Possibilty for SWTOR to Go Full Pay-to-Win

[TUXs]

Don't worry, I don't take him too seriously but I don't know, I just don't get the point of doing so. I get that some people want attention, but what do they get from that, I really don't understand. I guess I want to believe everyone can say something pertinent if they try.

 

Still, I know it's waaaay too much optimistic, I must have too much faith in humanity I guess

Don't change one bit You're the kinda person we need more of!!!

[blackphantome]

In my opinion, this is a step in the wrong direction. XP boosts just guarantee that you can level up your characters faster but that is all. With the new packs, people who buy these CXP-boosts are able to gear up faster than others (if they are lucky). It is not my intention to defend that because regarding those topics, everyone should have the same chances (premium or not, should be not part of that discussion).

 

I want to gear my char with my guild, my guild wants to gear up together.

 

I don't think it's P2W but it is clearly a step in the wrong decision because this influences much more than just the time of leveling your CXP levels.

[Jerba]

But valor now gives you ACCESS to r-warzones. R-warzones give more C-XP. And they do sell Valor boosts as i mentioned above already.

 

Edit: failed to point out that this indeed speeds up your gearing and is a money option.

I don't see the XP and Valor boosts as that big of a problem.

 

For the normal XP boosts, I know that I can get to max level in X hours so I need Y XP boosts, and you get enough boosts from the cantina crates and quest rewards that you don't need to buy any from the Cartel Market.

 

Yes, Valor will be required for Ranked PvP but if you enjoy PvP, you won't mind playing the X warzones required to reach the Valor rank, with or without boost. There is some P2W element, but it is not nearly as bad as for CXP.

And like XP boosts, there is a certain ending point where you'll no longer need Valor boosts. For Command Experience, it never ends, you can always continue earning points and sending Mods/Enhancements to alts.

[Andryah]

In my opinion, this is a step in the wrong direction. XP boosts just guarantee that you can level up your characters faster but that is all. With the new packs, people who buy these CXP-boosts are able to gear up faster than others (if they are lucky). It is not my intention to defend that because regarding those topics, everyone should have the same chances (premium or not, should be not part of that discussion).

 

I want to gear my char with my guild, my guild wants to gear up together.

 

I don't think it's P2W but it is clearly a step in the wrong decision because this influences much more than just the time of leveling your CXP levels.

 

People who play 40 hours per week will also gear up faster then a player who only plays 5-10 hours per week.

 

Pace-2-progress =/= pay to win, not even remotely. If anything, it helps level the playing field a bit as it gives the very casual player some options to keep reasonable pace with the players who play 6-8 hours a day. That is actually good for organized play, such as guilds, where some players play more, but everyone would like to keep to a fairly even pace as much as possible as they prepare for new content.

 

AND... to date..... consumable boosts only give a modest bonus in this game. There is no reason to expect any different IF... IF.. they decide to offer CXP boosts at some point.

 

Now.. if it were me... I would design a CXP boost to grant diminishing returns per week. That would help level the playing field between the heavy players and the light players, AND... it would make people actually think about when and how to best use one rather then just buying and spamming them on a character in their hyper-pursuit to be the first player on the server to have capped their GC gear. But I'm pretty sure that would be quite difficult to implement properly, so I don't see them doing it. So the alternative in my view is no CXP boost.. period.

Edited November 8, 2016 by Andryah

[Jerba]

I'm sure if there are boosts you can buy them on the gtn, and I'm sure they will be cheap cartel coin wise. plus hello sub coins. Also, keep in mind unless you are doing pvp or hm ops gear means practically nothing, with the super dumb down of bolster.

 

And again, they addressed command crates on the cartel market and they said that would not happen.

Depends on how much you play each month, but I know that for my playstyle, ~500 CC wouldn't even cover one week of boosts, and certainly not the whole month. (I base that on the cost for XP boosts, and I assume any CXP boosts will be similar in price, if not more expensive)

 

Also, the GTN argument is flawed. You'll want to use these boosts in the first week of the expansion. The first two days, boosts can't even be listed on the GTN, and then it will take a few weeks until the prices have stabilized, and with the current inflation, they'll be very expensive.

[Bruticis]

People who play 40 hours per week will also gear up faster then a player who only plays 5-10 hours per week.

 

Pace-2-progress =/= pay to win, not even remotely. If anything, it helps level the playing field a bit as it gives the very casual play some options to keep reasonable pace with the players who play 6-8 hours a day.

 

AND... to date..... consumable boosts only give a modest bonus in this game. There is no reason to expect any different IF... IF.. they decide to offer CXP boosts at some point.

 

Bravo for trying to reason with the gang but I'd quit while you're ahead. This whole thread is just getting silly now and it's clear you can't reason with these people with facts. Not to mention this entire thread is based on speculation and datamined information.

[Jerba]

Hate to be that guy but the mount is still exclusive, is it not? The EC mount is different. Even if you don't like the differences.

 

Yes there are other examples where BW has changed direction on certain things. But changing direction is not lying.

Musco specifically clarified that CM recolors would be released for the Ranked PvP mounts, but nightmare operation mounts would stay exclusive.

We now have several examples where they went back on that statement:

• The tank from EC. Yes, the CM mount looks different but it has a mount flourish, so I'd say it's better than the NiM mount.
  
• The rancor from DP. Recolor drops from TEC.
  
• The speeder from Monolith. Recolor was put in the latest CM pack.
  

 

There are valid reasons for BW to change their opinion on something, but just getting a few more CM sales, or saving some cost when you recolor a mount instead of producing new ones, are not valid reasons IMO.

 

Hey everyone,

 

I know there has been a bit of frustration from our PvP community regarding a Rancor mount going into the Cartel Market. Although I had mentioned at the time that there would be Rancor mounts coming to both the CM and Operations, I thought it would be good to explain our philosophy on mounts. Especially around their exclusivity.

 

For PvP mounts, such as Season rewards, what you are going to tend to find is that they are exclusive variations of a mount and not necessarily a completely exclusive model (not to say we would never do an exclusive model, that is always possible). For example, you will not find a Rancor that looks anything like Giradda’s Rancor, but you can find other Rancor mounts. Aside from the unique appearance, what sets this mount apart is exclusivity. That variation is not only exclusive in appearance, but it is only available for a limited time. Meaning anyone who comes into the game now, or who was not Tier 1 during Season 1, can never acquire that mount. Although I can understand that having a unique variant, and not a unique mount, can seem less exciting. It actually ends up being more exclusive in the long term!

 

For mounts that come from Operations, such as the Wings of the Architect, we treat these a bit differently. As you can tell from the Wings, and other mounts such as Titan-6, they are themed directly around the Operation where they drop. Our intent is that this will stay that way and those mounts will remain exclusive to those Operations. However, one thing that is different here than with the PvP mount, is that these mounts will always be present in-game. This means that although right now, only some of the best Operations players in the world have these mounts, in time they will become more accessible as new content is released.

 

I hope that clears up our approach to putting mounts in the game, and explains a bit about how we handle exclusivity around those mounts.

 

-eric

Edited November 8, 2016 by Jerba

[Bonzenaattori]

I actually don't even think this game has the core functionality to go pay to win.

If it did it would be incredibly one dimensional.

[Iliac]

There are certain people here who are simply antagonists. They don't contribute anything, they just antagonize. Don't give them the attention they crave.

 

Admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery. I'm glad you have taken that step.

[Toraak]

1st: it can't be P2W unless they got rid of the RNG from the crates. So someone would get a crate faster, it doesn't mean his RNG would actually get him geared any faster then anyone else.

 

2nd: We do not know if CXP boosts would be able to be gotten any other way in game. Are they one of the possible items from a Command crate as well? If so you can't consider it P2W since you could realistically get them for free.

Edited November 8, 2016 by Toraak

[TUXs]

Admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery. I'm glad you have taken that step.

I even GSF'd with you

[Jamtas]

so i think there are just conflicting viewpoints on what p2w is. Some consider pay to accelerate p2w and some seem to consider p2w being the only way to get gear is to buy it off CM with real money

 

Its arguing semantics really. I'd just say that they are adapting the mobile game method of gearing is slow unless you spend real money to make it quicker. (aka pay 2 accelerate.)

 

So the end game (gearing, operations, ranked pvp) is now moving to a pay-to-play model. The CXP boosts will be a pay to accelerate gearing (much like GoH mobile game)

 

Now to someone coming in now and downloading the game for free and deciding to pay a month to get the game, and being someone who had to actually buy the game itself and then buy subscription over the years, you will get different reactions from this.

 

So what we can say definitively is the game is now going to be pay to play once again (hopefully for good of game, a different outcome happens than the last time the game went this route)

 

And speculatively, the game may also become pay to accelerate.

[NakodaTheJedi]

lol with the way they brought up prices of packs you can probably bet it'll happen

[Soljin]

People who play 40 hours per week will also gear up faster then a player who only plays 5-10 hours per week.

 

Pace-2-progress =/= pay to win, not even remotely. If anything, it helps level the playing field a bit as it gives the very casual player some options to keep reasonable pace with the players who play 6-8 hours a day. That is actually good for organized play, such as guilds, where some players play more, but everyone would like to keep to a fairly even pace as much as possible as they prepare for new content.

 

Expend effort @ 100 percent CXP + hours spent= standard gearing rate.

 

If you play 40 hours a week or 8 a week that's your choice and you both are paying the same subscription price.

 

+25% CXP Booster= In game time stops while you accrue an additional 25% CXP.

 

CXP= rate at which gear can be acquired.

 

All players that start day one at max gear tier all slots= effects of CXP boosters are no longer an advantage.

 

The only way this is acceptable is if they also introduce a reliable way to acquire the boosters in game via reasonable effort.

Edited November 8, 2016 by Soljin

[Aulus_Claudius]

They may very well sell CXP boosters, but I wouldn't call that "pay-to-win." Pay-to-win refers to a situation where you gain a hard statistical advantage over another player that's unobtainable through normal play, within reason (a .00001% chance for something to drop from a rare mob doesn't reduce pay-to-win status of something in other words). If I could purchase increased base stats for my character, a new combat ability, or gear that's higher-level than anything currently obtainable, say ilvl 226 right now, that's P2W. Just increasing the speed by which a player reaches the highest level while leaving the end-game the same for everyone, on the other hand, is the entire business model for most major MMOs. Increasing XP earned to help you reach max level faster is no different from buying a boost to help you gear faster, and the one is no more P2W than the other.

 

Where it would become a very shady business practice, and a form of P2W, would be if they artificially made the CXP grind so slow that players feel like they must purchase boosts to stay competitive. There is no evidence of that, and I plan to see what happens in 5.0 before judging the new system.

[Rolodome]

so i think there are just conflicting viewpoints on what p2w is. Some consider pay to accelerate p2w and some seem to consider p2w being the only way to get gear is to buy it off CM with real money

 

Its arguing semantics really. I'd just say that they are adapting the mobile game method of gearing is slow unless you spend real money to make it quicker. (aka pay 2 accelerate.)

 

So the end game (gearing, operations, ranked pvp) is now moving to a pay-to-play model. The CXP boosts will be a pay to accelerate gearing (much like GoH mobile game)

 

Now to someone coming in now and downloading the game for free and deciding to pay a month to get the game, and being someone who had to actually buy the game itself and then buy subscription over the years, you will get different reactions from this.

 

So what we can say definitively is the game is now going to be pay to play once again (hopefully for good of game, a different outcome happens than the last time the game went this route)

 

And speculatively, the game may also become pay to accelerate.

Honestly, the semantic noise about whether something is strictly pay to win is just a distraction. The bottom line is, if people are calling something pay to win, it's because it involves the possibility of real life money being more valuable than skill, or supplementing skill, and people don't like that because gameplay is supposed to be defined by player skill, not by wallet size.

 

It's the reason people are willing to put up with cosmetics being sold exclusively (or near exclusively) for RL money, but they won't tolerate it with gameplay. Because when the guy with the bigger wallet can make up for his lack of skill by swinging his wallet at you, that undermines the integrity of the game and kills the spirit of competition.

[psandak]

If it wasn't so easy to get gearboxes from what I understand I would be more concerned about it as well, but it seems that the difference it will make is between easy and easier and not between hard and easy.

 

And I think that's the key right there - going from easy to easier.

 

But while writing my response, I did come up with an interesting question...

 

If they offered command crates for CC, would THAT be P2W? No play involved, just pay CC and get command crates.

 

Go back to my first post in this thread. In my estimation, paying CC for a command crate would be akin to pay dollars for a HS card pack. In HS you can either pay dollars for card packs OR complete quests (by playing) for gold that can be used to buy card packs. Translation to SWTOR: you can either use CC to purchase Command Crates OR you can play the game, earn CXP, and get Command Crates. Is this still only a pay to accelerate or is it P2W?

 

Pace-2-progress =/= pay to win, not even remotely. If anything, it helps level the playing field a bit as it gives the very casual player some options to keep reasonable pace with the players who play 6-8 hours a day. That is actually good for organized play, such as guilds, where some players play more, but everyone would like to keep to a fairly even pace as much as possible as they prepare for new content.

Agreed

 

 

I actually don't even think this game has the core functionality to go pay to win.

If it did it would be incredibly one dimensional.

 

It theoretically could...

 

A P2W paradigm occurs when the object being purchased gives the player a game play advantage AND encourages/forces other players to make that purchase to keep up.

 

use CC to purchase a temporary stat bump would do just that.

 

What I think some here are worried about is that a CM purchasable CXP boost is an indirect path to that - more direct - CC stat bump purchase.

[RswanBing]

Admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery. I'm glad you have taken that step.

 

No he doesn't have that problem, you're speculating, stop talking about it.

 

( This is a piece of Bruticis' inspired argumentation. Hope you enjoy it and find it useful. )

 

Seriously, comparing him and Bruticis is a little bit dishonest at least. One is trying to discuss, the other kept saying "NO NO NO".

Edited November 8, 2016 by RswanBing

[TUXs]

so i think there are just conflicting viewpoints on what p2w is. Some consider pay to accelerate p2w and some seem to consider p2w being the only way to get gear is to buy it off CM with real money

 

Its arguing semantics really. I'd just say that they are adapting the mobile game method of gearing is slow unless you spend real money to make it quicker. (aka pay 2 accelerate.)

 

So the end game (gearing, operations, ranked pvp) is now moving to a pay-to-play model. The CXP boosts will be a pay to accelerate gearing (much like GoH mobile game)

 

Now to someone coming in now and downloading the game for free and deciding to pay a month to get the game, and being someone who had to actually buy the game itself and then buy subscription over the years, you will get different reactions from this.

 

So what we can say definitively is the game is now going to be pay to play once again (hopefully for good of game, a different outcome happens than the last time the game went this route)

 

And speculatively, the game may also become pay to accelerate.

Great points. The only reason I consider this more P2W is the fact that gear is all RNG. The more rolls you get at loot, the better chance you have to get the thing you needed. The only way to get more rolls in during the time you play, is to buy the boosts. It doesn't matter if you're casual (1-2 hours a month) or hardcore (8+ hours a day)...you're not buying less time to complete anything, you're buying more rolls while you play. These are more like buying an extra loot roll in Operations.

[eartharioch]

[*]one HAS to subscribe for at least one month to get all the KotFE chapters and they will have to subscribe for another month (once released) to get the KotET chapters.

[*]and more importantly, one has to continually subscribe to participate in Galactic Command; let your sub lapse and you cannot get CXP anymore.

 

That said, this type of pay for content has been going on since F2P was introduced to SWTOR prior to RotHC; a F2P account could not play RotHC.

 

That's not a good analogy. For RotHC and SoR, you only needed to pay once for the expansion and then you could play it forever. You had to unlock Artifact Acquisition (again a one-and-done thing) to *equip* rewards, but nothing stopped you from getting them. Now, even if you unlock the content by subbing for one month (equivalent to buying the old expansions -- technically a few dollars cheaper, but with much less content), you have to be subbed to get the rewards.

 

Note, I'm not saying this is P2W, (especially if they offer Command Passes on the CM to replace the removed OP/WZ passes like Eric said they are considering). I'm just saying that this *is* different from the standard expansion model.

Edited November 8, 2016 by eartharioch

[TUXs]

No he doesn't have that problem, you're speculating, stop talking about it.

 

( This is a piece of Bruticis' inspired argumentation. Hope you enjoy it and find it useful. )

 

Seriously, comparing him and Bruticis is a little bit dishonest at least. One is trying to discuss, the other kept saying "NO NO NO".

Don't worry...I'll make him join me on a failing PuG group later tonight (again) He's earned the right to give me crap...he's saved my bacon more times than I can count...

[Tsetso]

Looking at this from a different angle I'd say it's not pay to win. There is nothing to be won in this game anymore. No new content, owpvp dead, instanced pvp popping a lot less frequently than a yeaar ago. So it's not pay to win, it's pay to pay.

[Tsillah]

And I think that's the key right there - going from easy to easier.

 

But while writing my response, I did come up with an interesting question...

 

If they offered command crates for CC, would THAT be P2W? No play involved, just pay CC and get command crates.

 

Go back to my first post in this thread. In my estimation, paying CC for a command crate would be akin to pay dollars for a HS card pack. In HS you can either pay dollars for card packs OR complete quests (by playing) for gold that can be used to buy card packs. Translation to SWTOR: you can either use CC to purchase Command Crates OR you can play the game, earn CXP, and get Command Crates. Is this still only a pay to accelerate or is it P2W?

 

Honestly, I think that's a really good question. It's really on the border as far as my personal definition is concerned and therefore I can't automatically dismiss it.

 

The question then becomes, does it really allow you to win?

 

Let me explain. I've played a game called Space Marine. It's a FPS shooter in the Warhammer 40K setting and part of that game is that you start with basic gear. As you play more you unlock better gear. So you start at a disadvantage but work your way through it just like everybody else.

 

Well, that's where SWTOR is going with 5.0 To be fair, I didn't mind it in that game because at first I could blame my losses on the lack of gear and then later I got better at the game so that it wasn't necessary anymore to blame it on the gear hehe.

 

Now if someone could get there faster by buying to unlock that stuff it would get them there faster, but I can still play through it and unlock the same gear. So the advantage is purely temporary. So I'd still class it as pay to accelerate because the gear is not exclusive to people who fork over more cash, which is the case in some other games.

 

At the same time, not defining it as pay to win, doesn't mean it's desirable. If think I could live a whole lot easier with the gc xp boosts than them selling the gearboxes in the CM. I prefer to have neither to be clear, but I think that if they were to sell the gc xp boosts, I would be able to accept that as I stated before, but if the gear boxes were to be sold in the CM it would devaluate the whole Galactic Command system and I'd likely quit the game over it.

 

So no, it wouldn't be pay to win in my view, but it would be detrimental to the game because it crosses other lines in devaluating in-game content.

[Andryah]

If they offered command crates for CC, would THAT be P2W? No play involved, just pay CC and get command crates.

 

Given past precedent around here... yes.. that would be considered pay-2-win by a good number of people. Some people still think the small number of color crystals sold direction on the GTN are Pay-2-Win, as well as the original gear that had stats that was direct sale on the CM. They are still there to buy in fact. Now, some of the outrage over these was conflated to use as a wider pedestal to complain from in general, but that's more a behavior then reality.

 

Not that I agree with people who take this position, because those items offered nothing that players could not already get similar stat levels (or better) for level in game. I consider Pay-2-Win to be where only content/items needed to "win" (whatever win actually means in an MMO....LOL) are available via out of game purchase. That would include instant leveling as well.. and I'm surprised the forum never blew up over them selling @60 characters on the CM.

 

This whole circle fest over what is/is-not Pay-2-Win has become more opaque since the proliferation of games that are not strictly subscription access. Some players just have not progressed with the times.

Edited November 8, 2016 by Andryah

[Calinaph]

If you want to be technical, no it doesn't improve the drop chance of individual armor pieces but it will shorten the average time until a player gets such an armor piece.

The whole GC system is designed with "harder content > solo content" in mind, but if a single CM boost can cause the easiest content to give more CXP than NiM operations, my raid group will be forced to either run solo content during raid hours, or it will take significantly longer to gear up. I was planning to farm tons of CXP when 5.0 launches, figuring out what gives the most CXP/time because that's what I enjoy doing as a MMO player.

With such a boost, I'd lose interest in doing that, and to me it would be a sign that SWTOR has gone P2W and it's best to jump ship because the longer you stay, the more P2W it will become.

 

by this (silly) logic, couldn't your raid group also just pop an xp pot and THEN run NiM content to gear up? The epeen in video games these days is so flippin' ridiculous.