36 replies to this topic

[Gabriel Amarell]

6.28.2012 I made a post pointing out what I personally view as unreasonable timetables for acquisition of in game items that is common to many “Free-to-Play” titles. In that post I pointed out that many “Free-to-Play” titles intentionally set their in game currency earning rate unreasonably low in an attempt to induce players to purchase in game currency, what’s worse oftentimes these games have completely inappropriate exchange rates between their in game and real world currency. The result is a game requires players spend large amounts of real world currency to purchase in game items, or sink unreasonable amounts of time into the game.

What I advocated was not elimination of “grind” but rather moderation such that for those who would rather play to acquire in-game items that option was viable without sinking unreasonable amounts of time into the game. My definition of unreasonable and yours will doubtless be different, but I would hope that acquisition of ANY mech (assuming your utilizing the most expedient method possible) would not require more than 5-6 hours of play. I believe that a 5-6 hour grind would be sufficient to induce most players to simply purchase their mechs rather than grind for them, but it would not be so arduous that players who wanted to play for mechs would feel that they could not do so.

The comments posted would seem to indicate that most of you fear any attempt to moderate the grind to any significant degree would cause most players to grind out in game acquisitions rather than spend real world currency eliminating the sale of in-game currency as a potential revenue source. I do not believe that to be the case, I think a balance should be found in which the grind is sufficiently time consuming that it encourages players with less time and more money to simply purchase their in game hardware, but not so time consuming that it makes players with less money and more time feel as if they cannot grind out the items they wish to acquire. My suggestion is 5-6 hours of grinding per chassis.

The other comments indicated that most people believe that the primary source of revenue will/should be sale of mechs for real world currency. Though I disagree I spent considerable time deliberating and I came to the following conclusion; I can accept purchasing mechs as a way to finance the game if the price is reasonable. It was suggested by one of the forum members that mechs would cost roughly $15.00 U.S. To me this price is completely unreasonable.

The current full retail price (in the U.S.) for a game is $60.00 for that price players get everything the game has to offer. To me this means that for $60.00 I should be able to have every mech in the game. The 13^th mech “Trebuchet” was recently announced, I believe that it is reasonable to assume that roughly 17-20 mechs should be available at launch. Let us assume that it is 17 mechs, $60.00/17 mechs = $3.53/mech. At $3.50 I would purchase a bunch of mechs and I would not hesitate to purchase new ones post launch, in truth I would do the same at $5.00 a mech.

Example: 1^st mech of any type any variant $4.00 any subsequent variants of the same chassis $1.00

The game is free to play, so every player needs to start out with a mech for nothing, no cost, and they need to be able to earn enough in game currency by playing to get any/all of the mechs in the game, so the currency earning rate can’t be unreasonably low, but if the price of mechs was reasonable $4.00/mech $1.00/ additional variant many players would grind out two or 3 and then purchase the rest to save the grind.

At $4.00/mech it would take 15 mechs to equal $60.00 (the price of a new game in the U.S.) and at that price I would probably have a hanger full of mechs and feel comfortable buying new mechs as they came out. At $15.00 I would feel like I am being ripped off and the developers are using the “Free-to-Play” model as a way to charge unreasonable prices for their product. If you want to use mech sales as the primary means of funding this game, please, keep the mechs coming, keep putting out new chassis every month or 6 weeks, and keep the prices reasonable so that I can afford to buy the new ones.

[RogueFox]

While you have taken the time to write a very eloquent post it is not entirely correct. Almost every game I purchase for $60 with online capabilties requires that I also pay a monthly subscription fee to play it online. Also just because it is F2P doesnt mean it is free to produce and host. The reason it is F2P is hopefully to get you to enjoy playing and to decide to spend money.

Your timetables are very skewed as well. Five hours of gaming is nothing so why would anyone spend money to purchase the Mechs.

When it comes down to it most players who are playing for free should be happy they get to at all. I fail to understand why anyone can complain about getting to play a game for free.

[WardenWolf]

Russ has stated - I'll dig up the quote if you want - that a medium mech would average around $10 if you want to just buy it outright. This was brought up as part of the 'how much do we get for the $80 that comes with the founders packages?' thread, and of course may be subject to change.

I do dislike what WoT does, where the 'better' tanks can take many weeks of grinding to get (at least if you play an hour or two a day) - and you have to earn them twice: unlock them via XP, then save up credits to buy them. Because MWO will not have tiers I expect that we won't see it get that bad by any means, but I do expect bigger mechs to cost more cbills... and further I expect that higher-end *tech* will cost more. So a mech variant that uses EndoSteel, for example, may cost twice what a normal chassis of similar class costs.

Now as for how long it should take to earn enough money for said mechs, I would think something on the order of 2-3 hours for the cheapest, smallest mechs would be good - and then scaling up into the 15-20 hour range for the absolute most expensive ones. THen of course possibly a couple of additional hours for the weapons and other equipment to deck a mech out the way you want.

Now having options to purchase mechs for $10 for a medium that might take, say, 5 hours to grind for - that would mean you pay $2 per hour you want to save. That seems reasonable. You could also have a premium account with a 50% cbill boost that would let you get the same mech in about 3.5 hours, and would confer other benefits as well (XP boost too).

Those numbers seem reasonable to me... so there are my two cbills

[Grokmoo]

I just want to note that the devs have stated that they are aiming for 10 mechs with 3 or 4 variants each to be in at launch. The Battlemech releases we see here are just concept art.

[Kumakichi]

Seems reasonable.

[Atayu]

Well another person that wants the game to not make money and not stick around long. First of all Other F2P charge up to 60 dollars 4 1 in game unit. Your pricing is not even close to what it should be. Now a F2P game is not like a off the shelf game a off the shelf game is what it is when you get it and thats all it is. A F2P game keeps growing and getting more content the hole time people play as long as they are making a profit. You need to understand the market better. Or were you just trolling?

[Endless Ike]

Yeah, I'm not totally familiar with why they decided to go free to play, but I agree that $15 per mech is a lot. I would probably only buy another one or two during the billions of years I plan on playing this game at that price.

[Zogrim]

In order to lower the grind, game should be monetized through combat bonuses - instant repair, special ammunition, power shields.. that is what you want, OP ?

Edited by Zogrim, 29 June 2012 - 10:42 AM.

[Elizander]

Measuring grind for a game is difficult. It requires quite a bit of knowledge about your customer base. If you set the level of grind for people with a lot of time, this will not be fun for casual players. If you set the grind for moderate to casual players, you can expect players who have a lot of time to practically never have to pay for anything practical (except for boosts/premium and cosmetic cash only items).

Six hours might not seem a lot to some people but there are those who can only play that much or less within a week, while it might just be half a day for someone who has a lot of free time. Some cases a person might only be able to play a couple of hours each weekend and it would be sad if he felt he didn't accomplish anything in that small amount of time he played.

In cases like this I think you will have to look at the items and their prices and figure out which will easily go for free to those who have a lot of playtime and balance it out with what casual players can potentially buy to save a couple of hours of grind for the day. I am not a fan of extreme grind for things I don't have a keen interest in (for example I found that going beyond Tier 3 in WoT without paying wasn't worth my time) but it is worth it for things I like (for example playing two weeks hardcore with minimal sleep to gear up my main character in WoW each time there is a new raiding tier). It's really difficult because everyone has a different idea of what is fair.

I'd love to get a good sense of progress for playing just one to two hours perhaps every other day. Even if I can roll up my sleeves and mindlessly grind for something I really like, I can't handle doing that for more than a week or two. Maybe three. Hopefully the rates will be good for most of us. My concern is mostly for the majority of players for the sake of the game's success (popularity and profit) since I like MW enough to play it even if it's a slower crawl than WOT (and I'm more willing to buy premium boosts in MWO than WoT).

[Atayu]

Endless Ike, on 29 June 2012 - 10:38 AM, said:

Yeah, I'm not totally familiar with why they decided to go free to play, but I agree that $15 per mech is a lot. I would probably only buy another one or two during the billions of years I plan on playing this game at that price.

That is your choice, Playing WOT another F2P game I bought 1 premium tank once i had a top tier medium and several other high tier tanks. I may only have 1 premium tank in the game and not spent to much money but i have several top tier tanks in every class of tank except arty as I don't like them really. But I have alteast a tier 4 plus tank from every line in the game. With several of the tech branchs maxed out. If things were as easy and cheep as you guys are talking about I would have every mech in the game in a week or 2, I want it to be way way way harder then that. This is suppose to be a skill based game not another easy button game for kids.

[xxx WreckinBallRaj xxx]

You're not entirely correct. Many games ship at 60$ box then want an additional monthly fee and/or have extra stuff you still have to pay for. Take World of Warcraft for example; you have to pay for boxes(Mists will be 60$ upon release, not counting required previous boxes to use) and THEN a 15$/fee on top of it. And this still doesn't get you everything as there are special pets/mounts that require even more money. Other MMOs sell a 60$ box with no monthly but will still want additional money for game features/contents.

In the end 10$/Mech will not be unreasonable. In fact that is almost how much heroes go for in League of Legends.(6.77$ if you want to be exact) If you take into account that League has 100+ heroes and MWO will likely ship with 16-20 Mechs(4-5 in each weight class)... it is not an unreasonable cost difference. You'll be able to buy the 1-2 that's really important to you then slowly grind the lesser important ones while playing the ones you like. I should add that 10$/month gets you Premium which is +50% C-Bills gained, which will probably allow you to simply farm for what you want rather quickly. Rather than buying a Mech... just buy the Premium and get SEVERAL over the course of the boost duration.

In the end MWO looks like it will have a really fair F2P business model.

Endless Ike, on 29 June 2012 - 10:38 AM, said:

Yeah, I'm not totally familiar with why they decided to go free to play, but I agree that $15 per mech is a lot. I would probably only buy another one or two during the billions of years I plan on playing this game at that price.

F2P is becoming the new standard in multiplayer gaming. It allows players to pay when they can afford to do so while not losing game access when they can't afford to do so. It allows the rich to buy perks to stand out while not preventing the poor from playing the game. It compliments everyone, where as a monthly fee is inconvenient and without choice.(You either pay it 100% or don't get game access) Also, it won't be 15$ a Mech. It is in the Elite and Legendary Founders but that includes the C-Bill boost attached. Come release they(With no boost) will be 10$ each.

Edited by Bluten, 29 June 2012 - 10:54 AM.

[Endless Ike]

Atayu, on 29 June 2012 - 10:47 AM, said:

That is your choice, Playing WOT another F2P game I bought 1 premium tank once i had a top tier medium and several other high tier tanks. I may only have 1 premium tank in the game and not spent to much money but i have several top tier tanks in every class of tank except arty as I don't like them really. But I have alteast a tier 4 plus tank from every line in the game. With several of the tech branchs maxed out. If things were as easy and cheep as you guys are talking about I would have every mech in the game in a week or 2, I want it to be way way way harder then that. This is suppose to be a skill based game not another easy button game for kids.

I've never played WOT, but I think the difference is that none of the 'Mechs are "premium" or "better" just different.

[Donovan Jenks]

Pirahna is not making this game becasue they are nice and have nothing better to do they are making it becasue they want, nay NEED, to make money.

That is the point, not to make it fair, or easy for people to play for free. Free-to-play is a marketing term for an INCOME MODEL not a loophole so people can create games that cost nothing for people.

The point is for you to want to pay money instead of grinding for hours becasue there is no subscription, that is how they make money!

[Gabriel Amarell]

so, everyone is ok with funding the game via mech purchase, and everyone is ok with $15.00 a mech or 30 hours of grinding...

so, do you all intend to have 4 or 5 mechs, or do you intend to spend $150.00 on this game...

or spend hundreds of hours playing it...

[Endless Ike]

Bluten, on 29 June 2012 - 10:52 AM, said:

In the end 10$/Mech will not be unreasonable. In fact that is almost how much heroes go for in League of Legends.(6.77$ if you want to be exact) If you take into account that League has 100+ heroes and MWO will likely ship with 16-20 Mechs(4-5 in each weight class)... it is not an unreasonable cost difference.

I'd just like to point out that $6.77 is not "almost" ten dollars

[xxx WreckinBallRaj xxx]

Gabriel Amarell, on 29 June 2012 - 10:53 AM, said:

so, everyone is ok with funding the game via mech purchase, and everyone is ok with $15.00 a mech or 30 hours of grinding...

so, do you all intend to have 4 or 5 mechs, or do you intend to spend $150.00 on this game...

or spend hundreds of hours playing it...

Question, how often do you usually spend playing a game? I don't know about you... but I spend hundreds of hours every month video gaming. So you say "or spend hundreds of hours playing it"<--- I was already going to do that!

Endless Ike, on 29 June 2012 - 10:53 AM, said:

I'd just like to point out that $6.77 is not "almost" ten dollars

I also pointed out that they have FAR more heroes than MWO will have Mechs. So you would actually spend more money on theirs to get all heroes(quite a bit more in fact) than you would here to get all Mechs.

[Yoringa]

What the OP says is not unreasonable. I don't know why people think you HAVE to strong arm people into spending money. Obviously there is going to be a bit of a grind, but it doesn't have to be unreasonable. This game in particular has a really nasty hook in terms of currency accumulation. The need to pay for repairs and such has the potential to make this game really unplayable. It's really disingenuous to make a free to play game, but make it so you HAVE to spend $x per month to play it. There are plenty of free to play games that strike a happy balance between grind and cash. They're not painful to play for free, but people still spend money on it because they enjoy the game. You don't have to hit people over the head for money if you make a good game and put reasonable terms on it.

[Thanatos676]

I have been waiting for a new battletech game for years, i spent what i was able to, so that i could support this game. I'm not gonna complain about how much a mech should equal in real money.

If you don't like the way the devs are doing the Founder's system don't buy anything. I for one cannot wait to get into the cockpit of my Catapult and LRM down some Atlas's and then jump away. This game is going to be good..

[Hawker]

First of all, MMOs like WOW have content (PvE) that takes AI code. All MWO has are PvP ques and some maps. There is a big difference between the two and what it takes to make, which is why PGI went with a PvP game only to start, it is cheaper to make.

Secondly, the $80 was stated to be worth about 7 to10 medium mechs I believe Russ said. Obviously there is going to be scaling on the costs between weight classes. He also said that was not set in stone (the mech costs).

Now, while I agree they have to make money to stay in business so we can play, that doesn't mean they need to gouge us or make everything a big time sink either. This is definitely a skill based game, so grinding isn't a precursor to uberness, more really a cosmetic thing. Considering that you will be able to adjust your load outs, one mech isn't going to be vastly superior to another. Player skill is going to be the main factor.

[aRottenKomquat]

Atayu, on 29 June 2012 - 10:47 AM, said:

That is your choice, Playing WOT another F2P game I bought 1 premium tank once i had a top tier medium and several other high tier tanks. I may only have 1 premium tank in the game and not spent to much money but i have several top tier tanks in every class of tank except arty as I don't like them really. But I have alteast a tier 4 plus tank from every line in the game. With several of the tech branchs maxed out. If things were as easy and cheep as you guys are talking about I would have every mech in the game in a week or 2, I want it to be way way way harder then that. This is suppose to be a skill based game not another easy button game for kids.

The difference is this game should focus on combat being fun. WoT seems to be all about fighting through sucky matchmaking to get to the top tiers, and IMO combat is rarely fun.