The Last CoV Primer - How's This Gonna Work?
By
40Thieves,
Posted on: 2005-06-02 17:38 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
Yeah pretty much the only people that think about the paying for updates and people working on the game are those people that are trying to calm all the ignorant people down who are shouting about not wanting to pay two fees.
Well I've seen companies that made you pay for the stuff that CoH is giving away - namely the updates.
An old axiom of business is never - EVER - give anything away for free. Not because you should be greedy, but because customers frequently are. Once they get one freebie - they want another and another.
Then the day comes when you've cut your costs and can't afford it anymore and they scream about how unfair it is that they have to pay for what they got for free once.
CoV is a seperate game. It's played in a seperate map - and there is limited connectivity between it and CoH from what I can see. Frankly, from what I understand of the AT classes in CoV - PvP with heroes would be very ego damaging for them.
The Tanks in CoV are more like what got nerfed in I5 - they have damage AND can take the hits. The Controllers - or Dominators - have both Controll and Damage. The Blasters - have the opposite of Defiance, the more damage they do the more powerful they get. Or so the last interview I read on the subject said.
So ... I don't think you can compare the two as easily as many of these people are doing. An equal level Hero vs. Villian match? I'm putting my money on the villian. Because of this - doubt very many people are going to go PvP and interact between the games like people seem to think.
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About a month ago, maybe a bit more, it was Battlegrounds and a few more new end-game instances. Instance being zones to anyone who hasn't played it. About a week or two ago, it was another new end game area as well as a new...hmm...reward area is all I can think of to call it. These were all done by patching.
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I just want to make a nitpick, for the edification of those who don't own/haven't played WoW. WoW instances are not zones. They're TaskForce-equivalents, not zone-equivalents.
I don't think any of the people complaining here about the costs of this game have any idea how CHEAP it really is compared to the cost of developers, servers, code, software tools, marketing and so on.
I think some of us have an idea.
The thing is COH doesn't have the subscriber numbers to justify releasing an expansion that was 1+ year in the making without charging more per month.
EQ did it all the time for just the price of the CD with the new code/expansion on it. But EQ could take the profit off the CD, multiply it by the number of expected buyers and turn a profit.
COH knows it can't, because it's not that big a game. It also needs (I think) need to push the envelope of its subscription fee to get more revenue in. COH *might* be profitable right now, but juding by the number of people I see playing each day and the fact they haven't had to add new servers in FOREVER, I'd wager its not making a lot of coin.
Also COH2 has to start sometime and that will take a lot of $$ to get off the ground. If they can cultivate some of that $$ by taking the current player base and making them pay another 10 dollars a month, then so much the better.
My worry is COH is banking on COV acquiring lots of new players and I really don't think it will. There will be an influx of new players out of curiosity, but I don't think we'll see a population explosion beyond the first 8 weeks.
At a minimum people will see an under-developed game compared to the competition that actually costs more than the current industry leaders. And to me, that translates to them bailing on the game a month or two after purchase.
I could be wrong, I hope I am wrong and of course, time will tell.
I only got coh to play against villians, and I think I have waited quitely for long enough. I am willing to pay for 2 accounts. It really shouldnt be that much more to add on cov to your account manager. If money is that much of a issue you should not be playing any how you should be getting another job.
All in all I just hope cov has the same fun facor and surprise as coh did for me when I first started.
Although I hope to get in before my pre-order kicks in.
All of this glorious angst.
Just my 2cents:
I think the role of a patch and expansion doesn't have to be as black and white as some people have made it. Since it's all code that can be downloaded anyhow, why not roll the two in together? We are paying for it, after all. Maybe not through direct purchases, but through our subscription. We get some new stuff periodically, they get to make needed changes/fixes, and everybody's relatively content (in theory, of course). Plus, better electronic distrobution of the stuff than physically - no headaches trying to get retailers to carry it, stolen merhandise, bad disks, etc. Much more efficient, I think (look at Valve and the other companies who are doing/eyeing electronic game distribution).
As for CoV and CoH - different games that can expand on each other! Wonderful! If any of you guys ever played, say, Card Fighter's Clash, SvC: Match of the Millenium, King of Fighters R1 or R2 on the Neo Geo Pocket and had a Dreamcast, you knew what the link cable was for - to connect your Neo Pocket to the Dreamcast so the game in the Pocket could communicate with the game in the Dreamcast (CvS, King of Fighters), unlocking new stuff for both. I believe that the Gamecube and the Gameboy Advance has similar setups (Zelda's, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles, etc). Two seperate games (on seperate platforms) enhancing each other. I like that idea a lot. The only reason different games can't normally function together is they're not made to.
I'm very glad Blizzard didn't make WoW: Alliance and WoW: Horde versions for us to buy, because I think they could've very easily, as all it would've required would've been some sort of arbituary seperation between the two. Now, the difference between WoW and COH/COV on this point is WoW had the two major divisions to start with (ie, made to have both at launch). COV and it's content is new (better than new, not finished!), and while maybe dreamed of during COH's development, simply wasn't there. Although I would've like to have seen a sharing between the two (both factions, same server), that probably would've been a nasty bit of work to do. And unless you renamed the servers, as mentioned earlier, I can't see myself playing COV on "Guardian." Also, again, mentioned earlier, Blizzard with it's, what, 3+million subscribers plus Starcraft/Warcraft/Diablo money and clout can pull stuff off that Cryptic/NCSoft simply can't at this point. I'm sure server capacity is one of them (although they really need to instance Ironforge, I think, like Atlas does sometimes).
Hopefully, however, COV and COH will let you know which servers are counterparts to each other.
COV and COH are two distinct products which can interact and enhance each other. Wonderful. But since they're seperate MMO's, I think Cryptic and NCSoft are more than justified in imposing an additional charge. But since COV benefits fairly directly (I'm assuming) from COH's development work, I would hope the additional cost will be, well, considerate. Also, by keeping everything on seperate servers, hopefully they'll be able to provide a nice, uniformly pleasant service to us. If your server can lag under COH's weight, imagine the weight of COH and COV together!
$0-$5, therefore, is perfectly acceptable to me.
I hope it works out for both games. As far as I can see/have read, WoW, COH and GW are pretty much considered the heralds of the next generation of MMO, each for different reasons (although GW doesn't refer to itself as an MMO). I'm hoping Cryptic has considered (I'm sure they have) how many overlapping/converted customers COV will have from COH. If I can get two good games for the same price (or up to $5) as one, I'll be quite pleased.
I can hardly wait until all the rumors are either transformed into facts or debunked. I can hardly wait until I5 (hurry up!) for COH. And I can hardly wait to make the evil version of my main character!
Thanks for the primer - it answered a lot of my questions. So I can ramble/meander instead of asking stuff ^_^
And I've been told that PVP isn't that popular in COH to begin with. I'm not sure how much of an impact the PVP areas are going to be for me. I'm not overly interested, and I've been challenged to PVP maybe once in the past 2-3 months playing.
Now, I've met some creeeeeeepy players ("Hey babes...three of you, three of us, coincidence? I think not...") far more often. If I could PVP crush those fools, well....maybe that would be cool 
COV/COH pvp will be more interesting. Especially the base raids. I'm very curious about these ruluru item that when placed in HQ give your whole group specials powers.
Playing in the arena you know what you are up for and who your up against. PVP areas in COV sound like you can wait someone out and take them out.
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COV/COH pvp will be more interesting. Especially the base raids. I'm very curious about these ruluru item that when placed in HQ give your whole group specials powers.
Playing in the arena you know what you are up for and who your up against. PVP areas in COV sound like you can wait someone out and take them out.
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Personally, I think that the PvP during missions will be really cool. Especially if they tell you only that there is a possibility that you might be ambushed/attacked by villians/heroes. The tension throughout the mission would rock, especially if you also have mobs that have powers like heroes/villians in the mission.
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I can tell you that we hired Dave Zeb Cook, author of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 2nd Edition, and creator of...
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A part of the primer I must have skipped over. I saw this and hit the attic. Dug through some boxes and found my AD&D 2nd edition player's handbook. Opened it up and, there it was. David "Zeb" Cook January 1989, even the "Zeb" was there. I was already excited about CoV but, seeing this made me even more optimistic. For me knowing the same man that was behind the first and greatest RPG experience I ever had those fifteen years ago is leading the team that's creating CoV just rocks. I am just that much more excited than I already was. *does the happy dance* 
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I saw this and hit the attic. Dug through some boxes and found my AD&D 2nd edition player's handbook. Opened it up and, there it was. David "Zeb" Cook January 1989, even the "Zeb" was there. I was already excited about CoV but, seeing this made me even more optimistic.
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Now you see where my dedication to Arachnos spawns from.
Yes, I do. My previous "I come first" attitude has be replaced with loyalty to Lord Recluse. (From a role-playing perspective)
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And I've been told that PVP isn't that popular in COH to begin with. I'm not sure how much of an impact the PVP areas are going to be for me.
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There are reasons that PVP has been less than successful in COH:
1- It is very counter-genre for Heroes to go out and beat each other senseless to the exclusion of villains... you could be out fighting villains. Don't get me wrong, the odd encounter in a mission with a AV-bot doesn't cut it, but then niether does fighting other heroes all the time.
2- COH is built on the same MMO team template of the past... you NEED certain ATs to fight effectively and individual fights between single heroes are not satisfying as they were never apparently meant to solo against each other... Arena fights between "equals" often turn into slaughters or stalemates. For example, a tank on tank battle is often futile... they can't effectively hurt each other. An empath against... well, ANYBODY else is equally pointless as the empath gets wasted.
3- It takes too long to get a fight going... sitting around waiting for an even match can be an all night affair.
4- There is no reward for winning. Nada, nothing. You burn your online time and get zilch for it.
But, I expect that hero/villain PVP will be better...starting with a new paradigm that will bleed over into COH from COV. By some accounts, the villains are more geared towards solo play and AT vs. AT balance. Hopefully this will herald a change to the ATs in COH to more balanced play...
Infamy: SS/DA Brt, Brushfire Bill: Fire/Thorn Dom, Kill and Tell: Ninja/Trap MM, Dark Duelist: MA/DA Stk, Howling Rad: Rad/Sonic Cor, Silent Rebuke: Claw/EA Stk, Shadow Technician: Dark/Trap Cor, Forbidden Brute: DM/Fire Brt, Doctor Exile: Grav/Thorn Dom, Eternal Warrior: Mace/SD Brt, Electrogravitic: Grav/Elec Dom, Huntsman Gold: Bane, Captain Chill: AR/Cold Cor
As a person who has been playing mmorpgs for over 6 years i have seen alot of expansions on these games.
Usually expansions for games means lots of new zones and content,and occasionally lvl cap increase and new kinda chars.
For these expansions you pay a one time price and no extra monthly costs.
This is exactly like Cov should be,the free issues they have been giving us is mostly changes to powers to make it more like "their vision" and fixes for existing bugs, in other games they call this just patches.
I dont mind paying the 1 time fee for the expansion game of Cov but asking another montly fee on top of coh is to much .
I see no reason why this company would want to suddenly cost alot more per month than any other mmorpg out there,not to mention that that would be kinda bad for bussiness i think.
Oh and by the way most mmorpgs have major expansions out at least once a year if not more,Cov will be the first major expansion Coh has gotten since release,since the issues have barely had enough "new content"to keep players busy since release(how many lvl 50s does a year old player have on average these days?)
just my opinion ofcourse
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Oh and by the way most mmorpgs have major expansions out at least once a year if not more,Cov will be the first major expansion Coh has gotten since release
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At least CoH has not moved to the "new shelf expansion every 6 months" like EQ1. I dread the thought of gamers falling victim to the "shelf dance" (companies simply throwing new boxes on the shelves as fast as they can print them). But I am getting off topic...
I too hope CoV will be rolled into the existing CoH subscription rate. I have a pretty good feeling it will, but one never knows. Only time will tell. Until then, we can at least be respectful to the folks at Cryptic.
After all, they aren't just sitting around watching reruns of My Favorite Martian. These folks are working their butts off to deliver a new game AND improve the original that so many of us love AND make their investors happy AND solve world peace.
... Perhaps not so much with the last one.
CoV isn't an expansion. It is a stand alone title. Meaning you don't need CoH to play. The added fee, if there will be one is actually the standard. SOE for example. I play EQ2, SWG and MxO for one monthly fee of $22. The only thing CoV and CoH will share is 4 PvP zones. The 7 other zones are not accessable to heroes. The price of the software for CoV is priced at $50 as a new title and, not the $30 that has become par to expansion prices. So if there is an additional fee it won't be enough to worry about. At the most an extra $5 bucks. So no worries here. Don't stress it. I am sure everyone will be satisfied. (expect for the few that are never happy )
P.S. as for the free content I have yet to play another MMO that adds as much content as Cryptic per update. Though SOE makes content updates every 3 or 4 weeks it is usually minor changes to the already excisting zones, not adding a new zone. In EQ2 we have to pay for new zones. I have purchased 2. One for 5 and one for 7. So when it comes to free content "CRYPTIC ROCKS".
I am really looking forward to the process to turn your Hero into a Villain! I think it would be cool to play a "fallen hero" with all of the old badges still on your info screen so people can see all the great things you once did for the city =)
The day for release is gonna have to be pushed back to january '06 just so people who've been promised a wack at beta can play it before release.
Hard to say. In CoH Beta, the testing population went from about 10-15K to over 50K in 3 weeks at the end, just before having an enviably smooth launch.
i personally think that it's going to be pushed back by maybe a week or 2. I remember the launch of CoH and the weeks leading up to it being very smooth going, but i also recall some other recent MMo beta tests and launches that didn't go as smothly in my opinion. I hope the Oct 31 date stays firm, but if they don't start sending out the next wave soon then i doubt it will be the final release date.
I think pride, if anything, will make sure they get it right and smooth.
How many companies can claim one, let alone two, launches as smooth as CoH?
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Hmm, im not sure i'd call the coh launch "smooth". As I recall Most of the servers immeditly crashed from the load and for two hours there were so many complaints by the impatient flamers i'm surprised the boards didnt crash as well. After about two hours though they got most of them up...compared to some other launches thats not bad but...hope CoV goes a little smoother.
You obviously don't have a lot of experience with MMOG launches. The servers were rock-solid by lunch on launch day with no further outages. Please let the class know of other major MMOG launches that went smoother than that. We're all waiting with baited breath.
You can quibble about CoH concerning a variety of aspects, but the game's launch day was a new benchmark.
A few questions I've had that I haven't seen asked, some more technical, some just questions from a curious consumer side, as you seem to be the one who is most up to date on these things Clintonian...
~ One of the ones that I have been really curious about...
I own City of Heroes. My brother and I both want to try City of Villains. I have heard that you can play each individually by using two separate accounts so you would be able to have one person playing City of Heroes while another plays City of Villains. The part that I have not heard explained yet is what if they are under the same account. As they are two stand-alone programs, I don't see why you couldn't have two people playing two stand-alone products under the same account. Will this be possible when City of Villains is released, or will I have to choose between having content that is unlocked by having the two games on the same account and a (supposedly) cheaper monthly fee, or being able to have one of us play CoV while the other plays CoH?
~ The preorder contains a fourteen day trial. Do current CoH owners get fourteen free days?
~ Villains will get cloaks, right? CLOAKS!
~ From a more consumer-curious standpoint, I can think of at least two promotions right now that give at least two weeks of "trial" time to players (the preorder and a magazine). Early beta invites are supposedly going to be sent to those who have been players for over a year continuously. Are those players who have been dedicated for less than a year but more than just picking up the game once CoV comes out going to be getting any "rewards?"
My thanks!
Okay ... am I the ONLY one who sees an issue with the fact that whether this is an expansion or whatever you want to call it -- it represents THOUSANDS of man hours of work to have pulled this off. And if you want *more* of it - aka - expansions and tweaks (nerfs) and all that goes with it...
That means more man hours. Now there is a reason why they call them "man hours". Because men=women=people WORK those hours so you can play. Believe it or not - they actually want to be paid for those hours they put in so we can all gather here and p*** and moan about their efforts.
Bottom Line - you want the game? It cost money to make it. They can't give it away for free even if they wanted to.
I don't think any of the people complaining here about the costs of this game have any idea how CHEAP it really is compared to the cost of developers, servers, code, software tools, marketing and so on.
If they're making a profit - it's not a big one. Look at the stock. It's not screaming up the ladder. You want this game to stick around? Quit whining and pay for it.
My 2 cents... take'em - leave'em - whatever you want.