The Hasty Mountains

I've spent just enough time in the Misty Mountains to kill some goblins, some bears and some not-yetis.

I can't say for sure whether or not I'll be coming back here, but the epic story so far has stayed in the western half of the Misty Mountains, and since the zone is significantly easier to navigate than the Trollshows I was in and out in about 4 hours. In fact the zone layout is probably the simplest I've so far encountered in LOTRO.

There's a tendency in MMOs for zones to become harder to get around in as you go through the game – often by extending the distance between objectives by making the zones larger (in size if not in content) once the character has obtained a mount, or by making the zone less open so that there are only a few often very convoluted routes to get where you're going. The Trollshaws did a lot of that second one.

By contrast, travel in the Misty Mountains is very direct. There are impassable slopes – we're in the mountains, after all – but the spaces in between them are broad and open, and there's a clear distinction between what can be ascended and what can't, unlike in the last zone.

It's a curious design choice in a way. Aren't mountain ranges supposed to be hard to traverse?