Fancy LotRO RP in Neo-Khuzdul? Now you can!

Update: The plugin-in should actually work on a Mac.

Hail!

Remember I spoke about a tool for LotRO Dwarf RPers, allowing them to speak Dwarvish with the click of a button (or two)…. well, without further ado, I present to you:

The Neo-Khuzdul Tool LotRO plugin

The Neo-Khuzdul Tool plugin is an vital tool for LotRO Dwarf RP-ers that wish to immerse themselves in the language of dwarves (without the need to plough through dictionaries or grammar documents).

Neo-Khuzdul Tool Plugin

Background

The Neo-Khuzdul Tool plugin was long a wish of mine, ever since I first started giving Neo-Khuzdul lessons in Lotro. As I felt there had to be an easier way for dwarf RPers to speak the language of their kind.

Back in February this year I got in touch with Simbo, the hobbit who created the fantastic Poetical tool I frequently used for my dwarf RP. I pitched this idea to him about a plugin for dwarf RPers, that would assist the RPer in speaking Neo-Khuzdul. To my astonishment he jumped on board and before I knew a first version was ready to be tested.

Without the hard work of Simbo, there simply would not be such a plugin… and it would likely still have been an unfulfilled wish of mine. So there you go, proof again that Dwarves need Hobbits when it matters!

A tremendous thank you to Simbo from myself and (I’m sure) the Dwarf RP-community of Lotro.

About the translations.

The latest updated material and dictionaries have been used to form the content of this tool.

Khuzdul is the language of the Dwarves in J.R.R. Tolkien’s legendarium set in Middle-earth. For this Neo-khuzdul Tool plugin both the original Tolkien material, David Salo’s Neo-Khuzdul and Khuzdul used in Turbine’s LoTRO have been used. This is my personal interpretation of Tolkien’s dwarven language, I do not claim this content to be canon.   This document is an interpretation of Tolkien’s work and any Khuzdul related material, all rights are reserved for their proper owners. Any reference to The Lord of the Rings Online or any other brand name is not meant to claim ownership of material.

In most cases I have opted for informal language, though in many translations found in this tool you will find both formal and informal versions.

How to install?

Drop the “Simbo” folder in your Lord of the Rings Online “plugins” folder. In case you already have a plugin by Simbo (which you really should have to be honest), you’ll have to drop the contents of it into the already existing Simbo folder.

How to use?

Simbo has really done his best to make the tool as user friendly as possible and I think he has done a brilliant job at that.

When you get started there are a few things to keep in mind.

  • Always think WHO you are speaking to, and ensure you select the proper “target audience” In English the pronoun “you” can be used for males, females, individuals or groups, not so in Khuzdul, where you have several forms. Hence it is important you always select the proper target audience in the tool before you press the “speak” button, otherwise your given translation may be incorrect.
  • Some lines mention (m) or (f), this indicates the line is speaking about a male or female (or intended for a male or female)
  • Some lines contain a field “___” to enter a name, feel free to type what you wish to say in the designated box.
  • Ensure you have the right channel selected “say, kinship, fellowship or raid”.

This tool is meant for mature RPers that have an affinity with lore, as such please take into account that Khuzdul was spoken among Dwarves ONLY (with the exception of place names and battle cries). It goes without saying that this is not to be used for spamming your fellow RPers.

Future?

Let’s see how this works out for everyone first…

Though I can already tell you that the Neo-Khuzdul Tool might in the months to come get an Elvish sister (oooh, exciting stuff but -hush- don’t tell anyone yet!)

Also, some of the saying might not be very clear at first glance, hence in a future version of the plugin you will be getting a little “extra information” box (that you’ll be able to show or hide) with some extra need-to-know info about these lines.

The files

UPDATE: Version 1.3 (3/3/2016)

Download UPDATED LotRO Plugin HERE

  • Adds German Translation (Translations by Grunior)
  • Adds “sort” button, to alphabetically sort all phrases in a section.
  • Adds “hide translation” button
  • Plugin will now remember it’s last position (open/closed)
  • Additional translations added.

NKpluginGerman

IMPORTANT NOTE: It is recommended to remove the previous plugin version before updating to this version.

A tremendous thank you again to Grunior for his enormous efforts in translating the existing plugin phrases to German and for spending much of his time on testing the new update.


 

UPDATE: Version 1.2 (17/09/2015)

  • Adds “filter” search box (As requested by many users. We hope this will benefit the user when looking for lines in categories with lots of phrases in it. Merely type in the box and only phrases containing the filter text will be listed)
  • Fixed issue with “hide” and “toggle”
  • Added French and German commands for “/say”, “/f” and “/k” (note: translation are still in English, not in French or German, this however allows usage on French or German clients)*
  • “Show Info” button has been moved below the phrases, this to ensure there would be no confusion with the new “filter” search box.
  • Translations added and placed in more accurate groups.

 

 

UPDATE: Version 1.1

  • Adds “extra information” button
  • Translations added and placed in more accurate groups.

Short video of the updated plugin:

Disclaimers

Some things to note:

  • The plugin has not been tested with the German and French client of LotRO. At present it is only available in English, yet other versions can be made (those interested in translating the English text to German or French, don’t hesitate to let us know).
  • The plugin-in should actually work on a Mac.
  • The plugin has however only been tested in Windows 7 and 8. If you run into problems with other operating systems, please let us know.

Let us know what you think!

How does the tool work for you? Does it work in your RP sessions? Are there bugs, are there suggestions for improvements? Please let us know! Just add your reply to this post and we’ll be sure to follow it up.

About The Dwarrow Scholar

The Dwarrow Scholar first experienced the brilliance of Tolkien when he received a copy of The Hobbit from his uncle as a kid, reading it feverishly again and again. Some years on, when he got his very own walk-man (aye forget about tiny phones, this thing was a brick and played cassette tapes) he made his own little audiotape of The Hobbit, so he could listen to it on his bike on his way to school. Between reenacting the Battle of Five armies with 4 of his school friends (still feel sorry for the kid that had to be the Orc) and before the days of the internet, you would find Roy frequently in libraries trying to find all he could about Tolkien and his beloved dwarves. When Roy isn’t delving into Neo-Khuzdul or searching for lost dwarvish treasures on the net he’s enjoying time with his wife and son, re-reading his tormented Tolkien paperbacks, watching a good movie, learning new languages or playing a game of LoTRO or other dwarf related games.
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12 Responses to Fancy LotRO RP in Neo-Khuzdul? Now you can!

  1. Vethlo says:

    Thanks for a great plugin! My dwarves will have some fun with it 🙂

    However the /neokhuzdul hide and /neokhuzdul toggle commands don’t work. It looks like the “cmd_hide” and “cmd_toggle” string are missing from Localisation.lua.

    Like

    • Cheers. I’ve checked it for you, and you are correct that the hide and toggle don’t seem to activate via the command line. Seeing that this isn’t a serious bug in my view it is something we’ll look into to fix for future versions. For now you can obviously use the X to close (hide) the plugin and toggle via the neokhuzdul icon itself.

      Like

  2. Edward says:

    Nice work !

    I’ve done a quick test on a french client and it works for the most part, but the button to output the text in a channel don’t work, except when it goes to raid (/ra)
    It’s because the french client use other aliases to send a text in a channel:
    /say > /parler
    /k > /conf
    /f > /comm

    I suppose the same problem occur in the German client.

    But except this problem, everything is OK:
    – Choice of categories
    – Choice of target gender
    – Choice of text
    – Placeholder text

    And I was amazed by the amount of translations. These could be very handy to many players.

    Like

    • As you mentioned this was rather expected unfortunately, seeing that the aliases are different indeed.
      Perhaps in future we’ll have support to create full French and German version, not at present unfortunately.

      Like

  3. Hi, Nice idea! I have installed the Simbo folder in my Plugin folder (on a Mac) and it doesn’t show up in game under plugins. It shows up in ‘Plugin Compendium, but is grayed out and won’t install so I am unable to load it. Shame, as it hink it would be great for aiding ingame RP but I can confirm that at present, this plugin doesn’t work on the Mac Client.

    Like

    • Sorry to hear it doesn’t work on your Mac Client. I’ve had quite a few people claim it does work on theirs (as should be the case), so that’s a bit frustrating.
      Not sure it will work with this Plugin Compendium though, as it really has been setup as a stand alone plugin.

      Like

      • Are they running Bootcamp windows or native Mac client? On native mac, when simbo is dropped into the plugin folder (I have even dropped a copy into the terrible plugins folder) it doesn’t show up in game at all. Can you direct me to one of the mac users who is successfully working with it please.

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      • Ok, ignore my previous comments. I had a wee mooch on the net and found a LOTRO thread explaining that the plugins need to be dropped into the directory library for them to work. (it is a hidden folder in the Users Library) I must have done this a while ago but forgot. So, All is well.

        For future reference and anyone out there who gets stumped like I did. On the Mac client, the directory address: Username/Documents/The Lord of The Rings Online/Plugins will not work on Mac OSX

        The correct Directory is a hidden folder located in: ~/Library/Application Support/com.Turbine.lotroclient/Plugins.
        If the Folder ‘Plugins’ isn’t there, then create one and add Simbo to it.

        Thanks for the Plugin, not had much chance to play yet, but it looks pretty extensive 🙂

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  4. Lorim says:

    It looks really great, but the Dropbox link is broken and it doesn’t show on lotrointerface.com :/ Is the project discontinued or is it just me?? Anyway: if you can help me I’d be greatful since it looks like a good plugin 🙂

    Like

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