Cash Shop Thoughts | Kill Ten Rats

Here's another nice article from Ravious.

http://www.killtenrats.com/2011/04/0...hts/#more-8540

Pretty true, people who only have proph are at a disadvantage, but nowadays it's cheaper to buy them all together than one separate.

But in the days of xunlai, you could purchase a 5 dollar prophecy key tenfold and get zkeys from it for months. 20+ zkeys a month from each account for months on end?

My thoughts are the same as they have always been.

I'm constantly searching for new MMORPG's and read loads of reviews per month on current, and up and coming MMORPG's. One thing which INSTANTLY turns me off, is a cash shop which sells items, upgrades and so forth which inbalance the game to a huge degree. Or imbalance the game so much that it takes an eternity to get 'said item' in game, through grind after grind after grind. Or even cash shops selling 'xp +50% runes' etc.

If Anet / GW2 set up a huge microtransaction cash shop they can say good bye to me as one player, and I'm sure I wouldn't be the only one thinking of looking elsewhere.

There are so many good f2p alternatives which require only a free download. Why pay in a shop to buy a game which would require heavy investment in a cash shop to be on a level playing field to others who have paid? I've never paid more than the retail price of a game, (i.e spending real money in game after purcahse = no) and I'm not going to start with GW2.

I'm fine with the current things in the cash shop, honestly its nothing crazy. But new classes for sale would completely ruin that mindset.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope
Sounds like whoever wrote that didn't have much else to blog about so he or she just made stuff up. So I don't see how this is a nice article.

I actually happen to play LOTRO. The cash shop isnt my favorite thing in the game and I don't agree on the stat boosters at all. So far I have spent about $30 in turbine points to get me started on unlocking the game permanently w/o the need to become a ViP but it takes a horrible amount of grinding. I feel Turbine could have done a better job with their cash shop.

Another game I have found to be enjoyable is Perfect World International. Their cash shop sells many cool things and they don't nickle and dime like turbine. One of the awesome things about PWI is if you don't intend to spend a dime on it is once you get to a higher level and accumulate lots of cash there is an in game system to buy their cash shop currency from other players with in game currency.

On a side note, PWI has a system I thought would have been cool for Guild Wars and that system is Market Mode. PWI does have an auction house but another feature is you can setup your own market and go afk. While afk, players can come up and see what you have for sale and buy stuff at a price you listed. A system like market mode in Guild Wars would have made trading a lot less painful.

Add me to the mob that will form when they add a profession to the cash shop.

I'm open to most stuff being in the cash shop, just so long as equivalent items are also achievable through gameplay, with a few exceptions. For instance, I'd have no problem with +50% XP runes in GW because XP means almost nothing anyway, and we have scrolls and HM which can replicate that anyway.

One thing I'm really surprised by is that Anet hasn't gone down the route of selling unique weapons and/or armour in the cash shop. By which I mean unique skins, not unique stats. I'd be fine with that, since it's cosmetic.

As an aside, the simple reality is that RMT exists whether Anet is doing it, or it's some website. Always has, always will, because the reward is far greater than the risk.

XP is worth abit more nowadays than before, because of the updated Survivor title.

Yes they have. Unique weapon skins from BMP and GOTY upgrade? Unique armor skins as in the costumes?

They said before that adding another profession to GW, whether it be Expansion or this "Cash Shop" profession possibility, would create problems. They would have to balance the game yet again to compensate for it.

While they do seem to crank out cash shop items that we never even asked to have added into the game faster than NECESSARY bug fixes or clipping issues (how convenient) I think we will see the game lump into one big ball of shit before we see that profession added to the cash shop.

What is a ball of shit you ask? Well I could name a few things like changing secondary in pre, post to pre time travel, makeover NPC moved from temple to starting towns, choose your character's model rather than be stuck with the profession one...etc.. (like a Warrior with elementalist body)

And my most favorite of all, Anet points. Yes. Anet points. You buy packs of these points in the cash shop and you can get immediate in-game satisfaction whenever you want it. Want items and armor from merchants without needing in-game gold? No problem, buy them with Anet points.

Think that is ridiculous and made up? SOE does it for their Free to play version of EverQuest II.

I agree about the GoTY one but you have to take a couple things into consideration here. The stats on those items are absolute ass if you put things into perspective, and Prophecies is basically automatically GoTY today anyway unless you are old and bought the game before like.. mid 2006 like I did and just purchased the GoTY upgrade later on. There was also the EoTN Pre-Order but that was a pre-order.

For the BMP, I couldn't consider that just selling skins because for one, you get a mini expansion with playable missions as cool characters in the lore of guildwars (It does suck that it's missing Shiro or Rurik/Adelburn back stories) but you have to actually work/spend time for those skins.

And costumes are just silly IMO, and quite frankly I think they are and look quite ridiculous for the game. That's not because I don't feel like shelling out money for pixels and polys already in my GW dat file, it's because they are...silly and unnecessary. They're for people who just want to look fancy at the end of the day (and at the end of their own ropes). One set of Elite armor beats the shit out of every costume any day of the week simply because it was made when the devs cared about the game and not money and because it's freakin awesome (plus, it truly WAS ELITE at one point).

I have been hoping they might do something like that with GW2. Unfortunately, NCSoft is running the show and I doubt they would let it happen if Anet even wanted to do something similar. I think they use the same cash shop system for all their games. It sucks.

Perfect World also offers a few security features that I wouldn't mind seeing in GW and GW2. Just putting that out there.

another profession no thats way to far

Buy commando profession now for $9.99? XD

Yes they have done it... Hint: Bonus Mission Pack... The reward for the quest u do there are perfect q9 weapons which you cannot find anywhere else ingame besides mursaat hammers...

if you mean when he says


I'm fairly certain he's refering to when Stumme says


I see no reason the writters knowledge of what a slippery slope is should be called into question when he's pulling the shit out of Stummes mouth.

Not even mursaat hammers, actually, since the BMP skin is different.

However, this is a bit misleading - you can get perfectly functionally identical weapons from the rest of the game, and this is, after additional paid for content. It's just like complaining that you get Nightfall weapon skins only if you buy Nightfall.

The rest just about evens out: the weapons are customized, so you can't get them if you don't have BMP yourself, but if you have BMP, you don't get to sell them. And they're unmodded, which is DAMN annoying when you want to actually use them and need inscriptions and mods to make the bloody things useful...

The BMP was a reward to some people for spending over $30 in a specific week in the cash shop. Six months later, the butthurt QQing on forums like this led to it being released for sale in the cash shop. So, yeah, I think the BMP doesn't really fit the criteria.

Besides, I mean as a direct purchase, without attached content. The GoTY upgrade comes close, but they're all shitty weapons anyway. Now, if the hourglass staff from EoTN pre-order was part of GoTY, then it'd be worth buying.

Costumes aren't armor. I'm thinking more along the lines of pre-searing chars in elite-like max armor.

I lolled at the idea of XP being worth anything....despite the new survivor title. If they nerfed boxing, maybe. But then there are the festival quests or FoW anyway.

Why? The only other way to get a new profession would be for them to make another campaign or expansion that you'd have to pay for, and that won't be happening.

Since a new profession (since there will be no expansion/campaign for it) would, at the very least need:

1) Would have to be startable in all campaigns

2) New NPCs and (for Prophecies and Factions) new skill quests

3) Need new foes (or altered ones, plus plenty of Bosses for elite caps) in all areas for Elite captures

4) Several new armor sets (I'd say two elite and two non-elite at the very least) and new weapon and shield types and skins (depending on what the profession will weild) that'd need to be designed and added to crafters and collectors across the three campaigns and EotN

5) At least 100 new skills, perhaps 120 (25 regular and 5 elite skills in each attribute)

...there is no way in Hell they'd give it out for free. I have my doubts that it would be any less than $19.95 (which I'd pay IF it included a character slot).

They already have - they're called "Costumes".

As far as stats go, four of them are quite good (Sundering Rhino's Charge, Nevermore Flatbow, Serrated Shield, and Tiger's Roar [for Fire and Air, anyways]). Looks? Well, other than the rather silly Rhino's Charge, they're all quite good.

I don't really see the problem with them selling a new profession (besides the obvious fact that they probably don't have the time for that, and they definitely don't have the time to make it balanced...). It really comes down to price. Most of us paid $40 for NF when it came out. How much of that was for each new feature: the heroes, the new professions, the inscribable weapons, the storyline, the new weapon skins, the elite area...there's a price tag on each of those, it just varies from person to person. Honestly, I'd prefer if they just went with a store currency, so they can actually charge less than $5 for certain small items (like, say, one merc slot, or a single makeover token) without credit card restrictions getting in the way.

Anet is selling weapons and armor (Bonus mission pack \ preorder \ imp \ costumes). And professions through expansion packs.

O plz god no selling professions in the GW store. I dont want GW2 to become Lotro.

Since ANet has had a history of failure with profession balance I just say new races. If they could pull it off I would be all for new professions but only with xpacks.

OH NO ANET IS SELLING PROFESSIONS IN THE IN GAME STORE!

I bought Nightfall there! Oh the humanity!

Next they'll be selling skills -- wait what, PVP UNLOCK KIT WHAR?!

Whatever. So long as the game is good, I'll slap down my debens. And if it sucks, I won't. Anet has a history of providing value for dollar. I trust em.

I mean chrissakes, it's ten bucks. I spend more than that on a pack of smokes that last for two days.

Yep. This has been one of the complaints of other players for ages. 10+ year old games like Ragnarok have had some kind of market mode system for ages. If Arenanet didn't institute this system to discourage afk'ers, my response is that's just ridiculous. Market mode would actually be in line with GW's policy aims. It facilitates the flow of money, eases unnecessary burdens, and provides one less reason for discouraged players to go to websites run by Chinese farmers who sell ectos/z-keys/game gold for real cash.

To anyone who says nay, just think about it. If I wanna sell my tormented shield in Kama, I shouldn't have to post a 1-sentence description in the trades window and stare at the screen all day just to sell it.

LOL. Good point. I'd rep ya if we had a repping system.

Selling professions? That's legitimate, people. But selling extra stat points or ectos? Verrry questionable. There's a line that has to be drawn, and Arenanet drew it nicely.


The beauty of GW is that a unique, uber-lookin' sword with the words "pwnage" written all over it will have the same ole' max damage and same number of upgradeable parts. It's just a dang skin. Selling a unique costume isn't much different from a unique sword. The supply/demand for it won't affect supply/demand for gold or ectos. It's not like other games where paying $100+ will get you the best sword in the whole game.

Its legitimate but its nickle and dimming which is what companies like turbine and nexon do to squeeze every penny out of you. A new expansion pack cost about $40 when ANet was making them for GW, if they just separated all the content and sold it for $10 each it would come out to around double what the expansion pack would cost all together. Things aren't bad atm but its a slippery slope with cash shops.

I wonder how much money some people would be willing to pay for a sword that does one more point of damage on average.

Let's just hope Anet never sells something like that.

They've already said that that would be completely out of the question. Of course, that doesn't matter to the Slippery Slope Screamers...

QFT.
Seriously, even considering the additional expenses of storage panes, costumes, and mercenaries that I've purchased, it has been quite the bargain as far as entertainment goes. How many nights at the movies could you get for the same price?