Latest CG, the clearest example of P2W in ED to date?

[WillFrog]

What's this then champ?
In what way is this 'not a competition'?

Yes, that is the line.

It's a competition in the strictest possible sense, but it's not a competition in actuality.

Imagine a race where the rules are: go more than 100m over the course of a month. Go farther if you want. Go faster if you want. Or don't. Doesn't matter. It would only technically be a race.

 

[Jaffz]

I give up

 

[angusmadmac1]

Ah Schroeder's Community Goal it is and it isn't ...

 

[SteveWW57]

I give up

For you zee CG is over ....

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

It's not a scoreboard. It's a line.The rest is frippery.

don't the top 10 players get their names listed at the end of the CG? or am I confusing it with power play rankings ?

 

[WillFrog]

don't the top 10 players get their names listed at the end of the CG? or am I confusing it with power play rankings ?

I don't believe so, no. That must be a Powerplay thing.

 

[Rainbro]

I guarantee you there will not be a single post from anyone flying a Cutter who was actually trying and still lost out when this is over.

I think you had to add in the qualifier about "actually trying" because obviously there is an advantage, you just don't think it matters because top 75% is a generous enough threshold. That's fair enough, it certainly could be worse, I'm not expecting many to be affected. But it's still a paid advantage, even if it only applies to those who are limited on time to "actually try". If Frontier keep extending the CGs, that range is only going to increase, and hauling +50% per run will look more appealing to those who don't have the time to just do 50% more runs.

 

[WillFrog]

I think you had to add in the qualifier about "actually trying" because obviously there is an advantage, you just don't think it matters because top 75% is a generous enough threshold. That's fair enough, it certainly could be worse, I'm not expecting many to be affected. But it's still a paid advantage, even if it only applies to those who are limited on time to "actually try". If Frontier keep extending the CGs, that range is only going to increase, and hauling +50% per run will look more appealing to those who don't have the time to just do 50% more runs.

Sure. Absolutely. I don't disagree. I just don't understand all the pearl clutching over something anyone with a decent hauler can do, no Arx necessary.

 

[Rainbro]

Sure. Absolutely. I don't disagree. I just don't understand all the pearl clutching over something anyone with a decent hauler can do, no Arx necessary.

I'm just not a fan of microtransactions in paid games, to be honest, I'd rather they focus on the main revenue stream of actually selling the game by promoting it with updates. I have zero data to back this up, but I reckon they'd make more money from the publicity of ship releases if they weren't chopping each release up - you'll get some who pay, but maybe it would be better to draw everyone to the game all at once rather than telling people on the fence that they should probably just go do something else for a few months.

This CG seems intended to push Panther sales, so regardless of how helpful that purchase is, Frontier now have another incentive to keep unique CG modules out of the tech brokers. Maybe they won't, but there's no way to tell if it'll be like all the other CG modules that are now completely unavailable, so same effect.

In the end, though, I guess I clutch my pearls over this because it's interesting to see how the discussion has changed from "I love Elite for keeping microtransactions cosmetic-only!" to this. And as has been pointed out, this ship sailed long ago. I caved and bought Horizons for the massive Engineering buffs, and I bought Odyssey despite having near-zero interest in it solely because I couldn't compete in War CGs without it. This is a small example by comparison. At least Horizons is basegame now.

 

[kofeyh]

Sure. Absolutely. I don't disagree. I just don't understand all the pearl clutching over something anyone with a decent hauler can do, no Arx necessary.

There has been vociferous debate regarding Arx since it's incept. So I've come to the conclusion that it won't matter what Frontier does in that space, a portion of the community will hate it, will not stand for it and any changes in the Arx store for any reason are on a sliding scale of intolerable. Which is a perfectly fine position to take. To each their own.

I am a (little) less patient when that presents as proselytizing said viewpoint as the correct and only acceptable one. And so like you, I am not really getting bent out of shape given folks can keep their own council on how much time to invest, which ship, when, and so on.

Arx has always been controversial, however. Even paints and cosmetics were at one time (and even now I am sure by some, based on statistical probability) considered paid to win.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

So does the CM3!

And the CM2.... oh, no, wait...

 

[Agony_Aunt]

It's not a scoreboard. It's a line.The rest is frippery.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

LHS 142 (24.8 ly) has 3 Starports with each having enough titanium and/or steel for a Panther load.

Almost, depending on when you go. I generally find i get around 500t of Titanium and the rest has to be steel.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

How many years have people been pestering for this?

If there’s one thing FDEV learn from this, I hope it’s that:
“giving players what they want = $$”

Which players? All? A majority? 50%? A minority? What if giving them what they want would be objectively bad for the game overall, because, let's face it, a lot of players don't think beyond "Wouldn't it be cool if...?"

Star Citizen is a game being developed by a "player" with that sort of mentality. Sounds all good on first glance until you start thinking about how all those systems will work together.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

There has been vociferous debate regarding Arx since it's incept. So I've come to the conclusion that it won't matter what Frontier does in that space, a portion of the community will hate it, will not stand for it and any changes in the Arx store for any reason are on a sliding scale of intolerable. Which is a perfectly fine position to take. To each their own.

I am a (little) less patient when that presents as proselytizing said viewpoint as the correct and only acceptable one. And so like you, I am not really getting bent out of shape given folks can keep their own council on how much time to invest, which ship, when, and so on.

Arx has always been controversial, however. Even paints and cosmetics were at one time (and even now I am sure by some, based on statistical probability) considered paid to win.

There's pros and cons to virtual currencies like this.

A con is that it obfuscates the real cost of stuff and makes people feel less like they are spending real money, especially when they can accumulate some in game to offset the cost.

A pro is for the publisher who doesn't have to deal with tons of tiny transactions and lose out a little on each one, they get to set the size of each transaction.

 

[Darth Ender]

There's pros and cons to virtual currencies like this.

A con is that it obfuscates the real cost of stuff and makes people feel less like they are spending real money, especially when they can accumulate some in game to offset the cost.

A pro is for the publisher who doesn't have to deal with tons of tiny transactions and lose out a little on each one, they get to set the size of each transaction.

They can set the price to absorb their costs....they set the prices.

Virtual currency has the same purpose as gift cards.... They force you to buy in increments that the things they sell aren't and you can't refund what you dont spend back to real money. That's the only purpose. They take the bits you dont spend as 100% profit and float.

 

[kofeyh]

There's pros and cons to virtual currencies like this.

There are pros and cons to simply existing as a human, to be fair, so this is a bit of a universal precept. There's also where people invest their time. Spending Arx is essentially trading time externally, for time internally. Whether to be patient and wait, or not. These are all valid choices. To each their own.

The reality is, however, that Frontier are a profit-making business, and they exist to make money. All profit-based businesses do. There is no exception. Therefore, we can lament, dislike or disapprove of the decisions they make, and we can voice these, but our only actual lever is to decide how much, or little, we will invest from a monetary standpoint.

We can want to have an idealised view of how the store or arx or anything for a profit-making business should work, as much as we damn well please, but that does not change the nature of the situation. Frontier must remain a viable entity to develop the game at the end of the day. That does not obviate them of responsibility for applying reasonable business practices. Equally, it doesn't obviate our choice in return.

And so we are down to the one thing we can control. Choice. Some will choose as you have, to wait. That's fine. I just disagree that there is a "correct" singular choice or that the PCII is effectively a requirement for the CG (I say effective, because there has been much talk of winning being keyed to the PCII). Nothing is ever that simple and assumption is always a risk.

On topic of the CG and engagement of, we're going to probably continue to disagree, even if we might agree on other aspects.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

There are pros and cons to simply existing as a human, to be fair, so this is a bit of a universal precept. There's also where people invest their time. Spending Arx is essentially trading time externally, for time internally. Whether to be patient and wait, or not. To each their own.

The reality is, however, that Frontier are a profit-making business, and they exist to make money. All profit-based businesses do. There is no exception. Therefore, we can lament, dislike or disapprove of the decisions they make, and we can voice these, but our only actual lever is to decide how much, or little, we will invest from a monetary standpoint.

We can want to have an idealised view of how the store or arx or anything for a profit-making business should work, as much as we damn well please, but that does not change the nature of the situation. Frontier must remain a viable entity to develop the game at the end of the day. That does not obviate them of responsibility for applying reasonable business practices. Equally, it doesn't obviate our choice in return.

And so we are down to the one thing we can control. Choice. Some will choose as you have, to wait. That's fine. I just disagree that there is a "correct" singular choice. Nothing is ever that simple. On that, we're going to probably continue to disagree, even if we might agree on other aspects.

I never said otherwise. We all have a choice and we all live with the consequences of our choices.

We just had a little side topic on the topic of ARX and i pointed out a couple of pros/cons regarding them.

 

[kofeyh]

We all have a choice and we all live with the consequences of our choices.

Indeed. We also have to live, at times, with the choices others make, because that's their choice to make. Whether we agree or not, doesn't overly change that.

We also have to remember that of all the ships that Frontier were going to introduce to the game, the PC has been the most asked for, from the very beginning. And so it was always going to have a, perhaps dramatic, entrance.

I look forward to when it's purchasable in-game; it's a good ship (irrespective of what all else is going on) and reflects Frontier's maturing capability in the ship development pipeline, so it will be great to see more commanders being able to access it, on their own terms. Particularly for alt-accounts, as a goodly number of commanders have.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Indeed. We also have to live, at times, with the choices others make, because that's their choice to make. Whether we agree or not, doesn't overly change that.

We also have to remember that of all the ships that Frontier were going to introduce to the game, the PC has been the most asked for, from the very beginning. And so it was always going to have a, perhaps dramatic, entrance.

I look forward to when it's purchasable in-game; it's a good ship (irrespective of what all else is going on) and reflects Frontier's maturing capability in the ship development pipeline, so it will be great to see more commanders being able to access it, on their own terms. Particularly for alt-accounts, as a goodly number of commanders have.

Definitely buying as soon as it becomes available for credits.

Its a shame they didn't balance it better.