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Wondering about Item Mall
I have downloaded and played this game a bit, and so far I like it. I'm wanting to continue playing, but I'm always a bit weary about games that boast a F2P model....considering many of them are just fake free and more along the lines are indirectly making you pay for little items, so I come here to ask how this game fairs with such things. What things do you have to buy with real money? Is it things that later on in the game you will NEED? Will it be necessary at some point to fork over some cash? Or is there other/harder ways to obtain the items, but possible?.. I've seen talk about coins that you need to enter higher level dungeons. Do you need to buy things such as that to enter later dungeons? I'm mainly just wondering if it's worth playing or if I will just get involved and be dissapointed later when I find I cannot continue having fun until I pay. Thanks.
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The only gear on the CS is undies and these gatchapon boxes that give a chance at a bunny headband or sunglasses. The stats on the gift box stuff is pretty good, compared to some gear, but gear in general (armor) is of negligible use. The difference in getting swatted by the red tyrant in hard/macha missions whether you have armor or not is usually still instant kill. The undies come wtih +100 def, but you'll never see the difference with or without it. Ever.
The only thing that really costs money that you may "need", depending on how anal you are going to be over the current rationing system for them, is tokens. People buy em, I don't see any reason to, but a lot of people do so that they can grind 8+ hours a day nonstop and not have to switch characters or wait for monday, thursday or saturday. You don't need any special kind to enter special dungeons, at least not yet, who knows... it's Nexon.
Other things that are just handy to have are goddess graces, which let you self rez. I had 20 of them from an OB event and went through them all, even though I wanted to save some for an emergency, but I found out that a total wipe = big whoop. Wastes like 15-20 minutes of your time to get to a hard boss and get wiped, big deal imo.
Really, the only gimmicks in place are the buyable tokens, undies and gatcha boxes. I'd buy undies, but not until they stop being temp-only. So far I've spent a total of 'squat' on this game because I just don't see any real reason to, and until I get perma-undies, it's likely I'll continue to spend jack.
I heard a rumor, though, that they released a +1000 defense item on the CS fairly recently. I haven't looked for it, but that deffo would be a big enough boost to notice. Honestly though, being good at dodging or countering > sucking up a hit anyday... and they don't have any items that will prevent people from sucking yet, so it's no biggie to me still.
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
Now Playing: Skyrim, Wurm Online, Tropico 4
Waiting On: GW2, TSW, Archeage, The Rapture
Yeah, I saw the haircuts were temp and I have alwasy found temp items like that worthless. Though most of what you told me sounds pretty good, nothing ridiculous. I'm not apposed to spending a small amount later, and I may if something big comes on such as the +1000 armor, though I just started, so not for awhile. Can you or someone else explain exactly what the "tokens" that you say are very popular do for you? What can you use them for? You said it's so you can grind for forever, but I'm confused on how that would help you...mainly cause I don't know what they do.
It's a system to limit how many dungeons you can run a week, except if you pay for more.
I don't know the real numbers or if these are all the methods, pricing or if the token cost increases with dungeon difficulty, but basically you can run X dungeons for a period of time, after that you have to either help newbies, pay, play another character or wait until you get more tokens.
You get 50 'silver' tokens 3 times a week, and every dungeon past the first one costs 2 of them per trip, but are only consumed if the boss is downed. So a lot of people farm by running a mission for loot and mining ores, then quit the instance before the boss > repeat.
The amount of tokens per boat ride are raised in intervals at I think the 7th and 12th trip, eventually hitting a max of four. That means you can get anywhere from 16-17 trips in one day, or stretch it to 25 trips across 2-3 days.
There are two kinds of purchasable tokens; platinum and crimson. The both only require one token per trip, regardless of how many silver ones it would cost, but the crimson ones are tradeable and can be bought on the in-game AH (price isn't worth it imo) and the platinum ones give extra XP/gold rewards at the end (I think for every player, and the more that use them adds to the lot consecutively) but cannot be traded.
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
Now Playing: Skyrim, Wurm Online, Tropico 4
Waiting On: GW2, TSW, Archeage, The Rapture
It's not a rumour. It's a 30-day item that was only offered together with the holiday permanent underwear package. It's a fairly significant amount of defense, but at best it'll buy you one more good smack from a boss. The game still boils down to whether or not you can get out of the way while fighting.
I don't particularly like it, as it sets a bad precident for future offerings, but it's really not making any meaningful splash so far.
A Modest Proposal for MMORPGs:
That the means of progression would not be mutually exclusive from the means of enjoyment.
Long Story short.
I will not pay for character Customizations, unless it Requires a GM to help me, not a computer, and a script. (Example a Character Transfer Across Servers)
I will also not pay for Bags, or storage space which does not unlock across all characters on the account.
So therefore I will not play Free 2 Play games that ask for money to pay for costumes, or Bags unless it is a reasonable ammount, and in my opinion all I see is Greed, and this is the reason I will not pay for such. Also Vindictus doesn't have that many people playing lately as I was on it last night at 11:00 my time, and there was hardly anyone on there.
Also most functions of the service, and actual game play is done Peer 2 Peer, not server based, so they save a lot of money from server costs, and other people can obtain your IP address, and other information as the gamei s peer 2 peer the actual Combat after you enter a boat instance is, not the town.
And no it is not a rumor, You can buy a Perm Costume which is $20 I think from the Nexon Item's store which comes with a Necklace, but it only works on one character not across all characters, and you can't change the color or anything, so it isn't worth paying for.
There are qutie a few companies out there adding Micro Transactions to their games, and if they are unreasonable, and feel like a rip-off to me I will not play the game anymore if they refuse to provide it free period, and this is the reason I quit playing Aion, they started adding all these costumes to the game, and character customizations which required Real Money for them, and I refuse to pay for any of that as it should be Free, and if I were the Developer of such a game it would be Free. I do not mind Optional pets/mounts like in World OF Warcraft, or paying for expansions, or Character Transfers though.
Ok, thanks a lot for the replies. That really cleared up a bunch for me. I'll probably keep playing the game a bit on and off for some fun, but won't get serious into it because of the token stuff, but I doubt I'll even use that many anyways so i'm not worried. Thanks a bunch!
Been contemplating a few things everyone has said, and I have a few questions.
1. One person said that you get 50 silver tokens, three times a week. Do you mean that you get 150 silver tokens a week?
2. That same person I believe said that it raises to 4 silver tokens per dungeon. Once it raises to that, does it ever go back down to 2 tokens, or does it always stay at 4 after that?
3. And to elaborate more on the incrementation of the tokens per trip. You said after the 7th and 12th trip i believe. Does that reset every day?
4. Last question, are the tokens stacked upon the ones previously not used? Meaning, if I only play a few dungeons a day, and have about 25 left when I'm getting my next 50, will I now have 75 or will it just set it to 50 again?
Thanks a bunch.
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
Now Playing: Skyrim, Wurm Online, Tropico 4
Waiting On: GW2, TSW, Archeage, The Rapture
Thanks, that answers just about everything I needed to know. I was figuring they weren't stackable because that could get out of hand very quickly and imbalance the economy greatly if a few people came back from long dormant accounts.
I just downloaded this game, too and having to pay for temporary character customization sucks. If it were all permanent and didn't cost so many points I might consider it..But Ew @ how it's set up now.
The cash shop isn't necessary to play the game. The only thing that might force you to break down and buy from the cash shop is for additonal storage. You can buy some fashion related items like hair, underwear, and makeup. You can also buy additional tokens (Which really, as long as you ration your tokens appropriately as tthe free token resets 3 times a week) You can also buy more effiecient HP Potions and if you die in a dungeon you can pay a small amount of NX for a Revive (There are revive items and a revive skill in game but if everyone wipes before being able to use it its pretty useful).
As for people complaining about fashion items being temporary. This is a F2P game, they have to make money somehow and really the only thing that is really limiting about this game is storage, which you can buy permanent chests for ~$10.5 a peice. Which in the grand scheme of things makes this game cheaper than any other F2P game out there i've played. As long as you only keep important items, the 2 chests is fine, but to make things easier i'd probably recommend expanding out to a total of 4 chests atleast. Still, $20 is less than buying a P2P at retail and it'll probably increase your enjoyment of the game alot.