LOTRO Skirmish Soldier Guide

Combat Roles

Your Soldier can be set up to perform any of the traditional combat roles: Tank, Melée DPS, Ranged DPS, Healer and Support. The word “Soldier” is used regardless of what role you want them to play.

This role is not set in stone either. So you can adapt your Soldier to the scenario in each Skirmish if you want to.

Personalisation

This NPC assistant is very customisable: firstly you can choose among the roles I mentioned, then you can select their in-combat abilities and other passive attributes. And lastly, there is an array of cosmetic changes you can make to truly personalise them.

If you’re new to LOTRO, then you may not yet have encountered Skirmishes, or you have just seen a prompt to take part in one.

Once you hit Level 20, you should be prompted to accept a quest called Skirmishes – Reporting In.

Follow this quest and speak to a Skirmish Captain, with the most likely candidate being the one just outside Bree, though there is one in Thorin’s Gates, right by Thorin’s Hall in Ered Luin too.

Skirmish Tutorial 1

You will then have two “mini Skirmishes”. The first is Thievery and Mischief, where you’ll be introduced to the idea behind Soldiers then fight alongside a basic one for a wee bit. Thievery and Mischief is a real Skirmish, but the tutorial just covers a small portion of it.

You will also face an Encounter and a Counter-Attack.

Skirmish Tutorial 2

Defence of the Prancing Pony is the second part, where an overview of combat roles is explained. These two tutorials also serve to demonstrate a Defensive Skirmish, where the previous one was Offensive.

Archer

Archer

As with LOTRO Hunters, Archers are range DPS. But they’re not “harriers”, instead they focus on single targets. This may help during boss fights, for example.

Bannerguard

Bannerguard

Similar to a Captain’s default companion, a Bannerguard supports you in combat. This includes buffs as well as basic combat.

They can also draw aggro away from you.

Herbalist

Herbalist

This is a “pure healer” class, so do not expect them to fight for you. You will have to protect them, though they can (and do) also heal themselves. Skills can be acquired that buff or protect you.

Protector

Protector

As the name implies, Protectors are tanks, sent to, well, protect.

Their damage is low, but they keep some of the heat away from you.

Sage

Sage

Sages are light armour, ranged DPS that focus on debuffing the enemy. Though they don’t always keep as long a range as you might like for their safety.

Warrior

Warrior

A melée, dual-wielding DPS class, and both single-target and AoE skills can be learned by them.

Just a note: Warriors always stay ahead of you, so can aggro enemies before you’re ready.

Ah, the gazillion gold-coin question! While the answer “suck it and see” may sound like a cop-out, that is, at least a valid answer! That said, I would consider what your character’s primary role is and then patch up your weaknesses with your Soldier’s strengths.

These are opinions and ideas and should not be taken as fact. It may take you a few attempts to find out what works for you.

For Healers

If you’re a healer, you probably want to go with Warrior (Melée DPS) or Protector (Tank).

If you’re a confident healer, then any DPS will do, but a Warrior may not take the aggro you want it to. A Sage may be great for AoE, but will also be squishy, meaning you could spend more time healing when you should also be dealing damage when it’s feasible.

For Tanks

If you’re a tank, well that depends on your confidence level! I used to always run with a Herbalist, but if you have enough self-heals, then you could choose either a Warrior (Melée DPS) or a Sage (Debuffing/Ranged DPS).

I have managed some sucess with a Sage while running Skirmishes with my Warden (Tank mode), given I have self-heals built-in.

For DPS

If you’re a Light or Medium Armour ranged DPS, then you can take your pick. A Protector or Warrior can grab some aggro away from you, or a Sage can join you in ranged DPS. But you may find yourself squishy with that combination. So I would be tempted to favour a Herbalist for heals or Protector to draw aggro.

For heavy armour DPS (e.g. Beorning), you may not need the NPC to heal you. In which case, a Warrior or Sage may be fun to go in and trash the mobs en masse!

Skirmish Captain at the South Bree Skirmish Camp

What is “Personal”?

Personal Traits relate to buffs and mitigations that apply to you while you’re in a Skirmish.

They can be useful to make yourself sturdier, or more potent in attacking, for example. Another aspect is that, if you are running with a Herbalist, healing companion, or a player-healer, then your incoming heals can be boosted.

For more on this, skip to Personal Traits.

Attributes

Attributes are combat roles you wish to train your Soldier in. I am going to call this your Soldier’s class from now on as I think that’s easier to understand. You can acquire more than one class, but for obvious reasons, you cannot equip more than one class at a time.

There are more slots, because you will use those to change your Soldier’s appearance (if you have Marks and Medallions to spare, anyway).

Skills

On the Skill tab you’ll find specific abilities your Soldier can use in combat. They are grouped by class, allowing you to quickly see relevant skills. Use these to “patch” your weaknesses. So, for example, I use the Herbalist’s Nature’s Power skill to replenish power on my Guardian, as that can sometimes be an issue for me in longer fights.

Training

This relates to passive attributes that help your Soldier to perform better in combat. Examples are

• How well they use their armour to protect themselves.
• The strength of their combat abilities.
• How well they can block, parry or evade attacks.

On larger screens, you’ll see I’ve split the Skills and Traits into tabs, in much the same way as in LOTRO. If you’re on a smaller screen, I haven’t figured out a good way of doing that yet.

Regardless of how you’re reading this, if you want to bypass all the options, you can go straight to Equipping Your Choices.

Protector

Taunting Strike
Draws a single enemy’s attention.

Threatening Riposte
A self-buff that aggros any mob that attacks them, keeping the aggro their way.

Threatening Shout
Shouts to draw attention of nearby enemies.

Whirl of Fury
Hits all nearby enemies, making them more angry at the protector. This is a good thing.

Warrior

Carving Strike
Causes a bleed damage-over-time to a single enemy.

Forceful Strike
A strong attack against a single enemy.

Quick Sweep
A low-damage attack against nearby enemies.

Strong Sweep
A higher-level damaging attack against nearby enemies.

Archer

Refocus
Allows the archer to replenish their Power gauge by a brief pause in attacks.

Deadly Shot
A strong shot against a single enemy.

Distracting Shot
A special kind of attack to reduce aggro against the Archer.

Pinpoint Shot
A shot with a high chance of a critical hit. Bonus damage is inflicted when a hit is critical.

Bannerguard

Cry of the Enduring
Grants an ally a temporary boost to Armour rating.

Potent Strike
Powerful melée attack (against a single enemy, I think)

Inspiring Shout
A cry that grants a low amount of healing-over-time.

Summon the Foe
A shout that draws aggro from nearby enemies.

Sage

Chilling Winds
Chills the air around them, slowing down enemy attacks for a time.

Weakening Draught
Reduces enemy resistences (Tactical).

Tanglefoot
(Crowd Control) Damages a foe, while also rooting them to the ground.

Oil of the Dragon’s Rage
Powerful AoE (tactical) attack.

Herbalist

Nature’s Power
Restores an ally’s Power (over time).

Refreshing Herbs
A medium one-shot heal.

Strengthening Draught
Buffs an ally’s defences.

Nature’s Cure
Grants an ally a medium-strength heal-over-time.

For All Soldiers

Boundless Morale
Gives your soldier more morale.

Boundless Power
*Darth Sidious voice* Unlimiteeeed Poweeeeeer! I mean, *cough* gives your Skirmish Soldier more power. Yeah, that.

Resurgent Power
Increase your soldier’s power regeneration.

Resurgent Morale
Increase your soldier’s morale regeneration.

Defensive Training
Increases defensive manoeuvers: block, parry and evade ratings.

Parry Training
You’ll never guess what this is for? Oh, you did. Spoil sport.

Evasion Training
Increase evasion – the ability to avoid damage. I’m presuming this could be full or partial evasion. I’ll try and fact check that.

Practised Critical
Increases your Soldier’s critical rating: the chance (and potency) of especially damaging hits. Does this affect heal critical, I wonder?

Tactical Resilience
Increases Tactical Mitigation: reducing damage from non-physical attacks (think light, sorcery, lightning)

Physical Resilience
Increases Physical Mitigation: reducing damage from physical attacks (If you were a Tater: boil ’em, mash ’em, stick ’em in a stew).

Resilient Body
Increases the amount of morale your Soldier gains from being healed.

Boundless Resolve
Increases Morale and Power gauges.

Battle-field Finesse
You guessed it! Increases a soldier’s Finesse rating.

Strength of Resolve
Increases a Soldier’s Resistence rating.

For Specific Soldiers

Shield Training (Protector)
Increases your soldier’s block rating.

Light Armour Training (Sage, Herbalist)
Increases armour rating for Light Armour Soldiers.

Medium Armour Training
(Archer, Warrior)
Increases armour rating for Medium Armour Soldiers.

Heavy Armour Training
(Protector, Bannerguard)
Increases armour rating for Heavy Armour Soldiers.

Physical Potency
Increases melée and ranged damage for Soldiers who use physical skills.
Archer, Warrior, Protector, Bannerguard

Tactical Potency
Increases damage dealt and healing done for Soldiers using tactical skills.
Protector, Bannerguard, Sage, Herbalist

Once you reach a high enough level, you’ll be able to equip all the basic Skills. That’s because, by default there are only four. However, if you want to explore others then you can!

Speak again to the Skirmish Captain and choose the “barter” option. In exchange for a combination of Marks and Medallions, you can unlock further Skills and traits. There are also Ultimate skills, especially strong ones.

Click/tap the image to see an example.

Check Your Allowances

Once you have purchased the skills and attributes you want from the Skirmish Trainer, you need to speak to the Skirmish Captain and select Manage Your Traits. On the right, you’ll see the same tabs as you had in the purchasing window, but only listing those you have bought.

Step 1: Get ready to fill slots.

On the left are the slots you can fill with those purchases. The number of slots you have available depends on your character’s level. As you can see, my L54 Warden has one locked slot on Skill, Training and Personal. That last one we’ll get to shortly.

Filling the Slots

Choose Attributes first – especially which combat class you’re going to use. From then, you can only slot relevant skills and attributes to that class. So, you cannot have Light Armour Training on your Protector, for example. Not all skills/training have class limitations. I have my Herbalist running with some Evade Training sometimes – the less damage they take the more time they have to heal me!

Step 2: Fill the slots and pay the coin cost.

If you have purchased Skills or Traits, but cannot slot them, don’t worry. You can use them later when you have more slots, or to play around with the settings after running a few Skirmishes. You may also want to stock up on different class skills so you can switch from one class to another.

Your Skirmish Soldier does not share the same level system that you do. Instead it has Ranks. As you purchase stronger and stronger abilities, their Rank increases. But it’s not as simple as matching your level to their rank.

In researching this ahead of Ill Omens, I found the Wiki had a great gauge for this. This is just for Nature’s Cure, but could apply to anything. Here are just the first few ranks:

Appearance choices are slotted into the Attributes line of the Trait Trainer UI.

But first, let’s head to where you can acquire different appearances: the Cosmetics vendor in a Skirmish Camp.

There you’ll find a range of options allowing you to personalise your Skirmish Soldier, in exchange for Marks and Medallions.

Choose Skirmish Soldier race first, then select options to customise them.

I’d suggest purchasing your race first, then moving onto the section in the vendor’s list that’s relevant for that race.

Slotting the Soldier Appearances

As I said earlier, these go into the Attributes section, along with your Soldier’s class. As nothing else goes on that row, it gives you plenty of scope to customise your assistant.

Full Soldier Cosmetics Guide!

I now have a much more detailed guide to customising the look of your Skirmish Soldier! This includes all races, outfits and colour options. Enjoy!

Read Now →

As mentioned before, Personal Traits are applied to you while you are in a Skirmish. They follow a similar thread to those of your Skirmish Soldier. As such, you should choose ones appropriate for your class or trait tree – or to shore up any weaknesses.

I have listed all the traits in the next tab, but you can skip to ‘Earning Marks’ if you want. Examples are:

• Defences: Block, Parry, Evade and Armour Rating
• Mitigations: Physical and Tactical
• Mastery: Physical and Tactical
• Incoming Healing
• Attacks: Armour Penetration, Critical Rating, Finesse

The last thing to cover here is that you can use your Skirmish Soldier in open-world content (“Landscape”). To do so, you’ll need to acquire a Landscape Soldier Token.

Each token grants you 1 hour of a Soldier’s assistance, but you can summon and dismiss them whenever you want to. This can be handy if you’re in a particularly tricky area. Once you’ve dealt with the challenge, dismiss the Soldier and save your remaining time for later.

How to Get a Landscape Soldier Token

The Wiki’s link above shows that they are very expensive if purchased for Marks/Medallions. There are other ways:

• From the LOTRO Store for 100× LOTRO Points.
• The Mithril Coins trader at a Skirmish Camp.
• They can drop as Hobbit Gifts.
• Sometimes they are the weekly freebie code too.