Spell Research Instant Upgrade crosses the line of Pay to Win.

To what end?

If SOE met your request, and added more items to the market place, what tier of game play would be negated by anyone with a Credit Card? Solo? Small group? Full group heroic? Raid?

The question of "To what end?" rises again. You do not have the time to go and get the gear to begin with... What do you propose you will do with the gear once you have purchased it? You will still have little time to play, and the upgrades to any gear that would be "worth purchasing" off the cash shop will not come from places you will have the time to complete on your limited schedule. So you are wanting to do what, exactly? Buy gear you do not have the time to get, so you can stand around and wish you could get gear better than that, but don't have the time to go and get it?

So where will that put us? People like you will be back on the forums, begging for the next phase of pay to win.

You have a family, own a business, that's great. Very rewarding pursuits. But the primary point of playing EQ2 is investing effort to earn a reward. As the owner of a business you of all people should appreciate such. Enjoy the time you can spend in the game, doing the things you're able. If you get to a point where your fun in EQ2 is derived from using a credit card to get loot you otherwise do not have time to earn, you are in for a very shallow gaming experience.

Actually, they can expect to get the item at the lowest available price (as long as my sales crates are current). If someone is selling that master for 500p, then I would price mine at 450. If someone is selling it at 125, then I would price mine at 100. It's a discount, either way.

EDIT: And that same principle applies to what ever item I am selling on the broker.

But anyway, it matters as far as voicing my opinion on the matter. It may not be the same as yours or the next guy's, but it is just as important. That's all I am doing.. voicing my opinion. And it matters not to me if yours is on the same side of the fence as mine.

Maybe Im getting desensitized to this sort of thing. I don't see the instant upgrade option that bad anymore. Back when research assistants came out people complained, but the change occurred. I do wonder if masters drop less frequently now to make the instant upgrade more appealing, but that just be my having bad loot luck.

I just feel the game has too many other important(imo) issues than worrying about master spell upgrades, as it is pretty much assumed that everyone has them now. I would much rather they find meaningful uses for all the plat we as a community gather.

this was essentially my Alchemist QQ post, why be an Alchemist when there are so many other ways to get a spell upgrades. I can't sell anything from alchemy that doesn't have a higher cost in materials. at levels 30-80 you can pay for the upgrade, you can research the upgrade you can buy/find a drop or LAST use an alchemist. The leveling is terminally slow and boring. Compare that with a provision-er who can make master crafted food from common materials and those DO sell.

Would not be the least bit surprised, and tweaked even lower over time.
Of course you are being desesitized to this that is the idea, slowly start introducing these items one after another then completely ignore any and all objections and if they don't simply ignore them outright Smokejumper came up with a wonderful justification for the ability to purchase masters instantly.

So the content they continue to release devoid of any challenge for the most part we should expect to see gear from said content available soon.

1. The fastest ground mounts in the game at one point were ONLY available via SC
2. The vaults of Serillis was intentionally seeded with cure pots that could cure 500 levels of hostile effects, including curses.

#1 was rectified due to player outrage.
#2 the items were removed due to player outrage SOE said they were mistakenly flagged.
There were still players that defended these, especially the potions they claimed that those cure pots were not OP

These were both intentional efforts, make no mistake, it was a trial balloon to gauge player reaction and it will happen again and again becoming more and more egregious.

I'm a fighter and an Alchemist. Playing on a gold account.

I harvest my own nodes, make my own Experts and then use SC to turn them into Masters.

I stopped worrying about the slippery slope ages ago, we done slid almost all the way down now, so why bother getting upset about it anymore? I'm still having fun playing the game so I don't care about the rest.

Technically, if you take this one step further, the same situation also demonstrates that people who actually play the game have an even better advantage, since they can buy SC with plat, get all their masters at the same time as those that spent RL $ and at the same time they don't need to do RL work to obtain said $. So at the end of the day, people that actually play the game are still at an advantage.

Thats only true for "people who actually play the game" who have plat or know how to make plat. Not all ppl who earn to win are good at it. Ppl who earn to win, and suck at it, are at a disadvantage with those who paytowin.

You do know, that until the instant "upgrade" with SC, you could buy the research reduction potions to do it that. They just put an 'easier' button. The ability to reduce research via SC has been in game since Skyshrine launch at least! Possibly longer and you're just now finding an issue with it? Or are you new to the game and just finding it?

Solo instances, goblin games and dungeon maker might have some as well in the mystery crates.

Sure I used SC to upgrade from expert to Master (Yay for triple Station Cash days) on my most important spells, the rest I am still researching the old-fashioned way, 30 days each and I consume dropped reduction potions when I get them to hasten the research. It was far nicer than paying the exorbitant prices on the broker for my healer masters!

If someone wants to pay 600 SC to go from expert to master, so what?

If someone is silly enough to go from apprentice to master via 2400 SC, yay for SOE?

Those who are incompetent at a particular task tend to suffer in comparison to those who are competent, yes.

I started Jan 6th. You know, last month. I can almost afford a krono (with platinum) at my server's prices for them now, with no more effort than putting drops acquired during leveling on the broker. I'm still leveling. If someone is incapable of doing that ...

Heh.

It's just hard to get worked up over this.

1. The effect is not new. It's been there ever since you could buy research time reducer potions. This just cuts to the chase and makes it more efficient.

2. What's really funny about the whole thing is the introduction of the Krono has brought on the so-called dreaded P2W MUCH more then research time reduction. It's often much more economical to sell a Krono on the broker and use the proceeds to buy masters off the broker then it is to buy research time reduction. Plus the plat can be used for other things such as SLR (see below). I notice few people have a problem with Kronos.

3. Many of the same players who are wringing their hands over paying for research time reduction have no problem at all with SLR. The argument seems to be that someone (not you) put in some time for the item in SLR as if that makes it ok. But the fact is YOU did not put in the time. From your point of view whether someone killed some monster to get the item or whether they used an exploit to get it for free makes no difference and I very much doubt people getting items through SLR care.

4. SoE isn't going to stop no matter how much people whine. And expect to see more in all MMOs. With the MMO industry going the way it is they need the money.

5. I suppose people will say that Kronos are ok because someone had to get the plat. But the fact of the matter is that if you get plat via selling Kronos YOU did not have to get the plat. Saying that it's ok because someone else had to get the plat is equivalent to saying that it's ok to buy from a plat farmer.

The fact of the matter is that the general rule for people whining seems to be what THEY are doing is ok, whatever it might be. But ANYTHING ELSE is evil. Especially if it's something which others can do but the complainer can't. (such as buy research time reduction when the whiner doesn't have the money to partake) So people introduce all sorts of convoluted rationalizations why what they do is ok but what others are doing is not. But it's all just rationalizations. There really is little difference whether it be buying research time, Kronos, or SLR. Or even buying/selling characters and accounts (don't say nobody does it). Or paying someone else to play your character for you. Just different aspects of the same thing. P2W. Get used to it.

I believe that's not actually the argument here. The argument here is that NO ONE put in the time. With selling in-game items, person A puts in game-time to obtain plat while person B puts in game-time to obtain goods, as a results of the economy the two exchange the results of their respective labours. Person A didn't put any time into getting the time and person B didn't put in any time into obtaining plat, but both put in time into playing the game. Commerce is a natural part of the world - even a digital one, SLR just circumvents an artificial trade barrier that shouldn't be there in the first place. The difference with SC is that arguably NO ONE put in in-game time to obtain SC. So it's not all the same as buying an in-game item after making in-game plat.

Of course when you factor in the fact taht you can just buy SC cash for in-game (earned) plat, it muddies the entire argument.

How come nobody has "won" yet?

I play with a person who has bought all the best gear, paid to get spells mastered and looks amazing on paper. They still can't play their character very well, at all - and they DEFINITELY aren't playing to the level of the gear and spell quality they have.

Just cause they bought everything doesn't mean they 'won'.

I don't see how that really is important. If I spend $18.00 (or whatever the amount is) to buy a Krono for plat to buy masters off the broker, or if I spend $18.00 on research time reducer potions, for me I'm still paying $18.00 to get mastered out while spending no time playing. No difference whatsoever. Whether I do one or the other depends on what's the most value for the money, not on whether someone actually played to get the item.

Whether or not someone I don't even know spent time playing is totally irrelevent. As I see it, to make a distinction between one or the other is pretty artificial. I don't care how much time someone else did or did not spend for me to get mastered out. All I care about is how much I had to pay.

It seems like every time I turn around SoE is reducing the amount of experience required to level and the amount of effort required to get items and plat. People are routinely soloing raid zones for plat and nobody seems to have a problem with that. To say that plat gotten through that kind of crap is somehow pristine whereas just outright buying something is evil is a pretty artificial distinction.

A few years ago SoE let an exploit stay which allowed people to get heroic geared out by killing grey mobs. Ok sure, they had to kill grey mobs for awhile to get geared out, but it's hard to see a difference between that and just buying the gear although at the time there were plenty of people on boards like this defending their right to get great gear by killing grey mobs.

If the only way to get geared out was to really PLAY THE GAME I might think differnetly but it isn't. Nowadays it seems like the way to do it is to buy plat then use the plat for SLR. Sheeze. What a load of crap.

I play with a person who has bought all the best gear, paid to get spells mastered and looks amazing on paper. And he's amazing. He has a fantastic grip on the game mechanics, knows his class, knows his toon, and is very much well liked. Everyone scrambles to be in groups with him.

Just because he bought everything doesn't mean jack. It is completely irrelevant.

One could argue that the way the MMO industry is going is the reason they have to do all this to make more money. Self-reinforcing cycle and all.

These are apparantly not the people the OP is complaining about. A player like this could 'win' if they were wearing a paper sack for armor. Their gear, however obtained, is icing on the cake. A player like you are talking about doesn't do better because they have a master spell or the Sword of a Thousand Truths™.

The OP is complaining about people marginally better than they are - that are able to do better because they can spend money.

More that their costs keep going up but their income isn't keeping pace, because the "industry standard" of $15 a month isn't sufficient to cover the bills once the game's population has dropped below a certain threshold yet their players aren't willing to pay a higher monthly fee. So they nickle and dime us to make up the difference as we seem mostly willing to go along with the idea.

Not quite. Check out earnings reports from the companies that make these games. There are problems, but that isnt the diagnosis that I think aligns with them.