The VIP vs Freemium Debate as a Tier 9 Vet

We're getting a Betazoid archetype?

Masterminds and Controllers were already unlocked by veteran rewards for me. But, when I switched to Premium and unlocked character slots, it appeared that my Warshade and Peacebringer toons could not be unlocked.

Or was I just confused by the three-card Monte shuffle game that is the Veteran Rewards/VIP/Premium system? The hand is quicker than the eye. Pick a card. No, your toon is not here; no, not here either; oh, too bad, you didn't choose the third, correct option. But, don't worry--you can pay to purchase more options to make up for your mistake.

Can someone verify, you were a subscriber and had a Warshade or Peacebringer and, when you switched to Premium, you could unlock and play your hero epic archetype toon?

I would need to delete a toon to free up a slot so I could then test whether I can unlock the Warshade or Peacebringer. I'm leery of doing so because, as noted, it was my experience that it would not work.

I'd be delighted to confirm that my misgivings are unfounded. Please advise.

Come on! Poke the bear!

Speaking of the new Dark Astoria content, will we lose the current Dark Astoria when the new arrives?

The old zone will be moved to Ouroboros as an echo zone.

I can verify that my main account is premium and i am able to create new HEATs/VEATs.

I can't, however, verify what requirements are needed to make that happen. It doesn't say anywhere in the reward window you unlock Epic ATs at a certain level. It might be a bug or maybe i've just been here too long that whatever qualifications needed i have.

As for the VIP vs Freemium question...no one can really say if it's worth it for the OP to go to freemium except for the OP...you have to evaluate the entertainment value you're getting yourself. But if it's worth anything, for me it's not much of a debate.

Incarnates isn't something i'll miss and i've already built up 6 personal bases (3 on each side) so i don't see making any new ones. I will have to get rid of the storage on my main to remove rent so i'd still be able to use/decorate it but i think i can get by without storage. The monthly perks, well, i've stayed on the same server for 7+ years so server transfers don't mean much to me and the stipend can be replaced by paying $5/mo on points instead of a $15/mo sub.

The slots is the big thing but i have a lot of alts that i haven't used in a while so instead of unlocking existing alts with the server tokens, i just open new empty slots.

Of course you might also want to put into perspective my state of mind towards the game to properly judge how i'm valuing CoX's entertainment worth, so some background...


[WALL OF TEXT WARNING]


Since CoH headstart and for a couple years after that, my enthusiasm level for this game was such that i literally logged in everyday for the first couple of years and at the end of that day's session, i was eager for the next time i can log in.

Fast forward to today, my level of enthusiasm for logging in has dwindled to about 1 day a week, maybe 2. And i'm only able to do that because my friend was logging in...meaning i wasn't mainly logging in to play but to log in to interact with my friend. If my friend can't make it that week, i can't get myself to log. I wanted to cancel my sub for a while but couldn't because of that.

For some time i thought i just outgrew MMOs in general as an entertainment source since i've tried other games and i couldn't get that same enthusiasm i felt years ago. That is until i was able to try a new sci-fi game and found out i couldn't stop playing, and when i did stop, i was eager to play again.

So, having that comparison in my mind...i'm not feeling i'm getting as much value from CoX that i can get elsewhere.

I can still leech...err i mean...play that once or twice a week here thanks to Freedom (this account expires in january), but i think i get more value if i use my entertainment dollars elsewhere.

And that's my view about VIP vs Freemium. As i said, everyone's situation could be different so determining an entertainment source's worth is a personal matter. For me, i think maybe my personal limit on staying with a game is around 7 years since the only other game that had me as long was my first MMO Everquest and i stayed there for 6.5+ years.



TL;DR - Maybe i've been here too long hehe.

tyvm

Please do not take this the wrong way but you have a glut of content 1-35 on the blue side.
If anything you need to work on the post 45 on the blue side with more story arcs and TFs that are not with the Evil version of our world side or maybe expand on the Roman land stuff. Or I do not know may be have some stuff with the 5th?
And hello, red side need some love too.

Sorry but we need more non trials love post 45 not less.

Alpha-exclusive components come from the following tasks:

ITF
LGTF
Kahn/Barracuda
CoP trial
STF/LRSF
Vanguard Merits (however obtained)
Hami trial (sort of a wild card)

Those seven tasks were added to the game slowly from Issue 1-Issue 15. Or approximately five years of time. It's just that they had nothing to do with Incarnates at the time, of course.

Now let's look at the upper tier components. They come from:

Lambda trial
BAF trial
Keyes trial
Underground trial
TPN Campus trial
MoM trial

No wild card like with Alpha, but it's not needed since you can pick components. Also, you have a chance of getting rares and ultra rares from every run of the trials, where with the Alpha-exclusives you must use the WST process leading to a minimum of about three weeks to an ultra rare.

The six tasks at issue were added from April 5, 2011 to December 6, 2011. Or 8 months. Or approximately seven times as fast as the Task Forces were added.

With the exception of the UGT, all these trials are quicker on average than the Alpha-exclusive tasks. And now the UGT gives you a guaranteed rare/VR as compensation. Besides the component at the end, the trials give two kinds of Incarnate merits which can be used for most everything reward merits can be used for plus. In addition, you get BOTH, where with the Alpha tasks you have to give up your reward merits to get the components sans WST.

One of the reasons that I don't even post as much anymore is statements like the person I quoted. The trial system by any objective measure is more rewarding, the tasks are faster to run, more casual friendly, and content has been added MUCH quicker than the Alpha system. The Alpha exclusive system is good, but the trial system is quite simply one of the best endgame progression systems I've seen in any MMORPG.

Correction to that list - you got Alpha exclusive components from the following tasks:
"Everything you kill after unlocking Alpha." You do remember shards, right? Yes, you can get built components to speed things up by doing those TFs. But you could get shards just by playing the rest of the game. Note the popularity of the ITF for "farming" shards.

You could build somewhat slowly by doing just shards. You could build faster by doing the WTF and task forces in general.

The rest of the system should have followed suit. Threads dropping (but rarely) in regular content, full components (and bigger thread rewards) from trials.

Everything you say is SUBjective, nto OBjective. Especially mentioning casual friendly. I can get on one of my Alpha-unlocked characters, run a quick mission and have a chance at a shard (or multiples.) I canNOT do that with trials - with the "wait 20 minutes or more for one to form up, if there are enough people interested when you're on, and have it take longer."

Content has been added much quicker? No, it hasn't. Not by a long shot. You're choosing to look only at a few task/strike forces (ignoring the rotating WTF.) You cannot by any measure be honest and say the Incarnate system post-Alpha is more casual friendly with its reliance on trials. Not without having no actual clue what "casual" means.

Firstly, how is the phrase "more casual friendly" consistent with "by any objective measure"? "Casual friendly" is a VALUE judgement.

Secondly, I dispute that judgement. I don't see the incarnate trials as being more casual friendly than task forces.

Considering Deanna Troy's face?

They're going to NERF EMPATHY

DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM

Yes, how dare they give incentive to people to pay them money.

Miss the point much?






Oh, wait. Yes, yes you do. Gee, look, the VERY NEXT SENTENCE:
OH MY GOD! They'd actually have a hook that could get even MORE people - who could otherwise stay premium or even free - to consider paying for VIP! (As opposed to the current plan, which removes a zone that had actual story potential to lock it behind VIP-only.)

*Do* try keeping up.

That would not be practical, however. As I recall, the devs suggested that the entire zone was being redesigned in effect to make an incarnate-class zone. Its not just a place where incarnate content instances will launch from, but the actual spawns in the zone are being calibrated for incarnates. That creates a lot of potential avenues for incarnate content that is structured differently from trials, including non-instanced content, zone events, and the like.

Losing the "potential" of Dark Astoria to open those avenues for the solo and small-team incarnate content seems to be a perfectly reasonable way to spend that potential.

Dark Astoria has been replaced by First Ward - the story potential of Dark Astoria is the basis for the new DA content.

I am. None of that detracts from my point. They're making content for the people that actually pay for it. How horrible of them! Not giving away everything for free, god!

It's not VIP only because it's incarnate-oriented. It's VIP only because it's a perk for VIPs. It just happens to also be incarnate-oriented. They've already got a crapton more free content than any other F2P MMO. They've got to leave SOME things to make upgrading to VIP desirable.

It's not a math point, so I have no qualms about disagreeing with you here.

People have asked for years to have story content related to the zone. To the conflict between the Pantheon and the Circle. Finding out what the Tsoo want. Having that content would make people aware of DA *having* a story behind it.

Nothing would keep them from making a DA instance - you meet a contact that whisks you away to spirit-DA where Mot's waking up, for instance - where Incarnate level powers and abilities are needed and appropriate. Rather like... oh, FIrst Ward.

(And to TrolldenSmiley, no, First Ward does not in the least "replace" DA and the storylines that could well be tied in there. Not in the least.)

(And I'm remembering why I enjoyed not posting. These discussions get irritating fast, to me.)

See my Guides and Tutorials

They can go street sweep someplace else if they want to recreate the content experience in DA

It's being reused in the new DA content.

The Well and Praetoria don't play a major role in the new DA content.

Which is exactly what we're going to get in I22.

Technically true, but then you'd be limiting the options available for the incarnate content to preserve a hypothetical option that was obviously nowhere on the foreseeable horizon.

The flip side is that if they ever get around to really wanting to tell those stories, they could do so through instanced echos of DA.

This is it exactly. And yes, DA is near and dear to my heart - I've pushed for, suggested, etc. changes to DA for a while, and seeing what they have planned for it - ugh.

Circle of Thorns dialog in the zone seems to indicate *they* had some hand in the binding of - or at least maintaining the current status of - Mot. When? How? That ALONE could deal with a good arc's worth of content - where you find they're being weakened (the bindings, that is.)

The Pantheon learning about it is barely touched on (if at all.) Strongly indicated but not really touched on. And it's been an ongoing "battle" since the Rikti war. What changed? Again, another arc's worth, at least.

Not to mention the Tsoo - what did Tub Ci find out about, and why is he sending his people in to find? Are the Ancestor Spirits perhaps at risk, given the Pantheon sacrificing other ghosts? What could happen to them? Admittedly, that group of questions is a bit more tangental - but if what they're searching for is reinforcing the bindings, they become rather big players in the zone without planning on it.

Hell, I think one of my last suggestions before leaving (and, honestly, I consider myself still "left," TBH - barely in game, generally when TOR is down for maintenance, IE, today, and I'm even less fond of what I'm seeing for a direction for the game) dealt with doing just this. Creating arcs that would drive interest in the zone, ending up with Incarnate appropriate content, though I had the player(s) going against the Pantheon themselves.

See my Guides and Tutorials

Maybe an Incarnate story arc?

Maybe an Incarnate story arc?

Maybe an Incarnate story arc?

How would it be limiting? Honestly?

It's a moot point now, I know - the zone's getting discarded for this anyway, and it's not bringing a recurring sub back from me thanks to it. But if they're willing to create first ward - or, for that matter, Cimerora - I can't take that "limiting" as a realistic argument. (Barring technical limitations, but - again - they've created new zones anyway. I can't see that being an actual *limit* with five iTrials to go and with echoes of Galaxy available - and possibly one of DA at this ponit.)

Besides, why make those theoretical instances when the zone itself is there *now?* Why *not* make the Incarnate side of things the instance, or again the "spirit" zone (through the midnighters or some other mechanism if it's going to be coop?)

I just see it as poorly handled. But, as I said - moot now anyway.

See my Guides and Tutorials