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Lord of the Rings Online: Is There A Casual Endgame
Stradden
Managing EditorMember CommonPosts: 6,696
MMORPG.com Lord of the Rings Online Correspondent Daniel Hubbell writes this look at the endgame content in Lord of the Rings Online from the perspective of a casual gamer without too much time to dedicate to raiding.
I am not what you would call a 'hardcore' gamer in Lord of the Rings Online (LotRO). My claim to fame is that I've not seen a Balrog, at least not a Balrog in person. This may seem like a personal problem, but it is simply a symptom of what I like to call 'casualitis'. I'm infected, and I'd like to think many others are too, with an unpleasant lack of time. Oh, I can conjure up marathon escapades, but this leaves me dreary eyed and ostracized by the respectable parts of my family. So, for the time-challenged folk, what kind of end-game material is available for LotRO prior to Mines of Moria coming out?
If you can, at some point along the way, join a kinship. Try to find one without requirements on raiding and grouping. Endgame is as much about meeting new friends as doing actual content. Getting to level 50 also opens up the opportunity to finish the epic quest line that LotRO offers players. If you like reading a book, then you might appreciate the story that Turbine has inferred from Tolkien's original narrative. There is a great bit about Middle Earth that is only briefly mentioned in the books that gets some more attention from Turbine.
Read more on LotRO
Cheers,
Jon Wood
Managing Editor
MMORPG.com
Comments
Nice article but you missed a couple of lvl 50 instances!
Barad Gularan is located in east Angmar and is a small 6-man dungeon with some really fun fights and good drops. Very casual friendly but still challenging!
Then we have the 3 battlefield instances all started in Gath fortnir. Theese are timed instances (30 or 45 minutes) that lets you defend or attack certain positoins on the map. Theese are perfect for casuals since you can just jump in for 30 minutes and then be done with it and get some nice rewards.
As an officer and raid leader in a semi-casual kinship, I can tell you that its very much possible to be casual and still raid in LotrO.. In our kin we arrange raids so even thoose with little time can join. All you need is 3 hours, 2 evenings / week to be a sucesfull raider and enjoy all content in LotrO!
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and don't forget Monster Play, maggot!
Thanks great info, as a serious casual gamer that has to work and raise my family mostly. I still enjoy the odd spin into the lands of the Lord of the Rings though and I appreciate any casual/solo info (It still have a bunch of low level chars - my best sofar is 31). It is also good to know that Turbine doesn't forget us.
Yes, very casual friendly if you ask me. If you want to get beyond the solo play to the end game sort of content that requires grouping, then the advice about joining a Kin (aka guild) is important. Turbine transported the excellent matching system they developed for Dungeons and Dragons Online to LOTRO, but my observation is that few use it (in DDO you HAD to use it, but the better solo play in LOTRO doesn't seem to motivate people to do so). The other way that I work it is that I have a static group of people I play with each Sat. night. For casual play to be successful, you DO need to do a little work planning, whether by posting on a Kin website or scheduling with a set group like I do on Sat. nights. Like most MMOs, just logging in and hoping to get lucky and find your way into a group doing some of the more epic content isn't a good strategy in general.
"Integrity is doing the right thing even when no one else is looking."
While I love LotRO, and agree with all the facts you presented, I disagree with your conclusions. We appear to define "casual play" differently. Your opening paragraph suggests you define casual as time invested. To me, casual means playing for enjoyment -- not doing the frustrating work required to get through quests designed for the hardcore. I play games to have fun with friends, not to herd cats, bang my head against the wall, grind for rare loot, or accrue e-peen.
I have a level 50, and I'm part of a small social kinship (~15 RL friends) that's uninterested in raiding. I made it to 50 mostly solo, with the remainder being fellowship quests with one or two kin. I don't do PUGs because I think People Are Broken - although I will say that the players of LotRO seem friendlier than the PUGs I encountered in CoX. Still, I agree with the Gaming Demotivational poster about raiding -- "When You Want Your Fun To Depend on Random Strangers."
In my situation, on paper at least, there's virtually nothing to do. Every instance you mentioned in the article is effectively closed to me and my small circle of gaming buddies. Heck, my 50 has only completed Books I and VI of the epic quests. But I still have plenty of areas I haven't seen, quests I haven't done, traits I haven't completed, and -- most importantly -- I can always hang out with my friends.
"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
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You know, its absolutely pathetic how out of the loop casuals are on the raiding system and end game, even the 'correspondent' of this article is outright uneducated about probably the most casual friendly raiding system in any MMO I've ever seen. Unfortunately BECAUSE casuals are the backwater hicks of the MMO world and uneducated, they see "raid" and instantly assume they can't do them, so they don't, and then Turbine doesn't make more end game raids (there is only 1 12 man lair style (1 room, 1 boss) raid being released with Mines of Moria), and longer epic 6 man instances (like Carn Dum, which appropriately geared, can take several hours to do as an epic dungeon crawl (overgeared groups can clear it in 2-3 hours)... thankfully to something I'm going to discuss, it's still casual friendly! You have a few days to clear it.).. in lieu of more casual content (mostly open world leveling and solo quests) and short, non epic feeling 6 man instances.
So how is LotRO true End Game content casual friendly without the drastic measures (no long instances in MoM) taken in MoM? How can we have epic dungeon crawls and raids and casuals can still very much participate in them?
1. Raid Lock system.
The LotRO Raid Lock system is amazing, bottom line. How it works is that as you beat bosses, you gain a lock to that boss, so that when you come back on another day, you can pick up where you left off, and ideally, the trash mobs won't respawn so it'll be a quick trip back to where you were. Not only that, but anyone who is not locked to that raid, can join you and assume your raid locks, even people who are locked to that raid but are locked to an earlier boss than the ones you're locked to can join and assume your lock.
Example: I went on a PuG to the Rift and we cleared barz and zurm and fruz. That gives me locks 1, 2, and 3. The PuG breaks up and the next night I decide I want to finish the raid. I can't find the people that went with me last night. That's okay! I start up a new PuG, letting people know I am saved to lock 3. Anyone who has no locks to the Rift can join me, and anyone who has locks 1 or 2 or 3 can join me as well. If another guy says, well, I'm saved to lock 4 but would like to finish, does your group mind starting there? As long as everyone in the group is okay, you make that lock 4 guy the group leader, and he enters the raid first, and now everyone in the raid is saved to lock 4.
In the case of a 6 man like Carn Dum, the locks reset every 2 days, but in the case of raids, they reset every week, giving you an entire week to hack and slash your way through the raid. You can do 1-2 bosses a night in a casual kin and still complete the raid. That's an hour or 2 a night. Most people will at least have that amount of time. If a member can't make it you can substitute in a PuG member and that member can maybe later join at a higher lock. The lock system is not only Casual friendly it's PuG friendly. It's why you regularly (on a nightly basis) see PuGs forming for the Rift at various locks.
It is a dramatic improvement to say WoW's Raid ID system, where your progress is saved per boss kill, but the Raid ID is individual and you can't bring in another person who is saved to another Raid ID even if they only killed one boss and you're on boss 4.
Unfortunately because of Casual complaining about content being too hard/long, MoM doesn't feature any raid lock content because well, everything is short. Short and to the point can be good, but there's something to be said for a nice long sprawling dungeon you can't do all in 1 sitting. It's like reading a good book. Who reads a good novel in 1 sitting? There's short and to the point books too, but lets face it, the story is usually not as good in those Reader's Digest versions is it?
2. Barter Loot System
Remember in WoW when you went on an instance run or a raid over and over and over just waiting for your class set piece to drop and you can get it? Well that doesn't really happen in LotRO. Sure, there are some 'rare' drops that will keep you coming back, but the fundamental basics of your class armor set are not dropped individually, but bartered for. The barter tokens are drops that any class (or a subset of 2-3 classes) can use to purchase an armor piece. It is quite possible to get fully geared in the Rift in a reasonable amount of time. In the Rift especially there are 8 MINIMUM tokens for armor pieces dropped (and there can be more as bosses can drop multiple tokens), for a 12 person raid, this is a very good loot to raider ratio and if you go with a consistant group you can be geared out in as little as a month of weekly rift Runs.
This barter system has also been applied to 6 man instances recently and continues in Moria. Your set that you use to raid the Vile Maw with comes from bartered pieces that come from 6 man instances. You can be geared and ready to go through Vile Maw in a matter of hours because you can reset the 6 man instances, do the hard mode (really not that hard once you know how to unlock each one), get a token, rinse and repeat for all 6 instances. Or you can redo the same instance and get all 6 people their token.
This is not to mention the writ system introduced in book 14. From the writ system you can gain pieces raid and instance armor by assisting people through epic book questline instances or instanced class quests. It has been hinted at that casuals will be able to get their raid armor via another route other than doing hard mode instances.. I expect the writ system to be the way.
3. All classes have a secondary role
Sometimes finding the "perfect" group makeup might be a hinderance for casuals in other MMOs, but it is less so in LotRO. Can't find a Guardian for an instance run? You might be able to find a Champion, Warden, or Captain to tank instead (all 4 classes are capable of tanking pretty much everything in MoM). Need a dps? Hunter, Runekeeper, Champion, and Burglar can all fill this role, with even a Minstrel or Guardian or Captain being able to do some dps in a pinch. Need CC? Loremaster, Hunter, Burglar all have excellent CC now, with Wardens, Minstrels, and Runekeepers having some minor cc. Healer? Minstrel isn't alone anymore, provided you keep your pulls controlled or minimize time spent out of combat a Runekeeper is a great healer, Captain healing was also boosted up and can be sufficient for small fellowship content, Loremasters have some healing, and even Burglars can pull some healing off utilizing green conjunctions. Between a Loremaster and a Captain, or a Captain and a Burglar, or Loremaster/Burglar you can make up for not having a healer with most content (healers that can Crowd Control in some cases).
About the only thing that does still bully you around with needing certain classes is debuff clearing. Classes that can cure debuffs as a primary role can cleanse 3 at a time, where secondaries can clear 1 at a time, potions clear only 1 and have a 30s timer and tend to clear the least harmful debuffs first....
Personally I think Turbine can work on that (should clear the Eye debuff that'll instantly kill you in 10s rather than the -100 fate debuff..).. but otherwise, it's easier to make a balanced group than in most MMO's.
So basically I think what you casuals should do is actually take a look at endgame rather than just make demands that it be made easier (or cry for more solo content). It's more casual friendly than you think.
I've looked at it. I've nibbled at the edges of it, and I didn't enjoy it. It's not my cup of tea.
You dig it and that's fine with me. You don't need to suggest that casual players speak from ignorance or call us "backwater hicks." Some people like strawberry ice cream more than chocolate, others prefer casual monster bashing with a couple of friends to organizing a strike team of 6-12 strangers. *shrug*
You've at least given it a shot then, that's more than a lot of them can say. Problem is a lot of casuals have not tried the content and simply asked for easier, shorter content, and Turbine is giving it to them, without giving anything for the players seeking more challenging and epic content in return.
Frankly though, the main complaint of many casuals, including the author of the original article, is that they don't have enough time, that raiding takes too much time and you have to do it over and over again to get your loot and have to have the perfect group, etc.
Most of my post was to dispel that and discuss why the raids in LotRO are much more casual friendly than in other MMOs, so while their time might be limited, raids can be split up over a week, you can skip bosses by adopting someone else's lock if even 1 week is too short of a period of time, loot through a barter system is more reasonable, and having multiple ways to do put a group together that works. So basically then you have to decide is your excuse still you "can't " raid or do end game instances? Or that you don't want to. If you don't want to because it's not what you enjoy, then by all means, whatever floats your boat. But for those casuals who want to do it but claim they can't, and then ask Turbine to not make the content for other people and focus on more solo content and make instances easier/shorter.. that's the uneducated ones and I bet they actually could do the content if they actually tried it.
I've been playing LOTRO on and off since release.
I've always had a great time, I've been in a guild of 3 the entirety of my stay there. Me and 2 other friends.
I just this past week went into the Rift. We didn't make it to the end, but I still had an amazing time.
What I've always found about LOTRO is unlike WoW or other games, Gear, which is usually the motivator to be a 'hard core' player, isn't as much of a factor. I got by forever with my blue crafted set and blue crafted weapons. They're just as good if not better than most of the set armor and drops from high end bosses.
Turbine did a great job keeping the game "stress" level low! You don't feel like you're required to join a large raiding guild or feel like your character is obsolete if you don't log in 4 times a day.
I've been a level 50 for a good long while, and still haven't completed most of the Book quests and other character advancement options. I'm wanting to, but I'm certainly in no hurry. I find LOTRO to be the perfect casual game, and it applies well to the end game most of all!
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"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
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You bring me some hope amoung casual gamers. I myself am not in a 'hardcore' raiding guild. We do raid, but we don't do dkp, or have required runs, or anything like that. We just like to do all types of content. We craft (have lots of GM's of multiple professions (and I mean each alt of many members is also at least 1 GM crafter, my level 28 Loremaster is a GM scholar hehe), even have quite a few 200/200 fishing skill level people too), we do small instances, some of us pvmp to high ranks (have a few rank 9-10's) or play creeps (have a creep side "sister" tribe to go with the kin), I have this crazy obsession with housing decorations and cosmetic outfits (one of the cool features of the game I like.. armor gets replaced for stats but housing and cosmetics are timeless classics that don't go out of style no matter what level you are) and holiday festivals.. just lots of stuff and we raid on the side.
But to me, it really sucks when because of a big chunk of the populace, content that I enjoy doesn't get produced as much as I'd like, and I hope that those people will give the content a chance and maybe they'll enjoy it too, find out it's not as time demanding as you may think (not in this game anyway), and maybe more will get made.
None of my toons are anywhere near endgame yet (my main is a 39 champion), but I have to say I like LotRO very much and, yeah, I am a "casual gamer" in the sense that I have played for months and never joined any kin. I just log on and play. Finding groups is not too difficult for most group quests -- and, for the most part, I completely SKIP the full dungeon instances (Great Barrows, onward). I did this also in WoW. It works fine, for the most part (better in LotRO, however). I generally follow along oin the epic quest line, however, because it's fun and finding groups is not usually a problem.
This is not because I don't like the full-on instances but because I find them tediously long to complete and find groups for.
When I say I'm casual, what I mean by that is that I do not like -- REPEAT -- I do NOT like to waste time finding groups for quests. In LotRO, as in WoW, instances are skippable and so I skip them.
I am not crying to Turbine for more easy content. What I would like from Turbine -- from anyone, really -- is to finally develop a Looking for Group mechanism that conforms to how people really play. A player in LotRO, for example, should be able to list himself/herself as interested in "Dol Dinen quests" or "Fornost quests" in some sort of general way, rather than picking some specific quest or other, and LFF/LFG channels should be global and rigidly policed (so they they don't devolve into "Chuck Norris" general chat channels). I should be able to "hear" people in Lone Lands forming a group for Garth Agarwen even when I am in North Downs, and so on.
I think it's fine if Turbine wants to develop larger-group raid instances as long as they also (1) develop a better system for grouping and (2) develop corresponding instances for solo/small(er) groups.
Turbine has come closer than anyone to doing this, and I applaud them for it -- but it could be better still. What casual players need is for content to be easily *accessible*, not easy to complete, and that means better mechanisms for nonguilded players to find fellowships for specific areas and instances.
It may be that I may have to find a kin at level 50 if the LFF system is inadequate for casual players, but it's more likely I'll just move on to another game.
Does it indicate somewhere as to which lock you are saved at?
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Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Yes in fact it does, go to your social panel and to the right of the raid tab there is a raid locks tab, it'll list all the raid instances (including Carn Dum) that you are saved to and what lock you're at. Not only that, it'll display raid locks for people in your fellowship! This way you can see what the highest lock is and whether you want to start from that lock or not.
You know it's very possible to say, as a casual, do 1 boss per week, just wait till the middle of the week and find someone that'll give you the locks to the bosses you've already done so you can skip them, and just progress to the bosses you haven't seen yet.
This way, the original author of the article could even see a Balrog. There's no need to sit and plunge through a 5 hour raid all in one sitting, nor do I think there should be (but I think there should be raids that take 5 hours to complete but if it's done in 2-3 sittings it's not so bad is it?). Raid locks are great.
I see. Yes at level 50 there is so much to do. I don't know where to start.
I don't have muc time to play as well, but its so fun I have to play it.
A few comments for clarification.
First, on the OP's Comments:
1. He states that Books 1-6 can be done prior to level 50, but Books 7-14 are best done at level 50. Well I completed Books 7 through 11 before reaching level 50 on my Hunter and Burglar. So it is more accurate that, assuming your character is properly equipped and is properly grouped with other competent players for certain chapters requiring a fellowship, Books 7, 8 and 9 can all be completed at 45+. Naturally, being 50 and/or having level 50s along makes things easier.
2. Helegrod is mostly a 24-player raid area, but it does have a couple areas where a 6 player fellowship can shine if ready for a challenge. Coldbear comes to mind; he can drop what is arguably the best 2H Axe in the game (pre-MoM).
3. The Rift requires a solid raid group of 12 who know what they are doing; PUGs there are a recipe for disaster. Go with your kin mates or other people you know well and in either case, hit The Rift with an experienced Rift raid leader who knows WTF she/he is doing. Oh and waiting to go to level 50 places (like the Rift) at level 60 out of curiosity/to smell the flowers is romantic and can be argued as "fun" by some, but for me, it seems like a complete waste to wait like that -- never mind the lack of experience because the mobs, especially the elite mobs in LotRO are a waste of time killing them for the XP, you get your real XP for quest turn-ins. The RIft is all about EPIC GEAR and other TEAL ITEMS - not XP. At level 60, that Rift equipment will be about as useful as screens on a submarine. The only reason I can see to ever set foot in the Rift after level 50-52 is to help lower level friends.
Now about Raids in LotRO in general:
24 player raids are pretty much a disaster. Few players have the time or the inclination to do Helegrod -- it is almost always empty (at least on my server). Turbine knows this, hence it's very unlikely you'll see any more mega-raid 24 player time sinks in LotRO.
As for the 12 player raids, assuming you do have a good kinship and/or circle of friends to do them, as well as a raid leader who knows the raid very well (CRITICAL), go for it! Give it a shot. The 2 Hours a couple times a week can be fun. However, it still requires a commitment (2-3 hours per session & 2-3 times a week) ... and you must realize that once you get your Rift stuff, friends and kin mates still expect you to keep doing the raid because there's always someone that still needs SOMETHING in there (LOL). And then, as IRL issues occur, at the appointed time for your Rift Raid, there's ALWAYS at least a couple in your RIft Group that are no-shows -- and that means sitting while rotating on your thumb with 9 fingers showing while the fearless leader is in the /LFF Channel "LF2M - Need one CPT & one MNS only for Rift!" .. LOL! So for me, as for Raids being "fun" = not so much. I'm no fan of time sinks in gaming. So not always, but too often, raids can put a damper on game enjoyment.
I even cringed doing the lengthy Marquis de Sade inspired, sadist created 6 player areas such as Garth Agarwen in Lone Lands, Fornost City in North Downs, as well as the other day-long 8-12 hour grinds LotRO offers. Who has the TIME or the inclination nowadays to sit through the whole Fornost City sequence of quests at one sitting? And then, who enjoys having to come back to it 3-5 times because players in your group can't stay for 10 hours at a stretch and you're back the next evening in /LFF for what may be forever?
What we will see more of -- and there are quite a few of these in the MoM Expansion -- are the six player instance-type "raids." There's a lot more of these "quickies" because they are much more popular -- more managable, easier to chew, less time consuming than it's 12 player/24 player bigger brothers.
The trouble I've had with LOTRO is that it's just not a very friendly (or big) community. I've been playing since July and I haven't been able to find a group for the many quests for months. No one talks, unless you hang out in Bree.
I've tried joining a kinship, but again, no one ever seems to be recruiting in game, and posting on the official forums didn't work (only turned up one offer from a roleplaying guild, which wasn't what I was looking for).
So it really isn't casual friendly. They really need to improve the ability to find groups in the game (in the game tool was a nice try, but no one uses it, same with the LFF channel) and merge the servers or something. If you spend a couple hours a day playing and most of that is looking for a group, that's just not going to keep people interested.
R.I.P. City of Heroes and my 17 characters there
The community is server dependant. Elendilmir has a great community I find, and there are rift groups, and all sorts of other PuGs going on a nightly basis, not too hard to find a group to do something if you're open for anything.
As far as future 24 man raids.. I think they can work, they just have to be done right from the getgo. There are some major problems with Helegrod's implementation and Turbine has learned their lesson on it and it's evidenced by their retrofitting Helegrod with a barter system, changing the way Thorog was summoned (used to be if your key item holders dc'ed, left, crashed, or whatever, the run was over, no way to pull Thorog), using chests instead of drops on the corpse, and reduced the amount of items you had to collect for the quests. Prior to those changes and prior to the Rift (which how they made the Rift showed some dramatic changes for the better in the raid model they were using as well), Helegrod was awful, you could see yourself never completing the quests, the quest rewards were kinda junk anyway just added to utilize the new "clicky" gear stats, all the rewards and drops were like ilevel 45 rather than 50, so were not even really as good as crafted gear stat wise (was about 15 points short). Now understand it is not ALL about loot, but good loot should be expected from a raid, as you see yourself going on an epic adventure, surely your character should gain something out of this right? With essentially 4 boss fights, the loot to raider ratio was pitifully low, vs the Rift which a full rift clear will drop 11 teal items bare minimum for a 12 man raid. That's outstanding ratio, you go to Rift and raid a few times, you WILL get neat treasure out of it.
So what needs to be done for a successful 24 man raid?
Either bosses need to drop more pieces, or more bosses to kill, get the loot to over 50%, more people getting loot more often will make it more fun as you don't feel like you're wiping and paying repair bills and consumables for nothing.
The loot doesn't have to be BETTER than crafted or 6 man instance gear, but it should certainly not be INFERIOR.
Make sure there aren't respawns if loading in from a raid lock on another day.. should be a cleared path to the last boss locked to.
Pace the instance so that raid locks come about every hour of gameplay (not counting wipes/learning boss encounters).
Repeatable quests, to make sure that everyone who came at least gets something.
It can work, but I do myself prefer 12 man raids. 12 man is perfect, you can get at least 1 of every class in there, maybe 2-3 of some class. That means the devs can unleash the fury and test our abilities to the fullest, since we'll have all abilities at our disposal. Not like a 6 man where you can't assume they'll have at least 1 of each class.
The problem is that it really depends on how you define casual. I have a level 50 minstrel, and I am now struggling through the epic quests, currently on book X or so. I am in a nice kin, who help out with the epic quests sometimes, and I even occassionally take part in raids.
However, my real problem is not hat I don't have much time (I don't, but that is not the issue). It is that I don't have much time in one go. I have a 2 year old and a full time job. I can't really rely on having long stretches of uninterrupted time, and often by the time we have set up a group, I need to go again. I have also pissed people off by joining a PUG and then having to leave half an hour into the group quest to attend to a wee girl who can't sleep. And I just don't get much personal satisfaction out of having my kin group up with me to "help out" on an epic quest they have done ages ago - it just feels too much like charity.
To some extent, this is my own fault. Maybe I just shouldn't play MMOs. I find myself restricted to soloing, so I can just log off or take a break whenever I need to, but that sort of defeats the point of an MMO.
I think if LotRO had more public quests, like Warhammer has, where you meet people while you are soloing and join up in a casual way, then it would be a little more casual friendly. At the moment it really isn't.
It is often extremely hard to accomplish, but over the course of my years of MMO playing, I've been fortunate enough to meet (but too rarely, I'm afraid) other players who I not only enjoy spending time with, but who also really appreciate and who sometimes even actually share my casual style of play. I'm patient when they have to go AFK for 5 minutes or even longer to check on dinner, take a phone call, put the baby to nap, or whatever -- and they are also kind and understanding when I have to do the same.
It's all about having a good time and it's so special when you meet nice people you enjoy spending time with who are both casual players like yourself and understanding about real life situations that take you AFK and can't wait.
So as long as a player can actually play for a couple hours or so (in game stints of an hour or less preclude doing much besides soloing), brief AFK excursions are really not a problem -- you'd be surprised -- there's quite a few players in the same boat as you are!
One of the bueties of LotRO is that casual players arern't instantly gimped completely.
Crafted armor is just fine, and even if you only log in for a few hours a week you should be able to purchase enough good gear to play around with.
If you have slightly more time, a full set of crafted teal armor is only VERY slightly worse than raid type gear. It may take you a while, but you'll get it piece by piece, as well as some fine teal rewards for the higher epic books.
The deeds system was awesome for me as a level 50, it's a way to improve your actual charactor, not just gear that will be replaced. Though I'm a deed-whore and giggled like a madman when I found a "new" deed in the old forest I had missed, killing trees.
So far in Moria (just broke in last night), I've already began replacing my old teal armor, with say 4 hours invested, minus smoke and snack breaks.
SPOILER ALERT:
The good news is that even the most casual player with MoM will get to at least see a Balrog, and yes, he is awesome looking. I never saw his buddy in the rift because after 3 or 4 runs through the ealeir bosses I was done with that.
The epic weapon system is awesome, even when you replace the item you're using, you'll get some of your effort back if you deconstruct it . And, there are gobs more deeds.
Moria is a big win so far.
Stromwaltz: If you define "casual" as quality of play and not time, then I respectfully suggest that with just a little more effort you might discover that LoTRO is an even better game than you realize. I'm certainly not going to judge what you find enjoyable, and if being able to log in, hook up with one or two others or just go solo, and do whatever quests you can is your speed, then fantastic, LoTRO certainly can be fun just doing that. However, I would argue that if you put in a little extra effort such that you can regularly be part of a 5 or 6 person fellowship, you'll discover that there is a lot of content geared for that level that is, on the whole, of better quality than what you can only do with with 1 - 3 people. Again, I manage this by being part of a good kin in which I can post a night that I'm available to group and encourage others to "sign up," or, since I've been even more time constrained recently, I've developed a static group with 5 others and we coordinate with each other to play together, usually on the same night each week. So long as you can have a good group, larger instances like Fornost become a lot of fun (and given my time constraints I'm not afraid of doing a little online research on an instance in order to understand what it requires and to avoid some of the frustrating learning curve elements). I AM NOT talking about raids. Back when I had more time I made it a few times into some of the raids but in general I don't. My general view of solo play, btw, is that there are any number of single player computer games out there that will deliver a much better solo experience than any MMO will. But that's just me.
Arato: You make some good points and I can empathize a bit with your frustration that you think Turbine feels overly pressured to dumb down the game for casuals, but the thing is, the fact that you understand the lock system well, etc. almost by definition defines you are not a casual player. Likewise, a casual player almost by definition wouldn't be casual if they understood these elements well. I considered myself something of a medium-core player. I knew in general terms about all of what you described but still learned a few things from your post. It takes time and/or good mentors to help you learn about the nuances of the game, something that casuals generally won't have (time or mentors).
trancejeremy: I'm surprised that you aren't finding LoTRO casual friendly. Makes me think you've ended up on a less active server or something. I'd give it a little more time and/or try switching to a more active server (I'm on Elendilmir which I know to be pretty active).
Terminus-Est: I'll mention again the advantage of finding a static group of people to quest with. My wife and I did this and one of the main criteria we stated in establishing the group was that we were a bunch of casual players, most with kids, and if you wanted to be part of this static group you needed to be tolerant of interruptions. I also have a two year old and the others in the group (including another married couple) all have children also. Taking breaks to attend to crying children is something we all expect and understand. It may not be real easy to find such people, but it definitely isn't impossible either. Finding a Kin like mine (http://lorebook.lotro.com/wiki/Mithril_Crowns) can certainly help the process.
"Integrity is doing the right thing even when no one else is looking."
I agree with stormwaltz except on one tiny point. CoX probably has the best community of all the MMO's I ever played. Higher levels are helpful with advice and (if you don't beg for it) generous with their influence/infamy.
LOTRO is a "niche" game. It really appeals to the fans of the books, which is a good thing. However to someone who just likes fantasy MMO's in general, they may not find it as appealing and the, uh, reduced amount of soloability will turn people off. You can thank That Other Game for making people want more soloable content.
Quote: "LOTRO is a "niche" game. It really appeals to the fans of the books, which is a good thing. However to someone who just likes fantasy MMO's in general, they may not find it as appealing and the, uh, reduced amount of soloability will turn people off. You can thank That Other Game for making people want more soloable content."
Huh. I guess WoW is the standard of measure, and not having played WoW I'm ignorant of that standard. To me LOTRO is very soloable. You can easily get a character to the pre-Moria level cap of 50 and not have touched 60% or more of the solo content, and they are regularly adding new FREE content. But, I know WoW is a bigger and better financed game, so I can believe that they offer even more. Though I haven't played WoW, I've played many of Blizzard's other games and there's no question but that they put out quality games. My bias toward playing single player games if I'm going to "solo" may be playing a part here also.
"Integrity is doing the right thing even when no one else is looking."