Is not allowing free players to use tells really necessary?
By
Aggelakis,
Posted on: 2011-09-27 19:49 in Player Questions
Quote:
Not on Union if I can help.. I made teams with...|
Originally Posted by Wing_Leader
The thing is, so much team recruiting is done using the good old, "<Blah> team forming, pst if interested," method that F2P players will be completely excluded from joining teams that form this way (which is most of them, isn't it?).
I predict there will be a torrent of exchanges like this on every server: [Broadcast] Noobee: what is pst |
[Broadcast] Anglyznorgast1cyzm: Teams forming for new players.. Gather at the Mercy Arbiter. And I invite you.
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I spent maybe 4 hours in Freedom's Help channel last evening and not being able to use tells is a major point for a lot of free players coming into the game. I heard responses ranging from "this sucks I quit" to "oh, $5 isn't so bad for tells". There is also a lot of confusion about how reward tokens and paragon points work.
I don't think giving free accounts tells is the problem or solution. i think giving them a better lfg system and teaming system is. No-one knew how to use the teaming window because there are no actual tutorials in the game now.
And I did see a few RMTers in the help channel but not many.....yet.
I think my concerns about chat restrictions mainly stem from the fact that I want people to sub.
1) If I reffer a friend to the free to play DEMO, but cannot speak with them properly, it causes them to leave. Many of my gaming buddies were playing other games with sub fees but are growing tired of them. They know I have been playing this for a long time and I suggested trying it. I mean, it's free, and they might like it. "Meet me on Virtue where we can...Oh wait...not talk ever"
(I know my forum account says differently, but I did at one point have an alternate account which was taken in the divorce 
)
2) In a game that requires teaming, and heavens knows redside is needs the love a ton on Virtue, at least, it's almost strange that the one most important concept of City of Hero's Freedom, feels so limited. Yes I know there are work arounds, and yes I know that we could all move to Exalted to be rushed away from the onslaught of new players and technical issues, but the main concern I have is that the element of team building which has always been the shining gem of CoX has been replaced by clunky work arounds which effect new players and old players alike and create a rift between the two types of players.
Now I am not saying things should be 100% free, but we cannot tote the fact that the community is one of the best features of CoX if the new player entering the game cannot experience that community spirit that we go on so much about.
Limiting communication is fine. No custom channels is fine. Not being able to broadcast, send tells, or communicate with others just means old VIP players don't pick up new players. This can leave a bad taste in their mouths.
Right now as it is, I am having a hard time inviting friends to try the game, because word of mouth is only effective if the other person can hear, respond, and communicate back.
Free Freedom from horrid chat restriction!
Copied from another thread about the same thing, cuz my oppinion is still important! *Sage nod*
My son (who uses my account to play ) has invited all his friends to start F2P accounts. I tried to explain to him about the chat limitations and his response was:
Pft! Dad we just use Skype.
This is a song about a super hero named Tony. Its called Tony's theme.
Jagged Reged: 23/01/04
Quote:
He's a winner! |
Originally Posted by Jagged
My son (who uses my account to play
) has invited all his friends to start F2P accounts. I tried to explain to him about the chat limitations and his response was:Pft! Dad we just use Skype. |
Now kick him off your account and tell him to play free too.
total kick to the gut
This is like having Ra's Al Ghul show up at your birthday party.
Quote:
I'm trying |
Originally Posted by SwellGuy
Now kick him off your account and tell him to play free too.
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In truth we play at different times of the day so it won't be a problem until he becomes a night-time-lurking teenager
This is a song about a super hero named Tony. Its called Tony's theme.
Jagged Reged: 23/01/04
Quote:
Pure bulldookey. The only way that would hold water is if this game never had an RMT problem and/or chat restrictions. But the truth of the matter is it did and the chat restrictions were in place years before the game went F2P, and they virtually eliminated RMT spam.
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Originally Posted by MaestroMavius
No RMT excuse can counter that, so the only reason the Dev's won't is either SCR or because they feel it's that big an enticement to pop $5 for points.
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To the OP..
Necessary? No.
A really solid idea. Yes; for sure.
Sadly, the RMTers have made this so. Anything tha can be done to keep them out of CoH is a good idea. Obviously, there will never be total victory, only damage control. But mitigate as much as ya can..
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Aggelakis
It actually works different from what you are suggesting.
... So you can buy $5 and get one token. This unlocks most chat channels. You can buy $15 and get two tokens (first purchase and purchasing 1200pp). This unlocks the rest of the chat channels. You can buy $5 and get a token, then buy $5 two more times and get a token (purchasing a total of 1200pp). |
Ah ha! OK, so it costs $15 for Tier 3, and Tier 2 is any purchase.
Tier 1 = Freem
Tier 2 = Unlocks /tell
Tier 3 = Unlock all chats
Any purchase will bump you up from Tier 1 to Tier 2. $15 total will bump you up to Tier 3. So my numbers were off by $5 because I thought the first Tier actually did cost $5.
Quote:
1. If it really was a friend you were referring you'd buy him a cheap copy of the game off of Amazon so he'd start with a VIP account, and then he could decide if he wanted to drop to Premium.|
Originally Posted by Nyx
I think my concerns about chat restrictions mainly stem from the fact that I want people to sub.
1) If I reffer a friend to the free to play DEMO, but cannot speak with them properly, it causes them to leave. Many of my gaming buddies were playing other games with sub fees but are growing tired of them. They know I have been playing this for a long time and I suggested trying it. I mean, it's free, and they might like it. "Meet me on Virtue where we can...Oh wait...not talk ever" |
2. If they were really friends you wouldn't lie to them and say they could never talk. Instead you'd say for just $5 bucks free accounts cam permanently unlock the chat channels.
Edit: 3. If they are your friends why aren't you telling them that they can talk to you and anyone else in the game if they just put them on their friends list and talk in the Friend channel. Yes it works in the game for free players.
Quote:
| 2) In a game that requires teaming, and heavens knows redside is needs the love a ton on Virtue, at least, it's almost strange that the one most important concept of City of Hero's Freedom, feels so limited. Yes I know there are work arounds, and yes I know that we could all move to Exalted to be rushed away from the onslaught of new players and technical issues, but the main concern I have is that the element of team building which has always been the shining gem of CoX has been replaced by clunky work arounds which effect new players and old players alike and create a rift between the two types of players. |
Quote:
| Now I am not saying things should be 100% free, but we cannot tote the fact that the community is one of the best features of CoX if the new player entering the game cannot experience that community spirit that we go on so much about. |
And yet you aren't willing to tell your friends how easy and cheap it is to unlock the chat channels. Some great community spirit there.
Quote:
| Limiting communication is fine. No custom channels is fine. Not being able to broadcast, send tells, or communicate with others just means old VIP players don't pick up new players. This can leave a bad taste in their mouths. |
Quote:
| Right now as it is, I am having a hard time inviting friends to try the game, because word of mouth is only effective if the other person can hear, respond, and communicate back. |
Quote:
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!|
Originally Posted by Ateria
I mean... come on....
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/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
/tell $name $20 4 $5BILLION INF4MY!
That's why free players shouldn't have the ability to send tells
just to clarify it takes 2 Reward tokens to unlock tells and Supergroups. It takes 5 Rewad Tokens to unlock all the other channels.
From www.paragonwiki.com
Tier 2 Bonus
- Unlock Requirement: Two reward tokens earned.
- Owning two Reward Tokens grants the following to Premium Players: Ablity to join Supergroups, Access to Tell, Supergroup, and Coalition Communication Channels, Mail System Access, Player-to-Player Trading, Increased Inf cap of 500 million per character, Play stories within the Mission Architect (no rewards), +2 Salvage Inventory, +1 Recipe Inventory
- Unlock Requirement: 5 reward tokens earned.
- Owning 5 Reward Tokens grants the following to Premium Players: Access to all Communication Channels including Broadcast, Request and Global Chat Channels, Increased Inf cap of 1 million per character, +3 Salvage Inventory, +3 Vault Inventory, +1 Recipe Inventory
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Frostbiter
just to clarify it takes 2 Reward tokens to unlock tells and Supergroups. It takes 5 Rewad Tokens to unlock all the other channels.
Tier 3 Bonus
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Yeah, you're right. I was reading that wrong. It takes $45 to unlock all channels (still $5 for just /tell). Poo.
Quote:
Get him his own account sooner rather than later. So you don't have his main on your account |
Originally Posted by Jagged
I'm trying
In truth we play at different times of the day so it won't be a problem until he becomes a night-time-lurking teenager |
Quote:
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Originally Posted by gameboy1234
Yeah, you're right. I was reading that wrong. It takes $45 to unlock all channels (still $5 for just /tell). Poo.
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No idea if the free month awards a token. Let us know if you find out.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Rajani Isa
Of course, does a cheap box count as 1 or 2 tokens? In other words, 1 for the first box code on an account, and 1 for the free month?
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Frostbiter
No idea if the free month awards a token. Let us know if you find out.
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Just about 100% sure the free month is free and doesn't count towards monies spent or getting an additional token. Retail code = Tier 2, and that's it, regardless of how many retail codes are applied (Positron said that, explicitly). So I don't see how the free month could count.
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To an extent I agree. There is a mechanism already in place for tagging you are looking for a team to do missions/TFs/Trials/everything, but nobody seems to use it. Therefore, the associated search mechanism probably gets little use. Instead you just see zone announcements with instructions to "pst" if interested. Even when a team leader uses the search mechanism (which I always used to do when forming teams back in the day), the usual etiquette was to send a tell to anyone on the search list describing the team goals rather than sending blind invites. But if F2P players can't respond to those tells, all of these methods become useless.|
Originally Posted by Frostbiter
i think giving them a better lfg system and teaming system is.
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I think Paragon needs to develop a team recruiting mechanism that is simple and effective enough that it doesn't drive players to come up with their own alternative recruiting conventions and methods. Right now, the almost universal reliance on /tell as half of the recruiting process is a failure mode. It needs to be replaced by something, and ideally something even better than /tell.
I admire those of you who actually take the time to organize your recruitment. Announcing where to go to be added to the team, etc. But most of the time teams are formed on the fly, especially as members drop and replacements are sought while everyone is on their way to the next mission door. The ease and convenience of /broadcast-/tell is just too strong to think it will go away; instead you'll just find F2P players left out of most ad-hoc teams, and therefore feeling left out of teaming in general.
Oh, and not everyone has the luxury of a group of friends on Skype. I used to play with a group of friends and we used Ventrilo. It was great, but they don't play COH anymore, so I'm pretty much left just joining ad-hoc teams as they pop up. Thankfully I'm VIP and don't have to deal with the unavailability of /tell.
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Wing_Leader
But most of the time teams are formed on the fly, especially as members drop and replacements are sought while everyone is on their way to the next mission door. The ease and convenience of /broadcast-/tell is just too strong to think it will go away;
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I do agree up to here. I'd like to see the LFG system enhanced to allow teaming too. Just add your team to the LFG, and members get added to it when there's room. The TUT (Team-Up Turnstile, what the devs call LFG) should be made smart enough to give you a decent replacement pick based on the current composition of your team.
Quote:
| instead you'll just find F2P players left out of most ad-hoc teams, and therefore feeling left out of teaming in general. |
Disagree here. I fully expect most F2P folks to go premium. The cost is minimal and you can do it on accident, just by applying a code or buying any little thing. All returning players automatically have access to /tell if they ever had more than just the free trial.
So I think the population that can't use /tell is going to be miniscule. Data mining and experience will tell us if this ultimately is true or not.
Quote:
Ayeap.
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Originally Posted by Kitsune Knight
Have you ever seen a thread complaining about spam?
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And this is because the Devs screwed up by making Help visible by default now (the global tab), in addition to letting Freems talk on it. The RMTers will exploit any weakness in a system, and, people that don't think "how can I royally **** this system over?" generally are not good at ensuring a system doesn't get ****** over.|
Originally Posted by Morgan Reed
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Another problem that is the friends channel. I can type /friend $target$$ BUY SPAM FROM EVILSPAMMERSCO.moo$$unfriend $target and send a message to my target, regardless of my ability to send tells!
They could set up bind fields easily with a huge list of names, to add them all on /friend, then send the spam, then remove, then continue with the next chunk (not sure the size cap of the friends list).
The changes in i21 loosened the restrictions, and, likely, will result in a rise of RMTers if they think there's any money here.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by ShadowNate
;_; ?!?! What the heck is wrong with you, my god, I have never been so confused in my life!
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Chat restrictions were placed on Free accounts to protect the game environment from RMT Spam and other such unsavory elements. The investment required for being able to utilize private tells is enough to discourage most.
We've said this before and we'll say it again - We will always err on the side of protecting our Community from the constant harassment of RMT spam.
I've worked on games where free trial accounts/endlessly free accounts had unfettered access to PM's and multiple Global channels. The results were disastrous to the in game environment and served as a major drag to developer resources.
If City of Heroes Freedom were solely a Free to Play game, relaxing chat restrictions might make more sense, however the cornerstone of our business is, and will remain, our VIP subscribers.
-Z
Andy Belford
Community Manager
Paragon Studios
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This philosophy is much appreciated!|
Originally Posted by Zwillinger
We will always err on the side of protecting our Community from the constant harassment of RMT spam.
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I just hope that a clever way to maintain that goal and make ad-hoc teaming effortless (in the same way that /broadcast-/tell is, or was) for everyone alike can be found.
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Please stop protecting us from costume parts.
There are no words for what this community, and the friends I have made here mean to me. Please know that I care for all of you, yes, even you. If you Twitter, I'm MrThan. If you're Unleashed, I'm dumps. I'll try and get registered on the Titan Forums as well. Peace, and thanks for the best nine years anyone could ever ask for.
Quote:
Well, people seem okay with them protecting us from costume powers!
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Originally Posted by DumpleBerry
Please stop protecting us from costume parts.
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Sermon
@sermon
One of Six, Cannibal 6
Let free players respond to tells, but not initiate them.
They seem content to pass off free trials as F2P just because you can go 1-50. The same restrictions used for free trials, can't be used for F2P.
All that does is make the ones that originally tried a trial and didn't stay to get miffed and leave again.
If we want to assimilate the true new, we have to be able to communicate with them in a reasonable fasion. All the restrictions do at this point is bred ill will, hurt our rep and widen further the increasing sense of 'Us Vs Them'. Don't give free players control of the airwaves but at least let them reply to us...
No RMT excuse can counter that, so the only reason the Dev's won't is either SCR or because they feel it's that big an enticement to pop $5 for points. I'm sorry but it's not an enticement, it's a barrier. Not only that, the majority of 'True new' won't even know how cheap it is and will no doubt leave long before finding out, we can't freely tell them either.
I understand fully that we aren't F2P. I understand the hybrid structure. Most free players could care less. They saw the words Free to Play and assumed the game was now micro-trans based ala Shaiya.
We technically have no 'Free Play' tier. It's misleading wording designed to be misleading.
We have 3 tiers.
ViP
Premium
Trial
The fact that you can now go from 1-50 doesn't make this more than a 'trial'. Not when you lock out everything else. For that matter, the old free trials actually had more, though you could only level to 14 you could use any AT. No, this game is not F2P. It's free to look around and let us twist your arm long enough to get, at the very least, 5 bucks from you. Then you'll be Premium and can actually play the game.. for free.
Sadly, I understand that we aren't F2P in the mainstream PoV. I do, but they don't. We could educate them on our hyrbid model. We could, but we aren't allowed to unless we're standing right next to them.
/Facepalm
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