Originally posted by erictlewis

Originally posted by Robsolf

Originally posted by erictlewis

So from what I read, if you go in groups you get the rewards quicker you do it solo you still get the same rewards it just going to take you a lot longer to get them and a lot more of the SM's to purchase them with.  So that was my take on it.   So yes your going to be foreced to group to get it quicker, however you can still do it solo it just going to take you a lot longer to get there.

 

It's going to take you longer BECAUSE of the SM's.  They are going to have an exchange system, where you can trade in the smaller fellowship SM's for bigger fellowship ones.  the bigger ones, I assume, are for better items.

I'm consider myself a pretty solo'ey player, and I have no issue with this, so long as it doesn't mean I have to run a skirmish, say, 20 times to get the equivelent of a fellowships' 1.

...and, like I mentioned earlier, if it doesn't take up yet more inventory space.

 

Well the way it read it sounded like it was going to take a huge chuck of turn ins. So I am worried that it is going to take you many many runs vs a few runs with a 6 or 12 man.  Thus the entire reason why I said forced grouping.  Or maybee I should say encoraged grouping.

Just ask Ihmotepp: You need more rewarding group content because it takes more incentive to group. You wouldn't think so (who would not want to get rewards faster, right?) but it's true. With a group you have to deal with other people. That's not always fun. Sometimes they have to go AFK, sometimes they're clowns, sometimes they try to steal loot, etc. That's why solo is so popular. That's why Turbine allows people to do Skirmishes either way... but they need to give people incentives to group up. Yes, it's encouraged, because if it wasn't, few people would do it.

Originally posted by erictlewis

Originally posted by Robsolf

Originally posted by erictlewis

So from what I read, if you go in groups you get the rewards quicker you do it solo you still get the same rewards it just going to take you a lot longer to get them and a lot more of the SM's to purchase them with.  So that was my take on it.   So yes your going to be foreced to group to get it quicker, however you can still do it solo it just going to take you a lot longer to get there.

 

It's going to take you longer BECAUSE of the SM's.  They are going to have an exchange system, where you can trade in the smaller fellowship SM's for bigger fellowship ones.  the bigger ones, I assume, are for better items.

I'm consider myself a pretty solo'ey player, and I have no issue with this, so long as it doesn't mean I have to run a skirmish, say, 20 times to get the equivelent of a fellowships' 1.

...and, like I mentioned earlier, if it doesn't take up yet more inventory space.

 

Well the way it read it sounded like it was going to take a huge chuck of turn ins. So I am worried that it is going to take you many many runs vs a few runs with a 6 or 12 man.  Thus the entire reason why I said forced grouping.  Or maybee I should say encoraged grouping.

I read ya.  And I had to read it a bunch of times to get an idea of how the system as a whole was to flow.  If you look at it from the perspective of where they WERE to where they are GOING though, you can see a change from gating content from all but groups and the most suicidal, to finding ways where you can be inclusive of all styles of play.

ALL games I've played encourage grouping.  It's telling that encouragement is required beyond the standard benefits of being in a group in MMO's, but it's pretty apparent.  I remember seeing bonus XP for groupers in SWG, maybe even before.  They also encouraged it by gating the highest level/best paying contracts to big groups.

Like I said, if it's largely a case of 6 to a half dozen on time per loot, or even a bit to a groups advantage, I'm good with that.  But yeah... if it's ridiculously skewed, I'll be right there with ya.

Originally posted by Comnitus

Just ask Ihmotepp: You need more rewarding group content because it takes more incentive to group. You wouldn't think so (who would not want to get rewards faster, right?) but it's true. With a group you have to deal with other people. That's not always fun. Sometimes they have to go AFK, sometimes they're clowns, sometimes they try to steal loot, etc. That's why solo is so popular. That's why Turbine allows people to do Skirmishes either way... but they need to give people incentives to group up. Yes, it's encouraged, because if it wasn't, few people would do it.

On the other side of the coin, I don't like making people wait for me to empty the dryer, take bio breaks, or get dinner/drinks.

Originally posted by Astralglide

Originally posted by Sovrath

Originally posted by erictlewis

And yet once again we go with lack luster loot.  Forced grouping to get better loot.   One thing that Lotro has always had a problem with is lack of good or even epic loot.

I think there is a disconect between the devs want to give the players vs what the players want from the devs. 

This is a path they continue down, and it is sad.

 

 

I think there are a lot of players who don't want LOTRO to be about loot. It really wasn't about loot in the beginning as crafted, quested, dropped or raided equpment were all pretty good.

 

From my experience, all the gear you could craft was crap, except for the tools and jewelry (I haven't play Moria, so this might have changed) and the raid drops that I saw were marginally better than the high end story rewards. Loot is not what a game should be all about, that mechanic works well for WoW and failed miserably for WAR, but there needs to be some reason to get people to do instances more than once or twice. Finding groups in LOTRO was pretty painful sometimes and I had difficulty getting anybody to do them more than once. Some better gear drops, or even some cool clothes to deck out your toon would definately help

Are you familiar with crafting guilds?  Very rarely have I picked something up that's better than a quest or crafted item.  All the way up to 60.

Dunno.  It seems like on one side of the fence, you're complaining that crafted gear sucks, then complaining that instance gear is overshadowed by crafted gear and thus isn't enough incentive for a PUG.  Are you saying that instance gear double-suxx?  :)

I think the problem for PUG's has been that one person gets the ultra cool shiny uber loot, and everybody else gets "meh", so there's little point in trying especially if you already got the one shiny fat lootz.  I think using the SM system, everybody gets SOME benefit from each visit to the instance, so it should encourage more PUG participation.  Though groupers would argue it won't, since solo'ers can do the same skirmish(in this case) and not die.

Originally posted by Thillian

Originally posted by Robsolf

 

"undoubtedly".  Yep.  LOL!!!  What evidence, exactly, are you basing this indubitable declaration on?

"It ain't what you know that gets ya, it's what you know for sure that just ain't so." - Mark Twain

 

 

Pretty much a logical deduction. Lifetimers expected to stay with the game for longer than a year when they paid for the lifetime. It's been three years now since release. The longer the game will last, the more lifetimers will there be. Lifetime equal to a year of monthly subscriptions is not a good business for the company unless they expect to just pull the plug within that year or start releasing paid expansions and move your dev team away to do something else (re-release DDO? + new game in works??)

Offering lifetime payment option means you will not get any sort of money from players that EXPECTED to stay with the game for a longer time (logically, when they paid the lifetime right?) If I think about it, what other game apart from Lotro and Hellgate London ever offered lifetime subscription?

More lifetimers, yes.  Making them magically a majority of the LotRO population, no.  Particularly when you can play for 10 bucks a month.  Your logical deduction is correct, but wholly exaggerated.

Another lifetimer?  Champions Online.  But I suspect, in a few months, that will be a bad example.  :)

Seeing as how, by your very declaration, LotRO has been giving lifetime subs from the very beginning, and is still around some 3 years later, that's gotta say something about how having a hybrid payment model is doing.

We'll see, though.  If DDO is doing well enough to open a new server and that's equating to big buxx, they may go micro with LotRO whether forced to or not.  It's all about the bennies.  But from a "inside the game standpoint" the pops are good, and I doubt they're all, half, or even significantly lifers. 

And, it's just doesn't seem like the behavior of an economically troubled game to announce 2 $20 items, then give one away to people that are already on a 3 month sub.

Originally posted by Robsolf

Another lifetimer?  Champions Online.  But I suspect, in a few months, that will be a bad example.  :)

All right, isnt that Bill Roper as a producer just like he was in Hellgate London? Very true then, I wouldn't use this as a good example.

Originally posted by erictlewis

Originally posted by Tolroc

Originally posted by Mrbloodworth

Originally posted by erictlewis

And yet once again we go with lack luster loot.  Forced grouping to get better loot.   One thing that Lotro has always had a problem with is lack of good or even epic loot.

I think there is a disconect between the devs want to give the players vs what the players want from the devs. 

This is a path they continue down, and it is sad.

 

 

What the hell are you talking about?

Skirmishes are for any group make up from level 30-65. can be any group number from 2 - 12, AND you can choose a difacuility mode to top it all off, and its random every time. Everyone gets rewards at the end, period. You can then go and trade in for whatever you want, and even playing 2 mans, you can trade up to get all the same gear as people constantly playing as a 12 man group (you will need to acquire the tokens for that though, however you want to)..Oh yeah, that's totally forced grouping right there.

Lack of loot? What game are you playing? Because it isn't LOTRO.

Speak for yourself.

 

And on que, here comes Mrbloodworth flaming anyone that posts anything negative about LoTRO. Hey, you like the game and that's great. I like the game too. It gets pretty old watching you flame people that post what they don't like about LoTRO. What's ironic is that your second paragraph actually makes a good point, but it gets lost in the antagnostic attitude of the rest of the post.

 

 

Thats OK I knew beyond a dought that he was going to be right on me like stink on well you know. I am use to it by now.

Posted right from the site (Ah, the age old MMO debate. I'd prefer not to spend too much time here, as it can strike up a war as brutal as Vi vs. Emacs. With Skirmishes, we have decided to make all rewards in the entire system available to all fellowship play sizes. However, the costs of rewards will be different based on what play size you participate in. This difference is regulated by the level/size tokens mentioned above. A particular Legendary Item blank may require a token that can be only found in 6 and 12-man Skirmishes. However, the Curiosities vendor has the ability to upgrade small group Marks into large group Marks. This upgrade will cost a chunk of SM, but means that any player can eventually purchase any reward in the system.)

So from what I read, if you go in groups you get the rewards quicker you do it solo you still get the same rewards it just going to take you a lot longer to get them and a lot more of the SM's to purchase them with.  So that was my take on it.   So yes your going to be foreced to group to get it quicker, however you can still do it solo it just going to take you a lot longer to get there.

You just quoted and or typed more than one option in play, then said forced.

Awesome.