FTP robbery

[RoninaThorstone]

It's not 50% off when you have to spend 1k cc on it. Subscription gets you 4 passes and 500 cc ~ 1500 cc. Both cc and subscription you can buy cheaper in bundle. So it's $10 vs $15 for 1k vs 1.5k cc. Maybe I have the numbers wrong.

And I thought that weekly pass does not allow rwz. Is it just the operation passes that allows you story mode only ?

Even if you get 6 month subscription for 10 dollars per month, 6 months worth of passes for just pvp is still about 7.75 per month.

rwzs aren't included in the passes but tbh... find a group for ranked is a pain. Finding someone to queue against is even more painful. I gave up on because I was spending more time in queue than playing.

But yeah. the passes should include rwzs.

Like i said above, anything that has a queue should not be restricted. (as in I am not thrilled with the pass system but it is workable)

[Repefe]

Even if you get 6 month subscription for 10 dollars per month, 6 months worth of passes for just pvp is still about 7.75 per month.

rwzs aren't included in the passes but tbh... find a group for ranked is a pain. Finding someone to queue against is even more painful. I gave up on because I was spending more time in queue than playing.

But yeah. the passes should include rwzs.

Like i said above, anything that has a queue should not be restricted. (as in I am not thrilled with the pass system but it is workable)

Yeah, but with the subscription you get cc, so the difference at the end is pretty negligible except for with subscription you get all the other stuff unlocked as well. Really does not make sense to buy weekly passes if you do even just one of the 4 end game activities. Except maybe for the dungeons ... you don't really need the extra loot.

Regardless with so many other MMOs available having to jump through all the hoops with TOR ... meh.

[RoninaThorstone]

Yeah, but with the subscription you get cc, so the difference at the end is pretty negligible except for with subscription you get all the other stuff unlocked as well. Really does not make sense to buy weekly passes if you do even just one of the 4 end game activities. Except maybe for the dungeons ... you don't really need the extra loot.

Regardless with so many other MMOs available having to jump through all the hoops with TOR ... meh.

But how does that CC factor in? Its practically worthless for subscribers.

And yes. Its so bad that other MMOs make fun of swtor in their F2P announcements.

[Kelimbror]

Yeah, but with the subscription you get cc, so the difference at the end is pretty negligible except for with subscription you get all the other stuff unlocked as well.

Here's where you are wrong though.

Like HK mentioned, the CC is currently not of high value to a subscriber. Anything they can use them on can be bought with credits from the GTN. With a subscription you don't get anything unlocked. You are renting the unlocks. The second you stop paying, they vanish. If you buy the unlocks, those are premanent. So already it's a better value just to buy them once and be done with it.

Additionally, you are saying it is 'cheaper' to have a subscription. It's not. Cheaper = less money. You pay less money with the pass in this example. If all you want it to PvP, you are actually throwing $5 in the trash to subscribe.

[Thelxi]

It is disgusting.

[Repefe]

But how does that CC factor in? Its practically worthless for subscribers.

And yes. Its so bad that other MMOs make fun of swtor in their F2P announcements.

I don't think it's worthless. Just because you have no use for it right now does not mean it does not exists. You can turn it into credits, you can buy stuff on shop with it, you can keep it for when you have your subscription lapse to use in f2p mode ... not to mention the f2p route with passes have additional costs in buying all the necessary unlocks so you can actually play comfortably.

The only advantage of the passes is you can "unsubscribe" on weekly basis. But still we are talking about just one of the four possible endgames unlocked for price similar to full blown subscription with additional cost of the one time unlocks.

It's really not hard to make fun of TOR f2p model that's for sure

---------- Post added 2013-01-22 at 06:31 PM ----------

Additionally, you are saying it is 'cheaper' to have a subscription. It's not. Cheaper = less money. You pay less money with the pass in this example. If all you want it to PvP, you are actually throwing $5 in the trash to subscribe.

No, I am saying the difference is negligible. I am not saing that subscription is cheaper. To illustrate I will subscribe for 2 months and run 1 month on the weekly passes. It will cost me $30. Or I will run 3 months on weekly passes ... it will cost me $30.

[RoninaThorstone]

You know.

All this would be fix, for the most part, if they put weekly unlocks in gambling bags (same with most unlocks).
That way there would be more on the GTN and F2Pers could earn their passes through dailies and subscribers could make more credits from their gambling bags.

That would be the absolute easiest fix that they could do today and hot fix it in tonight.

But will they? No. Because they don't know what they are doing.

[Kelimbror]

No, I am saying the difference is negligible. I am not saing that subscription is cheaper. To illustrate I will subscribe for 2 months and run 1 month on the weekly passes. It will cost me $30. Or I will run 3 months on weekly passes ... it will cost me $30.

But it's not neglible. If you only want to PvP, you spend less money with passes. It is cheaper to not subscribe.

It's not 50% off when you have to spend 1k cc on it. Subscription gets you 4 passes and 500 cc ~ 1500 cc. Both cc and subscription you can buy cheaper in bundle. So it's $10 vs $15 for 1k vs 1.5k cc. Maybe I have the numbers wrong.

This is where you said it was cheaper. It might be a better value for someone who wants the whole game, but it's cheaper doing one activity by paying less money. The only way it might be cheaper is if in the long run you use your subscription to purchase passes for yourself like you mentioned, but I would have to take time to look at the numbers with the largest package of CC, the cost of the unlocks, ec.

All this would be fixed, for the most part, if they put weekly unlocks in gambling bags (same with most unlocks).
That way there would be more on the GTN and F2Pers could earn their passes through dailies and subscribers could make more credits from their gambling bags.

That would be the absolute easiest fix that they could do today and hot fix it in tonight.

But will they? No. Because they don't know what they are doing.

Will they? No. Because then they know they would start to make less money in the long run from subscribers going preferred/more people getting passes from credits.

I love the idea though. If it wasn't a greedy company it would vastly improve what is going on now.

[Repefe]

This is where you said it was cheaper. It might be a better value for someone who wants the whole game, but it's cheaper doing one activity by paying less money. The only way it might be cheaper is if in the long run you use your subscription to purchase passes for yourself like you mentioned, but I would have to take time to look at the numbers with the largest package of CC, the cost of the unlocks, ec.

I said that both subscription and cc you can buy cheaper in bundle ... or did my english fail me. By bundle I ment more than a month of subscription or more than 1k cc or whatever is the smallest cc pack.

[philefluxx]

At this point only a fool is expecting something different.

[Kelimbror]

I said that both subscription and cc you can buy cheaper in bundle ... or did my english fail me. By bundle I ment more than a month of subscription or more than 1k cc or whatever is the smallest cc pack.

Oh you were talking about buying multiple months which lowers the cost per month. I agree that the difference starts to get smaller in that case, but it will still cost less overall to use passes for whatever activity you like. I get the feeling a lot of people play some MMOs just for one aspect of the game. For those people, subscribing would be a waste of their money.

[ariakul]

to unlock everything it costs 7160 cc thats not including WZ, FP and OP's weekly access thats ruffly $65 upfront then its

Weekly Pass: Flashpoints 240
Weekly Pass: Space Missions 240
Weekly Pass: Operations 240
Weekly Pass: Warzones 240

so if you wanted to do all 4 it would cost you 3840cc which works out $40 a month 4x the sub or if you only did 2 of them $20 a month lol 2x the sub

also as a sub you get 500 cc a month so knock off $5 from my monthly fee and am paying $4.99 a month for all of the above

even without all the unlocks using a weekly pass more than once a month costs more than subbing

TL;DR

ftp = being bent over and shafted

If you are going to spend that amount of time playing........................you're better off subbing.

I got almost all the unlocks on the GTN, no real money spent.

[philefluxx]

BTW, why are people using the acronym FTP? Its F2P, FTP is File Transfer Protocol.... Hell even FtP would be better...

[SirRobin]

At this point only a fool is expecting something different.

Hehe... Yeah, pretty much. The game is freemium now and the way Austin makes its money now is by getting players to spend more of their own. The way its setup may not seem right or fair to some, but that is rather besides the point. The point is to maximize revenue potential and that appears to be exactly what they are doing.

BTW, why are people using the acronym FTP? Its F2P, FTP is File Transfer Protocol.... Hell even FtP would be better...

I had pondered that myself.

[RoninaThorstone]

BTW, why are people using the acronym FTP? Its F2P, FTP is File Transfer Protocol.... Hell even FtP would be better...

PC load letter? WTF IS PC LOAD LETTER?

[Edge-]

The system is set up to incentivize subscribing, that's how all freemium games are. To get the same benefits as a subscriber, it's almost always more expensive.

The system is intended to allow players to purchase things piecemeal to give them access to only the area's they want, with prices potentially spiking in the short term but ending up cheaper in the long term, or allow them to subscribe for cheaper access to the full game than what individual purchases will allow.

SWTOR takes this a bit to the extreme, but it's the same basic principle.

[Deleted]

The point is to maximize revenue potential and that appears to be exactly what they are doing.

Agree and will add that most threads made could be closed with what you wrote. Maximising revenue is either lazy, greedy, evil, abusive or awful for some people. It adds personality to a multi-billion dollar company I guess. For their shareholder's sake I'm happy EA are looking to maximise their revenue even though I don't agree with some of the ways they're doing it.

[Edge-]

For their shareholder's sake I'm happy EA are looking to maximise their revenue even though I don't agree with some of the ways they're doing it.

We'll see how successful they are in a few weeks. Early February earnings call, and they'll have to talk about SWTOR this time after they tried their best to ignore it last call. I'm actually quite curious as they've still not release any kind of momentum statement, which makes them an oddity as every other game that's made the transition that I can think of has released a momentum statement.

[Deleted]

We'll see how successful they are in a few weeks. Early February earnings call, and they'll have to talk about SWTOR this time after they tried their best to ignore it last call. I'm actually quite curious as they've still not release any kind of momentum statement, which makes them an oddity as every other game that's made the transition that I can think of has released a momentum statement.

LMAO it was one of the most pitiful things I read last year. How they mumbled through the SWTOR part with 'it's not helpful to concentrate on exact figures' or similar. I was expecting a hit on subs but that line (don't quote me on it as memory + Guinness do not an accurate quote make) left me glum.

[RoninaThorstone]

Agree and will add that most threads made could be closed with what you wrote. Maximising revenue is either lazy, greedy, evil, abusive or awful for some people. It adds personality to a multi-billion dollar company I guess. For their shareholder's sake I'm happy EA are looking to maximise their revenue even though I don't agree with some of the ways they're doing it.

But are they maximizing revenue for the short term or the long term? I take issue with the way they have set up their shop and handled the transition because it is probably very good at making money off the people who currently play, maybe even people who were on the fence. But what about 2 years from now? I don't want to see swtor living off a diminishing fan base, sapping them harder every quarter in an effort to make bank for the investors. I want them to have a model that slowly builds the player base over the years and generates more money through more players rather then just charging less players more.