SOE Punishing High Pay, but Non Members

Excatly this. For a game which already struggles hard to keep new players interested, this is really a dumb move.

They should have 3 levels:

1) Membership.
2) Valued customer (i.e. having spent X amount on the game)
3) F2P

Other F2P MMOs have gone this way and it seems very sensible.

You could add value to it by "adding" something to membership rather than taking away from non membership

Buff or nerf..... SOE went for the nerf

My main issue with membership with SOE games (through an SOE account) was that you had to leave an open card on file to get all the membership benefits (as opposed to most MMOs where you can buy say 6 months and don't need to leave an open auto-renewing card on file to get all the benefits during that 6 months), I'll never do that as it is a silly security issue, one which several MMO have messed up with over the years (including SOE back in the EQ1 days) - although I'm not actually sure if this is the case with the new system (guess I'll have to look into it again).

Pre-paid seemed like a good option (as there was a specific limit to what could be taken off the card)..... but, yeah charges.

In both cases it is not really the cash (over the years I've daftly run up to 4 MMO subs at once, dispite often not having time to really even play one properly ), but more the principle.



Some simple (relatively) changes would get them more members, I think.

Perhaps there should be some other login rewards, like "For the next 2 hours of in-game time, You'll gain a 5% more experience while playing X class/ using Y tool/ For kills with Z weapon group". This would reset on midnight, so that players wouldn't relog every two hours.

So much for the "new player experience".
I recently started a new vs char and that 12 certs were a nice bonus for getting up to a point, were playing is fun again and not just a stupid grind.

you now what else would add value? finishing the game and ending this perpetual beta machine. i never subbed because i was and still am waiting for this to be a feature complete game worth a subscription.
its bad enough companies are making us pay for alpha and beta testing but you guys want us to subscribe to something that is still argueably a beta. some greenlight and kickstarter games that opened a year after PS2 release are closer to feature complete than PS2 is now after almost 3 years.

also your store prices make korean MMO's look like high value/low cost purchases ffs

Awww man, i saw this rage thread coming!!

Well im a member and have been since it has been available, and I personally dont see what you gain from removing the passive cert gain from none members.

The passive certs, while not really important to a "vet" player are a BIIIG deal for the newer guys. If you are going to remove passive cert gain atleast make it smart. Let the new players get a larger amount of passive certs (24 per 24 hours maybe) and then stop this gain at a certain BR (BR 40 maybe).

This give the new players a chance to gear up some stuff a little faster (meaning they will enjoy the game in their early stages), while still giving the "end game" guys an incentive to subscribe.

A blanket stop to these certs, IMHO, is not needed, lazy and shortsighted.

So, here's what I have to say to SOE:
What the living faq, devs? WHAT WILL WE RECEIVE NOW?

You dont even need to do that if your using a credit card. ALL credit cards are guarded against online fraud and also mistaken purchases. You have nothing to worry about with a CC.

8 for a year or month? If 8 for a year is to much for you, i dont know how to help you.

I´m an ex-ProSieben player like you and i have 2 Prepaid-Cards. I have an virtual card from wirecard and it costs me nothing to have it. My second card is a real plastic card from Neteller and it costs me 10€ per YEAR. I dont get poor for 10€ in a year. I can load the cards with my bank account or other payment options. I can pay anything that needs a credit card even in a real store in the city.

"i cant find an prepaid-card!" does not count for me. its not an argument.

As a member myself, i find this very regrettable. I believe this will just antagonize non-regular players, and the excuse in that patch notes about not communicating on it is just bad reasoning: it's not because you don't communicate on it that people don't notice.

Less non-paying players == less players == less fun for members == less members.

I'm usually not all that adamant about things i dislike in games, but removing such little benefit that must be pleasant for the player, incentizing him to log in, thus to play, thus to maybe pay...In the long run, it's just not worth it; as such i think this is a completely idiotic move that will penalize all of us members, and SOE in the end.
Truly a shot in the foot.

That's mostly, but not entirely true, they can max your limit causing other (much more important) bills to bounce and such, and affect your credit score. MMOs have in the past mistakenly removed vast amounts from open cards (SOE included - many years ago admittedly), certainly it was returned in the end, but that doesn't mean it doesn't or can't cause problems.

And of course you've got to notice the issue has happened as well (with the best will in the world I wouldn't notice if a 6 month renewal hit after 5 months etc. just from the CC bill).

The simple solution is to just never leave a card open, as that would require actual targetted fraud and not just a billing issue to cause you a problem - but with SOE if you didn't leave an open card you didn't get all benefits.

How about this , if you play for certain number of accumulate time (1-2 Hour ) you will get the daily certs.

Having a payment bounce due to fraudulant activity on your CC will not decrease your credit raiting or inccur any extra costs.

Any CC company worth its salt will ring your contact number and inform you of strange activity.

I only know this because of a recent fraud on my CC, someone purchased £3000 of iTunes vouchers via my credit card. They maxed it out at that. The company rang me within 5 - 10 minutes of the transactions another 2 minutes after that my balance was correct. I was also in the process of buying a house so was worried about my credit, i was informed that the credit checks themselves would do more damage to my credit raiting than anything that could ever happen to my CC.

Only way to pay that is safer is PayPal.

This was a Barclays Platinum card.

In the end perhaps, but again you've got to go through the whole process, and expect 3rd parties to understand (they probably will, but have no legal need too do so - they aren't responsible).

As opposed to just not leaving a card open.

For example, if not leaving an open card somewhere would have stopped the £3000 being taken in the first place (it wouldn't as that is plain fraud, of course) what would be the best idea?

PayPal's not entirely safe either, they just tell you to go to your bank/CC company if it is over their number of days limit (I know, been there recently).

Leaving an open card is like leaving your front door open, probably (almost certainly) no one is going to try it, but if they do.......

Certainly my opinion is coloured by what I saw happen in the early 2000's with MMO billing, but why take a risk when it is completely avoidable?

Agreed, there should be some sort of middle tier. SW ToR did it simply - you purchase anything with real money even once, you get "preferred" status, not that there was much value in it, but perhaps daily certs could be just that.

Hi, and thanks for your advice, I appreciate it.

It still amounts to something like a 10% charge for something I only really need to continue my PS2 membership. I don't even play any of the other "allaccess" games, and never will, because PS2 is the only one that appeals to me.

I't no biggie though. As I said, I'm going to see how I get on being a F2P player. I might have to wait longer in the queues and my SPM will suffer, but I am now in a place with this game where Certs are not so important to me and I am playing for the pure enjoyment.

Thanks again for your advice

I'm in my fifties. I am not going to bother with pre-paid cards now. Just doesn't appeal to me. £8 is a drop in the ocean to me, now, but I still feel it is too high for something that I don't really need.

I may well change my mind in the future but right now it isn't a problem...

This really isn't an issue. People saying that we were all BR1 at a time need to realize when the folk that made their characters on November 20th had nowhere near the amount of XP thrown at their faces that players do now a days. Want to make a lot of certs real quick? Have you seen have quickly repair/healing ribbons come in? Ribbons in general added a huge buff to Xp and with the changes in this patch players are going to get an even bigger buff to XP, and then the cont underpop XP bonus, players in your squad with boosts/membership XP bonus, the list goes on.