38 replies to this topic

[101011]

jozkhan, on 25 August 2013 - 10:51 AM, said:

Thanks for the replies! Interesting stuff so far...

So what about the traditional F2Pers that exist in something like as someone mentioned Star Trek Online... we haven't heard from them yet... basically people who have played exclusively F2P since Open Beta started last year and are happily going along with just the 4 mechbays and have enjoyed the 'free' experience.

Do they really exist in MWO like they do in Star Trek Online say?

I think perhaps this is the point. While 'on paper' and 'in theory' MWO is free to play nobody who has been laying throughout open beta is a 'free to play player', everyone has paid something for something, or something for a lot of things.

Unlike Neverwinter and STO and the more orthodox free to play models, it doesnt turn out that way in the long run with MWO

Umm....okay, since I wasn't clear enough, I've been playing since Closed Beta completely free.

Grayzzur, on 25 August 2013 - 11:04 AM, said:

That is one area a new player should be aware of.. you get I think 4 bays for Mechs. Additional Mech Bays cost 300 MC each. It does require money to have a large stable of Mechs at your disposal, but not too much.. about $1.25-1.75 USD per Mech Bay right now, depending on how much MC you buy in a chunk. If you want to play completely free, you will have to sell Mechs to make room for new Mechs. Any time you sell anything back, it's at a loss in C-bills.

First, not a new player. Second, I have several reasons for not purchasing 'mech bays. The first is this: I have absolutely no disposable income. Kinda stops me from getting anything. I also will not fund this game when I quite honestly don't play very often, only a few hours a week, if I'm not playing anything else. Third, I'm not a huge fan of how the devs are treating their paying customers, so why should I pay if that's how I get treated? Fourth, even if I did have disposable income, I have no means of purchasing anything due to a lack of a credit card. So...yeah. (They should've put in a gift shop...can't belive this is going into release)

Edited by 101011, 25 August 2013 - 11:13 AM.

[jozkhan]

Sorry 101011 I scrolled back to your other post and it doesnt seem to say.

So how has that worked out for you? You have just the 4 mechbays? You mention the awful selling price of mechs, yes that does seem very harsh and also people must remember to take the weapons and kit off them (XL engines) before selling them too.

[Straylight]

jozkhan, on 25 August 2013 - 10:51 AM, said:

Thanks for the replies! Interesting stuff so far...

So what about the traditional F2Pers that exist in something like as someone mentioned Star Trek Online... we haven't heard from them yet... basically people who have played exclusively F2P since Open Beta started last year and are happily going along with just the 4 mechbays and have enjoyed the 'free' experience.

Do they really exist in MWO like they do in Star Trek Online say?

I'm one of those, actually. I've been here since early in the Closed Beta and haven't spent anything yet (not for lack of desire, mind; I'd love to support the game, but I have more important things to spend money on). Heck, I haven't even used the couple days of Premium time I've banked from promotions and whatnot yet.

No Heroes, no Champions, 4 Mechbays, and about 1,500 drops since they started tracking stats (probably around 2,500 total).

I'm having fun. I don't feel disadvantaged on the field (I actually find that my 'mech choices and newbie-green paintjob makes people underestimate me). When I get curbstomped, it's either because I did something dumb or because my team hung me out to dry, not because I got jumped by a player with cash to burn. At the same time, I've singlehandedly won matches with 1,000 damage dealt, 8 kills and no teammates left alive, and I've done that in cheap Lights.

I've ground through seven or eight 'mechs Mastered since the last reset at the end of CB, cycling stuff through my bays as necessary.

I did the same thing in STO for a long time, too. Eventually I bought a Defiant Retrofit, but because being able to wax somebody with Dual Cannons and Quantums straight out of cloak is fun, not because it was a competitive advantage (in fact, I routinely get pasted by people flying T5 free ships. Vo'quvs and their #$&%@ enormous crews are the bane of my existence.)

[Not A Real RAbbi]

I get that time is money, and in that lies an argument that the game is not free.

On the other hand, EVERY video game has some manner of learning curve. It takes a while to figure things out. It takes time to learn the maps, whether you paid hard currency or not. It takes a while to get used to weapon ranges and cooldown/reload times, whether you paid hard currency or not. It takes time to learn to recognize other mechs on the battlefield and associate their general capabilities, whether you paid hard currency or not.

So even a player that buys in with hundreds of Dollars is going to be at a disadvantage. He or she is just getting thrashed in much more expensive equipment while on the steep portion of the learning curve.

Free to play.

[101011]

Well, my first 'mech purchase was the DRG-5N. I hated it, but wanted to see whether I could possibly find a build I enjoyed, and therefore spent most of my cash on weapons/engines (this was before the cadet bonus). Never liked it, sold it for less than a million c-bills and ground trial 'mechs to purchase the HBK-4SP (finally read the forums), which I enjoyed, and mastered the HBK's with the 4SP, 4P, and 4J. Apart from detesting the 4J, it all went okay: took me maybe a week of playing to get the 'mech's basic skills, and another week to get the next 'mech. Then I sold my HBK's (my second mistake after the 5N, I should've kept the 4SP) ground a few hundred thousand c-bills in trial 'mechs, and purchased the JR7-D. I enjoyed it, spent quite a bit of cash kitting it out (DHS, endo, a nice XL engine), and moved on to the JR7-K, and did the same. Then I took a hiatus, came back, and decided that I wanted to play the Blackjack, and again, sold all my Jenners (stupid, stupid, stupid move) and ground out trial 'mechs some more to get the BJ-1DC, only to realize that I really don't enjoy that 'mech, what with the average maneuverability and poor armor. and have now had that 'mech in my bays for the past 2 months. Every so often I'll play a few matches, but I don't really have all that much fun and don't play more than two-three hours at a time. TL;DR: being a free player really punishes poor 'mech choice.

[Johnny Marek Summers]

Honestly I think it is free to play, up to a certain point. The player in question has to ask themselves, 'What do I want from this game?' If the answer is 'dozens of completely optimized mechs', then no it's not. However, Free To Play isn't whether you can get everything you want for free, it's whether you can play and enjoy the content without paying at all.

It is possible to be able to play completely for free if you are willing to have two mechs mastered out maximum with maybe two mech bays open to try out other mechs. The new player will have to do his/her due diligence and study up on the mechs to really find their preferred playstyle. And if you really want to play completely free you can always go with the Trial mechs to earn c-bills (at least until those are taken away).

You also can play for free by making endless accounts so you never have to pay to get your favorite mechs mastered. Well unless you favorite mech happens to be a Hero Mech...

The thing is if you want a mech you can get one without paying extra, if you want to upgrade that mech you can without paying in real money. Want to master it? well you have to get two other types of the same chassis, and you can do that without paying in real money. Want modules, well you can do that too without paying in any real money. It will take time, you can't get powerlevelled in this game. Everything you have, you have to EARN if you want to play for free.

Also, if you take into consideration things like Mechwarrior (the tabletop RPG) you usually only got one mech if you were a mechwarrior, then being given 4 mech bays when you only need 3 in order to level up a mech, isn't so bad.

[jozkhan]

ah yes of course I suppose the new account gig can give you 4 new mechbays and a new cadet bonus to play with. Do you think that strategy is used quite often?

[Straylight]

jozkhan, on 25 August 2013 - 11:33 AM, said:

ah yes of course I suppose the new account gig can give you 4 new mechbays and a new cadet bonus to play with. Do you think that strategy is used quite often?

I don't think we have a way to reliably well. It'd be interesting to see data on this, but that's difficult to track even from PGI's side of things.

My gut reaction, though, is "probably not". If you have money to spend on the game, there's no point, and if you don't, you probably don't have enough play time to bother juggling two accounts.

[Werewolf486 ScorpS]

Redshift2k5, on 25 August 2013 - 10:17 AM, said:

A paying player with dozens of mechs is at no greater advantage than a free player with three skilled up mechs. They both can only bring one mech to the battlefield, and even a 100% free player can master a chassis and kit it with modules. There is no disadvantage in gameplay.

There may be a disadvantage in TIME required to reach an equitable level, but time = money, you can choose which you would prefer to spend

I have an example of this. A friend comes over to play every once in a while, he's without a job due to taking care of his broken brother and helping with the kids at the moment. So he spends nothing on MWO. He managed to get through cadet in one weekend and buy his first mech (CTF-1X) and arm it. Now the second weekend he was over was right after the cbill/XP nerf (gee thanks Russ!) and he's only managed to get 3 mill in that time. It will take him about 3 to make enough to buy and arm the CTF-3D he will be getting and another 3-4 weekends over to get the CTF-2X. So about 10 weekends to get 3 mechs of Heavy class and start unlocking Elite level stuff on those mechs. Once he gets those done he will have 3 Heavys that are just as good as mine or yours.

I do think Mechbays should have a Cbill price for purchase as the Devs are limiting what you can get without spending MC. A mechbay for 10-20 Million Cbills is completely over priced, but understandable. Though it makes you cringe to think your 5 million Cbill Mech actually costs you 15-25 mill. Maybe They should just make mechbays unlimited instead.

[Tezcatli]

I hadn't spent a dime since beta, until two weeks ago. You really don't need anything they sell you. But premium and hero mech are nice to take a bit of the edge off from grinding.

At least they were before they cut our C-bill gains because I guess those people who do like 800 damage a match were earning to much and stacking up hoards of C-bills. Now it's more like if you get a hero mech, you make what you did before, and premium gets you above that a bit.

[Johnny Marek Summers]

Well I mentioned it because it is there. I'm not saying players should do this, but there are some people who either can't or won't pay for a game that is called 'Free to Play.'

Also, while time is money, you guys are playing a game. Games are used to entertain. You are spending that time in order to amuse yourself. As long as you are having fun blowing up big stompy robots, it should be time well spent.

As for making mistakes, well you didn't have to pay real money to make them. Back when you had to pay $60 to get the game then pay $15 each month to just be able to play, the mistakes which are just costing time now, would be hideously insanely expensive as it would cost time and real money to fix.

[Accursed Richards]

Tezcatli, on 25 August 2013 - 11:51 AM, said:

I hadn't spent a dime since beta, until two weeks ago. You really don't need anything they sell you. But premium and hero mech are nice to take a bit of the edge off from grinding.

At least they were before they cut our C-bill gains because I guess those people who do like 800 damage a match were earning to much and stacking up hoards of C-bills. Now it's more like if you get a hero mech, you make what you did before, and premium gets you above that a bit.

And of course, the people who already had millions stockpiled and every mech they wanted won't be affected in the slightest by the cut.

[Angel of Annihilation]

Short answer: YES

Long Answer: YES, but only in a limted fashion and only because eventually you really need to spend some real money on mech bays if you want to really advance through the various mechs available to you.

[Kmieciu]

MWO is free to play as long as the c-bill variants are more viable than the hero mechs.

[Wintersdark]

101011, on 25 August 2013 - 10:41 AM, said:

You left out the part where the free player gets shafted by having to sell his 'mechs for absurdly low prices after grinding out one chassis. "You want to sell your incredibly rare and valuable 'mech that is fully kitted out in the best equipment? Here, I'll give you enough cash to buy a Gauss Rifle!"

Well, that's the whole point. You can be completely competitive, on even footing. But if you want more, you have to pay.

That's not "shafting", it's entirely reasonable. This is a business, it needs to make money. The "Character Slots" concept is exactly how pretty much every F2P game gets players to spend their first dollars.

You can not, and should not, expect to get everything for free. THAT is just unreasonable.

[Ax2Grind]

A simple answer, MWO is absolutely a FTP game.

Being upset about the grind is fine, but it doesn't change the FTP status at all. The grind isn't even that bad compared to some other games, though I agree about not liking it or wanting it. Who really wants a grind? Base line is, there is no Gold Ammo...all that money does in this game is ease up the grind, and provide for a larger variety of play. A 100% free account can have 4 mech's of any type without paying a dime and have them fully mastered with modules. Oh you can complain because you want more variety, but you can...sell those mech's and get four new ones. There is nothing stopping you. To fully enjoy this game you don't have to pay a dime, period.

[Kushko]

I do not agree with OPs main point and think that MWO is F2P in every meaningful way.

BUT...he is right about the grind. At the moment it feels very off. Just recently i decided to surprise a friend by farming a K2 catapult on his account while he was on vecation and let me tell you it was very painful. And that was only 1 mech and he has a sarahs mech whos xl300 engine i used to complete the fit. So all in all it felt like a horrible grind for me just to get the 7mil for the mech+dhs (oh btw i also had premium running on that account) but if i had to grind for an xl300 engine on top and then god forbid 2 more catapult mechs i would seriously consider just not bothering and going to a different game (if i put myself in the shoes of someone who is not a huge battletech fan like i am).

I have spent over $150 on this game on my own account, i have several mastered mechs, a phoenix overlord pack on the way and i consider myself a decently skilled player (often getting top score, 10+ kills/assists and 800-1000damage) but i still feel like my own grind is far too slow.

And to those of you who are advocates of working hard and grinding for 100+h to master 1 mech i say this; i work hard in my real life and i play games to have fun. I dont expect everything/anything handed to me on a silver platter but i do expect getting new mechs at a decent rate, especially since getting new mechs is pretty much the only content mwo currently has.

Edited by Kushko, 25 August 2013 - 09:48 PM.

[Pezzer]

It's not FTP because you can't earn extra hanger slots. Once they make those available for 20 mil or whatever stupid price they make it, it will be free to play.

Also, since when does grinding=not free to play? This is a joke thread I'm assuming? Because I would take you seriously if there was any way to skip the grind. P.S. GXP doesnt count because time earning exp towards proficiency=time earning creds for next chassis=GXP would be a waste to use, seeing as how by the time you max BASIC out one can afford thier next mech. Maybe. Even in a Medium I'm having trouble earning towards my next Mech after unlocking BASIC, w/o more than 2 2x XP dailies per mech.

I mean, you can buy everything else with CBills, from consumables to paint. Why not add garages, even if it is for an exorbitant price (being realistic I would pay 2-4mil for a garage, and odds are be too lazy to work for it and use MC anyways at that price)? I don't get it, unless they are trying to directly copy World of Tanks at every turn.

[Roughneck45]

Yes, it really is free to play, with a grain of salt, like every other F2P title ever.

Edited by Roughneck45, 26 August 2013 - 01:18 PM.