Yeh. Same here.
The sensible thing to say is paid character slots tend to happen on free to pay games and it wouldn't be sensible for FD to charge for it.
We only need two, three at a stretch.
Could we have more than one character?
- Thread starter jcrg99
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Yeh. Same here.
The sensible thing to say is paid character slots tend to happen on free to pay games and it wouldn't be sensible for FD to charge for it.
We only need two, three at a stretch.
How am I meant to address it? It's entirely your perception that I'm ranting. I've defended FD on the 'just being after our money' charge all down the line, but have sadly lost faith that it is untrue. The way they chose to market the new skins was telling. I truly hope they do not sink to the level of charging for characters, but I would not put money on it any more. Personally I've reached a tipping point with them, a combination of their actions in a wider sense and the shoddy way they have followed up with me on certain support issues. They've lost me as a future customer unless they change their playbook.
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I guess the question is 'what is Frontier's definition of sensible?'. If the person/people making the call on these matters views maximising profit as the most sensible course of action then their view would be very different to mine and perhaps yours. Mind you, I don't think this would be a good way to make profit, nor do I think the packaging of skins is either. But if people are saying they'll pay £10 per character then, again, they may decide otherwise. Personally I think respecting those who backed you and attempting to encourage people to stay with the game long term through positive actions is a better course. Maximising profit is nearly always a symptom of short termism.
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You think FD' s micro transactions are money- grabbing?
In my experience, they've been positively pedestrian in the pursuit of coin on that front.
That comparison seems sound at first glance, but it isn't.
In a traditional MMORPG, you have races, classes, factions etc., each of which will offer different skill sets, different play styles, different parts of the game world and even different storylines....or in other words, different content.
Therefor, a lot of game content is dependent on you having the ability to roll alts, so you can access that content you paid for.
This is not the case in ED, all the content is readily available with ONE single character. There is no character creation that "locks" you onto a single path, and thereby requiring alts to explore a different path.
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If anything, that has been the problem, we've been yelling "SELL US SILLY COSMETIC STUFF PLEASE" for ages now. Only this week did we get new skins. That's something that GGG (of PoE fame) got totally right. I know that I bought a set for my most used ship in an eyeblink.
Read my post again. I said for them to sink to the level of charging for character slots would be money grubbing. I don't like the way they are packaging skins either but did not use the term regarding that. Up until that point I have had no issue with the way they have priced or sold things in their shop. As I said, I've defended them on the charge of just being out for our money. Hopefully they can regain my trust.
Whose conclusion?
The key difference (to me) is that GGG sell armour sets in individual pieces but offer a slight discount if you buy the whole set at once. That would have been the sensible way for FD to go.
Let me put it this way. If they had charged £1 per skin but £5 per pack i would probably have bought more than a pack worth for various ships. As it is I won't buy any.
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To be frank, GGG's cosmetics sales operation is painstakingly structured and lavish. The extras in ED still feel like a token afterthought at this point. There are loads of options I'd like- yes, individual items and a group discount- sure, perfectly sensible. I'd also like to be able to buy the coloured skins as colour sets as well as ship sets- i.e. I want purple for all the ships (as an example), for a sensible price. Buying the complete set of colours for every ship that you own, when you only ever want one colour, could get pricey.
However, it feels like the extra sales are somewhat token right now, and aren't even well-enough realised to support much critique currently.
I believe that the extra slots sales won't happen until all ships (and all other assets) belong to a commander rather than an account. Until they have made that basic restructuring, it's hard to offer extra slots. I can't remember who said this, so can't cite my sources- but doubtless someone helpful will come along with the missing info (and more precision, doubtless) before too long.
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Please don't take this the wrong way as I'm just trying to understand you. You have lost trust in FD and they need to rebuild it. You didn't like the way they packaged the skins but are generally OK with how they've gone about their business of selling cosmetic items.
Why have you lost trust with them?
I know you don't mean it to come across this way but it reads like you're really angry at FD for the idea that they might charge us for slots.
They could do that because it's still much cheaper than buying a second copy. But I agree it doesn't make sense as this isn't a free to play game, so aggressive micro transactions don't fit.
I think what Ancipital and I meant to say is the whole "maybe they'll earn my trust back but woe betide them if they ever charge for this!" angle just comes across as needlessly angst fueled.
However, if the need arose for FD to more aggressively use the shop to keep development running, I'd personally have no issue with them selling whatever they liked except in game items that affect game play. Extra character slots fits that bill.
But sure. This is getting way ahead of ourselves. Extra slot, preferably for free, please.
Edit: they do sell single skins and packs as an option. £10 for the pack, £5 or £3 for single. They just haven't gotten around to doing that for the vibrant set. Which is, appropriately, half the price of a normal 6 skin pack.
The shop has a lot of work to be where it should be. And I want them to make lots of money through it. But a little part of me smiles inside because it clearly isn't their priority. And no one should be upset by that.
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£1 per skin is pointless. But assuming the price is just an example, for the previous packs they skins were available separately or you could buy the pack with an extra skin. I bought the Horus pack (actually I only wanted the extra skin
). However, there is nothing cynical or money-grabbing about this. It doesn't affect gameplay, you don't have to buy skins. I completely support your right not to. However, I am more than happy to buy the ones I want, and the current prices/offerings are perfectly reasonable.£1 per skin is pointless. But assuming the price is just an example, for the previous packs they skins were available separately or you could buy the pack with an extra skin. I bought the Horus pack (actually I only wanted the extra skin
It's a matter of perception, and (once again) I did not refer to the skins as money grubbing (or grabbing). I'd argue that £1 per skin is not pointless if it leads to people spending more than they might otherwise, but even at £2 it would show a greater level of respect towards your players which is, to me, really the issue with how they go about things.
Ancipital may be correct in that the shop, and how it is currently managed, is simply half baked rather than cynical. I'm not totally convinced. But if significant numbers of people are happy to pay their prices and buy into their marketing scheme then it's entirely up to them. I think pushing character slots as a paid for feature would be taking things a step further than the current purely cosmetic nature of the micro transaction system.
Ydiss, I honestly can't be bothered to go through the reasons I'm annoyed with FD on a personal level. Enough to say that their support have been less than helpful or respectful. I'm bored of reporting things, testing things, sending them supporting vids when asked and then getting stiffed on any support for technical issues which seriously affect the game for me. If beta had been free I would shrug and say 'whatever', same if it wa sa f2p game. However it's a game I paid for and paid to help test, I feel they should respect that more than they do.
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dayrth
Volunteer Moderator
I think this is a good point. It was not a free game, but it was a one off charge, and about average price for a game these days, but you get a continually evolving and improving game. FD have to fund this somehow. It's not money grabbing to want to stay in business. A charge for extra characters seems like a reasonable thing to me.
For me the one big nail in the coffin that a single character hammers home repeatedly is the severe restriction is puts on my play time; it honestly kills enjoyable gameplay for me.
I have 3 different scenarios I play.
1 (my preferred) - hopping online with some buddies and playing collaborative gameplay, running missions together and so forth.
2 - playing in solo, generally this is because I don't have long to play but I have something I want to achieve, so it helps me maximise my enjoyment for a short period
3 - open muckabout - some times I just want to hop into open in a cheap ship and have a throw-away moment of fun in a cheap ship
The problem with 1 is that it relies on all of us being on-line and within 100LY of each other for it to be practical. That right there is the reason why I'm not faffing off to Sagitarius A, or mining, or searching for long-out trade routes, or exploring the outer reaches for Thargoids, or hiking 500LY across the system to participate in a community goal. RIGHT THERE, that's the reason. I don't have the time to take my commander away from the sole remaining bit of gameplay I find enjoyable, just on a whim that looking at a black hole will be worthwhile in terms of 3 weeks gameplay lost. I'd like to try those things, but I'm risk averse and I think doing that, and taking away option 1 above, would just make things worse.
More slots. You can even lock them to online/offline as far as I'm concerned (I was always amazed and shocked at the freeness to flip from one to the other but, with only one commander slot, it had to be allowed really).
It will make people enjoy the game more. I don't care one iota for "my immersion". This game needs to start getting enjoyable, and fast.
I have 3 different scenarios I play.
1 (my preferred) - hopping online with some buddies and playing collaborative gameplay, running missions together and so forth.
2 - playing in solo, generally this is because I don't have long to play but I have something I want to achieve, so it helps me maximise my enjoyment for a short period
3 - open muckabout - some times I just want to hop into open in a cheap ship and have a throw-away moment of fun in a cheap ship
The problem with 1 is that it relies on all of us being on-line and within 100LY of each other for it to be practical. That right there is the reason why I'm not faffing off to Sagitarius A, or mining, or searching for long-out trade routes, or exploring the outer reaches for Thargoids, or hiking 500LY across the system to participate in a community goal. RIGHT THERE, that's the reason. I don't have the time to take my commander away from the sole remaining bit of gameplay I find enjoyable, just on a whim that looking at a black hole will be worthwhile in terms of 3 weeks gameplay lost. I'd like to try those things, but I'm risk averse and I think doing that, and taking away option 1 above, would just make things worse.
More slots. You can even lock them to online/offline as far as I'm concerned (I was always amazed and shocked at the freeness to flip from one to the other but, with only one commander slot, it had to be allowed really).
It will make people enjoy the game more. I don't care one iota for "my immersion". This game needs to start getting enjoyable, and fast.
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A lot of people would like to explore yet cannot dedicate themselves to it and want an alt for this reason. Well, honestly I do not see a problem with serious exploring requiring some dedication. If you just want to put your name on a celestial, or even a fresh system, you can do it in a hour or two. However, the "tricky" part of really long range exploration is precisely the desolation of it. You are days of travel away from home. That's the challenge of exploring the galaxy!
Speak for yourself. I like having multiple characters at various stages of development, it gives me a way to go back and forward in time so to speak, doing things differently with a younger character to see if that would help. Ultimately, one becomes my main but not necessarily the one that has the most money, best ship etc.
If server space is an issue, it's easy to solve. An encoded save game on the client machine, a CRC checksum is created by the server as it load the save game to verify the save game against the checksum stored on the server. If both match, the save game is valid but if they don't, someone has tried to edit their save game and it becomes invalid and unusable. The checking is not done by the client at all and so the algorithm to generate the CRC checksum is hidden, the checksum for the save game is not stored on the client machine so there is no way to determine what the checksum would be. Only the latest checksum is saved on the server so, trying to copy then load a previous save game would be impossible too.
In this manner, no editing of the save game in order to cheat can take place and the server does not need all the storage space for all the save games. It would also mean that you could potentially have as many save games as you wish, the server need only store the save number, (which remains static) and the corresponding checksum for that save number which is updated every time the user logs out of that particular save game. The server encoded save game is written to the users disk. The number of save games you have is limited only by your own storage space. The only thing this requires is an algorithm to create and verify the checksum and the means to encode the save game for saving, both algorithms are kept and run on the server alone. This prevents hackers from reverse engineering the encoding method or the encoding used to generate the checksum.
Edit: Since the login server is the one least used in terms of processing power, it makes sense that these functions are performed by the login server rather than the game server.
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I don't believe that would be a concern in Elite, as that kind of issue is only really applicable to games where you have to make a choice that affects the route you take through the game. You don't have to make that kind of decision in Elite... Nothing you do today will stop you doing something else tomorrow.