Revisiting LOTRO impressions

[shiznitz]

I would love to get into the minds of people who actually use their mouse to manually select a hotkey'd icon. Seriously, how can you PLAY like that? I have not manually clicked an icon since I configued UO to my F keys (and ALT-Fkey, and CLTR-Fkey).

I mouse-click all icons in EQ2 and VG. My left fingers are on WASD and my right fingers are on the mouse. There is no easy way for me to hit 4 through -, let alone ctrl/alt + 4 through - without taking my hands either off WASD or off the mouse, either of which impacts maneuverability. In EQ2 my zerk is constantly shifting his position to keep the mobs' backs to the rogues and keep the mobs within AE arcs. In VG, where I play casters exclusively, the cooldowns for everything mean I cannot just hit 1,2,3,4,5 repeatedly and if I did I would get aggro anyway.

[Falconeer]

I would love to get into the minds of people who actually use their mouse to manually select a hotkey'd icon. Seriously, how can you PLAY like that? I have not manually clicked an icon since I configued UO to my F keys (and ALT-Fkey, and CLTR-Fkey).

I mouse-click all icons in EQ2 and VG. My left fingers are on WASD and my right fingers are on the mouse.

Exactly. My mind can't compute anything different than that. 

[Merusk]

Seriously, LoTRO keeps positively surprising me day after day. I can't understand why oh WHY they neglected such little things about the legendary "Combat Done Right" that WoW somehow achieved. I hope patches will bring Turbine to their senses.

Like most 'wtf' PvE combat aspects, WoW does't have it because of PvP.  /sticky and /face were deemed 'lame' a long time ago, so they left them out so you could actually get out of range of specials and have a more engaging PvP combat.

[Sky]

You guys suck at mmo combat lolzerz 

 

[Falconeer]

Tsk. My autoattack is better than yours. 

[Endie]

I would love to get into the minds of people who actually use their mouse to manually select a hotkey'd icon. Seriously, how can you PLAY like that? I have not manually clicked an icon since I configued UO to my F keys (and ALT-Fkey, and CLTR-Fkey).

I mouse-click all icons in EQ2 and VG. My left fingers are on WASD and my right fingers are on the mouse....In EQ2 my zerk is constantly shifting his position to keep the mobs' backs to the rogues

This is very true: in WoW pvp I am always moving backwards and angling at the same time in order to stop the bouncing rogues from getting into backstab position.  To do that and be able to select targets and mouselook means that I have to rely on my third hand to press function keys.

[Sky]

DVD Box in hand 

edited to add: Am I the first to get my DVD in? Because that would be ironic as heck.

[Numtini]

I usually use 1-3 for my most common macros and the mouse, which my right hand is on, for the rest. My hand just doesn't reach comfortably past the 3. Or honestly, I'm not so reliable on what key I hit either.

[Modern Angel]

Nah, I've had it in hand since 11am this morning. Went off without a hitch though that may be because it's pretty much just the preorder on, or mostly. Not seen anyone who hadn't preordered on yet.

[angry.bob]

So does the DVD have the super high res pack that people were downloading in beta? And if so, does it make a big difference?

[CmdrSlack]

DVD Box in hand 

edited to add: Am I the first to get my DVD in? Because that would be ironic as heck.

Mine came at 9 AM....thirty minutes after my order status at gamestop.com changed from processing to shipped.

/boggle

[Glazius]

I discovered something that eased my pain, not actually fixing any of the above mentioned gripes but modifying the attack mechanic enough to let it be more satisfying (or less frustrating).
Usually, when I target a mob and hit the attack button, or just right click on it to start auto attack 8 out of 10 times I get an "out of range" message and the attack fails to start. That's because:

In this case it wasn't the autoattack. I hit one minstrel song and queued another one, but it failed with an "out of range" message even though in some cases the target was already right up in my grill. It only happened when I tried to beat the autoattack "tempo" by firing off more than one minstrel song per autoattack cycle.

--GF

[Numtini]

I can never tell if the song isn't firing or the melee attack isn't.

[Venkman]

On Minstrels if you try to activate a Tier 2 or 3 song before the casting is done of a Tier 1 or 2 song, it will not successfully cast and STILL smack you with the refresh timer.

I mouse-click all icons in EQ2 and VG. My left fingers are on WASD and my right fingers are on the mouse. There is no easy way for me to hit 4 through -, let alone ctrl/alt + 4 through - without taking my hands either off WASD or off the mouse, either of which impacts maneuverability. In EQ2 my zerk is constantly shifting his position to keep the mobs' backs to the rogues and keep the mobs within AE arcs. In VG, where I play casters exclusively, the cooldowns for everything mean I cannot just hit 1,2,3,4,5 repeatedly and if I did I would get aggro anyway.

My fingers are basically the same layout. What I have done over the years is put all of the my "need to use while moving" functions in the 1-5 slots (and CTRL+1-5 and SHIFT+ 1-5), which I can easily reach while pressing WASD. Higher than that is where I put abilities I don't need to use while moving around, things like group buffs, ranged damage on targets pinned by tanks, etc.

I also use, liberally, the left/right mouse button combo which in WoW, LoTRO and I think EQ2 let you run in the direction you are facing, which is good for drivebys and kiting if your character has such abilities.

[Numtini]

On Minstrels if you try to activate a Tier 2 or 3 song before the casting is done of a Tier 1 or 2 song, it will not successfully cast and STILL smack you with the refresh timer.

Ah, ok. That makes it kind of hard to queue the songs then.

[Ixxit]

So does the DVD have the super high res pack that people were downloading in beta? And if so, does it make a big difference?

If you already have a current installation (from beta) just put the retail DVD in the drive and when the installer comes up,  check the repair option, which will ask you if you want to instal the high res textures.  The high res textures  make  the character armor look a lot more detailed; armor chinks  and seams and folds in leather are very distinct and almost bump mappy.  The ground textures appear a little sharper as well.  Overall a very subtle effect ( I am running the game on Ultra high anway so maybe that minimized the effect) so unless you are constantly stopping oogling everything/body  then you probably won't notice as much when things are in motion.

[Mesozoic]

I bought the game yesterday once I tracked it down; the local Best Buy was sold out, which was actually encouraging.  So far I've played a Human Hunter (I refuse to be called Man Hunter) to level 6 and a Dwarf Champ to level 5.  The Champ is my preferred so far.  The attack animations seem to work well and combat is interesting.

I didn't care for the Hunter; the slow timing of the special attacks left me feeling like I was better off just auto-attacking.  I'm sure the numbers work out to be better with the special attacks, but overall combat seemed disjointed and awkward.

I like the overall absence of magic and the way Turbine adjusted the classes to work around that.  It gives the game a more gritty feel to it than WoW.  Of course my last WoW char was a Blood Elf, not exact a gritty race.

Is there no rest system in LOTR?  I never noticed this before, but having played this, I LIKE the absence of a rest system.  Its nice to be able to log off in the woods without feeling like you're penalizing yourself.   I'm an adventurer, goddammit, I don't need a fluffy pillow in a tiny inn to spend the night.

I'm on Arkenstone.  Is there a (semi-) official f13 server?

[Falconeer]

What about pulling off the ***BETA*** tag in the forum title, by the way?

[Endie]

...
I like the overall absence of magic and the way Turbine adjusted the classes to work around that.  It gives the game a more gritty feel to it than WoW.  Of course my last WoW char was a Blood Elf, not exact a gritty race.
...
Is there no rest system in LOTR?  I never noticed this before, but having played this, I LIKE the absence of a rest system.  Its nice to be able to log off in the woods without feeling like you're penalizing yourself.   I'm an adventurer, goddammit, I don't need a fluffy pillow in a tiny inn to spend the night.
...

I agree on the lack of magic.  I like the difference it makes in feel to the generic_fantasy_land_019 thing that (ironically) the third-gen Tolkien spinoffs tend to have.

There is a rest system, by the way.  It seems to accrue pretty quickly, too.  I don't know eher it works and where it doesn't: I also like the fact that not everything is explained in detail, but I admit that most people might prefer greater transparency of the mechanics.

[zubey]

You don't need to log out anywhere special to accumulate rest/bonus experience.  You get it automatically from just not being logged-in.  You'll see it as a blue bar tacked at the end of your experience bar.

The bonus xp only applies to kills, though -- not quests.

[Modern Angel]

You know what I love about this game? It feels organic. Someone described it as a melange of EQ2 and WoW and they're spot on. EQ2 seemed almost too messy for me out in the world, maybe because the forced grouping made it seem too dangerous to wander aimlessly. WoW, now that I'm playing LOTRO way to much, seems almost sterile. It's like it was made in a lab, with scientisty types looking over the shoulders of the testers calculating precisely how many quests per square mile for levelling should go in.

LOTRO's big and just enough of a mess to feel real without going over into the world half of the spectrum enough to hurt its mass market appeal. I like it, more than I thought I would. I still have my WoW for some Karazhan raids and my scads and scads of friends, but I'll be damned if I've touched it in four days and I hadn't expected that.

The honeymoon will wear off. I've absolutely no confidence that Turbine can pull off a raiding endgame. Raiding requires a certain mathematical precision in its underlying mechanics to get right and they can't even get the crafting economics right. But until then wandering around aimlessly, oooing and ahhing at Weathertop or Bag End and a healthy dose of monster play is enough to keep me pretty much enthralled for awhile.

[Numtini]

My big criticism of WOW partiularly the early levels is that it is like a MMPORPG on rails--very directed almost like a single player game. (Yes, this is also WOW's strength and a major reason it is such a huge hit.) And that's not a feeling I get with LOTRO. There seem to be more quests at the lower levels than WOW and they offer more choice. I'm in the human lands and I got a quest to leave the town and go to Bree and then I got more quests in town and it occurred to me that this is something you never see in WOW--when you get the quest that directs you to move on, it's a huge signpost to move on--you've pretty much finished up everything in that area or you've levelled to the point where its not worth doing. It is mathematical in that fashion.

I think they will toss in some raids, but I think the raiders will go back to WOW. I hope they won't chase that dream and will mostly do events and single group stuff in the way they did for AC.

[Aranarth]

Cancelled my preorder at the slew of things that are missing or wrong with this game.  They almost copied WoW, but the game isn't complete in most areas.  I really liked the environment design, how every section of a zone had a distinctive look, but I had major issues with their UI implementation, their experience distribution, and their tradeskills system.

Ditto except I never bothered to preorder.

I was very involved for years in the community in anticipation of this one. Started playing in Alpha-2 back in August of 06. Gave it up around November and have no desire to play this game.

WoW lite in a Middle Earth wrapper..............................

[Endie]

Um, my condolences?

[Tebonas]

Thats why I feel like an old geezer more and more. I don't get the MMOG-generation.

For me everything that holds my interest for three month is worth the money I spend for it. If it wouldn't be I would certainly have to check my sanity for wasting three months on it...

[Mesozoic]

Well, I'm digging it.  I've now tried the Hunter, Champion, Captain, Lore-Master and Minstrel.  Of those I thought only the LM was a disappointment.  I'm enjoying the minstrel.  A series of spell-songs sounds like a coherent tune, at least at level 6.  And I even managed to scrap together enough silver to buy a lute, to while away the down-time.

[Modern Angel]

Thats why I feel like an old geezer more and more. I don't get the MMOG-generation.

For me everything that holds my interest for three month is worth the money I spend for it. If it wouldn't be I would certainly have to check my sanity for wasting three months on it...

I absolutely dig what you're saying. LOTRO is probably a three month experiment for me, at longest until Spore or Conan comes out. That's money well spent given how few of my musty old wargames they release these days.

Further reflection: crafting is an absolute mess and will cause some small segment to quit. Why? Because the economy's so out of whack on it that people won't realize how broke they are until they've already blown a wad on it. I was floored that my training at 20 amounted to 160 silver... and then I looked at my best friend and how he has 70 copper to h is name at level 17 because of crafting and repairs. There's going to be some frustrated people.

[CmdrSlack]

I was floored that my training at 20 amounted to 160 silver... and then I looked at my best friend and how he has 70 copper to h is name at level 17 because of crafting and repairs. There's going to be some frustrated people.

There already are.  There's a thread on the gen dis boards at the official forums about exactly that issue.  Basically, if you don't spend time killing stuff solo, you won't have squat for cash when the lv 20 training crunch hits.  Granted, there's ways to "think around" that or whatever, but the people who are solely questing -- in groups -- are the ones who will be hardest hit.  I haven't yet started using the AH, but I can see how it's going to be necessary to do so very soon.  At the moment, the only really viable tradeskill set is explorer -- largely because you can sell the ore, ingots, hides and boiled hides on the AH for a tidy sum.  The open beta period created a subset of people who just played one character to 15 and then farmed cash -- so they're looking to spend.  People like me who tried to level a few characters to 15 get by just fine, but I also primarily solo and have no problems killing the junk in my path.  I also explore and work on completing deeds/traits, so I tend to kill a ton of junk in that process.

The main trick for the cash starved is to go farm neekers and other insects in the midgewater marsh, or go hunt humanoids like goblins and brigands.

[Modern Angel]

I've found Tinkering to be relatively self-sufficient, too, though I suspect that's more to do with the fact that I don't have to buy retardedly expensive mats from the trainer than anything else.

[CmdrSlack]

One thing I just learned from that heckalong thread was that there's a supplier in Bree (in the town hall?) that sells wax for 12c instead of 48c.  It's sad that I'm planning to find this guy...but hell, bolts of rough cloth are over 1s in cost....levelling tailoring on anything but medium armor would be insane, IMO.  Some of the materials are just wayyy too costly.

I may have gimped (i.e. doomed him to some serious grinding time) my hobbit burglar simply because I tried to level up his farming at one point.  Now that they've broken that, he's just kind of sitting there.  Cooking seems like it'll be nice once I get him some more cash and he can afford to cook again.  Food provides a very clear benefit and should be desirable to others on the AH, I guess.

[Xanthippe]

The crafting system being broken has really lessened my desire to play.  It's my main enjoyment in MMOs these days, and if I can't craft, I'd rather go play a console game or something. 

[Sky]

Despite my infamous craftard remarks in SWG thread #872, I agree that having a solid crafting component is important to me, as well.

When I was adventuring in Butcherblock with my paladin last night, it got dark and I logged him out and logged in another character who was in town and spent the 'night' crafting. Sun came up and I logged back in with my paladin and kept on swinging sword.

The EQ2 crafting changes were one of the best changes in mmo history. I was leafing through an old notebook last night and stumbled across pages of notes for EQ2 subcombines, so I could total the raw ingredients needed for each crafted item. There was a convoluted tree of ingredients with each subcombine's recipe list branching down, each took up a page. I had one crafter then, my Sage, who I think was level 20 when I had last played before the changes. After the changes, I have almost all my  alt characters over 20 in crafting with two at/around 30, and tons of useful gear that really helps my solo playstyle.

[Venkman]

I was considering leveling crafting concurrent to normal questing, but I remembered trying to do so in EQ1 and WoW. It's really not worth it for me right now for two reasons:

1) quests STILL (here as in WoW) give better rewards than crafted stuff. People will more quickly outgrow crafted until they realize it's not worth investing in crafted goods at all until maybe later levels, assumging it gets better. This isn't the fault of LoTRO, but rather the convention they're following. It's just easier to control the relative power of players by releasing content in a contrived fashion.

2) Costs. I would rather hoard my cash until I know what I'll need in mid and late levels. Hard lesson from EQ1. WoW was the same way. Training (and Talent respecs) were INITIALLY tough on newbies until the mid-game. Nowaday's everyone's a twink. In time Turbine will adjust the costs and people will have more cash.

In short, unless the crafting system puts out universally good stuff that are arguably at least as good as what can easily be gotten from solo questing, it's a money sink for folks looking to do more than just quest.

[CmdrSlack]

quests STILL (here as in WoW) give better rewards than crafted stuff. People will more quickly outgrow crafted until they realize it's not worth investing in crafted goods at all until maybe later levels, assumging it gets better. This isn't the fault of LoTRO, but rather the convention they're following. It's just easier to control the relative power of players by releasing content in a contrived fashion.

The mastery level items in each tier and the journeyman and higher tier items (also the lootable recipes, even for the first tier) are actually pretty spiffy and are useful even at early levels.  I say this based only on experience with tailoring medium armor and weaponcrafting/woodworking, but there ARE nice items that you can theoretically sell on the AH to newbies and whatnot.

[Venkman]

My point was that this is generally the case when a game is new and players haven't seen what quests give. In a few months they'll realize quests give better for less, by a) it costing no money; and, b) them being how they'll normally play anyway because Quest XP is the fastest way to level AND give items. The game seems balanced right now based on what the average player can get and right now the average seems stats from quest gears. And leveling seems to happen fast enough that buying gear you'll quickly outgrow while training costs are so high isn't worth it.

HOWEVER, I have seen some stat on that talks about "crit" during creation. Does that mean that someone can create something of variable quality ala EQ2?

Also, importantly, the high training cost seems based on the player expectation that they can train every spell they get the moment they level up. That's the case even for rank newbs in WoW, but wasn't really in the early days of EQ1... unless they played the market or were twinked. Interesting way for Turbine to go.

Unless it's a bug :)