Originally posted by Calerxes

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by Torvaldr

Originally posted by Cecropia

Originally posted by HarryDresden

Originally posted by Cecropia
Looks like F2P conversions are time buyers and not the sweet saviour that many folks had dreamed. Ah well, it will be intriguing to see how everything unfolds.

That is the dumbest thing I have ever read.  You should really get out more ;) No one thinks that F2P was going to make an MMO last forever. No one said it would. Absolutely nothing lasts forever. Even a subscriber model can't manage that.  What it has done is add YEARS to the lifespan of an MMO.  Both DDO and possibly LOTRO would be closed by now if they hadn't gone F2P. With respect to sub numbers, LOTRO was at number three for western mmos very close to the time of the big switcheroo. This wasn't a dying game by any means. Turbine was obviously very excited with the success they had with DDOs F2P tranformation, and decided to roll the dice with LOTRO much to the shock of many. We'll never know how LOTRO would have fared had they continued with a P2P model, we do however now know how things are turning out for the F2P route.  There's a reason we heard very little about the health of the game with the exception of the initial attraction just after (F2P) launch. They rolled the dice, and instead of sustaining or even growing their playerbase for the mid/longterm, it looks as though Turbine just ended up buying themselves some time. They essentially squeezed the sponge dry.

I don't know about you, but that's not how I want to see my favorite titles bow out.

I don't think it's accurate to blame the model for poor development and implementation.  Keeping on the same path they were on with regards to development I think they would be in a simialr situation now.

Going F2P actually hurt them in the longer run, in my opinion, because they weren't doing that poorly with their sub revenue.  If you look back at the PAX East Keynote with Paiz it's clear that they saw a revenue opportunity by moving to the F2P model which disenfranchised a reasonable portion of loyal players.  So couple that with poor development practices (slow content releases, slow and poor bug fixes, lack of design direction and focus - design by committee) and you have a recipe of imminent failure.

All this still doesn't mean the game will shut down though. I expect it will linger with diminishing quality of content updates and game play as time progresses.

This! LOTRO at that time still had quite a few subscribers. Over 300k at least. Especially when the EU servers were still managed by Codemasters.

Sure it wasn't the 600k + subs they had in the first 2 years till after Mines of Moria, but 300k+ is still a very respectable number.

The thing was:

1. DDO's conversion to Freemium F2P model was a huge success in the first year!

2. They were bought by Warner Bros and wanted to put all focus on expanding the Freemium F2P model towards LOTRO.

So LOTRO going Freemium F2P wasn't because the game was doing bad. They just wanted to increase their revenue further after the initial success with DDO.

In other words .... they saw the $$$ signs and got greedy!

And now 2 years later it's starting to backfire, as they have chased away most of their loyal fans with their continuing greed, squeezing out the playerbase more and more, turning the Store into Pay 2 Win, VIP subscribing has become pointless as it's much cheaper to stay Premium!

So they have just shot themselves in the foot with their blind greed! /Facepalm

 

You goy any sources to back up those numbers?

No[mod edit] Its pop hasn't dropped off as fast as some of the games that came after it but it was never a big player in the MMO space. That's why it went FTP.

Of course we feel sorry for people who lose their jobs,but there is a certain restraint on my morals.

The problem is the guys at the top,making al lthe decisions,they put all those workers livelihoods on a limb because of the decisions they make.

All of these producers and boardroom guys have been making the same decisions as everyone else,then when you fail,let's try copying everyone else and try the F2p/cash shop idea.

Why even hire those guys,pay them a ton of cash to basically copy everyone else or make brutal decisions.

I can see a difference if some producer says ok,i have the go ahead to go way over budget and take all systems into great detail.Then the game doesn't do so well,at least they took a chance on something great.

Creating VERY limited gaming inside of games is not the fault of the workers,it is basically a few guys screwing up all these jobs.Problem is how do you fire the guys at the top,they are the guys running the company.

We saw the same thing with that Cheyenne Mountain company,the workers were extremely dedicated but the guys at the top screwed it up.Same thing with 38 studios,somewhere along the line 1 or 2 guys gave Schilling some very bad advice.

Who took the blame for the decisions on SWG?How about ruining FFXI?it only takes 1 or 2 bigshots to screw the whole thing up and usually bcause guys are looking to cut corners and save costs to get bonuses.

Originally posted by DavisFlight
LotRO has the biggest IP in the entire world, and they're limping along in barely relavent FTP, dumping out an expansion once in a blue moon that adds almost nothing. Mounted combat is the biggest feature to hit LotRO since launch, and it isn't even that good. That's kind of sad. Darkfall launched with mounted combat.

This is not specific to LOTRO, this is Turbine, which also affects DDO

The devs who got layed off could be ones working on DDO and not LOTRO. There is nothing in the OP or the linked article to say that LOTRO devs were layed off

Originally posted by Gaborik

Originally posted by DavisFlight
LotRO has the biggest IP in the entire world, and they're limping along in barely relavent FTP, dumping out an expansion once in a blue moon that adds almost nothing. Mounted combat is the biggest feature to hit LotRO since launch, and it isn't even that good. That's kind of sad. Darkfall launched with mounted combat.

 

Wrong Star Wars has the biggest IP in the entire world. Wrong lotro is not limping along. Question how many years has wow been out how many years has lotro been out? How many expansions has wow put out how many expansions has lotro put out? Every blue moon hmm? Try playing the game before you speak about a game thanks.

Well ive played the game from closed beta to a little after mirkwood, Itryed roi beta was crap tryed isen live was crap tryed ror beta was crap tryed ror live was more crap. Uninstalled lotro after 5 years of garbage and a wasted IP.

The moors was not revamped or "new" all they did was move 2 outposts and 2 rez points around and add buffs to keeps and outposts lol. Wheres the suposed new pvp map? that we were told 2 times about 5 years in nothing but 2 rez points and 2 outposts moved? Its a slap in the face to the pvp players what's left that is.

There was a turbine employee dating a customer lol believe what you will. The point was about ethics and proffesionalism which lotro devs/gm's had none of. Accusing and banning my friend for suposedly buying 3000$ in gold lol they didnt even apoligize for the mistake and told him to shut up about it.

CS/GM's telling people oh just go redo that 2 hour raid that took you a month to organize due to thier loot chest bieng bugged.

These along with the grocery store now are the main reason lotro has failed since f2p.

So i think you should play the game more or be more informed about it before you speak

Originally posted by Gaborik
This article never stated the layoffs were from the LOTRO team. And just last week they added 5 experienced developers. So these comments about the layoff prove lotro is failing are misguided. Granted lotro is not the most populated mmo out there or to some not the best. But from what my kinmates and experience day in and day out its still a very good and active game. I would bet the road to Mordor will continue and it will be a fun ride.

Yes, most comments are misguided from the title of the thread. They just see LOTRO - Layoffs and proceed with LOTRO bashing

Originally posted by starwarsnut

Originally posted by Gaborik

Originally posted by DavisFlight
LotRO has the biggest IP in the entire world, and they're limping along in barely relavent FTP, dumping out an expansion once in a blue moon that adds almost nothing. Mounted combat is the biggest feature to hit LotRO since launch, and it isn't even that good. That's kind of sad. Darkfall launched with mounted combat.

 

Wrong Star Wars has the biggest IP in the entire world. Wrong lotro is not limping along. Question how many years has wow been out how many years has lotro been out? How many expansions has wow put out how many expansions has lotro put out? Every blue moon hmm? Try playing the game before you speak about a game thanks.

Well ive played the game from closed beta to a little after mirkwood, Itryed roi beta was crap tryed isen live was crap tryed ror beta was crap tryed ror live was more crap. Uninstalled lotro after 5 years of garbage and a wasted IP.

The moors was not revamped or "new" all they did was move 2 outposts and 2 rez points around and add buffs to keeps and outposts lol. Wheres the suposed new pvp map? that we were told 2 times about 5 years in nothing but 2 rez points and 2 outposts moved? Its a slap in the face to the pvp players what's left that is.

There was a turbine employee dating a customer lol believe what you will. The point was about ethics and proffesionalism which lotro devs/gm's had none of. Accusing and banning my friend for suposedly buying 3000$ in gold lol they didnt even apoligize for the mistake and told him to shut up about it.

CS/GM's telling people oh just go redo that 2 hour raid that took you a month to organize due to thier loot chest bieng bugged.

These along with the grocery store now are the main reason lotro has failed since f2p.

So i think you should play the game more or be more informed about it before you speak

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by keirion

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by Papadam

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by Papadam

 

 

 

The instance cluster showed on the page that it was included the first 3 days when pre-orders went live! Then they made a stealth update to the page and removed it!

When people got angry and felt mislead, they came out and posted that it was a Copy/Pasta mistake from previous Rise of Isengard expasion! LOL

It took then a whole outrage on the forums that went on for several weeks! before Turbine decided to include the Instance Cluster within the expansion again. And only if you buy it with money! With TP you have to buy everything seperately and in end cost you a lot more!

And what you blattering about server merges man?? No one in this entire topic has ever mentioned that? lol. /shrug

FYI, you're currently offering false information, which undermines the accurate information in your post.

If you buy the expansion as an expansion in their Turbine point store, you will get the instance cluster included. This is an UPGRADE from the previous expansion where they could only offer it piecemeal until the cluster came out due to the lack of tech to be able to sell things that were not yet released.

It is true that people weren't pleased with the pricing with the lack of instance clusters. However, Turbine responded and fixed it, which is a lot more than most developers would do. Players as a whole are VERY happy with the expansion on all counts.

They didn't fix it! They were FORCED to fix it, as people refused to pay 40 bucks for a questpack and started demanding refunds based on false advertisment! Plus the outrage on both official and public forums didn't do them any good either!

The worst was that initially when the Pre-order page went live, it actually showed the Instance Cluster was included!

Then they waited three days to cash in on the initial pre-order rush, to suddenly remove the instance cluster from the pre-order with no notification whatsoever!

When people suddenly discovered this little stealth update and became very angry and rightfully so, they were forced to respond.

The response was that it was a "Copy / Paste" error from the previous Rise of Isengard expansion an that it was never intended to include an instance cluster to the Rohan expansion!

Then they waited for several weeks to see if people would buy this farce of an explanation and if they could get away with, before they finally decided to include the instance cluster within the expansion again!  /facepalm

 

You are completely missing his point.  This expansion they are selling the expansion as a whole, with the instance cluster, for POINTS.  Something they didn't do last year.  It's jsut about the only good thing they did this year.

Originally posted by Gaborik

Originally posted by starwarsnut

Originally posted by Gaborik

Originally posted by DavisFlight
LotRO has the biggest IP in the entire world, and they're limping along in barely relavent FTP, dumping out an expansion once in a blue moon that adds almost nothing. Mounted combat is the biggest feature to hit LotRO since launch, and it isn't even that good. That's kind of sad. Darkfall launched with mounted combat.

 

Wrong Star Wars has the biggest IP in the entire world. Wrong lotro is not limping along. Question how many years has wow been out how many years has lotro been out? How many expansions has wow put out how many expansions has lotro put out? Every blue moon hmm? Try playing the game before you speak about a game thanks.

Well ive played the game from closed beta to a little after mirkwood, Itryed roi beta was crap tryed isen live was crap tryed ror beta was crap tryed ror live was more crap. Uninstalled lotro after 5 years of garbage and a wasted IP.

The moors was not revamped or "new" all they did was move 2 outposts and 2 rez points around and add buffs to keeps and outposts lol. Wheres the suposed new pvp map? that we were told 2 times about 5 years in nothing but 2 rez points and 2 outposts moved? Its a slap in the face to the pvp players what's left that is.

There was a turbine employee dating a customer lol believe what you will. The point was about ethics and proffesionalism which lotro devs/gm's had none of. Accusing and banning my friend for suposedly buying 3000$ in gold lol they didnt even apoligize for the mistake and told him to shut up about it.

CS/GM's telling people oh just go redo that 2 hour raid that took you a month to organize due to thier loot chest bieng bugged.

These along with the grocery store now are the main reason lotro has failed since f2p.

So i think you should play the game more or be more informed about it before you speak

 

Again because one gm dated a player (this again not coming from a very reliable source)makes all of turbine unethical as you call it? Your friend bought 3000 gold? He should be banned (again this from an unreliable source shiw us these email). This isnt wow 3000 gold is a ton in lotro if you played you would know this. As for moors feel free to read this http://www.lotro.com/gameinfo/devdiaries/2236-riders-of-rohan-developer-diary-the-ettenmoors, a lot more there than you discribed. Feel free to explain which raid you speak of that took a month to organize? Which loot chest was bugged? As for you played the beta of ROR and therefore make your opinion about ROR is laughable. Im sure it was the 1st session which was a very stripped down version. Dude you dont like lotro its clear just move on making these claims like gm dating, friend bought 3000 gold and being banned makes you look silly.

thank you for proving my point about ethics. As you can see here this the kind of person who lotro wants to cater to.

Whats silly is a gm accusing a player of buying 3000$ worth of gold thats whats silly stupifd and unethical. For you to say and think thats a justifiable thing is the real joke. I have played its why i know its ridiculous which is why im discussing it in the first place. Its idiotic for a gm to ban someone who appealed for over a year to get his account back and got it back a year later and was told to shut up about it.

Frelorn was dating a customer who's in a monster player tribe. Its why they removed the monster player manual link off the elindilmir forums b/c i filed a ticket about and they investigated and removed the monster player manual.

The raid i speak of is moria gear back in the day and rift if you see people have jobs and lives and you have to organize the raids and times around that its apparent you arent in a guild even lol. This is a common bug in lotro even know i still hear about that chest loot bug.

As for the moors i dont need to read i been out there and played it. Anyone whos a pvp'er knows all they did was move 2 outposts and 2 rez points and added some buffs. Thats it

I find it interesting you dont want to discuss the suposed pvp map they lied their butts off about 2 times in a row. Btw im rank 15 which is worthless as well. 

so yes based on 5 years of game play and seeing their highly unethical behavior i do stand by that statement. 

Do you understand what unethical means? It means unproffesional. Imagine going to get burger king and theres illegal aliens working in ther kitchen dropping food on the floor and picking it up and putting the hamburger back on hamburger buns and serving it to you. Well thats what turbine gm/cs has done the last 5 years.

I can tell you havent played lotro long if you believe you what you do there. The diiference between the moors of shadows of angmar launch and now is they moved 2 outposts and 2 rez points added buffs and the delving thats pretty much it. They lied about that new pvp map. So defend away fanboi it is what it is

Originally posted by Gaborik

 

Well after this last rant i think i have it figured out. You had a crush on a creep (thats what they call monsters). She told you that she was dating a gm and if you keep harassing her she will report you. You also tried to buy 3000 gold and got caught. Its also obvious you have not played since moria since your so called raid that took over a month to put together was the rift. Just an fyi there are orthac, draig and skraids going on all day on my server. Thats fine you can call me a fanboi because i like to correct tro!!s.

Not always the case. About a years ago when I still played LOTRO I sold a items for something like 350 gold or something like that on the AH and was banned for 30 days  because they said that I had bought gold. I tried to petition the ban letting them know that I had recieved the gold from an item sold on the AH. All I recieved back was a email from a GM saying thanks for supporting the game but I had no items placed on the auction house and was lying.

GM's seem to be pretty shady in this game. At least in my experince with them. lol

In other news, Asheron's Call still requires a purchase and subscription and still has enough players to keep the game running and get monthly content packs.

WB should have just let Turbine do their thing.

Originally posted by f0dell54

Originally posted by Gaborik

 

Well after this last rant i think i have it figured out. You had a crush on a creep (thats what they call monsters). She told you that she was dating a gm and if you keep harassing her she will report you. You also tried to buy 3000 gold and got caught. Its also obvious you have not played since moria since your so called raid that took over a month to put together was the rift. Just an fyi there are orthac, draig and skraids going on all day on my server. Thats fine you can call me a fanboi because i like to correct tro!!s.

 

Not always the case. About a years ago when I still played LOTRO I sold a items for something like 350 gold or something like that on the AH and was banned for 30 days  because they said that I had bought gold. I tried to petition the ban letting them know that I had recieved the gold from an item sold on the AH. All I recieved back was a email from a GM saying thanks for supporting the game but I had no items placed on the auction house and was lying.

 

GM's seem to be pretty shady in this game. At least in my experince with them. lol

Originally posted by Gaborik

Originally posted by f0dell54

Originally posted by Gaborik

 

Well after this last rant i think i have it figured out. You had a crush on a creep (thats what they call monsters). She told you that she was dating a gm and if you keep harassing her she will report you. You also tried to buy 3000 gold and got caught. Its also obvious you have not played since moria since your so called raid that took over a month to put together was the rift. Just an fyi there are orthac, draig and skraids going on all day on my server. Thats fine you can call me a fanboi because i like to correct tro!!s.

 

Not always the case. About a years ago when I still played LOTRO I sold a items for something like 350 gold or something like that on the AH and was banned for 30 days  because they said that I had bought gold. I tried to petition the ban letting them know that I had recieved the gold from an item sold on the AH. All I recieved back was a email from a GM saying thanks for supporting the game but I had no items placed on the auction house and was lying.

 

GM's seem to be pretty shady in this game. At least in my experince with them. lol

 

Well I didnt say every case is wrong or a lie. But some people by their comments hint there is more to their story than they say. I would believe this could happen, what ive heard the 1st offence they just take back the gold and warn you. But every case is different iguess.

it took my friend over a year to get his account back emailing them every day for over a year then they dont even apoligize to him they just say heres your account back shut up about this. Theres nothing hidden or any of this bs either the community knew who this person was and stood up for him it caused a big mess and everyone filed tickets saying this is bs and a year later oh guess what the gm was wrong.

3000 in gold is crazy my arguement to the gm was if anyone bought 3000 in gold they need physcilogical help the game would be the least of thier worries its just crazy as the community filed saying the same thing its just ridiculous.

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by DavisFlight

Originally posted by FrodoFragins

Originally posted by JeroKane

So LOTRO going Freemium F2P wasn't because the game was doing bad. They just wanted to increase their revenue further after the initial success with DDO.

 

 

LOTRO is the most successful MMO of all time.  We are going F2P to let the masses enjoy this game.  Siege of Mirkwood was a tremendous critical and financial success and our player base is very happy with the state of the game.

 

Nice revisionist history there.  LOL.

There seem to be like, 3 LotRO fans that keep trying to derail this topic with some weird posts about a girlfriend or something? They're very ignorant to how small LotRO actually is in the MMO world.

ROFL! I am burning Turbine on the stake here in this topic and I am called a LOTRO fan??  Classic!!

No, I was responding to you, saying that most people agree with you.

LOTRO has been the most sucessful MMO to be released since WIOW. All the rest have just been far worse. LOTRO has won loads of awards. People saying to be crap is just a matter of opinion, and not fact, unlike SWTOR which is crap as fact

Again this thread is a farce, most posts are on the subject of "LOTRO layoffs" not "Turbine Layoffs" because of the misleadiong title

DDO has more chance of shutting down before LOTRO, and DDO will be more affected by this.

Originally posted by starwarsnut

Originally posted by Ozmodan

Originally posted by DavisFlight

Originally posted by FrodoFragins

Originally posted by JeroKane

So LOTRO going Freemium F2P wasn't because the game was doing bad. They just wanted to increase their revenue further after the initial success with DDO.

 

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I can confirm that Brandywine, which is arguably the highest populated server of the game, still remains highly populated.

Maybe they are just thinning out the herd on projects like LOTRO and DDO so they can allocate more resources to their new Harry Potter MMO?

Would seem logical.