LotRO's Next 12-Player Raid, Fall of Khazad-dûm, Begins Testing This Week

The Lord of the Rings Online's Bullroarer server has been spun up to start testing Update 30, and with it the next raid in the MMORPG. This 12-player raid, called Fall of Khazad-dûm is slated be tested this week, with the first test happening today. 

LotRO's Bullroarer test server doesn't usually stay up for too long, usually just getting a few days of testing in and then the dev team goes on to iterate on the feedback for the next testing phase. Fall of Khazad-dûm will actually see the team at Standing Stone Games change how they test raids on the server, however.

Per the forums announcement:

"The new raid The Fall of Khazad-dûm will have Tier 1 available for the full duration of the preview, but Tier 2 and up will only be available during the following preview times, when members of the LOTRO development team will be online and observing raiders as they run:Tuesday 5/18 - 3:00 - 4:00 PM EDT (19:00 - 20:00 UTC), 8:00 - 9:00 PM EDT (0:00 - 1:00 UTC)Thursday 5/20 - 3:00 - 4:00 PM EDT (19:00 - 20:00 UTC), 8:00 - 9:00 PM EDT (0:00 - 1:00 UTC)"

Cordovan, LotRO's community manager states that there will be balance changes on Wednesday between the two testing periods, so players who do dive into Fall of Khazad-dûm can provide valuable feedback to help influence the direction of the raid before the Bullroarer server shuts down  on Friday.

Update 30, Blood of Azog, continues the story started in last year's War of Three Peak's mini-expansion, leading into the Gundabad expansion later this year. Update 30 will see new quests, missions and more. In a letter from Executive Producer Rob Ciccolini earlier this year, players will also be able to look back on the history of the Dwarves, specifically the pivotal Battle of Azanulbizar. In case you missed it as well, LotRO's team announced late last week that they would be deprecating Windows XP support for it and DDO.