Now on to Mordor. This is, what I believe a majority of the player base has been waiting for, including myself. While I have enjoyed other zones and have hated some, Mordor is kind of, for me at least, what Lotro is about. Fighting the evil army of Orcs.

I thought I would get this from Moria, and to an extent I did since I go to fight plenty of goblins and orc, but the dark, claustrophobic atmosphere just did not appeal to me even though I loved that part of the movie.

**Confession: I have not read the books, I have only watched the movies** So my exposure to this world is based off only what I have seen in the movies, heard from others or experienced in game. I have received a lot of hate in regards to this, but I have tried to read the first book and did not like his writing style and just seemed to rabble on about hobbits singing or these long poems. I know that is what many of the fans enjoy about his works, but I just did not like it and preferred the movies and even some scenes in those made me cringe ( the kitchen dish throwing scene or the river barrel scene comes to mind)

I did enjoy my time in zones such as lone lands, I think that is where I first encountered goblins and orcs if I remember correctly. I made a human character so my first zone pretty much wild animals and bandits.

I loved the look of Forchel but hated the long runs back and forth to speak to someone.

Anyway, back on point. So here I was, faced with the expansion and which edition would I get.

The Standard Edition @ $39.99

Aria of the Valar – a level boost to Mordor!

It did not come with the new High Elf race which was and is hotly debated on the forums and sub reddit.

The Collector’s Edition @$79.99

Aria of the Valar – a level boost to Mordor!

High Elf Race

Character Slot

Exclusive Alliance Cosmetics

Exclusive armor, cloak, & kite!

Exclusive Title “Walked Into Mordor”

Exclusive Alliance Mount

The mount didn’t look to bad and I thought the armor was ok until I saw actual in game screen shots of it and it looks horrible and nothing like what is pictured.

The Ultimate Fan Bundle @ $129.99

Aria of the Valar – a level boost to Mordor!

High Elf Race

Character Slot

Exclusive Alliance Cosmetics

• Exclusive armor, cloak, & kite!

Exclusive Mordor Cosmetics

• Exclusive armor, cloak, & eagle kite!

Exclusive Alliance Mount

Exclusive Mordor Mount

Two Exclusive Titles

• “Walked Into Mordor”

• “The Ultimate”

Equippable XP Accelerator for all characters!

Exclusive Housing Teleport for all characters!

Three Relics for all characters

Two Essence Reclamation Scrolls for all characters!

Ten Extra Shared Storage Slots

A code for a month of VIP Access

I liked the look of the mount. I also liked the look of the Mordor armor, which also did not look as good in game as is does in the picture but still looks pretty good.

The xp item sounded cool although it is only for characters below 105.

I have never messed around with player housing so those items did not matter to me and would only go to the bank.

Storage slots are always welcome.

I have a lifetime account so no use for the month of VIP.

Hmmm decisions

So here I was faced with my decision on which one to get. Even though I have not played much throughout the years I really did not just want the base edition like I have done before. The other expansion other than Moria I had purchased with turbine points and the standard was the only option.

I knew I did not want the collector’s edition since I thought the Alliance armor was ugly and did’t care about the new race.

So the Ultimate edition loomed heavily over me. Did I think it was worth the $129.99 price tag? In all honesty, no I did not depending on the player of course.

For a F2P player, it’s a toss up since that person may already be doing the F2P option because they either could not afford a sub or did not see the value. Or maybe they just bought points from time to time.

For a VIP player paying a monthly sub, it might be worth it since they obviously see some value in the game to pay a monthly fee.

I do think that there was a bit of sticker shock to everyone though. Reading the subreddit and the fourms, it looks like it ranged form just being overpriced, to not enough content.

I agree with a lot of the arguments I read. I do think that all editions should have came with the new race and I do think that the collector’s and ultimate edition should have came with more digital items as well as some sort of points package.

Since I have a lifetime account I sat and thought about it. I have not spent any money on this game since my purchase of $299.99 in 2007 and however much Moria cost me at launch. So I decided to hell with it, even though I had only been back a short time, I had found a renewed enjoyment for the game and jumped all in on the ultimate edition.

I don’t regret my purchase and I’m not going to lie and try to sound like one of those people on the forums crying to support the game, I did it because I wanted the items, and could care less about “supporting” the game. It has made it this long and started making money once it changed to a F2P model so it does not need my help. Maybe it’s just me but I hate that argument and I usually stop listening to podcasts and stop following youtubers when they start pushing patreons or other ways of begging for money. I recently stopped visiting one of the WoW websites I used to frequent once they switched over to begging for money and shoving patreon in my face and even locking certain articles. End rant.

I promptly logged into my 102 Champion and used the 105 boost on him. I know its not that many levels but frankly, I was tired of the questing I was doing in Gondor and had recently got to Minis Tirith and could not stand that lagging, confusing city and the horrible quests I received once entering.

I also wanted the starter gear it gives you since the stats change many 105s with good gear were having issues because of the Finesse rating was too low on their gear and I guess some kind of change made it more important of a stat now.

The Valar gear gave me about 20k Finesse and from reading chat, most people entered with about 5-7k.

The mobs were still tough but at least my attacks were no longer constantly missing or being dodge/parried.

I then equipped the Mordor armor (except the helmet) and was happy with it.

The armor in the game has always bothered me. Unless you get some good instance/raid armor you were stuck with some really ugly gear. I know they keep it more realistic and not the crazy armor I get in WoW but I just never liked it so I always used some kind of cosmetic set I bought from the store.

I was also happy with the new mount.

The other armor, housing items, and the kites? went directly into my bank.

I also liked that my equipped traits were all bumped up to 20 with a couple 19s which saved me from that horrible grind.

I will still have some grind, however, since I only have 63 skill points (not looking forward to tracking those down)

I searched the web for a good red line build and was hard to find anything that not was not a couple years old but I made do.

I had finished the Epic Vol 4 book 9 intro quest already at 101-102 and was now ready to tackle Udun!