When familiarity breeds contempt (and why mystery of an MMO's mechanics keeps me engaged)

My MMO gaming of late has taken a bit of a turn. Guild Wars 2 has become my game of choice, after 5 years of LOTRO. There were a number of reasons for this change, the game had become stale for me, my kinship were often absent at the times I was playing, I was not getting anywhere with my level 100 Warden and my alts were just repeating the same old content I had been through so many times before.

Guild Wars, on the other hand is fast (loading in seconds rather than minutes), it's fresh, the story is all new but most importantly, the systems are a complete mystery. My Asura Ranger, Jestro, is awesome and the cosmetic system is incredible.

LOTRO had become stale because I understood everything about pretty much every character class and while not by any means an expert, it wasn't exciting. GW2 offered not only a raft of classes to discover, each with their own storyline, but a depth to what a character needs to do running up to level cap and even more so beyond. The PVP, which I have never been a fan of, is easy to get into and actually fun! (As much as I love PVMP in LOTRO, you can run round the small zone and not find a single opponent if you're on at the wrong time)

Now a new update for LOTRO has arrived along with a new system, allowing you to Imbue your legendary items, a system I have no idea about and the excitement is back. Today I spent my time back on Landroval, trying to catch up to the current content and figure out how to get a First Age weapon instead of my trusty Second Age.

This excitement may not last forever but it coincides with the latest incarnation of the Coursera course which brought me to Landroval in the first place, so an influx of new players to the kinship (The Courserrim) may be just what we need. Pinestro the Warden is there to help them.

I'll still be back to GW2 each night to slap Tequatl though :)