Fair MTX Models in free to play games

Anything P2W is an immediate hard nope from me. Likewise for anything approximating a stamina mechanics or gatcha. Fuck those cancerous ideas. I'll pay to remove ads, utility features like stash tabs, or very occasionally cosmetics.

Even better, give me a demo and a fair price for the whole game if I like it.

AladainAF said:

Do you consider P2W to be something like Warframe? where you can buy things without farming for them, even though farming by a F2P player is an option?

I agree with teh gacha/stamina mechanic. That's definately a hard nope from me although i dont mind gacha if its non-P2W stuff (like torchlight infinite and its cosmetics). Utility features like stash tabs -- would that also include things like quality of life things? eg: auto looting in a game, or other automatic things through the UI?

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Never played Warframe, but yes, I'm allergic to buying shortcuts of any type. Loot, luck/drop/exp accelerators, etc.

As far as the utility features, it depends on the game. Like porn, I'll know abusive design when I see it.

Ukerric said:

You know if those things are available to buy, then the game is designed around that. Anyone playing a "reasonable time" will level at a crawl, get awesome loot once every quarter, and similar things. The usual argument of "but anything in the shop, you can get in-game" is a fallacy - the game is always designed so that anyone but the most sockpooper will need the store to progress in a realistic timeframe.

Just remember the basics: the game is always designed for those who will pay for it. Not you, them.

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Disagree that it's a "fallacy". Whales want a mass of non-whales to whale over so its in the game's best interest to do enough to keep f2p's playing and nipping at the whales heels so they feel compelled to spend even more money.

Keeping F2P players happy should be seen as a worthwhile and necessary investment

I think the only game that's ever had something approaching the right idea is DDO. Active sub gave you full access to old content, but you could buy individual units or entire expansions for permanent access.

As far as I am concerned, any random cash element is out. The main reason is that the argument that 'It's not gambling if the house always wins and the suckers can never cash out' is cynical bullshit that is believed by absolutely no-one and is laughably weak cover for otherwise illegal behavior.

Online gacha = online lotto = online poker. They get the same restrictions and requirements.

AladainAF said:

Do you consider P2W to be something like Warframe? where you can buy things without farming for them, even though farming by a F2P player is an option?

I agree with teh gacha/stamina mechanic. That's definately a hard nope from me although i dont mind gacha if its non-P2W stuff (like torchlight infinite and its cosmetics). Utility features like stash tabs -- would that also include things like quality of life things? eg: auto looting in a game, or other automatic things through the UI?

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when it's like at thunder etc where even on monthly premium time you are still talking months and months of heavy grinding for 1 of 20 higher end vehicles, then yes, also p2w garbage.

AladainAF said:

I forgot what game did it but their model was that when a whale did buy shortcuts, it sounded like they were getting a large investment, but in reality, they were just barely over the F2P players.

I'm very interested to know what people feel is "fair" in a free to play game, outside of just cosmetics. It seems like there's got to be some kind of place a free to play game can be, where they still make money, but that everyones on generally equal footing, or at least feeling like they are, while at the same time money goes toward something meaningful and not just cosmetics.

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F2p inherently creates cancer. there is next to no middle ground unless a company is happy losing money to make hype/ attention etc.

Lots of games do it well. Look at FFxiv for exmple, granted it’s a AAA games with huge cult following, but all purchases are convenience or just visual.

I think, if you want to avoid any type of pay to win, purchases should be visual or non-progress related.

lost ark I found broke me in terms of dailys/weeklies/battlepass. It's something I noticed before, but it was there I really just put it together and said, this is terrible design.

they seem to do the opposite of what they were intended for. the idea of daily, etc is to incentive logging in daily, to give those power gamers someone to play and compete with. But they turn incentive, into a fucking job. and worse, only for the 5min-2hours to finish, then log off. no reason to keep playing.

I think if your game is going to allow farming to keep up with paying players, it needs to be unrestricted. let people no life that shit. Daily rewards need to be kept as superficial bonuses. none of that log in every day for a month, or you might as well not bother shit.

I'm going to list Guildwars 2.
It didn't start out as f2p but they eventually made the core game f2p with minor restrictions, mostly on like the trading post, chat, and mail to keep the gold selling in line, which actually doesn't seem to exist anymore, don't remember the last time I reported someone for gold selling.
They have no sub and just the cash shop, which they sell cosmetics (new outfit and weapons skins every month), account upgrades(bank space, bag space, shared space, extra character slots etc like poe), but no actual gear with stats (kinda pointless since it's horizonal progression in the end).
You can buy gems for the store with real money, but also with gold earned in game(star trek online has this too, but they sell op ships in their store making them p2w), I've played for 11 years and never once bought gems with real money and only with gold.
They sell expansions at a cheaper cost $30, you get the usual new pve zones, new elite spec for the 9 classes, unlock some other features like autoloot, glider, mounts, etc.
Going forward next expansion in aug is not going to release another elite spec but unlock the elite spec weapons for all in that class to use (recycling features tbh), but also release a new weapon set for the classes(weapons gives you the different skills to use).

It's one of the best cash shops in any game I've played, cosmetics, toys, and account upgrade only, able to buy gems with in game currency, no p2w gear.
The borderline p2w fuckery might be with pvp(the pve crowd tends to disagree in the forums), where every account type plays in the same pool of players, f2p/hot/pof/eod, they all get thrown into the same pool for pvp and wvw, so the people who bought the expansions have a slight advantage with the new elite specs. The balance dev team is also absolute shit (the current balance dev who replaced a biased balance dev last year, is also just as biased to their own class which is ruling pvp at the moment from the latest update). /shrug

Overall for a good f2p model, just offer cosmetics and certain account upgrades, able to buy the shop currency with in game currency, no gear with stats and you're good to go.