Overdue rent = locked out of bases?
By
Alexio_DeAmore,
Posted on: 2005-12-20 13:44 in Base Construction
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In fact, I saved Lord Recluse's post about this:
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Rent does not cause item decay. The affect of rent is that your functional items become non-functional. You can be offline for a month and your base will be unchanged. Back rent does not accrue. All you need to do is make the most current payment and your base is fully functional again.
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Well to be honest, he did say the truth.
A: You do not lose items. Nothing disappears.
B: Nothing does change about your base.
C: Base rent does not incure past the 1st due (will not stack).
So all in all, what was said is true. Just not the whole truth. You are correct that they never stated that we could be locked out of our bases after soo much time.
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In fact, I saved Lord Recluse's post about this:
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Rent does not cause item decay. The affect of rent is that your functional items become non-functional. You can be offline for a month and your base will be unchanged. Back rent does not accrue. All you need to do is make the most current payment and your base is fully functional again.
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Well to be honest, he did say the truth.
A: You do not lose items. Nothing disappears.
B: Nothing does change about your base.
C: Base rent does not incure past the 1st due (will not stack).
So all in all, what was said is true. Just not the whole truth. You are correct that they never stated that we could be locked out of our bases after soo much time.
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He said "The affect of rent is that your functional items become non-functional." Not an affect. And later in that thread, people did talk about not paying rent and using the base socially, and that was not corrected. And I do not have such a statement recorded to back me up, but I'm pretty sure I remember a red name saying you could use a base socially without worrying about rent.
My guess would be the decision to close down bases that haven't had rent paid after that statement was made, and they forgot this statement was made. An honest mistake.
That said...I think it's a lousy decision. And if it stands, it's gotta be a lot clearer this will happen as you create bases and in the rent notes, and there has to be a way to get a full refund on a base and make it go away
My arcs are constantly shifting, just search for GadgetDon for the latest.
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In fact, I saved Lord Recluse's post about this:
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Rent does not cause item decay. The affect of rent is that your functional items become non-functional. You can be offline for a month and your base will be unchanged. Back rent does not accrue. All you need to do is make the most current payment and your base is fully functional again.
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Well to be honest, he did say the truth.
A: You do not lose items. Nothing disappears.
B: Nothing does change about your base.
C: Base rent does not incure past the 1st due (will not stack).
So all in all, what was said is true. Just not the whole truth. You are correct that they never stated that we could be locked out of our bases after soo much time.
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QFT
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Can a base be raided while the occupants (I can't spell) are locked out?
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I wouldn't be surprised there's some bug that WOULD allow this the way bugs and things that need to be fixed are going.
Sorry, I was unclear. Yes, I meant that they didn't say we would be locked out of bases, not that they did say we wouldn't. So, the previous poster's statement about nothing being mentioned about base lockouts was not a misremembrance, as Recluse had said.
Confusing enough? 
And yes, I'm a bit disappointed if it does lock us out of the base.
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I'm afraid you're remembering somewhat wrong. There is a grace period after your first missed payment during which you base is powered down. But if you continue to ignore rent, eventually all access to your base is lost. Once you pay your rent, access is restored.
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If I actually wrote what I'd like to say about that, the thread would get deleted and I would get banned from the boards...
My pissed off meter just went up several notches. 
"Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself." ~Midnight Flux's former boss.
There are usually two sides to every argument but no end.
Everything placed above this line is always IMHO, YMMV and quite certainly not to be taken too seriously....
Adding my voice to the sentiment that a lot of us are -really- sure that during Beta, we were told that rent affected Base Items -only-. So basically, your base wouldn't do stuff other than be a place to hang out, so long as there was rent owed.
Not like it's the end of the world, but it's a bit of a blow to have to pay rent on a base that WILL NOT be able to do ANYTHING but be a hangout place for a few months, since the SG's not heavily prestige-grinding.
*shrug*
DJs for The Cape Radio
Makes videos & podcasts about reviewing toys, covering conventions, and more at Vangelus.ca
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If you don't pay rent for long enough then you will be locked out of the base.
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This is an absurd policy. It's bad enough that we have to pay rent in the first place. Given the ridiculous prestige costs for rooms and equipment (took me forbloodyever to afford the 225k price tag for the energy equipment), I think the entire concept and reality of rent should be abolished. Now people can't even enter their non-functioning bases for social or RP reasons? That seems overly punitive.
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I'm afraid you're remembering somewhat wrong. There is a grace period after your first missed payment during which you base is powered down. But if you continue to ignore rent, eventually all access to your base is lost. Once you pay your rent, access is restored.
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No, no, no and no.
Up until now I have been defending the way bases are setup, and yes, even the prices, and I'm only in a 4 man SG. I've been willing to wait to get all the nifty do-hickeys and whizzbangs for our base, however long it took. I like having a long-term goal.
But this? Uhuh. Waiting for functional base is one thing. Having to pay just to have access to a purely decorative base is completely different. Even the biggest decorative room is "only" 150,000 - I've made that in CoV and then some with no problem. So I figured the idea was that even a single person could have a decorative base very quickly, while "active" bases where intended for larger SG's. But it's the small to medium SG's that actually want functionality in their base that are getting screwed over once again - they're the ones that will have trouble paying for everything, and forcing them to pay the rent is just going to extenuate that issue.
We'll just have a base we can't get into for now, I think. It'd be nice to hang out in it, and I've amused myself when nobody else is on with redecorating, but if I have to choose between that and getting functionality, I'll pick the latter. I don't want to have to make that choice however, and it is a bad decision to force it upon us.
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I was under the impression that if you didn't ever pay base rent you would only loose access to things that would be useful in raids. Therefore if you never wanted to do raids you'd never need to pay rent.
Our base hasn't even been made fully functional yet but we get into it and use it for role play and to play with the editor, and we've let the rent go for a long time. Last night we couldn't get into it at all until someone finally paid.
Am I remembering wrong? Are you required to pay rent just to use the base even if you aren't using it for raids?
Thanks!
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I'm afraid you're remembering somewhat wrong. There is a grace period after your first missed payment during which you base is powered down. But if you continue to ignore rent, eventually all access to your base is lost. Once you pay your rent, access is restored.
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That's not what we were told before. It was said to us that if we failed to pay rent, our base would lose functionality, but we could still enter it normally. Also, we were told at about hte same time that rent could never get more than one "rent cycle" behind- it doesn't accumulate, and paying the most recent rent charge would catch us up completely.
This didn't come out of thin air. This is what the dev team posted, and to find out 2 months after the game went live that this isn't the way it works is a fairly major "oversight." Can you tell us if the second part of this is still true, that back rent doesn't accumlate, or did you guys decide to change that without telling anyone too?
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This is absolutely correct. There were even LONG discussions about the strategic value of NOT paying rent. Getting locked out was never something a redname talked about. If it were, there would have been some serious discussions on frequency, cost, etc.
As it stands, rent is somewhat, for lack of a better word, stupid.
What in the world do you purchase and then have to dump 10% (or whatever end of the sliding scale I'm on) of the purchase price into each week or two (I'm not sure which it is, the message seems to pop up at random).
What am I renting and from whom? Is the interdimensional transit authority taxing me? This sounds like an MMORPG design hold-over from some other game to me.
How about this, instead of inexplicable cylinders of mystical energy that appeared overnight in Paragon with no explanation as our base doorways, allow us to pick a building door and pay rent based on the type of building we choose. If I pick a skyscraper in Steel, rent is high. If I pick the back door of a Mighty Mart, it's cheap. Or give the option to BUY a base and eliminate rent.
I realize that was two rants in one (rent in it's current form is stupid and wth are these base teleportation blobs) but they can be made better by a single idea.
I might be wrong, but I think the whirling mass of ridiculous energy is the only addition to CoH that has come without any sort of story. Just a lame marker on the map and effect graphic, usually by a bus stop.
A better system would be that rent be based off of plot size and maybe power used.
This way, Casual sg's can have minimal rent, get ahead on prestige, buy decorative items, and then make a descision on wether they want to go for the functional items.
Hard core SG's can pay rent on the funtional items, and afford them as they are not being assesed on the prestige they are amassing just to pay the rent.
If you can't enter the base, you can't pawn your stuff for rent money. This means you'll have to either have Prestige in reserve, or play a lot to get your teleporter running again instead of quickly deleting your studio. Is this fair?
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Is this fair?
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The base system is not optimized for fairness, it's optimized for grinding. Your expectations, like mine, were set at a level which was entirely too close to reasonable.
@Mindshadow
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As it stands, rent is somewhat, for lack of a better word, stupid.
What in the world do you purchase and then have to dump 10% (or whatever end of the sliding scale I'm on) of the purchase price into each week or two (I'm not sure which it is, the message seems to pop up at random).
What am I renting and from whom? Is the interdimensional transit authority taxing me? This sounds like an MMORPG design hold-over from some other game to me.
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Rent may have just been the wrong term. Really, it seems more like depreciation than rent...
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That's not what we were told before. It was said to us that if we failed to pay rent, our base would lose functionality, but we could still enter it normally. Also, we were told at about hte same time that rent could never get more than one "rent cycle" behind- it doesn't accumulate, and paying the most recent rent charge would catch us up completely.
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That's exactly how I remember it, too. FWIW.
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I'm afraid you're remembering somewhat wrong. There is a grace period after your first missed payment during which you base is powered down. But if you continue to ignore rent, eventually all access to your base is lost. Once you pay your rent, access is restored.
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I don't mind saying that this addition to the policy feels like a low blow. Just because other MMORPGs have even worse policies doesn't mean you need to use such a strongly negative game mechanic. Bases should be a slowly improving reward for in game efforts. Not something that requires work just to maintain. I enjoy these games for the steady rewards I get improving my character. If my character degraded just because I didn't play regularly I would start to hate the game. Bases are different only in scale.
I thought the grinding for rent was bad, now we're locked out of our bases without it?!
I must admit, it was amusing enough to see an ad for CoV in my PC Gamer that said 'Build Massive Fortresses Room by Room', but there REALLY needs to be an asterisk on that saying 'With help from lots of other people and assuming rent is paid'.
Borderline false advertising.
Tai
"You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one."
� James A. Froude (1818-1894)
I look at it this way - Bases are meant to be a Supergroup thing, not a single person thing. So, by having a rent cost, it gets players more involved in their groups rather than groups just being there and having players doing nothing.
I, for one, enjoy the idea.
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Build Massive Fortresses Room by Room*
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* Well, maybe not YOU, but some Korean powerleveling group could probably afford a massive fortress in 5 or 10 years or so.
Add this the list of half truths and misdirections from the dev staff:
No more major changes to Powers
uh-huh
Not paying rent will only shut down functional items in a base
uh-huh.
Whatever.
I figure from here on out, just play and figure out the rules as they happen. The developers are useless for anything functional in game. Better off just going with what you learn, and hope that sharing it onthe official forums doesn't get it nerfed/ changed.
Mr. O
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I thought the grinding for rent was bad, now we're locked out of our bases without it?!
I must admit, it was amusing enough to see an ad for CoV in my PC Gamer that said 'Build Massive Fortresses Room by Room', but there REALLY needs to be an asterisk on that saying 'With help from lots of other people and assuming rent is paid'.
Borderline false advertising.
Tai
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I'm annoyed by this change in rent as well, but please, drop the "false advertising" crap. "False advertising" is the single most overused consumer threat, and most people are pretty ignorant of what actually constitutes false advertising. ;p
Sorry, it's a pet peeve. ;p
That said, I'm a bit distressed by this as well. I don't mind having to play the game to keep my base, (it is, after all, supposed to be a "carrot", and the game's fun anyway) But what bothers me is that there was a change made in the way something works and we weren't told about it. Mistakes happen and all that, but I think we're either due an apology, or a link directing us to where we missed this rather important information. Especially in light of Recluse coming on and telling us we're "remembering wrong". ;p (We gotcher post, man. Who's remembering wrong, huh???)
That said, some things to put it in perspective. Rent is pretty low. I have a casual supergroup with a couple of hardcore players in it, and they raise the prestige needed for our rent in about two hours. I can raise it within a week or so. And that's for a base with teleporters, auxilliary control items, workshops, etc. A decorative base's rent is -diminutive- in comparison. Some stuff you can keep in mind. A lot of people are talking about "the grind", but I personally don't consider missions grinding, and missions are the quickest way to build prestige. (especially oranbega missions with the portals in them). As a speculative definition, let's assume "grinding" means "doing the same thing over and over to the point of repetitive boredom"
If missions are grinding, then street sweeping is -uber- grinding, and therefore the whole game is nothing but a grind. Why are you even playing? To build a base, and nothing else? Buy a copy of the Sims and be happy. ^^;
Rent isn't difficult to pay off if you have a casual SG with no functional items. 2-4000 prestige or so, from what I've been able to figure.
The grace period means that you can pay it off less often then the two-week routine, and assuming it still doesn't accrue (didn't seem to for our group, anyway) you're not scrambling up a water slide by putting it off as long as possible.
You do have to put up with the reminders, which is annoying. It'd be nice if there were an option to turn off the reminders.
All that aside, I am pretty annoyed that we never heard about this until now. If it says something in the manual or somewhere on the website, then hey, our bad, we should've looked for the official info instead of assuming that beta carried through to live. (It isn't the devs job to babysit what we do and don't read, after all) But I haven't looked yet. Anyway, I'd like to hear another word from a redname on this, just to lock down their thoughts on this little development.
Jason Heavensrun
Swift : Freedom Server
http://www.bladeandepsilon.com/CheckmateStudios
Check out my first Architect Arc, "Bring Up the Sun", arc #339507, and let me know what you think!
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Build Massive Fortresses Room by Room*
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* Well, maybe not YOU, but some Korean powerleveling group could probably afford a massive fortress in 5 or 10 years or so.
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Hey, to be fair, it may not seem massive relative to what can be built in the game, but get the biggest 150,000Pr decorative room you can fit on the basic plot and tell me that's not massive by real-world standards. ;p
(throw in some columns strategically and it makes it look even bigger)
Jason Heavensrun
Swift : Freedom Server
http://www.bladeandepsilon.com/CheckmateStudios
Check out my first Architect Arc, "Bring Up the Sun", arc #339507, and let me know what you think!
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That's exactly how I remember it, too. FWIW.
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Yes, I remember it the same as well. It sucks that the Devs are actually human and can leave out information. What we need is robots who come in here and give out conned information so everything that people might assume on their own accord would be clear to begin with.
Since it was the players themselves who came up with the idea that the base would still be usable and no Dev actually came out and said it, seems like it is the players' fault everyone is upset. But players' (myself included) obviously can't be blamed for giving themselves misinformation even though that is what happened.
So Boo you Devs for being human again. Boo I say.
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I'm annoyed by this change in rent as well, but please, drop the "false advertising" crap. "False advertising" is the single most overused consumer threat, and most people are pretty ignorant of what actually constitutes false advertising. ;p
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Oh I know, I've worked in advertising. I agree that it is overused, and I'm not accusing them of it (hence the 'borderline') as much as the statement being misleading. I've just had to add too many disclaimers to ads and change copy to be 'pretty ignorant'. I'm not even blaming devs. I just found the statement on the ad to be amusing.
We all have different definitions of what 'grinding' constitutes... some people in other MMOGs enjoy just sitting around crafting items or washing dishes or whatever. But it's still their choice to do so; the options available to you are sometimes what makes it fun. Rent is essentially a mechanism that removes choice by forcing us to 'work' to keep it. I know this may mimic the real world, but is it FUN for a game? Do people enjoy paying rent every 2 weeks?*
Tai
* SG bases are for SGs of 1+ people. Your experience my vary and/or change on-line. Opinion is completely mine and not that of my SG members or 'average gamers' or even the 'average CoH player'. Batteries not included.
"You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one."
� James A. Froude (1818-1894)
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I was under the impression that if you didn't ever pay base rent you would only loose access to things that would be useful in raids. Therefore if you never wanted to do raids you'd never need to pay rent.
Our base hasn't even been made fully functional yet but we get into it and use it for role play and to play with the editor, and we've let the rent go for a long time. Last night we couldn't get into it at all until someone finally paid.
Am I remembering wrong? Are you required to pay rent just to use the base even if you aren't using it for raids?
Thanks!
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I'm afraid you're remembering somewhat wrong. There is a grace period after your first missed payment during which you base is powered down. But if you continue to ignore rent, eventually all access to your base is lost. Once you pay your rent, access is restored.
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Can you add an option to delete your base? All my small sg can afford is a social, nonfunctional base, and I was also under the impression that we could keep it at the cost of losing power (which isn't a concern for us). I'd rather just get rid of it now and start earning influence again, without the any pestering to pay rent.