Welcome to the initial beta release of the new Community Site for The Lord of the Rings Online™! This update combines the features of the four independent community sites (news, forums, Lorebook, and my.lotro.com) into a single site with shared navigation and a host of new features.
The new site design has been developed based on extensive analysis of how players use our online sites and what they do with them. With tens of thousands of articles and entries, alongside millions of forum threads and player, character, monster, and kinship pages the old sites sometimes made it too hard to find what you're looking for.
What's New?
In short, quite a lot! In addition to the sections called out below we made substantial changes to the applications behind the scenes that power the online community experience. From upgrades to 3rd party packages like vBulletin to changes in our home-grown server applications and of course very visible changes to the site visual designs, there's not much that hasn't been updated.
Login
One of our main goals with the new site is to simplify how players use it. A change that will be immediately apparent to current community members is our new login system. Previously, players had to remember both a game login / password and a separate community login / password. Our new login system allows players to log in with only their game username and password. Already have a forum login? Don't worry - your old forum login name is now your community nickname and will continue to be the way players identify each other on the LOTRO websites. If you're a new player, you'll be prompted to create a community nickname the first time you log in to the new community sites.
Shared User Interface & Navigation
The first thing a visitor to the sites will notice is that all community features share a new combined UI and navigation scheme. This simplified menu system puts the most popular and useful links at your fingertips. An upcoming version of the site will even incorporate a bookmarking system so that players may create their own menu of favorite locations within the community site system.
Site-wide Search
No matter what you're looking for - whether it's the components for a crafted item, a player-created guide, a recent news story, or even a friend's character page, you can get to almost anywhere in the site via the shared search box.
Customizable Home Page
In the past, the home page of my.lotro.com was the same for all players. In fact, we really had 4 different home pages - one for each site. If a player wanted to know what was going on around the world of LOTRO they would need to keep an eye on www.lotro.com, the forum homepage, Lorebook home, and the blog feed from my.lotro.com. No more! Now every player has the ability to have their own customized homepage that includes as much or as little information as they wish.
User home pages can be customized in multiple ways. First, logged-in users may rearrange any of the widgets on their page by dragging them around on the page. Second, players may set up their own color scheme which will propagate across all sections of the site. Finally, logged-in site users may add or remove widgets from the widget panel to their own home page.
Widget Panel & Widgets
Log into the site and you'll see that there's now a small button near the navigation on the upper right that reads "More Widgets." Click this button to open the widget panel. The initial release of the site includes a basic selection of widgets. More will be added in future releases; in fact, not only are we adding more widgets, but we're taking suggestions! Stop by the Community Site Feedback forum to share your ideas for new widgets.
A variety of widgets are currently available to choose from:
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My Blog
Embed a direct feed from your blog page right into your home page! |
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New Forum Posts
See the latest post activity in the forums.
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Community News
The latest articles from the LOTRO community team including Dev Diaries, official announcements and more.
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Featured Content
Specially selected info about the game and latest offers from the LOTRO Store. Keep an eye on this widget to make sure you don't miss a special event or offer!
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Site Help
New to the site? Community guidelines and other helpful links can be found in this widget.
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New Player Help
Not just new to the site, but new to LOTRO? This widget is placed by default on every user's home page and contains helpful links for first-timers and returning players alike.
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Messages
Another new feature is our new global message system. This widget lets you put your inbox right on your home page.
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Character Sheet
Tracking the progress of one of your characters? Drop their detailed character sheet right on your home page and save yourself a click when looking up your stats.
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Friends List
As part of this release we've completely revamped the Friends system. Anywhere you see another user's web nickname you can click and ask them to be your friend. This widget is another default and shows your list of friends.
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Map
Players may choose to include the interactive map of Middle-earth on their home page. With parchment and radar views, this map makes it easy to find a path within the lands of LOTRO!
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RSS Feed
This widget allows players to configure any RSS feed to include on their home page. Have a favorite fansite or source for MMO news? Want to subscribe to a favorite my.lotro.com blog or get a summary of the latest posts in a specific forum? This widget will let you do all of that. Even better, you may have multiple instances of this widget on the page, allowing you to monitor all your favorite feeds in one place.
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Skirmish Leaderboard
Love to Skirmish? Add this listing of top Skirmish players to your page and keep tabs on the competition.
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PvMP Leaderboard
In contention for a top spot on your server? Embed the PvMP leaderboards on your home page to track PvMP action on any server.
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Skirmish Stats
Access your detailed Skirmish performance information with this widget. Evaluate your performance, identify the Skirmish sessions that generate the most marks, or simply check your achievements over time.
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Friend Activity
Track your friends as they progress through the game's key events. Upcoming site releases will add community activity to the Friend Activity widget so you'll be able to see when your pals post on the forums, update a blog, or contribute an entry to the Lorebook.
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Character Log
Get detailed information about your characters as they progress through the game. Keep track of your achievements by placing this widget on your page.
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Skirmish Log
This widget places a detailed log of each Skirmish completion right on your home page.
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Major Sections
The site is divided into a number of sections that focus on providing specific features to players:
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My LOTRO
This is the front page of the community site for LOTRO players. Visitors who are not logged into the site see a standard selection of widgets. Players who log in will see their custom widgets here instead. This page is intended to be a player's utility kit for participating in the LOTRO community. Furthermore, since the site is also accessible in-game players can put widgets like the Map or Skirmish Stats on the page for use while in-game.
News & Articles
This section is home to all official articles published by the LOTRO team. Developer diaries, game news, special offers from the LOTRO Store and more live here.
Forums
The official game forums are accessible here. Players are encouraged to participate in a variety of user-to-user discussions about many topics of interest to LOTRO players. Returning players who used to keep the forum homepage bookmarked will probably want to switch to using the My LOTRO page. We've moved the calendar and news feeds to that section, and have focused the forum section on discussions alone.
Lorebook
This section includes the full Lorebook wiki as well as other articles and resources for players. The Lorebook is a full wiki - a collaborative reference that combines official game entries alongside articles submitted by players. Looking for a specifc item, quest, or location in Middle-earth? Find your answers (or contribute one!) here.
My Account
This is a direct link to the Turbine account management system. Update your subscription information, set your payment methods and more.
Help & Support
An online game like LOTRO can be complicated. Get help with any issues you encounter in this area. Find policies, FAQ's, and Premium Services like character world transfer are all contained in the Help & Support section.
Download the Game
The latest version of the game will always be available in this section. Download the standard or high-resolution version here.
Personal Links
Access your blog, update your preferences, manage your mailbox, and more with this collection of links that appear at the top-right of each page when you log in.
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Stay Tuned
This is the first release of our new community site. We've got more features and improvements coming. In the meantime let us know what you think in the Community Site Feedback forum!
