24 replies to this topic

[Fireeagle]

Well i allready did give this idea to the german part of the forum but i want to share with everyone:

We all know the problems with having not enough players (in my opinion there are many reasons for it- starting with missing PR work...worse game modes, patches that do not slove general problems). Those problems lead us to a verry limited number of players.

My suggestion would be:

• comercials, pcgame magazines etc...

Make a starterpack which contains:

• 4 Clanmechs in 3 Variants (the tonnage should be exactly one dropdeck for cw)
  
• 4 ISmechs in 3 Variants (the tonnage should be exactly one dropdeck for cw)
  
• Clanspaintcheme for all mechs you own(special Variants without the reflecting maybe?)
  
• IS House paintchemes for all mechs you own
  
• 16 mechbays
  
• 15 days premium time

And now the MOST important point:


MAKE IT CHEAP NOT MORE THAN 25 €!!!!!


Why this?

• EVERY player will buy it for sure- you get a good amount of mechs (as if you would buy a single player game) and it would make starting the game for some ppl verry easier!
  
• The balance of what you get for your money is much better than any pack you allready have.
  
• 25€ are more than nothing from ppl who might not even have spent any money in mwo because everyone can find a way to afford this ammount of money.

[Amer]

They will make it (though not as heavy on the content side as you suggest) for Steam launch - it's a huge opportunity.

Edited by Amer, 03 June 2015 - 08:04 AM.

[Fireeagle]

Well the idea behind it is simply: get new Players an affordable drop deck for cw- is and Clans i know it sounds verry cheap and verry mighty BUT: it will pay out in some days- having at least sold starterpacks instead of nothing.

[Thunder Child]

So basically, the Current Resistance or Clan Wave Packs, but a fraction of the Price? Personally, I think this is a bad idea.

I do like the idea of a Clan or Inner Sphere CW Starter Pack though. But, for the price you have suggested, it should be one faction or the other, should give only four normal mech chassis with three variants for each (no Premium Mechs of any type), provide three generic paint colors (probably from already available colors), NOT provide a free Camo (or if it does, an existing generic camo, not one of the special ones), and provide 15 million C-bills, rather than Free Premium. And each pack can only be purchased once.

I know it may seem harsh, but the game does need to make money. There are no subscriptions, and no real compulsory buys to play the game, so packs are really the main money maker for them. By putting out a dirt cheap pack, they are killing their main source of income.

But I do agree that a Cheap Community Warfare Starter Pack is a great idea. But if it's to be cheap, then it won't have any of the special features of a real pack.

Edit: Would be good if they got Community Feedback on the CW mechs too (though Clans would be rather limited, due to lack of strong chassis)

Edited by Thunder Child, 03 June 2015 - 07:29 PM.

[Fireeagle]

well thunder child which Option is better:

selling one is and one clan pack or 4 my suggested ones?

It s about the mass: Do you know dropzone commander - the tabletop game?
It is a relative new one but: they got some Attention by making a cheap 2 Player starter pack with a lot of Content.

http://cdn.shopify.c...Fv%3D1376350094


trust me i never ever had a tabletopstarterpack wich was as good as this one - and i Play warhammer, warhammer 40k, Battletech and some less known Systems.

Easier said:

If you want to have masses of billing customers - use the right bait for fishing in the masses!

Old chinese man said:

You want to earn Money so first spent some Money!

Edited by Fireeagle, 04 June 2015 - 04:30 AM.

[xWiredx]

I'm leaning a lot more on the side of one or the other with no real bells or whistles here. I think the cadet bonus is a nice start, and a starter deck would be a good additional boost to help players get in the game quickly.

Here's a problem OP isn't considering: one reason new people tend to quit is because they jump into CW right off the bat, get stomped repeatedly, and become frustrated/demotivated.

Also, 480 tons worth of mechs plus goodies simply costs more than that currently (and by a decent amount). If there's anything I've learned here since closed beta, it's that burning players that have been dedicated to the game for a while means the risk of losing pieces of that dedicated player base. Nobody wants to bring in 5 new people, of which statistically 1 will stay, and lose 1 dedicated player in the process. These things need to be carefully thought out so they can both keep the dedicated veteran player base happy AND add new players.

[Mondeza]

But don't they have semi starter pack's already. I know I bought the Hunchback pack when I started. Yes it is not a CW pack but CW is after you have had some experience in game.

Get the Pack of mechs you want to play and then use the Cadet Bonus to select a few other mechs. Probably cheaper this way.

Although I admit I did not know about the Mech packs in the Store until someone in my Unit recommended them. So maybe they should be re-branded.

Or create a pack with one Light, Medium, Heavy and Assault in it. Although I still believe new players should not be in Assaults and should be in Mediums or lights.

[Fireeagle]

would you start playing a mw game if you are not permitted to use the mech you would love to Play @ assaults...

[Thunder Child]

I get where you're coming from Fireeagle. Really, I do. As someone who is dropping Warhammer because it is too expensive, and looking at either Warmachine or Firestorm Armada, I totally get it. But the point I was trying to make is that when you buy a (very cheap) starter pack, it is literally JUST a starter pack. You get the bare bones minimum to play the game. Sure, you can buy twelve of them, but it's still only 12 lots of the most basic units. You wouldn't get an Emperor Class Battleship, or a Blackstone Fortress in a starter pack, for example. Or limited edition dice.

So yes, I agree that cheap Starter packs would be a great idea. But they should only provide the basics for the game. And they should not be a cheap way to farm Mechbays (because I know if they offered a deal like this, I'd buy 10 of them, and sell all the mechs just for the bays). And locking the mechs to the bays is a **** move. So, limit them to one starter purchase per account.

Another idea that I did like was having one Light, Medium, Heavy, and Assault, but have one of each class for both Inner Sphere and Clan. So a total of Eight Mechs, and their bays, plus a C-Bill cashout, for that price.

Edited by Thunder Child, 04 June 2015 - 01:44 PM.

[Aethelred Kell]

I think this is a good idea, but it needs to be a true starter pack. Offer it available for say 1 week after you finish your first 25 "Starter" matches. It gives people new to the game a true chance to get something good to start off with and make it a 1 and done purchase. It's available that 1 time and you can only buy it one time. It eliminates abuse, but gives the leg up to the new players who are the MOST in need of one and want to pay for it.

[Fireeagle]

well the Basic idea behind this is more like:
all MW games (the solo ones) gave you a Hand full of mechs- Problem with mwo: the 3 times Maximum skilling for the mechchassis (really worse idea!).

I know ist a lot of mechs and bays but:

People who will see MWO at steam will first think about the MW Sologames and instead of giving them a full game experience ( and we all know what happens to new Players in cw- thats simply a fact we have to face IF MWO goes on steam there will be a lot of new Players also in CW and they will be verry pissed (excuse but thats what they might write in the reviews))

And beside i would bet: at least half the mwo Players who are atm active will buy this package too! Money that lies at your feed an you only have to bend over to take it.

Of course they could make new mechmodels for the packages to make them only buyable by real Money.

What would they loose ?
What will be the gain for the game?

Edited by Fireeagle, 04 June 2015 - 04:11 PM.

[Narcissistic Martyr]

I have some friends who I finally convinced to start playing and let's just say of 4, 2 of them were rather pissed that my answer to "when can I own and customize a King Crab/ Dire Wolf" was 50-100 matches. I didn't tell that I was counting their cadet bonuses and that they'd average 100k per game which let's be honest a new player won't since you mostly get paid for damage/kills/assists. Or that since you really need to elite the chassis for it to actually be good we're talking 200+ matches for an assault mech.


People not being able to really start playing the class of mech they want or the faction they want is really discouraging. Yeah the trial mechs are a good start, but they want to feel like they own the mechs, not that they're borrowing them for a while.

Anyways, I'd be down with an inexpensive starter pack that gives a meta preconfigured CW drop of IS or Clan mechs for a reasonable price as long as the mechs can't be sold and it contains a light, medium, heavy, and assault mech. 4 Mechs for $10 wouldn't be terrible and the barrier to entry would be low. Maybe allow them to upgrade to 3 of each for $5 more per chassis. Once you get people spending money, they'll spend more.

[Thunder Child]

Narcissistic Martyr, on 04 June 2015 - 05:38 PM, said:

I have some friends who I finally convinced to start playing and let's just say of 4, 2 of them were rather pissed that my answer to "when can I own and customize a King Crab/ Dire Wolf" was 50-100 matches. I didn't tell that I was counting their cadet bonuses and that they'd average 100k per game which let's be honest a new player won't since you mostly get paid for damage/kills/assists. Or that since you really need to elite the chassis for it to actually be good we're talking 200+ matches for an assault mech.


People not being able to really start playing the class of mech they want or the faction they want is really discouraging. Yeah the trial mechs are a good start, but they want to feel like they own the mechs, not that they're borrowing them for a while.

Anyways, I'd be down with an inexpensive starter pack that gives a meta preconfigured CW drop of IS or Clan mechs for a reasonable price as long as the mechs can't be sold and it contains a light, medium, heavy, and assault mech. 4 Mechs for $10 wouldn't be terrible and the barrier to entry would be low. Maybe allow them to upgrade to 3 of each for $5 more per chassis. Once you get people spending money, they'll spend more.

I totally agree with this. The problem with the package suggested by the OP, is that it is $241.95 worth of stuff. Even if you cut out all the Warhorns, Paints, etc, and just provide basic mechs, it still comes to about the same price (using the gift store as reference. Individual prices might be cheaper with MC purchased mechs in game). And I'm okay with that. Because this game is a F2P game, and has to make money somehow. Otherwise they can't keep feeding the Hamsters to keep the server running.

The starter pack should literally just be a "here's four mechs, one of each weight class to make a 240 ton dropdeck. Here's 15 million C-bills to outfit them. Go to it". For the Clan Pack, it'd be Four Mechs for a 240 ton Dropdeck, but maybe 5 million C-bills instead, since Clan Mechs mostly come pre-optimized (No Endo, DHS, or XL Upgrades to buy).

Don't get me wrong, a Starter Pack is a great idea. But it should not destroy MWO's Income.

What they DO need to do is improve the economy slightly, so that non-premium players don't spend forever trying to farm things up. (That said, Premium Time and a Hero mech do wonders for C-bills..... just saying....)

[Chuanhao]

CW-Ready Starterpacks: Letting Pugs loose in Hard Core Mode

I can appreciate the spirit of OPs suggestion, but tend towards the “package” that Martyr and Thunder have put forward.

However, I agree with others that CW is not where you want a rookie to start with. It was designed to be hard core, without ELO, without 3^rd person view etc. And as such, in its current state would be a great turn off to the rookie.

So in spirit, enabling a user to obtain one variant of a mech in each weight class sounds right to me, but to do this for CW may not be ideal.

Instead:

Pug-Ready “Starterpacks”: Greater Viability in Puglandia

I agree that rookies need to quickly have the means to customize their mechs as that is very much part of the joy of the game. Trial mechs do not enable this.

We know that Heavies are the most “viable” platform for the game in terms of easiest to learn as it blends sufficient speed with armour.

Option 1: The cadet bonus should be increased to allow a new player to obtain three variants of a heavy IS chassis with enough leftover to outfit at least one of them with XL, Endo/FF, Artemis.

Option 2: select a chassis as a loss leader. I.e. It is essentially a giveaway. Complete the 25 rookie missions and be presented with your own “Rookie” pack of three variants of a Heavy IS mech.

The current “mastery” packs which includes a Hero and a Champion is not suited as it “eats” into income generators.

And why IS, cause you get to play with engines and such.

[Fireeagle]

Well see it from this side:

who of you won´t buy it because it i cheap?

Even if the mechs would locked for sale.

And whats better :

Selling a lot of the suggested package or nothing?

[Hotthedd]

Starter packs are a great idea, but devaluing your own product to chase a customer base that is known to be fickle is a terrible idea. You will gain very little in the long run, but will lose your long time customers that actually had to EARN their way into having those customized dropdecks.

The anecdotal: "My friend won't play if it takes to long to have a kitted-out best 'mech in the game." is BS.

The LAST people MW:O should cater to is the "I want it all right NOW!" crowd.

[MilesTeg1982]

Fireeagle, on 03 June 2015 - 03:39 AM, said:

MAKE IT CHEAP NOT MORE THAN 25 €!!!!!

let gets this straight you want to get your mechs for about a quarter of an allready reduced price?

well - although I do consider mechs not exactly cheap - I don't think they are too expensive (apart from the Gold mechs - but since these where pure vanity toys - its ok). Also - speaking a someone who actually bought clan wave 1 and 2 (I actually did order clan wave 3 too, but canceld that due to TBR and SCR nerf) - I would consider a such drastic price reduction not fair.

ps. I always wonder how people can afford a PC for games but don't have money for games ...

pps. yes I know that might keep some kids who are in school and don't have jobs and limited money from the game - in my mind thats not a bad thing - I actually would gladly pay a montly fee for the game to get rid of all the F2P-trolls.

Edited by MilesTeg1982, 07 June 2015 - 01:58 PM.

[Burktross]

Fireeagle, on 04 June 2015 - 01:25 PM, said:

would you start playing a mw game if you are not permitted to use the mech you would love to Play @ assaults...

Yes.
Before coming to mechwarrior online I hated mediums and lights and only used the mad cat like a true scrubwarrior.
I've realized that IS mediums master race

[Night Thastus]

Are you completely f*cking insane?
28$ (25 euros) for 4 clans, 4 IS, 16 mechbays, all the clans and IS colors, AND 15 days of premium time?

Dude, that stuff if bought now would be well over 150$. Likely alot more.
Sure, every player would buy it, but then every player who bought a "starter pack" would be pissed off when they found out everything else was way more expensive.

Not cool. Bad idea.

[Fireeagle]

Thats why you make it a starterpackage so at least the game gets interestin for casual Gamers too!