There seem to be some people who think it's a great travesty that subs have to pay for any cosmetic feature in this game. Leaving aside the fact that there probably wouldn't be a game to even play without the revenue from the Cartel Market, I'm curious what happened to the monthly Cartel Coin grants for these subs who are so anti-Cartel Market?

I counted up my free Cartel Coins just to see how many I would have accumulated if I hadn't spent them. The total is 6,800 coins: 2000 coins when F2P launched (1750 from past subbing, 250 from one-time F2P launch reward); 3,600 coins from monthly sub grant (600 per month for 6 month sub); 600 coins from security key monthly grants; and 600 coins from the achievement system. I realize some people's totals would vary if they haven't played the game as long, have a shorter sub period, don't use the physical key, haven't hit the achievements which grant coins, etc. However, let's just assume someone has even half of those coins....heck, even less than half - 3,000. How can people not afford an account-wide Cathar unlock (600 coins), or a hairstyle change or a few armor dye modules? If the Cathar unlock is 600 coins, can't see a character change or two or a dye module costing that much in comparison.

So for the anti-Cartel Market subs, where did you all your coins go? How can you not afford 1,000 or 2,000 coins from the free coins given out to subs? Did you blow them all on packs?

legacy unlocks, cartel packs, cartel armors, cartel crystals, all of those little fun things in a story that we THOUGHT we could spend our coins on, but apparently we were supposed to be saving them up instead >_>

I purchased almost all of these on the GTN. The only times I spent coins was when what I wanted was not on the GTN or it was over-priced.

I'm still sitting on close to 4500 coins.. and that's with playing a lot of alts.

You know why I save coins whenever possible? Because playing LoTRO taught me that excellent things (like a new race unlock) come along from time to time in the game shop.. and so I save for when that happens. Plus, I do not want to purchase coins unless I absolutely have to.. and so far I'm not even close to being near that trigger point.

when 2.1 hits my female jedi is getting one of the new long hair styles. i think it will fit well with some of the orange gear i have.

also insta travel tickets and more Resurrection droids are always handy

also inventory space both on character and in my cargo hold. i usually wait till my stipend i never buy coins though.

I purchased almost all of these on the GTN. The only times I spent coins was when what I wanted was not on the GTN or it was over-priced.

 

I'm still sitting on close to 4500 coins.. and that's with playing a lot of alts.

I didn't know you could buy things like HK for alts, rocket boosts, starship GTN, mailbox and vendor droid etc on GTN, and buying them directly through legacy with credits is pricey for those of us who are neither GTN, nor diligent daily mavens.

before you tell me "its your own responsibility" yes, it was my choice to use cartel coins, however at the time, I wasn't told that cartel coin grants that subscribers are given, have such specific strings attached. I was under impression that they are given for us as gift and an alternative, up until 2.1 I wasn't aware that I would actually need them for significant game features.

I'll be aware of that in a future and budget coins accordingly, I'm just annoyed at this turnabout. though I do realize the purpose of it. I'm pretty sure that bioware is perfectly aware that most people WERE spending their cartel coins on fluffy stuff on cartel market instead of hoarding them and this is not so subtle encouragement for people to buy coins in addition to their monthly grant.

Same thread, different title?

For the most part, I don't spend mine. I unlocked a species. I think I might have unlocked an account-wide perk. That's about it.

I still have well over 5k.

But my personal point of disappointment over this is that, as a percentage of the whole game, my subscription buys me less and less with each patch/release.

There seem to be some people who think it's a great travesty that subs have to pay for any cosmetic feature in this game. Leaving aside the fact that there probably wouldn't be a game to even play without the revenue from the Cartel Market, I'm curious what happened to the monthly Cartel Coin grants for these subs who are so anti-Cartel Market?

 

So for the anti-Cartel Market subs, where did you all your coins go? How can you not afford 1,000 or 2,000 coins from the free coins given out to subs? Did you blow them all on packs?

Let's compare to City of Heroes for a moment...

CoX was developed and run by a company with far shallower pockets than EA/Lucasfilm. It had a much smaller subscriber base. It released far more content additions for FREE in a similar time frame than TOR has offered for extra cost.

Business has to spend money to make money. EA has just decided that business has to spend your money to make more of your money.

1) Ship GTN (Account)

2) Ship Training Dummies (Account) (for decoration)

3) Ship vendor (Account)

4) Max bag space (Account)

5) One extra cargo bay (Account)

6) Each of my new toons gets a Cartel Armor set

7) Each of my toons gets speeder piloting at level 10 via Cartel Coins, to save me having to drop gold for it.

8) I bought one cartel pack, enough to realize it was a total complete waste of money.

9) I bought one speeder, but realized too late that it was a total waste of CC.

Right now I did spend 0 Cartel Coins.

Because BioWare is forcing me I will spend some on cosmetic changes when it is possible.

I collected them for future unlocks, when I go F2P, when the game is going to bore me...

Legacy unlocks, stuff like the rocket boots & the priority transport/personal starship upgrades. Plus character-specific unlocks, like the perk required for the latter upgrades to work on each toon.

Field repair droid, ship upgrades, cargo upgrades, and so on.

None of it is necessary, but it does add up. I've only been subbing since December, just a couple of those months with the security key active, so I've probably acquired around 3000 CCs total (including some from achievements). Having purchased solely unlocks like those mentioned above (and absolutely nothing from the CM), I'm down to 760 CCs, and there are still a few more unlocks I want to buy.

I purchased almost all of these on the GTN. The only times I spent coins was when what I wanted was not on the GTN or it was over-priced.

 

I'm still sitting on close to 4500 coins.. and that's with playing a lot of alts.

 

You know why I save coins whenever possible? Because playing LoTRO taught me that excellent things (like a new race unlock) come along from time to time in the game shop.. and so I save for when that happens. Plus, I do not want to purchase coins unless I absolutely have to.. and so far I'm not even close to being near that trigger point.

I wanted to ask you Andryah, being a LotRO player, how do you feel about the in game coin earning system, and do you think it should be done in some way here?

legacy unlocks, cartel packs, cartel armors, cartel crystals, all of those little fun things in a story that we THOUGHT we could spend our coins on, but apparently we were supposed to be saving them up instead >_>

and you still can use in game coins..look on the GTN. You can get almost everything sold in the CM without spending a dime

Let's compare to City of Heroes for a moment...

 

CoX was developed and run by a company with far shallower pockets than EA/Lucasfilm. It had a much smaller subscriber base. It released far more content additions for FREE in a similar time frame than TOR has offered for extra cost.

 

Business has to spend money to make money. EA has just decided that business has to spend your money to make more of your money.

Yes, and despite CoH's rapid output of content (which, I'll add, included rapid output of paid content such as powersets, costumes, paid zones, and paid mission arcs) NCSoft still shut down the game because it wasn't profitable enough to justify the resources being put into it. So I don't think that comparison works as well as you're hoping it would

Yes, and despite CoH's rapid output of content (which, I'll add, included rapid output of paid content such as powersets, costumes, paid zones, and paid mission arcs) NCSoft still shut down the game because it wasn't profitable enough to justify the resources being put into it. So I don't think that comparison works as well as you're hoping it would

Not true at all. The only "paid content" in CoX, up till their switch to F2P was the City of Villains expansion, which was comparable in size to most MMO's by themselves. It was also later given free to any subscriber.

It ran for 9 years, TOR has a long climb ahead of it to reach that.

and you still can use in game coins..look on the GTN. You can get almost everything sold in the CM without spending a dime

none of the unlocks I mentioned (granted in my next reply, rather than original post, but nonetheless) are sold on cartel market and therefore GTN - they are purchasable through legacy window only. they also cost millions to unlock if you use in game coins. not everyone has those millions. also - cartel coin unlocks that ARE sellable on GTN, often cost - again millions. the only exception that I found were inventory space unlocks, cargo hold unlocks and extra character slots - which are amusingly enough cheaper to buy with in game currency, rather than cartel coins (OR rather than buying with credits directly - case in point last inventory slot - that I was able to buy for 60k credits, which is considerably cheaper then buying one through inventory interface)

the point I was making is - coins that subscribers were given as "gift", had plenty of uses for subscribers prior to patch 2.1, contrary to implication in the OP.

Not true at all. The only "paid content" in CoX, up till their switch to F2P was the City of Villains expansion

The paid expansion Going Rogue came out before the F2P conversion.First Ward and Night Ward were zones that had to be bought. The VIP mission arcs had to be bought (that whole "Who Will Die?" thing). Many costumes and power sets had to be bought. Incarnate content was locked out to those who didn't pay. I was playing up until the shutdown was announced, either you didn't play it past CoV or you're just blatantly making things up.

I still have most of mine, i do buy 1 pack a month. I use regular coins to buy CM stuff off ppl and gtn. I dont see me wasting 600 coins on the Cathar(i dont see a point to have human cat face with a helmet on) also I wont waste CC on coloring/barber shop. Im sorry I dont believe anyone should have to pay for that with real money. The bottom line is BW/EA just want to milk us for everything they can. I was saying this along time ago and its all been coming true.

Anything we want in the game has for the most part ended up on the CM for real money. they will give us that little bone ingame like Artifice making some dyes but they will have the cool colors for sale. this game is just a Pay for everything you want.

whatever, time to bash my reply

The paid expansion Going Rogue game out before the F2P conversion.First Ward and Night Ward were zones that had to be bought. The VIP mission arcs had to be bought. Many costumes and power sets had to be bought. Incarnate content was locked out to those who didn't pay. I was playing up until the shutdown was announced, either you didn't play it past CoV or you're just blatantly making things up.

I didn't play it much after it went F2P. When I did I found my accumulated points were more than enough to buy anything that wasn't already included for subs.

I don't recall any content, beyond the CoX, that required any extra charge, but you may be right on those other zones. I don't recollect them at all.

I bought account-wide GTN slot unlocks, account-wide cargo-hold unlocks, and the ship GTN terminal (man was that cheap using CC).

That's it. That's really all I was interested in and at the time I bought them they weren't available on the GTN. Some have since gone up for sale at reasonable prices, but it's not an issue.

I have been playing the GTN, made millions (100+ million) off cartel market items that other people spent real money on. My guild (which gets about 60% of my profit) thanks the community for making that possible.

Unlike many, I have been saving my cartel coins. I did this because I expected that they were not "free gifts" and were intended to be how the subscribers would access cartel market features. Basically I expected the devs to want subscribers to have to use cartel coins for features they wanted. So far that hasn't happened, if you can afford to spend ungodly sums of in-game credits (which I can), then you can indeed get everything without buying extra cartel coins. As long as the Cathar unlock, dye packs, and vouchers for character customization can be sold on the GTN, then I have no issue with it.

If cartel coins are the only way to customize characters or dye armors, then I'll have an issue with it. I'll be able to afford it, but in principle I'm against gating features being impossible to get with only in-game effort or currency. As long as there is any other avenue allowing people to earn it (or earn the in-game currency to afford it) then I'm fine with it.

Side note: If cartel coins are the only way to access certain features, then I'd really like some avenue to convert in-game credits to cartel coins or real money.

I still have most of mine, i do buy 1 pack a month. I use regular coins to buy CM stuff off ppl and gtn. I dont see me wasting 600 coins on the Cathar(i dont see a point to have human cat face with a helmet on) also I wont waste CC on coloring/barber shop. Im sorry I dont believe anyone should have to pay for that with real money. The bottom line is BW/EA just want to milk us for everything they can. I was saying this along time ago and its all been coming true.

 

Anything we want in the game has for the most part ended up on the CM for real money. they will give us that little bone ingame like Artifice making some dyes but they will have the cool colors for sale. this game is just a Pay for everything you want.

 

whatever, time to bash my reply

That's pretty unfair.

They have announced and for the most part stuck with their plan for Cartel Market. It's for appearance. If a thing impacts appearance, it's Cartel Market.

There are a few exceptions. They've implemented some new looks that can be obtained outside of the CM like the new tier raid gear. There are a few items in the CM that have stats. But they're pretty much sticking to their guns on appearance = CM.

Also, lots of us want PvE content or PvP content or whatever else. Those things come to us free of needing to spend a single Cartel coin, assuming, of course, that we're subscribers. Only if the ONLY thing you care about in this game is appearance is your statement even close to true.

But if that's the case, why are you playing this game? Want SIMS: Star Wars or something?