While we are waiting for new The Lord of the Rings Digital Expansion: Siege of Mirkwood, we have collected all known information and made a small guide. We hope you will find it useful. If you have noticed any new info please let us know. Here is what we know so far
Siege of Mirkwood Details

LOTROster 1.2.0 is now available for download.  The main changes are the addition of icons for Profession and Level fields, more configuration options for fields that can contain icons, and support was added for a few more forum/CMS platforms.

Here's the detailed list of changes:

• NEW: Profession and level icons.
• NEW: Fields with icons can now be shown as: Text Only, Icons + text (like before) and Icons Only.
• NEW: You can now replace the default LOTRO rank names with custom ones.
• NEW: New template fields: "rankname" (combined rank icon + character name), "level" and  "classlevel" (combining class+level, like "class" used to do).  "class" now only displays the class without the level.
• NEW: Authentication support for Invision Power Board 2.3.x, SMF 2.0 and Drupal 6.
• IMPROVED: Optional row highlighting - edit css/lotroster.css and see the note there on how to enable it.
• IMPROVED: The menu entries for the three extra stat pages can now be renamed
• IMPROVED: All columns and header text are now left-aligned for consistency.
• IMPROVED: popup tooltips when hovering over icons
• IMPROVED: Verbose logging now logs when starting and ending an offline update
• IMPROVED: Will now refer to your guild as either a Kinship or a Tribe where appropriate.
• IMPROVED: More robust template handling.
• IMPROVED: Reports and logs if data.lotro.com is down for maintenance rather than just report a failure to update.
• FIXED: Swapped decimal and thousands separators in the charts percentages
• FIXED: Added missing "level" sort option on the dropdown menu.
• FIXED: Vocation and race icons couldn't be disabled in the configuration.
• FIXED: PHP notice if pvmprank icons were disabled.
• FIXED: Corrupted log entry if data.lotro.com is down.

Project website: http://www.lostrealm.ca/lotroster
Live demo: http://www.lostrealm.ca/lotrosterdemo

This Saturday search the banks of the river Brandywine to find barrels and crates from a doomed supply ship. The crew will reward you for your efforts for helping them recover their lost goods. This event doesn't happen often, so don't miss your chance at picking up some Corsair bounty!

You’ll be rewarded for your efforts with piratey gear from the thankful crew. You may even run across a few treasure chests the shifty fellows failed to mention! This special event only happens once a year in September, so don't you miss your chance!

Deckhand Eyepatch	First Mate Hat 1
First Mate Hat	Shipwrecked Mariner

Keep your eyes and ears about for the next week as the community team give away 111 The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar full game keys in celebration of a very special hobbit's birthday.

There will be multiple ways for you to win a key and other prizes as well.

Twitter for your Key
Don't forget to follow the LOTRO_Europe and Codies Twitter channels and as we will be giving away keys on them both. First person to grab the key and activate it into a Codemasters Online player account wins it.

May Contain Keys
The Codies' May Contain Gamers blog will have a competition running for a number of keys and a Mines of Moria Special Edition.

The LOTRO Europe Forums
We're even giving away keys on the community forums, so don't forget to join us there.

Make a date in your diary to join us from the 21st – 25th September for a whole week of celebrating!

Please note that on Wednesday, 16th September, 2009 at 09.30 hours (GMT+1) the Codemasters forums will be coming offline for approximately 1.5 hours. During this time the forum software will be updated to the latest version which includes several fixes and security upgrades.

Source

Troll and Ranger session play returns

After a long absence we are happy to announce that the Troll and Ranger session plays in the Ettenmoors will be re-activated this coming maintenance.

Source

Berephon has made a new post in MyLotro about some early content for Siege of Mirkwood.

I had produced 19 new quests in Fanuidhol, targeting the 4 largest Orc-encampments.The first quest sends the player to aid two Elves who each ask you to patrol 4 of the 8 Orc-camps in Fanuidhol. Upon completion of these quests, you can simultaneously undertake a series of 4 kill x, 4 collection, and 4 summoned boss quests, which then open up 4 daily repeatable quests which combine the kill x and collection quests.

The best news is that they reward players with Item XP, Galadhrim barter items, cash, and most importantly Galadhrim Reputation, without having to deliver flowers to the denizens of Lothlorien! These quests will become available with the release of the Siege of Mirkwood digital expansion. Hope you enjoy!

Source

New Lotro expansion Siege of Mirkwood will bring more functionality to Lotro mounts.

No longer will they simply move players around the game world quickly. With Siege of Mirkwood you can talk to an NPC on your mount, buy stuff from a vendor, cross land block boundaries, enter large spaces on horse without dismounting, emote on your horse, you can even name your horse. [source]

Mounts are being changed over to skills, not items. This means you will no longer be required to carry a mount in your inventory. In your skills panel, there will be a "mount" tab, which will list your current stable of mounts -- your horse, your other horse, your goat. And, because of mounts becoming skills, a number of issues with mounts will simply cease to exist: You will now be able to pass into instances and new zones while on your mount; you can now interact with NPCs (including vendors) from your mount; and you can now use emotes (with complete animations) on your mount. In other mount news, there's a brand new goat, the Wild Goat." [source]

You can have multiple horses. Each is a seperate skill, but there is no limit I am aware of on the number you can have. There will be a Dev Diary on the new system, so that should give you a ton of info when it's published. [source]

New video The Lord of the Rings: Siege of Mirkwood. Of special interests is a confrontation with the Nazgul on his Fell Beast, the finale of the new 12 man raid. Enjoy!

wilpatmo@youtube

Since the moment when Turbine announced new digital expansion Siege of Mirkwood all Lotro fan-sites have been collecting and providing new information, videos and screenshots about Mirkwood. The latest screenshots are a small sneak peak into a Mirkwood Map. We would like to thank ObiWan07 for these screenshots.

Mirkwood Map

Mirkwood

Region: Mirkwood

• Ashenslades
• Dol Guldur
• Emyn Lum
• Gathburz
• Mirk-eaves
• Taur Morvith
• The Dourstocks
• The Drownholt
• The Scuttledells

Under the command of Celeborn and Galadriel, players will fight through vast armies of Orcs alongside the Elves of Lorien in a battle that will take them to Dol Guldur, the fortress of the Ringwraiths. This update includes Book 9, which will have the most chapters of any book to date, and the Epilogue to the sweeping epic tale begun with the Mines of Moria expansion. No word yet on just how many chapters, or possibly books, the "epilogue" will contain. [source]

• The epic story continues on in Volume 3 as a regular content update early next year. (Sounds like a standard free book update, but hasnt been confirmed) [source]
• Epic Book 9 and much of its Epilogue take place in Mirkwood, so you'll need 'Siege of Mirkwood' for it. [source]
• Epic Book 9 will be able to be started without having completed Book 8 (or presumably any of the other books excluding Book 1 which you need to get in Mora). [source]
• There's a lot of meat to Epic Book 9: instances, skirmishes, monster-hunting, and a few surprises. [source]