Age of Conan started. Big chested, big-hipped Priestess of Mitra in the best outift ever (almost see-through silver bikini) started hed adventures.
Not an easy mode, died few times, but still was fun. Not sure about character customization - i received some points but nowhere to spend them (or I overlooked something). The only minus is exiting the game. Folks told I needed to use command /camp.
EQ2:tried yesterday. Interesting, but somehow did not captivate me.
Age of Conan started. Big chested, big-hipped Priestess of Mitra in the best outift ever (almost see-through silver bikini) started hed adventures.
Not an easy mode, died few times, but still was fun. Not sure about character customization - i received some points but nowhere to spend them (or I overlooked something). The only minus is exiting the game. Folks told I needed to use command /camp.
EQ2:tried yesterday. Interesting, but somehow did not captivate me.
Exit, just guessing here, but is there a possibility they were only goofing with you? /camp is an exit method indeed - just like the "Exit game" from the menu, or the trusty old alt+f4, or his buddy alt+f10... (maybe even LotRO's shift+esc is working too, but I can't vouch for that)
For character customisation, maybe you're still under lvl10? The main cust. option, the Feat panel is opening up at lvl10 I think. Do you have 6 icons at the top of the screen (in the middle), or just 5?
AoC has 3 methods for char.cust. where you can allotting points. The smallest one is the skills panel (3rd button on top, a figure helding his arms wide, "Attributes and skills"). It shows your stats and attributes on the left, and pvp stats on the right. + skills on the right as well, on the 3rd tab. You can spend points here on basic skills like run speed or climbing. It's good to put some on climbing, some quests and explorations need a high ranked climbing. Though you can reset the points any time, for ingame money, so you can spend those points as you wish.
Second and biggest method are the Feats. 5th button on top, "Feats", a dude with 2 star-like thingy above his shoulders. It's like the trait trees in other games. You have 3 trees, classA, classB and General (which is the same for the same archetypes, for example all 3 healers have the same General tree with basic healing-focused feats). You can experiment with Feats a lot, there are feat-planner pages, on the forum you can also find lots of posted builds. How you allot your feat points is defining maybe 35-40% of your character. As a PoM the 2 class trees for you are divinity (the healing-oriented) and vengeance (the dps-oriented), for a good build you'll need to mix those two. (But you can focus on only one of them, and also you can respec your feat points any time, for ingame money. You can also store multiple builds and switching between them)
Third method is AA, but as a starter, f2p player you don't need to worry about that right now (that was part of the Godslayer expansion, a way to enhance your character after you're level-capped). You can check it and its perks under the Feat panel, there's a button "Alternate Advancement".
Age of Conan chosen. Thanks to everybody who participated.
Impressions so far:
Character customization: positive (even can choose voice)
Fantasy with no skyscraper size swords, no anime toons: very positive
So far - all is free. However, cash shop ad pop-us eveyr time I log (I'm free player after all). 2 toons does not hurt me. Looks I cannot send stuff, but that does not hurt.
Classes are not that powerfull as in Lotro. My poor big-chested blonde Priestess of Mitra running with her strings only (thanks to Vanity tab...) had a very difficult times to fight mob that was 2 levels higher. Priestess is a ranged class, hence melee is difficult
Trait trees remind those in Lotro. So far investing into Vengeance to gain at least some offense. I can nuke lvl.5-8 crocodiles, but I want to nuke something on level. Strange is, that I ghain no new abilities on each level. used to it in Lotro.
Quests not boring, even "plz plz plz be so kind and kill da 50 piratez" ones.
A pity, quest you choose has no impact on gameplay. And I tried to play nice (big chested nude blonde...) Priestess.
Guilds are active, recruitment everywhere. Community is nice and mostly helpfull for newbies
However, surroundings are a bit harsh, no such warm peacefull atmosphere like Lotro's Shire or even Evendim. It's hard for me to actually like, say, Tortage and think about visiting it every now and then
Overall, generally - I'm satisfied. Have to master quest log and undrstand how to level fast. Then, one day I would be a good Priestess of Mitra. And later will try evil Necromancer - saw his minions in action, it's just cool.
Cool, to be honest, if there wasn't the anniversary festival in LotRO this week I'd go back to Hyboria as well, for leveling a new character... start to miss the game (but the new steed and the matching outfit looks so great I need to have them on my mains, and besides, firework parties are fun)
A few remarks: 4 and 5, nowadays you barely get new skills in LotRO as well, same goes to powerfulness post U13 (at least for those not at level cap). 9), yep, Shire is unique and Conan's world is (quoting from the press material) brutal and savage. Conarch village is a cozy place though - cozy by cimmerian terms, so it still would be harsh for a hobbit - I like to hang around there.
3) yep, the main game is totally free (with a 10gold cap and with less inventory). The "can't send" part is strange, I'll check on my free account later, but as I remember you can mail and auction stuff with a free account as well.
6,7) the writing is great, but yep, mostly just "cosmetics", all conversations ends with either take the quest or not (so like every other mmo, accept/decline). At start there were some experimenting with real choices, but the "don't read, just wanna hit accept"-type (ex-wow ) players hated those, so this is what's left. There are still extra lines / options sometimes based on your gender or faction, but doesn't affect anything in the end. It's accept / decline. Still fun though.
Fastest level is via grouping and doing all the quests. The game can be soloed all along easily, but since it's an mmo, grouping is encouraged by design (like your heals, if a spell of yours heals you 100, then it heals 200 if casted on a group mate), lots of self-buffs are applied to the whole group automatically, or AoE based, etc., so 1+1 is adding up more than 2 if you team up. And there's no drawbacks, except that you need to roll on loot, but it seems there's more loot drops when grouped, so it balances out the lost rolls.
Yep, reanim necro is fun, you can build a nice synergy with your pets (there are many types of them) and control them - or sacrifice them in need
edit: checked, you can send items attached to mail, and you can auction away items with a free account.
Age of Conan chosen. Thanks to everybody who participated.
Impressions so far:
Character customization: positive (even can choose voice)
Fantasy with no skyscraper size swords, no anime toons: very positive
So far - all is free. However, cash shop ad pop-us eveyr time I log (I'm free player after all). 2 toons does not hurt me. Looks I cannot send stuff, but that does not hurt.
Classes are not that powerfull as in Lotro. My poor big-chested blonde Priestess of Mitra running with her strings only (thanks to Vanity tab...) had a very difficult times to fight mob that was 2 levels higher. Priestess is a ranged class, hence melee is difficult
Trait trees remind those in Lotro. So far investing into Vengeance to gain at least some offense. I can nuke lvl.5-8 crocodiles, but I want to nuke something on level. Strange is, that I ghain no new abilities on each level. used to it in Lotro.
Quests not boring, even "plz plz plz be so kind and kill da 50 piratez" ones.
A pity, quest you choose has no impact on gameplay. And I tried to play nice (big chested nude blonde...) Priestess.
Guilds are active, recruitment everywhere. Community is nice and mostly helpfull for newbies
However, surroundings are a bit harsh, no such warm peacefull atmosphere like Lotro's Shire or even Evendim. It's hard for me to actually like, say, Tortage and think about visiting it every now and then
Overall, generally - I'm satisfied. Have to master quest log and undrstand how to level fast. Then, one day I would be a good Priestess of Mitra. And later will try evil Necromancer - saw his minions in action, it's just cool.
Not sure how it is today but AoC back in the day past level 20 became considerably less fun.
Not sure which PvE server I am on. My pretty Priestess got stuck and looks I won't be playing her. Necromancer currently is the choice...although a piuty, no ranged self-healing nuking unit, like Lotro's minstrel.
And yet I can't call harsh AoC my new home. I do miss something much like Lotro (but guess would have to play AoC, at least for big-chested blonde female Necromancers...)
p.S. tried EQ - did not like, something was just not for me. And looks like I am out of the options.
Tempest of Set. So far, good class - am at lvl.8 and can electrocute 2 enemies at once. Three enemies may be problematic...However, took 1 Fleash eater (lvl.11) and 2 Flesh feeders (lvl.11) while being lvl.8 or 9. Finished with little health left, but still victorious.
every reply gets compared to LotRO so my suggestion is just to go back to LotRO. u havent really liked any other game that doesnt have big chested women.
every reply gets compared to LotRO so my suggestion is just to go back to LotRO. u havent really liked any other game that doesnt have big chested women.
It is the way we usually recognize thimngs in the world: by comparing. If there are two persons of same age, race...and one is 3 meters high and the other 1,5 - we would say, first person is high IF compared to second one.
Same with online games. I like(d) Lotro before it started its move towards hardcore. Even now there are ridiculous thoughts to increase damage made by mobs up to 3 or 7 times (!). And hardcore Lotro is just not for me. if only they had a server where pre-Update13 content could be played - I would live there and not go to other servers. But it isn't and we know it won't gonna happen.
Hence - a need to find a new home. Lotro does not fascinate me any longer. And any game I play, I would compare to Lotro (which is pretty natural). I will look for something Lotro's Minstrell class. For same peacefull and warm atmosphere, for same pve f2p.
Buig chested women are just for giggle, especially when I show it to my friends, like "look how could design of armour looks like...".
---
About PoM: i had some guides about setup and I used what I found. And it is my own strategy - to make offense strong and care too little about defense. if I one-shot enemy, I have little interest in bikini-strenght armour that Minstrels in Lotro are wearing.
Dear mods, sorry for necro-posting...but maybe it's better to revive old thread than create another with same title?
Once again - asking for same help.
Lotro has sbecome un-playbale for me. The only thing I force myself to do is to turn in task items, take Hobbit presents, pay for house upkeep. Also - chat with my Kinship, the only aspect of game that still holds me there.
I have returned to Istaria, now am over-busy with crafting (so many structures, so many help needed, so little time)...but still am not convinced if it is really my game.
I do enjoy kind of peacefull games (Lotro could be one - wonder in green hills of the Shire at, say, level 30 and enjoy nature). Istaria could be one, especially with crafting and finishing every single crafting school. Age of Conan - played, but did not like. It is brutal and sometimes hard for me.
Tera would have worked except it flirts a bit too much with anime.
AoC maybe?
Otherwise I would buy GW2, it initially do have a cost (saw it for 25 bucks at my local store this week) but it have a very different level of polish compared with any F2P game I played, it fits your bill perfectly (it do have PvP but it is in special instances and you will get hitpoints like a max level character if you enter there so no 50 levels over ganking even if you enter the PvP zones willfully).
Only thing not exactly to your wishes with it is that the housing system at the moment is rather bad, you do have an entire block but I have just a few gathering nodes, a skillpoint and an X-mas tree in mine.
Well, besides that you have to cough up a few bucks to get the game but the advantage of that is that GW2s itemshop is a lot less severe than in any F2P game I played and you could get anything in it for in game gold (I bought some cosmetic armor and wepons and an extra character slots recently for gold that actually is pretty fast to get in once you have a maxlevel character).
Tera would have worked except it flirts a bit too much with anime.
Interesting game. Downloaded via torrent, installed. Now have 2 ranged classes, bot female. No chance to customize body (i.e. make really big-chested...). Robes, head, even voice can be. Controls are harder than I epxected and need to run to trainer once I get new skill.
So far, mixed impressions. Anime is not evil per se. Even pandas aren't. Controls are not so easy to learn. So far little story. yet...yet I will try to get accustomed to Terra (provided I could escape PvP so that no one could attack me).
AoC maybe?
Tried earlier. Good side: big-chested ToS running around in little bikini. bad side: sometimes hard content, once you finish zone, almost no way to return back.
Otherwise I would buy GW2, it initially do have a cost (saw it for 25 bucks at my local store this week) but it have a very different level of polish compared with any F2P game I played, it fits your bill perfectly (it do have PvP but it is in special instances and you will get hitpoints like a max level character if you enter there so no 50 levels over ganking even if you enter the PvP zones willfully).
Only thing not exactly to your wishes with it is that the housing system at the moment is rather bad, you do have an entire block but I have just a few gathering nodes, a skillpoint and an X-mas tree in mine.
Well, besides that you have to cough up a few bucks to get the game but the advantage of that is that GW2s itemshop is a lot less severe than in any F2P game I played and you could get anything in it for in game gold (I bought some cosmetic armor and wepons and an extra character slots recently for gold that actually is pretty fast to get in once you have a maxlevel character).
Unlikely that I will try, since it envolves paying...and I am hardocre free-to-play...but thanks for advice anyway. Maybe I'll try it one day
The game your describing is Wurm Online, although it is f2p its severely limiting, but you can earn silver in the game to pay for premium time just like in eve
Tera would have worked except it flirts a bit too much with anime.
Otherwise I would buy GW2, it initially do have a cost (saw it for 25 bucks at my local store this week) but it have a very different level of polish compared with any F2P game I played, it fits your bill perfectly (it do have PvP but it is in special instances and you will get hitpoints like a max level character if you enter there so no 50 levels over ganking even if you enter the PvP zones willfully).
Only thing not exactly to your wishes with it is that the housing system at the moment is rather bad, you do have an entire block but I have just a few gathering nodes, a skillpoint and an X-mas tree in mine.
Well, besides that you have to cough up a few bucks to get the game but the advantage of that is that GW2s itemshop is a lot less severe than in any F2P game I played and you could get anything in it for in game gold (I bought some cosmetic armor and wepons and an extra character slots recently for gold that actually is pretty fast to get in once you have a maxlevel character).
I would second this ^
If you look around online you can find GW2 for surprisingly cheap. That said, aside from it being B2P (you'd have to pay ~25-26$ once), it's a bit of a unique game. Which means there is just as much a chance that you will dislike it, as you will like it. Furthermore, while the crafting in that game is an important aspect of the game (and it has plenty of non-combat related activitiies), there are a limited number of things you can craft for profit (if that's what you're looking for).
Given the OP's list of criteria it sounds like what he wants is a:
High-fantasy, non-combat reliant, craft-centric game; that is also F2P. Which is kind of tricky, because most sandbox games aren't F2P, and most fantasy games are themeparks built around raiding / pvp.
I'm starting to think what the OP is looking for might be met more from games like Minecraft / starboun, but those aren't technicaly MMOs. There's also Trove & Cubeword(?), but I haven't been following those as closely. However they are supposedly MMO versions of minecraft, though I don't know how exactly they've implemented such mechanics / how well housing works.
Aside from that, most of the other options I can think of atm aren't fantasy games, or aren't F2P.
EDIT: This may be a bit off, but perhaps give Neverwinter a shot? The game isn't too hard, is totally F2P, has lots of customized PvE content (and you can design your own if you want). The crafting system isn't as well done as other games (as is there mostly as a way to gather AD, which can be traded for cashshop currency or items on the AH). There is raiding an such, but most of them are fairly easy. And it has a lot of RPers if that's your thing.
TERRA: played. Tried some "mobile artillery of terra" - smth that attacks with disc. Almost playable. Then tried archer: very good, playable. Then - some kind of sorcerer that had AoE attack and self-heal. Killed by lvl.3 Tree. Result - Terra uninstalled. Sorry, dear developers, it is hard when 2 of 3 your toons at lvl.3 die from non-named lvl.3 monster.
Terra does have strong influence of anime. Pandas, fat goat-men, swords that are bigger than person, holding it...Tried to cope with it, but perhabs with little success.
NEVERWINTER: thought about trying once. What stopped me, was some weird and not neccessary "Arc" software. Come on, if I want to play game, I will install game, not third party soft(spy/ad)ware to launch game. Is there anay way to bypass Arc?
WURM: well...what about PvP here? if it is sandbox, does it mean someone could come and ruin my hard hard work?
Originally posted by Kanester Getting killed at lvl 3 in Tera. Wow, now i know why you dont want pvp. have you looked on steam for some free easy mmo's?
Are there hidden MMOs on steam that this community doesn't know about?
OP, go with EQ2 if nothing else. If you can toss some money into it, someone else suggested GW2, which is a super choice for anyone that wants a choice in PVE. What is good about games like GW2 and ESO, you can play your PvE and if you want to shake it up a bit you can slip into PvP at your leisure. I love games like LOTRO with PvE only, but now and again it's nice to test your gear and skills on another player.
Death is nothing to us, since when we are, Death has not come, and when death has come, we are not.
I wouldn't go EQ2 if you want easy mode. In lotro you can see where to go in EQ2 you can not, only sometimes which is odd. I can't count how many times I had to look something up on internet and it sucks. Also questing in EQ2 is more complicated than WoW and Lotro.
There is also Dungeons and Dragons Online wich is pure pve.
The old EverQuest is 100% PVE and with mercs you got easy mode:-) And if you join you will be playing forver, hence the name EverQuest. Not only do you have to level but you need AA points wich is talent points and there is 10000 of them. You'll never be done because there is a new xpac every 6 months and there is iirc 21 expansions in game. 98% pure fantasy.
If you want something newer you could also try guildwars 2 since you don't have to play the PVP part at all but game is kinda meh.
Comments
Age of Conan started. Big chested, big-hipped Priestess of Mitra in the best outift ever (almost see-through silver bikini) started hed adventures.
Not an easy mode, died few times, but still was fun. Not sure about character customization - i received some points but nowhere to spend them (or I overlooked something). The only minus is exiting the game. Folks told I needed to use command /camp.
EQ2:tried yesterday. Interesting, but somehow did not captivate me.
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
out of all these games that's been listed i'd go for aoc, best pve out there. Really fun and you will never have to pvp.
it's low fantasy so no swords 50ft long. it is a little mature but if you give it time to grow. you WILL love this game
Exit, just guessing here, but is there a possibility they were only goofing with you? /camp is an exit method indeed - just like the "Exit game" from the menu, or the trusty old alt+f4, or his buddy alt+f10... (maybe even LotRO's shift+esc is working too, but I can't vouch for that)
For character customisation, maybe you're still under lvl10? The main cust. option, the Feat panel is opening up at lvl10 I think. Do you have 6 icons at the top of the screen (in the middle), or just 5?
AoC has 3 methods for char.cust. where you can allotting points. The smallest one is the skills panel (3rd button on top, a figure helding his arms wide, "Attributes and skills"). It shows your stats and attributes on the left, and pvp stats on the right. + skills on the right as well, on the 3rd tab. You can spend points here on basic skills like run speed or climbing. It's good to put some on climbing, some quests and explorations need a high ranked climbing. Though you can reset the points any time, for ingame money, so you can spend those points as you wish.
Second and biggest method are the Feats. 5th button on top, "Feats", a dude with 2 star-like thingy above his shoulders. It's like the trait trees in other games. You have 3 trees, classA, classB and General (which is the same for the same archetypes, for example all 3 healers have the same General tree with basic healing-focused feats). You can experiment with Feats a lot, there are feat-planner pages, on the forum you can also find lots of posted builds. How you allot your feat points is defining maybe 35-40% of your character. As a PoM the 2 class trees for you are divinity (the healing-oriented) and vengeance (the dps-oriented), for a good build you'll need to mix those two. (But you can focus on only one of them, and also you can respec your feat points any time, for ingame money. You can also store multiple builds and switching between them)
Third method is AA, but as a starter, f2p player you don't need to worry about that right now (that was part of the Godslayer expansion, a way to enhance your character after you're level-capped). You can check it and its perks under the Feat panel, there's a button "Alternate Advancement".
Age of Conan chosen. Thanks to everybody who participated.
Impressions so far:
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
Cool, to be honest, if there wasn't the anniversary festival in LotRO this week I'd go back to Hyboria as well, for leveling a new character... start to miss the game (but the new steed and the matching outfit looks so great I need to have them on my mains, and besides, firework parties are fun)
A few remarks: 4 and 5, nowadays you barely get new skills in LotRO as well, same goes to powerfulness post U13 (at least for those not at level cap). 9), yep, Shire is unique and Conan's world is (quoting from the press material) brutal and savage. Conarch village is a cozy place though - cozy by cimmerian terms, so it still would be harsh for a hobbit - I like to hang around there.
3) yep, the main game is totally free (with a 10gold cap and with less inventory). The "can't send" part is strange, I'll check on my free account later, but as I remember you can mail and auction stuff with a free account as well.
6,7) the writing is great, but yep, mostly just "cosmetics", all conversations ends with either take the quest or not (so like every other mmo, accept/decline). At start there were some experimenting with real choices, but the "don't read, just wanna hit accept"-type (ex-wow ) players hated those, so this is what's left. There are still extra lines / options sometimes based on your gender or faction, but doesn't affect anything in the end. It's accept / decline. Still fun though.
Fastest level is via grouping and doing all the quests. The game can be soloed all along easily, but since it's an mmo, grouping is encouraged by design (like your heals, if a spell of yours heals you 100, then it heals 200 if casted on a group mate), lots of self-buffs are applied to the whole group automatically, or AoE based, etc., so 1+1 is adding up more than 2 if you team up. And there's no drawbacks, except that you need to roll on loot, but it seems there's more loot drops when grouped, so it balances out the lost rolls.
Yep, reanim necro is fun, you can build a nice synergy with your pets (there are many types of them) and control them - or sacrifice them in need
edit: checked, you can send items attached to mail, and you can auction away items with a free account.
Not sure how it is today but AoC back in the day past level 20 became considerably less fun.
My vote would probably be eq2
---
Ethion
Not sure which PvE server I am on. My pretty Priestess got stuck and looks I won't be playing her. Necromancer currently is the choice...although a piuty, no ranged self-healing nuking unit, like Lotro's minstrel.
And yet I can't call harsh AoC my new home. I do miss something much like Lotro (but guess would have to play AoC, at least for big-chested blonde female Necromancers...)
p.S. tried EQ - did not like, something was just not for me. And looks like I am out of the options.
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
They're heading to megaserver tech, there's only one PvE server now, if you picked PvE then you're on Crom.
"ranged self-healing nuking unit, like Lotro's minstrel." khm... my bad, when I suggested PoM, I had my kinda minis in mind, with heal/buff/debuff...
If you want to dps, then ToS would be a better choice for you, his/her dps is almost as good as the dps classes. And has heals too. OP class
(or if you'll be a bit more comfortable with the combo system, Shammy is the most fun healer among mmo's. Bear ftw.)
Tempest of Set. So far, good class - am at lvl.8 and can electrocute 2 enemies at once. Three enemies may be problematic...However, took 1 Fleash eater (lvl.11) and 2 Flesh feeders (lvl.11) while being lvl.8 or 9. Finished with little health left, but still victorious.
So far, so good.
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
every reply gets compared to LotRO so my suggestion is just to go back to LotRO. u havent really liked any other game that doesnt have big chested women.
It is the way we usually recognize thimngs in the world: by comparing. If there are two persons of same age, race...and one is 3 meters high and the other 1,5 - we would say, first person is high IF compared to second one.
Same with online games. I like(d) Lotro before it started its move towards hardcore. Even now there are ridiculous thoughts to increase damage made by mobs up to 3 or 7 times (!). And hardcore Lotro is just not for me. if only they had a server where pre-Update13 content could be played - I would live there and not go to other servers. But it isn't and we know it won't gonna happen.
Hence - a need to find a new home. Lotro does not fascinate me any longer. And any game I play, I would compare to Lotro (which is pretty natural). I will look for something Lotro's Minstrell class. For same peacefull and warm atmosphere, for same pve f2p.
Buig chested women are just for giggle, especially when I show it to my friends, like "look how could design of armour looks like...".
---
About PoM: i had some guides about setup and I used what I found. And it is my own strategy - to make offense strong and care too little about defense. if I one-shot enemy, I have little interest in bikini-strenght armour that Minstrels in Lotro are wearing.
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
Dear mods, sorry for necro-posting...but maybe it's better to revive old thread than create another with same title?
Once again - asking for same help.
Lotro has sbecome un-playbale for me. The only thing I force myself to do is to turn in task items, take Hobbit presents, pay for house upkeep. Also - chat with my Kinship, the only aspect of game that still holds me there.
I have returned to Istaria, now am over-busy with crafting (so many structures, so many help needed, so little time)...but still am not convinced if it is really my game.
I do enjoy kind of peacefull games (Lotro could be one - wonder in green hills of the Shire at, say, level 30 and enjoy nature). Istaria could be one, especially with crafting and finishing every single crafting school. Age of Conan - played, but did not like. It is brutal and sometimes hard for me.
Any other advices about quality f2p fantasy game?
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
Tera would have worked except it flirts a bit too much with anime.
AoC maybe?
Otherwise I would buy GW2, it initially do have a cost (saw it for 25 bucks at my local store this week) but it have a very different level of polish compared with any F2P game I played, it fits your bill perfectly (it do have PvP but it is in special instances and you will get hitpoints like a max level character if you enter there so no 50 levels over ganking even if you enter the PvP zones willfully).
Only thing not exactly to your wishes with it is that the housing system at the moment is rather bad, you do have an entire block but I have just a few gathering nodes, a skillpoint and an X-mas tree in mine.
Well, besides that you have to cough up a few bucks to get the game but the advantage of that is that GW2s itemshop is a lot less severe than in any F2P game I played and you could get anything in it for in game gold (I bought some cosmetic armor and wepons and an extra character slots recently for gold that actually is pretty fast to get in once you have a maxlevel character).
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
I would second this ^
If you look around online you can find GW2 for surprisingly cheap. That said, aside from it being B2P (you'd have to pay ~25-26$ once), it's a bit of a unique game. Which means there is just as much a chance that you will dislike it, as you will like it. Furthermore, while the crafting in that game is an important aspect of the game (and it has plenty of non-combat related activitiies), there are a limited number of things you can craft for profit (if that's what you're looking for).
Given the OP's list of criteria it sounds like what he wants is a:
High-fantasy, non-combat reliant, craft-centric game; that is also F2P. Which is kind of tricky, because most sandbox games aren't F2P, and most fantasy games are themeparks built around raiding / pvp.
I'm starting to think what the OP is looking for might be met more from games like Minecraft / starboun, but those aren't technicaly MMOs. There's also Trove & Cubeword(?), but I haven't been following those as closely. However they are supposedly MMO versions of minecraft, though I don't know how exactly they've implemented such mechanics / how well housing works.
Aside from that, most of the other options I can think of atm aren't fantasy games, or aren't F2P.
EDIT: This may be a bit off, but perhaps give Neverwinter a shot? The game isn't too hard, is totally F2P, has lots of customized PvE content (and you can design your own if you want). The crafting system isn't as well done as other games (as is there mostly as a way to gather AD, which can be traded for cashshop currency or items on the AH). There is raiding an such, but most of them are fairly easy. And it has a lot of RPers if that's your thing.
Well well well...
TERRA: played. Tried some "mobile artillery of terra" - smth that attacks with disc. Almost playable. Then tried archer: very good, playable. Then - some kind of sorcerer that had AoE attack and self-heal. Killed by lvl.3 Tree. Result - Terra uninstalled. Sorry, dear developers, it is hard when 2 of 3 your toons at lvl.3 die from non-named lvl.3 monster.
Terra does have strong influence of anime. Pandas, fat goat-men, swords that are bigger than person, holding it...Tried to cope with it, but perhabs with little success.
NEVERWINTER: thought about trying once. What stopped me, was some weird and not neccessary "Arc" software. Come on, if I want to play game, I will install game, not third party soft(spy/ad)ware to launch game. Is there anay way to bypass Arc?
WURM: well...what about PvP here? if it is sandbox, does it mean someone could come and ruin my hard hard work?
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
Are there hidden MMOs on steam that this community doesn't know about?
OP, go with EQ2 if nothing else. If you can toss some money into it, someone else suggested GW2, which is a super choice for anyone that wants a choice in PVE. What is good about games like GW2 and ESO, you can play your PvE and if you want to shake it up a bit you can slip into PvP at your leisure. I love games like LOTRO with PvE only, but now and again it's nice to test your gear and skills on another player.
Death is nothing to us, since when we are, Death has not come, and when death has come, we are not.
I wouldn't go EQ2 if you want easy mode. In lotro you can see where to go in EQ2 you can not, only sometimes which is odd. I can't count how many times I had to look something up on internet and it sucks. Also questing in EQ2 is more complicated than WoW and Lotro.
There is also Dungeons and Dragons Online wich is pure pve.
The old EverQuest is 100% PVE and with mercs you got easy mode:-) And if you join you will be playing forver, hence the name EverQuest. Not only do you have to level but you need AA points wich is talent points and there is 10000 of them. You'll never be done because there is a new xpac every 6 months and there is iirc 21 expansions in game. 98% pure fantasy.
If you want something newer you could also try guildwars 2 since you don't have to play the PVP part at all but game is kinda meh.