MMORPG.com Lord of the Rings Online Correspondent Matt McLean writes this overview of his first few hours in the new Lord of the Rings Online expansion.

Greetings again all you men, dwarves, elves and hobbits (And hello to any Orcs who might be reading as well). My favorite online game (just so you know where my opinion sits), The Lord of the Rings Online (LotRO) has just released its first retail expansion, The Mines of Moria. Yesterday was a monumental day for all of the explorers of Middle-Earth, as it was the first time you could journey fully into Eregion and Moria. Thanks to some crafty scheduling at work, I was able to take yesterday off. So on Monday night, I patched my LotRO client up to date with all the Moria content, and first thing Tuesday morning I logged on to the game. After chatting with a few of my kinship mates, I check the game map for a way to get to Eregion.

After consulting with the map, I discover there are actually a couple of ways to get into Eregion proper. I decide to head towards the Giant Halls south of Rivendell. It’s a pretty straight shot into Eregion from there, and before you know it, I’m in undiscovered country. I roam around Eregion for a while, picking up one of the travel locations early on within Eregion. As more of the map is discovered, I’m really blown away by the vista before me.

Check out Matt's First Impressions of Mines of Moria.

You can unequip your relics (and not lose them) by re-forging every 10th level (there are tick boxes for refunding lp and unslotting relics). At levels 10, 30, 50 one of the item's existing legacies are randomly given i higher quality (unless they all are at the highest quality, in which a new one will be acquired), and at levels 20 and 40 a new legacy will be revealed (a max of 8 legacies are possible) when you reforge. The legendary weapons from the volume 2 book 1 quests are capped at lvl 30 (and they have to be equipped for them to gain ixp (item experience points), all other legendary items don't need to be equipped to gain it), not all legendary items are. The highest level any legendary item can obtain is level 50.

Just thought I should dispel a few misconceptions in the article.

I have just fallen in love with this game all over again. I wanted to finish Vol 1 before I started Vol 2, but I couldn't resist (plus wiping on the end instance for Bk 15 three  times helped with that decision). Wow o wow, is Moria a sight to behold. Biggest underground enviroment ever made and beautiful to boot. Loving it. And the Legendary items are a hit it seems.

Score 1 for Turbine. With paid expansions like this and the plethora of free content they give us, I'll never need another MMORPG.

Great read!

(1) Moria is basically the Dwarf Housing Area with Quests

(2) The Legendary Weapon is like leveling an Alt , Complete Time Sink.

Sad I decided to leave, been playing since BETA.  The game is good, don't get me wrong, but after playing over a year there just isnt anything to keep me playing.  Plus I don't have the time to grind the levels, do the deeds and waste time with meaningless quests (feeding dwarves, collecting branches to make them pickaxes etc)  Oh, and you cant use your horses in Moria, you have to grind Moria repuation to get a Goat to have a mount again.  Great waste of time.

I can see why anyone would think of MMO's as a waste of time, but i think this is the wrong forum to be posting then . lol, ye i couldn't resist making a smart-blip remark

The way i see it is that this is proving to be a great expansion in the same line as the game was made from the start. It holds true to its basics and adds some.

If you were hoping they would make an entirely new game, it wouldn't be an expansion anymore.

My idea of an expansion.

I will hopefully be going into Moria over the weekend and can't wait for the experience. Lotro is a great game and the Lifetime subscription I have is just making it more fufulling.

See you in Middle Earth, when can we expect the final review for MoM?