Page 11 of 22 FirstFirst ...
9
10
11
12
13
21
... LastLast
  1. #201
    Quote Originally Posted by PaladinBash View Post
    I'll happily pay to not play with peasants
    Ah, the glorious illusion that a subscription somehow makes a game only for "exclusive" members who are of "higher" quality. It's like a wonderful digital country club : D

  2. #202
    Quote Originally Posted by Sharuko View Post
    That is exactly how it was.
    Actually, no. The term isn't really an opinion. You can't have an opinion on it's meaning- it's failrly stright forward.

    Pay to Win.

    How does one win a game? By completing the goals of the gameplay as set by the game design.

    If one were to check my king such that I have no option to play any longer, they would have completed the goal of Chess successfully. That is a win state.

    You can not buy anything that allows you to win the game, or complete it's goals, in Rift. Given those boosters, one still has to play and win to reap their benefits. That is to say that having a 160% boosters to glory is well & good, but if you lose or are not playing then you can not win.

    Time is the only asset being sold here. And equally too!

    Under a strict sub based model [like Rift used to have] all players would be subject to the same time gating regardless of their payment. However, time is not equalized in that model. For it may be that player A has lots of time but pays $15/mo and player B has little time but pays $15 monthly. Supposing both players were of equal skill, one player has a permanent advantage over the other regardless of merit.

    However, if player B could waive his $15/monthly and instead invest fewer hours via ala carte purchase of a booster- both players would be equalized by same axis of time|money.

    Regardless, both players would still have to play and win by their own ability in both scenarios. Yet one allows for inequity based on time.

    One has to be able to purchase a win, or winning advantage so to speak, to be a pay to win game. "Winning" is defined by the game itself. Not the players.
    Last edited by Fencers; 2013-12-26 at 06:30 AM.

  3. #203
    Quote Originally Posted by Fencers View Post
    One has to be able to purchase a win, or winning advantage so to speak, to be a pay to win game. "Winning" is defined by the game itself. Not the players.
    But...my fabulous purple hat I bought in the cash shop makes me look more fabulous than you, so therefore I win...right? : P

  4. #204
    If TSO or Wild Star pulls off a successful sub model (though I see no indication that they will in the long term) then I'll eat my words, but they're my last hope.
    Otherwise, subs should die. WoW's the only notably successful sub based MMO left (and it's an outlier), with a few others trailing along. Subs do not offer bigger, higher quality, or more frequently updated MMOs anymore, that's just no longer the state of things and we have f2p/b2p titles on the market that demonstrate as much.
    Furthermore with the advancements in tech/reduced upkeep costs (relative to the server costs of early MMOs that necessitated the sub fee in the first place) I see no reason to have to fork over a blanket sum of cash each month to a game that may or may not offer an update, which may or may not be of quality, and may or may not be to my likings. It's dumber then pre-ordering a game based on promo-videos. Worse yet, you can't even log on to play old content if you don't pony-up the sub fee. You lose access to a game you've fully paid for and likely dumped large sums of cash into already.

    I can see sub fees regularly being used for the first few months after launch of new MMOs in order to re-coop the large development costs, or I could see them working if they re-evaluate the "default" sub fee cost of $15/months (perhaps $2 to $5, which would guarantee upkeep costs are covered+profit, along side a small cash shop). Aside from that though, I only see sub-fee MMOs persisting in occasional niches. As the market changes, there is of course the possibility of a re-emergence of the sub fee model in the future.
    Ultimately, I feel having a large variety in payment models available in the market is very valuable, but I don't see sub fees working in their current iteration. Under ideal circumstances, each game would have multiple payment models available to the player.
    Last edited by Arewn; 2013-12-26 at 06:41 AM.

  5. #205
    Quote Originally Posted by PaladinBash View Post
    I'll happily pay to not play with peasants that think paying a small fee for a game they like is an impossible burden. If I like a game, I'll pay for it. If the game starts to suck, I'll unsub until they fix it or I play something else. That means the company has a reason to keep their game good. If the game is simply the only decent one out and all the competition sucks, then be mad at every other developer making shit games rather than Blizzard for being the only successful one.
    Quite a lot going on here that is wrong or foolish.

    I mean, what would make you believe that one views a sub fee as an impossible burden? Some people just see it as unnecessary or inflexible, for example.

    Also who decides what is a "small fee" relative to personal income, country, disposable income and value per dollar? Surely it can not logically be the same for everyone around the world. And surely one can object or be disinterested in a recurring entertainment fee despite meeting all of the aforementioned.

    For example, my sister doesn't like Netflix.

    Netflix is a tremendous value per dollar for her when one considers the hours of entertainment available on demand for a flat monthly fee. Categorically it would be cheaper per month than her going to the movies just a single time in a month or renting a single movie once in a month elsewhere. She has the income to afford Netflix for her remaining lifetime. Also she lives in large US city with some of the best internet access available to her nation of origin.

    She just doesn't like having to pay the fee month after month. Regardless of how much she actually watches on Netflix- be it a little or a lot.

    It could be that some view MMOs in a similar way. I do actually. In that I don't mind sub fees but I like to "pause" them when I get busy IRL. Or some others may have another POV that is germane to their lifestyle and disposition in life.

    Also a sub based system doesn't have any greater responsibility to keep you interested. A free 2 play game has to be good enough such that one will spend money despite the fact they can walk away anytime.

    With a sub fee, you have already committed. The company has your money for the next 1, 3, 6 or 12 months regardless of whether one likes the latest content patch, plays intensely or casually or go on vacation/leave/jail/divorce/alien takeover.

    Lastly, why does one have to be "mad" at World of Warcraft necessarily? One can come to the conclusion that they prefer to not have a sub fee without necessarily giving a flip about WoW. Despite the audience this World of Warcraft website attracts.

  6. #206
    Quote Originally Posted by Fencers View Post
    Actually, no. The term isn't really an opinion. You can't have an opinion on it's meaning- it's failrly stright forward.

    Pay to Win.

    How does one win a game? By completing the goals of the gameplay as set by the game design.
    You are creating sets to match up your perceived definition. There is no standard definition of pay-to-win, it has changed around a lot over the last 10 years. A "win" in an MMO can be something as small as getting a mount at level 20. A "win" can also be getting an epic drop while questing. MMOs are a series of wins, many small some large. Even cosmetic items can be considered a "win".

    Time is an asset being sold. But in MMOs time investment leads to greater rewards, taking a short cut in terms of time is almost cheating.

    So what is your actual definition of pay-to-win? I want to try and nail this here and give you examples based on other games. Is it what I hear other people say "Items you can buy in game that you can't buy unless you have real money", is that it?

  7. #207
    Actually, why not extend this logic to homes? Having a studio apartment with one bath should be free. But if you want a dishwasher, washing machines, an extra bedroom, what have you, charge quite a bit per month. Revolutionary.

  8. #208
    Quote Originally Posted by Manhands View Post
    Actually, why not extend this logic to homes? Having a studio apartment with one bath should be free. But if you want a dishwasher, washing machines, an extra bedroom, what have you, charge quite a bit per month. Revolutionary.
    Uh...what? I'm...uh...what?

  9. #209
    Quote Originally Posted by Fencers View Post
    Actually, no. The term isn't really an opinion. You can't have an opinion on it's meaning- it's failrly stright forward.

    Pay to Win.

    How does one win a game? By completing the goals of the gameplay as set by the game design.

    If one were to check my king such that I have no option to play any longer, they would have completed the goal of Chess successfully. That is a win state.

    You can not buy anything that allows you to win the game, or complete it's goals, in Rift. Given those boosters, one still has to play and win to reap their benefits. That is to say that having a 160% boosters to glory is well & good, but if you lose or are not playing then you can not win.

    Time is the only asset being sold here. And equally too!

    Under a strict sub based model [like Rift used to have] all players would be subject to the same time gating regardless of their payment. However, time is not equalized in that model. For it may be that player A has lots of time but pays $15/mo and player B has little time but pays $15 monthly. Supposing both players were of equal skill, one player has a permanent advantage over the other regardless of merit.

    However, if player B could waive his $15/monthly and instead invest fewer hours via ala carte purchase of a booster- both players would be equalized by same axis of time|money.

    Regardless, both players would still have to play and win by their own ability in both scenarios. Yet one allows for inequity based on time.

    One has to be able to purchase a win, or winning advantage so to speak, to be a pay to win game. "Winning" is defined by the game itself. Not the players.
    By your definition, being able to pay to remove half the opponents pieces would not be pay-to-win in Chess. You still need to play, it's just reducing the time required to win. Removing some of the opponents pieces does not put you into an inevitable win state.

    "Winning" is nearly always a consensus decision between the game and the players. Taking WoW - do you win when you clear the top raid on heroic? when you're in BiS gear? when you finish a season as gladiator? when your gear is better than any other player on your server? when you've collected all the rare drop pets? when you've got your perfect transmog set?

    Despite many games' efforts to get away from being quite so one-dimensional, most players still define "winning" as revolving around combat capacity. So while you could make an argument that cosmetic items are pay-to-win for the collector crowd, I think that'd be enough of a minority position that we can safely ignore it.

    Now I think you get to the root of the matter when you describe it as being able to purchase a "winning advantage". That's the situation I described above in removing the opponents chess pieces, and that's the situation you're describing when you talk about equalising the rewards for a player who puts in time and a player who puts in money.

    Time is effort. If I spend more time at the gym, I expect to end up fitter then someone who puts in half the time. If I spend more time working on a game, I expect to do better than someone who spends the same amount of time at work & digs out their credit card in-game. In the short term, that might not work out - I could be less skilled, genetically gifted, whatever - but over the long term, time equates to practice equates to skill equates to success.

    So lets not be so dismissive of the time commitment. Time is the most fundamental currency a human being has to devote to the things they care about.

    Decreasing or removing the time component from improving your character's combat capacity is purchasing a "winning advantage". Whether that comes by purchasing faster leveling, faster honor grinds, or flat out buying +Strength gear - it's still paying to obtain a winning advantage.
    Last edited by lakhesis; 2013-12-26 at 07:38 AM.

  10. #210
    Quote Originally Posted by Sharuko View Post
    You are creating sets to match up your perceived definition. There is no standard definition of pay-to-win, it has changed around a lot over the last 10 years. A "win" in an MMO can be something as small as getting a mount at level 20. A "win" can also be getting an epic drop while questing. MMOs are a series of wins, many small some large. Even cosmetic items can be considered a "win".

    Time is an asset being sold. But in MMOs time investment leads to greater rewards, taking a short cut in terms of time is almost cheating.

    So what is your actual definition of pay-to-win? I want to try and nail this here and give you examples based on other games. Is it what I hear other people say "Items you can buy in game that you can't buy unless you have real money", is that it?
    Pay to win is pretty straight forward: Something within the game that you pay for with IRL cash which offers an advantage, which players not spending cash cannot match, that allows you to win at a section of the game that was designed to be "won". Fencers outlines this pretty well, there's no "perceived definition" in their post.
    The definition hasn't really changed over time, there have just been various people misusing the word over that time.
    I feel Fencer has also sufficiently explained "time investment" as well, and as such feel your question on it is redundant.

    I get where you're coming from with your "mounts at 20" example, but that's not a "win", it's a leveling incentive. It's a commonly used reward scheduling technique that makes leveling feel funner and gives you short-term goal posts to aim for and keep you motivated.

    Some examples:
    An exp booster in a game like WoW would not be pay2win because leveling is not designed as a "to be won" goal (player made races such as the ironman challenge would not count, as they are not a part of the game's intended design and are player defined and player regulated) . An exp booster for champions in League of Legends on the other hand would be pay to win because leveling your champion in each match directly translates to power and your ability to win.

    Even buying "power" gear which has stats, provided it can otherwise be reasonably obtained through in game means (without cash & without massive grind or time gating) and provided it is not the most powerful gear available, would not be pay to win either. It is currently considered to be in poor taste to add such a thing to a cash shop though.

    Quote Originally Posted by Manhands View Post
    Actually, why not extend this logic to homes? Having a studio apartment with one bath should be free. But if you want a dishwasher, washing machines, an extra bedroom, what have you, charge quite a bit per month. Revolutionary.
    That is an entirely different situation so completely and utterly removed from the context of sub-fee MMOs that it is ridiculous to even try to compare them.
    You'd have to rework that example considerably for it to approach being a reasonable analogy.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by lakhesis View Post
    By your definition, being able to pay to remove half the opponents pieces would not be pay-to-win in Chess. You still need to play, it's just reducing the time required to win. Removing some of the opponents pieces does not put you into an inevitable win state.
    Removing enemy pieces in chess is not a time short-cut, it directly hampers your opponent's ability to win. It's a fallacious argument.

  11. #211
    Quote Originally Posted by Arewn View Post
    Pay to win is pretty straight forward: Something within the game that you pay for with IRL cash which offers an advantage, which players not spending cash cannot match, that allows you to win at a section of the game that was designed to be "won". Fencers outlines this pretty well, there's no "perceived definition" in their post.
    The definition hasn't really changed over time, there have just been various people misusing the word over that time.
    Thanks for your personal definition of pay-to-win. My personal definition, is straight out things you can buy in game that gives you an in-game advantage, period.

    As I had stated in my previous posted, using your definition. WoW can sell anything in their game for real life cash and it wouldn't be considered pay-to-win, and that includes BiS gear.

    The opinions on this subject are all over the place. But to say there is a universally accepted or "correct" definition is silly. We can't even define what a "win" is in the first place.

    http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/04...ne-pay-to-win/
    Last edited by Sharuko; 2013-12-26 at 08:08 AM.

  12. #212
    Quote Originally Posted by CaptainArlong View Post
    Yep. I can't justify paying $15 a month for WoW. It's a 9 year old game. No, I'm not paying full price for something that freaken old. They either have to lower the price or make it free-to-play.
    Then don't play. Simple as that.

    Age doesn't matter, there's a reason WoW is the only major subscription MMO left. Millions are willing to pay still, so why would Blizzard change that for a more risky model that can so easily fall into the Pay To Win model?

  13. #213
    Herald of the Titans Achaman's Avatar
    10+ Year Old Account
    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Location
    pfft as if you care..
    Posts
    2,681
    eve online says no

  14. #214
    Old God Mirishka's Avatar
    10+ Year Old Account
    Join Date
    Nov 2010
    Location
    Get off my lawn!
    Posts
    10,784
    Quote Originally Posted by zito View Post
    I guess generic kill X, collect Y daily quests that were time gated to feel like long lasting content and only took an hour to do - count as content.

    My mistake.

    The majority of the focus is raiding. Anyone who doesn't even play the game can see it. They spend so much time making raiding easier to access. LFR, flex raiding, new raiding difficulty's, pre raid gearing, reducing the amount of exp needed to level, free level 90s.... It's right there in black and white. (They do it so they can get their community doing one thing and they only have to update that one thing) Only recently did they start to realize that shit is not going to work and it needs to be expanded. Hello timeless isle, which is a good start but a little to late imo.

    Oh, sorry, I thought we were having an intelligent discussion. Didn't realize you were looking for an excuse to whine and spout exaggerated hyperbole.

    My mistake.

    Because clearly Mists didn't give people scenarios, heroic scenarios, reputations, valor rewards (until the current tier, anyway), storylines to playthrough (say what you will about dailies, but lots of people really enjoyed the 5.2 content) Challenge modes, Pet battles, Brawler guild, etc etc. Nope, none of that happened. Mists has been RAID RAID RAID. /eyeroll

    As for your points about raiding, aside from repeating yourself pointlessly, you're one of the few people complaining about it being more accessible. Regardless I'll address your thoughts on that.

    Not everyone can log in at a set, scheduled time every week, because of kids/career/school/relationships. LFR was a great solution for those kinds of people until *players* decide to turn it into a cesspool of stupidity and idiotic behavior. Yes that's right... players are whats wrong with LFR, not LFR itself. Blizzard has no way to moderate/supervise every single LFR group, so its up to players to make it a decent/fun thing to do... sadly you're more likely to see pigs flying outside your window. If WoW excels at one thing it wasn't intended to do, it shows us what complete and petty assholes a huge number of people actually are in an anonymous/online environment.

    Flex was a great way to get friends and family-type guilds back into raiding without having to deal with the above-mentioned toxicity and dumbassery of LFR. Its a bit stupid to bitch about Flex because its had a very, very positive impact on the game. Flex was the game-changer of this expansion.

    Pre-raid gearing... not sure what your point was? Since BC the game has always offered various ways to gear up. With BC it was the rep/heroic epics, Badge of Justice vendors, with Wrath it was the BoJ/BoV vendors, ToChampion and ICC 5mans. With Cata it was reputations, JP/VP vendors and ultimately the Dragon Soul 5 mans. Mists has actually been the hardest expansion, in terms of gearing up a toon (until Timeless Isle) since BC. All the reputations you needed, very few heroic epics with a very low % to drop (mostly weapons IIRC) and lack of BOA/non-soulbound mats. Even 5.3 offered tokens that rewarded 476 epics (equally obsolete against Throne's gear at the time)

    Point being, all TI has done is give players a faster way to gear up to a moderate level (496 is a joke compared to the game's current 553+ Siege/Celestial/Ordos gear) and further eliminated the need for painful rep grinds. A good change, and nothing but.

    Reduced exp to level... again, so what? I'm working on level 90 #7, and my first 3 90s were done prior to the exp nerf. So at this point I'm kind of in 'Thank God' mode that it takes less. 88-90 is still a bear, still an absolute mountain of exp to get through, even if you run a lot of dungeons. All the nerf really achieved was making 85-87 go quickly.

    As for the free level 90... that's a nice gesture IMO with a couple of potential drawbacks. I know people who haven't played since BC that are considering coming back to the game for WOD, they're pretty excited at the idea of being able to jump right into the current WoW, not the 'this is what happened 5+ years ago' WoW. That's a great thing and a nice mini-reward for getting the expansion. The downside of course is a player having no idea how to play a level 90 toon in the class they've chosen to upgrade/boost. Someone coming back to the game after 3+ years isn't going to have a clue how to play a rogue, much less a level 90 one. So we're inevitably going to see a lot of 'no idea what I'm doing' types for a while I think. Not that I mind, as long as they're not pricks.

    Point being, some of you overthink this game way too much. Its $15 a month - the cost of a single person's 2-3 hour trip to the movies, less if you get concessions - for potentially countless hours of entertainment, often with people we enjoy being around/care about/like/even love. Instead some of you, like the person I've replied to in this post, choose to try and dissect what is offered/provided because it does not match up with what *you* think should be offered or provided. Thing is, its Blizzard's game - not ours. So if you feel so strongly that you're being ripped off, or that Blizzard is this evil corporation herding you all like so many sheep toward the vile activity of raiding or whatever... just do yourself and everyone else a favor and unsub.
    Last edited by Mirishka; 2013-12-26 at 08:02 AM.

  15. #215
    Quote Originally Posted by Arewn View Post
    Removing enemy pieces in chess is not a time short-cut, it directly hampers your opponent's ability to win. It's a fallacious argument.
    More honor, more xp, or more gear equally hampers your competitors in an MMO. Your character is not alone in a vacuum in these games.

    Even in cooperative play, you're normally in some degree of competition with other players for who gets loot, raid spots or server firsts. In competitive play, taking a time-reducing boost clearly hampers your opponents ability to win unless they also match your spend.

    Comparison with a pay-to-remove-chess-pieces game of chess is stark, but appropriate.

  16. #216
    Quote Originally Posted by lakhesis View Post
    More honor, more xp, or more gear equally hampers your competitors in an MMO. Your character is not alone in a vacuum in these games.
    No, not really. In chess, you are removing an enemies power without them having an opportunity to catch up. In a MMO, you are increasing your power temporarily while the enemy has the opportunity to catch up. Because remember, matches of chess are balanced at its core, while gear-based PvP is inherently imbalanced.

    Quote Originally Posted by lakhesis View Post
    Even in cooperative play, you're normally in some degree of competition with other players for who gets loot, raid spots or server firsts. In competitive play, taking a time-reducing boost clearly hampers your opponents ability to win unless they also match your spend.
    But in co-op play, skill is as important as gear for the more difficult content. Yes, gear is always a great thing. But I've yet to know of a guild that would take a raid geared player who wipes in the first minute of every boss compared to one who can survive the entire fight while doing their job despite their lack of gear. A lack of gear is a very easily fixable problem. A like of skill, is not.

    Quote Originally Posted by lakhesis View Post
    Comparison with a pay-to-remove-chess-pieces game of chess is stark, but appropriate.
    Again, I strongly disagree with this comparison.

  17. #217
    Deleted
    F2p = cash shop which can be Acceptable (selling pets, mounts, vanity stuff) OR Full-Retard (selling gear, inventory slots, mount speeds, etc) after "enticing" players to skip on acquiring these in-game by making their acquisition extremely tedious so people BUY it instead.

  18. #218
    Quote Originally Posted by Edge- View Post
    No, not really. In chess, you are removing an enemies power without them having an opportunity to catch up. In a MMO, you are increasing your power temporarily while the enemy has the opportunity to catch up. Because remember, matches of chess are balanced at its core, while gear-based PvP is inherently imbalanced.

    But in co-op play, skill is as important as gear for the more difficult content. Yes, gear is always a great thing. But I've yet to know of a guild that would take a raid geared player who wipes in the first minute of every boss compared to one who can survive the entire fight while doing their job despite their lack of gear. A lack of gear is a very easily fixable problem. A like of skill, is not.
    Hey, I'm not saying that only one player gets to pay to remove pieces. To be similar to an MMO, both players would require the capacity to pay-to-win. Match your opponents spend, and the game is equal again - just like an MMO with boosters. Pay-to-win games are not fundamentally unfair.. they just require you to match your opponents' cash investment.

    And I concur that skill is more significant than gear. I just don't think that the relative importance has much to do with anything under discussion, unless the gear & xp point contribution to success is negligible.

    Paying to boost your speed of gearing & attribute gain is a direct boost to your capacity to win. In a decently balanced game, it won't be enough to guarantee you a skill-less pass on all content.

    But it'll get you your win a damn sight quicker than someone relying on skill & dedication & gameplay alone.
    Last edited by lakhesis; 2013-12-26 at 08:29 AM.

  19. #219
    Titan PizzaSHARK's Avatar
    10+ Year Old Account
    Join Date
    Jan 2011
    Location
    Oklahoma, USA
    Posts
    14,844
    Quote Originally Posted by Mirishka View Post
    big huge post
    You realize that virtually everything you said is just reinforcing the point that the majority of WoW's content is focused on raiding, preparing for raiding, or otherwise trying to encourage players to start raiding... right?
    http://steamcommunity.com/id/PizzaSHARK
    Quote Originally Posted by Ryan Cailan Ebonheart View Post
    I also do landscaping on weekends with some mexican kid that I "hired". He's real good because he's 100% obedient to me and does everything I say while never complaining. He knows that I am the man in the relationship and is completely submissive towards me as he should be.
    Quote Originally Posted by SUH View Post
    Crissi the goddess of MMO, if i may. ./bow

  20. #220
    The most successful games are subscription games. Wow and EVE(eve have a steady population of 400k+ subs for almost a decade and is older than wow..). When MMOs fail they turn into F2P. Can you name me 1 F2P game that turned into sub because it failed as F2P? You know what I mean...
    The trick of selling a FFA-PvP MMO is creating the illusion among gankers that they are respectable fighters while protecting them from respectable fights, as their less skilled half would be massacred and quit instead of “HTFU” as they claim.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •