Upcoming Changes for Free and Silver Members

You sir have not the slightest clue about advertising, the fact that 3 of you decide to argue with me. You offer no proof.

Here I will make it more simple for you.

UNLOCKING ALL CLASSES EXCEPT FOR BEASTLORDS, yeah I see how that could be very confusing to a monkey. The way they did it wasn't for readability like you claim... if it was there would be no reason to try to hide it with shrinking the text.

Now is doing what they did a common advertising strategy? To that I won't disagree it is. However, just because it is a common marketing strategy, doesn't make it any less shady. The reason they did it is the same reason companies do it all over, its to get the person into the store, window, or game, and hope they can make the sell once the person makes it there. It is still very shady because they ARE trying to hide it with a small font. Otherwise they would have left it normal size, or the bigger size.

Like I said before, and I think it was funny someone said something along the lines of "if you don't the fine text then you get what you deserve." lol That statement alone backs me up. How? Simple. The average person will read that and think woot all classes are unlock they will then open up the game. BECAUSE THE ATTENTION IS FOCUS ON THE BIG TEXT WHICH IS GOOD NEWS. Meaning they won't read much further. This is again shady..

As far as your last request, you nor lempo is worth my time proving anything. If you want to know the truth you can go digging for it like I already have. And that story about how you lock up your EQ2 credit card that is just used for eq2 is sorta funny lol. Did you lock it up after or before the hack.

I've played WoW for years, but now just want something different. Well I've always known of EQ but never gave it a chance....so about a week ago I tried it out. Loved it!! However wanted to play a shadowknight, and thus was still just a little on the fence about it, as I did not want to pay for a class on a game that I wasn't sure would hold me. Then comes this bit of info, and I'm like, "hells yea", ...so now I'm playing another toon awhile just long enough to learn a little about the game and UI and getting more and more sucked in. So now, I'm actually thinking about going gold with it in order to just play the whole game. I figured, hey I payed for WoW for years, these companies that make these great games have to make revenue, and they just made me very happy. :-D So I'm in, and money is made by them. They know what they are doing. Hope to make some new friends in game though....as I'm coming into this alone. lol

I think you're forgetting or ignoring the fact that we're addressing two games at the same time here. EQ1 has classes and races that weren't in the original game. Beastlord is one of them. They also don't have a Freeblood race, so menitoning any of these exceptions right away in the headline would be confusing to anyone interested in EQ1.

To be fair, EQ got Beastlords with one of their expansions (Gates of Discord, iirc). But the point that Plavem doesn't seem to want to realize is that the All Classes and All Races statements apply equally to both EverQuest and EverQuest II, with the exceptions denoted by the asterisks.

Essentially, the following statement is similar in form, with the exception denoted in the same manner:

The inclusion of the exception doesn't make the statement misleading, or any less true; with the exception of my wife, I don't like my relatives. If someone doesn't want to check the information denoted by the asterisk, it isn't my problem if they get a mistaken impression.

I'm getting the impression that Plavem is running out of things to complain about and has now resorted to scraping the sides of the proverbial bucket.

I want to thank those in charge for this policy change. I can only guess it is a way to draw in the WoW players who are leaving in mass due to PvP policy changes by Blizzard. This change is going to draw in a lot of players (read multiboxers) to the EQ franchise. More players can only be good for the game and boxers tend to have more disposable income to spend on gaming/hobbies.

I played a single account at launch and didn't get very far (was invested in EQ boxing at the time). I came back in 2009 and played 6 accounts but stopped before my team made it to 30. I am going to play a single account until I am proficient/confident to start up boxing again. I only do PvE content but I decided to jump ship due the hostile atmosphere that has developed in the other game. No one likes being harassed during their designated entertainment time.

To reiterate, I believe this change was a shrewd business decision to scoop up dedicated Free Agent MMO players. More players=good for the game.

I have a mixed opinion over this. I like the idea it may bring more players and I am not against f2p people getting more. I do feel that a gold sub has lost value as of late with these changes and SOE should look at what they could do to add some value back to subs.

Perhaps though they don't see subscriptions as the real money maker now and just don't see much of a business case for subscribers any more? It does seem like that is a real possibility given all the changes directed at f2p...

That may very well have a lot of value.
It all depends on what the revenue streams are, which we will never be privy to.

I have a station pass currently, so I can operate in EQ + EQ2, but I don't have a good feel for the "value" atm. I think they wanted to do what they could 'right now' to catch the wave. We may see more benefits for gold in the future as they have time to plan things out.

Actually a great deal of guilds understand you have a real life and Dont require you to let them know when say your computer breaks down and your not online or your sent off to a tour of duty ect. IF a guild leader is demanding accountability for your lack of playing or your time away then your in the wrong guild

I am not sure why that one word got edited, but it made my post seem harsher than I intented. There is still good stuff in the free content do not get me wrong, what I was trying to say is that when they converted the game to free to play, they took parts of the game away from the free players, and let the ones paying keep everything, when at least I would have prefered them to give everyone what they were paying for before free, and add something more to the game to make it worth while to give SOE money, especially if they are going to keep charging for expansions. It just feels more like the game has a really really huge free trial portion rather than it actually being free.

As a silver player it just feels like SOE spends its time trying to *force* me to give them money, rather than providing me new products and/or services that make me *want* to give them money.

The current model is not world ending bad (especially with them now unlocking races and classes), I am obviously playing the game and I do occationally buy things to help support it, it's just more about how it feels and it would be nicer if the model was set more to make we want to buy things, rather than to withold some things to, in a way, strong arm me into paying.

Right on about time SOE was thinking about buy a class unlock yet this is great
so are you guys expanding the character limit too cause right now mine is full of my main and alts ?
Great news all week >worst news all week EA's Sim City Fiasco>i didnt preorder or by ,looks like i dodged that bulllet XD

I doubt that they are going to be expanding the charcter limit, everything can't be free and keep the game healthy. If you really like the game it is $10 for a slot I think, 1 time fee, slot never expires, you can delete and reroll the toon. If you enjoy the game and have that many alts is it not worth the cost of 2 burgers to you?

SOE, thanks for the new benifits. personally, the specific ones you unlocked don't do a whole lot for me; i could care less about the race / class stuff for ftp, i think that was a reasonable measure. The bags and shared bank is the most useful thing imho; but again, that was a reasonable limit the way it was. I can understand limiting broker and fabled gear... but, only to a point. i was a multi-year, multi-account subsriber who came back when you first went ftp. i raided very little, but quested a TON! i can't express to you how depressing it was to see that gear i had quested numerous nights for stripped away. i can completely agree that fabled gear that someone just buys would be reasonable to limit for ftp. i can even mostly agree that random drop fabled may be limited... but i COMPLETELY vehemently disagree that after a person completes numerous quests in a quest line with perseverance and dedication to EARN a specific item that can ONLY be gotten by that quest, it should be taken away and not useable!!! Ummm, i thought the name of the game was ever-QUEST?!? Now i have no incentive to quest, because i know, even if i do all the work, i get no reward. As for gear unlockers, well to anyone on a paycheck to paycheck budget (wife and kids with a mortgage, a full time job, and another part time job - i'm not talking mom's basement here ), there is no logic in buying unlockers till you are going to be max level for a while.

As for the broker, i again understand the whole plat seller thing, and the "i'm ftp" thing (although, over the years, including multiple account subscriptions, multiple expansions ... for multiple accounts, i don't have exact numbers, but my best guess puts me at having paid you somewhere between $800 and $1,000! ... so which part of "FTP" is that?), but i still think it would be reasonable (especially for silver accounts) to at least get between 1 and 3 broker slots at a time.

I doubt either of the points i raise would harm your system, and would still allow for unlockers, etc, but would allow silver accounts to not feel totally gimped to the point they can't possibly even come close to the same realm. i do honestly thank you for the changes, i wasn't trying to be sarcastic, they just don't do as much for my personal situation. And i do enjoy the game, just a couple points i wish would be adressed.

Thanks

A few people have used my posts as points to attack me on.. let me try to clarify them up.. I have been with this game since launch.... and yes.. I know it was MY OPTION.. I am not denying that fact.. but now that SoE is unlocking so much for people who do not pay.. .I just think that they could offers some token.. I am not talking money.. maybe a Prestige House or something.. just some gesture as not to say FU to what was their loyal gold members.....

Kody

Silvers in particular DO pay, even when they do not sub. Many many of us paid quite a bit to unlock races and classes. And buy unlocks for master levels of skills and also legendary and higher gear. We buy prestige houses, cosmetic gear, pet illusions, character slots, broker tokens, and even expansions. We are not all freeloaders.

This change will only encourage FtPers to spend more time playing the game and also to spend money on the game. It is a good thing.

That said, it would be nice to see some sort of special loyalty gift to those who have been subbing for a year or more. And yes, there are those gift claim things. But all-access subbers do not get those.

SOE did give things to people who were paying before. Everyone got to keep their race/class combos. We still had access to whatever expansion content we purchased. Some mechanics were taken away, but none of the content was. We even got the veteran rewards clock to keep ticking. SOE couldn't give too much away or it would upset those paying their good money. They had a fine line to walk and while it started off kinda bad, the model has improved. Aside from mail and broker use, I can't think of anything else that would need a look right now. Velious content will probably go free somewhere down the line. AoD could stand to be split into a la carte features.

If silver level forces anything, it forces people to think (about what they really need). When you're gold, you just loot whatever you want and equip if for whatever brief period. It doesn't matter.

I've been playing silver for a couple months now. I don't feel strong-armed into paying for anything. I can spend as much or as little as I want and I'll still do well in the game.

when will this happen

Plavem is just a troll, don't feed him. It's not worth it.

These are good changes to the game. Brings their F2P more in line with their other games. And can attract more players possibly to try the game and stick with it.
Even though I thought it was already pretty good. Any neutral race, and 8 classes is pretty good considering a lot of other MMO's don't even have more than 8 different classes.
Meanwhile, I still think there's plenty of reason to keep paying $15 a mo. for a subscription. There's still perks, and $15 a mo. is pretty cheap for such interactive entertainment.
Since CoE includes DoV, I think the least they could do is make DoV included with free accounts, enough time has passed and that content is pretty obsolete nowadays (CoE should include AoD).

But this is a good step forward.

We haven't announced an official date yet, but the plan is for the middle of next week. When we nail down which day exactly, we'll let you know!

I think the new model for Free to Play is a very smart move. It brings attention back to EQ2 at the same time that newer MMOs are trying to reel new players in. Those newer games (eg Tera/SWTOR) will take a long time to have as much content as this game, plus from what I can tell noone does housing, decorating, and crafting as well as EQ2 (nope, not even Rift ).

In hindsight, I wish I hadn't spent so much station cash in January, unlocking a bunch of classes and races prior to subbing for a year. Nonetheless, in the MMO industry, Free to Play games are jostling to be attractive to new players, and if they're too restrictive and pricey (eg SWTOR), there's a risk that players could get annoyed and leave after a few months.

Re subbing Gold, the only reason I did it was because I want the ability to set how fast I level up. I didn't like that the AA bar was stuck in the middle on Silver. I like to level slowly, and put lots of XP into AAs. Unlocking equipment and paying for Broker tokens didn't affect my decision. I also like the freebies that come with Gold, though I wish we got more Station Cash now that they're making store items so fast!

SM