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Foreword
As a game developer, I often find people asking me tough questions about the future.

Recently, however, I have been spending my time peering into the past -- as if through Galadriel's mirror -- reviewing early gameplay experiences. From this analysis we are making changes to better acclimate both those new to the wonderful world of Middle-earth and those new to MMOs in general.

It has been an extraordinary experience, one that I hope will be well-received by all our new visitors as well as anyone planning to play through the game again from levels 1-15.

A New Way of Thinking
When we carefully considered the experience that we needed to create for new players, 4 goals came to the forefront.
The gameplay should:

• Capture and engage players' attention
  
• Provide interesting and varied questing and activities
  
• Introduce players to the game, rather than overwhelm them with detail
  
• Most importantly, be FUN!

With these four goals in mind we began playing through the new player experiences for each race to identify the high and low points of each race's story. Not surprisingly, a lot has changed in the almost two years since The Lord of the Rings Online was launched! We found many places to enhance the early gameplay and story.

General Changes
Because of the differences between the two new player experiences, we will be discussing the Elf and Dwarf experiences extensively throughout this diary rather than focusing on the Man and Hobbit experiences. While there are changes to the Man and Hobbit experience from Jailbreak through the end of the Shire and Staddle, they are less substantial than the changes to the Dwarf and Elf experiences. Still, it is important to explain the changes that have been made to all four new player experiences.

We have added the ability to skip the new player tutorial from the character creation screen. This will allow a new character to use a selection box to skip over the new player tutorial instance (Jailbreak, The Silver Deep or The Fall of Edhelion) and make their way directly to the new player experience. Using this option will place you in the game world at level one without any equipment beyond your new starter gear.

We have also added a Skip Tutorial quest to each of the tutorial instances. This quest will advance you through to the public areas of Archet and the area outside of Thorin's Hall at level two. You will have a choice of gear equivalent to what you would find within the tutorial instance.

The Skip Introduction will now skip you through the Raid on Archet and Skorgrim's Tomb instances into the public version of the world. You will be level 5 and have weapon equivalent to what you would have in the tutorial instance. This option is still for advanced players and is not available if you have not previously completed the Raid on Archet or Skorgrim's tomb with that specific race. This option is not available if you have chosen to advance the tutorial instance or taken the Skip Tutorial quest.

Elf/Dwarf Pre-Skorgrim's Tomb
We found many of the quests in this area told players to run back and forth or up and down over vast expanses of land. This took much of the fun out of the area and soaked it up like a sponge: a fun sponge. This made us sad and gave us a great starting point to make changes to the area.

On the Dwarf side we made the following changes:

• Dwarf characters now start in Frerin's Court, no longer in the Breghold.
  
  • The location of quest bestowers and trainers in the Breghold resulted in maddening travel times as players ran back and forth throughout their early careers. We decided that moving all NPCs to the centrally located Frerin's Court provided a central location where players could more easily access all surrounding content.
  
  
• Quests now spiral out from Frerin's Court.
  
  • Early quests ? those beyond the initial training bits ? drive players outside of Frerin's Court toward the Silver Deep.
  
  
• Quest targets are clearly defined and located in central areas.
  
  • Too many of the targets new players searched for were sharing spawn locations. This could lead to frustration and difficulty in finishing quests.
  
  
• We eliminated much of the zoning.
  
  • We removed much of the previously needed dungeon zoning as waiting through load screens is not fun. No fun sponges!
  
  
• Added new quests to support the experience.

On the Elf side we made the following changes:

• Starting location altered.
  
  • The ruins are now infested with evil and require cleansing. Players will find they arrive at Edhelion in nearly the same location they departed the tutorial instance.
  
  
• Quests are focused on Edhelion.
  
  • Quests focus on cleansing the ruins of the evil that has crept into the location after the Elf exodus.
  
  
• Elf players have a unique experience from Dwarf players.
  
  • Quests now give Elf players a feeling that they are separated from the Dwarf players, where before the experience was wholly shared. Elf and Dwarf players do eventually share the experience but the merge is more gradual.
  
  
• Removed all zoning.
  
  • Quest structure allows Elf players the freedom to explore the area surrounding Thorin's Hall without the need to go underground.
  
  
• Many new quests added to support the elf experience.

It may not sound like a lot, but the result is a significantly changed new player experience.

For both Dwarf and Elf players we made the following changes:

• Quest target locations centralized.
  
  • Quests that ran players up the hill toward Edhelion or up the hill beyond the mustering cave caused too much running through heavy monster camps. In an effort to lighten travel times we updated the locations of certain dungeons to create more centralized questing.
  
  
• Enhanced rewards.
  
  • Rewards are now catered more toward race/class than before. We also added some dye to alleviate the monochromatic feel of new player armors.

Post Skorgrim's Tomb ? Dwarf
Dwarves arrive outside of Thorin's Hall as before. There are still ancillary quests available in the area of Frerin's Court, but the main storyline and many of the side quests will now drive players immediately toward Noglond where the meat of the questing will take place.

The old quests still exist. We did not feel the need to remove them, just a desire to better acquaint newer players with the game world.

Noglond now becomes the primary location for all early post-Tomb dwarf quests. This area supports questing from levels 5-10 and directs players toward Gondamon when they are ready to move there.

Post Skorgrim's Tomb ? Elf
Elf players now appear on a patio within Celondim rather than a full minute out of town. There they are greeted and directed to the quest givers of Celondim.

Those making their way through the Elf new player experience will find they now follow a very different track. Nen Hilith takes on a higher profile as quests more fully support this area. Players are slowly moved north toward Duillond and will find less back-tracking toward Celondim.

The Celondim-Duillond questing area serves players from levels 5-10 and ultimately pushes players toward the shared Dwarf and Elf hub of Gondamon..

Gondamon ? Epic Story
While Elf and Dwarf players have been following their own lines of the Prologue until this point, it is in Gondamon that they come together and share the Ered Luin story line.

Gondamon has undergone a significant transformation in terms of quest layout and bestowal. In an effort to provide players a cleaner questing experience, more quests are available from the outset and fewer quests send players back and forth to the same location multiple times. We have also made an effort to create smaller ancillary hubs where they make sense. An example of this is Thrasi's Lodge or the elf ruin near the Edain Mounds.

The epic story now drives players toward these hubs and allows players to complete these parallel quests while following the main story path. It is our hope that this assists players in learning our questing system earlier in their careers.

Gondamon's story now ends in the Edain mounds, Although the Epic story will still take players through the area of Rath Teraig, we consider the Edain Mounds as the highest level content now available in the new player sections of Ered Luin. Gondamon is built for questing from levels 9 ? 15 and provides direction on where to go from there.

Travel
More travel routes have been opened between the early questing areas to allow players to utilize the travel system sooner. We have also lowered the cost of many horse routes to ensure that new players have access to these new routes.

Interactive Objects
Many interactive objects in the world, mostly quest objects, have had their usage times lowered. We found that collecting an object for ten seconds was an arbitrary and unnecessary amount of time.

Crafting objects and some special quest interactions will still take longer, but these are now the exceptions, not the rule.

The Shire
No major changes were made to the Shire. Why? We like the Shire ? but more importantly, you like the Shire. As they say, if it isn't broken…

The minor changes made in the Shire are pretty straight forward. Delivering Mail and Pies now provides players with a slight boost to run speed to make those deliveries swifter. The Shire is still a good questing area for players from levels 5-15.

Why change this and why now?
Things needed to change in Ered Luin ? both player feedback and internal data supported this with the number of times quests were completed. We've wanted to revisit our starting areas for some time now, and with Book 7 we had the opportunity to make these changes.

Okay, you changed the new player stuff ? so what next?
Good question! Our goal is to ensure that questing in The Lord of the Rings Online makes sense and allows players to experience the game in an engaging, interesting, and most importantly fun way. This means some areas will need adjustment in the future. As we move toward that future, do not be surprised to find familiar areas have become clearer quest destinations with far less running back and forth and more opportunity for true exploration, or that the epic storyline has become friendlier to solo and smaller groups of players. Our goals are to address the issues we are finding in a comprehensive manner and improve the overall flow of the player experience.

We are also working on adding nifty ways of finding quests and getting rewards and making the world feel more alive, so that every day in Middle-earth continues your story. After all, this seems a right pleasant place to live!