Unfortunately they still want a month fee to play MonsterPlay which is the only truly unique thing about LoTRO!
Rest of the game is just a restricted Tolkien setting.
Sadly I stopped playing because Turbine never did any support, expansions or did any effort for Monsterplay.
Once a year on April fools day you got to chase chicken players and splat them which was vastly amusing the first time.
What other game can you play as a real monster (4 legged warg, 6 legged spider, etc) against other people?