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Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest news on Alpha Two.
Check out general Announcements here to see the latest news on Ashes of Creation & Intrepid Studios.
To get the quickest updates regarding Alpha Two, connect your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
This is why I would think that - if anything - adding embers to a longer duration pack would make more sense.
If a subscription is $15, most games have a 3 month subscription work out to cost about $14, a 6 month to cost around $13, and a 12 month to cost around $12 a month.
Rather than that, what I think could be worth Intrepid doing is making the 3 month cost $14.50 a month (so, $43.50), the 6 month cost $14 a month ($84) and the 12 month cost $13.50 a month ($162).
That way, Intrepid would potentially stand to make more money off of some players (those wanting longer term subscriptions, but not at all concerned with cosmetics), and may also encourage people to spend the occasional few dollars to top up what they get with their subscription packs in order to get an item they quite like, but wouldn't pay full price for.
If the longer duration subscription still works out cheaper per month than buying a subscription a month at a time, most people that would have gone for it still will. The fact that the savings would only be half as much with this as with the industry standard is not likely to influence peoples decisions.
All that said, we have no confirmation at all as to whether they will bundle embers with subscriptions.
On the other hand just give me a great MMO with no cash shop at all and I'd drop 100 a month for a sub.
Game for fun, not for life
So let’s say a developer wanted to accommodate the PTW crowd. Dedicate a server or servers where they can do that. All of their purchases aren’t usable on the non-PTW servers.
Then let the player community decide which servers they want to play on. Those who value the grind and earned rewards will gravitate to the non-PTW servers and those who like PTW will gravitate to the PTW servers. If there are enough PTW people, then the costs to the non-PTW folks could be reduced or more features and content can be added (with a modest subscription I think most players may prefer content).
I don’t think it has to be an all or nothing proposition. If the objection from PTW folks are they don’t have an advantage over the non-PTW players, the response is simply yes, you don’t have that advantage. Their argument is no longer about paying for progress. That’s why we refer to them as PTW players.
Now there can be different levels of PTW or pay for “convenience”. One level would be for the casual player or whale who doesn’t want to spend a lot of time in game, but doesn’t necessarily have to have the best gear. Another are the ones who want all of the best gear money can buy with all the boosts and buffs that go with it.
I repeat the premise that the above assumes a given developer chooses to accommodate the PTW or pay for convenience players. So far Intrepid via Steven do not appear interested in that at this time or possibly ever. They have their niche in mind that doesn’t try to cater to these types of players at the expense of the rest. Those players already have several games that cater to them.
I'll never understand players who are in favor of P2W. The big problem of P2W is it hurts the game healthy in the long way, breaks the economy, devalue ingame items, devalue time invested playing and eventually decrease the number of players in the game.
It's just a guessing but if they add a P2W only server I think it will be almost empty in less than a year.
Also, a P2W server could hurt Non-P2W servers. If you can test things faster and easier in the P2W server you will be able to progress much faster in the Non-P2W servers.
Losing the PTW server wouldn’t hurt the non-PTW server. If the PTW server is empty then it just means the PTW crowd moved on to other games or realized the virtues of non-PTW play.
As for PTW servers hurting non-PTW servers you need to elaborate. If each server is unique and dependent on the community, then what do you think will be able to progress much faster on the non-PTW server?
You are right. I'll try to explain my point of view better.
P2W is progress faster, if not I would not call it P2W. If you can progress faster in the game you will get knowledge about how the game works faster and that's is an advantage. I assume that players on a P2W server will be able to reach max level much faster, improve craft professions faster and other stuff.
They said servers are going to be unique but I don't think they are going to be unique in everything. For example, the raid dragons they showed in the Dev Stream will probably be similar in all servers if they spawn on that servers.
Let's say dragon boss spawn on the P2W server where all my tryhard guild have an alter and spawn on my non-P2W server where I'm playing too.
Since my character progression is faster in the P2W servers because of what P2W means, my character is going to be stronger than my non-P2W character so I'll probably will be able to kill this boss first in the P2W server, farm it and practice the encounter.
So when I fight for that boss on the non-P2W server I will have advantage against all the non-P2W players, because I know the fight, know what to do, know how to react, etc.
That's one example why I think a P2W server could affect a non-P2W server. I don't know if I explained the idea well.
What I want in a game, is the old formula - > TIme invested = Pay out. Not money in = time negated, or pay out. I want time + aptitude invested to = rewards of recognition, noteworthy accomplishments. I do not want money invested ='s rewards that are near carbon copies of the rewards people need to invest time and aptitude to acquire in game, or in lieu of carbon copies - rewards that outshine in their aesthetic caliber, the achievements that require time and aptitude. This one hundred percent diminishes my enjoyment in a game, it is exclusivity that brings value to something, rarity, uniqueness, difficulty. That's how I personally function as a player, and I know I'm not the only one, even if it's a dying mentality.
How this relates presently to the gaming market. TBC announces boosts for sale <-- I won't touch TBC, even without all the other errors blizzard is making, this one thing, negates my enjoyment of the game. That's before touching on the mounts, and various other things present in their store that they'll likely implement. New world, already planning to sell "quality of life changes", boosts, faster experience rates, likely things like more storage(that tends to be a huge quality of life gimmick in f2p games), regardless, that's enough to put me off new world, I think the combat system in the game was terrible from my experience anyway, but I'd at least have thrown a few weeks into retail.
This sentiment has been relayed already, but if a game is good - it makes you want to waste time, and you won't even feel like you are wasting time. If a class is well made, if the combat system is good, if the game world is immersive, if you're constantly growing in power as you move on your way through the game world, no matter how small the increase - > then things like how long it takes to level will be entirely arbitrary, because simply playing the game, playing your class, going through the motions will be satisfying enough to keep you engaged. The moment you start including things to expedite that process, skip it, or anything along those lines - you basically concede it isn't all that fun to begin with.
The most fun I've had leveling in a game lately in the more modern era, was WoW classic, although between Layering, people abusing raids for exp gain, world buffs, spell damage gear that shouldn't have been in at release trivializing raid content etc, the end game was the least enjoyable aspect, but I enjoyed spending the two to three weeks it took. Other games, tend to be a week or less to level cap, and the end game in those games wasn't worth it, even at that minimal investment.
In general, the most fun I had leveling mmorpgs was EQ/UO/DAOC etc, honorable mentions to middle aged games like Rift, although I think that fell by the wayside and the end game was too trivial. I'm rambling, I'll get back to the p2w vs sub vs box etc.
I would be inclined to pay a box price, and in many cases have - and in many cases have gone all out on editions and overspent versus value, I'm all for subs, and would prefer box + sub STANDARD, in lieu of a cash shop personally, a sub is like an agreement that a company will continue putting out content worth playing month to month, at all points. You get what you pay for, and when you pay for nothing - you generally get nothing, and psychologically, who owes you anything. They might throw in some transactions that instill you with a bit of dopamine for a game you think you want to play, but realistically that's not a long term retention dynamic in my opinion. It doesn't keep me around at least. :P
I didn't mind a game like league selling cosmetics, but getting armor in league isn't really "the point" of league, like it is in an mmo, how you look is very much only relevant to you, and in some cases it's just a head ache to other players versus a "wow" factor, because the varied artwork can throw off interpretation of mechanics, whereas buying your way to "looking cool" in mmos, will pretty much always undercut some value in some items in the game, it's unavoidable. Necessary evil? I won't concede that, par for the course and not going anywhere? Probably, but can we not pretend that it's actually a positive
What comes to mind when I see cash shops like that is the endless asian mmorpg assembly line where one game comes out, you're already able to buy items in a cash shop from launch for that endless crafting grind, hey want your weapon to be +15? well buy these awesome hammers that increase your chances ad-nauseam, meanwhile the design team is probably already making their next mmo within a month working on the next cash shop and waiting to retire the previous game within a year or two. That's all I see from a perception stand point when I see cash shops.
I tolerated things like server transfers, or faction changes in WoW, and once the game was too far gone to care anyway, boosts - sure, but again, let's not pretend it's a positive. Even those transfers and faction changes aren't "entirely a net positive" it just enabled people to be opportunistic instead of work on their environments, or begin anew in a new environment. If the game is fun to play, why desire to skip it, and in doing so give license to the developers to stop focusing on ensuring that process is fun, is anyone going to argue that WoW for example has a "fun leveling process" at this point? Shadowlands is an endless chore with -maybe- semi well made raids, and no game world to speak of.
Anyway, sorry for rambling. :P There's some thoughts in here somewhere about payment models. lol Take care.
Long term you can also gain information watching a stream. So realistically you are not really gaining a huge advantage by having a PTW server.
We also don’t know how much information the PTW player has given up in their attempt to get to the end, and that may actually be a disadvantage.
The PTW version of a game could also be a totally different experience.
And again, this is all hypothetical. Intrepid is not likely to entertain this arrangement. I only bring it up as an alternative approach if you wanted to go after the PTW market.
If a veteran is wearing a silver star and a purple heart, people see those medals and respect the person who earned them. That is a bit like having accomplished things in~game.
If you see a non-veteran wearing a fancy t~shirt he bought which says "I a Hero and a Patriot", that is the PTW player. Maybe they don't realize people laugh at them, ya think?
Maybe my example is a bit complicated to ever happen but P2W ruined my experience so many times in MMORPG and other games that the only idea of a P2W only server make me feel like somehow it will ruin the game again for everyone.
It's not a direct P2W mechanic, but it is. Because you can buy gold, then you can use the gold to buy armor and weapons, even mounts and pets on the auction house which lets you skip content. WoW is a P2W game today, one of the reasons why I don't play WoW anymore was because they had Heirlooms, you couldn't buy Heirlooms with gold, you had to do battlegrounds and get points, to later buy the heirlooms.
But then they introduced tokens and you could buy heirlooms for gold. Throwing away the prestige you had for working hard to get those heirlooms, now you can simply buy them, the game is focused for whales and casuals and trying to compete against them puts you in a disadvantage if you want to do it without spending money.
WoW is dying. They made $150,000,000 a month from Subscriptions at the peak. This number has drastically reduced so they expanded the cash shop. Activision want the money.
Of course it is dying, they are aiming for whales, whales will give them money for a while, but you can't have a game with whales only, since they are minority, and for MMO's you need big numbers. An MMO without a big community can't live forever. Sure, whales give more money, but eventually there will be less people to play with and the game will become dull to play. It's slowly happening, and the more they make the game for casuals and whales, the worse it gets.
Then we ignore them like plauge
This may be controversial, but I wouldn't offer them any with the lifetime subscription.
There are two reasons for this.
The first is that they are still getting a great deal.
Second, they are not losing anything at all if the other subscription packages gain embers.
If people did complain, Intrepid could then offer them a deal. They can exchange their lifetime subscription for an equal value of this subscription package.
The lifetime subscription is in the $500 pack, and the previous pack was $250 and had 6 months worth of subscription time.
So, the lifetime subscription cost $250+6 months subscription.
$250 is roughly equal to 18 months subscription time based on the above scenario that I'd like to see, meaning the lifetime subscription is equal to 24 months.
If Intrepid offered these people 2 12 month bundles and a bonus 6 month bundle, they are getting more value than the money they paid for their lifetime subscription.
I don't think any sane person would take them up on that deal - which is why I have no issues in not adding embers to lifetime subscriptions in the first place.
If they want to pay 40$ on a mobile game to make it autorun all the dungeons in 10 seconds and unlock the entire game with one click, congratulations I hope they are happy.
But there is another audience that detests P2W, that's us.
Aren't we all sinners?
Yours truly is reluctantly playing Star Wars: The Old Republic, likely until AoC comes out. I'll probably try New World, but it doesn't seem like New World will have anything innovative nor exciting, in it.
In SWTOR, you can buy tokens for max-level characters. I've only done it once, but that was because I've already levelled so *MANY* characters; It wasn't worth my time otherwise to spend the time levelling a character with a duplicate class. What would be better is if you could only do that once you've already levelled a toon of that same archetype.
For SWTOR, it fits to have P2W and Pay-for-Convenience - but again, I'm very much looking forward to AoC NOT doing this. This method has really messed up the in-game economy, over time - but that's just an expected consequence from over-monetizing the game. EA / BioWare couldn't care any less about the player expereience.