It's official, we have to move...

[Kiralynn]

From the Twitter dev chat...
Q38: @Crappledumpkins Recently chickens & a referee have been spotted at the Hobnanigans field again. Will this event be returning soon?
A38: Amlug We're working on it. WE have no ETA, but we'd like to see this make a return.

So, the monk and his chickens aren't going anywhere. We'll have to move.

Shall we stick with the Shire housing farm fields?
Should we start a petition in the LOTRO forums for a new field?
Other ideas?

[Craicwyth]

Oh, lovely.

I would almost like to petition for a new field, the reason being that the Shire fields are fine, but there is a certain atmosphere in the Shire which I don't feel is conducive to some of our work; (IE the architecture is kind of cartoonish.) However, I suspect that would be a lost cause. Landroval is, from what I understand, the only server that does many equestrian events, and aside from races, they are not particularly heavily attended. The stage in Bree was part of a much larger revamp, and is (likely) much more heavily used than a general performance field would be. So while this is the ideal option, I also see it as the least likely one. So, I suppose we will have to make do with the Shire Homesteads for the time being.

[Kiralynn]

I think you're right about the petition. There are a fair number of races on Laurelin, on rare occasion there is one on another server, but that's still just a fraction of the player base. I seem to recall from a dev chat that the Bree revamp was done on a developer's spare time, so unless some Turbine employee took pity on us and got permission, they won't be adding anything like that, unless it happens to sneak into any new zone that comes out with the next major expansion, and even then that would be too far away for low level and visiting players. We're already being noisy about the issue of horse racing and speed enhancements (if you haven't responded to the LOTRO forum threads about this yet, please jump in and offer your support, thanks).

I think our best bet is to re-scour the map looking for likely sites near major cities. In my experience, events in neighborhoods don't draw big crowds for some reason, unless they're really special and exciting. We may need to revisit the idea of designing routines around a central marker instead of inside a rectangle. That will make us much more "portable".

[Byrcha]

The trouble with a venue like the now-chicken arena is that it is single-purpose. Too bad they cannot find a way to do the chicken-soccer thing (or whatever it is) sometimes, and leave the field open the rest of the time. Like how the festival venues are set up. You don't trip over shrews in that festival garden in Duillond the rest of the year.

I think you're right about how likely we are to get a new riding field anytime soon and/or somewhere in/near an intro area. And if we want to leverage something, I agree that the horse-speed-buff-thingy is the place to push. So we likely have to cycle through venues for at least the next few performances. I suspect that the neighborhoods are troublesome for visitors because you cannot get swift travel there unless you live in the neighborhood, and they are not close to external stable travel (and some folks get lost easily once inside the neighborhoods). Right, it's really not that far, but a hurdle is still a hurdle.

Too bad I forgot to point out the field just outside Snowbourn when we were there last night. It is small, but otherwise flat and safe and near a stable-point. It does limit the audience, so we wouldn't want to perform there all the time. But it might work for a warsteed performance. We already know we can use that frozen lake in Thorins for a wintry performance, and the Shire neighborhood for something lighter, and maybe the Hengstacer's-orc-gazebo field too.

[Cennwyn]

Byrcha wrote:

The trouble with a venue like the now-chicken arena is that it is single-purpose. Too bad they cannot find a way to do the chicken-soccer thing (or whatever it is) sometimes, and leave the field open the rest of the time. Like how the festival venues are set up. You don't trip over shrews in that festival garden in Duillond the rest of the year.

Where and what is the chicken area?? I haven't seen this...

[Byrcha]

The Horsefields north of Bree-town, east of Saerdan's Cabin, SW of the festival grounds; it was changed a couple of months ago. It now has chickens and a referee for some game that players used to be able to play there, which apparently will be reinstated. But the chickens are hard-obstacles on the field now, not like 0-level non-combat wildlife which you can ride through or will run out of the way when you pass. So the field cannot be used for performance riding anymore.