Wow, I can't type anything in this box when using FOXFIRE...anyway, is there in game housing in LoTR?

Yes there is housing. Each race has their own housing areas and they are instanced. Houses are pre-placed. The number of items that can  be placed in the houses is very limited (less than 100 for large houses I think). You can only place items in pre-selected spots. I was so disappointed in the housing that I abandoned mine.

Also, most loot/quest reward/bought items can not be placed in your house as decorations.

There are 3 types of homes. A small one and large one, and  kin or guild house. There rent you pay on the home i think 65 silver for the smaill 165 for the large and 300 something for the kin/guild home.

Hmm, but it does have housing....I am going to play this game or EQ2 (maybe Vanguard) based on several factors....one was in game housing.  The others are player population and graphics as it pertains to the character, not so much the environment.  I don't want to look like a clown or like everyone else.

EQ2 seems to have everything but their sever lack of armor is keeping me and my wife at bay.  Vanguard's extremely underpopulated servers and potentially quirkery performance is some what worrisome but I understand their armor is top notch.  LoTRs has some nice graphics for their characters but I have limited experience with the game.  I know there is no real PvP...just PvMP which is horribly biased towards the FREEPS (I did PvMP for about a month and left in disgust at how burglers and lore masters could destroy ppl anywhere, anyplace all the time.)

Anyway, with the new classes it seems more interesting.  Warden seems to fit my play style and the other one fits my wife's ranged healer or damage dealer.

I guess the days of SWG type housing are a thing of the past...that was so nice.

Originally posted by meleemadness

I guess the days of SWG type housing are a thing of the past...that was so nice.

You can say that again. I liked being able to drop anything in your house and place it where you wanted. LOTRO housing is the exact opposite.

I think that with all of the inventory addons in SWG you can get the max item count up to 1250 in a large house/guild hall.

I think in UO you can drop stuff where you want it. I always did like housing in UO,

Originally posted by meleemadness

Hmm, but it does have housing....I am going to play this game or EQ2 (maybe Vanguard) based on several factors....one was in game housing.  The others are player population and graphics as it pertains to the character, not so much the environment.  I don't want to look like a clown or like everyone else.

EQ2 seems to have everything but their sever lack of armor is keeping me and my wife at bay.  Vanguard's extremely underpopulated servers and potentially quirkery performance is some what worrisome but I understand their armor is top notch.  LoTRs has some nice graphics for their characters but I have limited experience with the game.  I know there is no real PvP...just PvMP which is horribly biased towards the FREEPS (I did PvMP for about a month and left in disgust at how burglers and lore masters could destroy ppl anywhere, anyplace all the time.)

Anyway, with the new classes it seems more interesting.  Warden seems to fit my play style and the other one fits my wife's ranged healer or damage dealer.

I have a founders account for LOTRO. The only complaints that I have are no standard PvP and the housing just sucks. I also trust Turbine alot more then I do SOE as far as treating their customers right. I tend to shy away from SOE games due to management issues although I do have a current SWG account.

Oh believe me when I say I do NOT trust of believe anything SOE says, particularly if it comes from Smedleys lieing pie hole.

The revamp of the skeletons to allow greater armor variety was a huge scam and farce.  I knew that would never come true.  After years of their BS spewing ppl would defend SOE.  Now they come out and say it won't happen as it is too difficult.  It took them two freaking years to figure that out?  NO, it did NOT!  It was just another two years of trying to keep ppl playing with FALSE hopes.  That is the SOE way.....corporate greed is not just in the automobile and financial industries......SOE has that captured in the MMO industry, hands down.

I would have loved to see the SWG style of decorating, however I am glad they went with instanced neighborhoods. SWG 's put em where you want em cities made for some slummy neighborhoods.

As far as the character clothing options it is hard to beat LoTRO's. There are literaly hundreds and hundreds of differnet costumes and armors. Also in Lotro you can have 3 different ensambles on at the same time and choose which of the three displays. Your main equipment/armor or either cosmetic paper doll 1or cosmetic paper doll 2. The cosmetic gear does not have to be in inventory once added to the costume but they also have no benefits as far as stats. Only the main equipment adds to stats.  Also you have about 15 or 16 different dye colors to further customize your gear.

I like EQII also so I don't feel like you can go wrong with either game but LoTRO has the edge as far as  gear and population. Also LoTRO's quest lines are a bit better in my opinion.

I can see why some folks may have an issue with housing if they are basing it on previous game experience however I came over from Everquest so no previous housing experience except for my brief time in EQ2. 

I feel the housing is pretty good -- yah storage is always an issue in LOTRO can't effect bag space by trade skills like in other games and there are so many rep items, barter items, etc to hold on to that you run out of space (I have like 2 vault spaces of legendary items right now while I level em up to try to get one with a great combo of legacies).

However, the housing looks amazing the instances feature some great locations and it lends itself well to congregating for RP events or just random kin functions at the kin house.   The houses are in 4 specific instances that are divided in to neighbourhoods so you literally only have to travel to one of 4 zone ins and then you select a neighboorhood that your friend's house is in and go meet them there which is awesome imho.  Also you get a port to home and a port to your kin house -- my house and my kin house are in two different instance areas so that facilitates my travel throughout the world.   

Even though you can't just dump whatever in to your houses you can decorate your houses in to looking pretty darn awesome.    What I've never seen a single complaint about for LOTRO is it's graphcis outside of avatars (big debate on avatars) but the housing instances are just wonderful to look at and extremely appropriate for the races that dwell there.   

Someone else mentioned the cosmetic clothing feature which adds to those RP events.    So again while they aren't good dumping grounds (you get one chest in a normal and you get 2 chests in a deluxe  house and 3 chests in a kin house on top of the decoration spaces) they are designed extremely well and the UI for housing is very user friendly.

The housing is a lot like DAoC, minus of course the consignment merchants standing on a porch slapped on the side of EVERY house (auction house is such a better system)  Anyway, that's the closest game I can think of.

On the SWG housing note... much like most everything else in that game (as far as core systems) we will never see anything that good again I'm afraid