Free-to-Play and Preferred Player Adjustments

[DanielSteed]

Hello everyone!

 

Today we made an announcement about reducing some of the limitations for Free-to-Play and Preferred players. More specifically adjustments to credit caps, Quickbars, Medical Probes, and Quick Travel!

[TheDenniR]

Much too few credits you give, 10 million for preferential and 5 million for F2P would be more appropriate! 1 million is just too little for the current economy here in the game, I think you just have no idea.

[kalelrojin]

This will cause an influx of credit bots and the like. Won’t it? What improvements are you making to prevent credit bots and scammers like it? What improvements are you making to allow us to ignore such bots so the gen chat in game is not littered with credit site advertisements? When will we be able to have one shared ignore list for our whole account and not tied to per toon? When will we be able to ignore a toon’s entire legacy? Edited June 20, 2019 by kalelrojin

[Kiesu]

Could we have an adjustment to how many WZs a preferred player can do? 5 a week is so low.

 

I would also argue letting preferred do SM OPS would be beneficial to the playerbase. They're currently rather easy and would serve as an activity boost and learning experience to those looking to maybe do more group content.

 

I'm always very sad when I'm unsubbed and some casual guildies get stuck in OPS with a DC tank or healer and cant complete the ops. I'd happily step in, but the system thinks I'm not worthy helper if my sub is lapsed, and can only say sorry and do a sad emoji in /g when asked for a hand

Edited June 20, 2019 by Kiesu

[TheRandomno]

This will cause an influx of [credit seller] bots and the like.

 

Probably not a good idea to reference a credit selling site by name on the forums.

 

How exactly will this affect credit sellers? The only relevant change is the credit cap, and I'm sure credit sellers keep at least a few subbed accounts to store their credits on.

 

Regarding the changes, the new cap is nice but won't make much difference with today's prices. As for the Quick Travel and Medical Probe changes, I don't remember having any restriction on Quick Travel as preferred, and the medical probes were capped at 5 uses. Removing the restriction is good though.

[Iymurra]

1 mil should at least cover most gear re-socketing and augmenting costs. 2 to 3 mil would be better for preferred I think. If you upped it to 5 or 10 mil people who wouldn't otherwise might start to play with the GTN creating a better market.

 

I'm of accord that you should unlock Ops. Currently the population in operations is... terrible. SM at least. If you opened it up to F2P sm ops might actually become playable. Hell, open up HM EV & KP & EC while you're at it. Those have been around for what... almost a decade now? They're not new content by a long shot. Nor are most subs doing them for anything other than quick conquest. Giving F2P and Preferred access to some aspirational content might help make them not so bloody terrible at playing the game.

[Stariessaber]

I do have a question for people who have previously obtained an additional quickbar, will they also receive this additional qucikbar? So for example Preferred currently have four, then have purchased an additional one so now have 5, will this addition mean they will have six.

 

Also what will happen with existing purchases medical probes and quick travel passes after once these changes are implemented?

[DarthYun]

Good job.

 

Now consider removing more or make them less of a "perceived" limitation of the game. I think there is a lot of these limitations that are perceived as a big one and make no sense to be in the game. Consider removing more cause personally I think they are "perceived" as big ones for new players and a big turnoff.

[LordDarrack]

This will cause an influx of gamereasy bots and the like. Won’t it? What improvements are you making to prevent credit bots and scammers like it? What improvements are you making to allow us to ignore such bots so the gen chat in game is not littered with gamereasy advertisements? When will we be able to have one shared ignore list for our whole account and not tied to per toon? When will we be able to ignore a toon’s entire legacy?

 

Easy answer is mate 'Never'.

They don't care, bots and credit selling scammers have been rife since launch, they have no idea how to stop it, not a Scooby.

Its pretty obvious they lack the skill as a company to deal with it otherwise they would have removed the ability for them to spam mail/chat as other games have successfully done.

 

Be safe

[kodrac]

Sweet! Now I can start overpricing things up to a million!

 

Edited June 20, 2019 by kodrac

[SteveTheCynic]

Even before I read the article, the first thought through my head was, "and people will complain that it doesn't go far enough," and the very first response proved me right.

 

I must be getting cynical in my old age...

[TrixxieTriss]

Even before I read the article, the first thought through my head was, "and people will complain that it doesn't go far enough," and the very first response proved me right.

 

I must be getting cynical in my old age...

 

Steve, you old cynic, you

[DzastinBiberi]

Daniel, could you PLEASE tell the team to fix Title's? Some of them have no text at all when you go to the Char/Title selection, it's just black with no text.

 

I wanna display my Serial Killer title, I've reported this over a month ago and still nothing.

[UmbralSpirit]

Easy answer is mate 'Never'.

They don't care, bots and credit selling scammers have been rife since launch

 

*Rife since the 90's.

[TattooYoda]

So it starts, F2PPref whines and they get stuff. Next Pref will be able to run Ops.Don't make the same mistake Turbine did and give in to whiny F2P/Prefs. SSG has a good idea they open 2 Sub/VIP servers things are simple there no gold spammers,whiny players.

 

Watch yourself Bio give them an inch then they will want a foot next.

[sharkfishman]

This is fair, and a nice change. However, the only thing I would point out is that making these changes virtually identical doesn't seem to show much love to preferred players. I mean, what is the difference now between being free and preferred? 1 quickbar?

 

At the very least, the ratio of in-game cash should be kept the same. It was 250,000 and 350,000. So why not 1,000,000 and 1,500,000? Or 750,000 and 1,000,000?

 

I guess it depends on whether you want to make preferred players feel valuable too or not.

[Kiesu]

So it starts, F2PPref whines and they get stuff. Next Pref will be able to run Ops.Don't make the same mistake Turbine did and give in to whiny F2P/Prefs. SSG has a good idea they open 2 Sub/VIP servers things are simple there no gold spammers,whiny players..

Prefs and F2P cant even write here. What are you on about.

[Heal-To-Full]

Today we made an announcement about reducing some of the limitations for Free-to-Play and Preferred players. More specifically adjustments to credit caps, Quickbars, Medical Probes, and Quick Travel![/color]

This is very welcome!

 

F2P players' 5-revive limit is a problem for everyone - it makes subscribers wait while their f2p/preferred party members revive at the medcenter and run back. This makes a ton of difference.

 

But I have to agree with other players that you're underestimating the inflation. In 2.0, one could even buy packs off the GTN as a f2p. Today, players are charging and getting 100 million for armor sets. But that's all right, that's players. Let's look at what the developers feel as fair prices for items.

 

Currently, the Field Legacy Cargo Droid goes for a cool 2 million for the 1st level, and 3.5 million for the 3rd. It's not a must-have, but it's not something I see as necessary to deny to f2p. if that's worth 2 mil, that should be a good number.

 

In short, a plain 10x increase - 2 million for f2p and 3.5 for preferred - would be a good match to the game's inflation.

 

We're not talking f2ps buying luxury items on the GTN, or even large Strongholds. It's just matching their cap to the costs of vendor items and unlocks, the developer-recognized inflation. GTN inflation is much more than 10x. And if we were to future-proof this, others' suggestions for 5-10 million cap for preferred (i.e. mostly subs on a temporary semi-sabbatical) is not unreasonable either.

 

I don't think operations should be entirely unlocked to f2p players, as the level 70 is still behind a paywall. But they could definitely use a limitation, similar to warzones today. You can make it a really small limit, like 2/week per character (or even 1/week if expended only for the final boss), or 5/week per account, or whatever - but at least give something to let f2ps get a taste for the raiding. SM ops just aren't the elite activity they used to be. And I sincerely hope and expect that many will sub, once they try and realize that what they're missing out on (or not getting enough of) is within their ability.

[ShieldProtection]

ungrateful people.

[Rolodome]

So it starts, F2PPref whines and they get stuff. Next Pref will be able to run Ops.Don't make the same mistake Turbine did and give in to whiny F2P/Prefs. SSG has a good idea they open 2 Sub/VIP servers things are simple there no gold spammers,whiny players.

 

Watch yourself Bio give them an inch then they will want a foot next.

Ops passes used to be an option. They removed them with Galactic Command under the leadership of sir "Thrill of the Hunt."

 

Not that nickle and diming for such things was ever great, but the point is, your statement is absurd, if somebody knows the history of this game.

[SteveTheCynic]

Ops passes used to be an option. They removed them with Galactic Command under the leadership of sir "Thrill of the Hunt."

 

Not that nickle and diming for such things was ever great, but the point is, your statement is absurd, if somebody knows the history of this game.

All the statements in this thread, with the exception of Trixxie's, are absurd.

[Rolodome]

Even before I read the article, the first thought through my head was, "and people will complain that it doesn't go far enough," and the very first response proved me right.

 

I must be getting cynical in my old age...

Well it doesn't even mention one of the key flaws of this game's model that has been the case since it went F2P and got worse with the GC changes. That those who are part of the game, but whose sub lapses for whatever reason - or those who want to be a part of it, but can't afford to spend a lot - can't easily help pad the numbers in some of the key areas of end-game content. This results in a worse experience for subs, who have a harder time finding people to play with.

 

These changes are interesting, but feel like they are years behind the curve. Granted, it may be the leadership that has impacted whether it's changed for the better at all and if that's the case, hopefully they are keeping an open mind to further changes. This game isn't getting any younger and the population isn't exactly booming.

 

I would that one key question to ask with any F2P/Preferred restriction is, "How does this impact the experience that subs have?" They are the ones being courted for obvious reasons and part of the advantages of that model is keeping some people around as F2P/Preferred to pad the numbers. It also just a matter of... if someone is a sub and drops down, you don't want to give them such a drastically poor experience that they decide to quit because they didn't renew immediately.

 

Of course, there are people who know how these things work far better than I. I'm just speaking to the general principles of what makes sense for a model like this. My goal is the long-term health of the game which relates to long-term profits, rather than short-term quarterly profits, which likely has not been the same goal as the game's leadership at numerous points in its life, if not the entire time.

 

That being said, I don't really like any F2P model and would prefer if things were more straightforward (sub and you get everything, no strings attached - pay for an expansion every once in a while), but if someone is going to use a F2P model, it makes sense to utilize its advantages and it doesn't seem like this game has ever done that very effectively. There are worse F2P models, sure, but there are also, I would argue, a lot better and plenty of room for improvement. As that famous Breaking Bad line goes, "No more half measures, Walter." This model feels like a series of half measures that sends mixed signals, pits the community against itself, and makes the game difficult to recommend to anyone.

 

I applaud them for trying to improve things with these changes, but, well... I don't know that it's worth typing the words I'm saying. I'm probably just considered to be someone who thinks they know things they don't on this subject. Which could be the case (it's very important I keep an open mind to the idea that I have no idea what I'm talking about), but they certainly haven't sold me on the value of their brand of F2P model.

 

All the statements in this thread, with the exception of Trixxie's, are absurd.

Is that cause you're a cynic?

[tummiswtor]

Wow...

[DarthCasus]

Well.. these weren't worth waiting for. I appreciate the thought (after how many years) but this won't convince Preferreds to come back and participate. F2P is fine as of these changes but of course there are people convinced that people are "ungrateful" and "freeloaders" when they damn well could have paid triple the amount of money but not a sub as of late.

 

Don't dance around the bush BioWare, the Preferred category doesn't look convincing or worth returning for to date and 4.0 and 5.0 scared off enough people to take a serious swing at it. So please do.

[SteveTheCynic]

That being said, I don't really like any F2P model and would prefer if things were more straightforward (sub and you get everything, no strings attached - pay for an expansion every once in a while), but if someone is going to use a F2P model, it makes sense to utilize its advantages and it doesn't seem like this game has ever done that very effectively. There are worse F2P models, sure, but there are also, I would argue, a lot better and plenty of room for improvement. As that famous Breaking Bad line goes, "No more half measures, Walter." This model feels like a series of half measures that sends mixed signals, pits the community against itself, and makes the game difficult to recommend to anyone.

You're not entirely wrong, except that there's an assumption in the above that I don't think is justified. (Notice that this is all a matter of opinion unless BioWare staff weigh in and issue a statement one way or another, which I don't think is at all likely.)

 

The assumption is that SWTOR is an F2P game with a subscription option, whereas for me, it's the other way around: a subscription game with an F2P option. There's room for debate, of course, but the structure of the F2P / Privileged states makes (for me) more sense if you think of subscription as the "normal" state and F2P as the "exceptional" state.

Is that cause you're a cynic?

That's a distinct possibility.

 

EDIT: I believe I should mention one other point. I played this game for two years as Privileged before deciding that enough was enough, at which point I subscribed.

Edited June 20, 2019 by SteveTheCynic