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The Road to Mordor: Just around the bend
It's been a few months since the November Update in Lord of the Rings Online, and the natives are restless -- as usual. Some folks are despairing the long wait until Rise of Isengard while others are itching for more challenges to their currently level-capped characters. Then there are the players who are hopelessly lost in Moria and would give their eye teeth for a flashlight. Happily, a new update is just around the bend, code-named Echoes of the Dead. The actual name is Echoes of the Dead too, so I guess that's not such a great code. Over the past couple of weeks, we've started to get a feel for just how large this update is, and after reading through the Bullroarer test notes on Wednesday, I think we're in for a tsunami of a patch. Of course, these patch notes come in the middle of Turbine's carefully spaced dev diaries dealing with each major change or addition, which means that we're a little in the dark as to the specifics of half of this update. That's not going to stop me -- or any of you -- from analyzing, speculating and gesturing excitedly to no one in particular. So let's dig in to this hearty meal of mushrooms and patch notes to see just how deep LotRO's rabbit hole goes!
Anarchy Online update adds raid interface, turns zones into instances
Anarchy Online's version 17.1 update went live last week. It added a complete raid interface to the game, allowing players to combine up to six teams into a raid group with its own chat channel and loot rules. The interface will allow raid leaders to move players between teams, and every player in the raid group will be able to monitor the vitals of other raid group members.Additionally, a handful of AO's existing playfields -- Sectors 13, 28 and 35 to start with -- have become raid instances. That means that raid groups can take these encounters on at their own pace and without competition. Funcom plans to do this to more playfields in the future.The update also features your standard assortment of bug fixes and gameplay and balance tweaks. Read the patch notes at the AO website for details.
Introducing Naxxramas
In Warcraft lore, Naxxrammas is the floating necropolis that is home to the lich Kel'Thuzad - and it's going to be introduced in World of Warcraft in patch 1.11. (For more lore on Naxxramas and Kel'Thuzad, check WowWiki.) There's little solid information on the place, other than that it will be a raid dungeon with many bosses. Tseric chimed in today with a little additional information on how casual players will be able to fit in to this grand story-line. He cryptically informs us:In one way or another, this war will touch on players lives more directly, now that the lair of Kel'Thuzad hovers over the lands and the lich's influence is tangibly focused.In the past, Tigole has also mentioned a world even that he refered to as the Scourge Invasion, but it's still unclear as to how this will actually manifest in the game world. Any opinions?
