DDO is free now and from what I can see, not as confining as it used to be. I can direct you to a great veteran guild if your 25 or over. Being DnD, DDO caters to grouping but most quests can be done solo now as well. There are also dueling pits now and a lot of outdoor adventure areas. I was happy to see that since I have always loved the combat animations. I am not in any way giving up on UO yet. I log in every day and I am hoping this Iantown community push goes somewhere. I would like to see us hanging out on specific evenings of the week to BS or deal with any trouble that comes around. When it boils down to it, for me the community and players is the most important thing. Making Abyss rounds loses its appeal if its no longer needed by the community. Between my work schedule and Kelmos's it seems we never feel like dungeon crawling at the same time. Vending has given me enough gold that solo farming is not much appealing either. However, I can log into my DDO guild vent any day any time and find not just people, or lower level players looking for groups, but old friends from my DDO beta days. So this guild is not like ours here that come and go every few weeks. Its been going strong for over 4 years. Shoot me a PM if your interested and I will get you in touch with people that will shorten the application process. They also have chapters in most of the major MMOs and I know the folk in the WoW chapter as well. I use this game for exactly what you said your looking for....something to suppliment when there is nothing going on in UO and I am too tired to work on projects.
non-mmo....oblivion all the way. I loved it because you aren't locked into doing things in a certain order or being in a certain place. The Shivering Isles expansion had a twist at the end I really enjoyed.