Rispon Avenue

When faced with the option to buy a new game the other day, I realised that the only game I want to play right now is LOTRO.

I got some unexpected cash, and thought why not splash out this time. My SO got something that she had been after for a while, and I figured I would do the same. I then immediately went to find which game it was that I wanted. I thought about it. I thought some more. Looked up recent releases on IGN and nothing really stood out. And then I realised, I have all the gaming I need with just the one game.

Between work and life, I don’t have as much game time as I would like, and I’m pretty darn happy with spending all that game time with my SO running around as our dwarf and hobbit combination. I still have other games on my computer, but I tend to be focused on one game at a time, and right now it’s LOTRO.

So instead of getting a new game, I decided to get a gadget. I love gadgets, in all their odd glory. So I decided I’d get a Sun Jar. I’ve always thought these things very fun, and I’m looking forward to having mine turn up later this week. I also thought the Lego inspired USBs looked fun, but the site I found them at didn’t ship internationally. The other thing I liked at this site was a clock that would work well in my study, but as I said, no shipping to the UK. Overall, the Sun Jar seemed the best gadget to get with my free cash.

Now I’ve got to get back to playing more LOTRO. I’ve spent long enough writing up this post, and as much as I’m looking forward to getting my Sun Jar, I’m more looking forward to getting a level or two with my new character.

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That’s exactly what my SO and I have got with our two new characters/classes in LOTRO…

I mentioned that we tried out some Hobbit Burgs and had then switched over to a Dwarf Champion and Hobbit Minstrel combination, and we are now a bit further into that. My Dwarf is level 21 at the moment, whilst my SO’s Hobbit is level 18. At first we missed that sense of solidarity because we couldn’t run together the whole time, her in the Shire, me in Ered Luin, but once we were up to that point where we could run around together, so Bree-Land, we have had a marvellous time!

The Dwarf Champion is such a fun class to play, your essentially a moving wall of blades, and that’s just a heck of a lot of fun. When you play as a Dwarf, you have a greater sense of your character, too, because you don’t just get a generic human character model, you get a sense of being a part of a mythos, being part of the story, you watch your Dwarf fighting through hordes of Orcs, and you feel like you really are a part of Middle Earth… It’s a much more accessible feeling when your playing as a mythological species, rather than a human. Of course, that only works with something that has always been a part of myth to you, if someone had never heard of The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, or any of Tolkien’s work, then they might pick up the game and think playing as a Hobbit would be utterly rediculous, and what are these short fat people? But nearly anyone would still find a Dwarf accessible because recorded myths of Dwarves have existed back into the 12th Century, and probably before that too.

Because of Tolkien’s work being so well known today, Hobbits have become a part of today’s Western Mythos, so when my SO plays as a Hobbit, she too gets that feeling of being part of the mythology of the world of Middle Earth. It’s a great feeling, and it’s terribly fun to watch our two stunties running hell-for-leather across Middle Earth.

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As the Summer Festival is on in the LOTRO world, it means that there are currently a heap of Summer Quests on, which only run during the festival. This leads to a flurry of extra activity, but only in certain parts of the world.

The areas where you will see extra activity are The Party Tree in the Shire, all over Thorin’s Hall and the stairs of Frerin’s Court, the festival area of Duillond, and the festival area in the Horse Fields in Bree-land. You can get some curious, some fun, and some useful, some not-so-much rewards for competing in the events, or completing quests found in these areas during the festival, which has just been extended out through to August 31st.

Now, I’m not hugely interested in the festival goings on, I do like to get the racial dances of the character I am playing at least, maybe the other races if I’m particularly in the mood, but as for the rest of it… it doesn’t thrill me as it does some people. However, my SO gets really into it, and as she’s playing a Hobbit, she’s running around the Party Tree having a grand old time placing bets on the Hobbit Races, finding missing items, fishing, and of course, eating. It makes me happy to see her have such a good time, so I like the festivals for that.

Now, back to those dances. Each of the races, Dwarf, Hobbit, Elf, Man, all has two racial dances that can be obtained from doing a little dancing quest with a Dance Master at each of the festival locations I mentioned earlier. So far with these rather new characters, my SO has both the Hobbit dances and the second Dwarf dance, and I have the first Dwarf dance. Some of the dances are better than others. Both the Dwarf dances look good, a sort of Irish dance meets tap-dancing for those two, and the first Hobbit dance has this same feel. The second Hobbit dance, however, makes the dancer look like a drunken sailor. It’s hilarious and horrible all at the same time.

On to some of the rewards you can obtain, now. You can find the complete list here at the LOTRO Wiki, but a few of the stand outs for me are the cloak, it is actually a very nice looking cloak, the two rather strange drinks, and the Essence of Toad. Now, the two drinks, the Mug of Triple Strength Brandy, and the Mug of… Liquid, look pretty interesting, and if I remember correctly, they have have a chance of porting you anywhere in the world… but I’m not sure if that’s these ones. As I said, with me not being all that interested in the festival, I’m not 100% sure on what these things do because I haven’t gone and gotten them.

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The last few weeks have been absolutely mad for me. No time to really relax, which has certainly taken its toll, but this weekend that finally changed. Things have finally returned to normal, so my SO and I found some time to play LOTRO, and seeing as we hadn’t played in so long, we started new characters.

In this case, I finally dropped my ‘No Hobbits’ rule, and created a Hobbit Burglar. Cute little fellow, that I had a surprising amount of fun with. He played well, the Burg skills were fun to use, interesting, and just something a little bit different. I duoed this character with my SO’s Hobbit Burg, and we had a lot of fun stealthing around the place. Good times! The combination of the two Burgs meant we knew what the other was capable of, and that can make all the difference.

The going was pretty quick, surprisingly so, actually. In just a few days my SO and I had hit level 19. Alas it couldn’t last… I saw all those awesome Dwarves running past and I felt less than thrilled with my tiny little Hobbit. I have to say, though, that even though I am no longer playing that Burg, I do have a much greater appreciation for the Hobbit folk, not that I didn’t like them before, but I like them more now.

Like this fellow here, he has a blog, he is a Hobbit, his blog is The Hobbit Herald, and I think that’s funny. :lol: Whilst I am at it, another LOTRO blog I have found useful is The LotRO Follower – very handy for when the servers are down, as this site has that sort of info listed up to date on there. And just because I like some of the comics, and lots of the maps, here’s a link to a blog called The Brasse, another LOTRO inspired blog.

Anyway, so I’m not playing a Burg anymore. It is good, but not what I want, in the end. So I am playing a Dwarf Champ and my SO gets the Minstrel she always wants to play. Now we’re both content with our characters! :)

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That’s right, I’m surly like an old man. Surly because at work at the moment, a few big projects are due all at once. I try to be ahead of the game, have all my work ready ahead of times, but when you are creating websites for people, there are always last minute problems and bugs that need to be fixed by yesterday. Wow, that was an obnoxious turn of phrase… Anyway, because of this flurry of activity, I have been so very surly. Like a surly old man. Think Clint Eastwood in the beginning of Gran Torino… very, damn, surly!

Things just bother me a heck of a lot more when I am in this stage of exhaustion. For instance, earlier, I went to make some toast. I just wanted some Vegemite toast (yeah, I like that stuff :lol: ) and a cup of orange juice. Fine, let’s go for it! But as I was cooking my toast, which I cook under a grill because it is a wide bread that doesn’t fit in a toaster, I smell burning. I whip the toast out, and it is barely cooked at all, not even slightly golden. I put the toast back in there and back to the burning smell. It was really horrible. I think something must have fallen on top of the grill plate, but all I know for certain is that is a very bad smell. And bad smells make me, the surly person, feel even more surly.

I think what it comes down to, is feeling like the smallest desires are being pushed against. You can’t sit down without remembering you have to grab something from the next room. Or you can’t go to bed because you just remembered some silly piece of last minute work you were stuck with that has to be done first thing in the morning. It seems like the simplest of things, even a nice snack, are constantly being thwarted.

For days I have been wanting to get onto LOTRO and go round all the Summer Festival activities, I always really enjoy those, but I haven’t had the chance because of this huge workload. But I have consoled myself with the knowledge that in a few days things will return to normal, and I can have some time to relax.

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