that?"

Jealousy.

People who are fanatically, devotedly, personally invested in some other game are jealous of how others enjoy LOTRO, and are driven by their jealousy to try to tear down the competition to the object of their fanaticism.

@ddavidt

Great to see that some ppl have been able to justify lockboxes by blaming trolls.

Again - Im not fanatic to any game. And I do not hate any game. I take a clear stand on game features that are either good or bad. And lock boxes is one of the worst idea ever made for a RPG MMO game.

Not to mention the fact that the greatest story ever told is sinking this low. To create a gambling feature with real life money in a game for young kids. Its a disgrace. Total and utter disgrace.

Hopefully we will see auhorities react soon like in ASIA where features like these were banned cause of the addictive nature of the slot machine effect..

@ddavidt Really hmm .... OK devils advocate time.

Just because you or the other people posting don't have issues with how things are going it doesn't mean that other feel the same. One persons perfect mmo feature will be another person most hated. Can't please all the people all the time etc that is just human nature at work.

Granted some people may not express themselves in the most polite or coherent manner. but their core issue is still an issue for them nevertheless even if its not for you.

You may disagree with what I have just said. That will be a valid opinion of your own but the difference is I wont label you as a fanatic or hater (or whatever the term is these days) for thinking differently to me I will just chalk you up as a person with your own opinion and move on.

Just to clarify I have no axe to grind with lotro and enjoyed the time I subbed to the game (moved on due to guild doing the same) but I do take exception to people dismissing something as fanaticism just because they have a differing opinion on something. Differing opinions drive the world forward and makes things happen after all.

@Deadalon

Where did I or the comment I was replying to mention lockboxes, let alone trying to justify lockboxes by blaming trolls?

@Balraw

My reply was to:

"Every time there's a post about LoTRO, I read it and think it sounds good. Then I scroll down and hit the comments.
Such hatred for a game that I, and so many others, love. Why is that?"

Not about disagreement(impolite, incoherent, or otherwise), but about the motivation behind the outright hateful trollish comments which LOTRO articles often receive.

Waaaaaargh!

No, really, that's apt for the LotRO universe as well as the Warhammer one!

;P

LotRO's Wargs to be stealthy or beefy fighters

Reader Comments (16)

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 6:11PM Deadalon said

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 7:52PM aurickle said

Posted: Feb 29th 2012 4:52AM Deadalon said

Posted: Feb 29th 2012 5:16AM smartstep said

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 6:34PM Graill440 said

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 6:50PM smartstep said

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 7:04PM Oyjord said

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 7:30PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 7:41PM TortoiseCan said

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 7:43PM aurickle said

Posted: Feb 29th 2012 4:17AM ddavidt said

Posted: Feb 29th 2012 5:15AM Deadalon said

Posted: Feb 29th 2012 5:39AM Balraw said

Posted: Feb 29th 2012 4:13PM ddavidt said

Posted: Feb 29th 2012 4:31PM ddavidt said

Posted: Feb 28th 2012 11:12PM Space Cobra said

Info

Description

MSRP

Release Date

Genre

Developer

Publisher

Rating

Breaking News

The Secret World launch delayed to July 3rd

Featured Stories

The Mog Log: The Legacy rewards and what they mean

The Tattered Notebook: The passing of Ribbitribbitt

The Firing Line: PlanetSide 2's Matt Higby on the MMOFPS revolution

Engadget

Joystiq

WoW

TUAW