PS2 officially going P2W?

This is a really really bad idea. Not so much because it will have a massive impact on battles, although in a few instances it certainly could, but because it makes the game look like the same kind of P2W terribleness that EA produce. Being able to pay for C4 or a tank that you couldn't otherwise afford is as close to buying kills as it's possible to get.

Buying implants and chargers is getting a bit borderline. I personally wish you'd never implemented implants, partly for this reason. But buying resources is way too far.

not necessarily, i think SOE misinterpreted "Listening to the community" to mean "Listen to the loudest COD kids on the forums" and "Listen to what reddit tells us to do"

I agree about the reddit part, but it wasn't the "COD kids" who kept asking for the biggest, most time consuming changes.

What is this development that you are referring to? Optimization? Lattice system? Hossin? Continent locking? I haven't used these forums in quite a while until recently. So you have to be more specific. I don't partake in incessant weapon balancing "nerf this! nerf that!" complaints. If that is what you are implying? Nor did i ever have the desire for the implementation of things such as implants. Which i am sure must have taken over a lot of their valuable development time given the fact that they had to implement new interface elements along with balancing the gameplay to accommodate such a drastic addition to the game.

Server transfers and rename tokens were requested features long before the game was even released. I know since i was among the people asking for the addition of such services during the testing phase. They could offer it directly through their website. Various other MMO's do. Sadly, with the decline in population and the server merges, these have become a low priority for them.

I dislike the idea of on-demand Nanite refills, I was on the fence about Implant P2W-ness, but the implementation chosen is fine with me. Instead, why not develop the item-recert thing was discussed for so long? Why, just the other day, i lost a sizable number of certs on my TR character due to a confirmed UI bug / issue, and the SOE CSR absolutely refused to assist me. I was encouraged to come post in the roadmap recert thread, and upon searching for it, I found that it was locked! I would like to recommend developing this option, which already has over 2200 +1s. I know i'd pay SC for it.

I'm not a fan of purchasing resource boosts. The comment I saw that describes how I feel was, "why design a brand new resource system, and then let people pay their way around it?".

I feel this detracts from strategic gameplay because if i'm willing to pay for it, my assets are infinitely expendable. MAX units, vehicles, and grenades literally all day long for the low cost of SC.99.

I'm mostly referring to the three continents being redone in addition to Hossin being pulled from a near release last summer to be redone.

It's quite simple.

Money for consumable powerups is a very VERY slippery slope.

We've accepted, grudgingly I might add, chargers for sale because proper use (eg; don't equip T3 outside of high XP gain combat) and good play can see enough chargers that they aren't needed.

Attachments weren't really bad. They don't take many certs in the first place, though it has made us concerned over the possibility of you also selling other non-weapon cert lines for SC (Hint: we would NOT be ok with this... but since this would also shoot yourself in the foot with selling XP boosts, I personally don't think you will)

Resource boosts already act in a sense of P2W giving paying members more consumable resource to pull more vehicles. However, they're at least still limited by their (seriously inflated) income.

If someone can just have a bank of instant nanite consumables, then someone can just constantly keep pulling vehicles or inf consumables without any consideration of the timers. This is a flat out pay to spam option (which as noted, the resource boosts already supply to a slightly more limited extent)

It's not that we're afraid of people actually abusing this for P2W advantage, but MORE worried about how this will affect gaining NEW PLAYERS which this game will depend on to stay alive for years to come. You have to be EXCEEDINGLY careful with what you put up for sale. Anything cosmetic is absolutely fair game and we LOVE it (I think you've seen that with how much crap we've all bought!).

If you implement this you run a VERY high risk of further alienating potential new customers who won't want to play a P2W game. You MUST avoid that label that many of us have taken to defending against but we really have no defense against this proposition whatsoever.... because it IS a form of P2W (as noted, so is the resource boost which really shouldn't exist either TBQH, and it's not even half as bad as this proposition).

Worst yet, is that this won't even really net you more money. People who currently would buy a resource boost would instead spend money on these as needed. Nobody who wouldn't buy a boost would buy these. You already have a recurring income from the people who will give it for extra resources.

Signed,
Ronin
Happily SC dropping crazy member who bought a PC specifically to play this game back in beta

I really can't say this enough, one of the long term goals of the resource revamp was to add in some kind of siege mechanic.

The whole idea of consumables costing nanites on use, instead of there being a quasi-inventory of consumables... That is there to PREVENT people from sidestepping the eventual seige mechanic.

Why then, does insta-filling your nanite supply, which doesn't just kind of sidestep seige mechanics, but blatantly leaps past the seige mechanics... why is this even being considered, if it so obviously goes against something SOE tried to avoid in the game mechanics to begin with?

So, you're basically generalizing by quoting me? I didn't ask for a revamp of those continents nor did i ask for an unfinished version of Hossin.

Back to topic.

My point is, there are plenty of other ways to make a profit besides introducing more of these pay to win mechanics which are obviously turning a lot of people off. Including me. The slight resource/xp boost is certainly a nice incentive to occasionally subscribe as well support the development of the game but it's nothing game breaking nor particularly unfair. A middle ground, if you will. This, however, and the implants that they've recently introduced, most certainly are. They are selling power and are quite blatant about it regardless of their denial. All there is left to do is introduce weapon rentals instead of permanent sales.

DotA2 just made tens of millions of dollars off of something that can only be described as impacting gameplay because one of the reached "goals" was adding a new character that everyone will be able to play, for free.

"We have to sell things that impact gameplay to make more money" doesn't ring true any more, guys.

When it comes down to it, I don't think selling resources itself will fatally damage the game, any more than implants. But why? Why water down a mechanic that could really, truly help the game -like you did with implants- just to possibly make some more money when there's better options the community wants to pay for?

Why are you doing this instead of adding more cosmetic slots? Letting us break up armor pieces? Opening Player Studio to more items? Adding name changes/etc? Starting on weapon skins?

We're not blaming you for trying new ways to make money, we're blaming you for trying new, scummy ways that the community - at best - is ambivalent about, instead of the stuff we've been begging you to let us pay for.

Why?

Well, when we have power, no nanite refills will help them if the base is out of power. They'll need to fall back a base to pull their tank

So I don't see nanite refills affecting that particular siege mechanic.

However it does remove the impact of taking out a Lib if he can endlessly pull them from a base or 2 back, or WG at worst... whereas losing 2 libs in 7 minutes under the new system leaves someone bankrupted of Nanites and waiting on a refill.

I agree with this. There are plenty of customizations I'd buy and enjoy, but honestly there aren't any worth it at the moment. There are three armor choices, all of which pretty much look the same. I pick a camo, only so I look a little different so people I play with can spot me fairly easily. They don't quite lay down right and tend to clash with the colors that can't be turned off. Maybe have some options that aren't just camo, but tell you what your primary and secondary color will be? I understand they may need to remain faction colors, but perhaps variations of those colors?

I notice a lot of people like pumping custom tunes through local... which I certainly don't support as it tears at the ears through the warbled quality voice system, but it seems like highly customized voice packs and particular phrases or quick sounds might sell nicely.

In short, develop the social aspect as you can sell the crap out of social things without killing competitive play. There has got to be some unexplored territory here, particularly with the nature of the other games being developed on the platform that have some great features.

Not to mention, the all access pass seemed to me to have a lot of promise. Having a solid suite of games under a single subscription model. Are there no other meta-game rewards that can be offered to entice people to subscribe? A sub forum with early feature discussion, maybe some special game events, or something? Or heck, how about some purely transport vehicles? No weapons no problem. I could care less if someone is rolling around in a ****** up hover car that just gets them from base to base, priced like the ATV (resources or nanites), but with no special abilities or weapons.

Hmm... surprising censorship of something that wasn't a curse word... "...rolling around in a elaborately-outfitted hover car..." was the gist of that strangely censored sentence.

I am not in favor of any more cash incentives that equate to force multipliers, resource and xp boosts do already make a significant difference when most of your squad have them.

I strongly feel that SOE should be concentrating on things like name/server changes, recertification options, cosmetic options and more passive in game items (ie things that do not directly increase your power or decrease effects of resource fluctuations.

I think deeper outfit customization (maybe ownership of an outfit HQ (think warframe dojo)) would be more constructive for the game than destructive and could be appropriately taxed with the weight of cost for things spread over more people.

I would be happy to pay for gender swaps on a couple of toons. SOE gets money, no in-game effect on other players.

SOE don't listen to them, by all means add this.

I could afford many resource refills/boosts and I will never by one, the only people that will are the hard core games that are will to part
with there cash.

Do you really think it makes any difference if there are 25 instead 20 tanks spawn camping ?

No game can survive with out a development budget to add new content, it simply dies and when it does the people not paying simply move on to the next free game.

It's not even close to pay to win.

And SOE you should offer paid server transfers/cert refunds/name/gender change/character models, your about 10 years behind the rest of the industry as far as this goes.

Let's be honest - as a business, they're gonna try and sell whatever they can get away with.



Don't let them get away with it.

F2P games are great in a short term cash grab, but if you wish to have a long lasting MMO with continuous revenue then you need the subscription model with an initial pay-wall.

Tell blizzard that the F2P model is better....

F2P is good for 1 to 2 years; the issue arises when developers start focusing on consumable content rather than depth/interactive driven content.

Copy-pasting my post on reddit :

You know, if you just stop adding bullsh*t like this and focus on the actual game by fixing bugs, adding content and improving gameplay, you might see an increase in revenue aswell. From people who play the game and have been playing for quite a while, but have cancelled their subscription. Or people who stopped playing because the game only got worse, like my entire friends list after I came back from a 8 month break.

If you go through with this, how long you do think that cash flow is going to last ? Enough time to make a better game and not lose a large % of the player base ? I doubt it.

Maybe you should try a kickstarter campaign, at least that won't steer me towards the uninstall key.

Have you considered different, cheaper cosmetic upgrades ? More individual customization, like for example:
- different color on goggles, shoulder pads, shin-guards, lumifiber, etc ;
- alternate faction specific markings, change layout and placing or shape of ES trim ;
- more places to put a decal, that the player can then choose where and where not ;
- different texture layout on armor ( I know NC infils aren't too happy with their bikini ) ;
- more weapon attachments and weapon customization ( bayonet, different looking magazines, different stocks, convert my pump-action shotgun into a present day looking 12-gauge, etc )

And more in depth and more excessive customization of vehicles, for example :
- rumble seats on a lightning, only purchasable with SC ;
- tires, instead of tracks on lightning + hubcaps etc ;
- turn the harasser into a half-track, more transport oriented than combat ;
- skis on harasser & flash , why drive on esamir when you can ski ! ;
- completely different roles for vehicles, like a mobile shield regen lightning or a 4 rumble seat one only MAXes can use ;
- smoke & flare launchers on vehicles, only enough ammo for one use

I would pay to turn my lighting into a teamplay vehicle or to have a squad of snowmobiles ( THAT DON'T FLIP ) ambushing stuff on esamir. It's my impression that, in mmo games, individualism sells. More customization, more cosmetic choices, more uniqueness.

You can't milk an unhappy cow.