Posts made by Phaethonas

There is no such thing as pay for convenience.

These terms (pay for convenience, pay2advantage, etc) are nothing more than p2w apologist crap. Essentially they are basically p2w or they will be turned p2w down the road.

Daily post.

Daily post.

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Daily post.

Daily post.

@gofrit said in Mega Update - Cheaper Packs, Pre-Alpha Keys & More:

@phaethonas said in Mega Update - Cheaper Packs, Pre-Alpha Keys & More:

BUT this brings a question. Why have such a mechanic in the first place? When the developers are making a VIP ticket, they want it to be enticing, in order to sell.

Probably the cosmetic furniture ? a VIP could'nt look for bonus at all

What? What cosmetic furniture?

And regardless what you mean exactly, I suppose that, me saying;

Why don't you just have an optional VIP ticket that will give only cosmetic cash shop perks (e.g. the discount and special items you already have announced)?

covers you.

And speaking of furniture, @Prometheus, what about the NPC carpenter. People (including myself) have said that this will be p2w as well. You haven't addressed that at all at the news article, as far as I recall, and as far as I understand it is still one of the kickstarter perks. Correct? Neither you answered to my question(s) about it, like if such an NPC will be available at the cash shop.

@prometheus said in Mega Update - Cheaper Packs, Pre-Alpha Keys & More:

@phaethonas said in Mega Update - Cheaper Packs, Pre-Alpha Keys & More:

@Prometheus First of all what "unlimited sources only" means, exactly? And secondly, you still haven't answered if the VIP ticket will be an actual in-game item, that will be possible to be exchanged (see EVE's PLEX) or not.

As for trading, the plan is for VIP to be something you activate for your account, not an item that can be traded.

That would be great. This avoids the RMT + player driven economy = p2w issue.

Some sources of KP are limited, because you can perform the action only once (e.g. discovering a new region, a new creature, etc). VIP doesn't boost them. Others, like studying enchanted items, are unlimited - every time you find an enchanted item, you can study it and gain KP.

As long as you still have limited sources available, you'll be looking for those, since unlimited sources are rare and/or give much fewer points. Unlimited sources matter only once you've run out of limited. At that point, however, your character is likely already dozens of hours old, has unlocked all the 50 talent points and has a good variety of builds available - it can be considered "done" from a "competitive" standpoint.

OK, let me see if I got that straight. Let's suppose there is a rare enchanted item called "Enchanted_Sword_ABX1". I find that sword once and I study it, and that gives me 1 KP. The next time I find the exact same item ("Enchanted_Sword_ABX1") and not a similar item (e.g. "Enchanted_Axe_ABX1" or "Enchanted_Sword_ABG4") I will be able to study it again, and get one (1) more KP. Whereas, after I have gotten 5 KPs because I found/killed a cave_spider, I won't be able to get 5 more KPs after killing/finding anothe cave_spider. Am I getting that right?

Then, a VIP member will get 5 KPs from the cave_spider but 1.1 KP from the Enchanted_Sword_ABX1 (+10% from VIP perk). Correct?

If I am getting this right, and if the echanted items are really rare (and you are not just saying this in order to get out of trouble), then that VIP perk maybe it won't be p2w, or rather it won't be p2w to the degree that it will be game changing.

BUT this brings a question. Why have such a mechanic in the first place? When the developers are making a VIP ticket, they want it to be enticing, in order to sell as many as possible. It makes no sense to make a ticket that won't be enticing, because you want it not to turn p2w. If that is your goal, then don't have a VIP ticket to begin with.

My point is that, in the past developers have started with such mechanics giving a "very small/limited boost, that is not p2w", only to add to that as time went by. So, why should we trust you, that you won't do the same?

Why don't you just try less complicated things like adding a mandatory subscription and instead of being a buy2play game be a sub2play game? Why don't you just have an optional VIP ticket that will give only cosmetic cash shop perks (e.g. the discount and special items you already have announced)? Why are you including things that a) make uncomfortable the players and b) assuming that the VIP perks are not p2w now, you will find yourselves in the uncomfortable position of having people asking for more VIP perks that will be related to the KPs and learning slots? Which of course ultimately will make the game p2w.

And why include the VIP in the first place? As far as I know you haven't explained that, and you certainly haven't explained that at the news articles.

@Prometheus First of all what "unlimited sources only" means, exactly? And secondly, you still haven't answered if the VIP ticket will be an actual in-game item, that will be possible to be exchanged (see EVE's PLEX) or not.

@jetah said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@phaethonas

if you repeat yourself then you aren't explaining it correctly. (i know.. i know.)

That would have been correct, if other people were having questions about what I was saying. Instead, I find myself repeating the same thing over and over again, to some people (not all), with them, not addressing half (if not more) of my arguments, which they completely ignore.

@kellewic said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@phaethonas said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

1. Crowfall/Dual Universe/Any game with RMT + player driven economy
   Real money --> VIP token -->( in-game gold --> mats )--> gear with stats

This sounds like WoW last time I logged in with the WoW Token you buy for cash then sell on the auction house for XX gold.

My opinion is anything I can buy in a cash shop should be non-tradable for ingame items like mats, currency, weapons, armor, etc.; however I would like to see them tradable for other cash shop items. It's inevitable to get duplicate items especially if they implement loot boxes like PoE has, which contain "random" cash shop items worth at least the cost of the loot box.

It is like WoW but the ramifications are different. Games with a player driven economy (e.g. Dual Universe, Crowfall, Fractured) will be pay2win. Games without (e.g. WoW) won't be pay2win.

If you want to see things in minute detail then, this exchangeable token is as pay2win as the economy is player driven. With the Fractured economy being ~100% player, the VIP ticket will be very much p2w, if the VIP ticket is an in-game exchangeable item.

@benseine said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@phaethonas if you think everyone here is an idiot except you, chances are you are the idiot...

Not everyone. But sometimes, when I have to repeat myself, it seems to me that some, may be idiots.

ArchAge is p2w because you can swipe your creditcard to buy everything to craft highest tier items (atleast when I played it) to get an instant power gap over the rest of the player base.

If that is p2w, then Fractured isn't

I wouldn't be so sure about that actually.

Since day 1, I have made a question that still has to receive an answer. Will the VIP tickets/tokens be actual in-game items, that can be traded between players? If so, then you will end up having exactly what you describe.

Instead of buying the mats for gear, or the gear itself, with your money from the dev company, you will be able to do something else.

You buy VIP tickets/token, sell them in-game and get in exchange in-game gold, mats or gear. Even if it is in-game gold, you can use the said in-game gold to buy mats or gear.

In a kinda schematic way of putting it;

1. Archeage;
   Real money --> (mats )--> gear with stats

2. Crowfall/Dual Universe/Any game with RMT + player driven economy
   Real money --> VIP token -->( in-game gold --> mats )--> gear with stats

In either case it can be summed up as;

Real money --> ([...]) --> gear with stats

Even if Fractured won't have that kind of pay2win, there are many ways to go pay2win. Including offering more KPs, that if used (DUH) will offer an advantage.

@jetah said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@phaethonas

Why the sub model isn't viable now? What changed? Sure you have the argument "in the past 5 years only one game..." but you are not explaining as to why there was a change.

actually i did have a guess and already posted it maybe you glanced over it. those that were paying for the sub, at the time, were late teens to early twenty year olds. they are now in their upper thirties and forties. There was an outcry by the public that claimed 'they didn't want to pay every month for a game' because they were use to buying NES, Genesis, Dreamcast games with a one off purchase. Asian games started to cross the oceans which brought in a new model, free to play. little did the players know they had hard p2w walls that couldn't be overcome by play time. western developers and publishers looked into those games and saw the income potential and decided to try a version of that. I'm wanting to say LoL was one of the first western/eu developed f2p games, whose success overturned the 'subscription' model.

I have addressed this before actually.

First of all, it is a mistake to compare a finished product (a console game) with a product that receives constant updates. That aside, sure, I can fall behind the idea that at some point there was an outcry by the public wanting buy2play MMOs. But this is buy2play and not f2p and I have said that buy2play is a viable model, whereas the f2p model is not. That said, yes, there was a shift towards f2p games exactly because of the Korean cancerous f2p p2w games.

Now, though, there is a different outcry. Now, players want the sub2play, or at the very least buy2play models. Now, the only reason f2p games are being made is because;

western developers and publishers looked into those games and saw the income potential

which was and is my point.

So, to sum things up;

1. There is nothing inherently wrong with the sub2play model
2. There are a number things that are inherently wrong with f2p. Specifically the fact that it can become, easily, very much p2w. This is why there is only one non-p2w f2p game (PoE) and that is debatable at the moment, because of the purchasing of bags/inventory slots.
3. There was an outcry against sub2play games and in favor of buy2play, and this turned in the end, in favor of the f2p games.
4. Now, though, there is an outcry in favor of the buy2play and sub2play models, and against the f2p model, which is being abandoned. At the very least at "the West".

As such, the sub2play can work. People didn't want it before, now they see its merits.

As for Warframe, I may be wrong but I am reading that there is some sort of co-op pvp, but whatever. I may be wrong, it doesn't matter. If Warframe does not have pvp, then there is no reason to discuss about it. I don't care about pure pve games, that inherently are different than mixed games (see Fractured) or pure pvp games. Any comparison will be wrong.

@benseine said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@phaethonas all nonsence!

I didn't mentioned 1vs1. I made a simpke example that could just as well be about multiple ppl or crafters.

And the game is about exploring to discover/learn stuff to place in those learning slots. So if I got VIP but I spent all my time ingame just killing other players I gain 0 knowledge.

VIP doesn't make you explore and discover faster either. Only if someone with VIP discovers multiple things he'll learn them faster because he can slot more of them in the learning slots at once.

If two ppl have 0 filled learning slots, one has VIP and the other doesn't have VIP, and they discover something at the same time, get the tombe and place it in a learning slot, they get the new ability at the same time.

So it is play to win!

And VIP has nothing to do with finding exploits in games. Plz...

OMG that gave me brain cancer!

When you want to see if a game is pay2win, you don't compare apples to oranges. You compare similar situations.

With your way of thinking Archeage is not pay2win, because I can buy a sword from the cash shop, you will not, we will 1 vs 1 and I will be offline, and you will kill me!

Oh look, Archeage is play2win, not pay2win, after all. In order to make use of the advantage gained you have to play the pay2win game! WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT THAT!!

Sarcasm aside, yes all pay2win games need to be played in order to utilize the pay2win advantage......DUH!

This is why, you compare similar situations. I am repeating myself, why am I repeating myself? Am I talking to idiots?!!

You always compare players/guilds with more or less equal skill, time played. etc etc. Is there a way for one of them to open their wallet and win (or gain an advantage)? The game is pay2win. Is there not such a way? The game is not pay2win and the winner will be determined by the minute differences between the two players/guilds

@benseine said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@phaethonas said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@tylere said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

It's reasonable. The game needs some way to make money and while the VIP would give paying players an advantage, it dos not seem to be pay to win like many other games.

lol

pay2advantage = pay2win.

In Fractured a new player could beat a veteran player because there are no power gaps in Fractured, usually caused by higher gear or higher lvl.

So pay2advantage, in this particular case a timesaver, isn't pay2win in Fractured. Sure a VIP member gets more options ingame quicker then a non VIP member. Good for him, but that doesn't make him a winner. How much time he spent in this game and his personal gaming skills make him a winner.

1. How many times must be addressed that "pay2win" does not require a 1vs1? There are more "win" conditions than winning a 1vs1. There are guild/alliances wars that can be won. If you are a crafter, being able to craft earlier and in greater quantities "Endgame_Gear" is a "win condition" and so on. This is exactly why, all these nonsense, "pay2advantage", "pay2rush" etc are just ways fan-bois are trying in order to cover a very simple fact; their favorite game is p2w.
2. All that, are said in general. Let's add something specific shall we?
   At Fractured you will gain "increased Knowledge Point gains" with the VIP. Now, how will this work? Normally, upon learning something (e.g. you kill a boar and now you know that boars exist) will grant you a knowledge point (or more). Let's keep things simple and say that 1 animal will give you 1 KP. I am not a VIP member, which means that every 10 animals I will get 1x10=10 KPs. You are a VIP member and as such you will have "increased Knowledge Point gains." Let's assume that this means a 10% increase. This would mean that you would get 1.1 KPs per animal, so you would get 1.1x10=11 KPs, for the exact same pack of animals like me, that took you exactly the same time etc etc.
   Now, where can you use your KPs? According to the spotlight about the knowledge system, you can use KPs in two ways. You can either exchange them for Talent points (with the talent tree caping at 50) or use them for learning abilities. Let's exclude the talent tree because it caps, let's just focus at the abilities.
   In order to learn an ability you first need to unlock it (a process unrelated with the KPs) and then you have to actually learn it. Then you can use the KPs (and magical/fighting tomes) in order to learn the ability. Assuming that each ability requires 1 KP, then you will be able to learn 11 abilities instead of 10 that I can learn! As such, you will have more abilities than me.
   You may say that you won't be able to have active more than 8 abilities at the time, which would be correct, but wouldn't matter. That is because abilities will have levels (level one "Slash", level two "Slash", etc), in which case you will be able to have level 11 "Slash", when I will have level 10 "Slash"!
   Granted this is an example, and as such things may not work exactly like that, but you see where this is going, don't you? Even if the devs don't want the VIP system to be used in such a way (which I sincerely doubt at this point), players will find ways to exploit the system and make it pay2win, quite easily.

tl;dr The fact that KPs are linked with abilities will make the VIP very much p2w, even with the most narrow definition of p2w.

@tylere said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

It's reasonable. The game needs some way to make money and while the VIP would give paying players an advantage, it dos not seem to be pay to win like many other games.

lol

pay2advantage = pay2win.

@tulukaruk said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@phaethonas said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

Why the sub model isn't viable now? What changed? Sure you have the argument "in the past 5 years only one game..." but you are not explaining as to why there was a change.

People seen that they can get good games without sub. That's what changed.

Actually that is a logical fallacy.

How can the players have seen that they can get "good games without a sub" if there were no games without a sub (whatsoever) to begin with?

It is one thing to ask;

"Why do people support the f2p model"

In which case your answer would make sense and it is quite another to ask

"What changed? What made the first developers pursue non sub2play models?"

In which case, you answer makes no sense, unless time travel is involved, for the question asked.

Additionally, my answer, that the developers/publishers want/ed to milk their customers, still stands

That said, you saying that "people have seen that they can get good games without a sub" is ironic and hilarious. People are rejecting the f2p model, as seen by numerous polls, posts, threads, comments, articles and so on. Also, as seen by the fact that almost all new games in development will have either a sub2play model or buy2play model, with most of them being pure sub2play.

1. Camelot Unchained; Sub2play through and through
2. Dual Universe; mandatory sub, with the inclusion of a sub token, which in context of the player driven economy the game has, it will be a p2w mechanic.
3. Pantheon; Sub2play through and through
4. Ashes of Creation; Sub2play with a cosmetic cash shop
5. Sage of Lucimia; Sub2play through and through (?)

additionally

1. New World; I doubt Amazon will go f2p, what do you think?
2. Star Citizen; pure buy2play model? (similar to what I am suggesting for Fractured?)

I will give you a similar challenge. Name two (2) f2p games that are good (played by lots of players, cult status, good reviews etc etc) and are not pay2win. You can't. There is only one at best! Path of Exiles.

Warframe

Hilarious!

I just went to the Warframe forums and I am seeing the same shit I am seeing when everyone else wants to defend pay2win games.

1. "There is no win"
2. "It is pay2[x]" (e.g. pay2rush -lol-)

So yeah, I haven't played Warframe, but judging from the rhetoric of the Warframe players, I'd say with almost certainty that the game is pay2win.

Additionally the "name one/two/three" games from the past "0/5/10/15" years is basically arbitrary and unimportant. What matters is that the f2p model has failed to deliver games like the ones played in the past and still being adored. Don't stick at semantics.

Lastly, I doubt that either of these two games (PoE and Warframe) will make it close at being as popular as the top 10 currently played games, let alone games of the golden age of the MMOs.

So, "good games without sub"? lol fucking lol

@kralith said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

Thats true, it can work very well with a generel sub.

But @Phaethonas it is not true, that PoE has no player driven economy.
There is all about the player buying and selling: http://poe.trade/

I am not very familiar with PoE, so....

A "player driven economy" at an MMO means that most items (if not all), and certainly the most powerful items, are crafted by players. It does not mean "trading between players". Almost every game has "trading between players".

So, does PoE have a player driven economy? Does the best gear come from crafters or from NPCs?

Cause if PoE does have a player driven economy, the "stash tabs" are bordeline p2w. If PoE does not have player driven economy (as I think that it doesn't), then those cash shop items are just Quality of Life items, that do not affect gameplay.

@jetah said in VIP system : What do you think ?:

@phaethonas

the sub model was viable 15 years ago. now it isn't. if a sub game survived then it'll continue but WoW is now setup as a hybrid with a way to play the game to get a sub which helps their number. imagine if that didn't exist.

I say sub model isn't viable now because 1 game in the past 5 years has debuted and maintained it. there were at least 10 that failed.

You are saying the same thing over and over again, ignoring any and all related arguments I made.

Why the sub model isn't viable now? What changed? Sure you have the argument "in the past 5 years only one game..." but you are not explaining as to why there was a change.

All the while, you completely ignore what I have explained, in detail. The change did not happen because the sub model was failing. The change happened because dev companies and publishers wanted to monetize more their product(s) and you can't do that at a sub game.

At a sub game everyone is equal. You pay the sub? For as long as you pay, you can play as much as you want and you have access to 100% of the game.

At any other business model, there is some sort of inequality. Even if that is a purely cosmetic cash shop. A purely cosmetic cash shop is based on the idea that as long as you play without buying cosmetic items, you won't look cool. And that holds true to games that have a sub + cosmetic cash shop (e.g. Ashes of Creation). At AoC (if it ever launches, which I find extremely doubtful), if you want to "look cool", you will have to buy products from the cash shop.

Sure, we ignore this segregation, cause some of us don't want to "look cool" and it doesn't affect gameplay, and as such it is not p2w.

And now come the f2p games that are segregating in more ways, including ways that affect gameplay (aka p2w games).

So, you just keep repeating the same thing;

Name two games with a sub model in the past 5 years

I will give you a similar challenge. Name two (2) f2p games that are good (played by lots of players, cult status, good reviews etc etc) and are not pay2win. You can't. There is only one at best! Path of Exiles.

And unlike you, I am not limiting you in any way (see "past 5 years, or 10"). Cause you know damn well, that before the surge of f2p games, sub2play games were good and they are still fondly remembered, which explains their resurgence (Dual Universe, Ashes of Creation, Camelot Unchained, Pantheon, Saga of Lucimia). And sub2play did not kill those (old) games. Those games just had their time and instead of being replaced by newer sub2play games, they were replaced by f2p crap. And speaking of "their time", they were being played for far far far far more time/years than current f2p crap-games.

And yes, games like SWTOR jumped into the f2p crap-wagon, partly because they were crap and needed the f2p model in order to stay afloat, or because their devs/publishers wanted to milk their customers or both.

Now repeat for Nth time that "there is only one game with sub in the past 5 years", as if this means anything else than;

"In the past 5-10 years, devs and publishers have created f2p and hybrid models in order to heavily monetize their games and milk their customers."

And to stay on topic, I never suggested Fractured to be sub2play, something which brings a question. Why so much hate for sub2play games, from you? OK, we got it, you don't like them. Don't play them! You will have almost nothing new to play in the upcoming years, but, OK that is your right.

In context, and on topic, why so much hate? I would have understood such opposition if I was suggesting Fractured to have the sub2play model, but not now. I am suggesting for Fractured to have the pure buy2play model.

1. Initial box price = 30-60 dollars
2. Expansions (biyearly) = 30 dollars
3. Optional and purely cosmetic cash shop. And yes, this "purely" excludes most (if not all) quality of life items, such as NPC carpenters and these nonsense. The only acceptable QoL items are things like additional character slots, server transfers and customizing things like your guild symbol or something. Name changing should not be included, cause it will be possible to be abused. Additional bags, inventory slots and the like, should also not be included. The game will have a player driven economy, and those items will affect that part of the gameplay.

Nothing more, nothing less.

Anything more will segregate players in ways that will create gameplay inequalities, aka p2w.