Eastemnet Steel

There are times that I put myself through the craziest things for an outfit, especially when it comes to choosing a screenshot location.Originally, I intended Forlaw to be my location, but that didn't work as planned for this little level 37 Warden. Imagine what it was like running through Enedwaith, Dunland to the Gap of Rohan, through the Westemnet, and almost all of the Eastemnet when everything had a substantially larger aggro radius, was mounted, and had the guaranteed ability to one-shot a character as low as this. With zero Mithiril Coins left, I had no choice.

On my first attempt, I died just outside of Elthengles to a pair of wolves' pincer attack. I was very grateful to respawn in the Trollshaws, considering I'd be back in Sandson's Farm if it were a chicken session play. On my second attempt, I made it to the eastern border of Wildermore, but there were too many roaming ranged and mounted creatures. Instead, I backtracked a bit and safely made it to Harwick. Definitely better to settle for what I already had and not push my luck. I really wanted a snowy background for this!

The Gloaming

Oh, the memories working with these base colors! The last time I worked with black and orange, I was creating my Thrang-themed series and it's a difficult color scheme to coordinate effectively. Recall my "Silver Dawn" outfit from two weeks ago? The one featured this week is the near opposite, the dusk to that dawn theme. It took close to a week to complete this, even if it's a bit over the top.

The biggest obstacle was finding gear that was orange with areas that could be dyed black or black gear with areas that could be dyed orange. That brought to mind the Reforged Rift gear from the Summer Festival and the Ceremonial Gloom-bane set from the Cosmetics vendor at the skirmish camp. The former wasn't an option, as I missed the festival and had none of those skins. The Gloom-bane set worked somewhat, but it was too plain looking. If I'd wanted a simple black and orange outfit, they'd have worked...but I wanted to add another splash of color. That left me with very little outside the various crafted or bartered gear from the Mordor expansion. I found the "Pathfinder's Artifice" recipes, the ones that cost 75 silver signets to acquire and require a Fragment of the Gorgoroth Dungeons to craft, ideal. By default, they come with deep purple undyeable areas and look great when dyed black or orange. I was lucky to still have those fragments in storage. Whereas the "Silver Dawn" outfit had a lot of lightly colored, soft, and rounded pieces, this outfit, in the end, embraced a dark, harsh, and jagged look.

Silver Dawn

This outfit was actually inspired by Hymne of Cosmetic LOTRO. Having seen her use the Jacket of the Wild Hills in this outfit, I felt the desire to do the same. Originally, I started with a similar color scheme as my base, keeping the jacket lórien gold to match the braided celtic knot pattern.  However, no matter what I did, I couldn't get anything to match the chest very well. Days of trying new skins, only to run into the same exact problem--serious clipping. Not just movement clipping, but stationary clipping. The Jacket of the Wilds is one of the bulkier pieces and doesn't exactly sit skin-tight on the body. It was so frustrating that I almost tossed in the proverbial towel and moved on.