Black Crystallize camo is a Recruiter item

So if you haven't seen it yet, this is the recruiter page:
https://recruit.soe.com/

There are a bunch of really cool recruiter rewards on here. Pretty much every thing on this recruitment program is cooler then whats in the store to but currently. But thats fine, they are nice rewards for those who can bring more people too the game. But there is one thing in particular that caught my eye:
Black Cystalize camo, a.ka "Recon Camo", is an "exclusive" Recruiter reward.
It kind of bugs me that one of the most anticipated items to go to the Planetside 2 shop was put as a recruitment reward. It just kinda feels like a stab in the chest for those of us who have been highly anticipating this camo, as I know a lot of people have. To get the camo, you have to get 10 people, to each spend 10 bucks on the game.

But, you know, whatever, SOE just won't get my money. But heres what really gets to me:
On the PTS, there is a camo coming to the game called Grey Scales Camo
http://imgur.com/a/jZLse#10

Its essentially Black Crystallize or "Recon Camo", but with some gray/silver stripes. The fact that this is being sold as a substitute for those who can't get Black Crystallize (Which imo is still a better looking camo) isn't what gets to me. Its that fact that it is being sold for 1000 SC!

Really SOE, do you have to try to milk us that hard? Doing things like this doesn't make me want to give you more money. It just kind of upsets me, which is something you don't want to do to your paying customers. I was sitting here waiting to throw some money at you, but now, i'm not. I love the game, and am willing to give you money to pay your bills and allow you to continue working on this game, but please, don't do stuff like this.

Supply & Demand.

People think black camo makes any difference what so ever, so they are willing to throw an endless supply of money at it.

Disappointing news.

This could be the new Giraffe. Just the other way around this time.

As an NC/TR , jumping into the middle of +48 Vanus in the middle of the night > Giraffe.

It's not really that it makes a difference, we all just think that black camo looks kinda cool.
And you know, in a world where every camo and paintjob (both default sets and obtainable) are all boring samey woodland, desert and snow camos or obnoxious blue, red or purple ES schemes it isn't really all that strange that so many want to just have a neutral and discrete black camo on their stuff.

Black has always been the most popular color/camo scheme in online gaming, and a lot of companies go way out of their way to not include it in their games because they know that a majority of players would favor that over other options.
Others, like SOE in this case with the referrals and if this thing about the grey scales camo being sold for twice of a normal camo, just milk it.

Fun thing is, that regardless of what people will say now on the forums, people WILL spend 1000 SC for that camo, and some may even go as far as to just make alts and pay extra money just to get the recon camo and other fancy referral items.
Some are just crazy like that.

You want to make subscribing palatable to players, why don't you make this content available to those that actually subscribe? For each month that you remain a subscriber you get access to <insert items here>. Give a reason for people to continue to subscribe from one month to the next. How hard is that? If you reach Auraxium status you get this bundle of items...etc etc.

Sure you get percentage bonuses for xp and such. But you can do a lot more to make your subscriptions appealing versus asking your players to give their free time up to become salesmen for this game, versus leaving that in the hands of your marketing people...

People crave content. Why tie it up in some recruitment package.

We get that nice fish scale camo instead.

Because SOE is much happier with milking subscribers for their pocket change, or pocket dollars, through the daily member sales. It's amazing to see how much they're trying to pull out of the well, so to speak.

This. I would actually subscribe if they made these subscriber benefits. But convincing 10 or more of my friends to spend money on a poorly optimized free to play game? Not gonna happen.

True. One thing about member sales...I can honestly say 98% of the stuff I see in there are items i've already bought, and there are a lot of items I have not. I think I bought a fracture via the member sale. Everything else has been in my inventory already.

Just gotta tell them to ignore all the text stating it's 'FREE TO PLAY!!'...otherwise why the heck would they subscribe? I subscribed because I saw a potentially great PC title, and I wanted to support it. Not everyone works that way though.

Instead of giving the content to one person for convincing others to subscribe, work it into your subscription package to draw in potential subscribers.

So what Camos do the VS and NC get? Pure green and yellow? Or is SOE SERIOUSLY breaking colour rules and letting VS and NC wear TR colours?

Isn't that the test server?.... ... .. .
Wait until it is live and then ***** about it.
For all you know, they just put in 1000 just to do that...

The people who put it out there was like, I bet you 5 bucks, I can cause someone to get pissed at something about the camo and start a forum thread about it.. And the guy was like, you're on!!! and then he was like. lol.

It's on PTS for 1000 SC, you never know how it is going to on live.. Also it's premium EARLY access, just wait till it comes in the store for non-premium players (probably cheaper?).

Is sad by the rewards program >:

Most of us are.

I was hoping to buy the gold wings for my Reaver

You all did this to yourself. SOE never gave any indication that the camo would be put up for sale. People within the community constructed that fantasy. Now they feel betrayed that this fantasy of theirs didn't become reality, and they're stupidly blaming SOE.

We never dreamed they would make it difficult for us to give them money. Our bad.