UNDER THE EAVES OF LOTHLORIEN

What of Lothlórien? First of all, of course, it is visually stunning, above all the forest itself: impressively unlike anything we've seen so far, and, as it ought to be, ever so slightly spooky both by day and by night. The contrast with the gloom of Moria makes it that much more effective. I would also rate the epic storyline of Volume II, Book 7 very highly; it can easily be completed solo by anybody who has reached level 60, has a good, strong plot line and maintains its interest to the end (though I admit to finding the ultimate fate of the book's principal villain excessively tame, even rather wishy-washy).

On the other hand, I am disappointed by many of the quests which must be completed in order to gain favour with the Galadhrim, far too many of which are ridiculously trivial and even foolish. This is, I concede, a standing problem with all computer role-playing games, whether online or not, and one which becomes particularly acute in our case, where we are all playing notional second fiddle to the Fellowship: on the one hand the individual player is involved in events of epic scope and grandeur, but on the other, he or she must constantly be brought back down to earth lest he become too big for his boots (and for the lore).

Fair enough. One day Warlord of Angmar and Slayer of Thaurlach, the next begging Galadhrim guardians for the right to enter Lorien, or fending off Anduin lizards; that's the way an adventurer's life goes. But to be invited to go picking berries and mushrooms, or to be treated as a pack mule and instructed to carry supplies right, left and centre is really a bit much; where were you, buster, when we were killing Thorog in Helegrod? Such piffling quests do nothing to maintain suspension of disbelief, and are really a sign of laziness or lack of inspiration on the part of the developers. Obviously there will have to be grinding - but let it at least be inventive and preferably adventurous grinding, not this poor "kindly step out and get me a pint of milk, boy" household chore stuff.

BOOK 7 LATEST

Well, despite the panic Stateside, it looks as though Europe will be getting Book 7 today after all. According to the Codemasters login page:
Leaves of Lórien Coming Thursday!

Don't forget that this maintenance day we will be patching the servers up to Book 7: Leaves of Lórien along with the additional Patch 1. Servers will go down at 08.00 and be back up at 14.00 hours, UK time (GMT+1).

And at 19.00 GMT+1, the news was:

Unfortunately at the moment we are experiencing a few technical difficulties with our content distribution provider which we use for high bandwidth delivery of new patches.
We are actively managing the situation by moving some patching onto additional datacentre patch servers to improve the situation, which might lead to some of you receiving 404 errors while connections are being moved.
If you are experiencing slow patching speeds then please try stopping and re-starting the launcher as this may move you onto an improved patch connection.
We are in contact with the content provider and hopefully normal service will be resumed before too long.
Thanking you for your understanding and we hope you are able to get patched up shortly.

BOOK 7 AND THE END OF EXPLOITS

Volume II, Book 7 is due to hit Europe tomorrow, Thursday, just over two weeks after it was released in the States and a week after the first official release date. Not too bad, particularly if some of the more glaring bugs in the US release have been dealt with. I was particularly happy to see that the community's response to the probably inevitable delay has been much more muted and sensible than in the past - far less of that screaming, throwing the rattle out of the playpen, "want it now!" attitude we've seen in the past. Evidence of a more mature or of a wiser and more experienced audience? Either way, a relief.

Apart from the very welcome new content, Book 7 will hopefully also eliminate all those blatant exploits in the Moria instances which have been straining consciences and provoking arguments in PUGs for months. You know the ones I mean: the strange but indubitable fact that in many cases, if you stand in a doorway, you can hit a boss but he can't hit you. And yes, of course they are exploits, irrespective of the fact that they should have been (but weren't) fixed weeks ago. Principled players should (and mostly do) avoid making use of them, but the temptation is always there, particularly if you are called upon to repeat the 16th Hall instance for perhaps the thirtieth time, purely in order to complete somebody's radiant armour set. In some ways, this may well be the strongest argument against the the policy of requiring players to collect a specific set of armour before trying a particular raid (in this case, the Watcher): the fact that it became tedious enough to lead many players into the temptation of cutting corners. If all goes as planned, that temptation should soon be removed.

CARAS GALADHON SNEAK PREVIEW

Volume II, Book 7 of Mines of Moria, to be released - we fervently hope - in the not-too-distant future, will take players deeper into the enchanted forest of Lothlórien. Actually, all of Lothlórien (rather than just the tiny fragment of it we can access at the moment) was due to be packaged with the original MoM expansion, but as it was still unfinished round about the crucial Christmas release date, Turbine opted to hive it off.

The image above is of Caras Galadhon (or Galadon, as the first edition has it), tree city of Lothlórien and closest thing to an elven capital during the waning of the Third Age. It appeared recently on official game forums, only to be quickly whisked away for being in apparent breach of non-disclosure agreements. Such is the current hunger for more hard information about V II/Bk 7 that it seems worth recycling, though apart from looking pretty, it doesn't really tell us very much...