Frontier: Can you please define your understanding of "Limited"

[Cosmos]

Well fair enough.. Thats £10 I won't be paying to Frontier again and as you say.. maybe I and others could simply say well okay I wont buy any-more skins. Its an oddity where we are arguing about wanting to pay a company money. But yeah I do understand and I think the point here is its Frontiers screw up. During this convo I started asking myself what if.. What if people could suddenly buy into the DDF etc...

Then I thought, well okay. You pay up £300 why not? It could do with some fresh blood Yet there is a bit of a difference in creaming the player base to pay to name systems and enjoying a skin for a ship. I suspect we are starting to tread the line..

 

[Titus Balls]

Well fair enough.. Thats £10 I won't be paying to Frontier again and as you say.. maybe I and others could simply say well okay I wont buy any-more skins. Its an oddity where we are arguing about wanting to pay a company money. But yeah I do understand and I think the point here is its Frontiers screw up. During this convo I started asking myself what if.. What if people could suddenly buy into the DDF etc...

Then I thought, well okay. You pay up £300 why not? It could do with some fresh blood

That would be great, but do you think even 50% of the existing DDF would be up for that? Can YOU imagine the backlash?

It might be "selfish" but it's also the privilege all the DDF members paid for during the KS. I've suggested before that they should bring new people in, or have some kind of game council but I very much doubt that will ever happen.

 

[Cosmos]

That would be great, but do you think even 50% of the existing DDF would be up for that? Can YOU imagine the backlash?

It might be "selfish" but it's also the privilege all the DDF members paid for during the KS. I've suggested before that they should bring new people in, or have some kind of game council but I very much doubt that will ever happen.

On the DDF I really wouldn't complain.. £300

 

[Asp Explorer]

That would be great, but do you think even 50% of the existing DDF would be up for that? Can YOU imagine the backlash?

It might be "selfish" but it's also the privilege all the DDF members paid for during the KS. I've suggested before that they should bring new people in, or have some kind of game council but I very much doubt that will ever happen.

If FD opened up DDF entry again, I don't see why new people couldn't stump up 300 quid and join - but I wouldn't see the value in that just now, it's rather underwhelming.

 

[Cosmos]

You also know I've been an advocate for this game - I should feel lucky that my videos have been included in so many newsletters, and that Frontier choose to use my videos in their marketing. I don't though, a few things around here have left a sour taste. I have felt very little drive to make another one at the moment despite the fact a few of them have over 20k views each - free marketing for Frontier!

If I were you i'd accept that its helping to promo your group

 

[Rog]

Why anybody would stump up $$$ to join the Design Discussion* Forum now is beyond me - what would be the point.

*Used to be the Design Decision Forum, once upon a time. Until the goalposts were moved.

 

[Sanderson]

Poor Ed Lewis, [redacted]. On one hand, if for some reason this is totally his fault and it just "slipped his mind" or something similar, I'd recommend post-it notes, a daily planner or a ribbon tied around his wrist. On the other, I feel sorry for him as I have personal experience being the "monkey in the middle" and it's no fun, at all.

IMO, this is a case of Ed saying they'll be removed on here and then someone else saying "No, they're selling like hot cakes. Leave them up for a while until we can spin a way to keep them up. Somebody get that McRib guy in here." Cue the: "We always intended to offer these ship skins at various "limited" times throughout development, which coincidentally will be "rolling"."

 

[Asp Explorer]

Why anybody would stump up to join the Design Discussion* Forum now is beyond me - what would be the point.

*Used to be the Design Decision Forum, once upon a time. Until the goalposts were moved.

The goalposts weren't just moved - but knocked over, dragged away, and then the pitch ploughed over for a car park

 

[Cosmos]

Why anybody would stump up $$$ to join the Design Discussion* Forum now is beyond me - what would be the point.

*Used to be the Design Decision Forum, once upon a time. Until the goalposts were moved.

*whistles innocently*

 

[Cody]

The goalposts weren't just moved - but knocked over, dragged away

Wembley 1977 - the Tartan Army!

 

[Sanderson]

If FD opened up DDF entry again, I don't see why new people couldn't stump up 300 quid and join - but I wouldn't see the value in that just now, it's rather underwhelming.

What would be the point? The "vertical slice" (which oddly enough David's famous video assured prospective employees wouldn't happen as they didn't have a publisher calling the shots) left most of the participation and hard work from the community on the floor, for now? Maybe later? None of us know but, one thing we do know is a huge portion of the DDF wasn't included in the game (so far, apparently "rolling development was always the plan) and the DDF was always just a fun "wish list" exercise with developer interaction as a "reward" for the 300 clams. At least from all I've read that's what it looks like to me.

 

[fergal]

I bought the "gold" viper skin at launch.
I would recommend to anyone thinking about it to not get it.
I'd describe the colour as tan.
It's very drab and looks nothing like the picture of it on the launcher and the picture in the shop.

I would imagine the "chome" cobra skin would look like dull grey, not reflective.

 

[Phoenix]

FYI: I asked Edward for clarification on this matter directly via PM.

 

[Winterwalker]

Available for limited time only <=> collector's edition/never coming back. It's like Christmas Trees. It's sold for a limited time only. Then next year it will be sold again. They could take years to let something return, weeks, or months, but as long as it's removed from sale, it can return.

This ^^

(it's playing with fire .. but still this ^^)

 

[Titus Balls]

Poor Ed Lewis, [redacted]. On one hand, if for some reason this is totally his fault and it just "slipped his mind" or something similar, I'd recommend post-it notes, a daily planner or a ribbon tied around his wrist. On the other, I feel sorry for him as I have personal experience being the "monkey in the middle" and it's no fun, at all.

IMO, this is a case of Ed saying they'll be removed on here and then someone else saying "No, they're selling like hot cakes. Leave them up for a while until we can spin a way to keep them up. Somebody get that McRib guy in here." Cue the: "We always intended to offer these ship skins at various "limited" times throughout development, which coincidentally will be "rolling"."

It wouldn't surprise me - like I said, I've noticed that they have updated the images on the store, they've all been refreshed with a nicer background and new higher quality renders. To me that suggests they knew all along that they would be doing this.

I would have never have minded this if Frontier had been upfront and clear about their intentions. They haven't, they've continued to appear sneaky - either deliberately or through serious lack of internal communication between community relations and who runs the shop.

I also had a think about the pricing model and actually it makes no sense now. For one colour skin, that isn't even that nice and doesn't even have any reflective quality - they charge £10. For skins that actually have colour and detail they charge £3 - the mind boggles who thought this was a good idea. £10 should be chockfull of detail, reflecting the price paid - but they almost seem...lazy.

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If I were you i'd accept that its helping to promo your group

Not really - my videos are personal to me, they never mention my group and as far as I'm aware no one has signed up due to them. They've always been more about Elite than anything else.

 

[Sanderson]

When sales of the "limited time" skins slow to a crawl you might get a response from FD in this thread. Maybe. As long as they are making a lot of cash you won't.

I don't necessarily think this is "evil" but, it certainly is a reflection of what seems to me to be "amatuer hour" in the FD office. I've seen similar behavior more times than I can count in businesses that have a lot of young men with delusions of grandeur. They get a position or title, start to play with their new "authority" only to get smacked down by the real boss. It normally takes a while for them to realize they are little more than a buffer between the real power and the client. That's when the "I'll see what I can do", "It's out of my hands" and silence kicks in and they do little more than pass information up the ladder. At some point reality sets in, usually followed by "John Doe is no longer with the Company" after questions arise. Next step is "Hello, I'm the new (insert title here)" and the old guy gets all the blame. Classic "man behind the curtain" tactics that have been played for centuries.

Sad really.

 

[ciger]

Dont see a problem with selling the "limited" skins again. To me all the whiners are acting like little spoiled kids who do not want to share their candy with other kids. If someone likes and wants to have one of the flag skins why not let them? Sure FD did not actually do a great job of saying limited but hey who cares. I got the cobra wire frame skin and could care less if it goes on sale again.

 

[Sanderson]

Dont see a problem with selling the "limited" skins again. To me all the whiners are acting like little spoiled kids who do not want to share their candy with other kids. If someone likes and wants to have one of the flag skins why not let them? Sure FD did not actually do a great job of saying limited but hey who cares. I got the cobra wire frame skin and could care less if it goes on sale again.

It's more (I think) about poor planning, misinformation and the "stick foot in mouth" management for me but, that's just me.

 

[Cosmos]

Not really - my videos are personal to me, they never mention my group and as far as I'm aware no one has signed up due to them. They've always been more about Elite than anything else.

Well I enjoyed them and I know how much effort these things require to create so

Dont see a problem with selling the "limited" skins again. To me all the whiners are acting like little spoiled kids who do not want to share their candy with other kids. If someone likes and wants to have one of the flag skins why not let them? Sure FD did not actually do a great job of saying limited but hey who cares. I got the cobra wire frame skin and could care less if it goes on sale again.

Limited in this sense could mean a few things. I'm guessing these types of paint job are limited in what will be available for the various ships rather than a time limited thing. But some clarification might be useful.

 

[Phoenix]

I'm guessing these types of paint job are limited in what will be available for the various ships rather than a time limited thing. But some clarification might be useful.

You can get clarification: Just look at the screenshot in the first post of this thread. The Skin was clearly advertised with "Available for a limited time only - OFFER ENDS September 14th".
Okay, you could say that one could fake a screenshot. Right. But what about sources we cannot alter?

The Newsletter #40 clearly stated: "Also, availability of the limited edition flag paint jobs will end this Monday so if you want to grab one before then, go to the store and add them to your basket.".
This newsletter was sent out 2014-09-12: http://us2.campaign-archive1.com/?u=dcbf6b86b4b0c7d1c21b73b1e&id=cbbe7b15e6

So, the were clearly limited time. Nothing else.