The Lord of the Rings Online Interview

During last month's E3, MMORPG.com had the opportunity to chat with some of the guys at Turbine about their plans to switch The Lord of the Rings Online over to a free-to-play business model. A bit of what they learned:
We asked about how Monster Play will be impacted and they explained that it is there for the VIP players. They are looking to expand the Free to Play model into Monster Play at some point in the future. Overall they want to keep LOTRO's core systems from being impacted by the model and also to keep veteran players happy with their VIP accounts. The system will not impact the ability for players to make legendary weapons. They also do not want the new model to disrupt the community they have already built.

Two of the areas in the game store that Turbine feels will be popular are the Deed Excelerator and the Rank increases. It is almost as if instead of paying for Power Leveling, you are paying the game company to allow you to achieve things faster. The MMO audience continues to battle against the grind that has been set down by some MMOs. LOTRO is looking to offer players with less time a way to advance. The other area is the ability to buy Rank Increases. Again, the advancement is up to the player whether they want to spend some money to move up or if they have the time, continue gaining ranks at a normal pace. Also Turbine made it clear that there is only one price for ranks.