86 replies to this topic

[Orzorn]

Icebound, on 18 November 2012 - 09:25 AM, said:

If players got to keep each skin they bought, you would probably hear about people who bought every color available, and would be more likely to experiment and try new colors every once in a while. Instead the most likely scenario is people buying one paint job per mech and never changing it. I don't know how they thought this was a good way to encourage sales.

Nickel and diming looks lucrative at first, but discourages sales and discourages collecting (especially since we can't collect with a pay-per-use system).

[Gorith]

I'm ok with paying for skins aslong as I can paint all my mechs mostly purple

[Keisuke Nagisa]

I think what people are having an issue with is that you will have to pay $ every time you want to change your camo. It would be akin to paying $ to put a new bobblehead in your cockpit. And you cant then put that bobblehead in another cockpit. And if you remove it you have to pay as well and you lose it.

I'm not sure what this is going to cost but I can only imagine the cost will be under a dollar to change your color on a certain area. The idea being instead of selling color packs you can use over and over for 5-10 bucks they want you to spend .50 like 100 times over the course of a year.

Honestly id rather buy color packs. Id pay 5-10 bucks for a pack of maybe 30 colors and only pay c-bills for repaints. And they could release different finishes like metallic, matte, sparkly, plus pokadot patterns or stripes or dazzle schemes. Im sure they would make more money that way as with the planned system I can only imagine most people painting one or two mechs once and calling it a day.

Like Oz said. A pay per use system means we can't collect all the colors they might release. So instead of spending who knows how much on each color and pattern pack that is released now the majority of people will only buy a repaint probably once or twice on their most used mechs. I guess its not all bad. Now we will save money instead of having to give it to PGI for colors. Heres a dollar PGI go buy yourself something nice.

Edited by Keisuke Nagisa, 18 November 2012 - 10:10 AM.

[MrLee]

Bagheera, on 18 November 2012 - 09:01 AM, said:

So, when you bought a BT miniature, it came with a set of paints and all the supplies to paint it, for free?

Also, The skins of the current mechs are not a uniform "Grey"

[Volthorne]

Orzorn, on 18 November 2012 - 09:28 AM, said:

Nickel and diming looks lucrative at first, but discourages sales and discourages collecting.

Valve and TF2 would like to disagree with you.

[Orzorn]

Volthorne, on 18 November 2012 - 10:41 AM, said:

Valve and TF2 would like to disagree with you.

I get to keep my items in Dota 2 and TF2. That encourages collecting.

Edited by Orzorn, 18 November 2012 - 10:42 AM.

[Volthorne]

Orzorn, on 18 November 2012 - 10:42 AM, said:

I get to keep my items in Dota 2 and TF2. That encourages collecting.

I was more specifically referring to the gambling crates in TF2. You need to buy a key from Valve for $1 to open them, but you are in no way guaranteed to receive an item worth $1, nor do you get to keep the key after. People still buy millions of keys each year.

Edited by Volthorne, 18 November 2012 - 10:49 AM.

[Farmer]

Volthorne, on 18 November 2012 - 10:48 AM, said:

I was more specifically referring to the gambling crates in TF2. You need to buy a key from Valve for $1 to open them, but you are in no way guaranteed to receive an item worth $1, nor do you get to keep the key after. People still buy millions of keys each year.

Different theory. That relies on slot-machine gambling, not nickle and dime. Five and diming someone relies on them repeatedly buying a bunch of little things, not buying one thing that could be a bigger thing. The gambling aspect has a draw to it while the known quantity just gets old. Especially if it's required EVERY TIME.

[Elizander]

People will complain about everything.

[Khobai]

Quote

Different theory. That relies on slot-machine gambling, not nickle and dime. Five and diming someone relies on them repeatedly buying a bunch of little things, not buying one thing that could be a bigger thing. The gambling aspect has a draw to it while the known quantity just gets old. Especially if it's required EVERY TIME.

Slot Machines are based on the same principle as Skinner boxes. Skinner found when he gave the rats food every time they pushed the lever, they only pushed the lever when they needed to eat. But if he gave the rats food at low random intervals whenever they pushed the lever, they would constantly push the lever over and over.

Charging players MC every time they paint their MC is a form of operant conditioning. Although its not on the extreme end that say WoW is with its random loot drops. And blizzard has certainly taken a lot of heat for WoW being borderline unethical with regard to human behavior modification (people have even died while playing wow because it altered their behavior to the point where they no longer functioned properly lol).

Personally I think it would be better if you just paid once for a paint job, and then youd have that paintjob unlocked forever.

Edited by Khobai, 20 November 2012 - 12:33 AM.

[Insidious Johnson]

Space poors be driving hoopties with no spinning rims. Yo Yo Yo. Can't compete with MC Spammer in the style department. Stop! Spammer time!

Edited by Insidious Johnson, 20 November 2012 - 12:37 AM.

[Wizard Steve]

FrostPaw, on 18 November 2012 - 08:06 AM, said:

Would you prefer to pay just to log in?

Actually, yes.

[BloodLegacy]

Yeah, camo is pointless and unnecesary therefore people like me will pay for it... wait... ahh screw it, whatever. Pay for it or dont, it doesn't really matter... But I will.

I should really stop posting whilst drunk.

[Suki]

I wanna my Cata paint hellokitty like, think it would be perfect

[4er3BaPa]

Quote

I wanna to paint game textures to my mech...or transparent textures for full invisibility

[ian davion]

I'm not paying if I can't collect things. I would pay for camo and colors if I could keep them and use C-Bills to switch between the ones I payed MC for. Everyone I talk to on TS said that they may by only one or two paint jobs with this system and leave most of their mechs the stock colors. We all agree that it would be better if we could pay MC to collect colors and camo.

[Thorn Hallis]

Stefano McCarron, on 05 November 2012 - 09:59 PM, said:

The worst thing about this whole camo thing is, that you yourself will never see your Mech.
If you pay, you pay only for the pleasure of your enemies and teammates...
Sad but true...

What, you 'Mech isn't showing up in the mechlab?

[BigJim]

Quote

The worst thing about this whole camo thing is, that you yourself will never see your Mech.
If you pay, you pay only for the pleasure of your enemies and teammates...
Sad but true...

True, but that's how human nature works; Everyone who buys nice clothes, gets a nice haircut, bothers to shave in the morning - Whatever - Is doing it for other people.
If everyone else in the world was blind, would you bother to brush your hair? Hell no. It's always to make you look better in the eyes of other people. Always.


So that said, I'll definitely want a unit-skin for all my competition-level mechs, and probably my Pubbie-mechs too.
Why the hell not? It's a computer game.
I already choose my mechs based on which ones I think look the coolest (gimpy-arm Dragons notwithstanding) and I won't let a few MC's stop me.

Even if it's 300MC per skin (same as a mechbay), that's what? 90 pence?
Less than 3x ratty apples off a market-stall.
Simply parking in town to buy those apples would costs me over 3x times more than that..


As has been said ad-infinitum, this is how games like this are funded, and the persistent servers keep running.
I've paid £40 so far on this game, and if I worked it out since June, I've already spent more time having fun with it than just about any other game I've played since 1998 - Far better value than any other game I've played, and I've only just made a small dent in my supply of MCs.



From a business standpoint, doesn't the old model seem ridiculous?

You charge X-amount of pounds for a CD in a box.
Game is released, and you get a decent amount of return straight away. As time goes on, revenue drops off, eventually game is relegated to bargain bin prices.
No more money comes in, or if it does, it's insignificant.
However, you need to keep funding expensive servers and hardware/admin costs for ever, and ever, until you stop supporting it altogether.
If you were taking that business model to just about any company outside of the gaming industry, you'd be laughed out of the office.

My rebellious side doesn't like the idea of the FTP model as it currently stands, but I have to admit in my heart of hearts, it makes a lot more sense than the good ole' days that I'm used to when games came with a manual the size of a telephone directory and multiple floppies/CDs, packaged in a box that you could fit a pair of walking boots inside..

Edited by BigJim, 20 November 2012 - 03:24 AM.

[Galerius]

I care about game mechanics as much as customization.
I want the option to camo all my mechs. Wether common, Hero or Founder. Once the unit belongs to me, I want to paint it to my leisure.
Forced Uniqueness is imposed commonality.

Note aside:
F2P? I rather pay a monthly fee than have no say over the way my BattleMechs look. I am seeing several clear disadvantages to the F2P model; and although camo might be the least important, the others are of weight that deserves questioning.

Edited by Galerius, 24 January 2013 - 06:15 PM.

[Major Scumbag]

I have heard people call MWO a pay to win game. Infact it isnt. It is pay for time mostly. Everything you can buy doesnt give you an advantage to someone that doesnt. Minus the Hero mechs. But even them its different variants and c-bill boost. You dont get "golden ammo". I can see being a pain to have to pay to color your mech. I would even buy it if.....it was permanant and slightly less in cost. Premium time still doesnt give you an advantage on the battlefield. It just cuts down the grinding. You could get the PC Gamer(if you still can) and get 3 colors wich are perm. You can mix those 3 colors on any mech. So basicly all my mechs are combo or solid color of black, grey and red. Ofcouse my 3L is solid red. We all know red is faster . Plus it comes with a bobble head for the cockpit.
I tell my freinds constantly. If you like the game and want it around in the future. Spend some cash. Support the game. I am use to paying 15 bucks a month on an MMO. Would I do it here? Ofcourse I would. 15 bucks to me is 3 mocha's for a month or 1 dinner out. I dont even mind paying for it in beta. I am paying because I support the game and having fun. Its not perfect but what they have to work with. I give them props.

Edited by Major Scumbag, 24 January 2013 - 06:14 PM.