ToR Needs to be F2P

[DarkerMatter]

I have played LotRO.

 

You have to unlock one of the classes with turbine points. Let me say that again, in case it didn't penetrate your skull. You have to pay real money for one of the classes.

 

Edit: Also, there are other limitations of a free account. Such as the amount of money you can have.

 

Actually you don't have to pay a dime for any of the extra content in LotRo, unless you count time. By completing deeds in LotRo you gain turbine points which you can use to "buy" content, class or what ever you wish. I did not spend a dime on the game and was able to get two expansions and all the additional content in between.

[Nyteblades]

Actually you don't have to pay a dime for any of the extra content in LotRo, unless you count time. By completing deeds in LotRo you gain turbine points which you can use to "buy" content, class or what ever you wish. I did not spend a dime on the game and was able to get two expansions and all the additional content in between.

 

I still play it and if you subscribe not only do you get full access to everything you also get a bonus 500 points a month on top of the points you earn for deeds.

 

As say as far as free 2 play goes they did a dam good job my server silver load, Has more people on at 3 am in the morning than my server on tor does at anytime of the day.

[Akomo]

Short answer- No.

 

If you want to play a SW universe game with great graphics then pay for it.Creating these games arent cheap.People deserve to be paid for it.Most F2P games are crap with the exception of a few.

[Crash-X]

Yep, F2P will end up ruling the mmo market someday. Look at all the so called "AAA" mmos that are f2p now....they didnt do that because they suck. They did it to save the game and generate more revenue. Gw2 is a good way to do a Non-play to win F2P game. You buy the game and then its free to play. The company gets a huge surge of $ for the developing of the game and theres always the cosmetic shop for ppl to buy crap out of.

 

The game im looking for which will be insanely cool on the f2p sandbox market is The Repopulation...these guys know whats up.

 

TOR couldve survived as a sub based mmo had they not went themepark with this game, but since they did i can see them sucking subs dry and adding half *** content until they are left with no other choice but to go f2p. It will happen. This game is almost comparable to the star trek online flop.... what do ya know its f2p now lol.

 

Nope not even close.

 

STO had a complete broken faction and half of the game (ground combat) was pretty much not worth it. If there was ever a MMO that wasn't ready fo rlaunch that one is it. Imagine the entire Empire faction incomplete...

[Akomo]

Actually you don't have to pay a dime for any of the extra content in LotRo, unless you count time. By completing deeds in LotRo you gain turbine points which you can use to "buy" content, class or what ever you wish. I did not spend a dime on the game and was able to get two expansions and all the additional content in between.

 

And as a result of you not spending a dime , content that does come for free(which usually never does in f2p) comes by once a year if your lucky.Otherwise fork over the dollars.Either way Turbine will get money for it.

 

The bandwidth you use costs money as does your monthly fee for the internet.So nothing is "free".

[JonJW]

I still play it and if you subscribe not only do you get full access to everything you also get a bonus 500 points a month on top of the points you earn for deeds.

 

As say as far as free 2 play goes they did a dam good job my server silver load, Has more people on at 3 am in the morning than my server on tor does at anytime of the day.

 

I play on Gladden and we have a healthy population as well. No problem finding groups.

[justandulas]

Even though my server is dead atm, I am patiently awaiting merges/transfers. I really love this game, it has the best PVP of any MMO on the market currently. If they decide to make this game f2p, I would stop supporting them and stop playing. I didn't stop playing during the bugs at launch, and I haven't stopped playing even though my server suffered a massive drop in population (all the reps ran to fatman and it just snowballed from there) but I would quit if they went f2p. I am not a fan of F2P MMO's as you get nickel and dimed for everything good. I would rather pay a sub fee and get everything than have to deal with eq2 like charges for everything. Sorry, swtor should never go f2p.

[Akomo]

Nope not even close.

 

STO had a complete broken faction and half of the game (ground combat) was pretty much not worth it. If there was ever a MMO that wasn't ready fo rlaunch that one is it. Imagine the entire Empire faction incomplete...

 

Go back now , and theres tons to do in STO.Way more than PvP trust me.So much so ive had to relearn it from scratch again after being away for 6 months.

[JonJW]

Even though my server is dead atm, I am patiently awaiting merges/transfers. I really love this game, it has the best PVP of any MMO on the market currently. If they decide to make this game f2p, I would stop supporting them and stop playing. I didn't stop playing during the bugs at launch, and I haven't stopped playing even though my server suffered a massive drop in population (all the reps ran to fatman and it just snowballed from there) but I would quit if they went f2p. I am not a fan of F2P MMO's as you get nickel and dimed for everything good. I would rather pay a sub fee and get everything than have to deal with eq2 like charges for everything. Sorry, swtor should never go f2p.

 

I love the game as well, and I really like the pvp. The wz's remind of skirmishes from lotro, only the wz's are pvp. If the game used a f2p model like lotro then I would still play, and pay a sub for that matter.

[Akomo]

Even though my server is dead atm, I am patiently awaiting merges/transfers. I really love this game, it has the best PVP of any MMO on the market currently. If they decide to make this game f2p, I would stop supporting them and stop playing. I didn't stop playing during the bugs at launch, and I haven't stopped playing even though my server suffered a massive drop in population (all the reps ran to fatman and it just snowballed from there) but I would quit if they went f2p. I am not a fan of F2P MMO's as you get nickel and dimed for everything good. I would rather pay a sub fee and get everything than have to deal with eq2 like charges for everything. Sorry, swtor should never go f2p.

 

Yep same here.Im retiring if this one goes F2P.Unless i get a lifetime sub, no thanks on F2P.North American MMO's have been worth it to me.The only one i got burned on was from Korea.

[Crash-X]

Go back now , and theres tons to do in STO.Way more than PvP trust me.So much so ive had to relearn it from scratch again after being away for 6 months.

 

Yeah it has added a lot but I was just saying how the situations are not the same.

 

Also that STO didn't have the hype that SWTOR did, it maybe didn't even have twenty five percent of the hype SWTOR had. So the two launches were not similar at all besides both being well...sci-fi games.

[Spectus]

...Lotro have got it right. F2P is the way to go.

No, they didn't, and no it isn't.

 

Inevitably, when game companies (case in point, Turbine) take their MMOs the free-to-play route, they do the following:

 

1. You wind up paying more for a-la-carte content than you would if you just paid a flat subscription fee.

2. They smuggle elements into the game that you *have* to have in order to be able to continue playing.

3. Or worse, they convert must-have items that were formerly available in-game into store-bought exclusives. (Yeah, I'm looking at YOU, Turbine!)

4. They barricade their most-desirable items behind huge artificial grinds, then make shortcuts available via their online "store" for "only xxx number of points!"

5. The prospect of playing a "free" game overloads the newbie zones with foul-mouthed brats.

6. Three words that should never, EVER be used by a MMO publisher: "Turbine Store Exclusive!" (or whatever your favorite game's source of real-money-bought junk is called).

7. They PROMISE their most loyal subscribing customers that they will NEVER screw them by doing ANY of the three things above... and then eventually do them anyway.

 

In short, F2P is the MMO industry's version of pancreatic cancer.

[JonJW]

No, they didn't, and no it isn't.

 

Inevitably, when game companies (case in point, Turbine) take their MMOs the free-to-play route, they do the following:

 

1. You wind up paying more for a-la-carte content than you would if you just paid a flat subscription fee.

2. They smuggle elements into the game that you *have* to have in order to be able to continue playing.

3. Or worse, they convert must-have items that were formerly available in-game into store-bought exclusives. (Yeah, I'm looking at YOU, Turbine!)

4. They barricade their most-desirable items behind huge artificial grinds, then make shortcuts available via their online "store" for "only xxx number of points!"

5. The prospect of playing a "free" game overloads the newbie zones with foul-mouthed brats.

6. Three words that should never, EVER be used by a MMO publisher: "Turbine Store Exclusive!" (or whatever your favorite game's source of real-money-bought junk is called).

7. They PROMISE their most loyal subscribing customers that they will NEVER screw them by doing ANY of the three things above... and then eventually do them anyway.

 

In short, F2P is the MMO industry's version of pancreatic cancer.

 

What are the "must have" items they converted to store exclusive?

[Spectus]

I dont think you have played lotro or EQ2 then. i haven't seen any ad's. and yes you have to pay for expansions, but you have to pay for expansions here too. and you can lvl a char 1-50 without paying a cent for anything on lotro.

Are you kidding me??

 

The "Turbine Store" button is a permanent advertisement on every LOTRO player's interface. Not to mention every stupid congratulatory message every time you earn five Turbine Points (which in the Turbine Store is worth roughly five cents), be it from completing a deed to uncovering a stablemaster route. And every time you see an invitation to unlock some element, be it a stablemaster route or early access to the Basic Riding skill, or a quest pack for a newly-entered zone, or any other come-on that asks you to spend Turbine Points -- THAT IS AN ADVERTISEMENT. And yes, they are everywhere. And then of course, there's the Turbine Store itself, with its garish Deals Of The Day banners and merchandising and "BUY NOW!" buttons...

 

Bottom line for me is the whole thing makes me feel like I'm trying to play LOTRO in a shopping mall. And it totally destroys the very essence of why I love Middle-Earth so dearly in the first place -- to get AWAY from all that commercialization! And it breaks my heart to see them do it to my favorite imaginary realm.

 

And by the way, yes, you CAN theoretically level to 50 without paying a cent in LOTRO -- IF you like grinding the same five tasks every day, or you don't mind just roaming around randomly killing mobs to 50 sans content. But the big calling card of LOTRO was THE CONTENT. And if you want to enjoy THE CONTENT past level 20, or wherever the free-to-play content ends now, you HAVE to buy quest packs on a zone-by-zone basis. And even the "tasks" have their own come-ons to the Turbine Store, because if you want to have more than five "tasks" (cheap, repetitive "quests" to turn in XX number of trash-loot items to a Task Board for small amounts of XP) per day, you have to -- you got it -- BUY THE TASK PACKS FROM THE TURBINE STORE!

Edited June 3, 2012 by Spectus
addendum for "you can level to 50" claim

[JonJW]

Are you kidding me??

 

The "Turbine Store" button is a permanent advertisement on every LOTRO player's interface. Not to mention every stupid congratulatory message every time you earn five Turbine Points (which in the Turbine Store is worth roughly five cents), be it from completing a deed to uncovering a stablemaster route. And every time you see an invitation to unlock some element, be it a stablemaster route or early access to the Basic Riding skill, or a quest pack for a newly-entered zone, or any other come-on that asks you to spend Turbine Points -- THAT IS AN ADVERTISEMENT. And yes, they are everywhere. And then of course, there's the Turbine Store itself, with its garish Deals Of The Day banners and merchandising and "BUY NOW!" buttons...

 

Bottom line for me is the whole thing makes me feel like I'm trying to play LOTRO in a shopping mall. And it totally destroys the very essence of why I love Middle-Earth so dearly in the first place -- to get AWAY from all that commercialization! And it breaks my heart to see them do it to my favorite imaginary realm.

 

Not sure I would call a button on the GUI an advertisement. True the button is always there, but it's small and down in the corner. Not like it's in the midle of the screen.

[Nyteblades]

Are you kidding me??

 

The "Turbine Store" button is a permanent advertisement on every LOTRO player's interface. Not to mention every stupid congratulatory message every time you earn five Turbine Points (which in the Turbine Store is worth roughly five cents), be it from completing a deed to uncovering a stablemaster route. And every time you see an invitation to unlock some element, be it a stablemaster route or early access to the Basic Riding skill, or a quest pack for a newly-entered zone, or any other come-on that asks you to spend Turbine Points -- THAT IS AN ADVERTISEMENT. And yes, they are everywhere. And then of course, there's the Turbine Store itself, with its garish Deals Of The Day banners and merchandising and "BUY NOW!" buttons...

 

Bottom line for me is the whole thing makes me feel like I'm trying to play LOTRO in a shopping mall. And it totally destroys the very essence of why I love Middle-Earth so dearly in the first place -- to get AWAY from all that commercialization! And it breaks my heart to see them do it to my favorite imaginary realm.

 

And by the way, yes, you CAN theoretically level to 50 without paying a cent in LOTRO -- IF you like grinding the same five tasks every day, or you don't mind just roaming around randomly killing mobs to 50 sans content. But the big calling card of LOTRO was THE CONTENT. And if you want to enjoy THE CONTENT past level 20, or wherever the free-to-play content ends now, you HAVE to buy quest packs on a zone-by-zone basis. And even the "tasks" have their own come-ons to the Turbine Store, because if you want to have more than five "tasks" (cheap, repetitive "quests" to turn in XX number of trash-loot items to a Task Board for small amounts of XP) per day, you have to -- you got it -- BUY THE TASK PACKS FROM THE TURBINE STORE!

 

Also i think your missing the part where to bypass all the things except the little button thats hardly noticable. All you have to do is wait wait thats right the same thing you do for this game SUBSCRIBE

[Spectus]

Not sure I would call a button on the GUI an advertisement. True the button is always there, but it's small and down in the corner. Not like it's in the midle of the screen.

In addition to the Store button, there's the afore-mentioned "Congratulations! You've earned 5 (or 10, or 25) Turbine Points!" messages, which serve as constant reminders that the Turbine Store is just a friendly click away. Not exactly the sort of thing my Hobbit would be thinking about if he really were scurrying around in Angmar or the Shire or Southern Mirkwood or staring at the walls of Isengard. And every time you see an "Unlock XXX Now" message, that's an advertisement that, if you click on the innocuous little one-line invitation, you're instantly smacked in the face with the whole garish Turbine Store interface in the middle of your game.

 

And then there are the displays in the loading screens, which generally invite you to spend Turbine Points on some batch of content or some "Turbine Store Exclusive!" item, such as a new Spring Festival mount.

 

About the only way it could be worse is if Turbine stuck a "BUY AT THE TURBINE STORE!!!" billboard on the side of the Prancing Pony itself, or painted it on the roof of the Forsaken Inn like one of those "See Ruby Falls!" barns in the American Southeast.

 

The last straw for me was when Turbine removed the Relic Removal function away from the Relic-Master NPCs and created "Scrolls of Relic Removal" -- which are, you got it, TURBINE STORE EXCLUSIVES!

 

The whole immersion-breaking stench of the Turbine Store is EXACTLY why I cancelled my LOTRO subscription, which I'd maintained in continuous status from Day #1 of LOTRO's open beta.

[JonJW]

I never see an "unlock now" Icon because I pay for a sub. And the notification for earning turbine points is no more invasive than the notifications for completing deeds. earning rep, or titles. I'm a huge Tolkien fan, but I certainly don't let F2P get in my way of enjoying middle-earth.

[Spectus]

Also i think your missing the part where to bypass all the things except the little button thats hardly noticable. All you have to do is wait wait thats right the same thing you do for this game SUBSCRIBE

See my previous post for the "Scrolls of Relic Removal" thing. That's just ONE of DOZENS of examples of "Turbine Store Exclusives" that even SUBSCRIBING players are coerced into buying. And then there are more items and perks which, while they remain theoretically available in-game, the chance of a player actually obtaining even one such item is practically nonexistent, such as scrolls that give permanent boosts to a character stat. I played LOTRO for a good two years after the Turbine Store went live, with five characters I brought to the level cap and decked out in top-end raiding gear, plus another half-dozen alts of varying level, and I NEVER saw any of those items drop as loot.

 

In many other areas, Turbine turned many other grinds into inducements to shop at the Store. In the original game, deeds doubled and doubled in their time requirement through every zone until Angmar. At that point, the player base began to threaten them with public lynchings, so they backed off somewhat through Moria. Then, they hit on the idea to sell short-cuts via the Turbine Store! Oh, hey, what a great idea!

 

Bottom line again is, it turned the grind into a sucker ploy.

 

The game-design principle Turbine originally sold us was that we would "NEVER" notice that we were grinding. That was the original purpose of their deed concept. LOTRO was the "un-grind" we were told.

 

In short, the decision to sell short-cuts on these elements is an Epic Turbine Fail, as proven by the fact that there's even a market in the first place for their Turbine Store short-cuts.

 

Makes me wish I could cart the whole Turbine Store into the Crypt on Belsavis and encase it in lava.

[JonJW]

See my previous post for the "Scrolls of Relic Removal" thing. That's just ONE of DOZENS of examples of "Turbine Store Exclusives" that even SUBSCRIBING players are coerced into buying. And then there are more items and perks which, while they remain theoretically available in-game, the chance of a player actually obtaining even one such item is practically nonexistent, such as scrolls that give permanent boosts to a character stat. I played LOTRO for a good two years after the Turbine Store went live, with five characters I brought to the level cap and decked out in top-end raiding gear, plus another half-dozen alts of varying level, and I NEVER saw any of those items drop as loot.

 

In many other areas, Turbine turned many other grinds into inducements to shop at the Store. In the original game, deeds doubled and doubled in their time requirement through every zone until Angmar. At that point, the player base began to threaten them with public lynchings, so they backed off somewhat through Moria. Then, they hit on the idea to sell short-cuts via the Turbine Store! Oh, hey, what a great idea!

 

Bottom line again is, it turned the grind into a sucker ploy.

 

The game-design principle Turbine originally sold us was that we would "NEVER" notice that we were grinding. That was the original purpose of their deed concept. LOTRO was the "un-grind" we were told.

 

In short, the decision to sell short-cuts on these elements is an Epic Turbine Fail, as proven by the fact that there's even a market in the first place for their Turbine Store short-cuts.

 

Makes me wish I could cart the whole Turbine Store into the Crypt on Belsavis and encase it in lava.

 

No one is forcing you to buy those relic removal scrolls. It's a conveinence yeah but in no way impedes your progress if you don't purchase. Only way you coud remove relics prior 2 F2P was during a reforge. And as a paid sub i get 500 free points to use a month so I don't have to use real cash to get items like those relic removal scrolls.

[Approbate]

NO!

 

I want to pay to play this game. F2P games are scams just look at Allods

[chrisftw]

NO!

 

I want to pay to play this game. F2P games are scams just look at Allods

 

that game has like 50 million subs amiright?

[Spectus]

What are the "must have" items they converted to store exclusive?

Two that stand out particularly:

 

- Scrolls of Relic Removal

- Stat-Increase Tomes

 

Theoretically, the stat-increase tomes were rare loot drops, but in two years' worth of hardcore gaming, I never saw one. The Scrolls of Relic Removal were replacement items for an optional function you could have a Forge-Master perform when you reforged a legendary item. The function was removed from the Forge-Masters, while simultaneously replaced by these scrolls from the Turbine Store when Turbine revamped LIs in 2011. And as far as I knew, those scrolls are ONLY available from the Turbine Store.

 

There were other objectionable things, such as the resource packs you could buy for your crafters, which reduce the value of player-gathered resources on the Auction House, and various potions which reduce demand for crafted or looted potions.

 

And that's just off the top of my head. And I'm not even well-versed in the Turbine Store's inventory; not by a long shot. I hate the thing and tried to avoid it at all costs, so I am sure the ones who are trying to sell F2P here know better than I do the many ways the Turbine Store subverts both the integrity of the game and of its development team. But I can hardly expect someone who's trying to convince others how wonderful F2P is, to actually be honest about the Turbine Store.

Edited June 3, 2012 by Spectus

[GreatGarth]

Why shouldn't tor be f2p. It's not like bw is pumping out updates or merging servers.

[VegaPhone]

I think the solution is the make the cost reflect the return and how each person should pay depending on which part they benefit from.

 

I am not talking about micro transactions, but VO for different languages and making people pay for the cost more appropriately for that specific investment. Since there are more english speaking players then the cost is shared with more people and the shared cost to the individual is less than French and German.

 

Therefore the solution to helping swtor is to make those who use german and french VO pay more per month.

 

Since the cost in time, new animations for cinematics, and cost in VO was an opportunity cost for more development in swtor for other aspects to make the game better. Therefore, let the german and french VO users help.

 

If they do this, I believe 1. we will see a lot of the german and french using english VO (which means other language VO is pointless and hurt the game more than benefit from it), 2. swtor will indeed get more money and be able to hire more people in an attempt to throw more money at their problems trying to fix something they had plenty of time to set up for a better release with more features and more overall content as well.

Edited June 3, 2012 by VegaPhone