still active? and how does it compare to other MMO's out there?

[Noob Van Noob]

i've been playing guild wars 2 but not really liking the PvE. PvP is pretty fun but PvE (havent gotten too far there) seems meh and from what i've heard there are no real raids. this caught my eye, especially after watching the third Hobbit movie :P
in particular, how does it compare to: Guild Wars 2 and Final Fanatasy XIV??

[MMOGamer71]

Best MMO ever made IMO based on lore and the player community.

[Natty La Ridge]

Still active. Can't compare to GW2 or FFXIV because I haven't played either, but: LOTRO is not a JRPG. It's an old-skool D&D-style MMORPG with about a decade worth of enhancements and extensions. If you've played WoW or SWG you'll grasp the basic game instantly, but LOTRO has added depth in just about every area, including crafting, questing, class progression, etc.

If you approach it from the perspective of another MMO, you'll tend to play it like that MMO (TMOT I've done it), and thus miss much of what's unique about LOTRO. Decide how you want to approach an MMO of depth and substance, and LOTRO will likely provide you with a way to do what you want to do. It's fairly unique in that way.

[Stry8993]

There is a CRAP ton of character progression. I've been playing the game since launch, they've added SO much. And from what I'm seeing, you can pretty much 'grind' out all of the playable content for free, or you can sub, or buy with cash as you want/feel you need.

The people that play are some of the most dedicated and friendly people you'll ever meet in an MMO, bar none.

[Chromaki]

It doesnt have a great event system like GW2 but the event system doesnt really add much impact or thrill to the game anyway. GW2 is like an arcade mmo if you think about.. i didn't get as much lore from it as i did GW1 and PVE is trickled out at a very slow rate. I still play it but the fun of it really was at the start when i didnt know as much as i do now and now i never really know what to do on it apart from WVW or PVP. Combat is fun in GW2 as its arcadic but it soon becomes tedious and as there isnt the trinity it all feels the same and survivability feels like its based on luck not your adjustments to your character. Plus i keep trying to push myself to play Guild Wars 2 thinking that im missing something or not doing something right but the point is right there. You shouldn't need to push yourself to play a mmo. You should be willing to play one to be excited to find something new or to just join a random group doing something new but its an arcade and repeats and recycles and repeats.. No actual change to the world as it actually states and no feel of accomplishment in feeling like you actually just added a hand in taking that down.. Its more like yea done see ya in a couple of hours to do it again... with no actual rewards either. Its a busy game thats for sure but keep in mind that helps because of the mega servers all servers joined into one for pve only.

Rift: Is a great mmo nearly as good as lotro in my opinion the event system is alot better than gw2 i feel. Also the lore and music is nearly just as good and the community is quite friendly to from my experience and you can always join a group in quests. But.. its not as big as lotro and as immersive but still in the end its you're own preference to choose from. Or just play each from time to time its up to you. Combat is similar to lotro in the pace but I like how its fully your own creation in how your character fights a enemy.

SWTOR: is a great for story only and doing dungeons! (FlashPoints) but what they've done is for story towards the end you have to do some operations (raids) or Flashpoints to progress through the story and so.. you wait for ages for a group as eveyone will be ahead of you and so you're stuck like an idiot waiting for a group that won't come. They've added a solo option for the new expansion but you're only aloud to do it once as a solo mode and thats it.. so basically im stuck now waiting for a group which will never come so its wasted money for the expansion and other parts of the story.. But until that point it was a hell of alot of fun and I would continue now for story only until the end if it wasnt for that.

Lotro has the best lore and feel of an adventure in a MMO that i've ever played the world is huge and so there is so much to explore and see and to just feel like you're apart of middle earth. I wish lotro had a slight event system though, like orc's attacking keeps and castles as such. But for the journey and music and interesting story if you dont mind reading the text you're going to be in for a great adventure. Plus Lotro does have a very good community. To me LOTRO is strictly a PVE game but there is a PVPM option which is Players vs player monsters (orcs and such creatures). Combat can be slowish but its more of a traditional MMORPG but is still alot of fun. You may have to unlock a few things within your character with the store but it doesnt take away any fun from the game.

In my opinion choose LOTRO as there is so much to discover and people to bump into and kill some sort of monster in Middle Earth. Something unexpected will be found along the way.. Its Middle Earth dont forget mystery awaits.

Ill finish now as im sounding like a commercial :P

Edit: Just fully read your question now sorry :P only mention rift and swtor as i play that aswell from time to time. never played FFXIV but heard its good.

[Noob Van Noob]

^
pretty much sum up what i dislike about guild wars 2, though i disagree on the luck part. WvW is basically who has the bigger blob but structured pvp can be quite fun if you have a good team. that said i still dislike the lack of trinity. thanks for all the info btw.

[Ape-tier Buffoonery]

FFXIV is neat because the class/job system allows for one character to do everything as opposed to leveling a bunch of alts. For example: Leveling up in Gladiator and Conjurer allows you to become a Paladin, which gets it's own bonus set of skills, and can use everything from GLA and a good amount of CNJ, they also can cross skills from other classes etc to tweak their abilities.

On the whole Lotro wins in story. I'm sure there's someone who's more into FF than I am, but while Lotro is taking place at the same time of the books/movies and follows suit. FFXIV as far as I know takes place 10 years after the last game (I think?) And in doing so they can just run with whatever they want as long as they remind us of the "Heroes of light" which saved everyone from the cataclysm a decade ago that literally nobody in the game remembers except that "They were saved by them, but we can't remember their names."

However FFXIV is a bit more action oriented and I find battles are usually a bit more quicker paced and more "fun" as when monsters have aoe/special attacks there's usually some visual marker where you can move out of the way. There's also more classes that benefit from "Backstab" and "Flanking" attacks where you need to keep moving behind/beside the monster in order to keep your damage output as high as possible. Lotro has Warden which is probably the most intricate class to any MMO I've ever seen, but he doesn't make up for the others.

As far as end game raids go they're roughly the same. They give difficulty and both have their own things to figure out.

Biggest difference is: Lotro is f2p
FFXIV is subscription

You can play Lotro until roughly 50ish completely free but you will eventually want to buy some expansions. If you really wanted you could grind out TP (Store currency) with your main/alts and buy the packs like that. All in all while people who pay do get a whole lot more perks you can buy everything they get with just some hard work and grinding.

FFXIV didn't have a store last time I played it, which might have changed but I don't think so.
Subscription isn't too high if I remember, but it does add up montly especially if you're not willing to spend too much money.

edit: The community is great for both games but I usually found the lesser savoury types on FFXIV.

[Chromaki]

Originally posted by Noob Van Noob:

^
pretty much sum up what i dislike about guild wars 2, though i disagree on the luck part. WvW is basically who has the bigger blob but structured pvp can be quite fun if you have a good team. that said i still dislike the lack of trinity. thanks for all the info btw.

Yea true just thought perhaps it's based on luck when i said but maybe more based on skill, mine lacks now and again :P and yea exactly WVW is just about who has the bigger blob of players sometimes I follow a small band of players and its fun but it doesnt last long.. but no problem just happy to add to the info that has been said :)