FAQ

Note This wiki is NOT a place for scattered mod suggestions, bug reports, or questions. If you have any questions, comments, queries, or concerns about the mod, you can click a direct link below to address your issue. Be sure to read the FAQ before posting a suggestion! FAQ (Frequently-Asked Questions) • Technical Support • Planned Features • Admins • Ban Appeals

See here for a list of things not to suggest.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can you update the mod to Minecraft 1.8?

See the post I wrote about this matter here.

My game is lagging! Help!

Fastcraft is a highly recommended mod for increasing FPS and decreasing lag. You can download it here.

I found that this mod, for me, fixed 100% of chunk-loading lag and all the FPS lag in tree-heavy biomes. I really cannot recommend it fully enough; go and try installing it now! You will be surprised how good it is.

Can you add features from the new mod versions into older versions as well?

No. This would require huge amounts of work (as Minecraft code often changes substantially between updates) and may even be impossible for some features. If you want to play with the new features, it stands to reason you need to keep up to date with the mod.

How do I obtain saddles in Middle-earth?

Since this is a mod with a heavy focus on exploration and adventure, saddles are very useful items to have in Middle-earth. Luckily, you don't have to go searching dungeons for hours on end; the mod adds a saddle

crafting recipe!

You can also find saddles in some structures in Middle-earth.

The mod also adds crafting recipes for iron, gold, and diamond horse armor, and many others. These recipes can be seen here.

Is this mod compatible with [insert mod name]?

This mod should be compatible with most Minecraft Forge mods. Other mods may work with this, but it's not guaranteed.

In either case, you may have to configure some IDs to avoid conflicts. You can change the IDs for this mod by finding the 'LOTR.cfg' located in your .minecraft/config folder. Open it up and change any conflicting values. Dimension IDs may range from -128 to 127 inclusive. Biomes, however, don't conflict anymore, because this mod now uses a totally different set of biomes from Vanilla Minecraft, and Blocks and Items no longer require configuration after the Minecraft 1.7 update.

This mod is known to not be fully compatible with OptiFine - running the two together often causes glitches and crashes. If you run into problems running this mod and OptiFine together, we will ask you to remove OptiFine before we can help you with technical support.

Is this mod compatible with NEI (Not Enough Items)?

The mods will not break each other or cause issues when run together, but the LOTR Mod no longer includes support for NEI's Recipe Mode on the Middle-earth crafting tables. Such a feature was included before the Minecraft 1.7 update, but was removed so that I would not have to wait for NEI to update before updating my mod.

As for version Beta 25, The Ranger Malvegil made a new NEI plugin for the mod. More information can be found here.

Is this mod multiplayer compatible?

Yes! Instructions for installing the mod on a server are available here. Note that, as usual, any players connecting to the server must have the mod on their clients. Also, their IDs must be configured (see above) in exactly the same way as those for the server, otherwise things on the clients will not work correctly

Can I run this mod on a Cauldron (MCPC+, Bukkit) server?

Well, you can, but it's probably not going to work very well and I don't recommend it. The mod is developed for Minecraft Forge. MCPC+ changes much of the code from vanilla and Forge, and as a result, there will likely be many bugs/errors/crashes when the mod is run on MCPC+ which do not occur when running the mod on the intended Forge server.

If you encounter a bug on an MCPC+ server, check to see if it happens on a Forge server before reporting it to me. If you cannot reproduce it on a Forge server, then it is caused by MCPC+, not this mod, and I will not attempt to fix it. Please read this excellent post for more information.

Can you add Gandalf / Minas Tirith / the One Ring / Mumakil / etc.?

Short answer: No. Please do not ask for these things.

Long answer: Every main character, region, structure, and so on, from LOTR is planned to be added in the future. But there is a general plan for the mod, and these things will come later on, when the work on more basic features such as biomes, blocks and items, and NPCs are mostly completed. Asking for your favourite character to be added will not make them be added faster.

Will Anduril, Sting, Gandalf's staff, etc. ever be craftable?

No, they will be obtained through questing when the quest system is added. Please note that the quest system referred to is not the mini-quest system already in the mod; the full story-quest system will come much later.

Can you make the Biomes smaller?

If you find it difficult to travel around Middle-earth it is probably because you are walking everywhere. Make use of the mod's fast travel system or any of the various mounts the mod adds, and you will find travelling much easier.

Can you add race selection?

I will never add this, due to compatibility issues. Custom player skins are not compatible with, for example, dwarf, hobbit, and elf models. If race selection was added, you would not be able to use a custom skin. Also, changing the size of the player could interfere with vanilla game mechanics or other mods.

However, the alignment system and the quest system will allow you to customise your experience on a much greater level than a race system. There are also mods such as iChun's Morph mod that probably already offer something like what you're looking for.

If the Morph mod exists, why can't you add race selection?

To reiterate. Race selection is not planned in any form. Custom player skins are not compatible with NPC models. If race selection was added, you would not be able to use a custom skin.

Can you make NPCs that lead other NPCs into battle / better hired unit AI / etc.?

Sir or Madam, you have unrealistic expectations of what can be done in Minecraft. This is a voxel-based sandbox game, not a war game. Whenever someone asks for something like this, it makes me wonder whether if you'd ask the developers of your favourite RTS or FPS game to add building blocks and fully deformable terrain to their game...

Such a feature could in theory be added but it would take a long time indeed to develop and debug it. Time which, at the moment, is more wisely spent building up the world of Middle-earth.

Can you add a way to see the total number of hired units?

Unfortunately not, because there is no 'secure' way to make such a thing possible. The game can record when the player hires a troop, but cannot always record when one is lost, because a troop could be lost by any number of untrackable ways besides just being killed or disbanded: it could be removed by a command like /nukeentities, be removed by a corrupt chunk, fall into the void, or something like that. So over long spans of time - and especially on servers - the 'total number of hired troops' would gradually increase more and more above your actual number.

Why doesn't the Summon Horn of Command summon my units?

The horn will only call your units if you're standing in a safe, unobstructed space. It will not call your units if you're flying, jumping, in water, stood on a non-solid block, or there is not enough room for the unit to stand in (e.g. you can summon Orcs into a one-block wide hole, but not Olog-hai).

Also, the horn cannot summon units from far away - this is simply a result of the way Minecraft works. Only nearby areas of the world are loaded, meaning that if you move too far from your hired units, the horn cannot summon them because they physically do not exist in the world. (This is the same reason that crops don't grow when you're too far away from them, furnaces don't smelt, and so on.)

An exception to this is if you're on a multiplayer server and you travel far away from your units, but another player stays close to them, they will still be loaded and you'll be able to summon them over any distance.

Why does my alignment gets reset everytime I load my world?

You probably play on a cracked launcher. These are known to have problems saving the player data right (including the alignment data). The only solution is to buy the game.

Why is the water grey?

This mod replaces the blue Minecraft water texture with a greyscale one so that there can be a much, much larger range of water colours in Middle-earth - bright tropical blue, dark polar seas, swampy brown water, and more. The mod also accounts for vanilla Minecraft water and any custom water colours (e.g. swamp) so that nothing in the vanilla biomes will be noticeably changed.

I judge the play-experience of this mod in itself to be a higher priority than compatibility with other mods. So, inevitably, as a result of this there could be some graphical problems with water when using this mod alongside another. Here is how to fix those problems:

If you are using a mod that renders water (e.g. in a tank, pipes, or suchlike) and it is grey, contact the mod author telling them to account for the biome's waterColorMultiplier during rendering. This is a very simple step. If their mod is programmed correctly they will already be doing this, since this is a feature of vanilla Minecraft (swamp biomes) but most modders probably would not care about that possibility. However, if the modder accounts for vanilla swamp water colours, they will automatically account for this mod's water changes as well, and the problem will be fixed.

Can users send in their builds of major structures so that they will be added faster?

No. If you really want to build the structures, that is fine, but Mevans does not want to get bombarded with a million different builds to choose from. And 'sending in a build' does not actually help that much - it couldn't just be 'scanned into the mod', it would still have to be coded into the mod and made to fit with the terrain. As such, this will do nothing to speed up the addition of major structures.

Can there be a way to get positive Utumno alignment?

No, never. Utumno was designed as a dungeon, hostile mobs only. Being able to obtain positive alignment would defeat the point of Utumno. This also extends to Utumno crafting, smelting, or any other resources from Utumno.

If the Far Harad tribes are non-canon, then why can't you add [non-canon suggestion]?

The West of Middle-Earth is fully fleshed out in the lore, so keep suggestions for here canon. While the Far Harad tribes are noncanon, they make sense, and so do the planned Rhunic Clans. Please keep the suggestions for Far Harad, Rhun, and the Dark Lands either to a minimum or post ways to improve existing factions. This means no Dwarves in Far Harad or the Dark Lands, no Snow-elves, in infinitum.

Will there ever be a LotR-based enchanting system?

Yes. Enchanting or possibly improving items is planned, and will work differently in the mod than the vanilla system, in order to balance it better.

In the meantime, you can always enchant by going back to the Overworld (via the Ring Portal or an Elven or Morgul Portal, despite the fact that it is not recommended for you to do so, as it takes some part of the fun and difficulty of the mod.