49 replies to this topic

[Talynn DeRaa]

It only came to me just this morning when I was browsing all the Mechwarrior Online videos again, most specifically, their Mechlab breakdown video:



When watching it, as well as others, talking about the cash shop system, and how you "Cannot Buy Power," I realize now exactly what it is: the Cash Shop model for Mechwarrior Online is a direct comparison to the Cash Shop model for Team Fortress 2. Now, I can already hear some of you thinking: "How? TF2's just a game of hats!" Right you are, my friend, but there's another side to that game that a lot of people always neglect....Weapons.

You see, in TF2, waiting for things to drop for you can be extremely long, and tedious, and thus, there are 2 alternative ways, aside from Trading, in which you can acquire what you desire: Way 1, which is the most obvious, is buying the item itself on the Cash Shop. This can be a Hat, Misc. Item, Weapon, or Keys for crates, which is the other way (Not part of the MWO business model, mind you.) Of course, with how MWO might be, we may never have any means of actual trading mechs / weapons or anything like that, but it might help for healthy player community growth. Might. And ONLY trading mechs and their components, and perhaps the trade of Vanity and aesthetic.

Ah, but I still havent said how this relates to how MWO's Cash Shop model is like, now have I? No. Let me explain...Take for instance player A.) he plays for free. He earns his C-Bills the regular way, has never put money into the game. Its going to be a long journey for player A to get -all- the mechs, equipment, and everything that he wants. Now, lets look at player B.) a Cash shop customer. He's only just started just as Player A had, but he was able to purchase a 'mech, or two, or three, that he wanted. He may not have the C-Bills to customize and fine-tune the weapons and equipment, but he -was- able to make them look nice, as well, what with Fuzzy Dice in his cockpit, and a really outstanding paint job. Again, he isn't able to get weapons, or anything, since that all costs C-Bills, nor does he have any Pilot / Mech Skills, but he does have more mechs, thanks to the Cash Shop, which means his funds will be much more hard-pressed down the ine, possibly. This is how it relates to TF2: The Mechs, are the weapons, the ones that arent the vanilla standard ones, and the Paint job / other vanity items, are Hats, and accessories.

With this realized, all I can say is this: PGI, keep doing what it is you're doing, and do not stop. This model will net you massive profits. If it worked in TF2, it will most certainly work here. People love their vanity items, people love looking unique and cool, and sometimes, want to have some shiny new toys at the drop of a hat, rather than working for them. this will work, and it will net you a lot of profit.

[RG Notch]

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.

[Schrecken]

TAKE MY MONEY!!!!!! PLLEEEEEEAAAAASSSSEEE!!!!!!

[Talynn DeRaa]

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.

We don't necessarily know how much of a boost of money that actually is, however, and if it will actually mean anything in the long run. Not to mention the fact that, possibly, we won't be able to nearly have as many pilot / mech skills through the Founders mechs as we would regular ones. And even then, those are the Founder's mechs, which are going to be only a one-time thing. They might give us boosters for getting more C-Bills per round, but I'm sure that bonus still won't be nearly as strong as some may think. There may be no direct "Real money to C-Bills" transfer that will actually be adequite, such as buying mechs with Cash shop money and then selling them for C-Bills, etc...Who knows, maybe even Cash-Shop bought mechs won't have a resale value in C-Bills at all. (But that doesn't sound like all-too-much like a good idea...)

[Nikoliy]

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

[Crisis Averted]

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.

The founder's pack mentions premium membership, which allows you to gain more c-bills and xp per battle.
They never mentioned a player could spend $10 for 10mil c-bills for example.

They have hinted that a player could buy weapons/mechs with real money however so the effect will be the same.

Bryan Eckman said:

I’m not going to lie, some things can and will allow you to acquire items faster, or even instantly with real cash.

As long as there are no "real money only" mechs and weapons I don't mind

Edited by Crisis Averted, 17 June 2012 - 07:43 AM.

[Talynn DeRaa]

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...? Not exactly sure how that would work. Again, this system may not have any kind of trading implemented at all, nothing beyond what players can buy / sell themselves.

In TF2, there is trading, yes, and generally most trading is done in the medium of either Refined Metal, or Keys. The only people with these items are generally people who have either, A) Played a very long time, or Have a lot of money, or C) Both. The usual "Gold Farming" and all those other techniques cannot work in TF2, since its own cash shop is very oriented toward the player itself, and not toward any kind of player-controlled syste. Thats the trading.

But we may not get trading in MWO. Least, not direct C-Bill trading.

[Aegis Kleais]

Never underestimate instant gratification and impatience. There are what fuels a F2P shop

Oh yeah, and then there's the desire for individuality via customizations.

[Talynn DeRaa]

Aegis Kleais, on 17 June 2012 - 07:45 AM, said:

Never underestimate instant gratification and impatience. There are what fuels a F2P shop

Oh yeah, and then there's the desire for individuality via customizations.

This is EXACTLY what I believe the cash shop system will be. People who want instant gratification for that "Shiny new mech" but will still have to work for more fine-tuning, such as Mechlab, and Pilot / Mech skill.

Everyone wants to be a pretty, unique little flower, just like everyone else.

[spellfire]

atualy what I read said that the founders pack increaces the rate you get c-bills so guessing like world of tanks premium accounts and in that game you certainly still needed to work for it
so its likly to just mean you get dubble cash per match with certain mechs
but hey might of missed something but belive we are getting a brake down of how it works on the 19th

[Orzorn]

You don't buy C-bills, you buy c-bill boosts, this was confirmed by one of the devs about a month or two back. You can also buy XP-boosts.

So you still have to play the game to get the non-MC purchasable stuff you want, like weapons. Which is a good idea, because it keeps people in the game, which keeps them spending money.

Edited by Orzorn, 17 June 2012 - 07:53 AM.

[Talynn DeRaa]

spellfire, on 17 June 2012 - 07:49 AM, said:

atualy what I read said that the founders pack increaces the rate you get c-bills so guessing like world of tanks premium accounts and in that game you certainly still needed to work for it
so its likly to just mean you get dubble cash per match with certain mechs
but hey might of missed something but belive we are getting a brake down of how it works on the 19th

There may be some elements of the WoT Cash shop system in MWO, mainly those for boosters for C-Bills and Experience. But I hope nothing as extreme as....Premium Tanks, Armor, Ammo, etc. Thats what I want to avoid entirely: Cash shop only items that aren't Vanity / Aesthetic / Cosmetic. Thats a road straight to Pay 2 Win.

[RG Notch]

Crisis Averted, on 17 June 2012 - 07:42 AM, said:

The founder's pack mentions premium membership, which allows you to gain more c-bills and xp per battle.
They never mentioned a player could spend $10 for 10mil c-bills for example.

They have hinted that a player could buy weapons/mechs with real money however so the effect will be the same.



As long as there are no "real money only" mechs and weapons I don't mind

The founders packs include a certain amount of "in game currency" i.e. elite pack : $80 value of in-game currency* for in-game item purchases

I read that as real money for C bills. I could be wrong but that's the way it appears to me. If that's the case I can buy what I want, when I want it with real money.

[CCC Dober]

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.

[Chunkymonkey]

It seems like that AT FIRST , the founders mech's will be better than anything else because of advanced tech(i think, am NOT sure) but also later in the game, the founders get more experiance per mech so everytime a mech comes out, they still get ahead-not really non p2w

[BlackMoore]

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.

Edited by BlackMoore, 17 June 2012 - 08:10 AM.

[Kosomok]

I would expect MWO's shop to be similar to LotRO's store, in many respects--with changes due to the difference in mechanics between the games.

The big sellers in the LotRO store are cosmetics, account items (storage space, wardrobe slots, account features like inventory bags, etc) and temporary buffs. LotrO does not sell end game gear.

So I would expect the MWO store to sell cosmetics, account items (garage spaces, changes in other storage and so on), and temporary buffs to XP or C-Bills. Because of the difference in game mechanics/models I would also expect the store to sell mech chassis and weaponry--but it may be that the store does not sell them, it sells you C-Bills that you use to buy stuff via the mechlab.

I would expect module availability to be gated by XP, even if you have to buy the modules with C-Bills. Chassis bonuses seem to be purely based on XP on the particular chassis (subject to acceleration via store-purchased or Founders boost).

The model works very well for LotRO, should do well for MWO as well.

[grimzod]

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.

Also as mentioned above garage spaces will likely be monetized. You get four to start maybe and have to buy the rest.

I'm interested to see if things like ELRMs will be included as 'gold' ammo.

Edited by grimzod, 17 June 2012 - 08:14 AM.

[RG Notch]

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.

Well it appears that the Premium account status will boost XP and C bills, at least I hope it does. I pay for my games and I like to support the devs, for that I should be rewarded, not dramatically, but rewarded with faster development than those who want to free ride on what my money pays for. You want the game to survive and grow, then pony up some cash. If you can't be bothered to pay like others are willing to do, then you advance slower. Eminently fair in my opinion. It's why I always prefer P2P where everyone contributes.
Anyways this is conjecture without Dev input, but seems reasonable speculation to me.

[Fr33lanc3r]

*sub diety name here*, Why is it always, well WoT does it this way, so that must be the ONLY way they could do it.

The mechs can be bought in 2 ways, MC and C-Bills, if you could do a straight c-bill conversion why even have the other, just saying... their model for the money market is much more akin to TF2 or LoL or HoN (all out prior to that **** poor excuse for an F2P model that is WoT) or DoTA2 or ..... all of which are considered infinitely above WoT for the competitive field of gameplay and besides HoN probably have a much higher profit margin per player than WoT who nickel and dime their player base to death.

Let's look at LoL, they have XP boosts and IP boosts (in game currency essentially C-Bills). These two boosts can only be bought with RP (essentially MC or real money transactions), these are only BOOSTS, and obviously once your summoner caps level (pilot caps level) it no longer is necessary to buy the XP boost, but the IP boost is still nice for those that want to wait a little less long on getting runes (probably akin to the mech skill tree).

For things that are directly buyable via RP it's characters (ie mechs, both buyable with either ingame or real money), skins (only real money), boosts (only real money), and a couple other extras (like a "retail pack" of characters).

Please for the love of *insert diety here* stop using the WoT model for comparison, there are better, older, more well established, more lucrative, and overall stronger models out there.

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.

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....