So I finally made 50 in LotRO. This is no small feat for a player who, of late, has become increasingly casual.
In celebration of this great occasion, I shall now rant.
LotRO, has so much potential to be more than it is. But it falls short. I imagine to myself the lead designer saying, “OK, now let’s add fun!” Everyone else hears, “OK, we’re done!” and packs up to go home.
LotRO is a lot like an omelet without cheese and pork. A cottage, without an ocean or a lake. Eden, without nudity and a snake.
But let me explain …
Players, it is said, are divided among four categories:
- Achievers feverishly work to complete the game.
- Explorers seek the furthest reaches and finest details of the game.
- Socializers look to interact with other players.
- Killers thrive on conflict and competition..
I think most players are some combination of all four categories … perhaps with different weightings depending on the genre, the game and even their mood.
I think elements of all four are required to achieve the criticality that brings an MMO to life. Perhaps I’m bastardizing Bartle’s view of the (virtual) world, but I believe LotRO only addressed the needs of one of the four groups: Achievers.
Achievers thrive on the grind. Give them a mountain, and they’ll climb it (“because it’s there”). And LotRO has done the grind very well. The work to reach level cap isn’t really that onerous. There are (now) plenty of solo quests to see you the entire way through. The quests have wonderful narrative. And LotRO even tries out some novel quest mechanics (“avoid the nosey hobbits”, for example).
But honestly, it isn’t fun. I pretty much ignore the quest text. The quests really only come in only a few flavors: kill X of Y (or the closely related, kill Y to obtain X of Z); click on X at dangerous place B; move from A to B (carrying C) without aggro from Z.
In terms of kill X of Y, there’s nothing special about LotRO. The last useful combat skill I received (prior to L50) was Merciful Shot at 30. That’s 20 levels (and many months) to use one static combat algorithm.
Here’s my combat algorithm (solo):
- Stance Precision ON
- If multiple mobs: lay trap
- If tough mobs (or in a hurry): Use fire oil
- If tough mobs: Focus! (enables merciful shot later)
- If really really tough mobs: Eat Lembas
- Swift Bow (two arrows, long warm-up, easily interrupted)
- 2. Core combat.
- …Quick Shot (low damage)
- …Merciful Shot (heavy damage, requires focus)
- If Target > 50% morale OR no focus, goto 2. Core Combat
- If Target < 50% morale, Merciful Shot (really heavy damage, requires lots of focus)
- …Goto 2.
It sounds more interesting than it is. It’s become wrote key-presses. Like playing a piano song that’s been practiced for years.
Different damage types have minimal impact on how quickly I’m able to drop most mobs. I’ve had the same bow since L47, I think. And it’s not like there’s a huge list to choose from or situations requiring that I switch weapons. It’s all a rather simple and straight-forward calculation.
Worse still, there’s very little uncertainty about whether or not I will win a fight. Three con-white mobs is fine if I’m prepared. Single con-orange mob, up to to 4.5K is good. The 8K mobs are marginal. Some specific ones I can, others I can’t. Again, you know if you can after trying just one. Maybe I’m missing something. Maybe I could be doing “more”.
I used to think that MMO combat was a little like playing the slot machines. You put in your quarter, pull the big arm, and maybe you’ll win something. LotRO even misses this angle. Typically, there’s no uncertainty, and the drop (as sold to an NPC) always exceeds the marginal cost of killing the mob, but only slightly. A quarter slot machine that ALWAYS pays out 26 cents, is not fun.
Recently, I’ve found I’m surfing the web while fighting even the toughest mobs.
As for the other quest types?
Click on X at dangerous location Y … The quests don’t typically present challenging puzzles. Identify stuff in the way. Kill it. There are precious few surgical strikes (kill X quickly, dash in, then run). No figuring out the right order to kill mobs. There are a few timing challenges (must kill X within Y seconds and move on to avoid aggro from mobile add) … but they tend to be easy.
Move from A to B (carrying C?) without getting aggro’d by Z … Again, it tends to be either simple or frustrating. The mobs don’t actively chase. And if they did, there’s no way to effectively dodge or avoid or escape.
LotRO has these wonderful quest possibilities drawn from other game types. But it’s pointless. They have the form, but not the challenge, from the other game types.
But the grind is there to reward for hours of killing mobs whose names I no longer even bother to read. Slowly, that bar moves right. And when, finally, that’s done, there are other grinds. There are other character classes. There’s the reputation grind (in at least 6 exciting yet indistinguishable flavors). There’s the Epic Book grind. There’s the prospecting and crafting grind (available in any color you want, so long as it’s black).
I know for a fact that I’m obsessive. I suspect that it is this characteristic in me that LotRO appeals to. LotRO truly excels at the Grind.
But what about the Explorer, Socializer and Killer?
While the world may be vast, and may span environments from lush forest, to snowy mountain and steaming lava, there is no real variation. When in snows of the Misty Mountains, my fire oil lights and burns the same. I don’t suffer from the cold, nor do I slip and slide or lose my footing. Food isn’t any more plentiful in the Shire. Bows aren’t any truer in Rivendell. It looks big, but it’s all the same.
The mechanics of the game are smooth to the point of boring. I’ve found precious few circumstances where terrain matters … at the slightest hint of an unfair advantage, the anti-cheat mechanism kicks in. There aren’t any tricks you need to know to defeat certain mobs. There might well be myriad different mobs, but they’re all the same.
At any given time, there are only a half dozen bows available to my hunter … and there’s only ever one that’s of any value … the one with highest DPS, of course. Min-maxers would die of boredom in LotRO.
For Explorers, there isn’t much in LotRO. Oh sure, it can be fun to pose with Aragorn for pictures, but that wears thin, quickly.
How an MMO manages to miss the boat on social aspects, is beyond me. Where there’s an opportunity to connect people, LotRO heads the other way.
When you sell something on the AH, you’ve no idea who bought it from you. There’s no opportunity to seek out a long term relationship. There’s no way to differentiate yourself as a seller anyway.
There are so many quest gates and level restrictions are strict enough that it’s nigh impossible to keep a group playing together without real commitment. One is better off hooking up with random and (socially) pointless PUG’s to complete those quests.
I’ve never before played a game where guilds die so fast. I’ve been through two in roughly a year since launch. If you think this isn’t excessive, you obviously have no idea what a long term relationship is.
Within-guild communication is the standard chat channel. In the age of online social networking, LotRO hasn’t pushed the standard for communication at all.
At heart, I’m a socializer. For me, LotRO plays like a big single player RPG. That’s fine, for sure … but it barely qualifies as an MMO, in my opinion.
As for the killer, I can’t comment. I haven’t actually tried Monster play. Certainly, I like the concept of having a separate play mode with the intent of permitting one to put the hurt on the other side. I’ve heard anecdotally that Monster side is underpowered, and isn’t terribly “fulfilling.”
Can anyone out there comment on whether a Killer is likely to take any joy from monster play?
To summarize my long winded whine … LotRO is a fine game if you’re looking for a pretty time waster with decent content and story. Puzzle Quest is cheaper and gives much of the same reward.
Not that I’m complaining. LotRO is fine and my subscription is safe. It’ll be my reserve game, for days when there isn’t anything better to do. But I’m disappointed. The world Tolkien imagined should offer something for the explorer, the socializer and the killer, too.
Oh well. Only a few dozen war dispatches left to grind.
14 Comments
I so much wanted to enjoy LOTRO. I loved the zones and the setting. And I don’t mind a grind sometimes if there’s at least a sliver of gold at the end of the rainbow. But I never felt I was getting anything truly worthwhile in return.
We got to 49. You’d think we would at least have stuck it out to 50 but my husband truly disliked the game and didn’t want to stay a moment longer. Otherwise, I likely would have stayed maybe a little longer anyway.
We tried monster play. Was neat for 5 minutes or so. You can do a few PVE quests if the good guys aren’t around to catch you or join up with a raid. I just didn’t enjoy it at all.
I would like to disagree with your final conclusion. If LOTRO managed to entertain you for more than one year, I would say it almost completely fulfilled your expectations. What you point out now are basically things that could be improved, but I am not sure how much quality-of-play improvement they would bring. Definitely not enough to stay another year?
And I would say that Puzzle Quest is missing out a bit on the social side compared to LOTRO, even if the entertainment value is quite good. But do you really want to play Puzzle Quest every other day for one full year?
Look back, remember the good things and move on would be the best. Like try something with more social interaction to see if it is your thing (ATiD as example) or something more PvP like (a.e. EvE).
Or try Puzzle Pirates for a change …
… also I think the expected customer retention time should be something like one year (based on the price of the lifetime membership). So you are slightly above the average ^^
It seems to me that you see the game based on the type of player that you are. This seems like a strange thing to say. Most people would respond by saying, “of course.” But really, your achiever type of gameplay has colored your view of the game, that, I would suspect, differs greatly from other types of players. This is not to say that your criticisms are not valid, just that your viewpoint is one sided and ought not be considered as a well-rounded review of the game. …but I guess that is what blogs are for…
I see people with their RP flag on all the time. The Shire especially — people seem to love to create a hobbit and role-play, moreso than I see in most RPG’s. In fact, if I manage to convince my girlfriend to give MMO’s a shot, it will be LOTRO as hobbits. OOC, Advice, etc. chat channels are busy, that also falls under the Socializer type. So does being social in tells or kinship chat that the rest of the zone doesn’t see.
Nothing for Explorers? Are you kidding me? I consistently rank extremely high as the Explorer type on Bartle tests and I love exploring in LOTRO. It’s also nice that they reward some of that exploration with the Deed system. There’s plenty of out-of-the-way stuff to find. Explorers don’t stay on the roads…
Combat? It may have slower combat turns than WoW/EQ2/whatever but bottom line: it’s still the same ol’ turn-based combat every other MMO uses. People gripe about the skill queue but ya know what? I certainly came up with my own “combos” in WoW and so did nearly every other player I talked to. So why should I stare at the hotbar waiting for a cooldown when I could just go ahead and hit the skill and when it’s ready it’ll execute. It lets me play the game more rather than playing the UI.
I have a tendency to equate the Killer type to pre-teen griefers but that’s me. I don’t typically care for MMO-style PvP either, but I’ve had fun in the PvMP for the very little bit I’ve tried it. I don’t mind not having an “evil” side to level up, and yes the creeps are under-powered which is a shame. From what I’ve read they’re not nearly as under-powered as they were at launch, and it sounds like Turbine will gradually bring them up to par with the creeps. They’re adding a new creep healer class in one of the upcoming books and the new expansion will have a whole new PvMP zone so they are doing stuff with it.
If nothing else, it’s fun to roll a creep and have your ass handed to you by people playing your main class so you can get an idea what that class can do at level cap… from the receiving end of it!
Fun is what you make of it. LOTRO has a lot going for it, and it looks like it’s just going to get bigger and better as time goes on. BUT. So many people over the years wishing to play in Middle Earth never seemed to realize just how low-fantasy it really is. Every fantasy MMO has been high-fantasy until LOTRO, and it takes getting used to. Hell, I love LOTRO but I still pop over to Vanguard to get my high-fantasy fix because it’s just so abnormal to everything we’ve played over the past 10+ years.
First of all, congratulations on making Level 50 and I’m sorry I never made you a bow that was worth anything.
For a time, I really loved LOTRO. It was great to be immersed in that world. Your post brings up some good points and I’m thinking about why I don’t play it anymore. I guess the easiest answer is my friends were all outleveling me so fast that I got frustrated. Their attempts to “power level” me weren’t successful because I really like to experience the game at my own pace. I do agree with you on the guild component – having a good group is so essential and it’s tough when the group you usually quest with falls apart. Maybe I’m a clique-style gamer – I tend to want to run with the friends I have and not spend much effort on making new ones.
I did kind of like the “carry” quests. And I did all my little post office runs in the Shire, even avoiding nosy hobbits.
I’m going to out Tuebit here… He’s clearly a Socializer at least as strongly as anything else. The remnants of our old SWG guild that have persisted in LotRO consists mostly of one person, who is an Achiever to the point of insanity. Add a lack of interaction with friends to an insanely grind-driven partnership, season with near-complete lack of “worldiness,” simmer, and you get… this LotRO experience.
Personally, I ended up back in WoW, when I game online at all — which is rare these days, due to lack of time. I’m not saying “LotRO is TEH SUCKS and you are TEH STUPID for liking it” though. When it came down to what I wanted to do in a game, I decided that the early WoW raiding game was more my thing than anything I saw in my near future in LotRO.
The graphics in LotRO are phenomenal, of course, and I really liked the badge / trait system. If any one thing drove me away, it was probably just the extreme depth of the mission arcs. Miss a single play session, and it was nearly impossible to get back in sync with my packmates, requiring someone to stand around repeating missions and getting relatively little reward — or, the gods forbid, PUGs. I’ll probably give LotRO another spin some day in the future. Heck, I’ve re-upped City of Heroes 3 times now!
@Maryah
If LOTRO managed to entertain you for more than one year, I would say it almost completely fulfilled your expectations [...] I think the expected customer retention time should be something like one year [...] So you are slightly above the average
First let me say, I have no intention of canceling my LotRO membership. I look forward to seeing the sights and running the missions of future expansions. There isn’t anything in LotRO that disgusts me to the point of wanting to quit. I can afford to have the account just sit their for my occasional visit in between level cap bumps (especially considering founder’s pricing). There isn’t another game that really interests me at present, anyway.
But this article was a rant. That genre (can it be called a genre?) seeks to serve up negativity with a generous helping of hyperbole. It’s fun! But it shouldn’t be taken too literally.
In a way, I’m slightly above average retention … in another, less. I went from L47 to L50 in the last two weeks (roughly). Prior to that, I hadn’t logged in, in perhaps 3 or 4 months (crunch time at work). Prior to that, I played only a few hours a week.
If I had played an average players week, I’d probably have reached L50 and come to the same conclusion about 2 or 3 months in. This is exactly what happened to all of my friends.
LotRO has a great base. Its pretty. It’s reasonably well balanced. It’s reasonably bug free (at least compared to other crap out in the last 5 years). There is (now at least) lots of content to see you through to level cap.
But, really, there is nothing special about LotRO (other than the setting, perhaps). And that’s fine by me.
What LotRO needs to do next is focus, not on quantity but on quality of content. Let’s see some really tight missions, for ALL levels, for groups, small groups and SOLO that really make you try. Content that you struggle with a few times, looking for the magic route or series of actions that leads to success. Stuff that vexes a little, before it rewards. Stuff that makes you think.
@Zentr
It seems to me that you see the game based on the type of player that you are.
I agree absolutely. Above, Tachevert talks about the other last remaining player of LotRO from our group. A true Achiever if there ever was one. He’d vehemently disagree with everything I’ve written. For Achievers, this is a great game, I’m sure.
Part of the problem might also be my choice of class. Hunter, I think, is a rather simplistic class. I’ve heard anecdotally that Loremaster is a far more involved and interesting class, especially in a group.
@Scott
Nothing for Explorers? Are you kidding me?
I think, within the Explorer group, there are at least two subtypes. Those that like to explore the world. Those that like to explore the mechanics of the game.
I’m far more interested in exploring the mechanics of a game. And there isn’t much to explore in LotRO. Compared with other games I’ve played, the explorable variation is small, especially within crafting. If you’d ever played SWG (crappy combat system though it was), you’d know what I mean. The depth of item craft and stats was incredible, and was fun to explore.
Even combat in LotRO is like oatmeal that’s been run through a blender … it’s too smooth. I like lumps. Put another way, I like exploits. Not the dev-decried-bannable stuff … but the little tricks that some games make you learn.
Yeah, it makes for an easy kill when you can stand on top of a cliff and kill helpless orcs below. But it is REALLY fun for the mechanic explorer when you figure out that, while a head-on assault won’t work, you can sneak in the back way, kill the elite mob from up on the cliff and sneak to the objective.
Conversely, in LotRO this almost NEVER occurs. Sure, it’s a lot easier for the designers to manage and balance encounter difficulty when terrain doesn’t matter. But its boring. For me, anyway.
Combat? It may have slower combat turns than WoW/EQ2/whatever but bottom line: it’s still the same ol’ turn-based combat every other MMO uses.
It’s fairly standard combat. It’s definetly not the MOST boring. I think I’d give that award to SWG (pre CU, at least).
But it’s also not the liveliest. I think I’d give that award to City of Heroes / Villians. A very dynamic and active combat system (even if the combat scenarios tend to be rather repetitive).
But that’s not really my complaint. My biggest complaint is that there was nothing to trick up my combat with since L30.
When you get a new and useful combat skill, you spend some time and thought experimenting on how to best work in into your approach. It changes things up. It adds to the interest of the game.
The last useful combat skill I got was at L30 (prior to L50, at least)! That’s 40% of the levels and probably 98% of the XP with a single combat approach. That’s a long time to do one thing.
According to my extensive research*, you require 467,828 XP at level 30, and 2,792,706 XP at level 50. Your final 20 levels are actually only around 83% of the XP. Will you please restrain your hyperbole? We need to establish our SERIOUS GEEK STREET CRED here.
* 20 seconds on Google
Explorer: It’s one of the few MMOs out where you are actively rewarded for exploring. Some of the better traits are pure exploration traits. There are also so many cool references to the books that tie into exactly nothing you can get a reward from. I just like wandering around to see this stuff. If that’s not explorer content I don’t know what is.
In terms of having mechanics to explore, I think you picked the wrong class. Hunters are one of the easiest and most repetitive classes in the game. They have tons of neat abilities, and I have to say that some of the later quests for ports were a real bitch (in a good way), but it’s overall a pretty shallow class. The trade-offs that they face in terms of trait load outs are subtle (at best), and I don’t think you could have picked a class with more repetitive combat.
The exact same comboes will work on damn near anything, and none of their abilities are chained or proc off of rare events (well, Ok there is that one melee ability that procs if you dodge . . .). The only real choice you might have is whether to build focus before you pull.
Most of the other classes have chains of abilities that you have to build up, often with branch points (at least once you get some skills under your belt, they are all dead simple pre-10). Several classes also have important abilities that proc off of random events in battle (flanks, blocks, on death, ect.). If you try to phone things in on one of those classes you will seriously hurt your DPS.
You also have choice of stance, or choice of pet in some classes. LM especially plays quite differently depending on the pet that you use (and no, the default 15 bear doesn’t give you a good idea for this..it takes ages for the bear to become a useful pet). A hunter has stances, but plays about the same regardless of which you use. I mean I guess you could argue that having a snare or not makes a difference, but you can always get that from barbed arrow regardless of stance.
Socialization: Ok, first off sorry your KSs died. But it seems to me you just had some bad luck. There are a several guilds on my server that have been around since open beta, and the one I first got into at launch and the newer one I left it for are both growing pretty steadily. I can’t tell you how many WoW guilds I was in that imploded. But I don’t blame Blizzard for it.
And why no props for the pure socialization mechanics? Have you opened up all the social emotes? Have you learned how to play an instrument and formed a band? If you lack talent (I do) you can always pre-load songs. There is plenty of pure RP/ social stuff to do there. Maybe you should have joined some RP KSs instead of goal oriented KSs if that’s the sort of thing that floats your boat.
As for the Killer, well that’s not really the kind of player LoTRO caters to. But I suspect you pretty much knew that without having to ask.
Two asides:
Damage type makes a heck of a lot more difference than you seem to think. Helps a crap ton on certain raid bosses, I can assure you. Using the right damage type can also easily be the difference between some of those 8K elites being risky or reasonable solo.
Also, if you didn’t do it, for the love of all that is holy get your legendary traits. If you didn’t, you robbed yourself of the only real 30-50 ability upgrades available. Rain of thorns, if nothing else, makes a huge difference. You could have gotten it at 39.
@Durphey
I just like wandering around to see this stuff. If that’s not explorer content I don’t know what is.
Yes, that is one part of explorer content. And yes, it is cool to be able to explore the book in a 3d world space.
Doubtless you love the books. Turbine missed an opportunity to make the locales of the book come alive when they made them essentially all the same (save only the pixels painted on the surface).
Why is it that I don’t suffer frost-bite in the Misty Mountains … the fellowship was, after all, in fear of losing their lives in the Pass of Caradhras.
But more to the point … for LotRO isn’t a deep and detailed MMO in many ways. One could suggest that people that want this go play another game … but that’s beside the point.
If Turbine wants to succeed, to DO need to cater to a broader audience.
Hunters are one of the easiest and most repetitive classes in the game
Agreed. But I hung in there till the end. I’ve seen this quite often. People dismayed at the game as a whole because of their choice of class.
(As an aside though, LM is the ONLY class I’ve heard anyone get excited about.)
It’s one of the reasons I’ve always enjoyed a skill based system where one can customize play style to match one’s preferences. And if you make a mistake in a skill based system, you don’t have to start completely over again.
hunter has stances, but plays about the same regardless of which you use.
I’d argue this one. Stance Precision is pretty important if you want to do lots of focus based shots.
Rain of thorns, if nothing else, makes a huge difference.
Good point! I’ve gotten two of the three books completed. I’m still not actually complete the Furthest Charge (1 page to go). And yes, had I gotten it at 39, it would have provided a welcome change up.
And yet, the only way I could have gotten it at 39 would have been to spend spend spend on the AH. The chances of actually completing it before 40 without resorting to the AH is approximately 0%.
Even all the way to 50, I had to buy the book and about half the pages (and I’m still missing one page). And this isn’t for lack of trying. I’ve spent hours killing every 39+ humanoid mob going in the hopes of getting the right page.
This, and the other two books, would have been far more effective as a series of quests (one per page perhaps).
Personally, I believe Turbine didn’t want players to obtain these skills quickly. They’re really just excuses for grinding at the higher levels.
Missed opportunities for Turbine to make a better game.
Socialization: …it seems to me you just had some bad luck.
Being an extremely casual player has MORE to do with it. In comparison with many other games out there, LotRO is not a highly social game.
There are just too many roadblocks in the way of long term interaction with people. If you’re in the game all the time, this is probably less of a problem. When you’re casual, poorly socialized games become apparent quickly.
I’m glad Durphey, that LotRO does it for you.
For me, it’s merely “ok” … it misses many opportunities to be a much greater game.
Luckily, there isn’t anything else that currently appeals to me. (That and I’m genuinely interested in seeing the future expansions).
Given I’ve been playing since late beta (breaks notwithstanding, but I did the lifetime so can take a break with no guilt) and just dinged 36 with my main — yes a lore-master! — I’ll happily put my fingers in my ears and sound off a “neener neener” that I’m more casual than you. Maybe I’ve just been lucky, but I’ve found LOTRO to be, by far, the most social MMO since old-school SWG.
SWG was awesome because battle fatigue forced people to socialize in cantinas and other areas, chat, and *omg* role-play even.
I try to take strides in every MMO I play to find a good guild that fits me, and boy oh boy did I luck out in LOTRO! We’re all very social, have a blast in guild chat, and this is the first game other than the occasional instance guild groups in WoW where the guild makes a point of helping people out and doing stuff together. I always wondered what doing “guild runs” all the time was like. Now I know, finally. I also have the disadvantage of my job, which puts me (usually) having days off during the week rather than weekend, and available play-time in the mornings when most people are sleeping or at work, yet in terms of being social, in both kinship chat or OOC, I have no problems whatsoever. If only I could get a group during those hours, though…
My hunter is only level 13 but I’ve heard similar “complaints” about that class being a bit on the simple side. I’d have thought the champion would be the king of simplistic but apparently not. On the other hand, I keep reading how the lore-master is very difficult to play “well” depending on what “well” means. It’s certainly challenging. I typically don’t like playing “caster” classes, but I am really enjoying experimenting with different aspects of the lore-master and finding what works in different situations and, perhaps more importantly, what works for my personal play style. There’s also more there for the so-called “exploration” of game mechanics for lore-masters playing with stats and gear for situations, which stats can be replaced with another for similar benefits, etc.
The expansion is also bringing two new classes to the table, that will mix things up a bit.
Here’s something to consider: people whine LOTRO doesn’t have enough “new” to satisfy them. I seem to recall Turbine saying for a couple years prior to release that LOTRO was going to be pretty traditional, blah blah, ie. a “safe” MMO. It has all the same game-play elements we’d see in [insert DikiMUD-influenced MMO here] so why get all upset when they delivered exactly what they said they would? Would you be more upset if they’d added something “new” yet controversial like if they’d found a way to add DDO’s active combat system into a full open-world MMO?
Low-fantasy can be a drag, no doubt about it. Bears, boars and wolves everywhere. Yet I seem to recall spiders, murlocs, etc. everywhere in Azeroth too, and no one complained about that…
… I’ve been playing since late beta … and just dinged 36 with my main … I’ll happily put my fingers in my ears and sound off a “neener neener” that I’m more casual than you.
I bow before your casualness.
My hunter is only level 13 but I’ve …
Wait! WTF? You have two characters? And you dare to call yourself casual?
I’m waaaay more casual than that! I’m so casual, I bought at launch, it was two weeks before I installed and a good month before I’d created my first character
.
Well, ok, I cannot tell a lie. I have a second character that I use as an AH Mule. But I only levelled high enough to get out of the noob tutorial. Honest!
Dude, you are so jaded.
The beauty of Lotro-design, mobs- everything, is what it is about.
The lack of moronic Killers and therefore more mature players is what it is about.
Try Conan. That is truly the dark abyss. Or go back to WoW for the uber epeen spiky gear and female shammy ta-ta’s.
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