Spring Racing Carnival - Official Schedule

[Keli]

Slight change. Now we have on May 4th

11:30 - Die Meisterbarden von Bree

13:30 Breakfast Club

15:30 Die Meisterbarden von Bree

17:30 Lonely Mountain Band

For the 17:30 concert I have Geoffroi, Kiralynn, Runesdaeg, Brenthiel and, possibly, Lilikate. Anyone else wants to join us, contact Keli, Kellbryt, Geoffroi etc

[Kiralynn]

What an amazing line-up, I'm so impressed! Thank you!

Please list me as a maybe/backup for the spring concert. By the time it rolls around, I will have been hosting events and answering questions since 7:30pm on Friday. I might need to, I don't know, eat a sandwich. *grins* If I'm needed, I'll be there. Otherwise, I could use the rest.

[Byrcha]

In case it matters to the planning, the Anniversary Festival has indeed been extended to May 6th: http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.php?509654-Server-maintenence&p=6763578&buffer_share=d424b&utm_source=buffer&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=Buffer%253A%252BA%2520Casual%2520Stroll%2520to%2520Mordor%252Bon%252Bfacebook#post6763578

[Kiralynn]

I think I'm going to cry. All that lag from the envelopes and extra NPCs is going to have a huge impact on the race. Between that and failing to respond to even one polite email, I am so upset with Sapience right now. I take that back, I don't think, I'm sure.

[Keli]

I feel your pain Kira. It seems Turbine's player relations have taken a backward step recently and I don't thing the player council is an adequate substitution for community managers that go the extra yards.

[Kiralynn]

I sent one last, desperate email to Sapience and he responded asking for event details. Wish me luck, pray, rub your lucky rabbit's foot, and hold your breath!

[Byrcha]

Since it is unlikely that they will modify the Festival schedule, perhaps we can cover this simply by layer-wrangling? There will still be envelopes blowing around, but maybe not many characters who aren't racers or fans.

[Kiralynn]

My biggest concern is this - Since the festival started, I can't see half of the buildings in Bree. I see doors and banners on them, but just big blank spaces where the actual buildings should be. No matter how long I stand around, they never appear. I have heard a lot of conversation on the channel that suggests other people are having the same problem. I logged in from a "monster" of a gaming rig with a blazing fast internet connection and still couldn't see half a dozen buildings after wandering around Bree for over an hour. This even happened early on Sunday morning when very few people were with me in Bree.

I logged into an alt yesterday and it was even worse. I couldn't even see the courtyard of Town Hall, where we plan to host the events! I could barely jump into the air and find a way up into the courtyard. It looked terrible and it was ridiculously hard to navigate.

Not only will this make the city a minefield of invisible objects to visitors, it may prevent the racers from actually seeing the course!

Now, I am making the assumption that the added video resources required to handle all the flying envelopes, random fireworks, extra NPCs and such are the source of the problem. This makes sense due to the timing, but maybe there is another reason.

[Harperella]

Kiralynn of Rohan wrote:

My biggest concern is this - Since the festival started, I can't see half of the buildings in Bree. I see doors and banners on them, but just big blank spaces where the actual buildings should be. No matter how long I stand around, they never appear. I have heard a lot of conversation on the channel that suggests other people are having the same problem. I logged in from a "monster" of a gaming rig with a blazing fast internet connection and still couldn't see half a dozen buildings after wandering around Bree for over an hour. This even happened early on Sunday morning when very few people were with me in Bree. I logged into an alt yesterday and it was even worse. I couldn't even see the courtyard of Town Hall, where we plan to host the events! I could barely jump into the air and find a way up into the courtyard. It looked terrible and it was ridiculously hard to navigate. Not only will this make the city a minefield of invisible objects to visitors, it may prevent the racers from actually seeing the course! Now, I am making the assumption that the added video resources required to handle all the flying envelopes, random fireworks, extra NPCs and such are the source of the problem. This makes sense due to the timing, but maybe there is another reason.

Hmmm... that's not been my experience. But I won't say it won't be a problem. Layer wrangling will help somewhat, but our racers are probably going to need fast machines to navigate the chaos. I will say this--a fast machine can cope with all of the above. Especially if graphics are turned down ahead of time. And a smart jockey will think to do this ahead of time.

--Harper

[Byrcha]

I too have encountered some graphical glitches since Festival started, though not quite as bad as Kira describes. However, it is potentially race-breaking -- I've seen partial-buildings in Bree, and I ran into invisible walls in a landscape-ruin in the Barrow Downs which would normally have been visible (though wights walking around ten feet up in the air was fairly amusing).

The only other option is to delay the race. I know it has already been advertised (and will be again tonight at Ales and Tales), but better that than having a potentially broken race? It is still up to contestants to study the course and minimize lag themselves as needed, but if waiting a week would improve overall condition it might be worth it.

[Harperella]

The show must go on! If there are significant technical problems, then we can always call it a scratch and reschedule the final race. But right now everyone has this on their calendars. It's up to us to hold to that schedule unless the race is impossible to conduct. From where I sit, it looks like it is difficult, but doable. Sort of like getting bad weather the day of a RL race. Everyone just has to deal with it--unless it is so bad that the course is unusable.

--Harper

[Kiralynn]

I am planning to host the event (nobody signed up to host anything except for Harperella) unless something catastrophic happens. I'm still massively disappointed and somewhat concerned, but as they say, the show must go on.

A side note, setting to Low graphics settings didn't help. This problem never happened to me before, no matter how crowded the event, until the last patch that launched the anniversary. That same patch also reset all of my LOTRO gamma, brightness and color settings. It was very odd. I'll play with my setup between now and the big day.

As long as volunteers turn up to help, the SRC is going to be epic!

[Keli]

Looks like I have agreement from Bright Star for the 21:00 slot on May 3rd.

That just leaves the 19:30 slot on May 3rd. Surely there are some OW/BBB/LMB musicians that can take this slot?

[Kiralynn]

Keli wrote:

Looks like I have agreement from Bright Star for the 21:00 slot on May 3rd. That just leaves the 19:30 slot on May 3rd. Surely there are some OW/BBB/LMB musicians that can take this slot?

Perhaps the Old Harpy Crew or BBB will take this slot?

[Keli]

Bright Star confirmed.