Ya I think they added too many servers. It was okay for headstart, but they added like 6 more for official release. So while I'm sure headstart servers are healthy, I have doubts about others.

Been already called rabid fanboy so I guess I'm in the club too :)

And frankly I have no idea what single feature keeps me so entertained. As if You pick them one by one, You usually will think, been there did that. Yet all of them together makes Rift fun.

@OP
Quite harsh game rating hidden under one role(main healer) in one class issues, I'd give it at least 3.5/5. Doing expert T1/T2(no raids yet) with my guild and we tend to have 3 clerics(including me) and everyone has a blast.

Thinking about Rift instances as one warrior tank/ one cleric healer/ three dps is what people are trying to bring from WoW, despite it doesn't work this way well. Imo going for pure dps/tank/healer is a no no in Rift. Souls give so much flexibility so You can adjust Your character to have off healing/off tanking or CC apart of Your main role.

For example Justicar mixed with Druid/Shaman is neat offhealer/offtank with dps on top. Put him next to warden and he can deal with AoE heals while main healer focuses on single targets. If fight is not damage heavy he can go help with dps. With self heals and tank mode he can off tank some add with few HoTs on him. All that in one build. And it's just melee cleric...

@OP

1. Quests are mostly meh, but due to invasions and rifts popping often they don't get You bored all that much. And since those and BG gives xp You should be fine.

2. PvP is weak for someone who would treat it as main activity. Souls due to all combinations offers high degree of customization and thus fun, as long as You can read and are willing to experiment. BGs are called WarFronts and are okay but You'll get bored as there are only 4 of them. World PvP is a tad meh, but due to no flying mounts or dungeon finder it has potential. Have to see what Trion will do about world PvP in next bigger update.

My advice - don't buy now, but keep eye on Rift and check where world PvP will go. I think Trion idea is to mix some world public groups PvE/PvP(rifts, invasions) and instanced PvE/PvP(dungeons and raids and WF). So if You like only one element it won't deliver.

I smell a person who rolled FOtM class then it got nerfed(champion/paragon) aka no longer OP in PvP and he ragequits complaining all over the place.

Well played rogue is awesome just look here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wg__21P2_PM

Killing mages, warriors, clerics. You just need skill :)

Cause it's a good and polished game. Of course haters gonna hate and whine, not because game is bad, but because it doesn't carter to them. Mature folks will say it's good game but not for me. Can't wait for GW2 or TOR launches beta so all those go and whine there.

Just look at guys like simmihi whining about world event bug which as of know is already being fixed and event(or should I say phase 2 of it) is temporarily disabled. Surely if world event was delayed he would bitch about that too. Can't please those kind of people.

Seriously Rift isn't perfect but speed of bug fixes, balance fixes and new stuff Trion brings in is amazing. Authenticator, coin lock, hack fixes, solid support(person who was hacked in my guild got restored after 5 days and got 30 days extra game time), balance fixes(champs and sabos) and tons of smaller things like nearly no gold spam(compared to WoW where it's usual stuff). And this is delivered in about one month from release. Compared to pace of bugfixes of LOTRO(which is a good game as well) Trion is like Porsche vs bicycle.

I blame WoW for spoiling kids too much. Blizz being huge company and having millions of players and huge income, while being hated is for them at same time like some kind of holy avatar and each new game released by usually much smaller company is expected to be simply better. Not gonna happen...

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Originally posted by Sovrath

This is silly.
Though I will go on record as saying i have a litany of criticisms toward the game and that I think how they implemented the store is tacky, there are no game breaking, power buying "you must purchase with cash" items.
I had a few points so I got a morale potion. used it. It was good. But wasn't so ground breaking that I ever bought it again. And if players do want to get them the you can use your turbine points and not spend a dime.
Every player gets Turbine points. So just use them. You get them for playing the game or if you subscribe then you get an allotment each month.
Which means that over the course of play you will get enough points to spend in the "store" without ever paying a dime.
And calling people "fanboys" doesn't support your argument. If anything it weakens it.
You don't have to "pay" or get 2nd rate anything. One can make their way through the game and never open the store. I agree that adding legendary items with extra slots that are "only in the store" is suspect at first glance but as I said you get points anyways so use them on that if that's your thing.
The real shame is that they aren't available directly in game and one has to turn to a somewhat artificial vendor to get them.

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Again it's been only 7 months and already cash shop offer is highly debatable for being called fluff. Either way those "convenience" items just make my experience 2nd rate despite I subscribe. Some people like You don't care and some like I do. Calling that silly is not really better than calling all nitpicking at "pay to win" term fanboyism, touche ;)

You say I get points and that's fine, the thing is again subscription and so called hybrid model Turbine promised and stated. So I pay monthly and yet to get full experience I have to fork out extra cash or grind like in Your every F2P game. After all TP not differs that much from in game currency/items You sell in other F2P for cash shop items. So I really don't see any option of not spending a dime that wouldn't give me 2nd rate experience if I want to fully enjoy game in every aspect.

In P2P model I'm free to fully experience game without paying extra for quite useful in game items. In F2P I'm not paying monthly sub, and having possibility of having 2nd rate experience or buying cash shop items. Turbine got worse from those two while promising hybrid model with only fluff(for everyone) and content(for freebies) in cash shop.

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Originally posted by Mouls
P2W is RoM and Allods
LI is a boring grind in fact is P2NG(pay to not grind)
whats is p2w is the debuff removal pots(wich removes 3 debuffs),and the tomes wich are not big deal compared to what you find in others F2P.

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Bottom line store and it's "pay to win" destroyed the game for me. No not because I win or lose something like fanboys like pick at. But because I either pay or get 2nd rate experience. More grind, worse pots, less stats, worse LI it's all about those tiny things that add together. And I guess it'd be okay if I wasn't already subscribing...

Rift is really well made game. It's all about polish and fun rather than novelty. Neither of things I've listed below is exceptional, but when You mix them, Rift starts to shine.

• questing is okay, nothing exceptional with nicely marked story quests so some players know when to read ;)
• crafting while not major element of game, has it's own place with nice blue and even purple items. Dismantle ability is handy tweak that allows You to recycle some not needed items instead vendoring them or filling AH with useless junk.
• rifts are like random pug groups fast and fun way to get some loot and kill some stronger mobs. While experience may vary according to pug those are neat way to enrich Your leveling experience while doing 10th quest in a row.
• invasions are region wide events which basically shows that game is alive. Seeing 2 24 folks raids in action rather than around AH and mailboxes is really nice. While those events soft force You to involve in them, they give nice rewards, experience and usually finish with big bad boss fight. Sure it's more often than not simple zerg the big guy. It's still fun. To spice things up boss fights often end up with big pvp battles.dungeons while quite well visually designed aren't anything special. Some trash, then boss, repeat. Roll on loot. I find it so far weakest part of my experience.warfronts aka battlegrounds are solid. Another way to get some nice gear and exp and even some money.soul system is most unique and best designed so far. Also it makes people rage and whine all across internet cause they can't get that warrior-tank, dps - rogue/mage, healer - cleric isn't 100% true in Rift. I just hope devs will hide numbers(aka no meters, just 3rd party parsers) and allow You to pick what You like rather making homogenization off classes which is foreseeable result of min-maxing and math.

tl;dr If You are bored with themepark MMOs You'll just wonder, why this game has so good opinions among ppl. But if not and You are just looking for fun MMO, where everything is still fresh and devs are actually active and listen to people - Rift is best pick. And I'm sticking with it, canceling WoW and not bothering with newest LOTRO book.

I agree that guide for doing quests is useless. Valid in game tutorial which LOTRO already has explains all basics and NPCs/quest tracker grab Your hand and guide You. If it's still too hard then maybe start with learning how to click mouse and type with keyboard.

Also revamp is too big word on what Turbine does at least compared with what WoW did in Cataclysm, adjust would be better word. Still same quests, same NPCs just more conviniently placed and some quest went thru soloization/level adjustment(making group quests soloable). Don't get me wrong changes to old content is needed and really helpful for all new players, I just don't get the hype and "300 new quests!" ad-like statemants.

I wonder if the game even needs such players as OP. "QQ my class got nerfed I ragequit/stop my sub". Maybe play after the changes first, then post, then You won't look like yet another WoW kid? Especially when alpha patch notes also have:

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* Mages: Reduced pushback on all non-healing Mage spells.

* Mages: Increased the base damage on all damaging Mage abilities.

* Increased the amount of Armor on Cloth items.

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3 persons in Gloamwood? Was it 4.30 AM during working day? Cause at Sparkwing EU server at around midnight(Sunday) in Moonshade Highlands(which is a tad less populated zone, see comments above) guardian side alone mustered bout 15 people to stop invasion and we killed boss. During peak hours there are usually at least 1 full raid.

Rifts and invasions do scale, again at least at my server. If there are few people, mobs packs(those invading ones) are 3+ normal mobs + 1 normal mob with higher health bar. For comparison with full raid those mobs change into 3+ elites with mini boss with much higher health amount.

Also with low pop like 99% Rifts are minor, which are easy to duo all way to last stage or if You alone at least till stage 3 just to seal them.

Seems like very biased point of view in that blog.

Cash shop ruined this game for me. Instead hybrid model they went double dip way by giving subscribers who use cash shop much better gameplay experience - including stats, potions, grind reductions like in regular F2P. Not to mention shop buttons...erm I mean UI "revamp" everywhere. What next - sad Mr. Frodo face popup that says "buy at store or Sauron will spank me"? If at least it'd mean more updates...cause so far it's even worse than pre F2P.

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Originally posted by Serenes

So? I'm suppose to just put up with someone being bad? I'm suppose to just say hey its okay you wiped us twice because you can't pull half the DPS the rest of the group pulls but hey its okay =] I don't think so. Its okay if you follow ur own path but I DO not put up with people being stupid..... You can have a bad build and it can hurt your dps and it will get you kicked. I may be being a dick, but your being a bigger dick by wasting my time and 3 other peoples time.

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Also from my experience one l33t player with perfect* build and huge ego in group causes much more trouble and wipes than any other person with any reasonable build.

* If such thing as perfect build exist and is measurable at all.

This thread show exactly where WoW has failed. DPS/Heal meters and min-maxing. They(well not they but d-people who got tools to harass normal folks, but You get my point) change game into job.

Threat, healing, damage(in PvE obviously) should not be visible outside Your character. As simple as that. Not only because they hurt community(like 5:24 boss fight duration vs 7:12 means enough to kick players and make drama) but also they don't measure things like off healing, off tanking, cc and overall supportive things. And You don't need meters to spot a bad player.

LOTRO done it right and has one of best communities in MMOs.

OP is simply wrong. Not enjoying something =/= something being bad. In this case battlegrounds are great place for PvP for many folks(thus popularity), just not for him. Instead of writing his opinion, he wrote "I know better" post.

Next for the popularity. Some folks claim that battlegrounds PvP activity vs open world comes from hefty rewards devs put in. I say You do exaggerate much. Surely devs can influence incentive to do something by giving neat rewards. Yet they don't have magic purplez sprinkler that will make something not fun entertaining. In simple words if something is boring and/or grindy no reward will make it fun. Legendary items(especially before changes) in LOTRO are perfect example for that. Thus devs will develop that which players find more fun, as this means popularity and profit. Which brings...

Balance. Battlegrounds popularity comes from it, like many above posters noticed. Surely not perfect one, but in games that major power comes from levels and gear it does help immensely. From development side - You don't have to deal with server faction balancing. From player side You don't have to deal with session faction balancing(for example in this zones You have only 4 allied people vs 20 enemies), mixed PvE and PvP(ganking), level imbalance(again ganking). Also...

Casual gamers. Open PvP world is taxing, requires lot of attention and sometimes preparation. Many gamers that are 25+ have many irl responsibilities making their gaming session short and irregular. Battlegrounds are perfect match for them.

Finally lack of RvR or open world PvP in popular titles is simply a result of those being a niche for some gamers. I'm quite sure that if it was such golden mine people claim someone would already mine it aka succeed on MMORPG market(which is quite crowded place). So question emerges - just a vocal forum minority claims or huge financial success that no dev managed to claim yet?

OP is simply trolling. Everyone with different opinion is lying, only OP has real facts, what next - omg the game isn't WoW...QQ? Frankly I don't care if he zerged his way to 50 and is one of few no lifes(?8 am?) in area and has some problems with invasions. Being in mid lvl30 I'm fine with no issues at all. Roads are clear, invasion are scaled, people fight them. Grey mobs could have leser agro zone, I guess, but hardly gamebreaking.

Yeah OP it's time to move on or even take a break from MMOs alltogether as many things You wrote about are generic to theme park MMOs.

Questing - in WoW in old areas was indeed dull. But with chainquests actually have story behind and make some sense, this was a good move and truly needed revamp. Other MMOs do it too(i.e. LOTRO) and usually players are happy about changes. Kill 10 rats quests are in any other MMO - LOTRO, Runes of Magic, Rift...so You won't escape from those.

Dungeons - You obviously are bored with PvE end game. Won't find anything elsewhere, except old LFG system on local chat. Aka You'll sit in some generic zone and type waiting for group.

Guilds - try finding a good one. Hardcore guilds offering all raiding mean hardcore rules. You don't more than 4 folks to do all instances in game, cept raids. But in general You'll find other MMOs better in this department.

Endgame - same as in other games, but with crosserver auto lfg. You'll only find very same in other games. Aka doing achievements and spamming lfg while waiting at AH.

So either try out sandboxed MMOs like EVE or just take a break as You won't find anything different elsewhere.

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Originally posted by onaht
I see plenty of opportunities to criticize the OP, but instead a lot of you guys are hating on him because he's killing lower levels? What?
I always roll on a PvP server given the choice, and I know full well I'm going to be ganked by some dude 10 levels higher while surrounded by 5 mobs AT LEAST 5 times. It's a PvP server! I don't understand why ganking on a PvP server is so taboo. They have separate PvE servers for a reason.

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If I'd see someone in LOTRO over 50th lvl on full F2P I'd ask him to go treat himself as he can't be mentally healthy. I really wonder how many people here praising F2P actually aren't lifetime members or subscribiers and did say 1-40 content without paying real money.

The game is good and polished, can't argue with that. But F2P? With amount of grind ahead You won't see anything people praise that game for as You'll be busy grinding mobs like in cheap korean games, then remake character and all over again...