Answers NOT in the FAQ (just yet)

[Fred2011]

Is it just me that finds this line from the new Q&A worrying: "a couple ideas we’re currently experimenting with include: "

I just read that as we haven't even finished putting in the new skills yet. But hey... Buy Now!

[ipatino91]

I'll get my legendary Keep-net, we need 2 landings nets and a bait thrower with some dps, o and because its a fishing raid we will forgo the minstral and bring a priest..its more humane that way.

I lost at at "bring a priest..it's more humane." +rep for you!

[TheOneRinger]

There are very important differences between a pre-order and a pre-purchase.

A pre-order can usually be cancelled if details come out prior to delivery that make the service no longer appealing to the customer. In many cases, a customer is not even charged for a pre-order until the product is shipped or the service is made available.

With a pre-purchase, you are buying something with no guarantees, no refunds, and in this case, not even a good description of the features included in the service Turbine is selling.

By bundling additional goodies that benefit your characters right now, Turbine is enticing customers to purchase a future service its employees aren't willing to even fully describe. I think it's irresponsible of Turbine to be selling Riders of Rohan before customers can even take a look at it.

Turbine isn't alone in using this tactic, but I wish they had worded their offer differently. They should have said, "Buy these goodies now, and get Riders of Rohan free when it's released!" Since no one would actually be purchasing the Riders of Rohan service, this would absolve Turbine of any responsibility to accurately describe the features of that service.

Enticing? Forgive me, but isn't all marketing supposed to make a product look as good as possible? They're not blackmailing you. The final choice, and the responsibility for that choice, always lies with the consumer unless said consumer is deceived.

And I have taken a look at what I'll be getting. I'll be getting Eastern Rohan (a gigantic region nearly twice the size of Moria), more of the edges of Fangorn (I love what they've done with the place so far), Amon Hen (I will have so many screenshots from here), the opportunity to watch the Breaking of the Fellowship, mounted combat (seriously awesome possibilities if done well, better than any instance), and a radically different end-game which involves grouping for mounted combat and building an outpost in Rohan! That's actually more detail than I had when any of the other expansions first became available for pre-purchase. With Moria we even had loads of mis-information (anybody else remember reports from members of the press at demonstrations that you'd be able to fall down the entire Endless Stair? I was looking forward to that). Quite frankly, I think this launch is shaping up to be much better than previous ones.

Bottom line is if you think this is enough detail to make the purchase, go ahead and do it. If not, the pre-purchase isn't going anywhere for three long months. In the meantime, if I pre-order, I am in no way, shape, or form being taken advantage of.

By the way, I'm not angry. Just excited, and hoping somebody else (besides MadeOfLions ;p) is too.

[Kerin_Eldar]

Thats it? your kidding right?

endgame fishing quests..I think I have seen it all now..

Because if content isn't about satisfying the cravings of phat lewt e-peeners then it has no place in an MMO.

Amirite?

[Wanderv]

Obviously the product is on sale right now so obviously you should be talking about what the product contains right now, obviously.

Obviously it's a preorder. Preorder is a buying of something that is not finished yet. Yes it's a sort of gambling. Obviously content to be released is not finalized yet.

And obviously you do not have to buy preorder.

PS. I wonder what happens to lotro-forums. Never saw so much kiddish and ridiculous whine.

[Runesi_EU]

Obviously it's a preorder. Preorder is a buying of something that is not finished yet. Yes it's a sort of gambling. Obviously content to be released is not finalized yet.

And obviously you do not have to buy preorder.

PS. I wonder what happens to lotro-forums. Never saw so much kiddish and ridiculous whine.

A pre-order is something that can be cancelled before the product is delivered as you find out more details, Turbine have been quite clever here in that if you pre-purchase the legendary pack you get delievered some items right now and have no option to cancel.

As there is no option here to cancel before the product is delivered whilst we find out more about it then it seems only fair that we know more about the product now. Of course we don't also have to purchase right away and indeed I haven't but some have, what if they then find that mounted combat is lttle more than 2 new skills to use whilst wearing horse pants, the "new type of repeatable content" is just a new set of daily quests, the new IC promised in the future will have to be paid for by all inculding VIPs and Rohan purchasers or they find out that Rohan has only 10 quests in it? I'm afraid holding back information when people have the option to cancel after they hear it is fine, holding it back with no option to cancel is not.

I'll choose to ignore the trolling at the end of your post.

[Reniannen]

A pre-order is something that can be cancelled before the product is delivered as you find out more details, Turbine have been quite clever here in that if you pre-purchase the legendary pack you get delievered some items right now and have no option to cancel.

As there is no option here to cancel before the product is delivered whilst we find out more about it then it seems only fair that we know more about the product now. Of course we don't also have to purchase right away and indeed I haven't but some have, what if they then find that mounted combat is lttle more than 2 new skills to use whilst wearing horse pants, the "new type of repeatable content" is just a new set of daily quests, the new IC promised in the future will have to be paid for by all inculding VIPs and Rohan purchasers or they find out that Rohan has only 10 quests in it? I'm afraid holding back information when people have the option to cancel after they hear it is fine, holding it back with no option to cancel is not.

I'll choose to ignore the trolling at the end of your post.

You've played LotRo for what? 3 years at the very least? You must have a pretty good idea of what is to be expected of an expansion and the game in general - more quests, more levels and more stuff. If that isn't enough to get you to buy it now then don't, you can wait for the release, can't you?

I like LotRo, I like questing and exploring new areas. LotRo is making an expansion - expansion means more LotRo for me. And it has Rohan in it. Why would I need to know the specifics? (Disclaimer: Having just bought another game I am not buying RoR at this time but I will buy it.)

[nubcat]

You've played LotRo for what? 3 years at the very least? You must have a pretty good idea of what is to be expected of an expansion and the game in general - more quests, more levels and more stuff. If that isn't enough to get you to buy it now then don't, you can wait for the release, can't you?

I like LotRo, I like questing and exploring new areas. LotRo is making an expansion - expansion means more LotRo for me. And it has Rohan in it. Why would I need to know the specifics? (Disclaimer: Having just bought another game I am not buying RoR at this time but I will buy it.)

But the region and mounted combat is free, afaik. The expansion mostly looks like a quest pack for all the information we know about it. So yes, we know what to expect from an expansion, hence why so many people aren't buying it. They've yet to show us if it's good value for money.

Both Rift and WoW are adding 6+ dungeons and 3 raids each, as well as a ton more content, what RoR is offering in comparison just scratches the surface: neither of these even have a release date (afaik), yet we know more about them than we do about RoR.

I don't play either of these other games but I can't help envying those that do, since they seem to be getting more than their money's worth.

[Ingaras]

A pre-order is something that can be cancelled before the product is delivered as you find out more details, Turbine have been quite clever here in that if you pre-purchase the legendary pack you get delievered some items right now and have no option to cancel.

As there is no option here to cancel before the product is delivered whilst we find out more about it then it seems only fair that we know more about the product now.
...

It's not only fair... they have a legal obligation to inform people about the main content of 'the product', it's not up to us to guess it. I know it's pretty common in MMO/gaming industry to do it this way, but it seems to me they're trying to find the edge of that definition with 'there's more but we're not talking about it right now'. Imagine buying a new car and asking 'Will it have a passenger seat?' and the salesman answering 'Sorry, I'm not ready to tell you right now, come back in a month or so. But it certainly has a driver's seat!'

Of course if they do make any unexpected big changes after you've ordered you have the right to cancel the order and get your money back (at least on my side of the pond), it's probably just going to take some effort.

[Kerin_Eldar]

It's not only fair... they have a legal obligation to inform people about the main content of 'the product', it's not up to us to guess it

Complete rubbish, they have no such obligation at all!

The only legal obligation that have is that they must not mislead as to future content which can be reasonably expected to be an inducement to purchase: lack of information is NOT misleading, advertising must be ACCURATE, completeness doesn't come into it.

Providing limited, or non-existent information is clearly not 'illegal', someone is free to 'pre-purchase' if they trust the seller, or not as the case may be, they will only have legal recourse if any statement made prior to purchase proves to be false later on.

[Ingaras]

Complete rubbish, they have no such obligation at all!

The only legal obligation that have is that they must not mislead as to future content which can be reasonably expected to be an inducement to purchase: lack of information is NOT misleading, advertising must be ACCURATE, completeness doesn't come into it.

Providing limited, or non-existent information is clearly not 'illegal', someone is free to 'pre-purchase' if they trust the seller, or not as the case may be, they will only have legal recourse if any statement made prior to purchase proves to be false later on.

Pff... now I'll have to look it up. There you go:

EU Distance Selling Directive, Article 4:

Prior information

1. In good time prior to the conclusion of any distance contract, the consumer shall be provided with the following information:
...
(b) the main characteristics of the goods or services;

I already said they don't have to get into all the details, but there's definitely a minimum. But let's not get too caught up in legal debates... it'll only get this thread closed.

[Raon]

Complete rubbish, they have no such obligation at all!

The only legal obligation that have is that they must not mislead as to future content which can be reasonably expected to be an inducement to purchase: lack of information is NOT misleading, advertising must be ACCURATE, completeness doesn't come into it.

At least in my country (Spain) any publicity that silence fundamental data of any good or service is against the law.

Article 4 of the General Law of publicity of 1988 (Ley 34/1988, de 11 de noviembre de 1988, General de publicidad)
http://civil.udg.es/normacivil/estat...ct/Lgp.htm#BM4

I'm sure that it's a similar law for full europe.

Providing limited, or non-existent information is clearly not 'illegal', someone is free to 'pre-purchase' if they trust the seller, or not as the case may be, they will only have legal recourse if any statement made prior to purchase proves to be false later on.

I put the spanish word about it of the law and the translation:

"Es asimismo engañosa la publicidad que silencie datos fundamentales de los bienes, actividades o servicios cuando dicha omisión induzca a error de los destinatarios." (Article 4 second paragraph)

The translation:

It is also misleading advertising to silence critical data of assets, activities or services when such failure drives to mislead recipients.

As you could see at least in my country silence any important information about a service/good that you are selling is againt the law.

[Podraig]

Cracks me up how this is happening again, I am 100% sure this was mentioned last year during the fiasco that was ROI, also the whole no refund and anyone in the EU who wanted a refund just needed to contact digital river ( office is in Ireland ) and state turbine broke distance selling laws with false advertising, now give me a refund or i'll contact my countries consumer protection agency.

[Steinskaldir]

Ingaras can update partly the instance part - the instance cluster is not part of expansion but part of following update. It means that RoR will be without instance content - only the un-named "new group content".

[Patrickwg]

As Aaron put it, it's one of the aspects of what you can choose to do at endgame. The other options are various quests in Mounted Combat, group encounters, and building a Rohirric outpost. If you don't want to do the fishing, you certainly won't have to, but it is an option.

Obviously, we're not getting into detail on these things yet, but we certainly will be talking about those things more as we get closer.

Any one else read this and think these are nothing more then the current daily quests we have for grinding reputation, and not a new endgame system like turbine is trying to tell us it is.

[Runesi_EU]

Any one else read this and think these are nothing more then the current daily quests we have for grinding reputation, and not a new endgame system like turbine is trying to tell us it is.

Indeed;

Build a Rohhiric outpost = day 1, gather wood; day 2, gather more wood and some hides; day 2..... day 10 its all built, knock it down and start again

Fishing quests = boring

Daily mounted combat quests = I am actually interested to see what this is like but for how long it will keep my interest remains to be seen.

[cossieuk]

Daily mounted combat quests = I am actually interested to see what this is like but for how long it will keep my interest remains to be seen.

Would have been nice if they had included a mounted skirmish as well.

[Mark_J]

Any one else read this and think these are nothing more then the current daily quests we have for grinding reputation, and not a new endgame system like turbine is trying to tell us it is.

I read this as Limlight 2.0

Daily repeatable quests are not a substitute for end game content.....just saying...

[Gewoonikke]

Can we get the answers to the real FAQ's pls, after trolling through 2 pages of threads I can't find anyone asking can they use there own horse or where can my dwarf ride a warhorse, infact the current FAQ should be titled frequently asked questions about mounted combat and not frequently asked questions about ROR.

Now lets see some answers to questsions about ROR.

1 Are there instances?
2 How many of each type? raids/6 mans/3 mans ect
3 Are we getting new virtue or trait slots?
4 Are you going to fix the constant lag?
5 Are we getting a new crafting teir or will the current teir be adjusted?
6 What new skills are class's getting from 75-85?
7 How many quests will the next book parts have ect.
8 Will there be anymore changes to the Li system besides the crystal allowing 7 legacies?

I am sure there are more but these spring to mind at the moment. As is whats currently advertised is nothing more than a quest pack, some definitive information on other features needs to be forthcoming to allow a informed purchase.

/signed