Are you playing Lord of the Rings Online primarily because you love Tolkien’s
books? We think the game is a fitting tribute to these wonderful treasures. Turbine, the company that
designed and built the game, have been meticulously true to the spirit of the
books. Their realization of the races, cultures and places is superb. Even the
invented places are thrillingly plausible extensions of the books. If you have
the time, we urge you to explore Turbine’s version of Middle Earth for
yourself. For those that do not, we have written this guide to expedite and
perhaps enlighten your journey.
Michel Delving means large excavation. If you go and stand on the
white rock outcrop to the west of the Town Hole you can see that Turbine’s
Michel Delving was formerly a large quarry. The surrounding area, Delving
Fields, is suitably pitted with quarries. Tolkien didn’t tell us very much
about Michel Delving, other than that it is home to the Mathom House and Town
Hole. Both are there for you to check out. You will be able to enter the Mathom
House once the hobbits there trust you. One thing that most Tolkien officiandos know about Michel Delving
is that its Mayor, Will Whitfoot, was “an exceptionally plump individual”. And
there he is, standing outside the Town Hole, plump even by hobbit standards.
Tolkien didn’t mention an inn or pub in Michel Delving but given
hobbits' love of beer it must have had one (well, in Tolkien’s mind, anyway).
Turbine have invented one and called it the Bird and Baby, a word-play on
Tolkien’s favourite pub in Oxford, the Eagle and Child. It has a hidden secret
that we will return to later. For now, it’s time to visit Hobbiton.
Head east out of Michel Delving on the Great East Road. The first
place you’ll encounter is Waymeet. It might look like a gypsy camp now but it was
once an important place, sitting at the crossroads of the Great East Road and
the Old South Road. Gandalf (returning from imprisonment in Orthanc) and Khamûl
the Ringwraith (searching for Bilbo) both came up the Old South Road and must
have passed through Waymeet. They probably didn't even register it as a settlement.
From Waymeet, continue east until you reach a crossroads near a small wall. Hobbiton is downhill to the north. Speak to the Stable-Master (and indeed to every subsequent Stable-Master you meet) as you enter Hobbiton. You may be surprised to see the Ivy Bush just across the road. It always seemed unfair that Hobbiton had no pubs while Bywater a mile or so up the road had two. Turbine have resolved this by moving the Ivy Bush into Hobbiton and calling the village Hobbiton-Bywater. We think they should have moved the Green Dragon instead, on the basis that Tolkien says that it was the closest pub to Hobbiton.
Cross the river on Hobbiton Bridge. Sandyman’s Mill with a large water wheel is supposed to be on the right. And there it is with Ted Sandyman standing outside. It is supposed to have a large yard behind. Perhaps this is the stable yard. On the other side of the road is the granary known as the Old Grange. Looks good to us.
Finally, near the top of The Hill, there is Bag End, with its green door and brass doorknob. Lotho and Lobelia Sackville-Baggins are there standing outside. If you haven't done so already, this is a good opportunity to learn a few emotes '/slap' and '/bio' might be appropriate here). Outside, there are the chairs where Bilbo blew smoke rings with Gandalf in The Hobbit, and the kitchen garden where Sam eavesdrops on Gandalf's conversation with Frodo. Inside, the rooms fan out from a central corridor, just as Tolkien describes, with the living rooms towards the windows and the functional rooms towards the hill. The first room on the left looks like the parlor, in which case the fire is the very one where Gandalf discovered Bilbo’s ring was The One Ring.
Three Is Company - Hobbiton to Woodhall
From the bridge, the three hobbits head south and cross the Great East Road (beware the wolves as you get close to the road). On the other side they head south-east, towards Green Hill Country, intercepting the road to Woodhall and Stock. Turbine clearly envisage this to be at the Tuckborough Post Office.
While you are in Tuckborough, nip south to Great Smials, ancestral home of the Took family and the Thain. The main door is known as the ‘Great Door’. It’s disappointingly small in the game - actually, it is only half the size of the internal doors! Tolkien describes Great Smials as full of tunnels and home to many generations of Tooks. It has ten internal doors, so this is plausible. While they contemplate Fangorn, Pippin recounts that Great Smials has a dim and stuffy room once inhabited by Old Gerontius Took, where the furniture has never been moved. This is the room behind Adelard Took. Indeed, Adelard offers a Quest chain involving the room and Old Gerontius Took.
Go back to Tuckborough Post Office and take the road east towards Stock. In the book, the road becomes a deeply cloven track surrounded by tall trees, after which it goes steeply uphill. This must be the area around Old Odo’s Leaf Farm. Frodo, Sam and Pippin sleep in the roots of a great tree. We are not convinced that Turbine thought about this, but if they did the copse of trees at 33.9S 67.5W seems most likely.
On the morning of 23rd September, the hobbits cross a stream where it flows under a bridge. This must be the bridge at 33.5S 67.5W. The road climbs to the top of a steep bank, from where they can look across Wood End. This is where they have lunch and encounter a Black Rider. Sam and Pippin dive into a hollow to the south of the road. Frodo hides behind a tree to the north. Again, we are not convinced that Turbine thought about this but if they did, the most promising candidate tree is at 33.6S 66.3W.
They continue east, traveling a stone’s throw south of the road. Eventually they come to a branch of the road that heads north to Woodhall, where they meet Gildor and a wandering band of High-Elves. They spend the evening talking to the elves and sleep there on the night of 23rd September. This is clearly the 'Abandoned Elf-camp' at 33.4S 66.1W, which is strangely not abandoned as there is an elf there.
A Shortcut To Mushrooms - Woodhall to Bamfurlong
Someone at Turbine has clearly spent ages reproducing Maggot’s Farm. Apart from all the normal farm paraphernalia, it has mushroom sheds, a thatched cottage, Maggot’s dogs, a wagon, ponies and even a duck pond. Bravo Turbine! All exactly as they should be, although it must have been a tad cramped on the evening of 24th September when 14 of them sat down to supper in a house barely big enough for 2. The high wall and wooden gate are missing, but they are un-Shire-like and would spoil the look of the place perhaps.
Maggot takes Frodo, Sam and Pippin to the Ferry in his wagon. They go along a path towards Stock, then turn right into Ferry Lane. This is where they meet up with Merry. Again, the area has been meticulously reproduced, with white washed stones beside Ferry Lane, the wooden landing stage, the two white bollards glimmering under the light from two lamp posts. Wonderful stuff. The only mistake is the two white posts that are supposed to be at the top of Ferry Lane have been put at the bottom, right in front of the landing stage.
A Conspiracy Unmasked - Crickhollow
Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pip pass Buck Hill and Brandy Hall - in front of you as you come out of the Brandywine - and head north. Soon after entering Crickhollow they take a lane on their right that leads to Frodo’s new home, which sits behind a narrow gate in a thick hedge. And there it is, exactly as Tolkien describes: a single story house, with round windows and a turf roof, as much like a hobbit hole as a house can be, standing in the middle of a large lawn surrounded by a circle of trees. Chapeau Turbine! All very well done.
Did you notice that the front door is smashed? Of course, the house was attacked by three Nazgûl who thought that Frodo was inside. Fatty Bolger was there alone and managed to raise the alarm after escaping out the back door. One of the Nazgûl dropped a hobbit cloak on their way out. Frodo’s house in Crickhollow could hardly be more as we imagined if we had designed it ourselves.
The Old Forest
The Old Forest is beautifully crafted. It has an ominous sinister feel. Exactly as Tolkien explains, the trees move around, some are very unfriendly, and some do grasp at you with their roots. Turbine have livened it up with many more bats, wolves, bears and spiders than you might expect from the books. It used to be so dangerous that new players avoided it, but Turbine have ‘nerfed’ it in recent upgrades, making it much less dangerous than it used to be (and far less dangerous than it should be).
Of course, the Old Forest is one place where you can’t follow in Frodo’s footsteps because the trees will have moved since he was there. You can however visit the static landmarks he passed. Bonfire Glade is east, straight up the path from the tunnel. Bald Hill is east from Bonfire Grove, just a few hundred metres up the middle fork when the path splits. Frodo heads north from Bald Hill but the trees divert him south until he hits the Withywindle. They have moved around since. There are now several ways to reach the Withywindle. We suggest you pass through Bonfire Glade and turn south passing the stack of wood. This will bring you to Gilliam Brandybuck standing by the Withywindle. Tolkien describes the Withywindle as a dark river of brown water, bordered and over-arched by ancient willows, and filled with thousands of willow leaves. Looks perfect to us.
There is no sign of the east path that Frodo follows, but you can wade through the water instead. Soon after passing the Abandoned Cottage (a Turbine invention) you will come to an open glade and catch your first glimpse of Old Man Willow. Sadly this encounter isn’t the challenge it used to be when he would sap all your energy (power), slow you down and attack with his roots. In the book, Tom Bombadil saves the hobbits from Old Man Willow and leads them to his house. He’s a lot busier now that there are hundreds of visitors in the Old Forest. You will have to make your own way.
Keep heading east up the Withywindle. You will come to a small bridge with a waterfall straight ahead. As Tolkien explains, when they see the waterfall, the forest suddenly stops and the hobbits find themselves on short tended grass. They follow a path up a slope. The path becomes better formed, bordered with white stones, and leads to Tom’s house. Just do exactly as Tolkien describes and you will find Tom’s house, usually with the ‘man’ himself poncing around outside.
By Turbine’s usual high standards, Tom’s house is not quite up to par. There is no stone threshold, no thatched eaves, no long low room, only three candles hanging from the beams, and only one short stubby candle on the table. Still, if you go inside, Goldberry’s chair is there, surrounded by earthenware pots containing floating white lilies. The penthouse is there, although it seems to have lost its curtains and mats. Perhaps Turbine were in a rush: as evidence you might notice that the penthouse table is an exact duplicate of the dining room table. Tom’s house might be wrong but it’s beautifully wrong: his roof, for example, is held up by gorgeous carved logs and his garden always has pink butterflies darting around.
The Barrow Downs
The Barrow Downs were created by the Eglain, the indigenous people of the region. The Dunedain of Cardolan, a kingdom belonging to one of King Earendur’s sons, retreated into the Barrow Downs after being defeated in battle by the Witch-King of Angmar (you should get a nice Cardolan related Deed when you ‘kill’ wights in the Barrow Downs). Presumably under Tom protection, the Dunedain survived under siege in the Barrow Downs for 200 years before succumbing to a plague. The Witch-King sent in evil spirits to prevent anyone else hiding there, which is why you will find it still infested with wights and barghasts.
Presumably the hobbits head northeast, but in LOTRO you need to head southeast. They have lunch in a saucer shaped hill top with a single standing stone in the middle. This is the Dead Spire at 32.1S 55.1W. A fog comes down - if you are lucky the same may happen to you in the game. The hobbits are overcome by a wight’s spell. They are captured and taken to a great barrow. You can head into the southern Barrows to check this out, but we think it is better to go there as part of a Fellowship during Chapter 11 of Volume 1 Book 1. In the book, Tom saves them again and leads them back to safety. Hopefully you will be equally lucky in Chapter 11, but for now you will have to make your own way north, back onto the Great East Road.
As Tom leads the hobbits out of the Barrow Downs they come to a line of bushes along a dike that Tom explains used to be the border of a great kingdom (that we know to be Cardolan). In LOTRO there is plenty of rubble and ruins, but no bushes and no dike.
Bree
As we all know, they are hoping to meet Gandalf in the Prancing Pony. It is east of the main gate. Tolkien describes the Prancing Pony as a three story house with many windows and a wide arch between two wings, with the entrance on the left up a small flight of stone steps. It has a lamp above the arch and beneath it a sign with a fat white pony. Turbine are bang on here. Everything is perfect, even down to the the small side door for hobbits to access the hobbit sized rooms.
A Knife in the Dark - Bree to Weathertop
After leaving Bree, the road bends to the east. As it does so, hobbit holes are visible in Staddle to the north. Strider leads them into a wood, then takes a path to the north. They spend two days in the wood before heading east into the Midgewater Marshes. The only LOTRO path heading north is near the Yellow Tree. It skirts the edge of the marshes rather than staying in Chetwood, but it must be the one. We struck east in line with Staddle. Strider and the four hobbits spent one night in the marshes, but we couldn’t find any evidence of it. During the evening Sam hears some insects that make a ‘neek-breek’ noise. He names them ‘neekerbreekers’. They are common LOTRO foes in sands and marshland.
Concerned that Weathertop will be watched by the enemy, Strider decides to approach it from the north, using an ancient Dunedain supply path. On their fifth day out of Bree, the ground starts rising. Turbine clearly envisage this to be at the Midgewater Pass, the western entrance of which is by the Mustering Cave at 30.6S 42.8W. Be careful as you emerge from the eastern end of the pass: it is swarming with wolves. If you are solo, your safest route is to jump into the river and swim up steam to the ford. Strider and the hobbits camp under some alder trees by the stream. Judging by the oddly placed copse, Turbine must envisage this camp to be at the ford just east of Gondrinn.
Strider leads the hobbits along the supply path heading southeast then south, until they reach the western foothills of Weathertop. In LOTRO this path leads to Candaith, from whom you need to pick up the Book 2 Prologue. The Prologue will eventually take you up Weathertop. For now, just head 100m or so south from Candaith to find their camp of October 6th at 31.2S 37.9W. It is down in a dell, exactly as it should be, surrounded by five logs, one each to sit on. The stream where Sam and Pippin trampled the evidence is nearby. Sadly we could find no obvious evidence of the fight with five Black Riders.
You will visit the summit of Weathertop in the Book 2 Prologue, but to follow in Frodo’s steps you can go there now. As Strider explains, the wide circle of crumbing rock is all that remains of the once magnificent watchtower that housed a Palantir. We know that Gandalf had a fight there three days previously. The stones and grass about are blackened, as they should be, by Gandalf’s lightning spells. In the center is a cairn of broken stones. Strider finds a white stone with scratched runes. It is there, by the cairn. If you look down on it, you will clearly see GIII (although it is in sindarin rather than runic for some reason) scratched on the surface.
Flight to the Ford - Weathertop to Rivendell
Tolkien describes how Strider and the hobbits cross the Last Bridge hearing no sound other than the rush of water against its three great arches. Perhaps there has been a bit of a drought since because the LOTRO version of the Loudwater is almost fordable and disappointingly silent.
Strider decides that they can’t risk staying on the road. A mile or so after crossing the Loudwater, he takes the hobbits north of the road, up a narrow ravine. This must be the valley north of Rochwen. They go in a very inefficient loop that returns to the East Road. Start by heading north. When the path goes uphill, veer to the northeast. Follow it around, through a valley of trolls, as it curves ever more easterly. Eventually it heads downhill, ending up in Stone Trolls’ Glade at 31.2S 18.2W. If you are in the low Level 20s, just run along the East Road until you get to the start if the Gorge, then head north to reach Stone Trolls’s Glade from the other side.
Exactly as Bilbo described, in LOTRO one stone troll is stooping, the other two staring at him. Better still, bless Turbine, one of them has a bird’s nest in his ear! If you head 50 paces or so up the valley to the west, you will see the door to the troll-cave where Bilbo finds Glamdring, Orcrist and Sting. Bilbo and the dwarfs bury the rest of the troll’s treasure by the side of the road and mark the place with a rune inscribed stone. Strider points it out to the hobbits as they rejoin the East Road. Turbine are usually so meticulous with these famous landmarks that we are convinced it must be there but we couldn’t find it.
As you head east, you will reach the path to Thorenhad. A little further on they meet Glorfindel. Then the road heads downhill towards the Ford of Bruinen. The hobbits run out of puff so they camp by the side of the road. As Glorfindel, Aragorn and the hobbits come within sight of the ford, they are jumped by five Black Riders hiding in the trees. Frodo bolts for the ford but four more Black Riders come down from the rocks and try to intercept him. Frodo manages to cross the ford. The Nine chase him but are swept away by a flood. Glorfindel kindles a fire to try to deal with any that escape. We found no evidence of the gate in the trees, but the four could have been hiding in the dell north of the road. And Glorfindel’s fire is still there at 33.2S 12.7W.
Rivendell & The Misty Mountains
Rivendell and TLHH look, feel and sound right. The entrance is along a very plausible zig-zag path from the High Moor. It has a precipitous drop on one side, over which Gandalf’s horse almost falls in The Hobbit. The Last Homely House is simply beautiful, with suitable porches and decoration. Elrond’s Hall, the Hall of Fire, and Bilbo’s room are there for you to explore. Our minor gripe is that some details are wrong. There should be a second path, possibly a stairway, on the south slope. The path should cross the Bruinen above the main falls. TLHH should have a garden. The stables are in the wrong place. Elrond’s Hall is in the wrong place and lacks feasting table and chairs, which seem to have been erroneously moved into the The Hall of Fire. And Frodo’s room on the upper floor is missing. Never-the-less, from the few clues they are given, we love what Turbine have done.
Oatbarton and Dwaling, north of the Shire, have no canonical relevance but once you reach Level 28 it's fun to go there and pick up a quest from Ronald Dwale named ‘Missing the meeting’. It instructs you to go to the ‘Bird and Baby’ and tell Jack Lewisdown that you will miss their book club meeting. ‘Bird and Baby’ (see tease above), ‘Ronald’, ‘Jack’, ‘Lewis’, ‘book club’. That should give you an inkling of who else and what else you might find there.
Goblin Town
In The Hobbit, Bilbo, Gandalf and their dwarf companions leave Rivendell on mid-summer day. They head up into the Misty Mountains, climbing for many days as the weather gets colder and colder. One night there is a terrible storm. The company shelter under an overhanging rock. Tolkien explains that they were “high up in a narrow place, with a dreadful fall into a dim valley at one side of them”. This is clearly the path east from Vindurhal, but it doesn’t have any overhanging rocks (well, there is a rock arch at 20.6S 4.8E but we don’t think this isn’t intended to be it). Getting drenched, they send Fili and Kili to find somewhere better to stay. Fili and Kili find a cave ‘just around the next corner’.
Turbine’s labelling is slightly confusing here. Tolkien describes the cave as ‘a fair size ... with a dry floor and some comfortable nooks ... with room at one end for the ponies’. LOTRO’s ‘Black Crack’ is at 20.3S 5.4E. It does have a cave of sorts outside, but it is too short and too high. Turbine’s cave is inside the Instance with the actual Black Crack being open, so that it just looks like a normal passageway. Never mind, it’s only detail. It is Bilbo’s entrance into Goblin Town.
After being captured, Bilbo and the dwarfs are taken ‘Down, down into Goblin Town’ until they reach the Great Goblin’s cavern. The cavern has a large fire in the middle and a platform at the far end, upon which the Great Goblin stands. Gandalf killed the original Great Goblin, but a new one has taken his place. You can follow Bilbo’s path by heading northeast from the Black Crack until you reach the main passageway, then heading north through two Instance boulders.
Gandalf springs them. The dwarfs escape down dark tunnels. By Karen Wynn-Fonstad’s estimate, they run 30 miles before reaching the ‘back door’. Gollum’s cave is a little further still. In LOTRO, Gollum’s cave is just a few hundred yards down a tunnel to the east of the Great Goblin’s Den. On the basis that Bilbo finds the ring between the Great Goblin’s cavern and Gollum’s cave, it must have been somewhere down this tunnel, although we could find no evidence of it.
You can approach Gollum’s cave from a passageway east of the Great Goblin’s Den, from an eastward passageway just south of the entrance to the Great Goblin’s Den, or from a largely uninhabited tunnel from the south that runs parallel to the main passageway - check on the Internet for a Goblin Town map. You know you have got to the tunnel leading to Gollum’s cave when you see a very well designed wall painting of him. Follow the passageway into Gollum’s Cave Instance. We don’t know much about Gollum’s cave but Turbine have faithfully reproduced what we do know. It is a large cave with a slimy island in the middle where Gollum lived. His tent and the remains of his meals are there as evidence. He paddles around on a small boat, which you will find by the shore.
For the time being, Gollum’s cave is as far you can follow Bilbo’s journey. You can however pick up the buttons he lost when escaping through the back door as loot items because some goblins still carry them around.
The Ring Goes South - Rivendell to Durin’s Door
One interpretation is that they go to the Ford of Bruinen and then head south, which in LOTRO means travelling down the north/west bank, crossing back over the river at the ford outside Garbert’s Cottage. Another interpretation is that they leave the East Road as they approach the Ford of Bruinen, which means travelling down the south/east bank from 34.9S 9.6W, descending to the Crumbled Cellar at 35.8S 11.4W, and joining the other route opposite Garbert’s Cottage. This route then goes south up the ramp, across the tree bridge, and into Eregion. A third possibility is that they strike south through Giant Valley. This is least like the book description - Giant Valley is a Turbine invention, after all - but we feel it is the way Turbine originally wanted you to think they went (see discussion below).
We suspect that Turbine got confused or changed their minds about the route into Eregion - there was after all a 2 year gap while Eregion was being developed. In the book they must have come along the Bruinen Valley because Giant Valley is a Turbine invention. However, Tolkien tells us that their first campsite in Eregion is on Hollin Ridge, which Turbine have located on the route from Giant Valley. For our purposes, imagine that that their first camp was on the now inaccessible ridge north of Sad Rechu. Tolkien explains that they head southeast to their second campsite. You will find it at 43.8S 12.9W.After much discussion, they decide to cross the Misty Mountains along a pass known as the Redhorn Gate. From the camp, Tolkien says that they follow a twisting path. To pick up the route, head south from the camp site, then follow it up into the mountains. Exactly as Tolkien describes, soon the mountain is rising up to the left of the path as they walk along the cliff face. Then snow starts falling. It is still heavy on the ground at 46.3S 4.2W. The snow becomes a blizzard at 46.7S 3.1W. Then their way is blocked by an avalanche and rock fall. They reluctantly camp on the mountain. The camp site is still there, at 46.6S 2.7W, surrounded by four passive grims.
Having given up crossing by the mountain pass, the Company dig their way out of the snow and climb down. They next camp on top of a hill, where they are attacked by wolves. This is the Burnt Tor at 49.1S 10.5W. Like Weathertop, the Burnt Tor it is burnt by Gandalf’s magic. Remnants of the battle are still there if you search around.
The Company head south and east until they meet the dried up river bed of the Sirannon. In LOTRO, you have to head west then south, meeting the Sirannon at 51.9S 10.7W. There is a path on the near (north) side of the river bed, just as there should be. They follow the path east for many miles which takes you to Echad Dunann - a Turbine invented Quest hub - in the game.
Enter the Instance behind Rathweld. The road veers southwards, presumably at 50.6S 7.3W. They come to a sharp bend where it veers eastward again. This must be where Bosi is standing at 51.8S 6.6W. Exactly as Tolkien describes, a little further east they see a cliff over which a trickle of water falls. Gandalf remembers it being a full waterfall on his previous visit. They climb to the top of the adjacent stairs to discover that the river has been dammed and that a lake has built up behind the dam. Spot on, Turbine. If you climb to the top of the stairs, you will see the dam and lake, exactly as they should be.
Gandalf decides that they must go around the north of the lake. When they get to the northernmost point of the path, their way is blocked by a green and stagnant stream. This is the stream at 50.3S 3.7W, although it is easily jumpable in the game. Heading south, they pass the stumps and fallen boughs of holly trees that once lined the path. Then eventually they find two tall living holly trees with roots spreading from the cliff to the water that mark the entrance to Moria. They are there at 51.8S 3.5W. Frodo notes that they don’t look like any holly tree he has ever seen, and he is right. They are not in berry and don’t look anything like the holly trees elsewhere in Hollin. We reckon that Turbine have substituted something cheaper. Oh, well, there is the door anyway.
