Lord of the Rings Online

Malkav_sl said:

Meh, wanted to try it again, but it seems you had to do something to transfer an euro account from Codemasters to Turbine like 2 years ago and it's no longer possible.

So, I've lost everything, and really don't want to start back up again.

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Not sure if I ever did this. What happens to people who bought the lifetime sub thing ?

Malkav_sl said:

Meh, wanted to try it again, but it seems you had to do something to transfer an euro account from Codemasters to Turbine like 2 years ago and it's no longer possible.

So, I've lost everything, and really don't want to start back up again.

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Taken from:Selected Topic

"The Codemasters to Turbine account transfer service for players of The Lord of the Rings Online? is now closed. It is no longer possible to transfer European Codemasters accounts to Turbine's billing system.

We no longer have any ability to assist with any former European Codemasters LOTRO accounts, characters, or information, and no longer have access to non-migrated accounts or payment information.

In accordance to EU privacy laws, when Turbine took over operations for LOTRO EU on June 1st, 2011, an account owner had to directly choose to share the account information with Turbine. In order to access any part of a LOTRO EU account, it had to be migrated from Codemasters to the Turbine Global Service. Communication on the operations transition was sent by Codemasters to the email address on the Codemasters account. Turbine also sent communication via email if the email address was available. There were also announcements on LOTRO Codemasters and Turbine websites and forums regarding the account transfer service.

The migration process was available from May 31st, 2011 until November 9th, 2011 for all players with LOTRO EU Codemasters accounts. All LOTRO EU players migrating their accounts had the same limitations and time deadlines. Please note that banned accounts were not eligible for migration."

To be honest, what McCheese posted earlier is true. The best thing about the game is the journey, racing to the end is not the way to enjoy it, so starting over might not be too bad especially if you've not played in a while.

Running Dog_sl said:

To be honest, what McCheese posted earlier is true. The best thing about the game is the journey, racing to the end is not the way to enjoy it, so starting over might not be too bad especially if you've not played in a while.

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And with the way they've streamlined the story quests, you don't have to worry about being cockblocked by a group quest at low levels where finding a group might be a pain in the ass. You can solo through all of those now with a mega-buff they give you for that purpose. Of course, you can also still do it the group way too, as I understand it.

They really have done Middle Earth justice, filling in the holes and such in the books in a manner fairly true to the spirit of the world and the work. If you love Lord of the Rings, this is a theme park ride worth taking. I know I am certainly going to pop in at some point and get to Helm's Deep, shit, my captain was there the first minute this opened, and he is going to be there waving his halberd in defiance at the Black Gate when they get there.

Running Dog_sl said:

The elf area is the best place to do your first quests since you'll pick up Turbine points the fastest there, and you can use those for buying riding skills.

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Can I make my way to the Elf starting area after leaving the Archet newbie instance? Also I apparently have 6 anniversary boxes one of which has a mount so I guess I just need training.

Faltigoth_sl said:

And with the way they've streamlined the story quests, you don't have to worry about being cockblocked by a group quest at low levels where finding a group might be a pain in the ass. You can solo through all of those now with a mega-buff they give you for that purpose. Of course, you can also still do it the group way too, as I understand it.

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That was my biggest gripe at release. Getting cock blocked because there wasn't a large enough population to keep moving forward. Stalled out in my 30s and just uninstalled. Had a great time with the content and their "origin" story initiations to tie into the quest lines. I think LOTRO is why I enjoyed War in the North so much.

I played this a couple years ago and had to bow out around 40 because I simply couldn't find anyone wanting to do group content. Those changes make me want to fire it up again.

Skrigg_sl said:

Can I make my way to the Elf starting area after leaving the Archet newbie instance? Also I apparently have 6 anniversary boxes one of which has a mount so I guess I just need training.

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Yes, although Archet is the most "out of the way" of the starting areas From Archet you go to Combe(?) and then take a ride to West Bree. From West Bree you can reach the other starting areas by fast travel - Celondim is the elf place. Each starting area has a different start to the epic quest line but they soon converge into a single thread.

Riding training costs turbine points. Most of the mounts you can buy for gold in game, or are rewards for the festivals they hold.

Arguing with some people over The Hobbit changes made me realize I never gave this game a try.

Where (if anywhere) do people go for forums for "rotations" and such? Or is the combat so trivial at low levels it does not matter?

Also, are there any significant differences in the storylines for various classes / races? If so what should I be trying first, as someone who hasn't read the books in like a decade?

I would imagine the LOTRO forums have all of that info. Race/class differences are not that profound, the story merges at level 10, like 2 hours in. Low levels, you only have a fraction of your abilities so there isn't that much to figure out.

It is well worth a playthrough just for the story quests, if you are even the most minor LOTRO fan. They did a fine job capturing the essence of Tolkien, as well as a very good job at filling in the blanks in the narrative. Though I am still surprised that they did not go east for an expansion at Dale / The Lonely Mountain. Huge fight happens there, would have been a good 'time waster' to delay the inevitable end at Mordor, which the game is closing in on. Instead they just gave it a couple of instances and called it a day; with the Hobbit's release, you would think they would have capitalized by moving to a part of the world that is fresh in everyone's minds.

Faltigoth_sl said:

I would imagine the LOTRO forums have all of that info. Race/class differences are not that profound, the story merges at level 10, like 2 hours in. Low levels, you only have a fraction of your abilities so there isn't that much to figure out.

It is well worth a playthrough just for the story quests, if you are even the most minor LOTRO fan. They did a fine job capturing the essence of Tolkien, as well as a very good job at filling in the blanks in the narrative. Though I am still surprised that they did not go east for an expansion at Dale / The Lonely Mountain. Huge fight happens there, would have been a good 'time waster' to delay the inevitable end at Mordor, which the game is closing in on. Instead they just gave it a couple of instances and called it a day; with the Hobbit's release, you would think they would have capitalized by moving to a part of the world that is fresh in everyone's minds.

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IIRC its a complicated issue of licensing. If it's mentioned in the LOTR then they can include it. If it's in the Hobbit they can't because they don't have the license for it. Obviously there's some overlap, so it's a gray area and Warner's lawyers probably told them to play it safe.

There's a nice offer on at the moment where you can get 14 days subscription for free, which boosts any account to VIP status which comes with a bunch of benefits like extra bag space and unlocking of all class trait bonuses which normally cost Turbine Points. As long as you cancel your subscription within 14 days you won't get charged and your account will drop in status to Premium, but that grants you one more character slot than plain F2P and you get to keep some of the benefits on any character you logged in while a VIP, such as the extra bags and unlocked class bonuses, and maybe even the swift travel.

To be on the safe side I wouldn't subscribe to more than a month just in case Something Goes Wrong or you forget to cancel.

*edit* link to thread discussing this:

14 Days of Free VIP: Limited Time

Zefah_sl said:

What's the best way to experience the game? Is it legitimately free to play? If not, what microtransactions are pretty much musts? Or is a subscription the way to go? Should any of the expansions be purchased? Does the latest expansion come with previous expansions or must they be purchased separately?

Sorry for the question bombardment, but I'm looking to do some content tourism in this.

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LoTRO is one of those games you can legitimately play without paying anything, but it takes a ton of work. You get coins for just doing content (finishing quests, achievements and exploring) which can be used to buy everything. Or you can just pay for the coins. A sub will get you coins every month too.

It's been a while since I played but iirc you can download the basic game for free and you get two character slots per server. Most of the classes are available. If you don't sub you will need to start thinking about buying stuff around level 20. Sooner if you want more storage space. You will want to get a mount skill. I think they made one of the 20 to 30 quest zones free so you may not need to buy more quests until level 30 or so. By then you should have enough coins from just normal questing etc to pick it up.

Everything can be bought with coins, and if you are in a hurry to get to end game you will be spending money on expansions and more quest levels. If you are an altaholic then you'll get plenty of coins to spend and can skip paying for most things. Pretty tough to save enough coins to buy expansions though, so it's a good idea to keep an eye out for sales on those. They have them regularly.

You'll get a feel for it as you go. And the forums have the best info.

PvE is a lot easier for every single class since the major class revamp the last xpac did in november.

Game was always fairly solo friendly but people are now soloing 3 man, some 6 man, and some even 12 man content.

Lodor_sl said:

PvE is a lot easier for every single class since the major class revamp the last xpac did in november.

Game was always fairly solo friendly but people are now soloing 3 man, some 6 man, and some even 12 man content.

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And complaining about it.......

Dev team: Why is level 2 of angry birds cut the rope more dificult than solo play?

So, Turbine, what is the official word on difficulty?

I have a lifetime sub for this, unfortunately it is the combat that always makes me quit. Just feels off, powerless, can't explain it. Got like 15k accumulated Turbine points now.... which is not that much actually, they have constant deals going, I think it is double points now.

Anyway, might try it again and just go slow, for the story. I think the world still looks great, avatars not so much.

Treesong_sl said:

And complaining about it.......

Dev team: Why is level 2 of angry birds cut the rope more dificult than solo play?

So, Turbine, what is the official word on difficulty?

I have a lifetime sub for this, unfortunately it is the combat that always makes me quit. Just feels off, powerless, can't explain it. Got like 15k accumulated Turbine points now.... which is not that much actually, they have constant deals going, I think it is double points now.

Anyway, might try it again and just go slow, for the story. I think the world still looks great, avatars not so much.

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I was actually confused when I logged in to see if I could catch the bug again. I say confused, because I remember the graphics of the game being great at release -- then I log in like three weeks ago and it looks like dog shit on max settings. Is it tinted glasses or did they actually downgrade their graphics over the years?

Didn't Turbines games have 2 different versions you had to download? Like there's an HD version that's 2 or 3 times larger than the regular download.

The graphics in the game aren't like...Skyrim levels of detail or anything obviously, but they look quite nice for what they are. The newer content (especially starting with Rohan) sees a real bump up in detailing as well. The textures, poly count, and amount of objects in the world really make it look nice. The bad side of that is you can tell the big difference when you then go back to the vanilla content. Go through Fangorn, then go to the Old Forest - the Old Forest looks so sparse by contrast (even though I still love it).

I think LOTRO still looks great (especially the hi-def version that bixxby mentioned), but it is certainly starting to show its age now. The textures are still crisp, but the character models are visibly lacking in the details that modern games are able to do.