Isengard Cluster

By: Joe 'jwbarry' Barry

Aloha, and welcome to the Ring of Isengard. It's time to take a stand against the forces of Isengard as they near the peak of their power. In this dev diary we're going to walk through the design goals of the new instance cluster, their story, updates, all of the new instance cluster toys, etc.

The Stats

In this update we have a total of 5 instances -- three small fellowships, one fellowship, and one raid. There are 15 boss fights, two difficulty tiers, 10 challenges, over 75 new monsters, 250 new skills, 500 new effects, 200 new chest drops, and 54 new armour sets!

Recent History

As a team, we were very happy with how the "In Their Absence" cluster turned out. We had a solid amount of instances, a great variety of mechanics within and between the spaces, a strong story told through the instances and quests, selectable difficulty levels, two full sets of armour, and a host of gameplay updates and tweaks to improve the play experience. The play numbers supported our new ideas as being steps in the right direction, so we used these ideas as a new foundation to build our cluster.

Draigoch was a change-of-pace raid. He was meant to be more bite-sized and accessible to as much of the player base as possible as a really cool experience with a dragon.

Design Goals

This cluster is a return to the classic LOTRO cluster model with In Their Absence's added benefit of Tiers. Tiers work well because they not only allow us to keep content accessible (such as Draigoch on Tier 1) but also allow us to present a challenge to those who wish to experience one (such as Ost Dunhoth on Tier 2 and Challenge.) However, while we were very pleased with In Their Absence, there were areas we knew we needed to further focus on in order to raise the bar with our instances.

Interactives and environment were a heavy focus this time around. We have things like ballistas that need to be loaded and then fired, superheated walls the boss can knock you back into, and giant saw mills that chop down trees in the background. We wanted to focus on bringing the spaces fully to life and making sure there was always something going on around you; whether these things were important to the gameplay or just interactive background decorations.

We doubled down on story and bringing in what we call the Tolkien factor. (Otherwise known as T-Factor; see MadeOfLions's definition of T-Factor here.) In Their Absence didn't provide a large opportunity for us to sink our teeth into existing lore; it was primarily wrapping up a series of storylines and characters we had created. Heading into the Ring of Isengard and confronting Saruman allowed us a fantastic opportunity to craft a custom story that built off of and enhanced the lore of the books, being respectful of what we know to have happened, and filling in some cracks with what-ifs and potentials that deepen the story. This created a set of instances that really feel grounded not just in Middle-earth but in The Lord of the Rings.

We continued to push on enhancing and differentiating our difficulty tiers. Tier 1 remains focused on the casual pug player, offering a path for anyone to get in the instances and play. Tier 2 retains its target on kinships and established groups. Finally, Challenge is still for those that like to push the boundaries of their groups. With Isengard we focused on ensuring that each new level was noticeable and significant.  Going up a difficulty Tier should come with an impact on gameplay.

We have continued to push on and extend the gameplay upgrades we made within the last cluster. Automated Raid Markings and Cooldown Resets have returned within the new raid. Monsters have learned how to utilize bubbles and what we're calling overheals -- an attack that will inflict a permanent damage over time effect not removed until you are healed to (or over) full health. We have places where if you move you take damage, where if you aren't constantly moving you take damage and even one where you take damage if you're not jumping. Anger has been upgraded by Adaptation, where a monster can only be hit with each type of control once before becoming immune to it for the duration of its life. We have new UI elements to display and track important information of progress and the state of mechanics during boss fights.

We placed an extra emphasis on itemization for the instances this time by focusing on several areas: item drops, armour sets, and the new necklace.

There are over two hundred new items distributed through the chests in the new cluster, roughly evenly split between the instances and the raid. About a third of the items can be found in Tier 1 chests, about a third in Tier 2 chests and the final third from Challenge chests. These items have been statted to suit a vast variety of classes, playstyles and compliment the armour sets.

There are now three armour sets for each class, with each set corresponding to a different trait line. Each of these sets has a minor and a major version. The minor version has one skill affecting set bonus at 5 pieces while the major has two skill affecting set bonuses at 3 and 5 pieces. While the 5 piece bonuses are attractive, we see benefits from the mixing and matching of the various 3 set bonuses to create hybrid sets as well.

There is also a new mechanic involving upgrading and customizing a necklace. As you play through the cluster, you will accumulate Sigils of Orthanc. These Sigils can be used to craft a brand new necklace to your specifications. While the necklace starts as nothing more than a trinket, you'll be able to upgrade and enhance the necklace until you create a legendary quality neck piece that is suitable for your preferred playstyle.  Plus, one of the components involved with upgrading your necklace can also be used to upgrade Draigoch cloaks!

The Story

Now we get to the part that will probably stir the most of the conversation - the story. Why are we in Isengard, specifically the Tower, what are we possibly doing there, and how in Middle-earth are we going to actually fight Saruman and not shatter the lore and game world? We've spent much of the last year working out how all that comes together in a satisfying way. During this time we workshopped about a dozen different scenarios and possibilities, but ultimately came back to where we started and what we knew we had to do.

First question to deal with right off the bat: Are we really fighting Saruman? Yes, we have to. As soon as you say the words "Isengard Instance Cluster," he's the first thing everyone thinks of. There has to be a showdown with him. There isn't any way really around it that doesn't have tons of its own issues. Unfortunately, Isengard comes with built-in expectations that have to be met.

However, we totally acknowledge there's a metric boatload of built-in expectations that arrive as soon as you say "fight Saruman." The setup for that, how the battle goes, what he does, what you are able to do, who wins, how they win, etc etc etc. The following should help to answer a lot of those questions and concerns.

The most important part of our setup comes from a couple of seemingly innocuous lines in the books. During the council of Elrond, Gandalf tells of his encounter with Saruman where he was imprisoned on the peak of Orthanc. I've bolded the two parts in here we're particularly interested in for the purposes of this cluster...

Quote:

What is this ring? Where did it come from? What does it do? How come we never hear about it ever again?

Those questions make up the basis of the story for the Ring of Isengard cluster. Throughout the small fellowship and fellowship instances we'll discover the forges and learn that Saruman has been creating rings. The raid focuses on the threat they pose and destroying them.

Saruman has been copying Sauron's plan. He has created himself a ring that amplifies his control over the primal elements of nature. He has also created a suite of minor rings that have been given to several trusted lieutenants, each allowing the manipulation of a single element (fire, frost, lightning, acid, shadow). Fortunately for us, Saruman is capable but not competent in making rings. These rings do not have the same workmanship or quality of the Rings of Power -- there are minor flaws and impurities. They are still very potent, but their power is limited. But, even beyond the limitations of the minor rings, Saruman also made a very grave miscalculation. While his ring is more powerful than any one of the minor rings, together they can overwhelm his commanding ring.

The storyline of the raid is to find the lieutenants, destroy them, take their rings, and then battle Saruman on the peak of Orthanc.  It's here when you'll utilize the power of the minor rings to ultimately destroy his ring. Once that happens, victory is obtained and I won't spoil the end sequence. The goal of the raid is not to defeat Saruman. The goal is to destroy his ring and then get out alive. Saruman may still win the battle, but you will have struck a decisive blow.

This story gives us a very strong tie to the books and lets us grab onto a loose end that was never resolved within the lore. Now we know the resolution: an intrepid band of Free Peoples infiltrated Orthanc and destroyed the ring before it was able to have an impact on the upcoming war. Who knows how different Helm's Deep may have been had Saruman still had this power.

In Closing

It's not often you get to setup and build a storyline culminating in a battle with Saruman. We're proud to join the handful of people who have had that opportunity and feel we've put forth something that would rival anyone's best efforts.  But, at the same time, we're pushing our own best to brand new levels.

From Amlug, Fantus, Nohbody, and the dozens behind the scenes, we are proud to bid you welcome to Orthanc.