CanadinaXegony said:Kronos doesn't fix anything at all...kronos currently dominates the trade scene on Agnarr..its still RMT. It disgusted me as a matter of fact. So I started saying you want me to buy from you...plat only or NO SALE. A krono costs $17.99 real money. Why on earth would I beggar myself to buy pixels in a game? Why on earth do other people do it? Beats me. Some people charging 3 and 4 kronos for an item that is farmable with a group. Its out of hand, and I DON'T EVER WANT TO SEE THAT IN PANTHEON...ever. Saddens me that EQ has been reduced to barely concealed RMT.
Cana
and yet these people complain that $15/mo doesn't feel like their getting their money's worth. There is pressusre to play all the time to make sure they get as much playtime in that sub period.
With flying over a few posts it is mentioned already that the devs said it will be a subscription based game, that you have to buy else all the kickstarter packages wouldnt make sense at all ... there are pledges that gave you 1$ a year subscription so basically lifetime free sub ... and you get 2 copies of the game, which also makes no sense if the game would be free :P
so it pretty much says it by the pledges - subscription model + buying the game ... i really hope that they dont fall into something like other companies do / did .. making rather expensive pre order packages and then soon after launch turn f2p, so you more or less paied for nothing
Always just loved the simple base game cost + monthly subscription model. The game has smaller regular "updates" (a few mid-small quests added every so often, hotfixes/maintenance, rebalancing, etc) but then maybe every 2 years or so, a big new expansion you had to buy.
I HATED games that had "big" (often times NOT the case) expansions every year, that still cost the extra $40-60 bucks on top of the $15 each month. If youre gonna play me like that, just call it $20 a month and be done with it. Expansions should be big things that alter gameplay, or add a new dynamic to gameplay entirely. A "shock" to the system if you will, to really change it up. The subscription should be enough to cover maintenance/sustainment costs, while still allowing for regular content implementation (again of a smaller size) to give the game its feeling of a direction. Just my 2 cents.
*these regular "big" expansions coming out too regularly (some games even did them quarterly) often made them feel unpolished, too small, or I would wonder why they didnt just combine 2 of them into 1. Take the time to really test/develop the content coming in the expansions so it doesnt just feel like an update, but an actual expansion of the game mechanics/functions/offering (as its name implies it should be)
I don't give a damn if the sub is $15 or $30 a month, and anyone who's worried about that should fix other issues in his life first, before spending time on playing video games.
I also don't care about how much will an expansion cost. I do want it to be properly polished, tested, developed, even if it takes longer.
But if there is any sort of a sale of items for real money, I'm out. Once you open that door to hell, the game will never recover.
The public - the people who will play such a game - is not the same public as the one that's waiting for Pantheon now.
There is no world large enough for us and for them.
@Aethor "There is no world large enough for us and for them."
This is exactly the mentality that I don't want to see in Pantheon. For Pantheon to thrive, even to exist for several years it needs to be inclusive. It needs to welcome all gamers not just the "old-school" MMORPG players.
Painting a demographic with one colour is erroneous, and often such over generalisations really are an individual wanting to promote their knowledge and confidence in an area where there are insufficient facts to support a rational debate. It also limits your beliefs and leads to poor choices.
In effect by over generalising you are creating an artificial barrier which will impede new players joining Pantheon. "Hey have you played Pantheon?" "Nah I hear it's full of elitists." is a possible conversation, an over generalisation in reply to an over generalisation.
Have a good one 8)
Oh, and to stay on topic. Buy the game, pay $15 a month, buy expansions.
Jazznblues said:@Aethor "There is no world large enough for us and for them."
This is exactly the mentality that I don't want to see in Pantheon. For Pantheon to thrive, even to exist for several years it needs to be inclusive. It needs to welcome all gamers not just the "old-school" MMORPG players.
Painting a demographic with one colour is erroneous, and often such over generalisations really are an individual wanting to promote their knowledge and confidence in an area where there are insufficient facts to support a rational debate. It also limits your beliefs and leads to poor choices.
In effect by over generalising you are creating an artificial barrier which will impede new players joining Pantheon. "Hey have you played Pantheon?" "Nah I hear it's full of elitists." is a possible conversation, an over generalisation in reply to an over generalisation.
Have a good one 8)
Oh, and to stay on topic. Buy the game, pay $15 a month, buy expansions.
I actually can relate to what Aethor said, though I probably wouldn't have expressed myself that way. This isn't peanuts we're talking about. I know from experience the result of trying to swallow a switch from a sub model to a microtransactions-based one. I stuck around for over a year and the experience got progressively worse until I quit the game. So yes, I'm now very strongly against any form of microtransactions, and if they ever come to Pantheon - which I hope they don't - the probability of me leaving the game is high. This isn't an "open world vs. instanced content" discussion. It's a central tenet of the game and it was actually what drove me to pledge when I found out about Pantheon.
Jazznblues, You make a good general point that we should be inclusive and not adhere so strictly to a vision of the game that we become incapable of compromising where necessary to achieve the right level of player base. But the fact is that some things are dealbreakers. If pantheon became a first-person shooter game, I wouldn't play and neither would a lot of the people on this development forum. So too with microtransactions for some people here, myself included. So yea, I definitely hope this community will be inclusive where we can, but for some matters you gotta just hold the line on an absolute position, and pay-to-win systems fall into that category for many.
Having played many subscription games and F2P games as well as playing through a couple migrations, I've grown tired of the farm/grind mentality in games where in game currency can be used to purchase a subscription
I would much rather just pay to play the game and be surrounded by players that have done the same, so I don't have to deal as much with campers and farmers that found the most efficient way to generate money for their subscription and have taken over a particular dungeon or area
I want to adventure in Terminus, not have it be a part-time job, and I'd much rather the focus for everyone be more on adventuring and playing than making profit efficiently, so I'd rather just pay for entry into the game world with real world money and then have fun playing the game
Calculating profit "earned" per hour played to any degree becomes infectuous and leads to a lot of bad social trends in a game, in my experience, including elitism, as players "farming" a dungeon for profit are the ones that become elitist, only running with top level players because they are only interested in the most efficient way to make money
So, to say it is elitist to not want to play with freeloaders or P2W people isn't really appropriate, from my view
If someone truly cannot afford to play Pantheon, there are many alternatives, though they won't be as good as Pantheon, but that is the same as anything you get for free
If someone doesn't want to earn their gear or skill by playing the game, there are also alternatives to Pantheon that are built for that, and they should go play those games
I, too, am of the mindset that a certain percentage of a subscription should go towards ongoing development (as opposed to a separate cost to purchase an expansion). This negates any effect of having to take into consideration people that have purchased the expansion as well as people who have not purchased the expansion. Everyone who logs into the game is playing the same version of the game - albeit upon expansion release there may be a requirement to load a bunch of files or updated files. To this extent an extra $5/month per subscriber only amounts to $60/year - which may not be enough to offset ongoing development costs.
Still, I would rather Pantheon not have to contend with players who have the expansion versus players who do not have the expansion and being able to accomodate both - it would require extra checks and balances - an exercise that can be eliminated if expansions are automatic with the subscription. I also realize that this may mean some players upon reaching their version of end-game will drop their subscription and wait for the expansion and then renew their subscription to play through the expansion. They wouldn't necessarily be contributing to further development of the game by intermittently dropping their subscription.
Aethor said:I don't give a damn if the sub is $15 or $30 a month, and anyone who's worried about that should fix other issues in his life first, before spending time on playing video games.
I also don't care about how much will an expansion cost. I do want it to be properly polished, tested, developed, even if it takes longer.
But if there is any sort of a sale of items for real money, I'm out. Once you open that door to hell, the game will never recover.
The public - the people who will play such a game - is not the same public as the one that's waiting for Pantheon now.
There is no world large enough for us and for them.
Amen to this entire post. I've said these exact things numerous times. It makes my eyes roll that people rage and quibble over $15 for a game they spend 80+ hours a month playing while they smoke and drink and eat out and drive a car they can't afford. If the $15 a month REALLY matters, and for some people I appreciate that it does, having grown up very very poor, then those people should be hitting the books or whatever and not playing an MMO religiously.
muscoby said:I, too, am of the mindset that a certain percentage of a subscription should go towards ongoing development (as opposed to a separate cost to purchase an expansion). This negates any effect of having to take into consideration people that have purchased the expansion as well as people who have not purchased the expansion. Everyone who logs into the game is playing the same version of the game - albeit upon expansion release there may be a requirement to load a bunch of files or updated files. To this extent an extra $5/month per subscriber only amounts to $60/year - which may not be enough to offset ongoing development costs.
An extra $5 a month per subscriber may be $60 a year, but even if they only had 50k total subs it would be an extra 3 million (gross) a year.
muscoby said:I, too, am of the mindset that a certain percentage of a subscription should go towards ongoing development (as opposed to a separate cost to purchase an expansion). This negates any effect of having to take into consideration people that have purchased the expansion as well as people who have not purchased the expansion. Everyone who logs into the game is playing the same version of the game - albeit upon expansion release there may be a requirement to load a bunch of files or updated files. To this extent an extra $5/month per subscriber only amounts to $60/year - which may not be enough to offset ongoing development costs.
Still, I would rather Pantheon not have to contend with players who have the expansion versus players who do not have the expansion and being able to accomodate both - it would require extra checks and balances - an exercise that can be eliminated if expansions are automatic with the subscription. I also realize that this may mean some players upon reaching their version of end-game will drop their subscription and wait for the expansion and then renew their subscription to play through the expansion. They wouldn't necessarily be contributing to further development of the game by intermittently dropping their subscription.
From an economic perspective this doesn't make sense in the market. Essentially you are asking the people who will quit between expansions to subsidize the cost of the expansion for the people who do keep playing. /shrug. And don't get me wrong, I'm all for paying a PREMIUM price for a premium game.
I think it would be a bold statement to start off at $20 per month. For all intents and purposes, I have always considered Pantheon a premium game in the making. If VR is committed to staying away from things like cash shops, I think it totally makes sense to bump up the bill a little bit. Cash shops have been used by other companies as a way to supplement income. A lot of players say they don't want them in game ... but are they willing to foot the bill to make that happen? I'm not qualified to make that determination but I can say pretty comfortably that I would be willing to shell out a little more monthly funding, and never bat an eye. Even if someone is on a tight budget ... you can opt to purchase the generic version of many things in life, while still picking/choosing when going premium makes sense. Considering just how vested people are in MMO's and their characters, this seems like an area where folks wouldn't want to skimp out.
oneADseven said:I think it would be a bold statement to start off at $20 per month. For all intents and purposes, I have always considered Pantheon a premium game in the making. If VR is committed to staying away from things like cash shops, I think it totally makes sense to bump up the bill a little bit. Cash shops have been used by other companies as a way to supplement income. A lot of players say they don't want them in game ... but are they willing to foot the bill to make that happen? I'm not qualified to make that determination but I can say pretty comfortably that I would be willing to shell out a little more monthly funding, and never bat an eye. Even if someone is on a tight budget ... you can opt to purchase the generic version of many things in life, while still picking/choosing when going premium makes sense. Considering just how vested people are in MMO's and their characters, this seems like an area where folks wouldn't want to skimp out.
Exactly. Look, I am better off than most folks I know financially (because I am frugal with my $$) but I would be willing to pay a little more per month to keep PTW out of this game! If you want a game that has cash shops and PTW in it, there are plenty of them to go around.
Krixus said:Aethor said:I don't give a damn if the sub is $15 or $30 a month, and anyone who's worried about that should fix other issues in his life first, before spending time on playing video games.
I also don't care about how much will an expansion cost. I do want it to be properly polished, tested, developed, even if it takes longer.
But if there is any sort of a sale of items for real money, I'm out. Once you open that door to hell, the game will never recover.
The public - the people who will play such a game - is not the same public as the one that's waiting for Pantheon now.
There is no world large enough for us and for them.
Amen to this entire post. I've said these exact things numerous times. It makes my eyes roll that people rage and quibble over $15 for a game they spend 80+ hours a month playing while they smoke and drink and eat out and drive a car they can't afford. If the $15 a month REALLY matters, and for some people I appreciate that it does, having grown up very very poor, then those people should be hitting the books or whatever and not playing an MMO religiously.
Yep!
I've played on Agnarr and watched something I use to love goto heck in a hand-basket. Rudiness, wild wild west attitudes, gold farmers and people setting krono rates as the way to acquire items. That said, I play alot so I accumulate alot of currency over time, not from selling items I make from crafting (a money sink for me) but from the amount of items I vendor from things I kill and the money they drop and quest rewards. If it wasn't for the Krono I am sure EverQuest would have died along time ago, its there cash cow really moving the game in my humble opinion. That said, I personally refuse to buy any item that is being sold for krono or farm gold to purchase them in game from farmers. However I will help a guildie out, if I have accessive currency and they had a Krono I will purchase it so they can keep advancing there crafting. I will then use said krono for its intent purpose and to consume it for game time when appropiate. I eluded in anoother forum I have 6 of them that are just wasting away now because I never plan to use them in EQ. I only support krono / plex as its intent and purpose and thats to extend a players game time, for those that can't always afford to play.
A example, I use to play Star Wars the old Republic, and I was un-employed for 2 1/2 years for health issues. Guildies would buy me the subscription cards and let me use them and in turn I would pay them with the in game currency we thought was fair transaction. Bioware made money still, and the other player made in-game currency they needed. Sadly, I would of kept playing that game if bioware didn't sanction my account because I found a bug, duplicated it to confirm it, then as I reported it was suspened for three days for duplicating the bug and had my 700 million credits that took me 5 years to make reduced to zero as a additional punishment.
I still think there's a simple solution to this if Pantheon decided they wanted to raise the base subscription rate from $14.99 (Disclaimer - I'm not saying they should).
EQ was actually 9.99/month at launch, then in 2001ish? it was 12.99/month and upticked again in 2005ish? to the currently accepted 14.99/month. So, even EQ in 1999 versus today did change their prices and modified their subscription based off market costs/inflation. The difference is, no one since 2005 really has challenged those accepted subscription norms and no one ever remembers EQ was 9.99 at launch.
Given that, obviously $14.99/month in 2005 went further than 14.99 in 2017. Should Pantheon be the MMO that challenges the accepted subscription rate? The Pantheon Devs will obviously do the market research to weigh costs and benefits, but I think there's an easy solution without the need for market research if Pantheon decided to raise it. You could still raise the base price, but, have the accepted norm still be offered, so you satisfy both the company and the comsumer - just offer the tiered packages with the option of a lump sum:
Month to Month: 24.99/month or $24.99 Lump Sum
3 Month Sub: 21.99/month or $66 Lump Sum
6 Month Sub: 19.99/month or $120 Lump Sum
9 Month Sub: 17.99/month or $162 Lump Sum
12 Month Sub: 14.99/month or $180 Lump Sum
And, just have the person be on the hook for however many months they subscribe too if the subscription option is chosen, or with the lump sum they'd obviously be paid in full until it expires.
muscoby said:I, too, am of the mindset that a certain percentage of a subscription should go towards ongoing development (as opposed to a separate cost to purchase an expansion). This negates any effect of having to take into consideration people that have purchased the expansion as well as people who have not purchased the expansion. Everyone who logs into the game is playing the same version of the game - albeit upon expansion release there may be a requirement to load a bunch of files or updated files. To this extent an extra $5/month per subscriber only amounts to $60/year - which may not be enough to offset ongoing development costs.
Still, I would rather Pantheon not have to contend with players who have the expansion versus players who do not have the expansion and being able to accomodate both - it would require extra checks and balances - an exercise that can be eliminated if expansions are automatic with the subscription. I also realize that this may mean some players upon reaching their version of end-game will drop their subscription and wait for the expansion and then renew their subscription to play through the expansion. They wouldn't necessarily be contributing to further development of the game by intermittently dropping their subscription.
This hit the nail on the head.
Edit** Also, i think people got wayyyyyyyyy too hung up on my example of $15 vs $20 and missed the actual point which was whatever the number is, I feel a subscription that covers regular improvments/additions, rather than a recoup method where you hope the expansion pack brings in enough to be worth it, is worth while.
I just tossed out the numbers when making up the expansion vs ongoing updates example, but having a subscription that covers regular "direction oriented" story/quest content (whatever that amount may be) is so much more preferable. Especially when as you said, you dont have to then consider players who have and have not, bought any expansions. Expansions have a place, but they should be imo BIG game or story direction changes, not just a new small arc.
Aethor said:I don't give a damn if the sub is $15 or $30 a month, and anyone who's worried about that should fix other issues in his life first, before spending time on playing video games.
Thats pretty stupid to say ... Because prices shouldnt be way over the top - i am with you that it definitely shouldnt be f2p or with a cashshop ... but making it 30$ would just ruin it, because it would make such a big cut in player base, which is the death of every mmo
and fixing things in life has nothing to do with, not willing to pay overpriced stuff ... I have 2 games running both of them cost around 10€ / month and I have backed pantheon with lifetime subscription because I am pretty sure that i will play this game longer than the monthly charge would be, so it was a 100% WIN-WIN pledge
I would really love if people wouldnt always think in a blackbox ... open your minds ... there are people that dont just play 1 MMO as a one and only, where they put in all their available time - there are a lot of player like friends i know / and myself for sure that play multiple games one game for this, one for this ... one probably just because they love the community, talk to people ingame ... which they love to support the devs with 10-15€ but would never be in this game if they have to pay 30€
An Option i really love from another game i play is the "grandfathered subscription rate" - The subscription was set to a rather cheap price at start and goes up in price as everything does over the time ... like every few years they raise the prices for their monthly sub ... people with grandfathered subscription are people that never stop their sub, will always get it for the price they paied when they subscribed, so even if the price raises, the sub stays the same, as long as its continuous subscription - once unsubbed for longer than 2 weeks resubscribing costs the new price, whatever it is. This stops people to unsubscribe once content is done - for example from an expansion - like it is in WoW right now ... at expansion start there are usually 1-7M more people subs, than a few weeks / months after ... this way people think about it and dont want to lose their subscription rate, so they play from time to time and pay the sub, rather than leaving the game for a few months and then come back with increased subscription rates
Lagencie said:An Option i really love from another game i play is the "grandfathered subscription rate" - The subscription was set to a rather cheap price at start and goes up in price as everything does over the time ... like every few years they raise the prices for their monthly sub ... people with grandfathered subscription are people that never stop their sub, will always get it for the price they paied when they subscribed, so even if the price raises, the sub stays the same, as long as its continuous subscription - once unsubbed for longer than 2 weeks resubscribing costs the new price, whatever it is. This stops people to unsubscribe once content is done - for example from an expansion - like it is in WoW right now ... at expansion start there are usually 1-7M more people subs, than a few weeks / months after ... this way people think about it and dont want to lose their subscription rate, so they play from time to time and pay the sub, rather than leaving the game for a few months and then come back with increased subscription rates
Now thats an interesting model. I'd have to take some time to think through any pros/cons to decide how I ultimately feel about it, but its a model I hadnt heard used before and thats always something fun to consider!
Krixus said:From an economic perspective this doesn't make sense in the market. Essentially you are asking the people who will quit between expansions to subsidize the cost of the expansion for the people who do keep playing. /shrug. And don't get me wrong, I'm all for paying a PREMIUM price for a premium game.
Quote was applied to my quote. Actually, just to correct the misconception: I said no such thing. I was merely pointing out that there would be a subset of players that would not maintain a subscription if they reached their version of end game and would re-subscribe once an expansion came out.
Note that the subset of players that care about nothing but the endgame and having a character with the best gear in the game may continue their subscriptions if you give them something that will be useful to accomplish this goal before the next expansion comes out. As in the ability to get a small amount of end game currency every day when that end game currency will let them get a bit of "next expansion" gear when it comes out although not very much. The feeling of having a leg up when the expansion actually hits may keep some people paying their $x per month and logging in regularly. As long as they can't get a BIG headstart since you don't want them to leave a month after the new expansion because they have everything.
Lagencie said:Aethor said:I don't give a damn if the sub is $15 or $30 a month, and anyone who's worried about that should fix other issues in his life first, before spending time on playing video games.
Thats pretty stupid to say ... Because prices shouldnt be way over the top - i am with you that it definitely shouldnt be f2p or with a cashshop ... but making it 30$ would just ruin it, because it would make such a big cut in player base, which is the death of every mmo
and fixing things in life has nothing to do with, not willing to pay overpriced stuff ... I have 2 games running both of them cost around 10€ / month and I have backed pantheon with lifetime subscription because I am pretty sure that i will play this game longer than the monthly charge would be, so it was a 100% WIN-WIN pledge
No you're stupid!
This is the exact nonsense we're talking about. You'll go see a movie tonight for $15 that lasts 90 minutes, but you won't pay an additional $15 (from $15->$30) for something you might spend 50 or 100 or more hours a month playing? How many people buy single player games once a month on steam and play them for 8 hours and are done?
If the game is worth $30 a month then people will pay it. Just like you pay $5 for a caramel macchiato.