49 replies to this topic

[RG Notch]

Fr33lanc3r, on 17 June 2012 - 08:13 AM, said:

Jesus f*** christ, it's not god d*** dollars for c-bills, it'll be dollars for MC currency, it's like paying 40 bucks for 50 worth of gift cards to some store....

And you know this how? Seriously, I would love a dev statement on this, or are you just assuming like the rest of us?

[Talynn DeRaa]

CCC Dober, on 17 June 2012 - 07:55 AM, said:

OP: That's all nice and dandy except for one thing: exp boosters. My hope is that they don't make it into the game, not even on the Founder Mechs and here is why: we have seen that real money can be converted or substituted for c-bills. That's strike one against the fair play concept. Now the dreaded exp boosters. They are not accessible by any other means than real money and that's strike two. Combine them and you can buy all Mechs on day one and access all upgrades long before you normally could. That's WoT reloaded for ya.

If the impact of said exp boosters can be minimized in the long run, then I wouldn't mind. Those who pay would earn their exp just like anybody else, no difference. But if it isn't then I see 'power gamers' buy in and exploit that mercilessly. It's not gonna take them too long to max out and have all Mechs and options available. Now I don't know if that gives them the edge in combat (not yet), but I have a feeling that it pays to keep a good eye on it. Maybe the devs have realized already.

I'm sure that the XP Boosters are already going to be fairly minimal in comparison to free-to-play players. IT'll be a simple convenience, if anything else. The "Premium" membership will likely have very minimal boost in xp and c-bills gained.

grimzod, on 17 June 2012 - 08:09 AM, said:

Premium tanks = founder mechs xp and cbill boost
Premium account = xp and cbill boost

Both seem to be in already

$$ for cbills = confirmed in founder packs. Reasonable to assume marketing will insist on this monetization of in game currency

Capturing casual gamers with $$ to burn is made easier with these three proven (see world of tanks) monetizations of in game play content.

As I said before, The Founder's Mechs will probably not allow us to expand in Pilot Skill at all, only allow us to net more C-Bills. That would balance the advantage of Founder's Mechs right there.

BlackMoore, on 17 June 2012 - 08:08 AM, said:

Keep in mind no matter what you buy with real money or c-bills is only part of the equation. In one of the Q&A's it was mentioned that Mechs will have their own leveling system. You go up in skills and the Mech your in goes up in it's own skills. Or more accurately your skill in that particular mech goes up. So somebody with a nice shinny new Mech will not have an advantage over someone else that has played in there older, more used Mech.

Thats exactly the advantage they want to highlight. Someone who may spent tons of money, in both C-Bills and cash shop money getting a lot of mechs and customizing the crap out of them, but someone who minimizes themselves to only a couple mechs, or even one mech, will have a major advantage over a pilot who's everywhere in all sorts of mechs.

[Calem]

Well I just hope PGI will always have the last say on cash shop items, and NOT (future) regional publishers. I could give some nasty examples of greedy publishers selling effectively lottery-type packs consisting of guaranteed item(s) and possible extras, imagine an easter egg sale of an easter mech texture with "a chance for a MadCat MKII" in it as a possible, but not guaranteed bonus on top of the texture. This has happened (in a fantasy MMO) in Europe, and the company whom I shall not name broke lottery regulation / children protection laws in the process; and - guess what? - didn't give a **** about it. The "chance" of course was set to abysmally small, so effectively they just used a carrot to milk the addicted parts of their playerbase out of RL money. Since they could. Publishers can be very uncaring if their balance sheets demand.

Reasonable people of course understand bills have to be paid and due profits have to be generated. Nothing wrong with profiting from a good product.

Just, please, PGI, make sure it's being done in an honest, straight, we'll not screw you over kind of fashion as long as you have control over your own product. Once the wrong contracts are signed, the ball might be out of your hands.



PS. In that spirit, I would appreciate if the founder's pack's bonus to c-bill generation would be quantified. How many percent bonus are we talking? Tell people what they'll pay for beforehand, it's good business culture and will prevent a lot of grumpy forum posts.


Thanks. I hope.

Edit: typo fixed

Edited by Calem, 17 June 2012 - 08:19 AM.

[Talynn DeRaa]

Calem, on 17 June 2012 - 08:17 AM, said:

Well I just hope PGI will always have the last say on cash shop items, and NOT (future) regional publishers. I could give some nasty examples of greedy publishers selling effectively lottery-type packs consisting of guaranteed item(s) and possible extras, imagine an easter egg sale of an easter mech texture with "a chance for a MadCat MKII" in it as a possible, but not guaranteed bonus on top of the texture. This has happened (in a fantasy MMO) in Europe, and the company whom I shall not name broke lottery regulation / children protection laws in the process; and - guess what? - didn't give a **** about it. The "chance" of course was set to abysmally small, so effectively they just used a carrot to milk the addicted parts of their playerbase out of RL money. Since they could. Publishers can be very uncaring if their balance sheets demand.

Reasonable people of course understand bills have to be paid and due profits have to be generated. Nothing wrong with profiting from a good product.

Just, please, PGI, make sure it's being done in an honest, straight, we'll not screw you over kind of fashion as long as you have control over your own product. Once the wrong contracts are signed, the ball might be out of your hands.



PS. In that spirit, I would appreciate if the founder's pack's bonus to c-bill generation would be quantified. How many percent bonus are we talking? Tell people what they'll pay for beforehand, it's good business culture and will prevent a lot of grumpy forum posts.


Thanks. I hope.

Edit: typo fixed

I have full, and absolute faith in PGI. They seem to have a lot of confidence in what they're doing with the game. They may make a few bad choices (Artemis is still pretty fresh in my memory, but who knows, it was just a concept. That may not be the final product), but again, I have faith, and I'm sure they'll make things work out in the end.

[grimzod]

If your expecting no pay to win aspects to crop up good luck to you.

[Fr33lanc3r]

RG Notch, on 17 June 2012 - 08:16 AM, said:

And you know this how? Seriously, I would love a dev statement on this, or are you just assuming like the rest of us?

Based on how they have repeatedly stated they are staying away from pay to win, and they have 2 currencies, it's highly unlikely (I would say with 99% probability, and would be willing to bet at least 1 paycheck on it) that it will be cash for MC since that's what's there explicitly FOR cash income.

I swear it's like any other model doesn't exist... Look at Riots system, when you spend 10 dollars in game 10 dollars of RP plus you get x bonus RP, and that bonus increases by quite a bit with each dollar amount tier that it goes up, these aren't the earned in game currency. Everything that PGI is doing with their currency model screams Riot (LoL) or Valve (TF2).

The basic premise is, if you don't want to make the game pay to win, and you want multiple currencies, neither currency can be unique, and thus why have multiple currencies.

Edited by Fr33lanc3r, 17 June 2012 - 08:27 AM.

[Cerlin]

Nikoliy, on 17 June 2012 - 07:37 AM, said:

I would like for them to actualy sell C-Bills just to keep the "gold farmers" away.

Gold farmers shouldn't matter if there is no trade between players.

[RG Notch]

Fr33lanc3r, on 17 June 2012 - 08:25 AM, said:

Based on how they have repeatedly stated they are staying away from pay to win, and they have 2 currencies, it's highly unlikely (I would say with 99% probability, and would be willing to bet at least 1 paycheck on it) that it will be cash for MC since that's what's there explicitly FOR cash income.

I swear it's like any other model doesn't exist... Look at Riots system, when you spend 10 dollars in game 10 dollars of RP plus you get x bonus RP, and that bonus increases by quite a bit with each dollar amount tier that it goes up, these are the earned in game currency. Everything that PGI is doing with their currency model screams Riot (LoL) or Valve (TF2).

The basic premise is, if you don't want to make the game pay to win, and you want multiple currencies, neither currency can be unique, and thus why have multiple currencies.

Please provide me where there is anything from a dev stating there are two forms of currency. I'm being serious I haven't seen this, I'm not doubting you I just want to see it in writing from a dev, too much on these boards, my own posts included, are mere supposition. I would happily rescind my statements if I see the devs saying this. And by THIS I mean the 2 types of currency, I don't care how much they say they say the game won't be P2W, that's what they all say.

[Stonewall]

Let's just wait and see. If the model works, great for PGI, Battletech/Mechwarrior and us fans; if it doesn't it will fail and we all move on.

[DocBach]

They've already said that C-bills are ingame currency earned by playing, and that MC is the currency you purchase with real money.

[Fr33lanc3r]

RG Notch, on 17 June 2012 - 08:29 AM, said:

Please provide me where there is anything from a dev stating there are two forms of currency. I'm being serious I haven't seen this, I'm not doubting you I just want to see it in writing from a dev, too much on these boards, my own posts included, are mere supposition. I would happily rescind my statements if I see the devs saying this. And by THIS I mean the 2 types of currency, I don't care how much they say they say the game won't be P2W, that's what they all say.

I would like to point you towards the video in the OP's post, on page one, it's the first one, probably the reason the topic was started, probably the thing that should be read/watched before replying, that little thing. It has this cool thing on the left side, called CB (C-Bills) and MC (Cash purchase money). Again, it may be removed at release, but as it stands they have 2 currency setups, and as I said, why have 2 currencies if one can buy the other, to keep from a P2W aspect, you would have to have neither have anything unique, and thus destroy the reason for 2 currencies.

[Shadowscythe]

Cerlin, on 17 June 2012 - 08:25 AM, said:

Gold farmers shouldn't matter if there is no trade between players.

Yes, please no trade system. If you want to help a friend. Give them money,..."but they live far away, and don't want to use their own credit/debit card"..... mail them a prepaid throw away debit

My main fear so far about being able to buy weapons and equipment thing would be DAY 1... When everyone with money will be buying XL engines, endo steel, double heatsinks, gauss rifles, ERPPCs Pulse lasers while everyone else day one is using AC, LRM, medium lasers (mostly)

Having higher tech.... is pay to win....not a full on I win button. but definately a big advantage. 2 players with equal skill (I know, hard to compare skill), the mech with tech 2 will probably win.

Of course this playing field will even out in the long run when the free people get enough c-bills to get all that. But we don't know how long that will take..

Unless there is some kind of level requirement in place on the tech 2 items that is, again, we don't know.

YAY Speculation!

Edited by Shadowscythe, 17 June 2012 - 11:06 AM.

[Sierra19]

Well, one thing about c-bill and XP boost for premium accounts, is that it needs to be fairly big, reasonable, but big. If premium account status gives, say, only a 10-20% boost, it's not worth it, unless it's like 5 dollars a month, and even then most people would not be willing to pay real money for such a small boost. It's not economically worth it, so the game will suffer. My guess is premium accounts will cost about $10-15 a month, and for that I'd better be getting a 40-50% boost on XP/c-bills. And there is NOTHING wrong with that model. It's pay to make your in-game life easier. If you don't want to or can't afford to pay, then don't. However don't whine about premium account users or people using the cash shop "paying to win", because it's those of us who DO pay, that keep the game going for those who can't or don't want to. We're not buying an advantage, you will still be able to get the same mechs, pilots, and equipment as paying players, it'll just take you longer. I've seen my fair share of terrible players, driving around top shelf tanks, so I'll say the same thing here: It doesn't take skill to reach end game content, just persistence. Even the absolute worst player can buy his/her assault mech, eventually, they will just have to play a lot longer than most of us to get it.

[RogueFox]

I am wondering why I would give this company any money if it doesn't benefit me at all in game. I keep seeing the same post from people stating that players who give no money shouldn't be at a disadvantage to those who pay.

If the only perks I get if I pay are a cool paint job and fuzzy dice then my money will stay with me and I will join the legions of others who take advantage of the developers and investors generosity of a free game.

If I pay and get access to some exclusive mech designs and faster access to skills and weapons then I will gladly pay a reasonable price.

Why would anyone pay if they can have the same things without paying?

[CCC Dober]

@Sierra
The 'not-buying-an-advantage' only holds true if accelerated access to better tech does not equal better performance in battle. This was the case in WoT because reaching the next best gun was more or less the difference between being able to pull your weight or not. We'll have to wait how the tech is handled in MW:O. If it's all good, then you can drown yourself in boosters for all I care. I'll be comfy to know that Joe Blow can still kick your *** if you're drunk

No face rolling for you hehe

[KageRyuu]

Step One: Make MWO

Step Two: ?????????

Step Three: PROFIT!

Edited by KageRyuu, 17 June 2012 - 01:10 PM.

[IRaigothI]

I dont think currency is going to be an issue.
They say they wont be selling power, and I trust the with that fact.
I suspect they will be going the way Riot Games did with League of Legends.

[GHQCommander]

RG Notch, on 17 June 2012 - 07:22 AM, said:

But if one can buy C-bills for real money, which the way the Founder's packs are laid out seems to be the case, then one can certainly buy the Mech and all the weapons for it with real money.

Yes I agree.

Either play for c-bills or buy c-bills, use c-bills to purchase everything.

That is what I've been thinking all along. He mentioned it being different model, don't see how, not when compared to MMO territory games I have played.

[GHQCommander]

xXKrogothXx, on 17 June 2012 - 03:26 PM, said:

I dont think currency is going to be an issue.
They say they wont be selling power, and I trust the with that fact.
I suspect they will be going the way Riot Games did with League of Legends.

There is always an advantage to putting money into the game otherwise it would not survive long.

So when you say they won't be selling power. It does not mean they won't be selling so much conveniance that rich players can let rip with LRM all day and poor players need to use more lasers.

I honestly think anyone who feels none paying players will be on the same level as paying players, is going to get a surprise. What free to play game does not offer something that results in a player perfecting their avatar.

Perfection looks and feels like POWER when against someone with little money who will need to do a lot more play to afford to perfect their mech the same way.

[Draco Argentum]

CCC Dober, on 17 June 2012 - 11:43 AM, said:

@Sierra
The 'not-buying-an-advantage' only holds true if accelerated access to better tech does not equal better performance in battle. This was the case in WoT because reaching the next best gun was more or less the difference between being able to pull your weight or not. We'll have to wait how the tech is handled in MW:O. If it's all good, then you can drown yourself in boosters for all I care. I'll be comfy to know that Joe Blow can still kick your *** if you're drunk

No face rolling for you hehe

Its entirely dependant on how much difference there is between the xp gain rates. WoT has a very long grind for crew skills so that part is a soft P2W. LoL has a short grind for summoner level so its not P2W. MWO? Well, having to play all three varients to max a chassis, looking dicey.