SOE Punishing High Pay, but Non Members

This. If you are really so interested in helping new players, then do this. In PS1, I would get to level 5-6 just by going into the the VR an trying different vehicles and weapons. Give players 50xp everytime they test a new weapon in the VR, and 100xp for each stage of the tutorial they complete for the first time. That would give 20-30 certs without setting foot into the actual game.

What next? daily bonuses for subscribers only?

His SPM isn't even that good either.

This move just seems miserly and not at all in my interests as a paying player. Frankly, I need the free players. I need them to log in for their 12 certs. Then I need them to get tempted with all the flashy things on the UI and join a fight. Then I've got a game to play. Removing this incentive to them is not in my interest - my future allies and enemies are born from the curious noob who logged in today to buy his new gun sight, had a great experience and came back for more.

The problem with the value of the membership was two fold: Firstly, the early tiers like Copper were stupid and miserly - to get a notable bonus you had to go straight to Auraxium but personally given how MMO developers are habitually capable of pulling a trainwreck out of their hats every six months I prefer to reserve the right to cancel my sub to show my dissatisfaction with directions I dislike. i.e. no multi month subs (the savings are pitiful anyway). But now that Copper gets it's 48 certs a day straight away this problem is solved!

The other issue with membership value was that it was pretty poor value of money. Once server merges reduced play options and queue times became a non-issue it really felt like a modest XP buff and a bit of pocket money for the in game candy shop. But again, it's been solved - expanding membership to other SOE games has drastically boosted the worth of my PS2 sub in my eyes. I mean I don't actually play the other games very much but it's there.

So no, I don't see what this move is supposed to achieve other than annoying the players we need most to make up the numbers so that we have a game to play.

An item being free via Cert Purchase makes no difference. The ONLY distinction is that any "cert available" item you purchase is that you aren't actually buying the item, but rather purchasing the time it would have taken to earn that item with cert points. Never the less, my statement still stands: if you don't feel your purchase is worth the money spent for what you directly received, then you shouldn't have spent the money.

But not every store does that. It's up to the vendor to decide if they want to offer that. And those reward programs require an amount to be spent or a number of transactions before the reward is given.

Conveniently, SOE does have a program like that. It's called "All Access Membership". For just fifteen bucks a month you get all sorts of reward perks, including highly discounted items.

Yeah, I would like to add a bit of feedback here too.

Let's see... I bought 1 month of Planetside to make sure I got a spot in PS2 Beta for $15 (then they decided to give every PS1 player ever access rather than just current subscribers); I bought Alpha Squad for $60; Bought $20 in SC for PS2 three times for another $60 ; Subscribed for 3 months at one point for another $45. Plus other PS2 related purchases I can't recall at this time. And all that gets me exactly 0 consideration in these matters, because I am not a subscriber. Yup, it's so great to support a game and be treated like I am some kind freeloader.

Yet, I paid $60 for Guild Wars 2 and despite many changes over the years, Arenanet hasn't removed any fundimental aspect of that game with the expressed intent of trying to entice me to buy it back.

I dunno, SOE, you folks are just far too slimy for my liking. I spent money on EQ, SWG, EQ2, Vanguard, DCUO, FreeRealms, and PS2, buying boxed games, expansions, and in game items, etc. but never again man. You've shown your true colors and SOE isn't something I have any further interest in supporting (and I feel bad for the good folks that work for such a sleaze ball company).

Never again. Your loss.

Who cares? I mean they upped the cert for playing for the objective, probably makes up for it, if not more..

That is a great idea! Ribbons XP only for members, it will give membership more value.
(/sarcasm)

And what if you can't afford £10 every month. I have rent to pay, bills to pay, I have to buy my own food. All on a part-time, minimum wage job. I'm lucky if my weekly take home exceeds the amount I could earn by claiming benefits. However, every once in a while I have £10. One month of membership would net me 500SC. My £10 gets me 1000SC, if I just by station cash. This allows me to buy more from the store.

As for your comments about how "if you don't feel your purchase is worth the money spent for what you directly received, then you shouldn't have spent the money." I'm paying to try and help fund the game. I could just play for free and unlock everything with CERT, but I want to help SOE, I want to help the devs, I want to see this game continue. That's what I pay for. Not the guns, but for the game itself, and I feel that my payments towards helping this game should include some sort of reward on top of the gun I've just bought. Some form of public recognition. Recognition is meaningless unless it's public. Loyal soldier made that recognition public, and all you got was some camo and a free title. You actually get more from completing the class quiz, but it makes you feel appreciated.

What people are suggesting is a tiered system whereby people get rewards based on what they've paid for. So you have your F2P players, Premium players (those who've purchased SC) and Members. DDO uses this system, If you buy Turbine points then you get rewarded with 2 free character slots, members get four additional character slost and all the P2P dungeons are unlocked for them. I don't see why SOE can't implement a similar system that rewards and recognises people who pay what they can but who can't afford membership.

This isn't about login certs, this is about getting a small reward for supporting the game as best as I can. Or do you believe that I should starve myself to get a reward (the item I've paid for isn't a rewards, it's goods for money spend, a reward is free).

even though i float 9.1k certs right now (NON-BOOST!) and cert gain has certainly become easier than two years ago, removing this login cert reward is a bad move in my view. it not only hurts new player retention and but is also a slap to the face of vets since they'll have less people to play with. if freshly joined players will be less likely to stick around, plan on merging the last remaining servers into one large megaserver and call it WORLD, seriously.. >_>

How about you add value to my sub by actually adding to its value and not nerfing the F2P experience? You are just making people mad with this. People like me who before finally subbing bought tons of station cash.

How about if you bought any SC and spent it on this game, you get the free certs. Even if you only bought a boost or something small. You help support the game in any way you get passive certs.

Yeah it's definitely not why I pay for my membership.

The only real issue I have with it is this appears to only serve as a detriment to the new player experience even though that is not it's intention. The cert gain rate of a new player is substantially different than even a modestly established player. I believe that a lot of them rely on this "welfare" to help them out while they are learning the game.

If you really want membership benefits, I would go with what Malorn said and have non-gamebreaking or overly-critical, but teamwork-oriented consumables that can be combined like implants and used to support squads and organized play. Then you can add benefits like an 25% increased drop chance or something as such to expand the use of membership.

And that entitles you to what?

If you buy a 700 SC pistol, does that mean they should throw in a 700 SC LMG in for free? No it doesn't.

As a Member, I've probably spent nearly $4000 in subscription fees for All Access since it was introduced, SC (mostly for PS2), and expansions to various games. Your $400 isn't very much.

You get only what you pay for. You paid for $400 worth of stuff in PS2, and got $400 worth of stuff. You could have taken that money and got a sub for PS2 for the entire duration of PS2's life plus have enough left over for 7000 SC. But you chose not to.

So tell me why you should have something I paid for, when you didn't pay for it. Because lets be honest. Your $400 is piddly compared to what I've spent. As well as other members I know who have spent far more than I have. So lets not seperate this into tiers based on money spent. You won't like the fact that you're at the bottom tier. You could be at the top tier for only 15 a month as it stands now.

You working a part-time, minimum wage job has nothing to do with SOE, this game, or anyone who plays it. Unless you are medically unable to work, there is no reason to whine about it to anyone actually. If you are truly unhappy about your working life, you'd probably best be served by saving the time spent making certs and instead read an electrician course textbook and enroll yourself in a vocational school.

See? You just got free advice on a free game's forum. Doublefree.

That wasn't very nice.

I dunno, electricians make bank. If I was a bit younger I'd do it. Stuff is hard work but definitely worth it. Classes for it are pretty simple and cheap to take.

And this is what is funny as hell..

DC Universe Online an SOE game has that very tiered level of memberships.

Free, Premium with better benefits if you buy from the store or had a previous membership, and full benefits membership for a subscription

They did it there why not here

Perhaps there are valid reasons for that person only working a minimum wage part time job. To slight the person for that, offering so called "advice" that he may not be able to follow... That was not very nice. In fact I think you will find that it is against the forum guidelines.

He didn't insult the guy. It -might- be slightly off topic. But not really. The concern of the thread has to be with purchased benefits. One could easily obtain such benefits with a great paying job like an electrician.