PvMP players in The Lord of the Rings Online haven’t had much to get excited about in quite some time, but a recent interview with LotRO’s lead designer, Allan”Orion” Maki shed some light on what SSG is doing to change that.
The over two-hour interview with one of the MMO’s most prominent streamers, Bludborn, touches on a wide range of topics surrounding The Lord of the Rings Online’s PvMP mode (Middle-earth’s version of PvP), but around an hour and twelve minutes into the interview the two start to talk about one of the first new classes Monster Players have on the horizon in quite sometime: the Angmar Sorceress.
“It’s the class that I’ have really been gung-ho on making for a really long time,” Orion states when introducing the class on the stream. The Angmar Sorceress is, as Orion puts it, an “analogue for both Loremaster and Runekeeper.” She’ll function like a utility character on the battlefield, buffing allies and debuffing the Free Peoples of Middle-earth along the way. A fully Tactical damage dealer (Orion states that she does “no damaging physical” attacks at all), she’ll weild a staff and rain down elemental damage effects on the battlefield.
As Maki notes in a subsequent forum post, she will weild skills that do acid, fire, frost and shadow damage based on her stance, and can swap stances in combat as the battle progresses. The Sorceress will also feature a mechanic called the Sorceress Study, which will allow players to prepare spells ahead of time.
“She can change stances while in battle to adjust to the moment-to-moment needs, and she can utilize her advanced training and understanding of sorcerous powers to prepare herself before battle by preparing a selection of spells ahead of time. While her prepared spells deal less damage and have shorter durations, she can, through traits, overcome those drawbacks.”
It’s the first real class Monster Players have been able to look forward to for quite some time, and in addition to all the other improvements planned for The Lord of the Rings Online’s PvP mode. The new class has been in the works for three years now, and could see a debut as early as Update 45’s Bullroarer preview.
