No one wants F2P. We all see what F2P is and becomes. It's a slippery slope to P2W. People want structure and continuity, which I think monthly subscription bring. I WANT there to be a subscription
Why the majority of the game that have started with sub only are F2P now ?
RIFT, Starwars, LOTRO, Age of conan, rune of magic...etc...etc there is hundred of title like this, why cause there too much MMO now, subs not work the population is too low.
The RIFT started a sub only servers this year and the first few month was big success. I do not follow it so I do not know the current situation, but they make the expansion to these servers so I think they still have enough subscribers to maintain the project.
Yeah, EQ1 and EQ2 have started this 3 year ago with the Time Locked Server that was working the first year, cause all the people with a sub already (from many different server) log on that server so the population was higher than the F2P server and cause the first year the level was locked to 50, so easy to find a group at low level, and a good plan for new people that never explore the old EverQuest content (best part of this game).
Now this TLS server have less population, cause the level is higher and there no group to find at low level.
Rift do exactly the same thing, that the problem with the vertical progression, after 1 or 2 years the low level zone will be empty, buts its a temporary solution to keep the sub not to create new sub.
Did you know how this F2P strategy comes out ? who do it first ? and why the official MMO have adopted this marketing strategy ?
I think a large portion of the people supporting this game are tired of gimmicks. OP, you are challenging the very fabric that is drawing an audience to Ashes. The majority here doesn't want F2P or P2W. Those models have proven time and time again to be complete shit because they rely on cash shops. You only end up being as good as the money you invest into the game.
I appreciate the hypothetical, and maybe your concept could work on another game in another time. I would be intrigued to see what kind of world your model created. My hunch is it will fill the game with 'tiers' of players, and will only invite exploits. For Ashes however, I don't think your model is attractive to anyone here.
Did you know how this F2P strategy comes out ? who do it first ? and why the official MMO have adopted this marketing strategy ?
No, I do not know the F2P's history. I am not the enemy of F2P. I think both of them has weakness and strengthness. But, I saw many times when the F2P went to P2W so I have some fears. With the example of Rift, I just wanted to mention, that the subscription type games still can have enough player to maintain it. Additionally there were many polls in the forums and big majority wants subscprion. Personally me, I can live with sub only, but I also can live with F2P, if it is not P2W.
He say at 4:10 : "I think the free to play work best for the consumer when the things being sold for real money.........!!and the thing being sold can also be obtained in game via a reasonable grind!!
Thats exactly what i got in mind, this famous currency (cash shop or sub must be limitedby account, non tradeable to avoid P2W and avoid broke the in-game economy.
And in my description the grind (free account) will also benefit to the subscriber.(xp input)
After all that depend the individual vision, i can't imagine a sandbox MMORPG with the possibility to build village if everybody is a warlord or a battle mage, and if the dev open this game with a system like this, each new free player will create a villager or a farmer.
I can't imagine too a MMORPG like this with sub only if the player town can be attacked, cause the population will be lower and there will be issue.
I can take a good exemple with Archeage, this game is F2P, its terribly P2W, but the free account can't build a house, so the villages are empty and the superb PvP battle showing in the promotional video simply don't exist, cause the freeaccount have no interest to defend a village, and the low subs population is not enough too make this PvP fight interesting.
ArcheRage (Archeage private server) its a worst P2W than the official server, but everybody can build here, there no pay-wall, so whats happen the siege are really interesting cause there enough of attacker/defender to make a fun gameplay.
Same with Darkfall, i was playing this game 10$ sub its cheap, but the population is to low to enjoy it.
If you don't trust me take a sub and try it for 3 month the game is good, the sub just limit the population and killed that game at the end.
My description is just an exemple on how to open the game without paywall, and avoid P2W....
A F2P with paywall fail...
A P2W without paywall work...
So if the game is good, a F2P non P2W without paywall will work for sure....
The subscriber will always got more currency than a free account.
Then subscriptions would be what is P2W
No he is just more confortable, the freeaccount will benefit from currency input by the subscriber, and the subscriber will benefit xp input by the freeaccount.
Like i said with the chemistry table exemple, subs and freeaccount will benifit without paywall, subs will input more currency and free account will input more XP, so there no P2W cause both of them will have access to any town upgrade.
Nothing is free in that world, its just an idea to open this game and raise the population without paywall, cause a F2P non P2W with paywall that not work.
So if a freeaccount is tired to grind currency he take a sub or take his 500 currency when needed.
I was thinking like you about subs, i start to play on MMO 20 years ago with EQ1, Archeron calls... at this time there was only few MMO with subs.
Time have changed... (accept it or not)
If i start a new MMO its to play many years on it, not just 1 years and leave cause the population is to low and after that be confronted to a real P2W after 1 or 2 years to raise the population.
When a MMO with subs take a F2P direction its only for raise the population to keep the subscriber, and its always a P2W with paywall everywhere, thats why a MMO with subs sucks when it become F2P.
A MMO should take this direction at launch, not when the time is hard cause the subs will feel scamed if a there no paywall on a F2P.
I was thinking like you about subs, i start to play on MMO 20 years ago with EQ1, Archeron calls... at this time there was only few MMO with subs.
Time have changed... (accept it or not)
If i start a new MMO its to play many years on it, not just 1 years and leave cause the population is to low and after that be confronted to a real P2W after 1 or 2 years to raise the population.
When a MMO with subs take a F2P direction its only for raise the population to keep the subscriber, and its always a P2W with paywall everywhere, thats why a MMO with subs sucks when it become F2P.
The reason why most mmos have taken the f2p p2w model is because its the most profitable. They only care about milking as much money from players as fast as they can then when the revenue dries up they bring out the next "theam park" game and repeat This is also why they tend to have shockingly bad community relations because why bother, player satisfaction is overruled by greed.
Times have indeed changed to this model however its been enough time that enough people have been burnt for I.S to lead a new change back to a sub based model.
I also belive that from what I have seen sofar so early in the development of AOC that its style of keeping content alive is what will see it keep and grow its playerbase.
The bottom line is that if subs have an advantage over f2p, then subs are p2w. If f2p players that spend money in shop have an advantage over f2p players that don't, then they are p2w, also.
The best model for mmo's is sub based, it's not even a question. We want the game to succeed. The company needs to make money for it to succeed, and nobody wants p2w at all.
Sub based mmo's don't fail because they have subs. They usually fail because people lose interest. This can be caused by many things but mostly repetition and lack of content. If people are willing to pay a sub to play a game initially, then that can't be why the game goes f2p/p2w farther down the road.
Nothing good comes from making a mmo F2P no matter how you want to spin it. Allowing entitled kids to play for free doesn't help the game or company. And because mmo's have long lifespans, a B2P version with no sub should cost $400+, unless we want some version of p2w, which we don't.
I will not repeat again, the freeaccount can use everything unlocked in town so there is no P2W.
I never play this game just put interest on it cause the mechanic looks good, if i understand the sandbox goal (long term durability of this game) its to build a town, develop town, conquest...etc...etc...
The freeaccount will need to develop the town (xp input for the town) to raise social class and for raise social class they will need to earn currency by doing thing that will give XP to the town (develop the town), a subscriber will need to do less farming to be able to raise social class.
Everybody win cause that will help subs for develop a town and open the game without paywall or P2W, if the freeaccount don't want farm for raise social class they take a sub.
The currency do not give any gear or overpowered thing to boost character stat or skill so in a fight a subs is not stronger, the gear and the skill willl be determined by the activity of the player.
So a freeaccount can be a simple citizen (cheaper for the currency) and spend more time in combat and loot gear to be stronger
If an other player is more interested with the town developement, (subs or free) the currency and xp input will be more important, and the freeplayer and sub will earn more currency to raise social class, but weaker combat skill cause they will fight less than a conqueror, so a freeaccount conqueror should be better in combat than a sub farmer and vice versa so no P2W.
So if a sub do only conquest and a freeaccount do only town developement the freeaccount will got same amount or more currency than a subs who never farm to raise social class, so a freeaccount can also raise faster than a subs, the freeaccount must do a choice conqueror or farmer/tradeskill its RP, a subs conqueror can only raise social class faster than a freeaccount conqueror.
Statistically a freeaccount is supposed to input more town XP than a subs.
At the end everybody got a benefit, (free or sub conqueror, free or sub farmer or the other that will do both of that).
But really don't be so innocent, i read the dev blog, blablabla there a cash shop blablabla but its not P2W blablabla there will be only skin that can be obtained also by playing the game blablabla.... it will be sub only cause we don't want P2W.....
For the moment the fact, there a cash shop and a subs required for a game in an alpha state.
If they are really against P2W, with a game that require a sub they do not need a cash shop at all huh ? 15$ subs should generate enough money...
I will tell you the futur of this game and why i will never put a cent on it for the moment, this cash shop for skin just cover a futur P2W or F2P with paywall if they didn't get enough subs after the stable version of the game. (6 month/1 year)
If they open the game without paywall (P2W), all the guy who have paid more than 6 month subs (+90$) will think they were scammed by the company, and will lost a lot of subscriber in an operation like this its for that i say they must open the game at launch.
If you are really against P2W, like me, launch a petition and ask to remove the cash shop completly, if the skin can be obtain in game why there a cash shop for that ?
You guys here you see P2W everywhere, if a guy spend 100$ on skin he will win skin faster than somebody than do not buy on cash shop, so if i follow your ligne its already pay to win, cause he will not need to fight a big monster or farm hour to win a cool skin...
Do you really think that the devs of a game cant implement a cash shop within 1 single update in any game ?....we have the cash shop for cosmetics and most people have no problem with cosmetics only since cash shop cosmetics cannot be gained in game but cosmetics that need to be achieved in game cannot be bought in the cash shop.
How can you possibly p2w with a skin that grants no stat benefits?
In all honesty from what I've been reading your understanding of what is and isn't p2w is incomplete so please go and do some research on the matter.
Furthermore this games focus isnt as a town builder mmo. The whole node/town thing is only a part of the whole. Yes they are important but its not everyone gets their own town. They are a result of playing the rest of what the game has to offer.
The current system encourages players to get out into the world to experience all it has to offer and in turn this levels up the relevent nodes to unlock more that the world has to offer in a symbiotic balance.
As for free accounts in general it would be far easyer for anyone to abuse making multiple free accounts to spam your currency system.
Im also interested to see how much a sub based only account system will keep the gold spamers at bay as including free accounts just gives them free reign to screw the economy like every free game out there.
Be kinda pointless for gold spammers when they have to pay $15 a month for each backup account only to get each banned within days of going "active".
How can you possibly p2w with a skin that grants no stat benefits?
Its just a stupid answer about all the ppl they don't understand what's a P2W, i explain many time there no impact on the character stat with that currency, but some ppl here (not you) say if a sub got more currency than a free account its P2W....
P2W for me its when somebody can increase stat by buying item in cash shop.
Im also interested to see how much a sub based only account system will keep the gold spamers at bay as including free accounts just gives them free reign to screw the economy like every free game out there.
Be kinda pointless for gold spammers when they have to pay $15 a month for each backup account only to get each banned within days of going "active".
I already explain that in a previous post, the game must have a minimum cost (40-50$), and the bot farmer should interact with other player to be part of the town to reduce this possibility.
you say : As for free accounts in general it would be far easyer for anyone to
abuse making multiple free accounts to spam your currency system.
No cause the currency is more expensive for a free account, so that will cost +30$ each month to get the same amount of a sub (15$), that will require 4 account so 40$ by month, to be able to input more currency without playing.
And for the XP input + rent system its will be a pain to exploit the currency with a multiple account, cause if there no XP input the town cannot be developped.
If a freeaccount is able to grind +1500 currency by month, a subs is able to get +3000 currency easely so multi free account is a waste of money, cause you can get more than x2 currency as subs for 15$.
So the best way its to get 2 subs to exploit the currency and like you say : "Be kinda pointless for gold spammers when they have to pay $15 a month
for each backup account only to get each banned within days of going
"active"".
I will do not give MMO name, but a subs do not protect from gold spammers, i will take an exemple dont pay attention with the number. Im not talking about my description in this exemple :
If a gold spammers take a sub for 15$ and he is able to make 100$ by selling gold to a player each week, its not a problem to get an account banned if the balance is positive at the end.
My currency system will prevent that cause there will be only currency/xp input to develop a node.
After that when something is unlocked player must farm ressource to build new thing (like wood, stone...)
I don't know how will look like the town developement at the end, but what ever subs required or not, if a town need a huge amount of gold to be developped a subs will not protect the game from gold seller.
Gold selling system are out of control, so nobody can do something about this, cash shop or not, subs or not, so if the town need a huge amount of gold to be developped gold seller will be here and will ruin the game.
The dev should look this way to avoid this, im not talking about my description now, but the gold should be used only for trade cause if gold is required to develop a town there will be gold seller and it will be P2W.
How can you possibly p2w with a skin that grants no stat benefits?
Its just a stupid answer about all the ppl they don't understand what's a P2W, i explain many time there no impact on the character stat with that currency, but some ppl here (not you) say if a sub got more currency than a free account its P2W....
P2W for me its when somebody can increase stat by buying item in cash shop.
ANYTHING that gives any benefit AT ALL besides JUST LOOKING GOOD, that you spend any real cash on is considered P2W. That is the end of this conversation @Damsous . If you feel like disputing this fact, just don't, because you can't
An other no brain that have just read currency and cashshop without understand the concept, yes i can disputing this fact cause i have argument to defend it, end of discussion for you have a good day whitedude
An other no brain that have just read currency and cashshop without understand the concept, yes i can disputing this fact cause i have argument to defend it, end of discussion for you have a good day whitedude
So . . . where is that counter argument then kiddo?
My friend wanted to be a dick and posted that with my account when I walked away, but I still think its funny to egg him on. The more stupidity the kid spits out, the longer the label of troll will be stuck to his back
A box price of $40-50 dollars and the box price concept is only relevant to a one shot game without online servers. It is useless for a game that has an ongoing online cost with online game servers. A non-server game does not require monthly staffing, maintenance, upgrades, research and development costs.
The only way free-player + box cost would work, is to charge each player 12x$15 every year to cover the same 'ongoing' costs. But every additional player demands more hardware and maintenance requirements, so still never covers ongoing costs without an annual fee.
If you are not going to have extreme box costs or monthly subscription costs, then the only payment option to 'finance the company' is the cash shop.
AND THAT CASH SHOP MUST BE COMPULSORY.. to ensure a viable business model.
And this is how F2Play games work:
1. Create a 'fixation' on an object that can be improved and empathised with. A character association identified with an initial 'fun' process.
2. Create a devotion to that character by forcing the player to expend time and effort on its development and get your fix of endorphin based fun.
3. Slowly 'condition' the player (to avoid suspicion until they are too invested to object) to work harder and harder to achieve the same level of progress and thus dominate market share of their 'free time'.
4. Introduce RNG that gets lower and lower drop rates the further the player progresses, to further condition the player into 24/7 devotion for the now 'mere' chance of achieving 'some' progress.
5. By the time the player reaches the higher levels the player should now be fully addicted to his characters fixation to the point of abandoning the real world through their addiction. They should now be willing and conditioned to work endlessly for the mere hope of progress without complaint.
6. At this point the cash shop can be introduced without any pay2win elements until the cash shop is accepted. When the cash shop is accepted, slowly introduce more and more effective pay2win items. At which point, the high level players will be only to willing to gain through cash, what might take an eternity to achieve.
7. The grand finale. Make the pay2win items RNG based to ensure the players stand less and less chance of achieving high level items in the cash shop. In effect, making the highest level players so hopelessly addicted 24/7, that they are 100% socially devoted to the game, to empty all of their disposable income (and non-disposable income) into the game...with next to no chance of receiving anything for bankrupting themselves.
You see....Free2Play is a viable business model, because they know they can force players to pay..through the psychology of addiction. And even better, they dont actually have to offer anything for the money received, because its all RNG and they control the ever declining drop rates.
THE HOUSE ALWAYS WINS ! You thought you was playing an eastern MMO for fun. The creators knew you were playing the game to give them all your money. Willingly. Ignorance is bliss I guess.
Runescape had the best sub method Ive seen so far. You can visit and do some minor things when you're too busy to play and sub when you actually can play. Downside is the eternal battle against bots that ruins that visiting experience.
Most of the other game I've played have had horrible business models.
Thankfully I know not to worry about your ideas, as IS team is smart enough to stay away from abominations like yours. If they were to change their model they would come up with something properly reasoned.
I don't do this precision but a box price come with 1 or 2 month of subs included, if somebody is able to put 180 $ into a game every year, 30$ (45-15/1 month free sub) should not be a major issue.
A box price will cover a part of the game developement, and give a good amount of money at start.
You say : But every additional player demands more hardware and maintenance
requirements, so still never covers ongoing costs without an annual fee.
I agree with you on few point, but tell me why some ppl are able to run MMO emulated server for free....
On the popular title like WOW, EQ1(p99) or archeage there is more ppl than the official server, there no paywall but they are able to manage and make money with that.
This server will always generate less money than the official one but they are able to do it.
There a difference with a server maintenance and manage the investment plan.
On many thing, thats the investment plan that cost a lot on the long term, ashe of creation is a crowdfunding right ? so if they choose this way with a sub its cause they make a deal with an investment company, so the big head of INTREPID receivedd a huge amount of money and must manage and grow the investment the subs is the safer way to do that, if there not enough people (subscriber) to grow the investment the game will become a real P2W, if not all the subs cash flow go in the pocket of the big head of Intrepid so its worst than milk a player...
If a game is developped without investment plan, only by the crowd funding... so if there only a server maintenance to charge its not cost a lot of money.
There a lot of company that offer hosting cost/moderation/customer support and 24h/24 network support for a reasonable price today you will understand why a lot of dev try the MMO adventure and i will explain why the main reason of the subs its to milk the player.
Here the reality :
If there 100 000 player, for exemple 2500 player on each box, that will cost 10k$ (max) each month for the server maintenance, 100 000 player will generate a cash flow of 1.5 M by month for 10k server maintenance, thats the maximum cost for server maintenance.
And i can tell you if they get a contract for a server that can handle 100 000 player there will be a minimum of 25% discount on the price.
So 1000 subscriber can paid the whole server maintenance on that exemple.
The MMO server are not made in a garage... there many company for that, the customer can customize what he need, if he got a spike of 25k player for few month and after that that drop to 10k the server maintenance cost will be lower, the customer will only loose the discount reduction.
Server company got enough of ressource to adapt their box to player count, they can do this in less than 2h.
So 1 freeplayer will cost less than 1$ for the combany but if 1 freeplayer give 10 dollars in the cashshop, there no additional cost for the next 9 player, at the end if 10% of the player use the cash shop 1 time each month there will be no additional cost for the server and i can tell you there always more than 10% of player that spend money in the cash shop.
Thats why there a lot of independent MMO sandbox, with subs only or paywall everywhere, if a dev alone create an indie MMO and he got 300 subscriber at 10$ each month he will earn a minimum of 2900$ each month.
My vision and my experience, if a sandbox and especially a MMORPG with sandbox feature must attract a lot of player to be interesting, subs only will result to node underdevelopped, the fight to conquer a town will be 6 vs 3 player after few month...
A lot of people will leave the game cause that wasn't what they are looking for and the game will become a P2W to attract more ppl... and the only goal of a only sub MMO that become F2P its to keep the subs for make money as long as possible...
The worst thing its that you trust somebody that want to charge 180$/year for a game cause thats the only way to not make a non P2W, thats a good joke...
On many thing, thats the investment plan that cost a lot on the long term, ashe of creation is a crowdfunding right ? so if they choose this way with a sub its cause they make a deal with an investment company, so the big head of INTREPID receivedd a huge amount of money and must manage and grow the investment the subs is the safer way to do that,
Just to update you on this point The kickstarter is not what is funding the main development for Ashes, it was only to cover extra content not originally planned as part of the base game.
Steven the founder of Intrepid Studios himself put around $30 million of his own personal money towards making the game.
On many thing, thats the investment plan that cost a lot on the long term, ashe of creation is a crowdfunding right ? so if they choose this way with a sub its cause they make a deal with an investment company, so the big head of INTREPID receivedd a huge amount of money and must manage and grow the investment the subs is the safer way to do that,
Just to update you on this point The kickstarter is not what is funding the main development for Ashes, it was only to cover extra content not originally planned as part of the base game.
Steven the founder of Intrepid Studios himself put around $30 million of his own personal money towards making the game.
Where did you get this information? this guy was working for SOE before start Intrepid with SOE work mate, this company fail, and i doubt he got all this money with the SOE paycheck, if its true this money come from investor.... or he got a lot of chance in a casino or something like that.
I did'nt want to talk badly on him, i don't know him, but i just try to understand why this is subs only, to avoid P2W its not the true reason, i didn't trust that.
If he have done a deal with an investment company i totally understand his strategy by choosing a subs requirement, i think its the safer way for him and his work mate to not sink if there unforseen things.
But really, dealing with the investor, this trickster, its looks like good at start (lot of money input for the company) but at the end its trap.
@Damsous Your either an idiot or a troll to keep at this. Your information is just plain wrong in so many ways. Steven Sharif the owner of Intrepid Studios never worked for SOE and is a self-made millionaire. A simple google search would provide you with this information and how he made his money. No matter how much you whine and cry, the game is not going to be f2p or any of your suggestions used. You can pony up the actual cost of the subscription of shiny 15 USD or sit outside with your grimy nose pressed up against the window watching the rest of the first world play. Don't know what the conversion rate to the monopoly money yours uses, but it is sure to sting.
Comments
I appreciate the hypothetical, and maybe your concept could work on another game in another time. I would be intrigued to see what kind of world your model created. My hunch is it will fill the game with 'tiers' of players, and will only invite exploits. For Ashes however, I don't think your model is attractive to anyone here.
With the example of Rift, I just wanted to mention, that the subscription type games still can have enough player to maintain it. Additionally there were many polls in the forums and big majority wants subscprion.
Personally me, I can live with sub only, but I also can live with F2P, if it is not P2W.
This is also why they tend to have shockingly bad community relations because why bother, player satisfaction is overruled by greed.
Times have indeed changed to this model however its been enough time that enough people have been burnt for I.S to lead a new change back to a sub based model.
I also belive that from what I have seen sofar so early in the development of AOC that its style of keeping content alive is what will see it keep and grow its playerbase.
The best model for mmo's is sub based, it's not even a question. We want the game to succeed. The company needs to make money for it to succeed, and nobody wants p2w at all.
Sub based mmo's don't fail because they have subs. They usually fail because people lose interest. This can be caused by many things but mostly repetition and lack of content. If people are willing to pay a sub to play a game initially, then that can't be why the game goes f2p/p2w farther down the road.
Nothing good comes from making a mmo F2P no matter how you want to spin it. Allowing entitled kids to play for free doesn't help the game or company. And because mmo's have long lifespans, a B2P version with no sub should cost $400+, unless we want some version of p2w, which we don't.
In all honesty from what I've been reading your understanding of what is and isn't p2w is incomplete so please go and do some research on the matter.
Furthermore this games focus isnt as a town builder mmo. The whole node/town thing is only a part of the whole. Yes they are important but its not everyone gets their own town.
They are a result of playing the rest of what the game has to offer.
The current system encourages players to get out into the world to experience all it has to offer and in turn this levels up the relevent nodes to unlock more that the world has to offer in a symbiotic balance.
As for free accounts in general it would be far easyer for anyone to abuse making multiple free accounts to spam your currency system.
Be kinda pointless for gold spammers when they have to pay $15 a month for each backup account only to get each banned within days of going "active".
Fixed my signature
Downside is the eternal battle against bots that ruins that visiting experience.
Most of the other game I've played have had horrible business models.
Thankfully I know not to worry about your ideas, as IS team is smart enough to stay away from abominations like yours.
If they were to change their model they would come up with something properly reasoned.
The kickstarter is not what is funding the main development for Ashes, it was only to cover extra content not originally planned as part of the base game.
Steven the founder of Intrepid Studios himself put around $30 million of his own personal money towards making the game.