LOTRO is now officially free-to-play

So is the whole game free apart from the expansions and some quests?

“Start your adventure today at lutrol.com” lulwut?

“You shall not pay!” Good one.

@1 Sorry I don’t get it.

So, how do you feel now that it’s free-to-play, Stephany? Has it changed the game in any major way for you?

@3
I was just wondering what exactly was limited for free players but i see that they’ve got a chart on their site with all the details.
So it seems like free players do have full access to all of the world (except the expansion places) and have the same level cap as premium players. Looks like the stuff free players dont get is pretty trivial.

Why isn’t this available for Mac??? ARGGGGGHHHHHH

@5 I was talking about the “Start your adventure today at lutrol.com” comment. I didn’t get it for some reason, probably because my joke detector was smashed earlier this morning.

@4 Well, I played around in the store a bit (too much I might add) during early access, but I stayed as far away from it as possible last night due to not being in the mood to deal with waiting in line for mobs, having tanks come up and steal my mob while the induction time on my bow runs out, etc. I will probably do nothing else but play it tomorrow. Then, I’ll let you know what I think.

@5

The expansions have all the content for the higher levels, as far as I know. If free players are indeed able to reach the same level cap they put on with the latest expansion, they’ll have a hell of a time grinding in the lower level areas to reach it…

I played up through the end of the Mines of Moria back when that came out, so there’s no point to me going back and playing for free unless I decided to start a new character. I might eventually get around to buying the second expansion (or third, if there is one?), I don’t really have the time for it now.

@7
Bah, i just found their pronunciation LOTRO funny.

@8
Well on the chart it says that the level cap for all 3 types of players is 50. Maybe that isnt including any extra levels the expansions added.

Whilst I don’t think this hunk of junk laptop will run it, free is free *downloads*

@8 F2P folks can lvl up to 50. The rest are lvl 65, including the new area. No new lvl cap for a while yet.

@6: Because Mac is busy sucking balls.

The downloader tool you get off their site is insanely slow. If you want to download this and play it within the next 5 hours find another way.

I´v installed the standard clinet, it installs pandabooster and after that the download speed of the files is maximum[6mibt].

Now i´v played few hours and compared with Everquest 2 ext. i think it is the better game. I still would playe eq2ext just because it has faster ggameplay. Lotro is only for people with time and some balls to redo same quest[or similar] over and over, “bring me 5 fallen appels from the end of the map” and so on….i managed to reach lvl 12 very fast, but the extremly sloooow pace/speed of the game and the never ending quests, i s just not what i want. You basicly are lvling byu doing quests and quests all the time, you never will fight monsters in those quests, like “help the farmer Millier, he is under attack”..no forget it, this is a pure pve questing game…lvl12 hobbit hunter..[zfme]

I have played LOTRO, and here is what I advise:

http://www.everquest2.com/

It is also free to play now. The F2P servers have been live in open beta from a couple of weeks now. They too have tiered membership levels, and a lot of stuff for sale in the marketplace store.

In both games you could spend a little or a lot or nothing at all.

In EQII Extended the free level cap is 80. The game offers like 24 different classes to play. Several skill trees in each class to customize with. Pet based classes like Conjuor(elemental) and Necromancer(undead), Rouges, Fighters, Rangers, priests, and the normal standard stuff plus shape shifters, bards and pirate types.

After playing both LOTRO and EQII(and wow, and about everything else that my pcs will run), my two cents is that EQII just has more. Races, classes, 9 profesions/crafting, a huge world, etc.

LOTRO isn’t bad, I’d give it a 6.5 to 7.0.

I’d give EQII a solid 8.0.

By comparison I’d give WoW a 8.5.

Where as wow has been reduced to grinding in end game raids/pvp/heroics/dailies for rep/gold/and gear. EQII and LOTRO focus more on the journy to end game and not the simple destination of being the best geared at end game.

Where as wow offers cookie cutter classes each with its own optimal(read right) talent spec build, EQII at least offers a hella lot of ways to customize your builds. They can be very different and still be effective.

If I was looking to play something I hadn’t. If I was looking to play a free MMORPG. I would download both LOTRO and EQII Extended, even if you had tried them long ago, both games have matured.

The last bit, I will say is that, EQII downloads the client as you play. And no I don’t understand how they can do that either, but they do. If you create an account now, you will be in game playing in less then 10mins.

@12

Right…right.
But tell me, is that before or after beating Windows in customer satisfaction in each and every survey???