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Champions in Isengard Dev Diary
There is a new Dev Diary today on Champions! There are many, many, many changes coming. As the Champion was my second 65, and my main for a long time, these changes are very interesting to me! I will break the Dev Diary down and give my thoughts as I go.
The Developer in charge is Orion, and he is also one of the key developers for PvMP. He begins his explanation of the Champion changes by saying that the Champion for a long time has had two roles, DPS and Tanking. When Champions were forced to tank, they would suit up with a shield, making them a slightly less fun version of a Guardian. My all-time favorite quote by Orion was from his original blog post on Champion changes in Isengard, “Champions are based on Gimli. Gimli did not use a shield. Champions will not use shields.”
The problem of course is that Guardians are fantastic Guardians, Champs not so much. So why would you want a Champ to do a Guardian’s job, when the Champ doesn’t really like the Guardian’s job anyway because of the drastically different gameplay style behind the shield?
Orion decided to take a different approach. While Guards would be a shield tank with mitigations, and Wardens would be the parry and evade tanks with HoTs and morale leaches, the tanking Champ would play like a DPS Champ: shield-less, focusing on using skills to maintain aggro and survivability instead of doing as much damage to enemies, but still fun and fast like Champs like it!
Captains in Isengard Dev Diary
There was a Dev Diary yesterday on Captains and the changes coming to them in Isengard. For the most part, they are in line with the rest of the changes that have been mentioned previously. For a comprehensive list of all changes coming to Captains, see this constantly updated post.
The big difference in this Dev Diary from what we’ve seen so far is how the stat changes are going to be affecting Captains. Captains will now be basing our Outgoing Healing on Might as well as Melee Offense, making our builds much more straightforward.
This also means that we will be hitting like pansies and healing like level 30 Rune-keepers in our healing gear, come Isengard. Luckily, most of us have soloing gear that we use when we need more Might than Outgoing Healing, which will now conveniently give us both. I also imagine that they will go back and refigure the old gear like the Helegrod armor, to better match the stats. Keep in mind, this is the way it will be for Captains from level 1 and up. That means countless armor sets that are useless now, with lots of Will.
Let me know if you have any questions or comments!
Isengard Class Changes: Hunters
If you have been following the posts made by developers on the forums and in their my.LOTRO blogs, then you know that class changes are going to rock in Isengard. I thought I would put up a series of posts on each of the classes and keep them updated as new information comes in. Also, if I have an opinion, I will post that as well.
This overview will cover Hunters. The resident developer in charge of Hunters is Zombie Columbus (ZC). I am going to try to explain the information shortage and some of the information we have received.
NOTE: These are only proposed! Things may change in Beta testing. Read more…
Itemization in Isengard: Chests with Shiny’s!
A new developer diary was posted today by the LOTRO systems team on one of my favorite topics: LOOT!
There are some exciting changes coming with Isengard. Stat changes are literally changing the way we build our characters and we have all been eagerly waiting to see how we are going to reach the new stat caps (or lack thereof). The items are going to have to be both powerful and focused. Read more…
Isengard Class Changes: Captain, Second Iteration
If you are familiar with the proposed Captain changes released a few weeks ago, then here are updates that hit the forums on Friday. If you are not familiar with them, then click here for the entire list including Friday’s updates.
First, Raskolnikov answered some questions:
- Only one Brother Toggle can be active at a time.
- Improved Kick was moved from the 3-set bonus to the 2-set bonus in Leader of Men
- -10s Mark Skills Cooldown still exists as part of the 2-set bonus in Leader of Men.
Then he proceeded to BLOW OUR MINDS! I am so excited for these changes, its making me question whether to run my Hunter MAIN through Isengard first or my Captain. Read more…
The Fanatical Swordsman 