Lord of the Rings Online

In the past updates few things in lotro were made easier to achieve than before. For example the deeds were changed so that you need less monster to kill in order to achieve the same result, since people whined about the grind.

According to patchnotes for book 12 this seems to continue: many quests were made easier, the books for legendary traits are easier to get, monsters are not that agressive anymore etc.

In the end you have a level 50 char with all traits at maximum much faster than before ... but once you got it, there are not much things left to do in lotro, faction standing can be bought easily, pvp is broken (unbalanced, ranks can be legally cheated etc). 

I can't see how a mmorpg can stay successful with this politics in the long term. Sure, the graphics and the backstory attracts a lot of people to buy the game ... but isn't it a capital mistake to ignore the loyal playerbase that played the game from release regularly, by not offering longterm motivation goals ? There are many threads about this in lotro forums, but the devs seem to ignore them.

I extened my subscription for a while, despite finding myself in the situation above (you really dont have to a powergamer to get lvl 50 + max all traits you need + get the best possible eq) because i thought as the game is rather new, more endgame content (with this i mean more things to work on/to achieve, not necessarly new areas and such) will be added  ... but with the patchnotes of book 12 it seems that lotro is not taking that direction but  focuses on fluffy stuff such as clothing, housing, festivals etc.  so i guess this time the subscription will be cancelled for the last time.  Quite sad though, such a beautiful game environment, destroyed by a lack of understanding what it takes to make successful longterm motivations, like in many other mmorpgs.

Maybe Turbine will get it right sooner or later.

But for I like the game and it seems to be enough for alot of people

More likely != easier.

Less time != easier.

People use the word easy to mean different things and then start to confuse themselves.  I think it has started to become pretty clear that grind is simply bad in most normal people's opinion.

It has nothing to do with challenge.  The whole point of those things is to give people something to do to get those things.  making the process extremely arduous adds no challenge and is actually harmful because you want these to be activities people want to persue.

If you make it take no time at all you trivialize it, if its just a pain in the ass its worthless as a fun activity.  That is all this is.

The idea that any of these things should take forever or any lessening of the requirements is a "nerf" is completely the wrong way to look at it.  Becase these activities are not challenging in the first place.  They are busy work and farming.

Sometimes a bit of busy work and farming is fine.  These are essentially scavenger hunts.  Listening to the people who do them so that you can adjust them to be the most fun is a good idea.   Because its a well known fact that dragging anything out too long makes it no longer fun.

Assuming people are asking for changes because they are wussies is a bad idea.

Originally posted by Wagrof

It is easy

LOTRO is not a powergamer MMO. Not NOW (because it lacks high level content) and not in future (Because no way it can compete with WAR)

So LOTRO aims for a specific market -> Roleplayers , casual players , and quest players.

In this aspect they are doing smart moves:

Housing. Cosmetic changes. Festivals...

Casual player do not like grind (or not have time) - so easier deeds , etc ... good move

Less agressive monsters !!! GREAT MOVE ! Now you will be able to travel and enjoy the beutiful scenery , and not aggro the whole map!

Solo quest up to lvl 20. Not a most popular move , but population moved to high levels , so i recon it was needed.

....

I understand your concern though.

People that play MMO for more than 2-4 hours a day. Probably should stay away from LOTRO.

Originally posted by gestalt11

More likely != easier.

 

Less time != easier.

 

People use the word easy to mean different things and then start to confuse themselves.  I think it has started to become pretty clear that grind is simply bad in most normal people's opinion.

It has nothing to do with challenge.  The whole point of those things is to give people something to do to get those things.  making the process extremely arduous adds no challenge and is actually harmful because you want these to be activities people want to persue.

 

If you make it take no time at all you trivialize it, if its just a pain in the ass its worthless as a fun activity.  That is all this is.

 

The idea that any of these things should take forever or any lessening of the requirements is a "nerf" is completely the wrong way to look at it.  Becase these activities are not challenging in the first place.  They are busy work and farming.

Sometimes a bit of busy work and farming is fine.  These are essentially scavenger hunts.  Listening to the people who do them so that you can adjust them to be the most fun is a good idea.   Because its a well known fact that dragging anything out too long makes it no longer fun.

Assuming people are asking for changes because they are wussies is a bad idea.

I basically agree with the above.

Killing 180 boars for a deed is easy, just as killing 400 of those same boars would be easy however the time put in would be adverse to most players enjoyment.

The challenge should be in the quests be it solo or fellowship.

There are not a whole lot of deeds that you could consider difficult, they are all pretty much time consuming and that is it.

To the OP, if you want to quit because they are adding extra features to a game be my guess, but it seems a little bass ackwards.