Lotro: Three Year Anniversary and Feelings in Regard

It would be only fitting that on this, more or less the three year anniversary of the launch of Lord of the Rings: Online, I spend some time discussing one of my favorite past times.

I haven't played lotro since its launch, but it's been darn close. I started sometime in September 2007 (as frightening as it is to think about), during the beginning of my college career. I've never been a hardcore player, raider, or anything of the like, but I've been around, and I've been through the games ups and downs, and intend to be around for awhile longer.

That said, I've had some great times in this game. It was my first MMO, and will likely be the longest I'll every play any MMO. Though part of it is surely nostalgia, I remember very fondly my first venture out of Combe with my Captain of Middle Earth, trying to find my arse with both hands and a flash light, having absolutely no idea how any of the game mechanics worked.

But it happened, ever so slowly. In large part thanks to the efforts of my kinship (guild) the Children of Illuvatar. Though it's somewhat depressing now, realizing that I've been in the kinship longer than most of my kin mates have been playing the game, I can say for a fact my kin made me believe two things I never thought I'd be convinced of: There is a such thing as online community and friendship, and because of this (among other things) pay to play is perfectly viable. Not only have I met friends in game, but I've met fraternity brothers hundreds of miles away that I never would have known otherwise. No regrets.

Even as I look back on the game, look at where it is now, and where it may or may not be going, two thoughts spring to mind:

1) I'll be playing it till the servers shut down, unless Turbine severely screws things up. And,
2) That said, there is a certain trend in the game I'm not happy with: The Gear Grind

I'll preface this with a short story. Earlier this year, being somewhat disillusioned with this game, I gave WoW a shot. My roommates play it as avidly as I play lotro, and I figured, why not? Ten millions subscribers give or take have to be right about something.

And after playing up to around level 20, I will say, I enjoyed it. It was fun. Interesting world, neat game mechanics. I can definitely see why people like it. But the one thing that stopped me from progressing any further was watching my roommates. Their end game is essentially summed up as grinding instances endlessly to get better gear so that they can try more difficult instances to get better gear, then run raids to get the best gear. Then, when you're either completely tweaked out, satisfied with good enough, or burned out, you turn around and start an alt or take a break from the game.

It's this linear gear centricity that had me turned off of the Mines of Moria expansion for lotro. Whatever happened to comparable incomparables? I remember a game where there were multiple paths to more or less the same goal. This is no longer the case. Crafting or any other avenue of progression has definitely become the red headed step child to instances and raiding. Combine this with Siege of Mirkwood's quizzical lateral gear 'progression' and I don't even know what they're going for at Turbine anymore.

I also despise radiance. I feel like Turbine is trying to beat blizzard at their own game. It's foolish. Back in the SoA days, I would randomly get invites to run six and twelve mans with people. Gear was really a secondary concern next to skill of the player. Those days, however are gone with radiance gating. I have never, since MoM, had a single random invite to an instance or raid asking for a captain. Radiance has, whether they wish to admit it or not, been a rather divisive wedge within the community and, I think, a failed experiment that they need to wash their hands of and move on. However, I'm not holding out hope.

However, for those subscribers, this poll recently shed some very revealing light on the state of things. Though the naysayers had wildly different reasons for voting no, the displeasure could be felt in the thread. Here's hoping that Turbine listens.

I'm not going to jump ship. Lotro is still one of the best games I've ever played. Plus, I'm a lifer. I'll be sticking around. I think radiance stinks. Legendary Items are anything but. I really think Turbine needs to get back to the roots of what made SoA great: community, creativity, story, envelopment, and just generally Middle Earth. Don't try to beat WoW at being WoW! It can't be done! We'll see what the fall brings in terms of announcements and new expansions.