anybody playing LOTRO?

was wondering if anybody still play this game, i wanted to start it as well, but dont want to be alone on the server :)

I play LotRO on the Vilya server. I'm a super casual player there, but as I have a lifetime account I still go back and fool around with it now and then. It's a great game, as long as you're a big fan of the lore.

I have played it off and on since 2011 (made my account with a free trial back in 2009 when Moria expansion came). It's not a bad free to play game, and you can earn their cash shop currency in game. My drawback with that is it isn't a whole lot (5-10 tp) when compared to many things (quest packs cost 500+ tp). Edit: Forgot to mention I play on the Landroval RP encouraged server as a member of the Lonely Mountain Band. I shouldhop in there again soon.

» Edited on: 2013-02-23 09:49:17

Hm, thought I replied to this. I have a lifetime founders account, bought that back when it was in Beta, but I don't play much beyond the seasonal events, anymore. But I'm also on Brandywine, moved there about 5 years ago from Windfola and moving servers in LOTRO sucks and is expensive.

I used to play. I finally gave it up on RoR release. I finally realized all my hard work was really for nothing and the game was too far away from the game that I loved for several years. I cringed at Free to play when it came out and it only got worse :/ Hope you find a few to play with, but I won't ever really go back.

I miss LOTRO more than I miss any MMO. Right before Moria and even during, it was an amazing game. When it went to F2P, the roof caved in and it became a microtransaction nightmare. I check in every once in a while, but I really lost the stomach for it. Such a shame too... The potential was phenomenal.

Used to play. Got screwed on my founder's account when it went free to play, and most of my kinship and friends left the game for SWTOR and other greener pastures. I enjoyed it, but as mentioned before, it is not the same game it was before free to play. If you want to get anywhere or get the good equipment/weapons, you have to get in with one of the regular dungeon running groups, because none of them can be done with any ease from a pug (ran dragon before RoR expansion came out over 20 times and never once was able to get past third phase). That, and there is a LOT of grinding involved, for crafting, skills, and levels. I played from beta forward until RoR with characters on Arkenstone, Brandywine, and Silverlode. If you do head over, look up a kinship called Kingdom of Hibernia, and tell Fluff, their leader, that Tarendel says hi!

Starwynde: Was your account a Founder's or a Lifetime? Lifetimes made out like bandits, I know, mine is a Lifetime, but a Founder's account was just special pricing until it was cancelled, so they were treated just like any other paid subscription account, except that they got bonus Turbine Points that the other subscription accounts did not get.

It was lifetime, that got bumped to founder's (there was a few of us on the server who had that issue... apparently had to do with an issue on the LOTRO end of things and they said they lost the data indicating what account status we had). Because they apparently had no record of me having a Lifetime (I didn't have the bank statement to prove we paid for it) they gave me founder's pricing, which I had before I got the lifetime as a christmas/birthday gift from my hubby. I thought it was a little odd that they had no record, but I was happy just to get back into my account and find my characters were still intact.

Ouch, bummer. I had not heard about that happening to anyone. Personally, I really like the direction the game has taken since it went F2P, I honestly believe that the new influx of funds help turn the game around. I was starting to worry it would not make it to Rohan, much less all the way to Mordor, but now I can actually visualize my character(s) standing on the precipice in Mount Doom, where Frodo and Golem fought over final ownership of the One Ring. I should give it a lot more time than I do, but I get distracted by all the new shinies that keep getting released (and ultimately, disappointed by them, but I digress).

I still enjoy the game, I just find it hard to pay for something that I shouldn't have to. I had a hard time with some of the changes made when it went f2p, and I found myself answering in chat all too often "well, it USED to be like this, or we USED to have to do that, everytime someone complained about how much a mount cost, or how hard it was to get armor or weapons. Might go back at some point, but currently lacking time for too much of anything right now.

Well, looks like we're all scattered about on different servers, as it tends to be with games like this. I'm rather amazed LotRO has so many servers, but I gather it must be because of the relatively small number of characters each server can hold? Unfortunately LotRO is very unforgiving when it comes to starting new toons. It's not just the gear you have to replace, but all those virtues you have to grind up yet again! Granted, you can handle pretty much everything but raids without max virtues.

Moving servers is very difficult, too. It costs about $25 a toon and you lose any housing and... some other stuff, too, I forget what, exactly. I moved from Windfola to Brandywine back around 2009. I have 10 characters, all level 20 or above, so needless to say...

I would have no problem changing servers (though I tend to stay away from non-rp servers now), if all my lotro store purchases that weren't expansion packs or quest packs, carried over to other servers as well. I like the cosmetics I have on Landroval, and would miss them on another server. And $25 to transfer servers is just...

Hi, I'm new to the Family (and sorry for the necro of this thread in advance....) and I have been a fairly regular player of LotRO since early 2009.  I went through a time where I was not getting on much due to the community I had built up having grown apart with most people going off to other games.

I created a Kinship on the Brandywine server called the "Alliance of the West" and I still maintain the website for it although it's really only myself that accesses it regularly.  The biggest reason being that I have not actively grown the Kinship having been satisfied with the small group of regular role players that were still around, whether they have characters in the Kinship or not.

Here is the url to my site and it explains why the Kinship exists.  http://www.guildportal.com/Guild.aspx?GuildID=315671&TabID=2646570  In short, it was established primarily for gathering like-minded Tolkien lore oriented role-players, with also wanting to provide a gaming community to help with questing, crafting, Fellowship instances, skirmishing, raids, etc.  We never got too much into growing the gaming side.

I have taken a renewed interest in growing that again since I have stepped away from a director role in an large EVE Online corporation.

LotRO has it's good points and bad.  It was shocking to read and hear of Starwynde's experience with the Lifetime account.  As with any game that has an ongoing F2P model you will get the trolls and such and some of those can be annoying.  To me, F2P is a brilliant marketing idea, essentially creating an open-ended trial account situation that tends to draw the subscription adverse into spending money towards the micro-transaction end, which I think Turbine/WB probably make more money over a subscriber.  I pay annually so my monthly cost is low and I do enjoy the lore and game.

I can see where Turbine gained some ideas from GW2 and incorporated those into the current game.

Anyway, for those who are interested or would maybe be looking for a renewed life in the game feel free to contact me.  My Kinship Leader character is Gilhirdor and again, I am on Brandywine server.