ok well thank you all for your comments they have given me alot to think about but your posts have been very helpful to me.  thank you very much

anyone else have any ideas or suggestions?

Originally posted by wozzu

Both games have a free trial.

I'd play the trial before I bought the game for 20$. I found LOTRO and EQ2 to be very similar.

I would also play WoW's free trial. WoW is not like LOTRO or EQ2. WoW's emphasis is on nearly lag free combat.

EQ2 is lagg free when you play it on a US server, I played 2 weeks on a EU one first, was just about to quit because of lagg one I decided to try out a US one. All my friends change after just a look on the difference too.

If you lagg on a EQ2 US server your computer is not enough for the settings you have. The EU servers however seems to be some old junk from early EQ time, avoid them. Is more players on the US servers too anyways, and many EU players also.

Originally posted by xbellx777

anyone else have any ideas or suggestions?

   I think msot of us are still a little fuzzy on how you like to play......Do you mainly solo? Group? Raid? Do you prefer quests or just like to explore a big world? How important is crafting to you? End game? Theres alot of factors to consider...You have quite a bit of info here, probably enough to make a choice but you have to figure out how you prefer to play as to which will be the better game for you........

i mostly group and solo with a little raiding. i do craft but it depends on the game.  i just want a good pve game that you can group in

ya i just picked up wow's xpack instead of these two.  i heard they were both pretty good so if i get bored of wow again ill prolly go to one of them. im leaning towards eq2 a little more tho

well i go eq2

population wise its hard to tell as there are no numbers but as someone who made numerous characters and levelled them all thru to max level i never had a problem finding a group .

Soloing both games are pretty much solo friendly so another tie

Dungeons/raids here is why i quit LOTRO.EQ2 is just miles ahead in this with numerous dungeons and if you decide to raid there so much raid content .EQ2 wins clearly here

Maturity of community.I found both to be quite mature.another tie

Performance.LOTRO performs better and wins here,also eq2 is very zone based espically in the older expansions

Graphics.to me EQ2 has better graphics but this is all down to taste

combat.EQ2 to me is smoother and wins

Crafting.I found LOTRO crafting pretty tedious,not very useful and boring and limited.EQ2 has way better crafting

Variety to gain exp.EQ2 to me.You can level thru quest and combat same as rest but you can also level thru collections and doing lores.Also with EQ2 giving a massive boost to pre level 70 in exp gained it so easy to level up a new character now

content.EQ2 seems to be quite ahead on this

Classes.EQ2 has way more choices of classes and unlike at launch they actually made each class feel more unique and useful in the last 2 years.

I go with EQ2

I like to play on one or few big maps such as LOTRO instead of one map broken into pieces to different channels. And it is terrible to see the screen is black out with message like Downloading zone information........Please wait patiently or whatever you have to wait up.

One of the reason I quit EQ2 long long time ago just because the same map breaks into 4 different channels, our group went to another zone but we can't see each other at same map because the map has 4 channels. 

Since that bad experiences, I prefered to play with one giant map like WOW or least like LOTRO.

Although EQ2 may have more contents than LOTRO, but I figured out it is money worthy, time worthy and more importantly the fun to play a quality game than buggy game with numerous contents. SOE same like other Japanese game companies are good at producing single game or console game but not mmo. I think Korean game is going to replace Japs games sooner or later in the mmo.

 I have played both and liked both. However LOTR is what i stayed with. While each have their own charm and issues. I found over time on a busy server with LOTR it is very easy to find groups; One thing i hate about lotr is the lack of customazation of the characters they look awful compared to other games. The other issue i had was quest based game. The experaince is based on quests. While you can grind it is a very slow go verses questing.

  Find a busy server would be the recomendation on both games. My issue with Eq 2 was an issue i ran into with equipment  / groups and not landing groups or someone doing an inspection on my gear and go na we are full. Never had that my stuff is better then your stuff in lotr.

 I do feel the world is larger in eq 2  but make sure you ask questions of which still has very busy servers.

 As someone else said make your own ahw moments and you will be fine in either game. The journey is the game. Oh lotr has no traditional pvp it does have monster play which changes things up. Where you can after level 10- find a pond go in as  a monster and romp around that is fun... But you do not own the monster just borrowing them for a while.....

 Neat thing e about lotr is you can play an instrument  that can be fun as well

ok thank you for all your information it has helped me. who says there arent nice people on this site?

I played both games for 4months and while they both have + or - areas.

I would say I never felt gripped by EQ2...that is to say I started out in a city and spent darn near 20lvls in or close to that city. I started with the 4th expansion....so I admit to starting late but man I just couldn't figure out what was going on ingame...I mean I grinded but I didn't feel like I knew what the plot was.I even had to ask people what the expansion packs were for since everything I saw must have been the basic EQ2 stuff.

Now LOTRO had the unfair advantage of me already knowing the plot...and it's starter area had cut scenes to establish that plot. But I also felt the classes were to carebearish...that fits the lore though. I'll admit I enjoyed the flow of LOTRO better.

To answer any questions yes I'm a slow mofo on levels..4months on each game and I only passed 40th level in each.In the end I dropped both for AoC...which I lasted 1 month ....then WAR for 1 month.....I'm in limbo now asking myself the same question....which to go back to. If MS doesn't put out Jasper soon so I can play FO3 on the 360 I may cave and try and find a discount rate for both for a month around Xmas.

Originally posted by zoey121

 

  Find a busy server would be the recomendation on both games. My issue with Eq 2 was an issue i ran into with equipment  / groups and not landing groups or someone doing an inspection on my gear and go na we are full. Never had that my stuff is better then your stuff in lotr.

 

 

Hmm this is a bit strange as i am sure others will confirm.When lfg and picking members this is done mainly thru 2 ways 1)lfg via a channel 2)lfg thru interface.

Both options do not have facilities to examine gear.So you are generally picked because of your class,level and in some cases because of your reputation .

By reputation i mean say good or bad which applies to any mmorpg anyway