Dear Turbine

*note* I was going to post this on the Lotro forums, but somewhere in the process of writing it I lost my nerve in the face of angry apathetic devs and the ever-present trolls. Maybe if I ever find my courage I'll put it there...

I've been here almost a year, and for a while, something has been growing in the back of my mind, bothering me.

When I first started playing lotro, I was amazed at the depth of the lore, the attention to detail, the high level of immersion in another world that this game gave me - compared to other games. I quickly fell in love with the game and over the past ten months have devoted countless hours to wandering the fields and hills of Middle-earth.

However, the farther east I wandered, the less impressed I was with what I was seeing. Yes, the views are still fantastic. Yes, there is still a certain something (something I don't know quite how to describe) that will hold my attention. But something has also been lost.

Perhaps it is the lore - the quests began to seem less unique, I suppose. Perhaps it was the players - the higher in level I moved, the farther it seems I was from other enraptured, wandering souls and suddenly I found myself in the company of power-hungry players only interested in the quality of their gear or their personal stats.

When I gained Kindred Reputation with the people of Bree - I really felt as though that meant something. I had worked tirelessly, serving the people in so many ways - and finally, I was rewarded. The Council of the North, however, or the Galadhrim, or even the Lossoth - while I may know these people, know what they supposedly stand for - I do not have the same connection for them. I have not yet reached Kindred with any of those, but when I do, instead of a grand sense of achievement, I instead fear a feeling of "so what? I finally finished a long grind and can now ignore this facet of the game. Yayyyyy." Turbine, this is not how I should be feeling after leaving an area.

I will still play, Turbine. And chances are I will still love LotRO, but please, remember what you have left behind. Remember the Shire and the hills of the Lone Lands. Not all players are interested in leveling at lightning speed and running high-risk instances. I don't consider myself a RPer, perhaps I am just full of whimsy and wanderlust. There are many facets of the game you as devs have not touched for reasons totally unknown to us players since the launch of the game. Why is there still only one hobby? Why is the housing system made up of code over fourteen years old when the game is only on its third year? Why is the crafting system horribly unbalanced?

I started playing LotRO because it was different from all the other MMO's I had seen out there. Why did you feel you had to change, Turbine? Why must you become like all the others with your new content that pushes forward - raises the cap, raises the bar, the intensity, for what? Three days or less while the die-hards run everything and suddenly, they are all at level cap again and bored. Do you work just to please them while the rest of us run at our own pace? Just because we are not first does not mean we should be ignored.