Originally posted by Piiritus

Being a TSW fan I don't like this move though. I've been ok with cloth and cosmetics in cash shop but it seems they are trying to test the limits here and this is not good imho.

 No MMO with a cash shop relies on cosmetics only to generate revenue, because they know there's a small population of players who will actually care enough to buy that stuff.

They all start sneaking in items that are steadily more and more meaningful and have more influence with the players, be it gameplay-wise, socially, etc. Occasionally you'll have a developer/publisher who screws up by showing their hand and dropping items that are blatantly game-affecting from day 1, after insisting they never would add them at all (such as NCSoft with L2's cash shop).

The problem is, they play semantics with you. They use words like "optional" or "convenience only". The thing is, everyone's definition of "optional" is different when it comes to these games. To someone whose playstyle mandates leveling as fast as the game will allow (and there are many who are like that), things like xp potions are not "optional"; they're necessary. Convenience is another, and you can see it in action right in this thread. One person sees extra slots as a convenience, someone else doesn't. Just so happens that there's enough people who saw them as not being convenience only, who also found it rather screwed up that they would be cash shop only.

It should be seen as a precedent of what FC will likely pull in the future. They'll keep pushing and pushing and pushing as time goes on, seeing what they can get away with adding. Whatever doesn't get "too much" of an uproar will stay, and whatever does will simply be adjusted in some way. It's like a child constantly testing their parents to see how much they can get away with. Sometimes they end up contradicting themselves.

You'll see a developer claim that their cash shop will sell items for convenience only, to make things "more fair" for those  with less time would rather spend money to get something sooner than later. Then they turn around and sell items that are exclusive to the cash shop and for which there is no other way to obtain them, making it necessary - not optional - to spend additional money if you want those items. See the problem there? Sadly, many don't. And it happens all the time.

Cash shops are one of the biggest and longest running con-jobs in the gaming industry. There's so much song-and-dance and smoke and mirrors involved with their setup and execution, it could make your head spin to stop and think about it all. Semantics, carefully chosen terminology and slick PR are favored tools to affect and influence public perception; to keep people's focus on what the developer *wants* you to see, and away from what they don't want you to. It's a big ongoing psychology experiment, where the pay-off of successful research is more $$$ generated. Personally, I find it disgusting.

Sad that so many willingly, even enthusiastically, jump right in with both feet without even thinking about it first.

Just ask yourself this question: Is there any reason why any of the stuff in the cash shop can't be obtained simply by playing the game alone? Spending in-game currency to acquire aesthetic gear for your character, etc? FC did it for years in Anarchy Online. They even devised special "name brand" clothing lines, sold in sets, that people could get.simply by spending the in-game money. The Cash Shop is not a necessity. It's a money grab.

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by bcbully

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Since there is no NDA on current state of CB so i would like to add that FC decided to make gear management slots cash shop exclusive. For now you get only 5 in game which are very limited where you have 9 different weapons and you are expected to come up with 100's of builds and skill decks combos. Devs repeatedly said that they expect players to come up with many decks and would also be forced to experiment and yet they decided to make this crucual feature purchaseable by cash shop.

There is already a huge cry over this on forums and no response from FC yet. They are backing out on their promise to keep cash hop cosmetic only, but it shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. For PVP alone i have 7 slots, and i haven't even started with PVE yet. So go figure amount of cash it will cost to keep versatile.

 

The latest patch broke more things than it fixed. yes it is beta but game is 9 days away from headstart. Devs are very accomodating with feedback but the latest patch went out of control. It is most visible in Kingsmouth an since it is the starter area, it is not going put a good impression on potential customers who are going to try this game in few hours.

Unable to get any word if some emergency patch is coming up since a lot of missions are broken including the main storyline DAWN OF THE ENDLESS NIGHT. Questing is the best or i must say the only way to get decent AP and SP, and with so many broken missions, it becomes difficult to progress.

 

Yes there have been a lot of good and much needed addittions to UI and CC, some performance tweaks etc but negative outweights positive in current state.

My only concern is that OB will start soon and thery have to pull all the stops to make things work or new players will just get frustrated in starting zone alone forget about going to savage coast. Players are not forgiving these days.

 

EDIT; So community uproar finally got an official response and it will be possible to buy more slots in game too. Pheww!!

You must be new to CB OP. Btw the patch this morning fixed the broken stuff. This is the way it works in CB. Maybe you should stick to the BWEs.

 

Yes we all want more slots. We'll probably have 8 at launch.

Actually i have been in CB since may ;) and things have always been (surprisingly) very smooth, but the last patch i would admit put me ina panic mode when so close to OB;)

i want this game to do very well and have a very nice impression on players this weekend. But i have said this before and say it again thet TSW could have benefited from another delay for few days.

:) Yeah so I got a little pissed too (between me and you) ....Wake up call huh? Good post OP, in retrospec I should have did the same. 

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by elocke

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by DanitaKusor

Originally posted by Blackbrrd

I am going to repeat this since people are not reading the thread:

You can buy the extra slots for ingame money at launch.

Bah, why read when you can rant about the greedy heartless game developer based on what someone's best friend's cousin said.

The dev posted just now while this topic and the one on official forum has been going on for a while. Unless customers complain or protest you think FC will just come forward on their own? because that is how it works in MMO business right?

*rolls eyes*

Your tounge in cheek comment would be more relevant if i made this topic after FC confirmed that slots can be bought in game too.

Fact of the matter is, you jumped the gun.  If your post was timed better, say AFTER LAUNCH, then you would have solid ground to stand on.  Right now you don't, so suck it up, move along and stop getting pissy when people keep pointing out your errors.  I too doubt I'll use more than 5 builds, I just don't play my games that way.  Even in Rift I stick to the 5 I get and that's pushing it for me, mostly just use 3 tops.  1 pve group, 1 pvp, and 1 solo.

I didn't jump the gun FC did,  dev admited it was silly to make slots avilable in CS before making it avilabe in game for testing. Who jumped the gun here? and i am merely repeating the topic on official forums...which by the wasn't posted by me.

It is always easier to blame the players when you are out to play white knight isn't it?

Repeating the topic on the official forums HERE means you jumped the gun HERE.  Who's playing white knight?  I think you are over reacting to be honest.  Show me an MMO that doesn't have one "hot" issue at any given time.  There is always something to gripe about and it always ends up being pretty silly to get up in arms about.  Just like this whole thread/topic.

Originally posted by elocke

 

Repeating the topic on the official forums HERE means you jumped the gun HERE.  Who's playing white knight?  I think you are over reacting to be honest.  Show me an MMO that doesn't have one "hot" issue at any given time.  There is always something to gripe about and it always ends up being pretty silly to get up in arms about.  Just like this whole thread/topic.

If it was any other company i don't think people would make such a fuss about it, Ragnar usually squashes all misconceptions quite quickly but this topic has been up on forums since CS went live, so can you really blame people for thinking that way that also when name FC is in question? and interesting part is that the guy who responded doesn't even handle CS, he just reads these forums, saw my post and decided to respond.

Imagine that a dev reads mmorpg.com first and official forums later.

Gear Management is unlocked through faction rank.  Purchasing Gear Management slot is NOT the only way to unlock them.  That being said I agree that it should be removed from the cash shop.  In fact for me I demand it and let Funcom know.

So this is what they meant by "nice to haves." lol

They are projecting a ~30% profit increase per player from their cash shop. That is not going to happen with purely cosmetic items and some XP potions. There are bound to be some questionable items in the cash shop and that gear slot thing was a good indication of what we can expect. Just look at AO and AoC cash shops and you'll see this game's future. The only difference is that now you'll be paying a subscription fee as well.

Originally posted by heartless

So this is what they meant by "nice to haves." lol

They are projecting a ~30% profit increase per player from their cash shop. That is not going to happen with purely cosmetic items and some XP potions. There are bound to be some questionable items in the cash shop and that gear slot thing was a good indication of what we can expect. Just look at AO and AoC cash shops and you'll see this game's future. The only difference is that now you'll be paying a subscription fee as well.

Like what? I'm at a loss trying to think if anything that could equal that false alarm on the "questionable" scale.

Originally posted by bcbully

Originally posted by heartless

So this is what they meant by "nice to haves." lol

They are projecting a ~30% profit increase per player from their cash shop. That is not going to happen with purely cosmetic items and some XP potions. There are bound to be some questionable items in the cash shop and that gear slot thing was a good indication of what we can expect. Just look at AO and AoC cash shops and you'll see this game's future. The only difference is that now you'll be paying a subscription fee as well.

Like what? I'm at a loss trying to think if anything that could equal that false alarm on the "questionable" scale.

Did you expect gear slots to be available on the cash shop? Funcom has 2 games with cash shops, they know exactly what works and what doesn't. I can see stuff like bigger inventory upgrades being on the cash shop, for example.

Originally posted by heartless

Originally posted by bcbully

Originally posted by heartless

So this is what they meant by "nice to haves." lol

They are projecting a ~30% profit increase per player from their cash shop. That is not going to happen with purely cosmetic items and some XP potions. There are bound to be some questionable items in the cash shop and that gear slot thing was a good indication of what we can expect. Just look at AO and AoC cash shops and you'll see this game's future. The only difference is that now you'll be paying a subscription fee as well.

Like what? I'm at a loss trying to think if anything that could equal that false alarm on the "questionable" scale.

Did you expect gear slots to be available on the cash shop? Funcom has 2 games with cash shops, they know exactly what works and what doesn't. I can see stuff like bigger inventory upgrades being on the cash shop, for example.

Inventory is already huge, bigger than any recent MMOS, i doubt i will run out of space any time soon even though i am a pack rat.

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by heartless

Originally posted by bcbully

Originally posted by heartless

So this is what they meant by "nice to haves." lol

They are projecting a ~30% profit increase per player from their cash shop. That is not going to happen with purely cosmetic items and some XP potions. There are bound to be some questionable items in the cash shop and that gear slot thing was a good indication of what we can expect. Just look at AO and AoC cash shops and you'll see this game's future. The only difference is that now you'll be paying a subscription fee as well.

Like what? I'm at a loss trying to think if anything that could equal that false alarm on the "questionable" scale.

Did you expect gear slots to be available on the cash shop? Funcom has 2 games with cash shops, they know exactly what works and what doesn't. I can see stuff like bigger inventory upgrades being on the cash shop, for example.

Inventory is already huge, bigger than any recent MMOS, i doubt i will run out of space any time soon even though i am a pack rat.

That's not the point. The point is that this is a subscription based MMO and certain things should not be in the cash shop.

I will wait until a majority of players are at max level and then I will read MMORPG to see if ppl are tired of content. If ppl think the end-game is awesome and there seems to be longevity in it, I will purchase it. Otherwise I will keep away from this title, just like I do with any other MMO with poor end-game.

Hmm.. well apparantly, unlike quite a few other people, I actually learned something the last time I played a game from Funcom..  *cough* age of conan *cough*...  Just cause they made the game somewhat decent 3 years after release, doesn't excuse them for the launch.  I expect no less from Funcom with their new game...  If anything, it will be fun to watch..

/popcorn....

Oh its definately a cash grab, most of all the good clothing is in the shop. Want to have more gear slots bam pop the credit card out.

Originally posted by Markusan

I will wait until a majority of players are at max level and then I will read MMORPG to see if ppl are tired of content. If ppl think the end-game is awesome and there seems to be longevity in it, I will purchase it. Otherwise I will keep away from this title, just like I do with any other MMO with poor end-game.

There is no endgame right now.

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by pdx2012

They've never said the cashshop was cosmetic only, they said cosmetic and convenience only. Extra deck slots are definitely convenience items.

It would be convenience item if it didn't effect your gameplay like cosmetic T shirts and pants. How  can you say that with straight face that extra management slots are just covenience items?

Ok, you pointed this out:

For now you get only 5 in game which are very limited where you have 9 different weapons and you are expected to come up with 100's of builds and skill decks combos. Devs repeatedly said that they expect players to come up with many decks and would also be forced to experiment and yet they decided to make this crucual feature purchaseable by cash shop.

You have seven combat slots and seven passive.   To build effective decks, you need synergy which means you're going to need to have some focus on what you do.   There are only so many weapons that can, in combination, build this synergy and you're probably going to try to use just a few weapons that work really well together.    So, how many viable 5-weapon builds will there be for active combat?    I suspect not a lot.   Would you really need to select beyond 5 weapons for passives?    Probably not.   

Do you need to select more than two or three?    I think you'll probably remained more focused that way.   Assuming this isn't whack:   http://www.darkdemonscrygaia.com/showthread.php?t=25719    What I see is a strong implication that you're going to have natural groupings in deck building.   Let's take  blades.   I love blades and Blood really works well with them.   Building that effective deck, after multiple failures, was as far as I got in the game.   But I read the table and note that Hammer, Pistols, Elements and Shotgun really don't add much to blade deck synergies.     And every other primary weapon has something very similar going on -- four really weak weapons and four very complementary weapons.  And having tried Pistol/Blade on my first character...  Yeah, didn't work very well together.

So, from my perspective in deck building, I wouldn't really spend a lot of time trying to tweak some weird build that was comprised of the weakest additions to the pool.   So, I just can't how this is any kind of material issue when I compare it to the deck-building synergy process.   

I could see you being justifiably angry if they were capping you at Q8 weapons unless you bought unlocks...   Or you're only getting a 10-slot bag...    But I don't see where there is a real issue when one considers that four of the weapons with which you can build a deck are only marginal when it comes to the synergies you wish to create with your deck.   Even worse, trying to use all 9 would be likely make a character that is practically hopeless as you have just 14 slots (active and passive combined) from which to build a deck and you'd suffer from some hopelessly muddled deck that did nothing well.

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by DanitaKusor

We are talking about deck management slots here so similar to talent builds in other MMOs and you get 5 of them... most people won't even use 5.  I used a grand total of 1 by the end of beta weekend 3 and used it to save my solo build then swap around test builds by hand when needed, a process which only took a couple of minutes at most.

As for broken patches... yeah not uncommon in Age of Conan I recall, or indeed any MMO.  Even the most rigerous testing with a game this complex will still miss issues when a game goes live.

Let us not compare TSW to other MMOS and draw comaprisons only when it is covenient. TSW skill system and management is very vast and offers a lot more than just 5. There are 9 kind of different weapons which makes atleast 9 to 10 slots compulsory and that is minimum. If you are going to PVP you will change your tone ina minute that 5 slots are sufficient. TSW is designed ina manner where you have to have to more than 5 slots to be efficent whether you solo or in groups.

It doesn't necessarily follow.    All you have to do is look at the skills and processes of the game.   You have 14-total slots.   You try to build  9-weapon deck when half the weapons don't even work well together and I can see anything but that you're going to be hopelessly muddled.

And if you really need to swap out weapons to make a new deck.  All you do is swap weapons between combat and re-arrange your deck.   It's one minor step added to the between-combat downtime you're going to need re-arrange you deck anyway.

I think 5 is fair with no sub. I think 20+ is fair with a sub. I don't even understand why they have cosmetics in the cash shop. Those cosmetics should be in the game and should be part of the sub IMO.

Edit: Is there a place I can actually look at the cash shop items? I've been looking around and can't find anything. 

only a fool would be willing to play a game with a monthly sub fee, and a cash shop.   huge rip off. 

Originally posted by colddog04

I think 5 is fair with no sub. I think 20+ is fair with a sub. I don't even understand why they have cosmetics in the cash shop. Those cosmetics should be in the game and should be part of the sub IMO.

 

Edit: Is there a place I can actually look at the cash shop items? I've been looking around and can't find anything. 

Can you imagine the forum riots if Funcom had made the monthly sub $20 and left out the cash shop ? 

Originally posted by MoonBeans

only a fool would be willing to play a game with a monthly sub fee, and a cash shop.   huge rip off. 

 

Ahh how sweet.

"Everybody who disagree with me , are a fool"  Guess the world should thankful you are around.