Closing Down 2 High Road

Just a brief note to let everyone know that 2 High Road is closing down.  I am still playing LOTRO, but I find myself struggling to make time for writing blog posts.  Thanks to everyone that dropped by, and may the hair on your toes never fall out! 

Siege of Mirkwood Beta Invite

I received an invitation yesterday to the Siege of Mirkwood Beta.  For now, I don’t think I will participate, largely because of the following:

• Requires a separate client installation, clogging up more of my hard drive
• When I have time to play an MMO, I want to achieve objectives (rep grind, crafting, running instances, etc).  In Beta, these things go away when the Beta is over.
• Time is running out for me to experience the remaining end game content in Mines of Moria while it is still considered “End Game”
• Simply experiencing new content before the general LOTRO community sees it is not sufficient incentive to make me choose Beta over the “real” game.

However, I realize that there are many people who will leap at the opportunity to join Beta and that’s a good thing.  Hopefully, there will be good testers that give frequent and accurate feedback on any problems they encounter.  It seems to be the norm that shortly after a release of an MMO expansion there is always a patch needed to correct some major issues.  Turbine needs to release a slick, finished product to offset some of the criticism about this expansion being a little underwhelming.  Don’t get me wrong- this is by far the best game that I’ve ever played.  But I have to confess that as I was reading the press release about the new features coming, I kept finding myself thinking “and?  and?  that’s it?”.  In my view, for Siege of Mirkwood to be considered a legitimate expansion, the new areas need to be at least as large as Moria.  And if the Skirmish system is all that we are being told, LOTRO could definitely be breaking new ground in the MMO world.  If nothing else, it is almost worth $20 to be able to stay on my horse when talking to quest givers and vendors

Here are a few of the changes I was hoping to see in the expansion:

• Make /glff a moderated official channel.  Or better yet, scrap the existing LFF interface in favor of one people will use.  I’ve pointed out problems with the existing system before.
• Add a swift travel between Bree and 21st Hall.  Feel free to “gate” it with a reputation requirement (Kindred with both Iron Garrison factions?).  All non-hunters and non-wardens want this.
• Figure out a way to make past content relevant by scaling the difficulty and loot.  I hear that Rift and Helegrod are pretty cool, but I wouldn’t know because there aren’t opportunities to go there.

It is possible that I may change my mind and check out the Beta in a weak moment, but the NDA won’t permit me to post about it so you wouldn’t know until the expansion is released.

Conquering The Hall of Mirrors

The three man instances in LOTRO are a great concept.  Players are able to enjoy the “instance experience” (boss fights, loot, camaraderie, etc) even when they only have three players available.  The Library and School were the first implementations of the three man instance, and now Hall of Mirrors and Water Wheels are the latest refinement of the concept.  Supposedly, three man instances aren’t as class/role dependent as the regular six mans.  For example, a traditional tanking class such as a Guardian or Warden isn’t necessary to complete them.  Ditto for traditional healers like Minstrels and Rune Keepers.  This idea held true when we ran Library and School, my Captain could tank or heal competently for the group to succeed.  We even completed them using two hunters and a burglar (green fellowship maneuvers FTW!).  We have not found the same to be true in Hall of Mirrors.

There is not much information about strategies for Hall of Mirrors available online, especially since the latest patch which added the slick surface on the last boss.  Our initial attempt was made by two hunters and a rune keeper.  One of the hunters had ran it before to complete book 8 chapter 3, but their group did not take down Ergoth.  So we had at least a rudimentary understanding of the mirror alignment process and the first boss fight, but mostly we were flying blind.  I’ve included tips for the boss fights below, but not anything about mirror alignment except at the very end.  If you don’t already know, the mirrors have to be aligned so that light will “burn” through the “gunk” blocking some of the passages.  It is a puzzle element that you will enjoy figuring out and if you want to figure out the mirrors at the end on your own, then be sure not to click the link about the ten mirrors.

For the first boss fight, there is a sleeping Wolf matron and her two sidekicks.  When you pull, you will get the sidekicks while she continues to doze.  If you have a lore master, this fight is easy.  Simply keep one of the wolves stunned and quickly kill the other.  Then, finish off the other one.  If your dps is good, you should be able to kill both before the matron joins the fight.  If you don’t have a lore master, you have to be creative.  The wolves’ “gimmick” is that they heal each other almost completely back to full health and it is not interruptable   This can be prevented by keeping them separated on opposite sides of the room, and removing a corruption before the heal goes off (rune keepers have great corruption removal).  It took a while for us to figure this out.  By the way, always read the buffs on the mobs as they often provide clues about what is needed to deal with them.  Once the sidekicks are dead, or sooner if the dps is not strong, the matron enters the fray.  If you have a tank and dedicated healer, it is simply tank and spank with a liberal sprinkling of wound removal potions/salves.  If you don’t have a tank, then kiting is your best friend.  Also remember that if things go poorly (for example, someone dies), the remaining group members can run back into the hallway to reset the encounter.  This will save you quite a bit of money for repairs while you are learning the fight.

The second boss fight isn’t really a boss fight at all.  A task mistress will spawn and immediately behind you a defiler will spawn.  Quick note about the task mistresses in this instance:  they have to die within 45 secs of being engaged or their damage is increased by 1000%!  Again, be sure to read the buffs.  Ignore the defiler and kill the task mistress as soon as possible, then kill the defiler.  Think “corruption removal” on defilers.

After looting the chest, you can move on down to the platform area.  There are ten mirrors that have to be aligned correctly (spoiler alert!) before engaging the final boss.  Simple enough, right?  Oh yeah, there is a task mistress that walks around the mirrors spawning a defiler at each when she passes.  Basically, wherever she is at in the beginning (“North” for example) send a couple of people to align the other three areas (South, East and West).  Once she comes down into the center area, engage her and kill her quickly.  As soon as she dies, you have three minutes before another spawns.  Always be back in the center area when it time for her to spawn so that you can kill her without having to fight a defiler as well.  Once all of the mirrors are aligned and the defilers killed, it will open up access to Ergoth and the task mistresses will stop spawning.

Now, a quick update on our two hunter/one rune keeper group.  We managed after a long evening to get to Ergoth and even got her down to about 20k health before giving up.  However, this was prior to Turbine making the floor sticky on this encounter which pretty much removes kiting as an option.  We were distracted by other things in the game so we only last week started making attempts at HoM again.  Our new group composition was a warden, hunter and rune keeper.

To achieve “hard mode” in Hall of Mirrors, Ergoth has to be defeated while at least one type of her minions is left alive.  I believe there are four types, and four of each type, for a total of sixteen minions.  Before jumping into the pit to start the encounter, mark one of each type and simply avoid killing the marked creatures.  Everything else is fair game.  The fight consists of two phases that repeat constantly throughout the fight.  The first phase involves fighting Ergoth and she has some very strong abilities.  The first, and most annoying, is her knockback.  It interrupts whatever you are doing and knocks you back while inflicting 500-700 damage.  If you are close to the edge of the mirror you are fighting on, you can be knocked off and killed.  The second nasty ability is when she says something like “terror descends upon you!” and a random member of the group gets a tremendous dread effect put on them.  You can tell who has it because there will be a ghostly image attacking them (no damage though).  Even with a token and forty radiance, my rune keeper cowered often which means no heals for the others.  Eventually this will wear off, but she will repeat it at various times on various group members.  The final major ability she has is placing a wound effect, most often on the tank.  Bottom line is that the wound must be removed or the fight is over.  The warden used wound potions and I used salves on him when his potion was still on cooldown.  She also places a fear effect that inflicts damage, but because the fear and wound potions are on the same cooldown we elected to ignore it.  The first phase ends when she floats up in the air and the sixteen minions, who have been patiently watching on the sidelines, rush in to attack.  They don’t hit too hard individually, but if all of them get on the healer it could turn out bad.  The tank needs to pick them up and the dps needs to start picking off the minions (about 1800 health each), but NOT the marked ones.  After about 20 seconds, the minions run back to the perimeter and Ergoth floats back down.  Rinse and repeat.  Eventually you will get down to just the four minions and you can focus on burning down Ergoth.  When she gets to about 23k health she acquires another ability- healing herself for about 6k.  That’s the bad news.  The good news is that if you keep whittling away on her during her phase and ignoring the remaining minions during their phase, you will eventually get her down.  I believe her heals get smaller as her health gets lower.

This can be a very frustrating, yet rewarding fight.  I have read on the forums where people stated that they felt it was too difficult and were going to avoid it.  I encourage you to stick it out, it is beatable.

A few more tips:

• Wound potions, lots and lots of wound potions
• Morale and Power potions, you’ll need them
• Tokens
• Fight Ergoth in the light
• Everyone stay near tank so that they can use salves on him/her
• Everyone stay near tank so he/she can gather up minions
• Use Target Assist
• Ergoth and her minions’ damage type is Shadow, draw your own conclusions

I’m looking forward to trying this instance with different group compositions.  I don’t think my captain can tank it since he doesn’t have an AoE threat/taunt ability, but I believe that he can heal it well enough.  As a matter of fact, he has already healed it all the way to Ergoth but we didn’t beat her.  Heavy armor and a shield makes it easier for him to survive aggro from the minions.  I’m also curious as to how some of the other classes will do.  We are also now starting to learn how to beat Water Wheels so I’ll post some tips when we work out the kinks.  Good times

Closest Thing To A MOD In LOTRO

I ran across CSTATS a few weeks ago.  It is a combat log parser that lets you analyze your damage output and healing output.  It is different from the WoW “dps meters” in that it doesn’t have an in-game display.  Another important difference is that LOTRO combat chat only displays your character’s damage and healing information, not anyone else in the group.  So if you are looking to flex your “Leetness” against others you will be disappointed.  However, if you would like to compare your damage stats between different traiting setups, gear setups, damage types, etc., then this may be helpful to you.  I took my Captain out for a quick spin in Lorien and logged some quick and dirty kills (no buffs, etc) so that I could try it out.  This is only intended to illustrate the information available from CSTATS (did this in a rush, apologies for the poor image quality).  Below is a general overview of the info logged:

A more specific breakdown is also available:

One aspect of LOTRO that I would like better information about is how much damage types affect output against monster types.  For example, just how much better exactly is Light damage than Beleriand damage against a particular enemy?  Enough to warrant making the change prior to running an instance?  Or, how does maxxing out particular stats (through traiting and gear) like Might affect my total damage output?  Is it worth giving up something else?  It appears that CSTATS may be able to shed some light on these matters.  I’ll try to post some results of what I find over the next couple of weeks.  Please feel free to reply with any observations that you make if you decide to try out CSTATS.

Surprised by Forges

My Captain has been level 60 for a few weeks now, so of course that means I need to start farming his radiance gear against the day that we ever actually start raiding as a kin.  Not that I mind the lack of raiding, I haven’t really gotten weary of the end game instances yet.  Fortunately, we have added a few kinmates recently that have just hit 60,  and  some of our veterans have alts that have reached the plateau as well.  This provides for a really good pool of adventuring mates without having to stir the /LFF waters to flesh out a group.

We actually had enough on at the same time recently to form almost two full groups for farming Grand Stair to get the radiance boots.  It was exactly as I remembered it, and we didn’t have any trouble getting everyone their coins.  Riding a wave of confidence, six of us veterans decided to bring the smackdown on Forges to get everyone their radiance chest gear.  Although we have played together many hours, there was a little bit of adjusting to the different group dynamic.  For example, our tank used to be the healer and our healer used to be the tank.  The first boss was a little bumpy and even though we had a death or two we still managed to bring him down.  Of course this starts the timer for Hard Mode so we dash off to the second boss.  One of our fellowship ran past the ramp and aggroed an unnecessary group.  Though we were caught off guard, we managed to dispatch them quickly.  The second boss went down eventually, but a death or two again slowed us a bit which is detrimental when you are racing the clock.  We all know that success or failure hinges on the second boss and although a little off schedule, we charge ahead.  The third boss, as we remembered it, is basically a tank and spank except for when a water pouch is required to remove a fire debuff.  Immediately some one dies.  Then another…and another.  We are flabbergasted and a little embarassed that we wiped on the easiest boss in the instance.  Urgently, we regroup and run back down as we can see the chance of success ebbing away.  Hurry!  Everyone eats and buffs and we start again.  And we wipe….again.  At this point, we recognize that something is wrong.  After being careful and paying attention we realize that the flame jets shooting out from the wall seem to happen MUCH more frequently than before.  I always glance through the patch notes but I don’t recall any mention of this change.  Anyway, we raised the white flag and returned to the 21st Hall to lick our wounds.  When we went back a day or so later, we adjusted to the very frequent flame jets by changing our view to a somewhat overhead angle which allows you to see the pre-flame jet flare and thus have time to move out of it’s path.  By the time we got everyone their radiance coin, we were completing hard mode with almost 11 minutes left on the timer.  Not too shabby

At first, I was quite miffed by the change to the flame jets frequency.  But eventually I decided that although frustrating at first, it was actually nice to have a little challenging twist.  The flame jets were there before, but we were always able to beat the boss with complete disregard for them.  I consider Forges the best designed non-raid instance I have ever played (LOTRO or WoW).  It requires complete coordination and every one doing their tasks properly.  The only flaw in my opinion is the timer.  All of you know that random disconnects and client crashes can completely de-rail an otherwise perfect run.  Taking away the timer would remove the urgency (and fun), so I suppose the best option would be for LOTRO to iron out whatever it is that causes the somewhat frequent client crashes.

Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’

Book 8 has dropped and our kin welcomed the pleasant diversion from the earlier drama this week.  Several of us spent Wednesday getting the tokens needed for our Summer Festival Horse and last night we opted for an instance run on our alts.  I logged on to my Captain, Rochben, and pitched an open invitation to kin chat, “Who wants to come to Fornost?”  A couple of the gang reply “I’ll be there“.  After months of running the end game instances, we were a little foggy about the details of Fornost.  I had no clue about the first boss fight, so I asked Aristoff, “Do you remember the time we came before and what tactic we used”?  He replied that it was some off the wall randomness, but it wasn’t hard to beat it.  We decided to put the Guardian on the boss and I tell the Warden (Aristoff) that if adds spawn and attack the healer, he has got to be there to pull them off.  Alas, the fight was basically tank and spank without much trouble.

Fornost is a huge instance.  If you are level appropriate, plan to spend 2.5+ hours clearing the place.  We ranged from 39-46 and blazed through it pretty well, although there was an accidental pull that turned into quite a thriller.  Thankfully, I was able to use my combat rez, or things could’ve gone bad.  The only mishap came at the end.  Apparently Einiora (next to last boss), drops an item that is required to defeat the final boss.  Unbeknownst to the winner of the roll, his bags were full and the needed item was left on her.  I can’t fault him, I wasn’t paying attention either.  So we were unable to defeat the final boss and our Guardian stated that he was finished for the night.  I chimed, “You are not alone, I’m done too.”  Overall, it was very fun run and I had a great time.  Even though we didn’t defeat the final boss, success in gaming isn’t always black or white.  If you have a good time with friends, then you are successful.

Thanks for indulging this trivial homage to an icon of my generation.

Godspeed Gynnie, We Will Miss You

A couple of weeks ago, some of my kinmates and I were preparing a run through Great Barrow.  We had a group of five that could handle completing the instance, but I tossed out an advertisement in LFF anyway for the last spot because I know there is always someone that wants to complete the quests and cannot find a group.  I quickly get a whisper from a Minstrel asking if she could join us.  I replied in the affirmative and shortly thereafter we are all having a relaxed and grand old time with the Wights.  About halfway through the instance, our new friend says that she is sorry but will have to go AFK because the “doctor has come to my room”.  She puts me on follow and we continue, but of course the rest of us are wondering what circumstances brings someone to playing LOTRO while a hospital patient.  She returns after a short while, apologizing profusely for the inconvenience.  We tell her “No Worries!” and continue.  After the run, one of our group members (and our kin leader) continues a private conversation with her and learns that she is 20 years old, her mother died when she was young, her father is not involved in her life, she has no other close friends or family, and is a hospice patient with Stage 4 bone cancer.  Her doctor tells her that she has maybe two months left.

Our kin leader communicated this information to us, and being a kind hearted sort, speaks to her again the next day and invites her to join our kin.  She accepts and brings her hunter, Gynnie, into our family.  We all try to be as friendly and upbeat as we can whenever she logs on, hoping to bring a little sunshine into an otherwise gloomy world.  Gynnie and our kin leader strike up a fast friendship and he spends some time chatting with her each day, mostly to let her share her pains with someone.  Also, one of our kin officers that had a house next to the kin house gave it to Gynnie since he was planning to upgrade to a deluxe house anyway.  She was very excited to be a part of the kin and a resident of our neighborhood

Now, let me confess something right now.  Although I am not proud of the fact, I am quite often cynical of new people, particularly those with hard-luck stories.  Surely, someone wouldn’t lie about something as grave as this.  However, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that an attention starved teen drama queen could play a game like this thinking that no one will get hurt because it all takes place in the imaginary digital world.  For the time being I would take her story at face value, but I would watch carefully for inconsistencies/inaccuracies in her story.  I REALLY should lighten up sometimes.

Gynnie asked our kin leader if he wanted to be added to her Oncology Advisory Update List (or something like that), to which he agreed.  From what I gather, it is a system that provides information about her condition and treatment schedule via email or other means.  Gynnie’s nurse also commented that since our kin leader had taken an interest in her life, she had been more willing to cooperate with her treatment.  This past Wednesday night, the kin leader asked some of us to be online Thursday evening because Gynnie was going to have a very painful treatment and wanted to know someone was available for her to talk to (he had a previous engagement, would be on, but later).  I wasn’t able to log on until about halfway through the four hour process, but Gynnie immediately began sending me tells, they seemed a little frantic, I guess because she was so scared.  I tried to calm her by telling her that I have a daughter almost the same age as her.  Here is the conversation paraphrased:

Gynnie:  “What would you do if your daughter were sick and dying like me?”

Me: “I would do everything possible to make her last days comfortable”

Silence.

Me: “If your Dad were involved in your life, what would you want him to do?”

Gynnie: “I would like to hear that he cared that I was sick, that he would tell me he wouldn’t forget me.”

Me: “A father isn’t required for that, a friend can do that “

Gynnie: “But a father should offer “
Gynnie: “and mine never will”

She would also tell me many times that the treatment was horrible and she couldn’t do it anymore.  I was at a loss for what to say…”Sure you can!”?  Easy for me to say when I’m not the one going through it.  Or, “Yeah, you’re right.” ?  That’s not what she needed either.  I finally settled for, “I’m sorry you are having to go through this.  I’ve been praying for you.”  Finally, our kin leader logged on and she began to talk with him (don’t blame her, I wasn’t much help or comfort).

Friday and Saturday night were largely incident free as Gynnie mostly spent time talking with our kin leader.  Gynnie did whisper me to apologize for “dragging you all into my problems” and disrupting our playing time.  I told her that she was a friend and therefore could not be considered a nuisance.  Then she brought it up again, “I know I am going to die alone, I just don’t want to be forgotten”.  I replied that I have a stellar memory and  promised to never forget her.  This seemed to comfort her a bit and she didn’t bring it up again.

Sunday afternoon she logged in briefly without really saying much.

Sunday night things went South.  Gynnie logged in (with help from her hospice nurse) and immediately got in a group with her new best friend (kin leader).  Not too much later, he posts a message in kin chat to the effect of “Gynnie is not able to type, but she wants to say goodbye to everyone.  If you want to reply, now is the time.”  Wow.  So it’s time.  Everyone that is on posts as comforting a message as possible and Gynnie’s nurse reads them to her.  Then the kin leader says, “She wants to leave her character at her house, I’m explaining to the nurse how to get her there.”  I respond, “meet ya there!” and clicked on my travel to Kin House ability.  But I wasn’t the first one to arrive.  Another officer was sitting in her yard when I arrived, two more kin mates came in right behind me.  In a moment the kin leader and Gynnie were in front of us.  The nurse (God bless her), held the laptop up so Gynnie could see us with her at her house.  Prayers and words of love were typed in kin chat, the nurse reading them to Gynnie as her heart went into an arrythmia and she drifted away.  At 7:20 pm PST, she left us and went to rest with God.

And there we were, stunned in Falathorn Homesteads.  Gynnie had given everyone in the kinship maintenance privileges to her house for us to do with it what we will.  Our will is to keep that house as hers for as long as we play, and plant pretty flowers in her yard.  Everytime we run through her yard, it will say “Home of Gynnie”, and we will remember her.  And that’s what she wanted. Maybe this blog will be around for years to come and someone will read it and learn about Gynnie, helping to make sure she isn’t forgotten.

Dying young is tragic enough, but dying alone is even worse.  I am thankful that we were able to be there (albeit virtually) and provide a little comfort during her last days, but what if she hadn’t met us?  It roils my stomach to think of it.  Go hug your loved ones and thank God you have them.

(Gynnie is the one facing the house)

UPDATE 06/23/09:

Good news and bad news.  The good news is “Gynnie” didn’t die after all.  The bad news is my cynicism about people has again been vindicated.  The girl in the video is NOT “Gynnie”, and probably has no idea that this was taking place.  Therefore I have removed all references to her from this blog post.  I have chosen to leave this blog post largely intact because it’s purpose is to chronicle my adventures in LOTRO, and that means both good and bad.  This has been a difficult experience and I hope that it doesn’t cause others to be callous in the event that they have contact online with someone who claims to be sick, but maybe they will do more fact checking than we did.  Apparently this is a fairly common occurance.  My kin acted completely in good faith and from the bottom of our hearts, so we have nothing to be ashamed of and I am proud to call them friends.

Book 8 Instances Update

Amlug has posted a new blog entry that discusses some of the changes and new instances soon to be released in Book 8.  I’m still not sure how the First Age loot situation is going to work out, but the new 3 man instances (with Hard Mode available) seem intriguing.  Check out his post here.

Surprising Searches and a Rainbow

WordPress, like most blogging sites, provides some statistical data to the people that choose to use their venue for communicating with the world.  It is easy to check and see how many visits my blog has had each day, week, month, and overall.  Also tracked are how many times posts are viewed, and interestingly, what search engine terms brought viewers to my blog.  I thought it would be fun to share some of this information with you.

#1 Search Engine Term that brought viewers to this site- “Fork”

Yes, fork.  The only post in the history of this blog that has the word “fork”, is a reference to my exasperation with running Dark Delvings repeatedly.  “Fork” has brought 34.7% of all search engine referrals to this site.  I bet they were surprised when they got here

#2 Search Engine Term that brought viewers to this site- “Saruman”

Not completely surprising since the Many Coloured wizard is a central character to the books.  But again, only one post mentions him and it was done tongue in cheek.  19.2% of search engine referrals were swooned by his voice and brought to 2 High Road.

#3 Search Engine Term that brought viewers to this site- “LOTRO Mods”

Now this makes a little sense.  World of Warcraft players are awfully attached to their mods and hope to have access to the same type of UI enhancements that they have grown accustomed to.  I know a couple of players that went back to WoW simply because they missed being able to use their favorite mods.  I expect that when most WoW players try LOTRO, one of the first things they do is seek out similarly performing mods to do their favorite tasks.  10.4% search engine referrals have learned that their beloved mods are not available in this game.

Beyond the top three, it quickly diversifies into a broad and sometimes strange array of references;  “LOTRO Server Status”, “Best LOTRO Tank”, “Highest DPS LOTRO”, “Goblin Town Entrance” and strangest of all, “Mafra”.  Go figure.

On a different note, here is something that you won’t find in WoW.  It’s a rainbow!

A New Twist on Radiance Gear?

I have not participated in a Watcher Raid yet.  Conventional Wisdom says that a minimum +50 Radiance is required.  Others say that +60 is recommended.  How to get bonus radiance gear?  Grind out Hard Mode in the six major instances in Moria.  And, you must do it for everyone that wants to see the Watcher.  This means a minimum of 36 instance runs if everything goes perfectly and each member of your fellowship stays until every last person has their gear.  In the real world, you will have to pug a few spots to people who will sometimes suddenly remember (AFTER getting their radiance piece) that their significant other needs them to complete some chore around the house.  It is not beyond the realm of possibility that 80-100 runs could be required to fully gear out your group, once you factor in:

• Learning curve for each instance
• Random “Link Dead” Fellows
• “Accidents” that cause the run to fail Hard Mode
• Losing rolls for the coins to pugs

In light of this, some of my Kinmates heard about the revamped Bounder’s Sheriff Cap and are currently pursuing it through completing the host of Shire quests.  By going this route, you can achieve +60 radiance with only five pieces of gear instead of six.  Unfortunately, my Burglar needed the bank slot some time ago and I deleted it.  My Rune Keeper has not done very many Shire quests at all, so it is certainly a possibility for him.  There are some positives and negatives regarding the Cap:

Positive:

• +20 Radiance is better than the +10 Radiance from Manathar
• I can solo the content, so waiting for a group isn’t necessary
• Dark Delving is hard, not many people want to go there
• I like the Shire anyway
• The Cap is stylish!
• The DD and 16th Hall pieces are not part of the “set”, so I won’t have those bonuses anyway
• The radiance gear grind is getting wearisome

Negative:

• I lose some very important stats
• Completing 75 quests, albeit low level, will still require an investment of time
• My sense of satisfaction from completing DD on Hard Mode won’t be sated

Also, there are posts on the forums claiming that it doesn’t stack with other radiance gear.  If someone already has it and can confirm, please post a reply here so we will know.  Here are the two items for comparison (Bounder Sheriff’s Cap vs Manathar):

I’m leaning towards Manathar, but I also recognize that my Kinmates are even more exhausted from the gear grind than I am.  What do you think?  Is it worth losing the stats just for the extra radiance?