people seem to forget that it is also the games 1 year anniversary and we are getting nothing, oh 25 1 second fireworks that are very unimpressive and dull to celebrate. wooo

This is what I'm upset about too. At least an event would show us that they've been working on something more than cash shop crap.

STO's 1 year anniversary saw the launch of a major Featured Episode arc and the addition of the Delta Flyer and shuttle missions.

We got fireworks consumables.

people seem to forget that it is also the games 1 year anniversary and we are getting nothing, oh 25 1 second fireworks that are very unimpressive and dull to celebrate. wooo

So, What should we be entitled to for a game being a year old?

I'll have to disagree.

 

Over the years,I've played well over 20 MMO's and only one or two of those MMO's did a good job making events on a regular basis.They either become really cheesy,or annoying,or disruptive to normal game play.

 

Rather than plan events (which waste developers time from making content) it's better to hand out gifts. What I think TOR should do ,on Christmas (yes,I said Christmas),send in-game Mail to the chars wishing them well,thanking them for their support and few small gifts,like Minor Xp booster or random loot box.Keep it simple and classy,and save the time and money that would go into an event and put it into making new content..

I see no reason anyone in the SWTOR galaxy would celebrate the birth of a religious figure from an entirely different galaxy.

Yes, I've been subbed since launch but I'm seriously pissed now...

It seems that our subscriptions goes into the pocket of developers who work on the cartel cash shop to suck out our money even more.

but they didnt ignore the problem they still put in the life day crap and that atrocious speeder, christmas and life day are the problem, if you think the fact it was a "event" was why people didnt want it. you are mistaken

With exception for the speeder, most of what is in the cartel shop could just have been given an alternative name and there would have been no obvious christmas/life day relation. As for the speeder, I personally don't think we'll see a major number of them going around for it to be intrusive. At least I know I haven't seen a single one ride around so far on the fleet.

So I think there's a major difference between decorating the entire fleet in a holiday theme, creating holiday themed quests, etc versus a bunch of people walking around in a red robe and perhaps once every 2 days encountering a person on a mount with a few colored lights.

Although I'm pretty well aware that this community is plagued by some players who'll want to whine about anything they can and go as far as calling a few items a christmas holiday event.

The items per se could be a fun addition, but the prices make it obvious that it's intended to be Christmas for EAware, not the players. The 2400 CC for the Life Day package almost cost as much as a two months sub. That's out of proportion IMO, especially when half of it is just recolored/reskinned existing stuff.

An event to earn those items would have been much better, but I would have much, much preferred a bug-fix package for Christmas. If it gets the job done, I'd rather donate for bug fixes than pay for toys.

I agree mostly with you. I think it kinda sucks that they didn't do a Life Day World Event and I think they should've done an event alongside the CM stuff. But my assumption is that if there is any seasonal theme where they can sell special stuff in the CM they will because that's how EA's EASY runs their F2P games. EASY runs it where IF there is a free event or freebees you can bet there are also things being sold in the cash shop. Or EASY will just sell stuff in the cash shop and call it a day as a successful "celebration" of the seasons currently being marketed.

 

Like I said previously I'm new to MMOs but I've checked out EASY's games so I'm a bit jaded with how marketing in the F2P model works under EA. Sadly I'd say that, compared to how EASY runs cash shops, if this is the worst the CM does I'll be delighted and consider the CM very well done.

I don't think we'll ever see another free event the likes of we've seen here before or that other MMORPGs routinely run.

If you're new to MMORPGs then I guess you don't understand wat Bioware EA is actually doing here, but those of us that have played a LOT of MMORPGs do find it pretty appalling.

You would be correct that I believe they tagged the limited time on so they could charge a very high price. That it coincides with Life Day provides a convenient excuse to have something holiday themed (and thus be like every other MMO that apparently does some holiday theme) without getting people ragging that it doesn't fit the lore. I'd argue that I have a lower opinion of EA, not BioWare but at this point we'd be arguing over technicalities.

 

I would've been amazed if they had charged less than 1.5X the cost of the most expensive complete non-limited time armor set being sold in the CM prior to the Life Day stuff. And I would've considered it evidence that the Mayan end of the world will occur if it had been priced the same price (or cheaper than) the most expensive non-limited time full armor set.

That's the sort of behaviour a lot of people thought would happen when SWTOR went F2P, a lot of people said it could never happen......... but as we've seen it took a whole 2 months to happen.

Like I said I'm new to MMOs so I don't have anything to compare it to in that regard. That being said I'm very cynical with pricing and held no expectation that anything that had "limited time" tacked on would come at less than 1.5X the price of the most expensive non-limited time item.

In most MMORPG, even F2P ones, such event exist and gear is "free" within the event, certainly none that I know of have NO event and charge for gear......... and those that do have events and some buyable gear don't charge anything like as much as this for it.

Perhaps we're misunderstanding things. I meant that things like the Outlaw's Armor Set (1,200 CC or thereabouts last I saw) could be bought with roughly 2 months worth of stipends (3 months if your stipend is less than 600 CC/month). I didn't mean that the Life Day packs could be bought with 2 months of stipends so I apologize if I implied that. In that regard my point was that if something like the Outlaw's set takes a minimum of 2 months of stipend saving for 1 toon why should we expect limited time items like the Life Day pack not be priced so they would require at least 1-2 months longer (minimum) of stipend saving. As you've rightly observed limited time means you won't have the time to save up that amount though I would cynically say it's intentional pricing to force people to either 1) save stipends in anticipation of the next limited time item release or 2) shell out cash because they spent their stipend.

 

Again my pricing assumption of Life Day items naturally being more expensive is influenced by my cynicism that you noted earlier.

Yup that set can be (personally I think all gear on the Cashshop is a bit expensive compared to subscriber month coin allowances - most F2P MMORPGs give you 2 to 3 times the effective amount SWTOR give even a 6 month subber), but it has mods doesn't it? The Life Day stuff doesn't.

But 2400CC for the pack is insane, that's 4 months at best (with a 6 month sub) of subscriber coins per character..... that's an unheard of price for "holiday items".

Its a game...deal with it. Oh BOO HOO your poor pixelated items aren't free or easy to get...go tell that to people starving on this planet or getting killed every day in some civil war or something. You people make me sick sometimes with all your whining and crying and not having a CLUE about all the pain outside in the world that you are lucky enough to avoid.

 

I have tons of disposable income, so I can buy what i want...but if I didn't I sure as heck would not be crying here on the forums knowing that somewhere some 90 pound under nourished kid is going to be wracked with hunger while I cry about a 2400 cartel coin pixel pack.

How does anyone being ripped off by Bioware EA help anybody else?

Surely you (and I and everyone else) would be better off just paying a sub and donating to charities instead?

I can't see how making EA shareholders rich helps the poor and starving of the world, although maybe I'm missing something?

Except everything from the GTN and trade still ultimately comes from, you guessed it, the Cartel Shop. I once looked at that little tidbit as a positive, but I've grown cynical with this patch. They're just going to use that little asterisk as an excuse for adding anything and everything to the shop. It has become the focus of the game, and that's a very bad thing.

Yeah and the supply to the AH depends entirely from the supply from the Cashshop, the Cashshop isn't a magical horn of plenty, supply drops as people don't buy the older gambling packs.

Hm, I'll concede that some quests would have been nice.

I'm just tickled they even touched on Life Day.

I'm not entirely convinced a red scooter covered in Christmas Lights really screams "Life Day" more than "Santa", which aren't the same things at all.

They are not mythical, and I am indeed a whale when it comes to games that I am having a wonderful time playing. That being said, 5500 coins per character? No. My estimates were based on purchase for a single character, as all pricing should be, otherwise it would be completely unreasonable. I have over 20 characters between the Live Servers and the PTS, so even if I could afford the coinage per character, I would not spend it anyway. It would be unfair to hold BW responsible for the number of characters I choose to create and play with, so basing pricing off of just one is acceptable.

 

Otherwise, where would we draw the line? The two characters that F2Pers get? That would still piss off the people with 8 characters (one of each base class). So we draw the line at 8 toons. What happens then to the players who have 12 toons (the current default for subs on a single server). So we allow the pricing to encompass those players. That still leaves out the players who have 16 characters - 8 on a PvE server and 8 on a PvP server. What about 24 toons - 12 on each? And so on, until either the pricing has to be raised enough to not make it worth purchasing at all, or the cost of the items is so diluted as to not make it worth selling to begin with.

 

Would it be nice if the Armor was bound to accounts so that all toons could use it? Yeah, but again, the way the game was designed, that would be unreasonable, imo, not to mention useless for many of my toons anyway. It seems to me most of the CM items are not bound to a single character outside of the armor (which makes sense to me), so I would only need to purchase one item anyway and transfer it between characters as I play, if I wanted to.

 

BJ

So what would you say was an unreasonable price per charater?

It's between 2400CC and 5500CC obviously.

As a subscriber, this "f2p" is worse than i even imagined, and after having been through EA's Warhammer Online, I can imagine quite a bit...

I've been playing MMOs a really long time, and seen some pretty weird stuff, Trammel/Felucca, TOA, NGE, amongst others, but what i have seen EA do to their last two big (huge) budget MMOs really takes the cake.

 

Good luck, and thanks for all the fish..

Yeah it's somewhat amazing they've already manage to plumb new depths that they didn't even manage with WAR.

I was kinda expecting to see this sort of thing by next Christmas, but certainly NOT before this Christmas.

^This is how I feel, I just wish they actual put some real effort into the game beside the cartel market. As other said, all the other major MMO are doing celebration with fun quest and things to get the community together, along with normal updates. We have to buy things to even celebrate, that is sad. This was there chance to make an event to for the players to remember the game first year by and they did nothing.

You pay a sub for access to the game, all fun is charged for extra on the Cashshop. That's unfortunately how it is with SWTOR now.

So, What should we be entitled to for a game being a year old?

Maybe getting rid of people who bash against anyone who has concerns against the way "Bioware" is screwing its fanbase... Ah right f2p... *smirk*

The items per se could be a fun addition, but the prices make it obvious that it's intended to be Christmas for EAware, not the players. The 2400 CC for the Life Day package almost cost as much as a two months sub. That's out of proportion IMO, especially when half of it is just recolored/reskinned existing stuff.

An event to earn those items would have been much better, but I would have much, much preferred a bug-fix package for Christmas. If it gets the job done, I'd rather donate for bug fixes than pay for toys.

The cost per character is completely bonkers.

There's simply NO justification for it (which is why I suspect no one at Bioware EA has tried here).

So, What should we be entitled to for a game being a year old?

In every other MMORPG in existance? Usally something permenant like a pet or a title or even a flag or banner.

Stacks of fireworks are something ever other MMORPG gives away FREE with their FREE in game events.

I see no reason anyone in the SWTOR galaxy would celebrate the birth of a religious figure from an entirely different galaxy.

Who hasn't been born yet in the time period of the game.

In every other MMORPG in existance? Usally something permenant like a pet or a title or even a flag or banner.

 

Stacks of fireworks are something ever other MMORPG gives away FREE with their FREE in game events.

Really? In my experience most MMOs are in the same state SWTOR is in at year one. Scrambling to make content for the impatient masses. In any event, we've gotten plenty of permanent pets, titles, etc. over this year. I have two pets, a jawa, and various titles.

I know that most MMO players live by the Janet Jackson maxim of "What have you done for me lately?" However, we have received plenty of crap that most people I see in game don't even use.

Well, you can buy the Life day boots for 70 K and the lower robes for 200 K on GTN on my server at least. I wouldn't be surprised if the price went down a little actually but we will see where it ends up.

The cheapest Life Day item of clothing on my server is a pair of Life Day boot for 440,000 Credits.

There are 7 Life Day items of clothing in total, with the most expensive being 700,000 Credits.

In every other MMORPG in existance? Usally something permenant like a pet or a title or even a flag or banner.

 

Stacks of fireworks are something ever other MMORPG gives away FREE with their FREE in game events.

Oh...so just more entitlement issue's. got ya.

Really? In my experience most MMOs are in the same state SWTOR is in at year one. Scrambling to make content for the impatient masses. In any event, we've gotten plenty of permanent pets, titles, etc. over this year. I have two pets, a jawa, and various titles.

 

I know that most MMO players live by the Janet Jackson maxim of "What have you done for me lately?" However, we have received plenty of crap that most people I see in game don't even use.

Which MMORPGs are those then?

Even Warhammer Online had a Christmas event in its first year and that was launched in September. Now fair enough SWTOR not having anything last year, but this year?

In fact I think Warhammer Online had 6 or 7 seperate events in it's first 12 months.

From the patch notes directly...

All-new Grade 7 Artifact Quality Starship Upgrades are now available from the Fleet and Mission Support vendors!

 

Yes you can pay cartel coins for those same items and get them quicker than grinding them out in game, but they are all available in game now, so again, the cartel market makes no pay to win offer.

So you don't actually understand what pay to win means, do you? Because it doesn't mean that it's ONLY available through monetary means, it means that someone can pay to receive a hefty advancement over others who are playing the game.

Ship upgrades being available in the store at all is pay to win in every sense of the word and is a huge step in the direction people feared the cash shop would go - and which devs PROMISED us it wouldn't. If it's a ship's upgrades now (which doesn't really affect anyone else's play as you don't have to fight someone else's ship; though they do help you earn more BH comms and money), then soon it will be 28 armoring/mods/enhancements for people who want to pay $10 per armor piece so they don't have to run the new operation when it's released (that armoring and op are hypothetical and an example, by the way).

Oh...so just more entitlement issue's. got ya.

No, merely a statement of a MMORPG standard of basic service.

Clearly SWTOR is intent on redefining this minium standard severely downward in a somewhat brave and very puzzling move.

Well, you can buy the Life day boots for 70 K and the lower robes for 200 K on GTN on my server at least. I wouldn't be surprised if the price went down a little actually but we will see where it ends up.

The point is, and its been made quite a few times in this thread, the current way of EA handling the Cartel Market and its treatment of their subscribers is unjust.

I was very positive about the Cartel Market, I liked the idea that it had some cool stuff in there and that if you didnt want to spend money you didnt have to. I was also quite sure that subscribers like myself wouldnt feel any negative feedback, that the CM and the rest of the game would be 2 separate entities. But now EAware has proven that that's not the case and they made the leap and made the Cartel Market a part of the game.

The question is, where will this lead next? Will new end game gear be on the Cartel Market as well and will you raid for Cartel Coins? Will subscribers have to shell out extra money for the new races? What about new Warzones and Ops, will they still be free for subscribers or will that $15 a month just give us a permanent exp boost and 500-600 coins each month.

Its a dangerous precedent, and I dont like it

No, merely a statement of a MMORPG standard of basic service.

 

Clearly SWTOR is intent on redefining this minium standard severely downward in a somewhat brave and very puzzling move.

Only when it's you, whom is defining what is and is not standard in MMO's