Trial does not include Moria stuff or the 2 new classes.  Lotro is much more about a fantastic immersion into the lore behind the game.  Especially with the moria expansion you get lots of stories and events that is simply unmatched in any other game.  There are 15 books (major story lines) in Vol I before Moria and then there are 6 or so books once you start Moria.  I played FFXI and its one great thing is its difficulty.

You say that you want short easy stuff because you and your friends are busy, so you aren't going to find a game where it takes you more than a few weeks of steady play to accomplish all the 'easy' and solo attainable gear.  The end game stuff in LOTRO is mostly short runs on easy or difficult mode to get some of the best gear, then you can get a bigger group and run Vile Maw.  But if you take the time to do every book story from 10-60, and run the level 50 dungeons before the expansion, then you will have loads upon loads of stuff to do while leveling.  If your only goal is to get to 60 as fast as you can and skip everything else and obtain the best gear, then you will accomplish obtaining that gear with in a few weeks of hitting 60.

I'm glad that they extended the release date, because after being in BETA, it needs work and was not ready to be released this year.  I hope it does well, but I have to say I was dissapointed actually playing the game.

Lineage, Eve and FFXI have relatively harsh death results.  I would say Lineage 2 is the worst unless they changed it.

They need to find a distributor here that isn't going to "F" it up.  Which is apparently hard to do seeing all the failures out there.

Using fileplanet sucks to download the client.  It "estimated" my waiting time to even start the download at 30 minutes and its been over an hour.  First strike against the games distribution methods.

I can't believe your complaining about the graphics of Vanguard.  It was some of the best out there depending on what your computer can handle.  There are a few graphical bugs here and there, and some areas are more "polished" than others, but i'd hardly complain.  The trees and grass move, and what is this talk about shadows.  There are shadows everywhere.... 

I don't see the slow combat stuff either.  Try playing a monk, its fast and exciting.  There are slower classes, as is the case with every fantasy team build mmo.  I've played numerous fantasy mmo's from LOTRO, Everquest, EQII, WoW, Guild Wars, and Ryzom and this game has more content and variety of things and places.  You can easily level 2-3 toons and never do the same quests, plus crafting is challenging and rewarding, and then there's diplomacy - an addictive way to level and again, not too easy, and extremely rewarding.

I played this game for a while, and it is fantastic.  I was on Landroval server and I didn't have an issue with chat.  Especially once you make it to Bree.  The dwarve area was definitely the slowest and least populated, but I found the shire to be quite active for beginners.  Michel Delving always had a large group, especially around the crafting area.  One big thing to consider is that you are comparing it to WOW.  WoW has 11 million people.  I would guess LOTRO as 300-600k (they don't post numbers).  I would give it a go till you at least hit 15-20.  By then you'll be into major storylines and instances, and all around Bree, which is always crowded.

I never played this one after launch because of all the bad press and posts.  I understand it was very buggy and crap at launch.  That is NOT the case now.  I got a buddy pass and tried it.  I think its very well done at this point.  It has alot of options in races and classes, and there is so much to do even from the very beginning.  Its not a cakewalk like WoW, but I don't think its as difficult or as much of a grind like Final Fantasy XI Online.  I will subscribe and keep playing!

Agreed, Jadur is very wrong.  You can solo your way to 50 no problem.  You do miss some great content, but its also something you can go back and solo 1/2 of it when you are higher.  I play a burglur as my main and I like it solo'ing better than my guardian and hunter.  Hunter is definitely faster killing, but Its hard to get out of sticky unplanned situations like multiple adds and the such.  With my burglur I can dissapear in plain site (stealth and drop aggro), I can mez (crowd control) one mob, I can disable (6sec stun), plus i have 2 other 3second stuns that will give me a headstart to run away.  I'm only level 20 on my guardian, but I find it takes way too long to kill things compared to the other classes.

That's how I view it, and I know for a fact that most people would not support burglur as the best solo class, but it fits my style of gameplay very much.

I suggest LOTRO.  There are many options in gameplay from fellowship (parties) to solo questing to grinding thru kills.  I think the community is very friendly and inviting.  I used to play FFXI and WoW and have left them for LOTRO and enjoy its pace and content very much.