Answering some Freedom Questions

1. - It was stated that Controllers and Masterminds use a lot of server side resources. Something that the devs can see and monitor. So because those 2 AT's are far more server intensive they decided to restrict them in some way from players who are not paying. This is why if you either have enough subscription time or are willing to pay they can be unlocked.

This makes perfect sense to me.

2. Trust me you want the self selected elitists to be isolated off in their own server where they won't be disturbed by the plebeian masses. Otherwise they would be whinging constantly about it and making life more difficult for those who don't pay monthly.

3. Forums required paid staff to monitor them and manage them. Why should players who are not paying a monthly fee have any access to post to the forums? It makes no sense for those not paying monthly to have access. I suppose if they wanted to implement a 400 point per month fee for forum access I could see that. This would help defray the costs of the moderators and community reps.

Originally Posted by Nethergoat it's NEVER too late to pad your /ignore list!

You seem to be arguing that City of Heroes: Freedom is a free to play system like all free to play systems, because there's only one way to make a free to play system, and you're confused by the fact that they aren't making the free to play system exactly like how you believe a free to play system must be constructed.

I hope you at least realize the enormous incongruity of those two perspectives. The reason why City of Heroes Freedom doesn't do what you want or expect it to do is because its not a system that intends to be like what you think it has to be.

We've already been told in community rep posts that Controller/MM access would be available with a certain degree of Veteran Reward/Paragon Reward progress. They haven't told us how much yet, but they seem pretty confident that anyone who would qualify as "early adopter" wouldn't lose out if they'd kept a subscription a meaningful period of time.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Softcapping an Invuln is fantastic. Softcapping a Willpower is amazing. Softcapping SR is kissing your sister.

The Vet period was identified by Positron as being three years in the first post on this very thread. I'm torn, because it seems more than fair to people who bought the game via download or jumped on with Good Vs Evil or the like... but not to people who actually paid $50-60 for one of the game boxes at their respective launches.

I'm not affected either way; I don't intend to cease my subscription, and even my secondary account now has 5 years of Vet status behind it. I do identify and commiserate with those have issue with this decision, but the developers' decision also seems pretty fair to probably 95% or more of those who will become Premium accounts under the launch of CoH Freedom. It's the edge cases like Bloodwynd--those who have put significant investment into the game in the past, but not quite enough to reach that three year mark--that make this somewhat confusing.

Originally Posted by Nethergoat it's NEVER too late to pad your /ignore list!

... dang, how did I miss that?

Ouch... Okay, I do think that's a bit much... ... well, that's 12 badges. At least post-I21, those'll come once a month for VIPs, or once per 1200 points purchased, so it'll be in reach if someone's been around a while.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Softcapping an Invuln is fantastic. Softcapping a Willpower is amazing. Softcapping SR is kissing your sister.

No I arguing that by limiting ATs is bad because they are taking away pieces of the game that were already purchased in a box set. I think this ultimately will alienate former returning players and I think this just simply looks bad to try and get more money from something that was already bought at one time or another. The other problem I have with this is that Positron states that this is going to cause server issues. If I am trying to sell the world that has never played this MMO before, the last thing I want to let out is that due to server load issues, we have to limit certain ATs to premium or free members because we can't pull it off with this equipment. It doesn't add to the confidence that people want to play this game.

Now, I did suggest a model that I know will not be adopted because I think it is a better fit for this game overall for their respective model. But that is simply my opinion. Will the devs listen? Positron has never been known for listening to the community. For the most part, not ONE SINGLE dev has ever been known to listen to the community. There has been a long standing fact that starting with Statesman...we never knew how to play the game the way it was meant to be and we shouldn't be questioning things. T

No argument there. But I think that by creating a VIP only server, you really take the community away from the game to a degree. Either that or the Devs are creating a new server that won't fully be utilized just creating more financial stress.

Finally you are seeing my point. I have few issues outside of this that really tweaks me about Freedom. I could care less about the new Free players but a bigger bone must be thrown to the Premium players if they are going to be won back.

I just really feel that by excluding the premium players from the ability of writing to the forums is a bad idea. How can you tell them that you should come back when you are giving them not much more than a free trial of the game itself? You alienate those that simply want to hear a reason to come back by not allowing them the one part of all this that is the bigger selling point which is the community.

I know nothing has been said about PvP or the Arena but I would have if I were a Dev added that to the list.

Actually, it's not that it will cause server issues... just that they want to limit the ability of Free or disgruntled Premium players to troll the server by massing a populated zone and dumping pets with the intent of causing server slowdown. It won't (or rather, it shouldn't) actually break anything, but it can make life hell for those who are just trying to get from one mission to the other.

I would assume that organizing and possibly even participating in such a thing would be an offense worthy of account banning. This would obviously mean nothing to a completely Free player, but someone who had earned the ATs in question would be invested in that account by some dollar amount.

You've mentioned this, or at least similar sentiments, several times now. I think you're giving Posi especially too much flak, though. The developers aren't infallable, and they don't always get everything right... and sometimes they take a long, long time to fix the things that they got wrong. But they have a view that very few of the players actually get--the long view of what's coming next; the stuff coming out six months from now will balance the changes made today, etc.

And it's not like they don't listen to the playerbase at all about these things, either... sometimes we're split into dozens of different groups over tiny things. When we can get our own acts together, though, the developers are surprisingly quick to respond.

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Supposedly, the "new server" will actually be the old European Training Room server, reformatted. They've already invested in the hardware, and right now it's just sitting there doing nothing... might as well use it for something!

I've always seen those points. I don't feel as strongly about either of them as you do, but I acknowledge that they're weak points in the plan that should have some further measure of attention paid to them prior to CoH Freedom's launch.

A big part of this rebranding is the promise that they won't stand by while the existing subscribers get trolled. This is a pro-active solution that may be too strict, but it certainly solves the problem on the forum end.

But it's also why existing players have suggested creating a free section of the forums that would have lessened moderation. People do want to see some of the old faces come back to the boards, and they're willing to put up with some level of inconvenience (trolling, spamming, etc) to get it.

Nah, PVP is one of the big draws for certain F2Pers. It doesn't have to be good PVP, but there's definitely a breed of player that floats from one online game to another with the express purpose of beating up other players. I doubt anyone is going to come to CoH and stay because of PVP, but if it gets them in the door and something else makes them want to stay, then it has done its purpose.

Conversely, I'm sure there are members of the existing PVP community who are cackling over their keyboards at the idea of "fresh meat" in the PVP zones. *shrug*

Originally Posted by Nethergoat it's NEVER too late to pad your /ignore list!

That's a rather remarkable amount of wrong packed into a single post. From the top:

I actually quoted the two posts you made in which you first said that City of Heroes was going down a path that was contrary to what you think is appropriate for a free to play system, followed immediately by a post where you call everyone who tries to say that City of Heroes Freedom is *not* a free to play system like all the others is naive. So first *you* say its not like all the others, and then you say anyone who thinks is not like all the others is naive. There is a logical conclusion you can draw from those two statements, if you assume they are both true.

Second the devs never said that allowing free to play players access to masterminds and controllers would cause server issues. They said those were two of the most resource-intensive archetypes that exist so in thinking about which archetypes to make free for VIPs but ala carte for everyone else they were the logical choices. That was combined with the fact that they are also seen as two of the more challenging archetypes to play.

Third, no one ever specifically purchased unlimited access to controllers or masterminds. Trivial proof: stop subscribing, and see if you still have access. In a hybrid free-to-play and subscription model, its no longer simple login rights that are the primary gate to gameplay as it is in a pure subscription model. It is access to discrete gameplay options that are the true gates, since the login gate disappears. So *all* gameplay options that used to be bundled with a subscription become subject to review in a hybrid system. This is presumed to be automatically understood.

Is it unfair to premium players? Lets review: Premium players do not pay a subscription. They do not pay for access to *anything* by default. They are being given access to the vast majority of the game for free and being asked to pay for only a small fraction of the rest. Will this cause players to be turned off? Perhaps: but this is a game that has to be self-sufficient: I think its perfectly acceptable to "turn off" players who are given most of the game for free and still complain about the rest they don't get for free. I'm willing to lose such players, and I suspect NCSoft is as well: they are the least likely to be the target for the game: people who will be enticed by the free to play options into eventually becoming subscribers, or at least ala carte premium purchasers. So its not unfair, and its not even deleterious: it actually seems to screen out the very people we don't want: people who will look a gift horse in the mouth and complain.

You did not propose a system that would be better for the Freedom model, because you refuse to acknowledge what that model even is. You keep insisting that "free to play" must be what you expect it to be, and that therefore its implementation must be what you believe satisfies that target. But the devs aren't aiming at your target. They are aiming at a completely different target, a target that values subscribers first, and the people who don't actually pay to play the game second; a target that makes calculated decisions on what they will give away for free and what they will charge for that preserves the benefits to subscribers first, provides a path to buy into greater gameplay second, and cares about what the people who don't actually spend any money on the game dead last. Its a model that attempts to encourage previous subscribers to return by giving them *some* but not *all* of the original gameplay for free and tries to see which of them will recommit to the game, either partially as Premium players that buy access to extended gameplay ala carte, or VIP subscribers that pay a subscription. The people who decide to play completely for free, forever, we'll tolerate, we'll accept as part of the overall game community, but they will never be a priority.

As to the devs NEVER listening to the players, that's random silly hyperbole barely even worthy of responding to. At this stage of the game a sizeable percentage, perhaps even a simple majority of the game's features and implementation incorporates player feedback, commentary, or suggestions. By any objective measure the devs have listened and incorporated player feedback to an extremely high degree. Perhaps they don't specifically do what *you* want, but you are not the player community representative. They have listened to and acted on the feedback of hundreds if not thousands of individual players. That's plenty enough to make your assertion false on its face.

Hmmm...I did take their model and tweek it. So yea I did make a suggestion on how to implement a far better model.

So even though a premium player like bought at least the initial box set...they are no longer entitled to those ATs because screw them they quit??? How encouraging is that to potential premium players reading this very forum right now?? We want you to come back and pay us your subscription that for whatever reason you stopped paying and to top it off, the toons that you created before you left will be locked until such time as you give in to our demands and pay us.

Whereas I am saying...Welcome back, if you bought a box set or a couple of boxed sets, you get back what you bought with some small restrictions. We encourage you to pay a subscription as it will give you access to certain raids and task forces as well as full access to the incarnate system. We invite you to see all the good we have done since you left. Welcome back!

Now, I am only speaking for the premium players. I could care less about the New players. The current model seeks to alienate former and returning players and gives no incentive for resubscribing at all.

You're speaking entirely in absolutes and only from your own limited perspective.

There are going to be hundreds, if not thousands, of players who will come back to check out their old Blasters, Scrappers, Tanks, Defenders, Brutes, Dominators, Corruptors and Stal--okay, maybe not Stalkers... But you see where I'm going with this. Not everyone will be as hung up as you are about not getting their Controllers and Masterminds back in the free version.

I'm not particularly happy that my ex-girlfriend will be coming back specifically to play her Blaster (and to further ruin my life, of course)... but she won't give a rat's patoot about not being able to play Controllers or Masterminds. Back when she was a subscriber, she played her Blaster easily 90% of the time she spent in game, probably more.

If YOU have no incentive to come back because you don't get Controllers and/or Masterminds, then that's fine--just say it. But don't assume that everyone else is going to charge in with pitchforks and torches; most of them will have other characters that they'd much rather play than their old Controllers and MMs.

Originally Posted by Nethergoat it's NEVER too late to pad your /ignore list!

The incentive is you get full access to the game again. Your "model" seeks to extract the maximum amount of free stuff from the game, while trying to marginalize what isn't free so that you can claim on paper there are still advantages to the VIP subscription model while making sure they are things you don't care as much about.

The VIPs and the people who actually resubscribe will have none of the problems you mention. Only the people who decide not to subscribe will have those problems, *and* those problems will have remedies that do not require actually subscribing if they which to avail themselves of them, *and* represent small but meaningful elements of the game.


None of this is relevant to my initial assertion, however, which is that you seem to think there is only one kind of free to play model, and ironically the devs aren't implementing it. Which is ultimately a logical contradiction. Your difficulty is due to the fact that the devs are not implementing a free to play model that prioritizes what the people who do not pay actually get. The priority is first and foremost on subscribers. Not previous subscribers. Subscribers. Previous subscribers get many advantages over new players. Full access to everything they had before for free is not one of them, because that runs contrary to the purpose of the Freedom model. If you understand the purpose of the Freedom model is not to be attractive to people who don't pay, but to be attractive to people who do pay, and everything else is secondary to that, then it makes no sense to argue that the reason to give returning players who continue to not pay everything they need to be "happy" because that is not the devs' goal. The goal is first to preserve the VIP subscription experience as the highest value offering, and *obviously* so. The second goal is to get new players to *try* the game on the assumption that the game's historically high retention rates implies the act of playing the game gets a high percentage of players to want to subscribe. And the third goal is to offer returning players an opportunity to return to the game with a leg up over the free players, by offering them rewards in the form of the new veteran system.

None of those goals states, or implies, that one of the things we need to be worried about is how much value people expect to get for their zero dollars.

Its a strange thing to say, if only we give returning non-subscribers *more free stuff* they will be encouraged to subscribe. I say "strange" but I mean "bewildering." The goal is to give them *enough* to make the returning experience worth it for enough players. Not all of them, just enough of them. And right now they are getting a huge amount of the game for free, and more than beginning free players.

Since you're clearly not going to address the "why two totally contradictory views of free to play" issue, perhaps you can explain what possible reasoning would lead you to believe that the more stuff you give away for free, the more likely people will subscribe to get what little is left after you give away more free stuff. That seems, at least on the surface (and everywhere else) to be counter-intuitive.

Err why should buying the box set give them access to Masterminds or Controllers? Really why? Buying the box set never ever gave you anything more than access to the game in the first place. You had to buy it to play at all. Could not play ever if you didn't buy the game.

After Freedom launches I don't expect to see the box set sold anymore because you don't have to have it to play. Buying it is no longer the key to even being able to login to the game. Which it is right now.

That is all that buying the box is. Access is all it ever really provided. And note that the caveat has always existed that game play may change. Well guess what they are changing it. Now you don't have to have the CD key at all to play and have a premium or VIP account with the game.

Buying some of the boxes apparently does unlock other stuff for premium players, just not Masterminds or Controllers.

Ah you speak for the Premium players. How nice of them to anoint you their spokes being.

Oh and you appear to be confused about the goal of I21:Freedom. It isn't to have thousands of Premium players. It is to have thousands of paying players. Freedom provides just enough tantalization to encourage players to spend money even if they aren't subscribed. Really their goal is to maximize the number of VIP players so of course carrots are dangled infront of the Premium players.

What you expected everything to be free and require no money after Freedom goes live? Are you daft?

Ok to address your view that I am using two different viewpoints here let me try and explain a little bit first.

Freedom is taking a lot from other companies in regards to its free to play model. It is borrowing even up to the point of terminology. However, what they don't appear to borrow is the difference in each tier that is created. Every company has to brandish their own system. I can't deny that simply because each company is different and provides different product. Do I agree with the system that CoX is looking to use? No. I think it provides too many limitations to the premium level which is a key target area to try and get people to renew. Free players are going to be a tough sell regardless because this is becoming a dated game with limited development. Sure this game has plenty to offer, but how many times can you do the same mission before it gets relatively repetitive? There is little connection to a large overlying storyline other than hints through newer TFs. The rest of the content is a hodgepodge of stuff to do with no real clear sense of direction. One could even argue that the 1st ward being even more lvl 20-30 stuff is amazing crazy simply because the lack of stuff to do 40+ outweighs players need for more middle content. So the trick the NCSoft has now is to attract the subscriptions. F2P is an excellent way to do it. No argument. LOTRO for example tripled their subscribers by going to a F2P system and money has been used for very nice development. I know comparing two very disimilar games is like comparing apples to oranges. The difference here is that a F2P model that allows for the trial areas for free but still allowing the level up process to cap coupled with the ability to purchase individual questing zones has made the difference. They didn't change access to their VIPs (which is what they are called as well). They get their montly months too and were rewarded for continued time as well. Premium players were limited to what was already purchased with the option of buying more content as it comes out. They are limited in base functionality in game but allowed to access most of the content through micro purchases opening up areas. Quest chains are locked unless the area is purchased. They also locked 2 classes that were introduced in the first paid expansion until that expansion area was purchased. Everything and I mean everything has a price in that game. But if you bought something prior to going premium (which is oddly enough what they call it there too), you keep it for the most part.


Now as for calling people naive. Well when I am being told that the system that CoX is being implemented is not a F2P system but a Freedom system that allows users the gift of coming back. Well then yea...someone is being naive. Or when I am told the main focus is on the subscribers. Well no, it really isn't. The whole point of a F2P system is to try and attract new subscribers by showing the the game in such a way that they are willing to buy small items initially with the hopes that they by the CoV expansion or GR expansion. But to assume that this is all done for the greater good of the subscriber. Well no not really. They are important yes, but the current subscribers are not enough to keep things status quo any longer. New blood has to be introduced. This is very much a F2P system with a model I don't fully agree with as I see it punishing people who walked away for whatever reason by locking portions of the game that were bought in a boxed set or expansion such as CoV was.

Lets stop right here and grant everything you've said up to this point. Lets grant that the point of an F2P system is exactly that: to attract as many players as possible by making the game free, and then hoping to make money by encouraging the impulse shoppers among them to buy small low-friction items with microtransactions. In other words, fundamentally the model that games like Farmville pursue. Lets say we accept that as a given, and define the semantics that way. That is what Free to Play is, period.

So lets say I'm in charge of City of Heroes, and I don't want to do that. I have a pretty loyal subscriber base, and I don't want to shift my priority 100% from subscriptions to microtransactions. My playerbase does demonstrate that up to a point they are willing to buy ala carte additions to the game, as long as they are perceived as having sufficient value - booster packs, in other words, and the occasional boxed expansion.

My game is seven years old, and its not easy to drum up marketing noise for a seven year old game. But it does seem like when people *do* subscribe, a high percentage convert to long term subscribers. And those that convert to long term subscribers often become *very* long term subscribers. So what I want to do is to figure out a way to get more people to play the game, so that the game itself can create subscribers: rather than market the game, I will let the game sell itself.

I do have trial accounts, but those are highly limited and there's no easy path from trial to subscriber: you basically have to make one big jump. However, other games have shown that there is another option: some MMOs have created free to play options. Some are all the way free to play, and some intermix free to play and subscriptions in a tiered value manner. I want to tap the opportunities that such a game offering provides in terms of an increased audience for my game, but I do not want to infringe on my subscription base more than I need to.

So I have an idea of what my subscribers will tolerate. They will tolerate ala carte to a point, and that point is roughly the booster pack history of the game. I can offer free access to the game, but each free player costs me money in terms of resources. And I want a way to provide stepping stones for free players to either buy their way into a better game experience, or even jump up eventually to a subscription model. So I want a way to make large parts of the game purchasable in theory though an ala carte store.

Ok, at this point I've admitted I do not have the same goals that the free to play model has. I don't have them, and I don't want them. So by your definition of free to play I should not adopt a free to play model: it has different goals than I have, and I'm not changing my goals.

Instead, I'm going to adopt a new model that has a free access option with no subscription required that has very limited access to the game, and essentially no access to parts of the game which are subject to abuse which can only be remedied by revocation, because the cost to a player of revoking a free account can be made arbitrarily low or zero if they wish to abuse the game. I will continue to offer subscriptions that have the same access to the same game as before, more or less, with the option to buy ala carte additions to the game that are similar to the options that have always been offered in boxed expansions or booster packs. And because I'm going to have an ala carte store anyway, I will allow free players to buy expanded access to the game: I'll call those players premium players because they have now made an actual investment into the game by buying things: it means the cost of revocation is now non-zero and options unavailable to free players can begin to be relaxed for premium players, because revocation now has teeth.

But by your own definition this thing I just made, which is perfectly logical and addresses *my* goals and values for the game, is *not* a free to play system. It does not match your definition of one, or the goals you state are associated with one. Its something different because you say so, not because I say so.

If it was my game, that assertion I would make, and you can tell me all you want that I just don't understand what I want or what I'm doing, but that will fall on deaf ears. I've just articulated what I want and what I would do to get it, and there's nothing self-contradictory about what I want.

All you have to do now is make the leap to recognize what I just said I would do, is what the devs themselves have actually explained they want to do. And this is something I've heard expressed to me face to face in direct conversations with them. So I don't think there's any wiggle room for misinterpreting their intentions in that case. What the devs are doing is a hybrid free to play system, but ignoring the semantic games its not a free to play system as you define one. It isn't one, and they don't want to make one, period.

If you also look at the paragraph prior to the one that you quoted me from, you will also see that I am also taking my experience from a hybrid free to play system as well. So by assuming that I am simply trying to compare Cox with Farmville is wildly ludicrous as I never made the claim.

I am simply comparing the plan of a success hybrid F2P model that allows for people to come and buy content that they want without having to move up to the VIP level and has proven to make money in that capacity. CoX model has severe limitations as to "dangling that carrot" and creating the new subcriber. But if you assume that the 125K subscribers is the prime focus for this game, well then the F2P model that they are going to use isn't going to raise the number of subscribers or ultimately increase the revenue stream to the game as there is no incentive if every bit of the game is largely open and free. So holding costume packs or even the incarnate system hostage to VIP only is really no good reason for the game if there are already a large number of options available to you.

Alienated by no forum posting access and limited access to already purchased ATs. That is how you alienate a former player.

Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters

That's like saying you can alienate a former player by sending them a check for ten dollars, when they want fifteen instead. We're essentially going to be sending them a message that says "you can now play *some* but not all of the game for free" and you're saying many of them will say "well if its not everything I want for free screw it I'm not coming back" *and* this is a bad thing.

Its not a bad thing to tell people who want too much for free that they are not going to get it. I would rather have the ones that won't look a gift horse in the mouth. I'm willing to lose the rest, because we didn't have them in the first place. These are, after all, people who are currently not subscribers.

Why stop there? Aren't we alienating those players by not allowing them access to the Incarnate system? To the VIP server? To *anything*? Why block access to anything if we care about "alienating" people who are not paying us money.

You're drawing the us vs them line wrong. This is not a case of us being everyone who has ever played the game before the Freedom conversion, and them being all the new nobodies that will be joining later. This is a case of VIPs vs everyone else: the people who pay vs everyone who doesn't. And in second place, its a case of veterans who don't pay vs neopytes who don't pay, among all the people who don't pay. VIPs win, everyone else comes in second. Premium players come first among all the people who don't pay, which is still second place.

If you are speaking for the Premium players, then let me speak for the VIPs: you don't pay. You're getting access for free. You won't get access to everything. Fair has nothing to do with people who are getting things for free without paying. If you need more free stuff than we're giving you as people who don't pay just to grace us with your presence, even though most of these things can be bought and most of these things can be earned by enough veteran status, so in the case of masterminds and controllers we're talking about veteran players who aren't paying anything and quit the game and were around for two whole years, then I guess we'll have to make due without you.

Anyone can read the forums... Seriously, log off and read them. As to posting access, they should have a "premium (or above)" section for player help. Then again it would be a spam infested nightmare to police.

Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters

::blink::

That is just daft. How is that alienation?

Former players DO NOT HAVE ACCESS TO ANYTHING RIGHT NOW!

There is that clear? How is giving them some access without them lifting a finger going to alienate them? ??? ????