User blog comment:LOTRMod/Improving Depth/@comment-27723099-20150108200606

Not specific things but the overall direction and aim of the mod should be changed a bit. You made many decisions (for example things about banner protection) with multiplayer experience in your mind. Now you seem to feel that the mod aims not as much for the lore. You have to make a decision in which direction to go. You can't go in all directions at the same time. A "One mod to rule them all" is impossible.

Ok, I have some specific things to suggest that could improve the immersion of the mod:


 * Improved NPC dialogues. NPCs are currently very boring. You can ask them for miniquests (which was a great addition) and they can help you in combat, that's all. What if you could ask them for the way to the next tavern (direction) or ask them for some food when you are starving? Hire NPCs directly instead of just searching their commander?


 * Fluently changing biomes. I suggested this to you already personally for the Vales of Anduin biome. What you did is to add a second biome. Sure, you can split everything in smaller biomes but I think it would be less work and look better if you managed to generate the same biome different depending on the position of the chunk. The Vales of Anduin could become higher and higher the closer you get to the Misty Mountains.


 * Concentrations of NPCs and structures. It always bugged me a bit that if you go to Gondor (for example), there are small groups of Gondor soldiers everywhere. You can't walk a hundred meters without seeing multiple squads of soldiers. It's the same with most other factions. Instead, the groups should be much much rarer and either be bigger or belong to a group of groups, a company in military aspects. The war is an important aspect of Middle Earth but in the war you can't just walk anywhere. Troops are concentrated in armies, and also civilians are concentrated in settlements. How should Frodo&Sam ever have reached Mount Doom if Mordor is filled with so many orcs? The same counts for structures. Most buildings that are not part of a city, are at least near to a city. So it would be nice if structures had high chances to spawn near to existing structures. This would of course need a greater variety of structures, especially for Gondor, that has only military structures.


 * Mini-Characters. Named characters that have no specific influence on the main quests could be met while travelling in the world. For example you could meet Erkenbrand patrolling the plains of Rohan with an éored of riders, Glorfindel wandering through Eriador, Tom Bombadil in the Old Forest, Grishnakh, Ugluk and Mauhur, the Sackville-Baggins walking around Hobbiton and many others. Most of these characters could just be based of a common NPC but with changed equipment, a different name, and a different speech file. They could be a base for mid-tier quests for the later quest system.

All in all: Make the world look like Middle Earth looks and add as much interaction with NPCs as possible.