City of Heroes going F2P with Issue 21

[Ingmar]

ut from what I'm seeing, you can actually get by on 30-day temporary licenses for a lot of stuff with just $5 worth a points a month (400, which is the minimum amount), which lets you use inventions (150 points), access the AH (another 150), and have 100 more to play with.

That does not sound playable.

What else do they have to charge for though?

[Numtini]

What else do they have to charge for though?

One time fees rather than ongoing fees. If you are going to take very very basic game features like the ability to wear enhancements and charge by the month, you're not doing a cash shop, you're just doing a subscription under a different name.

[cironian]

One time fees rather than ongoing fees. If you are going to take very very basic game features like the ability to wear enhancements and charge by the month, you're not doing a cash shop, you're just doing a subscription under a different name.

You can level a character to 50 just fine without using any invention enhancements, since the sub-50 content was created with normal enhancements in mind. I don't think the missions have been made harder since invention was introduced, so you are basically getting "CoH from a few updates back" for free.

[Ingmar]

What else do they have to charge for though?

One time fees rather than ongoing fees. If you are going to take very very basic game features like the ability to wear enhancements and charge by the month, you're not doing a cash shop, you're just doing a subscription under a different name.

This is exactly what Puzzle Pirates does, didn't you argue in another thread that's what other MMOs should model themselves after? Maybe that was someone else.

[Numtini]

Everything I've ever done on Ypp is based on login days or use. 30 login days is very different for a f2p game than 30 days calendar. I think the labor badges are the only ones that go on a calendar basis because they work whether you login or not.

[Kageru]

It does seem pretty aggressive, locking off a part of the game that is so inter-twined with regular levelling. Then again for the subscribers making perfect enhancement sets is basically their end-game. It would seem more logical to have a finer grained lock so maybe cover end-game crafting, but perhaps that's a lot of work.

You can get permanent access to the invention system, but it's pretty steep. Something like 3 years of being subscribed or the equivalent dollar value in buying points. More really since you won't get discounts for being subscribed multiple months.

[Numtini]

They are apparently unlocking old players on an account by account basis. I'm in.

Unless I subscribe, as reported, none of my existing enhancements are valid. Very annoying. I don't lose my Lowe if I don't get premium. It's really a huge turnoff and an example of how not to do a cash shop.

[Rendakor]

I'm still not in. 

[koro]

Things I have discovered about the F2P thing as a Premium person with more than a year of accrued game time, but whose characters all have about 380-500+ days since last being played:

The game itself runs a lot better than it used to. When I last ducked into the game for a month or so a bit over a year ago as I'm wont to do every now and again, the thing still ran like ass on a modern PC, necessitating lowered settings. Now? Runs like butter. I dunno what they did, but I'm glad they did it.

There have been surprisingly few costume pieces added since I last played. Less surprisingly, they're all for-pay Booster Pack pieces. Lots of new content though, which I suppose is better than the Champions alternative.

If you unlocked certain things with vet rewards in the past, like the Nemesis Staff or the Sands of Mu/Ghost Slaying Axe, you still get those (in fact, they take them away from you if you had them active on that character, and you have to re-acquire them via the vet stuff in the mail), and you don't have to choose them from the vet reward tree thing.

While most content is still playable with SOs for those who don't have the insane amount of accrued play time to perma-unlock inventions, some builds are... not. My Dual Blades/Dark Armor Scrapper is essentially unplayable with SOs, as she relied on a ton of set bonuses and +recovery IOs to not crash her Endurance after about fifteen seconds of fighting.

The store has some inexcusable shortcomings. None of the packs of stuff (namely costumes, but other things as well) have breakdowns of what's contained in them, no option to open a window and see more info, and any preview pics are limited to the small 80x80 image to the left of the description, which not all things have. It also does a poor job of telling you what you already own (as in, it doesn't at all), so it seems entirely possible to either re-buy a pack you already own or spend a small amount of points on a single piece from a pack you own but didn't realize was in the pack.

From what I can tell, people are leaving the normal servers in droves to head to the VIP server, and those still left (on Virtue at least) are snotty as fuck about it. It doesn't help that free players seem to have different-colored names from everyone else, which makes for easy targeting of vitriol and blame.

[Kageru]

You can use the character creator to get some idea of costume pieces. There's a pre-defined costume selector (eg. "Witch") which shows the pieces in the set. Likewise for any area you can see all the pay pieces you can unlock. And I've pretty much just been buying the 1 or 2 individual pieces I wanted for my specific character. It would indeed be much nicer if it allowed you to specify a set and see all the pieces in that set plus have the pieces mention a set they are a part of.

The CoH team is clearly keen on retaining their subscribers. And the CoH players seem to largely consist of people working on numerical optimization of their level 50 characters. As such them fleeing to a server full of other people doing the same makes sense. Not sure I'll really miss them. Apparently super-groups as a whole are out of style. Read a comment that the veterans now tend to have a personal super-group for the storage.

Game seriously needs some new blood.

[koro]

Apparently super-groups as a whole are out of style. Read a comment that the veterans now tend to have a personal super-group for the storage.

I'm pretty unsurprised by this. Supergroups in general were little more than glorified personal chat rooms up until they instituted the global chat system back in 2005 or so, and they've only become increasingly irrelevant since then, due to the ability for global channels to be used by both heroes and villains, while SG chat is not similarly linked and further exacerbated by the utter failure of SG bases as a gameplay mechanic.

[Kageru]

Do you remember your first time soaring through the skies above Paragon City or the rush of Superjumping over the streets of the Rogue Isles? Now you can experience the amazing features of City of Heroes Freedom™ for free...FOREVER! That's right; we're pleased to announce that as of this week we are beginning the process of reactivating all inactive City of Heroes/City of Villains accounts as Premium accounts for City of Heroes Freedom! Reintroduce yourself to the world's best Superheroic MMORPG experience and renew your friendships for free!

Starting this weekend, we are gradually reactivating all inactive game accounts. Over the next several days, more and more former City of Heroes players will find their previously lapsed accounts have been re-enabled as Premium level accounts! We've saved your characters, so you can pick up where you left off, and returning Veterans can check out the all new Paragon Rewards™ Program for exclusive perks just for having been a previous COH/COV subscriber! Please note that not all accounts will be immediately enabled. If you can't log in; Just check back at a later time!

If you don't already have a City of Heroes account, never fear! Starting next week we'll be opening the doors to new free players! So everyone can take to the skies and join in all of the action available at no additional cost in City of Heroes Freedom!

Looks like they're ready to go.

[Lantyssa]

Seems I'm in.  Maybe they're going through by time subscribed?  Was up to 30 months or so.

The one character I've unlocked has at least some of the 'locked' stuff.  Mastermind with Nemesis staff power, her Blood Widow Helm, Clockwork outfit in other costume slot, capes, costume change emotes, juggling, etc.

Maybe new characters would only have access to things I haven't unlocked in the shop?  Seeing as I only have 8 global unlocks and 12 characters, doesn't really matter.  Otherwise it'd be nice if they were either removed as purchasable items in the shop, or given credit on my reward token board.  It'd be silly if I have to re-buy Villain pre-order hats since I pre-ordered just to get them.

[Xanthippe]

I want to log in just to check out all the toons my daughter made years ago.  She came up with some pretty wild outfits.

I'm surprised that nobody has made a better character creator by now, given the age of this game.  Likewise surprised that this hasn't become industry standard.

[Fordel]

I want to log in just to check out all the toons my daughter made years ago.  She came up with some pretty wild outfits.

I'm surprised that nobody has made a better character creator by now, given the age of this game.  Likewise surprised that this hasn't become industry standard.

That's because everyone else is riding the gear as visuals wagon, for good or for ill.

[Kageru]

I believe the idea is anything you have specifically unlocked stays available. So bonus items and in theory going rogue content should still be available.

Looking closer there's a bunch of content rent that will be the main differentiator. Auction house, Architect missions, Invention and Incarnate powers being the main ones. The first two are relatively achievable for a veteran character (8 months) while invention is not and incarnate content is VIP only. I'm pretty much thinking I'll just rent access to the invention system and treat it as a 2$ subscription that I can activate whenever I want to play some. Of course the game really needs a surge of new people to make it fun, it's pretty quiet and CoH is not so much fun as a solo game.

[koro]

I'm of the belief that having anything be VIP-only seriously undermines the whole point of the freemium conversion, especially with the Incarnate stuff being the current end-game material. I can imagine people coming into CoH, bearing with its dated mechanics if they find it fun, only to get to 50 and realize that the money they've probably been spending off and on for certain things doesn't give you diddly squat if it's not for a permanent unlock like costumes or character slots when you've gotta start plunking down monthly for the level cap stuff anyway.

Sure, CoH has always been about the journey - a journey that it does very very well - but now that they have a destination to reach, pulling the rug out from the freebies when they reach it is probably not a good thing.

[Kageru]

I don't think they're really approaching it as a free2play conversion. They want to retain their existing subscriber base while re-invigorating the lower level game. Or they might just be taking it carefully, always easier to open content once things have settled than take it away. Plus they can always make current end-game content free once they have some other level of content to keep the subscribers happy.

[Lantyssa]

I don't think it's a terrible model.  I've been playing off and on since beta, and my highest level character is 45.  Since I've bought CoH, CoV, and Going Rogue, I seem to have access to almost everything content and systems wise.  But I can say this as someone with (now verified) 33 months of veteran boosts and a ton of things unlocked.  For free it still strikes me as pretty much CoH at launch, so not bad, really.

The only thing which really sucks is the lack of access to IOs.  Fiddling with IO builds was a ton of fun for me.  Maybe I should just go the "It's only $2" route, but I'd really just like to have it permanently unlocked.  Especially since under the new model I may choose to just play for a week then set it down for several months.  It just feels like a waste if I don't use most of those 30 days.

[Reg]

I just checked and my account is unlocked as well. Like Lantyssa I already have access to pretty much everything I need except the invention system.  But the invention system is important so there's no question about not getting it. I don't know whether I'll just resubscribe or only pay the 2 dollars a month for it.

[Lantyssa]

For me, I need 12 reward tokens to permanently unlock IOs.

VIP is $15, which gets me one token, plus 400 points to spend on whatever.  That'll get me one month of VIP plus two months of IOs.
If I purchase points, for every 1200 I get a point, which also comes out to $15.  But IO unlocks only cost 160, so $15 will cover me for 7 months.  $20 gets me 10 months exactly.

For those of us with almost everything, the latter option really seems like the best.  VIP would really only give us Incarnate stuff, so until we're there, we might as well go with the long-term option.

[Numtini]

I can't get past the IO thing. I was really looking forward to this, but I haven't played at all. Logging into an old character and figuring out you're going to need to completely re-equip or pay an ongoing fee just feels like a slap in the face. It's the boil the frog slowly thing. Instead of being eased into paying slowly, I immediately hit a pay wall.

I think in general, having items that are expensive in in-game currency and can't be unequipped or swapped out but require a premium status to play is not a very customer friendly model.

So I played tanks this weekend and spent enough to pay for six months of IO licenses. It's an emotional reaction to the model, not an economic one.

[Lantyssa]

It is an emotional reaction I share.  I decided to think of it as a $2 sub as Kageru did.  If it holds my interest long enough, then it'll eventually become free.

[Reg]

If you have most of the important stuff unlocked already maybe you should just play low levels for a while and see if you still like the game.  You don't want to use IOs anyway when you're outleveling your enhancements every day.

[Nebu]

VIP is $15, which gets me one token, plus 400 points to spend on whatever.  That'll get me one month of VIP plus two months of IOs.
If I purchase points, for every 1200 I get a point, which also comes out to $15.  But IO unlocks only cost 160, so $15 will cover me for 7 months.  $20 gets me 10 months exactly.

For those of us with almost everything, the latter option really seems like the best.  VIP would really only give us Incarnate stuff, so until we're there, we might as well go with the long-term option.

I played CoH/CoV for like 3 years and I don't think I understood a single word of this post.  

I'll reread the patch notes again and see if it makes sense.  To be honest, I know nothing about the endgame.  I usually just got to 50 and rerolled a new toon.  That may have something to do with it.

[Minvaren]

I didn't get into IOs until around level 40 or so on my main (Ninja/Poison MM), but I have to admit they are like crack.  And with the amount of time I spent grinding missions and playing the AH to afford them, not getting to use them without paying a fee to do so is a bit annoying - let alone the cost to reslot with SOs like previous posters mentioned.

Guess they need to get their money one way or the other, right?   

[Reg]

If you played that long you just might have Invention unlocked for yourself already anyway. You should log in and see.

[Nebu]

By IO do you mean the invention enhancements?  That makes more sense.  My scrapper and MM have a bunch of them.  They make life much easier.

[Minvaren]

I think IO is used just because of DO and SO (dual and single origin) enhancements.

(tries to remember credentials to log into CoX and check on Invention status)

edit : 7 tokens to get invention unlocked. 

[ezrast]

I really think the free-to-play setup was designed to be unappealing to current players. The IO thing and only 2 free character slots guarantees that virtually no subscribers will decide to drop their sub to play for free, while being pretty innocuous to new players. Seems like they really didn't consider returning vets, though.

[Reg]

When I signed on this morning I had tokens to unlock up to 6 character slots as a returning vet.  That's nothing to people with alts I know but I only ever had one character so I didn't mind. It's sure nothing compared to the number of slots I had last time I subscribed though. I must have had at least 10 or 15 most of which were bonus slots of some kind.

Edit: Weird. I just tried to log in and it's prompting me to resubscribe again.  I guess my premium status comes and goes until they go free to play officially.

[Kageru]

If you have most of the important stuff unlocked already maybe you should just play low levels for a while and see if you still like the game.  You don't want to use IOs anyway when you're outleveling your enhancements every day.

The ability of IO's to not be obsoleted by level and the limits on salvage storage mean you probably will be using IO's from level 10 onwards. And as such most people will hit their first pay-wall at that time. It still seems that having a paywall for higher level IO's or high rarity ones would life that headroom a bit without making it any less tempting for the veterans.

[Reg]

Oh that's right. I forgot that IOs don't go red when you outlevel them. I agree though that Cryptic should just put the higher level IOs onto the pay wall to give the low levels more of an opportunity to get addicted.

[Kageru]

The CoH community seems to be dead / Terrible. The remaining players are mostly running AE farming missions or perfecting their raid enhancement set. Super-groups are a personal bank extension rather than community building. I hope most of the veterans do run off to their gated community and the maps are once again full of erratic noobs and flying rag-dolls.

[Amaron]

Seems like they really didn't consider returning vets, though.

The way it's worked for everyone else isn't by pulling vets back in right away.   Usually they get a bunch of noobs who pay $40 bucks on costume pieces, adventure packs,bag slots, etc.   Some of the newbs subscribe as well.  Then they sell Sparkle Ponies to current subscribers and suddenly their swimming in cash and can afford to do real updates.   That's when they are supposed to pull in returning vets really.

I tend to agree that CoH should of done it different though.   They have a lot more vets than other games and they are a bit dated in new players eyes.