Would've been incredibly awesome if you could create a level 1 warg and you had to level him up. Sort of like LotRO for freeps, only with creep quests. If any expansions do this I'll come back for sure! ^_^

As to leveling, there are already level 24 characters out there and the game just launched on Sunday. Now, those are rather extreme examples, but I've found that it takes about 10 hours of playtime to get through the first 10 levels. Of course, I've been pretty focused on leveling on the characters that I played through Open Beta and I expect to take more time with character development this time around. Still, leveling to 40 shouldn't be terribly difficult.

But, that's just half of it. You have your regular level (Combat Rank) and also your pvp level (Realm Rank) to bring up. Combat Rank is what determines your core traits and skills and Realm Rank grants you bonuses, extra trait slots, and access to good equipment. Combat Rank goes to 40 and Realm Rank goes to 80. From what I understand, it is a significant effort to get to 40/80. It's still probably nothing like the distant carrot of Rank 15 in LotRO, but just the same, it's not going to happen overnight.

With regard to the server rulesets, the are all RvR servers. However, on the Core servers each zone is divided up into RvR and non-RvR areas. When you enter an RvR area, you are flagged for combat and may be attacked by any player of the opposing faction (who is within your same Tier, 1-11, 12-20, 21-30, etc.). When in non-RvR areas, you may still flag yourself for RvR and engage in PvP if your opponent is so willing. It just has to be mutually consentual.

The Open RvR servers, on the other hand are RvR areas all over, excepting the starting area and the Capital City (unless it is under siege). The main drawback, as I see it, is that the Tier restrictions are loosened and players from the Tier above you may attack you at any time. That is, as a Level 1, you could be ganked by a Level 20, and so forth. The early signs are that the Open Servers are not proving to be too popular.

Collision detection - this brings back memories of Everquest, where ogres and trolls are being yelled at for sitting in dungeon hallways and blocking everyone...

Mac: the beams you mentioned were the searing hands spell right? I had that too, linked to two mobs that I killed. Not sure what caused it.

I never had the running around naked glitch, but I have this following screenshot. Notice how the portrait is of a bald guy with moustache, which was the face of the Bright Wizard I played before relogging as Archmage. Ths bug went away after a few minutes.

WAR is like that. Each zone has Battlefield Objectives that are fought over by the two factions. While the Scenarios are a quick way to get a good and (mostly) even scrap going, the open RvR that I've participated has been quite a bit of fun. It's not as rewarding, in terms of XP, RP, and gold, but in my mind it is every bit as compelling as anything in the Ettenmoors.

Let's not forget the weird glitch where it appears that you are running around naked. At first, I thought that it was just people being silly and wanting to watch their elf's little heiny run around, but last night when we both died/rezzed in the Gates of Ekrund scenario, it seems that my fat dwarf was in his undies to you (while appearing clothed to me) and that your skivvies were on display for me (I'm assuming that you were still dressed in your own client). It's an odd sort of bug.

From what I've seen, Mythic has made it very clear that the mods won't support Macroing and that they have a low tolerance for such behavior. I'm a bit apprehensive about it, just the same.

Yes, the one with very limited choices that leads to all the males and females looking the same. Another huge disappointment. I know, I know, LOTRO had same-itis too at launch. But that was then, this is now. And anyone coming out to play in the sandbox needs to be up to the same standards or the big kids will chase them off.

Last night we were much more effective in coordination. At times, the gameplay was fantastic. And 10 minutes later it was meh....

I ran across a quest where I'm supposed to find a book which is somewhere in an enemy camp. Rows and rows of tents. And enemies everywhere. No way to weave through it. No clue where that book is. Obviously a group quest but nothing tells you that. I could easily skip it since I can level in PvP, but I'm a completionist. The camp looks fantastic but oy vey....

Throughout the night I kept having graphic glitches. It looked like I had tractor beams from me to all the things I killed. And then I got surrounded in a blinding white egg at respawn that wouldn't go away and kept getting brighter every death. *sigh*

It's easy to find problems and things we don't like. But there is sooooo much they did right too which makes it very appealing. Little things like anyone in the party can invite people and a pop-up appears for the leader to approve or deny. Having two targets -- enemy and friend -- so you can damage and heal at the same time (but no enemy of enemy). And they have LUA integrated into their UI so add-ons are coming. I expect the playerbase will fix the raid situation, add better party/raid bars and implement timers for effects. Unlike LOTRO, the players can actually add the features they want to make the game more enjoyable. This is a huge huge huge huge huge step in the right direction.

I also did not notice the relation of the realm rank vs level rank.

Speaking of graphics bug, I get a lot of rubberbanding/teleporting for mobs. There were also a few occasions where the mob resets even tho I have not moved an inch from where I first hit it. I guess this is similar to the mob having the ? icon in LOTRO where the pathfinding algorithm failed.

One thing I noticed....on the character creation screen where you pick the face/hair etc, you know you can rotate the avatar by holding the mouse button and dragging left or right? If you drag really fast and release, you avatar spins real fast...then pants as if he/she was dizzy :)