Their "free" model SUCKS!

[Armourboy]

That may be the single worst system I've ever seen. TBH I think in the long run it will damage the game more than if they had just left things alone.

The problem they will have is that people will see F2P and go in expecting a few things that it seems won't be available. People will be fine with paying for the end game content as almost all F2P versions work like that. People will be ok with buying extra slots, new races, etc. as along as the ones available are reasonable to begin with. However, when people realize they can't really interact with the rest of the server in any way until they hand over some money, they will be gone.

Basically as I see it they should really have the limitations be end game content ( not gear itself but the actual content), extra space ( inventory/bank), extra character slots, and extra races. Things like UI, mail, crafting professions, AH listings, chat, trading, and generally other basic game features should not be bought, they should be part of the game.

I had thought about going back because I had left it loaded until I saw what they did with F2P, now I see zero reason not to remove it from my PC.

[RoninaThorstone]

Just treat it like a free trial and your issues will seem less bad.

Well, it is a free trial mode.

F2P implies that you can buy access to everything. You know, like a normal F2P model.

I don't like that a major company like EA is either misrepresenting F2P or trying to change the definition in order to make a free trial mode that charges people money. Either one is terrible and they should be held accountable by someone somewhere for this.

Basically what I am saying is I am a F2P gamer and this offends me. Don't try and label this shit as F2P because it gives F2P a bad name.

[Parrin]

Hello Derah. Good to hear from you again. I appreciate that you've managed to summarize just about everything that's wrong with their new model. Thankfully, they've almost admitted what a poor system it is, and offered another tier for previous subscribers. Looking at the restrictions from a different point of view, I like to separate them by (1) tools to prevent players from getting everything for free, and (2) tools to prevent players from abusing the system.

(1) would be things like limited warzones and flashpoints. (2) would be limited or removed skills, trading, mailing, and GTN (auction house) access.

I'm okay with (1). It's needed to avoid giving the game away to hardcore players, like pvp'ers. But I absolutely HATE (2). It's their pathetic attempt to stop botters and spammers. But the solution amounts to stopping theft by locking all the entrances to the store.

[RoninaThorstone]

Hello Derah. Good to hear from you again. I appreciate that you've managed to summarize just about everything that's wrong with their new model. Thankfully, they've almost admitted what a poor system it is, and offered another tier for previous subscribers. Looking at the restrictions from a different point of view, I like to separate them by (1) tools to prevent players from getting everything for free, and (2) tools to prevent players from abusing the system.

(1) would be things like limited warzones and flashpoints. (2) would be limited or removed skills, trading, mailing, and GTN (auction house) access.

I'm okay with (1). It's needed to avoid giving the game away to hardcore players, like pvp'ers. But I absolutely HATE (2). It's their pathetic attempt to stop botters and spammers. But the solution amounts to stopping theft by locking all the entrances to the store.

First off. You never limit anything queue related. NEVER. EVER. FUCKING DO THAT. You want as many people in the queue as possible at all times. If your subscribers are sitting in queue and its not popping you are going to lose subscribers. F2Pers are a great way to fill those slots. The normal thing to do would be to give subscribers a priority queue. This would help subscriber DPS the most. If you don't know why go look it up. What you do to "not give the game away for free" is place a daily or weekly cap on "WZ point gains" or "Item rolls won" or "pve currency gained". League did/does the same thing with IP from bot matches. After about 5 you stop getting points. But if you wanted to keep playing for nothing? "Yes! Please do!" they say. Because they know that if you are playing more than those 5 matches you will eventually become involved enough in the game either through higher contact with the community or sheer enjoyment that you will have a higher chance of buying things from the cash shop like champs and skins.

Second, "getting things for free". There is no reason to not give players the ability to get everything for free. By this I mean, that players should have a way to gain cash currency in game. "No one would ever do that" you are probably thinking. Its actually somewhat standard. Probably one of the best sub/f2p models out there is lotro who allows you to gain cash currency by doing just about anything in the game. But it takes FOREVER. That's the catch. See, people view games that don't let you do this as P2W or unfair. And they don't like playing them. People who don't have credit cards or cash CAN still unlock content, level up, battle ground with friends so long as they play enough. And players are content. By this I mean that if you don't have an active population you see a lot of people crying about it. "All everyone does is fly circles in stormwind" / "All everyone does is run laps in fleet". By adding incentives to certain activities you increase the number of people doing them. Right now, the only activities that have incentives are WZs and Ops and dailies. EA could expand on that a lot by adding Cartel Coin rewards for certain weekly's like world bosses or world pvp kills or anything they felt would increase the "liveliness". You want as many people playing your game as humanly possible even if they aren't paying a single penny.

[Parrin]

First off. You never limit anything queue related. NEVER. EVER. FUCKING DO THAT. You want as many people in the queue as possible at all times. If your subscribers are sitting in queue and its not popping you are going to lose subscribers. F2Pers are a great way to fill those slots. The normal thing to do would be to give subscribers a priority queue. This would help subscriber DPS the most. If you don't know why go look it up. What you do to "not give the game away for free" is place a daily or weekly cap on "WZ point gains" or "Item rolls won" or "pve currency gained". League did/does the same thing with IP from bot matches. After about 5 you stop getting points. But if you wanted to keep playing for nothing? "Yes! Please do!" they say. Because they know that if you are playing more than those 5 matches you will eventually become involved enough in the game either through higher contact with the community or sheer enjoyment that you will have a higher chance of buying things from the cash shop like champs and skins.

Don't worry too much about that. They have already stated that they are willing to tweak it to make sure that subscribers aren't kept waiting for warzones. Here's the quote,

"Coldin: While Weekly Passes have been mentioned for accessing Warzones, Flashpoints, and Operations, is there any intention of letting players purchase a Monthly, or Multi-Month pass for that content? Or potentially allowing players to purchase unlocks that increase the number they can run per week?

Blaine: We think that the weekly pass gives players the best option for consuming the content they desire as a Free-to-Play player. Ultimately, if you find that you’re playing the content that much, we strongly recommend converting to a Subscriber – you’ll get more bang for your buck! Of course, if we see that the Weekly Passes are not working as well as we expect, we will continue adding more options or adjusting functionality."

...and the link, http://www.swtor.com/community/showt...46#edit5340746.

I'm not saying their options are great. I'm just saying I can understand some of them, and am willing to accept it for now. But, yes, they still suck.

[Black Rider]

That's why F2P model isn't good for MMORPG.
As it seems F2P can be good in MOBAs

[RoninaThorstone]

That's why F2P model isn't good for MMORPG.
As it seems F2P can be good in MOBAs

Turbine says "lol. New expansion"

---------- Post added 2012-11-02 at 12:07 PM ----------

Don't worry too much about that. They have already stated that they are willing to tweak it to make sure that subscribers aren't kept waiting for warzones. Here's the quote,

"Coldin: While Weekly Passes have been mentioned for accessing Warzones, Flashpoints, and Operations, is there any intention of letting players purchase a Monthly, or Multi-Month pass for that content? Or potentially allowing players to purchase unlocks that increase the number they can run per week?

Blaine: We think that the weekly pass gives players the best option for consuming the content they desire as a Free-to-Play player. Ultimately, if you find that you’re playing the content that much, we strongly recommend converting to a Subscriber – you’ll get more bang for your buck! Of course, if we see that the Weekly Passes are not working as well as we expect, we will continue adding more options or adjusting functionality."

...and the link, http://www.swtor.com/community/showt...46#edit5340746.

I'm not saying their options are great. I'm just saying I can understand some of them, and am willing to accept it for now. But, yes, they still suck.

Yeah. Their "solution" was to increase the WZ cap. That's like saying "lets put a little less led in the baby bottle".

Oh and they completely ignored the FP queue which is way worse a problem since it needs specific roles.

[zerocarbs]

Now BW has made it share of mistakes but how much do you want from a free game?

I will not even consider coming back to the game under the free model being able to have only one of the three crew skills.

[Kelimbror]

I didn't even want to particpate in this thread, since we have a few already going into heavy detail about this. To the OP though, a lot of us echo your sentiments and hopefully EA continues on a cycle of backpedaling out of all their terrible decisions about this process. We've been kinda up in arms ever since the stealthily changed the terms on the Cartel Coins for former subscribers and it has just been a snowball effect since then.

They are making some progress, but have a long way to go to restore the faith some people had in them with the potential for F2P.

[Lugor]

Like many other posters have said, the free to play model isn't that. It really is an extended trial to level 50. What boggles my mind is the number one issue they claimed with losing subs is the monthly fee. Then they go and expanded their free trial to encourage you to subscribe. Maybe I'm not seeing this correctly, but it doesn't make a lick of sense to me.

How much fun will PvP be in the free trial when your competition has access to better equipment, more skills, and a better UI?

As much as I like various parts of SWTOR, it was less than the sum of its parts, and the least compelling aspects of the game are what they are asking you for now. EA's version of F2P needs to fail, and fail hard so no company will go down this road again.

[Edge-]

Sounds like a lot of people want everything for nothing.

Have you bothered to read anything I've posted in this thread? I've pretty clearly detailed why that' not the case for a lot of people, but some SWTOR fans have latched onto this mantra and keep repeating it as if this is the only reason people are complaining. Please bother to actually read instead of just repeating the same thing over and over.

Freemium is a viable model and SWTOR needs to remove some of the restrictions, but the whole point is to increase revenue, not just server load. I see people complaining about endgame content, to think you can play that much of a game for free is totally off base. Seriously who is going to make this content on no income?

Freemium is a totally viable model when done right. I'm not saying that need to go 100% free a la Aion or Lineage 2. DCUO has a wonderful freemium model that doesn't restrict free players too much but still provides a lot of value for the subscription, and a good incentive to use the cash shop. There are ways for them to increase server load and revenue/subscriptions without these draconian restrictions though. That's my point. I've gone into great detail in the past on how to monetize the game without being restrictive to free players, or devaluing the subscription.

[quras]

SNIP...

Yea, I disagree with about pretty much everything you said.

I've leveled 2 toons on the PTR to mid level and so far it''s been a good experience.

Are there some things I want to smooth out the edges. Yes there are but I didn't actually need them as a F2P player.
Now if you plan on investing any amount of time into the game beyond leveling and a small amount of PVP or flashpoints then you should consider spending a small fraction of the $15 a month sub your not paying and smooth out the edges of F2P.

And as far as professions go and only having one. To be honest You could get by with none since you don't really need any of them leveling.

Plus, you still have the option to get moved to preferred status and things get much better. You gain more conveniences in the game.

The only complaint I have so far is quest items and not getting to use them all. Other than that, The F2P Sw has is not all that bad.
I'm sure returning players will say, "WTF" why can't I pay like I did when I was a subber." but we all know that can't happen.

and it's 200K for F2P players and 350K for preferred players on cash caps. Just some FYI.

[RoninaThorstone]

Have you bothered to read anything I've posted in this thread? I've pretty clearly detailed why that' not the case for a lot of people, but some SWTOR fans have latched onto this mantra and keep repeating it as if this is the only reason people are complaining. Please bother to actually read instead of just repeating the same thing over and over.

The "YOU WANT IT ALL FOR FREE" thing is essentially the forum equivalent of putting your hands over your ears and screaming "lalala" over and over.

It's like they can not read "We want to be able to BUY access to end game."

And then they respond with "You can. Buy the raid pass, artifact gear access, and pvp pass"

And then we respond with "With those you can only do story mode, you can't do ranked WZs, and all indications point toward you not being able to wear higher than rakata gear"

And then they just ignore the post.

On top of not being able to BUY ACCESS to end game which makes this a TRIAL MODE. NOT F2P.

They won't address the structural problems with EAs model. (you know, other than it not being a F2P model)

I could list all the things that are below industry standards about the model but I've done that in like 10 different threads.

But they just keep at that "YOU WANT IT ALL FOR FREE" crap.

[Aphrel]

Buy the game!

Its worth the money.

Leveling and warzones are awesome.

Play a Sage/Sorc imo!

[Arlee]

I appreciate the OP's time and effort in compiling this list, though it is incomplete on a few points. Anyways there are already threads going discussing the whole F2P aspect AND the preferred status as well.