Update 44.3 Release Notes

Here are the Release Notes for Update 44.3, released on Wednesday, June 18, 2025.

Of Special Note:

The Midsummer Festival arrives Thursday, June 19th!

New for this year's Midsummer Festival, you're invited to visit the far-off tropical island of Furtherholm! Located in the Shield Isles off the coast of Umbar in the Bay of Belfalas, a crew of freebooters have retired from a life at sea to open the island as a retreat for travellers from all parts of Middle-earth. Come enjoy the sun and surf and collect rewards for lending a hand! All previous festivities, locations, and events associated with the Midsummer Festival remain available as well. 

To start this new summer adventure, talk to Ikhajât in front of the City Stables in Minas Tirith (Midsummer). She can also be found at the Party Tree, Thorin's Hall Inn, inside The Prancing Pony and The Festival Garden in Duillond. Furtherholm adds a total of 35 quests to the Midsummer Festival including a dozen daily repeatables that count toward the existing Midsummer wrappers. Also included is Gathering Guests, a quest that has daily and weekly wrappers for fourteen different sub-quests to choose from that send players to all parts of Middle-earth. Note that some Gathering Guests quests may not be available on Legendary Worlds.  Additionally there are two new deeds with titles players can earn.

The 2025 Midsummer Festival begins at 10:00 AM Eastern (-4 GMT) on Thursday, June 19th and continues until 3:00 AM Eastern (-4 GMT) on July 8th!

Treebeard Level Cap Increase

Our Legendary World of Treebeard has reached its final level cap of 130 with the release of Update 44.3. Treebeard will be closing after August 31st, 2025 along with our other 32-bit game worlds. You can read more about free transfers from these worlds on LOTRO.com.

News and Notes:

Miscellaneous:

• The reputation requirement for the "Sail to Dol Amroth, King's Gondor" skill granting item has been corrected.
• We have made changes to the Hard Tack of Thorin's Hall: Special Brew quest to ensure that the quest will complete.
• The Hooded Cloak of the Wise Wanderer and the Hooded Cloak of Roäc now correctly show the hood's texture on female avatars for Race of Man, River Hobbits, and Beornings.
• The Mushroom Hunter's Pack, Pack of the Able Angler, and the Pack of Whimsy now correctly accept dyes.
• FRENCH AND GERMAN: Translations for several titles now display properly in French and German.
• Captain: Banner of the West's armour now correctly states that one of its set bonuses will cause Shadow's Lament to reset the cooldown of Cutting Attack

• Legendary Mirkwood and Enedwaith Instances:

  • Stoneheight 

    • Dale Truitt and Búbhosh-grat now deal slightly less damage on Tier 2 difficulty.

  • Northcotton Farm

    • Legbarthil's Tier 2 egg morale has been reduced by 40%.

    • The Initial Damage from Thadur's Poisonous Vapours Corruption has been reduced.

  • The Lost Temple:

    • The cooldown for Ferndur's Virulent Plague has been reduced from 20 seconds to 15 seconds.

    • Frûmolog's morale has been reduced by 50%.

  • Sâri-surma:

    • Several Caeryg Guardian Skills no longer Stun or Daze players.

    • Coldbear's Spirit form now correctly requires and consumes 90% of his power when using Roar of the Damned.

    • Drugoth's stolen Beorning skill no longer fears players, but its wound is more potent.

  • Ost Dunhoth:

    • Gortheron Wing: 

      • Ivar's stolen powers have been adjusted slightly to smooth out the potency of each skill across each of their four tiers. In particular, Matumáth's stolen power is significantly weaker, and its difficulty across tiers is much more gradual.

      • Gortheron's Challenge Mode condition now clearly tiers up from 1-20 and has 5 visible tiers from 21-25 which allow you to see if you have any buffer to kill adds without failing the challenge.

      • Gortheron's Challenge Mode chest should now spawn correctly in all appropriate circumstances in which the challenge is completed.

      • Gortheron's morale has been reduced by 25%.

      • Some adds in Gortheron's encounter now have slightly reduced health.

    • Wound and Fear Wing:

      • Mammoth morale has been reduced by 25%.

      • Wound wing enemy (other than mammoth) morale has been reduced by 33%.

      • Silvertine Troll Damage has been reduced slightly.

    • Disease and Poison Wing:

      • Baleleaf and Dourbark morale has been reduced by 30%.

      • Birch-hound morale has been reduced by 25%.

      • Raging Stone-troll Damage has been reduced slightly.

      • Frothmar morale has been reduced by 30%.

      • Dunhoth Nemúl morale has been reduced by 33%.

  • Level 65 Instance Rewards:

    • The chance of rewards from all level 65 challenge chests (Mirkwood and ITA) have been increased. This refers only to level 65 rewards, and has no impact when these instances are run at lvl 66 or above.

    • Armour tokens are now more likely to drop from all chests in both Barad Guldur and Ost Dunhoth at level 65.