"Grandfathered" characters (more free stuff!) Official Discussion Thread

Jayda@Antonia Bayle wrote:

If the game isn't something you own, then how do you explain the existence of the Bazaar server, where you can buy and sell for real cash money gear and/or characters? The items (gear and characters) are things you make or gain through game play. These items are yours to do with as you please. Keep them or sell them. That is the entire purpose of the Bazaar server.
If Sony is seriously going to refuse to acknowledge the fact that the gear is part of the character and expect people to find replacement gear which will be, rest assured, substandard, then I seriously recommend people find some other game to play instead of reinvesting where they have already done so.

This post has moved: /eq2/posts/preList.m?topic_id=500098&post_id=5681436 Trolling.

All im going to say is you cant play the game with no gear. Loging in and finding my gear locked was funy tbh. You cant even group or quest. With the way its set up you log in talk to old friends for 5-10min log out and dont log back in. Being hit with a oh you need to buy gear unlocks for all you toons is bs imo. If they want old players to come back and play the game maybe give them the gear they earned the right to have? Just saying loging in and being hit with a bill right away is lame. Either you spend 15-30 bucks on gear unlocks for your toons or spend 15 on gold membership. Either way to actually play the game and not sit in a gh all day you have to buy something.

savedx wrote:

Agreed. That is actually more dire on Nagafen. Gear is so very much more important there and understandably so. As it is right now, if I go out with one of my non-scout characters that do not have a mount under them, I am toast. Until something gets done, all I can do is tradeskill rush orders because I'll not be an easy target. As it stands, I'd be a guaranteed kill. My characters had mostly gear that renders them nakee under the current set up.

When is this getting done? I paid for two unlockers (1 race and 1 class) on the 7th, and I still have not been refunded.

BWLeeEllison wrote:

Heres the thing if i buy a game or an expansion i expect to have access to the content i paid the $40 for. If this game gos free to play i expect to have the content i paid for.Curently what soe is saying is oh thanks for buying the expansions but you can not use the stuff you paid for. Either be free to play with things like bags/bankslots/plat limited or dont be free to play at all imo. It looks to me more like a free trial then anything atm. I dont think it would be to much to ask for the gear i earned to be useable for my toons. But as i said in my previos post you cant grp or quest naked.Now will soe listen to its player base about this? Doubtful but we can hope i mean ive played since launch bought all the expansions except aod. Least they could do for the loyal players they have had over the years is let them have the gear they have earned during the time they played.Its just bad business on soes part if they want people to start playig agian.

savedx wrote:

Here's the deal. All these people defending SOE against those of us asking for a common sense solution and calling us absurd for expecting yet more free crap are most likely all people who can afford to pay to play. My wife is fighting cancer and I have to stay at home to care for both her and our 18 month old son. She was recently put on disability so our budget is incredibly tight. I couldn't pay to play to save my own life right now. LotRO gives players the option to earn their version of Station Cash in game so those who cannot afford or choose not to pay have a way to at least get the FTP locks lifted. In the long run, if I had the money, I would buy certain unlocks there but work for the game credits overall. Earning the credits gives me an option to gain things I don't feel are worth the cash to get. I still have the option to buy stuff I don't want to wait for with real money, even though I can't.
If SOE won't give us the unlocks for the gear or w/e, at LEAST give us some way to earn station cash in game. LotRO ties those in with achievements. That could work here. Something to think about.

They should just change the wording around and all of this would go away. It's F2P for all new charachters/accounts. Old characters on old accounts will need to make a nominal purchase to make their old toons playable. Boom... just fixed the problem.

It's great my chars are unlocked. It sucks they are naked. Oh well. My monk will be easy to play and get gear for naked. He should be able to somewhat hold his own with no weapons or armor in the pre 70 game I would think. The rest of my melee's...not so much, they dont do well fighting with their hands. I cant get 80-90 quest gear for them really, since I have already done the quests and either sold or transmuted the drops over a year ago.

So.. my best bet is to kill very low lvl mobs and farm cash (lol silver) like that to buy off the broker, or delete half of my toons and make a new one and start fresh. Coming back naked with no decent way to even get marginal gear is not a good plan.

I don't fault Sony for this model. I can't think of any corporation that doesnt want to micro-transaction you to death. Like Bank of America and other mega-corps say" We have a right to make a profit"

BUT, it was nice to log on for 5 mins and talk to old friends, at least I can do that once a month.

ok soe sony wants new blood...lets look at from a newbies point of view.
Cool a free game. Lets make some money so i can get gear or makes some. Oh wait by level 20 i can have 400g. Lets see what 400g buys oh wait I cant use the broker to make money and nothing is 400g anymore.
Oh lets go questing. Oh look at this ornate chest with this fable item I cant wear. Or look at this quest Iitem I cant wear. I know lets craft oh wait i cant wear what I crafted.
Oh I want to tell my long didatnce friend how much fun (not) i am having not being able to do anything...oh wait cant use the mailbox either.
Now from a non newb...lets say I quit playing b/c I got layed off my job and the money is tight now b/c of the economy. So i paid in all these years have worked hard all these years and now cant even access what i paid for. Oh wow i have 100 plat wait cant use is it I can only have 20g per level. Oh yeah they stripped my gear. I cant make money b/c i cant use the broker wow all the same arguements.
Due to this change I can no longer riad or pve all it is ..is free to die
Runes of Magic a premiere ftp model does not do any of that. You can use the broker, you can use the mail, there is no cap on gold and you can use the gear you buy earn thru a quest or get as a drop.
They do limit you bag space. But you can buy more thru micro transactions. You can also upgrade your gear thru microtransactions.
They also dont limit your characters except by server 8 per server.
Sony has too many limitations and will only drive people away when they see that crafting questing are useless to you.
Also when you buy something it is yours too keep. If I buy a tv I dont expect Vizio to take my tv away b/c they have a new model out. If I bought access to an expansion or gear or whatever then you cant just take it away ..if you do I want a refund.

furyfire nagafen

Make new account
create new toon.
?
Profit
Send profit to old toons for retrofit.

There is an old saying . You get what you pay for. Cheap or free stuff is'nt usually worth having. I ptp this game. Not because I am super rich and have money to burn. But I want to be able to experience the game to its fullest.
I have no ownership of any type in this game. All I own are the disc and the box it came in. Sony owns my chars, gear ,houses and every virtual aspect of this game. I simply pay a fee each month so I can use it. I purchased every expansion to this game . And the reason for that is so I could explore the game and enjoy it a little bit more. It still does not give me the ownership rights to anything in the game.
Someone mentioned that people on the exchange servers made money from selling chars and coin. True we did make money. But it still did'nt make us the owners of the chars or coin. Sony still owned everything . Whether you bought or sold , it was still sony's product. All they did was give us the chance to play the game , have some fun and when we had more coin than we needed we could sell to someone who needed it or save another player the grind of leveling a char.
And all this comparing sony to other games that are ftp. Give me a break . If all these other ftp are so great why are you here wanting to play.
Nothing in life is ever really free , there is always a catch somewhere.

Nahdian wrote:

Nobody cares that Sony still OWNS all the crap on their servers. We all know how the EULA works. What you are failing to recognize is the attachment people have to their characters because of the TIME that was spent in building them. Time is a currency more precious than cash. The time you spend playing these games is more valuable to you than it is to Sony. Sony wants your cash only. Cash is earned by selling your time to the company you work for. Doctors and lawyers have a higher value for their time because of what they spent on their educations. Older people with little time left on this Earth have a high value on their time, as do people with terminal illnesses and all the young people who feel the world is over next year. Poor people tend to place a high value on the time they have to give up to earn enough cash to make ends meet; that carries over to a high value on whatever they wind up spending that money on because of the sense of the time spent earning it.
Say whatever you like about who owns what. If Sony wants to be Scrooge tight like this from here on out with the people who floated this game for almost the past decade, then the game will fail. What Sony is trying for is a player base boost. Word of mouth is the best way to boost the player base, because they are trying to be cost effective by not laying out a wad of cash for top end advertising. Grandfathering shows they are TRYING to keep the old players happy to help with their word of mouth campaign. But it is only lip service, a hollow gesture, if they do not follow through and make the gear that is such an integral part of those characters available for use.
The gear I have on my characters is not the best I could have earned because I never raided. The opportunities to raid just weren't worth the cost in my book. I am the leader of one of the oldest guilds on Nagafen, and I always played for the friendships I had and the people I got to know. I don't see why I should give up my position just so I could join a raiding guild to earn the gear that would make me even more successful as a rogue. The chance for better gear is not worth giving up what I had. My gear at my tier is so substandard it is laughable but it is good enough to allow me to get out there and make a dent in the world. The big problem right now is that I can use none of it. Why the hell should I pay for substandard gear? If I have to shell out cash money for gear, then put up an offer to buy the best gear for my level! The gear I have is crap but it is MY crap and I was happy with it as it was all I could manage to get.
Now that the broker is locked, I can't sell anything I have to buy replacement gear with. Given that I don't have any decent gear I can use at my level, grouping and raiding for replacements is out of the question, especially if someone inspects me. I play on Nagafen so gear is doubly important. All I can do is level my guild on rush order writs until this gets resolved. Players without gear cannot contribute to an active world. Those of you clinging to the notion that existing and returning players who chose or have to FTP instead of paying should not be given their gear should actually be asking for the gear to be unlocked as well. All the players who opt not to play because of the gear lock issue leave gaping holes in the selection of people you have to group or raid with.
SONY, let us have the option to earn our station cash in game, please. I would not mind paying but I can't. I have no option but to suffer without my gear. Either unlock the gear for grandfathered characters or let us earn station cash in the game somehow.

Myserable wrote:

AMEN Fury!!! BTW Love ur tats 8)

RavenwolfB wrote:

So I take it no one has any clue regarding this question?

I received one race pack refund(750sc)-which is what i was entitled to-i bought 3 other race packs 2 weeks before, which fell short of the 60 day period lol.

Nahdian wrote:

Well said. When they announced that they were grandfathering in previously made characters, i knew everyone would think it was wonderful, some would say about time, they should have done this all along, etc. I also knew-and said this to my friend who also plays this game-"wait until all these people thinking this is so wonderful, realize they have to pay out the nose to unlock their gear". I mean did you people really and honestly believe that sony would let you just pick up where you left off, and play the game, with no restrictions, for free, forever? If that were the case, anyone in their right mind would be a fool to subscribe-why bother paying 15 or 20 bucks a month, when we can play the same way for free? Then they announce that from this point on, everyone will begin accruing time for vet rewards, regardless of whether or not you are a paying subscriber-and people still complain because they want it to be retroactive, and get credit for the months they didnt pay for, when paying for your sub was a requirement to be eligible for vet rewards. It just goes to show you, the old saying is true: Theres no such thing as a free lunch.

I am still shy the 1500 points I spent t unlock my 2004 High Elf and my Oct 2011 SK. I am hoping they just havent gotten to it yet because they are getting slammed by returning players, thanks to F2P, and not because everyone called out sick to play the earlyt start of SWTOR.

It is like I said before, Marmus, the grandfathering is a hollow gesture.

But the beauty of it is, are you really any worse off than you were before? The answer is, no you're not. before they did this, you would have had to pay a sub, or, if you couldnt swing that, pay for class/race unlocks for all the characters you made-which, if you're like me , and have a ton of alts, can really add up-And you would have had to pay for item unlocks. Now, you have only to either pay a sub-which in my opinion is by far the better deal-or pay for item unlocks for each character. The fact is, they didn't have to give any kind of gesture-let alone one that saves you at minimum 7.50 in race unlocks. Since you werent paying to play anyway, on what basis do you have to complain? Because other games have a different system? As the poster above said, why do you want to play this game, if the other games' price model is so much better? This is a company, and at the end of the day, they are here to make money-they aren't a non-profit organization. They throw us a bone once in a while, and thats nice, but they dont have to. If you truly feel it was a hollow gesture, that somehow you were entitled to more, than the best way let a company know you are unhappy with them, is 1) write to them or call them-which you have done here, and 2) take your money-or if your not even paying them any money, free time i guess?- elsewhere. Hit em where it counts. I just cant see how anyone honestly and with a straight face can seriously expect everyone to just stop paying a sub and play the game for free with no restrictions, just because at one time, they were a subscriber. It just makes no sense to me.

BWLeeEllison wrote:

Sure all that makes sense. Now throw this little caveat in there that you forgot to mention.
You stopped making your lease payments!
So now, I don't think that "Sony's logic" applied to other situations would seem all that ridiculous. I think that most people looking at someone in the situation you described would ask the Lessee why they were upset? It's not like your paying for anything?
Make your lease payments or pay those one time fees and get to driving!