I'm agreeing on the stun fest. Every mob does it, every battle now. I don't even execute my specials now because many of them are timed sequence and they will be wasted in gray bar.
Turbine just is not the same company it was a couple of years ago. This expac has some glaring problems that never should have made it to release. I totally agree with the stun comment. It is over the top and need to be toned down. Also I am very tired of the garbage rewards for quest completion. Just give us ixp and exp, cash, or purple items now and then. Although I do not play the mpvp part of the game anymore, would it have been too much trouble to expand that area? I am sure it is getting quite stale in there. We should have been in Rohan by now...way to kill a game Trubine!
I agree, the mmo world moves fast and lotro should have had enough expansions by now to get us to Gondor at least, or bigger expansions (RoI should take us well into Rohan and then only one more expansion for Gondor/Mordor etc...). Now the situation is that we are nowhere near completing Middle Earth, GW2 and ToR are on the way and they will kill this game stone dead, as will the next big thing that is likely to come out before another expansion shows up.
I'm wondering if they will ever complete this game.
I have no idea why they still haven't introduced playable evil races, Goblins, Trolls, Orcs etc... and open world pvp, that would give the game a whole new breath of life in my opinion. In fact it should have been in the pipeline from day 1.
I've only played a few hours of it but so far I'm pretty underwhelmed. It doesn't feel like I'm doing much different then I was in Enedwaith...just with different names. Overall, the story arcs and quests all feel like things I've seen and done plenty of times before. I haven't encountered anything new or particularly interesting about gameplay either.
It's not badly done.....it's just for a paid expansion....I would have expected a little more "Ooomph" or something.....something to change it up a bit or add some new experience/feel to the game given how stagnant it's been for a long time now.
I really think they should have done something to try to make the story/region feel different from what we've experienced before.... (for example Forochel...free expansion back in the sub days....was a very decent sized zone and had a distinctly different feel as a zone and story arc to elsewhere in the game).
I also really think they should have been able to add at least 1 semi-significant gameplay addition...... Mounted-Combat, a new hobby, a new crafting proffesion, class, horse-breeding, pvmp zone, stamp collecting, anything..... something to breath a little new life into the game.
(IMO) We've been patient enough with F2P and the stasis mode it's put on actual game-play improvements for long enough that they REALLY needed to bring something more to the table.
As it is.....myself and most of the guild members I've talked to get a sorta "meh" feeling from ROI. It's nice to be gaining levels again and have some more content to do....but it all seems very "been there, done that" .
At least Dunland does so far...maybe the Gap and Isengard itself will feel different.
Fully agree with that statement.
I have to add two things.
First, WHY IN THE NAME OF ILUVATAR does it have to be boars, wolves and crebain AGAIN? I mean, REALLY? I bet when I stand at the gates of the tower of Sauron, with level 120, I bet there will be level 120 uber-boars, wolves and crebain. It's just so boring now.
Second, who the heck made it so that every frigging mob has stun? It is such a lame mechanic and so damn overused here.
Then there are so many mundane quests, like carry a bag of apples all through the village or clean 10 dirt piles from the road. And I think wtf? I killed demons and dragons and now I can carry some dirt around for some backwater villagers? Isengard surely is a low in LOTRO. The landscape is still breathtaking and the world story is interesting enough, but everythung else is cheap and a mere rehash of same old. I am very underwhelmed with this.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
If you played it once, you've played it all. No real knew formula's and even though the raid is finally 24 man its quite dull imo. If you are looking for something knew from moria or mirkwood look somewhere else. I wont be playing LotRo until the next update.
I've only played a few hours of it but so far I'm pretty underwhelmed. It doesn't feel like I'm doing much different then I was in Enedwaith...just with different names. Overall, the story arcs and quests all feel like things I've seen and done plenty of times before. I haven't encountered anything new or particularly interesting about gameplay either.
It's not badly done.....it's just for a paid expansion....I would have expected a little more "Ooomph" or something.....something to change it up a bit or add some new experience/feel to the game given how stagnant it's been for a long time now.
I really think they should have done something to try to make the story/region feel different from what we've experienced before.... (for example Forochel...free expansion back in the sub days....was a very decent sized zone and had a distinctly different feel as a zone and story arc to elsewhere in the game).
I also really think they should have been able to add at least 1 semi-significant gameplay addition...... Mounted-Combat, a new hobby, a new crafting proffesion, class, horse-breeding, pvmp zone, stamp collecting, anything..... something to breath a little new life into the game.
(IMO) We've been patient enough with F2P and the stasis mode it's put on actual game-play improvements for long enough that they REALLY needed to bring something more to the table.
As it is.....myself and most of the guild members I've talked to get a sorta "meh" feeling from ROI. It's nice to be gaining levels again and have some more content to do....but it all seems very "been there, done that" .
At least Dunland does so far...maybe the Gap and Isengard itself will feel different.
I agree with this. I too have only played a few hours and that is due to how boring it is. I just don't think the game is offering much with this new expansion except more levels and quests and 3 new zones that look like the last 3 zones put into the game. Lack of a new game system is apparent here as well, like you said. Anything would have been nice, a new hobby, mounted combat, something to break up the monotony of the how the game has been for the last 2 years.
Actually, I should be honest and say my 2 main issues with Lotro and most MMORPGs these days are:
1. Quests that send me back and forth to the exact same area more than once. STOP doing this! Holy crap, just give me all the quests for that area or make them continue while I'm IN the area instead of making me plod back through the 30 orcs I just killed, AGAIN.
2. Mobs, regular mobs mind you, do they really need to stun me in every fight? It just makes the fight tedious, boring and makes the flow of combat feel extremely slow. Stuns should be reserved for elite mobs or bosses.
Heh I've been stuck feeling the same general malaise about the constant back and forth for uncompelling quests luckily or not for me my main character at the start of ROI was still only level sixty so right now I've been trudging through Mirkwood to work my way up to Isengard hopefully they'll have come up with some post launch additions before I get there.
I have no idea why they still haven't introduced playable evil races, Goblins, Trolls, Orcs etc... and open world pvp, that would give the game a whole new breath of life in my opinion. In fact it should have been in the pipeline from day 1.
Several years ago there was a wonderful post on the LOTRO website from a dev that pretty much explained why there are no playable evil races (and why there probably never will be).
Turbine originally pushed Tolkein Enterprises (the IP holders) to allow them to have playable evil races for PvP and such when they initially proposed the game. T.E. said no. They did not want players to play evil characters as they felt it misses the point of Tolkien's work. Apparently this was a major stipulation for them to acquire the rights for an MMO in the first place. The dev also said that they had to really twist T.E.'s arm to even allow Monster Play.
Turbine provided a link to an I.P. website/trade magazine (I never thought one existed but there it is) where the I.P. holders were interviewed. It was a surprisingly good read. Apparently the Tolkien I.P. is managed by three guys who meet every month to discuss how the Tolkien brand is being handled and whether or not it meets their standards. They acknowledged that they get a lot of business from licencing video games but they really don't know much about it. With that being said, they were extremely unhappy with what EA did in some of their games and was a major reason why they decided not to renew their contract.
Like I said, it may take some digging on the Turbine forums, but it's a pretty enlightening read.
I have no idea why they still haven't introduced playable evil races, Goblins, Trolls, Orcs etc... and open world pvp, that would give the game a whole new breath of life in my opinion. In fact it should have been in the pipeline from day 1.
This has been explained for years.
The "evil" races really are nothing more than tools for the powers that be. They essentially do the bidding of their masters. The entire lord of the rings story is told from the protagonist's point of view.
Orcs aren't saying "hey, let's go see what trouble we can cause", or "let's explore".
One of the very difficult things to come to grips with is that the IP is difficult to set. To be honest, there aren't elves running around bree and humans running around the shire either. the whole story is about the impending invasion from Sauron and Saruman deciding that he wants "in" as well.
orcs and goblins and worgs (oh my!) don't really get to the shire because of the rangers and the elves.
The entire world is very segregated.
Let's just say there has been a lot of bending just to make this an mmo.
The problem is that a lot of players aren't interested in playing "the lord of the rings". they are interested in playing dungeons and dragons with a lord of the rings skin.
open world pvp would essentially throw out the whole basis for the lord of the rings and you would get an open world pvp game with a lord of the rings wrapper. Hobbits aren't camping mordor and goblins aren't camping the shire.
And this is why players are having difficulty coming to grips with the world of middle earth.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I don't see open world PvP any time soon either. Even a flagged system wouldn't work because Classes aren't balanced to fight each other solo. It was meant to be a PvE game from day one.
I have been playing lotro for a year. I have a 65 champ and a 61 scout, among others. I like the game and generally turbine is fair with their cash shop. It's a grindy game like all the rest.
I've thrown them some cash over this time because I'm not adverse to financially supporting something I'm feeling is honest and worthwhile. I purchased ROI and I have to say I'm disappointed. There just isn't a lot here for your money. It is a rehash of much before it. There is little new about it. It is not a lot of content for the $30-50 they were getting for the pre-order. The thing is crashing like crazy now.
I regretfully can't recommend anybody spend their cash for this expansion. It's worth maybe ten bucks, not fifty. Wait for a sale if you really want it.
I still like the game and will continue to play it, but my level of trust for turbine has been dinminished and I will likely not be pre-ordering any future expantions until I read that they are worth the price. This was probably a foolish move by turbine because in this economy money is hard to come by and getting this paltry return will leave a bad taste in many players mouthes. A LOT of MMOs have gone f2p and a stunt like this could well send the relatively few with money to spend on games to the others. Almost every one of these MMOs have gone f2p and the money out there is clearly not enough to support them all. Some will fall. And putting out a half-baked expantion is exactly the kind of thing that could make lotro one of the fallen. Smarten up turbine.
I have been playing lotro for a year. I have a 65 champ and a 61 scout, among others. I like the game and generally turbine is fair with their cash shop. It's a grindy game like all the rest.
Scout? Are you sure you're playing LotRO?
Hedonismbot: Your latest performance was as delectable as dipping my bottom over and over into a bath of the silkiest oils and creams.
I regretfully can't recommend anybody spend their cash for this expansion. It's worth maybe ten bucks, not fifty. Wait for a sale if you really want it.
The expansion costs $30, not $50, and includes the instance cluster update in December. You can spend $40 or $50 to get extra fluff.
Yup, I really wanted to see them hit a Grand Slam with ROI....(IMO) They needed to do that for us VIP's and long time players to indicate that F2P didn't mean turning the game into a cheap cash grab with very little development effort being put in aside from the creation of more junk to sell in the cash shop. At best, ROI, seems like a bunt rather then a swing for the fences.
If they had actualy sunk all the development resources used to create F2P into putting fresh content into the game...and fresh new systems.... thier sub base wouldn't have been taking such a nose dive in the first place. The main reason most of the people I knew dropped thier subs back in the P2P days...was because there just wasn't anything new to do in the game for a LONG, LONG time (unlike in the 1st year or 2 when content updates came out at a regular clip). When they started working on F2P (about 1 year BEFORE they anounced it)...updates came to a crashing halt and people got bored and left.
SOA was awesome.....but since the end of it...the game has continulay gone downhill due to 1 bad decision by Turbine followed by another.......
1) Even though the game did pretty well sub-wise in the SOA days..... for some reason they thought they had to make it more like WOW and try to capture part of it's player base. This was apparent with MOM and the attempt to hit us over the head with very loud, over-the-top, overt magic use being pushed into the game....not just with the RK's and Turbine's comment that EVERY MMO HAS to have a "magic user" class but pushing more and more overt magic into the story lines and general content. There is nothing really wrong with overt magic use in a general fantasy setting...however it dilluted a good bit of the particular appeal of LOTRO (as opposed to generic fantasy MMO X).... in that it was set in Tolkiens world.... where magic had a very different feel to it then in a typical high-fantasy setting. Add to that the Gear-Gated RAIDING grind oriented system that came with MOM & the Radience System....a play right out of WOW's playbook..... Not a bad thing in general...but definately very much out of place with what had made the game popular upto that point.
2) De-emphasis of Group Play and the rise of the Solo Oriented LOTRO. Now I have nothing against SOLO play in general in games....and I certainly understand the appeal of it to certain players....heck I do a fair amount of it myself. However it NEITHER coincides with what the story/theme of Lord of the Rings was all about (which was all about the Fellowship and the interaction between that GROUP of individuals) nor what the gameplay of LOTRO had been about up until that point. I have no problem with a game STARTING out as designed to emphasize solo play from the very beginning.... but a game that starts out with an emphasis on Group play from the very beggining, and is successfull at doing that....shouldn't turn around and try to switch the core nature of gameplay in MID-STREAM.
3) F2P.....(IMO) this was the most disasterous move that could have happaned to the game. Yes it gave the game a good quarter or 2 of boost to it's earnings.....but it cut the games long term legs out from under it. F2P did nothing for the existing player base who were screaming for new content and fresh systems regularly updated in the game...like they had been in the past. Instead it sucked a huge amount of resources out of the game, into doing nothing positive for the existing subscriber base. It did bring some new players into the game.....and that's a good thing....but what Turbine failed to realize is that none of these new players would be interested in continuing to play the game any more then it's existing subscriber base would.....once, they too, had run out of fresh and new things to do.
4) Turbine had a golden opportunity to turn stuff around even then with ROI. Thier first expansion after going F2P SHOULD have been a showcase for the new model & management team...to prove to the existing players (both VIP's and the F2P ones) that Turbine was commited to keeping the game fresh & new and alive. Instead what we got was entirely underhelming and stale....and seems to highlight that F2P and the new management....are basicaly not commited to putting the kind of resources into the game to keep it healthy and alive...but rather to milk the existing player base as much as they can with the F2P model...while putting minimal resources into updating the game.
I have been playing lotro for a year. I have a 65 champ and a 61 scout, among others. I like the game and generally turbine is fair with their cash shop. It's a grindy game like all the rest.
Scout? Are you sure you're playing LotRO?
Scout hunter ranger, whatever. I'm not going to mince words about it. I'm confident you knew what I meant.
I regretfully can't recommend anybody spend their cash for this expansion. It's worth maybe ten bucks, not fifty. Wait for a sale if you really want it.
The expansion costs $30, not $50, and includes the instance cluster update in December. You can spend $40 or $50 to get extra fluff.
The pre-order was $30-50 depending on the bonuses provided.
SOA was awesome.....but since the end of it... <snip>
As a gamer you have to ultimately vote with your wallet and your (precious) time. You're not doing yourself any favor by sticking with a title you don't enjoy. As for the current state of LOTRO: at least right now the servers I play on are jam-packed with players, so much so that my biggest gripe is the constant switching between layers because of the excessive population level. My observation is that the developers can't create content fast enough for their player base - I see level 75s already running around Galtrev. I have my share of complaints, but they must be doing something right because the player population seems very healthy, too healthy in fact. Whether it stays that way after SWTOR and GW2 are released remains to be seen. I enjoy LOTRO enough to continue playing it after 4 years, but if better titles come along I'll move to them with no regrets.
As a gamer you have to ultimately vote with your wallet and your (precious) time. You're not doing yourself any favor by sticking with a title you don't enjoy. As for the current state of LOTRO: at least right now the servers I play on are jam-packed with players, so much so that my biggest gripe is the constant switching between layers because of the excessive population level. My observation is that the developers can't create content fast enough for their player base - I see level 75s already running around Galtrev. I have my share of complaints, but they must be doing something right because the player population seems very healthy, too healthy in fact. Whether it stays that way after SWTOR and GW2 are released remains to be seen. I enjoy LOTRO enough to continue playing it after 4 years, but if better titles come along I'll move to them with no regrets.
Yup, lots of folks in the new zones but that isn't indicative of whether they are happy with what they bought. Of course they are going to use what they paid for. The prebuy of the next expansion will likely be an indicator of how satisfied they were with this one. From what I see in this thread sales may not be as robust for the next one. In the year it might take for them to churn another out many players could be gone to the various other titles that have gone f2p since lotro did.
After reading the entire thread, I am glad I made the decision to not buy the xpac. While several folks say they love it it sounds like it was still another mirkwood.
As a gamer you have to ultimately vote with your wallet and your (precious) time. You're not doing yourself any favor by sticking with a title you don't enjoy. As for the current state of LOTRO: at least right now the servers I play on are jam-packed with players, so much so that my biggest gripe is the constant switching between layers because of the excessive population level. My observation is that the developers can't create content fast enough for their player base - I see level 75s already running around Galtrev. I have my share of complaints, but they must be doing something right because the player population seems very healthy, too healthy in fact. Whether it stays that way after SWTOR and GW2 are released remains to be seen. I enjoy LOTRO enough to continue playing it after 4 years, but if better titles come along I'll move to them with no regrets.
Yup, lots of folks in the new zones but that isn't indicative of whether they are happy with what they bought. Of course they are going to use what they paid for. The prebuy of the next expansion will likely be an indicator of how satisfied they were with this one. From what I see in this thread sales may not be as robust for the next one. In the year it might take for them to churn another out many players could be gone to the various other titles that have gone f2p since lotro did.
That's funny: you put more weight on the posts of a handful of people in this forum thread (on a website where people don't seem to like *anything*) than on the many thousands of people who actually pay and play! On the other hand, I do agree that there's not enough content to last an entire year. Now that Turbine has moved to the new pay model, they have to release a steady stream of new content or people will leave when new big titles are released (assuming that they don't suck). But with the current content and the instance cluster update coming in December, they should be fine for the next six months or so. After that ... ?
Wish I knew. Been paying for over a year now and still only have a 41 as my highest level. So many good games out there to play and taking my time away from this one. I really like this game, just wish I had more time to play. It doesnt help that swords are second on my list of favorites behind guns..
"Sean (Murray) saying MP will be in the game is not remotely close to evidence that at the point of purchase people thought there was MP in the game." - SEANMCAD
This has definitely been the worst leveling experience I've had in LOTRO. I started running into cases where I couldn't get new quests unless I killed some elites, with their guards, that couldn't be CC'd. I used to be able to rely on bards arrow, traps and such to keep them from constantly hitting me. Eventually I gave up on those quests and moved to the next area where often I'd run into the same roadblock.
In most games, there are plenty of quests and you can easily skip the ones that seem to need a group. I've been playing really late at night and frankly there haven't been others around most of the time to do them with. Luckily I found someone in Nan Curunir to group with me to finish the chain there. Unfortunately I'm now sitting two thirds through level 74 with either 6 man group quests at the culling pit or quests I can't seem to find to finish my deeds. I've had the rest XP bonus the entire time as well.
All in all this was a horrible leveling experience. Silly bugs like falling through floors shouldn't exist after they were pointed out in beta. Quests that you can't get again if you didn't notice a clickable item on the ground in a one time instance is horrible when it's required to complete the quest deed.
I never minded the daily quest grind in Ened, but there's no way I'm going to do the Isen dailies very much. And there's no way I'm paying 1250 TPs for a 24 man raid that was supposed to be free.
My belief is that ROI is going to be the norm going forward, although they are unlikely to delay instances 3 months. LOTRO needs a huge infusion of capital and faith by Turbine/WB, otherwise it will just be an afterthought in the MMO world once SW:TOR and GW2 combine with WOW.
I managed to finish all quests on my hunter without ever even thinking of getting help. Yah, very few of them require some tactics to beat, but come on, 5/400 quests require you to think a bit instead of facerolling and its terrible thing?
I managed to do all deeds and such (ones not bugged), its about time exploring and paying attention is worth something. Not *everything* has to be idiot proof.
When i dinged 75 i still had >half Nan Curunir quests to do. So no problem there either. I didnt even do culling pit in Starkmoor.
One thing i agree with you, Pit of Iron platforms should be fixed asap, but still, you can do all quests and dailes without encountering any problems.
1250 TP is too much for a raid, i will prolly wait for discount.
Isen dailies are just for rep (although only if you want it faster), you can get more Ixp in same time doing mirkwood repeatables (cause thats all theyre good for after you ding 75/kindred).
All in all, nit too bad, no instances is a bit dissapointing, but they will be here...mmm...soon.
And i have no desire to play SWTOR, cause it will bring absolutely nothing new to the table unfortunately. Except bill for 110$ for the box and 15/month for exactly same gameplay.
GW2 might bring a bit of fresh air, but theres still not enough info.
Like i said they lied about the new pvp zone 2 times now. no mounted combat what exactly besides another 10 lvl grindfest does roi offer me?
Lotro is gonna have to pull a rabbit out of frodos but to make people even consider staying after gw2/lotro come out.
Swtor releases dec 20th id bet money lotro will pull a new pvmp in desperation the 15th or even 20th but as most people know it will be more bugged then current moors map and 4 years in pvp is worse then ever
I hope lotro dies personally they need a wake up call badly to realize there just milking the name and offering nothing.
Interesting they have money to hire new people but no money to fix thier 4 year old bugged crap? lolz
heres the new lotro commercial.
Its all about the turbine turbine STOOOORE we want to sell every every everything now u can pay to win is wheres it at G forget about the loooore now we got a dragon raaaaaaid in isengard!!
Playing LOTRO for PvP is nuts. Yah, some do it, but they said it from the release - its a side attraction and will always be. Turbine was quite upfront about that.
What does SWTOR offer except quest grind to 50 and then raiding for gear?
Here is a little advertisment for SWTOR - "We are not in Azeroth/Middle Earth/Telara/[insert generic MMO landmass name] any more"
And a piece of advice - you should get your facts straight before writing stuff, or it just turns out silly.
Playing LOTRO for PvP is nuts. Yah, some do it, but they said it from the release - its a side attraction and will always be. Turbine was quite upfront about that.
What does SWTOR offer except quest grind to 50 and then raiding for gear?
Here is a little advertisment for SWTOR - "We are not in Azeroth/Middle Earth/Telara/[insert generic MMO landmass name] any more"
And a piece of advice - you should get your facts straight before writing stuff, or it just turns out silly.
Yea I get a kick out o those who cry about pvp. It was added during one of the last beta programs due to all the whine folks who wanted it. It was never more than a side game, and never has been a focus for turbine. If you want pvp you best find another game, as pvp in lotro has been and always will be a joke.
Now what does swtor offer, it offers the Star Wars Universe, folks will play it just for that, just like they play lotro because its JRR Tolkien.
I don't expect SWTOR to really have an impact on lotro, because I think most folks that are currently playing lotro are not playing it for the game mechanics they are playing it because they want the lore of middle earth.
Comments
I'm agreeing on the stun fest. Every mob does it, every battle now. I don't even execute my specials now because many of them are timed sequence and they will be wasted in gray bar.
I agree, the mmo world moves fast and lotro should have had enough expansions by now to get us to Gondor at least, or bigger expansions (RoI should take us well into Rohan and then only one more expansion for Gondor/Mordor etc...). Now the situation is that we are nowhere near completing Middle Earth, GW2 and ToR are on the way and they will kill this game stone dead, as will the next big thing that is likely to come out before another expansion shows up.
I'm wondering if they will ever complete this game.
I have no idea why they still haven't introduced playable evil races, Goblins, Trolls, Orcs etc... and open world pvp, that would give the game a whole new breath of life in my opinion. In fact it should have been in the pipeline from day 1.
Fully agree with that statement.
I have to add two things.
First, WHY IN THE NAME OF ILUVATAR does it have to be boars, wolves and crebain AGAIN? I mean, REALLY? I bet when I stand at the gates of the tower of Sauron, with level 120, I bet there will be level 120 uber-boars, wolves and crebain. It's just so boring now.
Second, who the heck made it so that every frigging mob has stun? It is such a lame mechanic and so damn overused here.
Then there are so many mundane quests, like carry a bag of apples all through the village or clean 10 dirt piles from the road. And I think wtf? I killed demons and dragons and now I can carry some dirt around for some backwater villagers? Isengard surely is a low in LOTRO. The landscape is still breathtaking and the world story is interesting enough, but everythung else is cheap and a mere rehash of same old. I am very underwhelmed with this.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
If you played it once, you've played it all. No real knew formula's and even though the raid is finally 24 man its quite dull imo. If you are looking for something knew from moria or mirkwood look somewhere else. I wont be playing LotRo until the next update.
*sigh* I want the old shadows of angmar back.
Heh I've been stuck feeling the same general malaise about the constant back and forth for uncompelling quests luckily or not for me my main character at the start of ROI was still only level sixty so right now I've been trudging through Mirkwood to work my way up to Isengard hopefully they'll have come up with some post launch additions before I get there.
Several years ago there was a wonderful post on the LOTRO website from a dev that pretty much explained why there are no playable evil races (and why there probably never will be).
Turbine originally pushed Tolkein Enterprises (the IP holders) to allow them to have playable evil races for PvP and such when they initially proposed the game. T.E. said no. They did not want players to play evil characters as they felt it misses the point of Tolkien's work. Apparently this was a major stipulation for them to acquire the rights for an MMO in the first place. The dev also said that they had to really twist T.E.'s arm to even allow Monster Play.
Turbine provided a link to an I.P. website/trade magazine (I never thought one existed but there it is) where the I.P. holders were interviewed. It was a surprisingly good read. Apparently the Tolkien I.P. is managed by three guys who meet every month to discuss how the Tolkien brand is being handled and whether or not it meets their standards. They acknowledged that they get a lot of business from licencing video games but they really don't know much about it. With that being said, they were extremely unhappy with what EA did in some of their games and was a major reason why they decided not to renew their contract.
Like I said, it may take some digging on the Turbine forums, but it's a pretty enlightening read.
This has been explained for years.
The "evil" races really are nothing more than tools for the powers that be. They essentially do the bidding of their masters. The entire lord of the rings story is told from the protagonist's point of view.
Orcs aren't saying "hey, let's go see what trouble we can cause", or "let's explore".
One of the very difficult things to come to grips with is that the IP is difficult to set. To be honest, there aren't elves running around bree and humans running around the shire either. the whole story is about the impending invasion from Sauron and Saruman deciding that he wants "in" as well.
orcs and goblins and worgs (oh my!) don't really get to the shire because of the rangers and the elves.
The entire world is very segregated.
Let's just say there has been a lot of bending just to make this an mmo.
The problem is that a lot of players aren't interested in playing "the lord of the rings". they are interested in playing dungeons and dragons with a lord of the rings skin.
open world pvp would essentially throw out the whole basis for the lord of the rings and you would get an open world pvp game with a lord of the rings wrapper. Hobbits aren't camping mordor and goblins aren't camping the shire.
And this is why players are having difficulty coming to grips with the world of middle earth.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I don't see open world PvP any time soon either. Even a flagged system wouldn't work because Classes aren't balanced to fight each other solo. It was meant to be a PvE game from day one.
I have been playing lotro for a year. I have a 65 champ and a 61 scout, among others. I like the game and generally turbine is fair with their cash shop. It's a grindy game like all the rest.
I've thrown them some cash over this time because I'm not adverse to financially supporting something I'm feeling is honest and worthwhile. I purchased ROI and I have to say I'm disappointed. There just isn't a lot here for your money. It is a rehash of much before it. There is little new about it. It is not a lot of content for the $30-50 they were getting for the pre-order. The thing is crashing like crazy now.
I regretfully can't recommend anybody spend their cash for this expansion. It's worth maybe ten bucks, not fifty. Wait for a sale if you really want it.
I still like the game and will continue to play it, but my level of trust for turbine has been dinminished and I will likely not be pre-ordering any future expantions until I read that they are worth the price. This was probably a foolish move by turbine because in this economy money is hard to come by and getting this paltry return will leave a bad taste in many players mouthes. A LOT of MMOs have gone f2p and a stunt like this could well send the relatively few with money to spend on games to the others. Almost every one of these MMOs have gone f2p and the money out there is clearly not enough to support them all. Some will fall. And putting out a half-baked expantion is exactly the kind of thing that could make lotro one of the fallen. Smarten up turbine.
Scout? Are you sure you're playing LotRO?
Hedonismbot: Your latest performance was as delectable as dipping my bottom over and over into a bath of the silkiest oils and creams.
Yup, I really wanted to see them hit a Grand Slam with ROI....(IMO) They needed to do that for us VIP's and long time players to indicate that F2P didn't mean turning the game into a cheap cash grab with very little development effort being put in aside from the creation of more junk to sell in the cash shop. At best, ROI, seems like a bunt rather then a swing for the fences.
If they had actualy sunk all the development resources used to create F2P into putting fresh content into the game...and fresh new systems.... thier sub base wouldn't have been taking such a nose dive in the first place. The main reason most of the people I knew dropped thier subs back in the P2P days...was because there just wasn't anything new to do in the game for a LONG, LONG time (unlike in the 1st year or 2 when content updates came out at a regular clip). When they started working on F2P (about 1 year BEFORE they anounced it)...updates came to a crashing halt and people got bored and left.
SOA was awesome.....but since the end of it...the game has continulay gone downhill due to 1 bad decision by Turbine followed by another.......
1) Even though the game did pretty well sub-wise in the SOA days..... for some reason they thought they had to make it more like WOW and try to capture part of it's player base. This was apparent with MOM and the attempt to hit us over the head with very loud, over-the-top, overt magic use being pushed into the game....not just with the RK's and Turbine's comment that EVERY MMO HAS to have a "magic user" class but pushing more and more overt magic into the story lines and general content. There is nothing really wrong with overt magic use in a general fantasy setting...however it dilluted a good bit of the particular appeal of LOTRO (as opposed to generic fantasy MMO X).... in that it was set in Tolkiens world.... where magic had a very different feel to it then in a typical high-fantasy setting. Add to that the Gear-Gated RAIDING grind oriented system that came with MOM & the Radience System....a play right out of WOW's playbook..... Not a bad thing in general...but definately very much out of place with what had made the game popular upto that point.
2) De-emphasis of Group Play and the rise of the Solo Oriented LOTRO. Now I have nothing against SOLO play in general in games....and I certainly understand the appeal of it to certain players....heck I do a fair amount of it myself. However it NEITHER coincides with what the story/theme of Lord of the Rings was all about (which was all about the Fellowship and the interaction between that GROUP of individuals) nor what the gameplay of LOTRO had been about up until that point. I have no problem with a game STARTING out as designed to emphasize solo play from the very beginning.... but a game that starts out with an emphasis on Group play from the very beggining, and is successfull at doing that....shouldn't turn around and try to switch the core nature of gameplay in MID-STREAM.
3) F2P.....(IMO) this was the most disasterous move that could have happaned to the game. Yes it gave the game a good quarter or 2 of boost to it's earnings.....but it cut the games long term legs out from under it. F2P did nothing for the existing player base who were screaming for new content and fresh systems regularly updated in the game...like they had been in the past. Instead it sucked a huge amount of resources out of the game, into doing nothing positive for the existing subscriber base. It did bring some new players into the game.....and that's a good thing....but what Turbine failed to realize is that none of these new players would be interested in continuing to play the game any more then it's existing subscriber base would.....once, they too, had run out of fresh and new things to do.
4) Turbine had a golden opportunity to turn stuff around even then with ROI. Thier first expansion after going F2P SHOULD have been a showcase for the new model & management team...to prove to the existing players (both VIP's and the F2P ones) that Turbine was commited to keeping the game fresh & new and alive. Instead what we got was entirely underhelming and stale....and seems to highlight that F2P and the new management....are basicaly not commited to putting the kind of resources into the game to keep it healthy and alive...but rather to milk the existing player base as much as they can with the F2P model...while putting minimal resources into updating the game.
Scout hunter ranger, whatever. I'm not going to mince words about it. I'm confident you knew what I meant.
The pre-order was $30-50 depending on the bonuses provided.
Yup, lots of folks in the new zones but that isn't indicative of whether they are happy with what they bought. Of course they are going to use what they paid for. The prebuy of the next expansion will likely be an indicator of how satisfied they were with this one. From what I see in this thread sales may not be as robust for the next one. In the year it might take for them to churn another out many players could be gone to the various other titles that have gone f2p since lotro did.
I'm happy that I paid $30.00.
there was nothing in the $50.00 offering that added any significant substance.
The entire expansion, other than some fluff items, was $30.00. It's $30.00 now if someone wants it.
One could make a case for the additional Turbine points but that's not really part of the expansion, just an incentive.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
After reading the entire thread, I am glad I made the decision to not buy the xpac. While several folks say they love it it sounds like it was still another mirkwood.
That's funny: you put more weight on the posts of a handful of people in this forum thread (on a website where people don't seem to like *anything*) than on the many thousands of people who actually pay and play! On the other hand, I do agree that there's not enough content to last an entire year. Now that Turbine has moved to the new pay model, they have to release a steady stream of new content or people will leave when new big titles are released (assuming that they don't suck). But with the current content and the instance cluster update coming in December, they should be fine for the next six months or so. After that ... ?
Wish I knew. Been paying for over a year now and still only have a 41 as my highest level. So many good games out there to play and taking my time away from this one. I really like this game, just wish I had more time to play. It doesnt help that swords are second on my list of favorites behind guns..
This has definitely been the worst leveling experience I've had in LOTRO. I started running into cases where I couldn't get new quests unless I killed some elites, with their guards, that couldn't be CC'd. I used to be able to rely on bards arrow, traps and such to keep them from constantly hitting me. Eventually I gave up on those quests and moved to the next area where often I'd run into the same roadblock.
In most games, there are plenty of quests and you can easily skip the ones that seem to need a group. I've been playing really late at night and frankly there haven't been others around most of the time to do them with. Luckily I found someone in Nan Curunir to group with me to finish the chain there. Unfortunately I'm now sitting two thirds through level 74 with either 6 man group quests at the culling pit or quests I can't seem to find to finish my deeds. I've had the rest XP bonus the entire time as well.
All in all this was a horrible leveling experience. Silly bugs like falling through floors shouldn't exist after they were pointed out in beta. Quests that you can't get again if you didn't notice a clickable item on the ground in a one time instance is horrible when it's required to complete the quest deed.
I never minded the daily quest grind in Ened, but there's no way I'm going to do the Isen dailies very much. And there's no way I'm paying 1250 TPs for a 24 man raid that was supposed to be free.
My belief is that ROI is going to be the norm going forward, although they are unlikely to delay instances 3 months. LOTRO needs a huge infusion of capital and faith by Turbine/WB, otherwise it will just be an afterthought in the MMO world once SW:TOR and GW2 combine with WOW.
Sorry, my experience was completely different.
I managed to finish all quests on my hunter without ever even thinking of getting help. Yah, very few of them require some tactics to beat, but come on, 5/400 quests require you to think a bit instead of facerolling and its terrible thing?
I managed to do all deeds and such (ones not bugged), its about time exploring and paying attention is worth something. Not *everything* has to be idiot proof.
When i dinged 75 i still had >half Nan Curunir quests to do. So no problem there either. I didnt even do culling pit in Starkmoor.
One thing i agree with you, Pit of Iron platforms should be fixed asap, but still, you can do all quests and dailes without encountering any problems.
1250 TP is too much for a raid, i will prolly wait for discount.
Isen dailies are just for rep (although only if you want it faster), you can get more Ixp in same time doing mirkwood repeatables (cause thats all theyre good for after you ding 75/kindred).
All in all, nit too bad, no instances is a bit dissapointing, but they will be here...mmm...soon.
And i have no desire to play SWTOR, cause it will bring absolutely nothing new to the table unfortunately. Except bill for 110$ for the box and 15/month for exactly same gameplay.
GW2 might bring a bit of fresh air, but theres still not enough info.
Like i said they lied about the new pvp zone 2 times now. no mounted combat what exactly besides another 10 lvl grindfest does roi offer me?
Lotro is gonna have to pull a rabbit out of frodos but to make people even consider staying after gw2/lotro come out.
Swtor releases dec 20th id bet money lotro will pull a new pvmp in desperation the 15th or even 20th but as most people know it will be more bugged then current moors map and 4 years in pvp is worse then ever
I hope lotro dies personally they need a wake up call badly to realize there just milking the name and offering nothing.
Interesting they have money to hire new people but no money to fix thier 4 year old bugged crap? lolz
heres the new lotro commercial.
Its all about the turbine turbine STOOOORE we want to sell every every everything now u can pay to win is wheres it at G forget about the loooore now we got a dragon raaaaaaid in isengard!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMxX-QOV9tI
Playing LOTRO for PvP is nuts. Yah, some do it, but they said it from the release - its a side attraction and will always be. Turbine was quite upfront about that.
What does SWTOR offer except quest grind to 50 and then raiding for gear?
Here is a little advertisment for SWTOR - "We are not in Azeroth/Middle Earth/Telara/[insert generic MMO landmass name] any more"
And a piece of advice - you should get your facts straight before writing stuff, or it just turns out silly.
Yea I get a kick out o those who cry about pvp. It was added during one of the last beta programs due to all the whine folks who wanted it. It was never more than a side game, and never has been a focus for turbine. If you want pvp you best find another game, as pvp in lotro has been and always will be a joke.
Now what does swtor offer, it offers the Star Wars Universe, folks will play it just for that, just like they play lotro because its JRR Tolkien.
I don't expect SWTOR to really have an impact on lotro, because I think most folks that are currently playing lotro are not playing it for the game mechanics they are playing it because they want the lore of middle earth.