Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Are pay as You go even worth it ?
crazynanny
Member Posts: 173
After reading forums here and official ones I heard so much about hybrid payment being a reasonable thing for people, as it gives a choice to pay as You go or subscribe. Subscription is quite obvious so I want to consider pay as You go.
So payment for all areas and unlocks is more or less cost of what lifetimers(perma VIP) paid. But is it worth it? Considering issue with no sensible swift travels available in turbine store(60 minute one is a joke). This alone makes me feel like 2nd rate customer. Kinda felt bad when questing(epic books) with friend and recognizing I have to trot over Angmar on horse as swifts are no avail. Now if I imagine going to Rivendell from there(like 30 minutes ride) I get kinda annoyed. I thought that quest pack bought = all swifts available.
I sure hope that this will change as basic things like this are nearly gamebreaking and I thought pay as You go was a reasonable option.
Comments
Pay as you go is just that, pay as you go. It should really only be used by 3 types of people. 1) Those that want to check out the game but aren't ready to make an investment in it. 2) Those who are very very casual and don't have much time to play, so they play for an hour here and there and drop in money when they need something. 3) The super cheap who think they should never have to pay for anything and are willing to grind out Turbine points/run everywhere since they don't want to pay for swift travel.
You are NOT supposed to have all the benefits as those who sub unless you pay a significant amount of money, simple as that. If you want swift travel then keep paying for it or sub. Subscription is the smart choice and as people have said on MMORPG a million times, it is about the same cost as going to the movies ONCE in an entire month.
By the time you get to Rivendale and Angmar you will know if the game is worth 50 cents a day top you. If you want all the bells and whistles buy a subscription. If you just want free play or cannot afford that 50 cents then fine, just don't complain cause they don't give you everything the subbers get
I miss DAoC
I am currently free to play and I'm loving it, It's letting me experience the game and have a blast. I will probably sub as I cna see how LOTOR online is one of the most casually friendly games with it's systems and crafting. However if I don't want to play or I get into something else. I can stop paying and keep playing and if I want some featuers I pay for them. I like the idea because it means I can always play the game wether it's my main game or not.
If you are going to play hard and level fast, pay as you go isn't going to work for you. The rate at which you will have to buy content and perks will be expensive therefore a subscription is the way to go.
If you don't play much/level fast then you can likely make F2P be cheaper month to month by a bit. And you can take two weeks to a month off without feeling like you are wasting your money.
It really isn't a tough concept. The problem is that people who like to game several hours a night WANT to not have to pay for their gaming so they keep getting mad when f2p games still cost them money. They don't get the having to pay for entertainment idea.
My take on it is the F2P really works great for casual players. You can basically start the game play at a very slow pace and not pay a dime. Once you get into your 20's then you can drop a minimal amount of money for more content if you haven't acquired enough pts to unlock it for free. It also works great for former subscribers that bought the game. Full access to the game without paying the subscription fee. Everything else is just like it was before, paying subscribers get access to everything.
suppose for a minute you are in the military and subject to being home a week or two, then out to sea for a week or two. Suppose you are in college or med school and can only play a couple of days a week. Suppose you are dead broke with three kids to feed and clothe. May be you just want to play to 30 to see if you like it? It will be great for some people, just because it is not for you does not mean it is bad.
I miss DAoC
It's not about expecting everything for free or being casual or not. It's about if paying as You go is viable at all.
It is a convenience.
Do all the quests in an area and then run to the next area. Amazingly enough this was actually how MMORPGs were played by subscribing customers in the early days. It is not a necessity to be able to hop from point a to point b in 2 seconds.
Thinking that it is a necessity does show your mindset when it comes to MMOs and that you feel you are owed many things simply for playing.
I think the OP is right though. A premium spendign enough money should be on equal eye high with subscriptions, it should be a different model, not a second class customer. But the swift travel issue is really a bit harsh. Its really the only part of the game that significiantly divides VIPs and premium players that are ready to pay, and i just do not see a good reason for it(unlike say the gold limit or trade limits of F2P accounts which do serve a distinct purpose).
This is a problem thats only going to grow, the more people that take Turbines offer and permanently buy questpacks etc, the more people there will be that are willing to pay in principle but will unwilling to subscribe. Its one thing to tell a a new player to do subscription instead of premium content, its quite another to tell a premium member who possibly has already spend hundreds of dollars on the game that he needs to subscribe if he wants a basic gamefeature like swift travel.
It will become a problem in the long run, when we have lots of premium players that are basically stuck with their premium account since they bought so much content it would be economically unviable to subscribe for them. Swift travel needs to be a permanent unlock in the store just like gold limit, bag space or AH slots. If those critical protections against gold farmers/spammers can be permanently unlocked the same should be true for Swift travel.
This will affect all of us, even the lifetimers, when we have to wait 20 min on someone in our group because he has no access to Swift travel. I don't want to be in the position that i have to remove someone from the group or wait 20 min, i can see no good coming from this restriction.
Don't jump down my throat for stating the bleeding obvious , but as a subscriber I generally need to have gained a certain reputation with the local faction & have previously been to my destinations stable-master before I have access to swift travel . Is this not available for F2P players ? If so , then I can understand your frustration .
I have no idea why you are whining about a company giving you the chance to play a AAA MMO to level 50 for the cost of a download. I sure don't see other companies out there doing that.
if you want to play free then take what they give for free instead whining. That is like some homeless person complaining the mashed potatoes are cold and the hamburger patty is not a steak LOL
I miss DAoC
so either buy the swift travel scrolls or go vip for 50 cents a day. Sounds more like you want the lifetime membership than anything else.
I miss DAoC
Just to post my "opinions" I personally think the AH restriction needs loosened some as well as the no trade with money between players. Those two do put a strangle on a f2per who may be a crafter type.
And horses! my goodness! HOw many times has this question been asked,..."Where/how do I get a horse"? Giving a 24 hour horse and then removing it is torture almost. That seems to be the most agonizing play mechanism f2pers get.
Swift travel is gonna be pretty important for a f2per who joins a group 10000 meters away. Tweak is the word of the day.
In all fairness thats how it works in DDO, premium is exactly supposed to be like a lifetime without future content and the 500 TP stipend. Its very likely that premium players would spend a lot more cash than subscribers in the short term, so it makes no sense they should have worse service.
And my point stands, gold limits don't bother me, but swift travel limitations of half your group will affect even VIPs unless you refuse to group with Premium players. Im not trying to say turbine should't get the money, im just saying its imho not a good place for them to earn it. The whole idea of renting swifttravel for 1hr is poorly thought out since there is hardly any need to use swift travel for a whole hour. Even an on use counter would make more sense, i.e. 5 Swift travel rides for xx TP.
But like they said they will tweak things in the store, and looking how well they reacted to beta feedback im sure they will find a solution here that works well.
Well maybe I am looking at it the wrong way, but other than in a few instances I cannot see why anyone would choose pay as you go over a monthly sub if they are going to do anything other than the most casual gameing.
As far as dungeon groups I would think that 99% of the time VIPs are going to do them via the skirmish system these days anyway and thqat is VIP only if I am not mistaken.
I miss DAoC
While I think not allowing swift travel to be fairly strange, it's not as if that is the only means of getting around quickly (or atleast quicker than running).
In store:
- you can buy a mount and riding skill
- you can buy those X amount of time mount tokens
- you can buy a location X map
In game:
- Wardens can port to various locations
- You can set your map to different locations
- Captains can port to various locations and take their group with them? Call the group to them?
And I'm sure there's a few more.
As far as the OP's title, since you don't need every single zone to play, having the option of only buying what you want / when you want totally makes it worth it.
SWG (pre-cu) - AoC (pre-f2p) - PotBS (pre-boarder) - DDO - LotRO (pre-f2p) - STO (pre-f2p) - GnH (beta tester) - SWTOR - Neverwinter
It is not a personal attack at all. There is a group of players out there that feel they deserve all of the conveniences and levesl in a game without paying for it, and that mindset is wrong.
I have done everything in LotRO before, including having a mount, which a f2p player can get. So buy the mount.
The swift travel is a CONVENIENCE not a NEED. In a f2p game conveniences cost money, it's how they make ends meet. It is not trolling to try and make you understand that.
I keep reading in this thread that non subs can't sue swift travel....I'm confused, cause I can. I did have to spend 200ish points to unlock the ride skill, and I hadd to buy the 500 silver started horse as far as mounts go, but I never had a problem with swift travel. I have it, have had it, and still have it.
I personally love the option to permanently unlock parts of the game. Many people have already said it here, but that option really only works well if you like alts a lot or is a casual player. You can obviously kick the crap out of the content in any mmo and rush through zones. I personally have sub'd to many mmo's since the UO deal, and have always felt somewhat pressured to play to get my moneys worth. I no longer feel that pressure with the new model.
I will say I think the terminology mmo's use and what turbine used is creating arguments among players as well. The F2P section of LOTRO is extremely limited. IMO you need to spend a few dollars as you play to unlock the rest of the game, and at which point you arn't a F2P player, you get upgraded (as turbine calls it) a premium player. VIP players are those who sub.
Also note when you buy an expansion, you get ALL its content for free (no sub), period. Good deal to me, maybe not to others. However for those nay sayers, Turbine made a dollar off of me. If they never introduced this model, I wouldn't have picked it up. And yes, I did sub to this game a while ago, but it wasn't worth the sub fee to me. Its certainly worth a piece rate to me, as its gonna take me 2 months til I even finish off the TP I did end up spending.
Honestly not understanding this much, how is subbing better than purchasing areas of the game permanently? People have summed up that to buy all the zones for the original game minus expacs is only $53(which I have MoM already). That's less than 4 month's of paying for a sub, a sub is monthly therefore after 4 month's your permanently saving money since you have the zones. The only real benefit a sub gets is swift travel, everything else is unlockable and you will technically save money in the long run if you don't sub, especially if you play lots of alts(like I do).
As for the topic, I really dont think swift travel is a big deal at all. I could care less if I have it, I can take my time exploring the world better and watch as I ride. Back in EQ days you could not "swift travel" anywhere lol, you had to walk to where you needed to go. If it was on the other side of the world you had at least a 5 hour walk to get there(prior to whichever of the thousand expansions that game had that added the portals).
--------------------
-Currently playing FFXIV, and BDO.
this might be a dumb question but if you sub for a month, is swift travel, extra character slots, etc unlocked permenently? If so that would be cheaper than buying the scrolls, character slots etc wouldn't it?
I miss DAoC
Your lack of swift travel is *inconvenience* for *other* players, that are *paying* customers. Similar deal with auctions. Got it now? Care should be taken to make "convenience" items have most effect on yourself and minimum negative effect on others.
And in case you missed it, LOTRO went F2P so we are discussing F2P because that is kinda contemporary topic. Not the fate of aging P2P games, not some obsolete half-truth that nothing is free (mother's love is genuinely free, and many AAA films are broadcasted for free nowadays) or how selling packs works in GW/DDO when in LOTRO it is minor part of the model.
It is decent game, it has good production values, great IP, well working engine, nice community, it makes for generous free trial but game-play is lacking, the MMO grind is too obvious and cash shop is daytime robbery and grasping at straws.
Simply put, they just made good game worse and more expensive and that bugs me because it is what I dislike about the whole F2P business, not the "revolutionary" idea of selling product instead of service.