things like faster exp for paying extra are exactly why we are all here. we are tired of Pay-to-Win games where not everyone is on equal footing. where you can pay extra for an easymode game and easily pass the better players in terms of achievement just because you payed more.
Exmortis said:
Vortikai said:
Just reiterating that it is a really bad idea to gather the opinions of us investors as we are only a small part of the larger target audience. We are a bit different in that we have some money to invest in the game. Wait until Pantheon has larger investors who can give adequate advice for the business model of the game before changing anything.
The whole "we need to charge more because it is a niche game. And if they don't like paying $25/mo, then they can not play, because that means faster ticket response times!" rhetoric is beyond "unwise" and really bad for the community.
We are not Investors we are donaters and supporters. Please be ware that there is a massive distinction between investors and us, we have given of our free will money to support the game development, we are not financial investors getting a return on our investment of the game makes a profit.
Yes you have invested money, but we are donaters or supporters.
I typed that on my phone and forgot to move the "us" around. If you read my other post, you can clearly see I make the distinction.
Hieromonk said:
Vortikai said:
Niien said:
Vortikai said:
Oh, sorry. I meant that as a response to the OP and Brad's question. Have a good game first with major investors giving financial advice before you start charging even more than planned (else it end up like the TESO nightmare).
Haha, that's funny... you know what they will say... dumb it down so you can bring it X number of more people for X number of months to grab as much cash as you can grab at once and then dumb it X number of months later to a FTP model. Companies are all about money and profit all companies want to continue to grow because they and the people that run them are greedy.
There is no dumbing down, or I should say, that is not what investors or parent companies demand of the games or why those are failures. The only problem is when investors demand a subscription based game to be published before it is ready (Vanguard, TESO) which ultimately kills the game.
Also the dev team has an understanding that the chances of this game being published are low without investor support. Those investors will not think highly of a game that has fewer people playing it because of a higher-than-market rate for subscription fees. It's a bad business move.
Investor see their Return On Investment (ROI) as quicker, when they see people willing to pay $20/month for Brad's brand, than people wanting to pay nothing for SOE's brand.
Pantheon will have zero problems getting investors. It is choosing the right ones, that VRi will have a difficult time with.
They don't see this when the price is too high, and our opinions should not reflect those of the target niche audience in this (and only this) regard, since we are people who are willing to donate money.
Sevens said:
Vortikai said:
Niien said:
Vortikai said:
Oh, sorry. I meant that as a response to the OP and Brad's question. Have a good game first with major investors giving financial advice before you start charging even more than planned (else it end up like the TESO nightmare).
Haha, that's funny... you know what they will say... dumb it down so you can bring it X number of more people for X number of months to grab as much cash as you can grab at once and then dumb it X number of months later to a FTP model. Companies are all about money and profit all companies want to continue to grow because they and the people that run them are greedy.
There is no dumbing down, or I should say, that is not what investors or parent companies demand of the games or why those are failures. The only problem is when investors demand a subscription based game to be published before it is ready (Vanguard, TESO) which ultimately kills the game.
Also the dev team has an understanding that the chances of this game being published are low without investor support. Those investors will not think highly of a game that has fewer people playing it because of a higher-than-market rate for subscription fees. It's a bad business move.
Investors or Parents companies do not demand games to be dumbed down, this is true...what they do demand is a maximum return on their investment so the game HAS to appeal to as large an audience as possible thereby forcing the devs to dumb the game down.
Yup, this could happen. More likely though they just push the game out ASAP to start reaping the benefits of a sub-based game, which turns it into a TESO/SWoTR/Vanguard situation.
Also doesn't help when investors see we are a niche game considering charging $25/mo which means even less people interested in it than a $15/mo game. Incoming player growth will remain slow since all other MMOs on the market have sub-$15 subscriptions, while players in the game can likely unsubscribe after a while (not us, since we all love the game enough to pledge). It's just not sustainable. It's not something they would want. *shrug*
I am, however, all in favor with providing more options/payments at a higher tier, though I don't know on what basis (I am not so sure about premium subscriptions). The radiohead post sat really well with me in that regard. I just don't think it would be good for the community to set access to the game's content on such a higher-than-market MMO subscription price.
Exmortis said:
Sevens said:
The problem I have with the vanity store is that those items should be going to TSers to support the in game economy. Devs start designing for the store and the game suffers.
Yes but keep in mind one thing, you can make more money from the cash shop than it costs to add items to it, especially if you do it right.
My idea for the perfect cash shop:
When designing craftable items for fluff in game, design slight variations, make some cratable and some cash shop. Take housing items, lots of people love housing items, and if your going to design 10 tables for crafters to make, design 15, add 5 unique ones to the cash shop. You have supported the game, supported crafters, and added items that can make the game extra cash. the cost of making 5 extra tables will easily be recovered by the money made.
I would love to dyes in game for armor and boat sails and window curtains, as examples. But this is fluff, so make the dyes purchasable in the cash shop fully tradable and have to be used when the item is crafted by a crafter. Again you have supported the game by adding the ability to color armor, but you also supported the crafter as it must be crafted armor and done at the time of creation. The dyes will make money for the game.
You want to add particle effects to weapons, treat it the same as the armor dye.
I can name hundreds of examples, each changes the game zero from a game play perspective, however each one has the potential to income earners for the game. In fact each one of my examples was purposely used to both support in game play, and the cash shop with out affecting the gameplay. having red armor or a cool table in your house affect the out come of the next fight zero, but both can be cool.
I hate F2P, P2P and every other name for it, nothing makes me happier, than to know Pantheon will be a subscription game. However I am also not an idiot and I Know Pantheon is a niche game and will need every possible income avenue, and done right an in game cash shop can support the gameplay and its financial status with out ruining either as well. We all seem to know this too, as this sort of thread/dicussion has come up before.
The secret is the Dev team and management keeping the cash shop out of the realm of changing the game play. No XP pots, No potions, no items beyond appearance items that have no stats, no keys for stupid lock boxes. Keep it to fluff, or vanity items, fun things like illusions.
One last item, make monthly subs a buyable, tradable item at the cash shop. If people have the time to grind away and pay with in game currency, and there are those with the extra cash, why not? At the end of the day VRI gets the money for the sub. This is not new, Eve proved this to be a huge boon to the sub model.
I had three vanguard accounts, and will likely have at least three for Pantheon. I split my harvesters and crafters between accounts equally. In Vanguard crafters had dependancies, so I want to make a magic weapon and realize I am out of gems (In VG weaponsmiths had to use a refined gem with the upgrade process along with a rare or ultra-rare resource), I can log my artificer on my lappy and blast off a few gems for the process. I have no issue paying 20 or 25 bucks per account.
One thing to remember, I am hoping VRI gives reduced prices for longer subs, if its 20 bucks per month, make it 19 a month if you buy three at a time, pay 17ea for six months and maybe 15ea if you buy a year at a time.
Given his idea^:
A close-knit Clan might want to "distinct" themselves from others, since they are only a few, but very close guild. So, in a Clan discussion, they have decided to upgrade & buy the premium line of cloaks, With rare inks & markings & fabric, etc.
Cost $34 each, for all to have the same, rare-looking cloak.
But a rare looking cloak is nothing, without a Clan insignia, or a Guild Crest, etc..
I suspect many guilds & clans would like to be distinctive (within lore), and have their own coat of arms. These could be player driven & designed, but has a monetary cost for submitting, etc. This is a very chin up, safe & distinctive way for VRi to make additional revenues.
Heck, for lore's sake, it might even be a month long process, so it ends up being like a quest, in game.
To register your Logo with VRi: What if..?
$200 for Guild
$100 for Clan
$50 for family/tribe, etc.
I would love to see how far some Guilds would go, to create their Crest. Nothing wrong with monetizing any of it.
Vortikai said:
Yup, this could happen. More likely though they just push the game out ASAP to start reaping the benefits of a sub-based game, which turns it into a TESO/SWoTR/Vanguard situation.
Also doesn't help when investors see we are a niche game considering charging $25/mo which means even less people interested in it than a $15/mo game. Incoming player growth will remain slow since all other MMOs on the market have sub-$15 subscriptions, while players in the game can likely unsubscribe after a while (not us, since we all love the game enough to pledge). It's just not sustainable. It's not something they would want. *shrug*
I am, however, all in favor with providing more options/payments at a higher tier, though I don't know on what basis (I am not so sure about premium subscriptions). The radiohead post sat really well with me in that regard. I just don't think it would be good for the community to set access to the game's content on such a higher-than-market MMO subscription price.
Yes, charging more for your product does indeed eliminate a massive swath of people who will no longer buy your product. And thank God! That is the point, as you are selling a premium product. This is not a korean grind house trying to ask for $25/month, but a game world with a story told by one of the genre's legends.
Yes, the idea is too eliminate 8 million, of the 12 million WoW players, from ever considering your premium game. So out of the 4 million left, who can afford a Premium MMORPG, that 200,000 of them will be interested in Pantheon. The idea that more is better, doesn't apply... better is better.
Also, people don't shop their MMORPG's solely based on price.
Please keep in mind, that @ $25/month, Pantheon only needs 85,000 players for 5 years to be a major success.
Lastly, I do know a lot about business and investing & have already explained to you, what an investor would look at. This game will not be released for about 3 more years & is not even in pre-alpha. The people who gravitate towards meta-games like this and EVE are people with disposable incomes. I spend more on coffee than I do on MMORPGs.
Hieromonk said:
Exmortis said:
Sevens said:
The problem I have with the vanity store is that those items should be going to TSers to support the in game economy. Devs start designing for the store and the game suffers.
Yes but keep in mind one thing, you can make more money from the cash shop than it costs to add items to it, especially if you do it right.
My idea for the perfect cash shop:
When designing craftable items for fluff in game, design slight variations, make some cratable and some cash shop. Take housing items, lots of people love housing items, and if your going to design 10 tables for crafters to make, design 15, add 5 unique ones to the cash shop. You have supported the game, supported crafters, and added items that can make the game extra cash. the cost of making 5 extra tables will easily be recovered by the money made.
I would love to dyes in game for armor and boat sails and window curtains, as examples. But this is fluff, so make the dyes purchasable in the cash shop fully tradable and have to be used when the item is crafted by a crafter. Again you have supported the game by adding the ability to color armor, but you also supported the crafter as it must be crafted armor and done at the time of creation. The dyes will make money for the game.
You want to add particle effects to weapons, treat it the same as the armor dye.
I can name hundreds of examples, each changes the game zero from a game play perspective, however each one has the potential to income earners for the game. In fact each one of my examples was purposely used to both support in game play, and the cash shop with out affecting the gameplay. having red armor or a cool table in your house affect the out come of the next fight zero, but both can be cool.
I hate F2P, P2P and every other name for it, nothing makes me happier, than to know Pantheon will be a subscription game. However I am also not an idiot and I Know Pantheon is a niche game and will need every possible income avenue, and done right an in game cash shop can support the gameplay and its financial status with out ruining either as well. We all seem to know this too, as this sort of thread/dicussion has come up before.
The secret is the Dev team and management keeping the cash shop out of the realm of changing the game play. No XP pots, No potions, no items beyond appearance items that have no stats, no keys for stupid lock boxes. Keep it to fluff, or vanity items, fun things like illusions.
One last item, make monthly subs a buyable, tradable item at the cash shop. If people have the time to grind away and pay with in game currency, and there are those with the extra cash, why not? At the end of the day VRI gets the money for the sub. This is not new, Eve proved this to be a huge boon to the sub model.
I had three vanguard accounts, and will likely have at least three for Pantheon. I split my harvesters and crafters between accounts equally. In Vanguard crafters had dependancies, so I want to make a magic weapon and realize I am out of gems (In VG weaponsmiths had to use a refined gem with the upgrade process along with a rare or ultra-rare resource), I can log my artificer on my lappy and blast off a few gems for the process. I have no issue paying 20 or 25 bucks per account.
One thing to remember, I am hoping VRI gives reduced prices for longer subs, if its 20 bucks per month, make it 19 a month if you buy three at a time, pay 17ea for six months and maybe 15ea if you buy a year at a time.
Given his idea^:
A close-knit Clan might want to "distinct" themselves from others, since they are only a few, but very close guild. So, in a Clan discussion, they have decided to upgrade & buy the premium line of cloaks, With rare inks & markings & fabric, etc.
Cost $34 each, for all to have the same, rare-looking cloak.
But a rare looking cloak is nothing, without a Clan insignia, or a Guild Crest, etc..
I suspect many guilds & clans would like to be distinctive (within lore), and have their own coat of arms. These could be player driven & designed, but has a monetary cost for submitting, etc. This is a very chin up, safe & distinctive way for VRi to make additional revenues.
Heck, for lore's sake, it might even be a month long process, so it ends up being like a quest, in game.
To register your Logo with VRi: What if..?
$200 for Guild
$100 for Clan
$50 for family/tribe, etc.
I would love to see how far some Guilds would go, to create their Crest. Nothing wrong with monetizing any of it.
If you are paying for the privilege of designing and then importing into the game an insignia or coat of arms I would be okay with that. My problem is when dev resources are diverted from the game (and making tradeskill items are part of the game) and put to making stuff for the store. House items, apperance clothes, cool looking weapon skins should all be tradeskill items and not on the store
Took a bit to read through all this here and it's a lot of good ideas. I'm late to the party - but we had a similar discussion about a month ago in this thread:
https://www.pantheonrotf.com/forums/topic/1625/my-pod-cast-opening-thoughts
I'll paste my first thought I had there below:
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I don't think it's as much to the general population can't afford $15 dollars per month, or $20 per month, or $30 per month (unless they're on a extremely tight fixed budget), it's rather, a matter of principle, the idea that "I am not going to pay that much for a game."
You can make the argument that people need to look at it as a form of entertaiment rather than a game, but many won't buy it. $180 a year, $240 a year, $360 a year, etc + a $39.99 or $49.99 original box/download is an expensive game. Yes, you may convince some of the hardcore EQ/VG crowd to look at it as cheap entertaiment, but this game will need more than just than only that crowd to be initially successful and to maintain that success (although that doesn't mean to change the tenets).
If you have the subscription too high, people won't buy/subscribe which will make profits lower. If subscription isn't high enough, Pantheon potentially may not be profitable. If your subscription is too high, the expectations will be sky high that the game will be perfect or content will be contually pumped out - and if that expectation is not met, you may lose that player anyway (thus losing that higher subscription). I think it would be a bad idea like Xonth said to charge more than 14.99 a month or at the very least 19.99 a month with 3 month, 6 month, and yearly packages etc. that drop down the rate to 18.99, 16.99 and 14.99 a month.
Pantheon will be one of the few, if not the only subscription model game available in 2017, and I don't think it would be a great idea to try to make it the most expensive subscription model game ever released when there are so many other free (although terrible) options at F2P.
Raidan said:
Took a bit to read through all this here and it's a lot of good ideas. I'm late to the party - but we had a similar discussion about a month ago in this thread:
https://www.pantheonrotf.com/forums/topic/1625/my-pod-cast-opening-thoughts
I'll paste my first thought I had there below:
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I don't think it's as much to the general population can't afford $15 dollars per month, or $20 per month, or $30 per month (unless they're on a extremely tight fixed budget), it's rather, a matter of principle, the idea that "I am not going to pay that much for a game."
You can make the argument that people need to look at it as a form of entertaiment rather than a game, but many won't buy it. $180 a year, $240 a year, $360 a year, etc + a $39.99 or $49.99 original box/download is an expensive game. Yes, you may convince some of the hardcore EQ/VG crowd to look at it as cheap entertaiment, but this game will need more than just than only that crowd to be initially successful and to maintain that success (although that doesn't mean to change the tenets).
If you have the subscription too high, people won't buy/subscribe which will make profits lower. If subscription isn't high enough, Pantheon potentially may not be profitable. If your subscription is too high, the expectations will be sky high that the game will be perfect or content will be contually pumped out - and if that expectation is not met, you may lose that player anyway (thus losing that higher subscription). I think it would be a bad idea like Xonth said to charge more than 14.99 a month or at the very least 19.99 a month with 3 month, 6 month, and yearly packages etc. that drop down the rate to 18.99, 16.99 and 14.99 a month.
Pantheon will be one of the few, if not the only subscription model game available in 2017, and I don't think it would be a great idea to try to make it the most expensive subscription model game ever released when there are so many other free (although terrible) options at F2P.
This has been my chant since the announcement of the KS. I'm all for designing it for the core audience, and I'm all for supporting VRI as much as I can. But at the same time VRI is a business and any wrong decision one way or the other can limit current interest and growth. Even if the game is designed for the CORE group, We don't know if every VG and EQ player will migrate to it. So without actually having a confirmed 25-50k users, they need to keep finding ways to attract players in. Which sadly enough, they need to mirror other similar games such as wow. If VRI charges $20 bucks, it makes other games shine even more.
Sevens said:
Hieromonk said:
Exmortis said:
Sevens said:
The problem I have with the vanity store is that those items should be going to TSers to support the in game economy. Devs start designing for the store and the game suffers.
Yes but keep in mind one thing, you can make more money from the cash shop than it costs to add items to it, especially if you do it right.
My idea for the perfect cash shop:
When designing craftable items for fluff in game, design slight variations, make some cratable and some cash shop. Take housing items, lots of people love housing items, and if your going to design 10 tables for crafters to make, design 15, add 5 unique ones to the cash shop. You have supported the game, supported crafters, and added items that can make the game extra cash. the cost of making 5 extra tables will easily be recovered by the money made.
I would love to dyes in game for armor and boat sails and window curtains, as examples. But this is fluff, so make the dyes purchasable in the cash shop fully tradable and have to be used when the item is crafted by a crafter. Again you have supported the game by adding the ability to color armor, but you also supported the crafter as it must be crafted armor and done at the time of creation. The dyes will make money for the game.
You want to add particle effects to weapons, treat it the same as the armor dye.
I can name hundreds of examples, each changes the game zero from a game play perspective, however each one has the potential to income earners for the game. In fact each one of my examples was purposely used to both support in game play, and the cash shop with out affecting the gameplay. having red armor or a cool table in your house affect the out come of the next fight zero, but both can be cool.
I hate F2P, P2P and every other name for it, nothing makes me happier, than to know Pantheon will be a subscription game. However I am also not an idiot and I Know Pantheon is a niche game and will need every possible income avenue, and done right an in game cash shop can support the gameplay and its financial status with out ruining either as well. We all seem to know this too, as this sort of thread/dicussion has come up before.
The secret is the Dev team and management keeping the cash shop out of the realm of changing the game play. No XP pots, No potions, no items beyond appearance items that have no stats, no keys for stupid lock boxes. Keep it to fluff, or vanity items, fun things like illusions.
One last item, make monthly subs a buyable, tradable item at the cash shop. If people have the time to grind away and pay with in game currency, and there are those with the extra cash, why not? At the end of the day VRI gets the money for the sub. This is not new, Eve proved this to be a huge boon to the sub model.
I had three vanguard accounts, and will likely have at least three for Pantheon. I split my harvesters and crafters between accounts equally. In Vanguard crafters had dependancies, so I want to make a magic weapon and realize I am out of gems (In VG weaponsmiths had to use a refined gem with the upgrade process along with a rare or ultra-rare resource), I can log my artificer on my lappy and blast off a few gems for the process. I have no issue paying 20 or 25 bucks per account.
One thing to remember, I am hoping VRI gives reduced prices for longer subs, if its 20 bucks per month, make it 19 a month if you buy three at a time, pay 17ea for six months and maybe 15ea if you buy a year at a time.
Given his idea^:
A close-knit Clan might want to "distinct" themselves from others, since they are only a few, but very close guild. So, in a Clan discussion, they have decided to upgrade & buy the premium line of cloaks, With rare inks & markings & fabric, etc.
Cost $34 each, for all to have the same, rare-looking cloak.
But a rare looking cloak is nothing, without a Clan insignia, or a Guild Crest, etc..
I suspect many guilds & clans would like to be distinctive (within lore), and have their own coat of arms. These could be player driven & designed, but has a monetary cost for submitting, etc. This is a very chin up, safe & distinctive way for VRi to make additional revenues.
Heck, for lore's sake, it might even be a month long process, so it ends up being like a quest, in game.
To register your Logo with VRi: What if..?
$200 for Guild
$100 for Clan
$50 for family/tribe, etc.
I would love to see how far some Guilds would go, to create their Crest. Nothing wrong with monetizing any of it.
If you are paying for the privilege of designing and then importing into the game an insignia or coat of arms I would be okay with that. My problem is when dev resources are diverted from the game (and making tradeskill items are part of the game) and put to making stuff for the store. House items, apperance clothes, cool looking weapon skins should all be tradeskill items and not on the store
Not sure what you are saying, or asking.
The Developers would already have, all these things in game, and would not have to develop moAr stuff... just to make dyes, insignias, etc appear @ Kings Korner Armory.(ie: my version of VRi's Aesthetic shop)
You still have to buy/find your own Cloak. You can still use player made dyes and none of anything changes. Just that some inks & dyes will only be sold by the King's Court (VRi).
As for Guild, Clan, Family insignias...
You can design them in Microsoft Paint if you want... Pay the $200 and submit it to VRi for approval... AFTER you do the in-game quest of talking to the Kingdom's Regent, etc.
But as mentioned, I can only imagine the type of Guild Crest designed by some people/clans/guilds, specially with someone like Monty's talent. Many Guilds have some good graphic artists.
Hieromonk said:
Sevens said:
Hieromonk said:
Exmortis said:
Sevens said:
The problem I have with the vanity store is that those items should be going to TSers to support the in game economy. Devs start designing for the store and the game suffers.
Yes but keep in mind one thing, you can make more money from the cash shop than it costs to add items to it, especially if you do it right.
My idea for the perfect cash shop:
When designing craftable items for fluff in game, design slight variations, make some cratable and some cash shop. Take housing items, lots of people love housing items, and if your going to design 10 tables for crafters to make, design 15, add 5 unique ones to the cash shop. You have supported the game, supported crafters, and added items that can make the game extra cash. the cost of making 5 extra tables will easily be recovered by the money made.
I would love to dyes in game for armor and boat sails and window curtains, as examples. But this is fluff, so make the dyes purchasable in the cash shop fully tradable and have to be used when the item is crafted by a crafter. Again you have supported the game by adding the ability to color armor, but you also supported the crafter as it must be crafted armor and done at the time of creation. The dyes will make money for the game.
You want to add particle effects to weapons, treat it the same as the armor dye.
I can name hundreds of examples, each changes the game zero from a game play perspective, however each one has the potential to income earners for the game. In fact each one of my examples was purposely used to both support in game play, and the cash shop with out affecting the gameplay. having red armor or a cool table in your house affect the out come of the next fight zero, but both can be cool.
I hate F2P, P2P and every other name for it, nothing makes me happier, than to know Pantheon will be a subscription game. However I am also not an idiot and I Know Pantheon is a niche game and will need every possible income avenue, and done right an in game cash shop can support the gameplay and its financial status with out ruining either as well. We all seem to know this too, as this sort of thread/dicussion has come up before.
The secret is the Dev team and management keeping the cash shop out of the realm of changing the game play. No XP pots, No potions, no items beyond appearance items that have no stats, no keys for stupid lock boxes. Keep it to fluff, or vanity items, fun things like illusions.
One last item, make monthly subs a buyable, tradable item at the cash shop. If people have the time to grind away and pay with in game currency, and there are those with the extra cash, why not? At the end of the day VRI gets the money for the sub. This is not new, Eve proved this to be a huge boon to the sub model.
I had three vanguard accounts, and will likely have at least three for Pantheon. I split my harvesters and crafters between accounts equally. In Vanguard crafters had dependancies, so I want to make a magic weapon and realize I am out of gems (In VG weaponsmiths had to use a refined gem with the upgrade process along with a rare or ultra-rare resource), I can log my artificer on my lappy and blast off a few gems for the process. I have no issue paying 20 or 25 bucks per account.
One thing to remember, I am hoping VRI gives reduced prices for longer subs, if its 20 bucks per month, make it 19 a month if you buy three at a time, pay 17ea for six months and maybe 15ea if you buy a year at a time.
Given his idea^:
A close-knit Clan might want to "distinct" themselves from others, since they are only a few, but very close guild. So, in a Clan discussion, they have decided to upgrade & buy the premium line of cloaks, With rare inks & markings & fabric, etc.
Cost $34 each, for all to have the same, rare-looking cloak.
But a rare looking cloak is nothing, without a Clan insignia, or a Guild Crest, etc..
I suspect many guilds & clans would like to be distinctive (within lore), and have their own coat of arms. These could be player driven & designed, but has a monetary cost for submitting, etc. This is a very chin up, safe & distinctive way for VRi to make additional revenues.
Heck, for lore's sake, it might even be a month long process, so it ends up being like a quest, in game.
To register your Logo with VRi: What if..?
$200 for Guild
$100 for Clan
$50 for family/tribe, etc.
I would love to see how far some Guilds would go, to create their Crest. Nothing wrong with monetizing any of it.
If you are paying for the privilege of designing and then importing into the game an insignia or coat of arms I would be okay with that. My problem is when dev resources are diverted from the game (and making tradeskill items are part of the game) and put to making stuff for the store. House items, apperance clothes, cool looking weapon skins should all be tradeskill items and not on the store
Not sure what you are saying, or asking.
The Developers would already have, all these things in game, and would not have to develop moAr stuff... just to make dyes, insignias, etc appear @ Kings Korner Armory.(ie: my version of VRi's Aesthetic shop)
You still have to buy/find your own Cloak. You can still use player made dyes and none of anything changes. Just that some inks & dyes will only be sold by the King's Court (VRi).
Paying extra to have YOUR design brought into the game is fine..I can see that
My problem is having dev resources going to make items for the store...If you take a look at the cash shop in EQ2 90% of that stuff should be in game for the tradeskillers (house item, furniture, non combat clothes...etc etc etc) the other 10 percent (mounts and stuff) should be in game as a gold sink to help fight mudflation or as rewards for long and challenging quest. Cash shops need a constant rotation on new and exciting items to be sold so the devs design items for the store and NOT the game...I think this is a subject we will have to agree to disagree as I believe that F2P and cash shops are my #1 most hated features of any game.
You are envisioning an actual STORE with actual items.
My idea is all in-game driven, except the final cost, is in $USD. You can flip, rotate view you pre-applied colors, but when you want to make them permanent and final, it is time to fork over some CASH.
Insignias have been around forever and many MMOs have allowed you to import your own, I am asking VRi to put a COST on that.
Secondly, there are no ITEMS in my idea of a store.
You can't buy anything PHYSICAL in a Pantheon store, you can only ALTER an items appearance. Color is not an item, it is not tangible. There is zero developer cost, in taking a hue (color) and making it only available through direct purchase.
Hieromonk said:
You are envisioning an actual STORE with actual items.
My idea is all in-game driven, except the final cost, is in $USD. You can flip, rotate view you pre-applied colors, but when you want to make them permanent and final, it is time to fork over some CASH.
Insignias have been around forever and many MMOs have allowed you to import your own, I am asking VRi to put a COST on that.
Secondly, there are no ITEMS in my idea of a store.
You can't buy anything PHYSICAL in a Pantheon store, you can only ALTER an items appearance. Color is not an item, it is not tangible. There is zero developer cost, in taking a hue (color) and making it only available through direct purchase.
Yeah, I could deal with that...paying to import you own Coat of arms or insignia is a cool idea
Just no "store" as are in all other games (not sure about Eve)
Sevens said:
Hieromonk said:
You are envisioning an actual STORE with actual items.
My idea is all in-game driven, except the final cost, is in $USD. You can flip, rotate view you pre-applied colors, but when you want to make them permanent and final, it is time to fork over some CASH.
Insignias have been around forever and many MMOs have allowed you to import your own, I am asking VRi to put a COST on that.
Secondly, there are no ITEMS in my idea of a store.
You can't buy anything PHYSICAL in a Pantheon store, you can only ALTER an items appearance. Color is not an item, it is not tangible. There is zero developer cost, in taking a hue (color) and making it only available through direct purchase.
Yeah, I could deal with that...paying to import you own Coat of arms or insignia is a cool idea
Just no "store" as are in all other games (not sure about Eve)
That is the idea...
Haven't read each and every post but the I'll throw in my 2 coppers anyway.
First:
Personally I like the subscription games, mostly because you don't get as many of the disruptive elements amongst the community.
When a game is free to play, it's easy for people to jump in, play 2-10 hours and then start to whine (since many of these people have a great need to do this instead of just accepting that this wasn't for me and just go away).
In my experience (started playing EQ at launch as my first mmorpg and played MUDs before that... so yes I'm old) the community is much better in subscription games.
Secondly:
The size of the fee is not that important to me but I can agree that a too steep fee could make it hard to attract players. I would even suggest that you could have a lower feee the first month or so and then start paying the full fee (just be up front with this from the start).
Thirdly:
The size of the fee depends much on the quality and quantity of the content in the game. I would like to go back to early EQ when one of the points was that all content was available in the sense that everyone could reach it if they managed to reach it (no gated content that was hidden behind "artificial" keys and other nonsense...everyone knew this was a timesink to buy time before the next content release anyway).
I would argue that I think that games of today make too easy end game content, and because of this the game is viewed as lacking content. A friend of mine that still plays WoW summed it up pretty good, he plays for a couple months each expansion and after the new content has been conquered he play somethingelse for 6-7 months until the next expansion. I mean, WoW the game that racks in money like no tomorrow compared to many of the competition and they give back way way too litttle content compared to the cash they get imo.
Anyway, I got sidetracked, I think that it's healthy to have content that is too hard for much of the player base and which is only made accessable for large portions of the non-full time endgame players an expansion/content release later. What I mean is that the game at release have like 120% of the content that most mmorpgs of today launch with but 20% is only going to be utilized by a small minority of the players and they might not even finish it (this would be ideal really) before the next expansion/content release hits the market. The power increase with the expansions should also be minor and not the train wrecks of today.. I would more look at expansions as content releases with some extra flavour stuff. If this was the case, I would gladly pay a higher subscription fee because I was fairly sure that I would have new stuff to explore and aim for all the time and not just for a limited period which follows by the so called "farm period" when everyone just gears up in preparation for the next expansion (which in many cases just renders much of the farmed gear obsolete quickly due to the huge power steps).
Ok, rambling alot but in conclusion I would easily pay 25+ $ per month if I new that my gaming world had new challanges ready for me to explore all (most of the time).
Niien said:
I agree that a lot of other people outside of the supporters here will throw stones at the idea... however I will refer to a previous post of mine that will sum up their reaction.
This situation is very easily and overly simplified with this analogy.
One of my children doesn't do their chores for the week. As a consequence we ground them and tell them no games, friends, electronics, TV, etc for the week.
They then do the following:
- Complains, moans, and says anything they can to get out of it. Any excuse they can think of for not taking care of her responsibility, and trust me there have been some off the wall excuses.
- After the tantrum is over, they then try to bargain their way out of it.
- After that doesn't work, they gets really sad and starts to cry.
- Then after they are done crying they accept their punishment because we didn't give in.
- Then they are happy again five minutes later and a better person because of it.
So while I know a lot of people are afraid of taking chances, I believe that we should be setting expectations and put the word out into the community. After two years most people will have gotten their complaining out and people will be used to the idea that we are charging $25 a month and will just accept it.
I'm not 100% sure, so please don't quote me here, though I believe they are going to give one month's free sub to the box/digital copy of the game, so that will be more than enough time for someone to tell if they like the game enough to spend the $25 a month.
So video coming of the tantrums?
Great post BTW even with out video.
Aradune said:
It's definitely an interesting topic. I always hesitate to reply because I don't want to look like a money-grabber or something, but what if we did charge $20 or $25 a month AND we also used that income to give you guys a better experience and a deeper world and *more* content? We could do monthly updates that would have a lot more to them -- same with full Expansions every 9-12 months. Would Pantheon's target audience want this?
Agreed but not too much more than that, the game is already niche, and from what I see everyone "out there" seems to want things for free. Not that I agree with free, if you value something enough you'll pay for it.
I look at a monthly sub as paying my lease for my spot on the server. Bonus if you get two or more slots. Don't agree with the ftp community, because of all the bad behaviour and disrespect for others that I've witnessed. That behaviour drives people away, doesn't encourage years of play, or community. So 20 or so dollars a month, in the long run is relatively cheap cost for entertainment, considering what it costs to go to a movie theatre these days, including popcorn and soda pop. Or even an evening in the local watering hole, or restaurant. :)
Kazingathi said:
More is fine, just have to watch how much more. Even though I am purple and have life time sub, I will still probably give more money to support this game and cause. 20-25 doesn't sound to bad.
Agreed ..20-25 was the limit I was considering as well...and as time goes by I will probably add more funds to the pot too. :)
Hieromonk said:
Aradune said:
It's definitely an interesting topic. I always hesitate to reply because I don't want to look like a money-grabber or something, but what if we did charge $20 or $25 a month AND we also used that income to give you guys a better experience and a deeper world and *more* content? We could do monthly updates that would have a lot more to them -- same with full Expansions every 9-12 months. Would Pantheon's target audience want this?
Allow me.
I decided to wait on an in-depth discussion regarding this very topic. But, I have been parsing the outer community about this subject for many years. Consider this a particular field of interest and one of the reason I started the Age Poll here. With several more on the way.
I'd love to have a sit down with Chris and pick his brains.
I think if Pantheon can have the basic Crafting -and- Housing mechanics in place, before release.... So that VRi's future isn't utilized/consumed designing further mechanics, but further content. With Pantheon having real time GMs, that are not only Customer Service, but actual Role Players who moved about the world Playing with people at will. A premium MMORPG experience..?
I think the market will easily support $20~$25/month ($240~$300/year)
Myself, it comes right down to the game world the Developer will provide. I am not thrilled about Pantheon's "zones", but I understand the reasoning. If they are seamless, then I will pay more. But... if there are loading screens in 2017, I might not play at all. (I have a SSD & 16GB of ram). I dislike zones, because they break immersion...
On the other hand, If VRi decided to deliver a VG sized Open gameworld/engine like ArchAge, as an oldschool full-featured MMORPG...? $35/month easily...
I would like to stress that subscription rate should not apply to expansion of the game. I think EQ set the perfect mold and one of the reasons it lasted so long, was an extra $49 bucks for each expansion. Subscription is for the service VRi provides.
People should still be expected to buy your product. Free to Try, is a mistake..! ($5)
Lastly, quicker content is not what people want. They want a game free of hackers and GM that yanks them from the game, and names & shames them...
God Kings that protect the sanctity of our game.
-- Hear hear...my biggest beef is about the parasites that kill our immersion...whispers, mail box messages..spam spam..bots running the landscape killing everything in sight so you can't complete quests. Btw I can recognize those..and report every one I find. If you can rid us of those..that would be wonderful. I know that Mark Jacobs from Camelot Unchained, just despises those types and for awhile he WAS sending us system game messages naming them and shaming them..in Warhammer. The gamers loved that and would cheer him on. lol (sorry I really would like to see them gone period. hehehe)
ImmerseMe said:
things like faster exp for paying extra are exactly why we are all here. we are tired of Pay-to-Win games where not everyone is on equal footing. where you can pay extra for an easymode game and easily pass the better players in terms of achievement just because you payed more.
Hm. Actually, I can't come up with a single instance where I was affected in any way by purchasable benefits of any kind. In fact, I'm leery of assuming that someone paying for progress in the game would in any way hamper my game, unless it allowed them to level so fast, for instance, that it broke the population plan, perhaps by reducing my pool of groupable players. I am not against pay to win (yet).
It's already been discussed in regard to pay to win (cash shops etc) most here don't like that idea. Don't think the VRI team agrees with it either. :)
Khuul99 said:
Haven't read each and every post but the I'll throw in my 2 coppers anyway.
First:
Personally I like the subscription games, mostly because you don't get as many of the disruptive elements amongst the community.
When a game is free to play, it's easy for people to jump in, play 2-10 hours and then start to whine (since many of these people have a great need to do this instead of just accepting that this wasn't for me and just go away).
In my experience (started playing EQ at launch as my first mmorpg and played MUDs before that... so yes I'm old) the community is much better in subscription games.
Secondly:
The size of the fee is not that important to me but I can agree that a too steep fee could make it hard to attract players. I would even suggest that you could have a lower feee the first month or so and then start paying the full fee (just be up front with this from the start).
Thirdly:
The size of the fee depends much on the quality and quantity of the content in the game. I would like to go back to early EQ when one of the points was that all content was available in the sense that everyone could reach it if they managed to reach it (no gated content that was hidden behind "artificial" keys and other nonsense...everyone knew this was a timesink to buy time before the next content release anyway).
I would argue that I think that games of today make too easy end game content, and because of this the game is viewed as lacking content. A friend of mine that still plays WoW summed it up pretty good, he plays for a couple months each expansion and after the new content has been conquered he play somethingelse for 6-7 months until the next expansion. I mean, WoW the game that racks in money like no tomorrow compared to many of the competition and they give back way way too litttle content compared to the cash they get imo.
Anyway, I got sidetracked, I think that it's healthy to have content that is too hard for much of the player base and which is only made accessable for large portions of the non-full time endgame players an expansion/content release later. What I mean is that the game at release have like 120% of the content that most mmorpgs of today launch with but 20% is only going to be utilized by a small minority of the players and they might not even finish it (this would be ideal really) before the next expansion/content release hits the market. The power increase with the expansions should also be minor and not the train wrecks of today.. I would more look at expansions as content releases with some extra flavour stuff. If this was the case, I would gladly pay a higher subscription fee because I was fairly sure that I would have new stuff to explore and aim for all the time and not just for a limited period which follows by the so called "farm period" when everyone just gears up in preparation for the next expansion (which in many cases just renders much of the farmed gear obsolete quickly due to the huge power steps).
Ok, rambling alot but in conclusion I would easily pay 25+ $ per month if I new that my gaming world had new challanges ready for me to explore all (most of the time).
I agree with everything you are saying..I think the way the modern games are set up cheapens the whole experience for gamers, and that bores them and off they go. Example: Join today and receive a fully capped character! ( this was an e-mail I got from Wow awhile back) Little do they know that this is EXACTLY what turns me off. I don't want the game played for me...I don't want to be the audience in the third row (cut-scenes either too many or they run on for too long)
I don't need a pat on the head and a cookie for walking two steps to the quest giver with the giant yellow exclamation mark on their heads. :P *yawn*
Experienced, veteran players don't need pablum...they need steak. :) If the game makes me fall asleep and drown my character by accident I'll be cancelling my account. Immersion, challenge, keep me on my toes. That will keep me playing for a long time.
"I don't have time to play so dumb down the whole game to please me" doesn't work either. If you're casual that's your life style choice. Some of us have time to play, and want that niche game we've all been missing. :) There's been a drought out there for a game like this...yes indeed.
Vortikai said:
Just reiterating that it is a really bad idea to gather the opinions of us investors as we are only a small part of the larger target audience. We are a bit different in that we have some money to invest in the game. Wait until Pantheon has larger investors who can give adequate advice for the business model of the game before changing anything.
You hit it on the head. Asking your die hard fans if its OK to charge more is a terrible idea. Go ask a random gamer that might not have ever heard of Pantheon if they are willing to give a $30 a month mmo a chance and I can guarantee most will now. It does not matter how much they spend on other things its just the idea that you are basically going to be labeling your game as expensive. The biggest gripe I hear people mention when they talk about subscription models is that giving a company more money does not always equal more content back. WoW gets how many billions a year and do you think you are getting a billion dollars worth of content back, not even close. I am not saying VR is going to be better or worse then any other gaming company but the general feeling is you cant simply trust a company to promise more content for giving them more money.
There was already a big thread about this but my personal opinion is its better to attract more people with a good price and hope your gave can keep them going for years then to ask allot up front and most likely get less people.
The best example I can give are arcade games. Stick a fun arcade game in a popular restaurant and have it cost $1 to play. Its going to sit there collecting dust because no ones going to even try it. Take that same arcade game and put a 25 cent tag on it and you see people drop a few dollars each because they have no problem spending 25 cents trying it for such a low cost. It they find it fun its reasonable to keep putting quarters in. At the end of the day its better to get 20 quarters then zero dollar bills.
CanadinaXegony said:
Khuul99 said:
Haven't read each and every post but the I'll throw in my 2 coppers anyway.
First:
Personally I like the subscription games, mostly because you don't get as many of the disruptive elements amongst the community.
When a game is free to play, it's easy for people to jump in, play 2-10 hours and then start to whine (since many of these people have a great need to do this instead of just accepting that this wasn't for me and just go away).
In my experience (started playing EQ at launch as my first mmorpg and played MUDs before that... so yes I'm old) the community is much better in subscription games.
Secondly:
The size of the fee is not that important to me but I can agree that a too steep fee could make it hard to attract players. I would even suggest that you could have a lower feee the first month or so and then start paying the full fee (just be up front with this from the start).
Thirdly:
The size of the fee depends much on the quality and quantity of the content in the game. I would like to go back to early EQ when one of the points was that all content was available in the sense that everyone could reach it if they managed to reach it (no gated content that was hidden behind "artificial" keys and other nonsense...everyone knew this was a timesink to buy time before the next content release anyway).
I would argue that I think that games of today make too easy end game content, and because of this the game is viewed as lacking content. A friend of mine that still plays WoW summed it up pretty good, he plays for a couple months each expansion and after the new content has been conquered he play somethingelse for 6-7 months until the next expansion. I mean, WoW the game that racks in money like no tomorrow compared to many of the competition and they give back way way too litttle content compared to the cash they get imo.
Anyway, I got sidetracked, I think that it's healthy to have content that is too hard for much of the player base and which is only made accessable for large portions of the non-full time endgame players an expansion/content release later. What I mean is that the game at release have like 120% of the content that most mmorpgs of today launch with but 20% is only going to be utilized by a small minority of the players and they might not even finish it (this would be ideal really) before the next expansion/content release hits the market. The power increase with the expansions should also be minor and not the train wrecks of today.. I would more look at expansions as content releases with some extra flavour stuff. If this was the case, I would gladly pay a higher subscription fee because I was fairly sure that I would have new stuff to explore and aim for all the time and not just for a limited period which follows by the so called "farm period" when everyone just gears up in preparation for the next expansion (which in many cases just renders much of the farmed gear obsolete quickly due to the huge power steps).
Ok, rambling alot but in conclusion I would easily pay 25+ $ per month if I new that my gaming world had new challanges ready for me to explore all (most of the time).
I agree with everything you are saying..I think the way the modern games are set up cheapens the whole experience for gamers, and that bores them and off they go. Example: Join today and receive a fully capped character! ( this was an e-mail I got from Wow awhile back) Little do they know that this is EXACTLY what turns me off. I don't want the game played for me...I don't want to be the audience in the third row (cut-scenes either too many or they run on for too long)
I don't need a pat on the head and a cookie for walking two steps to the quest giver with the giant yellow exclamation mark on their heads. :P *yawn*
Experienced, veteran players don't need pablum...they need steak. :) If the game makes me fall asleep and drown my character by accident I'll be cancelling my account. Immersion, challenge, keep me on my toes. That will keep me playing for a long time.
"I don't have time to play so dumb down the whole game to please me" doesn't work either. If you're casual that's your life style choice. Some of us have time to play, and want that niche game we've all been missing. :) There's been a drought out there for a game like this...yes indeed.
**Edited because it clumped my comments in with Cana... O.o
I giggled a little bit like a school boy when I read the part about drowning while playing and canceling your sub because 1. it happened to me the other day that I fell asleep playing NWO and was dead and didnt care. 2. Most games now a days cant even put enough water in thier games you will drown. LOL!
Yeah, Raidan and Xonth pretty much have it (and Sevens when he/she talks about the sub stuff rather than store [I've been ignoring the store discussion in this thread]).
Though I do want to say a few more things:
-I agree with the poster about it's better to charge more than less as times goes on, rather than upping the subscription fees. I remember cancelling my EQ account when the subscription rate was raised by SOE because I thought it would just get higher and higher, and there's no point in investing time for a character when they may change the subscription fees at their own volition to be something I am not familiar with (though admittedly I think I played for a few months later).
-Asking us, Brad, is a bad idea. Get a solid game first then focus group it with random gamers, MMO players who haven't heard of Pantheon, those who have but are kind of reluctant to play, those looking for a niche game like Pantheon, and us, the fans of the game who donated money to see its success.
-Some people are still not getting this idea, so I will try to say it as simple as possible: unattractive subscription rates that turn off gamers from Pantheon may seem good to you, but you are not considering all the variables going into this. Namely, you are not considering incoming/new subscription player growth versus players who get bored (or cancel for other reasons). This could potentially turn off even more players since this is a group-based game, and players get frustrated when having to spend an hour or so finding a group before they can actually play/progress (though this is a slippery slope fallacy, so I won't stand behind it fully). Thus, it is harmful for the community, as we don't know of those who are interested in Pantheon (or may be interested in Pantheon) are willing to pay higher-than-average subscription rates, as we are not them.
Vortikai said:
Yeah, Raidan and Xonth pretty much have it (and Sevens when he/she talks about the sub stuff rather than store [I've been ignoring the store discussion in this thread]).
Though I do want to say a few more things:
-I agree with the poster about it's better to charge more than less as times goes on, rather than upping the subscription fees. I remember cancelling my EQ account when the subscription rate was raised by SOE because I thought it would just get higher and higher, and there's no point in investing time for a character when they may change the subscription fees at their own volition to be something I am not familiar with (though admittedly I think I played for a few months later).
-Asking us, Brad, is a bad idea. Get a solid game first then focus group it with random gamers, MMO players who haven't heard of Pantheon, those who have but are kind of reluctant to play, those looking for a niche game like Pantheon, and us, the fans of the game who donated money to see its success.
-Some people are still not getting this idea, so I will try to say it as simple as possible: unattractive subscription rates that turn off gamers from Pantheon may seem good to you, but you are not considering all the variables going into this. Namely, you are not considering incoming/new subscription player growth versus players who get bored (or cancel for other reasons). This could potentially turn off even more players since this is a group-based game, and players get frustrated when having to spend an hour or so finding a group before they can actually play/progress (though this is a slippery slope fallacy, so I won't stand behind it fully). Thus, it is harmful for the community, as we don't know of those who are interested in Pantheon (or may be interested in Pantheon) are willing to pay higher-than-average subscription rates, as we are not them.
I personally feel because this is a niche game ..that to go any higher than about $25 a month, wouldn't be wise. The team was stating that they were considering allowing a person to play (for free) for the first...say ten levels ( first few whatever levels) After that there is also the consideration that most games launch with the first 30 days free. But you have to buy the retail box or the digital download of course. I am not sure how those two things would work together...other than the ability to create alts til the 30 days are up? I don't think the reason the price would be higher, is to eliminate those that are more wanting the theme park versus the old school game we're all here for.
The price isn't there to eliminate anything it is to provide more content updates...etc.
If people are really attracted by this style of gaming, they'll find the means to play it. I don't see anything offputting by raising the price to say $20 or even $25. The kinds of entertainment you get outside of gaming are much more pricey. Think..football tickets or such. lol
Free to play to start is a good idea, for the first few levels, to get people to try it and get hooked, however free to play or cash shop after that is ABSOLUTELY TERRIBLE. League of Legends continues to be the example as to why this is a good idea, but it should be the example of why it is NOT A GOOD IDEA. When you build a game based on cash shop revenue, you need to DESIGN THE GAME ITSELF to push players to purchase stuff from your shop, whether it be having that new weekly champion being overpowered so that players feel the need to buy it even if they don't have the IP, or a skin that magically has larger spell ranges or hit boxes (this has happened multiple times).
No cash shop or F2P beyond first few levels EVER.
Now I'd like to float an idea, it seems as if the point of this thread is how do we help support Pantheon once it's released if we can afford more than 15$ a month and would like to give more, without cheapening the game with a cash shop. Here is my idea, it's sort of like a kickstarter only it never ends.. think of content which you would want in the game, that currently the game does not have and can't have because they don't have the money to pay people to implement it, and start a kickstarter-type goal that players from all servers can donate to... once you reach the goal the project can begin and the goal can be implemented. This method is generally used as a stretch-goal for Kickstarters, but why can't it work even when the game is out and being played?
This method would alleviate the issue of a cash shop giving power to people buying from it, instead if people donate they are donating to the health of the entire game, not just themselves. And if you just want to pay the 15$ a month and play, that is all that is required of you. I think this is almost the way Star Citizen is being handled, even though it hasn't released yet.