To Daking100:

I think the crafting system is good, but I prefer the system in EQ2 or even Horizons.

To the OP:

I have a lot of fun in game too! Welcome onboard!

edit: and to Markaj aka "I hate Vanguard more than anything else!", you will be happy to know they are patching the game right now!

I think Vanguard has tried to go the middle way, sliders but not with very much room for change in the sliders. I think EQ2 has the best customization so far. WoW is good but very limited. Vanguards is somewhat better than WoW, but only because the limits of the WoW sytem (too few choices). I must admit I am a little disappointed about this aspect of Vanguard.

A question I think is valid and I would like an answer to. Is it also possible to craft great gear? A good MMO really needs a good crafting system and good crafting system should either :

A: Supplement adventurers with things you can't get through adventuring, but you still feel that you need, or

B: Be able to make things that are just as good or even better than things you get adventuring.

Not saying every Joe out there should be able to make über items but time spent crafting should be awarded. So how is it?

Edit: This is a question to Virtuella of course, since you mentioned loot and loot systems. Sorry to go off-topic.

I have respect for everyone who leaves this game and does not feel it is for them. But saying it is a big and empty world is just a big fat lie. It is filled with lore and mobs and npcs and, at least on Gelenia, with other players. I can't believe how people actually manages to miss the huge amount of lore there is to discover. You find some of it through the very fun, to me, diplomacy minigame. BUT you alos find a lot of it through the ordinary quests.

Come on people, learn to read the quests and actually explore the gameworld. This is not a game you are being handfed everything, that is one of the strong points of this game (to a lot of us at least). If you don't like the game, fine then quit (and yes there are still bugs...) but don't lie about what is in the game!

I'm hoping to get into beta soon to see for myself...but it could be argued that the books are very much about the journey (both the physcial and the development of character). Therefore I think it really degrades from the immersiveness and epic feel if the world does indeed feel tiny. But then of course you have to take into account that they hopefully will be realeasing expansions that will include the whole of Middle Earth and then you simply can't make the world on a huge scale since it would be impossible to make it work gameplay wise.

And well yes, I love Vanguard too and it is a great game, but it is also a buggy game at this point.

Challenging quests: Even, I would say. Quests are pretty much the same in both games. One difference is that you can play WoW and level through quests, in Vanguard quests help but don't give as much xp.

Mounts: Vanguard has the best mounts no question about it! Might take you some really long time to get a very good mount though. Your first mount you can buy at lvl 10.

Popularity: Well, WoW of course! It has over 8 million subscribers! Vanguard has maybe betwenn 100 000 and 150 000, no one really knows as of yet.

Vanguard is a more complicated game, it has more complicated (and more rewarding, in my opinion) crafting and  a very fun diplomacy minigame. The reason I like Vanguard better is due to it giving more freedom, you can simply do more things, build houses, boats, get mounts that fly and you can reach whatever you see. No artifical walls in the world or instanced dungeons that break immersion (a lot of people like instanced dungeons and there are benefits to that system as well, like scripted encounters), a lot less hand holding than in WoW, the game lets you actually do stupid things! This is a great thing and gives a feeling of freedom.

WoW is by far the most polished game of the two, but I will play Vanguard due to the "deeper" gameplay options (I played WoW for 2 years, it is a great game as well).

A good amount of RAM is important in every MMO, maybe more so in Vanguard though.

I am playing Vanguard and loving it, I will probably become a founder member of Lotr. Right now I am trying to figure out how to get the time to play both games!

Thank you, puts a lot of my worries to rest. I am still concerned about character development and uniqness though.

Tell me, does the race you choose have any effect on gameplay or is it just cosmetical?

Vanguard IS a real RPG, and it is NOT as buggy as some people persist in saying. It is buggy yes, but it is improving all the time and is fully playable. But it is not a game for everyone, it does not reward you instantly and if you are just out there to level you will find it boring. But to us who love RP and a gorgeous open world that does not hold your hand, which is not instanced, which give you the freedom to develop your character into a unique character in a world that feels allive. To us it is a great game that gets better everyday.

But, I will play Lotr as well, it seems good too (and yes more polished than Vanguard, good for Turbine they cant afford another debacle) and the setting cant be better. I am somewhat worried about the simplicity in character development though, as some has mentioned. If this is the wrong impression, please correct me because I would love to be corrected!

Edit: Sorry, will try to keep to the subject. Yes I would love this to be a sandbox type of game. I have followed the development of Lotr since the first developers published they were making it. Then Middle earth online, back in what, 1999?

 A lot of people seem to think that the Vanguard community is too aggressive towards haters. I think the community has turned this way due to a lot of haters flooding the boards and spreading their hates about a game a  lot of people love, you will then get a defensive reaction. Has always been like this and will always be.

That said, in Vanguard - in the actual game, I think the community is fantastic. I have yet to meet anyone being sarcastic or throwing dirt at others! Most people I meet are helpul and friendly.

Of course this could differ from server to server, I play on the EU-server Gelenia.

I will probably pre-order and become a founder member just due to being a huge Tolkien fan, but what worries me is the simplicity some people are mentioning. Like all members of a class being virtually the same, very little in the way of forming your own character. Can you comment on this?

Also I play and love Vanguard right now, a little buggy but getting better. What I find good is the immense and open world and as stated above lots of options for making your character unique. Also it really feels like a living world (much like EQ I agree with that statement of yours).

I liked WoW and played for 2 years, but found it a little too simple and shallow for my preference. So in gameplay terms and complexity where does Lotr stand?

VanGrind....well it is a grind, if  YOU choose to make it one! I for one use these games as a back drop for RP, wow imagine that! And Vanguard has a fantastic world for RPers. And also the grinding you do in fact do is very fun, and this is something I did not expect!

But sure, if all you want to do is level level level, then this game will probably feel somewhat daunting...