Feldon This week’s rollup post includes news about Antonia Bayle server upgrades, some out-of-whack procs, and further speculation about Free-to-Play (F2P).
After the jump…
Regarding Server Upgrades
From SmokeJumper:
We have ordered new hardware to replace the overburdened Antonia Bayle and Nagafen. I’ll shoot out an ETA once we hear more.
Who’s Going to Fan Faire?
Want to know which of your favorite developers, community, or other team members for the various games will be at Fan Faire? There’s a thread for that.
An Eerie Light in Everfrost
If you stand in just the right spot in Everfrost, you will see a gap in the mountains of Everfrost which emits an eerie light source. The mystery has finally been revealed by Gninja:
It was originally going to be the entrance into Icy Keep: Retribution. But it will likely get other uses in the future.
Furious Blows + Swift Claws = Hairball
In response to a bug report that the Furious Blows effect (proc) is not stacking with Swift Claws, Xelgad has posted the following:
This is a bug. It will be fixed with the next Game Update.
Admiral’s Off the Chain
And regarding another proc, this time Admiral’s Chain, Fyreflyte has indicated that a fix has been submitted for the next Game Update by another developer.
The F2P Question
Ever since the Stratics interview with Dave “SmokeJumper” Georgeson at E3, where they posed the point-blank question about the future of Free-to-Play (F2P) and EQ2, Georgeson’s interesting response has resulted in a slow-but-steady stream of feedback on the EQ2 forums.
Not surprisingly, players have been divided.
- Some players have expressed hope that the introduction of independent, completely separate F2P EQ2 servers would bring more players to the game, resulting in more revenue, which would help with bigger, better expansions, and more robust game updates.
- Some raiders are concerned that F2P will peel off players from their guild rosters, making recruitment that much more difficult.
- Some players are convinced that SOE lacks the self-discipline to keep F2P completely separate from the current Subscription model.
- And naturally, some players are threatening to quit EQ2 and SOE altogether if they add this optional ruleset.
In response to the “never say never” question from players, SmokeJumper has added these comments:
I shouldn’t have implied that we would “never” make changes.
If you folks ended up changing your minds and instead demanded that we move you to an F2P model, then, well…we’d probably do it. Thus, “never” isn’t true.
But your wishes have been made clear to us and we have no plans to move your servers to an F2P status.
Leading up to Fan Faire and the Destiny of Velious expansion, there will be some very passionate, interesting discussions. We’ll keep you apprised.
F2P for the good of the game, I’m a little surprised how much i love F2P after playing DDO.
DO IT SONY and you’ll have to hire back those people because you’ll certainly be even more understaffed with the huge rush of new players, including me. I can’t see me returning to EQ2 unless it’s F2P tbh.
I love reading the official forums and you have Blockheads screaming “IF YOU STOP CHARGING ME I QUIT” lol Yes i understand their view, its funny though if you look at this with an outside perspective.
I am not much for the whole f2p model by itself. I don’t wanna be nickle and dimed for every piece of content. As long as they keep a subscription model that includes everything at the current price I could live with it.
I play both non-F2P games like EQ EQ2 SWG
And F2P games like Regnum, PWI, BOI.
And my general experience as a Player is that to get the same experience in a F2P game as in a non-F2P game, I will have to pay more money buying thouse things that is included in the non-F2P payment model.
Dont get me wrong, F2P model has its advantages. But so has the subscription model.
IMNSHO A Game like EverQuest II will suffer badly in playing experience if it was in a F2P model.
And as for a separate F2P server:
Well so then SOE wouls spend most of there time comming up with new stuff to sell on the market place to finance the F2P server. And less time on building the world of norrath.
Now I know F2P games like PWI also keeps building the world. but there expansions tend to be ALOT smaller and less worked on than EQ2 Expansions.
And most of all, frustratinly enugh thay tend to be very much incompleat.
Atleast thats my experience, compairing the two payment models.
There is such thing as free to play, so calling it such is misleading, people who don’t want “F2P” know this and don’t want either the gameplay to be money driven, or to have to constantly insert the credit card every action they take.
Saying that though there is a grey area between going so called “F2P” and just extending the trial in new ways. The problem is that I see all the options to pay a small fee for say the level 1-50 content reducing the overall revenue for SOE.
Here’s an idea. Offer F2P for all content below the current expansion! This gives just about anyone the chance to play on the same server as we do without taking our precious raiders. It would do a great job at repopulating the lower tier content and probably spawn guilds of level locked raiders/pvpers.
Then, when they want to level past 80 and explore SF they would have to convert to a paid account and buy the expansion. Lets face it, they give away all the old expansions anyway every time somebody guys the latest one. So why not give it away to everyone that might be interested and let the game speak for itself to help them decide to buy.
Finding competent raiders is hard enough, even on the most populated server. Having players branch off onto free servers, or offer players a server list that never even lists regular servers is a bad idea.
It’s tough to sell a product when you’re offering it for free without showing the client there is more. They’ll never see the super geared max level raiders, or the level grinding alts. Herd them onto free servers and many of them will never leave.
Introduce F2P for T1-T8 on live servers and I’m sure most would be all for it. We’ll get our population boost for sure, not to mention a bunch of people will be able to get some free 2boxing going. Win Win for the new and old players alike.
F2P can be ok if they do it like DDO did it. We go to the same servers, just to access expansion content you gotta change to a paid sub.
Shoulda switched the the DDO model in the first place instead of adding station cash.The publicity from going free to play alone is worth it’s wieght in gold.