We Paid for These Paragon Points, Mr. Positron

That is a slap in the face! I don't get my points until the 27th!

This is what Zwillinger wrote, describing the problem:
Obviously you're unaffected by the delay in transferring points since your billing date coincides with the receipt of your VIP Paragon Points.

This, on the other hand, is a succinct description of the problem that affects players whose billing date occurs in the first third of the month:
And to reiterate, the larger issue is the context of assorted problems that players have experienced lately. The open question is how Paragon Studios might address it.

Nothing needs to be addressed. You'll get the points eventually.

You see a company designing a system to be deliberately obtuse so it can manipulate players.

I see a company who kicked around the Cathedral of Pain trial for just shy of four years because they couldn't figure out how to code it so players couldn't exploit the trial; a company that apparently didn't foresee the potential for abuse by players in its mission creator system; a company that didn't think the playerbase would be upset with the initial Circle of Thorns revamp being a major departure from existing models.

You see shady. I see the usual level of planning and forethought.

Yes, and I've also noticed that the Eye of Horus is also floating in the waters off of Port Oakes.

IT ALL ADDS UP, MAN!

Just had to pop in to say this - I love your attitude!! If I had this attitude about everything in life, I'd be fair less stressed

On topic, though - I agree with the majority of posts - it's a technical issue that needs to be addressed, and they have said they're going to. They've given a workaround. I can still access the game content. Maybe this communication could have come sooner, or maybe it should have been picked up in planning (and I'm assuming there was planning involved in Freedom), but if it was the fix wasn't implemented in time.

All said, I can still access the game, including the game content, benefits from the initial points I was given and the $105 of points I've bought and the 36 reward tokens I've been given. While I have other issues with Freedom, points allocation isn't one of them. I would like more tokens for the current Tier 9 VIP rewards, but I could pay an extra $100 or so to get to that level if I chose. But I don't, so I can't get the shineys. It's my choice and I'll suck it up.

As usual, I rambled. Sorry all.

You apparently missed my sarcasm there. You are complaining that people affected by this will be missing sales because they will be getting their points a week or so later than expected. (Although note that it will be 1 month after they last received their points. And in the process of fixing this, they will receive their points less than one month later until the dates match.) I, OTOH, have to wait 1 1/2 months between the points I got in September and my allotment at the end of October. Look at how many sales I am missing. And that is WAI.

IOW, for the next few months, someone affected by this, will be receiving their allotment of Paragon Points at a faster pace than someone that is receiving those points when they are supposed to. What exactly are you complaining about again?

With regards to all_hell's rather incoherent rant about losing value because he paid for an entire year. I am on the 14 month plan and I find that particular argument to be full of [PANCAKE]. To put it as mildly as possible.

To update the old adage, "Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by computer error." That covers your examples and mine of CoH Freedom-related problems. It's just that there are a lot of them lately.

Similarly, I believe Noble Savage when he told us that he did his best on the CoT redesign and Positron when he told us that everyone in house loved the new look; I do not believe that Paragon/NC Soft arbitrarily trashed the design of an established element of the game in order to sell spikey shoulder pads to new F2Pers who wanted to recreate the look of their eleventieth-level witchaloks. Just because the MTX model has been corrupted by many MMORPG companies in the past doesn't mean it's inherently corrupting, theoretically.

Zwillinger has had to post an explanation of the situation after the fact, acknowledge the confusion, and apologize on behalf of Paragon Studios. The problem itself won't be resolved for months. It's what happens in the meantime that's the concern.

It was annoying, wasn't it? I found myself in the same position of preparing to purchase points - and hoping that the market wouldn't crash CoH again - when I was stopped by a small, persistent voice that asked, "And what next?"

Paragon Studies doesn't have to make a gesture of good will, but it doesn't have to sit on its hands either. One way or the other, it sends a message to the playerbase.

The EU version launched on 4th Feb 2005, so even though he got his dates a little mixed up in his particular case, he WAS also partly correct.

Just a point I'd like to make, these things are NOT a stipend. A stipend is a form of salary and that's absolutely NOT what these are.

They're a paid for item that we get as part of our month subscription, and as such, it should, by rights, be allocated on the day our subscription is paid.


Not that I'm anything other than mildly annoyed by the delay or anything, though I do roll my eyes at their lack of programming ability to issue the things when people pay their subs.

Too much work for a company to figure out how to make more money through creative marketing?
That's a new one.
I mean, it may not be true that they're intentionally trying to increase their income by doing certain things in certain ways, but it's not an unreasonable question.

I have heard that the devs do't let the marketing team do coding and that the marketing teams is touchy about the devs making marketing moves.
so, it's possible they have worked out some sort of division of labor that allows marketing to focus on market while the devs are concurrently developing new content.

The game may not be engaging marketing practices that are found in other areas of this industry. But if they are not, it's not because it's too much work.

Yes, please. I would like the money that I paid to bring me the same value as the money that people are paying in now.

I explained it earlier.

Points etc don't bring any value until I can enjoy the items I bought with them.
I have paid for points that I cannot spend yet.
I cannot begin enjoying the value of those points until after I spend them. So there's a period of months between the time I paid my money and when I can begin enjoying the benefits of what I purchased.

If I spent the same amount of money now instead of earlier, I would be given the points etc immediately and I could enjoy the value from now forward instead of having to wait several months.

Since I would have months more time to enjoy what I purchased, I would have months more value.

The problem will be resolved within a month. Not "months." A month. Singular. The only thing that matters when it comes to Paragon Points that you get your next month's allotment of points exactly one month after you got them the previous one. Whether that happens on your bill date, your birthday or the day of the the Hundred Year War ended is immaterial. The only thing that matter is how long it's been since your last stipend, and the answer to this will be "one month." Actually, the answer will be "one month, minus a day" since they'll be clocking it back one day for ever month.

So people didn't get their points on time. Big deal. That's the FIRST monthly stipend of the game, THAT is what is going to set the date of the stipend cycle. It doesn't matter if it happened last week or next week or noon tomorrow, so long as it happens at any point within the month of October. What matters is how long you're going to have to wait AFTER it, and how long is "one month, minus a day."

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

There's a period of 10 days, not a period of months. You will get your points on the 11th of this month, then the 10th of next month, then the 9th of next month after that until your "points date" matches up to your bill date. Until then, you'll be a day ahead.

Again, where is this "months and months" nonsense coming from? You already said you don't care about your "points date" not matching your bill date, so as long as they come every month, what do you care? You are quite literally complaining of a week's delay. While that's unfortunate, it's hardly such a big deal.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Actually, I believe that all hell is saying that as he's paying for a 12 month subscription he has to wait 12 months to get all the points from that. Where as if he dropped to Premium and spent that money he would get the full lot of points at time of payment.

As he says though, he has to weigh up whether that is worth it to him. It's not likely to change and in some cases, if you have tier 9 unlocked, I can see how it could be beneficial to drop to Premium.

Ouch... That's NOT a good argument. First of all, a year's worth of subscription will cost you around $12 a month, yet will only garner $5's worth of point per month. Dropping to premium will buy you approximately twice the amount of points. However, dropping down to Premium will rob you of Incarnates and the Architect, as well as all the VIP perks that Premium players have to buy.

I'm not saying it's a no-brainer one way or the other, but what I AM saying is that whether you get your points on the 1st or the 10th is pretty much the SMALLEST of the considerations you have to make when deciding between your options.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

That is not correct. It is months plural. Please see Zwillinger's original post:
If perhaps this issue doesn't affect you directly, then at least try to put yourself in the position of the players it does when discussing it.

Again, that is not the case - it was not the original system, and it misses the issue of the weekly releases in the market. Please see Zwillinger's original post:
Anyone who has a billing date in the first third of the month and who was counting on receiving their points when Paragon had originally promised delivery now will not have them in time for the first weekly sale, beginning with October's. (By the way, there's also no reason to use all-caps shouting to make a point when off base to begin with.)

This will affect some players more than it does others, but there's no reason to attempt to hand-wave the problem away. (Zwillinger certainly acknowledged it.) Your considerations and my considerations are not the only ones in City of Heroes - and Paragon Studios has to treat all its customers fairly.

Again, this is not the first customer service problem that Paragon has had recently. If it were, this discussion would be confined to the original one about Paragon Points and Reward Tokens in the News, Events & Announcement Discussion thread. Zwillinger has done a commendable job communicating with players each time something goes wrong, but at the end of the day, his mandate doesn't extend beyond apology. At a certain point, there must be more. Customer good will is rarely lost all at once, in an explosion of nerd-rage after a spectacular screw-up. Typically, it's just ground away, with one problem after another.

Now that's a hell of a good idea.

You're talking about a different topic than I am.

It's not nonsense. You're just arguing against something other than what I am talking about. I s'pose you're not reading my posts.

I paid my subscription in March. I will not see all of the points, etc that I have coming until the beginning of next April. If my math is correct, between now and April, there're exactly several months. If I had paid that money today I would be given all of my various things immediately.
Because of that difference in the delivery date, the money spent today would garner more value than the money spent in March.

I am quite literally not. You're thinking that I am addressing an issue that I am not addressing.

If you will re-read my posts you'll see that you're addressing something other than what I am talking about.

However, I am glad that you're taking the time to respond even if it's to something I am not saying.

I'm one of those players that has a billing day before the 11th. It still doesn't affect me because I choose not to complain about things I have no control over. I've spent points on the things I want, bought extra points to grab the two Tokens a first-time purchase of points will get you, and I've still got bank after buying Street Justice the other day, and I'll get this month's points to add to it when it comes.

Trying to argue that people who aren't affected by the "problem" should have more sympathy for those that are doesn't lessen the fact that the problem itself is tiny. You will get your points monthly. If they aren't coming fast enough for you, buy some early.

The problem was explained, the solution they've come up with has been laid out. This entire thread was pointless except to call attention to yourself. Bravo.