On March 30th, Lord of the Rings Online enters open beta. Often, the open beta for an MMO is when the game goes downhill. The early beta groups disband, the unwashed masses arrive, looking to freeload for a few months, and the game becomes a mess of patches, grumpy die hards and people predicting doom. But Turbine realizes that open beta is something different. They're giving pre-order customers a chance to play in the last open beta, before it's really "open" on April 6th. And they're letting them keep their characters.
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The second, riskier carrot, is the price break. By getting in early, new players get the opportunity to play for $10 a month, forever. On the surface, this seems like pure lost revenue -- a 33% discount that Turbine will be saddled with forever. But, the trick is you have to keep playing. For the serial Warcraft player, this price structure will work. Many people (myself included) reactivate their WoW account for a few months every year, effectively giving Blizzard the equivalent of one-retail-game's revenue. There's no disincentive. Characters live on forever there in digital limbo, waiting for you to press enter on the billing screen. In the case of LOTRO, once you step off the train, your price goes up. There's no coming back for the discount later. You can play the dip-your-toes in once a year game, just like you did with Blizzard, but if you even think you'll play the game long term, the loss of that $5 a month discount will give you pause.

The last carrot is also financial: a "lifetime" subscription for $200. This is much harder to justify in the long term. It ensures that Turbine will have a very good month, and little else. Pollyanna would say that they're simply rewarding the core audience -- those lore-focussed players who will hang around the Tolkein bar until the last stool is upended and the lights go out. But the cynic in me counters with the notion that an actuary in coffee-stained cubicle at Turbine's office has determined that the average player who pre-orders will only stay for 18 months, and thus the $200 is a chance to get an extra twenty bucks, and even better, get it now. The deeply antisocial part of me worries that said actuary thinks the game will LAST for 18 months.