Discussion - IMPORTANT: Paragon Rewards Program Update - 9/12/2011

I'm actually suggesting that the Devs are always going to be adding "new things" which people will rather foolishly base their subscription decisions on. You seem to be basing your decision on the announced plans for a single new toy instead on worrying whether or not you see yourself liking the overall game into the future. To me that just seems like a trivial thing to base an entire subscription on.

The similar kind of silliness happened when the Vet Award system first arrived. Many of us played the game continuously for around 2.5 years before we had any clue there was ever going to be Vet Award system. When it finally arrived some people complained "If I had only known the Vet Award system was going to happen I would have maintained my subscription." Sucked for them to be so fickle.

You should be making your plans based on whether or not you like the core game, not on whether or not you were promised (or not promised) bonus prizes that you'll now have to wait longer for. If a costume set was the only thing motivating you to spend the money on a multi-month subscription then I think your priorities on this might have been a bit skewed to begin with. *shrugs*

Dearth - either we have to wait a few for them to do it, or they delay the issue. Yes they could of devoted more to fixing this, but then we would still have other issues. Heck, as it is the Mac client is still going live with a few big bugs.

So, you are saying that new game features, pricing changes, and other things that the devs make changes to are not a good basis for deciding whether to continue a subscription? To me, it seems very reasonable to consider those things. Core functionality is important, but even a great product can be brought down by peripheral problems.

When they announced that the points would be front-loaded, I budgeted to purchase a 1-year subscription and an additional $100 worth of points. This would not quite put me in tier 9, but would set me up to get there next month. This announcement irritates me enough that I will withold that $250...for now...

Peripheral problems? Yes I'd definitely rank my access to one costume set as a very "peripheral" problem.

Once again I'm saying you should have a LONGER view of your plans for this game. If you want to make snap multi-hundred dollar decisions based on whether or not you'll get to use ONE costume set either tomorrow or a couple of years from now then I think you're probably not spending your money on this game for the most reasonable reasons.

Of course you are aware that we are talking about more than one costume set over the course of time. You are also aware that the costume sets that will be released as part of tier 9 are of the new shiny variety compared to many of the older, less aesthetically pleasing ones.

Errr... what? She/he is certainly qualified to make their own decisions. There's no right or wrong or should.

Personally, I was going to do a year subscription tomorrow. Now I'm not. The expectation set by the company I was going to give the money to turned out to be false, and admitted as such by that company. I think that's a valid reason to withhold any larger investment and approach further investment cautiously. And, since it's my money, I'm the one that gets to decide, and my reasons are valid. Whether you think so or not is completely and utterly irrelevant.

Maybe Lothic wasn't saying it, but I will: NO, those are not good reasons to decide whether to continue to play. They're not giving you enough free stuff in the way you want it? Pfft. That is the second stupidest ragequit reason I've seen yet, right behind Westley's EULA quitting.

The ONLY question that counts when you decide whether to continue to play: are you having enough fun playing for the cost involved? This is neither rocket science nor SRS BIZNSS.

It's a game. Quit for a while and get some perspective if you need to, but don't fool yourself that you're quitting because of something the Devs have done.

Then why are you so outraged? I'm the one who just canceld sub and I appear to be much less excited about it than you are. In fact you are so animated by my decision that you have called it (and therefore me personally) stupid and resorted to shouting. Very interesting...

The multi-month plans are cheaper though so they are a good idea.

(not that I support subscribing; just advocating getting a good deal)

Yes I'm aware of those things. I'm also aware that it's very possible that in a few months this "problem" or yours with being unable to "front-load" points will be fixed and the Devs may very well have introduced yet another costume set that makes the Celestial set look like crap in comparison.

I'm just wondering why you'd be willing to risk $250 on this game as of yesterday but not consider it a good "risk" for say 6 months from now. Really I'm mostly just amazed that something like this costume set is worth anyone's effort to sling hundreds of dollars back and forth from the Devs hands.

Actually the fact that they openly announced this change ought to earn them a certain degree of loyalty. After all they didn't really have to announce it prior to the launch as they did.

You do realize when people like you and Moly "withhold your investments" then the Devs are ultimately LESS likely to have the resources to change the game in a way you would like. If you see your actions as some kind of "punishment" leveled against them then I can only imagine that you like blowing into the wind as well.

Yes please.
I'll be stopping subscribing, but I would certainly love to be able to buy the sets if I like them.

It would still be a huge VIP perk to get the VIP tier 9 rewards for free instead of in the store.

Head start is tomorrow. At this point, and to be honest for a while now, people have been claiming cancellation over either trivial things, inevitable things, or very uncommonly things that simply mean the game has chosen a direction incompatible with their entertainment. In all three cases, I consider that loss in the same way I consider the loss of resources the devs can use to make a better game that is due to general inflation. Academic, unfortunate, minimal, unavoidable, and mostly irrelevant.

If they fix this problem I will definitely re-subscribe. Acutally, my subscription may never lapse since I have about 6 weeks of time remaining and there very well could be some surprises in store (no pun intended) tomorrow or in coming weeks that will make me change my mind.


I can understand where you are coming from. Primarily this is a reaction to the frustration that this announcement has brought and as such may not seem as reasonable to someone who isn't feeling the same level of frustration.

LOL, so, essentially the same as the obsessive over-analysis of the statistics and math underlying the game...oh snap...

Mostly, only with less associated pity.

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Two weeks ago I bought a vacuum cleaner. In the online literature, on the floor model, and in the salesman's pitch it was presented to me that the vacuum cleaner had a hose attachment. Not something I'd use very much, not integral to the performance of the vacuum cleaner, additional functionality but not necessary. I bought the vacuum, presented my credit card, and they ordered one for me because they didn't have one in stock. If that vacuum cleaner shows up and it doesn't have a hose attachment, is it beyond understanding that I might ask where it is? If they tell me that their ads, floor model, and salesman were all incorrect and I don't get that attachment, what do you feel would be an understandable and logical reaction on my part? Should I pay them for the attachment in the hopes that my money will go to them providing the attachment for free in the future?

I go to buy a minivan. The dealership's ad says that I can get a free DVD player if I buy it. The salesman says I can get a free DVD player if I buy it. So I buy it, only to find, on delivery (or say, the day before delivery) that the minivan doesn't have the DVD player. Now, that's a luxury item, it's not integral at all to the purpose of the car. What do you feel would be an understandable reaction on my part in that case? Paying them to install a DVD player so that they can maybe have the resources to install that DVD for someone else in the future?

As a customer it is not wrong to expect a company to live up to the expectations that they themselves put forth. It is completely understandable. In the same way that I would expect that Sears would provide the hose attachment (I really did buy a new vacuum, my man card is already in the mail back to HQ ), or my mythical car dealership to provide the DVD player, I expect that Paragon will live up to the expectations that again, they themselves set.

Quite honestly, from the tone and text of Z's posts, he at least (and I suspect a lot of the Paragon crew) feels very badly about this last minute and mismanaged setting of customer expecatations. That's to their credit. No one has any cause to complain about my investment in the game, I've been here forever and I've bought all but one of the boosters. I've put my resources toward helping.

This isn't a world ending thing. It's not a ragequit, or even a rage. It's not something that has cost me any money, as I didn't extend my subscription yet. I think I'm reacting in a very understandable way. I'm not going to reward Paragon, much as I may love them, for failing to fulfull the expections that they set. I'm going to do what I would do at Sears or the car dealership. Well, not exactly, because in those cases I would be asking for my money back. In this case I'm simply going to hold off on giving Paragon more money.

Disappointing this is.

And does this mean that you are still absolutely working to implement it, or, "when there's time to"?

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Disappointing, yet understandable. I hope that this is something that is actively worked on, rather than something that's going to be swept to the back while Paragon Studios hopes that people like me just accept it as working.

I don't think your analogies are quite applicable in the sense that in both cases the full feature set could have been known at the time of sale, whereas here the problem is the features are being developed and there's a certain amount of latitude expected in that circumstance (no different than say an unexpected delay in shipping a product) however I don't find your specific reaction to be unreasonable.