Expansion Livestream: Thurs, Oct 1 @ 10AM PDT

Discussion in 'News and Announcements' started by Roshen, Sep 30, 2015.

  1. agemyth New Member

    I like the direction of ToT from what we know so far. Just wanted to chime in with something I thought was strange on the livestream.

    The very first thing you guys talked about, even before what content/features are coming with the expansion, was the goodies in the collector's and premium editions. You went straight to trying to upsell us on cosmetics before we even knew what we were in for on the base level. I can understand you may be excited to share those with us because they look good, but everything else you showed so far looks good too :)
  2. suka Well-Known Member

    yeah i agree on so many levels. and usually i would buy ce for the house. i am having serious doubts this time with the obvious shape of the house. i would be embarrassed to say i owned it.
  3. Smite Active Member

    So come February 2016 when I've popped 200-400 hours in ToT I might start thinking... hey if I give up $15 a month and the time to go with it I can get through LoV in March, TR in April, ToN in May, etc. without breaking the bank or having a bunch of high quality games sitting on my shelf like DAI was in 2015 until I broke away in March.

    Maybe it's January and I take a half of every week to restart W3 to see both expansions along the way... that's 250 hours right there. Did EQ2 do anything wrong? No. Was there anything EQ2 could do differently to change that outcome? No.
    _ _ _

    It is as silly to think about Kettle potato chips trying to design their product so people won't drink Pepsi as it is for Daybreak to design products with entrenched investment curves to crowd out other activities on a perpetual timescale.

    If 500K was EQ1 at $40 packs and $15 a month then that's -100 million- a year gross? W3 sold 6 million copies. ToT won't sell 6 million copies. W3 has a team of ~80. EQ2 has a dedicated team of ???. How much money do you really need?

    EQ1's only revenue was the subscription/expansion. For F2P you don't even need a monthly subscription to make money as in theory the work required to make the expansion is self-sufficiently supported by the price times the # of copies of said expansion.

    Why is there a subscription at all? Adobe, MS Office, etc. all have options of buy/own or -rent for cheap- yet MMOs want us to buy the new game expansion pack and rent access to the rest of it and buy fluff? Last time I checked I can't just play in an empty locally hosted version of the game on my own personal computer with GM client options on the home network NWN/DOS style for F2P...

    WOW copied EQ1 and makes billions and LoL is nearly P2W yet W3 and DAI get produced, make money, and don't even dream of 12 month a year revenue requirements?

    1.5/2
  4. Smite Active Member

    There should be a subscription or a purchase model. Period. Legacy purchase & subscription models have made the genre inefficient as they make too much money per player funding projects that shouldn't exist or they create the greed apathy (Vanilla WOW) where changes to the product don't occur for the sake of not changing variables to the income stream.

    The USA pays for pharma product discovery for the entire world (prices) and we at EQ1/2 have been paying for game discovery for SOE/Daybreak since 2008. Put the risk for game discovery where it belongs - with investors, not taxpayers (your playerbase & Devs).
    _ _ _

    EQ1/2 can't change until EQN is out and rowing its own boat but the way things have been in the genre cannot continue forever. The first time I left and came back it was because there just wasn't enough other games to play. The Sims, Civ, and Dragonshard just didn't cut it. But now... just look at GOG, Steam, Ipad, Netflix/Hulu, etc. There's plenty to do and it's easy to determine the $/hr you're getting out of it.

    MMO's are still ahead but that gap is closing with 450 hours for 2 times through W3/W3-SP at $110. AoM was 400 hours for $260 -ish for two accounts with packs and subs not counting fluffs. W3 was whenever I felt like it. EQ2 is - seasonal - due to dynamic population waves through content. Disclaimer - DAI's 70 hours felt 2x as long as it should have been while PoE's 30 hours felt about right. Time spent does not necessarily = quality delivery.

    If there were 3 games a year W3 quality I wouldn't need nor have the time to play any MMO. Luckily for Daybreak DAI/W3 take ~3 years to make.
    _ _ _

    On an extremely positive note:

    It is amazing that AoM was much better than RoK given the difference in staffing and it would seem that ToT looks to be AoM quality+ with even fewer at the helm. EQ2 and EQ1 do what they do best but over in the EQN black box perhaps - in the door - pricing needs be nearly zero.

    The Prestige tag does this very well for a F2P MMO if you're set on not allowing a Divinity Original Sin style local world hosting on your personal home network with the advanced AI NPCs.

    2/2
  5. Roshen Well-Known Member

    Confirmed that the prices listed now are our prices for launch. These are not special prices for pre-orders.

    The pre-order bonus is Altar of the Ancients, and access to the beta server.
    Moonpanther likes this.
  6. yanglee New Member

    Is there no way to purchase as a gift for friend as RC did before?
  7. HaphazardAllure Well-Known Member

    This expansion looks amazing and I will definitely be getting a CE! Thanks for the stream and all your hard work EQ2 team. :)
    Xianthia likes this.
  8. Leeroy 16 year vet. Forum lurker. Altaholic.

    Probably something I'm doing wrong, but I've been watching the archive of the livestream and the giveaway link does not work for me, this one: http://bit.ly/10GeaBa that they showed on a slip of paper. I get an error, and I thought the promo was through tomorrow. Any ideas?
  9. Alphonsus Well-Known Member


    It's on oh not a zero.
    http://bit.ly/1OGeaBa
    Feldon likes this.
  10. HaphazardAllure Well-Known Member

    It's a capital letter O and not a zero, that tripped me up too. ;P
  11. Leeroy 16 year vet. Forum lurker. Altaholic.

    Ah thank you both. I just can't see that correctly I guess. Tired.
  12. Merriel Well-Known Member


    Thank you for the prompt reply, Roshen. This is very helpful for me to know. Hmm the altar will not be available at all after the pre-order period? The xp bonus part of it would not be of any use to me, but the deity part quite possibly would be, so if you could also let us know if the altar itself and the deity use of the altar after launch would still be available or not, after the pre-order period, I'd appreciate confirmation on this as well. Thank you.
  13. Feldon Well-Known Member

    The Altar of the Ancients gives you a bonus to XP. You buy benefits from the new Deity system by earning XP. If you plan to make use of the new Deity system, you'll want the Altar of the Ancients. That is the extent of the connection.

    Here's what the tooltip says:

    Merriel likes this.
  14. Lodrelhai Well-Known Member

    This may seem obvious, but I just want to be sure. If we buy, say, the basic version now, will we be able to upgrade to another version later?
  15. Merriel Well-Known Member


    So then I am to assume this altar will not be available at all after the pre-order period? That's what I'm assuming this means, but I don't like to assume anything so I just want to be very clear on this. Sorry, but I don't always comprehend things unless they are written in very clear and concise English. If it's not as clear as black and white, then I generally have to ask for clarification. I do appreciate the response, however.
  16. Feldon Well-Known Member

    If you buy Terrors of Thalumbra between now and November 16th, then you get the Altar of the Ancients because it is a PRE-ORDER item.
    If you buy Terrors of Thalumbra on or after November 17th, then you wouldn't get the Altar of the Ancients.
    Merriel likes this.
  17. suka Well-Known Member

    it is http://bit.ly/1OGeaBa -- a capital o not a 0
  18. Boli Active Member

    That item infusion sounds really interesting...

    I would if its as simple as "for each item you infuse or pay for another its +10 to its stats" or its more complex.... I know I'd love to pull off (and maybe improve) some old procs/effects from previous expansions in the mix.

    Ripping out the old effects from the claymore rewards and adding them into one of the new items sounds extremely tempting...
  19. Pipsissiwa Well-Known Member

    The expac looks great and I'm looking forward to it, but I sure won't be buying anything other the the SE.

    The CE costs significantly more than twice the SE, for what basically amounts to fluff items & a merc (with no choice of class) based on textures & models already made for the expac itself (so comparatively little extra work to create them). The SE price should reflect the work put in to create the assets, design the quests etc etc but the CE price is simply charging us even more for the same things in a slightly different form.

    If anything, the SE should cost more, with the CE just a bit more than that. I'm very prepared to pay for the effort and work put in to create the xpac, but not pay twice (or more) for the same assets presented in a slightly different form.

    The CE last time was twice the SE and that seemed ridiculous, this time it really feels like gouging. And don't get me started on the nasty pay-to-win feel for the upgraders in the Premium version.

    AOM was the first time I didn't buy the CE. Looks like this trend will continue. :(
    Merriel likes this.
  20. Anaogi Well-Known Member

    Wait, what? We have to preorder to have access to beta?
    Stabaholic and Pipsissiwa like this.