Thread: My Impressions, As An Avid MMORPG Player

LotRO has always caught my attention, but only now have I decided to try it out. Here is a short thought list...

Story: LotRO does a great job of introducing the story and characters, and I think that it is on par, if not better than the average MMO (ToR and GW2 etc obviously have an edge). The game uses the LotR license well, and the essence of the franchise is well represented.

UI: The games UI looks good, but doesn't function as well. The combat icons are to small, and hard to tell the difference between, by sight alone. Increasing the UI size makes it much more blurry and ugly. The map works well, and looks good, as does the character screen. However, many other menus are bound to strange default keys and have ugly interfaces, that are difficult to navigate (eg, tiny inventory screens).

Controls: Some strange bindings as defaults, but fully remapable keys. The movement is meant to be fluid when using a keyboard, but ends up being a bit unresponsive feeling. Mouse turn works very well, and I would recommend it over AD turning.

Combat: Strange. Skill delays make combat feel unresponsive, but also add an element of slowness and strategy, allowing thought out reactions. As a whole, the combat feels very average, yet I do enjoy the skills.

Graphics: For a... 5 year old game (?) it looks amazing. DX11 dynamic shadows are great, textures and landscape have much fidelity. That being said, small confined spaces have ugly textures (caves etc) and character models are a bit funny at times.
It runs really well on must systems (I've tried it on two).

Cash Shop: Not very good. Do not expect to play this game for a long time without paying. It isn't meant to work that way. You need to buy cold caps and traits (which directly make you more powerful). To be competitive, you need to spend money. In order to level up without grinding monster, you need to buy quest packs (eg zones).
Do not expect to be a competitive max level player without shelling out some cash. CS currency can be earned by hard, hard grinds. One of the less well implemented cash shops I have seen. How is buying traits any different than selling OP items? It isn't. A DCUO esque model would be better.

As a whole: If you are playing on and off, it could be a fun game. But don't expect to play it is as a main MMO without paying. If you love LotR or play only once a week or so, it's great. If you play semi frequently, buying a new zone every now and again might even be worth it!

Originally Posted by Aiomon

Cash Shop: Not very good. Do not expect to play this game for a long time without paying. It isn't meant to work that way. You need to buy cold caps and traits (which directly make you more powerful). To be competitive, you need to spend money. In order to level up without grinding monster, you need to buy quest packs (eg zones).
Do not expect to be a competitive max level player without shelling out some cash. CS currency can be earned by hard, hard grinds. One of the less well implemented cash shops I have seen. How is buying traits any different than selling OP items? It isn't. A DCUO esque model would be better.

First of all of course Turbine needs to make money out of this game somehow to be able to keep working on it. If you get Rise of Isengard legendary edition and then get month of subscription(makes your account VIP which will unlock gold cap, traits, etc. forever for all characters made during that time) and give you quest packs to zones you need to lvl up all the way to the current lvl cap for 65 dollars(RoI 50 dollars+15 for month of VIP). You also get 1500 TP(CS) points, +25% xp boost item, horse, etc. TBH overall it kinda sounds you don't really completely understand how the CS works here since this game can be played very cheaply.

I get that, but there is so many better cash shops out there.

Originally Posted by Aiomon

I get that, but there is so many better cash shops out there.

I kinda doubt that since what you said doesn't really make much sense, plus I've played DCUO too which you say has better CS model but you actually get lot more cheaper here. Not to mention LotRO itself is a way bigger and deeper game than DCUO is. I'm not saying this to try to put you down but rather suggest that research things a bit more.

I'm not even going to argue. Saying you get more cheaper in LotRO than DCUO is just wrong.

Originally Posted by Aiomon

I'm not even going to argue. Saying you get more cheaper in LotRO than DCUO is just wrong.

I played dcuo too,i think what he is saying makes sense.For lotr it seems you can grind out most if not everything you need(just takes time)

For dcuo i had to sub to get the cap and mail/trade etc unlocked just so i could get the mods and that i needed to get into raids.No ingame way of getting that unlocked without paying.

Then there are replay badges,allowing you to get the most epic of gear within a few feeks,and since they are coming to pvp also?That's really bad for the game,and not a sign of a good cashshop.

For what you start off with in both games at free player status,imo lotr gives you more,much more,content wise dcuo is rather shallow...although it is still a good game!Just doesn't hold my attention for long.

Not disagreeing there are better cash shops out there either,but i have been traumatised by playing a lot more f2p models of bad quality,the chinese games that are leased out to the american companies as a way to make a quick buck(think perfect world for one)or bigpoints BSGO,so for me the lotr store and f2p model is lightyears ahead of these types of games.

I am not saying that DCUO is good, I just think the model is superior. In LotRO you really need to spend an insane amount of time in order to unlock more content grinding. I was meaning that, as a casual/normal player that would not enjoy that, money would need to be spent. Just as a whole, I am not a fan of selling items that give you direct benefits over others, or restriction mid level content. Raids, sure, but not lv 20-30 zones etc.

Welcome to Middle-earth!

About the Store, just remember that at least Turbine gives us all an option to start and even continue playing for free and without a subscription, you can earn free Points which you can use in the Store to get items for free or at least much cheaper
Also there are ways to minimize the grind and one of them is going vip at least just for once, that way you get all the extras (on the chars you make during vip) such as bags, traits, riding skill and more which they stay even after the sub expires

Enjoy!