Lord Of The Rings Online: Concerning Farming in The Shores of Evendim

In the first major content update some changes are coming to the farming profession to help farmers out. Ryan "Tens" Bednar takes a moment to describe these changes:

Hey, everyone. I'm Ryan "Tens" Bednar, the Lead Game Systems Designer for the LOTRO Live Team. I wanted to give people an update on a hot forum topic - our plans to renovate the Farming profession as part of our first monthly content update.

We've been listening to player feedback on this issue, and we've decided to make a fairly major change to the system, in order to make sure that Farming meets its stated goals. What goals? I'll tell you!

• Farming is essentially a complicated "gathering" profession, similar in role to Forestry and Prospecting, but very, very different in how it works. Farming is risk-free and reliable, (no hunting for fields - farms don't move!) but require materials to progress. But, at the end of the day, Farming will serve a very similar purpose to these other gathering professions. Equalizing this scenario was the major impetus behind the changes.
• Farming creates "fun" items! Pipeweed (and now Beer!) are fun. They don't have great gameplay effects. They're a toy for social play and roleplay, and a great way to highlight the idyllic agrarian nature of the Shire. Items like that shouldn't be expensive. Expensive isn't fun.
• Farming is itself a social activity. The open beta, with its level 15 cap, pushed players to explore some of the ancillary features of the game, including Farming, more than players had in previous beta phases. And we were pleased to see people just peacefully farming, chatting, and having a good social and roleplaying experience. That shouldn't be expensive either. Expensive isn't fun.

So, to bring Farming to its new happy place, we're making a major change to the costs of all the ingredients and products of Farming - specifically, we're adjusting all ingredients and products to have a very, very low vendor value. When you farm, if you turn around and sell to a vendor, you may end up a handful of copper up or down. It will neither be excessively profitable, nor a money sink, to farm. Cooks (which are frequently also Farmers) will require the products of Farming to make their food, and beer, which will definitely be marketable to players. It's up to players to determine how much of that profit should pass on to the producers of the raw materials.

These changes and more will go live in our first content update, The Shores of Evendim. I wanted to thank the players for their patience during this series of changes to Farming. I am confident that after these changes go live, we'll be able to leave Farming alone, save for the new recipes and items we plan on adding as part of our continuing content updates!