Task system adding 250 free quests to LotRO

Wow! Something new and different for MMOs! A bunch of collection quests!

So... just 250 normal quests, then.

The point is that they're providing alternate ways for free players to augment their leveling instead of buying quest packs. But, yes, they are basically just normal quests given in different ways.

I can't see subscription players doing these, unless the cloaks are really cool or the XP is especially good.

I hope Turbine don't implement a system then leave it under resourced. I feel like additions like this are away from the critical path of the game, which is really Middle Earth and they are implementing grindy type reward mechanics to favor F2P players solely, they got MMO over Middle Earth and it's make the game feel more generic, like a Lord of the Rings skin over DDO.

Why not add more quests from significant characters in the LOTR world. Tom Bombadil one example, why not give him a whole bunch of lore related quests, why is he sooo underused in this game, a totally enigma, ripe for exploitation in this genre. It feels now there is limited attempt to consolidate the cannon content with the extended LOTRO stuff.

This will continue as F2P needs to be stand alone or modular, Middle Earth will not be what we hoped not comprehensive, cohesive or interlinked. Tolkien's world is the richest fantasy IP going, and we are getting collection quests, did I miss something here, who was screaming out for this exactly? Turbine seem to forget that they can innovate to produce a hugely successful game, but since MoM they discarded that and went the tried and tested path and did more damage to the world than any 'One Ring' could.

Many important literary characters have been used as simple quest giver NPC's the depth is just not there. A collection quest doesn't help you feel more involved with Middle Earth, but since the direction of LOTRO changed with F2P (although we were given assurances that nothing would change for subscribers), we are seeing more of this. Skirmishes do nothing to advance the story telling agenda outline dby Turbine, the game is feeling thinner with the addition of new content.

While people are crying out for some sort of endgame in LOTRO (probably the biggest fault with the game right now), all Turbine seem to do is to promote people to reach the end, without really anything of note to do once you make it there. This is a minimal sideways step to give players something to do, but gating content according to level them is crazy, what happens if you are a level 65 toon, are you ineligible to enjoy some content? What happened to this marvelous scaling technology used in Skirmishes and the new Dungeons?

Any Middle Earth game is a complicated affair, but I can't help thinking what would be the best way to realize Middle Earth in an MMO then think about the current direction of LOTRO, I just feel that Tolkien's world is losing it's wonder and mystery and we are left with quest givers, collection quests, rep grind and limited social tools....

I agree totally with Shipwreck. So many negative-Nancies in the mmo community, if the above posters actually read the full dev diary it says on the front page that tasks are a way to augment the questing experience plus with the lack of content F2P's have in questing zones a.k.a. Lonelands/Northdowns etc. it's a decent way to bridge the gap albeit the small amount that can be done in a day(which can be increased through deeds/purchasing things off the lotro store god-forbid.) , this isn't supposed to blow people's minds, rather it's adding a bit of extra things to do.

Well, really, when it came down to it... if you chose not to use the quest packs and leveled past them... literally all there is to do is the main storyline and farm mobs for exp. So, this is at the very least is giving those who choose to go that route (I would just buy the quest packs as farming mobs drives me bonkers) something to do with their vendor trash that could give them a reward of some kind. But usually quests are good enough... though truthfully I'll probably do them as well as long as a quests point to those mobs anyway. :)

More content, no matter what form, is always good.

This sounds a lot like the dailies in Runes of Magic, and I can't for the life of me understand why it would be a bad thing even for people leveling normally. Since you don't have to grab the quest to get the quest items, even for veteran players leveling an alt this could end up like some extra XP. I'd actually love to see this expanded to include drops from higher level mobs as well - doing a kill deed you are bound to pick up a lot of trophies anyway, might as well cash them in for some extra XP if you don't want to sell them for silver.

And for the free players, I'm sure this will be welcome. In many ways I agree with what Mike writes above - it's more content for the game, more content is good.

This system will help give an extra bit of XP through some of the more annoying level regions, especially the mid 30's. Too bad it stops currently at 50. With the change of deeds giving Turbine Points instead of XP, I'm finding the mid 50's to be a bit more work than normal. :)

Yay more low level quests and repetitive sounding stuff at best. This game needs more dynamic higher level content and open world content and less middling, repetitive stuff.

This is a huge boon to the F2P community - especially if they tie in some Turbine points to "tasks" or "task sets"

It's weird, after this game went F2P, it sounds as if half the game is just about getting turbine points. Not bashing on LotRO, it just seems as if most conversations about it always comes back to Turbine Points, instead of Fun or something.

While some may claim that is lazy quest making, I honestly have to disagree. More quests in any form is NEVER a bad thing, though how they're implemented can decide if they're worth the time and effort. These quests will be using items that you are collecting anyway. You're not going out of your way to kill things for these items. So you can basically do them while you're doing anything else in that area - which is a very, very smart way to handle collection quests.

Gold sink!

Or rather, alternate way to spend the trash drops besides produce more and more gold.

And more ways to clog inventory (darn, I have only have 3 claws, I need 2 more or 7 more to turn in!) so that additional bag space is desirable.

That cynicism aside, options and more choices of things to do are always nifty. If you're killing mobs for deed grinding anyhow, you can now choose to have additional xp or keep the gold earned as before. Mob xp per kill for LOTRO always seemed on the stingy side.

For the love of all that is holy, could someone please tell me if there is a server with an (active!) Massively guild/kinship/etc on it? Yes no? I keep asking and no one responds :"(

EQ2X is a way better f2p game.