LOTRO to relaunch as free to play?

Games
3121

I’ve subbed as VIP since a few months after launch. $100/year is a no-brainer, given the 500 TP/month and the time I spend in-game, on and off.

My only regret is not buying the lifetime sub 5 or so years ago for $200 before WB bought them out.

Well, not my only regret now…It’s too bad I moved my whole stable to Gladden during the server closures. I wasn’t playing for a year or so when that happened, and I logged in only to move everything and I chose the “default” choice.

My Nimrodel QT3 toon is the burg Deet, now 95, but I’m now playing my original minstrel who’s at lvl 82 and in Rohan.

I walked away for a year or so after hitting the “Big Battles” part of the epic quest line. I did not like it… I had to learn a whole new character role. At least with skirmishes and mounted combat I was still basically the same character, but with BB (now “epic” battles) I had to learn a different game.

Now I’m going to work on it with my original character.

3122

Amen to that, but on the other hand they did ‘lose’ my 6 level 85 characters when they server merged.

I would have been doubly angry if I’d had a lifetime sub.

Edit: 75, 80 or 85, I don’t even remember what the cap was then, pretty sure it was Rohan and 85 though.

3123

What did Turbine say ? That seems to be an anomaly. My transfer (a “solo kin”) went with no problems.

3124

It’s been a while but basically it all ended up with ‘sorry we can’t help you’.

3125

I’m going to need an invite as well, but I’m not on much.

Do we have a running list of members and character names?

3126

Holy crap you guys.

3127

Well, poop.

As long as Daybreak still keeps the current content up and running. There’s years and years of stuff in LOTRO to do as it is.

3128

Daybreak has also closed more MMO’s than anyone in the industry.

3129

First reaction: Slowly saying fuuuuuuuuck…

… and there goes the game I suspect.

Just having LOTRO put into the same stable with all the “failed” SOE titles is almost a guarantee that the horses will get shot and we’ll soon be eating lasagna with “mysterious” ingredients.

Time to “complete” the journey before they fully break it I guess…

RIP LOTRO 2017.

3130

Oh no, not Daybreak. So much for LOTRO being the most well-run and non-invasive of all the F2P MMOs out there.

I wonder what happens to all our Turbine Points? Or if there will even still be Turbine Points? The FAQ says they will change over to “LOTRO Points” or some such, but doesn’t go into further details. I hope they will keep intact the ability to earn them through deeds. I also hope Daybreak will continue the Turbine tradition of running weekly specials on different groups of account upgrades and consumables, including the quest packs and expansions. Somehow I doubt it though, as Daybreak is going to want to try to maximize the monetization as much as possible.

3131

It was pretty clear that Turbine were being transitioned away from big, expensive MMOs. Maybe this move gives it another year or two of life…maybe not. Either way, it was a good run.

3132

I wonder how they’ll destroy VIP subscriptions.

I purchased the CE with Lifetime back when the game launched and have had a “good roll” with that, and I’ve also spent a fair bit on turbine points at various points to get ‘extra stuff’; Doubt I’ll spend any on gamebreak though.

Damn you WB!

3133

Since you have a lifetime sub, to shut down the game, they have to kill you first.

3134

Cordovan is on the forums already saying none of the way you earn TP will change. He could be lying or misinformed, I suppose.

Of course they could decide to jack up the prices on all the crap in the store. They can feel free if it helps them make some more cash. I never bought anything other than quest packs and shared storage out of there anyway, and I have no plans to. They can milk the whales all they like.

3135

Milk whales? That’s ridiculous, whales aren’t mamm…um. Never mind. CARRY ON.

3136

Well that’s some great timing on my part. You guys made me redownload everything and I was curious to revisit my old toons. Now this…

…And I can’t seem to access my old toons anymore. I get it that my server (Nimrodel) is gone. The transfer wizard doesn’t seem to be able to access the old servers. I don’t have the energy to start over, do if they are really gone, so am I. Anyone have any thoughts? The FAQ is worthless.

3137

They probably went to the same black hole my characters went.

3138

Go into the launcher and don’t select a server, just click transfer. Your characters should be listed there, in some hellish limbo world.

3139

So I’m back in. Who can get me invited to the kinship? My character is

Why are people worried that LOTRO is going away? As long as it’s making money it should be fine no? I mean daybreak is still putting out expansions for EQ and EQ2.

3140

[quote=“charmtrap, post:3134, topic:59553, full:true”]
Cordovan is on the forums already saying none of the way you earn TP will change. He could be lying or misinformed, I suppose.[/quote]

I suspect he’s probably correct. It would be a huge programming effort to change the TP system at this point, and it sounds like there were only a handful of guys left at Turbine working on LOTRO. I can’t imagine Daybreak investing big money into making massive changes for a monetization system that already exists and works. It will probably be like you say, they’ll raise the prices on TP, then increase the cost in TP for much of the things in the store.

I wonder if I should use what TP I have now to buy another quest pack or two (I’m missing all the post Helm’s Deep stuff because I’m nowhere near leveled enough to bother), or if I should just hold out and maybe hope they do some kind of massive sale at the changeover to try and lure people back to LOTRO under the new ownership. Probably just wait and see what happens.

EDIT : Wow, it’s already happened?! I just finished downloading the new update and am staring at a new EULA from Daybreak.