Buy Game Time for CC + Buy/Sell CC on GTN = WIN

If it gets big, the IRS will notice. They are already sniffing around Second Life and Bitcoins.

And it DOES turn credits into dollars. Once you pay for game time with CCs, you just did that, because there is a dollar cost to game time. Once you start saying "I'll give you $1 worth of CC for 1 million credits," you just created the back channel. It's overt: "$1 worth." It can't be plainer than that. You've established the equivalency right there. And when you actually buy game time, which has a real world value of $12.99 to $14.99 per month, the loop is complete. You don't come out with cash, but you do come out with a cash equivalency that can be used to purchase something that normally requires cash. BW loses on the deal because they gain zero revenue from the transaction.

NO.. they do not. There are half a million lots of 500+ coins received free each month by subscribers. That's enough free coins to create 150K free subscriptions per month, with no revenue contribution to Bioware whatsoever.

That is why the idea is a bad idea.

The way EVE does it is different. Someone has to actually purchase a PLEX for real dollars, and then they are free to sell the PLEX in the open market in game for market rates. This insures that every PLEX transaction injects actual revenue into the game.

Until you come up with an EVE like method... your methods are bad (except for selfish people who want to skirt the subscription using in game wealth accumulated and don't give a rats backside about the fiscal solvency of the MMO).

There is a dollar cost to CC as well, which is exactly equal to the dollar cost of the subscription that was purchased using them. There is no way to turn game time, or credits, or CC, or anything else that you can get through this system back into real life dollars. Money goes in. Money does not come out. That is why games that already do this (and EvE does it on a gigantic scale) do not run into the problems you are looking for.

Given enough coordination a person could probably get anywhere from 3-5 subs worth of $$$ this just via play time. which then can be used to purchase cartel coins which at that point can be traded with others or sold outside of the system. It moves from gold farmers to CC farmers.

Maybe. Although it might work fine (better, even) to make people pay for one month of sub before they could get onto the play for pay train. So you have to sub up for 30 days to get out from under the F2P credit limit, but after that you can grind credits and pay for future months by buying CC to pay for game time.

Out of game transactions involving real life dollars (RMT) already exist, and already are bannable activities, and would not become any less bannable under this system. Selling in-game items of any sort to another person for real life money is a whole other subject that has nothing to do with what's stated in the OP. Trading an in-game item (credits) for another in-game item (CC) is not an issue when neither item can ever leave the game world, other than when they're consumed through the various sinks Bioware has built in.

People who want to do RMT already do it by gold spamming and account selling on eBay, and Bioware takes the same steps to ban them and shut them down as any game company. This system chokes the gold spammer market by providing a legitimate channel for players to trade real life money (through Bioware) into in-game currency (that's the part that legitimate players and Bioware's paying customers want), but it does so without allowing any means for the reverse conversion (which is what gold spammers want).

The result is that legit players can get what they want without giving the scammers what they want. The scammers' customer base goes away, and so do they.

It has already been explained to you that there are probably in excess of 250,000,000 cartel coins distributed each month to players. That's a conservative estimate. These aren't going away. If players can convert these to paid game time then, yes, indeed, those coins become the equivalent of cash because they are "paying" for something that would otherwise have been paid for with an influx of new cash. It has also been explained to you that the "Eve" comparison is invalid because it is not the same thing that is being discussed here. And, of course, as has also been explained, it would completely change the dynamics of both the CM and the GTN.

Bottom line is that Bioware would be INSANE to implement these changes as described. I am confident that they are smart enough to not do it.

It has already been explained to you that other games do exactly what is suggested and do not have any of the problems that you are referring to. The trivial "free" subscriber grant of 500-700 CC per month (actually pretty expensive considering you pay $15 to get them) changes nothing about that.

I had actually discussed this with my husband a while back -- and I was wondering about a few things.

What if you made a "subscription pack" item? Something that requires you to complete an RMT (much like the purchase of CCs) before being awarded the tradeable item. You could maybe even have multiple levels of it -- 1 month, 2 month, 3 month -- and maybe with or without the CC stipend.

I think doing this, with NO CC stipend, would be great. Maybe $10 for a "basic subscription" item that you can sell on the GTN or gift. That way, Subs can't use "free" CCs towards it, and you're also being given yet another subscription option (aside from Sub, Preferred, F2P).

Maybe?

As far as Plex/CCs -- maybe do the same thing as I said above. Have a "Cartel Coin Pack" that you purchase with an RMT (like you do now) that grants you a tradeable item. Once used, CCs are added to your account. But you would be free to sell these packs, and by requiring an RMT, BW wouldn't be losing money.

Would be interesting, to say the least. I wonder if they'll consider anything like this in the future -- or if they've already had discussions on it.

Absolutely terrible idea.
/not supported

Some of the flaws that immediately come to mind are;

-There are several people sitting on 7k CC and other ridiculous amounts because the Cartel Market doesn't interest them, Bioware would immediately lose out on six months of subscription from those people.
And I can already hear the counter "But people will buy CC just to sell it in game, it'll make up for that loss." - no, it won't.
People that want to convert real money into in game credits already do this by buying packs and unlocks and then selling them on the GTN.

-You are suddenly providing a way for the most unsavory elements of the community (such as RMTs) to completely bypass Bioware's F2P restrictions without having to spent a dime to do it.
Which means an already understaffed GM team gets to deal with a ton more crap - which in turn makes support times for people with legitimate issues even longer.

I've only skimmed the thread, so I'm not sure - but did you seriously suggest converting in game credits into CC?
A virtual and useless currency that can be farmed by the millions by everyone with time on their hands, exchanged for their store currency? You know, the stuff that actually helps pay for the wages of their employees.