Kilsin said:Season Passes, DLC's, Subscriptions, Free to Play, Buy to Play, Pay to Play, Expansions, Early Access, Micro-transactions, Cash Shops - where do you draw the line in all of this and what is your preferred method to pay for an MMORPG? #PRF #MMORPG #MMO #communitymatters
1. Buy the Game
2. Pay for the Sub
3. Pay for expansions
Anything in the game store should be cosmetic only, or perhapse mounts. I would suggest mount speed be based on the characters progression rather than the mount itself. Never pay to play. Early access should not be more than a day or two at most.
Ok by me:
1. Early Access (Basically pledges here)
2. Buy the Game (Repaying development costs is a must)
3. Subscription
4. Expansions
5. RL Merchandise
6. Game services like server transfers, extra characters, etc. (No name change though. You develop a bad rep, you deal with it. Also encourages RMT if names can be changed.)
7. Fluff Cosmetics. (Nothing from difficult content though. See below.)
No go:
1. Random lootboxes. (Personal thing. I spent way too much money on these things in mobile games.)
2. Progression boosts. (XP boosts for example add the temptation to design around the presence of them to make progression feel good with them and bad without.)
3. Cosmetics acquirable from difficult content (If something takes a ton of effort to get, let's not cheapen that achievement by letting someone throw money at it to look the same.)
I know I prefer to pay for the game.
1) buy it
2) subscription payments
3) pay for Expansions
4) pay for game services
I left WoW (ugh Cataclysm) for Rift, then 4 years later, I left Rift a few months after they went F2P - the game (and player) quality just went so totally downhill, although it wasn't quite P2W, it sure felt like it. And I loved Rift! It was very sad. Eventually after playing many F2P, and signing up to a few subscription games, I went back to WoW. I've left WoW again because of the constant hand-holding. It's nothing like it was in vanilla, TBC or even WotLK.
So yeah, what I'm saying I guess is ... you get what you pay for.
I have no problem buying the game, paying a monthly sub and paying for dlc content- expansions.
I have no issue at all paying for content or prices they cost id be willing to pay 30.00 a month as long as xp can't be bought and no cash shop exist.
Im fine if you guys want to sell t shirts mugs or mousepads but no ingame items.
I draw the line at pay to win and nowdays even cosmetic shops.
What i mean by cosmetic shops below.
Currently alot of mmos are putting things in cash shops that are not cosmetic such as xp scrolls' potions' and loot boxes which devalue the effort other players have put in to achieve that level. I liked eso a good bit until xp scrolls were added to cosmetic shop then i realized if they added that how long until the next pay to win item so i quit eso. Cosmetic shops are a very slippery slope.
Cosmetic shops to start with were a great idea and at one point i thought might be a good idea by companys but they took it to far and abused the system now i don't trust them and will not support them. In my opinion a game if going to have any type of cosmetic shop every item should be voted in by the playerbase similar to old school runescapes voter system.
I know Pantheon does not intend to have a shop this is just how i view ingame shops from my point of view.
I will happily buy the base game, pay a regular subscription fee, buy full expansions
I have done so for all the games I have really liked I am still paying for EQ and I started playing back in 2000. At one time I was running 6 accounts in my family
Please Please PLease NO CASH SHOP
On a side note if money is getting low and you need to have more money coming in. Then add a cash shop to a different server and charge anyone that wants to move to that server (because let face it if you are not making money then you have no reason to run this game anymore)
Kilsin said:Season Passes, DLC's, Subscriptions, Free to Play, Buy to Play, Pay to Play, Expansions, Early Access, Micro-transactions, Cash Shops - where do you draw the line in all of this and what is your preferred method to pay for an MMORPG? #PRF #MMORPG #MMO #communitymatters
I completely approve of buying the game outright to pay for what was developed, and then paying for a monthly subscription in order to maintain an online game as well as to pay for future development of the game. For that matter, I was never put off buying World of Warcraft's expansions either. I certainly felt like I spent less money paying a monthly subscription fee to an MMO than what I was watching other friends spend constantly buying new games at $60 a shot for their console games.
My 2 cents as well, I am more than happy to pay the base game, pay a sub fee, and buy xpacs as a whole. microtransactions, tiny DLCs, I have never been a fan of - $2.99 to access this quest chain! - is not something I want to spend my time doing. Either the content should be there or it shouldn't, then released in a massive xpac. Nickle and dime-ing me is the fastest way to get me to say no to a game that should have had that content in base release, that's what the $60-75 I'm spending to purchase it is all about.
I do not like classes/races behind pay walls. I do approve of them behind achievement walls, as it encourages players to get out and go, but never pay to get to play it. Similarly, I do not like the idea of paying to level boost - that removes the inherent joy of getting to explore the game. I AM okay with paying for name changes (unless making a server change), server changes for characters, etc. I also would enjoy some of these services being given after subscription time (you've played for X amount of months, here's a free name change for your account).
I am also torn on a cash shop for VISUAL AFFECTS only. I do not want to be able to purchase mounts or pets - let them be earned. Being able to dress up for holidays might be fun, or things of that nature, but that can also be covered in crafting - creating a boost for the crafting community. Sure, the devs won't get the money for that santa's hat, but it encourages me to hunt down a player who can not only make it, but has the materials and is at a good price - focusing on the player experience.
I will ALWAYS purchase IRL items for cash if I am thoroughly enjoying the game. In fact, I'm quite hoping the cloth map of terminus reward for being a Cohort+ Pledge becomes purchasable, as I REALLY want it but can't drop $500 on the game....
Season Passes, DLC's, Subscriptions, Free to Play, Buy to Play, Pay to Play, Expansions, Early Access, Micro-transactions, Cash Shops - where do you draw the line in all of this and what is your preferred method to pay for an MMORPG? #PRF #MMORPG #MMO #communitymatters
Subscription based MMO. Expansions digital regular / collectors + hard copy of regular / collectors - I'm a hard copy collectors edition type.
I would rather donate $5 bucks here, a $1 there, $10 bucks once in awhile via some "Donate / appreciation" venue instead of a Cash Shop.
I remember when EQ2 rolled out their cash shop. "Nothing game changing" I think was their initial public message. Now it's mounts that grant "these bonuses" , XP potions and you get the idea. Pages and pages of stuff.
I'd rather pay a subscription, help out by buying "collector's editions" ( /love /sucker art books + sound tracks) , so you focus on creating assets for us all. Instead of spending time creating assets to sell in a cash shop.
ps: during the release year/year after EQ2 had "DLC" adventures. Sure, I bought them so I wouldn't be left out but really they were content quickly forgotten and not worth the effort they put into creating them.
Buy the game - subscribe monthly - purchase expansions (should have a lot of new content). I can't stand cash shops and feel like all the cool cosmetic stuff that they sell is better when its obtained through a quest or some form of task competed by the player.
I really enjoyed the old AC days when they had monthly events/updates. It really made paying the subscription fee feel like it was worthwile.
Free to play is bad, low effort players, scammers, trolls, and hackers will flood the servers. Just look at Planetside 2.
Buy to Play is significantly better (this means you have to buy the game but thereafter its free to play on the servers). Elder Scrolls Online for example does not have the problems that Planetside 2 has.
Buy and then a monthly fee is the best way to keep out non-serious players. This has the negative side effect however of keeping out casual players who can't afford a $xx dollar monthly charge they barely use each month. I might still log in to WoW now and again if it didn't have a monthly fee, for example. As a result, I might have kept up with and bought the various expansions.
Either of the latter two is a decent way to go for the players that are not low effort, scammers, trolls, and hackers. I don't know which is better financially. I will say that its more likely that I'll stick with the game if there's no monthly fee than if there is one. Keeping a game installed on my hard drive is cheap, but if I'm going to pay a monthly fee, its going to have to be my "main game" or else I'll unsub.
As far as loot boxes and microtransactions go, that stuff has to be only for cosmetic stuff and cosmetic conveniences only. I'm more understanding if you're Buy to Play than if you have a monthly fee, if you want to stray into the slippery slope of stuff like "XP scrolls" and super-flashy mounts and stuff like that. If I'm paying a monthly fee, I'm far less understanding of microtransactions beyond purely cosmetic stuff.
I don't and never will buy the argument that people should be able to pay for shortcuts because "they're grown up now and don't have time to play". That's always been a bullshit argument to me, and is built around the perception that "the game starts at level 50". The leveling process should be "playing the game", not a "grind to get through as fast as possible". The last thing we need is a bunch of rich level 50s with no skills as a character or as a player. Don't let people buy progression no matter how much they whine or think they deserve to be able to pay for it. And crack down as hard as possible on the black market for this stuff too.
If you make a good game that deserves its monthly fee, increase the price. I'd gladly pay more each month to keep out the hackers and scammers (they won't bother with games that are expensive to re-buy every time they get banned). But make sure you have a good game first.
Kilsin said:Season Passes, DLC's, Subscriptions, Free to Play, Buy to Play, Pay to Play, Expansions, Early Access, Micro-transactions, Cash Shops - where do you draw the line in all of this and what is your preferred method to pay for an MMORPG? #PRF #MMORPG #MMO #communitymatters
Buy to play, Pay to Play, Expansions are all fine.
DLC is fine if the Price is worth what you get. (To see how to NOT do it right, look at ESO's so called expansions for 40$ for ONE ZONE.)
Season Passes - no way, ever.
Kilsin said:Season Passes, DLC's, Subscriptions, Free to Play, Buy to Play, Pay to Play, Expansions, Early Access, Micro-transactions, Cash Shops - where do you draw the line in all of this and what is your preferred method to pay for an MMORPG? #PRF #MMORPG #MMO #communitymatters
Buy the Game - Monthly Subscription - no free to play. Please allow us to pay a YEAR subscription in advance.
Pay for expansions.
Cash Shops are fine for cosmetics: think Elder Scrolls Online store. Mounts, houses, costumes; or Real life apparel, Cloth Maps, stuffed animals etc.
Or something a little like Blizzard cash shop: RL items made From game items. Think 12" green armored, flame sword, action figure: $129.95 !
and please, absolutely Nothing close to wow tokens or Krono etc. that will literally destroy the game. - if Pantheon has this. I quit. Forever. Seriously, if pantheon is even considering this type of currency, can you tell me now so I can totally quit following the game. (my line, in case you missed that)
I vote:
Buy the game>> pay monthly fee >> purchase expansions.
Cash shops are alright I suppose, as long as the above still pertains.. I don't like FTP games with cash shops much at all.
I'm really not in to fluff either I guess. I personally only want what I can actually aquire within the game- but thats just me.
Elder Scrolls Online housing system is a near-perfect implementation of a cash shop - like thing that has essentially no effect on gameplay that few to no people should have a problem with. Yet I'm sure ESO makes quite a bit of money off it. If you want to pay for your servers, this is a good way.
Aqua said:Happy to buy the game and have a subscription and buy for expansions ...really hate the ide of pay to win mentality.
This, a million times over. I'm more than happy to buy the game, pay a subscription, and purchase any expansions to avoid pay to win items or a bunch of players dressing up in a goat snuggie from the cash shop.
Monthly subs are fine
Paying for expacs are fine
DLC has a no vote from me. So far with every game I have tested or played with a that model creates gap in community. Those that have to be first at everything will rush through it and go play something else. This leads to the endless videos of complaining about no content. It also creates dead zones in games. Focus on the content and refine with the expansions.
Ox