Account Wide Unlocks in Next GU - Page 3

Dragonskin · 2013-02-27, 01:21 PM

Originally Posted by Aaron

Ah, okay. In other words, what's the point? Why would I start another VS toon when I already have a built up one? So, the only REAL benefit to account wide unlocks is if they let you have the other factional weapons in the same class. Otherwise, there is no benefit to the costumer. Is that what you are getting at?

That is what he is saying and he would be right except for all the common pool weapons that are not affected to by this. Classes themselves don't have many common pool outside the AV turret, decimator, annihilator and the NS-11. Vehicles on the other hand have a bunch of common pool weapons.. which would be any weapon for the sunderer, lightning, liberator or flash. The ESFs and MBTs are still faction specific so I think they will be treated as seperate even though they are all basically the same... which would be strange.

Outside of weapons there are very few faction specific decals, camo skins, or accessories.. Most of them are common pool actually. So those would all be benefitted by not having to rebuy them.

MrBloodworth · 2013-02-27, 01:32 PM

Originally Posted by Aaron

Ah, okay. In other words, what's the point? Why would I start another VS toon when I already have a built up one? So, the only REAL benefit to account wide unlocks is if they let you have the other factional weapons in the same class. Otherwise, there is no benefit to the costumer. Is that what you are getting at?

Yes, essentially. With the side effect of i will not be buying something on the new Toon if I did. Why would I? Its not where my investments have been made.

I think its a leap to think that ( Factional divide ) would generate more revenue then if I had everything I already bought, and the option to get more and budget.

I think we have already seen, there are tons of items, even if bundled by type or whatever, to spend money on, and there are more coming.

Why not keep the value already invested if it leads to OTHER purchases? The Opposite would be a real huge Value misjudgement. IMO.

Originally Posted by Dragonskin

That is what he is saying and he would be right except for all the common pool weapons that are not affected to by this.

I See no Value in treating one differently then the other. Not in terms of "Balance", Flavor, blue balls VS. bullets. This is 100% a Value decision. Faction is arbitrary in this context.

RogueAU · 2013-02-27, 02:04 PM

Yes! This and a cert reset = win! Test all the factions!

FireStormNova · 2013-02-27, 03:15 PM

Originally Posted by MrBloodworth

I would like some clarification on this then.

If I buy a Chaingun, I should by rights and money paid, get a lasher and a Jackhammer for my other factions.

"Balance" should have nothing to do with it, its a money issue.

If this is not the case, then there needs to be some really good reasoning my real dollars do not seem to transfer faction. I doubt anyone can think of one.

Yea i would have to 2nd that , it would seem strange to me if it only unlocks that 1 factions weapons? What did i realy gain? I can make 3 copies of the same faction on my account and dont have to unlock 3X Chainguns?????
I think people or more likely to have 1 of each faction then to have 3 copys of the same faction on there account!
It would also be comforting to people that are dropping station cash that if i unlock heavy weapons i get if for all the factions not 1 , and which i think is alot of people , because lets face it how many people do you think are useing 1000 cert points to unlock some weapons?
YES IT IS A MONEY ISSUE

Dyram · 2013-02-27, 03:23 PM

While it is good to hear that this feature is coming soon, a number of questions and concerns remain.

Does this only apply to NS weapons across faction? What about those weapons that are singular in nature, but made to fit the ES theme (ESF rockets, for example)? How will double purchases be handled? Why not cert purchases, too?

To discuss these, let's first create an ideal scenario for players and then work back from the company's point of view. In my eyes, the ideal would be:

Any NS weapon or tool or other common items (camo patterns, vehicle cosmetics) are unlocked for all characters without question.
A weapon purchased is that type of weapon purchased. All factions have mirrored weapon types, so any unlocked that are ES would be mirrored and unlocked onto other factions, such as how Alpha Squad worked.
A purchase from the Depot/Store is a purchase, be it through Station Cash or through certifications.

I feel like this is a nice and balanced feature set that most would agree is ideal for players, if perhaps not the most profitable for the company. That said, we ought not outright dismiss ideas purely for the sake of ensuring the company makes more money. If that were the clear focus, then account-wide unlocks wouldn't even be considered.

Common Pool & Items

I think by now that everyone agrees/understands that common items and common pool weapons should be shared universally across all factions on an account, so there's not much to discuss here.

Empire-Specific Weaponry and Their Counterparts

Reading through this thread, and that of the roadmap for account-level unlocks, ES weapons for infantry and vehicles have been a major sticking point. Many players find it safe to assume these are included when it comes to cross-factional characters, but realistically many more figure that SOE will make this a sticking point and not award similar weapons. While there are arguments to be made that the purchase of a weapon is of that weapon, and not of the idea of that weapon (a Lasher, MCG, or Jackhammer being the unique ES HA weaponry rather than simply a Lasher, MCG, or Jackhammer as a singular entity), I feel that as probable as this decision is for money-making reasons, it is one that should be avoided. When Alpha Squad launched, you were not purchasing individual weapons in that package, you were purchasing one additional weapon per class, and those given are the mirrored weapons for each empire. For instance, the VS Engineer did not get a Solstice SF with underslung while NC and TR engineers got a "plain" carbine, it was balanced statistically, these weapons, and their "slots" in each class are the same. This doesn't make these weapons carbon copies of each other, but nor does this make them completely different weapons capable of different things and therefore consider individually in nature.

And what of the vehicle weapons that are all considered as ES weaponry, when in fact they are the same? The most obvious of these are the much-maligned ESF rocket pods, as they are all each a unique weapon and model and texture to fit their faction, but are, for all intents and purposes, the same weapon system (not necessarily from a damage or balancing standpoint, mind you, but they are the same weapon). The MBTs, similarly, share weapon types, if not similar weapons themselves. Everyone knows the main cannon upgrades are similar in nature to the rocket pods in this. Each tank also sees a common pool upgrade to anti-personnel and anti-armor weaponry for their secondary, but also an ES upgrade for these same things. Sure, the weapons are quite diverse between the factions themselves, what with the Saron, Enforcer (that's still what that's called, right?), and Vulcan, but each serve that same role for the vehicle (with the caveat of unique traits for each). To not share these clearly similar and mirrored weapon types would be silly.

I think it was a salient point made that having ES weapons transfer to other factions as their mirrored counterparts would actually encourage exploration of the other factions and create more purchasing opportunities, as it frees up those same weapon archtypes from the player's consideration and their mind can instead focus on other things they want. Keeping the ES weapons solely to characters of that empire means that switching to a new character with a new focus in a different faction makes about as much sense for time invested on the main character as it does now, pre-account-wide unlocks.

Certification Purchases

My greatest issue, however, resides in what seems to be the shafting of "free players." While I would never hope for nor desire the character upgrades that, to some extent, have removed the "pure skill" from the game, to also be brought over to each character (for example, no fresh character should have scopes or rail items for their weapons, nor any suit or tool upgrades, just because the player's other character does). Letting new characters clone the character upgrades would essentially make ranking up even more pointless than it is at the moment and would create an army of supersoldiers without effort spent on each.

However, the way it has been worded thus far, account-wide unlocks will not work for items purchased with certifications. Why? The simply answer is money. However, the issue is more complicated than simple dollar bills. From day one, all vehicle and infantry weapons and tools in the store have been available for purchase by money, or by certs. This was always stated as the goal during development, and it is nice to have them continue to keep that word. Personally, I don't believe in purchasing weapons that are proven time and time again to be demonstrably better (sidegrades are a nice ideal, but certain weapons just shine through), or vehicle weapons that massively increase the viability of that vehicle to play a particular role, or new roles it could not fulfill without. For the justification of free-to-play, as long as these are purchasable through in-game means, however, I grin and bear it, because it makes the company money. Those who buy weapons are not bad people, though I know some, perhaps, are a tad impatient, but given enough time, I've purchased the same weapons with certifications all of the same. These are the same items in the same store. I've unlocked them. They've unlocked them. The only difference is they got their headstart from spending cash, and that is the point of being able to buy them with money.

The way the roadmap is worded, and I'm sure it's not wrong, implies that these certification transactions will not turn into account-wide unlocks. My TR nor my NC will get even the common pool items that everyone agrees should cross that barrier. Why? Because I'm a "free player." You know, the "free player" who purchased the Alpha Squad to support SOE before the game was even released, the "free player" that spends his money on cosmetic upgrades to spend time enjoying my character and actually developing him over time rather than shortcutting to the end. I don't believe in buying weapon unlocks, but for this reason, the many thousands of certs I have spent, the (according to the player page) 160 hours of play time, most of which is sunken into weapon unlocks via certs just to try to keep up with my friends who have purchased all and dominated with those expanded capabilities, for that reason, I will get nothing. Oh, no, sorry, I will get my camo across characters and faction... yay. Why should I even bother to play at this point? If my friend's characters are all as equipped as their mains, then I will fall even further behind, not because of skill, but because of my morals in the game and how I choose to still pay SOE money and support them. My character, to date, has earned 5062 certs total, and the great majority of that (like somewhere around 4/5) is spent on similar weapons that my friends have been using for months and enjoying the whole time. One of my friends has, in a slightly longer play time, earned 8594 certs, but due to his purchasing all of his weapons to get the headstart that buying weapons offers, he's also made his character far better over time, because he has sunken each one of those certs into the character upgrades, not unlocking things. For 1.5x my play time, with similar scoring, he has been able to spend 8x more on upgrading than I have. Great. Moving this discrepancy to our other-faction alts only widens the gap and I may as well not even bother playing.

Some people would argue that by paying, they are directly supporting the company while I am not and therefore deserve special privileges, like these account-wide unlocks. To be fair to these people, I universally support unlocks for paying members, because paying twice for something is really stupid. Despite their opinions, though, I am supporting the company. Even if you took away the Alpha Squad purchase prior to release, and even if you took away my camo purchases, you'd still have a player that has sunken 160 hours into this game (actually a pittance compared to the original, but that's not an issue for this thread). At the very minimum, I've been a statistic that SOE can use for 160 hours, with long play sessions sometimes lasting all day long. More than that, however, I've enriched the play environment by simply existing within it, as all of the players have. Without us players, the game is nothing. Beyond my direct interaction with the game itself, I also promote PlanetSide to those that seek out such a game, and, as I've stated above, brought in friends that have spent quite a bit themselves. I won't define myself by someone else's money, but you can see that despite not paying for weapons, I'm still a valuable player to the company. Arguably, the amount of time I spend on simple unlocks is actually more valuable than the money SOE has received from others. Taken from a purely numerical standpoint, anyone in the US is making enough money to buy the most expensive unlock in 1 hour of work. Each unlock of the same cost (1000 certs or $7), I've had to sink in tens of hours to acquire. People may call their cash valuable, but the honest truth is that money is pointless, your time isn't. Not only is your time worth that what you can make at a job, but there's also a much greater intrinsic value to it. I chose to spend my time this way, yes, but you chose to put down $7. Why should you get special treatment while I get none?

I don't feel that people who buy their weapons have actually earned them. Does that make them a bad person? No. At the same time, though, people like me, paying SOE through other means or not, actually work very hard to earn the same unlocks. We deserve these same items in the same store to be unlocked for us account-wide all of the same.

Treat store purchases the same, don't discriminate.

Without this, you, SOE, are projecting that you don't actually care about your free players, as you had originally stated. Without this, you, SOE, look hungry for money even despite the nicety of the account-wide unlocks for paying players. Without this, you, SOE, lose credibility to trade on the idea of free players having equal rights and an equal time playing this game.

TL;DR (Really? Just read the damned post.)
I'm not asking for special treatment for free, I'm just asking to be treated equally. Don't screw me over here.

bpostal · 2013-02-27, 03:31 PM

I highly doubt SOE is going to not unlock NS weapons for those who used certs vs Smed Shekles. An unlock is an unlock.
I could be wrong in my thinking but again, I don't think SOE is going to differentiate between the two.

Chewy · 2013-02-27, 04:07 PM

What about if you buy one 700SC ES weapon for a class you get credit for one 700SC ES weapon on another toon? Same for other SC costing weapons, you get credit for ONE weapon of that cost per SC payment.

NS gear, camos, armors, stickers, and decals are easy to share to all factions, but ES stuff should be accounted for somehow unless the TOS already have a wording about this in it. Either way I can see a shit storm happening by adding shared SC unlocks no matter what SOE chooses to do. And I wish them luck.

Rahabib · 2013-02-27, 04:21 PM

how many of you guys visited the roadmap and asked or voted up the issues you have?

Dragonskin · 2013-02-27, 04:26 PM

Originally Posted by Rahabib

how many of you guys visited the roadmap and asked or voted up the issues you have?

I voted it up and it's pointless to post a question about it in the thousands of posts that have asked the same thing that have never been answered by the Devs and no players have the answer.

The only Dev post on most of the roadmap stuff is the first one unless they had to clarify something that was misunderstood because it was poorly worded or left out of the original post.

Badjuju · 2013-02-27, 04:30 PM

Originally Posted by maradine

Right, but I mean, like - class of item? If I have a Nemesis on my main, would a TR alt get a Grounder? Does it apply to certs? The exact same certs? Etc, etc.

They stated previously that faction specific weapons would not unlock for different factions. I would assume that weapons of the same "class" would fall under those pretenses.

Badjuju · 2013-02-27, 04:36 PM

Originally Posted by Chewy

What about if you buy one 700SC ES weapon for a class you get credit for one 700SC ES weapon on another toon? Same for other SC costing weapons, you get credit for ONE weapon of that cost per SC payment.

NS gear, camos, armors, stickers, and decals are easy to share to all factions, but ES stuff should be accounted for somehow unless the TOS already have a wording about this in it. Either way I can see a shit storm happening by adding shared SC unlocks no matter what SOE chooses to do. And I wish them luck.

I think it makes sense to only unlock the purchased weapon, not its empire specific equivalent. Sure it would be nice but in the end it is the easiest way to do things, es weapons are in fact different weapons, and it makes more sense from a business aspect. After all the vast majority of their profits come from in game purchases. I am thrilled that they are making items account wide and am not going to complain about es weapons.

Btw they stated earlier that empire specific weapons would not unlock for other factions so I would assume their equivalent would not either.

Wahooo · 2013-02-27, 04:49 PM

Originally Posted by Badjuju

I think it makes sense to only unlock the purchased weapon, not its empire specific equivalent. Sure it would be nice but in the end it is the easiest way to do things, es weapons are in fact different weapons, and it makes more sense from a business aspect. After all the vast majority of their profits come from in game purchases. I am thrilled that they are making items account wide and am not going to complain about es weapons.

Btw they stated earlier that empire specific weapons would not unlock for other factions so I would assume their equivalent would not either.

The thing is it is a really weird grey area. I've unlocked second burster arm twice. I've unlocked MCG and Lasher but not Jackhammer. Is there a difference between these? Do I get a second burster arm for my NC toon? Do I get reimbursed for my VS second burster? If yes on both those do I get a JH and reimbursed fro my Lasher? In the sense of what I purchased there really is not a lot of difference between those two other than calling one "empire specific." "But those weapons really function differently." Ok fair enough I've unlocked SKEP and Grounder on TR... the faction specific equivalents function the exact same way but are still labeled ES. Where is the line drawn between common pool and ES specific?

I kinda believe it will be all or nothing when it comes to the weapons.

From what I can see, they were FIRST back when the subject came up very shortly after release it would ONLY be cosmetics that would be shared. Nothing to confirm/deny this would be the way, it will be has been said as far as I know.
The one thing that HAS been posted is SC PURCHASES shared account wide. To me this will certainly NOT include cert unlocks. Purchases and cert unlocks are tracked completely differently and I don't see that happening.

Either way. I think I understand where they would be coming from with cosmetics only. I would be dissapoint if that were the case but would understand. If it is weapons as well I consider myself happy.

FireStormNova · 2013-02-27, 04:52 PM

I don't feel that people who buy their weapons have actually earned them. Does that make them a bad person? No. At the same time, though, people like me, paying SOE through other means or not, actually work very hard to earn the same unlocks. We deserve these same items in the same store to be unlocked for us account-wide all of the same.
???????
Free game with micro transaction = to make money and why do you think the price is so high on some of the best weapons? Most people or not going to use there hard earned and few cert point to unlock a weapon for 1000 like i was saying befor.
I personaly have no problem paying a few dollars to unlock a cool weapon i like, but dont want to waste my certs on unlocking weapons when i can use them in better ways , but it is nice to have the option if you want to use your certs.
If you cant unlock the counter part weapons like in Alfa squad then Yes you should be at least able to unlock the common pool weapons for all factions!

Rasui · 2013-02-27, 05:03 PM

Considering every single weapon in this game has a counterpart for each faction. Not unlocking the equivalent would just be a case of laziness/difficult coding/greed. So if I have the Saron on my Magrider I want the Vulcan on my Prowler. Anything less and there's not really any point imo.

DirtyBird · 2013-02-27, 05:05 PM

My concern is with items I've purchased on one NC character on Briggs that I've also purchased on my Connery NC character.
With the uncertainty about Briggs longevity I created my own account wide unlock early on.
Will they refund the duplicated purchases? I doubt it.