What I think would be pretty cool, and might actually work, is have a theme park MMO.  Amusement park, I mean, not the derogatory term. You could design roller coasters and rides and such (like RollerCoaster Tycoon), then go around and ride other people's.

Each server would be like one big amusement park.

And beyond the ride creating there could even be some RPG aspects. At least quests. Go do this and that for a reward. 

Pretty easy though, when you can go six months without ever hearing another player talk (or type).

1) It depends on the area, but it goes from the normal to the ridiculous (Deer in Evendim)

2) Same as above. The Misty Mountains pretty much has a mob every 5 feet. Most other places aren't as bad.

3) Yup. They're working on stripping out the group quests (because there are no more low level players, basically) but it's very slow going. Be several months before they get to those areas. Also adding a thing so you can solo the group book quests since there are no groups (again, several months before it will apply to the whole of Book 1)

4) Yup. The new update/xp will apparently do something, taking out some sort of delay.

This recently came up on the official LOTRO forums. Some guy complained about someone running 6 accounts, all tied together, and thus being really tough in PvP. Since it's basically like fighting 6 characters.

This was met, as usual when similar complaints are raised, with a staunch defense of said practice (complete with pictures of people crying, including that old Dawson's Creek favorite). Best Community Ever, by the way.

Why is this practiced defended so much, to the point of being such a jerk (using those pictures, calling the complainer a crybaby, etc), while Microtransactions are hated so much.

Both are basically "pay to win". In one case, the guy can pay for 6 (or however man) accounts a month, plus the computer hardware.  In the other, he's paying for cash shop items.

It seems to me, the latter is far more fair.  You have to spend $1000s on the hardware to multibox like that. Really it is only for the rich. By contrast, while cash shop stuff isn't for the poor, either, it's probably only $100 a month in the worst case scenario (unless you're nuts), which would be about the monthly fee.

I could maybe see a skill argument. But it's not like these guys actually play each character. But using hardware or programs to send the same commands to multiple characters. That's not skill, to me, that's cheating.  (Not to Turbine though, indeed, one of their devs does this, albeit only with 2 characters)

And moreover, if this practice is common (as it seems to be), doesn't that hurt players only with 1 character?

The thing is though, people like grinding. As long as it provides a measurable sense of improvement.

Grind goes bad when you need to do so much of it, it just causes despair.

Take Lotro for example. I don't have any quests I can do, so grinding is my only option to level up so I can get to Moria (and get more quests).  (See my sig for my character, haven't done a quest since August, but just leveled up a week ago by pure grinding for the last 3/4 of the level. And have to do it again. And again, and again.)

I need 160,000 xp to advance a level. At 300 xp per kill, it's going to take me about 500 kills. Seeing the xp bar go up very, very slowly just causes me to despair, so I quit after only maybe 10-20 minutes. (And I wouldn't even bother, if I hadn't $300 sunk into the game).

And then you need to grind deeds to get traits (or you won't be considered cool to hard core players and get to do raids. That requires killing 100s of the same monster). Ugh, no wonder many people call it Lord of the Grind. (And that doesn't even take into the count the grinding of raids needed).

By contrast, take Atlantica Online. It's pretty grindy, but even so, because the levels are twice as much (130 vs 65), you make more steady progress.  And it's not until you hit 95 that the exp curve goes nuts. Even then, you get about 5% just for playing. Not until you hit 110 does it really get horrible

Not that that game is perfect, indeed, it replaces the gear grind with having to spend tons of money in the cash shop to max out gear.

I think the game is just meant for a certain crowd, people who can play only a few hours a day, but can afk for long time periods.

College kids are perhaps the best, they can play more often. But also I guess people who work. They can afk while at work or while asleep, then do the fun stuff while they are active.

But for more active players, it's not so great.

And actually, unless things have changed since I quit, the best weapons in the game (until expert) are the ones you get from polishes. Armor was really the issue for me, at least

Good.

While I like grouping in MMORPGs, I don't think it should be forced.

This is especially bad because what if you have a lot of group content in your game, but only a small amount of players that level? This has essentially happened with LOTRO. It took me 5 months to gain one level, because there's only a handful of quests to do. So I had to level up by grinding. Which in LOTRO is a slow and painful process. Very slow and painful. Very painful and slow.

I'd love to group. But whenever I'm on, there's no one in the same region, much less someone who wants to group.

I don't get this. They make a big deal out of having you log in to get a birthday prize. And they give away complete trash. Even the weekend giveaways are better.

I got the 10 ambrosia cakes. But I guess the best possible reward would have been the blessing potion cake. Which they usually give at least once during a weekend giveaway, to everyone. But here, most people didn't get that.

Even that though, has a cash shop value of a whopping 100 gcoins (or $1).

Why is this company so damn cheap? My only other experience is with Sword of the New World and K2.  For the 6th month anniversary they gave away $5 worth of cash shop money. And then for they gave away wings, I think.

At any rate, they give away tons of CS stuff there. And they are generally regarded as a somewhat lousy company. But Ndoors is just so miserly. Why? I mean, it doesn't cost them anything, really. Virtual goods. And it seems like it just generates a ton of ill will.

Tonight is the 1 year anniversary of Atlantica Online. Ndoors made a big deal of it, and how people should log in at a certain time to get a prize.

What was this wonderful prize? Cake.  In my case, a time that slightly heals my characters. An item I already literally had 100s of, except this one is a cake, not the normal one, so won't stack. 

So basically, it's worse than nothing. If I keep it, it takes up valuable inventory space. (But hey, I can get 10 extra inventory slots for $15).

Another one that was really bad was in LOTRO.  Blueberry Tart recipes for all. (Of course, only a small fraction of characters could even cook, since how the profession system in it works for crafting). At least I could sell that to the vendor.

But why do companies do this? It just gets people angry.  Giving away trash is worse than giving away nothing.

I just can't do any timed quests, my internet connection is s l o w. Which also means I can't do the 120 upgrade quests.

Irks me that all of the sudden, they add a new mechanic to the game (timed quests). Maybe that works in Korea, where everyone live in a cities (I guess) and has uber internet or plays in cafes. But in NA, a lot of people barely have broadband...

Someone mentioned they also changed the cooldown on the lower level indy dungeons (90-98)? While I don't do them anymore (except when I need more enchant boxes), I used to do them every day, really helps to level.

Might be a bug though, seems to be some confusion on that point. But if it is a nerf, it stinks.

Every F2P game I've played has had a terrible updater/patcher program. And every pay to play one I've played (which actually isn't that many, and that includes Guild Wars) has a good one.

Atlantica - their updater causes no end of problems. Basically updates are simply dozens, hundreds even, of zips files. Once they are all downloaded, it then goes to unzip all the files. But what happens if one is corrupt for some reason? It dies and spits out an arcane error message. Every time a patch comes out, dozens of people post for help trying to get the patch to work. If not for helpful users and the guy who originally figured out how to find the bad file in question, none of these people would play the game again.

Runes of Magic - I really wanted to try this game. But I can't. Because apparently the patcher doesn't have a resume function. Some people have superfast connections. But many people have slowish one. It can take 6+ hours to download a patch that is a gig or two. They can't devote that long to one devoted session to simply patching a game. Or what if something happens? I tried like 3 times to patch this, and each time failed.

Most the other ones have similar issues (most are more like Atlanticas)

And yet, these are very simple things to do, I think. I don't know about resume (which doesn't seem to make it into web browser built in downloaders), but for corrupt files, there's all sorts of checksum methods. It amazes me that these companies are throwing away all these potential customers, when it would have just taken a little bit more effort (not that much) to make a more robust patcher.

For all my complaints about LOTRO, the game, it's patcher is wonderful. (Well, I have heard some bad things about the Turbine Download Manager, but that's different)

I actually think we'll see a blending of the two. We are already starting to see that. Or perhaps there wasn't even that big a difference?

I mean, in both types, you have to pay for content, essentially.  In P2P games, you generally have to buy the game, then buy every extra expansion pack for its content.

In F2P games, you don't have to buy the game or any extra patches, but generally speaking, higher level content requires use of the cash shop to actually do (Atlantica is a good example. Around level 97, you need to use a blessing license, and where I am, 115+, you need to buy atlas ore to uber up your gear to survive the super powered mobs).  As does any cosmetic goodies (clothes/mounts/hair).

Turbine seems to be at the forefront of combining the two types. D&D is one model. But in LOTRO, they've started sneaking in MTs (selling more character slots, shared storage and a mount as part of a Adventurer's pack) as well as moving away from the buy one xp every year or two model, in favor of buy a mini-xp a couple times a year. (Want to finish Moria? Forget a free update, you can finish it in our new mini-xp, Shadows Over Mirkwood)

Anyway, you can make a case that all MMORPGs are potentially pay to win. Or can be.  Pay to play ones simply have it done through 3rd parties (gold farmers), whereas most f2p ones will let you sell item mall items in game for gold.  And I believe some, like Eve, will allow selling of game time for in game currency, so that's sort of a compromise.

Just a warning though - first impressions are deceiving. I really loved the game, really really loved it. So much that after my first month I popped for the lifetime sub.

However, the game really sucks after the starter areas.  Since the free trial stops, there are basically no more people, so no more grouping. And the number of quests nosedives (and the originality of said quests) despite needing more and more xp to level (and thus needing to do more quests).

I'm not saying to quit playing, just don't do anything rash like I did, and spend $200 only to find out you have stopped having fun after a month or two.

Originally posted by Phasma

 

 

Hey guys, about to try this trial for LOTRO, it looks promising, but as I'm downloading I wanted some info from the veterans and current players before I myself test it.

A few basic things first...  Currency farmers, botters?  Are there many of them?  Are they handled  proffessionally the staff of LOTRO?

How linear/grind tough is the game?  I don't mind grinding, I just want to know the extent of it.

How's the community?  Accepting, elitist jerks, mix of both, etc.

I think that just about covers what I want some basic info on, thanks!

 

1) I've never seen any gold farmers in game, but have on occasional seen them spam in Bree. There's a button that both reports and ignores them, real nice

2) Lots and lots of grinding. And I say that having played two Korean MMORPGs (Atlantica and Sword of the New World). I would say they have less grinding than this.  Not only the leveling, what's worse is the grind you have to do to do deeds. Kills hundreds, almost 1000s of a given type of monster on a map.

3) Quiet, almost non-existent, but when you do finally interact with people, they are generally elitist jerks.

I doubt it, just be in german, and possibly a few patches behind (but might catch up).

Well, you got your wish. I just hope the quest line is halfway doable, unlike the other two recent mercs (which I couldn't do, anyway).

Hmmm, I would think it would be better for you guys to pay in Dollars. Isn't it pretty much worthless compared to the Euro? Like 1 Euro = $1.50, and the dollar is only going to get weaker and weaker and weaker and weaker.

Knowing NDoors, they'll probably end up having the item mall be the same, but convert dollars to euros 1:1.  Like 30 euros buys 3000 gcoins, instead of the exchange rate, which would be what, 20 euros = 3000 gcoins. But a year from now, probably be 1 Euro = $2.

I think Club Penguin should be ranked a lot higher.

Being a fan of Penguins (the animal), I couldn't help but notice that every Wal-mart had pre-paid cards for something called "Club Penguin" near the checkout. And that they seemed to sell a lot of them.

Conversely, it's hard not to notice how big a flop LOTRO is. The price of Moria (the boxed set) plummeted to $10, oh, about a month after release. And yet it still sits on shelves.

Turbine is great at taking huge existing franchises (LOTRO and D&D) and sucking all the fun and enjoyment out of them.

Also, while Atlantica did have a pretty good first 9 months or so, if you read the official forums, players are pretty close to being torches & pitchforks mode, over the lack of any real recent content (and the recent we did get really was awful).

See also the reaction to the laughable "Q&A" about it here. Virtually every poster makes fun of it.

That confuses a lot of people (including me) at first.  It's simply your division for Free League (the automated PvP tournaments that happen every few hours). 18th is the lowest, for new players, and 1 is the best.

The in game help goes into a lot more detail about it, what the level ranges are at least.