Scouting out the Lonelands

So I’m currently running around Middle Earth with my 130 Elf Huntress as I complete the Ballad of Bingo Boffin. As a result, I’m revisiting a bunch of low level areas, and have decided to make outfits to go with it. My last outfit was worn as I quested through the Barrow Downs just outside of Bree, and today I’m sporting a more stealthy outfit as I travel through the Lonelands.

I’m actually having quite a bit of fun with this. Bingo Boffin is a pretty demanding hobbit. He’s lazy, and I’m half-convinced he can’t do anything for himself. But running around as a skilled warrior helping out a curious hobbit does make me feel more immersed in the world of Middle Earth than I have in a long time, and I’m having a lot of fun getting into the experience. Feeling annoyance at Bingo, dressing up in area-appropriate clothing, feeling superior and awesome next to this bumbling hobbit…It’s pretty awesome.

I see you orcs. Prepare to meet your maker.

I really had too much fun with this. But LOTRO is supposed to be fun, so that’s all that really matters. And as much as Bingo annoys me, questing for him really does make me feel like I’m back in Middle Earth.

So you want to dance, do you? Have at me, scum!

Moving on to a different orc camp to wreak more havoc…

Also, it’s really funny remembering that lower level mobs won’t attack you. You can literally run through the middle of an orc camp and they won’t even come near you. It’s like you don’t exist.

I’m supposed to kill you…but…you’re not attacking me…

Look, if I don’t kill you, you promise not to hurt me, right?

Alas, it was time to move on from my new friend. So I remounted my horse, and set off for Weathertop.

Also, I just want to say, it’s moments like this — where I can just stand at a distance and look at the majesty of Weathertop that I’m reminded of how much I love this game. This view is just so cool.

Lol I love how the feathers just float down after you kill a bird.

Outfit:
Head: Lesser Secret of the West Helmet (burgundy)
Shoulders: Pauldrons of the Mark (red)
Lesser Secret of the West Breastplate (crimson)
Gloves: The Bowmaster’s Gloves (crimson)
Legs: Spellweaver’s Leggings (red)
Feet: Lesser Memory of the West Shoes (black)
Bow: Exquisite Black Ash Bow
Sword: Defender of Gwingris
Dagger: Hero’s Dagger

Warsteed
Head: Head-Piece of the Northern Herald (Ccrimson)
Body: Harness of the Harbinger (crimson)
Saddle: Citadel saddle
Legs: Citadel Leggings (red)

Hunting in the Barrows

This one’s just a fun, casual outfit I made once I realized that the Lesser Claw of the West set, the Isengard Dispeller set, and the Great Alliance set all share a similar default color. That’s literally all it took. I got excited that I wouldn’t have to dye much, and I made this outfit.

I also realized I’d never used these leggings for anything. So…yeah. That’s about it.

I think this outfit is going to become one of my faves for my elf huntress.

Outfit:
Shoulders: Shoulders of the Isengard Dispeller
Back: Quiver of the Waking Wood
Chest: Lesser Claw of the West Breastplate (default)
Hands: Gauntlets of the Hidden Blade (evendim blue)
Legs: Greaves of the Great Alliance (default)
Feet: Threadbare Boots of the Dunland Healer (walnut brown)
Bow: Sealed Hunter’s Bow of the First Age
Sword: Sealed Reshaped Champion’s Sword of the First Age
Dagger: Invader’s Stiletto

Warsteed:
Head: Head-Piece of the Northern Herald (navy)
Body: Caparison of the Great Alliance (default)
Feet: Starlight Leg-Guards
Saddle: Saddle of Blackroot
Gear: Snow-Beast Accessory

Rohirric Ruffian

Here’s another sort of Viking-inspired outfit, this time with a distinctly Rohirric twist. The helm and gloves are both from Rohirrim cosmetic sets. It also gave me a chance to try out the Snowbeast warsteed set, which I’d gotten for myself last Christmas but haven’t really used. The outfit is very much supposed to feel like a scrapped together set.

Try me, outlaw! My baby bear will mess you up!

Ironically (or perhaps unironically if the outfit is supposed to be scrapped together??) it’s actually my high elf modeling this outfit. I think my thought process was supposed to be somewhat along the lines of, “what if my elf huntress went to Rohan and decided to immerse herself in the culture?” I’m not sure the finished product reflects that so much…by the time I finished it I actually had this narrative of a daughter of one of the horse lords who wanted to take up her father’s sword after he died, but had to scrap together her own armor and weapons to do so.

Something slew this orc…we should investigate!

I actually really had fun with this outfit. I don’t know why…It’s just fun. And less “put together” than what I normally strive for.

I like that you can just see my bear cup poking out between my legs. Like it’s ready to attack, but not ready enough to go out in front lol

Outfit:
Head: Helm of the Hornburg Defender
Shoulders: Embroidered Mantle of Bard’s Will (black)
Back: Cloak of the Skin-Changers (black)
Chest: Jacket of the Sunset hills (default)
Legs: none -- for some reason if you wear pants with this tunic, it will change the color of the tunic t the color of the pants. I'm not lying. I don't know why. 
Hands: Gloves of the Isengard Dispeller
Feet: Lithe Boots of Thranduil’s Power (black)
Bow: Arinora’s Bow
Dagger: Bronze Dagger
Sword: Potent Dextrous sword of Finesse

Warsteed:
Complete Snow Beast set (dyed black)

I think going forward I want to make more of these “pieced together” looks. They’re really fun 🙂 It’s like organized chaos. My favorite kind of chaos (and organization, if I’m being honest).

Forest Traveller

So…after some debate, I just said screw it. I’m posting this outfit in green too. After all, the purpose of this blog is really for me to catalogue my favorite outfits for my own reference. And considering this has been my huntress’ main outfit for over a year now, I decided I would post it too. Even if it is essentially the same as the last outfit.

This outfit actually came first, as I mentioned in my last post. It has different shoulders than the previous outfit – these shoulders were my initial pick to go with this outfit, but when I dyed it all orange, the shoulders didn’t work as well. So that’s that.

I wanted to pick an elk to go with the outfit, but it proved a bit harder than last outfit. In the end I decided to highlight the Elk of Felegoth’s Glory, but I also couldn’t resist adding a warsteed as well. Oops.

Also I had a really hard time picking a spot to take pictures in. It was hard to balance finding a place that was lush and green enough while also not being too dark, as is often the problem with forests. I tried Northern Mirkwood first, but that was too dark. Then I tried Fangorn Forest, and that was pretty good, except for an overall murkiness and fog. I did end up using several photos from that though. I did then go to the Old Forest at the edge of Bree just for some last photos, and that was probably the best location I found.

It was still hard though to get pictures where the outfit stood out enough against all the green.

Outfit:
Head: Time-Worn Headpiece (forest green)
Shoulders: Wymmar’s End (dark green)
Back: Cloak of the Autumn Traveller (dark green)
Chest: Ceremonial Thunderstruck Shirt (forest green)
Hands: The Bowmaster’s Gloves (forest green)
Legs: Trousers of the Autumn Traveller (dark green)
Feet: Lesser Memory of the West Shoes (sienna)
Bow: Exquisite Black Ash Bow

Warsteed:

Head: Withywindle Halter (forest green)
Caparison: Withywindle Caparison (forest green)
Legs: Withywindle Leggings (forest green)
Saddle: Withywindle Saddle
Gear: Hunter’s Gear

Elk: Elk of Felegoth’s Glory

Winter Huntress

Ahh…it’s been a while since I last posted. But with Yule Festival underway, I got to revisit a bunch of old outfits I’d been working on. So I figured I’d post some of the winter-themed ones (Also I tend to reserve outfit slots for unfinished/unposted outfits, and I was beginning to run out of new slots for new outfits…).

So this is just another sort of rugged look for my hunter. I wanted one that was more brown and neutral, with a “fur and leather” look to it.

Also I finally got the spotted warsteed skin to drop from warbands in East Rohan! I think this time it dropped off of the Warg Pack south of Harding – but in the past there doesn’t seem to be any pattern to which war band drops it most frequently. So sorry to anyone who was looking for advice

Also, I don’t know if this is happening to anyone else, but I’ve been noticing some shadow issues with the warsteed armor. There are rectangular patches where the in-game lighting isn’t reflected/absorbed properly, so they appear either super light, or – in the case of the warsteed of the hunter – just show up as black patches. You can see this on the front legs in the picture below:

Anyways. I did send a bug report in, but it’s probably not high on the priority list of things that need to be addressed lol.

Outfit:
Shoulders: Embroidered Mantle of Bard’s Will (black)
Back: Quiver of the Waking Wood
Hands: Gauntlets of the Hidden Blade (black)
Chest: Lesser Claw of the West Breastplate (umber)
Legs: Huneric Hundred-Slayer’s Garb (umber)
Feet: Lithe Boots of Thrandruil’s Power (walnut brown)

Horse:
Body: Hunter’s Caparison (default)
Legs: Hunter’s Leggings (default)
Head: Head-piece of Lamedon
Saddle: Shimmering Breeze Saddle

Waterbird

I finally made an outfit based around the cloak of the Ibis! I knew from the start I wanted to pair it with the robe of hopeful melody because of the similar bird like patterns on the chest piece, and from there the rest of the outfit sort of just fell together!

The rest of the outfit ended up being composed of other pieces from the Dol Guldur raid – the shoulders are from the hunter set, and the hands and feet are from the guardian set. The armors from that set seem to either be based around bird imagery or leaf imagery, so I picked the ones that were focused more on birds. The color scheme ended up being based on the shoulders, which have an undyable patch of dark brown, so I ended up dying everything else to match it.

I also got to pull out a warsteed set I’d never actually used before – the Elven Wing Set. I got it back when it was only periodically available, but never found an outfit it matched. UNTIL NOW.

It took some fiddling with the dyes to get the brown colors to match, but eventually I got it using burgundy dye for the warsteed.

Outfit:
Head: Hat of the Hopeful Melody (dark clay)
Shoulders: Far-Arrow’s Shoulders (lorien gold)
Back: Cloak of the Ibis (Dark clay)
Chest: Robe of the Hopeful Melody (dark clay)
Hands: Shield-Master’s Gauntlets (lorien gold)
Legs: Trousers of the Hopeful Melody (dark clay)
Feet: Shield-Master’s Boots (lorien gold)
Bow: Hunter’s Bow of the First Age (level 100)

Warsteed:
Head: Elven Wing Halter (burgundy)
Body: Elven Wing Caparison (burgundy)
Saddle: Saddle of the Forest Spring
Gear: Hunter’s Gear

Robin Hood

I’ve decided it’s time I get around to more of the outfits I tend to use as default looks for my characters. So here’s one I use for my hunter, which may or may not be but definitely IS heavily inspired by the tale of Robin Hood lol 🙂

So this outfit ended up being REALLY hard to take pictures of because it blended in way too well with the surroundings. Which I guess is the point? But I knew from the get go that I wanted to take the pictures in North Mirkwood/Dalelands…and it just…it worked too well lol.

The warsteed was really fun though. After recently opening some lootboxes I’ve gotten a lot of new cosmetics, including the warsteed set of the wild hills. I really like how it looks on my hunter’s steed.

Um…so…yeah. Not much to say! Not a particularly interesting outfit, just fun and ranger-y!

Outfit:
Head: Worn Ranger’s Hood (Grey)
Shoulders: Potent Skirmish Pauldrons of the Mark (Olive)
Back: Fancy Quiver (Sienna)
Body: Potent Battle Armour of the Mark (Olive)
Hands: Enduring Gauntlets of the Traveler (Black)
Feet: Reworked Boots (Grey)
Bow: Polished Lebethron Bow of Precision

Warsteed:
Head: Head-piece of the Northern Herald (olive)
Body: Caparison of the Wild Hills (default)
Saddle: Saddle of the Wild Hills
Gear: Hunter’s Gear

Gleaming Gold

So this is another outfit that fell together really quickly. I had stopped by Lalia’s Market cause it had the nearest vault, and I happened to espy Ceremonial Bleastplate of the Shining Blades (it’s a cosmetic version of champion moors armor). Anyways, I immediately decided I had to make an outfit surrounding it, and the resulting get up is basically a mix of Ettenmoors and Lothlorien raid armor.

The thing that honestly took the longest with this outfit was finding a matching war-steed get up that I could deem acceptable. Honestly, it’s not exactly what I pictured, but it’s fine. Maybe if I find something better I’ll edit the post, but it looks good enough.

I’m super happy with this outfit. I wanted something that would look regal and elegant but also deadly at the same time. This to me looked like something like Galadriel might even wear into battle. Definitely someone of very high status.

The outfit is featured on two of my high elves – my huntress (I made the outfit for her originally) and my new high elf champ, who I decided matched the outfit perfectly.

I made her on a whim, and then when level boosts went on a huge sale a couple weeks back I got one to use on her. I decided to go with the level 95 booster, since it’s been awhile since I’ve done some of the endgame stuff from Gondor onward. I almost kind of regret it, since I could have gotten so much more stuff if I went with a level 120 aria…but….enh. If I did that I probably wouldn’t go replay those regions. Besides, the level 95 was cheaper.

Here’s my huntress wearing the outfit:

I even picked a bow that matched the outfit!

Outfit:
Head: Circlet of Restoration (rust) **Lore master moors armor - ceremonial available in Lalia's Market**
Chest: Ceremonial Breastplate of the Shining Blades (white) **Champ moors armor - ceremonial available at Lalia's**
Legs: Leggings of Command (Imladris Fallen Leaf) **Captain moors armor - ceremonial available at Lalia's)
Shoulders: Shoulders of the Lady's Power (rust) **Champion Dar Narbugud raid armor
Hands: Gauntlets of the Lady's Power (rust) **Champion Dar Narbugud raid armor
Feet: Lesser Cry of the West Boots (rust) **Warden Harndirion armor** (I wanted to use the boots from champ Dar Narbugud set, but there were clipping issues).
Bow: Flightsong
Sword: Defender of Gwingris

War-Steed:
Head: Halter of Rivendell (rust)
Body: Caparison of Rivendell (rust)
Saddle: Saddle of Rivendell
Legs: Leggings of Rivendell (rust)

Now all that’s left is to make an equally awesome outfit in silver! The challenge has commenced 🙂

Scout from Rivendell

This is another outfit I’ve had for awhile, just never got around to taking photos of. I was hoping to take pictures in daylight, but it turns out twilight and evening suited the outfit well.

I’ve really enjoyed my high elf huntress. She’s been so fun to play and make outfits for, and I’ve really embraced the nature vibes when it comes to her style 🙂

This outfit was really centered around the shoulders and the cloak. It’s a pretty fun outfit in my opinion – although it probably works best for the autumn. I’ll probably wear it come harvestfest and fall festival.

Outfit: 
Back: Cloak of the Gloaming Autumn (Rivendell Green)
Shoulders: Mantle of the Gloaming Autumn (default/washed)
Chest: Jacket of the Wall-Warden (default)
Legs: Leggings of the Wall-Warden (default)
Feet: Boots of the Wall-Warden (default)
Hands: Bow-Master's Gloves (rivendell green)
Bow: Exquisite Black Ash Bow

War Steed:
Head: Head-Piece of the Northern Herald (Forest Green)
Body: Citadel Caparison (Forest Green)
Saddle: Citadel Saddle
Gear: Hunter's Gear

Into Wildermore

This was actually the first vales outfit I made, but in retrospect I’m glad I held off on taking screenshots until my huntress got her warsteed.

This is one of those outfits that came together almost immediately. I really don’t have much to say…I’m in the middle of exams and my brain is fried. All I have left is calculus…that doesn’t require much brain power…right?

I’m also still trying to figure out the graphics on my computer…I swear I always turn the graphics all the way up, and it’ll look great in game, and then I’ll take screenshots and it’ll be grainy. I’m actually getting a new computer soon – the one I currently have still runs windows 2007 and is over 10 years old. The screen is being held together with paper clips and the battery is dying and it doesn’t recognize a lot of newer wifi systems…but it’s fine. It runs LOTRO, after all, right?

Outfit:
Shoulders: Fated Westfold Assault Shoulder Pads (olive)
Chest: Doublet of the Trickster 
Legs: Trousers of the Woodsmen
Hands: Leather Gauntlets of the Leaping Stag (grey)
Feet: Reworked Boots (grey)
Back: Cloak of the Skin-Changers (umber)

Warsteed
Head: Hunter's Halter (default)
Caparison: Hunter's Caparison (default)
Saddle: Hunter's Saddle 
Mane/tail: white
Body: brindled white