DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

One thing’s for sure, Funcom isn’t holding anything back with their next update, Issue 4, as it is crammed full of HUGE updates.  Today we get a nice diary on what’s coming down the pipe for PvP as this was one of the touted features at launch but has been plagued by a number of problems since [...]

DocHoliday Major PvP Changes Coming for The Secret World Issue 4

1. The Secret World Issue 4 Teasers and More Over on the Flash Point Podcast, they just posted an...
2. More Details About The Secret World Update 1.4 In a developer diary from Graeme Lennon over on...
3. The Secret World Update Issue 3: The Cat God Launches Today I certainly didn’t see this coming this quickly, but...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I’ve been off and on with Rohan since launch and still am quite enjoying this expansion.  I’m not sure where I’d rank it up with the other expansions, but it is certainly up at the top.  My main reason for indecision is that Mirkwood also introduced Skirmishes and Scaling Instances which has quite [...]

DocHoliday My Journey Through Rohan

1. Riders of Rohan Day One Thoughts Yesterday certainly was an interesting day, that’s for sure, but...
2. My Take on the LOTRO Riders of Rohan Expansion Details After the news hit last night, I took some time...
3. Next LOTRO Expansion – Riders of Rohan Today Turbine came out with another big announcement –...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I had loads of fun spending time in LOTRO’s Yule Festival Theatre instance for all the little nuggets here and there, but it still was a scripted set of events that players really didn’t have much impact in.  Funcom has taken this idea and catapulted it to a whole other level with the upcoming [...]

DocHoliday The Secret World Unveils The Albion Theatre for Roleplaying Nirvana

1. The Secret World Alternate Reality Game If you’re like me and are coming to the...
2. Catching up on the Secret World After my previous post on my excitement, I started poking...
3. New Secret World Video I’ve been off and on following this game as the...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

In a developer diary from Graeme Lennon over on mmorpg.com there are some pretty cool details and screenshots of what’s coming down the pipe for The Secret World.  It is a good combination of details and behind the scenes of how the raid itself was created. I like how they’ve set the scene for [...]

DocHoliday More Details About The Secret World Update 1.4

1. The Secret World and Football Manager 2013 Sales I just wanted to share a couple of sales for...
2. Plethora of Secret World Hands-On Previews Funcom recently allowed a whole ton of press to get...
3. The Secret World Update Issue 3: The Cat God Launches Today I certainly didn’t see this coming this quickly, but...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I bring this topic up after a discussion in Google Chat pointing out that there are entire new quality tiers of craft-able items BETTER then the top guild obtained recipes.  I’m saying these are hidden as there isn’t any information on these anywhere from Turbine through either the developer [...]

DocHoliday Hidden LOTRO Rohan Crafting Quality Tier

1. My Take on the Upcoming Riders of Rohan LOTRO Expansion I’ve been pretty quiet lately (you can read more here)...
2. Dev Diary – Mirkwood Crafting Changes So there’s a fair number of changes coming up for...
3. LOTRO Rise of Isengard Itemization Developer Diary Today Turbine posted a new Developer Diary talking about...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

There were a few postings floating around yesterday about layoffs at Turbine, but I wanted to point out one specifically.  With all the issues surrounding the Dev Tracker, many (including myself) may have missed the post by Graalx2 saying goodbye.  I can only assume he was part of the before [...]

DocHoliday Changes for Turbine and LOTRO

1. Episode 22 – Isengard Interview with Turbine I have to admit I was a little shocked...
2. Turbine talks 2012 Plans for LOTRO Right on the heels of the Riders of Rohan Expansion...
3. Turbine Releases Riders of Rohan Store Prices For all the things Turbine hasn’t learned, they at least...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

The servers are down this morning to patch the game to version 8.01.  This is a bug fix patch to try and resolve the performance issues people have been having since Rohan launched.  Full notes can be found here, but I’ll also put them below since they’re short: Players who pre-purchased the [...]

DocHoliday LOTRO Patches Riders of Rohan

1. LOTRO Riders of Rohan Launch Trailer If you’ve dissected all the patch notes, here’s another way...
2. My Take on the Upcoming Riders of Rohan LOTRO Expansion I’ve been pretty quiet lately (you can read more here)...
3. LOTRO Riders of Rohan Patch Notes   While we wait for the servers to come up,...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

The short answer is LOTS!  I know many have enjoyed taking all sorts of shots at Funcom and TSW but along the way the TSW team has been able to put together a pretty solid (and profitable) product while putting out not only content updates but system updates too. To recap, after a near flawless [...]

DocHoliday What’s new in The Secret World?

1. Moving Through Kingsmouth in The Secret World With the extension of the grace period, I’ve pretty...
2. What Happened to The Secret World? I’ve wanted to write about this for a while as...
3. The Secret World Issue 4 Teasers and More Over on the Flash Point Podcast, they just posted an...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

Yesterday certainly was an interesting day, that’s for sure, but overall for me personally, it was a good one.  Launch days are always challenging for MMOs and some go well while others are on the rockier side.  While this wasn’t the smoothest launch for Turbine, they were very good at admitting [...]

DocHoliday Riders of Rohan Day One Thoughts

1. LOTRO Riders of Rohan Patch Notes   While we wait for the servers to come up,...
2. My Take on the Upcoming Riders of Rohan LOTRO Expansion I’ve been pretty quiet lately (you can read more here)...
3. Turbine Releases Riders of Rohan Store Prices For all the things Turbine hasn’t learned, they at least...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

If you’ve dissected all the patch notes, here’s another way to wait for the servers to pop – a new launch trailer! I gotta admit, the combination of the voice-over, the music, and the visuals are amazing!  By far, one of the best trailers I’ve seen in a long while!  

DocHoliday LOTRO Riders of Rohan Launch Trailer

1. LOTRO Riders of Rohan Patch Notes   While we wait for the servers to come up,...
2. My Take on the LOTRO Riders of Rohan Expansion Details After the news hit last night, I took some time...
3. My Take on the Upcoming Riders of Rohan LOTRO Expansion I’ve been pretty quiet lately (you can read more here)...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

Nice and early, the known issues for Rohan have been posted. Many little cosmetic and screwy things like: When using the Mounted Strike skill on enemies to the left, the player character animates as if attacking to the right. But this one might be VERY critical for many folks: Rohan – Rohan Awaits [...]

DocHoliday LOTRO Riders of Rohan Known Issues

1. LOTRO Riders of Rohan Patch Notes   While we wait for the servers to come up,...
2. Next LOTRO Expansion – Riders of Rohan Today Turbine came out with another big announcement –...
3. My Take on the Upcoming Riders of Rohan LOTRO Expansion I’ve been pretty quiet lately (you can read more here)...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

  While we wait for the servers to come up, you might as well get comfortable and check out the massive patch notes for this Update! I’m not even going to try to summarize as we know much o what’s in there and besides it is just too much. Also, I was pointed to this VERY handy FAQ last night via [...]

DocHoliday LOTRO Riders of Rohan Patch Notes

1. My Take on the LOTRO Riders of Rohan Expansion Details After the news hit last night, I took some time...
2. My Take on the Upcoming Riders of Rohan LOTRO Expansion I’ve been pretty quiet lately (you can read more here)...
3. Turbine Releases Riders of Rohan Store Prices For all the things Turbine hasn’t learned, they at least...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

Today Funcom released Game Director Joel Bylos’s first “State of the Game” post and it is quite a read.  He starts off with a little about his history with Funcom as well as the various reviews TSW has received.  While I know some think Joel and Ragnar are whining when they talk about these scores, [...]

DocHoliday TSW State of the Game Update from Joel Bylos

1. The Secret World Issue 4 Teasers and More Over on the Flash Point Podcast, they just posted an...
2. The Secret World Alternate Reality Game If you’re like me and are coming to the...
3. The Secret World Update Issue 3: The Cat God Launches Today I certainly didn’t see this coming this quickly, but...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I’m sure many weren’t all that impressed with what was included with the recently released Issue 3, but there was a teaser in there that it also was a pre-patch for their upcoming Halloween event.  And based on today’s blog post, I don’t think you can complain about a lack of content in this patch [...]

DocHoliday Halloween’s coming to The Secret World

1. The Secret World Update Issue 3: The Cat God Launches Today I certainly didn’t see this coming this quickly, but...
2. Funcom Continues to Tease The Secret World Even though The Secret World is still a number...
3. Status of The Secret World and What’s Next Now that they’ve extended the grace period (don’t ask,...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

Over on the Flash Point Podcast, they just posted an interview they had with Funcom’s newly promoted Game Director Joel Bylos.  The two hosts and Joel spend about 45 minutes talking about a wide range of topics including quite a few submitted questions and it really is worth a listen.  One thing [...]

DocHoliday The Secret World Issue 4 Teasers and More

1. The Secret World Update Issue 3: The Cat God Launches Today I certainly didn’t see this coming this quickly, but...
2. Group Sizes and Mechanics in The Secret World There was a post up on Massively with a...
3. The Secret World at Comiccon I realize this is a bit late, but I wanted...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

As a little bit of a variance from talking about games, I wanted to talk a little bit about hardware as I’ve had the chance to play around with a few pieces from MadCatz’s impressive lineup of gaming hardware.  I’ve had both the MMO7 gaming mouse and the Strike7 keyboard for a while now and also [...]

DocHoliday MadCatz Hardware Product Reviews

1. Moving forward along a different path As many of you have probably noticed (it has been...
2. In With the New Podcast and Expanding Another I just wanted to post a quick update on a...
3. Waking From my Food Coma While not 100% the issue of why I’ve been quiet...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I just wanted to share a couple of sales for folks are these are two games I’m really enjoying. The Secret World is 50% off this weekend at only $24.99 from this link off the main Funcom page.  A pretty decent deal for a game that’s really hitting its stride with its third update since launch [...]

DocHoliday The Secret World and Football Manager 2013 Sales

1. The Secret World Release Date and Beta Announcement Funcom is starting the day off with some big news...
2. My Other Addiction – Football Manager 2012 I’m sure some of you have noticed that I’m not...
3. Beta and Pricing Clarifications on The Secret World Interesting day today for the folks at Funcom as they’ve...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I certainly didn’t see this coming this quickly, but today’s downtime brings us another update to the game quickly on the heels of Issue 2.  I must say this is pretty darn impressive for Funcom to get this out the door and back on track like they have.  As I mentioned in my earlier post, this [...]

DocHoliday The Secret World Update Issue 3: The Cat God Launches Today

1. The Secret World Launches Illuminati Week On the heels of various other minor postings and folks...
2. The Secret World Templar Artwork Released Continuing with the week of the Templars, new Artwork was...
3. The Secret War Facebook Event Finally Launches! Sometime late in the night US or early morning...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I’ve wanted to write about this for a while as I have a few thoughts on what has happened and why this game is getting such a bad reputation.  To me it is almost the perfect storm of both real world issues as well as design choices they’ve made.  However, no matter how you slice it, it still is a [...]

DocHoliday What Happened to The Secret World?

1. How Big Will The Secret World Be? It only took the three battling factions a little over...
2. The Secret World News Re-cap I’ll have to admit I’ve been a bit lax of...
3. Funcom Continues to Tease The Secret World Even though The Secret World is still a number...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I’ve been pretty quiet lately (you can read more here) but specifically with regards to the upcoming Rohan expansion.  I have incredibly mixed feelings about this expansion, so much so that I haven’t purchased it yet and will most likely just buy it using my Turbine Points.  I will also admit that [...]

DocHoliday My Take on the Upcoming Riders of Rohan LOTRO Expansion

1. My Take on the LOTRO Riders of Rohan Expansion Details After the news hit last night, I took some time...
2. Next LOTRO Expansion – Riders of Rohan Today Turbine came out with another big announcement –...
3. Welcome Changes to the Riders of Rohan Pre-Orders Twitter was on fire this afternoon as Turbine reversed their...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

As many of you have probably noticed (it has been pretty darn obvious) I’ve been over-run by a series of real life circumstances.  I’ve at least resolved two of those issues, although one resolution has created another potential issue. First off, I’ve temporarily resolved an issue I’ve been having [...]

DocHoliday Moving forward along a different path

1. I’m still around I just wanted to put up a quick post to...
2. Moving Through Kingsmouth in The Secret World With the extension of the grace period, I’ve pretty...
3. Looking Forward and Back I’ve been getting back into a more normal schedule now...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I just wanted to put up a quick post to let folks know what’s been going on with me lately.  Things are a little chaotic for me IRL and as such my gaming habits have changed quite a bit.  For the most part I’ve been playing single-player games that have the benefit of a pause button such that I can [...]

DocHoliday I’m still around

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

I’ve been eagerly awaiting the release of the lore-master dev diary so I can see what direction the class is going to be taking in RoR. All of the class changes announced to date have very much been in the vein of “incremental improvements”, with a slightly improved version of a skill here and a [...]

PB Lore-mastery: RoR Class changes – the good, the bland and the bad

1. Lore-mastery: Riders of Rohan class changes wishlist The announcement of a new expansion is always exciting, as...
2. Lore-mastery: Taking ‘support class’ too far Sometimes people complain about lore-masters they run across because they...
3. Lore-mastery: Proposed Isengard class changes analysis All classes are getting an update in Isengard in conjunction...

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

With the extension of the grace period, I’ve pretty much dived all in with The Secret World and am absolutely loving it.  I will try to keep this spoiler free as much as I can but I will apologize up front if any of what I think are general comments give too much away.  However, you’re probably [...]

DocHoliday Moving Through Kingsmouth in The Secret World

DocHoliday's MMO Saloon DocHoliday's MMO Saloon - LOTRO, Secret World, & Rift with an End-Game View

Probably one of the more anticipated and hyped features of the new mounted combat system is the concept of these Warbands.  They’ve been described as roaming packs of destruction that will be like mobile quest targets of some sort for us to deal with.  Today at least we finally get a chance to look [...]

DocHoliday New LOTRO Rohan Screenshots Featuring Warbands