It’s such a special blessing to discover that the MMORPG you’ve been playing for years — if not decades — can still surprise you. These are massive games, after all, with plenty of content tucked in out-of-the-way places. And when you get into a routine that never ventures outside of familiar territory, those secrets stay hidden until someone shows them to you.
Lord of the Rings Online’s Middle-earth has plenty of delightful sights, quests, and deeds that aren’t immediately apparent — but are well worth making the effort to experience. In today’s column, I’m going to highlight nine of these secrets in the hopes that at least one or two may send you venturing to strange locales in anticipation.
Floid and Dewitt
Every once in a while in your journeys around Middle-earth, you might notice a certain white-haired man and his trusty steed in odd locations. They are Floid (the horse) and Dewitt (the not-horse), a pair of explorers traveling the world as you are!
Upon finding them, you are tasked with one of two deeds to find their other locations. Almost always, Floid and Dewitt are in very strange, out-of-the-way locales, and simply finding them leads you to interesting spots in the world. As a bonus, you can snag a pair of great titles for finding them: “the Wanderer” and “the Vagabond.”
Food titles
Did you know that there are several hidden titles that you can get by stuffing your virtual face? To unlock these, you simply need to eat one of every type of food in a particular category, whether it be breakfast, meat, partridge, pies, or veggies. There’s even an infamous title — the Unwise — for those who dare to snack on a piece of Barrow-down cheese. Yum?
Ghosties in Mirkwood’s inn
If you head to the Haunted Inn in Mirkwood, it’s important to understand that this isn’t just a marketing ploy. The place is actually haunted by ghosts that you can see if you stand at certain specific spots, such as in the corner of the kitchen area. You’ll see the screen flash if you’re very close!
Falling into pits in Moria
I suspect that many of us know what happens when you leap into the well in Moria’s Crossroads. It’s one of the only wells I know of in the game where you actually fall down into another zone — in this case, Water-works. You’ll die, sure, but you also get a title, a deed, and a “Well Traveled” title out of it. And you can rez and be in that zone, so it’s a weirdly fast way to go there.
But did you know that there’s also a hidden deed for those who jump into a whole bunch of specific pits in the great underground kingdom? There are six places in particular that you need to leap to your death — and the game won’t let you know you’re on track until you get all of them done and earn the “Blind Leaper” title.
Riddles in Moria
Another side diversion that you can enjoy in Moria is attempting to solve a series of devious riddles left behind by a guy named Falgeirr Twisttongue. There are seven in all, and they’ll send you, one after the other, on a chain to figure out various locations and puzzles in and around Moria. The rewards include a piece of gear and the “Twist-Tongued” title, which kind of doesn’t seem worth the trouble… unless you like riddles, that is.
Moria’s secret tavern
OK, one last Moria secret! There’s a hidden abandoned tavern high up above the Twenty-First Hall. The only way to get there is to drink from one of those teleporting kegs — like a Moria keg or Inn League keg — and hope that the teleport sends you to this spot. There isn’t much to do there, admittedly, but you can take a few screenshots, have boasting rights, then leap to your doom!
The giant Gundabad deep-claw
Here’s a new one that I didn’t know before this week: Deep underneath Gundabad is a special cavern containing one very plus-sized deep-claw. Getting there is actually pretty easy, yet most people never think to poke around in this place and so are ignorant of what it contains. See the above video to guide you there!
The Standing-stone
Standing Stone Games’ namesake actually exists in the game — and can even be taken home to enjoy in your character’s front yard. You can only get it during the Anniversary Event after going through a whole lot of scavenger quests, but this Bree-land oddity is available for visitation year-round.
The bunny cave
In the Great River zone, there’s an odd cave that isn’t host to any bears or foxes. No, it’s absolutely infested by lots and lots and lots of bunnies. If that oddity isn’t enough, a thorough exploration of the cave will discover a larger rabbit with a certain murderous bent. This is by no means a cheap geeky joke meant to reference any sacred comedy film from the 1970s, not at all.
What are your favorite secrets?
Of course, this is just the start of the many, many secrets and hidden locations in the game! Sound off in the comments about more of your favorites!
Every two weeks, the LOTRO Legendarium goes on an adventure (horrid things, those) through the wondrous, terrifying, inspiring, and, well, legendary online world of Middle-earth. Justin has been playing LOTRO since its launch in 2007! If you have a topic for the column, send it to him at justin@massivelyop.com.
