Ever since Lord of the Rings Online went free to play, Turbine has been in a constant state of experimentation with the game’s cash shop. Most of the updates go by with relatively little controversy, and when Turbine steps over the line and draws fire from the community, they are relatively quick to take two steps back and reevaluate their plans. With the release of Update 10, Turbine is experimenting with a new idea: Consolidating multiple niche cash shop items into a single multi-function currency. Or in this case, the Mithril Coin.
With Update 10, players will find that some of their cash shop items have been converted into Mithril Coin. The Mithril coins replace a number of specific-use cash shop items, including fast travel tokens and daily quest resets. The ultimate goal is to streamline one section of LOTRO, allowing for numerous activities to be fulfilled without cluttering an already over-stocked cash shop with even more stuff.
Mithril Coins will replace some existing items, such as Revive Tomes and Stablemaster’s Writs. Our goal is to provide a simple, consistent interface for the services you already use. Ultimately it should be faster and easier for you to reset a quest, travel or quickly revive.
According to the FAQ, Mithril Coins could be expanded into other areas of the cash shop, based on player feedback.
We have no intentions of removing the store, which is a great place to buy bigger ticket items like account-based purchases and unlocks.
Judging by this comment in the FAQ, it would appear Turbine is moving the game toward a system where lesser goods are sold via real money currency (mithril coins) while the cash shop is reserved simply for big items (mounts, regions, expansions, etc).
(Source: LOTRO)
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