I've always hated item shops. They're especially bad for pvp based games.

The only way an item shop can benefit an MMO is if the sale items don't give people an advantage over others (server transefers, stat resets, cosmetics, etc...).

Originally posted by neosapience

I've always hated item shops. They're especially bad for pvp based games.

 

The only way an item shop can benefit an MMO is if the sale items don't give people an advantage over others (server transefers, stat resets, cosmetics, etc...).

The PvP in lotro is laughable at worst, a curiosity at best.  And there is no distinct advantage to the cash shop in lotro.  You can grind for the currency to buy anything in the shop, or you can use money.  The choice comes down to time, or money.  There is nothing that one side has access to that the other doesn't.

Originally posted by Edli

 achievments and loot for many is important and that's why they hate f2p. To each their game. 

Even assuming that achievements and loot were available in the cash shop, which for this game they are unlikely to be based on the experience with DDO, then  no-one need buy them as they can open up the whole game through subscription as at present. Even in games where that is not the case, there's no reason why someone who chooses not to use the cash shop to those ends should resent others having the opportunity to do so given your own statement "to each their game".

It's only if the game is only viable to play if the cash shop is used that people should have a problem with F2P - and only then if the cost of achieving that viability is in excess of what a subscription would have cost them.

Originally posted by Shadewalker

Originally posted by Edli

 achievments and loot for many is important and that's why they hate f2p. To each their game. 

Even assuming that achievements and loot were available in the cash shop, which for this game they are unlikely to be based on the experience with DDO, then  no-one need buy them as they can open up the whole game through subscription as at present. Even in games where that is not the case, there's no reason why someone who chooses not to use the cash shop to those ends should resent others having the opportunity to do so given your own statement "to each their game".

Peoples that don't want f2p want a game unaffected from outside. Doesn't matter if I choose to or not to pay in cash shop. A mmo is not about you only. Your achievments after all have no meaning if they aren't compared to others. A boost xp potion is considered an unfair advantage and as far as I know ddo have this kind of item. There are peoples who care and peoples who don't. Mixing them is not a good idea.

Originally posted by Edli

Originally posted by Shadewalker

Originally posted by Edli

 achievments and loot for many is important and that's why they hate f2p. To each their game. 

Even assuming that achievements and loot were available in the cash shop, which for this game they are unlikely to be based on the experience with DDO, then  no-one need buy them as they can open up the whole game through subscription as at present. Even in games where that is not the case, there's no reason why someone who chooses not to use the cash shop to those ends should resent others having the opportunity to do so given your own statement "to each their game".

 

Peoples that don't want f2p want a game unaffected from outside. Doesn't matter if I choose to or not to pay in cash shop. A mmo is not about you only. Your achievments after all have no meaning if they aren't compared to others. A boost xp potion is considered an unfair advantage and as far as I know ddo have this kind of item. There are peoples who care and peoples who don't. Mixing them is not a good idea.

So when you said "to each their game" what you really meant was "to each my game".

I see.

Originally posted by Shadewalker

Originally posted by Edli

Originally posted by Shadewalker

Originally posted by Edli

 achievments and loot for many is important and that's why they hate f2p. To each their game. 

Even assuming that achievements and loot were available in the cash shop, which for this game they are unlikely to be based on the experience with DDO, then  no-one need buy them as they can open up the whole game through subscription as at present. Even in games where that is not the case, there's no reason why someone who chooses not to use the cash shop to those ends should resent others having the opportunity to do so given your own statement "to each their game".

 

Peoples that don't want f2p want a game unaffected from outside. Doesn't matter if I choose to or not to pay in cash shop. A mmo is not about you only. Your achievments after all have no meaning if they aren't compared to others. A boost xp potion is considered an unfair advantage and as far as I know ddo have this kind of item. There are peoples who care and peoples who don't. Mixing them is not a good idea.

So when you said "to each their game" what you really meant was "to each my game".

I see.

To each their games means to each their games. "F2p" to those who don't mind cs and sub to those who want a fair game for all. What I find silly is that some saying that this is the future. Every other game at some point will follow ddo and lotro. Yeah because a shitty game like ddo and a so so game like lotro are the pioneers of the golden age that is coming. You like f2p, that's fine play it but don't think that there aren't a lot of players that don't like this type of gameplay.

I'm not convinced that the critics of F2P here really get the point that LoTRO isn't switching from P2P to F2P per se.

If DDO and LoTRO are  setting the new standard for MMO's it is in the way in which they are offering both F2P and P2P business models to their customers so that players can choose between them.

There are perfectly valid reasons for not liking F2P games, but those reasons don't apply to DDO or LoTRO.

As for those who don't like the way other people will be able to play their game, well tough. Get over it just as groupers and soloers, crafters and non-crafters, raiders and non-raiders, PvE'ers and PvP'ers live happily alongside each other. Play the game your own way and don't worry about what the rest get up to. There's absolutely no suggestion whatsoever that the cash shop in LoTRO will give any one player an advantage over another player.

"Can we even call that gaming? Or just shopping?"

Beautiful, you summed up how I feel in one sentence. Shopping for items has no business being in a GAME. Games are about playing them, not shopping.

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Originally posted by Shadewalker
I'm not convinced that the critics of F2P here really get the point that LoTRO isn't switching from P2P to F2P per se.
If DDO and LoTRO are  setting the new standard for MMO's it is in the way in which they are offering both F2P and P2P business models to their customers so that players can choose between them.
There are perfectly valid reasons for not liking F2P games, but those reasons don't apply to DDO or LoTRO.
As for those who don't like the way other people will be able to play their game, well tough. Get over it just as groupers and soloers, crafters and non-crafters, raiders and non-raiders, PvE'ers and PvP'ers live happily alongside each other. Play the game your own way and don't worry about what the rest get up to. There's absolutely no suggestion whatsoever that the cash shop in LoTRO will give any one player an advantage over another player.

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I would agree with you if becoming a paying customer allowed access to ALL content in the game. This will not be the case. There will still be the tacted on item shop that will have items exclusive for purchase with real cash.

Originally posted by qombi

"Can we even call that gaming? Or just shopping?"

 

Beautiful, you summed up how I feel in one sentence. Shopping for items has no business being in a GAME. Games are about playing them, not shopping.

Then you should have no issue with LOTRO, as all items in the shop can be acquired by investing time in the game.  They're just offering the option of using cash OR time.

Originally posted by qombi

 

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Originally posted by Shadewalker
I'm not convinced that the critics of F2P here really get the point that LoTRO isn't switching from P2P to F2P per se.
If DDO and LoTRO are  setting the new standard for MMO's it is in the way in which they are offering both F2P and P2P business models to their customers so that players can choose between them.
There are perfectly valid reasons for not liking F2P games, but those reasons don't apply to DDO or LoTRO.
As for those who don't like the way other people will be able to play their game, well tough. Get over it just as groupers and soloers, crafters and non-crafters, raiders and non-raiders, PvE'ers and PvP'ers live happily alongside each other. Play the game your own way and don't worry about what the rest get up to. There's absolutely no suggestion whatsoever that the cash shop in LoTRO will give any one player an advantage over another player.

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I would agree with you if becoming a paying customer allowed access to ALL content in the game. This will not be the case. There will still be the tacted on item shop that will have items exclusive for purchase with real cash.

Paying customers will have access to all content.  Yeah, expansions will be behind barriers where you can either pay or grind for points to access them, but how is that any different from any other sub game?

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Originally posted by kaiser3282

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Originally posted by Gardavil2
 

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Originally posted by Wharg0ul
This is the ultimate culmination of the "instant gratification" mentality that has plagued MMORPGs in recent years.
It wasn't enough to dumb the games down, and make sure you never had to accomplish anything....now you don't even have to PLAY to get that next "New Shiny" (tm) item....just BUY IT with your credit card!!
This is the beginning of something VERY, VERY bad. You think WoW did permenant damage to MMORPGs?? Just wait 'till THIS little shit-flower blossoms.
We went from virtual worlds, to virtual Wal-Mart. And the lazy-ass "GIMME! GIMME! GIMME!" generation cheered the whole time.
 
 
 

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This and well said.
 

All Cash Shops in all online games (MMOs some people call them) exist for one and only one reason:
To drain your wallet of extra cash... to tempt you to go the "easy route"...and they justify it by reminding us that we are not as young as we used to be and we don't have the time to earn it ourselves.
Poppycock. It's profiteering pure and simple. It's cheating. Years ago the Players would have revolted... and did a few times. Now it's not only acceptable and defended by Dev and Player alike but also considered cool.
As another Player posted on these forums not so long ago... "The MMO world has gone straight into the Gutter". I agree.
Any Player that buys anything from a Cash Shop in a MMO is Cheating, period. No one will ever convince me otherwise.
AND I want LotRO to remain the kind of MMO where everyone can go everywhere together, not this zone access garbage other MMOs are going to now.(No I did not support MoM and SoM as being expansions that restricted Players movements. Level cap yes, restricted access no.)

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 Cool story, problem is you dont make the rules. You can claim it as cheating all you want, but it is the rules of the game, set by the people running it, therefore not cheating. Ive said it in another thread when someone else mad ethe same comments as you... You cant go into something like a poker tournament, which has rules defined by the people running the tournament, and just declare that youre changing the rules and everyone must play the way you want or else theyre cheating. You cant just cry foul for some made up reason of your own when the rules are already laid out.
Unless its an MMO you designed, programmed, and run yourself (or a private server of an existing MMO), you have no say in what the rules are, how other people can/should play, or wether or not something is cheating.

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You are free to hold that opinion if you wish and I can respect you right to do so. I just don't agree with it.. As far as I am concerned all cash shops are cheating. This "point of view" of mine runs so deep in me I doubt any argument would change my opinion on this.

So, since almost all MMOs are now going to a F2P or a F2P hybrid model, and most with cash shops, I guess the MMO genre that I loved is gone. All Players are customers, and all customers have the right to be disappointed, even angry, when a favorite product the love gets changed. Customers also have the right to discontinue their use of the product. Time perhaps to find a new hobby that I agree with.

Originally posted by zeowyrm

Originally posted by qombi

 

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Originally posted by Shadewalker
I'm not convinced that the critics of F2P here really get the point that LoTRO isn't switching from P2P to F2P per se.
If DDO and LoTRO are  setting the new standard for MMO's it is in the way in which they are offering both F2P and P2P business models to their customers so that players can choose between them.
There are perfectly valid reasons for not liking F2P games, but those reasons don't apply to DDO or LoTRO.
As for those who don't like the way other people will be able to play their game, well tough. Get over it just as groupers and soloers, crafters and non-crafters, raiders and non-raiders, PvE'ers and PvP'ers live happily alongside each other. Play the game your own way and don't worry about what the rest get up to. There's absolutely no suggestion whatsoever that the cash shop in LoTRO will give any one player an advantage over another player.

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I would agree with you if becoming a paying customer allowed access to ALL content in the game. This will not be the case. There will still be the tacted on item shop that will have items exclusive for purchase with real cash.

Paying customers will have access to all content.  Yeah, expansions will be behind barriers where you can either pay or grind for points to access them, but how is that any different from any other sub game?

 In many Sub games you can't buy anything. That's how it's different. More directly in many sub gamesthe mechanics aren't warped by the necessity of feeding cash shops.

Originally posted by Shadewalker

I'm not convinced that the critics of F2P here really get the point that LoTRO isn't switching from P2P to F2P per se.

If DDO and LoTRO are  setting the new standard for MMO's it is in the way in which they are offering both F2P and P2P business models to their customers so that players can choose between them.

There are perfectly valid reasons for not liking F2P games, but those reasons don't apply to DDO or LoTRO.

As for those who don't like the way other people will be able to play their game, well tough. Get over it just as groupers and soloers, crafters and non-crafters, raiders and non-raiders, PvE'ers and PvP'ers live happily alongside each other. Play the game your own way and don't worry about what the rest get up to. There's absolutely no suggestion whatsoever that the cash shop in LoTRO will give any one player an advantage over another player.

No, you're the one who doesn't get it. Items that aren't found in game that find their way ingame through cash shops destroy the gaming experience. You should not be able to go outside of the game, and essentially have a GM hand over little goodies. That is not keeping the spirit of the game. That is destroying any sense that the game is a living, breathing world. It is instant gratification at it greatest. Something this WoW hating community has always shunned until it showed up in their game of choice.

At one point in time we as gamers thought that using 3rd party programs, buying gold, or buying power leveling services was cheating. Now, that the company is slowly sneaking these things in, you guys are all for it?

If you sell rez/stat boosting/shrines/whatever in a cash shop it should at the least be available through in game experiences. I will admit DDO has been very good with this so far, and only a few items in the cash shop can't be found in game. However, this model is in its infancy, and is bound to evolve. We will see more powerful items as time goes on, and content will be balanced off the cash shop. Kinda like how DDO now offers a complete respec through the cash shop. Something that was never available, and still is not available, through in game experience.

Originally posted by brostyn

Originally posted by Shadewalker

I'm not convinced that the critics of F2P here really get the point that LoTRO isn't switching from P2P to F2P per se.

If DDO and LoTRO are  setting the new standard for MMO's it is in the way in which they are offering both F2P and P2P business models to their customers so that players can choose between them.

There are perfectly valid reasons for not liking F2P games, but those reasons don't apply to DDO or LoTRO.

As for those who don't like the way other people will be able to play their game, well tough. Get over it just as groupers and soloers, crafters and non-crafters, raiders and non-raiders, PvE'ers and PvP'ers live happily alongside each other. Play the game your own way and don't worry about what the rest get up to. There's absolutely no suggestion whatsoever that the cash shop in LoTRO will give any one player an advantage over another player.

No, you're the one who doesn't get it. Items that aren't found in game that find their way ingame through cash shops destroy the gaming experience. experience.

No, you don't get it.  You earn Turbine Points in game by playing the game.  You can then use those points to buy cash shop items.  You can, with enough time and grinding, acquire enough points to buy anything you want from the cash shop in LOTRO.  There is nothing in the cash shop that cannot be acquired by simply playing the game.  The choice comes down to which commodity to spend.  Time, or money.

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Originally posted by Kungaloosh1
At least Lotro is going the f2p way with their shop instead of charging a sub AND operating a shop like that steaming turd john smedly for eq1/eq2.

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I will give you that one. : )Looks like the normal cash shop fans though chimed in on the first page as usual. Sometimes I suspect some members of working for big mmo companies because I can see who in the right mind thinks it's a good idea to pay extra for things that would be in the game normally with just a sub.

If the game is free to play, okay I understand. Games have to make money but I still don't like the idea of items being bought with real life money because that is no longer gaming. But I am still okay with it, I don't have to play. What I really dislike is the companies double dipping now like Blizzard and SOE.

I will be dang if I will pay extra for items that I should be getting after I purchased the games and pay a sub fee.

Originally posted by zeowyrm

Originally posted by qombi

 

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Originally posted by Shadewalker
I'm not convinced that the critics of F2P here really get the point that LoTRO isn't switching from P2P to F2P per se.
If DDO and LoTRO are  setting the new standard for MMO's it is in the way in which they are offering both F2P and P2P business models to their customers so that players can choose between them.
There are perfectly valid reasons for not liking F2P games, but those reasons don't apply to DDO or LoTRO.
As for those who don't like the way other people will be able to play their game, well tough. Get over it just as groupers and soloers, crafters and non-crafters, raiders and non-raiders, PvE'ers and PvP'ers live happily alongside each other. Play the game your own way and don't worry about what the rest get up to. There's absolutely no suggestion whatsoever that the cash shop in LoTRO will give any one player an advantage over another player.

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I would agree with you if becoming a paying customer allowed access to ALL content in the game. This will not be the case. There will still be the tacted on item shop that will have items exclusive for purchase with real cash.

Paying customers will have access to all content.  Yeah, expansions will be behind barriers where you can either pay or grind for points to access them, but how is that any different from any other sub game?

 If what you say is true, that I retract my comments. I am okay with the business model but still not okay with item shops in general. At least they are not double dipping like WoW or SOE.

Originally posted by zeowyrm

Originally posted by brostyn

Originally posted by Shadewalker

I'm not convinced that the critics of F2P here really get the point that LoTRO isn't switching from P2P to F2P per se.

If DDO and LoTRO are  setting the new standard for MMO's it is in the way in which they are offering both F2P and P2P business models to their customers so that players can choose between them.

There are perfectly valid reasons for not liking F2P games, but those reasons don't apply to DDO or LoTRO.

As for those who don't like the way other people will be able to play their game, well tough. Get over it just as groupers and soloers, crafters and non-crafters, raiders and non-raiders, PvE'ers and PvP'ers live happily alongside each other. Play the game your own way and don't worry about what the rest get up to. There's absolutely no suggestion whatsoever that the cash shop in LoTRO will give any one player an advantage over another player.

No, you're the one who doesn't get it. Items that aren't found in game that find their way ingame through cash shops destroy the gaming experience. experience.

No, you don't get it.  You earn Turbine Points in game by playing the game.  You can then use those points to buy cash shop items.  You can, with enough time and grinding, acquire enough points to buy anything you want from the cash shop in LOTRO.  There is nothing in the cash shop that cannot be acquired by simply playing the game.  The choice comes down to which commodity to spend.  Time, or money.

Give it up, Zeowyrm. You'd have better luck teaching astrophysics to a goldfish than trying to make the anti-F2P crowd see logic. However, if you enjoy lost causes then by all means continue on. I wish you luck.

Originally posted by Gardavil2

All Players are customers, and all customers have the right to be disappointed, even angry, when a favorite product the love gets changed. Customers also have the right to discontinue their use of the product.

This has been true since the beginning of MMO's. All of the major companies in this genre -- Blizzard, Sony, NCSoft, Square Enix, etc. -- are mutli-million, or even multi-billion dollar companies. They have been for years.

The problem here is one of misplaced nostalgia. Many long-time MMO players have these rose-colored views of the games that they have played as somehow separate and apart from being retail products, and they've never seen themselves as customers because of it, unless they found themselves on the wrong end of the NGE.

Let's be honest here. In the beginning, these games were made "hard" (i.e., really time consuming) with annoying mechanics in place to slow down your progress so you would play longer, so you would sub longer, and they'd make more money off you in the long run. Those kinds of game mechanics simply don't work anymore. The market has just changed far too much. These days, people are less interested in spending 12+ hours a day playing a video game in order to progress. They don't want to become this guy:

It's not instant gratification, gimmie gimmie that drives newer gamers as much as it is a realization that these are just games, not a complete way of life. It's unhealthy to spend all your time in front of a monitor levelling up a toon.

For some players, like me, this means that you cut way, way back on your MMO gaming. You cultivate a life outside of your computer room, and learn to slow down and let the chips fall where they may. I'll never go on a raid again. I'll never have the most epic gear, or the most loot, or the greatest notoriety in any of these games. I'm okay with that. I don't play them for any of that anyhow. I play them because they're fun.

For other players, this means that maybe you want that gear, or you want to raid with your friends or whatever, but at the same time, you see your time as too valuable to spend 12+ hours a day grinding to get there, so you buy things to speed the process along, like XP potions. That doesn't hurt anyone, and it helps that player achieve their goals at their pace. And for all the complaints about cheating, it's really not that different from taking advantage of double XP weekends or other in-game bonuses to level up a character. It just costs you real money to do it.

Yes, they're games. They're also products, and always have been. At the end of the day, you've got two choices -- play the game, or don't. Buy the products, or don't.

Reallly the only problem is that of the motivational dynamic. In p2p they need to make you want to play to make money. In f2p they just need you to buy stuff.

The difference in the quality of gameplay will be notice by those that care. However history shows that those that care are always on the losing side of any commercial transaction, so suck it up.