The other night (this past Tuesday, to be specific), Merric and I briefly discussed the new store armour. Today I decided to compare those to their crafted counterparts and was a little dismayed at what I found.
First off, here are the stats on both crafted armour that can be created from dropped recipes, as well as the store armour.
| Crafted Armour (Single-Use Recipes) | Store Armour |
| Plient Linen Gloves (Crit Crafted level 20 light gloves)112 Armour +7 Vitality +42 Maximum Morale |
N/A |
| Plient Linen Shoulder Guards (Crit Crafted level 20 light shoulders)67 Armour +7 Will +42 Maximum Power |
N/A |
| Plient Linen Leggings (Crit Crafted Level 20 light leggings)186 Armour +7 Fate +27.6 ICMR |
Golden Trousers of the Benefactor III (Store, Minimum level 20)+231 Armour +8 Fate +8 Vitality +8 Will |
| Plient Linen Robe (Crit Crafted Level 20 light chestpiece)224 Armour +14 Vitality +7 Might |
Golden Robe of the Benefactor III (Store, Minimum level 20)+277 Armour +8 Will +8 Fate +8 Vitality |
| Plient Linen Shoes (Crit Crafted level 20 light footwear)89 Armour +7 Will +42 Max Power |
Golden Shoes of the Benefactor III (Store, Minimum level 20)+111 Armour +8 Fate +8 Will +8% Out of Combat Run Speed (!) |
Crafted armour requires a sapphire shard for each item that is crafted, and keep in mind that each attempt is not guaranteed to result in a critical result either. So, if you use a scholar’s journal to increase critical chance of success you will also requires a sapphire shard for each one of the journals as well. All of these armour pieces are bind on equip, meaning that you can trade them and sell them on the Auction House. Making critical (crit) versions, such as what is listed here, can be pretty expensive just in sapphire shards alone.
I looked for Sapphire Shards on the Auction House and they were listed for 800 silver each. I imagine the reason for this is that the named mobs that drop these spawn more rarely than any of their higher level counterparts. You can also get them from skirmish vendors, but who wants to spend all their marks on crafting mats when you have a soldier to level up? There are also 2 sets of repeatable quests in Breeland (one set in Northern Barrow Downs and another set in Nan Hern) for a maximum of six shards. After that, it’s up to hoping you get a rare spawn you can kill or spending skirmish marks on them. Just my opinion, but I think marks are still a cheaper way to go than the Auction House.
Now, the Store Armours:
The thing here is, there are only three pieces at that level to buy. I’m guessing that’s why the stats on them are higher (in the case of armour ratings, much higher) than their crafted counterparts. The +8% Out of Combat Run Speed puts the shoes a bit over the top as well. Add to that the fact that all three armour pieces are also Bound to Account, and this is the only low level armour set you will ever have to buy. Low level crafters can be safely bypassed altogether as you can pass the armour around to all of your alts that wear that armour type.
For me, this puts the armour sets firmly on the side of “Advantage” over “Convenience”. Even at just three pieces of armour, it’s a significant leg up over the pieces that can be crafted. In my opinion, either the crafted armours needs to be buffed to become comparable’ or the Store armours need to be nerfed. Honestly, I’d love to see Store armours removed altogether, but I think that’s unlikely to happen. Especially given the article that Turbine linked to on their LOTRO Twitter feed.
Take special note of the quote from Adam Mersky, “Furthermore, we have no intention at this time of selling any raid gear in the store.” It seems pretty clear to me that Turbine hasn’t ruled it out as a possibility either.
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January 20, 2012 at 10:21 am
Welp, time to jump to TOR. Oh no, that ship is sinking as well
January 20, 2012 at 2:26 pm
I wouldn’t say that at all. SWTOR is an awesome game, no doubt.
LOTRO still has its place though.
January 20, 2012 at 8:57 pm
I agree too. I enjoy so much SWTOR with my wife: the storylines are great, some companions are so funny or adorable (can we say Blizz?!), space missions are exciting, the community is great, etc.
January 20, 2012 at 10:32 am
I’m not a big fan of of the store selling armor either. However, once you get into your mid 20s, I think the crit crafted armors (no shards required) start to exceed the store bought stuff. Correct me if I’m wrong. So, unless or until they bring out higher level armor sets, the store ones become obsolete after about 5 levels. Not worth the $ IMO unless you are leveling a bunch of alts on the same server that use the same armor type.
January 20, 2012 at 10:58 am
The guild armor starts at level 31, but I still agree with you that you can make armor that is comparable or even better if you just wait a little bit.
January 20, 2012 at 11:56 am
You can’t get better crafted armour until level 28.
January 20, 2012 at 7:17 pm
Correct…..fully 8 levels after you are able to acquire the store items. This completely disincentivises Crafting Armor below level 28. I expect that we’ll see a drop off in players working Armorer which will then be the excuse for additional higher level armors being added later…. “There is a stunning lack of armor in the Ah so we are compensating by adding more to the Store…..Cheers”.
January 20, 2012 at 10:38 am
My biggest issue with Turbine in the last couple years has been communication. They seem to just throw things against the wall to see what happens, put up a feedback thread, and carry on to the next pr disaster.
Truthfully, I don’t mind that low-level armour is in the store. But the point about stats compared to the best crafted armour at the same level is a very good one. Obviously they can’t nerf the store set now (horse/stabledoor and all that), but had they come out and said this was being tested, that may have been raise as a concern ahead of time and we’d at least be in a better situation.
No matter when or how they announced this, there would have been an uproar. That bit was inevitable. What they can control is how they handle it. Right now, I do not get the feeling that things with LOTRO have any kind of stability. We really have no clue what they will dump on us next and that is not, in my mind, the way to run a company so dependent on its community of players.
January 20, 2012 at 10:42 am
I’m not big on it, but I don’t think it’s going away despite the response. From a business perspective I get why they think this makes sense — but this is also a MMO and this genre lives based on how its community feels and the impact they can make in game.
I said in another post here that my plan is to just start crafting good low level stuff and putting it on the AH. I hope others do the same so that the overpriced stuff at those levels on the AH finally just goes away.
If that’s truly the problem, as Turbine says, then it seems like a good thing regardless of what’s going on in the store.
January 20, 2012 at 10:52 am
On the one hand: Boo, hiss!
On the other: crafters bear some responsibility for this, because they overprice their goods on the auction house.
I have been making some low-level gear recently. It’s good, critted stuff (not the one-shot recipes) and I price it appropriately for the level. And it sells very well. One of my kinnies does a lot of crafting and said that I should price it much higher because it’s just high-level mains buying for their low-level alts. I said that I well remembered my unhappiness with auction house prices when I was leveling up my main and could not afford anything. I said that I am targeting the Wal-Mart shoppers.
In my opinion, the Turbine store-mongers are taking advantage of a situation that in-game crafters helped to create.
Sorry. Not a popular opinion, I know.
January 20, 2012 at 11:01 am
I think you make a good point, though. I disagree that it’s high-level mains buying for low-level alts, though. I personally made all my own armor when I was leveling my alts and almost never checked the auction house. So good for you for keeping it reasonable.
January 20, 2012 at 11:27 am
But to make all your own armor that means all your characters have to be either Metalsmith or tailor. What if I want to play a Scholar? I can’t make armor. AH is the only place to get good armor. That is why I have my main send mountains of gold to my scholars and weaponsmiths so they can afford armor on the AH. If I was a new player and had no source of gold I would be forced to wear whatever dropped in game.
January 20, 2012 at 11:48 am
I find if your high level mains are an explorer and an armourer.. you never really need to buy armour, your current character gets hides to send to your explorer, your explorer makes leather, then makes armour. Of course heavy armour is a little more complex…
A weaponsmith though can get both hides and metal.. well, if they’re an armsman that is..
Historian, yeah.. little awkward if a heavy armour wearer…
Either way you certainly only need one of each craft profession to be self sufficient..
January 20, 2012 at 11:56 am
i have worn what drops in the game on three alts now who have made it to the 50s (and still mostly wear quest rewards), and two that have made it to 65.
i rarely die, i can nearly always tackle yellow and orange quests, and i’m not spending money on the AH. works out well for me! i don’t see the point of armor in the Turbine Store when quest rewards are reasonable.
January 20, 2012 at 12:22 pm
Well…but I’m sure there are people who can and do manage with whatever drops in game, especially at lower levels, before they’ve got the hang of (possibly even their own) crafted armour, or the AH. And ROI (and Moria/Mirk, to a rather lesser degree) introduced quest armour that actually stacks up against crafted. It’s obviously not ideal, but quest/drop armor isn’t in itself horrible, only horrible by comparison to the crafted equivalent. Crafting isn’t necessarily a fundament of the game, I’ll give you that, but it’s just one of those things that makes life easier.
And the thing is, you don’t need every toon to be a weaponsmith or tailor, just one. You don’t NEED to pay high armour prices–not if you REALLY don’t want to. You just need to do the same work that the people who are charging you 800S for a silly light armour hat are doing. Even on the minimum of three toons, you can cover the spread of wood/metal weapons and tailored/smithed armour. If you’ve got an explorer main funneling mats onto two alts, they can keep up with you, and don’t need to get further than Esteldin and Thorin’s Hall to craft whatever you might need. The beautiful thing about crafting is that you get out of it exactly what you put in.
I’m a person with an alt for every craft, and I fill my needs and the needs of my friends and kinmates, because I enjoy crafting. I also have friends who don’t craft at all, because they rightly perceive that it’s not something that you HAVE to do. They’re willing to oblige the market, if the demand for what they want is high–but they’re also people who have another option in me, and the loads of other friendly, helpful crafters, who have an eye on the Trade channel, looking for the person who wants a new staff or bow or cloak. I know I’ve been on both the giving and receiving end of this process. People will take time out of their gaming and make you that set of crit armour. If you ask nicely and provide at least some of the mats, hell, if you’re just generally a good sport about it, maybe they won’t even charge you for their time.
If you really, really just can’t be arsed to craft? Then farm. Get an explorer and just farm everything, because crafting is a vicious cycle, and somebody always needs the mats, and the gold you make will fund your own item needs, completely the circle brilliantly.
My objection to armour in the lotro store is that as an avid f2p player–gold is disposable, TP is not, and you never, never, never spend TP on something that you can get in game, or that you don’t really NEED in game. These rules loosen up when you’ve acquired all the content you need, and when the only items left in the store are luxury items. Then you can’t start splurging. But armour isn’t a luxury item, armour is a need that’s already been provided for. I’m not going to make a slippery slope argument about “Oh, what’s next, a full set of top-tier raid gear for every lifetimer who can’t be bothered to grind for marks, and just want to look like a badass? OH CALAMITY, WHAT SHALL WE DO?” My view of the lotro store is that it’s a place where Turbine experiments, and not always with success. I don’t think this will be a success.
(sorry for the essay! Just an avid crafter!)
January 20, 2012 at 11:52 am
The lack of reasonable priced gear on the AH may be partially the high prices that some charge, but also it has to do with the set up of AH/crafting. I posted this on the forums, but I thought it’d be all right to relate here:
I can state that after 3-4 days of posting crit armour on Firefoot’s AH, there is definitely a demand that I can no way keep up with given the current crafting/AH systems. On Sat. I crafted nearly 500 items of T1-T3 gear light/medium/heavy (roughly >60 items for nearly every tier/armour combination and stored on 8 alts to post on AH), most of them crit and have been keeping them on the AH as I can. A good deal over 50% of them have sold in less than 3 days and I sold out of T3 crit Medium armour in the first day, T3 Heavy Armor the 2nd, and others over time.
The problem arises in the fact that I can spend hours crafting the armour to put up on the AH tracking alt inventory and maintaining a gigantic supply of crit items or I can spend 1 minute posting the raw resources on the AH and make as much or more from their sales. While we’ve heard the armour was the store’s solution to this problem, there are a few alternatives to help the game rather than band-aid the problem (even some using alternative store purchases). Among them:
- Remove the need for crit items after you have mastered the tier (or 2 tiers) above the craft tier. If I have mastered T3, then I should be able to auto-crit T1-2 (not counting the “shard recipes”). This still keeps crit crafting needed at the highest tier, but allows lower level armour to be created each time that is valuable and removes the need to farm for crit items to craft the gear. The crit items can then still be used on component pieces so they would still be desired. Using marks is “so-so” for crafting for personal use/kin use, but if the choice is spending 1200 marks on a stack of T3 Tailor crit items or spending the marks/medallions for a SoGE you’ll make far more money in less time going for the SoGE.
- Single-use recipes for lower than max tier need to become repeatable. The shards/flakes/sigils still can be used for critting the “best” of the tier and the guild symbols can be used for the auto-crit, but single-use recipes for T2-4 are just a pain to collect find. The top tier should still have single-shot recipes.
- Allow for the ability to place more than 30 items per character on the AH (even through store purchase). If I want to keep up a good supply on the AH of various armor pieces/sets, the 30 max is very annoying. I can still post 100s of items on the AH, so it’s not that I cannot post them, but I have to swap all the items between the crafting alt AH alt. Also, the the buyer doesn’t know that the AH poster is an alt of mine so they cannot tell if it’s an alt or someone playing the AH picking up the crafted materials and reposting.
- Allow for an extension to the posting time on the AH (even through the store – yes a another different store suggestion) of up to 1 week. With a time of 2 days, it’s a pain on slow AH days to re-post everything (especially when the cost of each item is not saved). A once-per-week posting & >30 postings would help substantially for those that want to maintain a lower-level crafting stapple of goods.
- Update the AH to have some tools/information to track goods I’ve sold. I’d like to be able to track what I’ve sold in the past at what cost and how long the posting lasted, if anything so I don’t have to keep a pricing schedule outside of the game for various pieces. The information doesn’t have track everything on the AH, but at least give me some trackable information so the posting-re-posting process is less of a headache for a dedicated crafter. If I’ve sold zzzz item 100 times, it should remember what I listed it at even if there has not been an item posted while I’ve been online.
January 20, 2012 at 12:31 pm
Yow, you’re not on my server, but thank you for the fascinating insight into the people who craft for the AH. I am not a person who crafts for the AH. I’d call myself a utility crafter instead of a for-profit crafter, but I’ve always known that if I put the time and effort in, I could be one of the people making the loads of gold. I’m less knowledgeable about the AH mechanics that you mention, but I’m with you 100% about a reform being needed for crafting and critting.
I don’t even see the need to drop the crit item requirement (though I enjoyed the T7 shift to making your own crit items, that seemed viable)–just make the base chance to crit on lower tier items increase with every successive tier achieved. Mastering T2 isn’t just a requirement to master T3, it increases your chance to crit in T1 by x%. When you master T3, T1 can increase by another factor of x%, while T2 increases for its first time–I don’t know, let the devs do the math, but through tools and crit items, a guaranteed 100% crit should be achievable.
January 20, 2012 at 1:27 pm
That would definitely work as well. Optional/crit items are definitely a hurdle that needs to be lowered the higher you progress in crafting tiers now matter how that happens.
Also, I’m really not normally one who mass produces crafting and/or places such high volumes on the AH. I’m normally the type that holds random events from Trivia to whatever, hands out tons of free goods in various L1-40 zones(from armour, to potions, to food, to everything), and basically makes anything friends/kin/etc. needs for free. When the announcement over statted gear came, I just REALLY want to do something in-game as a response and then it morphed into me trying to see what all the limitations of the systems were and understand why the AH is in the state it currenty is.
From the experience, whether people “need” the gear or not to level matters very little. There are a LOT of players that are looking at the AH in the L15+ range for gear to be used as an upgrade. For F2P players, it makes complete sense. Until a currency cap is unlocked, there’s precious little that they can spend their money on. You can only buy 2 tiers of vault storage, you may still refrain from interest in a house. Maybe you’ve picked up the riding skill, but regular mounts are cheap and you can’t earn enough money because of the cap for a rep horse. And you want to spend your silver/gold before it goes into holding. So the AH is where you look. (And going through the Bree intro at ~L15-17, you most likely will take a look).
And the crazy thing about it? Adding store amour at a high TP price does very little to solve the problem for these players trying the game out that can’t find armour on the AH. If they are wondering whether to spend money on the game, would they spend their first money to buy TP for armour before bags, currency cap, quest packs, etc?
Ah well, just my rambling thoughts/2cp.
January 20, 2012 at 11:31 am
I don’t disagree, but I think it was more ignorance than outright greed. Every level grouping has people out there who over price things. And I think other crafters naturally assume that’s a “fair” price when it’s all that’s up there.
The thing is that a lot of stuff at that level was often given away, at least in my experience. I saw that overpriced stuff on the AH, but I laughed and moved on. My experience is that this stuff would often be given away in trade channels or through a kin.
Had I known people actually wanted this stuff and were only looking on the AH and giving up, then I think I would have done things differently. I still think there is room to do so (nothing is stopping us from permanently undercutting the gougers — they can only buy and repost so many things).
But in any event, I agree with your response to the issue and plan to post things regularly at reasonable prices as well.
January 20, 2012 at 11:33 am
I think it is apparent that Turbine’s official reasoning was fabricated. There was no outcry of unavailable armor, nor was it even that the armor was overpriced according to their own forum response. Instead, it is a fundamental flaw in that crafting system that does not allow the gathering of shards on greater scale. They might have EASILY changed it should they have decided to remove the restrictions on the quasi-repeatable quests that can be done in Harloeg and near the lake south of Esteldin and north of Bree.
January 21, 2012 at 5:47 pm
Your suggestion would require a developer to spend time changing and testing the alterations to those to make sure they work properly which may not be as simple as you suggest. They would not be able to be implemented it in a patch but instead would have to wait for an update while putting it in the store just requires someone on the Store Team, which is different from the team or teams that would be required to make your suggested changes, to put stats on it, pick out a skin, and put it in the store with minimal help from the other developers that probably have better stuff to do.
Also based on the posts above there is actually a demand for the stuff but it is usually either over-priced or not available.
January 20, 2012 at 10:54 am
Eh. They’re basically comparable to level 75 crafted stuff or the Barrow Downs set. So, yeah. It’s an advantage for about 5 levels, but those are a fast 5 levels…
As far as the run speed boost goes, there are so many items that give you that at this point, that it seems kinda moot. The harbinger’s cloak comes to mind, though you probably have a better cloak by level 20. Plus if you are/are with a hunter, or can ride your mount (available to vips at level 20), then you have better speed boosts. Also, there’s a 5% speed boost you can buy with DPs. Not quite as good, but another option.
January 20, 2012 at 11:12 am
Interesting comparisons. I wonder if people’s opinions in general would be dramatically different if the stats of the store armour were effectively identical to in-game crit armour, thus making this *entirely* about convenience (since, as was pointed out, getting things like the sapphire shards etc can be a pain). The flip side, of course, is that since one would effectively be spending real money via TP, perhaps they *should* be better. Of course the argument against *that* is that there are other things sold in the store (potions, hope tokens) that people can craft — how much of that is better vs. crafted? Maybe the difference is consumables vs. permanent items?
My feeling is that these armours probably won’t end up selling very well and this will end up being a non-issue. I think that Turbine is still experimenting with what the Store is for, and some of these experiments are (understandably) worrisome to players who enjoyed the game prior to the Store.
January 20, 2012 at 11:18 am
For the store potions, wasn’t it a previous controversy that those are better than what you can get in-game, too? The power/morale didn’t share a cd with the in-game versions, had a shorter cd in general, and the poison/etc potions cured multiple debuffs. Have those changed, or have the in-game crafted versions improved?
January 20, 2012 at 5:41 pm
I missed this one. Here’s the thing with store bought potions vs. crafted potions: Store bought potions aren’t actually better. They function differently than what you can craft. A store potion will give you a small bit of power or morale back immediately, then it will do a small HoT or PoT for a few seconds. Crafted potions give you an immediate and significant recovery of your morale and power. To my mind, that makes crafted potions much more reliable than the store potions. A crafted potion can save your bacon if you’re in trouble. Store potions… well, you can still suffer defeat while waiting for the HoT to catch up to where you need to be.
I would not spend my TP on Store potions. But I have used the ones that are given away as quest rewards. I look at it the same way as I do dyes in the Store. Granted, I can make my own potions and dye, but even if I couldn’t it’s just easier, both on my and my wallet, to get those things from other players.
January 20, 2012 at 11:35 am
What angers me is quest rewards and monster drops skirmish gear to a lesser extent are complete junk if there was a lack of low level armour in the auction house monster drops quest rewards should have filled the gap without having to completely rely on crafters
at 20 you have 4 sources for armour ,quest rewards,skirmish barter,monster drops,and crafters and now the shop begining to look like wow with their heirloom gear
the other point is poorly itemized stats on crafted gear +7 might on a robe for example will all store stuff be really nicely itemised compared to crafted gear which seems its only competition
even store bought crafting tools were slightly inferior to the best crafted.
If the armour was the same as the skirmish vendor it would be less of a problem as you could just buy it with marks or tps and I dont think people would have an issue with that
January 20, 2012 at 11:58 am
I am no math expert, but I do think the pocket XP item would be a better investment using real money. If it is for alts. Thats all.
January 20, 2012 at 12:06 pm
the problem with AH being overprized is cus of the AH service fee… and the time required to do it… most of the time when I craft low level stuff like this that can’t be sold for high margin, I just sell it to vendors to save the trip and storage space and the fee… AH is like the government, taking hard earned cash. remove the tax, and more people would post in AH.
January 20, 2012 at 12:12 pm
The thing about the AH is that it’s a risk/reward system. A lot of players will vendor things like recipes rather than place them on the AH because vendoring rewards you with immediate coin. The AH, on the other hand, will take a little money now and will not reward you unless someone buys your item. If no one does, then you’ve taken a loss. It’s not worth it to some to take the time to list things on the AH if there’s a chance they will not be rewarded sufficiently for it.
There’s actually a lot of ideas in my head for what they could do to fix low level crafting (some of which has already been mentioned above by others) and how to make the auction house more appealing to stabilize the in-game economy. But I may save that for another day.
January 20, 2012 at 4:30 pm
That is a bunch of BS! I see 10 ingots for a selling price of almost a gold! Dyes that are 400-600S or more. Leather that is under 30 pieces for a gold or more, low level armour between 400-600S or more for each piece. The list goes on & on. This has nothing to do with ignorance or AH service fees, one word GREED! There are players who cannot get enough money in this game they gotta have more.
As far as the game goes, I love this game & really have no complaints. Way I look at it is there could be things added to this game allot worse then whats in it now.
Be thankful Turbine has not went the route Diablo 3 is going. Then again you people might like that option because then you can become the greedy cash cows like you claim Turbine has become.
January 20, 2012 at 12:27 pm
No matter which way you slice it, this sets a TERRIBLY bad precedent.
January 20, 2012 at 1:41 pm
This is the root issue of the problem. No one is really worried about level 12 armour upsetting the balance of the game or giving people a store-bought in-game “advantage”.
It’s the fact that they said they would never sell gear for real money and now they are.
If people wanted low level gear, guess whay? They want high level gear, too.
Do you think that if I were given the opportunity to plunk down a couple of bucks here or there, I wouldn’t like to get my hands on a full set of the Orthanc or Draigoch armour without having to grind for them? Or maybe they’ll start selling the Worn Symbols of Super Badassness next.
At the same time, since they’re selling potions, stats tomes and other items that give a real in-game advantage, selling gear is only the next logical progression. Whether it leads to a revolt among players remains to be seen.
Turbine is gambling that there will be enough people who will buy the gear (at whatever level they release it), and those purchases/revenues will outweigh the number of people who cancel their subscriptions.
The endgame for Turbine/Warner Brothers is to turn a profit, and someone must have thought this was the (ancient golden) ticket.
January 20, 2012 at 2:40 pm
Not to mention that they increased the price for task resets to 100TP instead of the 50TP it previously was… grr.
January 20, 2012 at 2:46 pm
The Task system is possibly the worst, or one of the worst, systems in LOTRO. It’s there mainly to give free players something to do in zones they haven’t purchased. Things like Task Resets and Task Increase tokens are there to make some quick cash off of those players.
Why? To keep people playing and making zones seem full of players. It’s akin to a practice that World Championship Wrestling used in their heyday. Back then, if they couldn’t sell out a venue for their television tapings, they would give away free tickets to people until they had a full audience. They did this to maintain the image that there was more interest in their product than was actually there.
Tasks are sorta, kinda A LOT like that. It’s something for people who aren’t paying to do. For the rest of us, it’s a way to score some extra reputation.
January 20, 2012 at 3:01 pm
Yeah, I own all the content (dropped VIP right before RoI), I just feel disgruntled that they doubled the price of it… 100TP is steep, I already rarely use it at 50TP, and it is just cause i have a bunch of turnins at lower level and am about to level past them and didnt want to lose out on the chance for rep. guess i can just sell them and maybe score some rep items on the AH for Bree, lol.
January 20, 2012 at 2:45 pm
I still love Turbine and I still love the game, but this new store-bought armour is 100% Pay-to-Win. They promised when the store came out that it would be Cosmetic and Convenience, and never Pay-to-Win. Yet look at the Store potions you can buy that do not share a cooldown with regular potions… those are also 100% Pay-to-Win.
I’d be curious to see links and captures of Turbine’s early promises for the Store again.
I do care about calling them on their crap. But I don’t care if Pay-to-Win exists in the store… I’ll never spend TP on it, and won’t be hurt in the slightest if others do.
January 20, 2012 at 3:04 pm
It’s not really pay-to-win until it is available at the top levels of the game… what I WOULD be ok with is them selling tokens, or medallions, or whatever, to use to barter for the same dragioch raid gear you can get in game, at the top levels. Not everyone has full time to do all of the work needed, but if it were simply equivalent to what you can earn in game then it is not an issue of pay-to-win, it is “pay for convenience” and people with plenty of money who want to give that to turbine to avoid working for something that I grinded to earn in game, well, that just keeps the game online a little longer for me to enjoy.
January 20, 2012 at 3:17 pm
That’s just the thing. If low level armours sell well, then it stands to reason that high-level armours will as well. From there it’s all downhill as whether or not your are fit to run certain, harder instances with groups will depend on how much money you have spent in the Store. It’s at that point that I’m out.
I have nothing against Turbine making money. I want them to make money. But I want them to do it in such a way that skill and game knowledge still means something.
For example, they sell trait slots. you get a few for free, and you have to buy the rest. I have a problem with this because a)traits are an important system in the game and b)it has created a portion of the playerbase that doesn’t realize this because they’d rather spend their TP on content, which I don’t blame them for, mind you. But it creates an imbalance that could have been easily avoided. These players have a harder time because they don’t have the traits they need. It’s also a bit of double dipping because in order to earn traits to slot you need to buy quest packs to unlock deeds to earn them, or you need to buy the traits from the Store.
I love Turbine, I do. But sometimes, I just want to shake the hell out of the people making these kinds of decisions.
January 20, 2012 at 3:06 pm
I think you have to be pretty frivolous with your real-world money to spend any on low-level armor. And if you are, then fine – that’s more money in Turbine’s coffers to spend on game content for me.
I never buy or craft armor until my character’s at least in their 40s. If I’m dying too often it’s because I’m trying to do too much with my character, not because I’m relying on armor drops.
January 20, 2012 at 4:58 pm
Buying low-level armor is no more or less frivolous than buying a coffee- flavored beverage at Starbucks, or buying a soccer ball to kick around the back yard.
We all have frivolities we like to indulge.
January 20, 2012 at 5:21 pm
Well, I’m frivolous with money, but this is just a shameful move by Turbine. This is the first time, after playing since 2008, that I’ve considered quitting. I have a lifetime subscription – my exit survey won’t matter a bit, but I’ve spent plenty at the TS, on items I didn’t really *need.* They’ve gone too far. They’re actively competing with players – they’re no better than gold sellers. I almost miss gold spam – at least, I could report that. This just means the end of a great game, & that’s sad.
January 20, 2012 at 6:20 pm
Personally, I wouldn’t buy store armor for my baby toons – but
neither would I presume to judge those who do, and call them “frivolous”. I see quite a number of posts in the LotRO forums that fall under the category of “It’s all about me”. Change the game so it suits MY play style. Everyone should be able to make game money the way I do. Anyone who doesn’t raid is incompetent. Solo players should just group up. I want to play as a polar bear, so there should be a polar bear class. Me me me me me me me! And ME!
Sorry. Thank you. I feel better now.
Would I buy high level armor in the store, if I could? I don’t know. Maybe. I’d be willing to grind skirmishes, or run around soloing other content, but if the only way to get really good armor is to run group content? I run group content on my mini, who is a healer. Grouping is her job. On my warden, I really prefer to solo, and I want her to be able to earn gear that will let her take on even greater solo challenges. If the game does not provide her with a way to earn it –yes. I might just buy it in the store. It wouldn’t be my first choice, but there it is.
January 20, 2012 at 9:40 pm
I wholeheartedly agree with your sentiment.
There is a line in the movie Field of Dreams, “It’s money they have, and peace they lack.” Well as a middle-aged family man that only has one hobby, lotro, it’s money I have and time I lack. I appreciate Turbine making allowances for my play style.
Now don’t get me wrong, I have no need to buy the armor. However, I do buy the following to save time:
1. It takes me a couple of hours to slay 360 of something for a single virtue. At the end I am not a better player, and I certainly did not enjoy the experience. It is worth the approximate $1.77 to buy a Discipline virtue. Frankly, I buy about 15% of my virtues.
2. Craft accelerators – I buy them.
3. Ingredient packs – I buy them for my main and my alts. So in effect, I am buying armor through my tailor/metalsmith alts.
4. Reputation – I love the extra 5,000. It came in especially helpful when I was trying to get rep with the Iron Garrison Guards.
Now don’t get me wrong, I believe there should be a balance in the game. We should not be able to buy our way to level 75 with top quality gear, but I think TPs give us with limited time a very good alternative to the senseless grinding of deeds.
Just my 2 cents.
January 21, 2012 at 2:17 am
Well, you’ll get no argument from me. Those are all really valid points. I hate the grind myself and have utilized the Store to lessen it. Adventure over Grind.
You may take my life, but you’ll never take my DEED ACCELERATORS!
…
*ahem*
I just don’t want to see this become a Pay to Win game. The game is better than that and its players deserve better than that. I probably wouldn’t have such a problem with Store armour (beyond them saying they wouldn’t do that and then doing adding it in anyway) if it wasn’t so much better than what can be earned in game.
January 20, 2012 at 6:23 pm
Sorry — the edit removed the “rant” and “endrant” tags from around my second paragraph!
January 20, 2012 at 6:30 pm
For my part, I get what you’re saying. I just think that rewards from doing instances and questing should be a driving factor for character improvement. Taking shortcuts in the store doesn’t help players learn the game. It doesn’t give incentive to craft or learn your class or any of the other things many of us take for granted in our gameplay.
It’s not that I don’t want good gear available to everyone. Believe it or not, I really, really do. But I want people to be able to acquire it in such a way that there’s a sense of accomplishment when they get that nice new gear. That’s what keeps a lot of people coming back for more. Having to break out your wallet to keep up with the Jones’ doesn’t.
And if they absolutely must sell gear in the Store… if there’s no way around it… then I’d rather they made it equal to what is available through in-game means. It should be an alternative to grinding for gear, not “this is better than anything you could possibly earn.”
January 20, 2012 at 9:28 pm
Bryandt — but I completely agree with you! I want the chance to earn my gear. I just don’t want to be forced to group in order to earn it. I want another option, and I want the opportunity to earn really good armor by soloing. I don’t mean raid armor, I mean top-of-the-line solo armor. Instead of taking the easy way out and putting gear in the store, I’d really like to see some great solo rewards in the game. If I won that gear, I could feel so…so…heroic! Instead, if I bought store gear, I would feel wealthy and cheap and the same time.
January 20, 2012 at 7:24 pm
Not sure you’re comparing apples to apples here.
I don’t find single-use recipes the most efficient way to craft. I totted up the stats for the Stout Quilted Armor — which are the crit versions of dropped recipes, requiring Bree Flax Fiber as a crit item. These are level 18 light armor (7 pieces):
Armor 756
Vitality 13
Morale 39
Power 39
Crit 96
Fate 25
Will 19
Compared to the store stuff, 3 pieces (level 20, I presume):
Armor 619
Fate 24
Will 24
Vitality 16
Run speed 8%
I still loathe the idea of armor for sale in the store. What’s next? Jewellery? Weapons?
January 20, 2012 at 7:34 pm
You’re right. I’m comparing Armour to Armour.
Like I said, yes there’s only three pieces of Store Armour for each armour type. However, if you supplement it with crafted or even quest gear to make up for the missing pieces, it will still push the Store armours well ahead of their crafted counterparts.
January 20, 2012 at 11:47 pm
Sapphire shards for 800s at the AH? Wow. On my server they sell for around 200s, if that. Plus they can be obtained for the equivalent of pennies at the skirm camps so its not like they are extremely rare items that only drop from rare elite mobs. That aside, trying to crit level 20 gear is pointless really. As long as you are completely outfitted with on-level purple gear you will mow down any world mobs red and below without breaking a sweat. Plus you will out-level it so fast its hardly worth the effort. Replace armor on the 2′s and 8′s (the 5′s also, if you are a hardcore crafter), weapons at the 2′s, 5′s and 8′s, and jewelry as better class-optimal stats become available and your golden, till you can start grinding for raid gear. Whether you craft purple gear or buy the store armor you will out-level it so fast it’s not really even worth discussing.
January 21, 2012 at 1:35 am
Well, the price on various things tend to fluxuate on Landroval. A lot. And prices, for reasons that completely escape me, tend to become very inflated. For example, tonight I sold a single Draigoch Scale on the Auction House for 150g. And that was undercutting the competition by about 50g. I’m glad to have that much in-game cash, but it still just blows my mind. That’s *insane*.
I will agree with you that you level past gear so fast at the early levels that the whole “gearing up” part of this is, to be frank, silly. But it’s the precedent that it sets that is of concern. If we don’t speak up and draw a line somewhere, then the sky’s the limit and everything is up for grabs. Just because an issue doesn’t relate to you now, doesn’t mean it will not down the road.
January 21, 2012 at 12:29 am
Quote: For me, this puts the armour sets firmly on the side of “Advantage” over “Convenience”.
Who has advantage over whom? Over the mobs? Well, that’s the point. Over each other? Well, we’re supposed to be on the same side, unless it’s PvMP which is not available at this level.
I agree that it further devalues crafting – that’s a shame, but since there are rarely crit items on the AH, then it’s a circular argument – more crit items for low levels would have removed the demand for store-bought items (if you take Turbine at their word, which I have no reason not to).
January 21, 2012 at 1:28 am
Advantage over low level crafters is what I was driving at. And over other players if you count sparring. (I don’t, but that’s a whole other debate.)
The set is just too OP. There is no reason for it to have stats that high. My main concern with that is that if/when they start selling higher level gear in the store, those sets will also have much higher stats than their crafted counterparts.
There’s no real reason for it.
January 21, 2012 at 12:04 pm
Upon consideration, the real problem here is “bound to Account.” Crafted or quest stuff — good stuff, in other words — is all bound to a single character. With few exceptions, stuff you can trade around your characters is cosmetic, without stats. This store armor is a great way to destroy crafting.
January 22, 2012 at 1:00 am
The real problem here goes beyond bound to account– the store armor is vendorable. You can pay for your TP, buy the armor, and sell it for in-game currency. Turbine is still feeling the after-effects of their security breach a while back, and this opens the door for hacks and gold-sellers. The store armor is a great way to destroy someone’s credit rating.
January 21, 2012 at 2:51 pm
Massively hast posted an article about this issue:
http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/01/21/the-road-to-mordor-convenience-not-advantage/
January 21, 2012 at 5:09 pm
Part of the problem for crafters is the way professions are set up to have 3 set profs but a lot of the time rely on a 4th/5th to get materials or parts for crafting (cut gems metalsmith bits etc). For those you either need to have a crafting alt or hit the AH.
Some people are still driven by greed over common sense and can essentially kill off a servers economy for crafters by the process of reselling materials for vastly overinflated prices.
Off the top of my head lotro doesnt really have a money sink beyond buying and maintaining a house, so the drive to max out your gold stash doesnt really make much sense. Took 2 days for the resellers to kick off on my swtor server, but at that stage of a games life it’s easy to spot and boycott their AH sales.
I’ve always been happy to craft for tips, as long as the customer provides (most of) the materials. Part of my altoholic nature means my account in most mmo’s will have one of each profession across multiple characters. I have in the past bounced between alts to make an item that needed bits from say scholar and forestry.
On topic though, I don’t like the store armour. I can see that some people might find it useful but quest rewards are mostly fine until you’re 20 odd and able to get semi decent upgrades via skirmish marks.
Crafting in RoI could/should have been updated with more relevant stats on gear to coincide with the updated stats that classes got, but it wasnt. Instead we find store bought stuff that has better stats for the classes using them and no silly stats, like might or agility on light armour, you sometimes find creeping in outwith the store.
January 21, 2012 at 5:17 pm
You bring up a good point. Originally, the crafting system was set up to where you needed to rely on other players or alts to get all the materials you needed to craft certain materials. Such as needing polished gems for armour or metal braces to craft crossbows. Over time, more and more of that interaction has been removed. (I think some of the higher-tier armours still require polished gems, but I’d have to look over my tailor to be sure).
The Store armours are a really cheap band-aid to a much larger problem, both with the AH and the Crafting system itself. Both systems need revision.
January 21, 2012 at 5:50 pm
In theory the interdependancy works well, however the theory doesnt factor in player greed which turns what could be a great strength into something more the opposite. Off the top of my head tailor guild armour only needs the leathers, westfold thing and a sigil.
Westfold stuff is on the whole much easier to make compared to the rest of the tiers, perhaps with the exception of cooking/farming which isn’t really worth the guildrep at top end.
And unfortuneately it can only take one or two per server to break the cycle of crafters being able to work together and support each other.
January 21, 2012 at 5:56 pm
There’s the rub, isn’t it? In a perfect world, this wouldn’t be a problem. But we don’t live in that particular fantasy land.
Now, I know it would take some time and it wouldn’t be a simple solution, but I think the answer to Player Greed is to place price caps on the AH. Similar to what is done with Material Traders in Guild Wars. In that game, the price for materials fluctuates depending on supply and demand, but never wildly and never to such an extent that is ridiculous. The player can sells their mats to the vendor and receive immediate gratification in terms of in-game coin, the amount depending on the material, the amount of material the vendor is buying and the demand for it. The material you sold then goes into a pool to be sold to other players. You don’t control the pricing at all.
But that would take work. And we’re still waiting for a new PvMP zone and a housing revamp. And where’s that new hobby at, anywho?
January 21, 2012 at 7:30 pm
I can not get around all the people who say they dont care about low level armor but draw the line at raid gear…
It is obvious that they will implement raid gear or special high end stat gear.
The uproar is not about the gear.. its about the promise they made to NOT ever do that. Along with all their other promise failures and under handed store actions on other stuff (remember rep horses in the store? remember store having the skeleton horse after the event was over? remember how they said the store was to be a convenience and now you have a store icon on EVERY game page and area?)
They bury the protest and debate thread in the store feedback thread and then remove pages of posts from consumers and also hide posts from view lotrocommunity.com/forum
add in the quote from the CEO that they can make the game annoying, irritating but we still wont quit…
(no but we wont give you any more money either)
and other really kinda creepy things.
I have cancelled all my subs, am going to play just the ‘fun’ bits (chicken play, role playing, music, decorating, outfitting) and not give them one more penny ever.
January 21, 2012 at 7:38 pm
It’s not just about the broken promise, or the effect on the community or a section of the community. It’s not about whether or not they’ll add more gear to the Store.
It’s about all of those things, concurrently. All of those things matter in relation to this community’s relationship with Turbine. And, indeed, it does seem the best way to speak your mind is to speak with your wallet.
I’m willing to bet that if everyone on every server stopped playing LOTRO for one day, just one, that would get their attention.
January 21, 2012 at 7:32 pm
wonderful new article in massively about this same thing:
http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/01/21/the-road-to-mordor-convenience-not-advantage/3#c35339393
January 21, 2012 at 10:37 pm
Thank you Bryandt for your post, hope Turbine reads this as I agree with everything you have pointed out.
January 21, 2012 at 11:40 pm
Thank you for reading.
January 21, 2012 at 10:55 pm
OK so I’ve said this before elsewhere.
We have to engage with Turbine in a meaningful way.
There needs to be a way for a new idea to be tabled by Turbine and the community give feedback on the idea.
What shape that takes I am not sure (could be a council of community reps or a polling system).
This way Turbine can know how the community will react and decisions can be made on direction in a more measured way.
Turbine do have to make money but they also need to have some pressures put on them in a good way from the community.
The community needs to realise that LotRO needs to grow as well so obviously some strong ground rules need to be taken into consideration. Principles as you were. Something everyone can hold up and say “that is the goal and ideals we are sticking to” so we can have a clear direction.
As a whole I’ve been pretty happy with the F2P model but there comes a point where instead of trying to scrape the barrel and make more money the devs should actually be looking at making a better game.
The engine is due for an overhaul and is starting to feel old. Is this what we get for F2P? Yes new content would be great but a more robust faster gaming engine would be better in the long term. I’d be prepared to wait for content if this was fixed. It still feels and looks a lot like Asheron’s Call (ok with obvious improvements) so shouldn’t it be time to do an overhaul to keep up with the competition?
Also if new players have a problem with getting ahead then the game mechanics are broken. I think that they are not because it is already so much easier than before.
January 22, 2012 at 12:39 am
Sparthir, I’ve read you on the forums and I have a lot of respect for you. I want to say that up front.
Now, it’s not that I don’t agree with you, it’s just that I think that will never happen. Can never happen. It’s a business and runs like any other business does. I do think that Turbine, in its search to innovate and “push the envelope” with what they can get away with concerning the Store has lost sight of their playerbase.
And having to turn to the community to get permission to do things (will never happen) can be just as disastrous as not doing so. What if this council makes a decision on behalf of the playerbase that’s just as unpopular? Now you have players angry not just at Turbine, but at this council of players as well.
Now, I’m not saying that Turbine shouldn’t value our opinions. They should. Of course they should. But they should use the resources they already have available to do so. They can send fliers to my email all week long. Why not send me a survey every once in a while and let me weigh in on whether or not I want to see a particular item in the Store or if I want them to add a particular piece of content?
Beyond that, there is precedent for player feedback effecting this game. Just not for the Store. Zombie Columbus wanted to turn one of the Hunter traitlines into a melee focused line. Personally, I thought that would be awesome. But the players looked it up and down and went “NO. Just NO.” and the idea was scrapped. (And now nobody is happy with the Hunter class, but that’s another story.)
There’s also the story of the Horse Whistle animation. When they first implented that animation, it was loud, shrill and could make ears bleed. Call your horse in the Moors and Creeps would know exactly where you were at from across the map. Feedback from players got that changed.
So maybe it’s time Turbine just listened to us again.
January 22, 2012 at 11:45 am
Don’t forget in terms of player feedback, there are the palantir private preview server/s. They presumably test and give feedback and opinion on this stuff, but its under and NDA so who knows whats being said. They may be fighting the players corner, but going unheard.
Any such council would likely also be under an NDA, because they would have access to early release data, and also at the end of the day, whilst Turbine will listen to, and implement changes from, feedback (I think we have enough changes to suggest this is the case) if it wants something a certain way, it doesn’t matter what the feedback is, it will do it anyway, and if it is seen publicly to disregard its ‘player councils’ opinions it would be bad press.
January 21, 2012 at 11:15 pm
The only way Turbine will take notice is a drop in revenues and traffic. As for discussion…where? On the game forum where they censor what we say and bury it? Frankly I am going to the internet and post my reviews and experiences there. Word of mouth is what got me to invest in the game, and it can be turned to go the other direction as well.
January 21, 2012 at 11:48 pm
If there is one thing Turbine has taught me, it’s not to invest heavily in an MMO. Now, I love this game. It’s my favorite one. But at this point I’d rather spend my money on a finished, static product than one that tends to thrash about wildly such as an MMO does I’m a lifetimer in this game and have spent money on every expansion twice over (for my wife, also a lifetimer, and myself). I will never, ever, do that again.
I’m not leaving LOTRO. Not yet. Not until I’m having to whip out the cash to do just about everything. If I wanted that, I would be playing Farmville.
January 22, 2012 at 11:43 am
The thread is hardly buried if you know how to utilize the forum options. I look for “new posts” every time I log into the forums. If there is a thread I want to read, I subscribe to it. Frankly, I prefer moving posts to the appropriate forum. I really do not want to see thread after thread about the same thing.
As to claims of moderator-deleted posts, I cannot comment. I have seen many that should be deleted as they little more than temper tantrums or are insulting in tone to another player.
January 24, 2012 at 7:18 pm
http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.php?442106-A-word-about-the-new-gear-offerings-in-the-LOTRO-Store
Wow. This is pretty awesome. No matter how you might feel about the issue, we’ve been heard.
January 24, 2012 at 7:39 pm
Yup, sure is
It also highlights how quickly some people will jump on anything from Turbine that differs from their remembered version of some interview or post from months ago, and then extrapolate that forward to predict the worst possible outcome and proclaim doom for the game!
I find that if you take Turbine at their word, there’s usually no need to worry.
January 24, 2012 at 8:10 pm
You have a point, but as you can see from Sapience’s post they haven’t done a very good job on what their word actually means. It was posted in several articles featuring interviews with various Turbine employees that they would never sell statted gear. If that was wrong, Turbine needed to refute that openly with the player base. They didn’t do that. As a result, the playerbase had an expectation that was shattered with the addition of the armours. It could have been easily avoided. It wasn’t.
Now, as you can see above, I never once predicted doom for LOTRO. Not once. Did I say that there was potential for harm to the game? I sure did, because there is. But we have Turbine’s promise that they’ll be guarding against that.
We also have their definitive word that they’ll never sell end game gear. I just hope they realize that I and other players like myself will remember that and will hold them to that.
To my mind, if anything has come to light in this whole mess, it’s that both the crafted armour and the Auction House merit looking at closer by Turbine. Hopefully, they’ll do that.
January 24, 2012 at 8:17 pm
Bry, sorry if you thought I was directing that at you personally – I definitely wasn’t!!! Yours was the model of a reasonable post, putting both sides without overreacting. I have much respect for your opinion, based on what I’ve read in the past.
I was talking more about the stuff we’ve been seeing on the Lotro forums from the usual suspects (you know who you are!!!).
I also don’t remember them saying “no statted gear” – I do remember them saying “no raiding gear”, which 99% of people know means armour & weapons, not consumables.
January 24, 2012 at 8:25 pm
It was a while ago so a lot of people don’t remember it. Doesn’t really matter,as the playerbase has believed that since F2P launch and recognition of that was made by Turbine via Sapience’s post.
And I didn’t take it as a jab at me personally, so no worries. But there are some folks who like to read into things what they want no matter what you say. So I wanted to do what Turbine should have done from the start and clarify my position on the issue before that happened.
I will admit that my initial reaction to the Store Armours was “Wait… WTF, TURBINE?! PITCHFORKS AND TORCHES! HERE WE GO!” But that’s hardly a constructive way to look at an issue, especially with so little information as I had at that time.
January 24, 2012 at 8:30 pm
NP Bry, all good
One thing we call all agree on – Turbine are lousy communicators!
January 24, 2012 at 8:34 pm
Oh, yes. I think they’re still using the Steefel Playbook for communicating with the press and others.