So as the number of subscribers goes up...

[Yogol]

Even though I don't play there myself, my heart goes out to the Landroval community.

I play there. Players are pushing to be a pay-only server, else you can kiss the special community on Landroval goodbye.

[Ayrolen]

Clover, thank you for that post. I couldn't have said it better myself.

No offense, but that sounds like work.

It's too much work for you to be nice to new players and contribute to the community that you think is going to go downhill? Are you kidding? Maybe you're playing the wrong game, not the future F2P subscribers.

[BerensBane]

Community is all of us together. As the current community we have a huge opportunity to shape our future. If we set a positive tone and welcome new players with open arms by answering questions, showing them the ropes, running quests with them and offering advice then they will feel welcome and become part of what we are.

If we shun new members by ignoring their many questions, calling them noobs and telling them LTP then that is how they will see us and you know what they say about first impressions.

What can you do? Think back on what it was like when you were a new player. What would have been helpful to you? We already have a group forming to enhance the Lorebook I am sure they would love some more help. We have tons of amazing guides. Why not write some more? When I started playing using the auction house was confusing to me, how about you?

Role-players this is an excellent opportunity for you to get new people involved. Plan some events and seminars that will teach new folks what role-playing is all about. There is plenty of time!

Instead of worrying what new players will do to our community, start thinking about how we can welcome them and make our already awesome community even better!

While I understand and agree with the sentiment of your post. I'm also sure there will be some F2P'ers that will respond to this type community. However, the type of player that this move will attract are the younger less mature players that don't understand or appreciate a mature community. That's just unfortunately the truth of the matter.

I'll try not to paint this change as all doom and gloom but you guys don't need to spin it as the greatest thing since sliced bread either.

[Delaney]

Instead of worrying what new players will do to our community, start thinking about how we can welcome them and make our already awesome community even better!

Sorry, Clover ... while the advice is generally good, in this situation it feels a lot more like, "You helped us make a successful game we can now milk for cash, and now we're asking you to make an extra effort to help integrate hordes of FTP people so we can make that money!" There's concern for the corporate health of Turbine (no money flow, no operating servers) and for the greatly desired new players, but not much that I can see for those of us who have been here.

Mind you, I do help newbies, I've never seriously told anyone "L2P", and none of my behavior will change this Fall. But /ignore doesn't spare you from the jerk jumping right in front of your character's face or following you, and unless the GM system is massively boosted, there's not going to be much help.

Complaining is just as much work. Point is, be positive instead of negative and treat people how you want to be treated.

Pity that doesn't seem to extend to the treatment of current players...

[ddaedelus]

I get so tired of people comparing everything to WOW. You do know there were other games on the market before WOW and after of which there are countless morons in general chats. The only reason WOW has more than it's fair share is because their game is the most successful and has the largest customer base.

Now of course the community here is going to turn into a circus. That's the type of players the F2P models attract. Turbine wants to make money and they have found a model that works for them. They know they will lose majority of their die hard players they just don't care.

I get tired of the comparisons too. But the fact remains that the majority of people you will attract, by sheer statistics if nothing else, will be former WoW players who are hoping for something fresh and something cheaper. This is not a bad thing necessarily, however I know from my experience that for many WoW players, WoW is their first and only MMO. They know one way of doing things -- the WoW way -- and players here are going to be constantly exposed to that.

For instance, I was trying to explain to one of my co-workers, a WoW addict, that in many other games you did not need tank-dps-healer in a group. He found that so utterly bizarre that his immediate response was "So no particular class is *needed* in a group? That sounds like a design flaw to me." You're going to encounter that sort of thing and a whole of "Well in WoW it works like this," in general chat. The comparisons aren't going to stop.

[Yogol]

Community is all of us together. As the current community we have a huge opportunity to shape our future. If we set a positive tone and welcome new players with open arms by answering questions, showing them the ropes, running quests with them and offering advice then they will feel welcome and become part of what we are.

If we shun new members by ignoring their many questions, calling them noobs and telling them LTP then that is how they will see us and you know what they say about first impressions.

What can you do? Think back on what it was like when you were a new player. What would have been helpful to you? We already have a group forming to enhance the Lorebook I am sure they would love some more help. We have tons of amazing guides. Why not write some more? When I started playing using the auction house was confusing to me, how about you?

Role-players this is an excellent opportunity for you to get new people involved. Plan some events and seminars that will teach new folks what role-playing is all about. There is plenty of time!

Instead of worrying what new players will do to our community, start thinking about how we can welcome them and make our already awesome community even better!

NExt thing you know, it will be OUR fault if the game goes down the drain, lol.

Let's face it, the only difference bwteen LOTRO and WoW is the lore and the community. You are now totally changing the community. Or do you deny that the community will change drastically ?

So, basically, you just lost one of the two major differences between LOTRO and the killer of them all.

The best of luck with that gamble !

[Patience]

Clover is ABSOLUTELY right and her post rocked my socks. This same discussion is happening on Facebook; I just posted this there and wanted to post it here too.

Know what's interesting? I remember when the game transformed from the original concept (Middle-earth Online) to a less sandboxy game with an epic storyline (The Lord of the Rings Online). The community at that time, which could be very elitist about anyone who wasn't a hardcore Tolkien fan and would often drive interested people from the community declared that the game would be terrible and attract only WOW players and kids.

That happens to be the game you're all playing, and love, today. The community is far MORE welcoming now than it was then, and the folks who came over from WOW and other games integrated into the community and adapted and helped shape LOTRO's community into what it is today - one of the best MMO communities out there.

Just wanted to point that out, as I've seen it evolve from the beginning, and I've heard before how a change to the game is going to destroy the community. I would even posit that THIS change is far, far less drastic than the change from MEO to LOTRO was!

Many of our original community members are still here - there was, pre-LOTRO, a great community and I don't mean to take anything away from them because they were a fundamental building block to the awesomeness we have today. But there was definitely a segment of the community who were very vocal that they didn't want WOW players or kids playing "their" game - but it seems to have worked out okay, in my humble opinion.

Meghan

[Ayrolen]

Bravo, Patience. Couldn't agree more.

[Angadan]

Sometimes, you eat the beast. Sometimes, the beast eats you.

Just because we've eaten the beast a couple of times, that doesn't mean the beast can't win in the future, Patience.

I'm all for rallying the community and giving it our best effort! And I appreciate all the posts you, Clover, and Sapience are making in this vein (it's becoming very common to open a thread and see one of the community team make such a post!)...just as long as we all keep our eyes open to the fact that sometimes the beast _does_ win.

I hope not here.

[8skyfaller]

Will the number of mature players go down ?
Just a thought. I don't have a problem with this F2P idea, but if the community starts to resemble something of WoW's, then I'm gone.

In Landroval, the community has long ago started to resemble something of a WoW RP server's, without the help of a "F2P" model. So I think the concern is moot.

[SylrienAtariel]

Community is all of us together. As the current community we have a huge opportunity to shape our future. If we set a positive tone and welcome new players with open arms by answering questions, showing them the ropes, running quests with them and offering advice then they will feel welcome and become part of what we are.

If we shun new members by ignoring their many questions, calling them noobs and telling them LTP then that is how they will see us and you know what they say about first impressions.

What can you do? Think back on what it was like when you were a new player. What would have been helpful to you? We already have a group forming to enhance the Lorebook I am sure they would love some more help. We have tons of amazing guides. Why not write some more? When I started playing using the auction house was confusing to me, how about you?

Role-players this is an excellent opportunity for you to get new people involved. Plan some events and seminars that will teach new folks what role-playing is all about. There is plenty of time!

Instead of worrying what new players will do to our community, start thinking about how we can welcome them and make our already awesome community even better!

Seriously? Seriously!.....Seriously.

How about this:

I'll take the hours, days and weeks necessary to organize events and seminars 'teach' people about roleplaying (which iin itself is part english lesson, history lesson and etiquette class)

...when you give me and other Rpers the tools to do such a thing.

...when the game's focus is less on endgame raiding and reused armor/weapons in an empty lottery and more about character and atmosphere.

...when you respect the players that aren't into downing the latest boss for a token they must achieve another forty times.

...when you fix the game. Radiance and LIs, among all the other things that your players take the time to report, post and desperately do their best to try to affect some compromise on.

Free-to-play is not what I give Turbine my money for. I pay a subscription fee to interact in another world, to be entertained as opposed to be forced into frustrating, hair pulling soulless grinds. I left WoW because of their disregard for their 'lore' and the repetitive nature of their game play. I shuddered at the blatant grab for cash with their recent announcements of microtransactions.

And now LotRO is doing the same thing?

Seriously.

[findorin-gilrain]

Seriously? Seriously!.....Seriously.

How about this:

I'll take the hours, days and weeks necessary to organize events and seminars 'teach' people about roleplaying (which iin itself is part english lesson, history lesson and etiquette class)

...when you give me and other Rpers the tools to do such a thing.

...when the game's focus is less on endgame raiding and reused armor/weapons in an empty lottery and more about character and atmosphere.

...when you respect the players that aren't into downing the latest boss for a token they must achieve another forty times.

...when you fix the game. Radiance and LIs, among all the other things that your players take the time to report, post and desperately do their best to try to affect some compromise on.

...

And now LotRO is doing the same thing?

Seriously.

nothing to add except +Rep

[Delvie]

I actually am hoping that this move opens up several more servers.

Moved off of Landroval quite a while ago due to severe lag issues one summer.

Have found RP opportunities on multiple servers.

I'm a Lifetime Subscriber who's played WOW, and I'm not a kid. I also have never finished any Tolkein book (he literally puts me to sleep) or watched the movies. All kinds of people already find LOTRO to be fun as will all kinds of new players.

[Thoroval]

Many of our original community members are still here - there was, pre-LOTRO, a great community and I don't mean to take anything away from them because they were a fundamental building block to the awesomeness we have today. But there was definitely a segment of the community who were very vocal that they didn't want WOW players or kids playing "their" game - but it seems to have worked out okay, in my humble opinion.

Meghan

I somewhat agree with you. I came from WoW (started LOTRO in open beta) and the community here at it's worst is generally better than the WoW community at it's best.

However, there is a very big difference between the in-game environment now and when LOTRO first came out. I mean, things were so friendly and awesome during the first year or so in LOTRO that I was constantly amazed every time I logged in. I would often log in just to listen in and participate in Shire chat. I wouldn't even play, I'd just chat! Today's environment just isn't like that anymore, although at times you can see hints of how great it used to be.

Seems to me that to deny that there won't be some negatives from this is to simply deny reality. I wish it weren't going to happen, but in all likelihood it will. And honestly Turbine, you're not helping in certain areas. Take one example: Character naming. When folks can run around with clear violations of your own published naming policy... names that are blatant and obvious variations of Sauron and other major characters... or with names that are sexual in-jokes... or racial slurs from other English speaking countries... when these people can run around with these names, get reported, and nothing is ever done, how does that help? Turbine's lack of enforcing their own conduct rules makes it just that much harder for players to help to maintain the friendly environment Turbine likes to trumpet about. What do you think will happen when anyone can play without a penny invested? Do you think they'll behave to avoid being banned? What do they have to lose? Certainly not money. You won't even be requiring credit card info anymore. Will accounts just be tied to email addresses? Easy enough to get dozens of new email addresses every day.

But it's definitely still better than WoW.

[Coil]

Community is all of us together. As the current community we have a huge opportunity to shape our future. If we set a positive tone and welcome new players with open arms by answering questions, showing them the ropes, running quests with them and offering advice then they will feel welcome and become part of what we are.

If we shun new members by ignoring their many questions, calling them noobs and telling them LTP then that is how they will see us and you know what they say about first impressions.

What can you do? Think back on what it was like when you were a new player. What would have been helpful to you? We already have a group forming to enhance the Lorebook I am sure they would love some more help. We have tons of amazing guides. Why not write some more? When I started playing using the auction house was confusing to me, how about you?

Role-players this is an excellent opportunity for you to get new people involved. Plan some events and seminars that will teach new folks what role-playing is all about. There is plenty of time!

Instead of worrying what new players will do to our community, start thinking about how we can welcome them and make our already awesome community even better!

And what of the developers and game-masters? What type of activities do they have planned to help ease the pain of masses of new players? What kinds of things will YOU be doing to ease the transition?

[Comstrike]

As I'm noting on our Kinship forum, and other threads here, so I'll note here.

We only lose our community on Landroval if we allow it to happen. We've had n00b spikes, though likely not as great as we'll see. We've seen the nature of the community prove the factor that blunted the edge. If we stay true to what we like to do, it will be the "level" that things seek out naturally as the initial chaos settles down.

My Kinships, Sons of Numenor and our newer raiding/endgame companion group Numenorian Guard do lots of things for newer members. We do easy and heavy RP activities, we have RP Workshop Chats weekly, the raiders welcome our RP'ers and teach them the tricks. And it has helped build a strong community-within-a-community.

I've already heard from old-timers with inactive subscriptions that plan on returning.

I have prospects for our counter-part division planned for "that other MMO due to launch," who likely will get into LOTRO precisely because they don't have to pay. And a lot of fence-sitters are going to get onboard as well.

So no, not everybody coming to the game will be n00bish. (n00b actually being derived from an Entish word for noob, or a painful and tough growth in a tree.)

I suspect entire guilds will come over to try LOTRO, who could not do so before. They'll keep to themselves.

I expect the nature of this game will see many n00bs give-up as they did when trials were first offered.

In any case, we have months to plan for this. If we cool our jets, level our heads, and learn to take the right attitude, we'll do just fine. I have ample faith in the game community not to implode.

This game still doesn't appeal enough to the kind of WoWfugee that we all fear, never has, still won't, and never will. So I think the issues are over-stated.

[SnowyWlf]

Speaking as a player who survived DDOs switch to F2P, here's what you can expect:

You will be suddenly awash with new players (we can hope, since more money for Turbine should mean more game for us).

Some of these players will be dreams come true.

Most, unfortunately, will not be. They will expect the game to be exactly like WoW and will be terribly confused by those features which are not. They will be confused by Virtues and Deeds. And they won't understand the class dynamics at all (and most of them never will). They will insist on tank-DPS-healer group composition even when not necessary.

Many will also be resistant to advice -- even genuine and friendly advice. I sincerely hope this does not happen here, but in DDO this lead to a massive community fracture: new players vs. veteran players. Ugly. It made it very difficult to be genuinely helpful in the game, and of course the forum regularly turned to noob/leet flame fests. As far as maturity goes, expect everyone's maturity to go downhill fast. And of course an unfriendly environment can cause the people you'd like to see stay to leave, both new and old.

Despite this sounding all very negative, I'm really only mentioning it as a cautionary tale. I'd hate to see the same thing happen here.

Thank you for your post. As someone else who has experienced this exact change in DDO, I can 100% verify the truth of this statement. This makes me wary of the change, but honestly we cant do anything about it. I already see almost exact replicas of the posts from the DDO transition, and already the seeds of F2P vs. Vets are sprouting... and we dont even have any F2Ps yet!

Ultimately, this could be overcome with very hard work and infinite patience as Clover and Patience have posted. But... we're here to play a video game and to enjoy our time. We arent here to change rude or immature new players into mature, well-adjusted citizens. We can and should all lead by example, but I'm afraid that one crowning feature of immaturity is failing to learn from other people and their examples. I am sure that players who approach the game politely and respectfully will be met with encouragement and open arms from veteran players.

But at the end of the day, who makes a greater impact on your play experience? The loud, rude and annoying players or the quiet, polite and nice people that you probably never even bump into?

[Clover]

And what of the developers and game-masters? What type of activities do they have planned to help ease the pain of masses of new players? What kinds of things will YOU be doing to ease the transition?

I can not speak for the developers or Game Masters. But, I have been have been putting together a giant list of helpful links and guides created by community members and will be adding it over the the Lorebook in the future. It is about 6 pages long now and is continuing to grow daily. If you have any links that you think may be helpful feel free to post them.

[Kraggy]

But there was definitely a segment of the community who were very vocal that they didn't want WOW players or kids playing "their" game - but it seems to have worked out okay, in my humble opinion.

You really think you've seen many of those here yet? LOL, you're in for a surprise.

[Carysta]

*snip*

Know what's interesting? I remember when the game transformed from the original concept (Middle-earth Online) to a less sandboxy game with an epic storyline (The Lord of the Rings Online). The community at that time, which could be very elitist about anyone who wasn't a hardcore Tolkien fan and would often drive interested people from the community declared that the game would be terrible and attract only WOW players and kids.*snip*

Many of our original community members are still here - there was, pre-LOTRO, a great community and I don't mean to take anything away from them because they were a fundamental building block to the awesomeness we have today. But there was definitely a segment of the community who were very vocal that they didn't want WOW players or kids playing "their" game - but it seems to have worked out okay, in my humble opinion.

Meghan

As someone who's been around since the MEO days, I just want to say thank you to the entire team for keeping what really matters strong. There are always bumps in the road, sometimes even big ol' potholes, but through it all we've seen some great things. There are threads all the time about wonderful things players have enjoyed, and a lot of this has to do with the friends players have made over time as well as the wondrous world we explore in-game. The community we've built will survive and even flourish, if we're willing to be open-minded. I know we're some of the most friendly, helpful gamers around, and I think if we carry this over through the f2p transition, our community will only be stronger.

I may be wearing rose-coloured glasses, but the sky didn't fall when MEO became LOTRO, and I'm not ready to go get my umbrella now, either.

[ThePhobos]

I can not speak for the developers or Game Masters. But, I have been have been putting together a giant list of helpful links and guides created by community members and will be adding it over the the Lorebook in the future. It is about 6 pages long now and is continuing to grow daily. If you have any links that you think may be helpful feel free to post them.

I appreciate the work you're putting into updating the lorebook with new information for new players. What I think needs to be considered though is that the type of player that many people are worried about are not the kind of player who will spend a few hours going through the lorebook looking for new info. They're not the kind of person to read a manual. They're the kind of person who will download the FTP game, find whichever class does the most DPS, log in, spam the chat channels asking the same information as often as they can (really, 5 second cooldown for chatting for free players? That's often enough for gold spammers) when it was just asked two minutes ago by someone else because this player is too busy power leveling as fast as they can with their dps class to read the chat channels. I saw it plenty in DDO when it went FTP.

While the current community can do a lot to try to keep the state of things the same, it only takes a few bad apples to ruin the experience and it will quickly bring out the worst in people. Take a look at GLFF on Elendilmir. Every few minutes there are sex jokes, racist jokes, homophobic conversations, the list goes on. Anyone who tries to police the situation that does not have a plus sign on either side of their name gets quickly shunned as the "channel police". Is it really our job to try to reign in those who don't want our help? Of course, I'm sure people will still continue to be helpful the way they are, but I think it's important for you guys to not underestimate the common mindset of many, not all, players who thrive on FTP game models. We the player can't and shouldn't have to police them, so if it does start to get out of control, I certainly hope you all have the tools in place (aka, lots of GMs monitoring channels) to keep things in line.

[Delaney]

Know what's interesting? I remember when the game transformed from the original concept (Middle-earth Online) to a less sandboxy game with an epic storyline (The Lord of the Rings Online). The community at that time, which could be very elitist about anyone who wasn't a hardcore Tolkien fan and would often drive interested people from the community declared that the game would be terrible and attract only WOW players and kids.

That happens to be the game you're all playing, and love, today. The community is far MORE welcoming now than it was then, and the folks who came over from WOW and other games integrated into the community and adapted and helped shape LOTRO's community into what it is today - one of the best MMO communities out there.

Just wanted to point that out, as I've seen it evolve from the beginning, and I've heard before how a change to the game is going to destroy the community. I would even posit that THIS change is far, far less drastic than the change from MEO to LOTRO was!

(Warning: This turned into a bit more of a rant than I intended, but it's an honest version of how I feel right now. While I am not quitting and I will give the changes a chance, as always, the complete lack of regard for current players is something I find galling. The following are my opinions, not anyone else's, and not stated as holy truths.)

*****

I can certainly understand the passion that a forum community can have (ahem) especially since one of the facets of the whole LotRO experience I have thoroughly enjoyed is due to a group here on these forums. However, unless I am drastically mistaken, MEO morphed into LotRO before it was ever released. That original group, while they undoubtedly spent much time debating and anticipating the game, never spent three years playing it and watching it evolve. They didn't, in the stage you used for comparison purposes, put time and effort into developing their characters, their kins, and their communities. I would posit that radically altering the access to and player base composition of a live game is actually a hugely different change than something discussed purely in theory.

All the official cotton-candy fluff spin is so bright and happy as if there couldn't possibly be any reasons why some current players might be upset. Let's see ...

• As of this current announcement, no new content for at least another three months. Moria was released on Nov. 18, 2008. Since then, all we've gotten is Lorien, Mirkwood, and some patches, none of which are major either individually or collectively. That's over eighteen months or roughly half of LotRO's lifespan. For those of you at level cap, can you do the Mirkwood dailies with your eyes closed yet?
• Still no fixes to certain current bugs and class anomalies despite numerous requests
• Still no advanced tools for grouping
• Still no tools for kinships
• Still nothing added to a hastily-cobbled together housing system
• Still no changes to a skill/trait system that hasn't kept up with the increased player levels
• Still using a fellowship maneuver system that's been untouched for years and also hasn't scaled with the levels.
• A hugely late announcement about a major change in the LotRO team - apparently Turbine thinks current players don't have enough interest in the game to care who the executive producer is.

Now granted, there has been some development work that was for something other than new content, but I do have to question why so much work went into revamping the first book of the epics and the newbie areas to make them solo-friendly when we're apparently going to have so many more people around for groups now:

Right! If you continue to subscribe or you're a lifetimer, things stay pretty much the same for you. Except there will be more players to group with and you'll also receive a number of Turbine points each month as part of your sub.

Ah, it's SO good to know that not much has changed. It's so tedious having to explore new areas and learn new instances. I still get to pay my fee (and in fact I am encouraged to keep giving Turbine money until they can let new people in for free!) and I'll get points for unknown stuff in a store I can't see yet. And while it seems like there actually may have been lots of work done recently, apparently it's all for the FTP model so that Turbine can get more cash. As for development for existing players - the lifetimers, the founders, the people who were stupid enough to always PAY Turbine to play while they were building their successful franchise - well now, let's not get carried away. We can go run the Rift again. On the upside, we DO get to keep the things like character slots and shared storage for which we paid Turbine even more money. Oh, thank you, thank you!

When we do have valid concerns about what effects these changes will have, we're brightly told that we can put forth the effort to integrate all the new people. Granted, our grouping tools stink, our chat lines are limited, the naming/conduct rules are poorly enforced, the GM system is hideously unresponsive, and absolutely no new tools that might be of help were announced, but any problems with an influx of leet kiddies, griefers, and/or people looking for cheap thrills is going to be, by inference, OUR fault.

As a result of our collective patience and loyalty to the game, (without which it could not have developed to this point) we will get ... hold on ... we get ... hrm. If we're lucky, the game we love might not be ruined. Also, in three ... or four ... or five months there's a new area of indeterminate size and some specialized storage. Also, for those of use who qualify, we'll get even more points for the unknown stuff in the unseen store, assuming THIS version of a loyalty program actually works. Oh, and they'll be lots of new people whom we can eventually teach to run the Rift.

No, I'm not drinking the Kool-Aid this time. I used to think that Turbine cared about having a good game and a good community in addition to being successful, but I've lost every shred of belief in such ideas and am now convinced the ONLY thing they care about is pulling money out of my bank account for as long as possible. It is, for me, a sad day.

[SylrienAtariel]

That was beautiful, Delaney. Thank you!

[ThePhobos]

I would have to agree here; that was a lovely wrap-up, Delaney, for some of the thoughts swirling through my head with regards to things that have been mentioned today.

[robo7425]

Delaney, Thanks for the post. I feel exactly the same as you.