A good MMO?

[Dustin2128]

I've played my share of MMOs on linux, natively and in wine. But all of them have major drawbacks- for instance, there hasn't been any real new content in regnum for years (I don't count the new character models- its not enough). I'm looking for an MMO that meets these prerequisites:
Essential
Good graphics
Good community (not warcraft's army of 10 year olds or runescape's army of 7 year olds)
Runs well on linux
Frequent content expansions and updates
Large number of choices for character creation
Large amount of armor and weapon combinations and choices
Skills
Would be Nice
Free to play or (small) one time payment
Large, open world
clans/guilds
mounts
player owned housing
gnomes as playable race
technology related skills (e.g. engineering)
Would be Epic
class: the technomancer :P

So, any recommendations?

[Naiki Muliaina]

A brief browse of native MMO's, see my sig.

Personal choice for well populated games, Dofus and Second Life. Regnums good, maybe what your after, but no where near as populated.

Actually.. Ryzom... No gnomes but you can have some degree of tech. It has a native Linux client. It also has a subscription though....

[beastrace91]

I was a HUGE Guild Wars player for some time. After you buy the game there is no monthly fee. Good graphics, runs well through Wine.

~Jeff

[donkyhotay]

Never played it myself but "Saga of Ryzom" recently went FOSS. Although the official servers are still pay to play you could potentially run your own if you want free. The client has been ported to linux of course and available for download. Might be worth checking out. Personally I play minecraft which meets all my current MMO needs even though it isn't really an MMO. It's lots of fun, especially with a group of friends to help you build up stuff.

[Dustin2128]

A brief browse of native MMO's, see my sig.

Personal choice for well populated games, Dofus and Second Life. Regnums good, maybe what your after, but no where near as populated.

Actually.. Ryzom... No gnomes but you can have some degree of tech. It has a native Linux client. It also has a subscription though....
I used to play regnum a lot, level 43 warlock at the moment. I used to like it, but then they started nerfing every class and never adding any real content. New starting areas are not what people want, what people want is a bigger map and better endgame. SL's not really my definition of an MMO, though I use it and enjoy it quite a lot, its not what I'm looking for.

Guild wars looks to match my prerequisites pretty closely, and I think I'll start playing when GW2 comes out. The asura (http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/races/asura/) race and necromancer (http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/necromancer/) class look like they'll fit my play/roleplay style perfectly.

By all means though, keep the suggestions rolling. Anyone know of an MMO with a nice steampunk feel to it?

EDIT: I'll also test out ryzom when I get the chance.

[schtufbox]

If you don't mind using Wine, then Lord Of The Rings Online recently went free to play (and no cost to get the client either). It works well with wine and I find it a fun game to play. The free to play model is pretty good, you get access to most of the 1 - 50 content, but have to pay for extras, and the costs aren't too bad. You can actually earn turbine points from playing too, so everything in the 'shop' can be earned ingame without spending a penny..but it will take a while that way :)

[Dustin2128]

If you don't mind using Wine, then Lord Of The Rings Online recently went free to play (and no cost to get the client either). It works well with wine and I find it a fun game to play. The free to play model is pretty good, you get access to most of the 1 - 50 content, but have to pay for extras, and the costs aren't too bad. You can actually earn turbine points from playing too, so everything in the 'shop' can be earned ingame without spending a penny..but it will take a while that way :)
I actually did test it out on (f2p) launch day. It looks like a solid game, but they still have way too much content restriction for free players. I'll keep leveling my lore master, but if I've reached 35 and free players still can't participate in any form of PvP, I'm going to leave.

[schtufbox]

I actually did test it out on (f2p) launch day. It looks like a solid game, but they still have way too much content restriction for free players. I'll keep leveling my lore master, but if I've reached 35 and free players still can't participate in any form of PvP, I'm going to leave for a few months.

You have a good point, I forgot about the stupid restriction on monster play/pvp :/ I actually have a lifetime subscription so I'm classed as a VIP, which makes it easy to forget the f2p restrictions unless I look it up each time :)

[Dustin2128]

You have a good point, I forgot about the stupid restriction on monster play/pvp :/ I actually have a lifetime subscription so I'm classed as a VIP, which makes it easy to forget the f2p restrictions unless I look it up each time :)
well, suppose its only fair, or else monster players would way outnumber free peoples. Do you know how easy it is to get to level 10? :)
how much is lifetime subscription anyway?