Pan'Theon: Rise' of th'e Fal'Len - #1 Thread in MMO

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Utnayan

Utnayan

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Sithro

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pwe said:
Was this posted before? I couldn't find it.

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Yeah, I think all of us that are old MMO players know that it will have a very limited appeal. But at the same time, I think I'm okay with that. If the game only manages to pull in 10k people, I'd be pretty happy. It will be a very niche MMO, but like the people that play EVE or one of the other smaller MMOs, it's about getting that sense of community and world back... Even if that means I won't be a top tier raider or whatever. That's okay. Sometimes you gotta go back to find the right path. Modern MMOs are not on the right path.
 
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a_skeleton_05

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Sithro said:
Yeah, I think all of us that are old MMO players know that it will have a very limited appeal. But at the same time, I think I'm okay with that. If the game only manages to pull in 10k people, I'd be pretty happy. It will be a very niche MMO, but like the people that play EVE or one of the other smaller MMOs, it's about getting that sense of community and world back... Even if that means I won't be a top tier raider or whatever. That's okay. Sometimes you gotta go back to find the right path. Modern MMOs are not on the right path.
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This is all well and good except that 10k players would barely be able to keep the lights on let alone fund future development. This isn't the 90's anymore, shit is more expensive. You would need more money out of those 10k than a normal subscription fee would bring in, meaning either a high monthly fee or some sort of MTX or premium service, which would split up that small playerbase in some fashion. And while I'm sure that Pantheon probably has some fat whales funding it for whatever reason, but they provide a risk of excessive influence on development if they're the ones keeping those lights on in a small playerbase situation.

I agree with the sentiment though. Something's gotta change to get us out of the theme park, because we've been lost in it for way too many years now.
 
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Flipmode

Flipmode

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I think a game like this can hold 50-100k subs easy. Before they ruined EQ1 and EQ2, I knew a ton of folks that liked that style of game.
 
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Ravishing

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Dom said:
This is all well and good except that 10k players would barely be able to keep the lights on let alone fund future development. This isn't the 90's anymore, shit is more expensive. You would need more money out of those 10k than a normal subscription fee would bring in, meaning either a high monthly fee or some sort of MTX or premium service, which would split up that small playerbase in some fashion. And while I'm sure that Pantheon probably has some fat whales funding it for whatever reason, but they provide a risk of excessive influence on development if they're the ones keeping those lights on in a small playerbase situation.

I agree with the sentiment though. Something's gotta change to get us out of the theme park, because we've been lost in it for way too many years now.
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Yes and No.
10K players @ $10/mth = $1.2M/Yr.

Servers/Hardware are cheaper these days than in the past.
Biggest expense is payroll. As long as the team is like 5 guys then it might work.

But realistically they need 50-100K players to ensure the game is a success and can grow.
I wonder what EQ1 has to keep those servers running?
I'd be surprised if it was more than 20K players.
 
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a_skeleton_05

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Ravishing said:
Yes and No.
10K players @ $10/mth = $1.2M/Yr.
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Now take off ~8-12% for billing, 10-30% for sales via digital retailers (steam/GMG/whatever) etc... License fees for whatever tech they're using, Unity fees, software license fees for production, debt accrued from the actual development process, investors to pay, and that's before you even get to payroll or server costs. It's doable, of course, but we're talking about skeleton crew maintenance mode. If there's any hope of the game actually growing, the team would have to be significantly larger. EQ has a shitload of previous content backing it up. This will be lucky to have enough to even make half a base game.

I can't speak to EQ, but the more niche older MMO's that are still around (LOTRO, STO, DDO) are surviving on extensive F2P models which is not going to fit as well with what people are hoping to get out of this.

I believe that there's enough people willing to play a game like this to a level that will make it an actual success, but the question of course is going to be whether or not the game will be good enough to interest/keep them.
 
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Ravishing

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Dom said:
Now take off ~8-12% for billing, 10-30% for sales via digital retailers (steam/GMG/whatever) etc... License fees for whatever tech they're using, Unity fees, software license fees for production, debt accrued from the actual development process, investors to pay, and that's before you even get to payroll or server costs. It's doable, of course, but we're talking about skeleton crew maintenance mode. If there's any hope of the game actually growing, the team would have to be significantly larger. EQ has a shitload of previous content backing it up. This will be lucky to have enough to even make half a base game.

I can't speak to EQ, but the more niche older MMO's that are still around (LOTRO, STO, DDO) are surviving on extensive F2P models which is not going to fit as well with what people are hoping to get out of this.

I believe that there's enough people willing to play a game like this to a level that will make it an actual success, but the question of course is going to be whether or not the game will be good enough to interest/keep them.
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Yes lots of fees! Welcome to business.
Though you exaggerate the numbers a bit.

Billing is not 8-12% if you do it in-house. It would be more like 3-5%. Especially for a small indie game that can just use a CC processor/Paypal.
Billing through Steam/Other retailers would be the 30%, but you then eliminate the above billing costs.
Unity doesn't have a Royalty after release, so the costs are already paid upfront, most tech these days is a monthly fee and not royalty based.
If they went with the Unreal engine they would need to consider a 5% royalty.

Obviously there is debt.

Still, Payroll is the highest expense. Artists ~75K, Devs ~85K, Programmers ~95K.

Pantheon seems to have a team size of 30-40 people.

That's quite a large payroll so without 50K+ players this game is toast.
 
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a_skeleton_05

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Ravishing said:
Yes lots of fees! Welcome to business.
Though you exaggerate the numbers a bit.

Billing is not 8-12% if you do it in-house. It would be more like 3-5%. Especially for a small indie game that can just use a CC processor/Paypal.
Billing through Steam/Other retailers would be the 30%, but you then eliminate the above billing costs.
Unity doesn't have a Royalty after release, so the costs are already paid upfront, most tech these days is a monthly fee and not royalty based.
If they went with the Unreal engine they would need to consider a 5% royalty.

Obviously there is debt.

Still, Payroll is the highest expense. Artists ~75K, Devs ~85K, Programmers ~95K.

Pantheon seems to have a team size of 30-40 people.

That's quite a large payroll so without 50K+ players this game is toast.
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The billing figure is from what I remember Marvel Heroes paying for their billing service (can't remember the name right now) The retailer cut can be as low as 10% with some of the smaller storefronts, but that would be for the box fee. They'd still have billing costs for the subs.

Any sort of figures we try to attribute to any of it is all just guestimation, but any way you cut it, 10k subs means life support.
 
Korrupt

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Scribble_mmo said:
Pixel Debauchery Showcases Record Breaking GUILD!

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Pixel Debauchery Episode 12
Scribble_MMO & Leksur sit down with various members of guild Faceless! We dive into the depths of their record-breaking history in Everquest, what it takes to raid at this highest level on various Daybreak TLP servers, and how they will position their guild when Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen is released. Check out exclusive, never seen before raid footage on various Everquest servers.

It's a must-see episode for Everquest fans, hardcore raiders, and Pantheon supporters.

The episode goes live on Pantheonradio.com check PantheonRadio.com for their scheduling.
In addition, you can this episode out @ Patreon.com/pixeldebauchery ( if you like what we do please pledge)!

Lastly, you can subscribe to our youtube channel at Scribble MMO
and view the VOD here (above)!

Special thanks to
Voices of Terminus Voices of Terminus
twitter.com/bazgrimtv BazgrimTV
Firesofheaven.org Fires of Heaven
facelessgaming.org Faceless
Album Chris Kane
Rpmmoradio.com RPmmoRadio
http://www.teamcnd.com Condemned
pantheonroleplay.com Pantheon Role-playing Site
pantheonmmo.com Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen
everquest.com Well you know EVERQUEST
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This has to be a fucking joke honestly, record breaking top guild ahahah
 
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Cukernaut

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They are going to be running the game on aws which is variable cost and i don’t think it will be cheap. Ouch.

Korrupt Korrupt I had a wild time on agnarr with FE lots of fun. They did some amazing things racing against the Clock . There wasn’t tons of competition. But there never is anymore with instances
 
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DickTrickle

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AWS at least the advantage of being easily scalable and (to a degree) only paying for what you use. It's actually a pretty smart option for them rather than trying to run it themselves.
 
Utnayan

Utnayan

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They should probably figure out how to show more than one zone before caring that much about billing.

bill.gif
 
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Sevens

Sevens

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Utnayan said:
They should probably figure out how to show more than one zone before caring that much about billing.
Click to expand...
They already announced that a new zone will be opened for the upcoming Pre-alpha phase, it was in the monthly news letter
 
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