The Lord of the Rings Online

[backstept]

any other players around here?

I was in the closed beta over two years ago before release, and quit for over a year. Just got back into it a month ago and I love it!

my main guy is only level 27 seeing as how I spent most of my early months playing tons of different characters to see which race/class combo I liked best
that, and I'm a pretty casual gamer, so power leveling isn't my style

I mostly play on Meneldor

 

[PluckyNinja]

I've played off and on since closed Beta. Just got my Lore-master to level 60 last week. I love it for a few months at a time, then a new game gets my attention. I always go back though. I'm working on some alts too. Warder and Rune-Keeper are fun. I'm on Landroval.

 

[backstept]

I like the Captain class the best
I bet Tolkien would have been real pleased with the loremaster and runekeeper (not)

 

[Chaos Descending]

I have been interested in trying this game, but Warhammer Online has all of my free time.

How does LOTR-O compare to WoW and Warhammer?

 

[backstept]

I haven't played those two, but I did play SWG, EVE and Guild Wars
and compared to the ones I've played it's fantastic.

SWG didn't really have quest storylines, and it really suffered from "Let's be like WOW!" so things were constantly changing for the worse.

EVE is ship based and has a near total player driven experience so it's not really comparable. Best MMO economy model, though . . . totally rocks!

Guild Wars is more for the crowd that likes TF2 and CSS . . . totally instance based and there's really no variety in character design with regards to appearance, etc.
it's all about how you use your skills and allocate skillpoints
good story driven quests and missions and pvp

LOTRO is set in middle earth and takes place after Frodo and company set off. You can play as a Man, Dwarf, Hobbit, Elf (only the Dwarf has no female option)
there are 9 classes, most cover the standard MMO class roles and a couple are a mix
the cool thing is that it's bound by Tolkien's lore (mostly but that's for another post) so there's a real coherence in npc names, locations, story elements etc
you won't find a group of npcs named after different Dax hosts

combat is solid, it's not like Guild Wars where you're constantly out of power, and the crafting system is nice . . . I just made Master Expert Prospector and Expert Weaponcrafter
Leveling is pretty good, in 9 days since I started this thread I've gone from 27 to 31 so it's not too bad

I've heard that it plays a lot like warcraft but I think that's simply because it's a MMO . . . there are just certain things that work in a MMO and that's why a lot of them are similar

 

[Manticore]

I've been playing the game since October '06 when I got into the beta, and I also did a two month stint on their QA team, so I'm probably more than a little biased, but I have to say, I love the game.

Its UI and very basic mechanics are similar to WoW, but really, they're very different games. LOTRO puts a greater emphasis on story and lore than WoW, instead of on instances and ph4t loot (though that's changed somewhat since Moria was released. ) Also, LOTRO puts a greater emphasis on leveling as opposed to the endgame, which is one of the reasons why the endgame isn't so hot right now. >.>

It's not a perfect game by any stretch of the imagination. Crafting is mind-numbingly boring above around tier 3, and with the Legendary Items system (weapons and certain other items that earn XP and level), only about 1/1000 items are any good, and the rest just get turned into slottable runes that improve other weapons. Turbine also has this annoying tendency to release a system, such as housing (God that was such a pain in the ass to test), in a fairly basic state and then barely improve it ever again. Also, while the UI is somewhat above par for standard MMO interfaces, its lack of customability really hurts it.

However, their content/quest devs, in my experience, are a step above, both in writing skill and overall creativity, and their art and world teams are out of the world. Engineering, too, is pretty damned good, as this game has the best combination of graphical quality and smoothness that I've ever seen.

As for me, I'm a 60 gaurdian on Landroval. I also have a 53 Warden that I've kind of given up on, especially since my leveling partner raced ahead to 56 while I was busy.

 

[CaptainStoner]

However, their content/quest devs, in my experience, are a step above, both in writing skill and overall creativity, and their art and world teams are out of the world. Engineering, too, is pretty damned good, as this game has the best combination of graphical quality and smoothness that I've ever seen.

That's been my impression of it also, though I haven't spent anywhere near that much time in it. I played it for a few months, and got a couple of characters to around LVL 10-12. I'd like to get into it again, although nocturnal existence is not an option these days!
The graphic engine is very smooth, I find, and very tweak-able. Even on a single-core Athlon 64 with an X700 video card, the visuals are perfectly fine even with some fairly high settings.
And I like the overall look - fun stuff like when you find the Party Tree (when I was playing there was a running/drinking contest going on) - it looks like Middle-Earth.
So far I've only played in the Shire, and in the Dwarven areas.

I like the social aspect. People were very helpful, and I could almost always find someone to adventure with if needed, sometimes hooking up with much higher-level characters. (Lol. Tor's dead again!)

 

[backstept]

I've been playing the game since October '06 when I got into the beta, and I also did a two month stint on their QA team, so I'm probably more than a little biased, but I have to say, I love the game.

Its UI and very basic mechanics are similar to WoW, but really, they're very different games. LOTRO puts a greater emphasis on story and lore than WoW, instead of on instances and ph4t loot (though that's changed somewhat since Moria was released. ) Also, LOTRO puts a greater emphasis on leveling as opposed to the endgame, which is one of the reasons why the endgame isn't so hot right now. >.>

I'm enjoying my leisurely leveling
endgame isn't that important to me because in this game as long as there's some interesting questing to do I'm happy

the whole radiance gear gating thing doesn't really apply to me at the moment since I'm only half way there

It's not a perfect game by any stretch of the imagination. Crafting is mind-numbingly boring above around tier 3, and with the Legendary Items system (weapons and certain other items that earn XP and level), only about 1/1000 items are any good, and the rest just get turned into slottable runes that improve other weapons. Turbine also has this annoying tendency to release a system, such as housing (God that was such a pain in the ass to test), in a fairly basic state and then barely improve it ever again. Also, while the UI is somewhat above par for standard MMO interfaces, its lack of customability really hurts it.

However, their content/quest devs, in my experience, are a step above, both in writing skill and overall creativity, and their art and world teams are out of the world. Engineering, too, is pretty damned good, as this game has the best combination of graphical quality and smoothness that I've ever seen.

As for me, I'm a 60 gaurdian on Landroval. I also have a 53 Warden that I've kind of given up on, especially since my leveling partner raced ahead to 56 while I was busy.

that's one thing I've noticed also
what LOTRO does well it really excels at
the art, quest storylines, faithfulness to Tolkien, etc are all top notch

 

[backstept]

Volume II, Book 8: Scourge of Khazad-dûm launches on June 23!

http://lorebook.lotro.com/wiki/Release_Notes_Volume_2_Book_8_Official

 

[Rocketeer]

I just started playing LOTRO about a month ago and love it so far. I'm an old AD&D gamer and wanted something with a medieval fantasy flavor. Was considering DnD Online but LOTRO had better reviews. My daughter started also and we often adventure together and trade equipment. I started with an elf hunter and he's just at lvl 19. Also have a man captain at level 16 and and an elf loremaster at lvl 8.

I didn't like the crafting at first, but I'm getting into it now. The hunter crafts forestry/workworking/farming and makes the bows and wooden weapons for any alt that needs them. The captain (explorer) provides the metal and wood to the other alts. The loremaster (historian) will supply the potions, oils, etc... to the other alts.

One thing that I really like about LOTRO is the storytelling. That plus the ability to visit places from the books/movies.

We're in the 5th Anniversary celebration right now. You should check it out if you haven't in a while.

.


Added - We play on Elendilmir.

 

[Jax]

Played it last summer over a 3 n half month period with a bunch of clan members while we waited for new games to come out (BF3 & TOR). Even though its free we ended up paying for 3 month sub to gain access to everything and even brought Mines of Moria expansion which was good fun. Got to level 62 or 63 before packing it in.

It was the first MMO I enjoyed past the first few days and may return one day.

 

[Rocketeer]

I bought a 3 months sub for my acct. Price was $29 but it comes with 400 Turbine Points per month. Just been using those plus the TPs my characters earn from quests. I also bought the Mines of Moria because I found it at a discount. When my time runs out I'll still be a Premium player.

Bought a 1800 tp card for my daughter so she could by a decent horse and a few other things. It changed her to a Premium player. Don't plan on getting a subscription for her account at this time.

My daughter showed me how to use the Costume views so now I'm having fun with that. Now I can wear that butt-ugly helmet protecting my noggin without anyone else seeing it.

I completed the collect the lost envelopes mail quest yesterday. I think that I saw some of the same players from STO. You know the players that run around in at the Academy event trying to collect the particles. (It's not neccessary to run around, you can stand at a respawn point and collect them almost as fast.) It was a madhouse with characters chasing the envelopes in the wind. I just stood by a landing spot and collected 18 in a few minutes (you only need 6). Somehow I was able to turn in the quest twice so I have 6 envelopes left if I want to do it again tomorrow.

.

 

[sojourner]

I keep trying this game about every six months, but I just can't get into it for some reason even though I love LOTR. I think it's what they had to do with the maps to make a workable game world. You look at the maps from the books and you see a huge open world where you can go in any direction find adventure and explore, but once you get in the game you find that it's been broken up into the standard "zone" format to channel characters in certain directions. It just sort of goes against what I liked about the books.

 

[Itisnotlogical]

Tried it a few months ago, the interface was absolutely horrendous. It may be just because my monitor's kind of large, but all the buttons were way too small and impossible to resize; there was too much clutter in general, too- lots of buttons and menus that weren't relevant were blocking my view of the action.