Post Book 8 Impressions

First off, I have done only one of the new instances given to us in Book 8, and that one bugged out. Haven't tried it after the hotfix. But I have been looking around at the revamped content in Breeland and Ered Luin, and I'm very pleased with the result. Not nearly so much running back and forth (which got annoying without a horse, if in such a small zone as Ered Luin), the quests are better written and more organized - they flow better. Great job Orion on the revamps. I particularly liked the tour of Bree, getting players familiar with the town. I remember being sent to the Prancing Pony and looking up where it was in my copy of the Lord of the Rings (kudos for putting everything in its proper place!) after I somehow managed to miss it. No missing it now with the pointer quest to the tour.

I've not participated in the epic book continuation either, as I'm a stickler for doing the books in order, and I'm currently on 2.5.5. Hope to catch up soon. Still, what I'm hearing is good. Rarely have I found an epic quest that sucked. They might have been hard, there might have been complaining, but the fact remains they're some of the most well-crafted content in the game.

There is one thing, however, that I have to comment on, negatively. The names of all the food items have been changed to include a container or amount in the name. Like "Jar of Mint Sauce" rather than just "Mint Sauce". That means that everything at the vendor is completely rearranged and the alphabetical order is no longer logical. If there are Jars of stuff, it's all together, if it's Bottles, that's together too. But it could be a Jar of Mint Sauce and a Jar of Vinegar. Those should be near the m's and the v's respectively, as before. It's almost like alphabetizing books or movies with the word "The" at the beginning all in the t's. It doesn't make sense because it's not the significant word. I can't find anything anymore at the vendors... Of course, I'll eventually relearn the order of things, but someone got a little overzealous on their modifiers this time around.

All in all a good patch. Book 8 of course fixed a lot of bugs, and the patch notes were extensive for this. I hope to see continued quality, with a little more forethought in some areas, such as the food items, or the larger issue of raid/instance design/rewards/progression.

EDIT: This is becoming a bad habit, post post editing. Anyway, Yeebo's comment reminded me that I have spent a good deal of time fishing for the summer festival deed. I tweeted that I now have the title "Sunshine" (with the requisite "Hello Sunshine" replies) which involved fishing in four different areas, a little over an hour real-time commitment. And these timed fishing excursions are repeatable, meaning you can get summer festival tokens simply by fishing. An excellent way to invigorate the fishing scene again.