Originally posted by Rajen

Originally posted by Ramonski7

 

They were also smart enough to price it at a amount to stave off potential abusers or switch happy loons from wanting to do it every single day/week/month. I could see if this was a fairly new MMO that's trying to milk every dime they can, but do you really think Blizzard's hurtin for money? Hell no, it's just a (fairly complicated) service that they alone have figured out how to do, with little interuption to the player who may happen to want to rejoin old friends or an old guild.

 

I wouldn't call the pricing smart... look at blizzcon for example, they charged $40 for a stream, in turn they had tons of people not even bother buying it and just leeching/stealing the stream for free because of the outrageous holier-than-thou pricing.

 

Why would blizzard develope something then intentionally discourage its use? That lacks logic... when it comes to business they aren't trying for personal goals they are trying to make money, wouldn't having a lower, more reasonable price, say.. $10 make more money as more people would be purchasing it. $30 is almost the price of an expansion pack...

 

I'm all for the implementation of the faction change by the way

Lol I'm sure Blizzcon has it's fair share of moochers, but for you to magically know how the $40 price tag performed among it's player base is folly on your part. Just as I could assume that Blizzard may have outsourced the contract of streaming the event, which in turn cost. Or maybe they thought that charging less than 1/2 the cost of an actually ticket to their event for players who were too far away to be there was reasonable. We can both play that game but let's move on shall we?

You then asked why would Blizzard develop something then intentionally discourage its use? And I say the price is set to discourage its misuse. Server changes cost $25 a pop, so an extra $5 for a more complicated procedure doesn't strike me as illogical. Granted that if they charge less they could see an increase in the use of this service as well as abuse, mind you.

Personally I just don't see the need for such a service, but I am sure someone who is too lazy to level an opposite faction avatar will probably want to spend the money.

Originally posted by Ozmodan

Personally I just don't see the need for such a service, but I am sure someone who is too lazy to level an opposite faction avatar will probably want to spend the money.

A horde Mage that switches to alliance is still a Mage.  I can pay $30 and faction change my mage to the other side or spend 2 months of sub fees leveling him and getting the gear... so whats the issue here? blizzard giving their players choice again.. HOW DARE THEY!!!!!

I dont mind the idea........the ONE problem I do have with it though, is that if you play on a server that is already heavily dominated by one faction, it will only make it worse. I play on Bloodscalp and from what i've read it's like 3 horde, to 1 alliance, lol >< Now with this, many alliance will jump ship over to the horde side. And spare me the "For the Horde" BS lol it's not about horde and alliance anymore...

Originally posted by coffee

A horde Mage that switches to alliance is still a Mage.  I can pay $30 and faction change my mage to the other side or spend 2 months of sub fees leveling him and getting the gear... so whats the issue here? blizzard giving their players choice again.. HOW DARE THEY!!!!!

They're not GIVING us anything. Unless you plan on quitting right after switching, you're still going to be paying that sub fee.

Originally posted by MMO_Doubter

Originally posted by coffee

A horde Mage that switches to alliance is still a Mage.  I can pay $30 and faction change my mage to the other side or spend 2 months of sub fees leveling him and getting the gear... so whats the issue here? blizzard giving their players choice again.. HOW DARE THEY!!!!!

They're not GIVING us anything. Unless you plan on quitting right after switching, you're still going to be paying that sub fee.

It does not take them 2 months to swap your faction so no your not going to be paying that 2 months if use the faction switch. 

So you spend $30 and get your mage,gear,exp,achievements moved over, and you can continue your progession. 

Or spend 2 months or possible more if your ulduar geared getting your new mage to such a level.. and while your busy doing that youv'e lost 2 month of progression.

In the end you've spent just as much money. $30 and get  instant transfer or $30+ of sub fees getting your re-roll to level. CHOICE!

Basically they are charging people 2 months worth of game play. What they should have done is at level 20 have a chain series of quests to go on. Make it difficult and let you only do this once per character. Maybe after that you have to pay but that is a steep price they are asking. The sad thing is that they could have charged 50 bucks and most crazy WOW fans would have paid for it. Yes, next will come the blizzard online shop. You will be able to pay to change class, buy mounts, weapons, armor, and so forth. If people are willing to pay for it then you really can't blame the game company.

Originally posted by Ramonski7

Lol I'm sure Blizzcon has it's fair share of moochers, but for you to magically know how the $40 price tag performed among it's player base is folly on your part. Just as I could assume that Blizzard may have outsourced the contract of streaming the event, which in turn cost. Or maybe they thought that charging less than 1/2 the cost of an actually ticket to their event for players who were too far away to be there was reasonable. We can both play that game but let's move on shall we?

 

You then asked why would Blizzard develop something then intentionally discourage its use? And I say the price is set to discourage its misuse. Server changes cost $25 a pop, so an extra $5 for a more complicated procedure doesn't strike me as illogical. Granted that if they charge less they could see an increase in the use of this service as well as abuse, mind you.

My blizzcon information was based off of seeing it personally. I only watched two streams that were up, which had about 10,000 viewers on both at once, that was only 2 streams there were a number of other streams. Say if they had only charged $5 and had 1000 of those 20,000 viewers buy it they would of made way more money rather than the $80 they got off of the 2 streamers. I mean it is an internet stream right? thats just ridiculous

As for $30 faction change... I have to stand against it, it isn't something that is difficult to do, it is an automatic system that is already set up that requires no work at all. A friend of mine that still plays would have faction changed 4-5 characters if it was $10, meaning they could of made $50 instead of nothing since $30 is just ridiculous for one character. Complication has nothing to do with it since it is an automatic process.

Meh ah well I really don't care anyway since I cancelled a whlie back, I just think it is ridiculous how they price such things and people are so wrapped up in it they can't see that it's ridiculous. Thats like charging $50 for something small like bread or milk xD

Originally posted by coffee

Originally posted by MMO_Doubter

Originally posted by coffee

A horde Mage that switches to alliance is still a Mage.  I can pay $30 and faction change my mage to the other side or spend 2 months of sub fees leveling him and getting the gear... so whats the issue here? blizzard giving their players choice again.. HOW DARE THEY!!!!!

They're not GIVING us anything. Unless you plan on quitting right after switching, you're still going to be paying that sub fee.

 

It does not take them 2 months to swap your faction so no your not going to be paying that 2 months if use the faction switch.

So you spend $30 and get your mage,gear,exp,achievements moved over, and you can continue your progession.

Or spend 2 months or possible more if your ulduar geared getting your new mage to such a level.. and while your busy doing that youv'e lost 2 month of progression.

In the end you've spent just as much money. $30 and get instant transfer or $30+ of sub fees getting your re-roll to level. CHOICE!

 

It would not take you 2 months to level. This is just for spoiled lazy people such as your self. I love these exaggerated posts with no facts what so ever to back it up.

bleh, just what I never wanted, to hear crybaby alliance...that's why I liked the whole KEK = LOL thing.  Don't get my wrong, alliance has some good players, but the majority of them are crybabies...horde ftw! KEK!

Originally posted by Death1942

do you hear that?  it's the sound of thousands of competant alliance players running to Orgrimmar...

 

faction imbalances here we come

Competant alliance players, you say?  Horde are fewer but all the eight year olds in that game play Alliance.  Horde on my server had the best guilds.

Originally posted by Yakboy

Originally posted by coffee

Originally posted by MMO_Doubter

Originally posted by coffee

A horde Mage that switches to alliance is still a Mage.  I can pay $30 and faction change my mage to the other side or spend 2 months of sub fees leveling him and getting the gear... so whats the issue here? blizzard giving their players choice again.. HOW DARE THEY!!!!!

They're not GIVING us anything. Unless you plan on quitting right after switching, you're still going to be paying that sub fee.

 

It does not take them 2 months to swap your faction so no your not going to be paying that 2 months if use the faction switch.

So you spend $30 and get your mage,gear,exp,achievements moved over, and you can continue your progession.

Or spend 2 months or possible more if your ulduar geared getting your new mage to such a level.. and while your busy doing that youv'e lost 2 month of progression.

In the end you've spent just as much money. $30 and get instant transfer or $30+ of sub fees getting your re-roll to level. CHOICE!

 

It would not take you 2 months to level. This is just for spoiled lazy people such as your self. I love these exaggerated posts with no facts what so ever to back it up.

 

 

No it will not take you 2 months to level, but will take you more than 2 months to get ya gear, all raid dungeons are on a 5 day cooldown.

Lets say ya mage is udular 25 or even 10 geared, you would need to run naxx10 atleast 6 times and you still wont get all your gear.

You cann get for lvl1 to lvl 80 with full Uduar10 gear in 2months, no matter how "no life" you are, as theres a limit on the number of raids you can run.

so for an uduar10/25 geared mage (even for a naxx10/25 geared) its a damn good service and worth the cost.  If you cannot see that then your blinded by your hate for wow and nothing more,

Yeah I really can't see any deep impact this will have on onything, or any real possible uses or exploits beyond someone who either wants a diferent experience (and even then most will simply level another toon) or someone who wishes to hook up and play with friends who happen to be on another faction.  The $30 price tag will somewhat restrict rapid and frequent faction hopping. It is simply another mechanism to let you play with your friends. And the more I see this new less restrictive "play with your friends" philosophy at Blizzard, the more I think it is something we will see much more strongly integrated into new MMO's.

It seems Blizzard has discovered one of those core principles for making money with a MMO. "Players who are lonely or frustrated do not stay subscribed for a long time. Players who are playing with well established frineds and guilds will keep playing and paying for years".

Originally posted by Swanea

lol.  And soon, race changes will come. Since you basically can race change off of this, you know you will see race change inter faction soon, as long as the class can be that race.

And I Wouldn't be suprised if by the time the next xpac hits, class changes with a 90 day cooldown (So you can't switch all the time).  With faction changing being 30 bucks, I bet race changes will be 25, and class change will be 40.

 

Oh yes. Got to love how this MT store for blizzard is so well accepted and perfectly fine, yet anything for any other sort of game is "retarded, dumb, causes people to leave the game, etc, etc, etc".  Yes, it's not offering uber items YET.  But it is still offering things in a store, more or less.  And it's cool, right? Because it's blizzard and wow?

One word: Items

That is why Blizzard is doing it correctly and other games are not. I will not play a game with an item shop in it. Switching faction is a service that isn't a normal game mechanic. I applaud Blizzard for finding creative ways to earn extra money without affecting in game items. One thing I do disagree with though from Blizzard is the trading card game giving in game mounts. Items should be obtainable in game and that is it.

I know you guys like the horde more, but the only reason why its better to play an alliance is if you are a pure world pker. Since we are less alliance, playing a pvp server is great since we can kill more horde players while questing rather then doing bg's all day.

     I just found out friends that moved to other states...have found eachother on Facebook and  have united on a WOW server to play. I, in turn, ran into one of them on Myspace.  I , being on another server and faction,  put in for a faction change...It took less than 5 minutes. I then put in for a server change....it took less than 25 minutes. I figured I'd just go whole hog and change my name...since I'm no longer a Blood Elf and am now Human.  It took .......less than 2 minutes....So ...in around just a half-hour...and for a total of $65.00($10.00+$25.00+$30.00)...I was ready to hang out with old friends in WOW. Do I wish it was free?...sure...but still well worth it and little to no downtime for my (new) toon. The only thing i'll miss is my wolf mounts (*sniff)...I hate the elekks. Another good point...I always wanted a Gryphon mount...beats the hell out of those ugly assed Pridewings...or manticores...or what ever those flying abominations were called on Horde-side.