Would you pay to unlock Cutter/Corvette?

Droid8Apple

Droid8Apple
I'm just curious. Would you pay money to unlock these ships? You'd still have to pay for them in-game and you wouldn't have the rank associated... just unlock the ships. If so, how much would you pay?

No, I don't see this as "pay to win" because you still have to fork over 1 billion for the Cutter to be equipped handsomely which doesn't even talk about the insurance or anything else. As for the Vette, if you can A-grade a Conda you can A-grade it for the most part. Similarly, I don't think that either of the two are a clear 'winner takes all' over the anaconda personally. I've played for thousands of hours with a lot of those hours being beta where I could do whatever I want and in my experience I wouldn't choose one as the best. If i did it'd be the Anaconda because it is a legit mixture of the 2 others.

I can't stand the "turning" of the Cutter but would love to have it's cargo/no mass lock/able to escape after submitting interdiction.

If ship transfer were sensible for the money/time I'd love to have a Vette to strictly use for combat, but the armor of the Anaconda makes up for the "less than" shields in comparison to the Vette/Cutter. But who wants to gamble letting their shields down? I don't. But that "hop" range (doesn't qualify as jumping) is disgusting. It's enough time-sink to get and outfit those 2, they should all have jump range. My engineered Conda has 27ly jumps with full armor, 2x5D module reinforcement, 1x5D hull reinforcement, shield cells and boosters...

Anyhow- enough rambling just figured I'd see what other people thought. If you made it this far then I'd personally pay $20 each to unlock them for purchase. For me, I'd get my money back knowing with hundreds of hours fine tuning alone to specialize them to specific roles. Not to mention the time using them to accomplish such roles.
 

Synthetic Frost

Synthetic Frost
No. It doesn't really take that much to rank up anyway. Just spend a couple days ranking up with data delivery missions at Wu Guinagi or Sothis and you'll have your rank in no time. I actually found it to be a lot easier than the enginner grind.
 
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Schmack

Schmack
No, but not because it's not worth it. It would rob my gameplay from me. It's like asking if you'd pay to be 21 if you're 15. You lose 6 years of your life. You lose your carrot on a stick if you can pay to win. In fact, after you get your barge, you'll probably sulk around in it a while then park it and get back into something easier to maneuver and more fun to operate. If you're thinking 600T cargo hauls, I've not found anything worth the trouble of that loadout yet that my T9 or Anaconda cannot do just as well, and time is money so I can get in and out faster = mo money mo money mo money.
 

sovapid

sovapid
Yes, I would pay to get around most of the grindy things I don't like in the game.

Off the top of my head I'd pay for instant ship transfers, CIF, High Grade USS spawns....
 

Aussiedroid

Aussiedroid
No, not personally. I lean the other way, where I think a lot of the store content should also be available in game.

I would rather play (even if in this case it is a pain) than pay for something - it provides more entertainment.
 

Syntherios

Syntherios
They're locked behind a grind-wall for a reason: they're endgame ships and should be available only to dedicated players. And how does needing a billion credits really matter? Credits don't even have value anymore. You could spend a few hours scanning Guardian monoliths and net 200 million through Ram Tah's mission, wait for a CG that has an absurdly high payout (like that one CG that had players bring narcotics and tobacco to that one degenerate which paid 100 million and caused a surge of Noobacondas), or hell, go to Quince and suicidewinder for a few hours and earn a billion right then and there.

Please.

A shortcut for impatient players is never a good thing. If you don't have the patience to grind for it, no matter how grindy it might be, then you don't deserve it (don't get me wrong; I'm not saying the grind isn't already ridiculous in this game). Besides, coming from a person who owns both a Corvette and Cutter, the Anaconda can do combat just as well as a Vette (albeit less intimidatingly and flashy) and the Cutter is really only good for grinding trade rank or doing PvP.
 

Jaiotu

Jaiotu
During the first year Elite: Dangerous was released there were several occasions in which the Imperial Clipper and/or some of the other Imperial ships were made available for purchase for a limited time. I foresee this happening again with both the Federation and the Imperial navy's ships. We are on the verge of war with the Klaxxians. Withholding these ships from those of us who are willing to defend all of humanity just because of "rank" isn't going to make any sense.

And no ... I won't pay real cash to unlock ships. This isn't Star Citizen.
 

Gunnet

G
I wouldn't. Paying $20 (or whatever) to unlock one is just buying something, but having to get the superpower rank actually makes it feel like an achievement when you fly the ship out the airlock for the first time.

I'm not at all adverse to microtransactions. But I'll never understand buying a game and then buying the ability to bypass some of its gameplay.
 

kofeyh

kofeyh
Droid8Apple said:
I'm just curious.
Click to expand...

No. This devalues the effort to obtain them and promotes pay-to-win. SC is already pay to win because literally every ship can be paid for day one (and to have them all, it's thousands of dollars) which creates a pretty stupid dynamic of haves and have-nots. I know you are referring to just the unlock, but it's still essentially the same thing.

Frontier want people to go through a bit of blood sweat and tears to obtain. As much as I detest the grind, it's there for a reason, and I am glad there's no way to short circuit that, simply because you happen to have a fat bank account that month.

Credits are already easy to obtain if one focuses on that. Also, I have no problems with micro-transactions for things like cosmetics because they cannot and do not fundimentally create a 'requirement' to somehow compete with others. They appeal to ego, sure, but they don't change the dynamic in-game. And that's pretty important.
 
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ThriveInDark

T
Yes I would pay $15 a ship, and I have not tried them yet. And no I don't mind as long as the ships are still available for free to players willing to grind. Pay to Win would be a paywall on better performing ships unavailable via free means. Not everyone may have the time but they may have the love.
 

kofeyh

kofeyh
ThriveInDark said:
Yes I would pay $15 a ship, and I have not tried them yet. And no I don't mind as long as the ships are still available for free to players willing to grind. Pay to Win would be a paywall on better performing ships unavailable via free means. Not everyone may have the time but they may have the love.
Click to expand...

This is SC in a nutshell. Problem is, the 'best' ships also happen to be the most expensive. Hardly surprising, but this creates a pretty crap dynamic because now to compete to at least some degree? Gotta open the wallet. Or be at a disadvantage, indefinitely. Even if it's just the unlock, it's still fundimentally the same thing.

CIG has taken that to a pretty distasteful extreme. I'd be appalled if Frontier started doing the same thing. The exclusive Cobra was bad enough, on just about every level. Let's never go there, again. ;)
 
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