LotRO Has A New Raid Today That Pits Players Against Shelob

The last update for The Lord of the Rings Online gave adventurers in Middle-earth three new instances but no raid to serve as a capstone to the experience. Today's 25.4 update fills that void, with a new raid facing down one of the most iconic villains of the Lord of the Rings: the spider-demon Shelob, a.k.a. Ungwetari, the last child of Ungoliant.

The update also makes changes to a number of classes, as well as general changes to all classes looking for more defense. Stun break cooldowns have been reduced to 60 seconds, partial avoidances are less expensive, and "The balance of defensive stats versus vitality has been tweaked to encourage more variety in itemization in defensive builds." Tanks rejoice!

Some defenses were perhaps a little too strong, however; the warden has the following note: "Never Surrender now grants its proper 5% mitigation bonus instead of 50%." Oops.

There's a lot more in the patch notes on the forums, so browse those to get the complete low-down on what's offered in this update. There are no screenshots, however, so that's why I went with an image of a spider at the top of this article. I hope it's scary enough.