Valar Guild

July 14, 2019 Sunday Meeting

5:00 P.M. Eastern time (-4 GMT aka 9 P.M. aka 21:00)
Discord: Valar Guild/meeting_place

Back to News
Transcript work by
Varda.

Attending (and spoke): (3)
    Discord: Arien, Ar-Pharazon,Varda (presiding)

Before-meeting
Meeting begins
Membership news:
Web:
Gaming:
    General reports for WoW, SC2, Heroes of the Storm, LotRO.
    Mention of a new LotR game by the collaboration of Amazon Game Studios and Leyou, with Leyou's new arm of Athlon Games.
Tolkien:
    Topic: hobo hobbits
After-meeting:
    Flashgaming Reviews by Ar-Pharazon.
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Before-meeting
(times are in Central from Varda's Discord, so add one hour for Eastern. Example: 4pm Central in the transcript is 5pm Eastern)

VardaToday at 4:00 PM
Aiya : )
ArienValarToday at 4:05 PM
aiya Varda :smiley:
VardaToday at 4:05 PM
Hey there, Sunshine. : )
ArienValarToday at 4:06 PM
it will just be a flicker of a ray i fear .. i have to work tomorrow at seven and get up at five
VardaToday at 4:06 PM
No worries. Just glad you could drop in!
And you were in all three LotRO worlds, nice.
Get some rest while you can!
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:07 PM
Aiya!
VardaToday at 4:07 PM
Aiya Phar :smiley:
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:07 PM
Was in conversation, sorry :wink:
ArienValarToday at 4:07 PM
my department boss is heading to a Rod Stewart concert which was re scheduled
last month , open air , but the weather was too bad
so all the days off had to be reshuffled for this week
ergo also shifts replanned hehe
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:08 PM
And the underlings have to suffer?
VardaToday at 4:09 PM
Underlings must be nimble-footed! : )
ArienValarToday at 4:09 PM
indeed :wink: but if its one thing i can understand that people want to go to its a concert :wink:
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:09 PM
hehe
VardaToday at 4:09 PM
There's that!
ArienValarToday at 4:10 PM
oh the profession collection on Anor is complete too
VardaToday at 4:11 PM
Woot!
ArienValarToday at 4:11 PM
so that was one last alt on there hehe
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:11 PM
Yay professions!
ArienValarToday at 4:11 PM
another Helfi .. i just love that intro
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:12 PM
High elf? I'm sure that'd make many a WoW player jealous.
VardaToday at 4:12 PM
Just play both games!
ArienValarToday at 4:15 PM
he is called Arienildir
VardaToday at 4:15 PM
Do you need an invitation?
ArienValarToday at 4:16 PM
uhu if u can aye :smiley:
VardaToday at 4:16 PM
Ok, which server?
ArienValarToday at 4:16 PM
Anor
VardaToday at 4:16 PM
before you have to go to sleep
ok
Pulling it up as we type. : )
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Elen sila lumenn' omentielvo!
Membership:
Fangorn waved hi at the screen. : )
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:17 PM
Aiya Fangorn!

VardaToday at 4:18 PM
Currently pulling up Anor
And we have Arien's high elf on Anor. : )
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Web:
We could use some more input for our Tolkien Site. : )
Eonwe has been putting up the news for us on the Gaming Site. Many thanks!
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Gaming:

World of WarCraft:
Saturday was the Luminous Luminaries event.
ArienValarToday at 4:21 PM
hi Fangorn waves back
VardaToday at 4:21 PM
: )
Battle for Azeroth PvP Season 3 has begun.
https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/news/23055935/battle-for-azeroth-season-3-has-begun
    World of Warcraft
    Battle for Azeroth Season 3 Has Begun! - WoW
    Battle for Azeroth Season 3 brings new challenges with the opening of Mythic Operation: Mechagon, a new affix in Mythic Keystone Dungeons, and more PvP action.
Check out the Season 3 notes.
https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/news/23050291/rise-of-azshara-season-3-notes
    World of Warcraft
    Rise of Azshara Season 3 Notes - WoW
    The official update notes the new season are here.
Check out this week's hotfixes.
https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/news/23036677/hotfixes-july-12-2019
World of Warcraft
    Hotfixes: July 12, 2019 - WoW
​    Here you'll find a list of hotfixes that address various issues related to World of Warcraft: Battle For Azeroth.

StarCraft 2:
Patch 4.9.3 came out this week.
https://starcraft2.com/en-us/news/23049576
    StarCraft II Official Game Site
    Wage war across the galaxy with three unique and powerful races. StarCraft II is a real-time strategy game from Blizzard Entertainment for the PC and Mac.

Heroes of the Storm:
There was a balance patch released this week.
https://heroesofthestorm.com/en-us/blog/23057727/heroes-of-the-storm-balance-patch-notes-july-10-2019-2019-7-10/
    Heroes of the Storm
    Heroes of the Storm
    Legendary heroes and villains from Warcraft, StarCraft and Diablo are summoned to the Nexus. Choose your hero and prepare to fight in Heroes of the Storm!

Lord of the Rings Online:
We are between festivals puff but feel free to pick up amazing things like the giant blue bee for Figments by the Bree Boar Fountain.
This week's Valarites showing up in kin on our three servers were:
Landroval:
Arien
Bregalad
Fangorn
Mirabella
Nar
Varda

Anor:
Arien
Fangorn
Varda

Ithil:
Arien
Dis
Falco
Fangorn
Varda
For those who  might not recognize Bregalad's name, that's Quickbeam.
ArienValarToday at 4:26 PM
another ent :smiley:
VardaToday at 4:26 PM
Right : )
Any other gaming news? Feel free to talk about your games, maybe bring in some other Valarites!

More LotRO news:
LotRO soundtrack for the Vales of Anduin. This came out during Update 24.
ArienValarToday at 4:27 PM
No other than the mentioned ones for me this week , but i spotted  Helm,  Phari and Menel :smiley:
VardaToday at 4:27 PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2HKwv9u5pY&feature=youtu.be
    YouTube
    LOTRO
    Update 24: Vales of Anduin (Full Soundtrack) - The Lord of the Rin...
Thank you, Arien!
Also in LotRO:
July 13-14th (this coming weekend): Weatherstock XI. Event schedule. It's being held on Landroval server at the Bree festival grounds.
http://lotroartists.com/events/weatherstock-xi-concert-series/

Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:28 PM
I spotted Fladrif!
VardaToday at 4:29 PM
yay! That's three ents in one week. : )
Any other general gaming news? I see folks right now playing SWtOR, WoW, SC2
or any other news to pass along?
From Elrond:
https://www.mmorpg.com/mobile/news.cfm/read/53077/ismb/1/amazon-game-studios-announces-a-f2p-mmo-based-on-the-lord-of-the-rings.html
    MMORPG.com
    Amazon Game Studios Announces a F2P MMO Based on The Lord of the Rings
    Amazon Game Studios has announced a collaborative effort with Leyou to bring a new free-to-play MMOG based on The Lord of the Rings to both PC and console at an indeterminate future.
    There were hints about the forthcoming game during Leyou's September 2018 "business announcem...
Be a few years, but nice to see they figure the LotR is still a hot enough property for business. : )


ArienValarToday at 4:31 PM
:smiley:
VardaToday at 4:32 PM
You can also do the current LotRO free to play. A lot of deeding and questing to make in-game "money" but you can then play any part.
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:32 PM
I wonder if they're going to completely ignore LotRO, try to learn from whatever they think are the flaws, or just do something completely different anyway.
VardaToday at 4:33 PM
Maybe they still have to figure out what to do with the license. : )
How to make it different from LotRO, see if LotRO is still around.
Far as I can tell, LotRO is still going strong. Kind of annoying to split us across regular and legendary servers, but we're still going.

[Note: the article about the intended game includes this:
According to press information, the game will provide players with "a new, immersive game experience for epic exploration of the vast world of Tolkien". To bring The Lord of the Rings and Middle-earth to life, a new team is being organized inside Amazon Game Studios and includes veterans who have worked on a wide array of titles including EverQuest, Destiny, Planetside, World of Warcraft, Defiance, Rift, and other MMOs.
"This collaboration combines Amazon's game technology and the talented MMO developers at Amazon Game Studios with Leyou's expertise in designing free-to-play games and operating live-service games." The new title also comes with the blessing of Middle-earth Enterprises that provides official licensing opportunities.
Read more at https://www.mmorpg.com/news/amazon-game-studios-announces-a-f2p-mmo-based-on-the-lord-of-the-rings-1000053077#tSLTa1P2cUckQBi6.99 ]
[Note: One rumor is that it may be a tie-in to the Amazon TV show set pre-LotR. General agreement that it will not be ready for years yet.]

On to
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Tolkien!
I ran across this bit in the FotR "At the Sign of the Prancing Pony" that has a single line about a different kind of hobbit, that might be some of us adventurers or be interesting for fan-fiction.
Quote:
The Shire-hobbits referred to those of Bree, and to any others that lived beyond the borders, as Outsiders, and took very little interest in them, considering them dull and uncouth.
There were probably many more Outsiders scattered about in the West of the World in those days than the people of the Shire imagined.
Some, doubtless, were no better than tramps, ready to dig a hole in any bank and stay only as long as it suited them.
But in the Bree-land, at any rate, the hobbits were decent and prosperous, and no more rustic than most of their distant relatives Inside.
It was not yet forgotten that there had been a time when there was much coming and going between the Shire and Bree.
There was Bree-blood in the Brandybucks by all accounts.
Endquote.
.
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:37 PM
Hobo hobbits.
VardaToday at 4:37 PM
Aye!
And even those dug holes to stay in for a while.
Digging them in banks sounds rather Stoorish.
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:37 PM
Better than keeping a tent with you, perhaps. A bit dirtier though, I'm sure they don't line the walls well :wink:
VardaToday at 4:38 PM
One wonders, yess, we wondersss.
Suppose Gollum did that sometimes? It would help take him out of the annoying light.
ArienValarToday at 4:38 PM
i like the idea :smiley: its a bit like my belf teenie once upon a time thief Kiera who used to build shelters out of everything she found in the forest
VardaToday at 4:38 PM
There you go.
Maybe they had developed a fast way to line walls, a tent of sorts inside hung on the walls?
ArienValarToday at 4:39 PM
a blanket? furs?
VardaToday at 4:39 PM
Likely.
Canvas
ArienValarToday at 4:40 PM
animal skins , something like this i d think .. leather , rightly treated insulates quite well
VardaToday at 4:40 PM
Aye
Problem when it's wet. "banks"
Maybe they felt it well worth their time to treat the leather to make it fairly waterproof.
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:41 PM
So a sort of sleeping bag to fit the hole :smiley:
Inflatable I'm sure!
VardaToday at 4:41 PM
That would make sense.  Carryable.
ArienValarToday at 4:43 PM
I wonder where they came from, maybe children that didn't quite fit into their families because they were adventurers or just not happy with the traditional way of life hobbits had
VardaToday at 4:43 PM
Now that's interesting. It says so little about it here.
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:43 PM
Probably hobbits that wanted to continue adventuring, thinking it was a waste of their lives to even go home.
VardaToday at 4:44 PM
Adventuring was frowned on, so if a hobbit wanted to, he might wind up a hobo, true.
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:45 PM
Only a bachelor with his own home like Bilbo would really be welcome back if only because they couldn't really stop him, and they'd still sell his stuff :wink:

VardaToday at 4:45 PM
So I wonder how many of us in LotRO are hobos that managed to make enough coin to stay in the inns and pick up those houses the game "sells" us?
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:46 PM
Those houses you buy are just glorified bankholes :wink:
VardaToday at 4:46 PM
heh, true, they did do that! Took him a while to get most of it back.
Now we know!
renames the hobbit kinhouse to bankhole
We have three kin houses since we have three servers. Dis requested one be a hobbit hole. : )
ArienValarToday at 4:47 PM
:smile:
i like hobbit holes :smiley: they look cosy
VardaToday at 4:47 PM
Fun place! Needs us to do more for the deco there.
We had some members say they felt claustrophobic in the hobbit homes. We have our own huge island on Landroval.
We have a human style kin house on Ithil, as requested by Falco. : )
Something for everyone.
ArienValarToday at 4:48 PM
i put a bit in one of them .. i run out place for some hooks that are used up in my houses so i took the spares to the kinhouse i think
VardaToday at 4:48 PM
Thank you!
Another item in that Tolkien quote mentions
There was Bree-blood in the Brandybucks by all accounts.
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:49 PM
Hmm yes, those hobbit holes do strike me as a bit claustrophobic.
Maybe with enough windows it's different?
VardaToday at 4:49 PM
More comfy for us when we're hobbits
They're underground holes, but the upper part has windows. We can also add windows. I remember some sold in Rohan, when we reach that on the legendaries.
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:50 PM
I don't know what it is. Maybe when walls are thicker, layers of dirt, it feels like it's harder to get out when you need to?
ArienValarToday at 4:50 PM
but you know whats starting sound quite comfy for me right now ;)?
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:50 PM
A bankhole in the shape of a bed?
VardaToday at 4:50 PM
Low celings, seeming even lower due to the width of the rooms?
You can put in beds of various types. : )
ArienValarToday at 4:51 PM
uhu .. with a bit of fur aye :smiley:
VardaToday at 4:51 PM
We are coming up to the hour, Arien.
The sun is getting mighty low, big guy.
ArienValarToday at 4:52 PM
uh its an early sunset today
VardaToday at 4:52 PM
Pardon, Avengers quote from the Black Widow to the Hulk trying to calm him back to Banner.
Wrong fandom. cough
ArienValarToday at 4:52 PM
next week back to normal i think so hehe all right :smiley:
VardaToday at 4:52 PM
Yay!
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:53 PM
I've seen several Avengers movies from random places in the timeline, but not sure which one that is from.
VardaToday at 4:53 PM
the gavel runs up to the hammerpad
the hammerpad yawns widely and the gavel falls in
thoooonnnnnnnnkkkkk aghhhhhh!
the gavel is coughed back out and wobbles back to the shelf
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After-meeting!
ArienValarToday at 4:54 PM
acrrobatic gavel :wink:
VardaToday at 4:54 PM
Not intentionally. ; )
ArienValarToday at 4:54 PM
Namarie for now and have fun hehe indeed bit Jona style :smiley:
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:54 PM
Namarie!
VardaToday at 4:55 PM
Namarie!
Sorry about the ads on these but:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31hIs3tivmA
    YouTube
    The Smasher93
    Avengers | AGE OF ULTRON | The Hulk & Black Widow [ Hey big guy, s...
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:58 PM
Yah, Ultron, not seen that one.
VardaToday at 4:58 PM
Please feel free to wait and see them in order. : )
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 4:59 PM
Is that the same Hulk who had a thing with Arwen cough I mean Liv Tyler?
VardaToday at 4:59 PM
hahahaha
She uses the sentence and variants to help the Hulk calm back to Banner.
She's the only one who seems able to make the sentence work though. : )
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 5:01 PM
heh

Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 5:20 PM
Personal gaming report!

Right. For flashgaming, it might be a bit more repeat from here on, because one of the websites I check has only updated on tuesdays lately rather than 5 times in the week, so the pool of new games is smaller :wink:
That said, nothing wrong with putting a game I like back in the spotlight after a while.
http://www.onemorelevel.com/game/colossorama is the first game, the new one :wink: A colosseum fight where you can get new weapons and items after every wave, and advance in earlier modes to unlock newer ones. Plenty of stuff to unlock, but it doesn't really seem to get easier :smiley:
    Colossorama - OneMoreLevel.com

https://www.kongregate.com/games/Rachid1984/wizards-run is the second game! One I'd played before, completed before, but it came up again this week and I found myself playing through it all over again. So that's a good recommendation at least :smiley:
    Kongregate
    Wizard's Run
    Wizard#39s Run is a fantasy game that plays like a top-down shooter with RPG elements.
    If you survive the 9 levels and defeat the source of the evil, there is a...
An upgrade shooter where you advance through waves and levels and get up to 15 levels worth of talents, which you can put in WoW-like talent trees.
And after you're done, there's a survival mode too :smiley:
The maximum level does make it so you have to be a bit careful where you put your talents, but you can always look at the comments for advice.
That said, there are multiple combinations of talents that will get you there.
So get experimenting :wink:

https://www.kongregate.com/games/ZBlip/mine-of-sight is the third game, another oldy! A puzzle game, rather like minesweeper but with lots of different icons and mechanics which you have to consider in combination to complete each puzzle. No guessing required!
    Kongregate
    Mine of Sight
    Minesweeper#39s weird cousin. Use a variety of clues to find all the mines. Over 100 levels.
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VardaToday at 5:51 PM
Later : )
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 5:51 PM
Namarie!
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 6:23 PM

Blizzard gaming:
Heroes of the Storm:
Still level 353, no new levels. Had a bit less time, and only got one of the remaining 7 quests done, so now at 71%. But a few others are part way. One of em is at 98% which was a painful way to get out of a match, so close :wink:
Even more disappointing, they adjusted (or fixed?) the time remaining to finish, and it's now at about 3 weeks. So I might need to cram in a few more than 2 matches a day at the end, especially the healing one is going very slowly. We'll see!
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 6:53 PM
Hmm, after testing it a bit, the experience one is also going very slowly, at about 10% per match. Other than those two, the rest of the quests should be easy enough. We'll seeeee...
Hearthstone:
Bit more xp, most of it apparently to the shaman, with which I did the brawl, a special dungeon run with 8 bosses, to get a cardback which... apparently was a repeat of one of the early season rewards, so I turned out to already have it :wink:
So yeah, shaman far ahead, will need to catch up with the rest... other than that, there's also a series of daily quests for the fire festival event, rewarding lots of gold and card packs, for pretty easy quests. Recommended!
WoW:
More raiding! Visited Dazar'alor one more time.. and then headed into the Eternal Palace!
Fun new raid, new bosses, pretty easy on normal. After 2 raids we already got 6 of the 8 bossfights down. Some good loot for me as well, and first progress towards the new raid essence :smiley:
Let's see, lots of other stuff done, hard to keep track...
Right. Dove into Kings' Rest again, this time on mythic+. Was hoping to get a lower one to start with, but ended up in a +5 because it was the lowest available at the time, and managed to get through nicely, getting me my first essence rank from the Mythic+ essences. The tanky one anyway, I'll need to go in around that level twice more to get the other roles' essences.
I got my necklace to level 54, unlocking the next part of Magni's questline, taking me to the Emerald Dream for some void-slaying, and earning the second rank of the dragon essence, so got that too :wink:
Weekly this week is pet battles, and in getting the 5 pvp pet battles done for the quest, I also completed the achievement for winning 10 battles with an all magic type team. 4 more families to go!
As planned, I continued my questing in Zuldazar, finishing up the upgrade for the last outpost, which turned out to be.. a beerkeg. I'm sure I'll rest easier knowing that my flightmaster there can now be permanently drunk, I hope the flights are still reliable.
Then I completed the war campaign, or at least the 8.0 section, making my way along the southern shore of Zuldazar, sabotaging a flagship, killing some horde in a warport while dressed as a blood troll, and finally invading a ship and blowing it up after it discovered our camp.
One reward for this was getting Shandris as my fifth mission champion, who I've since leveled to rare and almost epic quality. No rest for her until she's legendary! With the fifth champion unlocked, I was finally able to progress further in the war effort advancements, and complete it, getting new benefits for world quests, warfronts and emissaries.
Other rewards for the war campaign were the completion of the Pathfinder 1 meta-achievement, increasing mountspeed in this expansion's zones by 20%, very useful, and getting the Dark Iron unlock questline available. But I haven't touched that yet after all, because I ended up using my pathfinder speedbonus and my new outposts for something else:
World quests! I have now started exploring Zandalar every night for world quests, having done almost only Kul Tiras world quests until now. In an attempt to do every world quest available on Zandalar at least once, I have made my way across the zones daily, adding anything new to my list, including a lot of rare mobs with quests. With those movement and outpost advantages, including the very fast crawg called Spud, it has been going quite well, and the first duplicates are already starting to appear. Strangely, those are mostly the rares, and I'd expect there to be a lot more world quests for rare mobs than normal world quests... maybe it's just chance, and I'll see more new ones in the future.
But if this keeps up, it's starting to thin out already after less than a week, which means I should have time to go for those Dark Iron soon. My promise still stands, when I complete that questline and make my Dark Iron, I'll put up a screenshot in our screenshots channel :wink:
And finally, I dabbled in the new heroic mode for the Stromgarde warfront. It is quite buggy still, and we won it by accident of a sorts, defeating the enemy commander in our own base because not only did he fail to portal back to his own base during the second assault wave, according to the hotfix notes he shouldn't even have been part of the second wave in the first place. So we completed the warfront quite early, well undergeared, and without expanding our conquest of the map beyond our main base and the two resource nodes. Very odd. And while that was enough to complete the quest and get a new cloaks as reward, it didn't even count for the achievements! I do hope they fix this mess soon.
*new cloak, sorry, just the one cloak :wink:
And that's my report for the week!
Ar-Pharazon-VToday at 8:12 PM
Namarie!
VardaToday at 9:29 PM
Namarie
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