八卦!
Meghan: LotRO is much more casual of the two, because D&D is very numbers driven, and it's very focused on the combat system and character progression. LotRO is a much more casual 'jump in and out' game, and I think that the community kind of reflects that. It's interesting because DDO, originally, skewed much more toward men in their 30s, because these were all of the guys who were playing pen and paper D&D when they were kids, so they came to DDO to recreate that experience online. LotRO actually skews pretty heavily towards females for an MMO. We have a lot of women who play and I think only once have I gotten on voice chat in-game with someone who was playing a female character, and they weren't actually female. I remember looking for a group for the Great Barrow, and this level 50 hunter shows up, and she's a girl! She was just there to help the newbies out. I see a lot of that type of thing in both communities.
ZAM: So you've heard it here first! If you're looking for a girl in an MMO, play LotRO!
Meghan: Haha, that's right. Girls don't game? Yeah they do, and there are tons of women playing DDO, too. So as far as how the communities are different, I mean, DDO is a lot more hardcore and a lot more focused on the game mechanics, sometimes, than the LotRO players are. They're looking for different experiences.