Happy Yule Fest

From anonyHobbit and Bee, who just built their first snowman. (Bee found the acorn.)

Breathe Deep the Mirkwood Air

Having seen The Battle of the Five Armies (twice) when it was released on Friday, I returned home with a strong desire to visit Mirkwood again. I found it spookily beautiful when I first came there, and missed the bare trees and misty air. So Arae went back. She completed a few deeds that she'd skipped the first time through, and killed one heckload of Orcs. 

Far-Gazer

I now begin the painstaking process of putting together an outfit based on Thranduil's armour!

Horrorfest 2014

The crowds gathered in force this past weekend for the crazy fun that was Landroval's Horrorfest event. Elimraen and Faina spent an enthusiastic week trying to find perfect outfits, cancelling all other events in the diaries, stocking up on pie/beer/wool (I was supposed to be knitting at the same time as dancing) and made their way to the Da Bugans homestead of doom in time to catch the first band on Friday night. 

Here follow just a small selection of the screenshots Elim took. She thinks she has a promising future as a photojournalist. Judging by the dreadful feelings of withdrawal I was going through yesterday*, I'd say she's going to be spending enough time at future events to make that dream a reality. 

*Araewenel ran around Enedwaith for about ten minutes last night, finishing off some random Algraig reputation quests. The music craving got the better of her after that and she ported to Bree, desperately ran around looking for musicians, couldn't find any, so ran to the Pony to buy a harp from the Bard so that she could play something herself. There, thankfully, she found a minstrel playing in front of the fire and had a jig. Crisis averted. 

Screenies!

BARA BAHAU

New party outfits

Flock of Smeagols, making us feel all kinds of uncomfortable

We had a right little sync-dance troupe going

The Starlight Orchestra <3

Vethlo's 'and now I must return to my home planet' pose

A Rock and a Hard Place, plus fireworks!

Mondbarden! 

And my favourite band of the event, Old Winyards. They played the Farmer Maggot Pibgorn-off song and Elim went weak at the knees

Elimraen Elvanui, Level 36, Overachiever

Regrets her decision to come here today.

Dancing in the Town Square with Friends

Just caught Under the Sunlit Sky and Notenzauber playing in Bree. Elimraen was lucky enough to be taken under the wing of Rye, a kinnie, who gave her all sorts of tips about sync dancing. Good times :)

ALL THE NAMES 

Araewenel Elvanui, My First Level Capped Toon!

This happened last night! 

Dear Arae, who has been my main since about September 2012, reached level 100. I'd been putting it off and putting it off, feeling a certain unwillingness to 'have nothing left to do', which is a total joke, by the way. She has so much left to do. 
  
She'd been fighting her way round Gondor for the past couple of weeks, mostly with the XP Disabler equipped. Finally, last night, she got to level 99-with-about-100,000-xp-left-to-gain-before-hitting-100. [Gondor spoilers ahead] 

She got to the tent where Jajax was being held by Abedec. She checked her xp. I swung the camera around to look at her face and hit complete.

Hoorah!! There is something weird and wonderful about reaching level cap for the first time! Arae has been through a lot - unguided by me (or that's how it feels), she became attached to a certain NPC who did not make it as far as Gondor. More on that in future '30 Photos' posts. Now I think of her as damaged, with not a lot of laughter left in her. So this was a special moment. We've come a long way.

After rescuing Jajax and bidding him farewell, with a few whispered words to him about a kinnie who misses him, she made her way back to Dol Amroth. Having changed her outfit, obvs. Here she is on the road with newly-named Rovail (wings), who is wearing her nice new saddlebags. 

Arae likes Harpers' Court best of all in Dol Amroth. She went there to contemplate her journey so far and what is left ahead of her, if she can find the hope to keep on fighting. 

[Spoiler! She can :D]

Lotro(geek)'s 30 Day Picture Challenge: Picture 1

One year and four months ago, the Lotrogeek tumblr owner issued a picture challenge to her followers. Ever on the ball, a couple of months ago I actually came across it. I don't like to back down from a challenge unless it suits me or I can't be bothered, so I have decided to take this up, but on my own terms, otherwise it might become not fun. Nothing to do with Lotro should ever feel like a chore!

Here's the original post by Lotrogeek. I'm going to be all P about it (Myers-Briggs reference woo) and have no structure to the order I do it in, or the time it takes me. So, without further ado, here is number 30 on the list: 

The Faithful Follower - Show us that soldier, animal, herald, anyone that follows you faithfully through the game and makes you feel safe.

I have a lil' Hobbit Cook who splits most of her time between Michel Delving and Hobbiton, occasionally going so far as Bree for a festival. She's followed around constantly by her spotted shrew, Bee. The Hobbit herself is an introvert and doesn't take kindly to people even knowing her name. She's not in a kin. She hardly ever comes out of her shell to talk to people. But one time she did bow to Pineleaf when she ran across her farming in MD. I can happily report that she bowed back. 

Anyway! Voila, the Hobbit and Bee. 

(Sorry, Bee. I still think you're beautiful)

Middle-earth Yes; Regular Earth No

One day last month I was walking home from work. I was walking home in real life, in real life England, because that is where I am sometimes. Over the noise of the traffic I heard the strains of some music or other and before I knew it the thought 'Oh, I wonder if a band is playing in one of the squares in Bree. I should go and watch!' had fully formed in my mind. I facepalmed and laughed and then tweeted about it, obviously. 

Cue Lady Ziribella (new Twitter friend and imagination-sparker) talking about how it might not have been taken too well if I'd stopped by to have a dance. It made me think about some of the stuff that we take for granted in the game that is just not ok out there in the real world. So here's one of those 'This internet thing in real life' lists with a LotRO theme. 

Middle-earth yes; regular Earth no:

• Jumping over passers-by on your horse (thanks @ladyziribella)
• Bowing to a stranger because you agree with something you overheard them saying.
• Sending strangers (or sometimes anyone) jewellery, wood, oil that is on fire, etc in the post. Sending weapons in the post is illegal as it turns out. 
• Getting into people's wardrobes and trying on all their clothes.
• Laughing while talking about your friends dying, killing people, genocide.
• Gaining access to other people’s houses to have a look at their stuff and decorating choices without them knowing. 
• Not showering for 2 years, 4 years, 6 years. Anything beyond 2 days is pushing it, frankly. Running through rivers doesn’t count. Going for a swim might count depending on water quality.
• Synchronised dancing at parties or festivals. Looks amazing online (one of my very favourite things to do ingame actually!). But. If you attempt this in real life you may only succeed in giving off a Macarena/Whigfield vibe. Avoid.

I may continue adding to this as the ideas come but it's been long enough in the back of my mind that I just wanted to get it the heck posted. 

Weatherstock VI

This year was my first at Weatherstock! A couple of Gladden friends and I decided to create characters on Landroval for the festival and I had levelled Elimraen to 18 by the time it arrived.

Elimraen. To her shame the Dwarf dances are her favourites.

I am of the personality type that likes to obsessively relive funtimes. Since Saturday I've lost count of the number of times I've watched the LOTRO Players Twitch recording of Weatherstock, or at least certain parts of it (for instance, oh my gosh how good was the group that played Weatherstock Forever after the competition part had finished??). So, in order that I can indulge my nostalgic sensibilities, my plan for this post is to compile a list of Weatherstock 2014 photos, videos, etc, for ease of reference and finding. And also to give my impressions as a first time attendee! 

This next section gives a kind of history of me in the game. I didn't mean for it to turn out this long, but since it's my first post I thought I could give some context. Skip if you want :)

So, backtracking a bit. I believe Elimraen was created when I was a complete noob to LotRO, so back in about September 2012. I knew nothing about servers so I thought that all these names I was seeing on the list were places to begin in the game. As a result, I probably made my first character on Imladris because ELVES. I don't remember why I kept on switching servers, nor why I finally came to rest on Gladden, but I did, and I think I have around 15 toons on various servers wondering why I created them and then never went back. Now my main, Hunter Elf girl Araewenel, is at 91 and loving Rohan.

When a kinnie on Gladden asked if I wanted to go to Weatherstock with her I was immediately keen so went to check out the server to see if I already had a presence there. I found a Champion and a Guardian waiting for me, both levelled to 10. I decided to run with the Guardian because the Champ was called Araewenel and it would have felt weird to have toons with the same name but nearly totally different identities. 

Elimraen was reactivated right as the Spring Festival was getting going so she spent the first little while getting all the dance emotes ready for the party. 

Righty-ho, back to Weatherstock then. 

We made it for the whole thing, happily. We turned up at the Forsaken Inn for the pre-show show and enjoyed a bit of dancing. After a lot of lag and awkward positioning of Elim's head while following a friend's horse, we made it to the top though not with the main procession. 

I don't have any knowledge of the music system ingame. But the bands sounded great and I can't imagine how much planning and practice must have gone into all the performances. The atmosphere was great, the schedule was kept to (impressive) and we were provided with as much ale, pie and pipeweed as we wanted. Also a shoutout to Deney who provided me with my barely-acknowledged RL dinner while I danced the day, night, and next day away (actually I don't know how many game days went by). 

My greatest personal achievement of the day was a good deal of synchronised dancing with a friend without voice chat help:

/dance_dwarf2 <3

Favourite songs from the festi: 

The bacon song

The War Horse song

Weatherstock Forever

The Nazgul v Farmer Maggot Pibgorn-off song 

I spotted a few people who I follow on twitter and came over all starstruck. I stealth-hailed one of them, he didn't respond so I guess I won. Then in Bree once we were all back, I think Shades were playing outside the Pony so we watched them too, and I was joined by this striking Elf in the Elf dance. Yay :) 

Here are links to the LOTRO Players Twitch videos of the festival, for those missing it or curious as to what it was all about:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3 

So, huge thanks to the Lonely Mountain Band, all the bands involved, Sapience and LOTRO Players for the streams and everyone who attended who made this an amazing event. I'm totally hooked on Landy.

Arae dreams of...

...starting a blog. And now she's done it. /whipptydoo!

More to follow I imagine :D