Finally another class steed! This time it is the Steed of the Burglar, available for a limited time in the Lotro store. To start out with the positive: I love this steed! It’s another well made steed with pouches and lovely details. To follow up with the negative: it’s not really a Burglar’s steed. It could be anybody’s. It has some daggers and ropes, but I expected a more “shady” looking steed for the burglar class, with lots of black and grey, not brown and olive which are more suitable to rangers or hunters. In my humble but loud opinion, the designer team for the class steeds is making some really odd colour choices for the classes lately. The Steed of the Champion which came before this one, is mostly brown and red, where I would expect blues and whites for a champ. The same is true for this steed, it just has the wrong colours. Another slightly negative point is that the tack is exactly the same on both sides of the horse. All other class steeds so far had two unique sides with different pouches or items hanging from the saddle. The flanks of this steed are mirror images of each other.

That said, I still liked the horse enough to purchase it for my burglar, even though she will probably be alternating with the Treasure Hunter’s Steed (which I just realized I have forgotten to feature on my blog).
As with all mounts that are purchased from the Lotro store, you will obtain an adapted but similar skin on your war-steed after release of the Riders of Rohan.
The steed is not hard to match with an outfit as it’s base colours are very common. Anything dyed umber and olive will probably match. I chose to use the Arth-crus chest piece because the colour matches the piece of rope on the saddle. The Arth-crus has matching fingerless gloves that would provide a nice detail as well if you’re looking for just a tiny bit of red to complement your attire.
After I took these screenshots I realized I had forgotten to swap her legendary dagger for a more common one that doesn’t display this annoying reddish glow. I seriously want cosmetic weapons!

Chest : Arth-crus, umber dye (boe drop from Isengard instances, light armour)
Head: Elegant Silk Hat, olive dye (Dunland quest reward, light armour)
Shoulders: Worn Ranger’s Wrap, umber dye (Volume III, Book 5 reward, cosmetic)
Hands: Fingerless Gloves, umber dye (Yule Festival quest reward -helping the poor-)
Legs: Shabby Leggings, umber dye (Yule Festival quest reward -helping the poor-)
Back: Campaign Backpack, olive dye (Lotro store or tedious ingame grind)
Mount: Steed of the Burglar, Lotro store exclusive

Here’s a preview of the new Farmer’s Faire 2012 mount. It costs 2 race tokens and 120 Farmer’s Faire Tokens. This sounds like a lot but what I’ve seen from the quest rewards so far, the amounts that are rewarded are quite generous.
I has a black and brown tack decorated with golden wheat.
The steed has +62% speed and 200 morale, just like the last Anniversary steed, so this seems to be the new norm for festival steeds that used to have 100 morale in the past.

It’s Summer Holiday and I am being very lazy making outfits, so my blog isn’t getting a lot of updates lately, but today it is time for a new post. Last week the Steed of the Lore-master made it to the Lotro store, and since I have a lore-master that I play almost every day, I got her the horse immediately. The design of this horse is somehow not entirely what I expected. In my humble opinion, it’s not really ugly, but it’s not that great either. It has a lot of scrolls hanging from the saddle and books and feathers and ink attached to it which is all very lore-masterish, but the rest of the tack seems to lack a certain degree of realism (and what’s the deal with that horn on the saddle?). I like the stars on the tack, but the combination with the tan horse and the weird burgundy hems seems a little off. Like some other class steeds, the horse tack doesn’t match any available ingame dye. Some dyes come close, but never exactly (the same problem arises with the Rune-keeper steed for example). On a more positive note, unlike the Steed of the Burglar, this horse does have two different sides, which is very nice. The strange colours make it hard to match the horse with a suitable outfit. More so even, because I don’t usually wear these colours on my lore-master. But hey, I don’t shy away from a cosmetic challenge!
The good news is that as soon as the Riders of Rohan expansion launches, I will automatically get this horse as a cosmetic design for my War-steed, and I will be able to alter colours, mix and match with other pieces, and fashion a Lore-master steed of my own! If you want to see what the Lore-master War-steed cosmetics look like, check out the newly released developer diary video about War-steeds. About halfway the Lore-master Steed comes into view.

As the Riders of Rohan release date is getting closer, we are all aware that soon our high level items and armour will be obsolete. As with the Rise of Isengard expansion I expect my seals to be converted to medallions and the prices of raid pieces lowered. Nevertheless at the moment I still have a lot of excess medallions and seals, which I can use to purchase armour pieces for cosmetic use. The chest piece used in this outfit is actually for Wardens and can be purchased at the Ox-clan Camp near Isengard. And since my warden is hardly likely to ever reach level 75, I purchased it exclusively for the looks. I think the starry design on the chest matches the Lore-master theme quite well. The chest piece has a nice neckline which looks perfectly fine without shoulders too. The Hunter and Burglar class have a similar chest piece, but with a different emblem on the chest, but their matching gloves are all the same. However there is a slight difference when dying those items as the Burglar version seems to be more muted. I couldn’t make up my mind whether or not I should match the steed with a backpack or a cloak, so I used both.

Head: Quilted Hat, Evendim blue dye (Tier 2 crafted, light armour)
Chest : Jacket of the Spear-way, Evendim blue dye (RoI Instance Set Warden)
Shoulders: Pauldrons of the Wandering Bard, sienna dye (Ettenmoors Minstrel set)
Hands: Gloves of the [Quiet Knife], sienna dye (RoI Instance Set Burglar/Warden/Hunter)
Feet: Barrow-scout’s Boots, sienna dye (Classic Vendor, medium armour), also available as T5 medium crafted Westernesse Protector’s Boots.
Back Cloak: Widow’s Drape, sienna dye (Men of Dunland Quartermaster, ally standing) – also available from Dunland quest rewards
Back Pack: Cook’s Pack, Evendim blue dye (Lotro store or lottery, cosmetic)

Horse: Steed of the Lore-master (Lotro store exclusive)

As some of you may have noticed already, I’ve changed the layout of my blog again! I was ready for a new theme and a fresh look that will make this blog “Rohan ready”. The new layout allows for slightly larger pictures, so when you visit older posts you will notice that they don’t quite fit the entire body of the new layout, but such is blog-life.
This week I received an email from Winterwolf, a reader, with the request to help him out with an outfit. He wrote me the following description: “The outfit is for my latest character, Marthord who hails from the swan-city of Dol Amroth in south Gondor. I’ve been looking for an outfit that has that big heavy armour look about it, with lots of silver and some swan references, while still looking like an elite soldier of the nation of Gondor.” Whenever people mail me seeking advice, I usually help them out and point them in the direction that I think would be what they are looking for, but this request in particular triggered my inspiration and I just had to make a Swan Knight for my blog. My Champion is from Gondor and he usually rides his Steed of Minas Ithil. When I first got him the steed I created an outfit for it, but this was over a year ago, long before the release of Rise of Isengard and all the beautiful armour that it brought us, and long before I learned how to take proper screenshots or created any worthwhile outfits at all, ha ha. I didn’t have the cosmetics to work with that I have today, so revisiting this concept and using it for a Knight of Dol Amroth outfit was a great idea. If you still don’t own the Rise of Isengard expansion, but would like to travel there some day, check out the generous giveaway from Casual Stroll to Mordor for your last chance to obtain a Legendary Isengard edition that comes with all cosmetic goodies.
My very respected, awesome and inspiring fellow blogger Starry Mantle once made a Knight of Dol Amroth outfit too, and it’s very much worth visiting her creation for inspiration on the same theme as well.

The final countdown toward the release of Riders of Rohan has started and we now have less than a month to go before we will ride our War-steeds out onto the plains. For this reason I will be doing a number of Mount-inspired outfits this month, hoping that this will put us in the right mood. In this context I also want to point you to the Equestrian Fashion Contest that the Windy Acres Ranch is hosting on their blog. If you love horses and love outfits, this is your chance to participate and win 100 Turbine points! Windy Acres regularly hosts Equestrian events such as horse races and shows on the Landroval server. Please check out their schedule of events as they are worth a visit.

Head: Reinforced Leather Dunlending Helm, white blue dye (Dunland quest reward, medium armour)
Chest : Hyrde-Bréost, Evendim blue dye (reward from Vol.III, Book 4, heavy armour)
Shoulders: Barrow-warrior’s Shoulder Pads, white dye (Classic vendor, Great Barrows heavy set)
Hands: Barrow-warrior’s Gauntlets, white dye (Classic vendor, Great Barrows heavy set)
Feet: The Berserker’s Sabatons, white dye (RoI instance armour set, Champion)
Back: Swan-cloak, Evendim dye (Lotro store exclusive, cosmetic)

Horse: Steed of Minas Ithil (Lotro store exclusive)

I spent the last of my Medallions of the North-men! At least, for now my precious medallions are all gone, as I don’t intend to grind them in the coming weeks. First of all, I really expect the Summer Festival to start soon and when it starts I’ll be spending most of my game time over at the festival. Then, in only two weeks, it’s time for Riders of Rohan to launch, and all of my time will be spent in Rohan [edit: release has been delayed until October 15th]. On top of that, once Rohan launches I expect to see a lot of new armour pieces again, so there won’t be any reason any time soon to go back to the older items.
So the last Medallions of the North-men were spent on the Lore-master’s robe. This chest piece is an authentic piece of battle gear, as it has blood stains and signs of wear and tear all over it. It’s not suitable for a visit to grandma, but made to wear in the thick of the fight. Even though Hobbits cannot be Lore-masters, I consider this robe a perfect fit for a Hobbit lady.
In case you’re wondering about the weapons in these screenshots, these are both low level world drops, one-handed swords, sometimes going under the name of Scimitar. They drop between level 5-20, but one such sword (Tallang) is also available as a quest reward from Volume I, book 1.

As promised earlier this week, I am posting a few mount matched outfits to get inspired for Riders of Rohan. For this outfit I used the Forochel mount, one of the few ponies that I believe is truly perfect for hobbits because of its rugged and simple appearance. You can purchase this mount at kindred reputation in Sûri-kyla, and reaching kindred reputation is a slightly steeper grind than with other factions as you start out as Outsider.
There’s a whole range of nice items available from the reputation vendors that are unique to Forochel and the Lossoth, including some typical housing items. Each profession gets access to unique recipes that produce items with a special appearance. For example woodworkers can produce the beautiful Satakieli harp, tailors and metalsmiths can produce several Lossoth armours and cosmetics, and weaponsmiths can produce awesome weapons with appearances that are unique within Lotro. Unfortunately you need kindred reputation to use those items as well, but that’s even a better reason to grind out the rep. If you’re not sure what is available for your profession, check it out on Lotro Wiki, as some items are really special and worth collecting.

Whatever mount you ride, don’t forget to enter the Mount Fashion Contest on Windy Acres before August 31st!

Head: Lesser Arrow of the West Helmet, orange dye (Enedwaith barter, medallions of the Northmen)
Chest: Lesser Memory of the West Robe, orange dye (Enedwaith barter, medallions of the Northmen)
Shoulders: Chainmail Shoulder Guards of Vigour, grey dye (World drop, heavy armour)
Hands: Snow-dusted Travelling Gloves, white dye (Yule Festival cosmetic)
Horse: Prized Tundra Steed, kindred reputation Forochel

The Summer Festival has finally arrived and it brings us another beautiful new mount! It’s called the Summerdays Steed and costs 40 Summer Festival Tokens and 2 Race Tokens.
If you’re having trouble doing the necessary horse races to obtain the tokens needed for the mount, perhaps you will find this guide helpful.

The Treasure Hunt will be on this week! I was so excited to see the Lotro Calendar updated with several fun events for this month and the next! As the Riders of Rohan expansion has been delayed until October 15th, I guess the community team decided to move the Event schedule around a bit and keep us very very busy collecting all kinds of treasures this month. The Treasure Hunt was launched early this year for the first time and we haven’t seen it return until now. It is an incredibly entertaining and very addictive event that gives some fine cosmetic rewards, some of the most awesome emotes in the game, delightful housing items and a few beautiful unique mounts with high morale and speed. I know that when the event ran last time, I have been digging and digging until my hands bled! If you want to find out what exactly is up for grabs, check out Ketani’s Treasure Hunt guide. Today’s patch notes mentioned some new rewards for the event, so there will be even more goodies to dig up!
Just one warning though: the event is indeed very addictive. The quest cycle which gives you the Treasure Hunt Picks has a rather long cooldown that keeps you waiting impatiently, which can make it very tempting to buy the rather expensive picks in the Lotro store. I would advise against that, but in stead switch to one or two different alts to do the same cycle while you wait for the cooldown on your main to finish. Most rewards are bound to account and can be traded, except for the mounts and some of the major emotes. There is a barter that sells cosmetics and a selection of emotes, and this year a special mount has been added: the Harvest-brew Goat!
All cosmetics are bound to account and can be bought from the barter, except for the Treasure Hunter’s Rucksack, which only drops from digsites.

The Tale of the Shipwrecked Mariner event will run alongside the Treasure Hunt and is already live now. I think these two events are a perfect combination, as the pirate event in itself is a bit small and rather insignificant in terms of rewards. If you still need a pirate hat of sorts, head over to the Brandywine Bridge where you will find the beginning of the questline. If you’re looking for the perfect pirate cloak, check out the Classic barter at the skirmish camp. He sells three cloaks in the Forsaken Inn section. They’re awesome in combination with an eye patch!

Head: Treasure-hunter’s Hat, burgundy dye (crafted T6, light armour)
Chest: Cer. Robe of the Graven Word, burgundy dye (cosmetics vendor, Rift cosmetic)
Hands: Fingerless Gloves, burgundy dye (Yule Festival quest reward -helping the poor-, cosmetic)
Back: Treasure Hunter’s Rucksack, burgundy dye (Treasure Hunt digsite reward, cosmetic)
Hand-held item: Long-handled Shovel (cosmetics vendor, items)

Mount: Treasure Laden Pony (Treasure Hunt digsite reward)

If you didn’t manage to collect the 1000 Buried Treasure Tokens that were needed for the Harvest-brew Goat last weekend at the Treasure Hunt event, then here’s your chance to get a mount outfitted with the same tack! I think the idea is very nice, to make both a goat and a horse with the same theme, but I’m sad that the goat is only available through the rigorous grind of the Treasure Hunt that has to be completed in the short span of 3 days, and is not available at this Festival. Also, I’m not crazy about yet another Festival mount with that dull pale skin colour. Still, the horse or pony will be nice for some. At least this Festival it’s not an all “feminine” horse as so many guys complained about last Spring. The horse has two different sides, one with beer mugs and the other with a saddle bag. The tack has runes inscribed on the front side that some players think translate to “Westphal”, referencing an area in Germany with certain beer brewing traditions. Correct me if I’m wrong as all this is only forum speculation.

The Harvest-brew Steed costs 2 Race Tokens + 60 Fall Festival Tokens. It has +62% speed and 200 morale.

Riders of Rohan is going to change this wonderful game forever. Most certainly for the better, as I believe the majority of changes and the beautiful new Rohan regions are a much needed breath of fresh air. It’s going to be amazing, and most of us are looking forward to it with much anticipation. No doubt Turbine staff will be holding their breath tomorrow as they keep monitoring the download servers on the day of release. Those days are not like other days, and usually extremely stressful for everyone. I expect to get stuck on the launcher or not enter at all on the first day, but this is all fine with me. Eventually, we all get there, and cross that bridge into Rohan.

Just like any other player that bothers with outfits, I’ve prepared my characters for the journey into Rohan. I really wanted to achieve a very rugged look, at least for the first part of the journey. I know that I’ll soon be changing outfits again, as new gear will start to appear that looks more interesting than what I’ve been using forever already, but still I wanted my characters to look travel ready. So here’s my last pre-Rohan outfit for my Lore-master.
I wish everyone who reads this a very wonderful journey into Rohan this week. Enjoy the beautiful new scenery and most of all the incredible music!

Head: Snow-dusted Travelling Hat, rust dye (Yule festival cosmetic)
Chest: Lockmaster’s Jacket, default dye (Wardens of Annuminas barter, Burglar set)
Hands: Gloves of the Westfold, default dye (RoI expansion reward)
Legs: Westernesse Protector’s Leggings, navy dye (crafted Tier 5 medium armour)
Feet: Boots of Dunnauth, rust dye (Ost Dunhoth barter, Lore-master set)

Horse: Prized Dunlending Steed (kindred standing Men of Dunland)

The Wintry Yule Steed comes in two versions: the regular festival horse and a box of war-steed cosmetics. The normal horse is available for 80 festival tokens + 1 gold token and gated behind the completion of Tier 1 of the “The More The Merrier” deed. The war-steed cosmetics are available for 150 festival tokens + 1 gold token and gated behind the completion of Tier 3 of the “The More The Merrier” deed.

The Lissuin Steed comes in two versions: the regular festival horse and a set of war-steed cosmetics. The normal horse is available for 40 Spring Leaves at the Quartermaster on the Festival Grounds or at the Hengstacer Farm. The war-steed cosmetics are available at two different locations. Caparison and Leggings at the Quartermaster for 20 Spring Leaves each, and Halter and Saddle at the vendor in Bree near the Boar Fountain for 80/80/80 flowers each. You need to do the (daily) flower picking quest from the same vendor to obtain those flowers.
The war-steed cosmetics can be dyed.

Steed of the Midsummer – 40 Summer Festival Tokens
Caparison of the Midsummer (war-steed cosmetic) – 40 Summer Festival Tokens

Steed of Plenty – 120 Farmer’s Faire Tokens
Caparison of Plenty (war-steed cosmetic) – 120 Farmer’s Faire Tokens

I hope everyone is at least as lucky as myself, and pulling at least one of the special steeds out of those envelopes. This particular steed is somewhat confused about its origins, as the pony size is called “Warden’s Steed” and the regular horse is called “Steed of the Dusk-watch”. I guess I’ll stick to Dusk-warden Steed to include both titles.
For this outfit I used the Lore-master’s robe that can be purchased for Arnorian coins in Tinnundir. You don’t have to be a Lore-master to buy it, so if you have wardrobe space and coins, you can equip it as a cosmetic through the wardrobe. All Annuminas set-gear (around level 30-35) feature the typical Wardens of Annuminas star emblem, which is a perfect match to the stars on the horse tack, so if you don’t care for robes but do like the stars, check out the gear for other classes that is available.
It is assumed that this horse was originally intended to become a second kindred reputation horse for Annuminas, but I’ve never seen a confirmation from a dev on that assumption, so I’m not sure if this is true.

The coming days I will be spending some time levelling my characters, taking advantage of the +100% XP gain until April 30th. I think this is a marvelous Anniversary perk, as it allows me to get through some un-favorite content that I ‘ve been putting off for long!

If you want to know where a certain armour piece or cosmetic comes from, you can look it up on Lotro Wiki, by typing its name into the search box. You can equip any piece of armour cosmetically through the wardrobe, even armour that is not meant for your class or level.

Head: Worn Ranger’s Hood, umber dye (Epic Volume III, Book 5 reward, cosmetic)
Shoulders: Padded Mantle of the Dunland Soothsayer, umber dye (Dunland quest reward, light)
Chest: Robe of Long Memory, Evendim blue dye (Annuminas barter reward, lore-master)
Hands: West-land Gloves, Evendim blue dye (crafted Tier 4, heavy)
Feet: Ryscdail, umber dye (boa drop Isengard instances, light)

Horse: Steed of the Dusk-watch (drops from Lost Invitations quest envelopes, Anniversary Festival)

The digital download of the Mithril Edition is on sale, which is a great deal for everyone. Not only is it the cheapest way to buy 2000TP, you get a beautiful and unique horse for all your characters as well! Granted, the horse is only nice for its skin, as it has merely 100 morale, but that’s still good for starting characters or visits to friendly areas.

In this outfit I used a pair of leggings (well actually it looks more like a long skirt) that were obviously designed to go with a matching chest piece, however this particular chest piece only looks good on males. On female characters (women, elves and hobbits), it looks horrible as it flattens the chest completely and looks generally awkward. Still many players like to use these leggings on their female characters and I have seen several good and some less successful combinations on the Cosmetic Outfit thread on the forum and on various outfit blogs. After a lot of trial and error I finally found a top that I am satisfied with for my own outfit. Unfortunately this cosmetic chest piece does not allow for the use of gloves, but I consider this a minor compromise.
I used burgundy dye for this outfit but dyed black it looks totally awesome!

If you want to know where a certain armour piece or cosmetic comes from, you can look it up on Lotro Wiki, by typing its name into the search box. You can equip any piece of armour cosmetically through the wardrobe, even armour that is not meant for your class or level.

Head: Helm of the Hidden Dagger, burgundy dye (Ettenmoors barter reward, burglar)
Shoulders: Westfold Campaign Shoulder Pads, burgundy dye (crafted Tier 7, light)
Chest: Herdman’s Waistcoat and Shirt, burgundy dye (skirmish camp, cosmetic)
Legs: Embroidered Silk Leggings, burgundy dye (Dunland quest reward, light)
Feet: Scout’s Weathered Leather Boots, burgundy dye (Dunland quest reward, medium)
Back: Treasure Hunter’s Satchel, crimson dye (Treasure hunt barter reward, cosmetic)

Horse: Steed of the Horse-lords (Lotro Mithril Edition reward)

If just like me, you’ve been wondering why the 5th Anniversary loyalty cosmetics in the splash screens looked a little different from the real thing, here’s your answer!
Exclusive cosmetics & mount, similar but not exactly the same as 5th Anniversary loyalty cosmetics, now available for a limited time from May 11 to May 24, 2012.
These cosmetics and mount are slightly more ornate than the 4-year loyalty cosmetics.

I know I love the 4-year loyalty cosmetics, because they fit very well and because of their silk-like shiny texture. If these cosmetics are similar in quality, they are worth it!
For the mount collectors this looks like a very chique mount to own. As most store exclusive steeds it has the 68% speed and 250 morale. The good news is: its also available as “Account Wide”! This is the first time I see a store mount offered with an account wide option!

The cosmetics are also available with an “Account Wide” option, but if you have the Wardrobe, I don’t really see what the point of that is? Maybe I’m missing something here, but I usually delete excess cosmetics and keep them on only one or two characters.

Check out the different packages and options at the Lotro Store page.

My Lore-master is of course not your typical crippled hunchback that would often fulfill the role of a Jester at a court, but she holds her own when it comes to entertainment nonetheless! After a few days of picking piles and piles of flowers she finally got rewarded with the Steed of the Jester. Truth be told, I found the flower picking rather tedious and boring. In fact so boring that I fell asleep on my keyboard! And this didn’t happen just once but twice even! The things we do for steeds…

So now that she’s got her Steed of the Jester, I’m done with picking flowers! I’m just going to continue to enjoy the other parts of the festival. I still need a lot of fortune cookies and some garden items, so the shrews are not rid of me yet!
The hat in this outfit shares appearance with the Shadow-stalker Hemlet from the Burglar Helegrod set (also available at the cosmetics vendor). The shoulders share appearance with the Lothlorien Hunter Lady Discernment set.

If you want to know where a certain armour piece or cosmetic comes from, you can look it up on Lotro Wiki, by typing its name into the search box. You can equip any piece of armour cosmetically through the wardrobe, even armour that is not meant for your class or level.

Head: Cap of Harmony, red dye (quest reward Epic Vol.II Book 8, light)
Chest: Reveller’s Gilded Tunic & Pants, default dye (store exclusive cosmetic)
Shoulders: Shoulder-guards of the Keen Eye, red dye (skirmish raid drop, medium)

Horse: Steed of the Jester, drop from flower boxes Spring Festival

Finally another class steed! This time it is the Steed of the Burglar, available for a limited time in the Lotro store. To start out with the positive: I love this steed! It’s another well made steed with pouches and lovely details. To follow up with the negative: it’s not really a Burglar’s steed. It could be anybody’s. It has some daggers and ropes, but I expected a more “shady” looking steed for the burglar class, with lots of black and grey, not brown and olive which are more suitable to rangers or hunters. In my humble but loud opinion, the designer team for the class steeds is making some really odd colour choices for the classes lately. The Steed of the Champion which came before this one, is mostly brown and red, where I would expect blues and whites for a champ. The same is true for this steed, it just has the wrong colours. Another slightly negative point is that the tack is exactly the same on both sides of the horse. All other class steeds so far had two unique sides with different pouches or items hanging from the saddle. The flanks of this steed are mirror images of each other.

That said, I still liked the horse enough to purchase it for my burglar, even though she will probably be alternating with the Treasure Hunter’s Steed (which I just realized I have forgotten to feature on my blog).
As with all mounts that are purchased from the Lotro store, you will obtain an adapted but similar skin on your war-steed after release of the Riders of Rohan.
The steed is not hard to match with an outfit as it’s base colours are very common. Anything dyed umber and olive will probably match. I chose to use the Arth-crus chest piece because the colour matches the piece of rope on the saddle. The Arth-crus has matching fingerless gloves that would provide a nice detail as well if you’re looking for just a tiny bit of red to complement your attire.
After I took these screenshots I realized I had forgotten to swap her legendary dagger for a more common one that doesn’t display this annoying reddish glow. I seriously want cosmetic weapons!

Chest : Arth-crus, umber dye (boe drop from Isengard instances, light armour)
Head: Elegant Silk Hat, olive dye (Dunland quest reward, light armour)
Shoulders: Worn Ranger’s Wrap, umber dye (Volume III, Book 5 reward, cosmetic)
Hands: Fingerless Gloves, umber dye (Yule Festival quest reward -helping the poor-)
Legs: Shabby Leggings, umber dye (Yule Festival quest reward -helping the poor-)
Back: Campaign Backpack, olive dye (Lotro store or tedious ingame grind)
Mount: Steed of the Burglar, Lotro store exclusive

It’s Summer Holiday and I am being very lazy making outfits, so my blog isn’t getting a lot of updates lately, but today it is time for a new post. Last week the Steed of the Lore-master made it to the Lotro store, and since I have a lore-master that I play almost every day, I got her the horse immediately. The design of this horse is somehow not entirely what I expected. In my humble opinion, it’s not really ugly, but it’s not that great either. It has a lot of scrolls hanging from the saddle and books and feathers and ink attached to it which is all very lore-masterish, but the rest of the tack seems to lack a certain degree of realism (and what’s the deal with that horn on the saddle?). I like the stars on the tack, but the combination with the tan horse and the weird burgundy hems seems a little off. Like some other class steeds, the horse tack doesn’t match any available ingame dye. Some dyes come close, but never exactly (the same problem arises with the Rune-keeper steed for example). On a more positive note, unlike the Steed of the Burglar, this horse does have two different sides, which is very nice. The strange colours make it hard to match the horse with a suitable outfit. More so even, because I don’t usually wear these colours on my lore-master. But hey, I don’t shy away from a cosmetic challenge!
The good news is that as soon as the Riders of Rohan expansion launches, I will automatically get this horse as a cosmetic design for my War-steed, and I will be able to alter colours, mix and match with other pieces, and fashion a Lore-master steed of my own! If you want to see what the Lore-master War-steed cosmetics look like, check out the newly released developer diary video about War-steeds. About halfway the Lore-master Steed comes into view.

As the Riders of Rohan release date is getting closer, we are all aware that soon our high level items and armour will be obsolete. As with the Rise of Isengard expansion I expect my seals to be converted to medallions and the prices of raid pieces lowered. Nevertheless at the moment I still have a lot of excess medallions and seals, which I can use to purchase armour pieces for cosmetic use. The chest piece used in this outfit is actually for Wardens and can be purchased at the Ox-clan Camp near Isengard. And since my warden is hardly likely to ever reach level 75, I purchased it exclusively for the looks. I think the starry design on the chest matches the Lore-master theme quite well. The chest piece has a nice neckline which looks perfectly fine without shoulders too. The Hunter and Burglar class have a similar chest piece, but with a different emblem on the chest, but their matching gloves are all the same. However there is a slight difference when dying those items as the Burglar version seems to be more muted. I couldn’t make up my mind whether or not I should match the steed with a backpack or a cloak, so I used both.

Head: Quilted Hat, Evendim blue dye (Tier 2 crafted, light armour)
Chest : Jacket of the Spear-way, Evendim blue dye (RoI Instance Set Warden)
Shoulders: Pauldrons of the Wandering Bard, sienna dye (Ettenmoors Minstrel set)
Hands: Gloves of the [Quiet Knife], sienna dye (RoI Instance Set Burglar/Warden/Hunter)
Feet: Barrow-scout’s Boots, sienna dye (Classic Vendor, medium armour), also available as T5 medium crafted Westernesse Protector’s Boots.
Back Cloak: Widow’s Drape, sienna dye (Men of Dunland Quartermaster, ally standing) – also available from Dunland quest rewards
Back Pack: Cook’s Pack, Evendim blue dye (Lotro store or lottery, cosmetic)

Horse: Steed of the Lore-master (Lotro store exclusive)

I don’t know about you guys, but I think that Turbine has really created a wonderful Anniversary Festival! All the fireworks are awesome! Not only do they add to the festive feeling overall, they are just a lot of fun to launch and beautiful to watch. Somehow they redesigned the fireworks and made them look very real. I can almost smell the sulfur when I stand around in Bree. The Fireworks Laden Horse (or pony in this case) launches real fireworks every so often, which is an awesome detail on an already beautiful festival horse. It takes a little while to get the 40 tokens for it, but it’s well worth it!

So far I’ve been having an iffy with the RNG. It hates me for some reason and I hate it back, so I’m not getting any luck with the nice horses that drop from the Lost Invitations quest. My eye is set on the Lotro Store, perhaps some day some nice guy at Turbine decides to put them up for sale. However I did manage to loot the /toast emote (on my hobbit, who is the emotes collector), so I guess it’s unfair to call myself totally unlucky.
With still a while to go with the festival, I’m not giving up hope entirely. In any case I love this horse, and I ride it all the time!
I also think the eyepatch is appropriate for a hobbit playing with fireworks.

If you want to know where a certain armour piece or cosmetic comes from, you can look it up on Lotro Wiki, by typing its name into the search box. You can equip any piece of armour cosmetically through the wardrobe, even armour that is not meant for your class or level.

Chest: Robe of the Stone-hewer, sienna dye (Skirmish camp barter, cosmetic)
Hands: Fingerless Gloves, gold dye (Yule Festival reward from quest Support the Poor, cosmetic)
Head: Black Corsair Eyepatch, default dye (Festival gift box, cosmetic)
Back: Spark-maker’s Pack, gold dye (Anniversary Festival barter, cosmetic)